TimesToCome Mobile

Take this with a grain of salt, and consider getting Grandma a high radiation cell phone.

Mice were exposed to cell phone signals from a centrally-located antenna. Credit: © Photo courtesy of University of South Florida

The millions of people who spend hours every day on a cell phone may have a new excuse for yakking. A surprising new study in mice provides the first evidence that long-term exposure to electromagnetic waves associated with cell phone use may actually protect against, and even reverse, Alzheimer’s disease. The study, led by University of South Florida researchers at the Florida Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center (ADRC), was published today in the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease.

“It surprised us to find that cell phone exposure, begun in early adulthood, protects the memory of mice otherwise destined to develop Alzheimer’s symptoms,” said lead author Gary Arendash, PhD, USF Research Professor at the Florida ADRC. “It was even more astonishing that the electromagnetic waves generated by cell phones actually reversed memory impairment in old Alzheimer’s mice.”

The researchers showed that exposing old Alzheimer’s mice to electromagnetic waves generated by cell phones erased brain deposits of the harmful protein beta-amyloid, in addition to preventing the protein’s build-up in younger Alzheimer’s mice. The sticky brain plaques formed by the abnormal accumulation of beta amyloid are a hallmark of Alzheimer’s disease. Most treatments against Alzheimer’s try to target beta-amyloid.

Read more, Cell phone exposure may protect against and reverse Alzheimer’s

More information:
JAD
USF Health

The ATT MMS rollout will begin on the East Coast at 10am and roll west hourly as long as ATT servers hold up. Whether they will hold up remains to be seen, there were problems with the testers.

You’ll receive a text from ATT informing you that MMS is now working on your phone. ATT also said you’d need to do an update through iTunes to install the new carrier file.

On Sunday people started reporting MMS beginning to work on their iPhones

Some cities are getting it before others and people with family texting plans rather than iPhone texting plans are getting it sooner.

Some people are running 3.0, some 3.1, carrier files are 5.0 and 5.1. There are directions to obtain and install carrier file 5.1 on the forum, but it seems to be switches on ATT’s end not carrier or Apple files that are making the difference.

If you go to settings, messages and only see two options on your phone, it’s not on for you yet.

But the 25th is coming soon, so keep checking your phone and it won’t be long.

Slashdot has a story on O2, Sprint and Boost Mobile allowing search engine spiders to crawl your messages. Any MMS messages that send the photo to the phone website are findable:

Google inurl:pictures.sprintpcs.com/share.do?invite= to see Sprint’s list.

So if it is private – don’t mms it!

Check to be sure your phone provider is blocking search engine spiders from making your mms searchable.

ATT has said it would be opening bright and early at 8am to sell 3G iPhones. Now TUAW is reporting that Apple stores will also open at 8am Friday to begin selling the phones.

W00t! That means waiting inside an air conditioned mall instead of 100′ heat in Houston.

When I checked last weekend the Apple store had planned to close at 5pm and reopen at 6pm to sell phones. 8am seems like a much better option.

Apple’s website now lists 8 am as the selling time.

Way back when in the dark days of computing we all had dumb terminals that hooked into a mainframe computer.   Your smart phone ( Palm/Blackberry/WindowsMobile) acts like a desktop computer with its own processor and software.

But what if we also made it behave like a dumb terminal (iPhone)? You could access the fastest computers and unlimited storage and memory. This is the first of I’m sure many such applications to come.

Accenture’s “Pocket Supercomputer” is in fact a phone behaving like a thin client. It can be used to send images and video of objects in real time to a server where they can be identified and linked to relevant information, which can then be sent back to the user.

The camera on the phone is used to take a video of an object — such as a book. According to the Accenture, the server software is smart enough to recognize the cover of the book — it’s not yet able to read text — and can then, for example, return the price and history of the book, and details of where it can be bought. . . [read more Accenture demos the 'Pocket Supercomputer']

If Apple fixed the bandwidth problem with the iPhone by moving it to a 3G network we will likely see a whole lot more of this type of application.

Several reports are coming in on laptops and phones having data copied when you cross the border. Arriving in the US, people are reporting that security is insisting on looking through the data on your laptop and cell phone and often copying the data from your cell phone or laptop.

More information:

iPhone meets the 4th amendment
Civil liberties groups sue Homeland Security
US Confiscating data at the border
US courts consider legality of laptop inspections.
Examining Search and Seizure of Electronics at Airports

Another concern is having your cell phone stolen. Most cell phones now allow you to enter a password that will turn on after a set time. Since I almost lost a phone on a trip I’ve used passwords on my phones. Don’t wait until you lose the phone to decide you need a password.

Two hours a day for Starbucks card holders ( with auto reload, be sure to register your card and sign up for auto reloads ) and some special yet to be announced deal for AT&T customers. ( Which is a good thing, Edge is useless you need WiFi for an iPhone to be usable online. )

TMobile customers will keep their access to the Starbucks HotSpots.

SEATTLE and SAN ANTONIO, Feb. 11, 2008 — AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T) and Starbucks (NASDAQ:SBUX) today announced plans to deliver AT&T Wi-FiSM service at more than 7,000 company-operated Starbucks locations across the United States. The initiative brings together two of the most recognizable global brands to create a powerful and convenient online experience for consumers and business customers. Starbucks and AT&T will offer a mix of free and paid Wi-Fi offerings at Starbucks stores to meet the needs of both frequent and occasional Starbucks Wi-Fi customers.
The initiative further expands the AT&T Wi-Fi network, already the largest in the United States, to more than 17,000 U.S. hot spots and more than 70,000 globally.
Beginning this spring, Starbucks Card holders can enjoy up to two hours of free Wi-Fi service per day at Starbucks locations offering Wi-Fi access, while more than 12 million qualifying AT&T broadband and AT&T U-verseSM Internet customers will have unlimited free access to the Wi-Fi service. In addition, more than 5 million of AT&T’s remote access services business customers will be able to access Wi-Fi service at Starbucks locations. AT&T will soon extend the benefits of Wi-Fi at Starbucks to its wireless customers. . . [ read more More than 12 million AT&T, Starbucks customers to get free WiFi access]

More details here

TUAW is reporting that Starbucks WiFi portals for iPhones are being rolled out

Most of these tips you are already familiar with, but there’s a few new ones:

Keep the lens clean
Fill your frame
Hold your hand over the camera to shield it from the glare of the sun[ read more Cellphone camera tips]

But more interesting is the How to take amazing mobile phone photos section with tips. There are many excellent cell phone photos so you can see what it is possible to accomplish with your mobile phone.

Also on your Window Mobile phone – if you have light settings ( auto – indoor – outdoor – lightbulb ) select the lightbulb setting for all your photos.  This will get rid of that orange tone showing up in your photos.

I’ve also read that changing the registry setting from

HKEY_LOCAL-MACHINE\Software\HTC\Camera\P2\MainCamSupportCaptSize from 10 to 58 ( 0xA to 0×3A ) helps. I’m not sure what that does, I couldn’t see any difference in my pictures but try it and see. Perhaps it will benefit your photos?