Tech Talk Column

When I was growing up I used to enjoy spending time with my Dad attending race meetings at the Dubbo Greyhound Racing Club. While at the meetings, I would grab a race book and try and pick a few winners and Dad would give me a dollar to put a bet on …

The first Global Positioning System (GPS) satellite was launched in 1978 by the US Military with the intention for it to be for military use only but in 1983, then President Ronald Reagan, announced that GPS would be made available for civilian use. …

Happy New Year! I am a firm opponent of resolutions for the New Year but if I was going to make a resolution, maybe it would involve learning another language – or maybe not… If you remember back to the 1978 bestselling comedy science fi…

The second last day of the year seems like a good day to review the tech that we saw this year – but with the ten highest patent lodging companies combining for 36,108 patents amongst them, picking just a few items is tough (so go easy on my if…

Christmas is almost upon us and I know you are still running around looking for those last-minute gifts. Where better to look than the world of technology. I have compiled a few items that will have your inner geek drooling. To start with the future,…

In building my home over seventeen years ago, I had it wired specifically to a home automation standard that Clipsal had designed. It was in the very early days of home automation so the programming of the devices was quite clumsy and the interface l…

Just sit back for a minute and think of the process involved to deliver you the computer sitting on your desk or the phone sitting in your hand (I am assuming you are reading this column in an electronic form of course). As electronics companies grow…

In 1858 the first inter-colony telegraph links were built when Adelaide, Melbourne and Sydney were linked together with Brisbane being connected three years later. To emphasise the simplicity of the early networks, the Overland Telegraph Line was mad…

The term ‘Big Brother’ has entered our lexicon and is widely used throughout society today. As I am sure you are aware, the term comes from the title of George Orwell’s 1949 fictional novel by the same name where the residents of th…

In 2004 Nokia introduced the 7610 and the world of camera manufacturers started to change forever. It was the first megapixel camera and introduced the world to the concept of reasonable quality cameras in phones. It was only a short period of time b…

I constantly read a variety of Web sites and subscribe to various organisations to try and stay in touch with where the technological world is heading and I see new products every day. Some of them I shake my head at wonder how they received financia…

Over the last two months we have seen a plethora of new mobile phones hit the market from the biggest names in the business. The Sony Xperia X Performance; the ill-fated Samsung Note 7; the iPhone 7 and 7 Plus; the Google Pixel and Pixel XL and the S…

We are in the midst of an ongoing technology battle. You might think I am talking about Google V Samsung V Sony V Apple but this is a slightly different battle. The current battle we are witnessing in the Australian consumer market is between Apple a…

My issue today is about equity of access to technology. We live in a vast nation. Roughly 7.692 million square kilometres. Our population is not evenly spread across this vast nation with 66 per cent of Aussies living in our capital cities. The chall…

With a plethora of new smartphones having been released into the Australian market recently – including the iPhone 7; the Google Pixel; the Sony XZ and the ill-fated Note 7 – I thought it would be interesting to look at some of the featur…

Cloud computing is a term that is thrown around like a footy after the siren has sounded. To gain a better understanding of cloud computing, we should think of the electricity industry, in particular go back to the early days of electricity. Once it …

Modern technology should be like a motor car. You get in the car, push the start button, and drive away. You don’t typically think about the processes involved with the storage of electricity and the coils of copper turning inside the stator &n…

For those of us old enough to remember, cast your minds back to the eighties when we made our first visits to a video rental store to hire a VHS movie or even had the video store visit us in a mini-van. Being able to choose a movie rather than watch …

Whilst the region is excited about the advent of super-fast broadband, it is interesting to note what is happening behind the scenes to ensure the experience is what we expect it to be. Whilst the sound of downloading at speeds of 100Mbps is very exc…