Typically, the videos don’t follow a strict lesson plan and the vloggers have no goal in sight grander than simply talking about things they love. Despite that, these videos are a treasure trove of insight and are arguably more engaging than the average MOOC, in part because of their casual nature.

Here, we review and recommend six science education-geared YouTube channels.

ViHart

“We have to learn how to do easy things in a hard way in order to do hard things in an easier way.”

Vi Hart is an interdisciplinary mathematician. She’s interested in various topics such as art, music, virtual reality and tragic endings and she approaches them using the tool of mathematics.

Some of her videos do have a 101-flavour to them but for the most part her videos assume a high school level background in the subject and illustrate the value, universality and applicability of mathematics outside of a classroom setting.

Vi is for the jaded middle-schooler wondering where he will ever meet a logarithm again. Vi is for the maths alumna who misses the trippy joy of number theory. Or if you just want to hang back and watch someone entertain themselves with hexaflexagons, Vi has that too.

A caution: they. are. long.

Vi Hart creates what she wants to in the fashion that she wants to. These are no short works created to pander to the average attention span. These demand attention, and for an extended period of time. They do not function well casually played in the background. But if you can find the ten minutes, they are wonderful works of art in their own right and rare odes to mathematics.

MinutePhysics

MinutePhysics delivers what it promises – videos about topics in physics, usually in a minute and spare seconds. The earliest videos answered straightforward questions, like ‘‘What is Gravity?’’, but quickly grew in ambition and scope to include such subjects as the working of lasers and of satellite navigation.

There is the occasional dose of mathematics mixed in, such the ever-popular Hairy Ball theorem, although for a proper plunge into numbers, try ViHart above.

The same marker-wielding hand that runs MinutePhysics also created MinuteEarth, a unique channel that covers planetary-level phenomena such as epidemiology and geology. MinuteEarth serves as the miscellaneous bin that collects all the interesting topics that are outside the strait and narrow purview of MinutePhysics.

Do not forget to sample the series of ten-second videos that the channel created as a minimalist challenge. We recommend the ten-second video on the Dark Side of the Moon as an appetising amuse-cerveau, followed by an all-spanning course of What is the Universe?, and ending with The Hottest Place on Earth from MinuteEarth for, er, dessert.

Periodic Videos

If I were to recommend only one science vlog from this list, it would have to be Periodic Videos.  The original conceit was for the videos to cover each element of the periodic table, but the videos have progressed to topics ranging from household chemistry (tea) to mineral processing (one of the most popular is filmed inside the gold bullion vault at the Bank of England).

The videos are created by Brady Haran with the assistance of chemists from the University of Nottingham, but the star is undoubtedly Professor Martyn Poliakoff, CBE, known simply as ‘The Prof’. Distinguished as much by his trademark cadence as by his shock of grey hair, Prof. Poliakoff has been with the channel since its first video and recently starred in the five hundredth (where he showed off his collection of three hundred plastic water bottles). Brady Haran is also the creator of several other YouTube educational channels.

The channel has recently acquired a high-speed camera, which has allowed for some memorable videos. My favourite among these are those of cæsium in water, where the cæsium droplets flying away from the explosion leave individual vapour trails, and rubidium in (phenolphthalein-laced) water. The rubidium vapour cloud glows a brilliant lilac inside a larger cloud of rosy phenolphthalein at the 4:40 mark. It is quite mesmerising.

For starters, we recommend the one with rubidium.

The Brain Scoop

The Brain Scoop’s focus is natural history – a fascinating branch of science that has sadly much fallen in popularity since Darwin boiled pigeons in his backyard. It is about time that this messy, demanding, and rewarding science was brought back into fashion, and Emily Graslie has thankfully taken up that muddy gauntlet.

Graslie’s career is a testimony to the power of the Internet to amplify obscure voices and launch careers. An arts graduate from the University of Montana, Graslie volunteered at its museum, giving tours and dusting specimens.

In 2013, she started her own YouTube channel to take her viewers to the back stage (‘‘I found a two-headed fish down here once.’’) and show them around her haunts (‘‘This is a foetal elk! In a jar!’’). Within the year she was offered a position as the first Curiosity Correspondent at the Fields Museum in Chicago, from where she continues producing excellent videos that cover gutting wolves, pinning insects, and dissecting roadkill.

Graslie’s videos can be quite hands-on and animals, would you believe it, are squelchier and less adorable on the inside. Viewer discretion is definitely advised, and many of the videos themselves include a ‘grossometer’ for the benefit of younger viewers (who probably actually don’t mind the gross innards as much as the delicate grown-ups around them seem to think they do).

We recommend the episodes Dimetrodon is Not a Dinosaur and Horns vs. Antlers to start.

JimtheEvo

Microbiology might come across as much too recondite for a series of popular science videos, but public awareness of pathogens is uniquely important. Contagion is democratic. Hoping that somebody somewhere with a lab coat will ‘‘solve’’ an epidemic with the wave of a pipette is not sufficient in an age of transoceanic flights and high-density urban spaces.

From adhering to a vaccination schedule to practising restraint with antibiotics, popular participation is vital to the control of infectious diseases. The response to avian flu was heroic, but California is experiencing an Ebola epidemic even now. There is a need for public education in this sphere, and as often in biology, niches do not stay vacant for long. In this case, the organism of the hour is Oxford biologist JimtheEvo.

We recommend the History of Infectious Diseases videos to begin with. Not only does he cover major historical epidemics but also uses these as a lens through which to educate on basic microbe biology.

JimtheEvo has no gimmicks. His videos are akin to sitting down comfortably with your TA. He lectures in a straightforward manner and moves logically through the topics. We recommend going through them in chronological order because he sets the stage in early videos to answer questions in later videos.

Recommended: Vaccinations, Lies, and MMR, and Measles: A History of Infection.

Shed Science

In 2013, Sally LePage won a Guardian and OUP competition where the challenge was to create a minute-long video that would motivate viewers to learn more about a subject. Sally’s videos are not meant to be thorough and only just skim the surface of a topic, but their thoughtfulness and engaging nature does exactly what they are designed to: provoke viewers to deeper exploration.

Each individual video is typically very focussed, but her channel’s content spans from the snake in her neighbours’ garden to musical odes to starfish to theories within evolution. You may well find yourself marathoning through her entire content (and we urge you to do this because we are selfish and want more of her).

On the side, Sally has co-hosted a long list of videos outside her regular channel. Though some of these videos are more declamatory than educational per se, we recommend them just as enthusiastically.

One remarkable video has her collaborating with a couple of other YouTubers to debunk a video from Hank Green, easily one of the better known YouTube science vloggers. It’s a necessary reminder that science, which ought to be objective, is curated by humans, who are not always. Even as we invite you to roll up your shirtsleeves and dive wholesale into the universe of science vlogs, we urge caution and scepticism, especially on matters of opinion.

With that disclaimer in place, colouring your forehead blue is sexy.

Not to undermine the importance of technical knowledge on infant care, another category of books are often more engaging in parental education. These books are not instruction manuals on babies, but scientific readings on their behavior. Instead of asking, “How to deal with your baby?” these books ask the far more interesting question, “How is the baby dealing with your world?” How does a mind form? What is the baby-mind perceiving? What expectations is it projecting onto that perceived surrounding? What surprises a baby?  Between days spent fretting over the subtleties of a baby’s whine, it is perhaps amazement and curiosity which allows parents to enjoy one of the greatest shows of this world. I shall venture to claim that curiosity is the singular eligibility for parenthood.

There are a few excellent books in this latter category. Descartes’ Baby by Paul Bloom is perhaps preeminent. Have you ever wondered whether babies are born with a notion of three dimensional space, flow of time, solidity and cohesion of objects? Or do then learn such properties by observing the material world? Neuroscientists, Developmental and Cognitive Psychologists have raised such questions and  have devised ingenuous experiments, measuring attention by the duration of baby’s gaze, in arriving at often surprising conclusions. A baby develops ocular control and ability to fixate gaze on moving objects rather early on (three months) though depth perception develops later (six months). Two other books in this category that come to mind are, The Philosophical Baby by Alison Gopnik and What’s Going on in There? by Lisa Eliot. Lisa Eliot’s lucid book makes developmental neuroscience of babies highly accessible to anyone.

Experimenting with Babies is a rather unique book. Instead of presenting the research on early child development in the typical style of a popular science book, it presents an experiment (for each chapter) which parents can conduct on their babies, and thereby directly participate in the scientific process. All the experiments are from original research papers and is cited in the references. The experiments are sometimes modified to suit a home scientist with limited resources. Each chapter is divided into four sections: The Experiment, The Hypothesis, The Research and The Takeaway. The experiment is described, an hypothesis of what result to expect is presented, what researchers found is explained, and what we learn about infants in the process is finally summarized. It is an remarkably effective format for two reasons: firstly, reading the book is a breeze even with a screeching infant or toddler in a football-hold! Secondly, the format reiterates the way science is done. A scientist first reviews existing knowledge and comes up with a new and interesting question. A hypothesis is formed on what the answer might be. A feasible experiment is then planned to test the hypothesis unambiguously; the experiment should be able to corroborate or falsify the hypothesis. The experimental results are then assessed in the light of newly gained knowledge. As a result, fresh questions are often proposed.

The age group for each experiment is mentioned under the chapter title, along with the experiment’s complexity and the research area. The chapters are chronological in age group, starting with 0-3 months and ending with 24 months. There are 50 experiments in total. Most of the experiments are rather simple to perform, and in reading the book I discovered that without knowledge of the research I had performed some of them spontaneously on my one year old over the past year. And if you have a baby, I can assure you that you too have conducted some of these experiments, perhaps without your knowledge.

For example, take Chapter 26 named Mirror, Mirror. Every parent has probably been amused by how a baby interacts with a mirror and how it changes with age. At a very early age of 3 months babies already show interest in their reflection. At around the time they begin to crawl (my daughter started shakily at around six months) they are quite fascinated by their reflection. My daughter would coo at the mirror and touch it and smile back in wonder, and her interest only grew stronger when she began walking at ten months. However, babies don’t appear to recognize their reflection as their own image, the book informs, apparently until around 14-22 months. I would touch my babies hair while she was looking at her reflection and take my finger away the moment she turned around to look at me, hoping to inspire her to look at herself in the mirror and investigate. She would look at my reflection in the mirror and smile but did she really grasp the idea of her own reflection? The experiment suggested in the book is to put a smudge of makeup on the baby’s nose and see at what age they reach for their own nose instead of the their reflection. This is a well-known test, however, the book does not point out the many criticisms of the mirror test. Few animals pass the test, but there are problems of interpreting the results in determining self-recognition. One of the shortcomings of Experimenting with Babies is in not always presenting the scientific debate surrounding many of these tests or studies, though the author has made an attempt in several chapters.

Another observation you may have made as a parent is how the motor skills/dexterity of those little hands develop over the months. Hand-eye coordination is very poor early on. Chapter 28 suggests a curious little experiment. Which hand does a baby offer to grab a toy which is rotation either clockwise or counter-clockwise? I missed this experiment because it is rather age sensitive. Around 6 months and 10 months the baby has a handedness preference for a clockwise or a counterclockwise rotation toy. However, around 8 months right hand is preferred, apparently. The fast pace at which motor skills develop in this early months allows for different behavioral outcomes in the three age groups. I leave it to the reader to find the explanation in the book. There are several other chapters exploring motor skills, ranging from adjusting grasp to size of objects (chapter 25) to walking pattern of toddlers (chapter 39). An index classifies the chapters by the research areas and another index by the complexity of the experiment.

Picking out a single experiment as a favorite from the book does the book injustice, but the one enjoyed a lot is perhaps the Goldilocks Effect. In this experiment you hide toys behind cardboard stands and reveal the toys in simple to complex sequence or completely random sequence. Babies become attentive to the sudden appearance of objects only beyond a certain age. In the case of my daughter, I routinely hid a toy in front of her by a sleight of hand or revealed it from under a blanket, hoping she would notice and display gestures of searching or surprise respectively, appropriate to her age. She began doing so consistently only around the age of six to seven months. The Goldilocks experiment emphasizes that babies show both a “familiarity” and “novelty bias” in their attention. Too complex a pattern of presentation and their attention wanes. Too simple, and it is rather boring. This is also the reason that peek-a-boo games need to become increasingly sophisticated as the baby grows up.

I wish the book did not stop at 24 months and extended into later years of child development. Particularly exciting would be experiments done to study the development of morality in children—Rebecca Saxe’s work comes to mind.

In summary, this 200 page book will inform you more about the cognitive world of your child and keep you far more engaged with that little scientist compared to many other books on the first two-years of child development. So read it.

What are my choices?

In the world of smartphones, there really are only four viable players; iOS, Android, Windows Phone and BlackBerry OS. When choosing your next smartphone, it’s of the utmost importance to identify what aspects of smartphones your value over others. We will now list the strengths and weaknesses of every single platform. Once a platform is chosen we can then narrow down model and carrier choices.

iOS

The crown jewel of Apple’s “walled garden”, iOS singlehandedly shook the mobile industry to the core and changed it forever. It’s what powers the iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad.

Strengths: Stability, Performance, App/Multimedia Ecosystem, Consistent Experience (from model to model)
Weaknesses: Customizability, Hardware options

Android

Google’s Android has come a long way since humble beginnings in the shadow of the iOS. It is now the most ubiquitous Mobile Operating System on planet Earth not only surpassing the Apple product but completely leaving it in its dust. It powers everything from Smartphones, to tablets, to cameras and even smart TVs.

Strengths: Customizability, Hardware Options, App/Multimedia Ecosystem
Weaknesses: Version Fragmentation, Inconsistent Experience (from one manufacturer to another)

Windows Phone

While Microsoft has struggled to generate consumer market share with Windows Phone 7, it certainly won’t give up. With Windows Phone 8 (and Windows 8), the unification of Desktop, Tablet and Smartphone experience is taken to the extreme. With this new unified vision of what a Microsoft experience should be Windows Phone 8 looks like it should be on the rise, thanks to beautiful hardware and intuitive and simple software.

Strengths: Stability, Performance, Customizability, Consistent Experience (from one manufacturer to another), Hardware Options
Weaknesses: App/Multimedia Ecosystem

Blackberry OS

Once a shining beacon for Canadian tech companies, BlackBerry has, without a shadow of a doubt, fallen from graces. Much like Microsoft, BlackBerry faces an uphill battle against juggernauts in Android and iOS. The initial response to Blackberry 10 and the all touch BlackBerry Z10 has been pretty positive with many BlackBerry loyalists happy with the now modern OS while others are still biding their time for the QWERTY equipped BlackBerry Q10. What is clear though is that BlackBerry will need to shore up third party developer support with a large chunk of their App World offerings being simple Android Ports.

Strengths: Stability, Performance, Customizability, Consistent Experience
Weaknesses: App/Multimedia Ecosystem, Hardware Options

What should I choose?

Even if I could present all the information in the world, ultimately choice comes down to preference. Depending on the platform that most interests you, there is a wide range of choices. Consider also the carrier of your choosing, since some of these phones are carrier exclusives. Please note that this only encompasses phones released in 2012 and first half of 2013.

iOS

There really are only 2 choices (with capacity choices in between), if you’re on a budget or like smaller screens grab the iPhone 4S, else grab the iPhone 5 if LTE connectivity is a must. Both models are available from Rogers, Bell, TELUS, Fido, Virgin and Koodo.

Android

Here are, in no particular order, the best overall offering from each manufacturer:

• - HTC One (Rogers, Bell, Virgin and TELUS)
• - Samsung Galaxy S4 (Every Major Carrier in Canada)
• - LG Optimus G (Rogers, Bell and TELUS)
• - Motorola RAZR HD LTE (Rogers/Fido) / Motorola Atrix HD LTE (Bell)
• - Sony Xperia ZL (Rogers and Bell)
• - Google Nexus 4 by LG (Unlocked from http://play.google.com and from various Carriers in Canada)

Honorable mentions to the Samsung Galaxy Note II, Galaxy S III, HTC One X and LG Optimus 4X HD

Windows Phone

Like Android there are several manufacturers to choose from:

• - Samsung Ativ S (Rogers, Bell, TELUS)
• - HTC Windows Phone 8X (Rogers, Bell)
• - Nokia Lumia 920 (Rogers)

Honorable mentions go to HTC Windows Phone 8S.

BlackBerry OS

Anything running the old Blackberry OS 7 or earlier is a non-starter (Bold, Curve, Torch), I recommend ignoring them all together. If you are considering choosing the Canadian made BlackBerry, there are only two choices; the All Touch Blackberry Z10 and if you must have the hardware keyboard, there is the BlackBerry Q10.

Conclusion

While this isn’t an all-inclusive list of what’s available out there, it gives an idea of the cream of the crop. While we understand people aren’t always looking for the best or latest and greatest it’s important to think about the considerable investment a smartphone can be. Whether it is a 3-year agreement with a carrier or a costly off-contract purchase, it’s usually a choice you want to get right and we hope that this brief guide has helped in some way.

The book takes an approach that is very similar to his first book (Likeable Social Media) in that it uses a compilation of personal stories and real examples, rather than research, to convey his points. Likeable Business is a very straightforward and light read, just like the first book was.

There are 11 principles that the author believes makes business leaders more likeable and makes their organization better and more customer-centric. In this review, selected principles are covered in more detail than others while a brief summary will be shown for the remaining ones. Grab your copy if you are interested in reading in detail all the principles, along with great, insightful stories, and personal experiences about each.

Listening

The author talks about Netflix and how listening helped the company regain its customers. In the summer of 2011, Netflix began a price hike for all their services and that they would split their business into a DVD rentals (through a new site called Qwikster) and a separate streaming service business.  Customers were extremely unsatisfied and expressed their thoughts on Facebook and Twitter. Shortly after, Netflix’s CEO, Reed Hastings stated on a short blog: ‘It is clear that for many of our members two websites would make things more difficult so we are going to keep Netflix as one place to go for streaming and DVDs. This means no change: one website, one account, one password…In other words, no Qwister. While the July price change was necessary, we are now done with price changes.’ His decision to listen to his customers helped Netflix reduce the risk of losing more customers. After losing 800,000 customers after the original announcement, Netflix gained a net 610,000 customers in the fourth quarter of 2011.

Storytelling

Do your customers know the story of how you began? The author tells the story of a 19-year-old college kid named Brian Scudamore and coming up with the idea for what was then called ‘Rubbish Boys’ a customer-based junk removal service that traveled around Vancouver removing unwanted items from people’s homes. In 1999 the company changed names to 1800-GOT-JUNK? Within 5 years what had started as a $700 investment turned into a booming business with locations in most major metropolises across North America.

Brian uses storytelling as a tool to promote teamwork and grow his business because ‘When people understand who you are and where you come from, they’re more likely to rally around your cause’

Authenticity

Great leaders are who they say they are. Vulnerability and humility are hallmarks of the authentic leader and create a positive attractive energy.

Transparency

Openness and honesty lead to happier staff and customers – and a happier you. Take the curtains down between you and the customer because when you lie, you lose. Take for example the case of the BP oil spill where internally, BP said the spill could reach 100,000 barrels per day but when it handed the documents to Congress, the company claimed that the number was 5,000 barrels a day. As a result of the deceit, BP lost over $25 billion in market value due to falling stock.

Team Playing

No matter how small your organization, you interact with others every day. Letting other shine encourages innovative ideas.

Responsiveness

Today’s leaders are responsive to their customers, staff, investors and prospects. Responding shows you care.

Adaptability

Leaders must be flexible in managing changing opportunities. Humility and willingness to adapt mark a great leader.

Passion

Those who love what they do don’t have to work a day in their lives. Passion is contagious. It will affect your bottom line.

Surprise and Delight

Most people like surprise. This section explores many ways to surprise without spending extra money.

Simplicity

The world is more complex than ever before and yet what customers often respond to best is simplicity – in design, form and function. We humans all crave for simplicity. A likeable leader or business must be focused and deliver simplicity.

Gratefulness

An interesting concept, the ROI of gratitude is discussed in this section. The author tells the story of Charles Best, the founder and CEO of Donors Choose, an online nonprofit organization that makes it easy for donors to give classrooms in need. Charles conducted an experiment to demonstrate the ROI (return on investment) of gratitude. The experiment consisted of hand-writing thank you notes to about half of their recent first-time donors. The results were positive and they showed direct correlation between the act of being thanked and the likelihood of giving again. In fact, those who were personally thanked were 38 percent more likely to give another donation, proving an actual ROI on gratitude.

The Last Word

This book is great for those interested in reading about success and failure stories revolving around running businesses, from small to large. Some may even find it inspiring since there is a significant focus on entrepreneurs who have been widely successful by either practicing all or some of the principles discussed in this book.

While HTC is well respected by the tech community for having some of the most solid handsets available, that’s not to say they haven’t gotten their fair share of criticism. The primary complaint from many Android enthusiasts is that HTC phones, albeit named almost all completely differently, all seem to look “similar”. To some, this is an annoyance as handsets won’t stand out from each other, but I personally see it as a good thing as it provides HTC with an identity, something it seemed to lack before the Nexus One.

With the HTC Raider however, HTC clearly took a step away from the usual unibody aluminum shell and instead went for a very Motorola-esque design for the Raider. In fact, many times when taking a quick glance at the phone on a desk it really gave off the aura of the original Motorola DROID/Milestone. The mixed use of metal and plastic also reminded us a lot of the construction of the Samsung Captivate.

Many have criticized the design and other have been even harsher, calling it plain ugly. Although I didn’t hate the design, I certainly felt like it was a bit of a step back compared to other HTC offerings like the Amaze 4G. At 11.2mm and 176 grams, the Raider is thinner and lighter than its brethren, the Amaze 4G. To accommodate the behemoth 4.5-inch screen, the Raider is slightly wider than its 4G sibling but just about as tall. The weight can be a bit much for some but it adds to the premium feel that is somewhat lost with the use of plastics.

In terms of ergonomics the Raider felt very well balanced but didn’t feel as reassuring to hold as say the Incredible S. The glossy plastic sides and metal back simply do not provide enough friction between one’s hand and the phone. The tapers on the side also felt quite exaggerated and could have been toned down slightly given that it is already slightly thinner than the Amaze 4G, which was respectably thin in its own right.

In terms of overall build quality, the Raider is a bit of a miss for an HTC built phone but still feels more substantial and solidly built than many competitor phones. I do have to commend HTC for stepping out of their comfort zone in terms of design and, while some may not like its looks, it is neutral enough to please most.

Screen
If we only take into consideration HTC made Android devices, the Incredible S would be the gold standard for Super LCD screens used by the company. With the Raider, we’ve finally come across another Super LCD screen that is truly good enough to compare to the IPS screens and Super AMOLED screens of the mobile space.

When reviewing the Sensation 4G, I expected to see a screen as good if not better than the Incredible S, but sadly this wasn’t the case. The same train of thought was given to the Amaze 4G and again, it was a good effort, but fell short. The Raider has, fortunately enough, broken the cycle of disappointment.

The Raider has the best SLCD screen I’ve seen on an HTC device to date, coupled with a very crisp qHD resolution in a 4.5-inch form factor and you get a fantastic reading, gaming and multimedia experience. HTC really brought the A-game when it comes to the Raider’s display. Like almost any high end or flagship Android device you think of today, touch responsiveness, gestures and overall accuracy were as good as it gets.

Buttons and Keyboard

Pretty status quo as far as non-touchscreen user inputs to report. Power button and Volume buttons weren’t the most raised buttons, but were good enough to be noticed without looking at the phone. The dedicated camera button will certainly be missed, however, and with a camera as good as the one on the Raider, it really is unfortunate.

Battery Life

While the Raider was able to get us through a day worth of normal usage, LTE is still a huge battery hog. To stress-test the battery, I enabled the hotspot and tethered 2-3 devices simultaneous while still doing benchmarks on the phone and LTE really took its toll. Fortunately should the situation arise where one would need to tether for that long it’s assumed that there would be a USB port available to keep the phone charged, and this is highly recommended, should you down go this route.

Internal Hardware

Both Rogers and Bell had a nice lineup of existing dual core phones but the Raider is an amazing addition to both their lineups. Being one of the first LTE phones on both their respective network, it’s obvious that this phone was going to bring some killer specs:

- 1.2 GHz Dual Core Third Generation Snapdragon Processor
- 1GB of RAM
- 16GB of Internal storage
- Adreno 220 Graphic processor
- 75Mbps LTE capable chipset
- 8MP auto-focus camera (dual LED flash + 1080p HD video)

LTE 4G Capabilities

Not too long ago, LTE was simply a dream. A future of ultra high speed data that could allow a true, full faceted, multimedia internet experience on mobile devices. Today, that dream is a reality, LTE coverage in Canada is increasing by the day and becoming available to more and more Canadians.

4G has been a been a standard that has been used (and abused) over the past few months to designate any network that has significant improvements over 3G networks. Now depending who you ask, HSPA+ may or may not fall under the 4G moniker but ask those same people about LTE and they most likely will agree that it is 4G or at least the closest thing to 4G we currently have.

In our tests on the Rogers LTE 4G network in Montreal, LTE speeds were absurdly fast. Providing speeds that never dropped below 15mbps and reaching just about 30mbps we got the same speeds as earlier tests with the Rogers data stick.

Speaker and microphone

Like most HTC phones the external speaker and earpiece aren’t of pristine quality but really are just good enough. While I certainly would like to see HTC make immediate strides in the regards of sound, we should expect things to get better as HTC uses the synergy made from their majority acquisition of Beats by Dr. Dre.

Camera

One aspect where HTC traditionally hasn’t been a powerhouse has been cameras. But this changed in Canada with the arrival of the HTC Amaze 4G. It brought the first HTC phone equipped with what they claim is one of the best lenses and some of the best camera software on any smartphone. This new wave of ultra high end camera experiences on HTC phones is continued with the HTC Raider.

Still and video came out absolutely crisp, sharp and had immense amounts of detail. Although, unlike the Amaze 4G, the Raider was missing some of the camera features that the Amaze 4G had in the camera app but still produces quality shots. What I do miss the most however from the Amaze 4G is the dedicated camera and camcorder shutter buttons.

The Last Word

The Raider is certainly a solid phone that is in some ways built on the solid base of the Sensation 4G/EVO 3D and has the addition 4G LTE connectivity and a vastly improved camera. This overall package is just about as good as the Amaze 4G but with slight differences that make it a slightly inferior phone. That being said, if you’re a user that absolutely need the fastest data speeds, look no further than the HTC Raider. LTE is such a vast improvement over existing 3G technologies that is most certainly deserves the “4G” moniker and makes the Raider one of the best phones in Canada available right now

A few incremental upgrades were given to the Galaxy S and were pushed out as different variants like the Fascinate 4G, Infuse 4G (which we will review shortly) and the DROID Charge. But all of these phones were simply “intermediary” phones to a true successor; the Samsung Galaxy S II. We will see if it will live up to the burden of being the sequel to one of the top selling Android phones of all time.

Hardware
The first thing you will notice on the Samsung Galaxy S II is the incredible thinness of the device. Its predecessor, the original Galaxy S, was already a thin device to begin with but Samsung saw fit to put it on a diet (while bumping up the proverbial muscles to a dual-core CPU). Like the Xperia Arc we reviewed, the thinness doesn’t really hit you until you actually have the device in hand.

At 8.49mm thin the Samsung Galaxy S II is the thinnest phone we have reviewed at Android Bugle. Again, like with the Arc, the ridiculous thinness begs the question, where does it all go? This Houdini-esque trickery does have some downsides though. Some people will find it rather odd to hold during regular use or during calls because of the form factor. But we had no problems in everyday use and the “reversed” chin, or “butt” as some friends have called it, really helps with the ergonomics especially when used for gaming or browsing.

On the subject of ergonomics, the Galaxy S II clocks in at an incredibly slender 116g, which makes it the lightest phone we’ve ever reviewed. We would have liked to see some metal in the construction of the Galaxy S II (like the Galaxy S Captivate). It would go a long way in giving the phone a more premium feel, better ergonomics and more reassurance in the overall long term durability of the phone.

On the flipside, while the phone itself is entirely made of plastic it certainly is well put together and clearly we understand that Samsung has made the weight of the Galaxy S II a top priority and they surely succeeded. Unlike the original Galaxy S and many of its variants the Galaxy S II sheds it’s black glossy plastic back for a textured snap on cover that allows for a better grip on the phone and is surprisingly flexible.

Although we feel it’s a poor man’s substitute for a reliable rubberized coating. Nevertheless it is a good improvement on the fingerprint prone glossy back of its predecessors.

Again like the Galaxy S and many variants, the Galaxy S II lacks a notification light. We would like to see this on all Android devices but sadly given their track record, I believe Samsung will not include them on future phones. Hopefully I’m wrong.

Software

Android 2.3? Check. Latest TouchWiz 4.0? Check. Does it mean a good experience? We think so. First off, it’s good to finally see that a top of the line phone released with the latest version of Android. So we’ll hand it to Samsung for being on the ball and shipping the Galaxy S II with Android 2.3 Gingerbread.

Secondly, TouchWiz has been an interesting story. Somewhat like Sense UI from HTC, TouchWiz began on a platform other than Android but has made its greatest evolutionary steps on top of Google’s OS. Touch- Wiz 3.0 wasn’t exactly the most warmly welcomed overlay, especially amongst Android enthusiasts that might notice a resemblance to the UI of a competing Operating System.

Since a good majority of TouchWiz improvements have simply been carried over from TouchWiz 3.0 you can check out our Galaxy S Fascinate 4G review for a more in depth look at the changes that Samsung has implemented in the past year and a half including the various Hubs and interface tweaks.

We will try to focus on the additions to TouchWiz 4.0 that make it much more palatable and almost acceptable to even the most ardent Android enthusiasts. First off, Samsung seems to have introduced a theme of accelerometer and gyroscope based gestures. In the browser and in pictures, if a user holds down two fingers on the screen and tilts the phone forwards or backwards it results in zooming in and out. We aren’t sure if this is a good replacement for the ubiquitous pinch gesture but it certainly is an interesting concept.

Another interesting gesture-based addition is the tilting motion that allows for users to move widgets from homescreen to homescreen. This allows widgets, folders and shortcuts to be placed without having to slide the to the sides and waiting for it to switch homescreens. This feature we can definitely see people using regularly when wanting to spruce things up on their homescreen.

Overall these gesture based improvements, the changes to the looks (like widgets) to the UI and the enhanced features all have really made a drastic difference in the overall experience of TouchWiz 4.0 and Android 2.3 for one of the best mobile experiences available.

That being said the most ardent Android enthusiasts will always look to get stock UI, and we totally understand. But for people who are have no preferences, TouchWiz 4.0 definitely is up there with HTC’s Sense 3.0 as the most polished of the custom UIs.

Most of our reviews’ conclusions will highlight the overall desirability of the device being reviewed. Of course every single one of them has their merit and of course their downfalls. But for the Galaxy S II, I’ll keep it simple, it’s not just the best smartphone available at Bell/Virgin/Sasktel, it’s not just the best smartphone available in Canada, it is the best smartphone you can get in the world. As other major carriers in Canada get their version of the Galaxy S II, the sentiment will probably stay the same.

This phone will simply blow any potential buyers away with the total package of hardware and software. For those looking to stick with Bell and want the overall best superphone they have to offer look no further than the Samsung Galaxy S II 4G.

The Verdict: Hardware

Overall Appearance: 9.5/10
Could have been made of more premium material but out of this world thinness and overall form factor are fantastic.

Screen: 10/10
While we wish it had qHD resolution this screen is simply the best on the market by a mile. Fixed our biggest complaint with Super AMOLED by getting rid of PenTile pixel matrix.

Buttons: 9/10
Responsive back and menu buttons, nice home/volume buttons but once again odd placement of power button.

Internal Hardware: 10/10
HSPA+ speeds were excellent, fantastic performance, all from the best hardware available in a smartphone, period.

Speaker and Microphone: 8.5/10
Earpiece and microphone were good and decent at max sound. Exterior speaker is quite good.

Camera: 10/10
Top notch stills and phenomenal 1080p HD recording, top of class, competing easily with low/mid range point and shoot digital cameras and smartphone camera kings; Apple iPhone 4, Nokia N8

The Verdict: Software

UI Changes: 8.5/10
TouchWiz 4.0 brings MUCH more to the table than TW3. Still the ire of Android purists but some very nice additions that we would not be surprised to see in Stock Android. Android 2.3 out of the box.

Additional Enhancements: 8.5/10
Motion controls are odd but very functional. Nice addition of multitouch keyboard and Swype

Included Apps/Bloatware: 7/10
Bearable level of bloatware, but of course room for improvement.

Overall Score: 9/10

Surprisingly, Rio Hotel didn’t tweet ‘Come on over, we have no line’; instead, they tweeted: ‘Sorry about the bad experience, Dave. Hope the rest of your stay in Vegas goes well’. And indeed, Rio Hotel was the hotel he stayed at the next time he went to Las Vegas. Essentially, Rio Hotel earned a $600 sale from one tweet. The introduction finishes off with 3 things that social media can and can’t do for you: 1. It cannot make up for a bad product or organization; 2. It won’t lead your company to overnight sales success; and 3. It is not free as it is generally regarded—it takes a great amount of time and effort.

The book then continues with 18 chapters, a conclusion and an appendix. Each one of the chapters describes a different strategy that will help you ‘utilize social media to become more transparent, responsive, engaging, and profitable’.

A quick glance at selected chapters

Chapter 1 – Listen first and never stop listening. IBM’s Listening for Leads social media campaign where people called ‘seekers’ listen and look at conversations from users of social media sites helped uncover millions of dollars worth of sales leads.

Chapter 3 – Think and act like your customer. How many of you listen to and enjoy radio commercials? Think about what you feel when you receive or experience some of these advertising and marketing tools: direct mail, flyers handed to you on the street, emails in your inbox from marketing lists you don’t remember signing up for or telemarketing. Do not interrupt your consumer; put yourself in the consumer’s receiving end. Be likeable, not disruptive.

Chapter 6 – Respond quickly to all the bad comments. DND or do-not-delete rule refers to the rule that unless a comment is obscene, profane, bigoted, or contains someone’s personal and private information, never delete it from a social network. Companies that delete negative comments about their brands through social networks will disappoint the affected users, who will react by giving negative word-of-mouth to their friends about your brand. Due to the nature of social networks, this can have a devastating impact on your brand’s reputation, especially if the affected customer is a celebrity or a high-profile individual. To put it in perspective, Facebook users have 130 friends on average. One status update with a negative comment about a company will be seen by some of those 130 friends–if not all. But each one of those friends will also has on average another 130 friends. Think about the impact. Now imagine if it is a high profile individual with a few thousand friends.

Chapter 8 – Be authentic. Develop an authentic voice by showing humanity in your interactions with your customers, instead of sounding scripted. Models, processes and scripts will not help you connect with your consumer. Demonstrate a personality and truly seek to understand your customer. Chapter 18 – Don’t sell! Just make it easy and compelling for customers to buy. If you engage your prospects online, have a great product or service targeted toward the right people, and make it painless and compelling to buy whatever you’re offering, then you don’t really have to do any selling at all. The sales will come.

Also interesting

Throughout the book, the author talks about some Facebook features, in particular their ad platform. He emphasizes its power, reach and simplicity in targeting very specific audiences. That is, companies or brands looking to advertise on Facebook can target their ads to very specific people who have certain interests, job titles, relationship statuses, age ranges/demographics and even lets you target friends and connections of your current fans.

The book’s appendix is A refresher guide to social networks that matter most. It goes through the different uses of social networks. It focuses on Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, foursquare, YouTube and their main features and what it can do to help build your brand.

What’s likeable about ‘likeable social media’ by Dave Kerpen?

‘likeable social media’ is a light yet great and interesting read for those interested in marketing, social media and how to best use them to attract customers and make them genuinely love your company and brand.

There is at least one example (generally more) to illustrate each one of the 18 strategies discussed in the book. The examples come from either personal experience from the author, experience through the author’s customers and their social media campaigns and from other high profile social media initiatives by other companies and brands. The examples sometimes include Facebook screenshots of particular comments or responses made on companies’ fan pages that were either good or bad, successful or failures, depending on the topic explained and it clearly illustrates the idea the chapter is trying to get across.

I believe that the tips or strategies written in this book not only apply to marketing and businesses or brands, but also to personal life. If you are looking not only to be a likeable brand and to boost your company’s image or brand through social media, but also for a self-help book on how to be a generally ‘likeable’ individual, I recommend this book. This is a good read for anyone involved in marketing, social media campaigns and public relations–although each of us is, in some way our own marketer, social media manager and PR spokesperson.

Dual-Core handheld devices the talk of CES
At the heels of the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) of 2011, it was clear that two things dominated the show and were the talk of the tech world: Dual-Core smartphones/tablets and 4G wireless connectivity. Motorola and NVIDIA came out as the clear victors of CES, literally throwing down the gauntlet at its respective competitors. The event was abuzz with the talk of multiple Motorola devices powered by NVIDIA’s Tegra 2 dual core processors. The first real splash was the unveiling of the Motorola Atrix 4G for AT&T which will also be launched in Canada as the Motorola Atrix for Bell. The Atrix 4G is a new device that is a phone  with multiple docks that can turn it into a laptop, desktop and home media center, all powered by the same device.

Motorola used this momentum to announce the Motorola Bionic, Verizon’s LTE “4G” answer to the Atrix, and more importantly the Motorola Xoom, one of two announced “4G” Android Tablets running the highly anticipated Honeycomb 3.0 version of Android. All of these devices, including the LG Optimus 2x and the T-Mobile-bound LG G-Slate, are to be powered by Dual Core 1GHz NVIDIA hardware.

4G: what’s it all about?
No carriers in Canada have jumped aboard the 4G marketing bandwagon, as can be seen by the Canadian version of the Atrix 4G dropping the “4G”. However, US carriers have not hesitated to use 4G as a marketing tool, at the chagrin of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), who had originally laid out the specifications for 4G, only to have them ignored by US carriers. Part of the ITU’s original requirements outlined that 4G must exceed 1000Mbps or 1Gbps. US carrier branded “4G” technologies including HSPA+ (AT&T and T-Mobile),  LTE (AT&T and Verizon) and WiMAX (Sprint) all fall short of these challenging goals. The ITU eventually backed down from these demanding goals and now acknowledges all three as 4G technologies.

Nevertheless 4G or pseudo-4G will allow these new powerhouse devices, be it smartphones or tablets, to seriously challenge netbooks and tablets in the mobile computing space. 4G could eventually even be a threat to the old land-based, cable and DSL internet lines.

How does all of this affect us consumers?
For one, the announcement of Bell committing to a device before it is even publically announced is an important step forward in bringing cutting edge tech to Canada shortly after being announced and hopefully sparking more heated competition. Second, there is a slight possibility that at least one of the big 3 (Rogers/Bell/TELUS) follow their US counterparts and market their HSPA+ network as 4G. If that doesn’t happen, LTE will most probably be the prime candidate to carry the 4G moniker.

So where does this leave us consumers? The advent of Dual Core and 1GHz+ CPUs in smartphones and tablets, coupled with 4G-like wireless broadband internet connections will offer consumers a mobile experience unlike any before it. Unbounded 1080p HD recording and playback capabilities, unparalleled multitasking capabilities, true desktop-like browsing experience and handheld, console level gaming are just a few possibilities. The day when our mobile phones, laptops, desktops, gaming consoles and home entertainment centers become the same device will soon be upon us, and these new powerhouse devices, like the Atrix 4G, are glimpses of that future

The untrained eye may be tempted to quickly jump to the conclusion that the skills of the said developers must be lacking, but one who’s read the book Start Small, Stay Small: A Developer’s Guide to Launching a Startup by Rob Walling will hold a totally different opinion about the matter.

Most software start-ups fail (in the financial realm), not because of poor or inefficient code, or even because of the absence of key features in their product, but rather mainly because a market does not exist for their software. It is one thing to have the most beautiful, well-written program, but if it does not solve anyone’s problem to the point where they’d be willing to pay for it (and to pay handsomely enough to justify the efforts invested), then this program is a failure by most standards (and especially from a business standpoint). Now before you jump to my neck, such programs can still have some value (educational value maybe, think assignments), but we’re discussing the real world here.

As an entrepreneur wishing to market your applications, it is important that you perform a study of the market before embarking on any software venture. There are tons of strategies and techniques to
ascertain that there exists a true unmet need for your idea. So although it may be tempting to quickly delve into the code (the most enjoyable part, no doubt), it is wiser to first carefully study the market and make sure that the need justifies the effort/money you will be investing in the work.

Moreover, once you’ve verified that the need is present, your next move should be to plan a marketing strategy. Yes, even before you have one line of code written, your focus should be about the market and how you’ll manage to reach it. Think back to Bill Gates and how he struck a deal with IBM despite not yet owning the OS that he promised to deliver. I’m not really advocating this type of behaviour, but it just goes to show you how critical it is that you’ve not only found your user-base, but that you’ve planned out and maybe even established the communication channels with it. Here again, a number of strategies exist to create contact with your prospective customers, and you will find some of them in Walling’s book.

Now comes the beauty part. But not the beauty of the code; this should be the least of your concerns at this point. The beauty I refer to here is that of your product. Once you know that someone is ready to buy your software, and that you’ve established contact with them, now you must think about making your product appealing to their eyes.

Most hackers will probably vehemently disagree with me on this. And to be honest, I quite sympathize with them. If you are writing your software for hackers, then maybe aesthetics shouldn’t be something you care about. In fact, the entire article may not apply to them. I’m speaking of ordinary users who, if we go by the success of Apple’s eye-candy products, seem to accord a great deal of importance to the feel/look of anything they buy. So it’s likely that your GUI will need a good amount of work, and the time to plan it out is now.

Finally, once you have your market guaranteed, your marketing strategy planned out, and the look of your product envisioned, it is time to delve into the code. The final step is to implement all the necessary features to make your software a success in addressing the needs you’ve identified in your users. This is also the part where, as an engineer, you get to have the most fun, so enjoy!

By way of summary, here are the ordered steps to follow if you want to successfully sell your software: market, marketing, aesthetics and finally functionality. Don’t commit the oft-repeated mistake of reversing the order of operations, i.e. developing your product, then attempting to find a market for it. And by far, the most important of the four steps is the first one: to identify the right market. In fact, as history has often shown us, you may get away with a mediocre product and make tons of money if you find the right niche whose burning needs have been hitherto unmet. If there’s no competition, and the need abounds, then your success is almost guaranteed, albeit for a very little while