Game developer Positech Games is following up their successful game Gratuitous Space Battles with Gratuitous Tank Battles. The game is in development for Mac OS X and Windows, and is due out later this year. (more…)
Newer Technology has introduced a new 2 terabyte (TB) version of its MAXimus mini portable RAID hard disk drive. It costs $300. (more…)
Karelia Software has updated its Sandvox Web site creation software to version 2.1. The update is compatible with Mac OS X 10.7 “Lion.” Sandvox 2 costs $77. (more…)
RIM’s co-CEOs narrowly missed facing a forced shareholder vote on whether they should keep their co-Chairman titles at the company’s annual meeting. However, when you think about it, the proposal really has no teeth anyway. (more…)
Sgt. 1st Class Leroy Arthur Petry:
“It was probably going to kill all three of us. I had time to visually see the hand grenade. And I figure it’s got about a 4½-second fuse, depending on how long it has been in the elements and the weather and everything and how long the pin has been pulled. I figure if you have time to see it, you have time to kick it, throw it, just get it out there.”
I can’t even begin to imagine the horrors soldiers go through during conflict, but I salute you all.
A Nation Salutes | The Daily
After a pitiful year full of mismanagement, failed product launches and a falling stock price, I was sure that RIM shareholders would hold those responsible accountable. Apparently not. (more…)
One of my favorite music hardware companies, Apogee Electronics, released an updated version of its Symphony I/O beta software, adding new features and fixing a few bugs. (more…)
The numbers were off but the news was right: Electronic Arts (EA) has purchased casual game publisher PopCap Games for $650 million. The deal is expected to close in August. (more…)
Apple, under the direction of Steve Jobs, has taken a unique approach to Wall Street and Apple’s share price. On May 26th, 2010, Apple overtook Microsoft in market capitalization and became the largest technology company in the world. Less than a week later, Kara Swisher asked him about the monumental event during an interview at the 8th annual All Things Digital Conference. Even though Steve called it a “surreal” moment for “those of us that have been in the industry a long time,” he also noted that it “doesn’t matter very much” because “it’s not what’s important” since “it’s not why any of our customers buy our products.” In a 2008 interview he did with Fortune magazine, he explained what is important at Apple: “We just want to make great products.”
Matt Richman takes a look at what Apple should do with all of the cash it banked over the years, but the real gem of the article for me is how Apple is run by people and not businessmen.
Apple is one of the smartest run businesses in the world, but I’ve always had the feeling the Steve Jobs was making products that he wanted to use himself. The other side of that coin is a company that makes products to meet budget constraints or delivery deadlines.
I’ll take an Apple product any day.
Last November when we launched our $7.99 unlimited streaming plan, DVDs by mail was treated as a $2 add on to our unlimited streaming plan. At the time, we didn’t anticipate offering DVD only plans. Since then we have realized that there is still a very large continuing demand for DVDs both from our existing members as well as non-members. Given the long life we think DVDs by mail will have, treating DVDs as a $2 add on to our unlimited streaming plan neither makes great financial sense nor satisfies people who just want DVDs. Creating an unlimited DVDs by mail plan (no streaming) at our lowest price ever, $7.99, does make sense and will ensure a long life for our DVDs by mail offering. Reflecting our confidence that DVDs by mail is a long-term business for us, we are also establishing a separate and distinct management team solely focused on DVDs by mail, led by Andy Rendich, our Chief Service and Operations Officer and an 11 year veteran of Netflix.
Personally, I only stream videos from Netflix, so this price change doesn’t really affect me. The streaming plan is still $7.99 and Netflix is still the best, so I’ll be sticking with it.
Either people don’t listen to what features they’re getting on their phones or they believe what they want. Regardless, some answers from a new study are surprising. (more…)
Apple has updated iWeb to 3.0.4 and iDVD to 7.1.2. Both updates are available through the Software Update system preference. You can also download them from the Apple Support Downloads Web page. (more…)
Mobile handset-maker HTC on Tuesday responded to Apple’s new patent complaint, saying it should compete in the market instead of suing rivals. (more…)
Apple Inc’s chief patent counsel will soon leave the company, at a time when the iPhone maker is fighting numerous legal battles around the world, according to a source familiar with the situation.
Interesting that he’s leaving, but I wouldn’t read too much into it. Apple and every other company out there is involved in patent disputes and have been for many years.
But there will always be the open web for the geeks, the misfits, the eccentrics, the control freaks, and any other term we can think of to proudly express our healthy skepticism of giving up too much control over what really should be ours.
Marco Arment has a great post talking about how easily people give up control over their online identity. Like Marco, I’ve always tried to have my main email at my own domain too.
Own Your Identity | Marco.org
Parallels on Monday announced Parallels Desktop 6 for Mac Enterprise Edition, a new version of their virtual machine software for Mac OS X. It’s available to businesses as an annual subscription service. (more…)
If you’ve ever wanted to turn your iPad into a Personal Access Display Device – a PADD, a seen in Star Trek – here’s your chance. CBS Interactive on Monday released Star Trek PADD for the iPad. It costs $4.99. (more…)
Twitter on Monday said it now has more than 1 million registered applications on its network. (more…)
Apple Inc, Microsoft Corp, Research in Motion Ltd and three other leading tech companies received court approval on Monday to buy wireless patents from the bankrupt Nortel Networks Corp for $4.5 billion.
That’s a lot of money, but there are 6,000 patents in the portfolio, so it could save the group of companies a lot of headaches down the road.
Courts approve Nortel patent sale to Apple/RIM group | Rueters
PayPal on Monday released an update for its iPhone app, making it even easier for users to make transaction from phone. (more…)
Apple has updated three of the applications it includes in its iLife ’11 suite of applications – iMovie, Garageband, and iPhoto. The new versions, 9.0.4, 6.0.4 and 9.1.5 respectively, are available for download through the Software Update system preference. (more…)
Pangea Software has announced that they have made their games for iOS free, for Monday only. The company is marking its third anniversary on the App Store by making their entire catalog of iOS games free. The sale lasts from 8 AM to 8 PM Central time on July 11. (more…)
Geddy Lee’s bass sound is a combination of five channels, which represent various aspects of an entire bass sound, and run from clean to distorted-beyond-all-reason. The two main components of his sound are an Avalon DI and a Palmer DI. The Avalon is warm with a punchy midrange, and the Palmer is super clear with an extended low end. The last three channels are all distorted to one degree or another. There’s an instantiation of Eleven dialed up to sound like an old Fender Bassman—slightly distorted, but not crazy. There’s a SansAmp, which is more distorted and further down in the mix. Then there’s an Orange amp, which we run off to a bass cab backstage and throw another Palmer PDI-03 on. It’s cranked wide open and is preposterously distorted. It sits in the back of the bass mix. All of this gets sub-grouped, compressed, and run into an instantiation of Waves API 550A EQ.
I love the old Rush music.
Final Rush Rehearsals—Geddy Helps Fine-Tune His Own Sound | Avid
I take it that Apple is skeptical of the outcome of that ongoing ITC investigation and, therefore, wants a second try with potentially stronger patents. In April, the ITC staff (the Office of Unfair Import Investigations, which participates in most ITC investigations as a third party) expressed its opinion that HTC did not infringe any valid Apple patents within the scope of that investigation. The target date for a final initial determination by the Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) hearing the case is August 5, 2011 (as I already wrote in February). The ALJ could still rule in Apple’s favor: the staff recommendation is, after all, just an opinion. However, a negative ITC staff recommendation does not bode well to say the least. I’m sure Apple will fight hard to make the original complaint succeed but doesn’t want to depend on the outcome of that case.
It’s getting hard to keep up with all of these complaints and lawsuits.
Apple files second ITC complaint against HTC: better luck next time? | Foss Pantents
Apple’s iOS App Store has been a huge success for the company and recent analysis suggest that trend will only grow in 2011. (more…)
With Sequoya Projects you can create budgets, track expenses & analyse team costs on your iPad with all the functionality of a desktop app. It’s realtime too, which means you can get financial reporting regardless of location and time.Sequoya brings a cost efficient toolset within reach of smaller companies, producers and freelancers, challenging the features of high-end tools that cost infinitely more.
There are plenty of games available for the iPad, but it’s great having such in-depth productivity apps available too. Sequoya Projects is the first of three iPad apps coming out from Sequoya Media — Sequoya Workflow and Sequoya MediaWall are listed as coming soon.
Fast-forward a bit and here is the upshot of that pitch: my inquiry into it has led to a Times internal review and, as a consequence, Pogue is barred from making any more speeches like this one to public relations professionals.The decision came because such appearances are explicitly prohibited by The Times’s ethics policy. Excerpts of the relevant portions: “Staff members may not advise individuals or organizations how to deal successfully with the news media (though they may of course explain the paper’s normal workings and steer outsiders to the appropriate Times person)….They should not take part in public relations workshops that charge admission or imply privileged access to Times people….”
Looks like we won’t be seeing as much of Pogue. You have to be careful of perception at that level.
Times curbs Pogue’s P.R. appearances | New York Times
A new blog post at mobile apps analytics firm Flurry underscores the importance of so-called “freemium” apps at generating revenue for developers. (more…)
In the initial stages we are looking to identify a team of individuals who can help support the complicated process of applying for a gTLD and transitioning it into a working operation. Once that team has been identified we’ll then be looking to the community to fund iCANN’s fee and initial costs related to technical operations. An important way you can help is to keep in touch, by filling out the form on the right and subscribe to our Twitter feed. The more followers and community support we can get, the stronger our case to ICANN. If you find this project interesting, please tweet about it and write about it like crazy. This is your project to make sure domains related to your products remains your property and fairly priced. It is a certainly that someone will obtain the .app domain once ICANN brings the new gTLD system into force. This is the only chance we have to keep it within the app software development community.
Sounds like a worthwhile project to me. Take a look and support the cause if you can. More information is available at the .app Project.
A new report from International Data Corp. (IDC) shows that the “media tablet” market isn’t as strong as previously thought, though the iPad is still the most dominant device. (more…)