T-Mobile has announced today that it has expanded its HSPA+ data network to nine new cities, making it available to over 100 million Americans.
The new markets are: Boston, Mass.; Erie, Penn.; Fresno, Palm Springs and San Diego, Calif.; Miami, Fla.; Richmond, Va.; Spokane, Wash.; and Topeka, Kan.
Furthermore, the carrier will double the theoretical peak speeds to 42 Mbps in 2011, a 100 percent jump from the current 21 Mbps max speeds.
The T-Mobile G2 will be the first handset to support HSPA+ when it launches in September.
That device has a theoretical peak speed of 14.4 Mbps, faster than Sprint's 4G network.
Small cap company Microvision has seen their stock price jump today after anonymous sources claimed that the upcoming Apple iPod Touch will include a Pico projector from the company.
The Pico projector, used in some phones and digital cameras, allows for owners to display their pictures on walls and other surfaces right from the device.
Sources claim the the addition of Pico projectors to the next-generation devices has been confirmed by channel checks in Taiwan.
Please be reminded this all speculation for the time being, but Microvision's stock has jumped 19 percent so far on the rumor.
Apple is holding their annual September Media Event tomorrow.
Microsoft has announced today that they will be releasing a special edition updated Xbox 360 controller, with a "transforming D-Pad."
The updated D-pad design will transform for different uses. Larry "Major Nelson" Hryb explains and shows off the controller in the video below.
When gamers twist the D-pad, it pops up, revealing a raised plus sign.
Says Microsoft: "Select the traditional plus for distinct cardinal direction movement in games like “Halo: Reach” to change weapons and perform complicated combinations and deadly finishing moves in “Street Fighter” games, or rotate the D-pad to the disc format for sweeping motions in games such as “Pro Evolution Soccer 2011.” Choose your favorite controller set-up and experience unrivaled precision for all Xbox 360 games."
The control comes bundled with a Play and Charge Kit and will sell for $65 when it hits on November 9th.
Google has renewed its news content licensing deal with the AP this week, following months of negotiations.
The deal will allow Google to post full-text articles from the AP on Google News.
"We look forward to future collaborations, including on ways Google and AP can work together to create a better user experience and new revenue opportunities,"says Josh Cohen, a Google senior business product manager.
Says the AP: "Under the agreement, AP and Google will also work together in a number of new areas, such as ways to improve discovery and distribution of news."
There was no word on the financials of the deal.
In January, after a negotiation dispute, Google stopped publishing AP stories. They began running them again in February.
Google has rolled out the beta version of their Gmail Priority Inbox today, a feature that will automatically rearrange messages in a user's inbox so the most important ones show up at the top.
For now, the feature is "experimental" and may never go fully live.
Reuters says "the motivation behind Priority Inbox is Google's conviction that the problem of e-mail overload continues getting worse, forcing people to spend much time and effort managing their inbox both for personal and work-related matters."
Priority Inbox is optional and users can switch it on or off at their choosing.
If you enable it, Gmail will divide the inbox into three sections; the "priority" box for important messages, the middle box for "starred" and "flagged" messages and the final box for everything else.
Adds Matthew Glotzbach, director of product management in Google's Enterprise unit: "If you're in meetings and you come back to your e-mail and you have five minutes between appointments and you have 50 e-mails, which five messages do you spend your time on in that window of time?"
"We see this as an ongoing evolution of the focus of Gmail, which has always been around addressing this problem of information overload," Glotzbach noted.
Despite the massive influx of 3D films, summer movie attendance has fallen to its lowest level since 1997.
On the other hand, however, 3D, IMAX and standard ticket price hikes have all led to record revenue for the studios and theater chains.
Tickets sold from May through Labor Day are expected to drop 2.6 percent to 552 million, almost as low as 1997's 540.3 million tickets sold.
"The movies just didn’t excite people the way they needed to," says Paul Dergarabedian, president of Hollywood.com Box-Office. "When you raise prices and perceive that quality goes down, you have a major problem."
Revenue will set a record at $4.35 billion, a 2.4 percent jump from last year. The average ticket price will increase 5.1 percent from $7.50 to $7.88, thanks mainly to 3D and IMAX showings which cost $3 more, on average.
The BBC launched the iPlayer to much fanfare in 2007, and the service has been largely successful on the PC, smartphones and even game consoles.
However, the iPlayer was only available in the UK. That may be changing soon, says BBC Director-General Mark Thompson.
Speaking during the Edinburgh International Television Festival, Thompson says an international rollout is planned within the year.
Different than the UK version, the international variant will be "a commercial venture," although it is unclear whether the service will cost money to the end-user or be supported by ads.
There is always the chance that the business model will be something we have not yet seen for a streaming video service.
US video rental giant Blockbuster just announced the Onkyo BD-SP808 Blu-ray player, set to ship to retailers in September, features a client for their online video service, Blockbuster On Demand.
Blockbuster On Demand is already supported on a handful of players from Phillips, Samsung & Toshiba, as well as a range of other devices including TiVo DVRs and the Archos 605 portable media player. There is also a client for Windows.
Unlike the Netflix Watch Instantly service, which offers unlimited viewing of mostly catalog titles and TV shows, Blockbuster On Demand rents and sells individual titles, including many new releases.
Blockbuster is favored with support from movie studios in the form of earlier access to new releases because this is sees as a tool to keep Netflix and Redbox from dominating the home video landscape. But Blockbuster's failure to compete with either company has led them to bankruptcy.
Blockbuster's plans for success in the on demand rental space may also be in trouble if rumors about Apple expanding their iTunes rental operation are true.
Apparently Facebook has hit the user limit and crashed. Or it might be some other issue but currently millions and millions of Farmville addicts are cursing as Facebook seems to be down in its entirety.
According to Downrightnow.com, Facebook has been offline for couple hours and the hundreds of millions of users around the world are missing their hourly dosage.
The downtime not only affects the site itself but a lot of its partners and sites that use Facebook to spread their word -- such as your beloved AfterDawn.com. There has been no confirmation from Facebook why the site is inaccessible but it definitely is no intended maintenance break. Hopefully, Facebook will be able to straighten out their problems soon.
According to sources speaking to CNET, Apple is prepared to double the length of time prospective buyers can listen to music tracks before buying, from 30 seconds to one minute.
CEO Steve Jobs will announce the change on Wednesday, during Apple's annual September media event.
Apple has not confirmed the report, declining to comment on "speculation."
A long time complaint about iTunes (and other music download sites) is the fact that 30 seconds is usually not enough time to see if a song is really for you.
Furthermore, the sources say Jobs will use much of the media event showing off how Apple is improving the iTunes music discovery experience.
Sony Ericsson launched the high end smartphone Xperia X10 earlier this year which disappointed would-be buyers when it came with the outdated Androidfirmware version 1.6.
In May, the company noted that it would possibly update the smartphone to Android 2.1 in the Q4, and today they have confirmed the update.
Posting via Twitter, SE UK has said it will begin rolling out the 2.1 update in September, earlier than expected.
Coming with 2.1 for the X10 are HD video recording, Wireless home connectivity via DLNA and improvements to signature applications Timescape and Mediascape to make them even smarter and richer.
The X10 has a 1GHz Snapdragon processor, and a 4-inch 854x480 touchscreen which until now, did not have official multi-touch support.
Intel has purchased part of the large wireless chip maker Infineon Technologies AG, buying the company behind the chips used in the Apple iPhone.
The company has fallen far behind in the growing smartphone processor market since their technology uses too much power, draining the phone battery too quickly.
With the acquisition today, for $1.4 billion in cash, Intel now has the wireless-chip division of the company, and an instant "in" to the market.
Intel purchased the mobile software company Wind River Systems last year for $885 million, and they have since been creating the mobile OS dubbed "Moblin," which will run on smartphones using Intel chips.
Additionally, the company recently paid $7.68 billion for the large security software firm McAfee, and the company plans to integrate security into its mobile chips.
LG has announced that it will showoff a 2.9mm 3D OLED TV at the IFA 2010 event starting on September 3rd, claiming it is the world's thinnest OLED to date.
Nintendo has announced that they are dropping the price of the DSi and DSiXL handhelds in September, likely as a way to slowly clear our inventory before the eventual launch of the 3DS.
Starting on September 12th, the DSi will drop to $149.99 and the large XL will drop to $169.99.
The 3DS will give gamers a chance to watch 3D movies and play 3D games without the need for any special glasses.
Nintendo released the DSi XL last year, introducing the handheld with 93 percent larger screens than the DSi allowing for easier playback of movies and easier Internet surfing.
In the U.S., a one month Gold card will jump from $7.99 to $9.99. A 3-month sub will jump from $19.99 to $24.99. Finally, a 12-month sub will jump from $49.99 to $59.99.
In the UK, a 1-month sub will move from 5 GPB to 6 GPB.
Canadian gamers will see their 1-month sub price increase from $8.99 CAD to $9.99 CAD.
Additionally, in Mexico the 12-month sub will increase to 599 pesos from 499.
As a way to give back to loyal XBL fans before the price hike, Microsoft has dropped the price of the 12-month subscription in the U.S. to $39.99 until November 1st.
AMD, the world's second largest CPU maker and the world's largest seller of discrete graphics chips has said today it is killing off the ATI brand name, four years after the company purchased ATI Technologies.
The logo for ATI, which has been around since the 1980s, will be removed from all future GPUs, leaving just the Radeon name.
Sources that have seen the new logo say it will appeal to gamers and general consumers.
Removing ATI branding should help AMD to unify its wide brand of products, thus making itself more relevant in the eyes of consumers.
On the downside, the ATI logo is very recognizable to end-consumers that have installed graphics cards over the last decades. Despite that, one source says: "When I saw the new Radeon logo, I shortly forgot that ATI was not next to it. It looks rather compelling."
Surprising no one, Microsoft has filed an appeal of their loss in the i4i patent case. They were found to be infringing a patent on formatting documents using a separate XML file with markup instructions.
They use this technology in Word's DOCx file format.
In papers filed late last week, Microsoft lawyers claim lower courts are using an incorrect standard for the proof of prior art required to invalidate i4i's patent on a 'Method and system for manipulating the architecture and the content of a document separately from each other.'
Microsoft claims that because patent examiners failed to properly research prior art (existing use of the technology), it shouldn't be considered valid without 'clear and convincing' evidence to the contrary. Instead, they say, the lower standard, 'preponderance of the evidence,' is appropriate.
This is key to the company's defense, they say, because the proof of prior art, in the form of source code written by an i4i developer prior to joining the company, has been destroyed. In fact it was written for a program called S4, which the i4i developer worked on for his previous employer.
This makes it nearly impossible for Microsoft to come up with evidence which would meet a 'clear and convincing evidence' standard, which is similar to 'beyond a reasonable doubt,' used for criminal cases. 'Preponderance of the evidence,' on the other hand, would only require Microsoft to prove that the older product probably (more than 50% likely) invalidates the patent.
The FTC has dropped their investigation into whether LimeWire put user's identities at risk of theft saying that the latest versions of the software have much-improved safeguards.
In a letter, the FTC said research "showed consumers continue to inadvertently share sensitive documents via peer-to-peer software like LimeWire," and that it is necessary for distributors of the software to "act more responsibly and provide safeguards against inadvertent sharing."
Despite LimeWire drastically improving its service, the FTC says the company still needs to improve the client for less tech savvy consumers.
But it said LimeWire still has to improve its service further for less savvy consumers.
"We remain concerned, however, about consumers who are still using insecure legacy versions and are therefore subject to a risk of inadvertent sharing of sensitive, personal information," write the FCC. "We expect LimeWire to continue to advise consumers to upgrade legacy versions of its software because of the potential safety benefits of doing so."
BGR has posted leaked photos of Verizon's upcoming flagship Android device, the HTC Scorpion which is expected to hit the carrier within 6 months.
The Scorpion looks similar to the EVO 4G but with an aluminum trim similar to the Nexus One.
HTC'S Scorpion has a 4.3-inch screen, a front-facing camera and an 8MP standard camera with dual LED flashes. The device also has a kickstand.
The device will launch with Android 2.2 and will run the HTC Sense UI.
Finally, BGR speculates that the impressive device will use a dual-core 1.5GHz Snapdragon processor that does not ship until next month, the first smartphone to do so.
Warner and Disney have sued the advertising company Triton Media alleging that the company provided advertising consulting and referrals to nine "one-stop-shop" piracy sites.
The studios say Triton, of Scottsdale, Arizona, committed contributory infringement due to their assistance in the advertising.
Studios identified by the lawsuit are: www.free-tv-video-online.info, supernovatube.com, donogo.com, watch-movies.net, watch-movies-online.tv, watch-movies-links.net, havenvideo.com and piratecity.org.
Each of the sites offers access to unauthorized movies, games music and software.
The suit alleges that Triton enables the web sites to operate and has working knowledge that they are participating in illegal activities.
Disney and Warner are seeking an injunction that would ban Triton from working with similar sites, as well as monetary damages.
Fortune has reported today that Apple iPad orders are finally shipping within 24 hours, the first time the tablet has shipped within a day since its launch in April.
It took 170 days for supply to catch up to demand on the popular tablet.
Apple has been struggling to get production moving since the iPad sold out during launch weekend.
The iPad 3G launch was pushed back a few weeks and the international rollout of the tablet was pushed back a full month.
Orders from Apple.com, at their worst, had shipping delays of 15 business days. By May, that number had dropped to 7-10 and by July it had hit 3 days.
Google has acquired the Web start-up Angstro this week while also moving co-founder Rohit Khare to the Google team.
The search giant has been in an acquisition frenzy over the past few months, purchasing a plethora of sites and services that will help their upcoming assault on the social networking world and its champion Facebook.
Khare is a respected Internet researcher and entrepreneur.
Earlier in the summer, Google purchased the social gaming siteSlide, while recruiting its founder Max Levchin to become a VP of engineering for social media efforts. Levchin was the co-founder of PayPal.
Google has also invested $150 million in social gaming market leader Zynga.
The social networking service, dubbed "Google Me" internally is still in "stealth mode" and Google will not publicly discuss it.
Google versus Facebook has become a hot-topic in the tech world, with many believing Facebook will soon start its own advertising network to rival Google's AdSense, while Google prepares its full assault on the social networking world.
Google has said this weekend that the Department of Justice (DOJ) has filed a second request for information in regards to the search giant's bid to purchase ITA Software for $700 million.
ITA software is the company behind flight information software used by Bing, Kayak and Orbitz among others.
The software helps users search for flights, compare flight options and prices, and ultimately purchase tickets.
Google has no such software built-in to its search engine, and in that respect, Microsoft's Bing has the advantage.
Kayak and Orbitz voiced concerns that after the purchase, Google could shut off ITA information to them. Google has said it will not do anything of the sort.
Google responded to the second request: "While we think this acquisition will benefit travelers as well as those seeking their business, we know that closer scrutiny has been one consequence of Google's success, and we said that we wouldn’t be surprised if there were a regulatory review before the deal closes. This week we received what's called a "second request," which means that the U.S. Department of Justice is asking for more information so that they can continue to review the deal."
Verizon Wireless has started rolling outAndroid 2.2 Froyo to HTC Incredible owners this weekend.
Froyo brings a 450 percent performance boost over 2.1, native support for Flash 10.1, USB and Wi-Fi tethering, Apps2SD and cloud sync.
Since the start of August, the Nexus One, the HTC EVO 4G and the original Motorola Droid have updated to 2.2. Additionally, the Droid 2 has launched with the updated software already installed.
A few other phones, such as the Dell Streak, Motorola Droid X, HTC MyTouch 3G Slide and Samsung Captivate have all had 2.2 promised but with no set timetable.
NotebookItalia has leaked the specs for the upcoming Toshiba Folio 100, which many had been calling the "SmartPad."
The tablet should be the first true competitor to the Apple iPad as it packs some powerful features.
Toshiba's Folio 100 will have a 10.1-inch widescreen WSVGA display, run Android 2.2 Froyo, work on a Nvidia Tegra 2 processor and include 16GB of internal memory.
Additionally, the tablet will have 802.11b/g/n WiFi, Bluetooth, 3G, GPS, a 1.3MP webcam and an SD card reader with support up to 32GB.
As for ports, the Folio 100 has a USB 2.0 port, and HDMI port and a USB 2.0 mini audio jack.
Separating it even further from the iPad is the fact that the tablet supports the Opera Mobile Browser with Flash 1.10.
Paul Allen, co-founder of Microsoft, has begun a campaign of patent infringement lawsuits against companies ranging from YouTube and Facebook to eBay and Office Depot.
Allen's patents were originally granted to his company, Interval Media, which shut down in 2006. The company w
"We recognize that innovation has a value, and patents are the way to protect that,"said a spokesman for Allen. When asked about the notable absence of Microsoft and Amazon from the suit,
Last week, Toshiba announced they are currently developing 3D HDTVs that do not require any special glasses.
Sony has made a similar announcement today, working on 3DTVs it hopes can be released by early 2011
"Seeing 3-D without glasses is more convenient,"says Yoshihisa Ishida, Sony SVP. "We must take account of pricing before we can think about when to start offering them."
Panasonic and Sony have already released 3D HDTVs, both the displays require special (and usually expensive) glasses.
Sony says it will take the top spot in 3D TVs and Blu-ray player market share in Japan, thanks to its movie studio.
According to sources close to the matter, Blockbuster is preparing to file for bankruptcy in the next month.
Senior debt holders, company execs and the six major movie studios have all discussed Blockbuster's intentions to prepare a "pre-planned" bankruptcy in September.
The company will use Chapter 11 to restructure $990 million in debt and break leases on over 500 stores. The company has lost over $1 billion since 2008.
If the six studios decide to drop support for Blockbuster, the company will never emerge from bankruptcy, as it will lose its constant stream of DVDs and Blu-rays.
Blockbuster currently has 3425 brick-and-mortar stores in the U.S., and that is after they closed almost 1000 in the last year, alone. CEO Jim Keyes, say the sources via the LATimes, wants to use the bankruptcy to close up to 800 of the worst performing stores around the nation.
The company has fallen a long way from the top, with its current market value placed at around $15.31 million. Blockbuster was purchased in 1994 by Viacom for $8.4 billion.
The WSJ is reporting this weekend that Chinese electronics giant Lenovo is creating a video game console, dubbed the eBox.
Lenovo has created a new subsidiary, the Beijing eedoo Technology company to build the console.
The eBox will have controller-free gaming, which will likely be similar to Microsoft's upcoming Kinect motion control system.
Adds Jack Luo, president of eedoo: "We are the world's second company to produce a controller-free game console, behind only Microsoft. We saw game consoles as an area with growth potential."
Luo then made some comments on the market the eBox will be aimed at: "Our product is designed for family entertainment. Ebox may not have exquisite game graphics, or extensive violence, but it can inspire family members to get off the couch and get some exercise."
There is certainly a large family market in China, which has also banned the import of game consoles.
According to the site 148Apps.biz, Apple has hit 250,000 apps available in the App Store, hitting the milestone in just over 2 years.
Almost 51,000 publishers have released 252,000 apps for the iPhone, iPod Touch or iPad, although only a tenth of those apps were made for the popular tablet.
Books accounted for the most amount of apps, at 17 percent, followed closely by games at 14 percent.
Entertainment was the third most popular category, at 11 percent, with education, lifestyle and travel all following at 6 percent, each.
Royal Pingdom posted that 70 percent of App Store apps are paid, whereas in the Android Market only 36 percent are paid.
The Android Market is on the verge of hitting 100,000 apps.
The popular online and physical movie renting service Lovefilm has signed a UK distribution deal with MGM this week, making the studio's films available online and through Internet-enabled devices with the Lovefilm Player app.
Financials were not disclosed, but the deal will give Lovefilm subscribers access to 4100 MGM titles.
LoveFilm has 1.4 million European subscribers.
CEO Simon Calver says: "With the digital revolution underway, our opportunity for growth is huge and the addition of MGM titles is a substantial development in enhancing our digital catalog."
All MGM Classics are available now, and new releases will be available "on a transactional basis."
The online Australian retailers Quantronics and Ozmodchipshave been ordered by a Federal Court in Australia to halt all sales, imports and distribution of the PSJailbreak USB dongles.
PSJailBreak will allow owners of any version of PS3 to run backups of PS3 games as well as homebrew applications. The $170 mod is a piece of software stored in a USB drive. By inserting the thumb drive into your PS3 you'll be able to install and run the launcher application in seconds without permanently modifying the console or its software.
The PSJailBreak application also included a backup tool which allows users to backup their game discs to the PS3 hard drive. Movies whether DVD or Blu-ray, or previous generation PlayStation games aren't supported by the tool. The backup manager can also be downloaded for free.
So far, the companies have switched the status of the item to "no stock," not yet completely removing the listings.
Microsoft has said this week that the upcoming Xbox 360 software refresh will "significantly" improve the sound quality of the headsets.
The update is expected this fall, alongside the launch of the Kinect motion control system.
With the software update, Microsoft will "upgrade the codec and audio infrastructure that underpins the quality of voice communication from Xbox 360 to Xbox 360, and should make for clear chat between gamers when they play online," says Xbox Live Studios boss Jerry Johnson, via Eurogamer.
Explaining further, Johnson says: "The codec we used when we first launched was a low bit rate codec and we stuck with that."
Concluding: "We launched and we said we required broadband. We required a 64k connection, which not many people think of as broadband any longer. But that was the minimum requirement to run the service at the time.
Joel Tenenbaum, the graduate student who was convicted of illegally sharing 30 tracks via P2P will appeal his already reduced fine, says his lawyer.
Tenenbaum was originally fined $675,000, but the fine was reduced to $67,500 during the summer, after a judge deemed the original penalty unconstitutional and "excessive."
The student says he still cannot pay the reduced fine, and is seeking a further reduction.
If Tenenbaum gets his way, the RIAA says they will appeal any reduction.
"Sixty-seven-and-half thousand dollars only sounds reasonable because it was so much before,"said the student.
Justin Rattner, Intel's Chief Technology Officer has said this week that power usage in the company's next-generation wireless chip will equal processors created by rival ARM Holdings, with Intel pulling away with the generation after that.
Says Rattner (via Reuters): "With (our) Moorestown processor we equal them on standby power, in the next generation Medfield we will equal them on active power."
"I expect us to just pull away after that because we have a fundamental technology advantage, which they don't have."
Current Intel chips have been deemed "too power-hungry" for media devices and smartphones, especially when compared to ARM chips.
Battery life is a make-or-break metric, especially in media players and smartphones.
The MPEG-LA video standards group has revealed their overhauled AVC License this week, and in a somewhat surprising move, the group has made H.264 and AVC video use on the Internet permanently royalty-free.
MPEG-LA had planned to begin charging companies to use streaming H.264 in 2016 but now it will be free indefinitely as long as the viewers aren't being charged.
Pay-for video, and corporate use, will require a license, which costs money.
Showing it off at the Hot Chips conference this week, IBM has set the record for CPU with highest clock-speed, running the quad-core z196 at 5.2GHz.
IBM took the crown from itself, besting the 4.7GHz hit by their Power6 CPU.
The latest chip has 1.4 billion transistors on a 512mm2 board made with a 45nm manufacturing-process. The Power6 CPUs had 1.1 billion transistors.
Hexus says "each core has been given 1.5MB private L2 cache as well as access to 24MB shared L3 eDRAM cache. Somewhat uniquely, the z196 also has access to a fourth layer of cache off-chip. Six of these CPUs can be installed into a multi-chip module (MCM) and will connect to each other through two controllers with a total of 192MB shared L4 cache via a 40GB per second link."
Because the processors are so fast, the added level of memory is a necessity, just to make sure data runs smoothly.
The chips also feature a CISC-based z/Architecture, moving away from the more common RISC ISA.
IBM says the z196 will be built into the company's Z-series mainframes, and should begin shipping next month.
Panasonic Japan has shown off six new Blu-ray DVRs this week, each with BDXL-support, meaning they can playback and record to the new three-layer, 100GB discs introduced in July.
Each of the models come with HDDs and Blu-ray recorders, and will support the larger disc capacities.
Three of the new players even include 3D-support, the latest trend in the industry.
The DMR-BW series does not have 3D support, and the most expensive model has 1TB of HDD space on-board and comes with two digital TV tuners. That model retails for $1780.
Adding 3D support and another TB of HDD space, the DMR-BWT series' most expensive model will retail for $3300.
Although there are no plans for an EU or NA launch, Panasonic will begin selling all 6 models in Japan on September 15th.
During an interview with MCV, Sony CEO Kaz Hirai ruled out an all-digital future, at least for the PlayStation 4, saying the console will still use optical media.
Sony was generally criticized for launching the PSPGo handheld, which removed the company's proprietary UMD drives, and turned everything digital, forcing gamers to purchase and download their games through the PlayStation Store.
When asked if the PS4 would use a similar strategy, Hirai responded: "We do business in parts of the world where network infrastructure isn’t as robust as one would hope. There’s always going to be requirement for a business of our size and scope to have a physical medium."
"To think everything will be downloaded in two years, three years or even ten years from now is taking it a little bit to the extreme."
Earlier in the month, it was revealed that Sony is already preparing games for the upcoming PlayStation 4, the console which has not even been announced yet.
After the device is rooted, users can then install custom ROMs, as well as have access to Superuser controls.
For now, there are not custom recovery images for the Droid 2, so installing a custom ROM is impossible.
Says a XDA Dev member: "This is needed to install custom ROMs, which as of now, there are none. That means you won't be able to install any third-party Android ROMs on your rooted Droid 2. [Yes], they will be on their way at some point, but right now, the main appeal to rooting the Droid 2 right now is to use root-only applications, and remove the bloatware that Verizon has thrown on the device."
Social networking juggernaut Facebook is suing a new website called Teachbook, which is designed to help teachers, administrators & parents share classroom resources with each other.
The suit alleges, "Misappropriating the distinctive BOOK portion of Facebook's trademark, Defendant has created its own competing online networking community in a blatant attempt to become Facebook "for Teachers.""
Facebook's lawyers are claiming that using the name Teachbook is intended to (and would) confuse people into believing the site is associated with Facebook.
While there's certainly truth to the claim that the use of "book" in Teachbook's name is intended to let people know it's a social networking site, it doesn't automatically follow that people will assume an affilliation with Facebook.
In fact it seems like an equally valid argument that the average person would assume the name implies Teachbook is an alternative to Facebook, and therefore not affiliated.
There certainly don't seem to be any similarities between the logos or actual websites.
Gmail users in the US can now use the Voice & Video Chat service to make phone calls. The new service is accessed directly through Gmail's Chat interface.
If you have a Google Voice account, the associated phone number will be used for outbound calls. You can also forward calls from Google Voice to Google Voice & Video Chat.
The included call screening feature even allows Google Voice users to listen to callers as they leave messages.
Currently calls to US numbers are free, while there is a charge for calling internationally which varies depending on the country.
The long awaited Netflix Watch Instantly client for the iPhone and iPod Touch has finally arrived.
Netflix announced the availability of their free iPhone app in the iTunes App Store today. It requires iOS 3.13 or later.
The Watch Instantly service already allowed Netflix subscribers to stream video directly to devices including computers, Blu-ray players, HDTVs & game consoles. An iPad app has also been available since April of this year when the device launched.
"We're excited that our members can now carry Netflix around in their pockets and instantly watch movies and TV shows streamed from Netflix right to their iPhone or iPod touch" said Netflix founder and CEO Reed Hastings.
Following the industry's recent push into 3D, Roxio's latest Creator software bundle gives users the chance to convert their 2D photos and videos into 3D, as well as manage and edit 3D content.
Consumers can import files from 3D cameras and camcorders, edit the video, save it to a number of popular formats and finally burn it to DVD, or Blu-ray if you have the proper hardware.
If you have a large collection of 2D video and photos (like everyone does), you can convert it over to 3D using a few clicks.
Gizmodo reviewed that section of the software and had this to say: "The standard amateur 3D rules apply—things work best when you leave a good distance between you and your subject; when there's a well-defined foreground, midground, and background, etc.—but on some of the examples I saw, there was a decent 3D effect (on others it was less successful, but as always, practice makes perfect)."
Outside of the new 3D upgrades, Creator still allows for management, editing and sharing of a variety of file formats.
Apple has sent out invites for a music-themed event on September 1st, leading many to speculate that the company will finally announce an updated iPod Touch, likely one with a camera.
Historically, Apple has announced updates for their iPod lineup and for the iTunes media store in September.
Furthermore, many believe Apple will announce a new generation Apple TV, one that uses flash memory instead of a HDD, an ARM processor, and relies more on the "cloud."
Apple is currently negotiating deals with CBS, Fox and Disney that would allow iTunes users to rent TV shows for 99 cents an episode. All appear close to signing off, at least for some of their programming.
While still speculation, it is believed Apple will add at least one camera to the updated iPod Touch, while updating the display to a higher resolution.
Garmin has announced they are recalling 1.25 million GPS devices due to potential fire hazards from overheating batteries.
The navigation company was quick to tell investors that the recall would not hurt quarterly results.
Garmin had narrowed down the affected units to its Nuvi range, using third-party supplied batteries within a specified date code range. Each uses the same specific printed circuit board design.
The unnamed battery supplier agreed to split the costs of replacing the batteries.
Says one analyst: "I don't think it means much. Product recalls in the consumer electronic space are not unusual and recalls involving battery issues are fairly common."
Almost 800,000 of the recalled units were sold in the U.S., and Garmin says the battery has overheated in only 10 cases, with none causing injury.
According to RIAA President Cary Sherman, the DMCA doesn't work for the content industry because it doesn't make service providers responsible for policing copyright infringement.
In statements made as part of a panel discussion at an event hosted by the Technology Policy Institute, Sherman said, "the DMCA isn't working for content people at all."
He went on to explain, "You basically cannot monitor all the infringements on the internet," later adding, "everybody has to do something about piracy."
This line of reasoning is nothing new for the RIAA, but it remains as flawed as ever. It requires that you accept a number of assumptions which simply don't hold up to any real scrutiny.
The most obvious is that there's any way to stop piracy. It's easy to say somebody has to do it, but there's no evidence anyone actually can.
According to the Sherman the solution is for everyone from ISPs on up to do get involved. But this creates some significant legal problems.
How does an ISP monitor the content of on their network without violating federal wiretapping law?
And that's without considering that figuring out whether fair use is involved requires human intervention, which would automatically disqualify the provider from DMCA safe harbor protection.
Intel has announced today that a dozen new netbooks will be released this week using the company's new dual-core Atom processors, the fastest CPUs available for netbooks.
"Acer strives to continually improve on our customers' total mobile experience, whether it is increased responsiveness or extended Internet interactivity through longer battery life," added David Lee, associate vice president of Acer's Mobile Computing Business Unit. "We are pleased to select dual-core Intel Atom processors for Acer netbooks, helping to empower netbook users achieve even more – both at work and at leisure."
Earlier in the month, former Apple employee Paul Devine was arrested and charged with selling secrets to Asian suppliers in exchange for over $2 million in kickbacks.
Devine, one of Apple's global supply managers, was charged "with offenses that include wire fraud, money laundering and unlawful monetary transactions," which began in 2006.
Today, federal prosecutors have alleged that Devine stashed over $150,000 in cash in shoe boxes in his home, which were then discovered by federal agents during a raid.
Devine is also said to have been hiding $20,000 in different foreign currencies.
To be released from prison on bail, Judge Howard Lloyd says Devine must transfer all cash he has in foreign bank accounts and post that along with $600,000.
It is unclear how much money will be transferred over, but prosecutors say it is "very significant."
According to multiple reports, Indian citizen Gopal Gujjar was killed last week when his Nokia mobile phone exploded while he was making a call.
Gujjar died of injuries to his right ear, neck and shoulders.
The body was found with blasted remains of the phone near Gujjar's farm in Banda village, Kota.
Police say the phone was a basic level Nokia 1209, which was released in the nation in 2008.
Reports claim the incident is the first time in Indian history that a mobile phone has exploded while not being charged.
Earlier in the year, a 27-year old Indian woman was killed when her phone exploded during a call. In her case, however, the phone was charging while she made the call.
Apple has said today that iTunes U downloads have reached 300 million, three years after the store launched.
The service offers 350,000 files, and over 800 universities have active iTunes U sites.
Apple says a few of the most respected institutions, including Harvard, MIT, Cambridge, Oxford, University of Melbourne and Université de Montréal all "distribute their content publicly on the iTunes Store."
iTunes U content is usually free, but can be restricted to each university's student body. The content includes audio, video, PDFs, podcasts and slideshows.
"iTunes U makes it easy for people to discover and learn with content from many of the world's top institutions,"added Eddy Cue, Apple's vice president of Internet Services. "With such a wide selection of educational material, we're providing iTunes users with an incredible way to learn on their computer, iPhone, iPod or iPad."
Apple's service can be accessed from your PC or Mac, but only from an iPad, iPod touch, or iPhone if you need to use a mobile device.
ColombiaReports, an English-language news site in the South American nation has posted today that three Colombian teens have been murdered after a death threat against them and other teens was posted on social networking giant Facebook.
The three victims, aged 15,16 and 17, were killed just outside of Puerto Asis, in southern Colombia.
In total, 69 teens were named in the death threat, which "kindly" asked all to leave Puerto Asis within 72 hours or get killed.
Volmar Perez, Colombia's ombudsman, said that the murders "coincide with ... the publication of a (Facebook) list with the names and aliases of 69 teenagers where (it) is said that they have three days to leave Puerto Asis and if not, be killed."
Perez condemned the threats and the violent deaths.
Added the news report: "It is unclear whether the murders are carried out by leftist guerrilla group FARC or drug cartel 'Los Rastrojos,' both highly active in the southern department."
According to Bloomberg, Apple is currently deep into negotiations with News Corp., CBS and Disney trying to allow iTunes users to rent TV shows for 99 cents.
Says one analyst: "This is a smart move by everyone. Something like this a la carte rental service is an incremental opportunity and it doesn’t upset the existing ecosystem."
The move would also help Apple take back some share from Netflix and Amazon, which offer streaming or on-demand video services.
Bloomberg cited sources close to negotiations who also said Apple is set to introduce an updated iTouch with a higher-resolution screen, and an updated, cheaper Apple TVset-top box.
Huge electronics maker Toshiba has said today that is currently developing 3D HDTVs that do not require any special glasses.
The Yomiuri newspaper said that Toshiba plans to release the TVs by the end of the year, but spokesperson Yuko Sugahara declined to comment on the timetable.
Panasonic and Sony have already released 3D HDTVs, both the displays require special (and usually expensive) glasses.
The new TVs would use technology that "involves transmitting different images at various angles to create an illusion of dimension and depth, a principle used by current glasses-free monitors," says Sugahara, via Yahoo.
Nintendo announced earlier this year that its upcoming handheld, the 3DS, would use similar technology, allowing for 3D gaming without glasses.
Dell has launched their first smartphone in the United States since 2007, following up on their Axim line with the release of the Aero Android device.
The smartphone will sell via AT&T for $100 with contract, making it cheaper than the carrier's current Android offerings.
Dell is also selling the device for $300 without contract.
The device weighs just 3.67 ounces, making it one of the lightest Android devices ever created.
Dell's low-end device runs a customized Android 1.5, has a 624-MHz processor, a 5MP camera with 8x zoom and 2GB of internal memory with an expandable MicroSD slot.
Despite not running Android 2.2 Froyo, owners will be able to playback Adobe Flash videos, thanks to built-in Flash Lite, giving it an immediate advantage over the Apple iPhone.
Amazon's highly anticipated third-generation Kindle e-readers will begin shipping on Friday, but the e-tailer says that any orders placed this week will not ship until at least September 17th.
The e-tailer is selling their new Kindle Wi-Fi for $139, the cheapest model yet. A third-gen Wi-Fi/3G version will sell for $189.
Each new model is slimmer and include higher contrast screens and "crisper text." Both have six-inch screens, but weigh 15 percent less and are 21 percent slimmer. Each also has twice the storage of the original Kindles, allowing for up to 3500 books to be stored.
Due to strong demand for the products, both are temporarily sold out.
Says the site: "Due to strong customer demand, Kindle is temporarily sold out. Order now to reserve your place in line. Orders are prioritized on a first come, first served basis. Orders placed today are expected to ship on or before September 17th."
TNW has put out an interesting article today on Kindle e-book sales compared to iBook sales, going as far as to say that the Kindle still outsells Apple's equivalent by 60-to-1.
In June, Apple CEO Steve Jobs said iBooks had already captured 22 percent of the e-book market, a gigantic number given that the store had just launched. Many were skeptical of Job's number, however.
TNW spoke with J.A. Konrath, a popular author who is a huge fan of the future of e-books, about how well sales are going for him, on both platforms.
Konrath publishes his books on Kindle himself, cutting out publishers that used to take most of his profits. By doing so, and selling his e-books at a very reasonable $3 a piece, Konrath is making over $2 per book sold. When his books were in paperback, he was lucky to make $0.80 for every $10 book sold.
The author compared sales from iBooks, the Kindle, and from paperback: "Publishers might be looking at enriched or enhanced ebooks as their new big-ticket items to replace hardcovers. But the major ebook retailer, Amazon, isn’t set up for video. Kindle isn’t even able to do color yet. That leaves Apple, and according to my numbers Apple is a very small part of the ebook market. I sell 200 ebooks a day on Kindle. On iPad, I sell 100 a month."
Samsung has announced today that Melissa Thompson of Greater Manchester has broken the record for fastest text message, shattering the old record by almost 10 seconds.
Thompson was using a Galaxy S with Swype and texted the phrase: "The razor-toothed piranhas of the genera Serrasalmus and Pygocentrus are the most ferocious freshwater fish in the world. In reality they seldom attack a human."
The former Guinness World Record was 35.54 seconds for the phrase, which was shattered when Thompson did it in 25.94 seconds.
Thompson was shopping with her boyfriend when Samsung asked her to take a shot at the record.
Says the texting champ: "I used to send a lot of text messages - 40 or 50-a-day to Chris alone so we both knew I could type fast. But since we moved in together and I started my job I haven't been texting as much and, you could say, my fingers were out of shape. It's a real shock to find out that I'm the fastest texter in the world."
Motorola has released their official Android upgrade schedule, giving some long-time owners a set timetable for updates to their smartphone operating system.
A few of the devices are still running Android 1.6, or even 1.5, and are in desperate need of an update.
Unfortunately, most of the devices listed will not be getting an upgrade to 2.2 Froyo.
North America Droid X by Motorola (USA): Upgrade to Android 2.2 planned for late summer
Devour (USA): Will not have a software upgrade to Android 2.1
Backflip, Cliq and Cliq XT (USA): Upgrade to Android 2.1 (testing in process) planned for late Q3/early Q4
All Android 2.1 and 2.2 upgrades for Canada are under evaluation only. This includes the Backflip, Dext, Milestone, Quench
Europe Milestone: Initial rollout of upgrade to Android 2.2 planned for Q4
Backflip and Dext: Will not have software upgrades to Android 2.1
Asia-Pacific Milestone, Motoroi and Titanium (all Korea): Initial rollout of upgrades to Android 2.2 planned for Q4
Milestone (Asia-Pacific): Upgrade to Android 2.2 under evaluation
Backflip, Dext and Quench (all Asia-Pacific): Upgrades to Android 2.1 under evaluation
Facebook recently posted to their blog that they now have 150 million people actively using the social network from their mobile devices, including smartphones, MP3 players and tablets.
The Facebook for iPhone app is also now showing as having 103 million active monthly users, which amounts to almost every "i" device ever sold.
In June, Apple said they had sold about 110 million iPhones, iPads and iPod Touches.
Says David Kirkpatrick, of The Facebook Effect: "The Facebook application is by far the most important application on both the iPhone and the iPad. Without the Facebook application, my own opinion is the iPhone would never have become as important as it is. It’s the single most widely used application. It’s so heavily used compared to other apps that I have been told by someone who thought he knew the data — this is highly secret data and I don’t know the actual numbers — that more than half of all usage of the iPhone of apps, other than those provided by the phone itself like telephony and email, is coming from Facebook. And on the iPad, too, it’s just a huge, huge part of usage. So in a way, Apple and Facebook are joined at the hip, and I think that’s one reason why Zuckerberg and Jobs have been spending time together."
EMI Music has just purchased Digital Stores Limited, a company which provides online stores for artists including The Beatles, Queen & Oasis.
The acquisition is a logical one for EMI, which is in need of revenue streams outside of physical and online music sales. Although the business has been improving since the 2007 purchase by private equity firm Terra Firma, they still lost more than 600 million euros last year.
It also dovetails nicely with the recent trend of labels signing artists to 360 deals. These deals give the label a cut of everything from merchandise to tour revenue, and are becoming an increasingly important part of the modern music business.
Owning a company like Digital Stores also has a lot of potential for selling services to artists not otherwise affilliated with EMI. Both artists on other major labels and those who wouldn't be signing with any major become potential revenue sources.
If they manage it well, this could be a key part of EMI's transformation from a traditional label to an all around music marketing and artist services company. Of course any of the major labels could have done that already.
Popular singer Lady Gaga has overtaken Britney Spears as the "queen" of Twitter, becoming the most followed person on the micro-blogging site.
Gaga passed Britney and now has 5.74 million followers.
The eclectic artist just became the first person to have 10 million fans on Facebook, the social networking giant.
Lady Gaga moved to the title after adding 700,000 new followers in the last month alone.
Spears surpassed Ashton Kutcher in May, lasting just three months at the top.
Famecount, a social media-tracking site, says Lady Gaga may not stay at the top for long, as teen sensation Justin Bieber is adding 800,000 new followers every month.
According to security company McAfee, actress Cameron Diaz is used most often as malware bait, with search strings using her name having a ten percent chance of coming up with an infected site.
Dave Marcus, McAfee's director of security research and communication says searching for "Cameron Diaz and screensavers" increases that rate to 20 percent.
McAfee, as it has done since 2007, compiled the search phrases containing names of celebrities, athletes and politicians trying to calculate the percentage of sites that are tagged as dangerous.
Diaz surpassed Jessica Biel, last year's "champion," who fell to third place. Julia Roberts took second, while Gisele Buendchen and Brad Pitt rounding out the list.
"It's a simple fact. The bad guys read the same news as the good guys," said Marcus.
Marcus also explained why Diaz jumped so high, as the McAfee list was composed during the month where two of her films were in theaters, "Knight and Day" and "Shrek Forever After."
Phishers and attackers use the names to trick unsuspecting users into visiting malicious sites, which then installs malware on their computers.
Although it was recently judged to be a legal process, Apple still doesn't want anyone to jailbreak their "i" devices, and has applied for a patent that would give them the right to "kill" jailbroken devices, as well as "kill" stolen iPods and phones.
The patent is titled "Systems and Methods for Identifying Unauthorized Users of an Electronic Device," and it covers a number of security measures to "protect" devices from "unauthorized users."
Those unauthorized users are jailbreakers and those that have stolen devices from other legit owners.
The patent was filed in February 2009, and was just published this week. The application will help Apple identify "particular activities that may indicate suspicious behavior," so that Apple can restrict those devices. Suspicious activities include "hacking, jailbreaking, unlocking, or removal of a SIM card."
In some embodiments, an unauthorized user can be detected by comparing the identity of the current user to the identities of authorized users of the electronic device. For example, a photograph of the current user can be taken, a recording of the current user's voice can be recorded, the heartbeat of the current user can be recorded, or any combination of the above. The photograph, recording, or heartbeat can be compared, respectively, to a photograph, recording, or heartbeat of authorized users of the electronic device to determine whether they match. If they do not match, the current user can be detected as an unauthorized user.
When unauthorized use has been detected, "access to particular applications can be restricted, access to sensitive information can be restricted, sensitive information can be erased from the electronic device...," the application states, effectively wiping and bricking the device.
According to a large number of upset users, Samsung's latest firmware for their 2009 BD-Px600 players is causing playback issues, forcing owners to rollback the firmware for the time being.
Posters to the CNET and AVSForums say the update to v2.09 has caused all Universal and Warner Blu-rays to lock up at the main menu, not allowing for any playback.
Samsung has told everyone to rollback to version 2.07, and that should be a temporary fix.
There are still some users who are having trouble rolling back, and Samsung says they will have to wait until a fixed 2.09 (likely 2.1) is released "in a couple of weeks."
That should be good news, except to people who actually want to play their Blu-rays.
You can check one of the support forums here: AVSForums
Just like its predecessors Halo 2 and Halo 3, Halo: Reach has been leaked this weekend, with modders at Game-Tut finding a way to download the game from Microsoft's own servers.
Only a few people were allowed to download the game, and each needed a special code.
Game-Tut cracked the security, and has made the files available via P2P, torrents and warez for the public as [JTAG] Halo Reach RF ISORip XBOX360-XB3.
Gamers have already uploaded videos showing off battles in the game's Firefight mode.
Microsoft's response (via Joystiq): "We are aware of claims being made regarding a security exploit related to Halo: Reach and are aggressively investigating the matter. We have no further details to share at this time."
Motorola is reportedly sending out cease-and-desist letters to sites that are hosting Droid X Android 2.2 Froyo custom ROMs, forcing them to remove the ROMs from their sites or face legal ramifications.
Pursuant to 17 USC 512(c)(3)(A), this communication serves as a statement that:
(1). I the duly authorized representative of the exclusive rights holder Motorola for Droid X Keyboard Software, know as “repackaged-signed.apk”
The follow URL contains the software which we have confirmed as Motorola Copyrighted Software
http://www.xxxxxxxxx.com/downloads/update.zip
(2). These exclusive rights are being violated by material available upon your site at the following URL(s):
http://www.xxxxxxxx.com/downloads/update.zip
(3) I have a good faith belief that the use of this material in such a fashion is not authorized by the copyright holder, the copyright holder’s agent, or the law;
Global Gaming Factory (GGF) made headlines last year when it announced plans to purchase the infamous torrenttrackerThe Pirate Bay for $7.8 million.
The acquisition failed when CEO Hans Pandeya could not come up with the money by a certain deadline.
Pandeya wanted to turn Pirate Bay into a legal media store, using the site's popularity and traffic to its advantage.
TF posted today that Pandeya had moved on to another popular tracker, wanting to purchase the huge semi-private Demonoid tracker.
"I have finally managed to get some funds in place and want to acquire Demonoid and some other sites to execute my plans. I lost a year and a fortune due to Aktietorget’s [the equity marketplace] acrobatics during my attempt to acquire The Pirate Bay in 2009 but I think it is still not too late to acquire and convert torrent sites," said Pandeya.
Motherboard industry sources say the price drops are due to AMD trying to defend against increased competition from Intel, which owns 80 percent of the market.
Samsung has introduced its first portable Blu-ray 3D player this week, alongside 3D HDTVs in an effort to make 3D products more accessible to consumers.
The portable BD-C8000 has a 10.3-inch screen, built-in Wi-Fi, an HDMI 1.4a port and runs on batteries.
Buyers can watch their 3D movies on the go, or connect it to a 3D HDTV via the HDMI output.
John Revie, Samsung senior vice president of home entertainment says the player is priced at $500 and available this week.
Samsung's three new plasma 3D HDTVs are for "budget-conscious" consumers, with the smallest, the PN50C490 3D TV, starting at just $1100. The TV is 50-inches and is 720p supportive. The mid-sized 1080p PN50C680 has a 50-inch screen and costs $1,599.
According to the WSJ, LG will begin using Nvidia Tegra 2 dual-core processors in upcoming smartphones, marking just the second time a company has agreed to use the chips in their mobile devices.
Currently, smartphones from Samsung, Motorola and others use processors from Qualcomm and Texas Instruments.
Microsoft's now-defunct Kin smartphones used the Tegra chips, but poor branding and marketing led to heinous sales of the devices. Microsoft's Zune HD media player uses the Tegra line, with excellent results.
The new deal should breathe new life into both companies, especially on the heels of LG announcing a loss for their mobile division for the first time in years.
It is unclear what operating system will be paired with LG smartphones using the Tegra chips, but most tend to agree it will be Windows Phone 7, Microsoft's upcoming mobile OS. The Tegra chips should be able to flawlessly power Xbox Live gaming, one of Microsoft's headlining features of the new OS.
The Belgian ISP Telenet has posted via their forums an interesting list this week; the subscribers who have used the most bandwidth in the last month.
At the top of the list was a user of their TurboNet service, and that subscriber used an incredibly high 2.7TB worth of bandwidth for the period of July 4th to August 6th.
Continuing down the list were a few more users with excessive amounts of data transferred, with seven other users with over 1TB for the same period.
Those subscribers used 1.86TB, 1.49TB, 1.33TB, 1.1TB, 1.08TB, 1.07TB and 1.04TB, respectively, with most using the ISP's TurboNet XL service.
If you are curious as to why Telenet posted the top 25 bandwidth hogs, it was to encourage users to move from capped plans (50GB or 80GB) to their more expensive "fair use" "unlimited" plans. "Fair use," according to the ISP "means that you can send and receive a very large quantity of data via the Telenet network. Telenet will only ask you to adjust your consumption in the case of excessive volume consumption that may threaten the comfort of other subscribers."
HP, speaking during their Q3 earnings conference call, have confirmed a WebOS-based tablet for 2011.
Furthermore, the company promised a Windows 7 tablet, as well.
Says Todd Bradley, of HP's Personal Systems Group: "You'll see us with a Microsoft product in the near future, and a WebOS-based product in early 2011."
HP acquired Palm, including all their patents and the WebOS mobile operating system in April for $1.2 billion USD.
After the acquisition, it was unclear if HP would continue their long-standing partnership with Microsoft, and it is apparent today that they will.
HP's WebOS tablet should be a direct competitor to Apple's popular iPad, as well a plethora of upcoming Android-based tablets.
AfterDawn, has signed a licensing deal with French Bestofmedia Group for publishing localized editions of Tom's Hardware in Nordic countries. Today, the first of the localized sites went online when Tom's Hardware Finland was launched.
Tom's Hardware, founded in 1996 (and owned by Bestofmedia since 2007), is one of the best-known online technology publications gathering more than 30 million worldwide visitors each month. With Tom's Hardware focusing on PC technology and hardware and AfterDawn.com focusing on digital entertainment technologies, we believe we can effectively cross-promote both properties in Nordic countries, delivering our readers a more complete take on latest technology news and reviews.
As both companies are advocates of localized online content, the match was quite logical for both of us. Tom's Hardware wanted to expand their global reach to new countries and AfterDawn wanted to have a strong PC technology presence in the Nordic region. AfterDawn is Finland's largest technology website, with more than 5% of entire online population visiting the site on weekly basis and our ambition is to grow our traffic significantly also in Sweden, Norway and Denmark -- and now we have also another strong technology brand to support that goal.
In May, Sony Computer Entertainment Europe (SCEE) wrote in their official blog that the PlayStation 3 would soon be getting the Mubi movie streaming service.
The service has a large range of independent, classic and international films and was first announced at the Cannes Film Festival. The service will include "festival gems, classics, famous independent releases and art-house flicks" from such famous directors like Quentin Tarantino, Gus Van Sant and the Coens.
Today, the SCEE has priced the movies available on the service, €3.59 per movie ala cart, or €12.99 for an unlimited monthly pass.
Mubi will hit PS3 owners in the UK, Ireland, France, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Belgium, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Australia and New Zealand in October.
According to "three separate development sources" who spoke to Eurogamer, the next generation PSP will be the same size as the current PSP-3000 model, but will include touch-sensitive controls on the back of the device.
Each of the three sources say they have both seen and used the new PSP, describing the display as "rich and detailed."
The main new feature, however, is the way new games are controlled, with the touch controls.
Sony is still developing the handheld, and the company has been showcasing the prototypes with first-party games over the past few weeks.
The company has also already "settled on a business model" but that is still unclear. A digital-download only model, similar to that of the PSPGo, is likely.
Two of the sources claimed a holiday 2011 launch is imminent.
Popular tech site TechRepublic recently polled their audience of IT professionals, asking them which vendors make the most and least reliable notebooks.
While the numbers were not huge in their favor, TR's audience says Dell makes the most reliable notebooks. Acer being the least reliable was more unanimous.
Says the site: "TechRepublic recently asked its massive audience of IT professionals which vendors make the most reliable laptops and which ones make the least reliable laptops. Since most IT departments tend to use multiple vendors and/or switch vendors every 2-3 years in order to land the best deal, we thought IT departments would have a great perspective on this."
Of the 4609 IT pros polled for the "most reliable" study, 21 percent claimed Dell makes the best notebooks, followed closely by HP at 18 percent and Lenovo at 17 percent. Acer and Asus bottomed the list, at just 6 percent and 8 percent, respectively.
According to multiple reports today, Google's way-in-the-future Android 3.1 update will be dubbed Honeycomb, following their still developing 3.0 update, Gingerbread.
Currently, only a handful of smartphones have Google's latest 2.2 Froyo update, so thinking about 3.1 is just a dream at this point.
Says TechCrunch: "It's likely that it will be more of an incremental upgrade, in the same manner as Android 2.2 (Froyo) was to Android 2.1 (Éclair) as Google seeks to perfect the new platform on tablets and high-end smartphones. That means Android Honeycomb will probably be Android 3.1 or Android 3.2, rather than a leap to the unimaginable magic of Android 4.0."
Details on Gingerbread are still sketchy, although many expect 3.0 to add a significant UI overhaul, one that will remove the need for other brands to add custom skins such as HTC Sense or MotoBLUR.
Intel announced early this morning that it was acquiring security firm McAfee for $7.7 billion, in an effort to expand outside of its core semiconductor business.
The company paid a hefty premium for McAfee, $48 per share, an almost 60 percent boost from McAfee's closing price on Wednesday of almost $30 per share.
Paying in all-cash, the deal represents Intel's largest acquisition, ever.
Intel chips are currently used in about 80 percent of all the world's PCs and servers, and McAfee will help improve the security of the chips.
Additionally, Intel will continue to sell McAfee's mainstay security software to individuals and enterprises, adding another revenue stream.
Intel did make it clear, however, that any joint products from the companies would not be available until 2011.
"Everywhere we sell a microprocessor, there's an opportunity for a security software sale to go with it,"says Intel CEO Paul Otellini. "It's not just the opportunity to co-sell, it's the opportunity to deeply integrate these into the architecture of our products."
PlayStation 3 has given modders and hackers a run for their money. For nearly fours years hackers have tried to create a working mod that would bypass the PS3 software protection and run homebrew applications and backups. However, there has been no real breakthroughs, until now, if you believe what PS3News has to say.
According to the site, a product called PSJailBreak will allow owners of any version of PS3 to run backups of PS3 games as well as homebrew applications. The $170 mod is a piece of software stored in a USB drive. By inserting the thumb drive to your PS3 you'll be able to install and run the launcher application in seconds without permanently modifying the console or its software.
The PSJailBreak application also includes a backup tool which allows users to backup their game discs to the PS3 hard drive. Movies whether DVD or Blu-ray, or previous generation PlayStation games aren't supported by the tool. The backup manager can also be downloaded for free.
The music video website VEVO has launched a native iPhone app today, giving users a way to access the service's millions of music videos on the go.
Vevo, launched last year as a joint venture by YouTube, UMG and Sony Music, has reached over 1.1 billion streams, with almost 60 million unique visitors in the U.S. and Canada, monthly.
The service has licensing deals with Universal Music Group, Sony Music Entertainment, EMI Music, ABKCO, Beggars Group, Big Machine Records, CBS Interactive Music Group, Concord Music Group, Hollywood Records, Lyric Street Records, Razor & Tie Entertainment, Ultra Records, Walt Disney Records, Wind-up Records, Caroline Distribution, Fontana Distribution, INgrooves, IODA, RED, SAAVN and The Orchard.
Vevo's app is pretty straightforward, giving users the option to search for music videos, as well as filter through top video, premieres, new artists, artists on tour, and "nearby" videos that are hot in your city.
Any video debuting on Vevo.com will be available simultaneously via the app.
Unfortunately for users with iOS 4.0 installed on their iPhone/Touch, the app cannot multitask, yet.
T-Mobile has teased their upcoming flagship smartphone, the G2, the first phone to access the carrier's extremely fast HSPA+ data network.
The phone is expected to be the long-awaited successor to the T-Mobile G1, the world's first Android device.
T-Mobile posted the teaser page today, although it gives little details.
Says the site: The T-Mobile® G1® was the world's first Android™ -powered phone. Launched nearly two years ago, it created an entirely new class of mobile phones and apps. Its successor, the T-Mobile G2™ with Google™, will continue the revolution.
The T-Mobile G2 will deliver tight integration with Google services and break new ground as the first smartphone designed to run at 4G speeds on our new HSPA+ network. In the coming weeks, we’ll share more details about the G2 and offer exclusive first access to current T-Mobile customers.
Multiple sites have gone wild with speculation on the specifications, and a few have said the device will have dual 1.2GHz processors, a first for phones, as well as incredibly powerful. Additionally, a leaked T-Mobile memo seems to point to a September release.
According to the annual financial report for EMI, smallest of the Big 4 record labels, the company lost 624 million euros (just over $800 million using today's conversion rates) in the fiscal year ending March 31, 2010.
The report is prepared each year by EMI's owner, Terra Firma owned Maltby Capital, a Terra Firma owned company which purchased EMI in 2007.
Maltby Capital Chairman Stephen Alexander began the report by addressing developments in recent months suggesting Citigroup, the principal lender in Terra Firma's acquisition of EMI, might take over the company due to an alleged breach of lending terms.
Alexander wrote, "despite the issues around the financing structure and the related public speculation, both divisions of EMI have shown marked progress in their underlying performance during the course of the last twelve months."
This translates into losing less money than the previous year, which saw a loss of more than 1.7 billion euros. He also admitted having no actual first hand knowledge of the legal proceedings between Citigroup and Terra Firma.
There is a glimmer of hope for the future if they can survive long enough. EMI's goal, it says, is becoming "a comprehensive rights management company that can take full advantage of global opportunities in all markets for music to the maximum benefit of its artists and songwriters."
According to multiple reports today, HTC is set to launch their Google Chrome OS tablet on Black Friday, in conjunction with Google and Verizon.
Dubbed the HTC Chrome, the tablet will be the first real competitor to the Apple iPad, which has sold 3.5 million units already since its launch in April.
The reports say the Chrome will use a Nvidia Tegra 2 processor, have a 1280x720 multitouch display, 2GB of RAM, 32GB of SSD memory, a front-facing camera, GPS, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, 3G and of course, Chrome OS as the operating system.
Says one source: "Expect it to be every bit as geek-tastic as the Nexus One."
According to Game Informer Australia, Sony is already preparing games for the upcoming PlayStation 4, the console which has not even been announced yet.
Rumors of the PlayStation 4 have been around since the start of the year, with most expecting a 2012 launch.
While Sony's talk of games is not a direct announcement of the upcoming console, it does make sense that the company is preparing its publishing partners for the eventual launch. Most games take over 16 months to develop, so it is completely necessary for developers to know the specs of the new console at least a few years before its launch.
Sony has long said the PS3 will have a decade-long lifespan, and we are currently only in the fourth year of the life cycle. The now aged PS2 had a decade long lifespan as well, despite the PS3 being launched in 2006.
The company did not comment on the story, but Game Informer has it in their news section, not in the rumors section.
The popular video host Vimeo has introduced a new version of its video player today, one that detects the hardware being used by the end user and then outputs either an Adobe Flash or an HTML5 video player.
Additionally, the video stream output is based on how fast your connection is.
The feature was mainly implemented to add full compatibility to smartphones and other mobile devices, many of which still cannot play Flash.
Popular devices like the iPhone will never have Flash support, and a good number of Android devices still lack the 2.2 software update, which brings native Flash support.
Embed code is the same, and the new player's interface is the same as the previous player.
Larger rival YouTube has been testing the same type of player, and plans to make it the default soon.
Verizon has reported the results of a fiber-optic network trial they held in June for one lucky customer in Massachusetts, and it appears the customer received almost 1Gbit/sec speeds.
CW says "the customer received 925Mbit/sec. throughput to a server at its business location from a Verizon central office less than two miles away."
Speeds as high as 800Mbit/sec were achieved for servers 400 miles away.
Earlier in the year, Google said it wanted to experiment with a 1Gbit fiber connection trial for up to 500,000 lucky customers in a community. 1,100 communities submitted bids, with one city even temporarily changing its name to "Google." Google says it will pick a location by the end of the year.
When asked about the Google network, Verizon said: "We are not competing with things [Google is] planning. They may be thinking about competing with things we already have. We have the network in place today."
Earlier in the month, the popular Taiwanese daily Digitimes reported that Apple was creating a 7-inch iPad, almost three inches smaller than the current tablet.
Today, a second paper, Economic Daily News (EDN) is reporting the same thing, although with some details different from the first report.
EDN says the new device will weigh 500 grams, compared to the 700 grams of the current model. The paper says the device will use the same IPS display as the current model, while Digi's article said the device would get revamped with an OLED display.
The second report says Apple could release the new device as early as the end of 2010, although that seems unlikely.
The RIAA and NAB have proposed a new bill that would force all smartphones, MP3 players and tablets to include an FM radio in the future.
Gary Shapiro, the president of the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA), had some harsh words for the proposal, as it would affect a large number of devices built by CEA members.
"Rather than adapt to the digital marketplace, NAB and RIAA act like buggy-whip industries that refuse to innovate and seek to impose penalties on those that do," Shapiro added, via Ars.
For example, a product like the iPod Shuffle would be impossible to create, as the body would need to be made larger, and more controls would be needed to be able to tune stations.
The NAB is willing to cave into paying $100 million a year to the RIAA in royalties (under the Performance Rights Act), if the FM radios are implemented.
Last week, former Apple employee Paul Devine was arrested and charged with selling secrets to Asian suppliers in exchange for over $2 million in kickbacks.
Devine, one of Apple's global supply managers, was charged "with offenses that include wire fraud, money laundering and unlawful monetary transactions," which began in 2006.
This week, Devine has pleaded not guilty to the charges.
Prosecutors say Devine's email accounts clearly show him "orchestrating" deposits from the Asian suppliers.
Furthermore, Apple has filed a civil racketeering lawsuit against Devine.
Devine worked for Apple from 2005 until this year. Apple, in their suit, allege that Devine "colllected commissions" for years from at least six Asian supplier in exchange for confidential information that helped them to secure deals.
It looks like Hulu, the streaming video service owned by NBC Universal, News Corp & Disney is preparing to become a publicly traded company. The New York Times is reporting unnamed sources indicated an IPO (Initial Public Offering) could happen as early as this fall.
Assuming they can convince potential investors their new subscription service, Hulu Plus, can be profitable, there's still another hurdle to overcome. Hulu's management, led by ex-Amazon.com executive Jason Kilar, have been proponents of getting Hulu playing on every screen possible. But some of Kilar's better decisions have been undermined by Hulu's owners.
It's quite possible the insider information given to Times reporters was intended to see how potential investors respond. An IPO may wait if their reaction isn't positive.
But assuming they do go public eventually, Kilar and his team will need less oversight from Hulu's content providers. Those providers have been resistant to the idea of Hulu's free (ad supported) content making its way to TV screens through devices like media center PCs and game consoles.
Sony has announced two new updated models of their PlayStation 3 gaming console, each of which has a larger hard drive (HDD) than current models.
The 120GB model will be replaced by a 160GB model, and the 250GB model will be replaced by a 320GB model, each selling for the same price that the current models do.
Sony's new 160GB model will sell for $300.
The 320GB model will be bundled with PS3 Sports Champions Move, with a price tag of $400. Sony's bundle comes with a PS Eye, a Move controller, Sports Champions and a bonus BD demo disc.
According to the latest figures from comScore, Facebook has become the third most popular video destination on the Web, following Google and Yahoo.
YouTube (owned by Google) remained the clear market leader, with 144 million unique viewers for the month of July.
Yahoo followed in second with 55.1 million unique viewers.
Facebook moved up to third, at 46.58 million, followed closely by Microsoft sites (such as MSNBC) at 45.56 million. Rounding out the top 5 is VEVO, with 43.9 million unique viewers for the month.
Hulu remained popular, but fell into 10th place after comScore changed their rating metrics.
Perhaps more importantly, users spent an average 282 minutes on YouTube for the month, far and away the leader, followed by Hulu users spending 158 minutes at the site. No other company hit triple digits in the metric.
eBay has launched its new cashback rewards program this weekend, dubbed eBay Bucks, giving U.S. registered users a way to earn 2 percent back on most items they purchase through the popular auction site.
Users simply have to sign up for eBay Bucks, which is completely free, and you will be given 2 percent cashback on your purchases. That cash is then placed in your account, and can be used to take money off future purchases in the marketplace.
You must use PayPal to pay for items to get the cashback.
Furthermore, the cashback accumulates for 90 days before it is paid out to consumers.
A few categories are excluded from the earnings reward, including purchases from Classifieds, Business & Industrial Capital Equipment, Real Estate, and eBay Motors categories (except Parts & Accessories in eBay Motors).
Rupert Murdoch, the CEO of News Corp has announced this weekend that the company will launch a new national digital newspaper, one that will offer short, "snappy" stories and be available to tablet and smartphone users.
Says the CEO: "We’ll have young people reading newspapers. It’s a real game changer in the presentation of news."
Murdoch hopes the new platform will transform the way people read news, especially on tablet devices, which are gaining popularity.
The paper will operate under the guidance of the New York Post, one of News Corp's most profitable papers.
There is no timetable yet, but analysts anticipate a launch by Christmas.
Since the launch of the Apple iPad tablet in April, advertisers have increasingly looked to digital devices as a way to connect with users that have slowly but surely moved away from print news. Research firm Gartner anticipates 10.5 million tablets will be sold this year.
Google has confirmed their purchase of the virtual currency start-up Jambool for $70 million, continuing its strong expansion into the social gaming market.
"We're pleased and excited to welcome the Jambool team to Google. We are committed to offering consumers and merchants innovative digital payment solutions and Jambool will help Google evolve our payments offering and expand into digital goods and content,"says Google.
Jambool was founded in 2006 and has been a hit with its Social Gold virtual currency product.
Social Gold can be used in MMOs, virtual worlds, regular online games and social gaming applications.
The company was started by former Amazon execs Vikas Gupta and Reza Hussein.
Last month, Google purchased the social gaming developer Slide, for $182 million, and earlier in the year, Google invested about $150 million in developer Zynga, the company behind hits like Farmville.
Citing Verizon sources, Mashable has said that HTC Droid Incredible users will begin to receive Android 2.2 (Froyo)OTA during the next week, starting on Wednesday.
Those same Verizon team members already have Froyo installed on their devices, meaning the update is ready for consumer consumption.
Since the start of August, the Nexus One the HTC EVO 4G and the original Motorola Droid have updated to 2.2. Additionally, the Droid 2 has launched with the updated software already installed.
Froyo brings a 450 percent performance boost over 2.1, native support for Flash 10.1, USB and Wi-Fi tethering, Apps2SD and cloud sync.
In a short forum post today, Team Xecuter, in conjunction with Team Jungle and C4E has said that the new slimmed down Xbox 360 250GB model has been hacked, allowing users to playback backups.
Poster "Xecuter" says the team has successfully patched the DVD-Rom drive.
While a pack that can be released to the general public is nowhere near done, the first and probably hardest step is now finished, reads the post.
Xecuter took time to respond to commenters, as well:
Comment: It's fake
Answer: We are Xecuter, C4E and Team Jungle. Duh.
Comment: ...Get rich quick scheme
Answer: You mean like all the other free firmwares released ? Xecuter finance everything in the group so you don't have to.
Comment: Does anyone knows a cheap decapping service in europe?
Answer: If only they still used the MT1319L, eh?
This weekend, during the Star Wars Celebration V, Lucasfilm Ltd. and Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment announced that all six movies from the popular Star Wars series will be released on Blu-ray, in the fall of 2011.
The films will come in The Star Wars Blu-ray Box Set.
Lucas did note that all the movies will be the "special editions," since restoring the original versions (from the 80s) would "cost too much" and take too much time.
The box set will also include a plethora of documentaries, vintage behind-the-scenes moments, interviews, retrospectives and never-before-seen footage from the Lucasfilm archives.
"Blu-ray is the absolute best way to experience Star Wars at home – in pristine high definition," adds George Lucas, creator of the Star Wars Saga. "The films have never looked or sounded better."
As a teaser, the company showed off a deleted scene from "Return of the Jedi:"
According to the Wall Street Journal an Apple employee has been arrested and charged with selling secrets to Asian suppliers in exchange for over $1 million in kickbacks.
Paul Shin Devine, who is one of Apple's global supply managers, was charged "with offenses that include wire fraud, money laundering and unlawful monetary transactions," which began in 2006.
Devine was charged in a federal grand jury indictment.
Says the Journal: "Devine came up with a scheme in which he supplied companies such as Cresyn Co. in South Korea, Kaedar Electronics Co. in China and Jin Li Mould Manufacturing Pte. Ltd. in Singapore with confidential information that would let them negotiate favorable contracts with Apple."
"The indictment and civil suit claim that in return, Mr. Devine demanded payments, which were sent to bank accounts in his wife's name in amounts that were small enough to avoid attention."
The indictment also names Andrew Ang, who worked for one of Apple's suppliers, and who is charged with wire fraud and conspiracy. Devine shared the kickback money with Ang, who brokered the deals between Jin Li and Apple.
In May, software giantMicrosoft settled with little known company VirnetX for $200 million, after the former had been accused of patent infringement.
The patents in question covered methods for establishing Virtual Private Networks (VPN).
Microsoft now licenses the technology going forward.
This week, however, VirnetX has filed similar lawsuits against other technology companies, including Apple, Cisco, NEC and Aastra. VirnetX says each of the companies is currently violating at least one of five of the company's patents relating to network communication.
The company is seeking monetary damages and injunctions against the products.
Without the aforementioned Microsoft settlement, the company was practically dead in the water, with a reported revenue of just $43,920 for 2009.
Social networking giant Facebook has launched Facebook Live today, a channel dedicated to streaming video related to the company.
The site will use Live "to be your window into what’s new at Facebook," including demos of new features, special events, and even the occasional celebrity guest to the company's headquarters.
Facebook has made the channel into an app just like any other live streaming app (think Ustream), and it is also embeddable.
Livestream is the official live video partner for the channel, with full cross-promotion.
It is unclear whether Facebook will send us Live updates via our News Feed, or if the move is entirely a PR stunt to make the company seem more in touch with its users.
According to analysts at Gartner Research, Android OS devices outsold the Apple iPhone, globally, for the Q2 2010, moving into third place in the market.
10.6 million smartphones using the Google-made platform were sold during the quarter, good for 17.2 percent of the market. Apple sold 8.47 million iPhones for the quarter, good for 14.2 percent of the market.
Android's strong quarter put it right on the heels of RIM, the creator of the BlackBerry line of devices. RIM sold 11.23 million BlackBerrys, good for 18.2 percent of the market.
Devices running Symbian accounted for the clear market lead, at 41.2 percent, although that number fell significantly from the 51 percent figure it put up in the same quarter in 2009.
Windows Mobile, in a downtrend for years, fell to 5 percent, with 3.1 million units sold.
According to the latest figures from market research firm NPD Group, the U.S. video game market fell 1 percent in July, with slow game sales offsetting large gains by the Microsoft Xbox 360.
Year-on-year (YoY), total sales fell to $846.5 million from $850.6 million. However, lead analyst Anita Frazier says if the company were to add PC games, then sales grew 4 percent, thanks to massive sales of StarCraft II.
The much-anticipated sequel sold 1.5 million units in its first two days alone.
On the hardware side, sales jumped 12 percent to $313.8 million thanks to the release of a slimmed-down Xbox 360. The 360 topped the chart for the first time in almost three years, beating out the Wii and PS3 for the first time since the release of Halo 3 in September 2007.
Twitter has announced today that they plan to launch their own Tweet "button", giving users a one-click solution to share links.
As the site says: "Despite the high volume of sharing, there is plenty of room to make it easier. Copying and pasting, link shortening, and bouncing between browser tabs just to share a link in a Tweet is too much work."
The new Tweet Button well let users share links directly from Web pages (if they have the button added), with a pre-populated shortened URL, using t.co, Twitter's URL shortener and rival to bit.ly.
Twitter also adds that after you post you will see suggestions of accounts to follow, most likely those of the news outlet or site you are sharing, or the reporter of an article.
For companies who want to add the Tweet Button, the micro-blogging service says it is only a few lines of code.
Most sites already use the "retweet" button created by TweetMeme (including AfterDawn), and Twitter says the two companies have come together to create the new Button.
Google has updated Android 2.2 Froyo today, adding 10 new voice commands that will help device owners use the phone without needing to use a keypad, virtual or not.
The Voice Actions tool will let users dictate their text messages and emails by translating spoken word into text.
Additionally, the tool can make phone calls after you speak a person's name, or find songs to play.
Google showed off the technology during a demonstration this morning, with the spoken words being translated to written flawlessly. The company said Voice Actions remains accurate even in loud surroundings.
Android devices already had the ability to process spoken requests for Web searches and for the GPS system.
So far, only the Nexus One and Droid 2 have official Android 2.2, but a handful of phones are expected to get the update in the coming months.
T-Mobile Android device owners have had a similar feature for months, dubbed the "Genius" button, although there are no T-Mobile devices with 2.2, yet.
Oracle has filed a patent and copyright-infringement suit against Google today, claiming that Google's Android mobile OS infringes on the former company's Java technology.
Google declined comment, saying they need more time to review the suit.
Java, and all related technology, was created by Sun Microsystems which was recently purchased by Oracle.
The technology is used as a platform to build applications on smartphones, tablets, PCs and other computing devices.
In its complaint, Oracle says the Android software consists of Java apps and tech which infringe on seven separate Sun patents.
Additionally, the company claims Google knows full-well it is infringing on the patents because seven former Sun Java programmers and engineers have been hired by Google over the past few years.
Oracle is seeking a full injunction on Android, as well as monetary damages for willful and deliberate infringement.
In early 2007, media giant Viacom demanded that Google take down copyrighted content from YouTube, then and still the world's most popular video sharing site.
Afterwards, Viacom sued the site and its search giant owners for $1.2 billion USD, claiming Google facilitated uploading the copyrighted videos through YouTube while doing little to deter it.
In June Google, won the landmark case over the media companies, with a federal judge throwing out the lawsuit.
"Mere knowledge of prevalence of such activity in general is not enough," wrote Judge Louis Stanton at the time. "The provider need not monitor or seek out facts indicating such activity."
Says Viacom of the appeal: "We believe this ruling by the lower court is fundamentally flawed. After years of delay, this decision gives us the opportunity to have the Appellate Court address these issues on an accelerated basis."
Engadget is reporting today that Sony Ericsson is currently working on a "PSP Phone," one that will run on Android 3.0 and create a whole new "gaming ecosystem."
The report cites "trusted sources" who describe the device as a "cross between the Samsung Captivate and the PSP Go."
Sony's phone will have a PSP Go-style slideout instead of a QWERTY keypad, and a 1 GHz Snapdragon processor and a 5MP camera.
Running Android 3.0 (Gingerbread), the Android Market would be given a whole new section for games, ported from the PSX or PSP's vast libraries. The games can then be brought to other Android phones, as long as minimum specifications are met.
While this is not the first time we have heard a rumor about a PSP phone, this one seems to have the most legs and we will certainly keep you updated.
Apple has said today it will begin replacing any iPod Nano that overheats in Japan, improving on their past offer of replacing only the batteries of said devices.
Japan's trade ministry had ordered Apple to "publish an easy to understand statement" on how owners of faulty devices could receive their replacement batteries.
The first generation Nano models, those sold between 2005 and 2006, are the ones in question, accounting for over 60 incidents of overheating leading to four cases of minor burns.
Apple has blamed the "very rare" occurrences on a single battery supplier.
Says Apple: "We've worked closely with METI (trade ministry) to make sure first-generation iPod nano customers who are concerned with their battery have the latest information."
After being shown off first at CES and given an April release date, Plastic Logic delayed their e-reader in March and then again in June frustrating would-be owners who pre-ordered as early as February.
In late June, the company cancelled all pre-orders, making it very clear that the company was in trouble.
Today, Plastic Logic has announced that they are completely canceling all plans for the Que, due to increased competition from Apple, Barnes & Noble and Amazon.
"This was a hard decision, but is the best one for our company, our investors and our customers," said Plastic Logic CEO Richard Archuleta of the decision.
"We recognize the market has dramatically changed, and with the product delays we have experienced, it no longer makes sense for us to move forward with our first generation electronic reading product."
Differentiating the QUE from other e-reader was the fact it was aimed at the businessman demographic. The device would have retailed for $650 for the 4GB/Wi-Fi model and $800 for the 8GB/Wi-Fi/3G version. The Que featured a large 10.7-inch screen, and had built-in support for Microsoft Office documents as well as PDFs.
According to sources talking to the NYTimes, Amazon is still actively considering getting into the media player and smartphone markets, moving away from just selling the Kindle e-reader on the hardware side.
The sources say Amazon wants to make it easier for consumers to purchase content from Amazon MP3 and Amazon Video on Demand, just like how Apple has iTunes and the App Store built-in to all their "i" devices.
Amazon's internal hardware division, known as "Lab 126," has put out a few versions of the very popular Kindle e-reader but has done little else.
While the company has explored getting into the smartphone market, one source does say that project is out of the "company's reach," at this point.
Says the Times: "Internally, Amazon executives have been frustrated with other companies aggressively entering the digital content business, and one person with direct knowledge of the company's plans said executives there were prepared to do whatever it takes to ensure Amazon remained a major player in the sale of digital content."
Microsoft, during their latest Patch Tuesday, has plugged 34 security holes while updating 14 security bulletins.
Four of the most critical bulletins were rated "highest priority" for enterprises.
14 bulletins is the highest amount of security bulletins ever released by the software giant during a Patch Tuesday, and a full eight were rated critical.
The four aforementioned "highest priority" bulletins are (via EW): MS10-052, which resolves a vulnerability in Microsoft's MPEG Layer-3 audio codecs; MS10-055, which addresses a vulnerability in the Cinepak Codec used by Windows Media Player to support the AVI audiovisual format; MS10-056, which deals with four vulnerabilities in Microsoft Office; and MS10-060, which resolves two vulnerabilities in Microsoft .NET Framework and Microsoft Silverlight.
According to research firm iSuppli, the DRAM market could see a significant supply shortage in the Q3 2010 due to "limited manufacturing equipment availability" and other challenges.
"A commodity profoundly susceptible to the variable dynamics of supply and demand, DRAM is expected to ship 15.9 million 1Gbit-equivalent units in 2010, up 48.6% from 10.7 million units last year."
"Most of the year’s growth is forecasted to occur in the second half of the year, with each of the final two quarters of 2010 expected to post sequential bit growth of approximately 11%. In comparison, bit growth in the first two quarters of 2010 topped out at far below the 10% mark. Such high levels of growth, concentrated in a six-month period, will strain the production capabilities of DRAM suppliers."
Mike Howard, senior analyst for DRAM at iSuppli also adds that two major factors should lead the market into a supply shortage, with the first being limited tooling equipment, especially from ASML Holding. The second is the challenges for manufacturers migrating to below 50 nm.
Dell's Streak tablet/phone will hit the U.S. on Friday, says AT&T, launching at $300 with contract or $550 without.
The multi-touch tablet/phone is expected to compete against Apple in both categories, although it only has a 5-inch screen so a direct comparison to the iPad is weak.
AT&T has the device going up for pre-order on Thursday.
The Streak was originally supposed to launch in July, after being unveiled at CES in January, but delays pushed it back to its current date. Between CES and release, Apple has released the iPad and iPhone 4 to record sales numbers.
Dell launched the tablet/phone in the UK in June, to mixed reviews.
Dellsays the device will ship with Android 1.6, which is unfortunate, but an upgrade to 2.2 is promised by the end of the year.
Nintendo has confirmed this week that the ever-popular Wii has now hit 30 million units sold in the U.S.
It took about 45 months for the number to be hit in the nation, making it the fastest-selling video game console in history.
Sony's PS2, the top selling console of all-time, took 60 months to hit the 30 million milestone. The console currently has over 140 million units sold, globally.
"More than any other video game system in history, Wii has expanded the world of video games to new audiences,"says Cammie Dunaway, Nintendo of America’s executive vice president of sales and marketing. "This milestone is another reminder that people want fun games they can play with others – all at a value-minded price."
The Wii sells for $199 or even less if you get the right bundle.
Worldwide Wii sales are estimated at around 72 million, significantly higher than the 41 million number for the Xbox 360 and the 36 million for the PS3.
According to new research from the popular dating site OKCupid.com, iPhone owners are having sex with more partners than BlackBerry or Android owners.
Almost 10,000 smartphone owners were polled and the site found that men with iPhones had an average of 10 sexual partners by the age of 30, higher than the 8.1 partners for BlackBerry owners and 6 for Android users.
For women, iPhone owners had 12.3 partners by the same age, with BlackBerry users at 8.8 and Android owners at 6.1.
While the numbers could of course be skewed, (it is just a dating site and not a scientific journal) the numbers are still interesting.
The results of the survey were released along with OKCupid's investigation into what type of photographs gor the most positive hits on the site. Unsurprisingly, pics taken with DSLRs, using soft lighting, got the most positive results.
Google's Android mobile OS has finally hit the big time; security firm Kaspersky is reporting that users are being hit with the first trojan for the OS.
Trojan-SMS.AndroidOS.FakePlayer.a is being sent around as an SMS, infecting devices while pretending to be a media player application. Infected users will send out SMS texts without consent.
Android owners who receive the text are prompted to install a small 13kb .APK which then infects the device. The trojan will then begin texting out "premium rate phone numbers," to other users.
Kapersky is quick to note that so far the Android users in most immediate danger are in Russia, where the criminals behind the trojan can actually start charging money to user's accounts. However, anyone with a device can get infected.
While FakePlayer is the first Trojan for Android, there have been scattered spywares created for the OS.
Adds Kapersky: "The IT market research and analysis organization IDC has noted that those selling devices running Android are experiencing the highest growth in sales among smartphone manufacturers. As a result, we can expect to see a corresponding rise in the amount of malware targeting that platform."
Over the past year, there have been numerous rumors of an upcoming Wii 2, one that includes full HD output.
Today, GGS is reporting that Nintendo is indeed creating a Wii 2, one that will feature a Blu-ray drive.
The console will support resolution up to 1080p, and current Wii owners will be able to trade in their console for a slight discount off the new console.
Adding a Blu-ray drive will help Nintendo curb a problem that has long plagued their consoles and handhelds, piracy.
GGS cites a "bashful but reliable source" in Nintendo who says the company is already beginning to manufacture the console, with a 2011 release date eyed.
Finally, the source says Nintendo will not confirm or announce the console until just one month before it's launched to "generate huge publicity and viral marketing."
Verizon Wireless has finally, officially launched the Motorola Droid 2, although weeks of leaks have already shown customers the price, specs and release date.
The device will hit stores on Thursday the 12th, with online pre-sales starting tomorrow morning.
Motorola's new flagship will sell for $200 with 2-year contract, or $600 without.
Furthermore, once all the inventory is depleted, the aging original Droidwill be retired.
The Droid 2 is very similar to its older brother, but with a few key differences. The sequel has a powerful 1GHz processor and twice the RAM, as well as a redone keyboard. Many owners of the original Droid complained about the slide-out keypad, which was off center in order to add a directional pad which was practically useless. The Droid 2 has a more centered keypad.
Additionally, the Droid 2 is silver-on-blue, includes Android 2.2 Froyo, and has a new Motorola "skin" just like the Droid X.
Netflix has announced yet another licensing agreement for their Watch Instantly streaming video service. The deal with cable EPIX will give them streaming rights to movies from Paramount, MGM & Lionsgate.
EPIX is owned by Studio 3 Partners, which in turn is jointly owned by Paramount, MGM & Lionsgate. They offer a premium cable channel and VOD service featuring new releases and a selection of catalog titles from the three studios.
Movies currently offered on EPIX include Iron Man, Star Trek, Saw VI & the entire Indiana Jones series, as well as classics like The Godfather & the original version of The Thomas Crown Affair.
Right now EPIX is only available from a handful of smaller cable companies plus Verizon FiOS & Dish Network. Offering their movies through Netflix
EPIX subscribers who also have internet service from their TV provider already get access to EpixHD.com, where they can stream all the titles available through the premium cable channel in 720p, as well as some titles not available through the TV offering. Dish Network customers get access to the same content through DishOnline.
Earlier today, Google and Verizon made headlines by unveiling a joint proposal for the future of net neutrality.
The plan calls for "a new, enforceable prohibition against discriminatory practices. This means that for the first time, wireline broadband providers would not be able to discriminate against or prioritize lawful Internet content, applications or services in a way that causes harm to users or competition."
Google and Verizon's proposal leaves open the ability for ISPs to charge Web sites extra if they offer certain services.
Almost immediately after the announcement, MoveOn.Org Civic Action, Credo Action, the Progressive Change Campaign Committee and ColorofChange.org released a statement describing how tens of millions of Americans would be harmed if the proposal was to be followed. The groups already have a petition with over 300,000 signatures protesting the proposal.
Most seem very upset by Google's turn against net neutrality, the concept that all sites and bandwidth on the Internet should be free of restrictions. Because smarpthones would be exempt from any of the future changes, many also see the proposal as a way to push Android well into the future.
Bill Gates, one of the richest men in the world after he co-founded Microsoft in the 70s, has made some interesting comments today in relation to the college experience.
Gates says that soon college educations will be irrelevant, thanks to the Internet.
"The self-motivated learner will be on the web. And there will be far less place-based [college] things...College -- except for the parties -- needs to be less place based," says Gates.
Additionally, he says traditional college studies will soon be "five times less important than it is today."
It is notable to remember that Gates dropped out of Harvard University to found the company that has since become the largest tech company in the world.
Gates was quick to note that he feels K-12 education is very important, especially charter school programs that immerse the children in learning: "If you want to take intercity fifth grade kids and get them to think 'Hey learning is fun...I do that with other kids.' you need to have at least 80 percent of their waking hours devoted to your thing or otherwise you lose -- and these charter schools do that."
The Motorola Droid 2, easily the worst kept secret since the iPhone 4, has now had its price leaked, along with another confirmation on its launch date.
Motorola's new flagship smartphone will be available starting August 12th (this Thursday), if the leak is to be believed.
Pictures from Best Buy give us the price, which is $200 with 2-year contract, and $600 if you want the device without contract.
Additionally, Verizon's wireless page is showing the original Droid as currently "Out of Stock," an almost sure sign that the Droid 2 is ready to go.
The Motorola Droid 2 has a 1Ghz processor, runs Android 2.2, has 8GB of internal memory, a 5.0MP camera with IS and autofocus, and comes with an 8GB MicroSD card.
Google has continued its strong expansion into the social gaming market, purchasing the virtual currency start-up Jambool for $75 million.
Jambool was founded in 2006 and has been a hit with its Social Gold virtual currency product.
Social Gold can be used in MMOs, virtual worlds, regular online games and social gaming applications.
The company was started by former Amazon execs Vikas Gupta and Reza Hussein.
Neither company has confirmed the purchase price but multiple sources place the price at $55 million, with another $20 million based on incentives.
Last week, Google purchased the social gaming developer Slide, for $182 million and earlier in the year, Google invested about $150 million in developer Zynga, the company behind hits like Farmville.
The popular developer/hacker Comex, the man behind the Web-based iPhone jailbreaking site, has released Frash today for the smartphone, certain iPod Touch models and the iPad allowing for Adobe Flash support on jailbroken devices.
Apple CEO Steve Jobs has long said that the company will not support Flash on "i" devices.
If you own the iPhone 3GS with iOS4, the iPhone 4, the iPod Touch 3G or the iPad you can now run Flash from within the Safari browser.
While the app is a great start, the developer is quick to note that the beta (version 0.02) can only support very simple Flash animations, making it useless for the most part unless you love invasive Web ads.
AT&T, the U.S.' second largest wireless carrier, has announced the launch of their U-Verse Mobile App, now available through the iPhone/Touch App Store.
U-verse subscribers can now download and stream TV shows on their iPhone.
The app will also allow users to manage their DVR and download and watch the selected shows.
Additionally, U-verse subscribers can browse the full U-verse TV program guide, view descriptions of the content, and watch them in full screen mode on the iPhone.
AT&T says 100,000 U-verse subscribers already use the Web app and an early beta of the Mobile App, dubbed Mobile Remote Access.
"We’re making it possible for you to watch TV shows on your iPhone at no extra charge. It’s just one more valuable and innovative feature available on U-verse TV,"added David Christopher, CMO of AT&T Mobility and Consumer Markets. "Our U-verse multi-screen promise is now a reality for millions of U-verse TV customers, with content available on U-verse TV, U-verse Online, and today, U-verse Mobile. No cable provider comes close to matching the cross-platform experience we’re delivering today, and we’ll continue to add unique features that further integrate these screens."
Yoko Ono, the widow of the late John Lennon has said this week that negotiations between Apple and The Beatles are still at a standstill, so don't expect the popular catalog to hit iTunes or other MP3 stores anytime soon.
The band remains one of the few to not go legally digital, instead selling physical CDs like they did last year, with the catalog remastered.
Apple Corps (not to be confused with iTunes owner Apple), the group's holding company still cannot come to terms with the EMI Group, the label which licenses the Beatles' recordings.
Says Ono: "[Apple CEO] Steve Jobs has his own idea and he's a brilliant guy. There's just an element that we're not very happy about, as people. We are holding out. "Don't hold your breath ... for anything."
Apple Corps is jointly owned by Ono, Paul McCartney, Ringo Star and Olivia Harrison, widow of former member George Harrison.
Billboard is reporting this week that UMG (Universal Music Group) has pulled its artist's music videos from MTV.com, due to a breakdown in negotiations over licensing fees.
UMG has long licensed music directly to MTV but it now does all its direct licensing through Vevo, the joint venture site which includes Sony Music, YouTube and AT&T as stakeholders.
MTV's deal with UMG has now expired and Vevo was in negotiations with MTV before the talks broke down. The deal is only for online properties and also includes the sites for VH1 and CMT.
The popular TV network had this to say on the matter:
"For almost 30 years, we have enjoyed long and colorful partnerships with all the music labels, including UMG and their talented roster of artists on MTV, VH1 and CMT. As the industry evolves, we continue to seek out new and innovative ways to connect artists with their fans that are mutually beneficial to everyone. However, during our recent discussions with Vevo, we were unable to reach a fair and equitable agreement for rights to stream UMG artists’ music video content. As a result, UMG has elected to pull their music videos from our web sites. We are disappointed by this move and sincerely hope that UMG will work with us toward a fair resolution and allow their artists to once again connect with the millions of music fans who visit MTV.com, VH1.com and CMT.com every month."
Over the past few months, the Chinese Ministry of Culture has identified 185 sites that infringe on copyrights, adding that the sites violate regulations and do not have licenses to distribute music.
Since April, 23 of those sites have shut down, and the Ministry is still actively investigating the others.
"It is good news that the authorities are taking action against some infringing websites, but there are many more illegal music services that continue to operate with impunity," says Leong Mayseey, IFPI regional director for Asia, (via Billboard).
"Only 23 of the original 185 websites identified by the Ministry of Culture have been taken down and it is not clear what penalties, if any, their operators face. If China wants its creative sector to punch its weight globally, it must do more to create a widespread climate of respect for intellectual property."
Apple has updated the iPad App Store this week, allowing tablet owners to use Genius recommendations when looking for apps.
Opening the App Store on your tablet will give you the option to "Genius" (right next to "Updates"). After enabling it, users are given a list of apps they may want to try out, based on their past choices and downloads.
The iPhone/Touch App Store has had the option for a couple of years now, but now iPad tablet owners have the same ability.
Apple's Genius recommendations for the iPad work exactly like the iPhone/Touch version, giving an option to upgrade from free apps to their paid counterparts, as well. If you are completely uninterested in an app, tick "not interested" to ensure the same app will not show up again.
The company recently debuted "Try Before You Buy" for the App Store, as well, which gives users a chance to demo paid apps before buying it.
The IFPI has claimed the largest ever piracy raid in Bulgaria this week, shutting down four sites that illegally distribute music, movies, video games and software.
The Bulgarian Police's Cyber Crime Unit, in conjunction with the IFPI, have shut down nanoset.net, rapidadd.com, 4storing.com and afasta.com.
Bulgarian Association of Music Producers (BAMP) claimed the sites were run by organized crime members and filed the original complaints against each of the sites.
Nanoset was a P2P service but the other three were file-hosting and storing sites, each of which also offered streaming capabilities of unauthorized movies, many of which were still in theaters or had yet to hit theaters in the nation.
Police added that they believe users paid €2.5 million to access the content, and the sites also raised money through advertising.
Site operators were arrested and computer systems were seized, noted the authorities. Bulgarian ISPs hosting the websites were also discovered to have 120 terabytes of unauthorized content.
In May we reported that Foxconn was raising worker salaries up to 70 percent amidst a flood of worker suicides at their Chinese factory.
The company, probably best known for manufacturing the Apple iPhone among tons of other electronics we use daily, has been massively criticized for its working conditions, and low wages.
This week, the company has confirmed a new death at its Chinese plants, a 22-year old assembly worker.
The company says the woman "fell from a dormitory at a plant" in mainland China.
Foxconn, and parent Hon Hai have been under intense scrutiny all year following the eleven suicides at its plants in China. Worker's families were compensated ten times the worker's annual salary after each suicide, leading many to believe that the deaths were intentional to pass on money to family members.
TorrentReactor, one of the most popular torrent trackers on the Web, has purchased a small town in Russia and renamed it "TorrentReactor."
The site purchased the small town of Gar for $148,000 USD (4.5 million rubles).
TorrentReactor founder Alex confirmed the purchase to TF.
Gar was founded in 1958 by Russian Orthodox Church zealots and currently only has 215 inhabitants. Most are farmers.
Thanks to the purchase by the torrent site, the people of Gar will now get Internet, although there are only three computers in the whole town, with one connected to the Internet via dial-up.
"Most of it will be split among villagers and the rest will be used to re-equip the local school, repair roads, purchase agricultural equipment and machinery. Also torrentreactor.net company decided to pay for broadband Internet connection in the settlement which will result in about 900,000 rubles ($30,000) because there are no networks nearby," says Alex of TorrentReactor.
The move may seem like a marketing campaign for the site, but Alex says the TR team is trying to be humanitarians: "We realize it’s just a drop in the ocean comparing to the amount of money needed to help thousands of other villages. But we at least do something to support complete strangers. We are proud that we are able to do so and hope we will be proud of this in the future."
According to a new report from the Brazilian tech site MacMagazine, Apple may be ready to unveil its most updated iPod Touch, one with two cameras, on August 16th, earlier than its expected September launch date.
The site cites a "a reliable source within Apple," who says the company could unveil the device as early as on the 14th, but being a Saturday that does not seem as likely.
Since 2007 Apple has held its iPod press events in September, and most believe the new iPods will be unveiled this September, as well.
However, before 2007, the company released iPod models in any month from March until October.
The new iPod Touch will (rumored) have a front-facing and a standard camera, allowing for FaceTime video conferencing. Additionally, it will include a gyroscope.
Apple's senior VP of engineering Mark Papermaster is leaving the company, says The NYTimes, following the recent "antennagate" debacle of the iPhone 4.
Apple spokesman Steve Dowling confirmed the report, and added that his position will be taken over by Bob Mansfield, VP of Macintosh engineering.
Papermaster was formally IBM's vice president of microprocessor technology development, working primarily in processor design.
"Antennagate" refers to the ongoing situation in which iPhone 4 users lose cell reception when holding the phone in their left hand, covering the antenna.
Apple has repaired the situation by offering all iPhone 4 owners free cases for their devices, eliminating the problem.
While many believe that Papermaster's departure is directly correlated to "antennagate," Gleacher & Company analyst Brian Marshall thinks differently (via CW): "I don't think that's the case. When you have a company the size of Apple, you're going to have turnover at low levels and high levels. I don't see this as that big of a deal."
Vonage has introduced apps for Android and the iPhone this week that will allow users to make free domestic and international calls to their Facebook friends.
The apps, dubbed Vonage Mobile for Facebook, are free for smartphones running iOS or Android.
Open the app, sign in with your Facebook and then you will be asked "what information you want to allow your friends access to." At that point you will probably get the message: "Less than 5 of your friends have Vonage mobile for Facebook." You then have the opportunity to invite more.
You can make the phone calls over Wi-Fi or 3G, although 3G will use up minutes. Wi-Fi-connected calls are free, and will save you minutes.
Vonage says it plans to add pay services to the apps in the future, such as low-priced text messaging.
Google has confirmed that it has acquired Slide, the social networking gaming site.
Says Google: "We’re excited to announce we’ve acquired Slide, a social technology company with an extensive history of building new ways for people to connect with others across numerous platforms online."
The startup was created in 2005 by Max Levchin, the co-founder of PayPal.
NYTimes reported the acquistion price at $228 million while TechCrunch said $182 million. Google did not reveal the final number. Regardless, the price is a lot cheaper than the $500 million valuation the service was given in 2008.
When Slide began, Levchin used it as a third-party photo sharing service but it quickly evolved into a widget and app service, used in social networking giants like Facebook and MySpace.
The company's two most popular apps are SuperPoke and SPP Ranch. The first allows you to adopt a virtual pet, and exchange money for virtual goods.
Google has been spending significant amounts of money in an effort to start a social gaming platform, investing $150 million in market leader Zynga among other purchases.
After reporting their quarterly earnings this week, T-Mobile USA made it clear that smartphones are here to stay, seeing subscriptions triple year-on-year despite losing customers overall.
Users with 3G-capable smartphones are now 19 percent of the entire T-Mobile USA subscriber base, with subscriptions over tripling to 6.5 million from 2.1 million in the Q2 2009.
T-Mobile noted its most popular smartphones included Android devices like the MyTouch 3G and Nexus One, as well as the BlackBerry Bold and HTC HD2, which use the BlackBerry OS and Windows Mobile operating systems, respectively.
During the quarter, T-Mobile upgraded its network to HSPA+, giving some T-Mobile users faster data than even Sprint's 4G networks.
15 cities, covering 85 million people, now have access to T-Mobile's HSPA+ upgrade. By the end of the year the company says it hopes to have HSPA+ available to 185 million Americans.
Overall, the carrier saw a decline in subscriptions, due to a high rate of decline in the prepaid business. The company lost 199,000 prepaid subscribers while only gaining 106,000 contract customers.
Sharp has said this week that it plans to release a smartphone by the end of 2010 that will feature a 3D display allowing for 3D viewing without special glasses.
While the company is the largest mobile phone maker in Japan, globally it has fallen very far behind, especially in the rapidly growing smartphone market.
Sharp's recent foray into the smartphone market, building the Microsoft Kin models, proved to be disastrous, with less than 7000 units being sold in 90 days.
The company first unveiled its 3D panel technology in April, and many believe it will be used in the upcoming Nintendo 3DS handheld, as well.
CBS CEO Les Moonves has confirmed this week that the number one U.S. broadcaster is in active talks to bring some of its shows to Hulu, the popular online streaming service.
Hulu Plus is the site's new premium version which launched in June and costs $9 per month.
Users of Hulu Plus can watch full back-catalogs of available shows while free Hulu users can only watch the trailing five episodes of a current season.
CBS has the incredibly popular shows "CSI," "Two and a Half Men," and "Big Bang Theory" among others, and remains the only broadcaster to not include its content on Hulu.
"Are we having discussions with the Hulu subscription service? Yes we are,"Moonves says. "Our goal is to get paid for our content in as many different ways as we can without hurting the mother ship. The key here is flexibility."
CBS recently signed a 10-year content deal with Comcast for on-demand and Web video.
Android device owners will finally soon be able to stream Netflix's popular Watch Instantly catalog on their phones and tablets, as the rental company has confirmed it is working on an application for the mobile OS.
Netflix has posted two new job listings on its website, both of which are looking for Android developers. The latest listing is searching for an "Android Video Playback Expert," one who can help the company "build Instant Streaming client implementations on Android devices."
Additionally, the developer must have 10 years of experience, already implemented video playback in an Android app, have experience with DRM, and experience "with other mobile application platforms (e.g. iPhone/iPad)."
Netflix's "Watch Instantly" remains one of the most popular free apps on the iPad tablet.
Confirming what the job listings were suggesting, a Netflix employee had this to say (via Electronista): "I just know we’re actively hiring Android devs. I wish I knew more about a timeframe for you. Good things come to those who wait. Netflix is essentially a tech company and with the way Android is blowing up it would be stupid of us to ignore that."
According to the research firm iSuppli, more smartphones will be using the Android operating system by 2012 than are using the Apple iOS.
Google recently announced 200,000 Android phones being activated each day.
iSuppli says Android will be used in 75 million smartphones in 2012, up 1500 percent from 2009, when 5 million Android devices were sold.
In the same period, Apple iOS devices will jump to 62 million from 25 million.
At that time, Android would control 19.4 percent of the global smartphone market while Apple would have just under 16 percent.
"The flexibility Android offers for hardware designs and its appealing business model in terms of revenue sharing have attracted vigorous support from all nodes in the value chain, including makers of high-end smart phone models," says iSuppli senior analyst Tina Teng.
The Dish Network has announced this week that it plans to let subscribers watch satellite TV programming on their mobile devices, for free, in the near future.
Starting in September, the iPad, iPhone, iPod Touch and BlackBerry devices will get the free functionality via an app.
Android devices will get the service a month later.
While on the surface the announcement sounds great for Dish owners, unless you have a dual-tuner DVR at home, you will have to watch whatever channel is on at home on your smartphone or tablet, without the ability to change it.
You will also be required to purchase a SlingBox, or SlingBox-supportive DVR from Dish.
Google has acquired the social networking gaming company Slide, according to multiple reports.
The startup was created in 2005 by Max Levchin, the co-founder of PayPal.
NYTimes reports the acquistion price at $228 million while TechCrunch says $182 million. Regardless, the price is a lot cheaper than the $500 million valuation the service was given in 2008.
When Slide began, Levchin used it as a third-party photo sharing service but it quickly evolved into a widget and app service, used in social networking giants like Facebook and MySpace.
The company's two most popular apps are SuperPoke and SPP Ranch. The first allows you to adopt a virtual pet, and exchange money for virtual goods.
Google has been spending significant amounts of money in an effort to start a social gaming platform, investing $150 million in market leader Zynga among other purchases.
Google CEO Eric Schmidt has said today that about 200,000 new Android devices are now being sold daily, leading to huge growth in revenue for the search giant thanks to mobile search traffic.
When asked about the recent studies showing Android outpacing the iPhone handily, Schmidt added: "People are finally beginning to figure out how successful Android is. The number was about 100,000 (a day) about two months ago. It looks like Android is not just phenomenal but incredibly phenomenal in its growth rate. God knows how long that will continue."
While Google does not directly gain revenue from Android (which is free and open source), the more successful the operating system is, the more people are connected to the Web from their mobile phones, leading to an increase in search.
"Trust me that revenue is large enough to pay for all of Android's activities and a whole bunch more," Schmidt added, via Cnet. "I should also say that we love the success of the iPhone because the iPhone also uses Google's search and we get a chunk of that revenue when people search on the iPhone."
The European Commission has now chosen the Apple iPhone and HTC devices over the RIM BlackBerry line, two years after beginning searching for a smartphone to support amongst its employees.
Security and financial impact were part of the criteria in choosing the phones, and BlackBerry security issues were a main concern.
Throughout the week, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, India and Kuwait all threatened to block features of BlackBerrys due to security concerns.
The EC employs 32,000 people.
"Following this evaluation, the HTC and the iPhones emerged at the most suitable platforms for voice/mail-centric mobile devices. As a result, the Commission currently supports these two platforms," said an EC spokesperson, via Reuters.
Google has said today it is killing off its Wave collaborative messaging service due to a lack of user interest.
The search giant revealed the Wave service last year, which allows people to "communicate online by letting them exchange messages in real-time and collaboratively edit documents."
Many called the service a hybrid Twitter, IM and email client.
The service itself was very confusing to many would-be users, however, and Google has decided to add the service to its growing list of failed projects.
"Wave has not seen the user adoption we would have liked. We don't plan to continue developing Wave as a standalone product," noted Google Senior Vice President of Operations Urs Hölzle.
Hölzle did add that Wave's technology will be used in other projects, and that the code is not dead. "Many of Wave's innovations, like drag-and-drop and character-by-character live typing, will still be available to customers and partners that want to build upon the technology," adds the WSJ.
In early May, Microsoft sued Salesforce.com, claiming the company had been actively infringing on nine of the software giant's patents.
The complaint was significant as it targeted patents relating to customer-relationship management (CRM), which is the bread and butter of SalesForce's business.
Microsoft was seeking for an injunction on the features used in SF's software that infringes on the their patents.
Today, the companies have settled the suit, although details of the agreement were not disclosed.
Salesforce says with the agreement both companies will be covered by each other's patents.
Adds Microsoft: "We are pleased to reach this agreement with Salesforce.com to put an end to the litigation between our two companies. Today's agreement is an example of how companies can compete vigorously in the marketplace while respecting each other's intellectual property rights."
As promised last month, the iPhone Dev-Team has now released their iPhone 4 unlocking tool, Ultrasn0w, which can be used by U.S. owners tired of being stuck on AT&T.
The carrier unlock required a complete rewrite of the software because of Apple's new baseband OS for the updated phone.
It is important to note that users who unlock their iPhone 4 can use T-Mobile's cell network but not its high-speed 3G data.
Ultrasn0w 1.0 comes with instructions, courtesy of RedmondPie:
How to: Jailbreak iPhone 4 on iOS 4.0.1:
-Step 1: Unlocking requires that your phone is jailbroken on the latest firmware. Follow the complete guide posted here to jailbreak your iPhone 4 on iOS 4.0.1 / 4.0 using JailbreakMe 2.0.
How to: Unlock iPhone 4 (Any Baseband) on iOS 4.0.1:
-Step 2: Once you are done with the jailbreak, you can now unlock your iPhone on any baseband using Ultrasn0w 1.0-1 from Cydia. To do this:
Barnes & Noble has said this week, somewhat surprisingly, that it plans to put itself up for sale after suffering large losses in the battle for leader in the digital books market.
After the news, shares of the company jumped as high as 27 percent, finishing the day up 19 percent.
Founder and largest shareholder Leonard Riggio said he would consider being part of an investment group that could purchase the company.
The news appears to signal that the company is in desperate need of strong decisions that may not be so easy as a public company.
Says Forrester analyst James McQuivey: "They might feel they want to buy the company back now and take it public later and reap the windfall. But there aren't a lot of investors who will be that certain about the probable outcome of that bet."
The company has now formed a "special committee of four independent directors to consider all options for increasing shareholder value."
While the company remains the top brick-and-mortar book store in the world, it has faced increasing pressure from Amazon and Wal-Mart.
In October 2009, billionaires Janus Friis and Niklas Zennstrom, the creators of the Kazaa P2P client as well as Skype, announced that they had developed and financed the unlimited music subscription service Rdio, and the company has now made the service available to all.
Separating the service from others like Rhapsody is the fact that Rdio allows users to listen from anywhere in "the cloud," including through their phones, instead of needing to download DRM-laced music locally.
Furthermore, Rdio has many social networking features connected to Facebook and Twitter. Rdio uses subscriber's online social networks to recommend songs, as well. If a bunch of your friends like a certain artist, Rdio will likely recommend it to you.
Rdio has over seven million tracks available from the major labels and thousands of indies.
The service charges $10 per month for unlimited access to music on a computer or your smartphone. For $5, you can get browser-only access.
Rdio is available on BlackBerrys, Android devices and the Apple iPhone.
T-Mobile MyTouch 3G Slide owners will begin receiving an OTA update for their Android operating system tomorrow, but it is not the highly anticipated Android 2.2 Froyo upgrade.
Along with optimizations comes some nice bug fixes as well, including a fix for an issue that has been quite annoying to me as an owner; the inability to receive MMS when connected to Wi-Fi.
Says T-Mobile: "Beginning August 4, T-Mobile will send an over-the-air (OTA) update to myTouch 3G Slide customers, which will provide a number of benefits, including increased battery performance and enhancements to software features such as Faves Gallery and Genius Button. The update will be sent to customers in staggered waves beginning August 4 and we anticipate all customers will receive it by August 19."
The improvements to Battery Life consist of "Updates to the T-Mobile online contact backup connection, which will improve battery life."
Users will now be able to send and receive MMS messages when connected to Wi-Fi.
Motorola and Verizon will soon unveil a new tablet with a FiOS digital pay-TV service included, trying a new method to differentiate itself from the growing number of tablets expected to hit shelves this year.
The 10-inch device will run Android 2.x and can launch as early as "this autumn."
Motorola is a long-time partner of Verizon, creating TV set-top boxes for the FiOS service.
Market leader Apple has sold over 3 million iPad tablets since launch in early April, but HP, RIM, Microsoft, Samsung, Lenovo and LG have all promised tablets by the end of the year, running either BlackBerry, WebOS, Windows 7 or Android operating systems.
According to AppleInsider, the second generation iPad tablet will likely have a camera, a feature shockingly missing from the first version.
Citing a document of Apple's iPad management policies, the site says there will be an ability to disable the use of the camera. As we know, there is no camera on the current generation model.
Additionally, the site cites a recent job listing from Apple for a "Performance QA Engineer, iPad Media" wherein the description says "we are looking for a software quality engineer with a strong technical background to test still, video and audio capture and playback frameworks."
Applicants can then "build on your QA experience and knowledge of digital camera technology (still and video) to develop and maintain testing frameworks for both capture and playback pipelines."
The second generation model iPad will likely offer a front-facing camera with FaceTime video conferencing support.
In less than one year, Windows 7 has surpassed Vista in global usage, however both still pale in comparison to the aged Windows XP.
Vista was released in 2007 to extremely harsh critical reviews. The operating system left many concerns of application compatibility, stringent hardware requirements, and who could forget about the UAC?.
Windows 7 was released in September 2009 to high critical review.
New NetApplications analytics show that Windows has 90.67 percent of the OS market, with XP the dominant leader at 61.87 percent. Windows 7 has now moved to 14.46 percent, just ahead of Vista at 14.34 percent.
In the United States, XP has 44.26 percent, ahead of Vista at 23.31 percent and Windows 7 catching up at 16.09 percent.
Overall Windows share fell from just over 92 percent last July, thanks to a small increase in Apple Mac sales and a large jump in mobile operating systems. Linux share fell to under 1 percent.
NTT DoCoMo has announced their complete purchase of the mobile video firm PacketVideo.
DoCoMo was already a 35 percent owner of the company, purchasing the rest for $111.6 million.
Last July, the company purchased its first stake for $45.5 million.
PacketVideo will continue run independently, keeping the same CEO, president and board of directors.
The acquired company was founded in 1998, becoming one of the earliest mobile video innovators. The company was one of the first to place video on mobile phones, as far back as 1999.
Currently, PacketVideo powers the video services for Verizon, AT&T, Vodafone India, TeliaSonera, Telstra, Rogers Canada, and Telus.
Wikipedia lawyer Mike Godwin recently sent a letter to FBI Deputy Director David Larson rejecting a demand that the community authored online encyclopedia remove an image of the FBI seal from their article on the agency.
You may already know of Mike Godwin from the many internet references to Godwin's Law, which states, "As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches one."
Responding to an earlier letter from Deputy Director Larson, Godwin took him to task for using "creative editing" of US law as proof of authority over use of the seal.
The portion of the US Code in question, 18 USC Section 701, makes it a crime to manufacture, sell or possess a badge, identification card or other insignia used to denote an official representative of a US government agency.
Godwin noted that the statutory language, "badge, identification card, or other insignia" was altered to simply read, "insignia" in Larson's letter.
He went on to explain, "You will note that the phrase “or other” precedes the word “insignia”, both of which follow the enumerated items “badges” and “identification cards.” This constrains the definition of insignia to those objects which are similar in nature to badges and identification cards. This definition comports with case law interpreting 701."
According to the latest Net Applications data, Microsoft's Internet Explorer actually gained browser market share for the second straight month, gaining at the expense of rivals Firefox and Chrome.
For the month ended July 31st, IE grew its share globally by .42 percent, while Firefox dropped 1 percent and Chrome fell marginally by .08 percent.
Internet Explorer 8 saw the strongest growth of any individual browser version, moving up 1.38 percent to 42.16 percent.
Net Applications creates the figures based on browser usage, not installation or download numbers.
Overall, Internet Explorer has 60.74 percent of the market, Firefox has 22.91 percent, Chrome has 7.16 percent and Apple's Safari has 5.09 percent. Opera and others account for the remaining 4.10 percent.
RIM and AT&Thave unveiled the latest BlackBerry smartphone today, the Torch 9800, RIM's first slider device.
The device has a 3.2" HVGA+ touch screen with 480x360 resolution and a 5MP camera with IS, auto-focus and VGA video recording.
On the inside is 512 MB flash memory and 512 MB SDRAM. Included are a 4 GB eMMC + 4 GB media card. The phone has a MicroSD slot with support up to 32GB.
As is standard now, the device supports Wi-Fi b/g/n, Bluetooth 2.1+EDR and 3G.
Perhaps the most notable addition alongside the otherwise mediocre specs, is the upgrade to BlackBerry OS 6. BB OS 6 brings a WebKit-based browser which should significantly improve the Internet experience, long a complaint among BlackBerry fans.
The Touch will hit AT&T on August 12th for $200 with contract.
DivX has announced that Skyworth Group, a Chinese electronics company, will introduce DivX Certified digital TVs this year.
DivX certified DTVs are capable of playing MPEG-4 video, either from USB devices or streamed across a network if the TV has the necessary interface. They can also decode video encoded with a variety of other MPEG-4 tools.
According to a joint press release from the two companies, eventually Skyworth will be selling HDTVs with DivX Plus HD Certification, which among other things means support for Matroska (MKV) files.
The first DivX Certified TVs from Skyworth should be available throughout Oceania in August, and introduced soon after in Europe, Africa & the Middle East.
No date for the introduction of DivX HD Ultra Certified models has been announced.
Starting today, kiosks from Redbox will be offering Blu-ray discs for rental in addition to DVDs.
The discs, which will rent for $1.50 (plus tax) per night compared to $1.00 for DVDs, will initially only be available at a little more than half of their locations. As with DVDs, they can be returned to any Redbox kiosk.
The company expects to be stocking Blu-ray discs in all of their kiosks before the end of the year.
The initial selection of Blu-ray discs includes The Book of Eli, Bounty Hunter, Brooklyn's Finest & Green Zone.
With approximately 23,000 locations, Redbox is the leading operator of DVD rental kiosks in the US.
Last week, we reported that Sony's latest PlayStation 3firmware update, version 3.41 was crashing some consoles and some users simply couldn't install the new update.
Sony denied the software was causing the problems, instead saying it was user's individual hard drives, if they were using manually installed drives.
At the time, the company said: "We apologize for any inconvenience you are experiencing with upgrading Internal Hard Disc Drive (for PlayStation3) on your PlayStation(R)3 computer entertainment system. The information available to our Consumer Services Department does not suggest that this is a problem PlayStation(R) owners are likely to experience when upgrading the HDD with 3.41update. Sony Computer Entertainment America (SCEA) strongly supports the quality of its products and backs them with full confidence."
We ask that you update the previous HDD first to see if the update will go through. Then update from the thumb drive that is formatted in FAT 32 and has the 3.41 update downloaded."
Connecticut's Attorney General Richard Blumenthal seems to think that Apple and Amazon may be enjoying an unfair advantage in the e-book market and has accused the two companies of price fixing.
Blumenthal has requested meetings with the tech giants in an effort to discuss the deals they have with massive e-book publishers Macmillan, Simon & Schuster, Hachette, HarperCollins and Penguin.
The AG says both companies have deals with the publishers that promise them the best e-book prices over any competition.
Such "most favored nation" clauses blocks the publishers from offering discounts deeper than what Apple or Amazon receives. While the deals are not illegal under current antitrust laws, they certainly fall into a gray area.
"The concerns are compounded, and hence potentially more troublesome, since this arrangement appears to be something that will be agreed to by the largest e-book publishers in the United States and two competitors who combined will likely command the greatest retail e-book share," Blumenthal added, via CNNMoney.
According to Canalys Smart Phone Analysis services, the smartphone market grew 64 percent globally year-on-year (YoY) for the Q2 2010, with Nokia remaining the worldwide leader.
Nokia, long the world's biggest phone seller, shipped 23.8 million phones during the quarter, good for 38 percent share of the global market. The vendor saw 41 percent growth YoY.
While 41 percent growth is strong by any standard, it is important to note that that number fell well below the overall market growth of 64 percent, and well below the growth of Android and Apple.
For the quarter, Android saw a ridiculous 886 percent growth, with Apple seeing 61 percent growth. U.S. market leader RIM saw 41 percent growth for their BlackBerry devices.
Bloomberg has reported today that social networking giant Facebook may delay its IPO (initial public offering) until 2012, giving founder Mark Zuckerberg extra time to gain users and boost revenue.
The news comes from three anonymous sources within Facebook who do note that Zuckerberg has board control and could push for the stock offering at any time, but would prefer to have another year of growth before all finances go public.
Facebook is currently valued at about $25 billion, although revenue was only around $800 million last year.
"The burden of being public has never been greater," says Kevin Landis of Firsthand Funds. "Zuckerberg doesn’t have to put his name at the bottom of four 10-Q statements every year and attest that everything in there is true or else he’s responsible. The minute it’s public, he does."
Zuckerberg has said simply that the company will go public "when it makes sense" to.
The iPhone Dev Team has released the first official iPhone 4 jailbreak this week, using a browser-based exploit.
However, some of the users that have jailbroken their device has reported broken MMS and broken FaceTime.
Hacker "comex" released the option via jailbreakme.com, and visitors to the site on their iPhone 4 devices can start the jailbreaking process right from their phone browser.
The iPhone Dev Team's hack is the first for the device, despite hacker Geohot's claims to an iPhone 4 jailbreak last month.
As a note, iPads running iOS 3.2.1 will not be able to jailbreak their devices.
Making this jailbreak different than pretty much every other one before it, is the fact that it is completely browser-based, using the AppleSafari browser.
The hack comes a week after the U.S. Library of Congress officially made jailbreaking legal.
Record label representatives have been caught issuing DMCA takedown notices for Radiohead's In Rainbows album despite apparently not having any legal standing to do so.
Radiohead released In Rainbows online in 2007 after severing their relationship with EMI. It was initially offered online, with downloaders allowed to choose their own price - even if they chose to pay nothing.
The DMCA's takedown provision allows rights holders or their agents to have infringing content taken down by service providers. But the rights in question would have to be for digital distribution.
A few months after it's initial online release, the band made a distribution deal with a RIAA member, ATO Records, which doesn't seem to include any digital distribution (ie download) rights.
In fact it appears that Warner/Chappell Music, a publishing company owned by Warner Music Group, is contracted to be Radiohead's representative in digital licensing. Although public details of the arrangement are somewhat vague, Last.fm lists the company as the label for In Rainbows.
A Twitter user in Tokyo has posted the 20 billionth tweet in the history of the micro-blogging site, four years after the service launched.
The popularity of the service has grown exponentially over the past year, with the 10 billion mark being hit just five months ago.
15 million was hit in June, riding the heels of the World Cup tournament's huge popularity.
Twitter blogged recently that the service adds 300,000 new users every day, on top of the 120 million registered users it already has.
In February, the service said it was seeing 600 tweets per second, which moved to as high as 3000 a second during the World Cup. In 2007, when the site was still in its infancy, there were about 5000 tweets per day.
In its first fiscal year of availability, 2006, Sony sold 3.5 million consoles. For the fiscal 2007, Sony sold 9.1 million units. For the fiscal 2008, the company sold 10.1 million units. In fiscal 2009, with the release of the slimmed down version of the console, Sony sold 13 million consoles.
For the fiscal 2010, Sony has said they plan to sell 15 million units.
While the Microsoft Xbox 360 had a one-year lead in the current-gen market, the PS3 is catching up, now down by just 3.6 million, according to the Examiner.
According to figures site AndroLib, the Android Market has seen 100,000 apps submitted since its debut, although there are still not 100,000 apps available in the store.
The site says 18,000 apps have been removed or been unpublished, leaving the active app count at somewhere over 82,000.
Last month, Google confirmed 75,000 apps in the Market.
AndroLib counts apps available in the U.S and internationally, as well as those submitted in those nations.
Said the site this weekend: "When Androlib launched in June 2009, barely 5,000 applications and games had been submitted to the Android Market. This number quickly grew overtime exponentially. By the end of 2009, it would cross 20,000. Today, we are happy to announce this number surpassed 100,000."
Details are laid out about the smartphone in the leaked pages, as well, with the most notable being the launch-day addition of Android 2.2 Froyo. Android 2.2 includes 450 percent better performance, an improved browser, built-in Flash 10.1 support, and Apps2SD among other features.
Swype will also come pre-installed, giving users arguably the best virtual keypad typing system available.
The device has a 1GHz processor, a QWERTY keypad, 8GB onboard memory, and an 8GB microSD card.
Additionally, the phone will come pre-installed with a plethora of Verizon apps, Skype Mobile, NFL Mobile, Blockbuster, City ID and 3G Mobile Hotspot.
While there hasn't been too many complaints, a number of PlayStation 3 owners have complained since Friday that Sony's recent 3.41 firmware update has been crashing their console, or just won't install at all.
Sony has been quick to respond, saying the problem doesn't lie with the firmware update but instead with the user's individual hard drives.
Many users upgrade their standard Sony-issued hard drives, especially if they own PS3s that started with tiny 20GB or 40GB HDDs.
If you are having trouble, Sony has suggested switching back to your original PS3 HDD to get the update, first.
Says Sony:"We apologize for any inconvenience you are experiencing with upgrading Internal Hard Disc Drive (for PlayStation3) on your PlayStation(R)3 computer entertainment system. The information available to our Consumer Services Department does not suggest that this is a problem PlayStation(R) owners are likely to experience when upgrading the HDD with 3.41update. Sony Computer Entertainment America (SCEA) strongly supports the quality of its products and backs them with full confidence."
T-Mobile has announced today that it has expanded its HSPA+ data network to nine new cities, making it available to over 100 million Americans.
Small cap company Microvision has seen their stock price jump today after anonymous sources claimed that the upcoming 
