Do Kids Have a Right to Suck Boobs on Camera?

As of the close of 2010, what are the most recent sales numbers (or estimates) for the iPad?

Quora provides.

As of the close of 2010, what are the most recent sales numbers (or estimates) for the iPad?

Interesting discussion, but Philip Elmer-DeWitt from Fortune came through with the most accurate numbers.

"I've surveyed a couple dozen analysts, professionals and amateurs. Unit sales estimates for the quarter that ended Saturday range from 5 million to 7.54 million. Average estimate: 6.31 million. That would bring Apple's calendar 2010 iPad sales to roughly 13.8 million units."

What individuals or organizations will be providing live video coverage of CES 2011?

Here’s what Quora’s come up with so far:

What individuals or organizations will be providing live video coverage of CES 2011?

Company Specific
10:30am PT / 1:30pm ET – Skype press conference (Livestream)
11am PT / 2pm ET – Ford Keynote with CEO Alan Mulally (Livestream)
1:00p PT/ 4:00p ET – Verizon (4G LTE) Press Conference (Ustream)
3:30pm PT/ 6:30p ET – Lady Gaga + Polaroid Grey Label Reveal (Ustream)
4:30pm PT / 7:30pm ET – Keynote of Samsung President Boo-Keun Yoon (SPSTV)

News Broadcasts
Chris Pirillo – http://live.pirillo.com
Crunchgear – http://ces.crunchgear.com
Engadget – http://engadget.com/CES
TWiT Network – http://live.twit.tv

Possible Coverage (i.e., we’re not sure)
ElderGadget – http://eldergadget.com

Question: Why aren’t Ustream, Justin.tv, and Livestream making a push on set-top boxes?

My answer on Quora:
It's a much more expensive proposition to stream to a set top box than it is to stream to the web. The technology is very wide and varied between the differing platforms, which takes up a lot of development resources. Typically, if you want to go to mainstream platforms (like the xBox or iOS), you've got to use a completely different streaming server solution, and all the live streaming platforms you mention are pretty in bed with the Flash Media Server suite.

Why aren't Ustream, Justin.tv, and Livestream making a push on set-top boxes?

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I'm posting this here partially to test the integration between WordPress, and partially to put a pin into this topic. From a strategic position, at least on the surface, it seems like a pretty good idea to go for the living room if you're these guys, but there's a nuanced opinion in my mind forming around this that may explain the lack of live streaming presence in people's living rooms. So – more on this later. Probably.

Predictions 2010: A Work in Progress.

Putting together a monster predictions post is always daunting.  I remember the first time I had to do one, Pete started bugging me all the way back in November for it, and I didn’t get it done until the second week of December.

That week has come and gone this year, so I’m going to try something new.

I’m going to, for my reflections post, go back to my old predictions for 2008 and 2009 (did I do one for 2009?  I’ll hafta check) and see what panned out.

And I’m going to do as many predictions per night as I can muster on this site until I think I’ve covered all I can cover.

I started something of a predictions post last week, talking about convergence.  I think a lot of my predictions are going to revolve around the world of mobile, real time web, and cloud.

Here are some broad predictions that I’m obviously going to need to expand a bit for the main post.

Computers will disappear. This is something that Ray Kurzweil said, actually, so I can’t take full credit for it.  Here’s what he actually said in his original prediction:

Computers will disappear as distinct physical objects, meaning many will have nontraditional shapes and/or will be embedded in clothing and everyday objects.

I’m pretty sure he originally said this in his 1998 book, The Age of Spiritual Machines. I think we’ve already seen the start of that, and what we’ve seen the hints of now in consumer markets we’ll see go mainstream – devices that we carry around or wear that rely on cloud computing and ubiquitous Internet connections.

I carry two such devices in my pocket every day – my “dumb” phone, which is my private communications portal, and my TwitterPeek, which connects me to my public communications on Facebook and Twitter.  Many of you probably have an iPhone or similar device. We’ll see many more of these go mainstream in the near future.

No More Newspapers. TV will Start to Fail. Newsprint is betting big on paywalls, thanks to the ruminations of Rupert Murdoch. This will fail hard. We’ll finally see the death of a major newsprint organization this year.  This is an easy prediction to make. 

Once one of the big guys gets gone, we’ll start to see them … do more of the same until their death spiral is complete. There is nothing, at this point, that can save the printed news. Even if all the fossils at newsprint organizations decided to get on board with New Media best practices, they’re so far outclassed at this point that it’d never work in time.

We’ll also start to see TV stations start to hit the skids, a process that’ll likely be accelerated by the Comcast-NBCU deal, which will come to fruition late in 2010.

That’s all I can bang out this morning. I’ll probably have some more later today or tomorrow.

What Constitutes a Lonely Island Anyway?

So Good Old Andy Samberg is at it again with his crew of misfits over at SNL have put together a new digital short entitled “I’m On A Boat” with special guest T-Pain! (sarcasm was completely intended with that exclamation point) You can see the complete Digital Short posted above

Apparently Samberg, Akiva Schaffer, and Jorma Taccone are putting all these one hit wonders on physical media under the guise of “The Lonely Island”, who’s Debut Album Incredibad is now in fine retailers everywhere.

I can tell you now that this is the end of the world, and its time to start carrying shovels and identification papers everywhere….because if this album sells at all well, ill eat my shoes. And they are leathery bastards let me tell you.