The Obama administration is calling for stronger privacy protections for consumers as mobile gadgets, Internet services and other tools are able to do a better job of tracking what you do and where you go.
Thursday, 23 February 2012
Behind the Google Goggles, Virtual Reality
It wasn't so long ago that legions of people began walking the streets, talking to themselves.
On closer inspection, many of them turned out to be wearing tiny earpieces that connected wirelessly to their smartphones.
On closer inspection, many of them turned out to be wearing tiny earpieces that connected wirelessly to their smartphones.
Bangalore whizkid wins YouTube contest
Eighteen-year-old engineering student Sachin Kukke of Bangalore is the only Indian to win the global YouTube Space Lab science competition from the Asia-Pacific region, the world's leading online video portal said Wednesday.
EU suspends copyright treaty ratification
The European Commission, facing opposition in city streets, on the Internet and in the halls of parliament, has suspended efforts to ratify a new international anti-counterfeiting agreement, and instead will refer it to Europe's highest court to see whether it violates any fundamental EU rights.
Apple, Google among privacy accord signatories
Six of the world's top consumer technology firms have agreed to provide greater privacy disclosures before users download applications in order to protect the personal data of millions of consumers, California's attorney general said on Wednesday.
Microsoft files EU complaint over Google, Motorola
Microsoft Corp has asked EU antitrust regulators to intervene in a patent dispute with Google Inc and Motorola Mobility Holdings Inc as it stepped up its battle against Google.
Google to sell heads-up display glasses by year's end
People who constantly reach into a pocket to check a smartphone for bits of information will soon have another option: a pair of Google-made glasses that will be able to stream information to the wearer's eyeballs in real time.
Facebook status update: You're served
Legal authorities said Tuesday that a High Court judge in England has approved the use of Facebook to serve legal claims.
Nokia to unveil cheaper Windows smartphone
Nokia will next week unveil a new, cheaper smartphone using Microsoft's Windows Phone software, targeting a wider market for its new range of smartphones, two sources close to the company said.
U.S. cloud computing report slams India, China, Brazil
A U.S. software industry report on Wednesday chided Brazil, China and India for policies it said threatened the future of cloud computing, but also took aim at developed countries such as Germany that did well on its inaugural scorecard.
The Business Software Alliance, which represents U.S. industry heavyweights such as Microsoft Corp , said Brazil finished last in its survey of 24 countries, earning only 35.1 points out a possible 100 because of its policies in areas such free trade, security, data privacy and cybercrime.
The Business Software Alliance, which represents U.S. industry heavyweights such as Microsoft Corp , said Brazil finished last in its survey of 24 countries, earning only 35.1 points out a possible 100 because of its policies in areas such free trade, security, data privacy and cybercrime.
Samsung heads to the street to challenge the Apple iPhone with the Samsung GALAXY Note LTE
Samsung gave Android users a few hours with the Samsung GALAXY Note LTE to learn how to use the S Pen. These Android users then took to the streets of Manhattan to face-off against Apple iPhone users one on one. in one task involving the editing of a customized birthday message on each users respective device, the female using the Apple iPhone (4 or 4S) said she was "Jealous" and "embarrassed" because of the functions on the Samsung phablet that were not on the iPhone. While the GALAXY Note LTE user took the S Pen and put his head on his cousin's favorite NBA star (Jeremy Lin?), the iPhone user could only stutter and say that she couldn't do these things with her device. "I'm not very happy right now, my phone can't do that," she says. "It's so depressing."
USAF withdraws its request to buy several thousand iPads for the pilots and administration
Due allegedly to security reasons like the inclusion of the Russian-developed GoodReader software as part of the purchase, the Air Force Special Operations Command has apparently canceled its immediate plans to acquire several thousand iPads.
Samsung Galaxy S II sales roar over 20 million in 10 months
The Samsung Galaxy S II is one of the most successful high-end Android handsets out there and now it’s got the numbers to prove it. Samsung says the Galaxy S II has sold 20 million units in the 10 months since its release in April 2011.
Samsung files for Galaxy Axiom, Galaxy Awaken, Galaxy Heir, Galaxy Rite smartphone trademarks
There’s just a few more days until MWC kicks off, with the first keynotes scheduled for Sunday, and as we’re getting ready for the big show, Samsung has filed four new trademarks that may or may not result in actual devices very soon - the Samsung Galaxy Axiom, Samsung Galaxy Awaken, Samsung Galaxy Heir and Samsung Galaxy Rite.
Windows Phone 1080p video recording might be announced at the MWC
A claim has appeared on the WindowsPhone8 Twitter account, which has been pretty accurate in the past, that 1080p video recording is coming to Windows Phone handsets.
LG Optimus 4X HD detailed - the world's first quad-core phone is slim and powerful
The NVIDIA Tegra 3 chip inside actually has five cores, one with lower MHz count for the mundane tasks like standby and UI navigation, with the other four revving up to 1.5GHz when needed. That helps preserve battery life, but just to be on the safe side LG has included a hearty 2150mAh battery in the handset. This pentacore setup NVIDIA now calls 4-PLUS-1, which should help with marketing it.
It is still kept very thin at 0.35" (8.9mm) throughout, and rather compact, considering it sports the new LG 4.7" True HD IPS display with 720x1280 resolution, thanks to the extremely thin bezel on the sides. An 8MP camera with BSI sensor for better low light snaps and LED flash, 1GB of RAM and 16GB internal storage round up LG's first flagship for the year. Connectivity is taken care of by an HSPA+ 4G radio, MHL port and DLNA media streaming capabilities, along with the usual Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and A-GPS chips.
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Do you like where things are heading with the quad-core crowd?
T-Mobile to launch LTE service next year; carrier lost 802,000 contract customers in Q4
Not having an Apple iPhone 4S to offer its customers as the latest iteration of the smarthphone launched in October, T-Mobile saw 802,000 contract customers leave in Q4. We would assume that many of them felt that paying the ETF to break a contract was worth it so that they could purchase the Apple iPhone 4S. Fourth quarter revenue slid 3.3% to $20.6 billion.
RIP: HTC Evo Shift 4G and White HTC EVO 3D
A leaked list of upcoming Sprint handsets about to go EOL shows that both the HTC EVO Shift 4G and the white HTC EVO 3D are about to be taken off life support and allowed to die. The former is dated with its 3.6 inch touchscreen and the single-core 800MHz processor driving the phone. The LG Doctors will be pulling the plug on the device in the middle of next month. That is the same time that the plug will be pulled on the white version of the HTC EVO 3D. It is only the white variant of that model that is going EOL as the original black version of the handset is not affected and both the white and black models will still be getting updated to Android 4.0.
Quad-core powered LG X3 could get name change to LG Optimus 4X HD
Last year, when LG launched its first dual-core handset overseas, it was called the LG Optimus 2x. On board was a dual-core NVIDIA Tegra 2 processor. Now, according to PocketNow, the quad-core NVIDIA Tegra 3 powered LG X3 will be getting a name change to the LG Optimus 4X HD. Yes, it all makes sense, and no matter what LG calls the phone, the huge specs on the device are going to have a lot of smartphone fanatics dying to call it one thing-their own.
Verizon customers start petition for Samsung GALAXY Note
Last month, before the Samsung GALAXY Note LTE appeared on the Super Bowl telecast and was launched via AT&T, speculation centered on a version on the phablet for Verizon. This model for Big Red was called the Samsung GALAXY Journal. But to the chagrin of Verizon customers, there has been no word since then about the phone with the 5.3 inch screen getting launched on Big Red. So some Verizon customers decided to take matters into their own hands and have started a petition drive.
Sony officially kills Sony Ericsson website, replaces it with Sony Mobile
It was really just a matter of time before this happened, but this seems like the most official thing we've seen to show that Sony and Ericsson really are no longer Sony Ericsson anymore after Sony bought out Ericsson. The buyout was completed just about a week ago and Sony is already moving on to promote its new solo venture.
Asus releases official bootloader unlock tool for Transformer Prime
If you've been waiting patiently for the day when you could easily unlock the bootloader on your Asus Eee Pad Transformer Prime, today is finally that day as Asus has released the official tool for unlocking said bootloader. For those who don't know, unlocking the bootloader on a device makes it far easier to mod your device by rooting and installing custom ROMs, kernels, etc. Of course, if you didn't know that, chances are you shouldn't be messing with this tool anyway.
Samsung's new DRAM should super-charge mobile devices
Some have been asking when we would see mobile devices that come with more than 1 GB of RAM built in, but Samsung has decided that it would be better to just make the RAM that is available more efficient and faster. To that aim, Samsung has developed new DRAM that should super-charge next-gen mobile devices.
Nokia and WP7 see signs of light in European Lumia sales
We’ve seen positive and negative prognostications on the fate of Nokia’s WP7 line of Lumia phones, so now it’s time for another round of “let’s try to guess when Microsoft and Nokia won’t share hard sales numbers!”
It’s the New York Times turn this time, and they see some promising signs emerging from the European market. For example, European telecom Orange lists the Lumia 800 as one of their best-selling devices in Austria. Vodaphone reported that the Lumia 800 sold out in Ireland. And in the U.K. Microsoft’s promotion of giving away an Xbox 360 with purchase of a Nokia Windows Phone device drove demand, and WP7 devices claimed 2.2% of smartphone sales in the country in December of 2011.
While 2.2% may not sound like a triumph, every new platform has to start somewhere, and Windows Phone is at least posting growth in European markets year over year. In the U.S. the story is somewhat hazy, as the contracting Windows Mobile market has totally overshadowed the paltry number of devices being sold on U.S. shores, but the long and short of it is there aren’t many WP7 devices selling on this side of the pond.
Nokia hasn’t released a top-tier Lumia for the U.S. yet of course – that will happen with the debut of the Lumia 900, which is expected to launch as an exclusive to AT&T, possibly in mid-March. The panoply of WP7 devices from Samsung and HTC have otherwise failed to inspire U.S. customers so far, and if the Lumia 900 fails to gain traction it’s unlikely that we’ll see significant movement until Windows Phone 8 ships in the second half of 2012.
The elephant in the room of course is whether the rate of growth in Europe is high enough to keep Windows Phone in the game, and whether the platform will ever gain traction in the U.S. In the U.K. WP7 sales grew at a faster rate than the smartphone market as a whole, but it would take years of that sort of growth before they made a sizable dent in the market share of Android or iOS, and it’s safe to imagine that Apple, Google, and the Android OEMs would pull out the stops to try and prevent that.
It will take years for this to play out, but at least we should know in a few months whether Nokia and WP7 have what it takes to attract U.S. consumers. We’ll be sure to keep you up to date as the vaunted “third platform” tries to break into the U.S. in 2012.
source: NYTimes
It’s the New York Times turn this time, and they see some promising signs emerging from the European market. For example, European telecom Orange lists the Lumia 800 as one of their best-selling devices in Austria. Vodaphone reported that the Lumia 800 sold out in Ireland. And in the U.K. Microsoft’s promotion of giving away an Xbox 360 with purchase of a Nokia Windows Phone device drove demand, and WP7 devices claimed 2.2% of smartphone sales in the country in December of 2011.
While 2.2% may not sound like a triumph, every new platform has to start somewhere, and Windows Phone is at least posting growth in European markets year over year. In the U.S. the story is somewhat hazy, as the contracting Windows Mobile market has totally overshadowed the paltry number of devices being sold on U.S. shores, but the long and short of it is there aren’t many WP7 devices selling on this side of the pond.
Nokia hasn’t released a top-tier Lumia for the U.S. yet of course – that will happen with the debut of the Lumia 900, which is expected to launch as an exclusive to AT&T, possibly in mid-March. The panoply of WP7 devices from Samsung and HTC have otherwise failed to inspire U.S. customers so far, and if the Lumia 900 fails to gain traction it’s unlikely that we’ll see significant movement until Windows Phone 8 ships in the second half of 2012.
The elephant in the room of course is whether the rate of growth in Europe is high enough to keep Windows Phone in the game, and whether the platform will ever gain traction in the U.S. In the U.K. WP7 sales grew at a faster rate than the smartphone market as a whole, but it would take years of that sort of growth before they made a sizable dent in the market share of Android or iOS, and it’s safe to imagine that Apple, Google, and the Android OEMs would pull out the stops to try and prevent that.
It will take years for this to play out, but at least we should know in a few months whether Nokia and WP7 have what it takes to attract U.S. consumers. We’ll be sure to keep you up to date as the vaunted “third platform” tries to break into the U.S. in 2012.
source: NYTimes
Patently ridiculous: Google gets patent for multitouch trackpad
We've called out the US Patent and Trademark Office before on patents that it granted to Apple (on multiple occasions), and so it is our duty to point out when the USPTO grants a ridiculous patent to Google as well. This time, the patent is for a multitouch trackpad for use with Android. That's right, the USPTO has decided that adding official support for multitouch trackpads is a patentable idea.
DROID Fighter and LG Cayman are mystery devices for Verizon
A source for Droid-Life passed along a leaked screen shot of workshop dates for some Verizon handsets. Device Workshops are usually offered to reps to get them up to speed on a specific model, so that they can sell the hell out of it. Of course, some models sell themselves, especially when they have a massive 3300mAh battery attached to it. But that is another story for another day as right now we have two mystery devices staring us right in the face.
Google Docs for Android gets another big update
The Google Docs team has been busy, with another significant update to the Android app just weeks after the last one brought offline documents and an improved tablet experience to the platform. This time around the headline feature is real-time collaboration, although a host of improvements are in order.
"Red Carpet" Motorola DROID RAZR MAXX will be given out to select Oscar nominees and presenters
With the 84th Oscar Academy Awards all set for this Sunday, it appears as though Motorola is going to have a huge presence during Hollywood’s biggest night. Well, that’s because its special edition “Red Carpet” Motorola DROID RAZR MAXX will be given out to select nominees and presenters at the event.
Satechi Divoom iFit-2 Speaker Stand delivers high fidelity audio to all smartphones & tablets for cheap
With most devices nowadays, we’re bombarded with a host of accessories, like pedestal/speaker stands, that playfully enhance our gadgets, but they’re normally made to work with only a single device – plus, they’re usually on the expensive side as well. Luckily, there’s this thing called the Divoom iFit-2 from Satechi, that’s essentially a universal speaker stand.
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