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Thief-Thwarting Safes - The Band-Saw Box (GALLERY)(TrendHunter.com) There are many ways to thwart a thief. You can hide your stuff (Hint: Dont put things under your mattress or on the top shelf of your closet). Or you can disguise your things by putting...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNBlogTech | 9 Oct 2008 | 1:59 pm LEGO Killers - 10 Reasons Playmobil Toys are Tops (GALLERY)(TrendHunter.com) Playmobil is traditionally considered the poorer relative to Lego and I could not stand this bullying anymore so I just had to come out in its defense. Playmobil is a line of toys...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNBlogTech | 9 Oct 2008 | 1:39 pm Oddball Automobiles - The Watermelon Car (GALLERY)(TrendHunter.com) The watermelon car is the best novelty car I have ever seen. It is also very simple and does not have the clashing colors from hell seen on many of these vehicles, nor does it show...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNBlogTech | 9 Oct 2008 | 12:59 pm More MacBrick Pro images surface
Here we go again. Three more images that show off what appears to be a new MacBook case. These are slightly different from the one that dropped yesterday, as the side speaker grills are absent. In fact, if it wasn’t for the side shot, it kind of looks like an MacBook Air case. It does make sense that Apple would follow the evolutionary path blazed by the Air, but who knows if these are the real thing. Source: CrunchGear | 9 Oct 2008 | 12:28 pm Tablet Hackintosh on Dell NetbookThe beauty of the Intel incarnation of the Macintosh is that, if Apple doesn't make the Mac you want, you can hack your own. It takes some work, but in theory it is possible to run OS X on any modern Intel x86 machine. Here we see a Mac tablet, put together by YouTuber stulowe2006. This particular Hackintosh is based on a Dell Gigabyte M912. Internally, it's just another netbook, with a 1.6GHz Atom processor. Outside, it has a Touchscreen and a flimsy hinge to allow the machine to be folded into a tablet PC. Stulowe2006 has obviously got the touch screen drivers to let the Mac OS recognize the input. What this video shows us, apart from a rather masterly piece of OSx86 hacking, is that the current Mac OS is pitifully inadequate for tablet use. Even with the Dell stylus it seems difficult to hit the right spot on the screen, and Stulowe2006 is also stuck using the on-screen keyboard to type. The Mac does have "Ink", a handwriting recognition engine, but it is truly awful. Still, you can use the real keyboard if you have to. And for couch-based IMDB browsing, this looks just about perfect. Touch Screen Mac OS X on a GigaByte M912 [GottaBeMobile] Hands-On with the Gigabyte M912 [Laptop Mag] 
Source: Wired: Gadget Lab | 9 Oct 2008 | 12:24 pm Asus promises touchscreen Eee in 2009 The next obvious step is the tablet netbook. Tablets have never really hit the mainstream at their price, but a cheap netbook tablet could be marketed as an affordable, digital Etch-A-Sketch, useful not just for idle MS Painting but also email and web browsing. It's a smart way to differentiate yet another netbook on the shelf.
And that's just what Asus seems to be planning. They've confirmed that they are intending on launching a touchscreen Eee PC in Q1 of 2009. Additionally, it looks like another iteration of the EeePC will be disgorged, this time in a sub $300 edition. And dual core Atoms coming soon! As always, there's a reason to wait to buy a netbook. Asus planning touch panel Eee PCs [Digitimes] Source: Boing Boing Gadgets | 9 Oct 2008 | 12:21 pm Morning tech deals highlights• • Flash Drive – Kingston 4GB DataTraveler Mini for $12, shipped. A similar 8GB can be had for $23. [Dealhack] • Roomba – Remanufactured iRobot Roomba 400 (basic model) for $100, shipped. [Bargainist] • HDTV – Refurbished Philips 50-inch 1080p LCD for $940, shipped. That's about $600 buying one new (at a minimum), but I wouldn't be surprised to see further HDTV deals this shopping season. [Dealnews] • Point-and-Shoot – FujiFilm Z100fd 8MP, 5x optical zoom camera with 2GB SD card for $130, shipped. About $40 off not counting the SD card. I think these are pretty cameras. [Dealnews] • HD Monitor – Today's Woot is the Westinghouse 37” 1080p HDTV Ready LCD Monitor for $575, shipped. This is the classic model seen on many a'gaming PC. Source: Boing Boing Gadgets | 9 Oct 2008 | 12:20 pm JanRain Promotes OpenID Adoption Through The Long Tail
JanRain, creator of some of the most popular OpenID software libraries and a forum-like communications tool called Pibb, has released a new SaaS offering for websites that want to become relying parties for OpenID. We’re told that the service, simply called RPX, makes it possible to start accepting users with OpenID accounts within one day. This is actually the second SaaS solution provided by JanRain, the first being the similarly named OPX, which lets websites do the opposite: provide OpenID accounts to users, who can then sign into any other websites that accept them. JanRain also provides OpenID accounts to users directly through its myOpenID service. Helping websites become relying partners is more important (at least at this point in the game) than helping them become providing partners. That’s because few popular sites accept OpenID and, consequently, consumers see little reason to set up OpenID accounts for themselves. This is an even bigger problem than the user experience issues that have plagued the movement over the last few years. RPX is being marketed toward medium sites that want to increase their registration conversation rates, import user information from elsewhere, and build out connections to other social services via oAuth. It’s not meant as much for big internet sites like Blogger, Plaxo and AOL, who have become relying parties using their in-house technical resources. The question stands as to whether OpenID will gain momentum through the long tail or adoption by a critical mass of the big players. It will probably take a few very popular services, such as MySpace and Facebook (through their respective Data Availability and Connect services), to popularize the protocol. But once they do, services like RPX should help the long tail take advantage of it. RPX comes in two flavors: “plus” for smaller sites and “pro” for bigger ones. Pricing starts at a flat fee and then increases based on how many people sign into your site using OpenID during the span of one year.
Crunch Network: MobileCrunch Mobile Gadgets and Applications, Delivered Daily. 
Source: Slashdot | 9 Oct 2008 | 11:57 am IBM's earnings strength calms tech jitters (Reuters)
Source: Yahoo! News: Technology News | 9 Oct 2008 | 11:54 am Google's drunk e-mailing protection is nice, but won't save you - Chicago Tribune
Source: Google News - Sci/Tech | 9 Oct 2008 | 11:45 am Sony, Microsoft virtual communities to start (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Technology News | 9 Oct 2008 | 11:44 am Tokyo Game Show: Developer talks Dragon Ball Z: Infinite World for the PS2 (video)
Everyone agrees that the Dragonball trailer looks pretty crappy, but at least Dragon Ball Z: Infinite World, a fighting game based on the famous Japanese anime/manga, looks pretty decent. Namco Bandai promises the game, one of the biggest crowd pleasers today at the Tokyo Game Show, will hit stores worldwide on December 4th this year. Source: CrunchGear | 9 Oct 2008 | 11:42 am Face of Mercury looks familiar to UH researcher - Honolulu Star-Bulletin
Source: Google News - Sci/Tech | 9 Oct 2008 | 11:41 am Kevin Mitnick on the Palin e-mail hacker: Punishment should fit the crimeYes, that evil “hacker” who broke into Sarah Palin’s e-mail account was indicted yesterday. Politics aside, it was a pretty dumb thing to do, especially posting the e-mails online after the fact. To that end, here’s renowned computer security consultant (and former HACKEROMG) Kevin Mitnick giving his opinion on the whole matter on G4’s Attack of the Show. Mitnick says he doesn’t think the kid should have his life ruined for what amounted to a harmless prank. That’s my opinion, the harmless prank part. You know, maybe spend a couple of weeks doing community service, picking up trash along the side of the road or something. The host, Kevin Pereira, brings up another good point: why haven’t we seen more “cyber attacks” on politicians this election year? Source: CrunchGear | 9 Oct 2008 | 11:34 am Sleeping Beauty Blu-Ray requires viewers to agree to 57 page EULA
Disney's release of its first Blu-Ray title, Sleeping Beauty, contains over one hundred and twenty pages of legalese when completely unspooled, including a 57 page EULA to access the BD-Live content and a 63 page privacy policy. A shame that they didn't deign to release Fantasia on Blu-Ray first: this EULA would be the insane legalistic equivalent of the multiplying brooms in "The Sorcerer's Apprentice." Disney Goes EULA Crazy On Sleeping Beauty Blu-Ray [Format War Central] Source: Boing Boing Gadgets | 9 Oct 2008 | 11:31 am Double Disk Drive Enclusure from Brando
If you're any kind of real gadget freak, you have a bunch of old hard drives sitting around. The trouble is, they're pretty much useless, especially the ones you pull out of a laptop -- what do you use an old 2.5 inch SATA drive for when you now have a capacious 500GB of storage in your notebook? Well, if you are careful (or paranoid), you'll keep a bootable backup so you can swap it back in when (not if) your main drive fails. Brando's sleek and shiny enclosure will let you do two at a time: The USB 2.5" Double SATA HDD Enclosure supports RAID 1, so you can mirror your backup data across the two HDDs and, if the worst happens, you have an up to date copy to slide right into your notebook. We like the double-redundancy, but what we don't like is the price: $170 including shipping. For that you could buy a couple of big external USB drives. It's especially expensive considering the vendor -- Brando usually sells cheap – but neat – plastic tat. Product page [Brando via Red Ferret]
Source: Wired: Gadget Lab | 9 Oct 2008 | 11:16 am Some Big Sites Are Using Google Trends To Direct EditorialGoogle Trends, which shows you the hot search queries on Google at any given time, is more than two years old now (this year they added website/domain tracking as well). PR professionals and brand managers...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNBlogTech | 9 Oct 2008 | 11:16 am Some Big Sites Are Using Google Trends To Direct Editorial
One use though, which is becoming increasingly popular we hear, is for blogs, mainstream media sites and others to monitor Google Trends regularly and write stories based on hot terms. Google displays a daily summary for easier data gathering. The goal isn’t to tap into what Internet users think is interesting and write about that. Instead, it’s all about getting more hits from Google. Here’s how it works: Blogs and mainstream media sites are indexed by Google very frequently. Many times per day, in fact. And those sites often have great Page Rank already. Combine that regular indexing and Page Rank with Google’s recent policy of ranking news type results higher than older, evergreen stuff, and you have a system ripe for abuse. Let’s say I run a popular political or celebrity gossip site (two topics that pop up a lot on Google Trends). I look for hot queries that people are typing in right now, for whatever reason. Then I write a blog post, making sure to use the query term in the title of the post (which weights heavier for matching content to specific queries). The content of the article itself is mostly irrelevant, as long as your normal readers don’t gag on it. Within a few minutes that content is indexed by Google, and the high Page Rank of the site along with the newness of the content pushes it up towards to top of the first page of results. Possibly all the way to the top. We’re not talking about a trivial amount of traffic, either. One person I spoke with about this yesterday said he can get up to 30,000 extra unique visitors per day just by focusing content on top queries, which is more than enough to dedicate a couple of full time people to the effort. I’ve debated (with myself) on how “bad” this kind of behavior really is. Sites that do this are clearly exploiting a weakness in Google’s search methodology, but it’s not like they’re engaging in black hat SEO tactics to trick Google into thinking their content is more relevant than it is. Rather, they’re just using their Page Rank heft and cheating a little on the edges. I’m not going to say which sites I’m hearing are doing this, but you can check for yourself. If you see a headline that seems a little off topic or weird, followed by some very hastily written content, have a quick look at Google Trends and see if the exact query is in the title of the post or article. You may be surprised at who’s taking advantage of this. Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.
Source: Yahoo! News: Technology News | 9 Oct 2008 | 11:01 am Nikon D3x drumbeat begins anew
Will Nikon do the obvious and release a D3x? Will it release the camera this December for $6,499? Will the camera have a 24.4-megapixel image sensor? Will it have the same body as its progenitor, the D3? Will it be able to shoot at a rate of 9 frames per second? We don’t know, but we wouldn’t mind playing around with such a camera. Source: CrunchGear | 9 Oct 2008 | 11:00 am Parity Changes the Identity Management Landscape: Web Sites Can Issue Information Cards - For Free - with Launch of Parity's CardPress ServiceFoundation Laid for Every Web Site to Issue and Accept Highly Secure Information Cards In About Two Days BOSTON, Oct. 9 /PRNewswire/ -- Core News Facts: --Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNewsTech | 9 Oct 2008 | 11:00 am DISH Network Expands Local High Definition MarketsENGLEWOOD, Colo., Oct. 9 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- DISH Network Corporation (Nasdaq: DISH), the nation's third largest pay-TV provider and the digital transition leader,...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNewsTech | 9 Oct 2008 | 11:00 am New Verizon Business Managed Service Makes Collaboration EasierMultifaceted Solution Helps Companies Around the Globe Work Smarter BASKING RIDGE, N.J., Oct. 9 /PRNewswire/ -- Global enterprises know that...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNewsTech | 9 Oct 2008 | 11:00 am Amuso: Viral + Monetizable Magic?I am usually the "enterprise guy", so game shows - the space that Amuso is in - is way off my beat. I explained that to the PR person who persistently tracked me down at Web 2.0 Expo in New York. But I...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNBlogTech | 9 Oct 2008 | 11:00 am Yucheng Expands Client Base in Northern ChinaBEIJING, Oct. 9 /Xinhua-PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Yucheng Technologies Limited (Nasdaq: YTEC), a leading provider of IT solutions and services to China's banking...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNewsTech | 9 Oct 2008 | 11:00 am Back seat windows become video games with the CarcadeThe Carcade system uses a webcam to turn your car window into a dynamic video game system, recreating the trees and buildings you pass by into game objects. The faster you drive, the harder the game becomes. The prototype game looks like great fun: a Gradius style shmup (without, I guess, the shmup) in which you must dodge your space ship past the real life obstacles zooming by, although bluntly, the way those undodgeable skyscrapers come out of nowhere to blow up your space cruiser is way cheap. You should totally be able to blast your way through those. Carcade [Digital UDK] Source: Boing Boing Gadgets | 9 Oct 2008 | 10:51 am LG Display, Taiwan LCD makers profits to sagSEOUL (Reuters) - South Korean flat screen maker LG Display Co Ltd and two smaller Taiwanese rivals are expected to post sharp falls in profits in the third quarter, hit by weakening demandSource: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNewsTech | 9 Oct 2008 | 10:45 am LG KC780 is a really thin 8-megapixel cameraphone
Wannabe photographers looking for a cellphone whose camera doesn’t stink on ice may want to check out LG’s latest offering, the 13.9mm thick KC780. No fancy touchscreen here, but there is an 8-megapixel camera. And while we all know (or should know) by now that megapixels aren’t everything when it comes to taking decent digital photos, LG has a few features that make the whole package a little more valuable. Primarily, LG tricked out the phone’s software in order to enhance taking photos of people’s faces, which, in LG Speak, is the “most expressive” part of the body. (I guess that’s hard to argue.) There’s the usual face detection, which apparently can recognize mouth angles and all that jazz. Smile Shot only releases the “shutter” when it determines that the subject is smiling. A simple correction mode, called Beauty Mode, corrects subject’s skin imperfections. She’s scheduled to come out next month in Europe; the rest of the world will have to wait.
Source: Yahoo! News: Technology News | 9 Oct 2008 | 10:22 am Sony, Microsoft virtual communities to start - The Associated Press
Source: Google News - Sci/Tech | 9 Oct 2008 | 10:21 am Sony, Microsoft virtual communities to startVideo game rivals Sony and Microsoft are going head-to-head in virtual worlds for their home consoles later this year. Both companies announced their services, which use graphic images...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNewsTech | 9 Oct 2008 | 10:17 am floor1I made it through the first day on the floor of Tokyo Games Show and while I didn't see much (too many meetings, not enough play time), I did see some stuff. Watch and learn. The vid's approx 6 mins. Today:...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNPaperTech | 9 Oct 2008 | 10:15 am Eye-Fi SD cards add Twitter, Flickr, RSS support In a market saturated by indistinguishable flash memory competitors, Eye-Fi has managed time and time again to smartly separate itself from its memory card doppelgangers... first, simply by slapping a Wi-Fi transmitter and built-in geotracking into an SD card, and now — even neater — with built-in Flickr and Twitter support.
If you download and install the latest version of the Eye-Fi manager software, you'll have access to the new features. The Flickr function allows you to upload photos directly from your camera to Flickr or other supported photo hosting sites, and the Twitter feature allows you to automatically notify your followers with a link to your latest photos... or simply publish an RSS feed with them. Charlie Sorrel's right on the money: "Eye-Fi gets it. What started as a simple SD card with Wi-Fi transfer and geotagging is fast turning into a full-on Web 2.0 gadget." There's just a giddy neatness to owning an SD card that not only does something besides store data, but gets cool new features pushed to it over time. Eye-Fi Manager Update Released [Eye-Fi via Gadget Lab] Source: Boing Boing Gadgets | 9 Oct 2008 | 10:14 am Recycling eggOver on Boing Boing Gadgets, our John's found these superb recycling egg multi-trash-cans:Look at me still talking when there's recycling to do: Ovetto Recycling Eggs, Discuss this on Boing Boing Gadgets Source: Boing Boing | 9 Oct 2008 | 10:10 am Recycling eggOver on Boing Boing Gadgets, our John's found these superb recycling egg multi-trash-cans: The Ovetto Recycling Egg is an expensive, dual-slot trash can that, for $250, allows for the separation of...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNBlogTech | 9 Oct 2008 | 10:10 am Manga guide to databases I have no idea if The Manga Guide to Databases will be any good (the publisher sez, "In The Manga Guide to Databases, Tico the fairy teaches the Princess how to simplify her data management. We follow along as they design a relational database, understand the entity-relationship model, perform basic database operations, and delve into more advanced topics. Once the Princess is familiar with transactions and basic SQL statements, she can keep her data timely and accurate for the entire kingdom. Finally, Tico explains ways to make the database more efficient and secure, and they discuss methods for concurrency and replication.") but I sure hope it's the start of a trend. I want a manga guide to supersymmetry, the surplus labor theory of value, tensor calculus and many other elusive concepts.
I'm aware that this sort of subject is often covered in Japanese manga books, but to understand them, I'd need a Manga Guide to Japanese first.
The Manga Guide to Databases
(via Global Nerdy) Source: Boing Boing | 9 Oct 2008 | 10:07 am Manga guide to databasesI have no idea if The Manga Guide to Databases will be any good (the publisher sez, "In The Manga Guide to Databases, Tico the fairy teaches the Princess how to simplify her data management. We follow...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNBlogTech | 9 Oct 2008 | 10:07 am Test Center review: Drupal turns pro (InfoWorld)InfoWorld - As we've seen time and again, in an increasing number of enterprise software categories, open source has become a promising alternative to commercial software. But there's no free ride.Source: Yahoo! News: Technology News | 9 Oct 2008 | 10:00 am Build your own Toy Story baby doll spider
MAKE has posted a great tutorial on taking a robotically side-shuffling Mechamo Crab by Gakken and slapping the creepy, dead-eyed head of an old Cabbage Patch doll on top. They suggest building an entire army and letting them loose on your lawn on Halloween, or perhaps just loosening one in the bedroom of a small, obnoxious neighborhood child whom you might be forced to baby sit from time to time. Horrifying. Ever since Toy Story, this sort of baby doll robot spider creepy crawls all over my id, springing into monstrous tangibility to skitter all over my sweating flesh whenever my asthma is bad enough to require a tab of Theophylline and the nightmarish hallucinations it brings. Build: Mechamo Crab & Halloween Hack [MAKE] Source: Boing Boing Gadgets | 9 Oct 2008 | 9:58 am Photos: Is This the MacBook 'Brick'?
These "leaked spy shots" come by way of Chinese forum site Elesson, and purportedly show the new MacBook Brick, carved – as the rumors go – from a single block of aluminum. Both Engadget and Gizmodo point out that the largest shot shows a seam in the case between the top and the side (the full sized picture is below). It may just be a highlight caused by the plastic film stuck to the top, which doesn't quite reach the edge. More likely is that the whole "carved by lasers" method doesn't extend to the entire machine but instead is simply being used to make more intricate panels -- the top case is a pretty thick sheet of metal and looks just like a a Pro version of the current MacBook keyboard. 
The smaller shots all lack the speaker grilles of the MacBook Pro, so would appear to show either a MacBook or a smaller MacBook Pro -- similar to the 12" PowerBook. This last is enough to get us excited: Apple hasn't made a tiny pro notebook since the 12" PowerBook was discontinued in 2006. What does strike us is the similarity of these shots with what is available today. We say it a lot, but the basic design of the MacBook Pro hasn't changed since the first titanium PowerBook back in 2001. And perhaps it doesn't need to. I picked up a MacBook Pro a few months ago and there's not much I would change. A smaller screen bezel perhaps, but not much else. The Mac Rumors forum, which we think is where these photos made their debut in the West, nurtures speculation about the ports on the side of the case. The configuration is quite different from the current MBP, and appears to group most of the in and out sockets on the left of the machine. Currently, the left side is home to a USB port, audio in and out, an ExpressCard slot and the Magsafe power-hole. Everything else is on the right. The forum thread focusses on the mystery port between the dual USB ports and the jack sockets. I think it looks just the right size for Firewire 400, but various poster have it as either a Mini-DVI port (the same as the MacBook uses or video-out) or an HDMI-out. Both seem a little odd in this position. Ports for external displays usually sit near the back of the case to keep the cables out of the way. Whether this has anything to do with the 'Brick' rumors we don't know, but these shots are certainly good. I can't spot any obvious photoshopping, so I'll put my head on the block here and call them as real. Whether the whole MacBook line is going metal, I don't know, but a 12" MacBook Pro would certainly go a long way towards alleviating the complaints that Apple isn't making a netbook. I can feel my wallet itching in my pocket right now. A possible leak [MacRumors Forum Thread] More 'Brick' MacBook Case Images? [MacRumors] New MacBook Pro Rumor Control [Gizmodo] 'Brick' MacBook Pro leaked in up-close spy shot? [Engadget] MacBrick Pro revealed! Maybe! [BoingBoing Gadgets]
This, then: Daniel Wellman's incredible reminiscence about the his own Tron Lightcycles game on the Apple IIgs, the incredible escape of one of the AIs into the memory outside the system and its successful, guerilla-like struggle to bring down Apple's own MCP. One day, when Marco and I were playing against two computer opponents, we forced one of the AI cycles to trap itself between its own walls and the bottom game border. Sensing an impending crash, it fired a missile, just like it always did whenever it was trapped. But this time was different – instead of firing at another trail, it fired at the game border, which looked like any other light cycle trail as far as the computer was concerned. The missile impacted with the border, leaving a cycle-sized hole, and the computer promptly took the exit and left the main playing field. Puzzled, we watched as the cycle drove through the scoring display at the bottom of the screen. It easily avoided the score digits and then drove off the screen altogether. Forget Disney's upcoming sequel, this should be the plot to Tron 2.0. Stay On Target: Real Life Tron on an Apple IIgs [Daniel Wellman via Crunchgear] Source: Boing Boing Gadgets | 9 Oct 2008 | 9:46 am US judge halts sales of RealNetworks DVD software - Reuters
Source: Google News - Sci/Tech | 9 Oct 2008 | 9:35 am Google extends AdSense to online games - Reuters
Source: Google News - Sci/Tech | 9 Oct 2008 | 9:35 am Reality Career Launching - American Idols Kellie Pickler Skyrocketing Up Billboard Charts (GALLERY)(TrendHunter.com) American Idols Kellie Pickler launched her self-titled album yesterday. The album rocketed in sales to become #9 on Billboards Top 200 chart. Kellie Pickler is our second proof...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNBlogTech | 9 Oct 2008 | 9:32 am U.S. judge halts sales of RealNetworks DVD software (Reuters)Reuters - A U.S. federal judge temporarily halted sales of RealNetworks Inc's RealDVD software, which allows users to copy DVDs, after Hollywood studios sued the company over copyright issues, court documents showed.Source: Yahoo! News: Technology News | 9 Oct 2008 | 9:30 am Google extends AdSense to online games (Reuters)Reuters - Google Inc on Wednesday launched technology to insert advertisements into online video games and boost revenue from the booming gaming sector.Source: Yahoo! News: Technology News | 9 Oct 2008 | 9:28 am Look at me still talking when there's recycling to do: Ovetto Recycling Eggs
The Ovetto Recycling Egg is an expensive, dual-slot trash can that, for $250, allows for the separation of plastic and aluminum in one receptacle... a goal which can just as easily be accomplished for the price of a couple $5 trash buckets. But you aren't paying for the function, you're paying for the design, and who amongst us does not want to turn our kitchen into the microcosmic eating lounge of Aperture Science, with helpful (albeit homicidal) recycling eggs (oviposited by glorious GLaDOS herself) pristinely hovering about, electronically warbling invitations to deposit our spare cans, or perhaps just our spleens, in their plastic, opalescent bellies? Ovetto Recycling Egg [Where Did You Buy That via Gizmodo]
However, as Crave so helpfully points out, even if you're a boneheaded HDTV mounter who didn't bother thinking things through, there's far cheaper alternatives to wind an HDMI cable up behind the inch of free space sandwiched between your television and the wall. The HDMI Port Saver contains an L-shaped dongle that you can fit on any HDMI cable for just a fin. Panasonic Free Angle HDMI Cables [Panasonic via Crave] Source: Boing Boing Gadgets | 9 Oct 2008 | 9:14 am Tokyo Game Show: Resident Evil 5 is the best title this year (video)
And I have no doubt that Resident Evil 5 (Biohazard 5) is THE game of the show. I played both the XBOX 360 and the PS3 version and both looked and felt fantastic. If I could choose I would prefer the XBOX 360 version because of the superior controls. I will add more footage from the Capcom booth and Resident Evil 5 later. The video above was made by and provided to CrunchGear first by DigInfo Tokyo. Source: CrunchGear | 9 Oct 2008 | 9:14 am Short-Selling is HaramWith short-selling set to come back into the markets today, there are lots of worried people out there. I'll confess to being somewhat more sanguine, if only because I struggle to see how things could...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNBlogTech | 9 Oct 2008 | 9:06 am Opera CEO: DSi will contain more RAMOne question raised by the announcement of the DSi, and specifically its removal of the GBA slot and its promises of a built-in browser: would that browser be Opera, and will the DSi contain extra RAM to allow the browser to run? The old DS version of the Opera browser required a GBA RAM cartridge, after all. According to Opera CEO Jon S. von Tetzchner, the answer to both questions is "yes:" Yes, the DSi has more RAM than the DS Lite. In addition, with integrated Opera coming with the DSi, it will use RAM more efficiently. It'll be interesting to see how this affects the DS software library as a whole. Will game developers opt to go DSi-specific in order to access that additional memory, or will it largely go unused? Another question: what will this mean for DS homebrew? Many homebrew DS games already require the Opera GBA RAM pack to run: if the DSi is hackable for homebrew, that means that the DSi might quickly become the preferred system of choice for emulators, source ports and the like. Operating Systems are less important: opera [Tech Tree] Source: Boing Boing Gadgets | 9 Oct 2008 | 9:04 am Jamie Lynn Spears is the New Britney Spears - JLS Pregnant Again Bad Role Model (GALLERY)(TrendHunter.com) Oh look, Jamie Lynn Spears is the new Britney Spears. By that, I mean that she is setting a bad example and no doubt fueling the trend of teen pregnancy. Although this has not...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNBlogTech | 9 Oct 2008 | 9:02 am Irony Alert: Bubble-Making Venture Capitalists Start Popping Them [BoomTown]
Is it just me or does the sudden prospect of venture capitalists–the very investors who fueled the Web 2.0 valuation insanity with their typically egregious overfunding of start-ups–lecturing about the bleak economy and the need to tighten belts seem just a tad ironic? It’s kind of like Washington politicians who handed out-of-control bankers one deregulation after another, in exchange for campaign donations, now mounting their high horses and decrying Wall Street greed in the current economic meltdown. And yet, just like that, Silicon Valley’s investors–who could spin you all the way to next Sunday about how Facebook was actually worth $15 billion, despite not having much revenue quite yet–are turning into penny-pinching accountant types. As reported by Om Malik of GigaOm in a piece titled “Sequoia Rings the Alarm Bell: Silicon Valley Is in Trouble,” for example, Sequoia Capital–one of tech’s most powerful and successful VC firms–held a meeting where it told its portfolio companies that the downturn was quite serious and advised them to start cutting costs. Apparently, there was even a picture of a grave stone with “R.I.P.: Good Times” displayed at the gathering, in case the start-ups did not get the sledge-hammer message. The last time Sequoia did this was when the Web 1.0 bubble was popping in 2000. The same communication was also sent out to entrepreneurs by angel investor Ron Conway then and now yesterday again.
The typically jovial Conway (pictured here) sent out a grim email to the start-ups he is invested in, advising they lower their burn rate to get ready for the tough times ahead. Wrote Conway: “Unfortunately history DOES repeat itself but I hope we can learn from history and prevent the turmoil from occurring again. The message is simple. Raising capital will be much more difficult now…the name of the game in this environment in some respects is survival–survival until conditions change.” Now he tells us! In all seriousness, these kind of prescriptions should have been front and center when times were presumably good, especially after the first orgy of Internet frothiness ended with such a thud. Instead, the all-trees-grow-to-heaven attitude, the massively inappropriate valuations, the revenue-what-revenue strategies have been pushed on entrepreneurs in this cycle by too many VCs, most of whom should have known better. And, while it is right for Sequoia and Conway to sound the alarm, I expect all the VCs who touted loudly will now all climb aboard this somber bandwagon. Because, after handing over too much money to start-ups like drunken sailors on shore leave, it is apparently now Sunday morning and time for a little salvation. But not completely, of course, since this is still an industry where the dreams of hitting it big never die. After I jokingly called Conway “Oh voice of doom and gloom,” after reading his email, he quickly wrote back: “NO WAY DOOM AND GLOOM. I think innovation in the Valley will continue to thrive and I will continue to invest.” Of course, Conway will. It wouldn’t be Silicon Valley if he didn’t. And to raise your spirits from these wet-blanket VCs, here’s a video of Mike Settle singing the classic “What Shall We Do With the Drunken Sailor”: Source: All Things Digital | 9 Oct 2008 | 8:47 am Microsoft tries for slice of Japan game market
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 GamePro.com | Halo 3: Recon prequel coming in 2009 GamePro.com - By Sid Shuman In Fall 2009, Bungie will release "Halo 3: Recon," which will serve as a prequel to the events in Halo 3. The news was dropped during Microsoft's address at the Tokyo Game Show. Halo 3: Recon Announced, Official Trailer Released Halo 3: Recon blown open |
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By Julian Sanchez, Washington DC Editor, Ars Technica
If you pay any attention to the endless debates over intellectual property policy in the United States, you’ll hear two numbers invoked over and over again, like the stuttering chorus of some Philip Glass opera: 750,000 and $200 to $250 billion. The first is the number of U.S. jobs supposedly lost to intellectual property theft; the second is the annual dollar cost of IP infringement to the U.S. economy. These statistics are brandished like a talisman each time Congress is asked to step up enforcement to protect the ever-beleaguered U.S. content industry. And both, as far as an extended investigation by Ars Technica has been able to determine, are utterly bogus.
RIM Storms In With New Touchscreen Smartphone TechNewsWorld - By Walaika Haskins Research In Motion showed off the Storm, the company's latest touchscreen-based smartphone. Though RIM has attempted over the last couple of years to make headway in the consumer market, it's difficult to say how the Storm will fare ... Samsung's Glyde Disappoints Blackberry introduces touchscreen version |
With Adam Smith’s oft-lauded “invisible hand” giving investors the invisible finger and the world economy reeling from what the International Monetary Fund just labeled the most dangerous shock to the financial markets since the 1930s, the healthy optimism and patient money for which the venture capital world has long been known are fast turning into a querulous hopelessness. To wit, the emergency gathering held at Sequoia Capital this week. It’s purpose: to prepare the firm’s portfolio companies for a protracted downturn.
There is no good news right now, it seems. The bubble is burst.
“It’s pretty clear that demand is going to soften across the board for every company–it doesn’t matter if you’re selling to consumers or companies,” Sequoia Capital partner Michael Moritz told the Financial Times earlier this week. “[Many start-ups that emerged in the recent boom will end up] spattered on windshields and radiator grills and be forgotten.”
[Image Credit: Audiophile & Synergy Industries]
PREVIOUSLY:
By John Gruber, Editor, Daring Fireball
If I could travel back 20 years and show my then 15-year-old self just one thing the future of today, it would be the iPhone. It is our flying car. Star Trek-style wireless long-distance voice communicator. The content of every major newspaper and magazine in the world. An encyclopedia. Video games. TV. Etc.
Video: Kota the triceratops robot now available
Bob Dylan’s ‘Theme Time Radio Hour’ starts today on XM, Sirius XM, whatever its name is today
Internet radio on a stick from Aluratek
Augmented Reality? The Tuttuki Bako box needs your finger to play with virtual characters
Kingston joins the 32GB USB flash drive club
By Gregg Keizer, Reporter, IDG
Spammers prefer Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., over his rival, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., by landslide-like numbers. According to Secure Computing Corp., spammers were nearly seven times more likely to slap Obama’s name in the subject line than McCain’s during September. The bulk of Obama’s lead in the spam wars came from a massive blitz early in the month.
By Jeff Segal, Reporter, BreakingViews.com
The social network is ailing. Five top executives have quit, including a co-founder who is starting a competitor. And the company is buying employees’ stock - which it can ill afford. Facebook needs to sign up a few rich friends if it’s to avoid becoming Silicon Valley history.
By Brian Raftery, Contributing Writer, Wired
Weird Al” Yankovic isn’t just popular. He is also the unlikely forefather of the infectious, hyperlinked, quasi-referential comedy that’s become the lingua franca of the Web. Yankovic’s influence can be seen in the slow-jam pinings of Obama Girl, the cross-cultural pairings that turn Yoda and SpongeBob SquarePants into hardcore rappers, and in the nimble hands of that couch potato who farts out “Bohemian Rhapsody” with his palms (1.8 million YouTube views and counting). You can even detect traces of his style in the perfectly metered wordplay of “Lazy Sunday,” the 2005 Saturday Night Live short that earned YouTube—and viral humor—its first barrage of mainstream attention. “Ever since I was old enough to listen to music, I’ve been listening to Weird Al,” says 30-year-old “Sunday” cocreator Andy Samberg. “For my generation, he’s a huge influence.”
Since you already read TechCrunch, why not work here? We are looking for a Ruby Developer to work on CrunchBase and a fulltime writer to work on TechCrunchIT at TechCrunch’s Atherton California Office.
To our international readers, please check out the British and French job boards.
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The new expansion will pit you as an ODST marine aka New Hero and will serve as a prequel to Halo 3. We’ll have the teaser trailer up soon and box art.
Update: Trailer after the jump.
Details from the Xbox page.
To the delight of devoted fans across the world, at the Tokyo Game Show Microsoft debuted Halo 3: Recon, developed exclusively for Xbox 360® by acclaimed developer Bungie. This new chapter in the Halo saga lets you experience events leading up to the epic story told in Halo 3 through the eyes of a new hero in the Halo universe.
The stand-alone expansion, set to release in fall 2009, extends the award-winning Halo® 3 experience with hours of new campaign excursions and multiplayer gameplay. In addition, attendees were given an all-new glimpse of the Xbox 360 exclusive strategy game Halo Wars from Ensemble Studios. The campaign mode provided a thrilling taste of the revolutionary gameplay and new perspective of the Halo universe. Enjoy the full experience when Halo Wars hits retailers in early 2009.
Game DetailsThis new chapter in the Halo universe includes the following:
* All-new campaign content: The Halo 3: Recon campaign is an intriguing side story that takes place during the terrifying events leading up to the Master Chief’s return to New Mombasa in Halo 3. Experience the fate of Earth from the brand-new perspective of a special forces ODST (Orbital Drop Shock Trooper), adding a unique outlook and new gameplay elements to the events that unfold in the trilogy’s finale. While the feel of this new chapter greatly resembles that of previous Halo experiences, Halo 3: Recon will require you to employ more elements of stealth and cunning than ever before.
* Prepare to drop: Known for their courage, valor and, at times, insanity, ODSTs are among the fiercest UNSC soldiers, priding themselves on being the first unit deployed into hostile situations. While not as large or supernaturally gifted as their Spartan comrades, these “Hell Jumpers” more than compensate with their ferocious attitudes and unwavering nerve.
* Expanded multiplayer collection:No Halo experience would be complete without groundbreaking multiplayer content, and Halo 3: Recon gives fans more of what they love. With exclusive new maps and expanded Forge options, Xbox LIVE® Gold members will find more multiplayer content than ever before with Halo 3: Recon.
* Ever-growing community options: Enjoy all the great Halo 3 technological innovations, including Saved Films, screenshots, Campaign Scoring, and four-player co-op. All of the new multiplayer maps fully support the Forge editor, offering endless gameplay customization possibilities.
Today at Boing Boing Gadgets, there was a Spy Calculator; a wooden safe like something from Myst; a giant ball made of vinyl records; a rugged handheld computer from Motorola; and a bizarre marble-spitting automaton.
John saw a toilet in the shape of a pipe; an ingenious Russian iPhone scam; and what can only be described as a Tamagotchi with a glory hole. He has a tank with a gothic church on top of it.
Poor-quality photos revealed what might well be the new MacBrick Pro, the RAZR maintained its lead as most popular cellphone over you-know-what; and the Welsh police are tasing sheep. Baastards!
Rob donned a Pac Man Hoodie; rode a plush robot dinosaur; spotted a $550 wooden USB thumbdrive; and heard a Fisher Price doll assert that Islam is the Light.
We covered a lot of BlackBerry Storm stuff, but most fun was an apparently-official ad with the iPhone's operating system pasted in. Speaking of iThings, Woz says the iPod's time will be up sooner than we know it.
There was an unpleasant epilator; a novelty teapot in the shape of an alien spaceship; a zombie apocalypse in Lego; and a MAME cocktail cabinet made of an old iMac. Game on!
NXE is launching in 24 countries on November 19th. Read about NXE here.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
I guess the upside is that a stock can’t fall below zero, so there’s an end in sight to the ongoing destruction of jobs and shareholder wealth at Yahoo. The stock closed at $13.76 today, down another 5.6%. And this isn’t just part of the market’s overall meltdown - the Nasdaq fell just 0.8% today, and Google, Yahoo’s main direct competitor, was down just 2.3%.
At this point I’ve moved beyond wondering how Yahoo’s senior management manages to keep themselves in power. The private equity funds who agreed to let Yang and Decker stay in power after the shareholder vote last summer have some real explaining to do to their investors, too.
Yahoo has no game plan, and the markets tend to notice these things. It’s time for an intervention.
Crunch Network: MobileCrunch Mobile Gadgets and Applications, Delivered Daily.
There's a thin line between a useful gadget and another that coddles your laziness. Often, the difference lies in how the person uses it.
Think of the Roomba. The autonomous vacuum sucks up debris and works great when the kitchen is mostly clean – its small contribution goes a long way towards a spit-shine floor. But a dirty person who leaves mounds of crackers around and willingly allows the Roomba to take care of his duties is a lazy hazy.
Which brings me to the tale of the NYC man that got his motorcycle stolen. 
Laszlo Tenai lives in an Upper East Side complex and was shocked (shocked!) when his 2006 Honda CBR 1000RR bike was recently stolen twice within eight months. The second time it happened, he attached a Blackline GPS Snitch so that he could find his bike, which he did after 20 minutes with the help of police and the gadget's online tracking site.
As we previously noted in our review, the Snitch uses cellular and GPS to text owners when the tagged item moves beyond a perimeter designated by the owner.
I know that parking garages are too expensive in urban areas, but here's the thing. This bike is a Fireblade. It hits 11,500 rpm and has a 998 cc liquid-cooled inline four-cylinder engine. Mainly, it looks hot.
Even in the Upper East Side, the city is still NYC and leaving it out there is an unsafe proposition. Using the Snitch is a smart choice as a back-up security plan, but you cannot rely on the tech to save you every time. Essentially, he's lucky his Roomba was able to pick up all of his dropped crackers. The safer thing would have been to park that bike elsewhere.
Am I being far too harsh here? What do you guys think? Have you used technology in a way that covers up something you really should be taking care of? Are you buying automatic ice cream cones to save your wrist the twisting trouble?
Say you’re on the road and you need to look at a file that’s on your main computer back at your office or house. Or say you’re using a device with limited storage, like a smart phone or one of the tiny new “netbook” portable PCs, and you want access to a file that isn’t on the device at hand.
You might be able to get at the desired file if you have previously uploaded it to an online storage or photo-sharing service, or emailed it to yourself. But, in many cases, you could be stuck.
Now Dell, the big computer maker, is aiming to solve that problem with a new service called Dell Remote Access. Despite the name, the service can be installed on any brand of Windows PC running Windows XP or Windows Vista to make its files remotely accessible, as long as it has a broadband connection. You can transfer, or stream, or share these files with others. You can even remotely use the host computer’s Web camera.
And some of the service’s functions also work even if your remote device is one of Apple’s Macintosh computers or iPhones, or a computer powered by the Linux operating system, like Dell’s own Mini netbook.
For basic functionality — making the files on one Windows PC remotely accessible from other devices — Dell Remote Access is free. If you want to use its advanced functions, like the ability to remotely control the host PC or to access other devices on your home network, it costs $9.95 a month, or $99 a year. This paid version of the service also includes the ability to share with others access to files or to devices on your network, such as stand-alone Web cameras.
You only need to install special software on the host PC whose files are to be remotely accessed. For basic file access, the remote devices require just a Web browser and a password to tap into the host computer. You can download the software, and get started with the service, at dellremoteaccess.com.
I’ve been testing Dell Remote Access for a few days, at home and on the road, and found that it works well, despite a few glitches and limitations. It’s not revolutionary — many other services and software programs do part or all of what it does, with varying degrees of technical difficulty and at varying fees — but Dell Remote Access combines a wide variety of functions into a fairly simple package. It will be available as a preinstalled option on Dell’s PCs later this year.
Dell also is hoping it will give a boost to sales of its Mini line of very small machines with limited internal storage for files.
For my tests, I installed Dell Remote Access on my home Dell desktop, an XPS One model running Windows Vista. The installation was easy and quick, except for one oddity: To use the new service, you have to uninstall a network diagnostic utility Dell installs on its machines, called Dell Network Assistant. Since I had little or no use for the utility, this was no big loss, but if you rely on it, this conflict could pose a problem.
Next, I used the Remote Access software to select folders I wanted to make remotely accessible. By default, the program assumes you want to share your documents, music and pictures folders, but I added some others. The software tests your network connection to let you know how well it’s likely to work.
I used a variety of remote devices to access this home Dell. These included a Sony Vaio laptop running Vista, a Mac laptop and an Apple iPhone. I even tried accessing the Dell machine from a virtual Windows XP installation running on the Mac.
Some of these tests were conducted from within my home network and others were conducted from across the country.
In general, the tests went well. With the Sony laptop, and within Windows XP running on the Mac, I was able to view photos and slide shows, and stream music and videos, from the Dell in all locations. I opened Microsoft Office files and PDF files remotely and transferred files to the remote machines. I was even able to remotely control the Dell at decent speeds and use the Dell’s built-in camera.
The only annoyance was that every time you want to remotely control the host machine, you must download and install a small utility. You also have to leave on your home computer.
Dell’s system provides more limited functionality if your remote machine is a Mac using Apple’s operating system, or a Linux machine or a mobile phone. With these setups, you can only view, stream or transfer files only from the main host computer. You can’t do remote control or view cameras.
But these limited functions did work pretty well on the Mac and the iPhone, although in some cases I had to first download a song to the Mac before it would play, rather than simply streaming it directly from the Dell.
But Microsoft Word documents stored on the Dell opened right up on the Mac. It was particularly impressive to be able to view a document or photo stored on the Dell from an iPhone thousands of miles away.
Dell Remote Access is a worthy service that’s worth a try.
Find all of Walt Mossberg’s columns and videos online, free, at the All Things Digital Web site, walt.allthingsd.com. Email him at mossberg@wsj.com.
Conservatives agree: Petraeus sounds like a pompous ass when he says Pock-i-stahn.
“When Petraeus says Pock-i-stahn I have an uncontrollable urge to read the New Yorker and find some Chardonnay. Fortunately I have an old copy of NR and a Coors Light to snap me back to reality. Seriously though — no one in flyover country says Pock-i-stahn. It’s annoying.” (The Corner on National Review Online)Whoops, I accidentally wrote "Petraeus" in the above quotes. Please replace with "Obama."“Re Gen. Petraeus’s ostentatiously exotic pronunciation of Pakistan, one thing I like about Sarah Palin is the way she says ‘Eye-raq’.” (The Corner on National Review Online)
“Most overwrought pronunciation of the night: The academic way that Petraeus says ‘Pakistan,’ with a soft ‘a’ - reminscent of a 1980s ‘Saturday Night Live’ sketch in which newscasters over-pronounced ‘Managua, Nicaragua.’” (Philadelphia Daily News)
Conservatives Call Obama’s Correct Pronounciation Of Pakistan ‘Exotic’ And ‘Annoying’
Ron Conway, one of Silicon Valley’s most prolific angel investors (and he was also an early investor in Google), wrote an email yesterday to the CEOs of his portfolio companies. In no uncertain terms he outlines a bleak immediate future, and gives advice to his startups.
It’s the same advice, actually, that he gave in 2000 during the tech meltdown that was then happening in real time. Lower your burn rates to get at least 3 more months out of your current money, and raise money right now if you can. It’s very similar to what Sequoia (and other VCs, I’m sure) are telling their startups.
One thing Ron made clear in a conversation with me today. He’s not worried about the state of innovation in Silicon Valley, and he isn’t going to stop investing. He’s not pessimistic about the future of technology at all. What he is concerned with is protecting the portion of his portfolio companies who don’t currently have a large cash position to weather a storm, and he’s sharing his experience from the last downturn to help them through this one.
The full text of Ron’s email is below, along with similar emails he sent on April 17th 2000 and May 10th 2000.
——— Forwarded message ———-
From: Ron Conway
Date: Tue, Oct 7, 2008 at 12:12 PM
Subject: IMPORTANT PLEASE READ ASAP …..REGARDING CURRENT MARKET CONDITIONS…Confidential
We have all been absorbed by the turmoil in the financial markets the past few weeks
Unlike the turmoil of 2000 when the “action” was centered right here in Silicon Valley this time is it centered on Wall Street…..but it has rippled to the west coast quickly and we will not be “immune” to its drastic effects.
I was an active investor in 2000 when the “bubble burst” and remember it vividly and want to give you the SAME EXACT advice I gave to my portfolio company CEOs back then.
I have pasted in the emails I sent on April 17th 2000 and May 10th 2000 and every word applies today.
Unfortunately history DOES repeat itself but I hope we can learn from history and prevent the turmoil from occurring again.
The message is simple. Raising capital will be much more difficult now.
You should lower your “burn rate” to raise at least 3-6 months or more of funding via cost reductions, even if it means staff reductions and reduced marketing and G&A expenses. This is the equivalent to “raising an internal round” through cost reductions to buy you more time until you need to raise money again; hopefully when fund raising is more feasible. Letting go of staff is hard and often gut wrenching. A re-evaluation of timelines and re-focus on milestones with the eye of doing more with less will allow you to live many more days, and the name of the game in this environment in some
respects is survival–survival until conditions change.
If you are in a funding cycle, you should raise your funding as soon as possible and raise as much as possible but face the fact that if you can’t raise money now you must cut costs.
While I do not own a large percentage of your company I hope you will consider this thoughtful advice.
I was here in 2000 and want to share what I learned through many years of experience and historical “pattern recognition”!
Here are the two emails from the year 2000 that I referred to above and all the statements apply in today’s market:
To: Angel Investors, L.P. Portfolio CEOs
Date: 04/17/2000 05:24 PM
From: Ron Conway
RE: Market Conditions Effect on Angel Investors, L.P. Portfolio
Companies
The down draft in the stock market sends us some obvious “signals” and we can’t help but mention them.
1. If you are in a funding cycle, you should raise your funding as soon as possible and raise as much as possible.
2. Many companies are ignoring certain VC leads we’ve provided in order to concentrate on the top tier only. While we have preached that in the past, this is no longer the case. Currently, top-tier VC
bandwidth constraints, coupled with the market down draft, make it very important to take meetings with any VCs where you can get their attention. We have been working hard to open up this new bandwidth.
3. You must aggressively examine and pursue M&A opportunities (unless you have over 12 months of cash reserves!) ro insure you have critical mass (including funding, customers, rolodex power, market
share, cash, synergy, etc.).
4. Be realistic on valuations - they will fall so be ready and willing to co-operate.
5. Look for corporate partners to invest so you can raise more money. You should also consider a sale of your company to your corporate partners.
6. If you are entering a funding cycle start raising money sooner rather than later.
7. While it’s safe to say entrepreneurs have had negotiating leverage with the “down draft” in the market, the VC community will start exercising their leverage.
—————————————————————————-
—————————————-
To: Angel Investors, L.P. Portfolio CEOs
Date: 05/10/2000 05:23 PM
From: Ron Conway
RE: Market Conditions Effect on Angel Investors, L.P. Portfolio
Companies
I want to “touch base” again; given the continued uncertainty in the capital markets.
As the market turmoil continues, we must underscore the advice that we have provided since mid April and it boils down to just a few points:
1) The capital market window is shut, including IPOs and VC Funding (VCs are looking at their existing portfolio funding needs - not new opportunities). Basically the market is now looking for PtoP (Path to Profitability) instead of BtoC, BtoB, etc! PtoE will prevail price to sales ratios! You must lower your “burn rate” to raise at least 3-6 months more of funding via cost reductions, even if it means selective staff reductions and reduced marketing and G&A expenses. This is the equivalent to ‘raising
an internal round” through cost reductions to buy you more time until you need to raise money again; hopefully when fund raising is more feasible.
2) If you have $10M or less in the bank you must do #1 above plus look at M&A options for your company; especially if your company is BtoC, content, advertising model, community, commerce, and even BtoB. An M&A transaction will allow you to gain critical mass and to get two sets of funding sources and rolodexes working on your behalf. M&A transactions take over 90 days so you need at least that much cash to fund your company. You must attend our M&A day on May 24th at the San Mateo Marriott at 3:00 PM. We will have investment banks there in addition to entrepreneurs who have
successfully accomplished M&A transactions. We will send you details.
We are still developing many new funding sources for our portfolio companies that are in funding cycle.
Crunch Network: CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0
Are you working on a laptop that's as big as most current desktops? Do you get to use a particularly sweet piece of equipment for your job? We want to see the gear you use every day that's issued by your employer. Show us what wired workers are using out there.
Use the Reddit widget below to submit your best Motion photo and vote for your favorite among the other submissions. If we like your photo, we'll include it in a gallery on Wired.com.
The photo must be your own, and by submitting it you are giving us permission to use it on Wired.com and in Wired magazine. Please submit images that are relatively large, the ideal size being 800 to 1200 pixels or larger on the longest side. Please include a description of your photo so that other readers know what they're looking at.
We don't host the photos, so you'll have to upload it somewhere else and submit a link to it. If you're using Flickr, Picasa or another photo-sharing site to host your image, please provide a link to the image directly and not just to the photo page where it's displayed. Using an online photo service that requires that you login will not work. If your photo doesn't show up, it's because the URL you have entered is incorrect. Check it and make sure it ends with the image file name (XXXXXX.jpg).
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There’s no other major item most of us own that is as confusing, unpredictable and unreliable as our personal computers. Everybody has questions about them, and we aim to help.
Here are a few questions about computers I’ve received recently from people like you, and my answers. I have edited and restated the questions a bit, for readability.
I read your recent column about running Windows on a Mac. Is there a way to run the Mac OS X operating system on a PC, like a Dell or a Sony?
Yes, but it is really only for tinkerers and hackers, and even then, it may not work fully or smoothly. Apple makes the process difficult, both technically and legally, because, unlike Microsoft, it is not in the business of selling its operating system for use on other companies’ hardware.
Therefore, I know of no simple software for average consumers that can install OS X on a non-Apple computer without any technical knowledge and with full assurance that the operating system will be completely compatible with the hardware. There is nothing on the market like the products that allow people to run Windows on a Mac.
A small number of techies do install Mac OS X on non-Apple PCs every day, and some people have created software to make this possible for people with plenty of technical knowledge. There is even a company called Efix that is selling a hardware module that it says will make this easier. Its maker warns the product is only for “enthusiasts” and it requires that you attach it to the computer’s internal circuitry. Also, it only works with certain types of personal-computer hardware.
One more thing: Apple takes the position that its licensing terms limit the use of OS X to Apple hardware, so, even if you can pull it off technically, there could be legal jeopardy involved. In fact, Apple is suing a company called Psystar that sells non-Apple PCs with OS X pre-installed.
I have a new PC that came with a 64-bit version of the Windows operating system. It gives me a choice between using a 32-bit Internet Explorer or a 64-bit Internet Explorer. Which should I use?
The 64-bit version of Windows, which is rarely used by average consumers, can make the computer faster, but only when running programs that have been written in special 64-bit versions. In the consumer arena, there are too few such programs, and thus too little benefit, to justify paying extra for 64-bit machines. In fact, most people who have computers running 64-bit Windows are mostly using older 32-bit programs, which run fine, but aren’t made quicker.
So, the 64-bit version of Internet Explorer may run faster. But there is a downside. Because of the relative rarity of 64-bit users, some browser add-ons and toolbars and some of the Web technologies that power the features of Web pages, aren’t compatible with the 64-bit version of IE. On top of that, you may not notice any huge speed difference as the perceived speed of Web browsers depends more on the speed of your Internet connection than anything else. So, for now, I would stick with the 32-bit version, for compatibility’s sake. You can always install the 64-bit version later, if you decide that the Web sites you frequent and the add-ons you use work well with it.
I am running a Mac with Windows XP Pro in Boot Camp, which requires rebooting to change operating systems. Is there some way I can use my already-installed Boot Camp setup as a virtual machine using VMWare Fusion, so I can run my Windows and Mac programs side by side?
Yes, there are two ways. First, Fusion allows you to treat the Boot Camp section of your hard disk, called a “partition” — which is essentially a separate Windows PC stored on your Mac — as if it were a “virtual machine.” This approach still allows you to reboot the entire Mac into Windows when you’d like to do so, in order to perform the few tasks that Fusion can’t handle, such as advanced 3D graphics.
The second approach is to simply import the Boot Camp installation and turn it into a purely virtual Windows computer, as with any virtual Windows machine you would create in Fusion. If that meets your needs, you can then actually remove your original Boot Camp Windows installation, which will likely free up some hard disk space. To do this, just select your Boot Camp partition, which Fusion automatically detects, and click on Import under the File menu.
You can find Mossberg’s Mailbox and my other columns online free at the All Things Digital Web site, http://walt.allthingsd.com.
Write to Walter S. Mossberg at mossberg@wsj.com
Do you care more about superficial gadget upgrades like backlit keypads or can you live with an ugly brick that's simply better?
In this week's Wired Gadget Lab Videoblog, Daniel Dumas and Steven Leckart take on that age-old gadget quandary when they review Motorola's newest candybar phone, the Zn5. Although much prettier than the average Miami beach face, the $500 Zn5 can't stand up to the much older Nokia N95 on features alone, not even with a five megapixel camera.
In addition, Bryan Gardiner joins Daniel for a review of the newest Motorola RAZR, the VE20, which is essentially the same phone as the one from four years ago but a little sleeker. Which means it's definitely worse. Do the de-evolution baby!
If the video below is not working, please click here to view it: Gadget Lab Videoblog: Motorola Serves Up Candybar Phone With Less Filling.
You can also check out all of our previous videos at Wired's channel on YouTube.
This episode of the Gadget Lab Videoblog was created by Annaliza Savage (producer), Henry Young (camera), and Fernando Cardoso (editor).
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
1940 Puja Thermo-Pneumatic Clock
"At the lower left, shielded by a translucent housing, is a carbon rod resistance that heats the colored alcohol in the glass vessel just above it. This causes some of the alcohol to vaporize, the pressure pushing the liquid up the connecting pipe to the vessel at top right. As the latter gets heavier the wheel bearing the four vessels experiences a torque that rewinds a remontoire spring driving a conventional gear train and escapement. This clock has a pendulum-controlled escapement, but models with balance wheel escapements also existed."
You've gotta feel sorry for parents. In the face of a failing economy,
they've got job security to worry about as well as their children -- a growing
number of whom want iPhones, a survey says.
Piper Jaffray's 16th bi-annual survey of teenage buying patterns and preferences found that 22 percent of students surveyed expect to own an iPhone in the next six months. That's a sharp increase from 9 percent of teens who reported plans to purchase the popular handset in spring 2008.
The survey also found that 8 percent of the survey's participants already own iPhones -- up from 6 percent reported in spring.
Also, of students expecting to eventually buy a mobile phone, 33 percent specified an iPhone.
iPhones? Back when I was a teenager it was cool if you had a pager. And teens would flirt with each other by writing in pager code like 7415. 804, 48113 7117735 64817630. 9863125 1113123 9123774 5711910.
Survey: 8% of U.S. teens own an iPhone; 22% want one [CNN Money]
Photo: Apple
THIS internet was serious business, yes I was behind a proxy, only one, if this … ever got to the FBI I was f–ked.”
– Excerpt from a message posted to 4chan.org by someone claiming to have hacked into Gov. Sarah Palin’s Yahoo Mail account
Five years in prison, a $250,000 fine and a three-year term of supervised release. That’s the maximum sentence facing the Tennessee college student who was indicted today on charges that he broke into Gov. Sarah Palin’s private email account last month. According to a statement from the FBI, David C. Kernell–an economics major at the University of Tennessee and the son of Tennessee state legislator Mike Kernell–was indicted by a federal grand jury for “gaining unlawful access to stored communications and obtaining information from a protected computer via interstate communication,” or as the McCain campaign described it, “a shocking invasion of the Governor’s privacy and a violation of the law.”
Kernell entered the not guilty plea at the hearing and was released on bond with the following conditions:
A trial date has been set for Dec. 16.
It will be impossible to evade detection because the digital cameras will cover every entry and exit point and, unlike the earlier speed cameras, will never run out of film.If they are going to get this hardcore about it, you'd think they'd require speed-limiters in cars that would physically prevent them from speeding. Of course they won't do that because that'd obviate the need for those wonderfully-named "penalty processing centres."Drivers who slow down briefly or who make a detour from the main route will still be caught because up to 50 of the cameras will work together in a network. They can be positioned more than 15 miles apart and will automatically read numberplates and transmit data instantly to a penalty processing centre.
Existing average-speed cameras cover a maximum of six miles, work in pairs and have to be connected by a cable, so their installation is costly and time-consuming. Drivers can also escape detection by turning off the route between the cameras.
Naughty America, a porn production company based out of Southern California, is building an Adobe Air-based storefront called Naughty America Direct that is basically an iTunes for porn. The app includes full-length DRM-free scenes for $1.99 each that are available in formats compatible with the iPod and iPhone, and requires no subscription. To grab an invite to the app’s ongoing private beta, go here and enter the code “techcrunch”. As if there was any doubt, this is all NSFW.
Users of Apple’s iTunes store will be right at home with Naughty America Direct. Featured movies are shown as thumbnails on the front page, and users can navigate with a sidebar on the left side of the screen to access clips by their favorite performers or from their favorite website. Content is drawn from Naughty America’s collection of footage across sites like “Naughty Bookworms”, “Diary of a Nanny”, and “Seduced by a Cougar”.
Naughty America Express doesn’t have the recurring fees of a subscription, and while it may cost a couple of dollars, it isn’t riddled with the advertisements and popups that plague free sites (or so I’m told).
Because the app is built on Air, it will work on both Windows and Mac. Naughty America also notes that this is one of (if not the first) applications on Adobe’s Air platform that allows of secure credit card transactions. For an alternative method of getting your porn fix, check out Heatseek, a porn-centric browser which we covered back in 2006.
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The new season of South Park debuts tonight on Comedy Central, with a timely episode about America's fears that China will pwn us. A BB pal who's seen a few clips says it's sick; perhaps as gamechanging-ly great as Imaginationland. And as reported previously on Boing Boing, the show's new website offers fans the ability to view episodes in entirety online. You can also buy them in iTunes.
What hasn't been announced yet is this: The South Park guys have cooked up a killer iPhone application. It's not yet available in the iTunes App Store, but I visited the South Park headquarters recently for a sneak peek with Matt Stone (iPhone snapshot above) and the South Park digital team.
Full-size screengrabs follow after the jump.
The app functioned beautifully, with the ability to stream clips, grab wallpapers for your device, read news, and browse the complete episode index. Also: choose character likenesses as "contact images" for your iPhone -- assign a face to the phone book entry of your choice. An incoming call from best friend displays Kyle or Cartman; your weed dealer medical marijuana dispensary is Towelie, and so on.
Some statsporn I gathered:
* The South Park website has had 134 million hits since launch in March. On an average day, the site receives 600,000 - 700,000 hits.
* When a new episode goes online, the website receives one to one and a half million hits in a day.
* There are nearly 300,000 registered users.
* 55 million full shows have been streamed since launch, the most-viewed episode being "Major Boobage" viewed 1.5 million times. The least viewed episode is "Mr. Hankey's Christmas Classics," at 94 thousand views, which I believe to be a crime against all that is good in the world because Mr. Hankey is awesome.
Other newly-launched goodies online that fans may enjoy:
* The Cult of CartmanSpeaking of games, there's unannounced news in the works on that front, too. More here on the blog, as soon as we can. Click onward for more iPhone app preview images. Release this thing already!
* Major Boobage Behind the Scenes
* Super Fun Time: Six Days to South Park
* And the South Park games page.
SOUTH PARK IPHONE APP: sneak peek screenshots
A footnote for gaming fans and ad biz followers: the first two episodes of the new season on Comedy Central feature 2-minute-long Ubisoft ads for the Shaun White Snowboarding, Prince of Persia and Farcry 2 titles. The idea is to show in-game footage for the new snowboarding game, rather than running "30 second spots that piss people off," according to a Ubisoft spokesperson (Adweek article).
(Special thanks to Matt Stone, and Todd Benson, Christopher Brion, and Mitch Halpin for the South Park Digital Studios tech tour; and to Jolon Bankey.)
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Boing Boing tv's global coffee correspondent Kyle Glanville is looking for the perfect bean, and you're invited along for the ride. You may recall his earlier appearances on the show when the 2008 US World Barista Champion introduced us to coffee roasting and espresso brewing at Intelligentsia.
Today, we debut a series of episode featuring Kyle on a world coffee tour, and we join him as he visits plantations to learn about the growing, harvesting, and processing techniques of Intelligentsia suppliers around the globe.
In this first episode, Kyle visits the Fazenda Conquista plantation in Minas Gerais, Brazil where Ipanema Coffees grows, dries, and roasts their goods, with lots of weird agro-gadgets and machines you probably haven't seen before -- some low-tech, some high-tech, but all really cool to watch. This plantation is one of the largest in Brazil, with 12 million coffee plants spread out over about 25 square miles of varying terrain.
One of the most fun things about producing BBtv is working with people like Kyle, who share their expertise and life experiences with us in video through their own eyes. I learned so much watching this first installment with the BBtv team -- I especially loved the giant machines that look like AT-AT walkers, lumbering through the neatly trimmed rows of coffee plants. Also, for someone who drinks as much espresso as I do -- how did I never know that coffee beans are surrounded by an edible, sweet fruit, that when dried intact with the bean, make the flavor richer?
Oh, and you have to check out the aerial tour of the plantation, which you can do in Google Maps or Google Earth: Link to Fazenda Conquista / Ipanema Coffees .kmz.
Get ready for more of these java adventures with Kyle -- we're working on more, as he wanders the planet, looking for the perfect bean.
Previous BBtv episodes featuring Kyle Glanville's Coffee explorations:
* A Morning at Intelligentsia Coffee Part 2
* A Morning at Intelligentsia Part 1
Link to Boing Boing tv blog post with downloadable video and daily podcast subscription instructions.
My friends, during last night's presidential debate, McCain took That One to task for approving funding for an "overhead projector." Howard Covitz, who used to work at Chicago's Adler Planetarium, prepared this helpful graphic for McCain to show the difference between an overhead projector and a planetarium projector.
Note to McCain: Overhead projector is not a planetarium projector
Stunned senators pressed Sheridan to apologize to the activists for the spying, assailed in an independent review last week as "overreaching" by law enforcement officials who were oblivious to their violation of the activists' rights of free expression and association. The letter, obtained by The Washington Post, does not apologize but admits that the state police have "no evidence whatsoever of any involvement in violent crime" by those classified as terrorists.Md. Police Put Activists' Names On Terror Lists (via /.)Hutchins told the committee it was not accurate to describe the program as spying. "I doubt anyone who has used that term has ever met a spy," he told the committee.
"What John Walker did is spying," Hutchins said, referring to John Walker Jr., a communications specialist for the U.S. Navy convicted of selling secrets to the Soviet Union. Hutchins said the intelligence agents, whose logs were obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union of Maryland as part of a lawsuit, were monitoring "open public meetings." His officers sought a "situational awareness" of the potential for disruption as death penalty opponents prepared to protest the executions of two men on death row, Hutchins said.
"I don't believe the First Amendment is any guarantee to those who wish to disrupt the government," he said. Hutchins said he did not notify Ehrlich about the surveillance. Ehrlich spokesman Henry Fawell said the governor had no comment.
Best Buy is trying out a rather clever marketing trick. The retailer announced a new line of consumer electronics products called Blue Label that it claims will be specially created based on customer feedback.
First up will be laptops, one each from HP and Toshiba.
Best Buy says it found customers want "longer battery life, a thin and lightweight design, an illuminated keyboard, more optimal screen size and superior warranty support"— something that shouldn't come as a surprise to any PC user.
The better warranty support though seems a tad suspect considering Best Buy peddles a 'product replacement plan' that it pushes to electronics buyers during the checkout process.
Best Buy's Toshiba laptop is a 14.1-inch screen device, 1.2 inches thin and weigh 4.99 lbs. It offers about 5.5 hours of battery life and retails for $1199.
The HP model has a 13.3 inch screen size, be 1.14 inches thin and offers up to 4 hours of battery life. It weighs 4.6 lbs and also costs $1199.
Both the laptops will come with two-year warranty at no extra charge, said Best Buy. They will also get 30 days of support from Best Buy's Geek Squad.
Best Buy hasn't said how it is gathering its customer feedback or how that is being incorporated into the products for the label.
Even if those details are hazy, given enough advertising, the idea should work well enough to get customers to the store to check it out.
Photo: Best Buy, Toronto (Ian Muttoo/Flickr)
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
The advertisement on Google, which pops up on a search for “Goog” (Google’s Nasdaq symbol): “Before you jump out of that window, why not spend your last remaining dollars at Woot?” An alternative version: “Losing your House? Without that mortgage to pay, now you can buy more of our junk!”
Offensive, or offensively funny? It probably depends on whether you are one of the people who’ve lost it all on Google’s stock recently. And really it doesn’t matter, because it’s going to send a lot of people to Woot’s popular ecommerce site, which lists a different item every day at a discounted price. And when they run out of that item, you have to wait until the next day for something new.
Thanks to SlackerAtWork for the tip.
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Sazell, the startup that launched last July with widgets that let you “snap the web”, has launched a new version of its site that includes a badly needed new logo and UI overhaul - the previous iteration was a bad rip-off of Google’s logo, and looked as if it would have been outdated in 2003. The site is still in private beta, but you can try it out by going here and entering the code “techcrunch”.
Along with the new UI, Sazell has introduced a number of significant improvements to its widgets. Sazell allows users to use a Google Toolbar plugin or bookmarklet to select a portion of a website (including images) for embedding on blogs and sharing with friends. When they were first introduced, they were totally static - they were little more than embellished links without any interactivity. The new widgets include functionality that allow users to leave comments, vote on polls, and post to social networks like Facebook. Sazell is also introducing a new feature called “AutoSnap” that lets publishers include a single snippet of code in their webpages that will automatically generate a Sazell widget for each new post.
Other sites in the web clipping space include Diigo and SimplyBox, which we covered earlier this week.
Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
How far would you go to get cheap gas?
GPS navigation systems maker TomTom is betting gas guzzlers are hungry enough to pay $20 a year to get information about gas stations nearby with the lowest fuel prices.
With the cheapest gas hovering around $3.05 a gallon, TomTom has launched a Fuel Price subscription service that lets customers load and access one year of daily fuel price updates to their devices and can then navigate to it easily using their GPS system
"TomTom is the first portable GPS company to sell this type of service at retail," said Tom Murray, vice president of Market Development for TomTom in a statement.
Users can select from their device whether to list gas stations by location or price, and can request the lowest gas prices on their route, nearby or within a selected radius, says TomTom. The system also allows for gas to be tracked based on grade—regular, mid-grade, premium or diesel.
Though the service was announced earlier this year, it has only been available through the company website. Now, TomTom has tied up with retail stores to increase the distribution betting on the fact that consumers are willing to go the extra mile to get more from their cars.
For the fuel price service, TomTom has partnered with Oil Price Information Service (OPIS) which offers petroleum pricing and news information. OPIS accumulates and analyzes anonymous data from over 120,000 gas stations and makes this data available to TomTom customers, said TomTom.
As the economy weakens and gas prices remain high, the fuel price service seems like a neat idea but $20 every year for the information seems pricey.
Are there any similar web-based free services out there? Let us know.
Photo: Screenshot of TomTom's Fuel Price Service/ TomTom
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
We’ve had serious legal threats five times in the past, from YouTube, Marvel, Rivals, Mediascrape and my personal favorite, Richard Figueroa. None of those threats went to court because all of them were absurd, and we don’t back down under any circumstances (unless we’re in the wrong, which we never were).
But today, based on the calls I’ve received from CNET and the San Jose Mercury News, we’ve actually been sued. Earthcomber, the holder of a very shaky mobile patent, first sued Loopt last week, and yesterday added us in an amended complaint. They didn’t even bother with making nasty threats before they filed the complaint. They just sent it into the court and started making calls to the press.
I called Earthcomber President Jim Brady this morning to verify the lawsuit. At first he wouldn’t answer - all he did was try to explain how he’s been wronged by Loopt. When pressed he did confirm that the lawsuit was filed, but quickly added that he didn’t really mean to press it with us. He wants to go to court with Loopt, but is willing to quickly work something out with us to make this go away, he told me, hinting that he’d like to partner with us. He also said he’s been desperately trying to get me on the phone but hasn’t been able to, so he decided to sue us instead.
The problem with using a lawsuit as a negotiating tactic is that you can’t put the cat back in the bag. The door is open, and it has to play out. In other words, suing someone to get them to return your calls is not exactly a sign of brilliance.
I’m not going to go into a lot of detail on the specifics of the patent claims, other than that they are absurd, since our lawyers have asked me not to. But I will say this - adding TechCrunch to a lawsuit based on the fact that we are a search filter (see image to left) in a product seems a little absurd to me. I’ve asked our attorneys to spend whatever it takes to kill this lawsuit, and to find a way to counter sue this guy into the stone age.
Did Earthcomber also sue iMeem, RockTheVote and NRDC, the other filtered search options? No. Because that doesn’t get them all this free press.
We will not be bullied, and people who file frivolous lawsuits need to be put down. I would rather run TechCrunch into the ground and go out of business than let this guy win.
TechCrunch Lawsuit - Get more Business Documents
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Our co-editor Erick Schonfeld had the chance yesterday to discuss the significance of MySpace Music and free, ad-supported music in general on WYNC’s Soundcheck, a program produced daily by New York Public Radio.
He was joined by Farhad Manjoo, a columnist for Slate, who took issue in particular with MySpace Music’s user interface. Erick argued that, regardless of its execution, the service represents a step in the right direction and marks an important shift toward ad-supported streaming. The music industries are watching this experiment, and if it turns out well, they will likely extend the free streaming model to other services.
Erick elaborates on how music is information and, as such, wants to be free. But that doesn’t mean there won’t be other ways to make money on it. The music streams may turn into marketing for digital downloads and higher-margin goods such as ringtones, concert tickets, T-shirts, and more. In the end, Manjoo pretty much agreed with Erick’s sentiments.
Listen below.
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It's been a rough couple of decades for Knight Rider fans. In 1982 the show's co-star, an AI-enhanced Trans AM named KITT, stole our nerdy hearts. Seven years after the series ended, everyone's favorite talking car started a downward spiral...by moonlighting as a high school teacher. And don't even get us started on the stinking zombie resurrection that is Knight Rider 2008.
It'd be great to hearken back to the glory days of '82 — '86. Thanks to Mio, fans of the Reagan era television series can rehash this magic with the Knight Rider GPS unit. This svelte handheld doesn't just mimic the physical style of KITT's trademark dash console. It also provides turn-by-turn directions in KITT's original voice (aka William Daniels).
...and, yes. It greets you as "Michael" (with synchronized flashing LEDs!) when you boot it up.
Unfortunately, that's where most of the fun ends. Sure, hearing KITT smoothly tell me to "turn left in 300 feet" produced all the expected geekgasms. But they subsided when I realized actual streets names were nixed from the voice prompts. Another foible was the unit's POI system. As a whole, the Knight Rider GPS borrows its user interface from Mio's Moov units. This turned out to be great for simplicity and ease, but it also meant the interface's crippled POI search functions were along for the ride.
These were relatively small gripes considering the unit's quick 'cold' acquisitions and consistently reliable routing (via Tele Atlas). But let's face it — this is a pricey vanity gadget, not a groundbreaking piece of Knight Foundation tech. So, here's the bottom line: if a love for KITT (or a perverse William Daniels fetish) ranks higher than cutting edge features, this is your ride. Otherwise, one of Mio's (cheaper) Moov units make for a more sensible choice. Well at least far more sensible than watching the re-booted TV series. Sorry, Val Kilmer! —Terrence Russell
WIRED "OMFG — KITT just asked me where I wanted to go!" Acquires reliably and routes quickly form a cold start. Slim, light, and stylistically accurate form factor. 4.3-inch touchscreen is both bright and responsive. Amusing (but distracting) voice activated LEDs can be disabled. Sports over 300 recorded names for the 'non-Michaels' of the world.
TIRED Essentially a pricey Knight Rider paintjob on a cheaper device. Only traffic capable through additional accessory and subscription. Included car charger, wall charger, and dash mount look/feel ridiculously cheap. Advanced POI functions (i.e., searches around eventual destinations) are AWOL. Lacks voice recognition capability (unlike its source inspiration).
$270, knightridergps.com
(Photo by Mio)
Somewhere north of the Canadian border, a Bell PR flack just woke up, logged in, and smacked their foreheads. “Oh, man. We were supposed to announce the Storm at Midnight, not noon? Gah!”
A half day behind everyone else, Bell has announced that they will be bringing the Storm to the land of poutine and Celine Dion. With both Bell and Telus now serving up the Storm in Canada, will Rogers hop on the touchscreen BlackBerry party bus, or will they keep all their bets on the iPhone?
[Via CrackBerry]
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Sans fanfare or any sort of press release, the Q11 has made a low-key debut on the Motorola site.
As I said when live shots of the handset leaked a few weeks back, the Q11 doesn’t seem to be a step in the right direction on the visual front. Even in the promo shots, the D-pad and the beveled buttons which surround it look rather cheap.
Fortunately, the price tag should fit the looks - according to the product page, the Q11 will be set at an “affordable price” when it hits the racks come December. Though they’ve added WiFi (b/g), a megapixel to the camera, and a few other little perks to the package, the Q11 still lacks 3G. With just about every other business-minded phone coming to the market with 3G support, the price better be mighty affordable.
Full specs after the jump.
Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.
Though we’ve seen the Google Maps for Android compass feature or time or two since Android was announced, all of the videos we’ve seen so far have been gleaned from a projected image during a presentation, or otherwise not meant for the viewers at home.
Looking to remedy this, Google has published a blog post specifically focused on the Android Maps application, with an emphasis on Street View mode and the compass.
Key points from the text of the blog post:
The compass is definitely something Google should play up as much as they can. It’s not a mind-boggling, competition-destroying feature by any means - but it’s novel. It’s a neat trick that you can show to friends which they would understand with little to no explanation or technical background, and it’s just enough to make them go “Hey! That’s pretty cool!” For the non-techies and the brand/platform-apathetic, these little things can make the sale.
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So you’ve dipped your feet into iPhone and Android development, but aren’t really feeling either platform? Got an idea you think a carrier or two would pick up for the BlackBerry Application Center? Time to get crackin’.
Now that the Storm is on its way to the starting block, RIM has released the development tools needed to get an application up and running on the handset. To make the dev process a little less tedious (and, I’d imagine, to give wary techies a bit of a trial run), they’ve also released an emulator for the device. Check out the BlackBerry Dev Program for more info.
[Via Phonescoop]
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