14 書香人生 B O O K S & R E V I E W S SUNDAY, DECEMBER 13, 2009 • TAIPEI TIMES Hardcover: UK Technology reviews Don’t leave home without it Apple’s 27-inch iMac. PHOTO: BLOOMBERG ‘The World’s Heritage’ offers a comprehensive though by no means definitive introduction to the world’s most extraordinary destinations BY BRADLEY WINTERTON COntRIBUTING REPORTER hy doesn’t Taiwan have any World Heritage Sites? The PUBLICATION NOTES W answer is fairly clear. The list, currently comprising 878 sites in 145 countries, is compiled by UNESCO, part of the United Nations. And Taiwan, despite all its best efforts, still isn’t a member of the UN. Even so, China — whose pressure is the main, indeed the only, reason Cisco’s FlipShare TV. PHOTO COURTESY OF CRISCO Taiwan isn’t a UN member — hasn’t managed to include any Taiwan sites in its own listings, at least not yet. It has 37 sites of its own in this sumptuous official guide to all the current sites worldwide. The site nearest to Taiwan that the book contains is on the Ryukyu Islands — the “Gusuku Sites and Related Properties” — listed under THE WORLD’S HERITAGE: Japan’s 14 entries. A COMPLETE GUIDE TO THE MOST China routinely gives weather forecasts for Taipei on its domestic EXTRAORDINARY PLACES TV services, and it would come as BY UNESCO no surprise for it one day to succeed 832 PAGES in including some Taiwan sites in its UNESCO listings. The procedure for UNESCO/HARPERCOLLINS inclusion is that UN member-states submit proposals and these are then vetted by UNESCO committees. But to date no Taiwan sites appear, under any writes Koichiro Matsuura, Director- national heading. General of UNESCO, in his Forward. This is a huge pity. The criteria This book is enormously stimulating for inclusion are deliberately set very of travel plans. How magnificent Olive’s 4HD Hifi Music Server. wide, with 10 categories. Essentially, the Three Parallel Rivers of China’s though, there are two groupings Yunnan Protected Areas look, PHOTO COURTESY OF OLIVE — cultural or historic significance, and containing 15 such areas (though one outstanding natural beauty. Taiwan wonders what that means in reality) could well get several such places in eight geographical clusters. Of Dell’s Precision M6500. accepted for inclusion. the cities included here, Venice (“an PHOTO COURTESY OF DELL The Nantou mountain area centering incomparable series of architectural on Yushan (玉山) would easily qualify ensembles”) must be preeminent for (China got its own Mount Sanqingshan anyone who’s ever seen it, and for National Park in Jiangxi Province me, Morocco’s Fez (whose Medina included as recently as last year). So was included early on, in 1981) carries too would our many historic Aboriginal powerful memories. The primeval beech sites — one of UNESCO’s criteria is forests of the Carpathians (Slovakia and places that are “an outstanding example Ukraine) and the Norwegian fjords both of a traditional human settlement, land- look incredibly enticing. use, or sea-use which is representative And there’s no reason why of a culture (or cultures), or human Taiwan’s relative modernity — its FLIP OFFERS A WIRELESS WAY A SERVER FOR THE MOST SOME NEW iMAC DESKTOPS A MUSCULAR LAPTOP THAT interaction with the environment when Aboriginal settlements apart — should TO GET VIDEOS FROM PC TO TV DEMANDING OF MUSIC LOVERS ARRIVE WITH ISSUES DEFIES THE LIGHTWEIGHT TREND it has become vulnerable under the in any way exclude its many historic impact of irreversible change.” sites from consideration. Australia Roughly 3 million people use a Flip, Audiophiles know that the quality of the Apple’s reconfigured iMac desktop — a With netbooks and ever-slimmer That having been said, The World’s managed to have Sydney Opera the pocket-size camcorder from Cisco sound from CD recordings leaves much bright, shiny, wide-screen example of a notebook computers attracting the Heritage remains a wonderful House included in the List in 2007, for that has spawned a new category of to be desired. To hear the gold standard home computer — works beautifully ... most consumer attention this holiday, publication, either to read through, instance, hardly historic, and certainly video devices that are one-button of recordings, Olive has created its unless it doesn’t work at all, or arrives Dell apparently believes there’s still browse, or keep for reference. It lists not a natural phenomenon. China, of simple. Ease of use is also the capstone 4HD Hifi Music Server, a US$2,000, out of the box with a cracked display. room for workhorse PCs, even if its contents in order of acceptance course, has very many sites of both of FlipShare TV, a new system that 2-terabyte hard drive that stores and Some reviewers and, judging from — at about 4kg — they defy current by UNESCO, and the first was the historic and natural splendor, but enables you to wirelessly shuffle Flip delivers audio in studio quality, 24- a survey of some Mac forums, some fashion. Enter the Precision M6500 Galapagos Islands (“a tossed salad Taiwan boasts the highest mountains videos from computer to television, bit/192 kHz oversampling format. users, are encountering issues with “mobile workstation.” of marine species”) in 1978. But the in East Asia, still relatively unspoiled, then share them with far-flung friends The drive is large enough to store some new models. Workstations are just that: essential motive for such a collection as well as many urban sites displaying and family. 20,000 24-bit tracks, or 6,000 standard The review team at Engadget, for monster-spec machines intended for came earlier, in the 1950s, when Egypt’s a fascinating history of migration and The US$150 FlipShare TV system CDs. For buyers of the unit, Olive example, found that their new Intel high performance and powerhouse construction of the Aswan High Dam cross-cultural settlement. has three elements: a wireless USB will digitize and import 100 CDs at Core i7-based iMac would not boot up. applications. Dell’s just-released necessitated the moving of the unique “Interchange of values” is the first of key that you plug into the PC that no charge. (The 2.8-gigahertz Core i7 processor is package, priced to start at US$2,750, and vast Abu Simbel temple complex, UNESCO’s criteria for inclusion, and it stores your videos, a receiver box that All of one’s music can be sold as a US$200 built-to-order option, is structured around an advanced Intel otherwise doomed to be drowned. was under this head that China got the you connect to the TV, and a remote transferred from a PC, as well as and isn’t generally offered on machines Core i7 quad-core processor — among This was successfully achieved after historic center of Macau included in control. The FlipShare TV’s USB drive CDs, into the unit’s drive, and then sold at Apple retail stores.) the first mobile PCs to use that chip a worldwide fund-raising scheme, and 2005. Under this head, Tainan would be and TV base are already configured that music can be distributed to an And TechNews.AM reports that — and a 17-inch LED backlighted the concept of numerous other sites ripe for inclusion, and even the small to work with each other; no setup or existing audio system. A free iPhone some customers who ordered the screen, 1920 by 1200 pixels. There’s all over the globe that needed to be historic area of Hsinchu — the main home network is required. app lets the user control the selection Intel Core i7 received cracked a gaudier variation, the Covet in hot preserved, if rarely so dramatically, was point of entry for Chinese immigrants As its name implies, the FlipShare of music remotely. display screens, commonly with the copper orange (US$4,220), that makes brought to the front of people’s minds. for centuries — might not be exempt TV includes an element of social The biggest challenge with the 4HD damage near the bottom left corner, the Apple MacBook Pro look like the Today Italy leads the list, with from consideration. networking. Users can create is finding 24-bit recordings. In a deal speculating that the problem might be Fisher-Price version. 43 sites. Spain has 40, France 33, All in all, this is a marvelous book, a “channels” to share video instantly with Chesky Records, known for its due to inadequate shipping packaging. While the base version is loaded Mexico 30, Japan 14, Indonesia seven, fact that’s hardly surprising considering with other FlipShare TV owners. It’s high-quality recordings, the unit comes The defective products are being with only 2 gigabytes of memory — Malaysia (surely under-represented) the riches it catalogues. It’s easy to not an open platform like YouTube, with 12 24-bit tracks already installed. replaced by Apple. not nearly enough for a computer with three, and so on. The US has 20, and use, with the sites listed in order of however. FlipShare TV owners must The company is also in talks with the This may give pause to some this potential — it will accommodate the UK 27. admission to the World Heritage List, first “friend” those with whom they major labels to provide more 24-bit consumers who have been eyeing the up to 16 gigs in four memory slots, a Major absences, apart from but with detailed lists for each country, want to share video, a la Facebook. content, so you can hear that Black iMac’s gorgeous LED-lighted display feature normally found on desktops, Taiwan, are hard to catalogue.