It's not good to stumble on addicting Flash games early in the morning as a an entire day of work could be blown playing. Fantastic Contraption falls into that category.

This game reminds me of a high school physics project we had to build that moved an egg a certain distance into a container without breaking it. In Fantastic Contraption, you build a device to move a wheel into the goal. Sounds easy, but the levels get harder and the time spent longer. Clear your calendar of appointments and have fun.

[Via Kottke.org]

Looks like I might own one of those iPhones with the pesky 3G reliability issues. I bought the phone two weeks ago, but had spent the majority of the time since in Maine, where AT&T's 3G coverage is limited. Yesterday, I was back in a 3G area with what looked like a full signal, but every time I tried to call my wife, the call dropped after a ring or two. Took four tries before I decided to switch off the 3G, then the call went through without a hitch.

Hopefully the 2.02 firmware update that is now out fixes this pesky issue, though Apple isn't saying yet what exactly the new update remedies. If a hardware update is required to fix the issue, that will be a major headache for all owners of a 3G iPhone.

Update 8/26/08: Installed the 2.0.2 update over the weekend and my 3G reception seems to be better, plus the drop call problem has gone away.

With a number of new CDN vendors popping up each month, it could be tough for vendors to retain customers. One idea that sprouted up during a recent roundtable discussion hosted by Mirror Image: The idea of customer rewards. "At the very least, we should be getting something like frequent streaming miles," said a tongue-in-cheek Brad Wendkos, president of TrueFire.com.

Wendkos was really discussing the cost of streaming video and how vendors need to continue to drive the price per megabyte and/or stream down for business to continue to grow for the CDN customer. But the frequent-streaming-miles comment delivered the most laughs. You can hear the entire 49-minute roundtable here (mp3 link).

While many rejoice the fact that new iPhone 3G will be cheaper out of the blocks at $199 for the 8GB device, most note that over the two years of the required contract, the phone will actually cost $240 more than its predecessor. A reasonable complaint. But be glad you don't live in Canada, where Rogers - the official Canadian carrier for iPhone - customers will pay some $2,600 over the life of the phone, most expensive in the world.

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Ran into my first Firefox 3 stumbling block other than a few non-essential add-ons not working: Akamai's EdgeControl site doesn't seem to like Firefox 3. When I go to login to the site, I get the following:

You may be using an unsupported browser.

Please note that some EdgeControl features will only work in the following browsers:

* Internet Explorer 6 or 7
* Firefox 2
* Safari 2 or 3

Come on, Akamai - the largest CDN on the planet - didn't have enough warning that the new browser was coming that they couldn't get the site tested? Fortunately, the piece I use is compatible with Firefox 3.0, but your mileage may vary.

Cable giant Comcast usually gets a bad rep for customer service (even I complained about it), but I have to say I am impressed with their latest efforts through an unlikely source: Twitter.

Last night, while watching the incredible Celtics-Lakers game, I was trying to get some videos and podcasts uploaded to our site, but my Comcast internet connection was running terribly slow. A traceroute showed that the hop after my router was taking a whopping 1374ms to respond. Not good to say the least. So, I complained about it on my Twitter feed.

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Okay, it's a bit of stretch that I have much in common with Tom Green, the actor, comedian, author and talk show host. But, in an interview with him yesterday, he described himself as a "A/V geek", which is what I am sometimes referred to in the halls at Network World (well, maybe it's A/V guy, but why split hairs.)

Listen:

Why did Network World interview Tom Green? Because he's on the the cutting edge of live streaming over the Internet with his "Tom Green's House Tonight" talk show, which is broadcast live on TomGreen.com through BitGravity. Green built a multi-camera set in the living room of his Los Angeles-area home and brings in guests (Andy Dyck, Shannon Elizabeth, to name a couple) to chat for an hour or more. He even takes guest calls over the phone and Skype, with some calling in using Skype video. All this is done with a meager crew: Usually one guy, though for the bigger productions seven or eight people can be brought in.

The entire experience with what Green calls "Web-O-Vision" is reminiscent of his days broadcasting on public access in Canada, before he was picked up by MTV. Through the Web, Green is free to experiment and be wacky, without having to report to a network executive. Plus, by doing this himself, he's got more flexibility to work on movies and other projects that suit is fancy.

For some non-obvious reason, my colleage couldn't encode MPEG-2 files to Flash 8 video using Brightcove's Publishpod application, which has a built-in Flash encoder. All he got was the audio track, no video. We both have the same laptop and OS, yet Publishpod on mine works flawlessly.

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If you're a relative Twitter newbie like myself, our helpful new slideshow will give you a slew of options for posting to Twitter and reading others' Tweets. I am partial to Twhirl, but there are a ton of applications out there for the Twitterholic (the condition, not the site.)

Check it out and if there's a tool we missed, let me know either by e-mail or Twitter.

Samsung couldn't come up with a more appealing name for its slick looking touch phone than the F480? Does that come in a double-axle with a diesel engine? The Instinct, Samsung's other iPhone-like offering, has a cool name. Couldn't marketing spend a few bucks for something more thought provoking than "F480"?

For those of you in North America that are drooling over this phone, you'll have to head oversees to get it anytime soon.

Over on NewTeeVee, Chris Albrecht provides three main reasons he can't cut the Cable TV cord: Laziness, HD and Discovery (the art of finding something interesting while channel surfing). I'd put HD as the Number One reason and add "Live Sports" to the list. While there are plenty of downloadable/streamable entertainment options available via the Web, nothing beats watching a sporting event live in HD, except maybe sitting courtside at said event.

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How did we produce 41 videos in three days at Interop in Las Vegas? NewTek's TriCaster Studio played a huge role. Our video guy (Skip Bensley of Brilliant Video Productions) rented one for the shoot and learned the interface in about three days. Personally, I didn't run the unit so I can't comment on how well it works versus other systems. But, Studio Monthly did the job for me, covering all the technical aspects of the Tricaster in a review published in this month's print edition.

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If you've ever wanted one of those bottom of the screen tickers featured on every cable and local news broadcast for your own desktop, you now can with Snackr. This Adobe AIR-based RSS reader scrolls your feeds across the bottom of your desk in endless torrent of information. This isn't snacking on information - it's full out feasting.

The ticker can be customized with any number of feeds and can be placed on any side of the desktop (top, bottom, left and right). While there is an option for keeping Snackr hovering over all open Windows, the feature doesn't seem to work on my XP machine. Which is probably a good thing as changing my windows diverts my attention to more productive things (Twhirl not included).

I'm not sure I can keep this running much longer as my head may explode with data. Google Reader kept open in a Firefox tab seems enough to fill my RSS-reading needs. But for those with the ability to multitask - Snackr and its cool interface are worth a peek.

It's not often that I get to do podcasts on topics I actually have vested interest in (i.e. multimedia applications). But this week, I talked with Christopher Smith, president of the Aquent Graphics Institute, about the differences between the entrenched Flash and the upstart (as much as you can call Microsoft upstart) Silverlight. AGI teaches a number of classes on the various Adobe products so you'd think Smith would be a little bias in that direction. You'd be wrong:

When it comes to multimedia here at Network World, particularly video, we're heavily invested in Brightcove, so we'll be on Flash for the foreseeable future.

Got a "revised" final bill from FairPoint Communications (they bought the local phone lines from Verizon in New Hampshire, Maine and Vermont) for a whopping $1.68. Now, technically, I canceled my service before the cutover from Verizon, but got what I thought was a final bill last month for $4.95. Paid that. Now I got another "final" bill for $1.68. Was it really worth it for FairPoint to send it out? They could have written it off and saved the money on paper, postage and handling.

I should pay it in change, but I'll be good and write them a check.

As a customer of Comcast (got the full Triple Play from them after moving into a new house), news of their proposed bandwidth caps has me wondering: Should I be worried?

For those who haven't heard or read about it yet, Comcast is proposing bandwidth caps of 250 gigabytes per month for all users and charging a fee for every 10GB over the cap. It's unclear if VoIP traffic generated by Comcast's phone service counts against the cap. It shouldn't, but you never know.

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Okay, after months of dissing Twitter, I finally joined and now I'm becoming an addict. So much so that I find myself hitting refresh on my Twitter home page every five minutes. Well, I've found a better way to feed the addiction: Twhirl.

Twhirl is a mini-application that runs on top of Adobe Air and lets you monitor multiple Twitter and FriendFeed accounts. Right now, I am just doing my one Twitter account - any more and I'd have social networking overload. But Twhirl is a much better option for monitoring Twitter than using the site.

Not that our publication is annoying when it breaks up articles into a bazillion pages, but if you hate the prospect of clicking "Next" a hundred times to read a story, you might want to give the Firefox extension Repagination a try.

Install the free add-on and whenever you come across a Next Page button or link, just right click and use the Repagination context menu to magically display all the pages at once. It's pretty nifty, though not perfect.

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Gah! Omniture/Hitbox/what-ever-it's-called-now requires a stronger password than my bank. I can never remember my Hitbox password and resetting it is tougher than calculating Pi to the 100th decimal place. Why such strong security on a statistics site?

(And why doesn't my bank require such strong passwords??)

We here at Network World have been way ahead of the curve covering the soon-to-open exhibit of Charles Babbage's Difference Engine No. 2 at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, Calif. Now we've got the video of the device in action:

Who needs a solar calculator?

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I've finally caved and joined Twitter (user: jmeserve - I know, very unique). I've only got a few "followers" right now. I've tried the search interface in Twitter, but find it very frustrating. Unless you enter the username perfectly, Twitter search won't find your friends.

As I said in a recent Twisted Pair podcast, now that I've joined, Twitter will become uncool.

Seinfeld fans now have yet another outlet for watching their favorite show: TBS is streaming episodes of the show on its site for free (it's ad supported). The only downside is that you don't get the whole catalog of shows at your finger tip - like the "Reverse Peephole" or "The Bet" - only four a time that rotate through the site on a regular basis. Also, Mac users are out of luck - the site is Windows-only.

Yet another way to test out the reliability and strength of your corporate network connection.

While we were out filming a Cool Tools segment near the office, we came up behind this Corvette at a stop light:

The questions is: Is it the car or the blogger profession (or both) that impresses the ladies?

What is the obsession with creating digital paper that's "paper like"? Don't we already have a pretty good handle on the paper manufacturing process?

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This news must have been on the collective subconscious mind of a colleague and I as we discussed what a downer it is that today is Monday. But, we came up with a potential cure: The 7-day work week.

Think about it. By working every day, you never have to dread going back to work after a weekend, thereby eliminating for good the "case of the Mondays".

Of course, the pre-mature death rate would skyrocket, but isn't that a small price to pay for not dreading Mondays?

I received what to me was an obvious phishing attempt to gain bank card information as you can see from the image below.

Normally, I just delete these but I thought it was odd that the message carried a phone number instead of trying to redirect the victim to a hacked Web site. Most anti-fraud campaigns tell people to call in rather than follow links. So, I decided to give the number a try from my office since our number doesn't show up on most Caller ID systems. This is what I heard:

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