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Baltimore Teachers win a paid Trip to ISTE 2011 – The premiere ed tech conference!

by Mario Armstrong

Many of you know I’m a major advocate of technology and education and that I am on a mission to help people maximize technology in their lives. Which is why I joined up with the educational technology company eInstruction, to look for a deserving teacher from the Baltimore (city/county) area to send to the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) Conference in Philadelphia on June 26-29.

The annual ISTE Conference is one of the world’s largest premier educational technology events. More than 20,000 educators and teachers attend to see, hear and learn about the latest in technology for education. Attendees can network with other teachers, obtain professional development, choose from more than 700 sessions, including formal sessions and hands-on labs and visit exhibitors booths.

HOW TO ENTER:
1. Fill out the form below – Nominate your favorite teacher (teachers you can nominate yourself)
2. LIKE our Facebook Contest Page-click here
3. Extra credit given to those who upload photos and or video on the contest Facebook wall

Entry posts have to be received by May 20th29th (NEW EXTENDED DEADLINE) , and a winner will be announced on Facebook on May 23 31st!

The trip will include ISTE 2011 conference fees, ISTE membership registration, hotel costs and a $100 stipend.

GOOD LUCK!

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What’s new with RIM? New phones, videochat coming to PlayBook, new apps, and more

by Shy Mukerjee

RIM, the company behind the BlackBerry line of products, have a number of announcements today.  First up is some new phones.  Two BlackBerry Bold smartphones were announced today, the 9900 and the 9930 combine exciting new features like Near Field Communications (NFC), HD video recording and playback, and the new BlackBerry 7 OS.

Next up is video chat.  In an app that, according to the press release, is being released tomorrow, RIM is promising “one click” video and voice chatting over Wi-Fi on their recently released PlayBook tablet.

Also for the PlayBook is a native Facebook app.  While the details are pretty sparse at this point, RIM’s press releases promises that it will provide basically what you would expect: a native 7″ Tablet interface to chat, share photos and videos, interact with friends and more. We’ll be sure to take a look at the app when it’s released later this month.

RIM also announced that the BlackBerry Enterprise Solution (BES), the solution that brings the security of the their Enterprise Server to BlackBerry devices, is going to “incorporate secure device management for Android and iOS based devices and tablets, all managed from a single web-based console” according to their press release. Clearly, RIM is beginning to come to terms with the fact that they’re no longer the only game in town – and providing options for customers to use their secure enterprise technology on smartphones and tablets of their choosing.  This mirrors RIM’s previous announcement that Android apps would be made available to the PlayBook tablet through a special Android app player.

Mobile Payments Company Square Gets a Huge Boost with a Strategic Investment from Visa

by Shy Mukerjee

Last month, a viral video created by mobile payments processor VeriFone tried to spread FUD (Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt) about startup Square’s free device that allows small businesses and entrepreneurs to take credit card payments from their iPhones and iPads. The claim was that customer’s credit card data was being transferred unencrypted to the device, giving shady merchants the ability to steal your credit card information.  Square took this accusation in stride, pointing out that anyone you hand your credit card to already has access to this information. This month, however, those fears have largely been laid to rest.

Two weeks ago, Apple announced that they would be selling Square’s credit card readers in their retail stores for $9.99, taking the device off of the internet and straight to consumers.  This was a huge boost to the device’s credibility, as an endorsement from Apple is a big deal.

Now, in what could turn out to be the ultimate game changer for Square, Visa has announced that they’re making a strategic investment in the company. If there were lingering fears about the safety of customer’s credit card data with the device, surely Visa’s stamp of approval will convince consumers to embrace mobile payment devices.

Improving Apple

by Justin Alcon

I love Apple products. There, I said it. However, as comes with the fanboy territory, many of us have started to notice small things that we would change about our favorite iOS features.  Over at Apple Matters there’s an article about just this – in particular, how certain apps for your iOS devices can be replaced with something better.  The highlights:

Their list starts with Instacast, which does a better job of managing and finding podcasts than searching through the iTunes Music Store on your iPhone.  Podcasts represent a surprising share of iTunes traffic.  I can see why when I look at the really great ones like The Complete Guide to Everything, Laughing Historically, and the New Yorker Fiction Podcast. If you don’t have a favorite, you should definitely go exploring.  Similar to Instacast, although it is not on the list at Apple Matters, Stitcher is quickly becoming the most popular way to manage podcasts among my friends.

Next comes PhotoSync, which wirelessly syncs your photos between your iOS device and computer. If it only synced everything (not just photos), this would be a real game-changer.  Stil,l if your mobile life involves a lot of photo management this could really help you out.

Finally, they list Stash Pro, an image management application. It’s more expensive than the other apps we’ve discussed at $3.99, but it does allow you to download images directly from websites. Plus, you can add keywords, titles and ratings to images for superior organization of large sets.

I’d be amiss if I left my latest favorite Apple hack out of this post. It doesn’t come from the list over at Apple Matters, and it isn’t a software hack: it’s Applecores.  Pictured with this post is the cool, affordable little solution to my biggest Apple beef: tangled headphone cords.  You all know the story- you neatly wound your headphones and put them in your pocket, only to later you pull them out and boom! A bird’s nest of tangles and knots!  Well, no more.  Applecore offers their simple and effective solution for the Apple cord tangle for only a few bucks- a bargain, in my opinion, to be freed from the daily headphone de-tangle.

Intuit GoPayment for iPad

by Justin Alcon

Earlier this week, Terrance gave us the skinny on Square being sold at Apple stores. So now lets take a look at some of Square’s competition!  Enter Intuit’s GoPayment for the iPad, a mobile payment application that gets you paid on the spot using your iPad to process customer credit cards.  Yesterday, the company announced that the iPad app is now available to the general public over at iTunes.

GoPayment’s new layout takes advantage of iPad’s larger, high-resolution display and multi-touch interface (highlighting the devices superiority to is little cousin, iPhone, in this department). It also includes new features intended to enrich the user experience by integrating images and interactivity.

GoPayment uses the free Intuit Credit Card Reader.  GoPayment has actually been around for years, but only recently started to target the small business market (Square’s main share) namely, businesses without merchant accounts or who don’t already take credit cards.

Expect several other competitors to this market in the near future. However, Square should be most concerned about Intuit since Intuit already has trusted relationships with millions of businesses through QuickBooks and a few advantages in the way that payments are processed.

Blackberry PlayBook: A New Kind of Tablet?

by Shy Mukerjee

With Apple holding a near-monopoly of the Tablet market (currently at 73% market share) , and Honeycomb-based Android tablets finally hitting the market, is there room for a brand new platform?  RIM, creators of the BlackBerry series of smartphones, seems to think so, this week releasing their Wi-Fi only PlayBook tablet running a custom-designed operating system and architecture.  With prices starting at $499 for the 16GB model, is the PlayBook a legitimate 3rd option in a market in which Apple had nearly a year head start?  Today, we take a look. Read More