The Department of Justice on Wednesday announced that Google has agreed to forfeit $500 million in online ad revenue generated through AdWords advertisements for online Canadian pharmacies. (more…)
It’s not restricted to Sony Ericsson handsets, either. HTC’s often held up as the paragon of Android quality — alongside Samsung — but my own Desire HD is riddled with stuff that I simply don’t want: 3Mobile-TV, 3Musik and Planet3 were all installed alongside third-party apps such as Amazon MP3, Bebo, Bejeweled Deluxe and a demo of EA’s Sims 3.Who’s responsible? Networks, largely, which receive clean handsets and then load them up with rubbish after signing deals with numerous partners. And it’s not like you can just get rid of this software, either — most of it’s there to stay, with hard-coded blocks in place to ensure you don’t uninstall any of the tat you don’t want.
Mike Jennings goes on for a while, but finishes with:
… after all, this sort of thing doesn’t happen on iOS.
Yep.
The Rechtbank ‘s-Gravenhage (a Dutch court in the city of The Hague) today issued a formally Europe-wide preliminary injunction against Samsung’s Galaxy S, Galaxy S II and Ace smartphones — but not the Galaxy tablets — at Apple’s request. The decision follows a hearing held on August 10 and 11, 2011.
The injunction applies to European countries which recognize a particular software patent. FOSS Patents’ Florian Mueller says 14 countries don’t, including Austria, Belgium, Iceland Portugal, and Spain.
Asian suppliers have begun making a lower-cost version of the hot-selling smartphone with a smaller 8-gigabyte flash drive that will arrive around the same time Apple unveils its much-anticipated iPhone 5, two sources with knowledge of the matter told Reuters.
Apple’s COO Tim Cook already said that the company is exploring all possibilities and all markets for the iPhone. Makes sense that Apple would start taking on Nokia in this segment.
Android is being slammed by malware, according to a new report released on Tuesday by Antivirus vendor McAfee. (more…)
I can’t wait to get my hands on a guitar product after a company says it’s perfect for live playing, studio tone, and is also an audio interface. No promise like that has ever come true, and it usually only takes an afternoon to pick out all the flaws in those promises. (more…)
Now, the BX5 D2 monitors extend the bestsellers’ legacy with an elegant new design inside and out. We leveraged technology from our high-end monitors to extend the frequency response and provide an even more natural listening experience. Custom Class A/B analog amplifiers deliver superior dynamics and tonal accuracy across the frequency spectrum—while the latest-generation woven Kevlar low-frequency drivers and waveguide-loaded silk dome tweeters provide rich, defined sound. With the BX5 D2, you’ll enjoy the utmost accuracy in an engaging listening experience.
For $400, these look like very nice monitors.
United on Tuesday said it is converting its flight decks to be completely paperless and will deploy 11,000 iPads to all United and Continental pilots. (more…)
Something this good cannot be ignored.
Everyone knows Apple’s approach to their OS is proprietary. Even though Microsoft’s Windows Mobile 7 OS is freely licensable, it is fully controlled by Microsoft. And now that Google has bought Motorola, Android is looking more and more like it could become more tightly controlled as part of a vertically integrated offering. Unless HP quickly states that webOS will not only be licensable but also truly open (which I don’t think they will ever do), then I believe that there is serious room for a completely new mobile OS to emerge and especially give handset vendors targeting emerging markets an OS of their own to work with.
Not a lot of choices for handset makers that would allow them to compete with Apple.
Apple has released iTunes 10.4.1, an update that’s available for download through the Software Update system preference. (more…)
Looks like Microsoft’s Brandon Watson got more than he expected when he Tweeted about webOS devs switching to Windows Phone. In a follow up Tweet, he notes the overwhelming response:“…I have >500 emails in just the last 22 hours. Had to rethink the algorithm for responding to all.”
Brandon Watson is senior director of Windows Phone 7 development at Microsoft. He put the word out to published webOS developers shortly following HP’s decision to discontinue webOS hardware, offering webOS developers hardware and assistance if they wanted to switch to WP7 development instead. Good on Watson for recognizing an opportunity when he saw one.
Unity Technologies – maker of the Unity game development platform for iOS, Android, consoles and the Web – has announced details for Unite 11, this year’s gathering of Unity developers. The event is scheduled for September 28 – 30, 2011 at the Masonic Center in San Francisco, Calif. (more…)
Social networking is something most of us use to share ideas, media and to chat, but it’s not very private. Now you can setup and manage private groups with a new iOS app called Glassboard. (more…)
If you’re in the market for an iPhone, you might want to check out Best Buy on Monday.
Best Buy and Best Buy Mobile specialty stores are offering users the opportunity to pick up an AT&T 8GB iPhone 3GS for free. The offer is available to those who wish to upgrade or purchase a new two-year activation.
Of course, the iPhone 3GS is not the newest iPhone on the market, but it’s still a worthy phone. The sale is for Monday, August 22 only.
The deal is for in-store only sales, according to Best Buy.
In an email to Macworld early Monday morning, Loch wrote: “I’m happy to put Techspansion to rest. Again.” Updates for VisualHub (and its sibling AudioHub) are available at Techspansion’s website.
Techspansion and its payment processing service, Kagi, were at the center of a dispute earlier this month after Kagi released a Lion update to the discontinued software application VisualHub without Techspansion’s consent. Tyler Loch, founder of Techspansion, discontinued the software in 2008.
When you’re the CEO of a company and something happens to your competitor, you should show some class or at the very least keep you mouth shut. Of course, Michael Dell is not known for his class — remember the comment about Apple in 1997 when asked what he’d do with the company?
“What would I do? I’d shut it down and give the money back to the shareholders.”
That’s right Michael, because you’ve done so much in the past few years to further the computer industry. Let’s see, we have the competitor to the iPod. I can’t even remember the name, but it died. Then there’s the Dell Streak tablet — dead. And I saw a commercial the other day where Dell users can change the color of the lid on their laptop.
Wow, great stuff.
Here are Dell’s latest comments about HP.
With summer ending, we’re expecting a few announcements from RIM just around the corner. End of summer also means we’re closer to the holiday season where RIM and all the major tech companies scramble to get a killer product out of the door that everyone can buy for their loved ones. So what can we expect to see from RIM coming soon? Here are 5 things we have heard about and we know will come soon (hopefully).
When one of the five things on your list is “Native Email and PIM functionality on PlayBook,” you’re pretty much screwed.
BBM Music will arrive as a beta in the U.S., Canada and the U.K. in early September, before launching in the three regions later this fall. Subscribers won’t be able to export the music to PCs, but they will be able to transfer to the PlayBook tablet. The service will also reportedly contain a social aspect that will let subscribers share songs with other BBM Music subscribers.
The PlayBook of music services.
WordPress, the popular Web publishing software, now powers 14.7 percent of the top million Web sites in the world and is used in 22 percent of new active domains in the United States. That’s the word from WordPress co-creator Matt Mullenweg, who posted the stats in a new State of the Word blog on the WordPress Web site. (more…)
But there are exceptions to every rule, and we have found one, courtesy of our friends at Build-A-Beard.The owner and operator of said goatee — a goatee that is certainly worthy of praise — is one Jim Dalrymple of The Loop, who was caught in this photo hounding bicyclists wearing uncessary biking shorts while he was walking to an Apple iPad event.
The beard salutes you!
BlackBerry maker Research In Motion is close to rolling out its own music streaming service that will work across its mobile devices, according to four people familiar with the plans.RIM is in late-stage negotiations with major labels, including Vivendi SA’s Universal Music Group, Sony Corp’s Sony Music, Warner Music Group and EMI Group. The new service is expected to be announced by Labor Day in the United States, September 5.
Please stop now RIM. Your products and terrible and you screw up everything you touch. We’re embarrassed for you.
BGR:
One of our high-level AT&T sources just informed us that an AT&T Vice President has confirmed to several employees that the iPhone 5 is slated to launch in early October.
Yep.
What kind of perverse, unforgiving parallel universe did I wake up in that allowed the PlayBook to still be on the market, and HP’s TouchPad has been discontinued. (more…)
Court records reveal that Apple has already seized unauthorized iPod, iPhone and iPad accessories sold by two stores in the Flushing neighborhood of the New York City borough of Queens, and is now demanding the names of its customers and suppliers. It is also asking one of the defendants — Apple Story — to change its name to keep consumers from confusing the unauthorized gear with Apple-sanctioned products.The trademark infringement lawsuit was first filed on July 25 against Apple Story and Fun Zone Inc., both owned by New York resident Janie Po Chiang, who is named as a co-defendant in the suit, along with Fun Zone manager Jimmy Kwok.
Calling your Apple knock-off store “Apple Story” is just asking for a world of hurt.
If you were thinking about an HP TouchPad instead of the iPad, don’t bother. HP announced Thursday that it is discontinuing operations for webOS devices, including the TouchPad and webOS phones. (more…)
AT&T has indicated that it is doing away with its 1000 message a month plan, offering new subscribers a more expensive unlimited plan (or pay-by-message fees) instead. The change phases in on August 21, 2011. (more…)
BGR:
“The offered consideration does not compensate shareholders for the company’s intrinsic value and stand-alone alternatives going forward, nor does it compensate shareholders for the company’s value as a strategic asset for Google,” investor John W. Keating said in the lawsuit.
Take your money and run.
Avid released an update for Pro Tools 9, adding support for Apple’s recently released OS X Lion. (more…)
Global Equities Research analyst Trip Chowdhry sent an investor note out on Wednesday warning that a weak back-to-school season caused last weekend’s Mac sales to slump between 35% and 40% from the weekend of July 23rd. It was “probably one of the slowest weekends for Mac sales,” Chowdhry said.
It’s ridiculous for an analyst to check with four university book stores and then come to a conclusion like this.