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The other day I came across this little number by Christopher Null of Yahoo!, discussing seven legitimate issues with Apple's latest version of the iPhone. And there's in-fact more than that.

A while back, I talked about whether waiting for the newest run of Apple's showpiece mobile device was worth it. But that focused mainly on some favorite alternatives, while Null delves into the details of the iPhone's shortcomings.

Highlighted are the cost (roughly 160 bucks more over the next two years), the wimpy 2 megapixel camera, a battery you can't replace, no MMS capability, no ability to stream live TV, and limited storage space. And as one heady commenter pointed out, there's an eighth pretty annoying problem; no memory removal or expansion. In a world of SD and micro-SD-ready options the iPhone is inexplicably lacking, again.

These issues, standalone, may not be deal-breakers for some. But combined, how can they not be? Especially for the kind of money Apple expects us to shell out.

I had a great time at the Personal Democracy Forum earlier this week since I met wonderful people and learned about interesting projects.

The whole point behind PDF is to discuss how technology can help individuals participate in the political/governing process and improve governments' ability to serve their citizens.  While attending the Design Principles for Online Democracy panel discussion, Tom Steinberg of mySociety in the UK discussed various projects that his organizations have done for the British government. 

In my opinion, the coolest project so far is fixmystreet.com.  On this site people living in Britain can report sections of road that need repairs or attention.  These problems can run the gamut from potholes to "fly tipping" (Brit-speak for "littering").  Local governments can then use this site to determine where they need to deploy their employees to make repairs or correct problems.  Further, this site allows the public to make sure that the problems reported are corrected.

I think that this is a marvelous idea.  This site enables citizens to work directly with their local governments to ensure that important tasks are accomplished, and that makes fixmystreet.com a great example of what PDF is trying to accomplish — use technology to improve government.

Elizabeth Edwards spoke to guests at the 2008 Personal Democracy Forum about how the internet is influencing the world of politics. But it was husband John that later stole the show with his surprise (even to him) appearance.

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Another one of the presentations that I’d like to highlight from the Personal Democracy Forum is the one by Mark Pesce, who is currently an honorary professor at the University of Sydney.  I was glad that Pesce decided to make the trip because his speech was by far my favorite of the two-day forum.  A great written version of the speech can be found on his blog here, so I will save you the summary and simply discuss the fun facts that I found most intriguing.

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<cross posted from our ImpactWatch blog>

Since its launch in 1999, our ImpactWatch media monitoring platform has been focused on serving the enterprise market.  The product has been aimed at organizations that receive a high volume of coverage from both traditional and online media, require a large number of employees to access the data ImpactWatch collects and need high-end  reporting and analysis of coverage.  Due to its robust feature set and flexibility, ImpactWatch remains a great solution for these types of enterprise clients.

But in showing ImpactWatch over the years, I’ve run into a lot of people who love ImpactWatch’s interface and base tool set, but who don’t need all of the advanced features we’ve built into ImpactWatch over the years. They were looking for an elegant and affordable way to manage and report out on their media coverage as opposed to an enterprise level media tracking platform.

In an effort to provide these folks with a product they can use, we are in the process of rolling out two new ImpactWatch product lines that will enable the IW to serve the needs of organizations of all sizes.  Specifically:

1. ImpactWatch Basic – Aimed at groups that get a limited amount of coverage (approximately 1-50 clips a day) and only need for a handful of people to access data.
2. ImpactWatch Professional – For organizations with a higher volume of coverage (50-100 clips a day) and who need a few dozen people to access the system.
3. ImpactWatch Enterprise – This is our current system, which is aimed at organizations with a high volume of daily coverage (100+ clips), a large number of users and that need access to some of ImpactWatch’s high end reporting features.

I know this is vague, but we are in the process of a big development push and aren’t ready to talk about all the details yet.  Check the ImpactWatch blog for updates on our progress and look for us to roll out the new product lines later in the summer.

We’re excited.

We are just back from a great trip to the Personal Democracy Forum in New York, NY. We’ll be putting together a few panel recaps over the next couple of days.  In the meantime, I wanted to do a quick post about one of the more talked about exchanges during the event – the discussion between John Edwards campaign blogger Tracy Russo and John McCain e-campaign director Mark Soohoo about McCain’s computer skills (or lack thereof).

Predictably, Russo thinks that the ability to use a computer is critical to understanding the world we live in now and Soohoo disagrees.

While the exchange is undeniably entertaining, it struck me as the type of political theater we already see plenty of on a seemingly endless number of political talk shows.  It would be a shame if this “gotcha” moment attracted more attention than other, more interesting discussions that took place at the conference.  Anyway, we’ll do our part to make sure that doesn’t happen by sharing our thoughts on some of the better discussions we sat in on.

Several members of The Bivings Group team are present at the 2008 Personal Democracy Forum, which aims to prove that technology is changing the way that we do politics.  Currently, I am sitting in a forum titled "Clickocracy" which hosts four journalistically inclined panelists: Jose Antonio Vargas, Ben Smith, Ana Marie Cox, and Sarah Lai Stirland.

One of the most interesting things about the forum is that it takes full advantage of Web 2.0 tools.  In the background of the panelists is a large screen which displays questions and comments submitted by the audience in real-time.  The moderator (Jeff Jarvis) attempts to ask as many of these questions as possible, while searching through the numerous "Obama FTW!!!" comments.  What is it about anonymity on the Internet that turns everyone into a five-year-old?

Topics covered on the panel included the newest tools (Twitter!), the now famous My.Barack.Obama site, and if the number of Facebook friends can determine the outcome of an election.

A large majority of the conversation centered on the new definition of a "journalist".  After all, now that anyone can post anything on the Web, is there a true definition of a "journalist"?  Arguments have raged back and forth that journalism is a dying art that anyone can now pursue, from an 85-year-old widow to an 8-year-old kid, to the fact that 'true journalism' is now more important than ever.

In my opinion, the rise of blogging and other online forms or conversation has only helped me to weed out the bad writers from the good ones.  Instead of having to accept the only available journalism as the best of the bunch, I can now pick for myself.  In this way, the authors who have gone to journalism school, possess a sheer talent, or simply work harder than their counterparts stand out.  The rise of the semi-pro journalist, as one panelist coined, has only made me appreciate the fully-pro ones more.

As Hosam (another TBG employee) said at the end of the forum, "You can tell that those panelists really love what they do."

One of the biggest tiffs that I’ve had with Google is that their customer support is well…lacking.  If you have any problems with Google Apps other than the most rudimentary “How do I?” question, you are going to run into some problems.  And good luck and Godspeed if you want to talk to a live person on the phone.  I’ve gotten so confounded in automated responses that I have lost all track of time, space, and self.

One of the biggest problems facing Google is their own popularity.  To meet the needs of its ever-growing client base, they would need thousands of technical support personnel.  That’s why I find the news about Website Optimizer service plans so fascinating.

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