Problem solvers
October 29, 2007 7:32 am | by Aimee Kalnoskas, Editor-in-Chief | Articles | CommentsAs I kid, I sometimes got frustrated with what I saw as my Dad not giving me a straight answer. For instance, I would say, “Dad, I need a hammer”. “What are you using it for?” he would say. “There’s a finishing nail sticking out the wooden floor in my room and I need to pound it back in.” (I grew up in an very old farm house.) “Then you need a rubber mallet, not a hammer.
Power in my pocket
September 26, 2007 9:35 am | by Aimee Kalnoskas, Editor-in-Chief | Articles | CommentsI think is has finally happened. I have reached the tipping point in my purchasing of battery-powered portable electronic devices. That said, I should clarify that alongside many of my peers I am gadget-challenged. Still, I just can’t get that excited about applications like on-the-go streaming video and audio because the not-so-supercharged cloud hanging over all those cool devices...
Moving forward
August 30, 2007 7:06 am | by Alix Paultre, Director of Business Development, Advantage Business Media | Articles | CommentsEditor’s note: It is with great pleasure that I welcome Alix Paultre to the cast of characters at ECN. I’m handing over this bit of print real estate to Alix this month — but it’s only a one-month rental. See you next month! Cheers…Aimee Kalnoskas, editor-in-chief
Initiate efficiency
July 31, 2007 7:23 am | by Evan Koblentz, Online Editor | Articles | Comments“The frog was wrong” — that’s what I saw on a giant billboard when driving toward New York’s Lincoln Tunnel last year. It turned out to be a Toyota advertisement, with fine print stating, “It is easy to be ‘green’ when you drive the new such-and-such…” I didn’t think much of the car, but the slogan is terrific. That’s what we think here at ECN.
The great motivator
June 26, 2007 11:01 am | by Aimee Kalnoskas, Editor-in-Chief | Articles | CommentsMy neighbors, who live almost a hundred yards and up a hill away from me, love their SUV’s, monster trucks and electricity. During the Christmas season, the illumination from their myriad of Christmas lights and blow-up, lighted lawn Santas and Frosties alone allow me to keep my flood lights off for most of December.
Diamond Visions
June 4, 2007 9:19 am | by Aimee Kalnoskas, Editor-in-Chief | Articles | CommentsWhat does the Society for Information Displays (SID) and Dodger Stadium have in common? A lot of displays and the fact that I was at both venues on the same day last month, giving me a unique opportunity to see the digital signage on the show floor and in action at the ballpark. Having attended hundreds of trade shows and not one single baseball game until that point...
Got A Plan?
May 15, 2007 9:39 am | Articles | CommentsI've been fortunate in my career to have met and worked with talented engineers from all over the world, associated with a broad range of organizations, and involved in a wide variety of applications and technologies. Though some can trace their career paths with a straight edge, many have found twists and turns among their professional experiences that have led them along rewarding, if far less intuitive, routes.
Serving up a site
May 2, 2007 6:25 am | by Aimee Kalnoskas, Editor-in-Chief | Articles | CommentsI emailed a friend of mine about a week before April 1st lamenting the fact that we had a massive server migration coming up and the preparations were giving me a migraine. It turns out that he got stuck with the same April Fools event, and the Fortune 500 company that bought the Fortune 500 company he currently works for had also planned an April 1 switchover between servers.
Good things in smaller — and safer packages
April 2, 2007 9:57 am | by Aimee Kalnoskas, Editor-in-chief | Articles | CommentsBelieve it or not, I empathize with an inanimate device, and that device is the Lithium-ion (Li-ion) battery. It recently received some bad press because of a relatively small number of instances of exploding laptops using Li-ion batteries manufactured by Sony and shipped between April, 2004 and July 18, 2006.
FIRST: Close to home
March 29, 2007 9:42 am | by Aimee Kalnoskas, Editor-in-Chief | Articles | CommentsEvery once in a while something really new and interesting crosses my desk — and I am not necessarily referring to products. Lately, a lot of those ‘first’ looks have been about FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition in Science and Technology), and I’ve decided to shamelessly participate in what I believe is more than just media hype about this program.


