Talking with him about any kind of art?painting, music, literature, film?was a joy. His critical sensibility was marvelously astute (as can be seen in a book of his collected essays on children?s literature, Caldecott & Co.) and the pleasure he took in beauty was boundless. He adored Melville, Mozart, and Mickey Mouse (and would have noted the alliteration with pleasure?he wrote in different places about the mysterious significance he attached to the letter M, his own first initial and that of many of his characters, beginning with Max of Where the Wild Things Are). During one visit, he showed us a portable writing desk that had belonged to Melville, which still contained some of the author?s pen nibs and dried-out inkpots. Maurice was as excited and awed to be handing us the writing implements of his favorite author as we were to be hanging out with him. He collected all kinds of wonderful things?first editions of American literature, William Blake prints, James Marshall sketches, early Mickey Mouse memorabilia?and he loved to bring them out and show them to guests, not to brag about his possessions, but because touching and sharing and talking about beautiful objects made him happy.
Thursday, May 10, 2012
Wednesday, May 9, 2012
Hands-on with Kyocera Rise, an Android 4.0 smartphone with a QWERTY keyboard (video)
Kyocera is looking to regain a foothold in the US smartphone market, and curiously enough, it's doing so by catering to niche audiences. First we saw the Hydro, a waterproof handset, and alongside it is the Rise, which features a sliding QWERTY keyboard. Both phones are built for CDMA networks, although Kyocera has yet to announce carrier availability for either.
Spec-wise, the Rise is very similar to the Hydro, and this extends to the OS. In our brief time with the phone, we were treated to a largely vanilla interpretation of Ice Cream Sandwich, which makes the Rise a bit of a rare breed in the QWERTY world -- hopefully its future carrier doesn't dictate huge alterations. The phone features a Qualcomm MSM8655 SoC with a 1GHz CPU, a 3.5-inch, 480 x 320 IPS LCD display, a 3.2 megapixel camera with LED flash and a 1,500 mAh battery. When compared to other QWERTY sliders, the handset itself is rather compact and fit nicely in our hand. We were similarly quite fond of the sliding mechanism on the Rise, which felt natural and provided just enough resistance. The four-row keyboard is altogether forgettable, but it should serve those who insist upon physical keys just fine. Our biggest gripe about the Rise, however, is its low-res display, which seems like quite a misstep -- even for a budget device.
In terms of storage, you'll find 512MB of RAM, 2GB built-in and a 2GB microSD card. The Rise also features 802.11n (WiFi), Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR and EV-DO Rev. A. It's safe to say that Kyocera is targeting budget audiences with the Rise, but the strategy may work to its advantage if other carriers fail to keep their QWERTY sliders up-to-date with the latest version of Android. You'll find our hands-on video after the break.
Terrence O'Brien contributed to this report
Hands-on with Kyocera Rise, an Android 4.0 smartphone with a QWERTY keyboard (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 08 May 2012 07:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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