- Is the Wi-Fi at the Starbucks where you lug your printer,
laptop and tablet too slow for a respectable businessperson who is also too
damn cheap to actually get a real office and stop mooching off someone else? If
so, good news is on the way thanks to telecommunications giant Qualcomm. The
company announced
plans late last week for new technology that it says could triple Wi-Fi speeds for homes, offices
and public networks. At present, Wi-Fi networks can only serve one device at a
time, cycling quickly among different users. As anyone trying to download
movies illegally at the library or streaming their favorite TV show from a
corner table at the local fast food restaurant knows, that means slower speeds
for everyone when more devices connect to the network. “On a network like this,
streaming or video chatting can be like sitting in the driver's seat at rush
hour: you'll get to your destination, but it's going to take some time,”
Qualcomm said in a statement. To counter this problem, Qualcomm has spent the
past seven years coming up with a way to allow networks to transmit data to
multiple groups of users simultaneously using algorithms that adapt on the fly
to changes in usage. Their works has led to MU-MIMO, which stands for
"multi-user, multiple input, multiple output." Now that its new
gadget has been mostly perfected, the company plans to sell MU-MIMO-enabled
chips to manufacturers of wireless routers and access points, as well as to companies
that make smartphones, tablets and other consumer electronics. MU-MIMO can
supposedly boost download speeds by two to three times. However, devices on
MU-MIMO networks that aren't equipped with the technology won't see quite that
improvement. They may see minor increases, according to Todd Antes, vice
president of product management at Qualcomm's Atheros unit. "Using MU-MIMO
is like using the carpool lane: the Wi-Fi Highway doesn't change, but grouping
up with other users lets you go much faster while de-congesting the other
lanes," the company said in its statement. Demonstrations of MU-MIMO will
begin in the months ahead and the product is expected to be available
commercially early next year……….
- Libya has to have settled down by now, right? It’s not as
if a nation can sustain and survive that much rage for that long a period of
time….can it? Think again. The rage lives on and it was on full display over
the weekend as angry activists blocked the road to Benghazi's international
airport, protesting against the country's parliament, which was due to dissolve
two months ago. When politicians stick around too long, the people riot and a
security official in Libya confirmed the uprising that includes an awesome
display of dissidence in which activists set tires ablaze Sunday on main roads,
including the one leading to the airport. Not only did these bold souls block a
main road and choke off traffic to the airport, but they also created enough
havoc to force a university, some governmental schools, banks and the city's
port to close. Accomplishing all of that with only crude weapons of resistance
and a fondness for pyromania is impressive. The drama could have been avoided
if only Libya's parliament, split between Islamist and non-Islamist blocs,
dissolved Feb. 7 as it was supposed to. Instead of following the plan, the
parliament kept on chugging along in bureaucratic inertia after Islamists led a
motion to extend its mandate by another year. Even a transparent attempt to
curry favor and stem the rising tide of rage by voting to hold early elections
this spring hasn’t done much damage to the resistance movement and regular
protests against lawmakers continue to be the norm in a nation where riots and
clashes with security forces have become a way of life…………
- Rent, don’t buy. That philosophy should be tattooed on
the forehead of every member of the Golden State Warriors’ coaching staff – and
if the likelihood that a man with an unsightly tattoo on his face will soon be
fired seems obvious, just know that’s likely to happen anyhow. In the past two
weeks, the playoff-bound Warriors have offed two of their assistants in the
sort of coaching carnage that is rarely displayed by a team hoping to make
noise in the postseason in less than three weeks. The last pink-slipping came
on Saturday when the team axed assistant Darren Erman on Saturday for
"a violation of company policy," general manager Bob Myers said.
Myers added that "this is the type of decision that would be made across
the board and irrespective of position within the organization." The
firing came less than 14 days after head coach Brian Scalabrine was sent
packing by head coach Mark Jackson to the team's NBA Development League
affiliate in Santa Cruz. "Obviously, the timing is unfortunate, but we
hold all of our employees, whether in basketball operations or other aspects of
the business, accountable for their actions and to the same standard,"
Myers said. Scalabrine’s exodus was attributed to what Jackson called a
"difference in philosophies." Erman had been with the Warriors for
three seasons and coached their summer league championship team in Las Vegas
last year. Most of his job consisted of reviewing video and studying opponents,
but violating company policy made him expendable – whatever the hell that
means. No stories of arrests, orgies or sex tapes have surfaced, so it could be
something less sordid. The Warriors are leaking serious oil despite topping
Utah Sunday night and standing sixth in the Western Conference. At this pace,
Jackson is going to be a one-man coaching staff by the time the playoffs begin
later this month………
- As George Costanza might ask, “Was that wrong?” The
Archbishop of Atlanta may have taken a long, long time to come to that conclusion,
but at long last he has opened his eyes to the fact that living in a $2.2
million mansion while his flock struggled to make ends meet was not exactly
being about God’s work. After being publicly excoriated by church officials and
parishioners, Archbishop
Wilton Gregory finally announced Saturday that he would vacate his $2.2 million
mansion in early May. His announcement came after a meeting with members of
several church councils and parishioners at his headquarters and let’s just say
the acrhbishop didn’t exactly display overwhelming intelligence in what he said
afterward. "I want to thank those parishioners whose prayers, counsel and
concern brought this issue to light and ensured that their Archbishop
was properly attuned to the important symbolism of simple actions
and the challenges faced by many of the faithful in the Archdiocese of
Atlanta," Gregory said in a statement. Brought the issue to light? You
couldn’t look at the lavish home around you and realize that sort of opulence
looked really bad when your church is full of middle-class folks? It shouldn’t
take a closed-door meeting with 60 angry members of the Archdiocesan Pastoral
and
Finance
Council, the Council of Priests and parishioners to clue you in to that
reality. Gregory moved into the
6,000-square-foot home in Atlanta's upscale Buckhead neighborhood in January
and living on land donated by Joseph Mitchell, nephew of "Gone With the
Wind" novelist Margaret Mitchell, caused a bit of a stir. Three months
later, he finally apologized publicly for building the mansion. "What we
didn't stop to consider, and that oversight rests with me and me alone, was
that the world and the Church have changed," Gregory wrote Monday in the
archdiocesan newspaper. Gregory will now move into another available
Archdiocesan property and not a moment too soon after the Pope accepted the
resignation of Bishop Franz-Peter Tebartz-van Elst, also known as the
"Bling Bishop," who spent $42 million renovating his residence in
Limburg, Germany. The pope has made much of living in as humble of settings as
possible, so some random bishop in Georgia might want to follow suit……….
- The box office field was once again no match for a
superhero. “Captain
America: The Winter Soldier” kicked plenty of ass on its way to a $96.2 million
weekend and debuted with enough income to get more than halfway to earning back
its $170 million budget. That bumped reigning earnings champion “Noah” to
second place with $17 million, giving the Biblically-inspired epic with $72.3
million in domestic earnings through two weeks. “Divergent” fell one spot to
third place, banking $13 million to up its three-week tally to $114 million and
counting. The Almighty’s grip on the top five held for another weekend as
“God’s Not Dead” finished fourth with $7.8 million, giving the morally upright
flick $32.5 million in three weeks of relatively limited release. Fifth place
went to “The Grand Budapest Hotel,” which raked in $6.4 million and has
remained successful in limited release with $33.4 million in five weeks in
theaters. Up next was sixth-place finisher “Muppets Most Wanted,” which hummed
along with $6.3 million and has amassed a modest haul of $42.1 million after
three weeks. It did well enough to hold off “Mr. Peabody & Sherman,”
ranking seventh in its fifth weekend of release thanks to $5.4 million in
domestic earnings. The animated movie has now surpassed the $100 million mark
with $102.2 million in domestic earnings. “Sabotage” secured eighth place with
$1.9 million in weekend earnings, good enough for a disappointing two-week
total of $8.8 million. Ninth place belonged to “Need for Speed,” which slowed
down considerably (56 percent) in its fourth weekend with a scant $1.8 million
and has now brought in $40.9 million in four weeks. The last spot in the top 10
went to “Non-Stop,” hanging on with $1.7 million to bump its domestic take to
$88.2 million through six weeks. “300: Rise of An Empire” (No. 12) lost its
spot from last weekend’s top 10………..
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