Source: Photographybay.com
Source: Papercrave.com
Find yourself complaining about your camera’s megapixel deficiency? Well, skip over this story, as it will make you crap your pants!
The Place: Czech Republic - specifically the reading room of the super old and private Strahov monastery.
The Culprit: Jeffrey Martin and his bionic robotic GigaPanBot: “The GigaPanBot is an automatic rotating pan and tilt head designed to rotate and trigger a digital DSLR camera. It can be used in combination with fish eye lenses to shoot fast 360° panoramas or with tele lenses up to 600mm to shoot multi-row…”
The Outcome: A massive 40 GigaPixel – 360 Degree – 283 GB Panoramic Digital Image! Yea, I said 283 GB image! The finished images was stitched together from about 2,947 separate shots, taking a computer a little over 4 days to complete. Sweet jesus! Now that a new record is set, some one better start daisy-chaining those GigaPanBot cameras together, for a single 360 degree shot of New York…..from the Empire State Building. Just Looked over at my Canon T2i……it just shed a tear…..
Source: Wired.com
There’s fast and then there’s McLaren fast! Add a little Specialized bike frame technology into the mix and you get this beauty – the creation of a mixed union of industries working together to produce a near perfect bike. The Venge is made to break records and not just any records – it’s made to break all real word bike speed records! How does it do that? Well, it starts with the bike weighing less than 1 Kg or 2.09 pounds and once you add seat/handlebars/components it weights 4.5 pounds or just over 2 Kg.
Start to finish carbon fiber. This ultra light but surprisingly strong/ridged material allows the bike to essentially disapear from below the rider, giving the weight to power ratio a tremendous boost. Want one…..yea so do I. This beauty will set you back about $8000 and that’s not including the wheels, which are buy your own. Want to know more - click here.
Source: CrunchGear.com
The dates for Apple’s WWDC 2011 have been release and tickets went on sale…..and then they sold out within hours. The dates: June 6th-10th at Mascone West in San Francisco. Seems regular enough and in line with previous WWDC event except for one minor (major) rumor: no hardware at this years event. By no hardware, we mean no iphone! The blog-o-shere has jumped all over this story, with titles like: “No New iPhone For 2011!” or “2012 For iPhone 5″ but all this seems misleading or just misinterpretations of rumors.
If Apple was going to skip the release of the next gen iphone this year at WWDC, they most likely would release it in Q1 2012. Apple’s Q1 starts after the 24th of September, so that would mean iPhone 5 sometime in late september or October 2011. Why move the hardware release after so many years? Multiple factors may have forced Apple’s hand, such as: The recent Verizon iPhone 4 release – The lack of excitement of iPod hardware releases (Sept) – Fall is a much better marketing season or a buyers market – Distance iPhone and iPad hardware dates.
WWDC will show us the next gen versions of iOS (maybe iOS 5) and Mac OS X Lion – these are the bread and butter for Apple and form the backbone of all their products. An emphasis on software is actually a welcomed sign from a company that has been churning out hardware left and right. It’s hard for me to believe that a lack of iPhone 5 hardware at WWDC has anything to do with component issues or design delays – this is an organized re-scheduling of product releases to better market saturation. Like all things Apple, this is a long time coming.
Source: Apple.com
Only Google can make bad news look so good and be so interactive. Know of Google Labs? Well, you should! Google’s public data explorer enables anyone to get amazing statistical data analysis for many US economic indicators. Case in point – the above picture shows our debt spiraling out of control! Shockingly amazing. Google’s web based interface allows you to get economic data on all 50 states and manipulate it in terms of “Debt” – “Revenue” – “Expenditures” or “Cash Security Holding.” I promise, it’ll be a depressingly fun time!
Source: Google.com
All the talk has been on Google & Apple as of late, in terms of cloud based audio/video/storage but no one told Amazon that. Today, Amazon unveiled their “Cloud Drive” and “Cloud Player”:
“…Amazon Cloud Drive is your hard drive in the cloud. Store your music, videos, photos, and documents on Amazon’s secure servers. All you need is a web browser to upload, download, and access your files from any computer…”
Details: You open a “Cloud” account with Amazon (Free) and get 5GB for storage to start with, that’s about 1000 songs worth of storage. From there, you can put music, movies, docs or anything else your little heart desires and access it from any computer with web access or you can use Amazon’s Cloud Player (Android) for streaming music to your smart phone. (No mention of video streaming)
Do you buy your music from Amazon? Even better, as Amazon will give you 20GB for free when you buy a full album from their music store! Any music bought through Amazon’s Music Store will be stored automatically in your Cloud Drive, for a secure backup. Did you hear that Apple and Google? You guys better be cooking something good!
Conclusion: Amazon allows anyone to store multiple media types (music/movies/docs/etc) in a private/secure cloud locker for free (5GB limit) and then you can access that data from any web connected computer or stream music from your locker with Amazon’s Android based music app. Want extra storage space – drop some cash and you’re in business. Amazon for the win! Google and Apple, you’ve been put on notice…
Source: Amazon.com
Less than a week after Nokia’s first round of patent complaints against Apple were turned down by the U.S. International Trade Commission, Nokia has fired back with a second round of complaints, this time essentially targeting all of Apple’s products. From iPhones, Ipads, Ipods all the way to actual Macs – Nokia is taking aim at everything and all!
Specifics for the second round are as follows: Nokia is stating that Apple has infringed on Bluetooth, hand set voice quality, geo positioning, syncing of data and of course multitasking patents – of which have come from countless years of R&D – specifically $43 Billion worth! Oh Nokia, if that 43 billion number is right, I feel really bad for you. You should have spend more cash on design and marketing – you wouldn’t be in the situation you’re in now – Microsoft’s play toy.
So, how does this end? Like most patent lawsuits and complaints - either nothing will happen, there will be some kind of out of court settlement or licensing agrement but you can bet that Apple will buy Nokia before it gives in to licensing.
Source: AppleInsider.com
Source: Glennz.com
Have Time Warner Cable/internet? Illegally download movies/music/etc? You might want to read this. A U.S. District Court judge in Washington has ordered Time Warner to promptly hand over ISP records from 250 customers, whom are “Supposedly” downloading illegal copies of media. Time Warner has stated, as have other ISP’s, that searching, tracking and identifying customers that are possibly illegally downloading content is both “Expensive” and “Time Consuming.”
This is the same argument several ISP’s have made across the United States and the rest of the world. Not only is it unfair to ask ISP’s to front the cost of such investigations but it is also unjust to hand over private records of customers that are not even involved in such illegal file sharing. Essentially, someone with a wifi router unlocked can be charged with illegally file sharing, even though someone else could be piggybacking on their open network – tons of people have open networks across the world.
In my mind, this accounts to illegal search and seizure!
Source: BGR.com
Johnny on the spot! Looks like everyone is lucky excpet for Apple TV & Verizon iPhone users, as Apple issued an iOS update for most of their mobile devices. iOS 4.3.1 addresses several issues: “Occasional graphics glitch on iPod touch,” – “Bugs related to activating and connecting to some cellular networks,” – “Image flicker when using Apple Digital AV Adapter with some TVs,” – “Issue authenticating with some enterprise web services.”
If you’re jailbroken, stay away until the Dev Team can sort you out but if you’re not, get upgrading. On a side note, people are experiencing a slight increase in battery life and even though Apple doesn’t mentions it in the release notes, it’s always welcome.
Source: Apple.com
Source: Engadget.com
Path is an App and Web based social network or ecosystem, that has one thing in mind: Be social but not too social. “I’m brushing my teeth” or “A bird just flew into my window” – great but no one cares…..except your good friends and they might not care either. Path’s 50 friends limit makes sharing photos and comments more personal – more detailed and less diluted. Its straight forward interface and limited social media options enable your close ring of friends to really see a detailed view of each other’s lives.
In contrast: Facebook’s issue is that it’s too social, it’s too vast and massive, that we kind of get lost and the relationships you had with your personal friends degrades. Sure, you can limit your friends and your personal settings but you still get those damn requests from people wanting to be buddy buddy.
The new social is to be less social! The social media bubble is now starting to implode - except for twitter, which just rocks! People want less noise, less clutter and a more refined, more personal social experience – kind of like when you go out with your friends. When you’re at a bar, you aren’t talking to hundreds of people, your talking to the circle of friends you came with – Path is this social solution. Have a look:
Source: Path.com
Duke is cursed-Period! Looks like like the mythical Duke Nukem Forever, which is made from ground up unicorn horns and elvish blood, has been pushed back until early summer. The original release date was May 3 (USA) and May 6th (World) but that has been rescheduled for June 10, 2011 (World) and June 14, 2011 (USA). The fabled game, which will be released on PC, Xbox 360 and PS3, has been in production for years, if not decades and has changed several company’s hands. For me, they might as well and put it off for 5 more years, as the hype is so large – no matter how good the game is, it will crumble under its own weight. Hope you get a break, Duke!
Source: ArsTechnica.com
Source: Reform.lt
You’ve heard the rumors – you’ve seen the signs and now you’re reading the rumors and signs about Apple’s MobileMe overhaul. Chatter is pointing towards an April launch of the new MobileMe service, with price ranging from free to $20 a year – fine by me either way. So what do we get for free or $20/Yr? Well, you get the regular goodies like contact, calendar, mail, find my iphone, gallery and iDisk but talk is pointing to a sort of music locker. Yea, locker but not like your high school locker, which was filled with Sports Illustrated Swimsuit pictures – this one is for backing up your music library and then…..streaming it to your iOS devices.
Supposedly, Warner Music is already on board and Apple is leveraging that agreement against other labels – what Apple does best – to get everyone on board by the April launch. Apple has the means (North Carolina Data Center) and the content (iTunes) and the technology (Lala.com) – now it’s just a matter of talking the content creators into joining the club.
P.s. If you sign up to MobileMe free 60 Day Trial now – it will grandfather you into the new service or you can cancel if you don’t like it 
Source: 9To5Mac.com
Did you miss all the CTIA goodness? No worries, we have you covered! Samsung’s 2nd gen tab made its grand opening – or both of them made grand openings – if that makes sense. Sammy let loose upon CTIA the Samsung Galaxy Tab 8.9 and 10.1 – yea we agree, get a better marketing department. Both are thinner than the iPad 2 (WOW) and the 10.1 is crowned the thinnest and lightest tablet on the market - both look stunning.
Let’s talk price: The Wi-Fi only Galaxy Tab 10.1 will cost $499 for the 16GB model and $599 for the 32GB model. The Wi-Fi only Galaxy Tab 8.9 16GB will go for $469 and the 32GB model going for $569. Both are expected this summer and LTE/WiMax versions will follow later in the year. Overall, the exterior body of the tabs looks amazing, as for touchWiz…..just let Honeycomb do what it does best…..stock. Sammy has hit the price points but a summer release date allows Apple to have a 3-4 month head start. We shall see – see the Samsung Video below:
Source: Engadget.com
Watch All Three After The Break.
Source: TheCoolHunter.net
On the very day Rimm announced availability (April 19th) and pricing (16GB -$500) for its BlackBerry tablet, Apple counters with its own press release stating that the iPad 2 will go ahead and push into 25 more countries without delay on Friday, the 25th of March. This is what is called a ball-breaker! Apple will essentially have global distribution of the iPad 2 before the Playbook is even released in the States – Check & Mate!
Are you living in a lucky country? Have a look:
“…iPad 2 with Wi-Fi will be available in Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the UK on March 25 for a suggested retail price of $499 (US) for the 16GB model, $599 (US) for the 32GB model, $699 (US) the 64GB model. iPad 2 with Wi-Fi + 3G will be available for a suggested retail price of $629 (US) for the 16GB model, $729 (US) for the 32GB model and $829 (US) for the 64GB model. iPad 2 will be available in Hong Kong, Korea, Singapore and additional countries in April, and in many more countries around the world in the coming months. Further international availability and pricing will be announced at a later date….”
One thing is for sure, don’t expect such low prices, especially for my brothers living here in Europe. Higher tax rates and import duties have sealed our faith and our price points but for the die hard iPad fans, I’m sure you’ve already sold your first born.
Source: Apple.com
Would you look at that! We knew about the BlackBerry PlayBook for what seemed like years (more like months) but besides some specs and the fancy QNX based OS – we never really heard anything concret concerning price or release date……until today. Set your calendar boys and girls for April 19th – the entry level BlackBerry (16GB) will cost you, an “iPad 2 matching” $500 greenbacks, the 32GB goes for $600 and the 64GB model goes for $700 – pre-orders start today.
Where can you get your hands on one of these sexy tablet – where can’t you: Best Buy, Staples, Office Depot, RadioShack, AT&T, Sprint, and Verizon will carry the Tab - along with additional online retailers. Can’t wait and just need to hand over your cash now – Best Buy is taking pre-orders, just click here.
How will the PlayBook stack up against the Xoom and iPad 2? Let’s wait and see what the sales figures and consumer reviews have to say but one things is for sure – the 7inch form factor is not going to look so good when compared to its 10inch counterparts. Consumers have a deep seeded belief that size/price ratio should be high/low – RIMM is going to have to convince a lot of people.
Source: BlackBerry.com