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US President Likes His Blackberry?

admin — Sun, 01 Aug 2010 21:29:53 +0000

US President Barack Obama uses his BlackBerry or similar device as he walks to the Oval Office in Washington, DC in 2009. Obama fought hard to keep his BlackBerry when he became president, but with only 10 people authorized to email the super-encrypted device, he admitted Thursday that it is ‘no fun. ‘

Porsche Producing $650K Spyder 918 Hybrid

admin — Sun, 01 Aug 2010 21:25:47 +0000

So Porsche has decided to go forward and produce the Spyder 918 hybrid, which, up until now, was strictly conceptual. Did I mention it’ll cost around $650,000? Because it will. Yeah, I just pre-ordered two. Didn’t I, Hot Wheels? High rolla, HIGH ROLLA!

A 3.4-liter V8 petrol burner is combined with electric motors to put out 500bhp, while featuring the mind-altering acceleration to go from a standing start to 62mph in just 3.2 seconds. Topping out at 198mph and offering a very respectable 78mpg fuel economy…
The cost? That hasn’t been officially announced yet, but estimates peg it around the $650,000 mark. Don’t worry, though — it’ll be eligible for the federal tax credit; but you will have to pay GST of $32,500!

Well thank God for the federal tax credit. I know that’s what I’m concerned about when I’m wiping my ass with diamond-studded toilet paper. Did I mention my commode is solid gold? Which — you know how they say you can’t polish a turd? They’ve never seen one sparkling at the bottom of my bowl.

BP to try well kill Tuesday Aug 3

admin — Sat, 31 Jul 2010 21:33:41 +0000

Sat Jul 31, 9:33 AM

BILOXI, Mississippi (Reuters) – BP said on Friday it could seal its ruptured Gulf of Mexico oil well by next week as the House of Representatives voted to toughen regulation of offshore energy drilling.

Sat Jul 31, 9:33 AMBILOXI, Mississippi (Reuters) – BP said on Friday it could seal its ruptured Gulf of Mexico oil well by next week as the House of Representatives voted to toughen regulation of offshore energy drilling.

Windows 7 Had Sold 175 Million Copies!

admin — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 16:08:29 +0000

As part of its quarterly and annual financial results releases late last week, Microsoft announced that it had sold over 175 million copies of Windows 7 through the third week of July. According to Microsoft, Windows 7 is now selling at a rate of about 10 units every second or almost 1 million copies of Windows 7 every single day.

RIM stock jumps as revamped BlackBerry nears

admin — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 01:22:18 +0000

Shares of Research In Motion jumped on Wednesday on speculation that next week it would unveil a new touchscreen BlackBerry that could compete more effectively with Apple Inc’s iPhone and other smartphones.

RIM is expected to announce the launch of the BlackBerry 9800 at a joint event with AT&T Inc in New York next Tuesday. AT&T is expected to get exclusive U.S. rights to sell the new device.

China Renews Google’s License

admin — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 23:34:23 +0000

SHANGHAI — The Internet giant Google said Friday that the Beijing government had renewed its license to operate a Web site in mainland China, ending months of tension after the company stopped censoring search results here and moved some operations out of the country.

Two office workers outside of Google’s head office in Beijing on Friday.
Google made the announcement early Friday morning in California in a blog posting by its chief legal officer, David Drummond.

“We are very pleased that the government has renewed our I.C.P. license,” Mr. Drummond wrote referring to an Internet content provider license. “And we look forward to continuing to provide Web search and local products to our users in China.”
Google’s chief executive, Eric E. Schmidt, said Friday that the renewal “was the outcome we were hoping for.”
Mr. Schmidt, who told reporters on Thursday that the company expected to obtain the renewal, said that he did not know China’s decision would come so soon and was informed of the decision early Friday. He had expected the decision to come down within 24 to 48 hours.
“We’ll keep doing what we’re doing, and they’ll keep doing what they’re doing,” he said Friday at the Allen & Company media conference in Sun Valley, Idaho.

If the license had not been renewed, Google would have effectively been forced to shut down its Web site, google.cn, in China. With the renewal, however, Google can continue offering limited services in China and direct users to the company’s uncensored Hong Kong-based Chinese language search engine, google.com.hk. Hong Kong, a former British colony that is now a special administrative region of China, is governed separately from the mainland. Under the current setup in mainland China, users can conduct a Google search and see the results, but often they cannot open the links.
The license renewal is a sign that Google, while uncomfortable with operating in China and censoring its search results on Beijing’s behalf, is determined to keep a foot in China, which now has more Internet users than the United States.

Google announced in January that it had suffered China-based cyberattacks on its databases and the e-mail accounts of some users. The company said it would also stop censoring search results, which it had agreed to do when it first began to operate in China several years ago. The Chinese government insists that its citizens’ access to the Internet be stripped of offensive and some politically sensitive material.
In March, Google closed its Internet search service in China and began directing users to the uncensored Hong Kong site.

Many analysts were stunned by the moves and questioned whether Google was acting prudently in risking its spot in the world’s largest Internet market.
Just a few weeks ago, however, Google signaled a softer approach to Beijing by saying that it had stopped automatically sending users in mainland China to its Hong Kong site. The company said it had created a Web page that offered users in mainland China a choice, rather than automatically directing them to its Hong Kong site.

The move, though seemingly insignificant, seemed to comply better with Beijing’s strict regulations.
“This approach ensures we stay true to our commitment not to censor our results on google.cn and gives users access to all of our services from one page,” Mr. Drummond wrote at the time.
Renewal is required annually for Google’s license, which officially expires in 2012.
“This is a reasonable move by the government,” Jake Li, an Internet analyst at Guotai Junan Securities in Shenzhen, told Bloomberg News. “Google has brought itself into compliance with regulations, so there’s no good reason to deny them the license.”

Even before the censorship issue came to the fore, Google was struggling in China to attain the same market dominance it has achieved in many other countries.
The hottest Internet companies in China are those like Baidu, Tencent and Alibaba — fast-growing local companies that are making huge profits.

Google is not the only American giant that has had trouble in China. Yahoo and eBay have failed to gain significant traction here. And Facebook, Twitter and YouTube are blocked by the government.
Michael de la Merced contributed reporting from Sun Valley, Idaho.

Google Is Now Selling Signature $300 Designer Scarves

admin — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 18:53:09 +0000

We all know Marissa Mayer is a tech nerd turned fashionista, and it looks like her taste for designer clothes is rubbing off on the search giant.

But unlike the media or mobile industries, the fashion industry appears safe from Google. Google is selling “Google-inspired” scarves and other clothing to the public that were designed by emerging designers. Last year, designers who participated in a Vogue and Council of Fashion Designer program were asked to create a one-of-a-kind item inspired by Google in some way that reflected Google’s aura. Google transformed the finalists creations into iGoogle Artists themes but selected three of the designers to produce and sell their Google-inspired couture.

Here’s the description of the scarf:

Flora Gill designed an oversize, multi-yarn, intarsia hand-knit scarf incorporating silk bias trim with wool and nylon yarn. Inspired by Google’s multi-functionality and diversity, the scarf features Google’s signature colors and is designed to be worn in several ways.

In case you were wondering about the “several ways” you can wear the scarf, I guess you can wear it as a headband, around your neck, or as an armband as a symbol of solidarity with the Googleplex. I don’t know about you, but to me the scarf aesthetically is not worth $300. I mean, come on, for $200 more I could get an iPad.

You can also purchase Peace “Vintage” T Shirt inspired by the point on a Google Map that will set you back by $85. And for any jewelry fans out there, Google is peddling a $200 Old Fashioned Magnifying Glass Pendant, meant to be inspired by Google’s search.

You probably need this $600k HP datacenter

admin — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 23:55:08 +0000

I can think of so many valid reasons why you need this massive 10 rack HP datacenter: Folding@home, downloading torrents, compiling your homemade videos, backing up your precious ROMs and so on. Just stick it in the backyard and you’ll be good to go. What’s that? $600k only gets you the enclosure and not the blade servers? Oh, well. Maybe you don’t need it after all.

The $600,000 price tag also doesn’t include IT support so you’ll likely need to hire a couple of 14-year old high school rejects to manage the servers. In fact they could probably hang-out in the 20ft x 8ft x 8ft enclosure has it has hookups for air and water. Interested? Expect delivery in about six weeks after you obtain a second mortgage on your home and place your order.

Horizon debuts H-Cell 2.0 hydrogen fuel cell system for R/C cars

admin — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 01:33:21 +0000

We just checked out Horizon Fuel Cell Technologies’ personal MiniPak fuel cell charger at CES last month, but the company’s already back with another product that promises to take fuel cells where you might not expect them: hobbyist R/C cars. That comes courtesy of the company’s new H-Cell 2.0 hydrogen fuel cell system, which is an add-on kit that’s designed to replicate the full-scale hydrogen systems now being used on actual cars. In fact, it can even be refueled using a model-scale hydrogen refueling station, which itself can be outfitted with solar panels or wind turbines for a completely carbon-free experience. No word on pricing just yet, but the kit will apparently be available on March 15th — head on past the break for a quick video demonstration.

Netbooks to see speed boost this year

admin — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 19:33:16 +0000

Expect to see Atom-based netbooks speed up a little in the latter half of the year when Intel releases upgraded Atom CPUs able to talk to faster memory than the current lot can manage.

Today’s top-of-the-line netbook Atom, the 1.66GHz N450, connects to DDR 2 Ram through its built-in memory controller. Later this year, Intel will release the N455, which will hook up to DDR 3 memory.

DDR 2 runs at up to 800MHz. DDR 3 can clock at more than double that frequency.

What difference this will make to everyday netbook tasks remains to be seen. According to a report at website Fudzilla, the N455′s CPU core will still be clocked at 1.66GHz.

DDR 3 consumes less power than DDR 2, but since memory isn’t a key netbook power drain, the shift is unlikely to lead to any significant increase in battery life.