Wireless Wednesday for 3/11/15: Rick Playing Tennis, Apple Watch and California
Wednesday, March 11, 2015 at 1:33AM Rick is in Indian Wells this week as the BNP Paribas Open starts it's tennis run. This is the biggest tennis tournament in the world outside of the majors. It is also the most tech-friendly tournament on the ATP Tour. - They have their own app, tons of video screens around the grounds. They even stream the action from 2 of the practice courts.
Have a listen and see how Rick did on the court at "Tennis With the Stars"
Rick has been at all the pre tournament events.
1. The Wilson event with world No. 3, Simona Halep. New Wilson racquets in the Burn and the Blade. New Wilson tennis shoes and partnering with Sony on smart technology for the racquet. Rick did the tennis obstacle course Wilson has called the #BURNChallenge.
2. Rick was one of the media participants in the "Tennis With the Stars" event at the Omni Rancho Las Palmas Resort and Spa. He played with ATP World Tour top-10 players Kei Nishikori and David Ferrer . How was it?
3. Since Rick is in California we look at some tech developed in the State of California.
- First the Apple Watch. Apple had an event on Monday to formally introduce the Apple Watch.. Is the Apple watch viable?
And now it’s all here and ready to debut on April 24. (Preorders start April 10.) But do you want to pay $17,000 for it?
OK, you don't have to pay that much, but that's the top price of the premium gold option, called the Apple Watch Edition. If you're looking for something on the scale of hundreds of dollars instead of thousands, the company is offering the Apple Watch Sport (starting at $349) and the flagship Apple Watch (starting at $549). All of these watches come in two sizes, 38 mm or 42 mm; have different case colors to choose from; and have swappable bands. Depending on the band you choose, the standard Apple Watch can easily reach $1,000.
Apple claims that the watches will have about 18 hours of battery life, and they'll charge using a special MagSafe cable. As Apple previewed in September, users will navigate through the menus of the watch using a special knob that both physically turns and is touch-sensitive.
You can reply to a text message, browse Instagram, and remotely opened a garage door. The watch lets you know when you've been doing too much sitting, can track heart rate, and is also Apple Pay–enabled, so you can buy many different things.
More on the history of technology in California...
a) There are more than 30,000 manufacturing companies in California
b) 387,000 high-tech jobs in Silicon Valley alone and more coming....
How did Silicon Valley get it's name?
The series, entitled "Silicon Valley in the USA", began in the "Electronic News" back in January 11, 1971 issue. The term gained widespread use in the early 1980s, at the time of the introduction of the IBM PC and numerous related hardware and software products to the consumer market. The Silicon part of the name refers to the high concentration of companies involved in the making of semiconductors (silicon is used to create most semiconductors commercially) and computer industries that were concentrated in the area
c) More tech "startups" in California than any other state.
A "startup" is a new company, many times started with no sources of income.
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