This is pretty funny. Note: Some rough language and typical juvenile video game sexual stuff (NSFW). About the same stuff you experience any time you play on Live really, but hey the warning is there in case. Enjoy.

I was interviewed yesterday for a Business Week article that appears today, discussing the value of mobile-phone-based GPS services and why they're becoming so popular. The article is well-written and covers the bases in a couple quick pages. It's kind of funny to be interviewed as a consumer - Most of my interview experience has been as a security expert, so this was fun.

I'm a power mobile user in a very practical sense. I travel a lot, and very frequently to places I have never been before. As a result, I am always having to find my way to new locations in unfamiliar lands. So, over the past couple years, GPS-enabled technology  has become my friend.

I started my GPS navigation experience a few years back with a laptop and a serial USB add-on that you stuck on your dash, powered separately via lighter socket, etc. eventually I updated to a USB GPS device that worked similarly. The software I used (Delorme's Street Atlas USA, a couple different versions) was very cool and you could actually speak to it and it would take your commands and talk back to you. I could say, "Computer, where am I?" and it would reply with something like, "You are heading north on US Highway 30 at 61 miles per hour. You are in Columbia County, Or-ee-gohn." It never really pronounced Oregon correctly, but hey that's the text-to-speech technology of a few years ago. The hardware and software has all been substantially upgraded since then and works even better. But I can't lug a laptop around in the car to do simple navigation (although I did just that on a trip all over southern California once), plus there's a whole class of information I use today that you just don't have access to on the laptop in the car.

I also got my 4-wheeler ATV with GPS capability onboard. I pretty much never use it, but on occasion it's been useful to mark waypoints at intersections on logging roads I'm cruising (oh wait, I never do that) so I can know which turns to take on the way back. There's no map capability, but an arrow points at your next waypoint and the display tells you how far away it is. Pretty useful.

Eventually I decided I needed something more usable, which at the time meant picking up a stand-alone in-car GPS device - the Magellan Roadmate 760. It was a great unit. I'd decided prior to that not to get an in-dash unit (and I am glad I did, since I never travel distances in my own car, see further down). It served me well, but as I traveled more and more I found it to be too large and clunky to stuff in a backpack and run through airports and in rental cars. So I gave it to a friend of mine who used it until it crapped out.

My next device was smaller Magellan unit, on sale at Costco, and included real-time traffic information over the air and the ability to suggest alternate routes, which is very cool. It's a great device (and my friend who had the 760 is using it now), but again it's one more thing to carry around. I found myself printing out paper driving directions or copy/pasting/emailing the Google Maps directions to myself before I left for a trip, instead of packing and carrying the GPS unit. Again, I have enough junk to carry around, and even the compact model meant too much stuff.

When I got my Blackberry 8800 with GPS built into the unit and the TeleNav service, I had found the perfect navigation device for my needs. Some people argue that paying ten bucks a month for the service is not something they'd be willing to do, and that Google Maps on the Blackberry is awesome, but I disagree (strongly). Google Maps is cool, but it's far from a useful and safe navigation system. You have to type, keyboard navigate, and read tiny print. Plus, it doesn't have anywhere near the information provided through the TeleNav service.

I wrote about my experiences with the Blackberry and TeleNav in the past. You might want to read those entries for some early perspective:

• First five hours with the Blackberry 8800 - GPS navigation is like... Wow!
• TeleNav v5.1 upgrade on the at&t Blackberry 8800 offers real-time traffic and overall improvements

In those entries I explained a few of the real differentiators of the service. Here's a summary of what I get from the TeleNav service that makes it so perfect:

• Maps are always up-to-date with the latest available data and can be downloaded as needed. With a standalone device you have to download map updates, which you must pay for, and in the real world the GPS device makers rarely make updates available.
• The annual cost (since I already have the Blackberry and its cost is already easily justified for its various other uses) is about $120.00, which means after about three years you'll spend as much as you would on a mid-tier stand-alone GPS device - One that doesn't have live traffic updates and where the maps are only as accurate as the day the manufacturer loaded them on the device (meaning always out of date).
• I always have my phone with me, and in turn I always have my GPS device with me.
• No extra cords or brackets or suction cups or anything to haul around.
• Small, tiny, compact, and works great.
• Because it's on a data-enabled phone, the service provides all sorts of useful real-time capabilities in its directories and interfaces.
• I can enter an address, search for a class of business, or type in a name of a business or place, and it will find the closest matches to my location, let me call them and route me to them. Better than Google Maps does, by far.
• Advanced directory services like search for the closest gas station, or search for the lowest gas prices near me. Let me tell you, when you're in a hurry to get to an airport and don't want to pay the $8 a gallon the rental company charges to fill the stupid car for you, that $9.95 a month starts to sounds really inexpensive. And it is, after all, about the savings of time and money, not just the direct cost of the service.
• I get real-time traffic and re-routing, which has proven useful a few times, as well as turn by turn directions spoken out loud with a clear visual view of the immediate situation, so I can glance and see what's next. Google Maps does only a rudimentary version of this, which requires finding the right keys to click, reading a lot of information on the screen rather than looking at the road, and a map scrolling feature that frequently fails. Simple fact: It's a lot safer and usability is better with the TeleNav interface and capabilities. Google maps is cool if you want to know where you are and maybe your passenger is telling you where to turn next. Otherwise it's just not up to par with the services and software available out there today.

I like the TeleNav so much I actually pulled the SIM card out of my iPhone the other day while I was up in Seattle and put it into the Blackberry 8800 so I could use the TeleNav GPS service to find my way around (and interestingly it worked swapping the card). I brought the Blackberry with me just in case I needed it for specifically that. Yeah, I know - back to carrying two devices. Well, at least they're small ones.

Now, if TeleNav could be installed and work on the iPhone, we'd be screaming! We can only hope.

I was just looking at the Apple iPhone Store Credit site (after chatting with a friend who just took advantage of his $100 credit) and noticed the one of the documentation graphic photos of the iPhone (see right) shows software v1.1.1 (3B13) as the version running on the device. Click the Get Started link on the starting page and then scroll all the way down to see the graphic on the site. Since the latest release version (the one I have) is v1.0.2, there must be a new release coming very soon - and just as you'd expect with the addition on new features like the WiFi Store, it gets a second-decimal upgrade. Interesting that it's not v1.1.0 though. Hmm.

So I did a quick look-see in my RSS reader and lo-and-behold, iPhone Atlas is all over the case. That's a great site, by the way,  if you want to stay on top of iPhone information, for sure.

Below is what iPhone Atlas says we should expect. It will be interesting to see how well this list matches up.

Backing speculation spurred by an image on Apple’s iPhone store credit page that shows software version 1.1.1 (3B13) — the latest current release is 1.0.2 (1C28) — we’ve received word from reliable sources that an iPhone software/firmware update is imminent. Here’s what’s expected:

iTunes WiFi store Already available on the iPod touch, Apple promised delivery of the iTunes WiFi store for iPhones some time in the month of September. The functionality is expected to be added to the iPhone with this firmware update, or independently pushed to the iPhone via EDGE/WiFi.

Playback controls while sleeping/locked The iPod Touch sports a function that allows the home button to be pressed twice in order to bring up various media playback controls (volume, skip forward/backward) without fully unlocking the device. This feature is expected to be added to the iPhone in this release.

International/multiple keyboard support As previously reported the iPod Touch sports keyboard functionality that is far more robust than the iPhone’s, currently. It provides keyboards in 14 different languages, and supports alternative keyboard formats including QWERTZ and AZERTY. It can also make two or more keyboards available simultaneously, and has a feature that allows you to quickly type a period by double-tapping the spacebar. These features are expected to be added to the iPhone’s keyboard function in this software/firmware update.

Bug fixes/stability enhancements A slew of bug fixes and stability enhancements, including improvements for WiFI/EDGE networking are expected to be incorporated in the forthcoming release.

Hack/unlock concerns There is a significant likelihood that this update will undo unlocks (allowing the iPhone to be used on networks other than AT&T) that make use of a buffer overflow, including the iPhoneSIMFree method, and the freely available iUnlock method.

It is also likely that the iPhone will need to be re-hacked after the update to accept third-party binary applications (see our guide for instructions on doing so). Note that after changes were made to the iPhone’s software with iTunes 7.4.x, some iPhones entered an endless rebooting cycle when re-hacked, fixed via this method.

Check out iPhone Atlas for more, and subscribe to their feed for lots of great future info.

Updated: If you're wondering how this was resolve by Apple in my particular case, you can read about it here.

Ugh, this just had to happen.

I went to an Apple Store up in Bellevue, Washington yesterday before the nerd dinner and picked up a couple things, namely a Jawbone Bluetooth headset (which is awesome, more on that later), a touch-screen glass protector and a leather holster for my iPhone.

Don't buy the leather holster. Long story short, it's too tight, there's no way you can keep a good grip on the phone when you try to pry it out of the holster on your waist, and when it does come out you'll be lucky if it doesn't have some real velocity and inertia behind it. Like I said, you'll be lucky if.

I wasn't that lucky.

As I left the hotel today a text message chimed in and I went to pull the phone from the holster. It was hard to pull on, and when it finally gave way it came out fast, bounced off the palm of my hand, down my leg and to the floor. Actually, it didn't really hit that hard. Nowhere near as hard as every other phone I have ever had.

But the metal case that encloses the iPhone is apparently pretty soft. As in, it bends easily. The "power" button (that one on the upper right top edge) is now stuck and won't operate because even though the fall was broken and slowed, the soft-ish metal bent just enough to tweak the opening where the plastic button sticks though. So, now it's effectively jammed. Argh.

I was near the Apple Store (same one) when this happened and so I went there to see what I will have to do to get it fixed, but the wait for one of their "experts" was like three hours, and I had to dive into Seattle traffic to make the trip back home to Portland. So, I'll cal Apple or take it to the local store in the next day or so.

I'd recommend a couple things based on this experience. Again, don't use the leather holster, it's just a poor design, and one that a friend of mine has has loosened up over the month he has had it, but to the point where it no longer properly holds the phone (it went from tight to too loose, go figure). Also, if you're prone to dropping phones, go straight out and get one of the rubber armored slip-on cases. I sure wish I had chosen that instead of the holster. Hopefully this will help someone avoid a problem and the expense I am sure to be faced with when I get this thing fixed.

Wow.

Google's ponied up $20 million to the team that can reach the moon first with an unmanned craft, rove around a bit after a soft landing, and transmit some video back to Earth. This is way cool.

To win the Google Lunar X PRIZE, a team must successfully land a privately funded craft on the lunar surface and survive long enough to complete the mission goals of roaming about the lunar surface for at least 500 meters and sending a defined data package, called a “Mooncast,” back to Earth.

If you have the will, funds and desire, you can sign up a team yourself. Let me know if I can help. :)

Excerpted from the Lunar X PRIZE web site:

The Mooncast consists of digital data that must be collected and transmitted to the Earth composed of the following:

• High resolution 360º panoramic photographs taken on the surface of the Moon;
• Self portraits of the rover taken on the surface of the Moon;
• Near-real time videos showing the craft’s journey along the lunar surface;
• High Definition (HD) video;
• Transmission of a cached set of data, loaded on the craft before launch (e.g. first email from the Moon).

Teams will be required to send a Mooncast detailing their arrival on the lunar surface, and a second Mooncast that provides imagery and video of their journey roaming the lunar surface. All told, the Mooncasts will represent approximately a Gigabyte of stunning content returned to the Earth.

The total purse of the Google Lunar X PRIZE is $30 million (USD).

• GRAND PRIZE: A $20 million Grand Prize will be awarded to the team that can soft land a craft on the Moon that roams for at least 500 meters and transmits a Mooncast back to Earth. The Grand Prize is $20M until December 31st 2012; thereafter it will drop to $15M until December 31st 2014 at which point the competition will be terminated unless extended by Google and the X PRIZE Foundation
• SECOND PRIZE: A $5 million Second Prize will be offered as well, providing an extra incentive for teams to continue to compete, and increasing the possibility that multiple teams will succeed. Second place will be available until December 31st 2014 at which point the competition will be terminated unless extended by Google and the X PRIZE Foundation
• BONUSES: An additional $5 million in bonus prizes can be won by successfully completing additional mission tasks such as roving longer distances (> 5,000 meters), imaging man made artifacts (e.g. Apollo hardware), discovering water ice, and/or surviving through a frigid lunar night (approximately 14.5 Earth days). The competing lunar spacecraft will be equipped with high-definition video and still cameras, and will send images and data to Earth, which the public will be able to view on the Google Lunar X PRIZE website.

I'll be driving up to the Bellevue area Wednesday to meet up with my friend Scott at a geek dinner they're holding at the food court of the Crossroads Bellevue Mall from 6:30-9:00 p.m. Hope to see you there! Here's an iCal item to add it to your Outlook calendar.

Scott started work this week at Microsoft (congrats!) and this will be a fun opportunity to meet a few people and get out of Portland for a day or two. I'll also be dropping by to see a few other friends. Looking forward to the quick trip.

Oh, and if you're going (or even if you're not), please be sure to take the Nerd Test and bring your results along with you (or post in the comments or on your own blog or wherever). Here's mine, for reference. :)