Apple's Innovations and Steve Jobs

ABC World News made Steve Jobs their person of the week this week.  Starting out of his garage in 1976, Steve Jobs has seen Apple grow and its innovations pervade the marketplace of ideas and technology.

My first PC was an Apple--shortly after it was invented.  In 1990 I wrote my dissertation on a Macintosh at the university computer lab and purchased my first Apple in 1991.  I have been using Apple and Macintosh computers for years--then had to convert to Windows-based computers for business and later for schools.  (I am still a Mac-fanatic at heart.)

I have fallen in love with my iPod Touch (32Gs) and use it in the wifi mode for everything from surfing the web to e-mail to listening to audio books and more.  The iPad (Apple Tablet by whatever name it may end up with) appears to be a larger version of the iPod Touch--just with updated software and some Macintosh capabilities built in.  (Of course I want an iPad and an iPhone.  I'd be an early adapter except for the new economy.)

A suggestion to Steve and Apple based on my research on improving reading and academic performance, get the iPad to synchronize unabridged eBooks and eAudioBooks so that students can read and listen at the same time.  I've done that with students, especially English language learners, with good results.  In practicing Spanish, I've also listened to a book in English and read the unabridged book in Spanish simultaneously.

I hope that the app process for the iPod Touch and the iPhone will work for the new iPad as well.

Changing Weather Patterns in Florida--Absolute Zero Movie

A strawberry grower in Florida was interviewed on ABC Good Morning America Weekend on Saturday, 1/9/2010, concerning the impact of freezing temperatures on his plants.  He reported that he has seen colder weather in Florida for the past three years.  I grew up in South Florida and am very familiar with weather conditions there.  A friend of mine is thinking about purchasing a town house in Key Largo, Florida, and I was reminded of the Absolute Zero movie which talks about a polar shift where the ice caps melt at both the North and South Poles and Miami becomes buried in ice--overnight.

We are all aware of the global climate changes we are experiencing.  Whether or not these changes are being brought about by global warming or some other mechanism, the results are the same.  Ice is melting at the poles and many parts of the world are experiencing significantly different weather patterns.

How do we prepare for such changes?  For a polar shift, I really don't know.  (I don't think anyone does.)  That would be catastrophic for the entire planet.  Has it happened before?  Probably.  It could also be linked to the Bible story of Noah and the flood.  Could that be what wiped out the dinosaurs?  Perhaps?  Could a polar shift be caused by an interplanetary impact (a large meteor, for example)?  Possibly.

In any event, movies can give us food for thought along with entertainment.