|
|
|
|
Jon Stewart Exposes CNN's Texting and Driving SillinessThe Daily Show With Jon StewartMon - Thurs 11p / 10cCNN Warns Against Texting While Drivingwww.thedailyshow.comDaily Show Full EpisodesPolitical HumorRon Paul Interview The Daily Show about CNN's report...Source: RSS feed - channel BNBlogTech | 3 Oct 2009 | 4:50 am Wind-up mobile targets developing regionsSpencer Kelly on the BBC looks at a mobile phone with an integrated wind-up charger which could be useful for people without access to a power supply. Wind-up chargers which plug in to an electronic...Source: RSS feed - channel BNBlogTech | 3 Oct 2009 | 4:23 am 4,130 cell phones confiscated in US prisons in 2009Inmates and cell phones, an ongoing problem. According to The Los Angeles Times, prison officials confiscated 4,130 this year, more than in the previous three years combined.Source: RSS feed - channel BNBlogTech | 3 Oct 2009 | 3:40 am “Compatible With Windows 7″ logo program forces 64-bit readiness - Icrontic
Source: Sci/Tech - Google News | 3 Oct 2009 | 3:26 am App Store Anonymous (cartoon)[[intomobile via Geek Culture]Source: RSS feed - channel BNBlogTech | 3 Oct 2009 | 3:22 am Breakfast Pendants - The Fried Egg Nacklace is Strangely Intriguing (GALLERY)(TrendHunter.com) Necklaces are an integral part of one's fashion statement, they make or break your outfit. What better to add to your outfit then a Fried Egg Necklace, something that lets everyone...Source: RSS feed - channel BNBlogTech | 3 Oct 2009 | 3:19 am Legal Code In a Version Control System?coldmist writes "Sen. Thomas Carper (D-Del.) is on the Senate Finance Committee, which just finished work on the health care bill. The committee recently rejected an amendment which would have required them to post the legislation for public viewing for 72 hours before it went to final vote. Several senators felt that the actual legal code would be too cryptic and complicated to be useful. Carper himself said, 'I don't expect to actually read the legislative language because reading the legislative language is among the more confusing things I've ever read in my life.' So, why don't they put it in SVN (or some similar version control system) where people can tkdiff the changes (i.e. new legislation is in a branch) or output a patchset? If a bill is passed, it's merged into the trunk. It just seems so logical to me, yet I can't find any mention of doing this on the web. What do you think?"Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Gizmodo | 3 Oct 2009 | 1:52 am CrunchGear Week in Review: Surfer’s Surprise Edition
Here are some stories you might have missed this week. LED lightbulb puts out equivalent of 60 watt bulb, uses only 6 watts
Source: CrunchGear | 3 Oct 2009 | 1:00 am PSP Go Debuts, DisappointsSony has now officially launched the new version of their portable game console, the PSP Go, and the Opposable Thumbs blog took it for a spin to see how they liked it. Their impressions of the new hardware are almost entirely negative, despite being fans of the original PSP. One major point of contention was Sony's removal of the UMD drive in this revision, making it so you need to access the PlayStation Store to buy games. This kills price competition and used game sales in one fell swoop, while also making owners of any original PSP games unable to play them on the new hardware. The review says the new device looks sleek, but the dimensions make it somewhat cramped and awkward to use unless you have small hands. They also decry the switch to proprietary cables, and sum up their opinion by saying, "When your older, cheaper hardware is better and more able than your new offering, you need to fire some designers."Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Gizmodo | 2 Oct 2009 | 10:30 pm The Pirate Bay Sails To a New Homethe monolith writes "Back in August, the company supplying bandwidth to The Pirate Bay was forced to disconnect them. Quoting TorrentFreak: '"It took just 20 minutes before the Hollywood companies telephoned the new host who took over operation of The Pirate Bay," commented Patrik from the ISP which had been indirectly supplying bandwidth to TPB. Despite initially putting on a brave face and standing strong, Patrik's company continued to feel the heat. It is not a large outfit and doesn't have the resources to fight the entertainment industry and its threats. Last night, Patrik could hold off no longer after receiving mounting threats from the entertainment industries, which culminated in threats of a court summons. Having come this far, there is little doubt that IFPI and the MPAA would litigate if necessary. ... On the heels of several rumors today, Patrik said he could confirm news of the move, saying that he believes The Pirate Bay is now hosted in Ukraine.'"Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Gizmodo | 2 Oct 2009 | 9:20 pm IBM email challenges Google in the 'cloud'
|
 IGN | RIM Releases Official BlackBerry Desktop Software for Mac PC World Prior to this application, Mac BlackBerry owners had to rely on third-party software such as Mark/Space's The Missing Sync for BlackBerry, or PocketMac for BlackBerry, which RIM had included along with its handsets. BlackBerry Desktop Manager for Mac ... BlackBerry Desktop Manager for Mac: Hands-on BlackBerry Desktop Manager for Mac, Hands On BlackBerry Software for Mac Expected Oct. 2 |
 Straits Times | Our Kinder, Gentler Ancestors Wall Street Journal The behavior of our ape relatives, known as peaceful vegetarians, once bolstered the view that our actions could not be traced to an impulse to dominate. But in the late 1970s, when chimpanzees were discovered to hunt monkeys and kill ... Ardi's Secret: Did Early Humans Start Walking for Sex? Oldest pre-human revealed Fossils radically alter ideas about the look of man's earliest ... |
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
AFP - Legendary rifle maker Remington Arms Company said Friday it has teamed with videogame maker Mastiff to put virtual versions of its guns in a hunting title tailored for Wii consoles.
Reuters - Electronic readers could be the hottest gift this holiday season as a new crop of portable media devices begins to join iPods and other music players as must-have tech accessories.
By Tiernan Ray, Blogger, Barron’s, Tech Trader Daily
The solar technology industry may report a stronger-than-expected third quarter but could face disappointment in subsequent quarters, warns Hapoalim Securities analyst Gordon Johnson in a note to clients today. Johnson says that his checks suggest demand for photovoltaic modules in Germany has been better than expected, raising the prospect that solar tech makers could demonstrate better sales growth and margins than expiated when they report the September quarter.
The longer term quality of the industry’s growth may be questionable, however. When growth slows for industries, notes Johnson, the participants often resort to what he calls financial chicanery to hide the slowdown, and that’s what he expects from solar tech companies.
Read the rest of this post on the original site
If you've been dealing with a non-jailbroken 3GS running 3.1, now's your chance to redeem it. The Dev-Team has upgraded PwnageTool to allow the 3GS (and the newest iPod touch) to be busted wide open, provided it was previously pwned in 3.0 or 3.0.1. So if your iPhone had 3.1 out of the box, you're still out of luck.
If you’ve been dealing with a non-jailbroken 3GS running 3.1, now’s your chance to redeem it. The Dev-Team has upgraded PwnageTool to allow the 3GS (and the newest iPod touch) to be busted wide open, provided it was previously pwned in 3.0 or 3.0.1. So if your iPhone had 3.1 out of the box, you’re still out of luck.
That is all.
Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.
Fiddler, composer, singer, music teacher and lovely human being Amy Farris has passed away. I first learned of her work in the context of performances in various lineups with former members of the great punk band X, and their country offshoot band The Knitters: namely Exene Cervenka, and with Dave Alvin, with whom Ms. Farris played in the video clip embedded above (Dave Alvin & Guilty Women / "Abilene"). The Texas native died in Los Angeles on Wednesday of an apparent suicide. More at the LA Times.
Source: Boing Boing | 2 Oct 2009 | 5:25 pm
Owners of the new iPhone 3GS can now jailbreak the latest iPhone operating system (3.1) thanks to the hardworking hackers known as Dev Team. One caveat: If you didn’t jailbreak the iPhone when it was running iPhone OS 3.0 or iPhone OS 3.0.1, you can’t directly jailbreak iPhone OS 3.1.
Confusing with all the numbers, isn’t it? Allow me to rephrase: If you own the latest, third-generation iPhone and wish to jailbreak it to run unauthorized apps, you have to have jailbroken it when running an earlier version of the OS (iPhone OS 3.0 or iPhone OS 3.0.1). If your iPhone 3GS hasn’t already been tainted with a jailbreak before, this new jailbreak solution won’t work. More details at the Dev Team blog.
See Also:
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
PSP what? Nobody cares about that old thing. Honestly, do you want to carry around yet another heavy, fragile, state-of-the-art toy? No. What you need (what this country needs) is a cheap little handheld Genesis sporting 20 of the system’s greatest semi-hits. No need to worry about managed copies, DRM, firmware updates, or UMD transfer — just hit the power button and you’ll be playing Altered Beast or Sonic & Knuckles before you can say “Segaaaa!”
It’s a fully-licensed little device, meaning you won’t be playing Revenge of Shinogi or Ecco the Porpoise. These are the real games. The device itself is about as cheaply made as you’d expect for $50, but it runs everything perfectly well and the controls are comfortable and responsive. The screen is bright and sharp, though it appears to have a sort of interlacing effect. Sound is loud and clear with little distortion (and no bass). It comes with an AV cable as well, which, combined with a pocket projector like the MPro 120, means you’ve got a big screen Genesis in your bag wherever you go, provided it’s dark enough. I can’t speak to battery life, but I suspect it’s pretty good, considering how little the hardware needs to do. It takes AAAs.
My system came with a flaw in part of the screen’s covering, but it’s not very noticeable during gameplay. And since mine is a free review unit anyway, I’m not going to buck — I’m sure they’d replace yours in a snap if it had an issue like this.
The question, though, is whether you want to lock yourself into the games and system provided here, or pay another $50 and pick up something like a Dingoo? It’s up to you, but the simplicity of this little system is a selling point as well as a weakness — and in its limitations, it doesn’t attempt anything it can’t do, as the Dingoo does (its Neo-Geo and SNES performance is spotty).
I suppose what it comes down to is what games are on it. After all, it could be the best gadget in the world yet if it didn’t have decent games, why would anyone want it? Here’s the full list:
Sonic & Knuckles
Alex Kidd in the Enchanted Castle
Gain Ground
Arrow Flash
Shinobi III: Return of the Ninja
Ecco Jr.
Golden Axe
Crack Down
Altered Beast
Flicky
Decap Attack
Cyper Police ESWAT
Alien Storm
Shadow Dancer
Columns III
Sonic Spinball
Jewel Master
Kid Chameleon
Dr. Robotnik’s Mean Bean Machine
Ecco
So. Some classics, some garbage. It’s to be expected. Anyway, this little thing is a great little time-waster, perfect for subway rides, waiting in lines, and so on. It’s a gadget, it’s awesome, what else do you need to know?
They’re around, but Buy.com has free shipping.
Hurrah! What wonderful news!
IT Crowd and Peep Show get new series orders
Among the toughest questions posed to the Chicago bid team this week in Copenhagen was one that raised the issue of what kind of welcome foreigners would get from airport officials when they arrived in this country to attend the Games. Syed Shahid Ali, an I.O.C. member from Pakistan, in the question-and-answer session following Chicago's official presentation, pointed out that entering the United States can be "a rather harrowing experience..."Chicago's Loss: Is Passport Control to Blame?"It's clear the United States still has a lot of work to do to restore its place as a premier travel destination," Roger Dow, U.S. Travel's president, said in the statement released today. "When IOC members are commenting to our President that foreign visitors find traveling to the United States a 'pretty harrowing experience,' we need to take seriously the challenge of reforming our entry process to ensure there is a welcome mat to our friends around the world, even as we ensure a secure system."
The trippy video above featuring the song "Worm Mountain" by the Flaming Lips (feat. MGMT) was created by a DIY electro-gadget maker named darcyklyne. BB pal Tom Osborn (who works at the Lips' label, Warner Bros. Records, when he's not reading our blog) pointed us to the video and adds,
Here's a forum thread talking about how this person built the Tesla Coil. They ended up being a new fan that found out about The Flaming Lips from The Colbert Report and were somehow inspired to make the following video with their newly created Tesla Coil.
Richard Metzger blogs, "I can't wait to see the surreal new British comedy Bunny and the Bull, from Mighty Boosh director Paul King. Although it keeps getting referred to as "The Mighty Boosh movie" (and looks quite Booshian) it's not, the Mighty Boosh just happen to be in it." Video over at Dangerous Minds.
Previously:
We can all empathize with Michael Bolton in Office Space when he beat the toner out of Initech’s problematic printer. But we can’t level with this incredibly stupid Cincinnati resident Daniel Goodrich, who told an Apple Store employee at Kenwood Towne Centre he was so mad at his iPhone he could “pop a 9mm at it.” He allegedly went on to open the right side of his shirt, revealing that he did, in fact, possess a black, 9mm handgun.
That’s when the Apple retail employee got her manager to call the police. Goodrich was charged with aggravated menacing and causing fear of harm to an Apple employee, according to WCPO. See the video below for the whole story.
Via Gizmodo
See Also:
Photo: respres/Flickr
Oh man, I thought those compact florescent lightbulbs (CFLs) were expensive at around five bucks a pop. Say hello to the $40 LED light bulb — and that’s an introductory price. It’ll apparently cost $50 later.
So what’s the big deal? Well, the bulb only consumes six watts of power and puts out light equivalent to a standard 60-watt bulb. Also, unlike standard light bulbs, this one’s got an estimated working life of 25 years. Imagine moving into a new house or apartment and bringing the lightbulbs over from your old place.
The lightbulb is made by Lemnis Lighting and will soon be available at Amazon — there are 40-watt versions currently available. According to the company, you’ll realize a return on your investment in power savings within three years.
[via CNET]
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
By Nitrozac and Snaggy
It’s looking more and more likely that Apple is planning a fall refresh of its iMac line. Last week, we heard rumors that some new all-in-one, dual-core desktops were already rolling off the assembly lines of Apple’s manufacturing partners. Now Engadget has spotted Federal Communications Commission filings that confirm the existence of the new wireless mouse and keyboard that might be paired with them.
Neither filing provides much detail about either device beyond model number, though the keyboard described in one does appear to be smaller than the current model. That said, AppleInsider speculates that the mouse Apple (AAPL) is evidently working on will be significantly mightier than the current Mighty Mouse, scrapping the device’s rollerball in favor of a touch-sensitive housing and perhaps even an aluminum finish.
[IImage Credits: Engadget and MacBlogz]
This is a crazy fun demo of the new Avatar toys by Mattel. Each toy includes a little card that is scannable via webcam and creates an on-screen augmented reality robot or character. While this is old hat for most of us, Mattel is quite proud of being ahead of the curve and for good reason. You can see more demos at AvatarItag.com.
Total Immersion made the technology and even added a little “button” system to the cards. When you touch a spot on the card, the onscreen character pulls a knife, shoots a gun, or recounts part of the story. The added information and data will change over time, up to the release of the movie on December 18.
Obviously this requires a computer and a patient kid but it’s still an exciting addition to an already interesting movie.
We’ll have some of these toys in next week and we’ll stage mock battles for you all. Wouldn’t it be cool if you could put two cards on the table at once and have them fight? OMG!
Crunch Network: CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0
A year from now, or maybe two, when Sony has actually figured out what it’s doing with its online store, managed copies, and other details, the PSP Go might just be a good buy. Of course, they will have to lower the price by a hundred dollars, and I don’t think 16GB is going to cut it for long, and they’ll want to upgrade the wireless hardware too. But once those things are done… oh, who am I kidding? They’ll come out with the Go Plus and charge $300 for it.
We’ve been skeptical of the PSP Go since before it was announced, and now that skepticism has flowered into a righteous contempt. Everyone’s trashing the system, from its micro-sized controls to its slow wireless. Its saving graces (nice screen, more portable, great new save feature) are afterthoughts when compared with Sony’s thoughtlessness when it comes to actually getting and playing games on the thing. Not to mention the $50 premium, which won’t exactly entice new gamers.
While the PS3 Slim was a pleasant surprise in Sony’s increasingly baffling strategy in the gaming sector, the PSP Go is a dog. It’d be in the dustbin already if it weren’t Sony’s probable intention to make it the only handheld they make and move their PSP system entirely online. An interesting idea, but the PSP Go is a mighty poor start.
"Nollywood Omen" (Thanks, Vann Hall!)
In the first scene of 666, the devil sends two assassins up to earth to kidnap a pregnant woman. They cut her belly open in a tunnel and steal the baby, whom they baptize in the service of Satan. Throughout the movie, Satan terrorizes the people of Nigeria despite the efforts of Pastor Okonkwo (yes, he also stars in the film). Okonkwo often sends lightning bolts down to hell by the power of extreme prayer.
In part two of the quartet, the kidnapped child returns to earth and causes all manner of problems. He seduces a woman in her late 20s by flashing lasers out of his eyes; he goes on a bar crawl and possesses a woman who then kills a priest. Then, when a gang of Christians capture him and attempt to ritually stab him to death, he uses his powers to brand each of their foreheads with a lovely 666.
This is a crazy fun demo of the new Avatar toys by Mattel. Each toy includes a little card that is scannable via webcam and creates an on-screen augmented reality robot or character. While this is old hat for most of us, Mattel is quite proud of being ahead of the curve and for good reason. You can see more demos at AvatarItag.com.
Total Immersion made the technology and even added a little “button” system to the cards. When you touch a spot on the card, the onscreen character pulls a knife, shoots a gun, or recounts part of the story. The added information and data will change over time, up to the release of the movie on December 18.
Obviously this requires a computer and a patient kid but it’s still an exciting addition to an already interesting movie.
We’ll have some of these toys in next week and we’ll stage mock battles for you all. Wouldn’t it be cool if you could put two cards on the table at once and have them fight? OMG!
 Product Reviews (blog) | Analysts to Apple: Dump Exclusivity, Double iPhone Sales PC World If you think America's iPhone frenzy is at an all-time high now, just you wait. Apple could more than double its US iPhone user base by saying so-long to carrier exclusivity -- at least, according to predictions made by a Morgan Stanley analyst this ... Apple's iPhone May Be Better Off Without AT&T Analysts see iPhone sales growing, driving profit Dumping exclusivity could double iPhone sales |
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
 New Zealand Herald | Ig Nobel winners: Knuckle cracking to panda poo CNET News Have you ever worried that knuckle cracking will give you arthritis or wondered why pregnant women don't tip over? Me too. Research into those topics--as well as studies finding that diamonds could be created from tequila and giant ... Gas-Mask Bra, Tequila Diamonds Among 2009 Ig Nobels Gas mask bra traps Ig Nobel prize Ig Nobel awards go to knuckle-cracker, tequila chemists, other ... |
When is an update not an update? Today we learned that Eminem has reached a settlement with Apple over what he claims was the unauthorized use of his songs. Eminem said the record label has the right to the recordings, but not the right to turn around and sell said recordings to Apple.
What we don’t know, however, is any of the terms of the deal. How much did Apple have to cough up? Did Eminem and the record label have to pay for each other’s attorney fees? Nobody’s saying anything!
So, again, when is an update not an update?
I don’t know about you, but I can now rest easy knowing that, presumably, Eminem is a little bit richer today.
AP - Years ago, Comcast Corp. CEO Brian Roberts was asked at a conference what kept him awake at night. His answer: A new technology that would severely hurt the cable TV business.
Pardon my French, but this is the biggest hunk of shit I have ever seen in my life. It’s a short clip from the upcoming movie 2012, which stars John Cusack (as if I know who that is!). Here’s why I hate it with every fiber of my being.
1. The contrived husband-wife relationship. “Oh honey, you’re just being silly.” The wife instantly dismisses Cusack without listening to a word he has to say. Why not have a conversation, like adults, rather than just going, “That’s just my husband acting dumb again!”
2. Cusack’s driving skills are unbelievable. Like, I cannot believe them. Unless you’re Michael Schumacher or The Stig there’s no way you’re making those turns so effortlessly as THE WORLD IS LITERALLY FALLING APART ALL AROUND YOU. So unless Cusack plays a multi-time F1 champ I have a hard time believing he’s able to drive so damn perfectly.
3. That big, stupid donut that rolls across the road. God I hate that donut. Never mind that The Simpsons used that same exact gag like 10 years ago.
4. The whole airplane scene. Bite me, Hollywood. I’d actually like to talk to an aviation expert and ask him what happens in real life when you lift an airplane before you reach the correct speed.
5. Oh, and where are they flying to? If the whole word is falling apart, where are they flying to, and on a single tank of gas no less?
I’m embarrassed to be an American right now.
As a matter of fact, I want that scenario to happen now. I’d rather see the world destroyed than live in a world where people get paid millions upon millions of dollars to create that garbage, with all due respect to actual garbage.
To wrap up our visit to its R&D lab in Palo Alto, Mercedes-Benz's Gordon Peredo demonstrated "Smart Stop," a wireless safety system that stops cars automatically when the driver fails to heed a red light.
The technology isn't headed to production vehicles in the immediate future. Having it work in the real world depends on the existence of smart intersections -- which means cooperation from Congress, regional/local governments and the rest of the industry. Moreover, upgrading America's intersections won't come cheap.
Disclosure: Mercedes-Benz is a sponsor of BBG. Last week, we drove the new E-Class and were the first bloggers or journalists to get a look inside their North American R&D lab. Mercedes-Benz has no editorial involvement in the items we post about the visit .
Apart from a few trial installations, it could be ten years or more before the technology is standardized and available nationwide. When implemented, it won't just be about safety: cars that include the wireless transceivers can conduct a "conversation" with one other to share realtime local traffic data, as well as to warn the driver if he or she is accelerating into a stop light.
Current-gen driver-assisting systems include lane assist, to warn of dangerous drifting; a proximity detector that keeps an eye on blind spots; and steering-wheel sensors able to detect hand movement characteristic of sleepy drivers.
Those who prefer to go without can turn off "assistance," and Mercedes-Benz says this'll remain true in future generations of it cars. "Safety" features like the Smart Stop systems -- which already brake automatically to prevent imminent rear-end collisions -- are always on.
MP4: Download.
More info is at Mercedes-Benz's website.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
 Rediff | Bing Gets Dinged, But The Market-Share Game's Far From Over ChannelWeb By Brian Kraemer, channelweb Microsoft's Bing has lost market share to Google over the past month, prompting some to start digging the decision engine's grave. But with Bing just a few months into real competition with Google, that evaluation might be ... Bing and Google: Success On Their Own Terms Bing takes first slip in search market Google Refines Search Options, Adds Translate |
Here’s a bizarre use for Microsoft’s “Flash-killer” Silverlight—a ballistics calculator. Yes, Silverlight is being used to build an application that lets shooting and hunting enthusiasts “customize shooting conditions” while comparing Winchester-made bullets.
Winchester’s Ballistics Calculator lets gun users choose their type of ammunition and then compare up to five different bullet types with charts and graphs. You can enter specific conditions like wind speed and outside temperature, maximum range, direction, speed and height. The application will then display charts and graphs that visually lay out the point of impact, drop and trajectory of each type of bullet.
According to Microsoft, Winchester chose Silverlight because it is a “cross-browser, cross-platform plug-in” that allowed the ballistics maker to create an app that doesn’t have to be downloaded (but you have to download Silverlight).
Silverlight 3 launched this past summer, with the hopes of making inroads against its main competitor Adobe Flash. It looks like Microsoft is going after gun enthusiasts first.
Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.
So now that some of you have your Google Wave invites (I know not all of you, I don’t even have one for my personal account yet, if it’s any consolation), and we’ve gotten some of that inevitable backlash out of our system, it’s time to figure out just what Google Wave is. And more importantly, what it will be used for.
I tried to answer that on TV the other day, but the truth is that as a new communication medium, it’s hard to describe exactly what Wave is. It’s kind of like email meets instant messaging meets real-time sharing and collaboration, but even that description is lacking. Eventually, if Wave takes off, it’s probably one of those things that will just be understood for being what it is, even if no one can really describe it by relating it to something else.
That said, the video below does a pretty good job explaining a potential use case for Wave. And what’s most impressive is that this video wasn’t created by Google, but rather by a third-party, Epipheo Studios. If you have no idea why you would want to use Wave (at least 3.5% of it), or what you could use it for, this is worth a watch.
[thanks Ben]
Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.
Audrey Kawasaki says:
REVO LA is putting on a benefit art show to raise money for "Sekolah Dasar Balem Wamena" (SDBW), a model school, which has recently become a light of HOPE in the corrupt regions of West Papua, Indonesia.Featuring works from Ekundayo, Joshua Clay, Shepard Fairey, Mr. Brainwash and more. The show opens on October 4th sunday at the UCLA Ackerman Grand Ballroom.
I have two prints up for sale there.
Special edition large print of 'Two Sisters' and the Pressure Printing intaglio print 'Okimiyage'.
Yahoo is killing support for a popular Gmail plug-in from Xoopit, a startup it acquired in July. An email was sent out today to Xoopit users on Gmail tited, “Xoopit for Gmail is closing. Here’s the info you’ll need.” It details different ways users can export their files, photos, videos, and other attachments which may be stored on the service. From the email:
We will be officially turning off Xoopit for Gmail on November 13, 2009, to focus our efforts on making My Photos for Yahoo! Mail an amazing product and bring those features to all Yahoo! Mail users. Given our focus, we decided we cannot adequately support the Xoopit for Gmail product and give you a great experience in the future. Here are some details to guide you through this transition.
Xoopit is a handy email plug-in that works with both Gmail and Yahoo Mail, where it powers the My Photos feature. In Gmail, it creates a strip across the top which shows you images of all recent attachments, making it possible to visually scan email for their contents instead of by subject lines. You can also click on the Xoopit thumbnail strip so that it takes over the whole screen with a grid of photos, images,videos, and docs.
Back in July when Yahoo bought Xoopit, we wondered why Google didn’t buy it instead. Now at least we know why Yahoo bought it—to take it away from Google (and it’ also a really cool feature). Yahoo certainly has the resources to keep supporting the Gmail plug-in, which is very popular Shutting off support is a small gesture, but it shows that Yahoo is starting to play for keeps. And it doesn’t want to share its toys with Google, despite all of that talk about how open it is.
Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.
In the time it takes your computer to boot up, you can probably make some toast or a cup of tea before the thing is ready to use. In the near future, you might only have enough time to take a sip of that tea or check your watch.
Mindful of how frustrating the wait is, makers of PCs’ basic input/output systems (BIOS) are working on bringing instant-on computing closer to reality with promises of significantly faster boot time.
“People want PCs to be like their toaster. Push a button and it is ready,” says Steve Jones, vice-president and chief scientist of core systems at Phoenix Technologies, one of the biggest BIOS makers.
The BIOS is the first piece of code that a computer runs when it is powered on. Before Windows or Linux can start, the BIOS identifies, tests and gets system devices such as the video display card, the hard disk and other hardware up and running. But running the tests every time the machine powers on can be time consuming.
At Intel’s developer conference last week, Phoenix announced that the latest version of its BIOS could boot in just about a second by cutting out redundant checks and creating a smarter version of the firmware . Of course, that still leaves the time that it takes Windows to start up, but Microsoft has been working on that, too, and claims that Windows 7 starts up in about 20 seconds, compared to the 50 seconds or so for Vista.
The faster boot time will help users, says Nathan Brookwood, a research fellow at market research and consulting company Insight 64. But even with Microsoft’s improvements, he says, it is still nearly a minute before the user is completely up and running. “Every software application today wants to go out there and check for the latest version on boot up, which just gets in the way of what you really want to do And that is check e-mail,” he says.
Shrinking this digital annoyance is the new quest for PC makers. For most people, computers today have become as much a consumer electronics product as TVs, cellphones and DVD players. That means, consumers expect the same kind of instant response from their computers are they get from other electronics devices.
“If you pick up a phone, you expect to instantly hear a tone,” says Jones. “That’s the future for computers, too.”
Jones says the ‘I am ready for use’ signaling is an important psychological factor for consumers. “Bell Labs worked hard on this. They figured if you pick up the phone and didn’t hear something within 250 milliseconds, then you would be pretty uncomfortable with the device,” he says.
On PCs, that signaling time has been much longer. Boot-up on PCs is split into two chunks: the BIOS boot up, which is the time taken from pressing the power on button to the time BIOS finishes booting, also known as pre-boot, and the time taken for the operating system to load. Today, this can take anywhere from a minute to nearly three minutes. And that can feel like eternity for users.
“Lots of users today just press the power button and then grab a cup of coffee,” says Brookwood. “If the line at Starbucks isn’t too long, the system will be ready by the time they’re back.”
The BIOS has been part of PCs since the first IBM PC in 1981. The firmware initializes every computer to a point where an operating system can come along and with no knowledge of the machine start running.
“The BIOS is doing a lot more than waking up the machine and handing it a cup of coffee in the morning,” says Brian Richardson, senior technical marketing engineer, for American Megatrends Inc., a major BIOS maker.”It provides a layer so you can buy a PC take it home, wipe the configuration clean, change it and do it 100 times a day and your OS will still start up.”
Running the hardware checks takes time. About 15 years ago, the BIOS firmware in PCs would take up to two minutes to boot. Finding that customers were becoming impatient with the boot times, PC makers started pressing for PCs to be more like appliances with their ability to be switched on instantly.
“Electronics is not supposed to warm up anymore,” says Richardson. “So we have been trying to shrink the time it takes to get the machine ready.”
BIOS boot times can vary depending on configuration of the PC: More memory and more cards mean it will take longer. Increasingly, operating systems, such as Microsoft’s Windows, run initial checkups on boot to verify system details and ensure the most updated versions of the software is loaded. In other words, the OS is doing some of the work that the BIOS traditionally has done.
“Effectively what BIOS makers are saying is that if the OS is not going to believe us anyway, why bother?” says Brookwood.
That’s why PC makers are pinning their hopes on a new standard called Unified Extensible Firmware Interface. UEFI hopes to improve the intelligence of the BIOS so it doesn’t have to perform all checks every time the computer is powered on. Ultimately, the idea is to run fewer initializations as the computer boots.
Phoenix and AMI say there are some machines already whose BIOS is based on the UEFI standard for quicker boot but it will be late next year before a majority of PCs have it. And unlike the BIOS, which is tied to Intel’s x86 processor architecture, UEFI will not be specific to any processor architecture.
Microsoft’s upcoming Windows 7 operating system has also laid out some criteria for PC manufacturers to get hardware aligned in a way that they can meet the company’s standards. Microsoft has set a criteria of five seconds for BIOS boot time and 20 seconds for the operating system to boot.
That’s still nowhere near the instant-on computing dream and promises of faster BIOS risks setting unrealistic expectations among consumers, says Brookwood.
There’s a way to get instant-on. It’s called the sleep mode.
“People assume they get instant-on with their cellphones but no one reboots their cellphone everyday,” says Richardson. “So one form of instant-on is never to turn it off.”
Another route to quick boot is to do what Dell has done with its latest notebook. Dell’s newly launched Latitude Z offers instant boot to check e-mail, calendar, contacts and the web as part of a mode called ‘Latitude On.’ In it the PC boots from a special chipset running an ARM processor, the same kind of CPU that powers most cellphones, and a slimmed down version of the Linux operating system.
The Latitude On mode comes with its on power on/off button. Users can click on an adjacent power button to switch to Windows OS. That gives consumers options, says Robert Thomson, product manager for Latitude Z at Dell. “When you directly go to the Latitude On mode, you never bring up the main operating system,” he says “And when you turn it off, it goes into the suspend mode, which is not like that of Vista or XP but more like what you see in cellphones.”
At $2000, the Latitude Z laptop is a pricey answer to the problem of a two-minute boot up time for PCs. And it doesn’t give users access to all features and programs that run on Windows OS such as Microsoft Word or Power Point.
That’s why, Brookwood advocates just staying away from the power off button as much as you can.
“Most systems today have the ability to go to sleep as opposed to being turned off,” says Brookwood. “Too many users don’t understand that.”
Photo: (Justin Marty/Flickr)
By Matthew Rivera, Reporter, The Wall Street Journal
If the H1N1 swine-flu pandemic arrives this fall, one thing that may break under the strain is the Internet. Emergency planners say that school-age children and telecommuting adults could be accessing the network simultaneously, potentially overloading the public Internet’s capacity.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates absenteeism during a pandemic could peak at 50 percent during a six-week period. Many businesses have created emergency plans that assume that absent employees will be able to work from home. It’s not clear, however, that the Internet will behave in a crisis the way it does during typical days.
Read the rest of this post on the original site
The battle over your online identity rages on. Google Friend Connect, the search giant’s platform that lets you accept Google and OpenID accounts on your site, has just made implementing the service about as easy as it could be. And it did it exactly two days after Facebook released its own streamlined install process for Facebook Connect. Except Google’s is better.
Up until now the install process for Google Friend Connect hasn’t been too difficult — the site walked you through a handful of steps, asked you to upload two files via FTP to your webserver, and you were done. Up until very recently Facebook Connect’s install process was significantly more confusing, but two days ago they updated it to closely match Google’s flow (though you only have to upload one file instead of two). Today Google has managed to one-up Facebook once more: Friend Connect’s new install flow doesn’t require any file uploads, which opens the door to an entirely new set of users.
Now all you need to do to implement Google Friend Connect on your site is visit this page, enter your site’s name and URL, and you’re done. Google will present you with a gallery of HTML widgets that you can copy and paste into your site.
Aside from making things easier, this opens the door to a new set of users. Namely, people who either don’t know how to use FTP, or who run their sites through hosted services that don’t grant FTP access — and there are a lot of them.
Looking at raw numbers, Google Friend Connect appears at first glance to be besting Facebook Connect by a large margin: Google reports over 5 million sites using Friend Connect, while Facebook Connect has around 15,000. But those figures are misleading. In terms of mind-share, Facebook Connect is running circles around Google Friend Connect — just look at how many mainstream sites use Facebook Connect but not Google. Facebook has made it clear that it’s trying to attract more small sites that don’t have development teams, so don’t be surprised if it strikes back with its own super-streamlined install process in the next few weeks.
Crunch Network: CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0
Rob Cockerham says: "I made a sandwich calculator which will allow people to choose bread, cheese and other sandwich toppings and find out how much it will cost to put it together at home."
As expected, Google is calling new feature that blocked users from exporting their Orkut contacts a “bug.” An update today on the Data Liberation Blog (the group we specifically called out last night when wondering what was going on) notes that while Google was in the process of “adding additional security measures to Orkut Friends Export” it inadvertently broke the entire functionality.
If that’s actually the case, here’s what I love about this:
1) Google says it was trying to add security features to improve Okrut Friends Export, yet it apparently didn’t bother to test the functionality after adding said feature. If they had, they would have immediately realized it was broken, like so many users did immediately. Google is a company meticulous about its testing of things, so that seems a bit odd.
2) The fact that Google would add additional security measures immediately following the revelation that Facebook had a tool it was promoting in India to allow users to easily import their Orkut friends is interesting. And by “interesting,” I mean suspicious. Does Facebook’s importing tool still work? Anyone in India, feel free to let us know in the comment.
I’m not saying this wasn’t, in fact, a bug. I’m just saying that the timing of said bug was interesting to say the least. And it certainly doesn’t seem like the usually careful Google cared very much about creating a bug that stopped the hemorrhaging of its Orkut users over to Facebook in India.
Sometimes “bugs” are convenient until you get called out on them. Just sayin’.
[photo: flickr/the consumerist]
Crunch Network: CrunchBase the free database of technology companies, people, and investors
Section: Audio, Portable Audio, Video, Portable Video, Communications, Accessories, Cellphones, Cellular Providers, Smartphones, Mobile, Gadgets / Other, Features, Originals, Columns, Who's On Crack
Crack. Snort it, lick it, heat it and smoke it; whatever their doing, the following companies seem to have had too much. Local hospitals are on alert. The police force is notified. Let’s take a look at who looks to be on the rock this week:
Every blogger that says 2010 is the year of the tablet, take one step closer to rehab. Yes, Brian Chen, I am looking at you. 2010 may be the year some of these dream machines finally get stateside but it will be far from everyone’s favorite. The answer is as easy as q-w-e-r-t-y.
Typing on your touchscreen smartphone is pretty easy, right? Sure it is, you tap away with your thumbs at blazing speeds. Now imagine your shiny new lust-worthy tablet is between your hands; now start typing. Whoa! Hold up there cowboy. OK fine you say, I’ll just put the tablet down on my table and type. But then you can’t see the screen anymore, and lap typing? The only thing going on my lap is dancing, thank you very much.
Microsoft is ready to hit the buzzer at this point with their Courier videos. “Stylus, stylus” they shout. BZZZP. No, sorry thank you for playing. I don’t see us all going back in time to learn PDA Graffiti, do you?
So were are stuck without a decent way to input text and without it, these dream machines will be more of a punch line at a party in six months.
Proving that the geniuses in Redmond have more lives than a cat, their new preview of Windows 6.5 dropping soon looks pretty darn good. I’d written them off but just like Motorola, they seem to have something going. Our Editor-about-town got a hands on with the new OS and came away surprised.
Love the new look of Windows Mobile? Thank Apple. Competition rules, look it up.
This is my favorite story of the week. I found working units of Apple iPods alongside bricked Zune HDs in my local Walmart. WTF? Who’s idea of a fair fight is this? And that is just it: it isn’t a fair fight but I still am unsure who is rigging it. Walmart? Apple? MS? Who’s the culprit here? Who is complicit?
I don’t like the smell of this and plan on finding out.
Hot dog! Wait, oh what’s that? Not in the US? Bummer.
Seems Apple didn’t renew or didn’t chain themselves to a carrier long term overseas and are opening up the field. Sweet, for them.
Meanwhile, back in the US, where the iPhone is still the rock star, bloggers question whether the iPhone is hurting AT&Ts image. How much longer will iPhone fans have to endure the antics of AT&T instead of their prefered carrier? Only Apple, AT&T and I guess the FCC know for sure. Yep, the FCC is still considering doing something about exclusive phones on carriers. And you can bet that fight is all about the iPhone, now the Verizon Razzle.
Full Story » | Written by JG Mason for Gadgetell. | Comment on this Article »
Section: Gadgets / Other, ebooks
Over the past two weeks, 50 students and professors from Princeton University students were given the Amazon Kindle DX as a way to test their ability as an academic tool. Although some of the feedback indicated benefits to the electronic reader, many of the users have found the device difficult to use and awkward.
The main issue seems to be that students need to completely overhaul the way that they do coursework in order to use the Kindle DX. Instead of marking up texts or using post-it notes to highlight important points, you are required to use the annotations feature in the Kindle DX. Students feel that this feature takes too long to enable and it is much quicker to simply use a highlighter on a book. One student involved in the pilot described the DX as, “It’s clunky, slow and a real pain to operate.”
In May, the university had announced that they would be partnering with Amazon to run a pilot program as part of a sustainability initiative to save paper. Amazon.com was founded by Jeff Bezos, who graduated from Princeton University in 1986. There have been rumors that the university may decide to not continue using the Kindle next year.
Read: [The Daily Princetonian]
Image credit: Amazon
Full Story » | Written by Heather Wood for Gadgetell. | Comment on this Article »
Maybe this is why Comcast rushed to knock down a story that said it bought NBC Universal from GE (GE): It knew Wall Street would hate the idea.
As it is, now that investors and analysts have heard the more plausible deal–instead of buying NBCU for $35 billion, the cable giant kicks in up to $6 billion in cash, plus its cable networks, and gets 51 percent of NBCU–they’ve decided they hate that one, too.
Here’s the story in the graphic form (click chart to enlarge):
The Comcast-NBCU story broke after the market closed on Wednesday, in case that wasn’t clear. As I’m typing this, Comcast (CMCSA) is trading around $15.6 a share, down some seven percent since the talks became public.
Pull back a bit and you see that things could be much worse: As recently as March, Comcast was down below $12, and there wasn’t any multibillion dollar deal weighing down the shares then.
If anything, investors are much more forgiving to Comcast here than the professional chattering class of writers and analysts, who hate the deal. The conventional wisdom: Comcast’s dream of marrying cable programming with its cable service is misguided because media conglomerates like Time Warner (TWX) and News Corp (NWS) have already tried it and concluded that it didn’t work. If the Roberts family spends money on anything, they argue, it ought to be on shareholders, either via dividends or by buying back shares.
Here’s a sampling of today’s sentiments:
Pali Capital’s Rich Greenfield:
Comcast is trying to become a massive player in content…a move that investors should be frightened about, regardless of the initial “math” surrounding the transaction.
Barclays Capital Vijay Jayant:
Press reports of this potential transaction give credence to investor concerns that management has empire-building aspirations in general or that they may not believe enough in their own distribution business over the long term and therefore need to diversify their portfolio holdings…fundamentally, we believe that Comcast shareholders would be better served if the company were to invest in its own shares.
So if this is a trial balloon, you wouldn’t say it has been shot down completely. But it’s certainly sagging.
The passing of a year hasn’t much changed Oracle (ORCL) CEO Larry Ellison’s opinion of cloud computing. Remarking on the industry’s sudden fascination with the concept at Oracle OpenWorld last September, Ellison reduced it to a thin sheen of windshield condensation.
“The interesting thing about cloud computing is that we’ve redefined cloud computing to include everything that we already do,” Ellison said. “I can’t think of anything that isn’t cloud computing with all of these announcements….These people who are writing this crap are out there. They are insane. I mean it is the stupidest. Is it ‘Oh, I am going to access data on a server on the Internet.’ That is cloud computing?…Maybe I’m an idiot, but I have no idea what anyone is talking about. What is it? It’s complete gibberish. It’s insane. When is this idiocy going to stop?”
In conversation with former Sun (JAVA) CEO Ed Zander at a Churchill Club event a little over a year later, Ellison expanded on those remarks, suggesting that if the cloud is anything, it’s a cloud of BS.
Cloud’s water vapor….Cloud computing is not only the future of computing, it is the present and the entire past of computing.
…Salesforce.com has been around for a decade. And so has NetSuite…and people are saying, “Well, that’s cloud computing.” Google is cloud computing. Everyone is cloud computing….Everything is in the cloud now….It’s this nonsense.
…But it’s not water vapor. All it is is a computer attached to a network. What are you talking about? I mean, what do you think Google runs on?…Water vapor? It’s databases and operating systems and memory and microprocessors and the Internet!
…And the VCs, I love the VCs. [They ask their start-ups] “Oh…is that cloud?” [And the start-ups go] “Oh! Oh! Microsoft Word! Change ‘Internet’ to ‘cloud’! Mass change. Give it back to these nitwits on Sand Hill Road.”
…What do you mean by “cloud computing”?…All the cloud is is computers on a network.
Our industry is so bizarre. They just change a term and they think they’ve invented technology….You can’t just come up with a [slogan] like “Let’s call that ‘cloud.” [But] it sure beats innovation.”
Below, the full video. Ellison’s rant begins around the 45:54 mark.
Okay, everyone. Time for a pop quiz! Lets say your iPhone is totally ruining your day. Maybe the battery is flaking out; maybe you dumped a gallon of soda on it just to see what would happen. Regardless, you pop into the Apple Store to try and get things worked out. Now, what would you do next?
Do you:
A) Calmly ask for assistance, spend some time at the Genius Bar, and most likely walk away with your questions answered?
B) Skip over those smug Genius Bar dudes, and go straight to a manager?
C) Threaten to shoot your iPhone, and show the 9mm you have concealed?
Now, if you’re using process of elimination, the first one out would probably be option C. Unless you’re this guy. Then you’ll just go ahead and run with option C right out of the gate.
While talking with one of the brightly-shirted Apple employees, this guy (allegedly) stated that he was so mad that he could “pop a 9mm in it” – and then lifted his shirt to show his 9mm. The cops were called, and the guy was hauled away.
Gun control isn’t the issue here– this guy had a permit for the weapon, but was still willing to flash his gun in a crowded environment. This was just a bad, bad decision. Someone take his gun — and his iPhone — away.
Crunch Network: CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0
The interior design industry has been characterized as archaic thanks to a lack of digital presence. Decorati is hoping to change this by digitizing and democratizing the interior design space with its online platform for both interior decorators and consumers who are looking for professional design advice and guidance.
Interior designer and Decorati founder Shane Reilly was frustrated that trade-only manufacturers which produced high-end furniture did not publish their listings of products online. Interior designers would have drive to a design center to see samples or flip through three-ring paper binders for trade-only products, and then submit a purchase order via fax or mail. To offer decorators an easy alternative, Decorati pools manufacturer data online and made it searchable across type, price, and lead time. The site has furniture listings from over 500 manufacturers who typically show only in design center showrooms. And with Decorati’s platform, consumers can shop for these products without needing a professional license, democratizing the industry.
It used to be through word of mouth or business listings that consumers were able to find interior decorators. Decorati, which has a database of over 20,000 designers across the U.S., allows consumers to search for interior decorators by location and type of design. On the flip side, consumers can submit a project inquiry to Decorati’s Design Advisors program and Decorati will match them with up to five designers that match the consumer’s style and needs. This is also a revenue stream for Decorati, because designers purchase the leads. Decorati also makes money from commissions from any product bought via the site’s platform and through advertising on the site.
Another compelling feature on Decorati is the ability for interior designers to upload portfolios and tag each piece of furniture and accessory with identifying information. This benefits the designer because the portfolio is linked wherever the product shows up, and it lets the consumers can see how to use the product.
And Decorati has recruited several big-name investors, board members and advisors, including Peter Thiel (investor), Keith Rabois (board member), Steve Chen (advisor), Michael and Xochi Birch (advisors), and Scott Faber (advisor).
While the prices for furniture on Decorati aren’t cheap, the site definitely lowers the costs by letting consumers access high-end furniture and design ideas without the help of a costly decorator. And if you do want to hire a professional, the site makes it fairly easy to find one that matches your needs.
Crunch Network: MobileCrunch Mobile Gadgets and Applications, Delivered Daily.
iPhone OS 3.0 finally brought video functionality to everyone’s favorite Apple phone. It also enabled developers to add graphic overlays to the iPhone’s camera views thereby opening the door to new features such as augmented reality and other camera “tricks.” Thus, it’s come as no surprise that many new camera-focused apps have emerged, such as ProCamera, that are attempting to improve the overall photographic experience on the iCanDoAnything.
ProCamera, available now for $3 in the App Store, is a self-described “advanced iPhone photography application” that adds “greater functionality and possibilities to the iPhone, [by] taking full advantage of all hardware and software ressources.” Sounds interesting, doesn’t it?
In particular, ProCamera adds the following features to the iPhone camera: digital zoom, steady shot mode, tiltmeter (horizon guide), self-timer, big photo button, high speed saving, full screen preview v. autosave, grid-guide, macro mode (when combined with Griffin’s Clarifi Case), and a night images mode. Wow, that’s quite a mouth-full of new capabilities.
Perhaps the most intriguing addition is the steady shot mode, i.e. image stabilization, which “uses the iPhone’s accelerometer to determine a steady moment while you are focusing on your photo subject…similar to the Shake-Free-Function expensive digital cameras provide.”
We haven’t had a chance to put this through its paces yet, but ProCamera definitely sounds impressive. What about all of you? Has anyone had a chance to give ProCamera a go? Let us know what you think after you get back from your professional iPhotography shoot.
[via Wired]
Crunch Network: TechCrunch obsessively profiling and reviewing new Internet products and companies
Okay, now Facebook is just showing off. Having translated Facebook into more than 70 languages, including “Pirate,” it’s run out of living languages and the site is now available in Latin. What’s next, Klingon?
Actually, what’s next is whatever Facebook’s users want it to be because they are the ones doing the translating. Facebook crowdsources the translation of its site. During the protests in Iran this summer, Facebook was quickly translated into Farsi. This approach has been so successful that Facebook is now making its translation tools available to any other site or app which uses Facebook Connect.
And that’s sort of the point. There should be no language barriers on the Web. Any page should be available in any language. That’s an ideal, of course, but Facebook’s ability to tap into native speakers and amateur translators around the world makes that goal slightly less daunting. Even Google Translate doesn’t offer Latin.
(Photo credit: Flickr/Rachel Scott Halls)
Crunch Network: CrunchBase the free database of technology companies, people, and investors
AP - The nation needs to give the same urgency to making sure all Americans have broadband access as the Eisenhower administration did in building an interstate highway system a half-century ago, a report released Friday concluded.
Announced almost exactly one month ago, the world’s first “affordable” Android phone, the Pulse, is now available via T-Mobile UK.
The big news here is that T-Mo UK is offering the Pulse with two different payment options: pay-as-you-go or monthly charges. In other words, if you live in the UK and you’ve got an extra £176.16 lying around, do yourself a favor, and go get you some Android. No more “I can’t afford this cell phone bill” excuse.
Even better, if you are more of a monthly charge kinda guy or gal, you can grab the Pulse for FREE (w/ select monthly service plans). That’s a pretty sweet deal considering this Huawei-made, Android-powered phone includes:
So what are you waiting for, friends across the pond, go forth and set your ‘droid-loving hearts free!
Crunch Network: CrunchBase the free database of technology companies, people, and investors
Etsy via Cult of Mac.
Section: Communications, Cellphones, Email / IM, Smartphones, VoIP, Mobile
Our Editor Iyaz got some hands on time with Windows 6.5 and surprisingly, it looks pretty good. Internet Explorer loaded really slow, but indoors is always a toss up. This phone is not slated for the US as of yet. Too bad, it looks good too.
Flash lite is supported. No accelerometer on this model but the rep says it will be on US builds. Overall, the Zune-inspired UI looks pretty nice.
Iyaz angles for some Zune - Windows Mobile convergence but the rep doesn’t tip his hand other than to say, “they share a lot of DNA”.
Enjoy
Full Story » | Written by JG Mason for Gadgetell. | Comment on this Article »
If you’re anything like us, you’ve got two things going through your mind right now: 1) Why the hell is HBO waiting until June of 2010 to air Season 3 of True Blood? and 2) What’s the Verizon HTC Imagio like in action?
Actually, we’re lying about that second one. We got a chance to play with the Imagio a few weeks ago – we just weren’t allowed to film it, shoot photos of it, talk about it, look at it funny, or insult its honor. Third party reseller Wireless Zone wasn’t under such restrictions, it seems – they’ve managed to spend a bit of time getting to know the device, and have emerged with 8 minutes of Imagio to share with the world.
[Via WMExperts]
Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.
 Telegraph.co.uk | Newly revealed Apple patent application looks suspiciously tablet-like CNET News The sharp-eyed bloggers at AppleInsider have noted a newly revealed patent application related to multitouch surfaces--leading to further speculation about Apple's purported tablet PC project. As per usual, the application came through ... Apple Patent: Likely a Mouse, Not the Fabled Tablet Apple tablet won't be just an e-reader, argues analyst Apple's rumored tablet would likely have an on-screen, multitouch ... |
Worldwide sales of semiconductors in August rose five percent over July, racking up their sixth month of consecutive gains, according to the Semiconductor Industry Association.
“Notwithstanding the slow recovery of demand from the enterprise sector, we are encouraged that industry momentum has turned positive following the steepest downturn in more than a decade,” said SIA President George Scalise.
Great news were it not for the fact that at $19.1 billion, August sales were down a horrific 16.1 percent year-over-year. Furthermore, for the first eight months of 2009, sales are at $133.8 billion–about 21.3 percent below this time last year.
So while it’s wonderful that we’re seeing these sequential improvements, it’s important to remember that the industry is still fairly deep in the abyss and has a long way to go before it climbs out.
 Telegraph.co.uk | Amazon Settles '1984' Suit PC Magazine Amazon has settled a case with two Kindle users who sued the company after it deleted copies of George Orwell's 1984 from users' devices without warning. Amazon will pay $150000 to law firm Kamber Edelson LLC, which represented the ... Lawyers' Donation Sweetens $150K Kindle Settlement Amazon settles Kindle lawsuit over "1984" copy Amazon.com to pay $150000 to settle suit challenging take-back of 1984 |
Apple may soon introduce a mouse featuring multitouch technology, like that seen in its iPhones, iPods and MacBook trackpads.
Sporting a touch-sensitive housing, the new mouse will do away with the roller ball on the current Mighty Mouse (pictured above), sources told AppleInsider. The rumored multitouch mouse might apply the inertia feedback seen in iPods and iPhones, whereas scrolling speed accelerates or decelerates in response to how the user touches the surface.
Presumably an Apple multitouch mouse would function similarly to the unibody MacBook trackpads, which detect multitouch gestures. On new MacBooks, tapping the trackpad with two fingers triggers a right-click function, for example; this rumored multitouch mouse might copy this behavior. Also, for a mouse, we would expect a multitouch gesture to replace scrolling in different directions, and perhaps there will be special gestures that trigger Exposé commands as well.
Apple’s new mouse may be released with new iMacs, AppleInsider’s sources said. The popular iMac desktops were last refreshed in March, and Apple typically upgrades them every seven months. That would suggest new iMacs — perhaps packaged with multitouch mice — will hit stores very soon.
See Also:
Photo: stopthegears/Flickr
From the Cincinatti Inquirer:
A clerk at the Apple Store in Kenwood Towne Centre kept a cool head when a customer reportedly took his frustration with his iPhone too far. Hamilton County sheriff's deputies say Donald Goodrich, 38, took his phone into the store and told the clerk, "I'm so mad I could pop a 9mm at it. I could really do it right now, look!"
Play back the quote in your head, but with Christopher Walken's voice.
iPhone frustration leads to arrest [Cincinatti.com]
Section:
Haven’t caught all of the Gadgetell news this week? Here’s your chance to catch up on this week’s top 10 articles!
Full Story » | Written by NEWS for Gadgetell. | Comment on this Article »
From Continous Lean, via Daring Fireball.
NPR has received $3 million in funding to launch a new journalism project that will focus on providing in-depth, hyper-local coverage on community-specific issues on an online platform. NPR received $2 million from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) and $1 million from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.
The new funding will allow a pilot group of a dozen NPR stations with the resources to provide in-depth, hyper-local news on a topic that is most relevant to the community where the station is located. The grants also allow the stations to hire new “journalist bloggers,” who will focus exclusively on reporting and aggregating news about a topic relevant to that city. The pilot radio and TV stations have not been chosen yet.
In addition, PBS’s The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer will share its embeddable video player with the pilot participants. The player makes it possible to access and present video content from NewsHour, Frontline, NOW, Washington Week, Bill Moyers Journal, Tavis Smiley and about a dozen local PBS stations. The NewsHour will also feature selected reporting from the participating stations on its Web site.
Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.
By Andy Jordan, Editor and Producer, Tech Diary, The Wall Street Journal
Break out that mixtape. You know, the one with “Don’t Stop Believin’” and “Thriller.” It’s the Sony Walkman’s 30th birthday.
And it got a present. Kind of. The modern Sony (SNE) Walkman digital music player beat out Apple’s (AAPL) iPod share of the portable music player market in Japan in the last week of August, according to a study by BCN, a Japanese electronics research firm. The Walkman took 43 percent of sales, compared with the iPod’s 42.1 percent, capping 241 weeks where the iPod reigned in Japan.
The study didn’t take into account sales of the iPhone, which researchers viewed primarily as a cellphone. But nostalgic Walkman aficionados might recognize the frenzy over the role of the iPod in popular culture.
Read the rest of this post on the original site
Another day, another Android handset. The One comes to us from Spanish start-up called GeeksPhone. No word on available, planned market, or price, but so far the specs are looking good for the quadband GSM and 2100MHz UMTS HSPA phone.
It’s got a 3.2-inch WQVGA hybrid resistive touchscreen up top, with a slide-out QWERTY keyboard underneath. It sports dual cameras – a 3.1MP autofocus guy on the backside and a VGA front-facing camera – 3.5mm headset jack, 802.11 b/g, GPS and acceleromter. A 528 MHZ ARM11 Jazelle powers the kit. Not to shabby, eh? [Xataka via Slashgear
Crunch Network: TechCrunch obsessively profiling and reviewing new Internet products and companies
Looks like Acer’s going to be putting more of its mobile eggs in the Android basket next year, with about half of its handsets in 2010 to feature Android instead of Windows Mobile.
Dr. Kal Mos, Engineering Director for Mercedes-Benz R&D, North America, demonstrates future in-vehicle entertainment and information systems at the company's Palo Alto lab.
In the fourth post from our visit to Mercedes' North American research lab in Palo Alto (Disclosure: MB is a sponsor of BBG), we discover that COMAND's next-gen media streaming user interface is uninviting (and unfinalized) but effective: think the 1990s web, but with modern features like high-def YouTube videos, Facebook or Twitter integration, and Google or Mapquest Maps.
As these features rely on more consistently available and faster networks than what we have today, it'll be introduced when a next-gen cellular network (i.e. LTE) is live in the USA. Mercedes-Benz cars in Europe, however, will be ahead of the game, as LTE 4G cellular networks are set to go live next year.
Some features are disabled while the vehicle is in motion, to ensure that the driver is not distracted. Most intriguing are plans for an app store operating along similar lines to Apple's. Developers will be free to create new programs that run in-dash. APIs, however, will be strict: if you think Cupertino keeps a close an eye on its devs, look away now.
MP4: Download
Add Morgan Stanley’s Kathryn Huberty to the list of analysts calling for Apple to broaden the iPhone’s distribution by ending carrier exclusivity deals.
In a research note issued this morning, Huberty–noting that the iPhone’s market share grew 136 percent in France when Apple switched to multicarrier agreements there–said iPhone sales could more than double if the company took a similar tack in other countries.
“We expect Apple to broaden iPhone carrier distribution over the next two years and believe this opportunity is under-appreciated by the investment community,” she wrote. “This total opportunity is substantial–it adds up to an incremental 20.3M iPhone units and $3.76 in adjusted EPS, 100 percent and 41 percent of iPhone units and adjusted EPS respectively.”
Adding further details to her projections, Huberty continues: “In the top six iPhone markets that are still exclusive, we believe that Apple’s market share could rise to 10 percent, on average, in a multiple carrier distribution model from 4 percent today. These six markets represented almost 70 percent percent of iPhone shipments in C2Q09.”
Huberty also claims that if Apple (AAPL) were to end its exclusivity deal with AT&T (T) and add Verizon (VZ) as a second carrier, its share of the U.S. market would more than double, rising to 12.2 percent from 4.9 percent today.
Huberty, it should be noted, isn’t the first analyst to make such a claim. In June, Bernstein Research analyst Toni Sacconaghi said that a deal with Verizon could more than double U.S. iPhone sales in the near term. Said Sacconaghi: “Verizon’s postpaid subscriber base is not only larger than AT&T’s, but more importantly, is untapped whereas we estimate more than 10 percent of AT&T’s postpaid users already have an iPhone.”
 BBC News | Fresh crew, billionaire clown reach space station CNET News The Soyuz TMA-16 spacecraft carrying cosmonaut Maxim Suraev, NASA flight engineer Jeffrey Williams, and Cirque du Soleil founder Guy Laliberté maneuvered to a smooth docking with the International Space Station early Friday to close ... Space's First Clown Reaches ISS Acrobat, Astronauts Dock At Space Station Space acrobat closes in on space station |
The value of venture-backed exits (which is almost entirely M&A these days) might be down about 50 percent in the third quarter, but total M&A activity (including public companies) is seeing a noticeable uptick.
We ran some numbers on Crunchbase, which keeps track of all announced acquisitions, and in the third quarter $31.8 billion worth of acquisitions were announced, double the amount from the second quarter and up fourfold from the $7.6 billion low in the fourth quarter. That number was even up 23 percent from the year before.
Many of the bigger deals involved publicly traded companies, such as Xerox buying Affiliated Computer services for $5.75 billion, Dell purchasing Perot Systems for $3.9 billion, and Adobe picking up Omniture for $1.8 billion. There were also a lot of biotech and pharmaceuticals deals such as Abbott Labs swallowing Solvay Pharmaceuticals ($6.6 billion) and Dainippon Sumitomo eating Sepracor ($2.6 billion).
The actual number of M&A deals is pretty flat at 213, which is about where it’s been for the past four quarters. But the average value of each deal in the quarter was $349 million, up 85 percent from last year. So buyers might be more picky, but when they do pull the trigger they are willing to spend more money. And they are more willing to spend money for companies with established businesses, which often means they are publicly traded or have been around a while.
Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.
Section: Gadgets / Other, Miscellaneous
It seems the current economy can now be blamed for both the rich as well as the poor losing money. In recent news Bill Gates has lost $7 billion in this last year. Of course, while that may sound bad, truth be told he is still very rich. According to the recently published Forbes list of “400 Riches Americans 2009” list, Bill Gates is still worth a whopping $50 billion.
Ultimately that means his net worth has dropped from $57 billion down to $50 billion. Overall, that is an incredible sum of money, and it is certainly more than I even dream about making in my lifetime, much less losing in the course of one year.
But what I wonder is whether he would even notice this drop in net worth. Maybe this is like his version of misplacing a $50.
Finally, a few of the other individuals that topped the richest Americans list are Michael Dell and Jeff Bezos. And while, Michael Dell was also down, he only lost $600 million. Of course, both Michael Dell and Bill Gates look bad as compared to Jeff Bezos who managed to go up by $100 million dollars. But sadly (can I really use sadly when speaking about millions and billions?) Bezos is still only worth a little over what Bill Gates lost last year. So I guess even with a $7 billion loss, Bill Gates is still clearly the winner.
Finally, two other notable names include Eric Schmidt and Steve Jobs, who are still very wealthy but managed to lose $400 and $600 million respectively.
Full Story » | Written by Robert Nelson for Gadgetell. | Comment on this Article »
Ooma sells lifetime VOIP subscriptions for $250, including excellent hardware: a great deal if you are even remotely capable of financial planning. Its new model, the Telo, also includes a matching DECT 6.0 handset.
I prefer the blocky look of the original box, but this one is more fashionable. The VOIP deal changes, too, with some give and take: you get more free calling and cheaper premium features (down to $10 a month), but voicemail is now among the premium features. Just get a physical answerphone for $8 or set up Google Voice.
Caller ID, call waiting, and 911 are still free of charge. The handset has MP3 ringtones, BlueTooth and Google Voice hookups. With the subscription, you get free number porting, a second line, automatic blacklisting of telemarketers, and call forwarding.
Press release [Ooma]
HP's latest mediasmart home server can stack up to 17TB of storage in a box the size of one of those little desktop fridges you can buy from Skymall.
Data. Beer. Your decision.
P.S. it has much-improved Mac admin software, and an enhanced media/video collection and conversion package, say the makers.
Datasheet (PDF) [HP]
The irony being that searching for "Pirate Bay" now brings up the infinitely shiftier piratebay.com. From the Google results:
In response to a complaint we received under the US Digital Millennium Copyright Act, we have removed 4 result(s) from this page. If you wish, you may read the DMCA complaint that caused the removal(s) at ChillingEffects.org.
The DMCA complaint isn't yet available at Chilling Effects. But plenty of real piratebay.org pages still show up; presumably the DMCA claim wasn't well-formed enough to actually accomplish its objective.
Section: Computers, Hardware, Peripherals, Displays/Projectors, Mice / Keyboards
Maybe you followed my advice over six months ago and decided to take an old computer and make it a server. Perhaps you are an IT professional who manages servers. Either way, you may want to check out StarTech.com’s Laptop KVM Adapter. This device connects to your server’s VGA port and a USB port. Then you attach a USB cable from your laptop to the device. You now can control the server regardless of operating system. Video shows up on your monitor and you’ve got full control using your keyboard and trackpad. If you have a headless system somewhere, the Laptop KVM Adapter seems like a time saver. Convenience does not come cheap, however. The KVM costs $469.99 and is available now.
Product Page: [KVM Console to USB 2.0 Portable Laptop Crash Cart Adapter]
Full Story » | Written by Iyaz Akhtar for Gadgetell. | Comment on this Article »
Spotify, our favorite online music-streaming jukebox, has just added offline music to its desktop version, bringing it into line with the excellent but flawed iPhone version.
Spotify is a piece of software that lets you play pretty much any music you like. It already keeps a “secret” cache on your computer and uses that to serve music to other users. Think legal BitTorrent for music, but with an instant-on that makes iTunes look even more sluggish than usual.
The iPhone version will let premium users (people who pay €10 or £10 per month for the ad-free service) store up to 3,333 tracks on their devices for offline listening. The latest desktop iteration of Spotify has just gone offline, too, with the same track limit. This is wonderful news, and means that Spotify could replace iTunes for all but applications and podcasts for most people.
It makes a great deal of sense on the back-end, too. If you already store gigabytes of cached music to make things more responsive, why not make those gigabytes available to the user? And of course you still have access to the gazillions of tracks in the catalog when you are online.
The service is still unavailable to US users, who must be getting more and more jealous as the cool features pile on. Pretty much as jealous as I am of you guys having Google Voice already. Make sure to check out the in depth coverage of the Spotify phenomenon by the handsome Eliot Van Buskirk over on our sister blog, Epicenter.
Spotify goes offline [Spotify]
See Also:
Something seems very wrong about driving to the beach to go surfing. You’re all set to enjoy a free ride from Mother Nature and marvel at the power of the sea, and yet you get to the coast by burning her very lifeblood and spewing toxic waste into her lungs.
No, much better to go by bike. I see plenty of surfers here in Barcelona heading to the sea with their boards on side mounted racks. Apart from the fact that the Mediterranean has practically no surf, these racks work fine.
But an alternative from ACG SurfRacks puts the board overhead on tall stands. Why is this better? Because it makes you narrower (and therefore less of a nuisance on the boardwalk), taller (added visibility) and our favorite, the board itself acts as a sun-shade, kind of like the canopy on those dorky BMW cocoon-like C1 scooters. Add to this the fact that a side wind is less likely to blow you out into traffic and you have a solid set of specs.
The racks bolt on to your bike and offer two padded T-bars, front and back, to which you can secure the board. As the chaps behind the racks are surfers, they’ve spent more time out on the waves than working on their website, so we have no prices for you. There is, though a list of surf shops which stock them. Predictably, the majority are in California.
Product page [ACG via Bike Hacks]
Section: Communications, Cellphones, Cellular Providers, Smartphones, Mobile
Those who are waiting for the follow up to the Palm Pre may soon find their wait coming to an end. Well, that is assuming that this latest rumor is accurate.
The rumor is dealing with the second webOS based handset, which has been dubbed the Palm Pixi. Anyway, according to that rumor, the handset will be available as of October 20.
Unfortunately, the rumor is just that and comes with little evidence, but judging from how we have already heard that the Pixi will be available before the end of the year, it sort of fits in the timeline.
If this does prove true, expect to find the Pixi at Sprint retail locations as well as Best Buy.
Via [BGR]
Full Story » | Written by Robert Nelson for Gadgetell. | Comment on this Article »
Since the v3.0 operating system allowed applications to access the iPhone’s hardware, iPhone photo applications have switched from being after-the-fact processors to full-on camera suites, letting you do everything from capturing images to post processing to (in some cases) uploading to FaceBook and the Twitter.
The latest is the rather appropriately professional-looking Pro-Camera, which can be yours for $3. Pro-Camera offers the self-timer and digital zoom found in other applications, but it brings some rather nice new features, usually found in proper, standalone cameras.
Most successful will probably be the anti-shake, which uses the accelerometer to detect your jitters and stabilize the image. Using a similar method, you can also overlay a horizon line to keep the pictures straight, or display a grid overlay.
Some other “features” are hardly more than padding: if you have Griffin’s Clarifi, you can take close up shots (the Clarifi is an add-on lens for the older 3G which allows macro shots in any application), for example.
We are interested, though, in the “Night Images” mode, which promises to clean up low-light shots. Our guess is that this relies heavily on image processing using information form the accelerometer, or just some fancy noise-reduction algorithms.
These kinds of camera apps are exciting in a different way, too. Effectively, it has turned the iPhone into a camera development kit. How else could you buy a single camera and then be able to easily switch between various control methods and feature-sets depending on subject matter or just personal preference? We’re looking forward to a lot more of these, especially when people start making special hardware to complement them.
Product page [Pro Camera]
Product page [iTunes]
See Also:
In his otherwise wonderful “Tablet Computing From 1888 to 2010”, our own Brian X Chen missed one essential innovation. It was the original IBM thinkPad, an in-house model which was used by staff while the slab-like notebook was gestating in Big Blue’s techno-womb. Made for many years before the laptop appeared at the crossover of the 80s and the 90s, it even (almost) conformed to the majority of Chen’s tablet rules:
2: The screen measures between 5 and 10 inches diagonally.
3: It is a keyboard-free, slab-shaped device (not a big ass table).
4: It detects finger and/or stylus input.
The ThinkPad was, of course, the handsome notebook you see above, a leather-bound pad which spoke of the austere authority of International Business Machines, and with a wry, knowing playfulness seen also in Paul Rand’s Eye-Bee-M poster (Rand designed the IBM logo, and was also one of the few people ever to push Steve Jobs around when he refused to offer more than one option for the NEXT logo). According to legend, this Think pad inspired the name of the computer version. I want one. It makes the Moleskine look like a wad of cheap paper napkins.
The Original IBM ThinkPad [A Continuous Lean via ★]
After several practice runs, Joby - maker of the jointed, grip-anywhere Gorillapod tripods - has finally, really, truly come up with an iPhone-specific model.
Essentially, the Gorillamobile for 3G/3GS is the standard Gorillamobile with a slide-in case for the iPhone. You pop the handset inside and on the back is a slot that marries up with the locking, slide-in tripod head. The idea is that this provides a more secure mount for the iPhone than the previous options, which were to use the included suction cup or sticky pads. These accessories still come in the box, along with the tripod screw for mounting real cameras.
This adds just $10 to the price of the kit, which we have already tested out and recommend, bringing it to $40. Compare that to the average $30 for an iPhone case and it looks like pretty good value. The only problem we see is that if you have another utility case for your iPhone, you’ll have to do some swapping. One day, somebody will fix all this by making a combined battery pack/tripod/close-up lens/strobe case. Of course, it’ll make your iPhone the size of a laptop, but at least you will have everything with you.
Product page [Joby. Thanks, Mark!]
See Also:
| World : News Archives | Business | Entertainment | Sports | Technology | Science | Marketplace Audio |
| India : News | Business | Entertainment | Sports | Telugu | |
| Blogs : Humor pages | Norkay's Blog | Kids Stories | Indian Recipes | Database Tech Blog |
| Sundries : World Video Clips | Songs Clips | Indian Video Clips | |
Be honest: the first time you saw the somewhat-short, somewhat-stout 
