Technology posts

Apple has admitted to a widely-reported problem in which millions of iPhone 4 units are likely to lose signal when gripped by the lower left corner, saying there’s nothing unusual about the flaw, illustrated in this video. In an official statement issued late last night after hundreds of customers reported the flaw, which particularly impacts left-handed users, the company issued the following widely-published statement. “Gripping any phone will result in some attenuation of its antenna performance, with certain places being worse than others depending on the placement of the antennas….

Behold the tale of two inseparable interspecies buddies, a monkey and dog (only Japan, right?), whose friendship is torn asunder by a big move, and subsequently mended by the magic* of Toshiba products. I swear this isn’t a plug for Toshiba – I honestly just really enjoy anything with a monkey in it. And the shot of the car driving away with the dog house on it made me choke. With laughter or tears, you ask? That is for me to know, and I will take the secret to my grave. *”Magic” (c) copyright 2009-2010 Apple Inc. [Via Trendhunter]…

Torrents have been getting a bad rap lately, but pressure has been increasing lately as more and more studios are cracking down on piracy. They must know that you cannot kill a system like that (even by suing those who downloaded The Hurt Locker), it’s just too large and spread out. Somebody seems to get this, as we are now seeing the first series ever to be released exclusively for free download via torrents. The show, Pioneer One, is a science fiction story about an object falling from space only to release radiation which spreads all over North America. US Homeland Security, suspecting terrorism…

The world of technology is unarguably one of the most exciting fields in the contemporary era. The breathless pace of change, the innovation, the competition – it’s all so exciting! But at the same time, the world of tech has bred some unfortunate side effects. Whether it’s the pace or the newness, something about technology gives rise to things that just aren’t acceptable or desired. I’m not talking about reduced attention span here, people. What I’m talking about is a kind of petulant, selfish, annoying behavior that we really need to stop. Here are five things that can occasionally make the…

How have you been making use of your time? PixelOptics have spent the last decade developing emPower, which is – get this – electronic spectacles that can change focus via an electrical current run through a layer of liquid crystal in the lenses, effectively rendering the bifocal obsolete. You tell me what’s not bad ass about that. Just tell me. I dare you. The specs have three modes: when off, they act as a regular progressive lens – not the greatest, but suitable for everyday activity. When in manual mode, the electronic layer is locked in the on position, and the glasses function more or less like…

Adobe has (at last) introduced a version of Flash it swears is suitable for mobile devices, Flash Player 10.1, and in an attempt to prove it isn’t sitting alone whistling its multimedia software’s song, claims HBO, Sony Pictures, Turner, USA Network, Viacom, Warner Brothers and others are already creating Flash Content for MObile. Adobe promises the software — which we all know has been heavily-criticized by Apple CEO Steve Jobs — offers performance and mobile specific features. If you’re on a Windows Mobile, Symbian, Palm or Research In Motion smartphone, I’m afraid you’ll…

Google seems set to stick it to iTunes in an attempt to carve out its own slice of the music market, hoping that by linking music sales up with its dominant search engine it will be able to achieve a content ecosystem designed to support sales of devices powered by its browser-based Android-one-day-Chrome OS. The company is thought to be closing in on launching a music download service, offering tracks for sale and download. This will be followed by the introduction of a subscription-based music service next year (2011), at least, that is what the Wall Street Journal claims. Negotiations aren’t…

These days, if you asked most people which company is out to destroy the PC, they’d tell you ‘Apple’. But it isn’t just Steve Jobs out to crush the personal computer. In fact, a much better symbol for the end of the PC came recently when Google launched an on-site video editing app on YouTube. Why? It was one more step in a trend that moves computing away from the desktop and onto the web. And nowadays, you could even skip editing on the web – the new iPhone will let you edit movies and then upload them directly to YouTube, no computer required. Things that were unimaginable just a few short years ago are now…

Oh dip. This is a sultry unit. Toshiba is celebrating its 25th anniversary by dropping a true iPad killer into the fray. Billed as a ‘concept product’, a limited quantity of the Libretto W100 are being released into the wild as a test to see if consumers will dig it. Hell, I, for one, dig it. Just look at this thing. With a 62gig SSD, 2gigs of RAM, dual 7-inch screens at 1024×600, Bluetooth, WiMAX, and, perhaps most importantly, Windows-goddamn-7, the Libretto W100 sounds a lot like the future of mobile computing we were all hoping the iPad was going to be. This is a real computer, running real, grown-up…

California must really be strapped for cash. In a move to generate some revenue, the state is considering a bill to allow electronic advertisements to be placed on vehicle license plates. Before your ass gets too puckered, I hear you – what about driver safety, right? Apparently, the ads will only play if a vehicle idles for more than four seconds, or is stopped entirely. The plate number would be visible perpetually in one form or another. That’s… slightly better, I guess. “The idea is not to turn a motorist’s vehicle into a mobile billboard,” said Senator Curren Price, the guy behind the idea,…