Early this morning, the WSJ revealed that a new Apple iPhone was coming this summer, although they had very scarce details.
Says the article: "Apple plans to release a new version of its current iPhone this summer, continuing its practice of annual upgrades at about the same time of year, said people briefed on the matter. The model is likely to be thinner and have a faster processor, two people familiar with the device said."
Later in the day, John Gruber of DaringFireball revealed some specs for the upcoming "iPhone HD," which should see launch in the summer.
Says Gruber: "And they have no actual details of the next-generation iPhone. Nothing. Not the A4-family CPU system-on-a-chip. Not the 960 × 640 double-resolution display. Not the second front-facing camera. Not even the third-party multitasking in iPhone OS 4. All they have is that there’s going to be a new iPhone this summer, period."
Verizon Wireless , who for weeks has been promising the release of the Android 2.1firmware for Motorola Droid owners, has started rolling out the firmware as an OTA update.
However, the rollout will be staggered so some users will not get the update until Thursday or even later.
Reads the official memo:
Starting 03/30/2010, Verizon Wireless is pleased to announce a new software update for the DROID by Motorola. Users will be able to upgrade their software to version AP: ESE81/BP: C_01.3E.03P to receive new improvements and enhancements.
*Key Advantages:*
o Email - Yahoo Mail is now supported - customers can simply
sign in with their Yahoo! Email address and password. Note:
Yahoo! Email is not available over Wi-Fi
o Pinch to Zoom now available in the Browser, Maps, and Gallery
o Speech-to-Text - Customers can now use their voice instead
of typing whenever a text-entry box appears
o Google Goggles is now preloaded
o The new Gallery application uses 3D layout and shows both
pictures taken with the customer's Android device and images
from Picasa Web Albums account online
Zune HD users should be pretty happy to hear that firmware v4.5, first leaked in January, is "coming soon," and will bring native XviD support to the device as well as streaming Smart DJ.
Microsoft says the player will soon have native support for the MPEG-4 Part 2 ASP codec, and the player will playback XviD videos, which is still the codec of choice for most videos downloaded online. The format will play via your HDTV as well if you own the Zune HD Dock.
Smart DJ playlists, a "Genius"-esque song playlist creator, will also be available on the player and not just the desktop software.
TomTom,, the popular GPS maker, has announced that they will begin offer "lifetime map updates," a feature that gives customers automatic updates to the latest digital maps when they become available instead of needing to download them manually.
Adds Jocelyn Vigreux, president of TomTom: "Roads are continually changing– from new street names to closed bridges - so it's important for users to always have the most up-to-date maps. With the introduction of Lifetime Map Updates, customers can rest assured that the directions their TomTom device provides will always be the most accurate and efficient available."
The lifetime map updates will use "Tele Atlas" maps, which are continually updated with millions of miles of road and points of interest.
The company says "in order to download TomTom’s Lifetime Map Updates, TomTom users need to simply connect their device to TomTom HOME, TomTom’s free desktop software, and if map updates are available, they can be downloaded to the device. Registered TomTom users will be notified of new map updates as they become available. Typically, Tele Atlas releases maps on a quarterly basis."
Notable iPhone hacker "Geohot" has posted today on his blog that he is working on a CFW (custom firmware) that will work around the dropping of OtherOS support, also telling PS3 owners to avoid updating their consoles, for the time being. Says the post:
"A note to people interested in the exploit and retaining OtherOS support, DO NOT UPDATE. When 3.21 comes out, I will look into a safe way of updating to retain OtherOS support, perhaps something like Hellcat's Recovery Flasher. I never intended to touch CFW, but if that's how you want to play...
Two things, some people seem to think CFW will enable some sort of piracy. It won't. It'll just be a custom version of 3.21 that doesn't lose OtherOS support. Hacking isn't about getting what you didn't pay for, it's about making sure you do get what you did.
After years of planning and months of coding, we're happy to announce the launch of Spanish AfterDawn. Spanish version is the fifth localized version of AfterDawn - and second one for this year.
As with the other locales, the Spanish version differs from its big sisters (namely, English and Finnish sites that have been up and running for more than a decade) in a way that only selected site areas have been translated. Spanish version launches with:
Same as with forums -- empty, waiting for you guys to get the ball rolling with this one.
We wont be launching Spanish news section or guide section for the time being, but if the site gathers enough interest, we're more than happy to start publishing Spanish language content as well.
Starting on April 1st, with the PlayStation 3firmware update v3.21, Sony will kill off the "Other OS" feature which had given "fat" PS3 owners the ability to install Linux on a second partition.
Patrick Seybold, Sr. Director, Corporate Communications & Social Media says the move was made "due to security concerns."
Seybold says the update is optional but if users choose not to update they will lose:
* Ability to sign in to PlayStation Network and use network features that require signing in to PlayStation Network, such as online features of PS3 games and chat
* Playback of PS3 software titles or Blu-ray Disc videos that require PS3 system software version 3.21 or later
* Playback of copyright-protected videos that are stored on a media server (when DTCP-IP is enabled under Settings)
* Use of new features and improvements that are available on PS3 system software 3.21 or later
Google, which announced last month that it will begin building an ultra fast broadband network to service up to 500,000 customers around the United States, (with speeds advertised at about 100 times the current average speed for broadband connections) has said today that 600 communities applied for the experiment, as well as 190,000 individuals.
"As we narrow down our choices, we'll be conducting site visits, meeting with local officials and consulting with third- party organizations. Based on a rigorous review of the data, we will announce our target community or communities by the end of the year," adds James Kelly, a product manager.
The DSi XL handheld goes on sale in North America tomorrow, but there appears to be one hitch for current DSi owners that are thinking of making the change to the larger-screened new addition to the handheld market.
DSiWare games, downloadable games that cost anywhere from $0.99 to $20, will not be available for instant transfer to the XL, even if you already purchased the games for your DSi.
Says Kotaku: As of now, a spokesperson for Nintendo confirmed to Kotaku, the gaming giant offers its consumers no ability to transfer their purchases from one DSi to the bigger screen XL. But the rep did give a sign that a change in policy could be coming: "We're looking into that specific topic, but we don't have anything to announce at this time."
The problem stems from the fact that Nintendo does not have a sustainable account (such as XBL, or PSN) where user's purchases are listed and are available for download again as long as you are signed in your own account.
The XL will cost $199 USD and has screens 93 percent larger than the DSi.
According to a new Reuters update, launch day Apple iPads may be already sold out, with customers who pre-order now not receiving their tablet device until April 12th, 9 days after launch.
Taiwanese parts makers have placed initial estimates on iPads available at launch at around 300,000, and the WSJ said earlier in the week that at least 200,000 have already been pre-ordered so it appears that Apple may already be having supply issues for the huge demand.
The iPad, available in a few different options, with prices ranging from $500 to $800, is Apple's biggest launch since the iPhone in 2007 and certainly has gigantic hype.
George 'Geohot' Hotz, the teenage hacker known globally for hacking the iPhone, has said this week that the iPad may already be "jailbroken" when it hits customer's hands on April 3rd.
Dubbed "untethered jailbreak," Geohot says "the jailbreak is all software based, and is as simple to use as blackra1n. It is completely untethered, works on all current tethered models(ipt2, 3gs, ipt3), and will probably work on iPad too."
Blackra1n is the utility that current jailbreaks up to iPhone OS 3.1.2.
Albert Gonzalez, the 28 year old hacker convicted of stealing and reselling over 170 million credit and ATM card numbers, has received 20 years in prison for his role in over 20 counts of identity theft, wire fraud, computer fraud and conspiracy that led to $200 million in losses for banks, insurers and retail companies.
The hacker stole the credit card numbers using sql injection and packet sniffer malware software to create backdoors into the corporate systems of retailer chains TJX Companies, BJ's Wholesale Club, OfficeMax, Boston Market, Barnes & Noble, Sports Authority and Dave & Buster's. Gonazalez and two other conspirators also used wardriving, hacking using accessible Wi-Fi in retail stores.
At the time of his arrest Gonzalez forfeited his Miami condo, a 2006 BMW 330i, thousands of dollars in jewelry and $2.7 million USD in cash.
"On April 6th, we will be releasing a system update over Xbox LIVE for your Xbox 360 that will allow USB flash drives to be used for storing profiles, game saves, demos and more. I’ve been testing this feature out for a few weeks, and I have to say it’s really great. Once you take the system update on April 6th, you’ll be able to connect your USB flash drives to your console and head over to the memory section to configure your new storage device. Once you do that, the system will conduct a one time performance and integrity check to confirm the drive is working properly. You will then be able to configure how much storage to use on the device, up to 16 GB. The remaining space on the flash drive will be accessible by your PC or Mac. USB Hard drives may work, but like flash memory, you’ll only be able to use up to 16GB of space. Since performance on flash based USB storage is usually better, I highly recommend using flash based instead of spinning media like a hard drive…it’s just going to give you a MUCH better experience.
The publisher first made headlines when it announced the DRM which made it so gamers must be always connected to the Internet, or not be able to play the game. If you are ever disconnected from the Internet (or Ubi's servers go down), you are forced back to the main menu, losing any progress you made between save points.
Hackers took down Ubisoft's servers just a few days after the games became available, by using a DDoS attack, making it so legitimate players could not play their games, while pirates could.
Ubi is now apologizing by giving free games to select users who were still having issues after the servers went back up. Some were offered a full free game, such as Prince of Persia, while others were given free DLC that's normally included in premium editions.
According to Bloomberg, the unlimited music streaming service Spotify will finally get to America in the Q3 2010.
Spotify is available in Europe and for iPhone users, and has over 7 million users.
Senior Vice President Paul Brown says that the company is negotiating with U.S. mobile phone providers over partnerships. Spotify is looking to add an app for BlackBerrys and Palm smartphones, as well.
"We're buying server space in random parts of the states and there are licensing discussions too. But they are going fine because we’re in a long-term partnership with the labels and publishers," says Brown.
Although the service is free and ad-supported, there are also 325,000 paid subscribers who pay 10 pounds per month to use the service ad-free.
Leaked by the Wall Street Journal today was info about the upcoming subscription model for, yes, you guessed it, The Wall Street Journal on the Apple iPad.
The popular finance newspaper costs $29 a month for the print edition, but only $8 for a subscription via the iPhone. The iPad subscription will cost $18 per month.
The package will be available on April 3rd with the launch of the tablet.
The WSJ also noted that they had sold four-month ad packages for $400,000 with six large advertisers including Coca-Cola.
Verizon Wireless, the largest carrier in the United States has announced today that it will open its own mobile app store next week, March 29th.
The app store will allow Verizon subscribers to purchase apps that will be billed to their end-of-the-month phone bill, unlike other stores that must have separate accounts such as Google Checkout or an iTunes account.
The clear market leader is Apple however, with 150,000 apps which have seen 3,000,000,000 downloads.
Jesse Becker, head of Netflix marketing has announced today that the company has begun shipping out Wii streaming discs to some users that have signed up at www.netflix.com/Wii already.
Says Becker:
"We’ve got some great news to share. We are in the final phase of getting ready for the launch of streaming to Wii. Today, we shipped out instant streaming discs for the Wii to some of our Netflix members. Their feedback will ensure that we deliver a great experience to everyone when we launch. Instantly watching movies and TV episodes from Netflix via Wii will be available soon at no additional cost – all you need is a Netflix unlimited plan starting at $8.99 a month, a Wii console and a broadband Internet connection. If you have reserved your disc already, you don’t need to do anything - we will send you an email as soon as we ship the disc. If you haven’t, reserve your disc today at www.netflix.com/Wii and stay tuned for a launch announcement!"
Time Warner Cable has announced the launch of free Wi-Fi for New York City subscribers.
Additionally, TWC has partnered with Cablevision to offer thousands of free Wi-Fi hotspots in NYC, as well. Wi-Fi is now available in Manhattan, Queens, Staten Island, western Brooklyn, Mt. Vernon, parts of the Hudson Valley region, and Bergen and Hudson Counties in New Jersey. Long Island, parts of New Jersey and Connecticut, Westchester, Rockland, Northern Hudson Valley, the Bronx, and Brooklyn will be available through the partnership.
Adds Howard Szarfarc, Executive Vice President for TWC NYC: "Our sophisticated network is a combination of wireless and wireline services, bringing a wide spectrum of products and services to our customers. This free new Wi-Fi option adds another dimension for Road Runner customers, bringing even more convenience. Road Runner customers can experience a fast, simple and easy connection from their laptops or portable Wi-Fi-enabled devices in Time Warner Cable Wi-Fi zones, meeting their growing need for mobility."
To use the Wi-Fi, "Time Warner Cable customers must be signed up for Road Runner high-speed online service. Customers who use laptops and Wi-Fi-enabled devices can log on to Wi-Fi by entering their Road Runner user ID and password through a simple sign-on screen. The quickest way to obtain or reset log-in and password information is at home, at the computer, through Road Runner’s online support at www.rr.com. Additionally, customer login and account verification are available by calling Time Warner Cable Wi-Fi Support at 1-877-895-WIFI (9434)," reads the press release.
At this week's Pwn2Own hacking contest, the iPhone, Safari, Internet Explorer 8 and Firefox browsers were all taken down within minutes.
Vincenzo Iozzo and Ralf-Philipp Weinmann took down the iPhone browser in under five minutes, and left with $15,000 in prize money. Weinmann is most notorious for being part of a team that cracked WEP Wi-Fi security in 2007, faster than was previously recorded.
Charlie Miller of Independent Security Evaluators took down Safari for the third year in a row, leaving with $10,000 in cash as a prize.
The most impressive exploit came from Peter Vreugdenhil who took down IE8 on Windows 7 by "bypassing the operating system's Data Execution Prevention, or DEP, security mechanism, which is designed to stop most attacks." Vreugdenhil earned the same prize as Miller. German student "Nils" took down Firefox on Windows 7 within minutes as well, earning $10k.
TippingPoint, the company that runs the contest, does not divulge the details of the flaws that are used to exploit the browsers but instead purchases the rights to the exploits and then turns it over to the companies behind the browsers.
Microsoft'spreviously announcedXbox Game Room is now available, says the software giant, giving access to classic arcade games for the 360 or the PC.
The service will eventually have 1000 games available by 2012.
Most interesting is the pay structure, which will be either 40 MS points for a single play (like at an arcade with quarters) or 240-400 points to own it.
After nearly two years of excuses for the secrecy of negotiations over ACTA, the Anti Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, a full draft of the proposed treaty has been leaked online and it looks just as bad as critics have suggested.
Among the worst provisions of the proposal is the requirement that third party service providers must implement measures to proactively identify and elminate access to content that's in violation of copyright law.
Failure to do so would make them liable for such infringement. Even worse, according to a note from New Zealand's negotiators this would even include search engines.
Assuming some service finds a way to implement this sort of proactive system, their ability to safeguard the privacy of users would be severely diminished.
Under current laws, when content owners identify content they believe infringes on their copyrights they can notify the service provider, such as YouTube, and demand that the content be removed. This is known as notice and takedown.
Under the ACTA proposal content owners would also be entitled to any information the service provider has which could identify the user responsible for the content without any judicial oversight.
According to analytics site Flurry, the Apple iPod Touch/iPhone continues to see strong growth in the handheld gaming market, taking chunks of market share away from the DS, but more so from the PSP.
Using data from the NPD and Apple, Flurry says that iPhone/Touch games accounted for only 5 percent of the whole portable market in the U.S. in 2008 but that number has grown significantly to 19 percent now. On the declining side, the DS/DSi dropped from 75 percent to 70 percent and the PSP saw a giant drop from 20 percent to 11.
The overall portable gaming market is estimated at $2.55 billion, as of the end of 2009. That leaves iPhone/Touch game revenue accounting for about $500 million in 2009.
"Our main finding is that iPhone (and iPod touch) is a gaming platform to be reckoned with,"says the site.
Verizon Wireless and Skype today have announced Skype Mobile will be available to Verizon subscribers beginning tomorrow, the 25th of March.
The service, reads the press release will "use the Verizon Wireless voice network for the wireless connection of the Skype-to-Skype calls, providing Verizon Wireless customers with a superior experience and top-notch call quality."
Skype Mobile will be available for devices running Android as well as BlackBerrys either at www.verizonwireless.com/skypemobile or at www.skype.com/go/mobile. Visit the latter link through a PC and enter your mobile number to receive a text with a link. Both Android and BlackBerry users will also be able to download the app via their respective app stores.
The main advantages of using Skype Mobile are the following:
* make and receive unlimited Skype-to-Skype voice calls to any Skype contact around the globe;
* send and receive unlimited instant messages with other Skype users;
* manage the Skype contact list directly from the mobile application; and
* call international phone numbers at competitive Skype calling rates.
Says Russ Shaw, general manager of Mobile for Skype: "Skype mobile will deliver an unparalleled experience for Verizon Wireless customers. It will be the best way to enjoy unlimited conversations with Skype contacts all over the world at no extra cost. In addition, Skype mobile will allow people to easily and inexpensively make calls to landlines and mobiles abroad at Skype rates."
The new revelation comes from Stephen Watt, Gonzalez's best friend and convicted accomplice. Watt was convicted of creating the sniffer program that Gonzalez used to hack into the corporate systems.
The Secret Service would not comment on the pay or identity of informants.
Former federal prosecutor Mark Rasch adds: "It's a significant amount of money to pay an informant but it's not an outrageous amount to pay if the guy was working full time and delivering good results. It's probably the only thing he was doing -- other than hacking into TJX and making millions of dollars."
For pleading guilty to identity theft, wire fraud, computer fraud and conspiracy, Gonzalez is expected to receive over 20 years in prison when he is sentenced later this week.
The once-popular Sony handheld PlayStation Portable has turned five years old today, with Sony announcing that the many revisions of the handheld have sold 60 million units worldwide.
"It's been a resounding success," adds Peter Dille, Sony's senior vice president of marketing.
17 million of the sales have been in the United States. In comparison, the PSP's biggest rival, the Nintendo DS/DSi has sold 125 million units globally, with 40 million in the U.S.
Dille says the latest PSP hardware revision, the Go (which removed the UMD drive) has "met our expectations," although sales have notably been low.
In the first month since Microsoft created the "browser ballot box" as a way to end the EU's antitrust case against them, Internet Explorer's market share has dropped, as much as 2.5 percent in some nations such as France.
Data from StatCounter says IE market share dropped 2.5 percent in France, 1.3 percent in Italy, and 1 percent in the UK, not giant numbers, but definitely notable. Opera has reported that downloads of their browser are 200 percent higher, while Mozilla says: "We have seen significant growth in the number of new Firefox users as a result of the Ballot Choice screen."
The ballot box gives Windows users a chance to choose between 12 different browsers.
So far what is confirmed is that the 3DS will not require special 3D glasses, will have full support for DS and DSi games, and will be officially unveiled at the E3 event in June.
The price is $129.99 and will be available starting on March 28th.
At the same time, Microsoft has announced the price drop of the 120GB standalone model, which will be slashed to $99.99 "while supplies last," meaning there probably aren't too many left.
The 250GB model is an infinitely better deal, however it is important to note that both versions are very overpriced when compared to HDDs you can buy from e-tailers.
This week at the CTIA 2010 event, Sprint has unleashed the first 4G/WiMAX for the U.S. market, the HTC EVO 4G. The device had long been rumored as the "HTC Supersonic," and the device will run on the Android 2.1firmware alongside the most powerful specs seen on a smartphone yet.
* 4.3 inch WVGA capacitive touchscreen display (with pinch to zoom)
* Android 2.1 with Sense UI
* Google Search, Google Maps, Google Talk, Gmail, Google Goggles, YouTube, Google Calendar syncing
* Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g and 3G/4G Mobile Hotspot capability for connecting up to eight Wi-Fi enabled devices
* GPS with Sprint Navigation
* Digital compass
* Bluetooth 2.1
* 3.5mm headset jack
* FM radio
* Amazon MP3 store
* Qik video sharing
* Kickstand for hands-free viewing
* 8MP autofocus camera with dual LED flash
* 1.3MP front-facing camera
* HD video recording (720p)
* HDMI port
* 1GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon processor
* 1GB ROM, 512MB RAM * 8GB microSD card in the box
* 1500 mAh battery
Stuart Parmenter ofMozilla has posted today that the company will not be creating a version of Firefox for Windows Phone 7 because "Microsoft decided to close off development to native applications."
Development of FF for Windows Mobile 6.5 will also be shut down given the fact that Microsoft has said they are betting the future on Win 7, not 6.5.
"Because we don’t know if or when Microsoft will release a native development kit, we are putting our Windows Mobile development on hold," reads the post.
Parmenter does hope that eventually they can start development back up, but says they will move their focuses elsewhere. "While I hope that we do see Microsoft provide us with a way to build Firefox for Windows Phone 7, we will continue to focus on the things that we can control: building a great consumer product on both Android and Maemo."
Last night Slashdot received an anonymous tip claiming that Palm was actively considering dropping the arguably superior mobile operating system WebOS for Android. The tip says Palm CEO Jon Rubinstein will release an internal memo on the matter in the near future.
Says the tipster of the memo: "While Palm is incredibly proud of our engineers who spent timeless work and effort to bring us this advanced operating system, consumers simply have not caught on. To provide a better future for ourselves and our customers, the only logical choice is to transition our hardware and software to the Android platform."
The tipster also notes that the WebOS UI will be integrated into Android, similarly to the popular HTC Sense interface which runs on top of Android 1.5-2.1.
PreCentral, the site which is pretty on top of Palm rumors, accurate or not, says the tip is likely a completely falsification, and we at AfterDawn are inclined to agree. The engineering necessary to create a working WebOS UI to work with Android will take too much time that Palm does not have.
Blockbuster has announced this morning that it has reached a deal with Warner Bros. to have new Warner releases available for rental day-and-day with release date, and a full 28 days before rivals Redbox and Netflix get them.
The financials of the deal were not released but it is clear that the deal is only for brick-and-mortar stores and online rental and not for Blockbuster's thousands of kiosks.
Blockbuster has almost $900 million in debt, and analysts have given an "ongoing concern" notification for the company, implying bankruptcy may be on the horizon.
The first movie available because of the deal is "The Blind Side," available today for rent.
"The studios appreciate that we are the only business that has the ability to offer cross channels," says CEO James Keyes, via BW. "That enables us to give consumers access to movies when they want it and where they want it."
Opera has submitted their Opera Mini browser for the iPhone today, hoping Apple will approve of the very fast browser which was first unveiled at the Mobile World Congress.
Opera Mini uses Opera's servers to render and compress pages, thus increasing speed for the end user. Apple could still possibly reject the app given that is a "duplication of core iPhone functionality," (Safari Mobile), however it has recently approved WebKit-based browsers.
The video shows off the Opera Mini browser in action, mainly running on AT&T's slower 2G (EDGE) data network, and Mini runs extremely fast. The interface is interesting as well.
Gizmodo has unveiled an internal Apple document that shows that the company will begin offering contract-free iPhone 3G and 3GS models soon, allowing would-be buyers to pay a premium to buy the handset without needing to sign up for an AT&T contract or even provide proof of a current AT&T contract.
However, the phone will still be "locked," meaning unless you unlock it yourself, you must use the smartphone on AT&T and not other GSM providers.
The only restrictions are you must provide a valid form of ID and you are only allowed to purchase one device per day.
The 8GB iPhone 3G will be available for $500, the 16GB 3GS for $600 and the 32GB 3GS for $700.
Rabid Neurosis (RNS), the once popular music release group was taken down last year by authorities working on tips from the RIAA.
A few of the most prominent members were arrested and charged with conspiracy to commit criminal copyright infringement.
This week, Matthew Chow of RNS has been found not guilty by a jury. Additionally, Adil Cassim of the group has been found not guilty as well.
"I am relieved by the jury's verdict and I am grateful to my attorney for his hard work," says Chow. Adds his lawyer: "We encountered some extremely complex factual and legal issues in this case. The jury was very attentive during the trial. Their verdict was just."
The three other RNS members that were charged had already plead guilty and gave testimony for the prosecution.
Chow and Cassim were facing up to five years in prison and a $250,000 USD fine.
Nintendo has confirmed that they will be releasing a new handheld system in Japan in early 2011, with a full introduction coming at the E3 event in June.
The system is dubbed the 3DS and will "incorporate 3D technology" without the need for 3D-glasses. The system, as is standard with new Nintendo handhelds, will be backwards compatible with all DS and DSi software.
The DS and DSi have sold over 125 million units globally, and the company says the 3DS will be a successor to the DS, not just a minor revision.
Although there are little other details available about the system, we reported earlier this month on an obscure DSiWare game called Rittai Kakushi E Atta Koreda (3D Hidden Images: Found it!), which, by using the front facing camera, tracked the player's face and eyes and created a 3D effect, with the screen moving to create a sense of depth.
Speaking of the microSD card and other new flash memory improvements, SanDisk said at that time: "The 64GB embedded memory, moviNAND, and the 32GB microSD card each greatly expand the data storage density of mobile devices, meeting customers' memory requirements and ushering in a new era of mobile and IT device capacity growth."
While 1GB, 2GB and 4GB versions retail for under $15 USD, this new 32GB card has an MSRP of $200.
This is a quick blurb until there is more information but it appears that heading to Google.cn (China) redirects the site directly to http://www.google.com.hk/ (Hong Kong).
The Hong Kong search engine is not censored but it is still unclear whether Chinese users can access the site, which seems unlikely.
We will update this item later when there is more news on it.
Universal Music Group (UMG), one of the "Big 4" record labels has announced its latest ploy to increase physical CD sales in the U.S., slashing prices of new releases to under $10.
Dubbing the pricing program "Velocity," UMG hopes that consumers will go out and buy CDs, which will still retail for higher prices than the comparable songs digitally, but with a closer gap.
"We think it will really bring new life into the physical format," adds Universal Music Group Distribution chairman/CEO Jim Urie.
Wholesales prices for new releases have now been dropped to an average of $7.50 from $10.35, and MSRPs for retail prices are dropped to between $6 and $10.
UMG is hoping that the big hit taken to revenue can be made up with an increase in sales volume. Overall CD sales are already down 15 percent year-on-year, with bigger drops expected.
Velocity is set for a Q2 launch and should last through the holiday season.
UPDATE: "Reports that EA SPORTS plans to sue the creators of South Park are false."
On Wednesday, Comedy Central aired the first episode of South Park's 14th season, dubbed "Sexual Healing" which revolved around Tiger Wood's sex scandal as well as the video game Tiger Woods PGA Tour 11, which is set for a Q3 2010 release.
Today, Daily Informer is reporting that EA Sports, the publisher behind the Tiger Woods series is set to sue South Park writers Matt Stone and Trey Parker over their disgust of the episode.
The episode shows sequences from the upcoming golf game but also includes scenes of Tiger and wife Elin fighting, and even crashing his SUV into a tree. At the end of the episode, after Tiger has apologized to the media and the game returns to just playing golf, the kids of the show leave the game, calling it "boring again."
While many fans found the ep funny, EA Sports did not and DI says their source at the company added that "soon after the airing of the episode the top beef were called in, even Peter Moore was informed of the situation. Before the episode aired the marketing folks were already worried, but now they have a lot more to worry about."
While I will be linking to the full and comprehensive article Slyck has written on the matter, it appears that ACS:Law, the firm known for accusing game pirates in the UK has threatened to sue the file sharing information forum Slyck.com.
The threat demands that Slyck remove three forum threads that exist for members to discuss their ongoing litigation with ACS: Law and just generally go over the current UK laws against alleged file sharers. The three forum threads have a total of 10,000 posts.
ACS: Law gave Slyck three days to take down the threads or face a lawsuit in the UK. However, because the site is based in the U.S. and is protected from defamation verdicts in other nations, they have refused to remove any content.
Dell, releasing their first smartphone since the death of the Axim line in 2007, has dubbed their upcoming device the Aero.
The smartphone will be available in the U.S. via carrier AT&T.
Without giving a timeline, the carrier says the device will be available "soon."
The Aero will have hardware based on the Dell Mini3 phones sold in China and Brazil and will run Android 1.6 but will have a custom UI designed by Dell with input from AT&T.
Despite recent analyst downgrades that suggested the smartphone maker should be bankrupt within 9 month, Palm has announced some good news today, stating their Pre Plus and Pixi Plus phones are headed to AT&T, making the smartphones available via Sprint, Verizon and AT&T, the three largest carriers in the U.S.
The phones will be available in the "coming months," and will cost $150 for the Pre and $50 for the Pixi with two-year contract.
Data plans will be mandatory but the unlimited plan is "recommended" meaning buyers can pay for a cheaper non-unlimited plan.
Palm's shares have slightly rebounded but still hover around the 52-week low mark.
Amazon has introduced their Kindle software for the iPad today, looking to actively compete against the Apple iBook store and Barnes & Nobles rival iPad app.
450,000 books are available via the Kindle store, giving iPad owners a plethora of options when they receive their tablets on April 3rd. As is standard, the app will use Whispersync to sync the last page you were reading if it was on another device such as the Kindle device or an iPhone or BlackBerry.
Additionally, you can customize the background color and the font size of the book you are reading, as well as adjust brightness.
According to GameStop, recent PS3 and Wii hardware shortages will continue for some time, both in store and online.
"I am not exactly sure that I have a total answer, obviously, it is a question that we ask the platform holders," said the company during their recent earnings conference call. "Consequently, I can tell you that we do anticipate that we will be in that situation for the PS3 for another couple of months, unfortunately, because we could sell a lot more hardware than what we have on both that and the Wii platform."
Fortunately for would-be Wii buyers, the retail store says it expects the Wii to be back in stock before the PS3.
As for why both consoles are in shortages? The "unprecedented demand" has left the companies "still scrambling to catch up from the December surge of hardware that occurred." In December, the Wii set an all-time record for most consoles sold in a month in the U.S.
India, one of the world's biggest film markets, also has one of the bigger piracy rates in the world and the Hollywood and Bollywood studios want to try to put an end to it.
The MPAA and seven Indian companies have signed a coalition intended to fight piracy, with the group working with movie theaters to try to shutdown camcorder recordings, as well as working with ISPs to shut down the ease of Internet piracy.
The industry group would not reveal the budget but did say it would come from its members, the major studios. The MPAA has anti-piracy coalitions in the U.S., the EU and Hong Kong.
"People are becoming more of the same mind," adds Dan Glickman, the chairman of the Motion Picture Association of America. "The Indian film industry now understands their product is getting stolen at significant rates."
According to an Ernst & Young study, piracy cost the Indian economy $959 million and 571,000 jobs in 2008.
The Move is used in conjunction with the PlayStation Eye camera and allows for real-time tracking of the player's body movements.
Standalone prices are still not confirmed but the company says that a "starter bundle" including a game, the PS Eye and the Move will retail for under $100.
Yesterday, Engadget Live showed off the Move in action, including 'Minority Report'-esque augmented reality and multi-touch.
There is not too much to explain that isn't in the video, but Sprint has started a new ad campaign for their 4G Mobile Hotspot, giving iPhone, iPad and other smartphone users the ability to connect to a 4G data connection.
4G is available in 25 cities currently, with more (such as NYC) promised "for the near future."
Download speeds with 4G are usually around 5 Mbps, about 400 percent faster than average 3G speeds from carriers such as Verizon and AT&T.
Vodafone Spain has confirmed today that they accidently shipped 3000 smartphone handsets with MicroSD cards that were infected by the "Mariposa" malware.
Those affected are users who were shipped HTC Magic phones.
The carrier came clean after a meeting with Panda Security. The story of the infected memory cards began when a Panda technician was shipped an HTCMagic phone. He immediately recognized the malware, which is used to steal information.
Vodafone says the infection is "isolated and local," and that users in other parts of the EU should not be worried.
For those that read Spanish, the original posting is here: Movilzone.es
Bharti Airtel, India's largest mobile carrier has announced that it will begin selling the Apple iPhone 3GS in the upcoming months, bringing the popular smartphone to 124 million Indian subscribers.
The iPhone 3G model has been available in the nation through Bharti and Vodafone since late 2008, but no carrier had struck a deal for the 3GS until this week.
Earlier in the week, Bharti submitted its bid to participate in an auction for 3Gbandwidth in the nation. India has no commercial 3G services currently but successful bidders will be allowed to begin selling 3G data plans commercially in September.
Just two days after a jury found that Microsoft had violated patents of small company VirnetX and fined the software giant $105.75 million USD, VirnetX has filed suit again, trying to get the jury to prove that more Microsoft products infringe on their patents, as well.
The jury had found that Windows XP, Vista and Office Communicator infringed the patents, but the suit was filed in 2008, so the new lawsuit now claims that Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 also infringe on the patents.
"This is a tactical and procedural post-trial action to ensure and protect our property rights as we proceed to final resolution with Microsoft," says VirnetX CEO Kendall Larsen.
Microsoft has already vowed to appeal the first ruling, and challenged this latest suit as well. Says MSFT spokesperson Kevin Kutz (via AllThingsD): "Microsoft respects intellectual property, and we believe our products do not infringe the patents involved. Moreover, we believe those patents are invalid. We will challenge VirnetX?s claims."
Tracy&Matt is reporting today that struggling smartphone maker Palm may be offering the Palm Pre Plus (and the Pixi Plus) via O2 in the UK.
They site received a message from a "credible tipster" which reads as follows:
O2 are following up the Palm Pre with the Palm Pre Plus and the Pixi Plus. The Pixi is new to the UK having a fixed qwerty keyboard like the RIM devices it shares the 8Gb storage of the original Pre but with a shortened display of 320 x 400 dropping 80 lines from the Pre. The Pixi Processor is a Qualcomm instead if the Omap of the Pre, albeit running at the same clock speed. The Palm Pre Plus is like the original Pre but without the centre button and comes with the matt TouchStone enabled back previously having to be purchased separately allowing the wireless charging of the phone on the induction TouchStone charger. The Pre Plus has 16Gb of storage and a double the ram also. The build quality is said to be better than the original Pre with the keyboard being much more responsive with a definite click. In tests it has been seen to run 50 apps at the same time. The expected launch date is April 2010 shortly after the App Catalogue comes out of Beta for European users allowing access for paid applications.
AndroidCentral is reporting that the Sprint models of the Samsung Moment and the HTC Hero will be receiving Android 2.1 in the near future, citing an internal Sprint memo.
Reads the memo:
What you need to know:
-With all the anticipation of Nexus One joining the Sprint Android family of great devices, customers with the HTC HeroTM and the Samsung MomentTM with GoogleTM may wonder about the Android 2.1 platform that supports Nexus One.
What you need to do: -We know that technology has enabled greater productivity and spontaneity in our lives,and because of this we have become very dependent on staying connected. Customers don't only expect more from their wireless phones -- they demand it. -Let your customers know we are actively working on having the Android 2.1 platform available to our Hero and Moment customers over the coming weeks.
Escom LLC., the company that bought the domain name for $14 million just 4 years ago, has filed for bankruptcy protection, saying they are owed $10 million. The three creditors, Washington Technology Associates, iEntertainment Inc, and AccountingMatters.com noted that the auction "would have diminished the value of Escom's assets."
When a company files for an involuntary bankruptcy protection, lenders are temporary prevented from seizing assets.
Cablevision, the cable and Internet service provider for 3 million users in NY, NJ and Connecticut has announced that it will telecast the NY Rangers hockey game on March 24th in 3D, the first live 3D sportscast in the U.S.
Mike Bair of MSG says the cable company is planning many more 3D events in the coming months.
"We would consider additional playoff games if the equipment is available," adds Bair, via Variety. "We'll do more games next season and we would like to do a live concert for FUSE, our music network, later this year."
MSG will get its own separate 3D channel eventually as well.
Citing the fact there are very few users out there with 3D HDTVs, the company will offer a viewing party at Madison Square Garden for $20, including bigscreen, RealD projection and full 3D.
Shigeru Miyamoto, the man behind the Mario franchise has said today in an interview with the AP that he is trying very hard to get Nintendo's DS handheld into schools as teaching tools or educational aids.
"That is maybe the area where I am devoting myself (the) most," Miyamoto adds.
He notes that the DS is already used in museums and aquariums and that the gaming giant will begin to release the DS "in junior high and elementary schools in Japan starting in the new school year."
Additionally, the designer, when asked about new motion control systems Natal and Move, simply said he was "honored" that Microsoft and Sony were following in the path of the Wii, for which Miyamoto also has design credit.
Palm, the struggling smartphone maker, has taken a giant hit again today after blowing earnings and receiving multiple downgrades from analysts.
Shares of Palm stock are down 26 percent to a new 52-week low after the company posted a loss of 61 cents a share, outdoing the expected 43 cents a share loss expected by analysts. After the earnings, two analysts downgraded the stock to "sell" from "neutral/hold" and added a price target of $0, implying they believe the company will be bankrupt within 12 months.
With the earnings report, Palm emphasized high volume of shipments for their Pre/Plus and Pixi/Plus models, however it appears the carriers selling them are having trouble getting customers to buy, even with extreme price cuts.
Ilya Grozovsky of Morgan Joseph & Co., said "Palm is essentially an accelerating death spiral," and cut his price target on the shares to $0. "They have had a tremendous problem selling their devices even at carriers like Verizon with 80 million subscribers."
The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has denied Google's application to trademark "Nexus One."
For Google, the rejection is not yet final, giving the search giant a chance to submit more evidence as well as new arguments.
"Registration of the applied-for mark is refused because of a likelihood of confusion with the mark in U.S. Registration No. 3554195," wrote the USPTO.
No. 3554195 is a trademark of the word "Nexus" that was registered years ago by Integra Telecom, an 11-state wireline phone provider.
For their part, Integra thanked the USPTO for protecting its trademark and says they hope to work out a deal with Google. Adds John Nee, Integra's vice president of corporate communications: "Google hasn't contacted us since the PTO issued its objection but we hope we can work together to achieve our respective business goals."
Earlier this month, Apple sued rival smartphone maker HTC over violations of patents related to the iPhone, accusing HTC of infringing on up to 20 patents relating to the popular smartphone's hardware and user interface.
Taking its time in doing so, HTC has responded today, vowing to fight the charges.
"HTC disagrees with Apple's actions and will fully defend itself. HTC strongly advocates intellectual property protection and will continue to respect other innovators and their technologies as we have always done," said HTC CEO Peter Chou, via a press release. "We will continue to embrace competition through our own innovation as a healthy way for consumers to get the best mobile experience possible."
If Apple succeeds in the case, they will get an injunction on HTC, barring the company from importing and selling any of their infringing devices in the U.S. The company is also seeking monetary damages.
Joystiq is reporting today that "USB Mass Storage Device Support" should hit the Xbox 360 console sometime within 2010, most likely with the upcoming Spring 2010 dashboard update.
Citing a document written by a "senior software development engineer," the support will allow gamers to save and consequently load game data from USB devices, a much wanted feature.
With the support available, gamers can download Arcade games, DLC or other content right to their storage device, although it is unclear what capacity cards will be made available (minimum must be 1GB and max must be 16GB). The source also claims that "installation of a full disc-based title" is also a possibility, although the disc will still need to remain in the tray, for authentication purposes.
In regards to the minimum and maximum posted above, the document says: "The system partition occupies 512 MB of space, and by default the consumer partition occupies the remainder of the device capacity, or 16 GB, whichever is smaller."
Amazon has introduced the Mac version of its Kindle software today, expanding the platforms on which it is available to include PCs, Macs, the Kindle device, iPhones and BlackBerrys.
The software is available for free via Amazon, and lets users purchase and read e-books on their computers. Amazon offers 450,000 titles via the Kindle Store.
Additionally, Amazon said an iPad Kindle app would be available in April.
Despite selling a standalone e-reader device, Amazon says e-book sales are much more profitable, so Kindle sales are not top priority. However, Amazon remains the market leader for e-book sales and e-readers.
Omar Ramos-Lopez, an angry ex-employee of the Texas Auto Center in Austin took out his revenge on his former employer by remotely shutting down 100 cars, using the company's computer system.
After hacking into the vehicle immobilization system, Lopez either deactivated the starters of the cars, or activated the horns, leaving them honking all night.
80 of those affected complained to the company about missing school, work, or of having to get their car towed, or repaired.
The system, run by Pay Technologies (PayTeck) is only supposed to be used if a car owner fails to pay their loan or lease obligations.
Lopez was arrested and charged with breach of computer security.
Twitter founder Jack Dorsey has confirmed that they will eventually offer a Chinese version of the extremely popular social network, although a time frame was not given.
The confirmation came at a panel discussion earlier this week after Chinese activist Ai Weiwei asked: "Is it possible to provide a Chinese access on Twitter? I need a clear answer, yes or no."
"I would say yes. It's just a matter of time," said Dorsey, in response.
Ai Weiwei calls Twitter a very important part of the future of China, which has practically forbidden a free flow of information and censors search engine results. "In China, we cannot see YouTube, Facebook, or Twitter, and very soon, maybe not see Google," he adds.
Why is Twitter so important? "At 140 words, in Chinese, you can really write a novel. You can discuss most profound ideas really to democracy, freedom, poetry," Ai Weiwei notes, via PCWorld.
Dorsey adds that he wants Twitter in China, but technological and political hurdles need to be jumped, including finding a way for Chinese characters to be universally supported via phone SMS. Getting inside "the Great Firewall" would also be a problem.
Following in Ubisoft'sfootsteps, Electronic Arts has confirmed that upcoming games from the publisher will include the very controversial "always on" DRM scheme that forces gamers to be connected to the Internet at all times or lose the ability to play their games.
While gaming, if you ever lose connection to the Internet, or even if EA's servers go down for any reason, you will not be able to play C&C4, not even in single player mode.
Ubisoft learned the hard way that the system is flawed and does nothing but push legitimate buyers over to pirated versions, which allow for full playback without DRM, but it seems clear that EA will have to learn the same lesson on their own terms.
Popular anti-virus company McAfee is reporting today that Facebook has become the target of a virus that aims to steal passwords and other sensitive information from the social network's 400 million users.
The virus comes via spam emails that state that users Facebook accounts have had their passwords reset. You are then urged to click on an attachment to "obtain new login credentials." Once opened, the attachment unleashes a group of trojans, including a password stealing software.
"This threat is potentially very dangerous considering that there are over 350 million Facebook users who could fall for this scam," adds McAfee.
For those who are scared of the virus, the email is titled "Facebook Password Reset Confirmation! Customer Support." Delete it immediately.
The PlayStation Move, Sony's contender in the motion controller market, was just announced last week, and Sony has already released an ad mocking rivals the Wii and Microsoft's Natal.
The Move is used in conjunction with the PlayStation Eye camera and allows for real-time tracking of the player's body movements.
The system should retail for under $100 when it becomes available later this year.
According to a new study by GetJar, the market for mobile apps will grow to $17.5 billion USD by 2012, with mobile application downloads jumping from 7 billion to 50 billion.
"It is easy to see how mobile apps will eclipse the traditional desktop Internet," GetJar CEO Ilja Laurs says. "It makes perfect sense that mobile devices will kill the desktop."
GetJar is the second largest App store in the world behind Apple's.
The App Store currently has 150,000 apps, the Android Market has 30,000 and other stores such as RIM's and Nokia's continue to grow.
Gorge was an indexing service, which didn't host any of the material on its own servers, embedding or linking from other sites instead. Most agreed the service worked well, but most also agreed that there was little chance the site was legal.
This week, the site has been effectively taken down by the MPAA, which has ordered a cease-and-desist on behalf of the studios it represents.
"TVGorge has recently been advised to remove all of our indexed content," says TVGorge, via TF. "We understand content owners have a need to protect their content and we can only hope they take the initiative to provide easy access to all of their great TV shows at an international level. If anything, hopefully we have shown them that people are desperately looking for a place to watch their favorite TV shows."
One-time extremely popular release group pirate maVen (aka Geremi Adam), has been sentenced to 10 weeks in prison this week, after pleading guilty to distributing camera versions of two feature films.
maVen (Adam), the 27-year old Canadian resident, was for at least 2 years, the most popular release group for telesync releases, although in 2006, releases stopped coming, after the FBI began investigating the group.
In April 2006, Adam was arrested after recording "Invincible" at a theater in Montreal. Despite seizing his camera and laptop, Adam was released. One month later, Adam was arrested again, accused of selling his recorded movies for profit to other release groups or on the streets.
After the arrest, the FBI went as far as to call Adam the "world leader" in Internet piracy.
According to a new report, Building a Digital Economy: The Importance of Saving Jobs in the EU's Creative Industries, illegal downloading of movies, music, games and TV cost the UK economy £1.4 billion in 2008, as well as leading to the loss of 39,000 jobs.
If the trend continues, says the report, piracy will lead to 1.2 million lost jobs and £215 billion in lost revenue across Europe.
The report was commissioned by the Business Action to Stop Counterfeiting and Piracy (BASCAP), and endorsed by the EU's "creative industries," writes the AP.
Says Norwegian actress Agnete Haaland, President of the International Actors Federation (which also endorsed the report) added: "The fact is that piracy is killing the industry. What we are talking about is actually a criminal act. We need to change all poor attitudes towards illegal downloading and recognize that it is theft."
Google has announced that the Nexus One is now headed to Sprint, as well, although price and an exact release date were not part of the press statement.
"Nexus One is a powerful device that belongs on a powerful network. This is another step in our continued partnership of innovation with Google," adds Fared Adib, Sprint vice president of product development.
The Nexus One is now available, or will be available for all the major carriers, Verizon, T-Mobile, AT&T and Sprint.
Additionally, Sprint is rumored to unveil a 4G-capable phone dubbed "Supersonic," next week.
Google has just introduced a new version of their Nexus One smartphone which supports 3G data speeds for AT&T customers in the US and Rogers customers in Canada.
The initial version of the phone offered by Google was already compatible with AT&T's network. However, data speed was limited because the frequency used for 3G data transmission by AT&T and Rogers wasn't supported.
So far the new model is available only through Google's web store. No plans have been announced to offer a subsidized version.
A CDMA version of the Nexus One, designed to work on Verizon's network, is expected very soon.
Google has told MobileCrunch today that the Android Market has reached a new milestone, 30,000 applications.
The company last reported figures in December of last year, claiming 16,000 apps.
Although they would not include numbers on paid versus free, stat site AndroLib says the ratio is about 39 percent to 61 percent, with free in the clear lead.
In comparison, the Apple app store has about 150,000 apps currently available, with both markets growing very quickly.
Okay, while the headline may be a bit sensationalist, according to the new 2010 Digital Hate Report, terrorists and racists are increasingly turning to social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter to lure children.
The report is released annually by the Simon Wiesenthal Center for Tolerance, and it "aims to assist law enforcement, public officials, educators, parents and the news media to better grasp the scope of hate."
2010DHR is based on 11,500 "problematic" sites, forums, Twitter posts and social networks and the report has found that "hate-filled" language is increasing in social networks, as well as offensive and "disturbing" video footage.
More disturbing, was the increase in "how-to" posts for suicide terrorists, including bomb making and laser technology. Terrorists are using social networks to brainwash young children into "hate-filled Islamic fundamentalist zombies," some as young as six years old.
Sky has purchased 15,000 3D televisions from LG Electronics and plans to install them in pubs around the country to promote its 3D broadcasts. Back in January, Sky broadcast a Barclays Premier League match between Arsenal and Manchester United and held screenings of the event in nine pubs to show off the technology.
The broadcaster is set to launch a 3D service for wide use in the UK in April, while consumer electronics manufacturers are pushing out new 3D flat-panel televisions. The industry hopes that growing interest in 3D movies in theaters will spur interest in 3D TV at home.
Sky hopes that showing football matches and other sports events in pubs in 3D will generate some interest in it. LG also benefits from the deal in that its televisions are being promoted as part of Sky's demonstrations.
The UK broadcasting regulator has rejected Channel Five's request for capacity on Freeview's Multiplex B. Ofcom was not convinced that Five was fully committed to HD broadcasting. Under the rules, the bandwidth will now be allocated to the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC).
Ofcom has to assign Freeview HD capacity to non-commercial broadcasters if the bandwidth is not being used by commercial broadcasters. Five was unable to clearly inform Ofcom of when it will begin broadcasting HD or how it plans to maintain a daytime HD schedule.
Ofcom is believed to have been planning to give the bandwidth to Channel 4 or S4C instead, but both also failed to commit to a service that would meet Ofcom's requirements.
Five will now have to wait until 2012 when Ofcom will again allow commercial broadcasters for pitch for HD capacity.
Research is showing that action taken by Microsoft and others to tackle the Waledacbotnet have been effective. Microsoft's "Operation b49" employed a number of technical measures coupled with court actions to cut off the controllers of the spam-spewing botnet from the 70,000 - 90,000 infected PCs.
"While it is still too early to know the entire scope of this particular takedown's impact, early returns show that Operation b49 has been delivering on the disruption of Waledac and helping to map new territory in the fight against botnets,"Microsoft's Jeff Williams said.
He said that data from Microsoft and other security researchers "indicate that our actions have effectively decimated communications within the Waledac bot network." An analysis by the Shadowserver Foundation of honeypot PCs (machines allowed to be infected by researchers to observe their behavior) showed that commands received by the infected machines plummeted.
Microsoft's upcoming update for its web browser, Internet Explorer 9, puts a lot of focus on support for the HTML 5 standards. IE9 is also expected to beef up performance, offloading tasks within the web browser to the graphics processing unit (GPU), or using separate CPU cores for certain elements of web pages if available.
While still easily the world's most used web browser, Internet Explorer has seen its market share drop along with its reputation as rivals such as Mozilla and Google pump out more and more features, support and speed for their web browsers.
The new IE supports CSS3 features such as rounded corners and opacity, while also now supporting SVG even though Microsoft is pushing its own Silverlight platform for rich graphics. At a conference in Las Vegas where IE9 was demoed, Microsoft showed H.264 video running at 720p in the browser, with the support for the video and audio content built-in.
Microsoft Corp. has been ordered to pay $106 million in damages to a communications company by a jury overseeing a patent infringement lawsuit. The jury found that the Redmond-based software giant had violated two patents held by communications company VirnetX Holding.
The ruling followed a trial lasting a week in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas. Specifically, $71.75 million was awarded for violation of one of the patents, while $34 million was awarded for the other, bringing the total to $105.75 million.
Microsoft Corp. was disappointed with the ruling, and maintains that it does not violate any patents held by VirnetX Holding. The patents in question cover methods for establishing Virtual Private Networks (VPN).
The Chinese government expects Google.cn to respect the country's rules with regard to censorship even if it plans to quit the country altogether. Shares of Baidu were up 4.8 percent on Monday, while shares of Google fell 3 percent as speculation mounts on Google's likelihood to leave the country.
The search giant announced in January that it would quit China if it had to maintain self-censorship of its search results. The ruling communist party forces search engines to filter out results for certain terms, or certain results that it deems inappropriate for Chinese citizens to see.
Google's threat to leave the country came after it, along with at least 20 other companies, was the target of a cyberattack aimed at stealing Google's Intellectual Property and at the e-mail accounts of Chinese activists.
"On entering the Chinese market in 2007, it clearly stated that it would respect Chinese law,"Yao Jian, a spokesman for the Ministry of Commerce, said. "We hope that whether Google Inc continues operating in China or makes other choices, it will respect Chinese legal regulations."
"Even if it pulls out, it should handle things according to the rules and appropriately handle remaining issues,"he added. Google entered talks with the Chinese government over the situation, but reports suggest that the company is almost certain to close its Google.cn site and quit the country, which has 384 million Internet users.
Large computer maker Dell has filed suit against five Asian tech companies this week, alleging that all five colluded as a cartel to overcharge for LCD panels.
The suit is against large manufacturers Sharp, Hitachi, Toshiba, Seiko Epson and HannStar Display and was filed in San Francisco.
The complaint notes that Dell is taking action "on behalf of itself and its affiliates to recover for antitrust and other harms arising from billions of dollars of purchases at artificially inflated prices, over several years, of thin film transistor-liquid crystal display panels, or products containing TFT-LCD panels."
Dell goes as far as to say that the LCD price fixing has been in effect since 1996.
In the past, Sharp was accused and pleaded guilty to price fixing, agreeing to pay a $120 million fine.
VGChartz has posted an interesting and speculative report this week, implying that Microsoft may be creating an Xbox 360 "Slim," a redesign that will shrink the size of the original console and mark the first major complete redesign since the console's launch in 2005.
Microsoft is hiring a new motherboard engineer, one for the 360 development team, with the job ad going up last week.
CEO Steve Ballmer, known for letting speculative comments fly almost every time he speaks, started the rumor mill last week as well, saying new console models would be available in the future with different "form factors."
Here is the full job ad (and let the speculation begin):
Job Category: Hardware Engineering
Location: United States, CA, Mountain View
Job ID: 714897
Product: Xbox Home
Division: Entertainment & Devices Division
Motherboard Design Engineer
Job Description
The Xbox 360 Console development team is seeking qualified candidates for an Electrical Engineer. The responsibilities of this position are focused on specifying, designing (schematic capture, PCB layout, BOM, cost analysis), implementing and verifying the mother-board and other various sub-system boards that make up the XBOX 360 product line. This work includes development of requirements and evaluating different solution for functionality, cost, and risk. The subsystems on the XBOX 360 mother board include (but are not limited to): High speed busses (front side bus, memory bus, PCIe bus, SATA bus, USB bus, I2S, etc.), memory, Ethernet, audio/video, system clocking, power and thermal management, and misc. analog/digital circuitry.
The XBOX 360 Console Development team is responsible for aggressive cost reduction of the console throughout the life of the product as well as expanding the market for the console in derivative products. The position involves working closely with industrial designers, electrical engineers, mechanical engineers, software engineers, test engineers, component engineers, and program managers.
Sony has introduced a new 'Skinny' SDK this past week, one that will give developers a way to create non-game applications and add them to the PlayStation Store, quickly and easily.
The company has described the lightweight 'Skinny' tool as "a simple yet effective means for content holders to put their intellectual property on the PlayStation platforms without software development."
On average, the apps will take one day to create. The software will be mainly used (Sony hopes) to create "strategy guides, game maps, cheats, training manuals, episodic videos, eBooks and eMagazines," and will include a web-based authoring tool and a software client.
Hitwise has posted a very interesting chart today, one that shows that Facebook has become the most popular site (by traffic) in the United States, at least for the week ended March 13th, the first time in years that Google has been unseated for a full week.
Visits to Facebook increased 185 percent for the week year-on-year, while Google only saw 9 percent YoY growth. Combined, FB and Google accounted for a giant 14 percent of all US internet traffic last week.
Facebook was the most visited site on Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, New Year's Day and the weekend of March 7th, but never for a full week.
Arstechnica has put together an interesting article this week that shows the loyalty (or lack thereof) of current BlackBerry owners.
Citing a Crowd Science survey, Ars says that 2 out of every 5 current BlackBerry owners would switch to an Apple iPhone when their contract was up.
Additionally, 33 percent of current iPhone owners, as well as 16 percent of BlackBerry owners use their devices for "exclusively personal use", not for work. Only 1 percent of iPhone owners use their devices exclusively for business/work and 7 percent of BlackBerry users do the same.
Higher percentages, 66 percent for iPhone owners and 77 percent for BlackBerry users, used their devices for both work and personal reasons.
Finally, the survey showed that 90 percent of both Android and iPhone owners would stick with their current OS/devices when their contracts were up, showing much better loyalty than current RIM users.
After almost a year's worth of development, we're happy to reveal the new version of our site, dubbed as "v4". Many things have changed since the previous version - most notably the layout itself, but also the code behind the site has went through some major changes.
From now on, all of our various language versions will use the same codebase and same site structure, making further development much, much easier than in the past. Furthermore, launching new language editions of the site will become a breeze compared to the old system where each site was basically a clone of its siblings, but maintained independently.
As always with major upgrades, we are expecting to see weird problems to pop up -- and hope that you'll let us know if you encounter a bug or weird behaviour while browsing through the site. You can contact us by either posting a comment to this news article or by using our feedback form.
Now, let us know your comments about the new design.
Showing off the app at the MIX event, Microsoft Windows Phone 7 devices will have a Netflixstreaming app (currently in prototype stage) that will allow for movie playback over 3G or Wi-Fi.
The popular Netflix "Watch Instantly" streaming service has over 12,000 movies, TV episodes and documentaries.
There is not much other info on it, but Engadget has a shaky video of the app in action, and it looks pretty good so far:
The popular PlayStation Home virtual world has reached 12 million users, says PS Home director jack Buser.
Noting the figures at the Game Developers Conference, Buser says Home users have doubled since June 2009, and jumped 20 percent since December.
85 percent of users that created an avatar on their first visit returned for a second visit and Buser says average users spend "hours" at a time in the virtual world.
"You're going to see us really embrace this idea of total game integration," adds Buser of future plans for Home. "It's an incredibly important part of [Sony's] strategy."
Titles will be given dedicated Home space, as well as bonus mini-games.
As of today, the first ever "dotcom" has celebrated its 25th birthday, an Internet landmark.
On March 15th, 1985 Symbolics computers purchased the first domain with a dotcom ending, becoming one of just 6 companies/individuals to do so in 1985. In 1997, the one millionth dotcom was registered, a number that has since exploded.
"This birthday is really significant because what we are celebrating here is the internet and dotcom is a good, well known placeholder for the rest of the internet," adds Mark Mclaughlin, Verisign CEO. Verisign is in charge of the entire dotcom domain. "Who would have guessed 25 years ago where the internet would be today. This really was a groundbreaking event."
In 2010, 668,000 dotcom sites are registered every month, and 57 million domain names were registered between the year 2000 and 2010. For the 15 years preceding it, only 21 million domain names were registered.
McLaughlin of Verisign also adds that it currently logs 53 billion requests for websites every day, and "we expect that to grow in 2020 to somewhere between three and four quadrillion."
A new proposal in Britain, taken up by the House of Commons today, wants to make it law that ISPs are forced to block access to all sites that offer unauthorized movies, music and other pirated content like games and books.
Content holders say the amendment will finally give them "the tools to tackle the piracy problem at the supply and demand levels," says the NYTimes, but critics see censorship of the Internet and general undermining of the development of England's digital economy.
The Open Rights Group, which has been fighting against Internet censorship, says the new law will certainly be abused, allowing individuals or companies to "suppress any Web content they find objectionable, under the pretext of protecting their copyright."
The British government says curbing piracy will bring hundreds of millions of dollars in new revenue to the entertainment industry, which accounts for 6 percent of economic output, but critics say the policies will be expensive for the ISPs, and taxpayers will be forced to help pay for the enforcement of policies they couldn't care less about.
BrokeMyController has reported this week on a newly discovered Microsoft patent, one that will bring about automated DLC purchasing system to the Xbox 360.
The patent would work as follows: You and friends are on Xbox Live and one of your buddies asks you to join a game for multiplayer. Unfortunately you don't have the latest map pack DLC. The new system would send up a prompt screen, asking that you purchase the DLC to accept your friend's invite. Hit "yes" and the DLC will download and install, without the need to head over to the Marketplace, and you can get back to playing the game with your buddies.
Currently, if you are invited to a game for which you are missing DLC, you are "required to back out of the commenced multiplayer session, manually locate the desired content, purchase the content, install the content, relocate the inviting players, prepare his own request to join their game," says the source, which is clearly a hassle.
MOG, the subscription-based music service that offers 7 million tracks for just $5 USD a month has announced today the release of a mobile app of their service.
The company has deals with Universal, Sony, Warner and EMI as well as independent labels and the service offers on-demand music, allowing for users to pick and choose what songs they want to hear, either in their browser, or now on their mobile devices.
"You can see the queue, you can jump to anywhere in the queue, when a song comes on the library, you can save it," adds David Hyman, CEO of MOG. "When you listen to Bob Marley radio, it's not Bob Marley inspired radio. You get Bob Marley 24/7."
The mobile app will be available on the iPhone and Android devices in the Q2 2010, and users will get MOG radio, 64 AAC+ quality, and ability to download in higher quality, for just $10 a month, by far the best subscription package available to date.
According to Deagol's AAPL Model, Apple saw 152,000 iPad pre-orders in its first weekend of availability, however, sales dropped off significantly from Friday until Sunday (view pics at the end).
In the first day, an expected 120,000 tablets were ordered, with orders slowing down as the days went on, for a total of about 152,000 now.
Adds the post: "A nice, round rump evolves after 12 hours into a relatively straight line slightly sloping up. I'll just add that this slope will increase in the next few hours and days, that is, the line will curve in the opposite direction right about now (72 hours) and get steeper, and then it'll become straight once again for some time. Once we get past 100-150 hours, I expect a new, more subtle rump to form in which the slope will very slowly get shallower as the days and weeks pass."
The original Palm Pre (minus the 'Plus') has a 500MHz processor and 256MB of RAM, and the mid-range processor has been criticized by critics of the smartphone for some time.
This week, modders have overclocked the Pre (running 1.3.5.1 firmware or 1.4) to 800MHz, and saw obviously faster performance.
The phone drains battery very quickly, and the phone runs hot as well, but for those with some extra time on their hands and extra money (in case the phone explodes) it might be worth trying out.
Nokia Corp. said that the market for mobile phones totaled 1.26 billion handsets last year, beating the Finnish giant's forecast of 1.14 billion. The company reduced its share of sales to 34 percent from an earlier forcast of 38 percent, recalculating the size of the market and the scale of the growing grey market for counterfeit and unlicensed mobile phones.
According to Gartner research group, the grey market totaled around 145 million handsets in 2009, with the majority of them being sold in China, India and Latin America. "These include vendors of legitimate, as well as unlicensed and counterfeit, products with manufacturing facilities primarily centered around certain locations in Asia and other emerging markets," Nokia said.
"This is a good thing for Nokia because it is really showing that they want to measure the real market and grey market has been a big driver in 2009,"said Gartner analyst Carolina Milanesi. "It is an opportunity for them to go after and try and actually win over users in that segment as well."
Sky and Virgin Media have confirmed that they will be offering ITV1 HD through both company's entertainment services starting in April. This brings more World Cup football games to UK subscribers in High-definition.
"The addition of ITV1 HD from 2nd April means Sky+HD homes across all ITV regions will be able to watch World Cup matches live in HD, as well as other major ITV shows such as Law and Order: UK, The Prisoner, Foyles War, Lewis, Survival with Ray Mears, and Britain's Got Talent,"Sky said in a statement.
Virgin Media also announced separately that it will be offering ITV1 HD from April 2, and that some of ITV1 HD's content will be available on demand on ITV Net Player on Virgin Media's TV Platform.
Sky also said it will be launching Hallmark Chanel HD and Sky Sports 4 HD to bring its total line-up of HD channels to 40.
NVIDIA is hosting a website that covers legal cases against Intel Corporation for anti-competitive practices. The site is clearly part of NVIDIA's PR campaign against Intel as the spat between both companies over rivaling technology continues to grow.
The site has extensive details from legal cases brought against Intel, including cases brought by the European Union, the Federal Trade Commission in the U.S., New York State etc. and also aims to educate consumers about the base of the conflict; at least from the perspective of NVIDIA.
The site is an interesting browse and to its credit, is very informative and does its intended job quite well. Nevertheless, some of its content is amusing and reminds you that it is presented from a single side in this argument. Take, for example, the difference in how NVIDIA describes what a GPU is, and what a CPU is.
Q. What is a GPU? "A. GPUs, or graphics processing units, are specialized processors first developed by NVIDIA in 1999. They were initially used to render three-dimensional graphics. In more recent years, GPUs have also been used for “general purpose” computing, which harnesses the computing power of the chip to perform certain functions traditionally handled by the CPU, often more efficiently than can be done by the CPU alone. General purpose GPUs are being used by scientists and engineers around the world to perform ground-breaking research in fields like medicine, biology and chemistry as well as for mainstream applications like streamingHD video and transcoding media files."
PRS for Music has compiled figures showing that growth in digital music downloads lead to a increase in royalties paid to British songwriters, composers and publishers. About £623 million was paid out in 2009 in royalties, up 2.6 percent from the total in 2008. It represents the first time that growth in digital revenues was larger than the drop in CD and DVD earnings for the industry.
"2009 was the first year in which the growth in revenues from the legal digital market compensated for the decline in revenues from traditional CDs and DVDs, though we remain cautious as to whether this represents a true turning point,"said PRS for Music chief executiveRobert Ashcroft.
"The next decade does, however, promise further growth in earnings from the legal digital market as well as the use of British music overseas." The global music business witnessed continuing declines throughout the last decade. It blames growth of Internet piracy and the decline of physical format sales for the reduction in revenues.
There is something that doesn't seem right about charging games consumers extra fees to unlock content that is already present on a disc they bought, or at least that is what gamers feel. Fans have pointed out that new Downloadable Content (DLC) for BioShock 2 is actually already present on the game disc itself, despite being labeled and sold as "DLC".
The Sinclair Solutions pack was "released" on Thursday and includes two new playable characters, 20 new trials, weapons upgrades and increases the level cap to 50. The add-on is priced at 400 Microsoft Points, the equivalent of about $5. However, fans of the game posted on the 2K Forum that the download size for the PC add-on was just 24K in size.
Similarly, the download size for the Xbox 360 add-on was just 108K in size. Clearly the content is already on the disc itself, fans believed. According to forum community manager Elizabeth, they are right. She posted that the download was already on the disc to ensure there was no split in the userbase for the games' multiplayer mode.
According to details in a court filing, Nokia Corp. and Apple Inc. will seek a U.S. court hearing in a patent infringement case in mid-2012. The detail shows that both sides expect the mobile patent feud between them to continue for quite some time. Nokia has already moved to have a case brought against it by Apple dismissed in the meantime.
Nokia sued Apple in October 2009, alleging that the company's iPhone uses patent technologies owned by Nokia Corp. without paying royalties for their use. Nokia is seeking up to €1 billion ($1.36 billion) from Apple in the case.
On December 11, Apple filed a countersuit against Nokia accusing the Finnish mobile giant of infringing 13 Apple patents. The company later removed four of the 4 patents from the list.
Patent disputes like these are becoming all too common in the ever-growing market for mobile gadgets. Last week, Apple sued HTC Corp accusing it of infringing 20 hardware and software patents held by Apple. HTC makes touchscreen smartphones that run Google software.
According to AppleInsider, multi-tasking may be the headlining feature of the upcoming iPhone OS 4.0, giving millions of users their biggest demand.
Multi-tasking will allow for apps to run concurrently in the background, although it is unclear how many apps will be able to run at once.
The news comes from sources with "proven track records" in predicting upcoming Apple updates, says AI, and the sources say that Apple has "developed a full-on solution" to multi-tasking, although it is unclear how battery life will be affected.
The iPhone 4.0 OS is expected to be released in June at the earliest.
Greek authorities have taken down the large torrenttrackerGamato.info, accusing the site of facilitating copyright infringement of music, games, movies, and books.
Six admins of the site were also arrested in raids of their homes in Athens, Salonika, Larissa and Aridaia.
The police officials were working on tips from IFPI Greece, the local branch of the industry group.
Gamato.info was a top 20 most visited site in Greece, with an estimated 155,000 daily visitors. The site had around 13,000 movies, 6500 games and over 35,000 music albums available.
Says Jeremy Banks, director of anti-piracy at IFPI: "Gamato.info was facilitating the illegal distribution of music, film, games and books. It is the perfect illustration of how such illegal operations are damaging a wide range of creative industries in Europe. The Hellenic Police swiftly recognized this was not a victimless crime and took action against those who sought to shamelessly profit off the back of others' creative work. This skilfully executed action by a highly knowledgeable police force should act as a real deterrent to others in Greece considering engaging in online piracy."
According to multiple reports, the UK launch of the Google Nexus One has been delayed until the middle of next month, a setback that should lose it sales to the HTC Legend, which is set for release in a few weeks.
The handset will be available unlocked at a premium or locked to Vodafone with a two-year contract for free.
Because of the delay, the Nexus One will have to compete with the Legend as well as the HTC Desire, both of which use Android, along with the very popular HTC Sense user interface.
Overall, the Nexus One has struggled in the US, and Goldman Sachs recently cut their sales estimates from 3.5 million this year to a measly 1 million.
James Murdoch, chairman and CEO of News Corps. European and Asian operations has made some interesting comments this week in regards to piracy, calling on governments to "get tough" on illegal downloading.
"We need enforcement mechanisms and we need governments to play ball … There is no difference with going into a store and stealing Pringles or a handbag and taking this stuff. It's a basic condition for investment and economic growth and there should be the same level of property rights whether it's a house or a movie," said Murdoch. "The idea that there's a new consumer class and you have to be consumer-friendly when they're stealing stuff. No. There should be the same level of sanctity as there is around property. Content is no different. They're not crazy kids. No. Punish them."
James Murdoch is the son of mogul Rupert Murdoch, the chairman and CEO of News Corp, and younger Murdoch is expected to take over the company when his father retires.
Adding to what his father has said in the past, James said News Corp. will act against "content aggregators," including search giant Google, in order to protect its copyrights.
"We're being very careful legally to protect our rights," says Murdoch, via Guardian. "If there's money getting stuck it's getting stuck in an inefficient distribution layer … where Google and Yahoo are suddenly indexing copyright material and then selling bits of it and making money from it. You may have to withdraw access to those things. You may not."
Pre-orders for the much-hyped Apple iPad just started on Friday but that isn't stopping eBay sellers from trying to make a pretty penny off the tablet before it officially ships on April 3rd.
There are currently 442 iPads up for sale, with a range of prices, most with a heavy premium.
The most ridiculous comes from a "top rated seller" with the moniker egiftscentral_123, who is selling a Wi-Fi/16GB model for $21 million USD, and even then is audacious enough to charge $14.42 for shipping.
Users that will ship internationally seem to be the only ones receiving true bids, as the iPad is set to go on sale in only 10 countries next month.
According to the Financial Times, Google Inc. is "99.9 percent" sure to shut down its Chinese search engine. The newspaper cited a source familiar with the situation in reporting that talks between Google and the Chinese government over censorship have reached an apparent impasse.
The report said that Google is likely to make a decision very soon but that it will take some time to follow through on its plans. The company would carry out an orderly closure to take steps to protect local employees from retaliation by authorities.
On Friday, China's Minister of Industry and Information Technology, Li Yizhong, warned Google about its decision to stop censoring search results for Chinese users. "If you don't respect Chinese laws, you are unfriendly and irresponsible, and the consequences will be on you,"he told reporters.
Google shocked the business world and ignited tension between the United States and China in January when it revealed that it would pull out of China if it would not offer unfiltered search results. The move came after Google was targeted by a cyber-attack sourced in China aimed at its Intellectual Property and the e-mail accounts of Chinese activists.
Electronic Arts has dropped its in-game advertisement partners and opted instead to sell its ads in-house. EA is currently partnered with IGA Worldwide and Massive Inc, owned by Microsoft, but has held an event in New York where it pitched its properties to advertisers and media buyers.
The sale operations will not be handled in-house when the deals with IGA Worldwide and Massive Inc. end in August this year. Both companies will provide ads until Electronic Arts ships the next Madden NFL title in the United States.
Reports from the New York event suggested that Electronic Arts put a big emphasis on content on the Apple formats, such as the iPod Touch and iPad, and also social networking sites like Facebook, along with its expected titles and formats.
The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) and performing rights group TONO have given up efforts to legally force Norwegian ISP Telenor to block the Pirate BayBitTorrent website. The case had seen Telenor triumphant twice after it refused to block the Pirate Bay and the IFPI brought the case to court.
In November 2009, a court decided that Telenor had no obligation to comply with the IFPI's demands. TONO confirmed that the verdict would be appealed, but in February the Borgarting Court of Appeal rejected the appeal on the grounds that there was no basis in Norwegian law for the claim.
The next option for the IFPI and TONO was to go to the Supreme Court, and most thought it would happen. However, the IFPI and TONO have decided not to take that route. "We wanted to get a legal clarification on whether under Norwegian law it is possible to order ISPs to block access to The Pirate Bay," a TONO statement reads.
LG Electronics has revealed that it plans to release its line-up of 3D televisions and other products in the UK in May this year. The electronics giant's initial line-up includes two LED TVs and a Blu-ray Disc player. The televisions use active-shutter 3D technology which requires suitable glasses that will not be included.
The 47-inch and 55-inch LC9900 series televisions will feature 400Hz frame interpolation, 4 HDMI ports and 10,000,000:1 contrast ratio. The backlighting for the 47-inch comprises of 864 LEDs, whilst the 55-inch set had 960 LEDs. Both come packed with Freeview HD receivers.
Bluetooth and WiFi are included in both sets, and they also feature USB 2.0 ports for playing DivXHD, MP3 or JPEG Images from portable media.
According to an article in the New York Times, Apple Inc. CEO Steve Jobs feels that Google violated the alliance it had with the iPhone-maker. The article highlights the growing bitter rivalry between Apple and Google Inc. due to Google's release of products and software that would compete with Apple technologies.
"We did not enter the search business. They entered the phone business," Jobs was quoted as saying at a company meeting. "Make no mistake; Google wants to kill the iPhone. We won't let them." The article says that the comments were reportedly met with "thunderous applause" from the Apple employees present at the meeting.
After Google released its Android operating system for mobile devices, relations between the companies reportedly started to sour. A number of heated meetings between Apple and Google executives reportedly followed the software release, many of which apparently turned confrontational with Jobs accusing Google of stealing features from the iPhone.
Apple Inc. pushed out Safari 4.0.5 earlier this week to address a slew of security vulnerabilities that could be exploited by attackers. In total, Safari 4.0.5 fixes 16 known security vulnerabilities with the browser. The update is available for Mac and Windows.
Among the vulnerable Safari components are ColorSync, ImageIO and the WebKit engine, which were hit with critical code injection and information disclosure bugs. Unpatched Windows machines running the browser are more vulnerable than those running Mac software.
Swiss security firm Objectif Sécurité was able to crack 14-digit LMHash Windows XP passwords with special characters in just 5.3 seconds. The firm optimized its rainbow table of password hashes for use with solid-state drives. Objectif Sécurité's Philippe Oechslin said that the result was 100 times faster than previously possible.
The test showed how much of a bottleneck the speed of hard discs are in password cracking based on password hash lookups is. The test rig itself was hardly amazing, running with an AMD Athlon X2 4400+ processor and the optimized tables with 80GB of password hashes on an SSD.
The company claims it is 500 times faster than a password cracker from Russian firm Elcomsoft that utilizes NVIDIA GPUs.
Ofcom has proposed that frequencies reserved for 2G (GSM) networks be used by 3G technologies, complying with an EU deregulation directive on the 900 and 1800MHz bands. The proposal is part of a bunch of changes that Ofcom is proposing, which includes permitting radar installations at level crossings for safety reasons and rule changes on Ultra Wide Band.
While moves by the European Union meant that eventually the UK would permit the use of 2G bands for 3G networks, the subject has been controversial in the UK.
2G frequencies were allocated for use in the UK, whereas 3G spectrum was bought at enormous costs on the basis that it was the only way to operate 3G networks in the region.
Allowing 3G on 2G had its good points, but it devalues the 3G spectrum that operators spent enormous amounts of money to obtain. However, with the UK government standing firmly behind the plan and the EU directive mandating it, Ofcom's final approval should go through in August this year.
AMD is pushing its 'Ontario' dual-core chip for use in netbooks, according to an "AMD Notebook Platform Roadmap" slide that is doing the rounds again. The chip though is not "new" news, with Ontario being made public by AMD in November 2009. The chip is part of AMD's "Fusion" line-up. It contains AMD's "Bobcat" core and will have an on-board DirectX 11 graphics processing unit (GPU).
AMD has treated the market for notebooks and ultrathin devices quite differently from Intel. Intel has developed its Atom line of chips specifically for these small-scale devices whilst AMD maintains that they are essentially just tiny notebooks and don't need dedicated chips.
Maybe AMD is correct in a way, as sales show that users buy the netbooks with larger screens (relative to netbook sizes), larger hard-drives and with software capabilities of their notebooks. Linux-based netbooks haven't sold as well as Windows, and low-storage-space SSD netbooks lose out to traditional HDD-based netbooks.
Microsoft Corp. is racing to release a patch for Internet Explorer 6 and 7 to address a serious security vulnerability that could allow an attacker to take control of a victim's computer. The Redmond-based software giant has picked up the pace on this particular flaw since the public release of exploit code by Israeli researcher Moshe Ben Abu.
The exploit code release means Microsoft will issue a patch for the flaw before the next 'Patch Tuesday'. "We have seen speculation that Microsoft might release an update for this issue out of band. I can tell you that we are working hard to produce an update which is now in testing," said Jerry Bryant, senior security communications manager lead at Microsoft.
"This is a critical and time-intensive step of the process as the update must be tested against all affected versions of Internet Explorer on all supported versions of Windows. Additionally, each supported language version needs to be tested as well as testing against thousands of third party applications," he wrote in an advisory on the Microsoft Security Response Center blog.
According to a report by the Wall Street Journal on Thursday, 4G-capable mobile handsets may be available through Verizon Wireless by mid-2011. Verizon Wireless opted to use Long-Term Evolution (LTE) technology for its 4G networks in the United States, whereas Sprint opted for WiMax in order to get to market faster.
Verizon Wireless Chief Technology Officer, Anthony Melone, told the Wall Street Journal that he expected Verizon to offer 4G-capable mobile handsets within 3-6 months after a commercial 4G network is launched by the operator. This would be about twice as fast as previously expected.
Before handsets are available, the 4G networks will be accessed by users through USB air cards for faster Internet access compared to 3G products. Initial handsets will still use CDMA technology to provide access to Verizon's 3G network for voice traffic and when the 4G service is unavailable for data.
Verizon CTO Dick Lynch said at a panel discussion at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona in February that getting voice to work over LTE has been particularly challenging. The operator recently said that speeds in tests of its LTE network showed peak data rates of 40-50Mbps.
Mozilla's Firefox 3.6 has been downloaded over 100 million times since it was released in January this year. The 100 million figure doesn't include existing users that upgraded to Firefox 3.6 from older versions using the built-in upgrade system in the browser.
Still, a lot of existing Firefox users have not yet updated to the newer version of the browser, and so Mozilla has begun to push notifications to users who haven't updated yet.
Firefox ranks highly against other browsers when it comes to pushing updates, with about 85 percent of users switching to new versions within 21 days of a release.
Google's Chrome is the only browser that ranks better than Firefox in this area, largely due to its agressive background updating system. Mozilla celebrated a milestone of 1 billion downloads for Firefox last year, and the browser is used by an estimated 350 million people each day.
The U.S. Federal Court of Appeals has upheld the jury verdict against Microsoft in its patent case with small company i4i, over the customizable XML used in Microsoft's extremely popular Word processor.
With the ruling upheld, Microsoft must pay i4i $240 million USD, as well as continue to sell Word 2003 and 2007 stripped of certain custom XML features.
"A reasonable jury could have concluded that Microsoft 'willfully' infringed the '449 patent based on the evidence presented at trial," wrote the judges in the new ruling. "Similarly, there is no evidence Microsoft ever made a good faith effort to avoid infringement; internal emails show Microsoft intended to render i4i's product 'obsolete' and assure 'there won't be a need for [i4i's] product.'"
Evidence presented at the trial showed that Microsoft employees had been part of i4i demos and received sales kits that clearly identified the software as patented technology.
Of the decision, adds Loudon Owen, chairman of i4i: "From our perspective, there are only so many more avenues for appeal for them. It also resulted in an even more detailed and structured decision in our interest."
Apple has announced the Battery Replacement Service for the iPad today, and notably the company has decided to not only replace the battery, but replace the entire device for $99 if you ever need a battery replacement.
"If your iPad requires service due to the battery’s diminished ability to hold an electrical charge, Apple will replace your iPad for a service fee," says Apple. However, buyers will "receive a replacement iPad that will not contain any of your personal data."
The service is $99 and $7 shipping, and Apple says it will take about one week turnaround from the time you send in your dead iPad to the time you receive your replacement.
To not lose your data, Apple suggests syncing first.
"Before you submit your iPad for service, it is important to sync your iPad with iTunes to back up your contacts, calendars, email account settings, bookmarks, apps, etc. Apple is not responsible for the loss of information when servicing your iPad."
According to government officials, it appears that the Android Marketplace may be banned from South Korea, as its game contents have yet to receive approval from the nation's regulating body, the Games Ratings Board.
The Ratings Board sent a letter to Google's Korea branch detailing what must be done, and board official Lee Jong-bae adds: "If Google does not take any measures, we may block the Android market here."
Over 4000 games have not yet been rated by the country's board, but still remain available to South Korean users, which appears to be the problem. Korea has two Android devices, from Motorola and LG, with up to five more promised for 2010.
AndroidCentral reported yesterday that Verizon'sNexus One listing in the Equipment Guide showed a reference to HTC Sense, the user interface seen in most HTC-made Android devices, but not used by the current T-MobileNexus One.
Today, the carrier has removed the reference to HTC Sense, replacing it with "Google Experience UI," which makes much more sense.
Also notably is the fact that Verizon will not offer the phone in retail stores, and will be available only at google.com/phone, squashing rumors that users would be able to demo the phone in Verizon's thousands of retail shops.
Fortune magazine writer Philip Elmer DeWitt is reporting that Apple sold 90,000 iPad tablets in the first 6 hours of availability yesterday, with the majority purchasing the Wi-Fi-only 16GB version. By the first 24 hours, that number had swelled to almost 120,000.
The group of analysts compiling the data is asking that anyone who purchased an iPad please just email their order number to ipadsales10@gmail.com to keep the tally current.
Original estimates showed around 50,000 sales in the fist two hours, and then 75,000 in the first 4.5 hours.
The numbers are unofficial, but rest assured if they are anywhere near accurate, Apple will release a press release on Monday noting the extremely strong pre-order sales.
Twitter users can now opt-in to allow for current location sharing, a feature that will append your Tweets with your geolocation.
Adds Twitter co-founder Biz Stone of why they added the feature: "A recent burst of interest in location sharing applications, games, and services has many Twitter users excited about appending geographic data to some of their tweets."
The real question remains as to how many users will opt-in to the optional feature or even what the point is. Still, once a good number of celebrities opt-in, it is likely many followers will do the same. Those who frequent at pleaserobme.com will then have a field day.
Netflix’s second $1 million contest, which offered to give the winner the money for creating the best way to improve the company's movie recommendation system, has been canceled this week, with Netflix citing privacy concerns.
University of Texas researchers found that the "anonymous" data released by Netflix for the contest, including recommendations and choices from hundreds of thousands of users could be used to identify the users, by name.
The researchers brought the news to the FTC, and a class action lawsuit as well, leading Netflix to cancel the second contest. They have also settled the lawsuit.
Says Neil Hunt, Netflix’s chief product officer: "The resolution of both matters involves certain parameters on how we use Netflix data in any future research programs."
According to the latest data released by the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3), cyberfraud losses doubled in 2009, with victims reporting $560 million in losses for the year.
The biggest scam was one using emails claiming to come from FBI Deputy Director John Pistole. Victims were asked to pay small fees in order to receive a larger amount of money in return, money that obviously never comes.
Of the 336,665 complaints received by the IC3, over 55,000 were FBI-themed scams. Total complaints were up 22 percent from 2008, and losses were up 111 percent.
Among other popular scams were fake antivirus software, non-delivery of merchandise or payments via online marketplaces and identity theft.
PCWorld reports the strangest scam as being one where the victim received an email from a hitman claiming he had been hired to assassinate them. The assassin offered to cancel the job, if the victim sent them $800 within three days.
OnLive, the cloud gaming service set for a June launch in the U.S., will notably allow for a la carte rentals, says GI.biz, with CEO Steve Perlman confirming that subscription packages will not be required.
Basic OnLive packages cost $15 a month for "full OnLive services," but the rental "Portal" will not require a package.
Says Perlman of the individual rentals: "The OnLive Game Portal is for gamers looking for direct access to OnLive games without being required to subscribe to the features of the full OnLive Game Service. Through the OnLive Game Portal, gamers will be able to play select games directly on a rental basis as well as game demos for free; subject to available OnLive service capacity and whatever usage limits are associated with each given demo. Rentals will be priced on a per-game basis."
The a la carte rental "Portal" will launch a bit later than the the service, adds Perlman.
CVG has an interview with Microsoft Xbox and Entertainment's Stephen McGill, who has made it clear that digital media is the future, and not Blu-ray discs.
Says McGill: "We have no plans to adopt [a] Blu-Ray drive for the Xbox 360. In fact, the future of home entertainment started last autumn when Xbox 360 became the first and only console to offer instant-on 1080pstreamingHD movies."
Microsoft has seen some pressure of late over the low capacity of DVD discs in comparison to Blu-ray, especially after Capcom said it had to cut content from the upcoming Lost Planet 2 on the 360, because of the lack of space.
ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers), the overseeing body of the Internet, has decided to postpone the ruling on the proposed .xxx porn domain until the summer.
The .xxx domain was originally approved in 2005, but government bodies, including the American government, have been critics of the domain and ICANN has since rejected the proposal on various occasions.
An independent panel of judges has recently ruled that ICANN's latest rejection, in 2007, "was not consistent with the application of neutral, objective, and fair documented policy." It is therefore up for approval again.
ICANN may choose to not vote at all, and CEO Rod Beckstrom says the public opposition to the domain is still very heavy.
If approved, porn sites can use the .xxx domain, but are not required to do so.
The Plastic Logic Que 'business' e-reader has been delayed until at least the Summer, reads an eWeek report.
CEO Richard Archuleta says the company is working on "fine-tuning" the device, as well as improving overall stability. Anyone who pre-ordered the device was sent an email explaining the delay.
Because the Que has a businessman target demographic, the device will retail for $650 for the 4GB/Wi-Fi model and $800 for the 8GB/Wi-Fi/3G version. Mostly all other e-readers sell for under $300, including the popular Nook and Kindle devices.
The Que features a large 10.7-inch screen, and has built-in support for Microsoft Office documents as well as PDFs.
Nokia has asked a federal judge to toss the ongoing patent dispute case between the phone giant and Apple, claiming that Apple's claims are "designed to divert attention away from free-riding off of Nokia’s intellectual property."
In October, Nokia filed suit against Apple, accusing the company of infringing on 10 patents and asking for backpay on royalties for the patents. Apple has sold 42 million iPhones since 2007.
Apple then counter-sued, accusing Nokia of patent infringement, as well, asking for an injunction on some Nokia smartphones.
Nokia's latest filing accuses Apple of "revisionist history, misleading characterizations, unsupported allegations and flawed and contradictory legal theories to turn these fruitless negotiations into a multi-count federal lawsuit." Both companies tried to work out a deal, but got nowhere.
In February it was reported that tucked away in the iPad/iPhone 3.2 SDK, a few icons relating to video calling, such as "decline or end video" and "accept video," were found, giving theory that future versions of the devices may have front-side cameras.
Today, 9to5Mac is reporting that SDK 3.2 beta 4 removes all those video chat files, although it is unclear as to whether Apple did so to make the video chat features a "surprise" in the future or just because they were originally there as a mistake.
The NPD Group has released their latest industry sales figures for the U.S. gaming industry, and the number were not pretty.
Overall sales fell 15 percent year-over-year to $1.48 billion, a 50 percent higher drop than even top industry analyst Michael Pachter was expecting.
"Honestly, I had expected the industry to perform somewhat better this month," adds NPD analyst Anita Frazier. "Nonetheless, strong new releases, and Easter gift-buying bodes well for industry performance in March."
Outside of the giant decline, the most notable news was that of the Xbox 360 outselling the Nintendo Wii for the first time since 2007. The 360 saw 422,000 units sold, with the Wii seeing 397,000 sold. Closely behind was the PlayStation 3 at 360,100 units sold. For handhelds, the DS/DSi blew out the PSP again, 613,200 to 133,400.
"The Xbox 360 nabbed the top-spot among the three console systems for the first time since September 2007, when Halo 3 was released," notes Frazier of the hardware sales. "The PS3 enjoyed a 30 percent increase over last year, even while retail supply is reported to remain constrained."
Earlier this week David Rivas, VP of Technology Management at Nokia, showed off a demo of the interface for the Symbian^3 (S^3) smartphone OS at a demo in San Francisco. The first Nokia phones running the now completely open source platform will be available later this year.
During the presentation, which primarily demonstrated customizing the interface, Rivas talked about the features that will set it apart in the smartphone market. Of particular note were his comments about multitasking.
He pointed out that Nokia has had multitasking on their smartphones for several years, and indicated it will be "coming much more front and center."
You can see the demo in this video posted by PhoneDog.com's Noah Kravitz.
The cloud gaming service OnLive, first announced last year, finally has a set launch date.
Starting June 17th in the U.S., users can pay $15 a month to play games from major publishers EA, THQ, 2K Games, Warner Bros., and Ubisoft in the "cloud."
"This marks a huge milestone for both OnLive and the interactive entertainment landscape as a whole, changing the way that video games are developed, marketed, accessed and played," says Steve Perlman, Founder and CEO of OnLive. "We are opening the door to incredible experiences for gamers and enormous opportunities for developers and publishers."
The service includes standard features such as voice chat, profiles and gamer tags and will allow for pausing and resuming of games. OnLive is available for PC and Mac users.
"The OnLive Game Service creates a new opportunity for consumers to play the latest games without spending hundreds of dollars on a hardware system to make it happen," adds Mike McGarvey, COO of OnLive, via Gi.biz. "As a Mac user myself, I'm excited about the opportunity to help bring high-end gaming to this new and significant market."
In Google Reader Play, items are presented one at a time, and each item is big and full-screen. After you've read an item, just click the next arrow to move to the next one, or click any item on the filmstrip below to fast-forward. Of course, you can click the title or image of any item to go to the original version. And since so much of the good stuff online is visual, we automatically enlarge images and auto-play videos full-screen.
Reader Play adapts to your tastes -- as you browse, you can let us know which stuff you enjoy by clicking the "like" button, and we'll use that info to show you more items we think you'll like. If you want, you can also choose categories, and we'll personalize your stream to only show you stuff from those categories. And you don't even need a Google account to use Reader Play. Of course, if you want to star, like, or share items, we'll ask you to sign in to your Google account. Since Reader and Reader Play share the same infrastructure, any actions you take in one will be reflected in the other.
Sony has launched their highly-anticipated motion controller, the PlayStation Move, a system that should rival the Wii and Microsoft's upcoming Natal motion system.
Says Peter Dille, senior vice president of marketing for Sony Computer Entertainment: "The migration path from the Wii household to the PlayStation 3 household is a pretty natural path, partly because of the experience that you can get on the PlayStation Move but also because of the content that we find on PlayStation 3."
As viewed in the demo video, the Move is used in conjunction with the PlayStation Eye camera and allows for real-time tracking of the player's body movements. As for accuracy?
"Nothing has ever been this precise," say Shuhei Yoshida, president of Sony Computer Electronics Worldwide Studios.
Standalone prices were not revealed but Dille says that a "starter bundle" including a game, the PS Eye and the Move will retail for under $100.
Motorola and Microsoft have announced a new deal today that will make Bing search and maps the default for the smartphone maker's Android-based phones.
The phones will now come with a search widget pre-loaded.
The company signed a similar deal with Baidu last week, to make Baidu the default Web search engine for Android phones sold in China.
The moves come as Google continues its dispute with China over censorship, a fight that has yet to be resolved, and one in which Google threatened to pull its search engine service from the country entirely.
The New York film maker Casey Neistat has made a funny but interesting video this week about the new sensation that is Chatroulette.
For those that have never tried the site, you sign on, hit "New Game" and you are matched up with another person from somewhere in the world who is on their webcam and wants to "chat."
Doing a small independent study, Neistat picked a random Thursday and chatted with 90 different people, finding that 71 percent were men, 15 percent were women, and 14 percent were "perverts." 83 percent were "fairly young" and the rest were older.
Palm, the struggling smartphone maker, continues to see the price of their handsets drop, with Wal-Mart now slashing the price of the Palm Pre Plus for Verizon to $30 with 2-year contract, and the Palm Pixi Plus to free.
If you prefer Amazon, the e-tailer has the Pre Plus for $40 with contract, still a large discount from even just last month, when the phone was retailing for at least $70 with contract.
Citing the price cuts, C.L. King analyst Lawrence Harris downgraded his estimate for 2011 EPS (earnings per share), dropping his expectation of a $0.50 per share loss, to $1.10.
The bigger loss estimate also adds in costs of Palm's costly new advertising campaign for the Pre Plus.
In a letter to the Financial Times, BT Group Chief Executive Ian Livingston suggested that persistent file sharers caught breaking copyright laws should face fines instead of technical sanctions proposed by the UK government. He said that suspending service for persistent infringers as spelled out in the Digital Economy Bill could deny a fair hearing for the accused.
Instead of the technical sanctions outlined in the DEB, Livingston said people could choose to pay a penalty or fight the accusation. Those who dispute accusations could take their case to a new tribunal instead of the courts. The suggestion brings BT in line with the Open Rights Group, which believes such a system would be fairer and less risky than the proposed suspensions and other sanctions.
In the letter - which was also signed by the bosses of TalkTalk, Virgin Media and Orange, as well as Facebook, Google, eBay and Yahoo! - a recent amendment to the Digital Economy Bill faced considerable criticism. The amendment made last week would allow copyright holders to injunct ISPs and force the blocking of specific web addresses.
Reggie Fils-Aime, President and COO of Nintendo of America, has told Forbes that the company is not ready yet to begin work on a new home console to replace the Wii. "When the software developer comes forward with an idea that can't be executed on the current platform, that's when we start thinking seriously about the next system. We're not there yet, from a Wii perspective,"he said.
Fils-Aime once against mirrored Nintendo's general attitude toward including the latest technology in games consoles, saying that as an enabler, technology has to enable a new and unique experience for players. "So when people talk about high definition for the Wii console our feedback is that that by itself will not create a brand new experience," he said.
Google Inc. Chief Executive Eric Schmidt said on Wednesday that the company expects an outcome in its dispute with the Chinese government soon. Schmidt made the comments on Wednesday at the Abu Dhabi Media Summit. "I'm going to use the word 'soon', which I will not define otherwise," he said.
"There is no specific timetable. Something will happen soon." In Washington, Nicole Wong, the firm's vice president and deputy general counsel, told the U.S. House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee that the company stands by its decision to stop censorship in China.
"(if) the option is that we will shutter our .cn property and leave the country, we are prepared to do that,"she said. At the same time, it was revealed that the United States is mulling a possible legal challenge to China's Internet censorship and related policies which it claims hurt U.S. companies that invest in the Chinese market.
The recent spat between Google and China started in January when the search giant announced that it would stop censoring search results in the country and would leave the market if it had no other choice. The announcement followed a hack targeted at Google's intellectual property and the e-mail accounts of Chinese human rights activists.
According to a new blog post, YouTube's mobile site will now come with ad campaigns, giving advertisers a chance to offer up ads to target audiences easier.
Google says the mobile site saw traffic grow by 160 percent in 2009, with tens of millions of videos being streamed everyday on their mobile phones.
Says the post: "Today, we're launching ads on the home, search, and browse pages of the American and Japanese YouTube mobile websites (m.youtube.com from your mobile browser). This is a great way for advertisers to reach YouTube viewers across multiple platforms. In fact, at launch YouTube will immediately provide one of the largest audiences for a mobile ad campaign anywhere on the mobile web. And because YouTube mobile attracts early adopters, the site can deliver to advertisers a coveted demographic of tech savvy trendsetters."
The company points to early adopter campaigns by Sony and Kia, in which both companies were pleased with the audience they reached.
According to a new survey from security firm Barracuda Labs, 73 percent of Twitter accounts remain "inactive," with less than 10 total Tweets.
Despite the large numbers, Barracuda says the number is down, from 79 percent in June of last year.
34 percent of Twitter users have never even made one Tweet.
A few of the other stats:
-74 percent of Twitter users have under 10 followers.
-60 percent follow less than 10 people
-34 percent of users have more followers than people they are following
-Growth jumped 21 percent in April 2009, when Ashton Kutcher was on the verge of hitting 1 million followers.
Which group Tweets the most? Let's check the chart:
Those with around 700-1000 followers seem to Tweet the most, with celebrities and those with millions of followers not Tweeting nearly as much.
Google has launched the Apps Marketplace today, an online store designed to give third-party developers a chance to sell their Web applications to the over 25 million users of Google Apps such as Gmail, Docs and more.
The apps will need to support an OpenID sign-on as well as OAuth-authorized access, and from there the apps can be made available. When installed, the apps will be integrated into the menu of Google Apps.
"With administrator approval, [third-party apps] may interact with calendar, email, document and/or contact data to increase productivity," adds Chris Vander Mey, senior product manager for Google Apps. "Administrators can manage the applications from the familiar Google Apps control panel, and employees can open them from within Google Apps."
On the developer side, to gain access to the marketplace is a $100 fee, and then Google takes 20 percent of application revenue.
Members of European Parliament are united in opposing the European Commission's secret negotiation of the highly controversial ACTA (Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement) treaty. They voted 663 to 13 in favor of a resolution requiring the Commission, the European Union's representative in ACTA negotiations, to share all information about the talks with them.
Besides the lack of transparency in the negotiations, MEPs have concerns about provisions which would dictate how intellectual property protection in EU member states would work.
This would include what's covered, for how long, and even the definition of fair use and types of penalties for infringement. In other words it could require a substantial rewrite of most European IP law.
They are also concerned about language that could be at odds with EU privacy rights. They are demanding that the European Commission provide proof that no fundamental rights would be impacted.
The resolution "Calls on the Commission to conduct an impact assessment of the implementation of ACTA with regard to fundamental rights and data protection," and "consult with Parliament in a timely manner about the results of the assessment."
First unveiled at the CES event earlier this year, the Android-based Spring Design Alex e-reader should begin shipping by "early Spring," says the company, after production and software delays have held it back so far.
Visiting the Spring Design store (pic below), the Alex Store says you should be able to start ordering the device by the "first week of March," which clearly has come and gone.
The company has told Engadget however that "that there were some slight issues with the order page and that it should be up within the “next week or two."
The Alex runs Android 1.6, has a 6-inch E-Ink top screen and a 3.5-inch color, touchscreen on bottom.
Sex.com, one of the most expensive domain names on the Internet, will go up for auction on March 18th with an opening bid of $1 million.
The domain was originally purchased for under $100 in 1994, and then sold in 2006 for $14 million to Escom LLC, who could not afford the payments and then defaulted the site to DOM Partners, the lender who backed the $14 million bid.
The question remains as to whether Sex.com is worth $1 million, let alone the $14 million it sold for just a few years ago. Even so, auctioneer Richard Maltz says: "We don't know who's serious and who's not, but prospective bidders need a $1 million certified check. It should be interesting."
We will report on the final selling price on the 18th.
According to the latest February data from comScore, Bing continues to take more search market share, again at the expense of Yahoo.
Market leader Google grew from 65.4 percent to 65.5 percent while Yahoo fell from 17 percent to 16.8 percent. Bing was the biggest riser, from 11.3 percent to 11.5 percent.
Ask remained about flat at 3.7 percent, and AOL stayed completely flat at 2.5 percent.
Overall, total US core search volume increased 10.4 percent year-on-year.
Gizmodo is reporting today that Sony Japan has announced the release of standalone shutter glasses that can be used alongside the company's upcoming 3D-supporting HDTVs.
Roughly converted from yen, the Sony TDG-BR100 and TDG-BR50 active shutter glasses will cost $133 each, with a June release date. The infrared emitter necessary to drive the glasses will cost $55 extra.
Besides the high price for the TVs themselves, the glasses are in themselves a significant investment, especially for a family with kids.
Giz does note however that Sony's prices are way above what the norm should be, and one manufacturer even says "their shutter glasses would cost about 1/4 Sony's current asking price."
Sharp will release its first two Freeview HD set-top receivers in the UK over the coming weeks. First though, it will release a new Freeview DVR (standard-definition) receiver that uses USB-connected storage to make it easier to transfer recorded Freeview content to a computer (but unfortunately will not play back content from a computer).
The Sharp TU-T1UR has three USB 2.0 ports on the front of the box for use with external hard driver, flash drives or SD card adapters. It connects to a standard definition television through SCART, Composite cables or through HDMI (even though the box is not HD). It features a typical eight-day programming guide and standard DVR recording and scheduling features.
China Mobile has announced plans to invest billions of dollars in a Chinese bank as part of a broader plan to develop mobile phone-based banking and business services for end users. The company will pay out 39.8 billion yuan ($5.8 billion) to gain 20 percent of Shanghai Pudong Development Bank.
Mobile phone companies and service operators globally are looking to the high levels of mobile phone use as an untapped instrument for financial transactions and other business uses. Of the between 6 and 7 billion people on earth, it is estimated that around 1 billion have some kind of bank account.
Nokia is one company that has seen huge potential to turn mobile phones into tools for financial transactions with Nokia Money. In some countries, such as Finland, using mobile phones to pay for certain services like public transport, or to pay for a car wash or soft drink from a dispenser, is fairly common practice.
China Mobile and the Shanghai Pudong Development Bank will work together to develop mobile phone services such as customer payments and money transfers and other e-commerce solutions.
The United States is considering whether it can mount a legal challenge against Chinese Internet restrictions that it claims hurt U.S. companies such as Google Inc. in the Chinese market. U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk revealed Washington's consideration on Tuesday, but added that direct talks with Beijing could yield faster results.
"We are still dialoguing not just with Google, but with other Internet providers, to make sure we fully understand what is happening in China,"Kirk said in remarks at the National Press Club. The case would be the first of its kind taken up by the WTO if it is to go ahead. Such a case has been pushed by free speech groups within the United States, such as the First Amendment Coalition, for years.
The case of Internet censorship has come to the limelight again this year since Google threatened to leave the Chinese market. While having to comply with strict Chinese censorship regulations, Google was also targeted by hackers in the country. The attacks were aimed at Google's valuable source codes and other property, and also the e-mail accounts of human rights activists in China.
Record company EMI has found itself the target of legal action from Pink Floyd in a dispute over royalty payments and technicalities of how music is sold to consumers in a digital form. Having being outsold only by the Beatles, Pink Floyd has been signed to EMI for 40 years now.
The artists are disputing how royalty payments and the marketing of their music are calculated in modern industry. It also objects to how EMI can "unbundle" their albums - or in other words sell any individual tracks from any Pink Floyd albums over the Internet without selling the full album.
Pink Floyd's lawyer, Robert Howe, told the High Court in London that EMI is violating a contractual clause that "expressly prohibits" unbundling of tracks for individual sale from Pink Floyd albums, which include The Wall and The Dark Side of the Moon.
EMI disputes that it is violating the clause, saying that it only applies to a "physical product" and does not apply for digital sales made on the Internet. Howe disagrees, saying that EMI's position makes no commercial sense, and is clearly contradicted by the conditions used in the agreement with EMI.
According to comments made by Mindy Mount, CFO of Microsoft's Entertainment & Devices division, the games industry can expect to see Microsoft's full line-up of Project Natal titles at this year's E3 event. She said that the company's best designers are working on the platform currently.
Microsoft's Robbie Bach also claimed in January this year that 70-80 percent of game publishers are committed to releasing Natal titles. With Microsoft's first party developers having shrunk in recent years, the size of a full first party line-up is hard to estimate. Reports are that Rare is one developer heavily involved with Natal.
Lionhead Studios are implementing features of Natal into the Fable III title, and smaller first party developer such as Shawnpoint Studios and BigPark reportedly have developments for Natal too.
"We have very strong first and third-party developer support for [Natal],"said Mount. "Needless to say, we're putting some of our best people on coming up with great game ideas for this, and we're going to have some great stuff."
Sony Corp. and Samsung Electronics have announced plans to introduce 3D televisions in the coming months. Both companies are betting that 3D televisions will increase revenues as more high-profile titles such as Alice in Wonderland and Avatar hit theaters. Sony also plans to release 3D game titles for the PlayStation 3 (PS3) console in time for its 3D launch in June.
Panasonic Corp., the world's fourth largest flat-panel television maker, has teamed up with Best Buy in the United States to promote its line-up of 3D televisions. Best Buy stores will set up viewing areas for customers to sample the 3D TVs, and Panasonic has an ambitious goal of selling 500,000 units in the fiscal year starting April.
Samsung, the industry leader, will sell 46-inch and 55-inch 3D televisions (LCD) in the United States this month, and will add more models to its line-up over the coming months. "It will likely be ardent game players who will first buy 3D TVs as an early adopter," said analyst Alex Oh of Hanwha Securities in Seoul.
Sony Computer Entertainment America has announced today that they have signed deals to offer HD digital downloads and rentals from all the major movie studios via the PlayStation Network (PSN), the first platform to do so.
"Securing high definition content from these studios is another significant milestone further validating PlayStation Network as a complete entertainment network in the home. PlayStation Network is the first and only service to deliver high definition home entertainment from all six major studios, directly to consumers for download," added Peter Dille, senior vice president, marketing and PlayStation Network, SCEA. "PlayStation Network continues to offer the most comprehensive catalogue of HD movies to PlayStation Network members that realize the wide-ranging entertainment power of the PS3 system."
Currently the films are only available to United States gamers, but should hit the UK, France, Germany and Spain "soon."
According to FBR Capital analyst Craig Berger, Apple is prepared to build 5 million iPads for the first half of 2010, a higher estimate then most previous analysis.
Says Berger in an investment note: "We believe various news articles and competitor notes calling for a build delay were just false alarms."
Additionally, Berger gave estimates for other Apple devices, including iPods and Mac notebooks.
The analyst expects builds of 9.3 million iPods for the March quarter, 1.7 million notebooks and 1 million desktops.
The iPad has an April 3rd release date for models with only Wi-Fi support. 3G versions are expected in the coming months.
An analytics firm, the Strategy Analytics Connected Home Devices (SACHD) has released a forecasting report that says the Sony PlayStation 3 will eventually outsell the Xbox 360 and the Wii, on route to 127 million units sold.
The "Taming the Waves: Games Console Life Cycles and Platform Competition," report says that Sony's PS3 will surpass the Wii eventually despite a giant gap now, as the firm believes the PS3 will still be a viable platform for at least five years after the Wii is replaced.
Overall, SACHD sees 103 million units sold for the Wii, and 127 million for the PS3. They did not offer a prediction for the Xbox 360.
Just one day after Apple unveiled their first iPad commercial during the Academy Awards, HP is fighting back, releasing a few videos that show off the powerful features of the upcoming Slate tablet.
The Windows 7-based tablet was first shown off at the CES event earlier this year, and should be Apple's biggest rival when it is released.
"With this Slate product, you're getting a full Web browsing experience in the palm of your hand," says Phil McKinney, vice president and CTO for HP's personal systems group (PSG). "No watered-down Internet, no sacrifices."
The Slate runs Flash no problem, unlike the iPad, which is looking like it will never have Flash support.
Venezuela's Hugo Chavez has signed into effect a new anti-violent video game law that makes it a crime to import "violent" video games, with offenders being forced to pay a heavy fine or even spend up to five years in prison.
Gamethirst has translated the "Ley para la Prohibición de Videojuegos Bélicos y Juguetes Bélicos" (Law for the banning of violent video games and toys) and posted it (reposted here):
1. Violent video games: Video games or programs that can be use on personal computers, arcade systems, video game consoles, portable devices or mobile telephones, or any other electronic or telephonic device, that contain information or images that promote or incite violence and the use of weapons.
2. Violent toys: Objects or instruments that in form mimic any kind of weapon used by the National Bolivarian Armed Forces, weapons of war used by any other nation, citizen or state security forces, as well as those that, though not promoting war, establish the kind of game that stimulates aggressiveness or violence.
Article 13. Those who in any way promote the purchase or use of violent toys or video games as defined by this law will be punished with a fine of between 2,000 and 4,000 tax units.
America's largest carrier, Verizon Wireless, has announced they have signed a deal with the NFL to stream live football games via the RedZone Channel over mobile phones.
The deal will last for the next four seasons, and will begin with the NFL draft in April.
Although unconfirmed, the deal is said to have been priced at $720 million.
The NFL has never had a deal of this caliber, preferring to broadcast games on TV, on CBS, FOX, and ESPN. Verizon continues to look at ways of bringing in new revenue, as the mobile phone market is near saturation in the United States.
Although completely unconfirmed, TechArp is reporting that Windows 7 Service Pack 1 is coming in the Q4 2010.
TechArp has been spot on for past service pack releases, dating back to the XP days, so the new report is speculation, but at least worth listening to.
In January, rumors began swirling of an upcoming SP1, but Microsoft responded: "There is currently no news around this at the moment."
Vista saw its SP1 released 14 months after release, and that OS was debateably one of Microsoft's worse. After SP1 is released, Microsoft is expected to see a bump in sales, as corporations normally wait until after the first service pack release to migrate to a new operating system.
According to a new WSJ report, Google has teamed up with the Dish Network to create an Android-based set-top box that will be used to stream YouTube and other videos to HDTVs.
The set-top will be operated with a keyboard, making for easier searches.
Additionally to YouTube, the deal will allow for searches of video content from Dish as well, and the ability to create video playlists. The Journal also notes that Google has been working on the box since last year, and that it still may not ever get released, as it is not top priority for the search giant.
Dish Network has 14 million subscribers.
It is unclear how Google will price the box, and whether ad revenue will subsidize the price.
Ubisoft has confirmed that their DRM servers remained under attack until earlier today, thanks to a DDoS attack.
Yesterday we reported that Ubi's servers were down, meaning legitimate buyers of their games could no longer play the game, since the "always connected" DRM could not connect.
Read the original Tweet: "Our servers are under attack again. Some gamers are experiencing trouble signing in. We're working on it and will keep you posted"
Today, the company says the servers are back online: "Login servers were partially reestablished at 10pm CET and fully restored at 1am CET. The attack affected only those trying to login"
Ubi's "always connected" DRM means gamers must be connected to the Internet at all times, so the game can authenticate. If you are ever kicked off the Internet, even for a second (or Ubi's servers are down), you are brought back to the main menu, losing any progress you made in the game since your last save.
T-Mobile America has announced the replacement of Yahoo as the default search engine for its line of smartphones, including Blackberrys and WinMo device. Google will now be the default, although users can switch back to Yahoo if they want.
The news follows AT&T's recent announcement that it had selected Yahoo as the default search engine for the new Android-based Moto Backflip.
Yahoo had been the default since late 2008, but that deal appears to have expired.
T-Mobile's Web2Goportal will still be predominantly Yahoo-based, with "prominent placement of Yahoo News, Yahoo Sports, Yahoo Finance, Flickr and weather," says eWeek.
Major League Baseball (MLB) has signed a new deal to stream live events online for ESPN, a move away from their baseball-only roots on a big scale.
ESPN streams about 3500 live events per year, including soccer games, NBA games, and tennis tournaments. The sporting giant will begin using the MLBAM (advanced media) unit in April, and change the name of its video hub from ESPN360.com to ESPN3.com.
MLBAM will use the popular Flash software, which is a move away from the current streaming services they had, which required a stand-alone download.
Says John Kosner, senior vice president of ESPN Digital Media: "Baseball does a terrific job in terms of online video and distribution of their games. They really are the best in class for sport."
MLBAM is in charge of 3000 baseball games per season, as well as the NCAA college basketball tournament.
The popular CBS NCAA March Madness iPhone app, which includes live streaming of the NCAA Tournament, will support streaming over Wi-Fi and 3G this year, with 3G being a welcome addition from past years.
However, the app will double up in price, to $9.99 from $4.99 last year.
The company will offer a free "lite" version of the app, but it will not include any live streaming, just highlights and box scores.
The NCAA March Madness on Demand (MMOD) app begins coverage starting on March 14th with the selection show, and will end after the tournament has run its course.
The added price to the app is thanks to a deal between CBS and exclusive iPhone carrier AT&T, which for years has not wanted to put additional strain on its data network, but seemingly will for some extra revenue.
Adds Rob Gelick, Sr. Vice President and GM, CBS Mobile: "The CBS Sports Mobile 2010 March Madness products appeal to both casual and diehard fans, keeping them connected to the action via live video and highlights, news, scores, and brackets. Last year CBS Sports Mobile witnessed a huge appetite for mobile video when we were the first to stream live sports events over the iPhone, and this year, by including Wi-Fi and 3G, we expect that appetite, and audience, to grow even more."
According to the NYPost, Blockbuster is on its last legs, and is looking for an equity partner as it runs completely out of money.
Citing insider sources, Blockbuster needs $213.5 million in cash to pay off loans and interest for 2010, with a similar amount coming due in 2011. According to latest financials, the company only has about $211 million in cash, and is expected to lose as much as $120 million in 2010, leaving them with no ability to pay off the loans unless they sell more of their assets, or complete larger cost cutting measures.
After the report, Blockbuster CEO Jim Keyes disagreed with the assessment: "All your numbers are wrong. They bear no resemblance to any materials we have in the market." Any talks with private equity firms are for "strategic alternatives," not to add capital infusions.
In February, Blockbuster said they owed $105 million in interest payments for 2010, but did not add what they needed to pay in principal.
The Chinese government has said it is ready and willing to punish hackers in the country that allegedly targeted Google Inc. and other companies earlier this year, if Google can provide evidence against the accused. Vice Minister Miao Wei said that Google has not filed a report to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology over the cyber attacks or sought negotiations with the government.
"If Google has had evidence that the attacks came from China, the Chinese government will welcome them to provide the information and will severely punish the offenders according to the law,"Miao said. "We never support hacking attacks because China also falls victim to hacking attacks."
As for Google's threat to leave China following the events and ongoing tensions over mandated censorship, Miao said that the company didn't notify the ministry that it is considering a withdrawal from the country either. "If Google decides to continue its business in China and abides by China's laws, it's welcome to stay," he said.
"If the company chooses to withdraw from the Chinese market, it must go through certain procedures according to the law and regulations and deal with customers' problems that may arise." He went on to vow that China will continue to provide a sound investment environment for foreign investors and protect their legitimate rights.
Panasonic Corp. will work with U.S. electronics provider Best Buy for its launch of 3D televisions in the United States. The official launch of Panasonic's 3D ventures in the U.S. will be on Wednesday, and Best Buy will be the main promoter of the products in the market.
Best Buy will setup viewing areas at its retail outlets across the country, where consumers can try out the Panasonic 3D products. Panasonic is aiming to sell half a million 3D televisions in the United States in their first year on the market, and expects a 50-inch Viera model to retail in the region for $2,500.
Consumer interest in 3D has been on the rise due to high-profile theatrical releases of 3D titles, such as James Cameron's Avatar or Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland. Panasonic is in 4th place in the global market for flat-panel televisions (behind Samsung, LG Electronics and Sony).
Apple Inc. is believed to have played a part in raids carried out at this year's CeBIT expo in Germany. Along with Siemens and Sisvel, Apple is believes to have been behind the forced shut down of an exhibitor's booth at CeBIT on Friday. The unnamed company was showing off Netbooks and e-book readers.
The unnamed company is alleged to have violated patents held by the three. On Thursday, lawyers from Siemens, Apple and Sisvel reportedly had visited to the booth and levied a €10,000 fine in advance of the raid. On Friday, German police moved in and forced the unnamed exhibitor to shut down.
The raid was not the only one to happen at CeBIT this year either, according to reports. Moves such as these are common at trade shows like CeBIT, as bigger tech companies use their patent portfolios to essentially "shut up" a smaller competitor that might not get as much exposure in a particular market.
iSuppli has issued a warning to manufacturers of LCD televisions about an upcoming shortage of LEDs, which are used for backlighting of some LCD televisions. LEDs provide a much better video imagery for viewers when used in LCD TVs, compared to LCD TVs that utilize fluorescent lamps for backlighting.
LCD televisions generally required between 300 and 500 LEDs per panel, all producing a uniform level of brightness. This makes the sector much more vulnerable to an LED shortage than notebook makers for example, as notebooks generally use about 50 LEDs in LCD screens.
Due to the popularity of LED-backlit LCD televisions, consumption of LEDs rose from 57 billion units in 2008 to 63 billion in 2008. iSuppli expects it to reach 104 billion by 2011, while current industry capacity is about 75 billion units.
Unless LED fabrication plants are built rapidly, or manufacturers figure out how to reduce the number of LEDs required in an LCD television whilst not compromising on picture quality, iSuppli predicts that the industry will have to deal with a "drastic under-supply" of LEDs starting later this year.
HardOCP had an interesting report over the weekend in which they proclaimed that NewEgg buyers had been receiving counterfeit Core i7 microprocessors, and today Intel and the retailer have confirmed the reports.
Users had reported receiving packages that contained a "huge hunk of plastic" where normally a fan would have been, as well blank manuals, and guide documentation that was full of obvious errors. The processor itself is described as just a "hunk of metal," with no pinouts, making it useless.
Intel has confirmed: "Intel has been made aware of the potential for counterfeit i7 920 packages in the marketplace and is working to how many and/or where they are being sold. The examples we have seen are not Intel products but are counterfeits. Buyers should contact their place of purchase for a replacement and/or should contact their local law enforcement agency if the place of purchase refuses to help."
The number shipped is still unclear, but estimates are in the 200-300 range.
NewEgg has issued a statement as well:
"Newegg is aware of a shipping error that occurred with certain recent orders of the Intel Core i7-920 CPU. After investigating the issue internally it appears one of our long term partners mistakenly shipped a small number of demo boxes instead of functional units. Our customer service team has already begun proactively reaching out to the affected customers. In line with our commitment to ensure total customer satisfaction, we are doing everything in our power to resolve the issue as soon as possible and with the least amount of inconvenience to our customers."
Microsoft has officially announced their Office 2010 "Technology Guarantee" plan today, offering a free upgrade to the upcoming suite for anyone who purchases Office 2007 between today and September 30th.
Additionally, Office 2010 for businesses is set for a May 12th release.
"Were excited to confirm that Office 2010, SharePoint 2010, Visio 2010 and Project 2010 are on schedule and will release to manufacturing (RTM) next month. For businesses, we will launch the 2010 set of products, including Office 2010, SharePoint 2010, Visio 2010, and Project 2010 worldwide on 12 May," says the Redmond giant.
Retail consumers can expect their Office 2010, in 32-bit and 64-bit to hit in June.
Over the past couple of weeks, we have been reporting on the ongoing debacle that is Ubisoft's "always connected" DRM scheme, now available on at least five PC games.
The publisher first made headlines when it announced the DRM which made it so gamers must be always connected to the Internet, or not be able to play the game. If you are ever disconnected from the Internet, you are forced back to the main menu, losing any progress you made between save points.
Embarrassingly for the company, Silent Hunter 5: Battle of the Atlantic was cracked on the first day, with pirates enjoying the game, offline, and with the DRM removed.
In another embarrassment for the company today, it has been reported that legitimate (as in, they purchased the game) Assassin's Creed II and Silent Hunter 5 gamers were unable to play this weekend, as Ubisoft's servers went down, meaning the DRM could not connect.
"Due to exceptional demand, we are currently experiencing difficulties with the Online Service Platform. This does not affect customers who are currently playing, but customers attempting to start a game may experience difficulty in accessing our servers. We are currently working to resolve this issue and apologize for any inconvenience," says Ubisoft.
Skype for the Symbian smartphone OS will not be available to North American visitors through Nokia's app store. The decision not to distribute the app through the Ovi Store was apparently made to help market Skype's partnership with Verizon.
Last month the two companies announced a deal to offer Skype on a number of smartphones, including a Blackberry and several Android phones.
Sravanthi Agrawal of Skpye’s corporate communications team said, “Skype has made a decision in the United States to not promote the Skype for Symbian app through the Ovi Store. We did this so that we could drive more attention to the recently announced Skype and Verizon Wireless agreement. This was a marketing decision — plain and simple."
Skype's decision came as a surprise to Nokia, who reportedly wasn't told of the plan ahead of time. Like everyone else, they found out when the app was released to users outside the US last week.
Cablevision and ABC have come to a deal, 45 minutes after the start of the Oscars. More word on the agreement when it is finalized.
Original article:
Disney has blacked out the broadcast channel ABC for Cablevision's 3 million subscribers, the day of the highly-anticipated Academy Awards.
Cablevision says it's willing to restart negotiations with Disney, along with a third-party arbitrator, to end the spat over transmission fees.
The cable company has a decent monopoly over the Bronx, Queens, Brooklyn and parts of NJ and Connecticut.
"Given the extraordinary public interest in this matter, Senator (John) Kerry and other public officials have suggested that arbitration is appropriate in this highly unusual situation," added Charles Schueler, Cablevision's executive vice president of communications. "Cablevision will agree to binding arbitration and calls upon Disney CEO Bob Iger to immediately return ABC to New YOrk area viewers and join us in binding arbitration to resolve this matter fairly."
ABC says they have put forward a counter-offer this afternoon.
Earlier this week we reported on the "funeral" of Internet Explorer 6, hosted by Aten Design Group, a design firm in Colorado.
The service had a coffin with a dummy inside with an IE6 logo for its head. Anyone who attended was welcome to eulogize the browser with memories, good or bad.
Google plans to pull all IE6 support from its Google family of sites, including Docs and Gmail starting next week, and YouTube fans will start to get hit with nagware popups when trying to access the site from IE6.
People familiar with the seedings say one of the primary focuses of Safari 4.0.5 is to fix a regression in the browser's JavaScript engine that manifested with the release of Safari 4.0.4. The maintenance release will also reportedly see certain code blocks, like Move Code, transitioned from the Safari codebase to that of Webkit in order to improve cross platform support.
A short list of other enhancements planned for the Safari 4.0.5 include improved HTML5 Video Playback, quicker loading of the Top Sites panels, faster JavaScript performance, better performance loading YouTube, and an overall reduced memory footprint.
In a strange discovery this weekend, an O2 tariff list reveals that video calling has been added to the "key features" list of the plans for the carriers, and that it will cost as much as the current voice-only plans.
The listing could mean a possible leak into future video chat capabilities of any iPhone, however, current hardware could obviously not allow for such capabilities.
iPhone OS 3.2 beta has shown references to video calling as well.
According to new digging from 9to5Mac, Wikipedia is likely to be added as one of the default search engines for Safari on the iPad as well as upcoming versions of the iPhone and iPod Touch.
The code is seen in the iPhone 3.2 SDK, and will be the third default behind Google and Yahoo.
It is still unclear why Wiki is being added over Bing or other true search engines, especially because Wikipedia has a very popular free app as well, but still interesting.
AndroidAndMe is reporting a new interesting rumor today, that cable company Cox is teaming up with phone maker Kyocera to bring a new Android phone to the market, one that will have TV/DVR capabilities.
Says the article:
"Worked on a quick short-term sub-sub-sub contract where I wrote an app for Android, to be run at a trade show. The hardware I installed on was a Kyocera, but even more interesting was the Cox logo on it. The logos were taped over but quite legible from the bumps nonetheless. There were also some Cox apps included; I think one was either for watching TV or controlling DVR? Not entirely sure. The screen was WVGA800, very nice and sharp, though the hardware wasn’t the fastest. Unfortunately I didn’t have a chance to photograph or examine it too closely since I only had about an hour to load and debug."
Cox Wireless is ready to hit three test markets in the next few weeks, and the Android device may be the first on the LTE network, which has seen peak speeds of 25Mpbs.
Disney has blacked out the broadcast channel ABC for Cablevision's 3 million subscribers, the day of the highly-anticipated Academy Awards.
Cablevision says it's willing to restart negotiations with Disney, along with a third-party arbitrator, to end the spat over transmission fees.
The cable company has a decent monopoly over the Bronx, Queens, Brooklyn and parts of NJ and Connecticut.
"Given the extraordinary public interest in this matter, Senator (John) Kerry and other public officials have suggested that arbitration is appropriate in this highly unusual situation," added Charles Schueler, Cablevision's executive vice president of communications. "Cablevision will agree to binding arbitration and calls upon Disney CEO Bob Iger to immediately return ABC to New YOrk area viewers and join us in binding arbitration to resolve this matter fairly."
ABC says they have put forward a counter-offer this afternoon.
Davenport Lyons, the notorious law firm known for going after alleged file-sharers on behalf of large game publishers such as Atari, is now under investigation for harassment and bullying by the Solicitors Regulation Authority, an industry watchdog, says GI.biz.
The consumer group Which? has been complaining about the firm since 2008, when the law firm first began sending out letters accusing citizens of unauthorized file sharing.
Each letter demanded a payment of £300 or the case would be taken to court. Which? calls the letters as "excessive" and even "bullying" and says "that Davenport Lyons was making incorrect assertions about the nature of copyright infringement and ignoring evidence presented in defence. It added that the letters incorrectly claimed their recipients were legally responsible for ensuring their internet connections were properly secured."
Adds Deborah Prince, head of legal affairs at Which?: "We're pleased to see some action at last from the SRA and hope the tide is finally turning in favour of consumers. We now want to see some decisive action to stop these bully-boy tactics."
According to Electronista, Verizon is setting up for a retail launch of the Google Nexus One, with in-store representatives training to sell it in stores. This is notable because the current models of the device sell only online, via Google's Android store.
Reads the report: We don’t have a whole lot to go on, other than a couple of emails that were bounced around by some curious customers and some rather knowledgeable reps, but it certainly looks to us as if Verizon has begun training — at least some of its employees — on an EV-DO variant of the Google Nexus One. A tentative release date has not yet been communicated trough the chain of command, but apparently this sucker will be sold in Big Red’s retail stores across the country once it’s available. Again, this is about as confirmed (or unconfirmed) as it gets, and we’re merely passing it on to our readers because…well, we love you guys and gals to death. Don’t come kicking in our doors if it doesn’t exactly pan out.
Engadget has posted a full new report on the upcoming Microsoft Courier 'digital journal' tablet.
The report says the device is under an inch thick, weighs about 1.3 pounds, and is about 5x7 when closed. The device is built on the Tegra 2 chip, and will run on Windows CE 6/Windows Phone 7.
The interface will require a stylus for the most part, and will include handwriting recognition. Also included are a camera and headphone jack.
Earlier this week, the WSJ reported that Sony is finally ready to create a PlayStation-branded smartphone, one that will help it compete against the iPhone, and Microsoft's new Windows Phone 7 line.
Additionally, the company will be creating "a portable device that blurs distinctions among a netbook, an e-reader and a PlayStation Portable, or PSP," one that it hopes will compete against the iPad and net/smartbooks.
The products have a target launch in 2010, but prices are nowhere near finalized.
Today, the company has declined comment on the report, calling it "speculation."
"As already announced, Sony (including SCE) and Sony Ericsson have been strengthening their collaboration in the networked mobile space. However, it is not our strategy to discuss future products or business plan before we make a formal announcement. Any media report that suggests details of the product or business is based on speculation," read the press release.
According to new charts from web analytics firm Quantcast, the Android operating system continues to gain market share in mobile OS share of Web consumption, and at a blistering pace, at the expense of the iPhone OS and the RIM BlackBerry OS.
Despite the growth, the iPhone remains the clear leader, but its share seems to have saturated, with recent trends showing negative growth for share over the last year.
Between February 2009 and February 2010, Android saw 95.3 percent growth, while RIM saw 7.5 percent growth, and the iPhone OS saw -10.2 percent.
China Unicom, the exclusive operator of the Apple iPhone in China, is looking to sell the smartphone with Wi-Fi, which current Chinese models do not sell thanks to government regulations.
"I know that in the market there is hope we will offer an iPhone with Wi-Fi," adds Chang Xiaobing, chairman and CEO of China Unicom, outside an event in Beijing. "We have been holding talks with Apple in this area."
Sales of the iPhone have been rather light in China, and many blame the lack of Wi-Fi support for the slow sales. Many would like to use the iPhone to surf the Web, but also do not want to pay the data plan rates to use 3G.
China Unicom, the second largest carrier in the nation, has said it will begin selling Android handsets in China this year, despite Google's ongoing spat with the Chinese government.
In late January, Google postponed two high-profile Android smartphone launches in China, both of which would have been available through Unicom.
"We are open to mobile phone operating systems, and we recognize that Android is a mainstream system," said Unicom Chairman Chang Xiaobing, via Reuters. "We will definitely use Google's Android in our mobile handsets."
Google has announced its acquisition of DocVerse, a technology company that allows people to edit Microsoft Office in the cloud.
The company paid $25 million for the company, the latest in its long string of acquisitions.
Google will immediately add the service to its Google Docs suite.
Reads the official blog post:
The future of productivity applications is in the cloud. We've always believed the web is the best platform for creating and sharing information, and Google Docs has already helped millions of people become more productive. But we recognize that many people are still accustomed to desktop software. So as we continue to improve Google Docs and Google Sites as rich collaboration tools, we’re also making it easier for people to transition to the cloud, and interoperate with desktop applications like Microsoft Office.
For example, we recently made it possible to use Google Docs to store and share any type of file that you have on your computer, not just the ones you create online. Today we’re excited to announce another step towards seamless interoperability: we have acquired DocVerse.
Today, the software giant has updated the Xbox Live "Code of Conduct" to include for the allowance of sexual orientation, race, religion, and nationality in Gamertags and profiles.
"Under our previous policy, some of these expressions of self-identification were not allowed in Gamertags or profiles to prevent the use of these terms as insults or slurs," adds Xbox Live General Manager Marc Whitten.
Although some terms will still not be tolerated, the use of "Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgendered and Straight" are okay, says Destructoid's Jim Sterling.
"Microsoft had been working with GLAAD and [its own] LGBT community to narrow down the terms. Use of those words in an insulting manner won't be tolerated either, so it seems as if Microsoft has retracted its scorched earth policy and will now be reviewing the use of these words on a case-by-case basis. It may not seem like a big deal to many of you, but it was certainly a big deal to some, and it's very cool that Microsoft has taken the stick out of its arse and decided to judge the use of these words on their own merits. Microsoft doesn't do everything right, but this was definitely a good thing. Well done!," concludes Sterling, via TGDaily.
Livestream, the live video streaming startup company, has just hit their biggest partnership yet, a one-year deal with the AP to stream all of the AP's live video needs, starting with the Oscars red carpet festivities in two days.
The videos will stream at http://www.livestream.com/aplive, and users can log in with Facebook or Twitter IDs, or register for new accounts.
The AP and Livestream will share revenue from APLive, and revenues will come from licensing deals and advertising. Adds TechCrunch: "Revenues can come from licensing (AP-affiliated publishers can embed the video on their news sites) or advertising (partners can embed the video for free with the APLive branding, which comes with pre-roll plus overlay ads sold by the AP and Livestream jointly)."
Livestream currently has deals with ESPN, NPR, Fox, Scripps, and National Geographic.
YouTube has announced the launch of automatically generated captions for all its streaming videos, a new feature that should help both deaf users, and those who want subtitles for videos in other languages.
Google software engineer Ken Harrenstein, who has been blogging about the eventual launch of the captions, showed off the new feature at a press conference. Harrenstein is deaf, and says the company has been working on the project since 2005.
Automatic captioning has been available to a small number of groups since last year, but the feature has now gone wide.
Researcher Mike Cohen says "the captioning technology blends Google's speech-recognition and translation algorithms."
The technology continues to improve daily, getting better at factoring in accents, and canceling out background noise.
Although first announced with a March release date, the Apple iPad now has an official new launch day, April 3rd.
Analysts and consumers had expected a March 26th launch.
Although Apple would not specify the reason for the delay, analyst Peter Misek reported last week that the tablet was seeing "unspecified production problems," and Apple was not happy with the amount of tablets that would have been available by the end of March.
The Wi-Fi-only devices will be the first available, and will cost $499 at minimum. 3G-capable versions, which sell for $699 minimum, are coming at a later date with an AT&T contract.
Would-be buyers can start pre-ordering on March 12th.
The devices will go on sale internationally in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Spain, Switzerland and the U.K. in late April as well.
Less than week after Microsoft began offering alternative browsers to European Windows users, Opera has announced that downloads have tripled.
"It varies from country to country, but yes, in several major countries, Opera downloads have tripled since the ballot screen appeared," added Rolf Assev, the chief strategy officer for Opera.
Downloads surged as high as 350 percent in some nations such as Belgium, Spain, France and Poland.
The downloads may have been helped by the launch of Opera 10.50, but Assev says compared to past launches, "such as Opera 10.0, 10.10 and 9.5, and the tripling is above what we would normally expect with a new version launch."
The so-called "ballot box" was implemented on Monday, thanks to a European Commission mandate, two years after Opera complained to anti-trust regulators that Internet Explorer being bundled with Windows was "stifling competition."
The ballot allows users to choose what browser they want, Safari, Chrome, Firefox, Opera, or stick with Internet Explorer 8.
Apple has banished a whole new set of apps from the App Store, banning any apps that actively scan for Wi-Fi hotspots.
Apps that use a database of hotspots combined with GPS are still allowed, but many of the most popular "Wi-Fi locators" have been taken down.
One developer, Three Jacks Software, of the popualr WiFi-Where app, was clearly frustrated:
"I find it quite ironic that Apple removes these very handy, very useful apps from the app store when there are so many useless gimick [sic] apps that just pollute the App Store pages."
A few of the other notably banned apps are WiFiTrack, WiFiFoForum, yFy Network Finder, WiFi Get, eWifi, and WiFi Analyzer.
According to the Gigatweet counter, the incredibly popular social network service Twitter has hit 10 billion "tweets," seeing fast growth from past milestones.
1 billion tweets was hit in November 2008, and 5 billion was hit in November 2009.
Given the current pace of tweeting, Gigatweet has projections for when future milestones will hit, with 20 billion coming as soon as 197 days from now, or about mid-September.
Despite a gigantic lead in the online MP3 market, Apple appears to be playing dirty against Amazon MP3, using its clout with the record labels to try to snuff out Amazon's popular "Daily Deal" promotion.
In 2008, when Amazon MP3 first launched, the Daily Deal was paid for by Amazon, out of their own pockets, as a way to get traffic to the service. In 2009 however, says a label exec, "that promotion morphed into something where the labels make arrangements to provide an exclusive selling window with Amazon for a big release expected to do a lot of business on street date."
In exchange for the Daily Deal promotion, Amazon gets a one-day exclusive window for sales before street date, as long as digital marketing support through the artist's Web sites, or MySpace pages.
The same executive said about that situation (via Billboard): "When that happened, iTunes said, 'Enough of that s**t.' "
According to a new WSJ report, Sony is finally ready to create a PlayStation-branded smartphone, one that will help it compete against the iPhone, and Microsoft's new Windows Phone 7 line.
Additionally, the company will be creating "a portable device that blurs distinctions among a netbook, an e-reader and a PlayStation Portable, or PSP," one that it hopes will compete against the iPad and net/smartbooks.
The products have a target launch in 2010, but prices are nowhere near finalized.
Equally as surprising is the news that this will be a Sony-only venture, leaving out Ericsson, its long-time smartphone partner.
PSP and PSP Go sales have been extremely disappointing since the launch of the iPod Touch and the Nintendo DSiDS continues to rack up impressive sales, all at the expense of PSP market share.
A federal appeals court has ruled in favor of TiVo today in the long-standing patent case brought against them by Dish and EchoStar, with the news sending TiVo's stock shares up over 55 percent on gigantic volume.
The district court had ruled last year that Dish and EchoStar had violated TiVo patents and ordered a permanent injunction on DVRs being sold by the company's that used the infringing technology.
The companies were also told to pay TiVo $300 million in damages, and the latest ruling will finally pave the way for TiVo to receive that money.
Aten Design Group, a design firm in Colorado has hosted a "funeral" today for the aged web browser Internet Explorer 6, which is quickly being thrown out in favor of faster, safer browsers, including its descendants IE7 and IE8.
The service will have a coffin with a dummy inside with an IE6 logo for its head. Anyone who attends is welcome to eulogize the browser with memories, good or bad.
Some users already posted their thoughts, on the invitation page.
"I feel terrible admitting this, but ... I never really liked him," writes "Eddie Escher," via CNN. "He had so many hang-ups, and he looked awful -- especially in his later years. But... he was always there when you needed him. You have to give him that."
The real nail in the coffin (pun intended) is coming next week when Google pulls all IE6 support from its Google family of sites, including Docs and Gmail. YouTube will drop support within a month.
All I will say on the matter is I hope IE6 dies fast, there is absolutely no reason anyone should be using it, ever.
Google has released a new Android application called Gesture Search today, which allows users to shorthand (gesture) on the touch screen and jump to a destination, such as a contact or application.
Says Google: "Gesture Search lets you quickly find a contact, a bookmark, an application, or a music track from hundreds or thousands of items by drawing alphabet gestures on the touchscreen. Gesture Search continuously updates search results as you add each letter and improves search quality by learning from your search history."
You load the application, are then given a blank screen, and then you can "gesture" letters until you find what you want.
The main criticism so far seems to be the fact that Gesture Search is a standalone application and needs to be opened each time. It would be better suited as part of the actual operating system.
The second largest criticism is the fact that it only works on phones running Android 2.0 or higher.
In what has to be a gigantic embarrassment for the company, Ubisoft's highly criticized "always connected" DRM has been cracked on the first day of release of the game Silent Hunter 5: Battle of the Atlantic.
The publisher made headlines earlier this month when it announced the DRM which made it so gamers must be always connected to the Internet, or not be able to play the game. If you are ever disconnected from the Internet, you are forced back to the main menu, losing any progress you made between save points. The DRM was confirmed for Splinter Cell: Conviction, Silent Hunter 5: Battle of the Atlantic, Assassin's Creed 2, Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands and the all new Ghost Recon titles.
Yesterday, the pirated release, Silent Hunter 5 Battle of the Atlantic-SKIDROW, was made widely available, circumventing the DRM easily with a patched executable.
Ubisoft, however, is saying the pirated game is not fully complete.
According to Microsoft CFO Peter Klein, the software giant has sold over 90 million copies of the Windows 7 operating system.
Windows 7 hit retail shelves in October and has critically been a success.
Adds the official Microsoft blog post: "We're humbled and excited that people are responding so positively to Windows 7 - our customers have made it the fastest selling operating system in history."
Last month, Microsoft said Windows 7 demand had given the company record quarterly revenue, with high demand expected to continue.
RealNetworks has announced that they have settled their outstanding lawsuits with the major Hollywood studios over their Real DVD ripping software, effectively killing the product off after making just 2700 sales.
Additionally, Real will pay $4.5 million to pay off the legal costs of the litigation.
"We are pleased to put this litigation behind us," adds Bob Kimball, president and acting CEO for Real. "This is another step toward fulfilling our commitment to simplify our company and focus on our core businesses. Until this dispute, Real had always enjoyed a productive working relationship with Hollywood. With this litigation resolved, I hope that in the future we can find mutually beneficial ways to use Real technology to bring Hollywood's great work to consumers."
The settlement also terms a permanent injunction that will block RealDVD and similar technologies forever from sale in the US or abroad.
The $30 USD software application allowed users to make a copy of their DVDs and it play it back on their PCs, allowing for, what Real thought, were legal backups. Clearly, Hollywood did not agree, despite the fact that Real's backups also included DRM to stop sharing of the backups.
Topeka, Kansas mayor Bill Bunten has announced today that the city will temporarily be renamed Google, in an effort to get the search giant to bring their proposed 1000Mbit free Internet to the city, via the "Fiber for Communities" program.
"It's just fun. We're having a good time of it," says Bunten. "There's a lot of good things that are going on in our city."
Cities were given a March 26th deadline to explain to Google why they are interested in the broadband, and Google will then choose a couple of cities for the pilot project, with no more than 500,000 in population total.
When asked if they would make the name permanent if Google invested in them, Bunten laughed.
"Oh, heavens no, Topeka? We are very proud of our city and Topeka is an Indian word which means 'a good place to grow potatoes.' We're not going to change that."
FileShareFreak has a very interesting report out today about Cinavia DRM, which is a new audio watermarking technology that takes aim at pirates, and those trying to playback movie downloads via their PlayStation 3s.
The site says the watermarking works by "comparing the source of the audio to the format in which a movie was released (ie theatrical or commercial disc), and if the watermarked audio source detects a difference, the movie will either be mute (but most likely not play at all)."
To date, it has been found in a TS version of "The Wolfman" that has been popular via P2P and torrent sites.
"Movies protected by Cinavia technology carry inaudible codes embedded by the copyright owner in their audio tracks that indicate where and how they are allowed to be used. For example, movies that are being released to theaters can carry a Cinavia code that indicates that they are supposed to be duplicated by professional replicators and played back on professional projection equipment only," reads the official site.
A couple of days ago we reported that iPad manufacturer Foxconn was having an "unspecified production problem," and there might be shortages of the tablet in March.
The report came from an investor note by Canaccord Adams analyst Peter Misek, who said Apple was hoping to ship 1 million, but might only have 300,000 available by launch in late March. Misek even said launch could be pushed back until mid-April, until 1 million units were available.
Today, Taiwanese component makers have denied those rumors, saying their supplies are on schedule.
"Our supplies are on schedule and Foxconn should be able to ship 600,000-700,000 iPads in March and one million units in April," reads the Digitimes report.
They also do not expect Apple to delay the launch.
Last year, The Pirate Bayinfamously got "purchased" by little known company Global Gaming Factory for $7.8 million, however the deal never went through.
It appears, (via TF), that GGF had an even more ambitious offer in the works, 20 million euro for giant torrent indexer Mininova.
Today, it was revealed, from sources close to GGF and Mininova including CEO Hans Pandeya, that a deal was set in place for "no less than 20 million euros," but fell through when Mininova lost its court appeal in the case brought against it by anti-piracy agency BREIN.
"I’m going to buy Mininova too and eliminate all the competition," Pandeya had told one-time partner Wayne Rosso before the appeal fell through. Clearly however, Pandeya could not have afforded Mininova, as he couldn't afford Pirate Bay.
Posted through the official channels, Apple has a new job listing posted which all but confirms that the company is looking to expand the iPad iBookstore globally.
The listing, reported by macrumors, is for a manager in the "Asia Pacific & Canada iBooks division."
The listing says: "The role includes: working with management, regionally and in Cupertino to determine strategies and priorities for iBooks in Canada, Australia, New Zealand and other countries; identifying content providers to target, establish and develop relationships; working with legal and production teams to finalize relationships and secure content; and coordinate launches with partners, production, and marketing. This role will also be responsible for marketing the books offering on the iBooks store by coordinating with Apple's production teams, the marketing team, and the production and marketing teams of partners.
The successful employee holding the position will be based in either Markham, Ontario (outside of Toronto) or Sydney, Australia."
According to a new NPD report, gamers spend the most time online via the Xbox 360 compared to rival consoles, averaging 7.3 hours per week.
PC gamers came in second at 6.6 hours per week, and the PS3 came third at 5.8 hours per week.
Overall, hours spent weekly on online games has increased 10 percent year-on-year, from 7.3 hours in 2008 to 8 hours in 2009.
Additionally, 20 percent of all games bought by online gamers were digital downloads, up from 19 percent in 2008.
Adds NPD Group industry analyst Anita Frazier: "The installed base of video game systems continues to grow, the platforms available to play games continue to expand and the options for content acquisition have never been greater, especially online. And yet, effective monetization of many forms of online gaming continues to be a topic of much debate and discussion within the industry."
The popular Hulu online video service has been dealt something of a blow by Viacom. The service will soon be without The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and The Colbert Report after failing to secure the rights to carry the shows after March 9.
Hulu's senior vice president of content and distribution, Andy Forssell, confirmed that the shows will no longer be available on the U.S. service after March 9. Hulu offers programming to viewers for free, while using advertisements to generate revenue. The revenue is shared with content owners like Viacom's Comedy Central.
Hulu is jointly owned by General Electric Co's NBC Universal, News Corp's Fox Entertainment and Walt Disney Co's ABC. It will continue to negotiate with Comedy Central to resolve the dispute.
Other disputes have emerged between content providers and video delivery outlets recently too. ABC on Monday threatened to remove content from services run Cablevision, while Fox and Time Warner Cable Inc resolved a similar dispute.
Argos has "sort of" entered the pre-owned games trade in the United Kingdom. The catalogue-driven retailer is trialing a system where customers get vouchers in return for certain pre-owned video games. Only 27 of the chain's 735 stores are taking part for now, and the company has no plan for expanding the trial yet.
Only selected PS3, Xbox 360, DS and Wii titles are being accepted -- all listed here -- and they have already been assigned a value. Grand Theft Auto IV will get you £11 in vouchers, while Assassin's Creed II will get you £22.
"Argos can confirm it is trialling a trade-in service for video games in a few stores in the North East region commencing in March 2010," an Argos spokesperson told GamesIndustry.biz.
The movie industry has been hoping that digital downloads of movies will make up for lost revenue of falling DVD sales. In 2007 and 2008, legal movie downloading surged as more and more high profile players entered the market. However, while 2009 saw growth, it was way below analyst expectations and industry experts warn that the financial downturn doesn't explain it all.
A new report by Screen Digest showed movie downloading revenues in the U.S. of $291 million, way below the predicted $360 million haul. The total for 2008 hit $219 million, almost double what it was the year before. "The market just cooled off," said Arash Amel, a research director with Screen Digest. "This wasn't caused by economic factors . . . the level of interest in digital downloads just isn't there."
Consumer confusion is believed to be a large factor in cooling demand. Different avenues provide movie downloads with completely different limitations. "Digital downloading is characterised by its restrictions - it's all about what viewers can't do, rather than what they can do,"added Mr Amel.
The Federal Constitutional Court in Germany has overturned a controversial law that retained communication data between citizens for anti-terrorism purposes. The court called the law a "grave intrusion" of citizen's privacy in its decision. The ruling is a blow to Chancellor Angela Merkel's government, which was displeased with it.
The Court said that the law needed to be revised, and that it did not correctly balance privacy rights for German citizens with measures to protect them from harm. Under the law, communication data by e-mail or phone was retained for possible use by law enforcement agencies, but the content of the communication wasn't itself retained.
Nearly 35,000 Germans had appealed to the court to overturn the law that stemmed from a Europe-wide data retention plan formed under the UK's EU Presidency term. Just the previous year, London had been the target of several terrorist attacks.
"The disputed instructions neither provided a sufficient level of data security, nor sufficiently limited the possible uses of the data," the court said, adding that "such retention represents an especially grave intrusion."
Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere, the country's top security figure, expressed disappointment at the court's decision. "It would be inappropriate to criticize a ruling by the constitutional court, but I have to say that it does not instill happiness,"he told reporters.
Spanish police have arrested men behind a 13 million-strong botnet used to spew spam around the world. All three men arrested were Spanish citizens, and none had any significant hacking skills. Over 13 million computers in 190 countries were believed to have been compromised in this case, with half of the Fortune 1000 companies and 40 major banks in some way affected.
The botnet was rendered inactive in December 2009 following action by the FBI, the Spanish Guardia Civil and security experts around the world. One of the three individuals gave investigators the break the needed when he inadvertently logged into the network without disguising his IP address. He was arrested in early February, and the other two arrests followed later in the month.
"This is very alarming because it proves how sophisticated and effective malware distribution software has become, empowering relatively unskilled cyber criminals to inflict major damage and financial loss," said Panda Security senior research adviser Pedro Bustamante.
Personal and sensitive information was harvested from the network by the three men, one of which had 800,000 pieces of personal data on his computer. The group made money by renting out use of the botnet to cyber-criminals that would use it to send out huge amounts of spam to Internet users.
Nokia Corp. announced on Monday that Skype for the Symbian platform has been released. This makes Skype available for 200 million smartphone users worldwide. Skype for Symbian will allow Nokia smartphone users worldwide to use Skype on the move, over either a WiFi or mobile data connection (GPRS, EDGE, 3G). It is now downloadable for free from the Ovi Store, Nokia's one-stop shop for mobile content.
Skype for Symbian will run on any Nokia smartphone using Symbian^1, the latest version of the Symbian platform. Skype will soon introduce this client to Symbian mobile devices from other manufacturers, including Sony Ericsson.
Using the new Skype app for Symbian enables smartphone users to:
Make free Skype-to-Skype calls to other Skype users anywhere in the world
Save money on calls and texts (SMS) to phones abroad
Send and receive instant messages to and from individuals or groups
Share pictures, videos and other files
Receive calls to their existing online number
See when Skype contacts are online and available to call or IM
Easily import names and numbers from the phone's address book
"Symbian enables us to bring smartphones to more and more people and ensures scale for our solutions and compelling services, such as Skype. We're seeing around 1.5 million downloads a day on Ovi Store now and believe that the Skype client for Nokia smartphones will have wide appeal to Symbian users," said Jo Harlow, Senior Vice President for Smartphones, Nokia.
Today Western Digital announced a line of solid state 2.5 inch SATA hard drives called SiliconEdge Blue. The new drives include 64GB, 128GB & 256GB models.
The drives are intended to "accelerate SSD technology adoption by OEMs, technology enthusiasts, gamers and road warriors," said Michael Hajeck, senior vice president and general manager of WD's solid state storage business unit.
Traditional hard drives are arguably the weakest point in most computers. Reliance on mechanical parts makes them somewhat fragile and also limits performance.
The SiliconEdge Blue drives boast a sustained read speed of 250MB per second, compared to 100MB per second for Western Digital's fastest disk-based 2.5 inch drives in the Scorpio Black line. It's also a significant upgrade from 138MB per second for their best high performance desktop drive, the Caviar Black.
Sustained write speed isn't as good, which is normal for solid state storage. At 140MB per second it edges out the Caviar Black and handily beats the Scorpio Black.
Of course that performance comes at a steep price. The 64GB model has a suggested retail price of $279 USD. The 128GB model is priced at $529 and 256GB will cost you $999.
Microsoft is working on a mobile version of their Surface touchscreen interface. Called Mobile Surface, it uses a projector and camera to create an interface that reacts to movement in 3 dimensions, rather than the 2 like a touchscreen.
On Monday Seattle, Washington's TechFlash posted a video of a Microsoft researcher demonstrating the technology.
Don't expect to see this in any devices in the near future. At this point Microsoft is still figuring out what sorts of applications might be built around this type of 3D interface.
And of course, being designed with mobile phones in mind, it will require a smartphone designed to take advantage of it.
The first phones running the new generation of the Windows Mobile OS, Windows Phone Series 7, won't even go on sale until late this year. Mobile Surface is certainly much further away than that.
Hulu, one of the most popular online video streaming sites in the United States, had some bad news to note today, reporting that Viacom has pulled two of its most popular shows, "The Daily Show With Jon Stewart" and "The Colbert Report."
"The Daily Show" is the third most-watched show on the site, and Colbert's show usually ranks in the top 7.
Viacom does say that they will not be completely getting out of the streaming business, however.
Reads the press release:
Comedy Central has made “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart” and “The Colbert Report” available to consumers through Hulu since June 2008. Although that agreement has concluded, full-length episodes of each show will remain available at TheDailyShow.com and ColbertNation.com, respectively.
Hulu was one of the many digital distribution partners we’ve worked with over the past few years to add new outlets for our valuable and powerful content and to help drive the businesses of our partners. We had a great experience with Hulu, and we hope to work with its team again in the future.
In February 2009, LA resident Emma Alvarado filed a lawsuit against Microsoft accusing the software giant of profiting from consumers downgrading from Windows Vista back to XP.
Alvarado's complaint says Microsoft forced customers to first purchase the new operating system, before they could downgrade to the operating system they really wanted, XP.
The case was tossed out this week.
Writes U.S. District Court Judge Marsha Pechman: "Nowhere does she allege that she paid to downgrade or that she did not receive a copy of Vista when she freely chose to purchase her new computer with that software. That she chose to downgrade to XP without extra cost does not demonstrate that Microsoft retained a benefit without giving value. Nor does the fact that she chooses to use only one version nullify the fact that Microsoft gave her value for the bargain." If anything, "it appears that Plaintiff obtained two versions of Microsoft's operating software for the price of one," Pechman continued.
"We're pleased the Court agreed that Plaintiff's complaint failed to state a viable claim and dismissed it in its entirety," Microsoft spokesman Kevin Kutz responded.
The Examiner has reported today, and confirmed that Apple store employees will receive the iPad tablet for sales training starting March 10th.
The report says the date is confirmed by a manager in SoCal that wishes to remain anonymous.
Although the rest of the facts are not confirmed, the anticipated release date is set for March 26th, with 3G versions not available until mid-April at the least.
Commercials for the device will begin airing nationwide on March 15th, with e-reader capabilities being "emphasized."
Additionally, anyone who camps outside Apple Stores for the launch with receive "a special gift," although it is unclear whether that will be a gift card, a free e-book or something else.
BusinessInsider has posted their latest "Chart of the day," and today's shows how quickly Google's Chrome browser is taking market share from rivals Internet Explorer and Firefox.
The fast, popular browser, which has been out for 18 months and has no marketing campaign, has taken about 7 percent of the market, according to new StatCounter figures, taking share from its rivals.
In terms of growth, Chrome has grown from 4 percent in September to its current figure, while IE fell from 58 percent to 55 percent and FF fell from 31 and fractions to 31.
Safari continues to grow as well (slowly), at the expense of Opera and IE.
Last month we reported that Ubisoft had begun implementing a new DRM scheme into their PC games, making it so gamers must be always connected to the Internet, or not be able to play the game. If you are ever disconnected from the Internet, you are forced back to the main menu, losing any progress you made between save points.
Today, Softpedia is reporting that the DRM scheme has been confirmed for Splinter Cell: Conviction, Silent Hunter 5: Battle of the Atlantic, Assassin's Creed 2, Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands and the all new Ghost Recon games.
Says an Ubisoft rep: "It's hard for us to say, yes, from now until the day that we all die all of our games are going to include this but most will."
I can only imagine how many would-be buyers are going to be pushed to the cracked, pirated versions that Ubisoft is so desperately trying to curb.
After putting the popular browser into version 10.5 alpha just 10 weeks ago, Opera has released the final version of the browser today, with a plethora of new updates.
"Opera 10.50 is the fastest browser in almost all speed tests," says Lars Boilesen, CEO of Opera Software. We have heard the same claim from Google with their Chrome browser but I'm sure concrete data will be out later today on the matter.
Opera says the updated browser uses "a new JavaScript engine, Carakan, and a new graphics library, Vega," as a way to get the fastest speeds.
Additionally, Opera 10.5 adds "Private browsing," which allows users to use "private browsing to remove specific sites from your browsing history. Unlike other browsers, Opera 10.50 allows you to browse privately in a tab or in an entirely separate window."
Finally, the browser has Aero Glass and Peak integration and improved standards support for HTML5 and CSS3.
Apple has sued rival smartphone maker HTC over violation of patents related to the iPhone, accusing HTC of infringing on up to 20 patents relating to the popular smartphone's hardware and user interface.
"We can sit by and watch competitors steal our patented inventions, or we can do something about it," added Apple CEO Steve Jobs. "We've decided to do something about it."
Apple is looking for monetary damages and an injunction that will block HTC from selling phones using the infringing patents in the United States.
The complaints have been filed with the ITC, which can order HTC to halt sales, but complaints of this nature normally take months at the least and sometimes as long as decades.
HTC responded: "HTC values patent rights and their enforcement but is also committed to defending its own technology innovations," adding it did not have enough time to review all the claims.
The Associated Press plans to release an app for the Apple iPad. It will be an extension of their new AP Gateway service which is intended to be a clearing house for licensing content from AP and any member companies that choose to participate.
Although short on specifics about the app, last week's announcement did mention that it "incorporates a paid subscription model and offers AP members the opportunity to participate."
Their may be a market for paid news subscriptions if it can deliver an experience superior to existing internet sources. Unfortunately that's not what AP seems to be focusing on.
The key pieces of AP's plan will be "using some [content] to attract a broad audience while saving other content for custom experiences," and allowing AP members to "set the rights" for content they contribute.
Both of these propositions are problematic. Let's start with "saving content." What they're really talking about is limiting consumer access to certain news items unless they pay.
That may seem appealing if you're a newspaper editor, but unless there's no alternate source for a story it's also impossible. It's also a good way to send readers to a competitor.
Over the past few weeks, the rare NES game Stadium Events has grown some notoriety, selling in eBay auctions for $13,000 (opened) and later $41,300 (sealed).
Today, although it seems like a scam given the circumstances, another "sealed" copy of the game has sold for $800,200, blowing out the former (already overpriced auction sales.)
The seller only has 34 feedback and hasn't sold anything since 2007, and the auction description is written with little grace or regard for grammar, so the bidding seems shady at best.
Reads the auction:
This is the Stadium Events Games NTSC which is still sealed inside the plastic wrap. In my posession here is probably the one and last SEAL brand new Stadium Events game on Earth. I nearly crap in my pants when i found out what this is worth and the rarity of this item. Well you big time collectors i think this is what you guys are waiting for and looking for. Please do not email me with Low Ball offers. Good bidding on this game and may the best bidder wins.
A new DSiWare game has been released in Japan called Rittai Kakushi E Atta Koreda (3D Hidden IMages: Found it!) and it ingeniously achieves 3D without the need for the gamer to wear glasses.
Using the front facing camera, the game can track the player's face and eyes and create a 3D effect, with the screen moving to create a sense of depth.
Because there is no need for glasses to filter light, the images should produce little to no strain on your eyes or brain.
Watch the video, it's a very impressive experience, especially for a game that only retails for 500 Nintendo points.
HackingNetflix has posted a screenshot of a new survey Netflix has issued, that asks users about their interest level in an iPhone app that would bring "Watch Instantly" streaming to the device, via Wi-Fi.
The survey reads:
Imagine that Netflix offers its subscribers the ability to instantly watch movies & TV episodes on their iPhone. The selection availability to instantly watch includes some new releases, lots of classics and TV episodes. There are no advertisements or trailers, and movies start in as little as 30 seconds. You can fast-forward, rewind, and pause or watch again. The movies & TV episodes you instantly watch are included in your Netflix membership for no additional fee.
Whenever you want to instantly watch content on your iPhone, your iPhone must be connected to a Wi-Fi network (such as one you might have at home or at work, or in public places like coffee shops, book stores, hotels, airports, etc.)
If this functionality were available, how likely would you or someone in your household be to instantly watch movies & TV episodes on your iPhone via a Wi-Fi network?
A new iPhone app is growing in infamy today, thanks to its ability to delete text messages remotely, or the ability to self-destruct messages at the users request.
Dubbed TigerText, the app lets users set a time limit for texts, and when that time limit hits, the messages deletes from your phone, the receiving phone, and the TigerText server.
The app is aimed at adulterers, sexting teens, and those who want to keep their intimate texts private.
TigerText is free for the first 100 messages, $1.49 per month for 250 messages, and only $2.49 per month for unlimited. All messages are saved on the TigerText server meaning they are never saved in your carrier's database or physically on any phone.
Moving one step closer to world domination, Google has acquired the cloud photo editing service Picnik, giving users a way to edit, crop, touch-up, and add effects to their photos, without needing a stand-alone application.
Says Google's official blog:
More than ever before, people are sharing and storing their photos online. But until recently, you had to edit your photos using client software on your computer. Today, we're excited to announce that Google has acquired Picnik, one of the first sites to bring photo editing to the cloud. Using Picnik, you can crop, do touch-ups and add cool effects to your photos, all without leaving your web browser.
We're not announcing any significant changes to Picnik today, though we'll be working hard on integration and new features. As well, we'd like to continue supporting all existing Picnik partners so that users will continue to be able to add their photos from other photo sharing sites, make edits in the cloud and then save and share to all relevant networks.
We're very impressed with the Picnik team and the product they've created, and we're excited to welcome them to Google. We're looking forward to collaborating closely with them to improve the online photo editing experience on the web. In the meantime, we encourage you to head to Picnik, import some of your photos from Picasa Web Albums, Flickr or Facebook and try your hand at photo editing in the cloud!
Sony promised a fix within 24 hours and has delivered, repairing the glitch and giving users access again to the Internet from their consoles.
The official reason for the bug was problems with the internal clock on older "fat" PS3 consoles. Affected models recognized 2010 as a leap year, which it is not.
"Having the internal clock date change from February 29 to March 1 (both GMT), we have verified that the symptoms are now resolved and that users are able to use their PS3 normally," writes Sony.
As a last resort, the company had told affected gamers to not turn their PS3s on, or risk losing data and trophies.
The European Commission has cleared the proposed merger of Orange and T-Mobile in the UK, a deal that would create the largest mobile operator in the United Kingdom. The Commission cleared the merger after Orange and T-Mobile agreed to make changes to ensure competition in the market and to give up some of the wireless spectrum that would be allocated to the new company.
"I am happy that we managed to resolve the competition issues in this case quickly in close cooperation with the Member State concerned," European Competition Commissioner Joaquin Almunia said in a statement. The Commission had raised concerns about the merger, in particular what effect it would have on 3UK, owned by Hong Kong-based conglomerate Hutchison Whampoa.
"With the merger... there will be only four players in the UK, hence the concerns about the fate of 3UK," it said,"the commission said.
"In order to address the competition concerns... the parties concluded a revised agreement with 3UK which will secure its position as a competitive force on the market. The Commission concluded that the commitments offered by the parties remedy the identified competition concerns."
According to research firm Enterbrain, the ever-popular Nintendo Wii has hit the 10 million unit sold milestone in Japan this week, 170 weeks after its initial launch.
The firm says as of yesterday, Nintendo has sold 10,009,736 units in the nation.
The only console to reach the milestone faster in Japan was the PlayStation 2 which hit the figure in 131 weeks, a full 10 months quicker.
Sony's current generation console, the PlayStation 3 has 4.77 million units sold in Japan, adds the firm, with the Xbox 360 in third at 1.24 million units sold so far.
Sony is still working on a fix for a suspected bug in the clock functionality of the PlayStation 3 (PS3) console that caused a variety of errors and problems for PS3 and PSN gamers since last night. The bug only appears to affect the "fat" older version of the PS3, but not the newer slim models.
Sony has advised users of the non-slim models to leave their consoles off until a bug fix is available, saying that certain functionality might be affected by errors, and a risk of not being able to restore certain data. The PlayStation-maker listed the following problems are being reported by users.
The date of the PS3 system may be re-set to Jan 1, 2000.
When the user tries to sign in to the PlayStation Network, the following message appears on the screen; "An error has occurred. You have been signed out of PlayStation Network (8001050F)".
When the user tries to launch a game, the following error message appears on the screen and the trophy data may disappear; "Failed to install trophies. Please exit your game."
When the user tries to set the time and date of the system via the Internet, the following message appears on the screen; "The current date and time could not be obtained. (8001050F)"
Users are not able to play back certain rental video downloaded from the PlayStation Store before the expiration date.
"We hope to resolve this problem within the next 24 hours. In the meantime, if you have a model other than the new slim PS3, we advise that you do not use your PS3 system, as doing so may result in errors in some functionality, such as recording obtained trophies, and not being able to restore certain data." said the company.
The European Commission has put into effect a new EU-wide rule that will cap 'shock' mobile phone bills built-up when users unsuspectingly surf the Internet for extended periods of time without a data plan or when roaming.
Customers must now tell their carrier at what point to cut them off, and if they do not by July 1st, then the cap will be set at 50 euros. On the carrier side, the companies will have to warn users whenever their bill hits 80 percent of the limit.
Adds European Commissioner for Digital Agenda Neelie Kroes: "Protection against data roaming bill shocks is a useful step towards building customers' confidence to use mobile networks to surf the internet when travelling around Europe. Such confidence is essential if people and businesses are to use the internet to its full potential."
Data roaming charges have led to massive bills in the past, with some unlucky users getting hit with $1000+ bills for downloading movies or watching TV while data roaming.
A new study from the Pew Internet & American Life Project has revealed that 61 percent of Americans now get their news online, although local TV remains the most popular method of getting the news.
Overall, 50 percent of Americans read local print newspapers, and 17 percent read national papers. 59 percent of Americans get their news from online and offline sources, with only 2 percent getting their news exclusively from online sources.
Figuring out where users get their news is not as easy, however. 65 percent do not have a favorite site, and 80 percent use 2-5 sites for their daily news. 56 percent use portals such as Google News, Yahoo News or AOL, and younger users follow specific news organizations or journalists via Twitter and Facebook.
18 percent listen to daily podcasts from the news organizations.
What are people searching for when they go online? 81 percent looks for the weather, 73 looks for national events, 66 percent look for health events, 64 percent look up finance or other business. Rounding up the top 5 is international events, at 62 percent.
Thanks to a new investor note by Canaccord Adams analyst Peter Misek, it appears that Apple will have hardware shortages for the iPad tablet this month, claiming that manufacturer Foxconn has an "unspecified production problem."
For its first month of availability, Apple may only have 300,000 tablets available for ship, about a third of what Apple's internal hopes had been.
Misek even believes that Apple may push back launch until April, to ensure they have 1 million tablets ready to ship.
Initially, the iPad was delayed thanks to "glass strength issues," says Electronista, and production was slowed to make sure quality was up to par.
Continuing to create a unified Ovi brand, Nokia will change their current Music Store to Ovi Music, selling DRM-free music tracks.
Under the Ovi brand, Nokia offers games, GPS maps, videos, and now music. The brand started on specific smartphones but has now expanded to most of the Finnish company's mobile phones.
As is the current trend, Ovi Music will offer the tracks in DRM-free format, allowing for playback on all devices.
Ovi Music, when fully integrated, will be available here: Nokia Music.
On February 15th, Microsoft unveiled the Windows Phone 7 Series, the long anticipated new generation of the Windows Mobile series.
The operating system tries to differentiate itself from the iPhone and Android phones, which use home screens of widgets and icons, and Microsoft says it has tried to blend applications together for a more "integrated experience," allowing the OS and applications to "share information with the user in a natural and seamless fashion."
The homescreens include "People," "Pictures," "Games," "Music+Video," "Office," and "Marketplace."
Today, Engadget has shown off the first Windows Phone 7 partner device, from LG, although it is still a prototype. There is little details on the actual hardware, but they have posted a quick video and some pictures.
Some gamers who have tried to play popular PS3 titles today might have had a nasty shock. Thousands of users are being prompted with an error - "8001050F – Hardware failure. Cannot update Firmware or connect to Internet" - and report not being able to connect to the PlayStation Network (PSN), play certain titles offline, access or play downloaded PSN content and more.
The fault is being blamed on a bug with the consoles clock or calendar which oddly set the date back to Dec 31, 1999 for many users in the switchover from February to March. Sony is well aware of the issue and made a statement earlier. "We have found out that some users are experiencing a network connection failure when signing on to PlayStation Network," the PlayStation maker said.
"We are currently looking in to the issue to identify the cause of this network connection failure and will update further information as necessary on the PlayStation blog and official website. We appreciate your understanding and continued support."
The problem only seems to affect users of older "fat" PlayStation 3 (PS3) consoles, while owners of the Slim PS3 models reportedly have no problems so far.
The BBC Trust has revealed to The Register that it will not investigate a move by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) that resulted in open source software being unable to play content from the iPlayer service. The BBC blocked out open source implementations of the Real-Time Messaging Protocol (RTMP)streaming content from the iPlayer service through the use of SWF Verification.
"The decision to block open source plugins is a matter for BBC Management. The Trust has not received any complaints on this issue and has no plans to look into it further at present," a BBC Trust spokeswoman told The Register.
Adobe has effectively made it impossible for develops to create a fully-compatible open source Real-Time Messaging Protocol (RTMP) client. RTMP is used by Flash for streaming video, and it is publicly documented, but Adobe has guarded the RTMP content protection measures. SWF Verification is a security measure that can lock out an unauthorized client from multimedia content.
In 2007, Universal Music Group made a stir when it forced YouTube to remove a video of a toddler dancing to Prince's "Let's Go Crazy." YouTube complied with the video removal, leaving mother Stephanie Lenz shocked and angry. Lenz teamed up with the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) to prove that the use of the song in the video constituted fair use.
Lenz and the EFF decided to bring the issue to a judge where they wanted a declaration that the video was "fair use" and was protected under current copyright laws in the United States, and Lenz also sought damages against Universal for the "meritless takedown request". Disputed takedown requests are the subjects of many a rant on YouTube from regular users. In cases, DMCA takedowns have been issued against users as a way to silence them.
Universal didn't want to back down without a fight, saying that Lenz had bad faith and unclean hands in pursuing damages. Unfortunately for Universal, a California district court judge has rejected Universal's assertions and granted partial summary judgment to Lenz. The decision paves the way for Lenz to collect attorneys fees.
Microsoft Corp. has begun offering alternative web browsers to users of its Internet Explorer browser in Europe. Delivered via Windows Update, Windows XP, Vista and 7 users will be prompted to make an "important choice" on what software they want to use to browse the web. The move is part of a settlement with the European Commission.
Users of the mentioned operating systems that have already chosen something other than Internet Explorer as a default browser will not be prompted to make a selection. For users with Automatic Updates switched on, the screen should appear within the next few days without any user intervention. If Automatic Updates are turned off, the download can be gotten from Microsoft's Windows Update site itself.
When the first screen displays, it will also install a shortcut to the Desktop in case the user would prefer to check it later. In Windows 7, it automatically unpins Internet Explorer from the taskbar. If the user selects any other browser, or even opts to stay with Internet Explorer, then it will have to be pinned to the taskbar manually again. This is done easily by locating an Internet Explorer shortcut in the Start Menu or Desktop, right-clicking on it and clicking "pin this program to taskbar".
Selection Screen
The second screen provides the user with a selection of web browsers to choose from. In accordance with the agreement between Microsoft and the European Commission, the browsers will appear in random order. Additional browsers can be viewed by scrolling to the right. The screen provides three options; "Install" to install the selected browser, "Tell Me More" to get more information about a specific browser (provided by the vendor of the browser) and "Select Later" to make a decision at a later time.
Sony Computer Entertainment America CEO Jack Tretton has made it abundantly clear this weekend that the PlayStation 4 is not coming any time soon.
Tretton says the PS3 is only "in the first 25% to 30% of this generation," meaning there is at least 6 more years before a PS4 is sitting on retail shelves.
"I would say we're sitting in the catbird seat," Tretton added, via CVG. "We've just passed the third year of the PlayStation 3 and we're just hitting our stride. And I don't think anyone is saying, 'This is a five-year cycle; what's new on the horizon?' I can't even imagine what can be done technically beyond the PlayStation 3 in the near future. A question I often get is when we are going to see PlayStation 4. When somebody can craft the technology that exceeds what we're able to do on the PS3, but we are still just starting to harness it."
Although not related, Tretton also said he expected God of War III sales to "blot out the sun."
Androidandme has reported today that all American Android smartphones will be receiving an update to firmware version 2.1, although some will have features missing.
Notably included is the now aging T-Mobile G1, the first Android phone ever, which is still currently running firmware 1.6, like many other devices.
The report does note that some phone will have to be wiped first before they can be upgraded, which shouldn't be too big of a problem as long as you backup your device beforehand. Some phones will also need to be connected to a PC for the install to work, although it is unclear which phones will need the extra effort.
The updates are expected to "still be on schedule for Q2 2010," with the site saying the G1 and the myTouch 3G getting the update first.
Early this morning, the WSJ revealed that a new Apple iPhone was coming this summer, although they had very scarce details.
Verizon Wireless , who for weeks has been promising the release of the Android 2.1 
