The more I use my iPad, the more apparent it becomes to me that tablet computers like the iPad will eventually replace college textbooks. I can remember semesters in college over ten years ago when the cost of my textbooks was as much as I what I paid for my iPad this year. The advantages of using tablets in place of traditional paper textbooks are pretty clear.

• Shipping cost is eliminated.
• Textbook replacement cost is eliminated. (Your dog can eat your iPad, but not the digital content within it.)
• New editions can be deployed almost in real time.
• Pages can be highlighted and annotated without devaluing the book.
• Textbooks can be searched instantly for keywords and phrases.
• Instructors could distribute specific annotations and bookmark key sections.
• Video and audio content can be embedded within textbooks.

So it’s not surprising that universities like Oklahoma State are beginning to experiment with iPads.

Of course, iPads are more than e-readers. They could truly be an all-in-one learning console. Social-media-like tools could allow students to collaborate on projects, share information, and access notes both in the classroom and away from campus. Notes can be taken right on the device and synced with a cloud-based server system hosted by universities (more dog insurance).

These ideas are only based on what we know we can do today with tablet computing. There is no telling what uses will be conceived of (good and bad) when this new technology is put in the hands of college students, who make up one of the most creative segments of the population.

I’ve talked separately about TextExpander and Notational Velocity in the past, but it’s worth noting that the two really go well together. My primary use of Notational Velocity is drafting blog posts and other articles. For me, it’s basically a stripped down, no-nonsense word processor. A better term would be word-taker or word-holder. I write, and it quietly listens without tempting me to do a bunch of fancy formatting.

TextExpander lubricates the writing process even more by instantly expanding longer chunks of text that I would otherwise have to mindlessly pound out over and over.

I think it’s always best in life to focus on creating new, unique things and not spin your wheels performing tasks that are better handled by things without a cerebrum. TextExpander is a great way to automate repetitious writing. By putting it in charge of the rote and the mundane, you free up your fingers for more creative expression.

Here are a few simple ways I’m using TextExpander with Notational Velocity…

Faster note creation and search

If I’m starting a draft for this blog, I always start the note title with “draft [pe]”. Since I have Notational Velocity set up to store notes as individual text files, this lets me sort my notes alphabetically to see all my drafts at a glance in Finder or make use of Spotlight and LaunchBar to search and retrieve files outside of Notational Velocity.

The [pe] part essentially creates a unique tag that lets me search only for practically efficient posts in the Notational Velocity search field. The term [pe] is not likely to appear in the body of any other notes; it’s only in the title of my practically efficient posts. I got the idea of creating unique text in note titles after seeing Merlin Mann's q trick.

I’m a big believer in minimizing the friction between thinking and doing. So I use TextExpander to create that first little bit for me. If I type dpe, it expands to “draft [pe]” and I can then type a quick title for my note. This is much faster, and more importantly, less distracting than having to fumble for the [] keys.

More efficient web writing

I’ve talked about MultiMarkdown in other posts. Since I write almost exclusively in MultiMarkdown in Notational Velocity, I naturally take advantage of TextExpander to make the process even more efficient.

Here are a few examples of TextExpander snippets I use for MultiMarkdown syntax along with what they create:

• mma1

  [%|][]

  Creates a MultiMarkdown anchor (link) using the [] syntax and positions my cursor in the first bracket.</li>

• mma2

  [%|]()

  Creates a MultiMarkdown anchor (link) using the () syntax and positions my cursor in the first bracket.</li>

• mmap

  [%|](%clipboard)

  Creates a MultiMarkdown anchor (link) using the () syntax, pastes my clipboard between the (), and positions my cursor in the first bracket. I use this one constantly. It lets me quickly create a link if I’ve already copied the URL to my clipboard.</li>

• mmimg

  ![alt text](/path/to/img.jpg "Title")

  Creates the MultiMarkdown image syntax.</li>

• mmlinks - This one creates a vertical list link numbers:
</ul>

        [1]:
        [2]:
        [3]:
        [4]:
        [5]:
        [6]:
        [7]:
        [8]:
        [9]:

I usually put them at the end of a draft in which I’m using the [][] link syntax (e.g. [My Link][1] for a cleaner “foot note” style. This lets me quickly add up to 9 links before having to type out more numbers. The MultiMarkdown HTML converter will ignore any of these at the end that aren’t in use.

Update... here's another:

• mmc

  [%clipboard](%|)

  Often, I want to hyperlink a word or phrase I've already typed in my text editor. I use this TextExpander snippet along with LaunchBar's clipboard history to mimic the process of inserting a hyperlink in a blog editor like WordPress. The steps I follow are below. It's actually really fast once you do it a couple of times. Your fingers never leave the keyboard.</li> </ul>

  1. Copy the URL from your web browser (or wherever it is).
  2. Highlight the text word you want to hyperlink in your text editor.
  3. Copy the word with CMD+C.
  4. Type mmc over the highlighted word. This will replace "your word" with [your word]() and put your cursor between ().
  5. Finally, bring up LaunchBar's clipboard history with CMD+\ and arrow down to the URL you copied. Release the keys to insert the URL between the ().

  Other HTML

  I also use the predefined group of HTML snippets that comes with TextExpander to quickly expand other HTML codes if necessary.

  Please share your own tips and tricks for using TextExpander with Notational Velocity or other general writing.

Not long ago, I changed the theme here at practically efficient, and wouldn't you know it, I've done it again. I was having some trouble with styling consistency and other annoyances that were detracting from the readability of the site. Rather than reinventing wheels by playing with CSS and other time-sucking, fiddly website odds and ends, I decided to outsource it to the pros by upgrading to Thesis 1.7.

I should have tried Thesis a long time ago. If you have a WordPress blog and are tired of spending your time tweaking the layout, Thesis is a great choice. It's the most intuitive WordPress theme design system I've ever seen. It also throws a Google welcoming party behind the scenes 24/7.

I'm always on the lookout for ways of making my life, work, and hobbies more efficient. Recognizing when you can avoid reinventing the wheel is probably 75% of the battle if not more.

If you're struggling with something that's keeping you out of reach of where you want to be, it's worth looking for ways of leveraging the work of others. It's more true today than ever. Wheels are being invented everywhere at lightspeed. Don't waste time reinventing or spinning yours.

Earlier this year, I wrote a series on passwords, and I recommended 1Password as my favorite password manager. One virtue of a great password manager is portability. Until now, 1Password mobile apps were only available for the iPhone and iPad. Now, you can take 1Password with you on your Droid, EVO, Nexus One, or other Android phone too.

The Android app is pretty crude and still in beta. It's read-only, meaning that you can see all of your passwords, but you can't add any. To get your passwords in, you'll need to manually copy your 1Password keychain to your phone over a USB connection. It's not hard, and full instructions are in Agile's blog.

I'm sure the 1Password Android app will get better and better. This is great news for those of us that use 1Password but don't have an iPhone.

Rumors of a Verizon iPhone have been steady for a while now. The recent Bloomberg pronouncement that the iPhone is coming to Verizon in January 2011 has taken it to a new pitch. But what no one seems to be talking about are the logistics of making this happen. There will be two major, major hurdles to jump. One is short-term, the other long-term.

1. How do you get iPhones into the hands of all the Verizon customers that want one without declaring martial law around Verizon and Apple stores?
2. How can Verizon’s network handle the load?

Let’s look at some numbers.

According to PCWorld, a survey by ChangeWave indicates that 19% of Verizon customers are very likely to buy an iPhone. Another 34% are somewhat likely to buy one.

That’s about 17 million customers who would want an iPhone right away and another 31 million who might want one.

Now let’s add in the AT&T customers who are likely to swim over to Verizon’s ship once the iPhone lands on deck there.

Bloomberg reports that as many as 1 million AT&T iPhone users would switch to Verizon. In my opinion, this figure is probably on the low side. AT&T’s customer satisfaction seems to be continually sliding downhill, and when Apple fixes the iPhone 4’s signal display to show 2 fewer bars in most places, that’s not going to improve the perception (or reception) of AT&T’s network at all.

But anyway, that’s a total of about 18 million new Verizon iPhones needed pretty quickly after launch in 2011. To put that in perspective, AT&T’s total existing iPhone user base is 18 million. And then you have potentially another 31 million iPhone-wanters later on.

Within a year of the iPhone’s launch, Verizon could have as many as 50 million customers who want an iPhone if these numbers are anywhere close to true. Yikes.

As magical as Apple’s production process is, Jobs still can’t snap his fingers and have millions and millions of new iPhones appear instantly. It will take time to manufacture enough iPhones to meet the untapped vein of demand in Verizon’s customer base.

In other words, not everyone that wants a Verizon iPhone will get theirs day one, or even month one.

It will be interesting to see how Apple (and Verizon) implement lessons learned this summer. If releasing iPhone 4 to existing AT&T customers caused such a meltdown, imagine what happens when you let millions and millions of Verizon customers out of the gate?

And there’s that network thing. We Verizon faithful like to boast how good the network is, but can it really handle that much traffic? Will Verizon fall victim to the iPhone’s success just like AT&T has?

One thing seems likely to come out of all this. Data prices are going to get more expensive before they get cheaper. The US wireless broadband infrastructure will bear a heavy load for the foreseeable future as phone makers like Apple keep giving us more and more reason to consume data through the air.

All of this extra data demand will push the Verizons and AT&Ts of the world to make their networks better. We will probably have amazing wireless broadband networks in the US in ten years. Until then, expect some traffic jams.

Not long ago, I wrote my personal review of iBooks and Kindle on the iPad. My conclusion was that they were both great on the iPad. I still believe this. But taking a bigger picture view, I see Kindle as the champion of e-reading for a while. “Kindle” is becoming less associated with the original Kindle device and more about platform independence.

iBooks is a fun app with nice features, but Kindle is not just an app – it’s a portable library. It’s everywhere. I can read my books on my iPad, Android phone, or Mac. In other words, any book I’m reading is not only always at my fingertips, it's on the right page. This is amazing to me. I love it.

Amazon is smart to put the Kindle app everywhere. They are smart to focus on selling content and let the consumers of the content choose how they want to consume.

If e-books are a revolution in reading, it won’t be about the hardware. It will be about having books everywhere, always a tap away.

Last week, I wrote a post at my other blog, Risk + 2.0, on how we can apply lessons in Dale Carnegie's How to Win Friends and Influence People to social media. It ended up on WordPress.com's Freshly Pressed list and got an amazing response from within the WordPress.com community. One of the things I'm most fascinated about regarding modern technology is the way it connects people like never before. But we have to remember the people part first. Treating people with kindness and respect is always a winning strategy, but doing it online sometimes takes a little more effort since modern mediums are less natural.

Dale Carnegie's ideas are just as relevant today as they were in the 1930s.

It's easy for most of us, myself included, to think that digital content creation is something that came about in the last decade or two. There's no doubt that the web has taken it to dizzying heights. But as The Atlantic Magazine points out, digital content creation officially began some 50 years ago with the Xerox 914.

The photocopier prompted creation, not just the recombination of others’ ideas. An alternative to the mess of the mimeograph and the expense of the offset master, the Xerox 914 opened a renaissance in self-publishing. The designer Aaron Marcus, a Yale art student in the late 1960s, remembers using an IBM typewriter with proportional spacing and sharp, single-use ribbons to design and produce books of his own. Indeed, the match between Xerox and IBM Selectrics (introduced in 1961, with interchangeable type elements) paved the way for 1980s desktop publishing.

The last 50 years have seen a lot. It's unlikely that anyone using a Xerox 914 in the 1960s had any idea what was starting.

Now imagine the world 50 years from today. What are we starting right now? Anything is possible.

Readers of this blog have probably noticed that iLike Apple productsiDo But iDon’t have an iPhone Weird, iKnow

I left the flip phone world behind forever in 2006. My first smartphone was an XV6700, a Windows Mobile phone. I really liked the XV6700 and marveled at what it could do. The web browser, IE mobile, was way better than the dinky mobile browsers I had used on flip phones before it. And it just felt more like a computer with software like Word, Excel, and other apps that I thought would be tremendously beneficial.

In practice, they were not.

The XV6700 was not practical to use. The battery life was terrible. And you had to use a stylus to get things done. It was essentially a PDA. We know what happened to PDAs.

Probably the worst part of my experience with the XV6700 was that the screen would get misaligned at least once a day, usually more. Realigning the screen was a huge pain. I often had to do it at the worst possible times, like when I needed to make a phone call but couldn’t because pressing the 4 key would register the 5 key. Or if I needed to to jot down an important note, I would have to aim 2 or 3 letters to the left or right of the letter I really wanted.

I would classify the XV6700 not as a smartphone but as a special needs phone. It had to be fed, watered, and babysat. It needed a parent, not an owner. I already had enough, more meaningful obligations in life; I didn’t need to spend that much time taking care of an inorganic object. Technologies that draw our nurturing energy away from real relationships should be discarded and discarded quickly.

My two-year contract with the XV6700 eventually ended, and I decided to give the Blackberry Curve a try in 2008. As usual, I deliberated a great deal and did a lot of in-store experimentation. I remember one Verizon salesman telling me that after he switched from the XV6700 to a Blackberry, he literally threw his XV6700 out his car window.

I laughed. He didn't.

Within a day of using the Blackberry, I knew why. I was quickly convinced I had made the right decision by dumping the XV6700, or more generally, Windows Mobile.

The Blackberry had long battery life and a great keyboard. It was a messaging machine. And there were no screen alignment issues to deal with because it didn’t have a touch screen – something I was happy to abandon after my experience with Windows Mobile.

I was very happy with the Blackberry Curve for quite a while, even as I started to notice the makings of a revolution in mobile computing in the most unlikely of places. Apple had unveiled a thing called an iPhone – basically an extension of the iPod with calling ability and a few other features. (These other features would of course eventually be known as apps.)

The iPhone really did not interest me much initially. It had a touch screen after all, and I was still trying to get the taste of Windows Mobile out of my mouth. Touch screens were a waste of time in my mind – a fun idea but not nearly as practical as a physical keyboard.

But after observing the rapid acceptance of the iPhone way of doing things in the mobile world, I realized that Apple was on to something. So I bought an iPod Touch as a way to scratch this new itch aggravated by Apple.

After just a few minutes with the iPod Touch, I realized that this was not of the same vein as Windows Mobile. This was something new, something truly game changing. This was the future, and it looked beautiful. Like most Apple products, it was not about form versus function; it was function encased in form, if not downright art. It appealed to both sides of the brain at once.

I began to notice more and more iPhones appearing around me. But also noticeable were the complaints with AT&T’s service. And I couldn’t help but notice that when I traveled with iPhone users, there were often times when they didn’t have service. But I did. Not only did I have voice service, I had 3G coverage with Verizon.

Experiencing slower web surfing speeds because you don’t have a data signal is without a doubt a “First World” problem. Not being able to make a call in an emergency is a real and potentially life-threatening problem.

It was really those experiences of having a phone that worked while AT&T users didn’t that helped counter my iPhone envy. It reminded me that even though you might own a hotrod, you need roads to drive it on. Otherwise, it stays in the garage and it becomes the subject of what it could do, not what it does.

Speaking of does, in late 2009, a thing called the Droid got my attention. It was pretty clear to me, and remains clear to me today, that Android was Google’s attempt to go head to head with Apple in the mobile hardware market.

After much in-store experimentation, I decided to be an early adopter of Android and bought a Droid in the fall of 2009. It became apparent to me that Apple’s webkit browser technology was worth more than the Blackberry’s keyboard (a vote that the rest of the smartphone market seems to be casting today). While the virtual keyboard in Android is not nearly as good as the iPhone’s, it’s still pretty good.

Android is a remarkable mobile operating system. And while obviously patterned after the iPhone OS, now succinctly iOS, it is a very good take on touch technology.

Android also sports a few things that iOS doesn’t. Most notable on my list are:

• Integrated GPS navigation in Google Maps. Bye, bye standalone GPS devices.
• Home screen customization. My tasks, calendar agenda, and weather are always sitting right in a dashboard view.
• Notifications. All notifications are neatly consolidated in the menu bar at the top of the screen.
• Global sharing services. This may be the most underrated feature of Android. All sharing services (from email to Twitter to Evernote) are globally accessible. It’s not up to the app developer to build sharing into individual apps.

Android is great, but it doesn’t completely quell my iPhone envy. I think my fascination with the iPhone is about more than its superficial features and design. Sure, it’s a beautiful piece of hardware. As my wife’s uncle recently said of his iPhone, “doesn’t it just look like something that God would have made?”

As usual, I probably over-think things. My fascination with the iPhone is about what it represents culturally. To me, the iPhone is an important beacon in the American innovation landscape.

At a time in American history when it seems we’re sliding backwards in all major sectors of the economy, the iPhone sits atop a pedestal reminding us of what could be; what creative minds can accomplish; what progress looks like. The shiny glass screen gives us more than a beautiful retina display. It’s a window to the future.

Without a doubt, the iPhone is a flagship sailing into new waters with its destination set for worlds on the other side. It’s made computing mainstream – so mainstream that we don’t even consider it computing. Hell, we don’t even consider it a smartphone anymore. What is it? It’s just a device, a truly a transformative, culture-altering device.

Am I over the top here?

Just look around the next time you’re at a nice restaurant. Look at how many faces are adorned with iPhone makeup – that soft glow cast by the iPhone’s screen. And look at their spouses and company and how they implicitly accept it. The iPhone has a welcome seat at the dinner table. In the year 2000, computers predominantly sat on dusty desks. In 2010, they are dinner guests. They lay next to forks and spoons… perhaps symbolizing that these devices are no less vital utensils in everyday life.

The iPhone is propelling innovation forward faster than we realize. And we all benefit from it. I benefit from it even though I don’t own one. Android would not exist in its current form without the iPhone. I would not have an iPad without the iPhone. And it’s difficult to even imagine the innovation we’ll see over the next ten years – innovation seeded by the iPhone that will grow in an increasingly fertile technological landscape.

There is a lot to be excited about. It’s not about always having the most recent version of a phone. It’s about soaking up the possibilities in this new era. It’s also important to realize that there is no need to rush out and buy an iPhone if it isn’t practical yet – like it isn’t for me due to network constraints.

It will all get better and better and better. And things will get better faster than they ever have before. Just don’t ever take any technology for granted, and never forget where we came from. To do so diminishes the joy of progress. Always remember yesterday.

iKnow iWill.

No matter what I do, I always seem to end up with windows on top of each other while working on my Mac. Often when I need to drag a file from one window to another (e.g. from Finder to an FTP program), I have to arrange the windows so that I can see parts of each. Then, I can do the drag and drop. I recently found a better way through experimentation. After you begin to drag a file, you can press CMD+Tab with your other hand. This brings up the app switcher. You can either point the dragged file at the destination app or use the hand on the keyboard to tab to the app.

Either way, this is a much faster way to bring the destination app into focus. It makes dragging and dropping much more efficient regardless of how many windows you have open.

I recently found out about a great free text editor through one of my favorite Mac blogs, Minimal Mac. Fraise is a completely free text editor for your Mac. I don't do a lot of programming, but I do open HTML and CSS files a good bit. The syntax highlighting is very convenient.

If you're looking for something a little more robust than TextEdit, check out Fraise. I've been really pleased with it.

Though I'm a bit tardy posting this in internet time, it's still well worth reading Andy Kessler's June 11 piece on The iPhone, Net Neutrality and the FCC. It really highlights the importance of having a competitive market for broadband in the US -- and how far we have to go.

Think of real-estate agents or graphics designers or physicians who will incorporate wireless broadband into their business. Usage caps or pricing tiers will be nasty road bumps or even brick walls on the decades-long path of progress and productivity that has driven the U.S. economy since the early 1980s.</p>

I think competition fixes all that. But according to a study a few years ago by Smartmoney.com, less than 1% of 30,000 cable markets had more than one provider in 2000 and 2005. Any guesses for 2010? In Paris and Tokyo, competition is vibrant, with eight to 10 competitors, speeds higher, and prices much lower than in the U.S. More competition here is the way to keep bandwidth charges reasonable.

Microsoft’s new web apps have been available for a few weeks now. These are web-based versions of Microsoft’s popular Office software (Word, Excel, PowerPoint). I recently decided to give the Word web app a try. This post is basically a thought-dump of what I found regarding:

• Registration
• Interface
• File rendering
• Results of a test using a complex Word flie
• Overall impressions (the good and not-so-good)

Registration impressions

If you have an ID for Hotmail, Messenger, or SkyDrive, you can use the same ID to log into Microsoft’s web apps. If you don’t have one of those (or if you don’t want to use it for that purpose), you’ll need to create a new ID using an email address.

The sign up process was fairly straightforward. First of all, it’s totally free. Microsoft doesn’t ask for a lot of information, but they do want your birth year – an odd piece of information sitting in an otherwise sparse sign-up page.

Interface first impressions

The interface is very clean and not-crowded, especially considering that this is Microsoft. The landing page shows your recent documents with revision dates, and it also gives you some icons for creating new documents.

If you point your mouse cursor at the document owner’s name, the link turns into an “edit” link allowing you to open the document for online editing.

The web app version of Word is clearly patterned after the desktop version. The familiar ribbon interface sits atop the page, though there are far fewer commands on it.

File rendering

While working on my Mac, I usually work with Word files in Pages 09, NeoOffice (a Mac-friendlier version of OpenOffice.org). or Google Docs. Which one I choose depends on 1) whether I’m collaborating with others and 2) how complex the file is.

Google Docs is tops for collaboration. It makes sharing “working” versions of files extremely easy. And since Google Docs is a web app, it works right in your browser. It’s accessible anywhere you have an internet connection.

Where Google Docs often falls short is handling complicated Word (doc or docx) files. I occasionally have to work with Word files that have fields or other complicated coding specific to Microsoft’s proprietary file format.

NeoOffice actually does a pretty good job of reading all but the most complicated Word files. It will also “save as” doc too.

I was really hoping that Microsoft’s new web apps would step in and be the new champion of displaying and saving complicated doc and docx files. So I decided to give it a test drive with such a file.

Testing a “complex” Word file

I recently received a Word file that had some yes/no checkboxes in it. I needed to fill these out and and return the file to the sender (legibly).

First, I tried Google Docs. No luck. The layout was fine, but the checkboxes did not display.

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="153" caption="Google Docs"][/caption]

Next up, was Pages. Now normally Pages handles Word files pretty well, but this time, it was a bit of a disaster. The document had an embedded table that Pages didn’t take kindly to, and the whole page turned into a big mess. The yes/no checkboxes didn’t show either.

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="104" caption="Pages 09"][/caption]

At this point, I figured it was worth giving Microsoft’s web apps a shot at it. I figured who better than Microsoft to display, well, Microsoft-formatted files. The layout of the document overall was good. Unfortunately I still didn’t get my checkboxes. Instead, I got field codes.

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="157" caption="Word web app"][/caption]

Finally, I turned to NeoOffice. It won this round hands down. Checkboxes at last!

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="249" caption="NeoOffice"][/caption]

Overall first impressions of Microsoft web apps and other random bits

Good things

• The interface is simple and nice. In many ways, this is a welcome change forced by Microsoft’s inexperience in developing web apps. The desktop version of Office gets more crowded with every release.
• Getting files in is pretty easy once you figure out that you need to be on the SkyDrive page. SkyDrive is basically where all of your files live online.
• It works in Firefox and Safari. This is worth stating because Microsoft has traditionally shunned all browsers other than its own Internet Explorer when developing web-based interfaces.
• Registration is simple, fast, and free. It could do without the birth year field, however.

Less than good things

• Microsoft’s web apps feel a bit slow compared to Google Docs. Opening documents took longer than expected, and sometimes there were delays when navigating within the site. It’s worth noting that Microsoft recommends downloading and installing Silverlight to run the web apps more smoothly. I did not do this.
• Downloading needs some work. When I downloaded a file that had spaces in the name, it put quotes around the file name and even saved the file on my local hard drive with the quotes (e.g. “My file.doc”). This caused the file to be unrecognized on my Mac by any programs until I manually deleted the quotation marks from the file name. Additionally, you are only given the option to download the file in the Microsoft format. Google Docs, on the other hand, lets you download as Word (doc), RTF, PDF, text, HTML, and ODF.
• As noted above, the web app version of Word doesn’t seem to handle complicated doc and docx files any better than Google Docs (based on my limited testing).

In conclusion, I was hoping Microsoft’s web apps would give me a new tool for editing and sharing complicated Word files without having to boot up Windows and run Microsoft Office. It’s not ready for that yet, but it seems like a step in the right direction.

Right now, Microsoft web apps seem like a first-draft copy of Google Docs and don’t offer any significant benefits to me personally. I may change my mind as I continue to explore Microsoft’s web apps, and I will post what I find. Soon, I plan to look into the web version of Excel.

It will be interesting to see if Microsoft really invests in web apps or if they’ll eventually be put out to pasture in the sky. In many ways, web apps are a catch-22 for Microsoft.

If Microsoft doesn't develop them, they risk letting Google dominate the web app space. If Microsoft ends up doing a great job with web apps, they’ll surely cannibalize sales on the desktop (paid) versions of Office. Fully featured Microsoft Office web apps also mean that people no longer need Windows to use Microsoft Office -- any computer with an internet connection will do.

Have you tried Microsoft web apps yet? What do you think of them?

Verizon's newest iPhone competitor, the Droid X, will come with an unlimited data plan for $30 per month. CNET:

The fact that Verizon is keeping this data plan is significant because AT&T. . .  has eliminated its unlimited plan in lieu of a new two-tiered offer that caps monthly data usage. Now it looks like Verizon is using AT&T's pricing shift as an opportunity to pick off consumers, who may be interested in the iPhone 4 but are scared off by AT&T's change in data plan.

Maybe this move by Verizon will also stabilize the shift to tiered data plan pricing in the UK, which appeared to be precipitated by AT&T's move to tiered pricing.

Will AT&T hold steady or back off?