Ina Fried / Beyond Binary:
Ballmer: ‘We are done’ with Yahoo acquisition idea — Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer threw his daily bucket of cold water on the notion that the software maker will return with a new bid for all of Yahoo. — “We are done with all acquisition discussions with Yahoo,” Ballmer said …
A report from Japanese gaming magazine Famitsu has brought us a bucketload of new details about Square Enix and the games currently in development by the company. Don't look now, but it seems that Tetsuya Nomura's Final Fantasy Versus XIII is taking a back seat to Final Fantasy XIII which is being overseen by colleague Yoshinori Kitase.AT&T, the nation's largest network operator, has come together with Korean cell phone manufacturer to launch the LG Incite.
After Apple began selling Macintosh systems based on Intel processors, a program called "Parallels Desktop" was released that let you run Windows in a window on a Mac. It instantly became the de facto standard for breaking down walls between operating systems on the Mac OS. Parallels uses a technique called "virtualization," which creates a virtual computer running within the physical, real computer. Called a "virtual machine," it can use different operating systems, allowing Mac users to simultaneously run, say, Windows or Linux. 
Here?s an update to the story about the FCC versus Comcast that we posted on Wednesday. The FCC has officially ruled today and it turns out that Comcast will not be fined for throttling peer-to-peer network traffic, but it will have to stop discriminating against certain internet traffic until the company comes up with a compliance plan ?to fully disclose its practices? to customers.
Bloomberg reports that the five-member FCC panel voted 3-2 against Comcast. Critics of Comcast?s traffic-regulating activities are calling the ruling a ?bellwether case?. It?s important to note that although Comcast has been ordered to stop throttling traffic, it appears that the reasoning behind the ruling has more to do with the fact that the throttling wasn?t being disclosed to customers, not that the throttling was actually taken place. So it appears that bandwidth management can and will continue, it?ll just have to be more transparent.
Throughout the day, people go through my trash cans. It's a depressing sight. Among the streets of affluent Newport Beach are legions of trash pickers, pulling out cans, bottles and other recyclable material. Most are Latinos, recent immigrants or illegal immigrants, I would guess. Often they might be accompanied by one or two small children. It always makes me thankful I'm not having to take my children to scavenge through trash cans, plus makes me wonder why things can't be better.
We don't separate our recyclable material in Newport. I don't know exactly why. One rumor is that residents are just too lazy. Another is that with the small streets and alleys in Balboa, the part of Newport where I live, there's not room for multiple bins. Instead, the city ships everything off to a "Materials Recovery Facility" where everything is sorted through by others, using machines and by hand, to pull out what should be recycled. Apparently, it gives the city a 50% recycling rate.
I guess. I've always wanted to somehow get a tour of this MSF and see the recycling happen in action. It always feels weird to just toss bottles and cans in with the rest of the regular garbage. And by doing so, the alleys of Balboa get turned a place for the scavengers to harvest each day.
A minor problem, aside from the inhumanity of people surviving by picking through your trash, is the inconvenience. Plastic garbage bags get ripped open, so that any pickings can be extracted. That lets in flies, and when it's hot, you get lots of them.
We consider putting out all the cans and bottle separately, so that people who wanted them could just get them in a far more humane and efficient way. The problem is, apparently, that the bags still get ripped open anyway, just in case there's stuff inside worth getting.
That led to a search for see-through bags, so that those coming to our trash cans could see there was nothing inside worth harvesting. It's one of those things you never imagine doing, standing in a Home Depot looking for see-through trash bags, so that young mothers with their children won't waste their time on your garbage.
We never found the bags. The harvesting in the alleys continues on, as well as in the trash cans along the beach itself. Such a world.
Are you one of those unlucky souls who enjoys decent cell phone reception when you're out and about, but can't get a signal at home or in the office? You're not alone.
Outsourcing is now standard among cellphone carriers, whether it's for call centers or retail sales. But as Sprint (NYSE: S) Nextel looks for ways to right its listing ship, it is mulling a fairly dramatic outsourcing effort that could involve thousands of its IT and network-operations employees, the Kansas City Star reports. A spokesman for the carrier declined to give specifics on the outsourcing idea other than to say it was an option. "What we spend on our network per customer is more than what our networks are spending," said the spokesman, John Taylor.
Macquarie Research analyst Phil Cusick recently suggested the carrier might be exploring outsourcing IT-related jobs to IBM and network operations jobs to Alcatel Lucent or Ericsson (NSDQ: ERIC). He thinks the carrier could outsource as many as 5,000 to 10,000 employees through the move. "Network outsourcings typically involve transferring the affected network-operations employees (though not the network itself) to the vendor, which will then 'right-size' the cost structure," Cusick wrote recently in an investor report. "Given (Sprint's) redundant iDEN and CDMA workforces, we would expect significant layoffs (including in Kansas City) that (Sprint) may not have the political stomach to do itself."
It's not an entirely new idea in the industry. Carriers have various functions that operate internally and externally, oftentimes moving in both directions depending on performance and other metrics. Sprint Nextel is working on improving the customer experience, re-building its brand and increasing profitability, Taylor said. "The other focus that we have is that we really want to simplify our business and that's been true from the very beginning (when Sprint acquired Nextel in 2005)? We've begun the process of turning things around, but there's a lag of perception in the marketplace and it's understandable."
Social Media Deals Report: This 199-page report, filled with charts and data, examines the categories, number and size of VC and M&A deal in social media from 2007 through 2008. Visit the ContentNext Reports page
Filed under: Software, iPhone, App Store, iPod touch, First Look
As a gadget hound and productivity freak, I've tried just about everything over the past 10+ years, both hardware and software. My gadgets have included a Palm IIIe, two Handspring Visors, a Newton 2100, a Newton eMate and a Palm Tungsten E2. They were all nice (some more than others), but each shared deficits of one type or another. Graffiti and easily-lost styluses were two biggies.Continue reading First Look: FrontPocket for iPhone and iPod touch
TUAWFirst Look: FrontPocket for iPhone and iPod touch originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Wed, 19 Nov 2008 11:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Inspired by Emmett Williams, a practitioner of concrete poetry, Rob Giampietro has written three poems: Wastebasket, Snowflakes, and Spraypaint.
Giampietro has put out a call for someone to develop a Williams Word Generator. Drop him a line if you can help out...shouldn't be too much different than the many "words within words" generators scattered around the web.
(link)
Though nearly the entire pre-flight process has been tweaked to make use of modern technologies, one outdated aspect still lingers: the tickets. Every single time I fly, I find myself checking the location where I put my tickets once every 3-4 minutes. Are they still there? Did I remember to zip up after I last checked? When I pulled my hand out, did the ticket sneak out? I’ve never lost a ticket, yet I consistently fear that I will. It’s just such an abnormal thing in our daily lives - when else are we given something to hang on to for a few hours that is so easy to lose or destroy, yet so significant in the success of our plans? Lose that ticket, and there’s a good chance queues and regulations might just make you miss your flight. Miss your flight, and you’ll be making up for it your entire trip.
Fortunately, the times are changing. As handset displays grow to higher and higher resolutions, functionality generally limited to ink and paper becomes possible. Scannable barcodes can easily be printed onto just about any device made within the last few years, opening the door to ticketless boarding via your cell phone’s display.
Continental was the first in the US to embrace this concept, back in May of this year. Now American Airlines has hopped on board with the launch of their Mobile Boarding Passes program. If you’re flying out of Chicago (ORD), Los Angeles (LAX), or Orange County (SNA), you’re given the option to send a digital boarding pass to your cell phone via e-mail. The boarding pass contains a QR-code-ish bar code - security will scan this, and you’re on your way. Just remember to juice up your phone before heading to the airport!
Crunch Network: CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0
… that I have heard on radio:
(she) “I would like to have more people paying attention to my presenting skills!”
(he) but you don’t have any, that’s why people look at your breasts.
"Accomplish more today and everyday... with Agendus for Windows Mobile! The Smartphone (non-touchscreen) version of our award-winning personal information manager (PIM) includes powerful new features and significant usability improvements to help you work smarter and get more done while on the go."
Here's yet another reason we have no excuse to not to be organized. The feature list alone is reason enough to consider Agendus 3.0. If you're looking for a solution to keep your tasks, contacts, and schedule organized in one neat package, this could be for you. It's $19.95 at our store but if you're not quite sure about it there is also a trial. If you decide that this is the one for you, be sure and come back to let us know what you think.
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Filed under: Cellphones, Handhelds
LG Incite for AT&T, now with more official originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 18 Nov 2008 13:33:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Read | Permalink | Email this | CommentsThere are many things to consider before you a purchase a cell phone. One major consideration for most consumers is the price of the cell phone.
Understandably, cell phones that have very few “bells and whistles” will cost much less than a mobile phone that also serves as an MP3 player, a video camera, a camera and has a full QWERTY keyboard, although sometimes you can pick these phones up for relatively cheap if the wireless carrier is offering incentives or rebates.
What’s not included in the price of most cell phones is the wireless service to make phone calls and send text messages. Wireless plans can vary from prepaid accounts which allow subscribers to pay as they go (or use minutes) to family calling plans that offer multiple handsets for family members with a calling plan that covers all the mobile phones in the family.
You can buy a cheap prepaid cell phone at most large retailers such as Wal-Mart, Target and even some smaller drug stores. Convenient and cheap, prepaids are a popular choice for those that aren’t “heavy users.”
My advice is, check cell phone prices before you buy. Since it’s a buyer’s market, chances are you can find a better price if you search vendors before buying.
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Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Hardware, Portables, Apple, Macbook Pro, MacBook, MacBook Air
Talk about being slightly touched. Arik Hesseldahl's BusinessWeek article, published today, says "...as of Nov. 19, Hewlett-Packard has beaten Apple to the punch, announcing the first multi-touch-enabled notebook PC, the tx2. I can't help but wonder whether Apple just lost an important race."
Not only did Apple not lose an important race, the tx2 isn't the first multi-touch notebook. Engadget points out that the Dell Latitude XT, which offered multi-touch technology, came on the scene back in July of '08. But even that wasn't first, because the MacBook Air was introduced on January 15th of 2008 with a multi-touch trackpad.
"Well," you say, "there's a difference between a touchable trackpad and a touchable display." You're right: one's meant to be touched and one isn't. The reason the trackpad on the MacBook Pro and he MacBook has gotten larger, smoother and glassier is because Apple is (and will continue to) inviting you to do more with it than tap and click. Multi-touch gestures on a notebook ought to be delivered via the surface that's made to be touched, not the surface made to be viewed. On the iPhone those surfaces are one & the same because there's no other option.
But really, the notion that Apple "lost an important race" by not being first is the biggest error here. Apple wasn't the first to release jukebox software, a portable music player or a mobile phone. Yet, iTunes, the iPod and the iPhone are the most successful examples of each. Apple's greatest strength is patience.
The designers and developers at Apple know you want a fully touch-enabled laptop. So do the folks at HP. The difference is that Apple's staff are patient and careful enough to execute it in exactly the right way, not just the most obvious way.
[Via MacDailyNews]
TUAWBusinessWeek: HP "out-touches" Apple originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Wed, 19 Nov 2008 15:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Filed under: Macworld, Rumors, Snow Leopard
Snow Leopard could ship as early as January, according to comments made by the director of Apple's Unix Technology Group.
Jordan Hubbard said at the Large Installation System Administration conference last week that Mac OS X 10.6 will ship in the first quarter of 2009, according to MacNN.
This primes the Macworld Expo rumor pump: Scheduled for January 5, Steve could debut new quad-core iMacs in addition to showing off this new version of the operating system.
This is not to be confused with Mac OS X 10.5.6, a minor update, which could be available as soon as Friday.
TUAWMacNN: Snow Leopard could ship 1Q 2009 originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Wed, 19 Nov 2008 12:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Nate Anderson / Ars Technica:
Canadian regulators allow P2P throttling — Massive Canadian ISP Bell Canada scored a big win today, as the country's telecoms regulator issued a long-awaited decision in which it concluded that Bell can continue to throttle P2P traffic at will. In a turn of events that would have seemed shocking …
About two months ago, I purchased a Canon HF100 high-definition video camera to replace my ageing but still totally sweet Canon GL2 (that thing has such great optics!). It took me a while to re-create my template in 16:9 format, but I did and published my first two HD videos to YouTube...and I was quite disappointed with the results. YouTube only offers a 4:3 aspect ratio player, so 16:9 videos look pretty tiny with those big black bars on the top and bottom. I set out to find a better solution for embedding videos on Thoughts Media sites, and I think I've found one: MotionBox.
I say "I think" because while the video quality is utterly fantastic, and for $20 per year they offer a lot of value, I've been seeing some problematic playback issues today - sometimes the video will start right away, other times it will take 30+ seconds before it starts, and sometimes it won't start at all, instead showing a black box. And sometimes it will just "break" and stop playing. These are obviously serious problems, but I don't know if MotionBox is just having a bad day, or if my bandwidth Kung-fu is weak today. So check out the video below and report back what you find - does it play back OK? Any problems or glitches?
Microsoft:
Microsoft Announces New Zune Pass Music Subscription Model — Consumers can now keep the tracks they love. — Zune, Microsoft Corp.'s digital music and entertainment service, today announced landmark agreements with major and independent music labels to bring significant new value to the subscription music model.
