Looking Out For Number One

Microsoft Xbox Takes U.S. Console-Sales Lead After 2 Years, Surpassing Wii (Bloomberg) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 11:25 pm

Bloomberg: Microsoft Xbox Takes U.S. Console-Sales Lead After 2 Years, Surpassing Wii  —  Microsoft Corp.'s Xbox 360 beat Nintendo Co.'s Wii and Sony Corp.'s PlayStation 3 last month to become the best-selling video-game console in the U.S. for the first time in more than two years, helped by the release of the “BioShock 2” shooting title.

Source: Techmeme Firehose |

Lenovo says business will focus on mobile Internet (AP) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 11:11 pm

AP - Lenovo Group expects wireless Internet products to account for up to 80 percent of its sales within five years as it pursues expansion in faster-growing emerging markets, CEO Yang Yuanqing said Friday.

Source: Yahoo! News: Internet News |

Should You Pre-Order an iPad? - OWNING A CUTTING-EDGE gadget ... (Kelli B. Grant/SmartMoney) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 10:55 pm

Kelli B. Grant / SmartMoney: Should You Pre-Order an iPad?  —  OWNING A CUTTING-EDGE gadget has a certain cool factor, but early adopters rarely get a great deal.  Some observers say Apple's (AAPL) new iPad, available to pre-order Friday for an April 3 release, isn't likely to be an exception — though there will probably …

Source: Techmeme Firehose |

Qualcomm's Multi-Fold Device Can Replace Your iPad And iPhone (Go Rumors) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 10:25 pm

Go Rumors: Qualcomm's Multi-Fold Device Can Replace Your iPad And iPhone  —  In digital media circles, there are traditionally three screens for user consumption : the TV, mobile phone and desktop.  This conventionality is seen to be the primary reason why manufacturers were not comfortable in developing …

Source: Techmeme Firehose |

Skype Deliberately Crippling Functionality of iPhone and WinMo and Verizon Apps? (Derek Kerton/Techdirt) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 9:55 pm

Derek Kerton / Techdirt: Skype Deliberately Crippling Functionality of iPhone and WinMo and Verizon Apps?  —  There's something anti-competitive afoot in the ‘VoIP over 3G’ space this year.  Let me run you through a timeline, and see if you can't spot the dirty pool:  — Skype has had a highly functional VoIP client …

Source: Techmeme Firehose |

PCCW Unit Suspended From Beijing Land Transactions (Update1) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 9:52 pm

Pacific Century Premium Developments Ltd., the real-estate unit of Hong Kong billionaire Richard Li’s PCCW Ltd., was suspended from buying and selling land in Beijing, according to a local government statement.

Source: BusinessWeek.com -- Technology |

iPad available for pre-order at 5:30 Pacific (Macworld.com) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 9:41 pm

Macworld.com - If you're looking to be first in line to pre-order Apple's new iPad, then set your alarm, because Steve Jobs's latest creation is available for pre-order in the U.S. early on Friday, March 12: 5:30 a.m. Pacific Time or 8:30 a.m. for those of us on the East coast.

Source: Yahoo! News: Apple/Macintosh News |

iPad available for pre-order at 5:30 Pacific, 8:30 Eastern (Macworld.com) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 9:41 pm

Macworld.com - If you're looking to be first in line to pre-order Apple's new iPad, then set your alarm, because Steve Jobs's latest creation is available for pre-order in the U.S. early on Friday, March 12: 5:30 a.m. Pacific Time or 8:30 a.m. for those of us on the East coast.

Source: Yahoo! News: Apple/Macintosh News |

Apple's eBooks will be much more organized than Apps (Appslice) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 9:30 pm

Appslice: Apple's eBooks will be much more organized than Apps  —  TrakPal V2 iSatFinder Coordinates CycleTracks iNomad Found in Haiti Locate Me!  GPS Meeting Point  —  When Apple's eBook Store opens next month iPad owners will have a lot of categories to browse.

Source: Techmeme Firehose |

Web 2.0 versus Control 2.0 (Lucie Morillon/Reporters Without Borders) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 9:05 pm

Lucie Morillon / Reporters Without Borders: Web 2.0 versus Control 2.0  —  The fight for free access to information is being played out to an ever greater extent on the Internet.  The emerging general trend is that a growing number of countries are attemptimg to tighten their control of the Net, but at the same time …

Source: Techmeme Firehose |

iPad Goes on Pre-Sale Friday Morning (PC World) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 8:45 pm

PC World - The world is one step closer to holding the Apple iPad in its shaking hands: consumers can pre-order iPads on the Apple Website starting tomorrow, Friday, March 12, at 5:30 a.m. PST.

Source: Yahoo! News: Apple/Macintosh News |

Believable Rumor: iPhone 4.0 Software Includes Multitasking (Kit Eaton/Fast Company) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 8:40 pm

Kit Eaton / Fast Company: Believable Rumor: iPhone 4.0 Software Includes Multitasking  —  Some tech rumors pop up then fade quickly into obscurity, while others just keep coming back—one of the biggest of this sort concerns multitasking on the iPhone.  It's here again, centered on the upcoming 4.0 firmware.

Source: Techmeme Firehose |

Mozilla begins testing Account Manager for Firefox to simplify web logins (Lee Mathews/Download Squad) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 8:15 pm

Lee Mathews / Download Squad: Mozilla begins testing Account Manager for Firefox to simplify web logins  —  Mozilla's developers are busily crafting all kinds of features for future versions of Firefox — Jetpack's no-restart add-on functionality,out of process plugins, a bigger, badder JavaScript engine.

Source: Techmeme Firehose |

Why I'm Skeptical of the FCC's Call for User Broadband Testing (Lauren Weinstein/Lauren Weinstein's Blog) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 7:50 pm

Lauren Weinstein / Lauren Weinstein's Blog: Why I'm Skeptical of the FCC's Call for User Broadband Testing  —  Greetings.  The FCC has issued a call for Internet users to test their broadband connections and report the results back to the FCC for analysis.  —  After inspecting the associated site and testing tools …

Source: Techmeme Firehose |

Why Google Android is winning (Matt Asay/CNET News) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 7:25 pm

Matt Asay / CNET News: Why Google Android is winning  —  The global smartphone market is still RIM's to lose, with Apple in the pole position to profit from its mistakes.  But new ComScore data on the U.S. smartphone market suggest that both should be worried by what they see in their rear-view mirrors:

Source: Techmeme Firehose |

FCC releases Internet speed test tool (Reuters) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 7:18 pm

Reuters - The U.S. Federal Communications Commission on Thursday launched a broadband test service to help consumers clock the speed of their Internet.

Source: Yahoo! News: Internet News |

Summary Box: Video game sales drop 15 percent (AP) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 7:03 pm

AP - THE GAMES: Video game software sales dropped 15 percent in February compared to a year ago to $624.4 million. "Bioshock 2" from Take 2 Interactive, which launched in February, and "New Super Mario Bros." from Nintendo were the top two sellers.

Source: Yahoo! News: Software News |

Milo's Response To Google's Blue Dot Specials: A Picture (Leena Rao/TechCrunch) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 7:00 pm

Leena Rao / TechCrunch: Milo's Response To Google's Blue Dot Specials: A Picture  —  This morning Google announced a new Blue Dot feature on the mobile version of Google Product Search that shows whether a product is in-stock at nearby stores.  This seems to pose a threat to startup Milo, which highlights local inventory …

Source: Techmeme Firehose |

Airline Twitter promotion attracts huge crowds (Caroline McCarthy/CNET News) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 6:35 pm

Caroline McCarthy / CNET News: Airline Twitter promotion attracts huge crowds  —  JetBlue employee Morgan Johnston took this photo of the people who showed up in the Financial District when the airline launched an ambitious campaign to give away free tickets by telling Twitter users where to show up.

Source: Techmeme Firehose |

South by Southwest: A Virtual Playground in Austin (Jenna Wortham/Bits) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 6:15 pm

Jenna Wortham / Bits: South by Southwest: A Virtual Playground in Austin  —  Every March, thousands of entrepreneurs and digital types descend on Austin, Tex., for South by Southwest Interactive.  They're hoping to get a glimpse of some of the newest Web and mobile innovations, and perhaps to sample some tacos.

Source: Techmeme Firehose |

Xbox 360 Outsold Wii in February, Says NPD (PC World) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 6:10 pm

PC World - Microsoft's Xbox 360 outsold Nintendo's Wii in February to claim the top spot in the U.S. monthly sales ranking for the first time in more than two years, analyst group NPD said Thursday. Overall the industry had a poor month with total sales down 15 percent from February last year.

Source: Yahoo! News: Personal Technology |

Firemint wins four Pocket Gamer Awards (Macworld.com) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 6:09 pm

Macworld.com - On Wednesday, Firemint was honored with four awards from handheld gaming Website Pocket Gamer at a ceremony held at the annual Game Developers Conference. The company behind Flight Control () and Real Racing () has few titles on the iPhone market—virtually every one has become a mega-hit.

Source: Yahoo! News: Apple/Macintosh News |

Firemint wins four Pocket Gamer Awards (Macworld.com) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 6:09 pm

Macworld.com - On Wednesday, Firemint was honored with four awards from handheld gaming Website Pocket Gamer at a ceremony held at the annual Game Developers Conference. The company behind Flight Control () and Real Racing () has few titles on the iPhone market—virtually every one has become a mega-hit.

Source: Yahoo! News: Personal Technology |

How Google directed its search ads firehose at mobile (Richard Waters/blogs.ft.com) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 5:55 pm

Richard Waters / blogs.ft.com: How Google directed its search ads firehose at mobile  —  As the FTC lays the groundwork for a possible challenge to Google's purchase of AdMob, it is instructive to look at something else Google has already done to gain a strong foothold in the mobile ad business.

Source: Techmeme Firehose |

GDC 2010: Scaling the summits of gameplay Thursday, 11 March 2010, 5:54 pm

roundup This week's Game Developers Conference brings together designers, programmers, publishers, and others for the latest from the world of video play.

Source: CNET News.com |

Web will be 'critical' revenue source for Times: publisher (AFP) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 5:53 pm

AFP - Charging online readers will give The New York Times a critical second revenue stream but the print newspaper will be important for "many years to come," publisher Arthur Sulzberger said Thursday.

Source: Yahoo! News: Internet News |

February video game sales drop 15 percent (AP) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 5:51 pm

AP - U.S. retail sales of video games declined 15 percent in February, hurt in part by an ongoing decline in sales of music games and lower sales of the Wii system.

Source: Yahoo! News: Personal Technology |

What's Happening--and Where? - Every day, millions of tweets are created. (Biz/Twitter Blog) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 5:35 pm

Biz / Twitter Blog: What's Happening—and Where?  —  Every day, millions of tweets are created.  These little bursts of information are about anything and everything—they make Twitter a hub for discovering what's happening right now, anywhere in the world.  A recent burst of interest in location sharing applications …

Source: Techmeme Firehose |

A peek at Unreal Engine on Palm Web OS Thursday, 11 March 2010, 5:32 pm

At the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco, Palm surprises everyone (including Epic Games) by having a working demo of the Unreal Engine running on the company's Web OS.

Source: CNET News.com |

Ga. man who posted 'Elton John must die' arrested (AP) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 4:47 pm

AP - A Georgia man who posted a video of himself on the Internet holding a sign that said "Elton John must die" has been arrested for making terroristic threats.

Source: Yahoo! News: Internet News |

VeriSign to spend more than $300M on tech upgrades (AP) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 4:35 pm

AP - VeriSign Inc., whose technology is key to allowing Internet users to access Web sites with names ending in ".com" and ".net," plans to spend more than $300 million over the next decade to upgrade its systems.

Source: Yahoo! News: Internet News |

Battle for human rights increasingly fought on Internet: US (AFP) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 4:32 pm

AFP - The United States said Thursday that the battle for human rights is increasingly being fought on the Internet as China, Iran and other states try to block access by political activists and others.

Source: Yahoo! News: Internet News |

Google makes its local shopping move Thursday, 11 March 2010, 4:08 pm

Company announces Thursday that it will offer mobile device users inventory checks on local stores, allowing them to see if products are available.

Source: CNET News.com |

Thunderbird beta 'Lanikai' released Thursday, 11 March 2010, 4:03 pm

Mozilla Messaging updates the Lanikai build of Thunderbird to beta status. Notably, Thunderbird 3.1 beta 1 shares the same Gecko engine as Firefox 3.6.

Source: CNET News.com |

SkillSoft 4Q net income falls 16 pct (AP) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 3:59 pm

AP - SkillSoft PLC, an education software company that has agreed to be taken private, said Thursday its fourth-quarter net income fell 16 percent from a year earlier, when it benefited from a tax windfall.

Source: Yahoo! News: Software News |

Web Connectivity a Bigger Deal for HDTV Than 3D (PC World) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 3:59 pm

PC World - Is 3D television the next big thing in consumer tech? Splashy, flashy, and (virtually) in your face, 3D TV is getting a mega-promotional boost by its backers, including Panasonic, Samsung, and Sony, all of whom hope you'll be so bowled over by 3D's visual splendor that you won't mind paying a few thousand bucks for the 3D-at-home experience.

Source: Yahoo! News: Personal Technology |

New iPhone OS Rumored To Finally Allow Multitasking (NewsFactor) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 3:57 pm

NewsFactor - Version 4.0 of the operating system for Apple's iPhone, iPod touch, and the forthcoming iPad will represent a major overhaul of the software and will feature a "full-on solution" to one long-standing gripe about Apple's devices -- their inability to multitask.

Source: Yahoo! News: Software News |

New iPhone OS Rumored To Finally Allow Multitasking (NewsFactor) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 3:57 pm

NewsFactor - Version 4.0 of the operating system for Apple's iPhone, iPod touch, and the forthcoming iPad will represent a major overhaul of the software and will feature a "full-on solution" to one long-standing gripe about Apple's devices -- their inability to multitask.

Source: Yahoo! News: Personal Technology |

New iPhone OS Rumored To Finally Allow Multitasking (NewsFactor) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 3:57 pm

NewsFactor - Version 4.0 of the operating system for Apple's iPhone, iPod touch, and the forthcoming iPad will represent a major overhaul of the software and will feature a "full-on solution" to one long-standing gripe about Apple's devices -- their inability to multitask.

Source: Yahoo! News: Apple/Macintosh News |

Safari 4.0.5 offers improvements to Top Sites, third-party plug-ins (Macworld.com) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 3:52 pm

Macworld.com - Whether you’re a fan of Apple’s Web browser, or just having some problems with its competition, there’s now a new Safari update available just for you. Well, you and everybody else—you wouldn’t want them to feel left out, would you?

Source: Yahoo! News: Apple/Macintosh News |

Report: Verizon 4G handsets out by mid-2011 Thursday, 11 March 2010, 3:45 pm

Verizon Wireless exec tells The Wall Street Journal it will have a 4G wireless phone on the market within three to six months of launching its 4G LTE network.

Source: CNET News.com |

Razer, GPG pledge Mac support; DICE investigating (Macworld.com) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 3:41 pm

Macworld.com - Now that Valve has pledged to support the Mac with the forthcoming release of Steam on Mac OS X and simultaneous Mac and PC releases for all its upcoming games, several in the gaming industry have been quick to respond with their own pledges of support.

Source: Yahoo! News: Apple/Macintosh News |

Razer, GPG pledge Mac support; DICE investigating (Macworld.com) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 3:41 pm

Macworld.com - Now that Valve has pledged to support the Mac with the forthcoming release of Steam on Mac OS X and simultaneous Mac and PC releases for all its upcoming games, several in the gaming industry have been quick to respond with their own pledges of support.

Source: Yahoo! News: Personal Technology |

It's Time to Finally Drop Internet Explorer 6 (PC World) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 3:33 pm

PC World - A security researcher has published exploit code for the latest Internet Explorer zero-day flaw on the Web and Microsoft is warning that more attacks against the unpatched vulnerability can be expected in-the-wild. One thing seems to be more apparent with each passing Internet Explorer (IE) vulnerability: its time to upgrade the Web browser.

Source: Yahoo! News: Security News |

It's Time to Finally Drop Internet Explorer 6 (PC World) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 3:33 pm

PC World - A security researcher has published exploit code for the latest Internet Explorer zero-day flaw on the Web and Microsoft is warning that more attacks against the unpatched vulnerability can be expected in-the-wild. One thing seems to be more apparent with each passing Internet Explorer (IE) vulnerability: its time to upgrade the Web browser.

Source: Yahoo! News: Internet News |

CNET overhauls its Blu-ray player reviews Thursday, 11 March 2010, 3:26 pm

CNET Reviews has overhauled its Blu-ray testing for 2010 by adding inline charts, more systematic image quality tests and a detailed spreadsheet for easy comparison.

Source: CNET News.com |

Lithium or hydrogen bike? Choose your steed Thursday, 11 March 2010, 3:22 pm

Sanyo's new eneloop hybrid bicycle recharges while it's being pedaled; Iwatani showed off a fuel cell bike that runs on a hydrogen fuel cell stack.

Source: CNET News.com |

Revenge of the Cable Guys Thursday, 11 March 2010, 3:00 pm

If you think online TV will be free forever, think again. The cable companies have a plan to keep control—and stick you with the bill

Source: BusinessWeek.com -- Technology |

Your Own Private Help Desk Thursday, 11 March 2010, 3:00 pm

India's iYogi promises to keep you up and running—but the hard sell grates

Source: BusinessWeek.com -- Technology |

OnLive Plans On-Demand Streaming of Video Games (NewsFactor) Thursday, 11 March 2010, 2:56 pm

NewsFactor - In a move to shake up the online gaming industry, OnLive has announced PC and Mac versions of its on-demand, instant-play games will roll out in June during the E3 2010 show. Here's the rub: Gamers don't have to buy a console, and they can get broadband speeds.

Source: Yahoo! News: Apple/Macintosh News |