The other day I cam across an article on an Israeli news website – a very well known one – that had an article the the word “iPad” in the title. When I clicked on the story, though, I discovered that the iPad really had nothing at all to do with the story. So what was “iPad” doing in the title?

The answer is obvious: Some SEO guy probably told the people at the site that using iPad in a headline will get them more hits from readers. While no longer at the very top of Google’s keyword ratings, there are still enough searches to drive readers to a story or post. It’s like “internet gold” – say the word “iPad” and all the diggers come running!

I know they are doing this because the same thing happened to me – inadvertently. I wrote about prospects of the iPad in Israel months ago, long before the infamous ban that the government imposed on it because of a phony “wifi issue.” The brouhaha, from about a month ago, was well publicized (if for some reason you didn’t hear about it, check out the story here). So I already had a couple of stories on the iPad’s presence, or lack of it, in Israel.

In fact, before the scandal broke in mid-April, my blog post, iPad in Israel? Don’t Hold Your Breath! was the first one you would get when you searched for “iPad” + “Israel” in Google. So when people started searching for information about the ban, thousands ended up on my blog, just because it was on top of the search results! Realizing what was going on, I put together a post on the ban itself – and my theory on why it was being banned – and sent it out to the world, putting a quick link on the original page. And then that post started getting thousands of hits!

It took the “big” sites that wrote about it, like the HuffPost and Pcmag, a couple of days to catch up (my original post is still on the first Google page, although it’s now on the bottom). Lesson learned: If you want hits on a site, make sure you stick in a buzzy, trending keyword.

OK – we knew that. But what if you don’t have anything to say about the subject at hand? No prob – you can easily, automatically generate a first class story that you can tweet, facebook, Digg, Redditize, etc., chock full of keywords and related content. Just go to the Story Generator at the “Dear Computer Generative Art and Interactive Evolution site,” and type in the keyword of your choice. The result? “A story is generated using random pieces of search engine results. Users participate in the interactive selection by saving interesting results.” While perhaps not the most scintillating prose, you get back some serviceable text that does the job.

As an experiment, I’ve generated text based on the number one search term in Google Trend‘ “hot searches” at this very moment – “Joe Cocker,” apparently fresh off his performance on the last episode of American Idol. Let’s see if it does any good!

PS – Is this considered manipulating search engine results by Google? Hope not!

Joe Cocker as generated automatically with Dearcomputer.nl

What a beautiful song from the movie, and she was all I needed as well but I lost her.

Top Ten. Subsequent efforts were less popular, and problems with alcohol (both on- and off-stage) reduced Cocker’s once-powerful voice to a croaking rasp.

The European release Hymn for My Soul, which features cover versions of songs by Stevie Wonder, George Harrison, Bob Dylan, and John Fogerty, was issued on Parlophone in 2007. In the early 80s he made a brief comeback with a hit duet with Jennifer Warnes on “Up Where We Belong”.After a brief spell performing as Vance Arnold, and in the Joe Cocker Big Blues band, Cocker came to prominence with The Grease Band, formed with Chris Stainton.
In the early 80s he made a brief comeback with a hit duet with Jennifer Warnes on “Up Where We Belong”.After a brief spell performing as Vance Arnold, and in the Joe Cocker Big Blues band, Cocker came to prominence with The Grease Band, formed with Chris Stainton.
Joe screams his head off like a white Ray Charles on acid.
What is the first song you play? Trainwreck No. In 1959 he joined his first group, the Cavaliers, playing drums and harmonica.

They played Motown covers in northern England pubs until 1967, when producer Denny Cordell became Cocker’s manager and persuaded him and the band to move to London. The title track, one of many cover versions Cocker would record over his career, went to Number One in EnÂ?gland and Number 68 in the U.S. tour, Cocker met Leon Russell, who wrote “Delta Lady” and coproduced Joe Cocker!, the Grease Band’s swan song. He recorded regularly throughout the ’70s, but without much success.
His 1994 album, Have a Little Faith, hit the U.K. He hit number one in the U.K.

“Peace in our time,” or an underhanded Arab attempt to embarrass Israel? A spokesperson for Microsoft’s offices in Saudi Arabia announced Tuesday that the company would be releasing its Project Natal 3D controller in October – in time for the winter gifting season. According to this,

Speaking in an interview, Microsoft Saudi’s Marketing Manager, Syed Bilal Tariq, has confirmed that Project Natal will be releasing worldwide sometime in October… Tariq goes on to say that more information will be coming at E3 (Electronic Entertainment Expo, June 15-17).

Note, btw, that the interview is being broadcast on KSA2, Saudi Arabia’s English language TV service, which I actually receive here in Israel, thanks to my non-YES satellite dish. Unfortunately, I missed the Saudi morning news today, so I’m glad someone recorded it

So what’s so weird? Just this: The Natal 3D controller, which is the key of the system, is 100% made in Israel, by a company called PrimeSense (look for my upcoming great interview with PrimeSense boss Inon Beracha, coming to an internet near you this week!).

PrimeSense has developed a wandless 3D technology that tracks tens of thousands of points in space at one time (as compared to the two points Nintendo Wii trackers can follow), and extrapolates the information to capture every move of anyone or anything that ventures into the sensor’s field of vision. “It’s like wearing a suit with tens of thousands of Wii points,” Beracha told me. Besides being far more effective, the PrimeSense box is extremely inexpensive to produce, meaning that prices on xBoxes could actually come down (or at least not go up!). Note that the video below is from an MS press conference in Tel Aviv last month demonstrating the PrimeSense technology.

One thought that occurred to me was that Tariq was hoping to embarrass PrimeSense by giving an unrealistic date for the system to be on the market, one that would be too early – thus making the Israeli company look bad, either by failing to supply the sensors on time, or by rushing them out to market and mucking up Natal. Fortunately, PrimeSense completed development on the sensor awhile ago, and they are all ready for market, Beracha told me.

So what’s the head of MS Saudi Arabia doing touting a great piece of Israeli technology? Does he have more loyalty to the corporation than to the “ummah?” And considering what an “Israeli outfit” Microsoft is (it’s home to the third largest MS dev team in the world), should a good Israel-hating Saudi even be working for the company?? And how is it that MS isn’t on the Arab boycott list??? Mr. Tariq, if you’re out there – the (Israeli) people want to know!

I’m always amazed at how Israelis can do so well raising money or selling stuff abroad with such poor English. Especially people, like angels who are trusting high-tech people with their money; angels are very picky when it comes to deciding with whom to invest money, and they make judgements based on all sorts of criteria that are more impression than fact (I got this from more than one angel).

So imagine my shock when an angel investor who has put money in a number of companies – ie he is a person of some means – makes a presentation in front of about 100 people, and in his slide show puts up a cute picture of a bear, with this caption:

“a vision without an action is mearly a dream”

Just looking at that sentence I can find five things wrong with it (“mearly” is the least of it!). This is a person who interfaces with lots of American and European investors, and you have to figure that if he could make such a mistake in a presentation he had to prepare for (he was invited, planned out his presentation, used PowerPoint to make the show, etc.), he’s probably making mistakes in spelling and grammar left and right!

Okay, maybe the guy was in a hurry. But what about the many websites I see by Israeli companies with atrocious English? Like this, from a website for a company that is a fairly large player in Israeli commercial VoIP (ie supplies equipment and services to many integrators):

Telephony and telephony related systems based on Voice over IP (Voip) technology had reached the stage in which it could be used in any business in order to reach maximum efficiency. . Voip based soft-switches as well as small office PBX’s are becoming to be the natural choice for businesses all over the world, supplying its owners with a vast variety of telephony functions without the burdening expenses and costs of the old ‘traditional’ analog phone systems.

Besides being boring, that text has several grammatical errors. It’s on their website, as part of their “window to the world.” And there are plenty of sites with much worse texts which are obviously translations of their Hebrew sites (some of them look like they ran the Hebrew through Google Translate and forgot to clean it up). If they’re not careful with the way they present themselves to the world, are they going to be careful with you, the customer?

As of Saturday night, Israelis are able to bring iPads into the country. The Communications Ministry has apparently decided that the wifi system in the iPad is not a danger to the security channels, as apparently had been thought originally.

So what happened? How does a “security problem” magically turn into a non-issue? Perhaps it was the heavy and embarrassing media coverage; or maybe they realized that indeed, as I reported, several Apple products that are already sold here already contain the problematic Broadcom chip that was at the root of the problem.

Whatever – the bottom line is that what could have turned into a boon for Apple’s Israel importer, iDigital, will now be working to its disadvantage, because it’s likely to be months before Apple is ready to supply international markets with iPads. Now anyone who wants an iPad can either peg a friend to bring one in for them. Or, they can order one from Mustop, which can get the basic wifi model one for $660, with all taxes and shipping paid. Too bad for Chemi Peres, son of Shimon Peres and the head of iDigital!

Oy vey. Once again Israeli buyers of a hip gadget are about to get ripped off – with the “authorities” doing everything they can to make sure they get “theirs” (as in their money) out of the pockets of the schnook customer.

I know it sounds cynical, but it’s the only logical explanation I can come up with for why the Communications Ministry is banning iPads from Israel. In this age of instant communications, fast and efficient shipping, and open markets (ie nearly zero customs duties), getting a device like an iPad should be a piece of cake. For example, at this site, with shipping costs and taxes, you would be able to have a $499 iPad delivered directly from Apple in the U.S. to any Israeli address for $660 – a pretty reasonable price.

But like with so many other items (coincidentally, mostly from Apple), the markup is going to be much higher, because “they” are going to do their best to prevent customers from getting reasonably priced iPads – basically forcing Israelis who want one to get it from the local Apple license-holder (the iDigital retail store, which is NOT an Apple store!) for a premium price, just like they did with the iPhone. The difference is that the iPhone was a lot easier to hide, so the customs people have a much better chance of nabbing iPads when people try to smuggle them in!

So why can’t you bring an iPad into the country? According to this article in Ha’aretz (the same story appeared in numerous Hebrew publications),

the decision follows the refusal of the ministry’s engineering staff to compromise on testing the device’s suitability and compliance with Israeli wireless networks… For now, the ministry has not given the device categorical approval required for wireless devices; and ministry officials say its wireless technology is not compatible with Israeli standards.

“The iPad device sold exclusively today in the United States operates at broadcast power levels [over its Wifi modem] compatible with American standards,” explained the officials. “As the Israeli regulations in the area of Wifi are similar to European standards, which are different from American standards, which permit broadcasting at lower power, therefore the broadcast levels of the device prevent approving its use in Israel,” said the officials.

Huh? Doesn’t the whole world – U.S. and Europe included – use IEEE 802.11 Wifi standards? Aren’t there all sorts of Wifi-based devices produced all over the world that can be used internationally? What do they mean by “broadcast levels?”

Here’s the picture I have been able to put together – and it ain’t a pretty one. Without getting too technical: The Wifi chipset used by the iPad is BroadComm’s BCM4329 Low-Power 802.11n with Bluetooth® 2.1 + EDR and FM (Tx and Rx). 80211N is a relatively new addition to 802.11 standards, and it’s relatively rare in Wifi devices, so far. The fact that it is “low power” is also apparently behind complaints by many users that the iPad drops out of networks more readily than other devices, like Macbooks. This chipset includes Wifi and FM radio reception and transmission capabilities (in order to allow you to, for example, use your car FM radio to listen to music from your device while driving).

So, it’s possible that this is what the engineers meant when they said there were “different standards,” although 802.11n is in use in Europe as well. It would seem to me that they main bugaboo here is the chipset’s ability to broadcast, usually frowned upon in Israel.

But here’s what gives the game away: The BroadComm BCM4329 chipset is the SAME ONE in use in the latest editions of the iPhone and the iPad Touch – both of which are sold right here in Israel, by iDigital! Get it? If the problem is the Wifi chipset, then what difference does it make if it’s installed in an iPhone, iPod, or iPad? None! It only makes a difference to someone (or some entity) that has an interest in carving out for itself as much of a monopoly as they can get away with!

Now, I’m no engineer, but I do know how to Google – and it took me about 45 minutes to come up with this data (the things I go through for you people!). But certainly one would expect engineers from the Communications Ministry to have put two and two together and realized that they had already approved use of this Wifi chipset in Israel! If I could figure it out, they could too.

The thing is, there is no one to lobby for approving the iPad, no one to point this out to – and now that the engineers have made their decision, any change is going to have to go through “channels.” And where will those channels channel through? Why, right through iDigital, the Israeli “experts” on all things Apple. And what do you think iDigital is going to say when asked if they recommend unfettered importation of an item they are planning to sell eventually, for more money of course? I may be a cynic, but I know how the game is played!

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• iPad has same Broadcom BCM4329 FM Tx/Rx radio capabilities as iPhone, iPod touch (9to5mac.com)
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As I predicted, and as my prediction has borne out, the iPad won’t be coming to Israel for a long time – officially, that is (they say maybe at the end of the year…). But thanks to some enterprising Israelis, you can get an iPad right now – a used iPad, to boot, even though the thing has been on the market for three days!

This miracle comes to you courtesy of Israel’s premier second-hand site, Yad-2, where you can buy used electronic equipment, TVs, cars, even apartments – and now, iPads! There are currently about two dozen iPads up for sale on the Yad-2 site, apparently purchased by enterprising Israelis (or their agents) when the thing went up for sale (I imagine that the iPads are currently sold out in retail stores, and shipping from Apple takes about two weeks at this point). The prices for these “used” iPads range between NIS 2800 for the cheapest 16GB version – $756, not too bad of a markup from the $499 it costs at Apple stores – to NIS 4,700 ($1,270) for the $699 64GB version. Expensive, but still cheaper than paying for a ticket to the States, taking a cab or train to the Apple store, standing on line, having lunch at some mall eatery, doing some “extra” shopping, and coming back home.

About the iPad itself I have nothing to say, since it has all been said by every talking head out there already. Suffice to say I’m very happy with my Macbooks and my smart phone, so I’m probably not going to be an iPad early adopter. But you never know.

I did, however, notice some interesting phenomena associated with the iPad that I would like to share. Were I in the market to buy one, I would usually buy an item like an iPad at Amazon, which has free shipping, no tax, and easy return policies. Right now, though, you can’t buy an iPad at Amazon – they’re not being offered there yet.

Or is “yet” the right term? Usually, Amazon usually takes pre-orders for every new gimcrack and gizmo (especially those from Apple) – but there’s not a hint of iPad availability, now or in the future, at Amazon. Is it because Apple is keeping iPads “in the family” – ie only at Apple retail stores and, I guess, at AT&T stores when the 3G version comes out (a la the iPhone) – or is it because Amazon is taking seriously the iPad’s potential to compete with, and probably eventually outsell, the Kindle?

Here’s something really interesting: The domain, ipad.com, is NOT owned by Apple! It instead belongs to, according to Alexa, one Martine Bejasa of South Fork, New Jersey, and is copyrighted by the Enero 6 Corporation. There is much speculation in the blogosphere on the nature of this Enero 6 (Enero is January in Spanish), with some attributing it to an in-joke by Steve Jobs, who has historically made some major Apple announcements on January 6. However, there really is no need to speculate; the New Jersey phone number of Mr/Ms. Bejasa is listed on his/her domain information page.*

A quick Google search of the name shows that Martine is a real person and has owned the iPad.com domain name since 2001. Considering that Apple owns all the other domain names associated with their products – iPod.com, iPhone.com, and Mac.com (but oddly, not Macbook.com), Mr/Ms. Bejasa could be in for a big Apple payday!

*NOTE – I checked the info on the actual Alexa page and it seems to have been changed. But I still get the original info -with the phone number – using my Alexa plugin for Firefox. Which means I could actually call Mr/Ms. Bejasa to clarify this – but I’m not such an iPad fanatic. If anyone wants to scoop the blogosphere, here’s your chance!

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• Apple Sold 300,000 iPads on Launch Day. Most Buyers Owned Macs (shoppingblog.com)
• Why the iPad actually strengthens Amazon’s position (guardian.co.uk)
• 10 Obvious Things Amazon’s Next Kindle Will Do To Compete With The iPad (AMZN, AAPL) (businessinsider.com)

Happy Passover from the Robots of the R&D Institute for Intelligent Robotic Systems, Computer Science Department, College of Management, Academic Studies, Rishon Lezion (thanks Marc!)

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If you’ve been looking for a hi-tech job in Israel, there’s good news: New statistics indicate that the long drought in hi-tech jobs is over. A poll released last week by Israeli placement company Jobinfo says that demand for hi-tech workers is up 40% this year – while the numbers of those seeking jobs in the field has fallen dramatically, as companies retain their current workers and hire new ones.

Jobs in hardware development rose significantly – by over 30% – in the first quarter of 2010, compared to a year before. There was also a 12% increase in jobs for internet programmers – especially for developers with skills in PHP, Java, and C.

Along with the new demand, salaries have risen, the poll says. Engineers with 2 to 5 years experience are making 8% more this year than last, while salaries for web engineers have gone up as much as 20%. Jobinfo says that “The positive statistics are a positive sign that indicates that the time is ripe for hi-tech workers who lost jobs in the past to look for new ones now, and it is also an excellent time, in our opinion, for those who already have jobs to examine the opportunities in the marketplace.”

Well, of course they would say that – they’re a placement company! But still, the numbers don’t lie – and neither do the anecdotes, as a number of people I know who have been looking for quite awhile have begun new jobs in the past month or so. Yeah! Party like it’s 1999!

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Over the past few days, Intel has been showing its new Xeon (Westmere) processor, which the company says has 40 percent better performance and 30 percent better energy efficiency. The processor features a chip that supports six cores each. Meant for use in servers, the Xeon is also the first processor to use Intel’s 32 nanometer manufacturing process, which results in processors with features as little as 32 nanometers wide. All of which means the Xeon – built on Intel’s familiar x86 architecture – can get much more done with less power, and is likely to find its way into new hardware. Already, IBM has announced a new line of servers that are faster and cooler running, all running on the Xeon.

Given Intel’s history in Israel, you always have to suspect that much of the work done on any new piece of hardware the company comes out with was largely developed in Israel. Alas, that is not the case for the Xeon (a derivative of the Nehalem processor). So I have been told by “informed sources” in Intel. Note, however, that the Next Big Thing from Intel – processors that use the Sandy Bridge (aka Gesher) architecture, with many improvements to the Nehalem series of processors. Sandy Bridge processor technology was largely developed in Israel – the project will be remembered for having its name changed from Gesher, the Hebrew word for “bridge,” after a political party (now defunct) emerged in Israel with the same name. Sandy Bridge-based processors will only be released in 2011, after the “life cycle” of the Westmere/Nehalem line peters out.

Although Israel can’t take direct credit for the speed and efficiency of the Xeon, it can take credit for an important security feature built into the processor: Included in all new Intel processors is the Intel Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) Instructions Set. Tests showed that encryption/decryption of files was 400% faster with AES, and whole disks can be encrypted with barely any impact on performance (anyone who has ever tried to encrypt even a single file with a “regular” processor will understand the benefit).

The AES instruction set, from what I can tell, was largely developed in Intel’s Haifa research facility; the white paper cited above was authored by Shay Gueron, a researcher for Intel and a Professor of Applied Mathematics at Haifa University. He, along with a colleague from Intel in the U.S., is the patent holder for “A method for speeding up the computations for characteristics 2 elliptic curve cryptographic systems,” which looks pretty cryptographical, and is clearly part of the AES.

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