The ups and downs of Hawaii’s export trade

Where did we go wrong (especially considering we had been going so right, just a few years ago)?

In 2007, the Business Roundtable issued a glowing report that 20.5 percent of Hawaii jobs were supported by trade, a rising indicator showing the state well-positioned as "an export platform to the dynamic Southeast Asia economy."

Fast-forward to this week, when Honolulu’s exports totaled $2.4 billion in goods and services—ranking the city 84th among the nation’s top 100 metropolitan areas.

Lessons from this: (a) Success is fleeting; and (b) take all such studies with a grain of salt.

Go ahead and break into your iPhone, if you dare

Along with the swaggering that usually follows big tech stories, reaction to Monday’s iPhone ruling also elicited a cautionary note from Geekdom: It may not be illegal anymore to mess with your smart phone, but that doesn’t make it smart. The U.S Copyright Office ruled that "jailbreaking" an iPhone or other mobile device to make it work with a different cell phone carrier or to install an unsupported app will no longer violate federal copyright law.

Good news for those who really know what they’re doing. For those who don’t, the folks at Apple smile sweetly and remind you: It still voids your warranty.