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Google pushes new video standard that could cut bandwidth use in half
One of the constant complaints we hear from wireless and even some wireline ISPs is that the surge in online video demand has put a strain on their networks that leaves them with no choice but to implement unpopular policies such as bandwidth caps. But CNET reports that Google is hoping to make help ISPs significantly ease the strain of video on their networks by pushing its new V9 video technology standard that the company says can help content providers "save about 50% of bandwidth by encoding your video with VP9." Of course, the VP9 standard hasn't even been finalized yet and won't be available for general use until mid-June at the earliest. All the same, Google is promising developers Read More » 
Google CEO Page: Microsoft's Outlook Google Talk integration is 'milking off' Google innovation
Google CEO isn't very happy that Microsoft decided to integrate its Google Talk messaging service into its Outlook webmail platform without extending a similar offer to Google for the Gmail platform. Page, speaking during the Google I/O developers conference Wednesday, said that Google always pushes to have open-source platforms that other companies can use but lamented the fact that much of the tech industry doesn't extend the same courtesies for many of its own innovations. Page went onto say that he was "sad" that companies such as Microsoft were "milking off" Google's innovations by not being as open with their own software. Read More »
The Obama administration takes aim at 3D-printed guns
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Print, Aim and Shoot: What Does a Plastic Handgun Mean for the Future of 3-D Printing?
Print, Aim and Shoot: What Does a Plastic Handgun Mean for the Future of 3-D Printing? Read More »
Amazon launches Android app store in China
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PlayStation 'Heritage Sale' Discounts Nine Long-Running Franchises
Dubbed "Sony Smash Bros." by fans, after Nintendo's crossover brawler, PlayStation All-Stars Battle Royale features characters from Sony PlayStation games fighting each other in stages which mix their own titles. The characters featured include everyone from first-party favorites Nathan Drake (from Uncharted) and Sackboy (from Little Big Planet) to the armored Big Daddy from 2K Games' Bioshock. ... Read More »
New Ubuntu 13.04 Release Comes in Seven Different Varieties
You wouldn't know it to look at Ubuntu.com -- the homepage for the world's most popular free alternative PC operating system -- which only promotes the new 13.04 version of Ubuntu in its normal, familiar flavor. But versions of Ubuntu which work completely differently, or were designed for audiences from educators to creative professionals, also exist for free download. Read More »
Android design chief praises Facebook Home, calls it incredibly polished
Facebook unveiled Facebook Home, an application that replaces your Android phone's homescreen with Facebook photos and status updates, earlier this month for select Android smartphones. Google chairman Eric Schmidt previously called the software "fantastic" and said it was a creative tweaking of the operating system that fits in well with Google's conception of Android as an open source platform. He isn't the only Google executive who finds Facebook Home intriguing, however: Android design chief Matias Durate told ABC News that Facebook's homescreen replacement "shows an incredible amount of polish and attention to design detail," which is impressive especially because it "didn't come from a hardware manufacturer." He added that "with the Home experience, they did a nice job expressing the Facebook Read More »
HP Jumps on 7-Inch Tablet Bandwagon with $169 Slate 7
When most people think of PC manufacturer HP and "tablets," they probably think of a Windows 8 device. Either that, or the ill-fated TouchPad, an iPad-sized webOS gadget which sold so poorly that HP had to dump them all in a $99 fire sale just a few months in. Read More »
Ubuntu 13.04 'Raring Ringtail' Now Available as Free Download
The new version of the world's most popular free (and open-source) PC operating system, Ubuntu, is now available as a free download from Ubuntu.com. Ubuntu 13.04 "Raring Ringtail" largely contains under-the-hood improvements that most people won't notice, but does contain a few new user-facing features ... such as a more visible notice about how its Unity search feature logs your keystrokes and sends them to websites like Amazon. Read More »
Google Predicts Stock-Market Crashes, Study Suggests
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Archos to Release Three 'Pure Android' Prepaid Smartphones
Despite being ubiquitous, "Android" can be awfully hard to find. Many smartphones and tablets that use Google's open-source Android operating system, such as the Kindle Fire and Samsung's latest phones, barely mention this fact in a footnote. Read More »
A new contender enters the fray: First Firefox phone now available
Apple's iOS and Google's Android platforms have a stranglehold on the global smartphone market that doesn't appear to be slipping anytime soon. But as a bloody battle rages for the No.3 and No.4 positions in the smartphone race, a new contender with a very different strategy has now hit the market: Firefox OS. Beginning immediately, the first two Firefox-powered smartphones are available to developers and the general public. Or, they were available — it's hard to say if consumers at large have had their interest piqued by Firefox OS, but both the Keon ($119) and Peak ($194) were sold out on Tuesday morning shortly after becoming available so developers are certainly intrigued. We don't know how many units were stocked Read More »
A review of Facebook Home – by someone who can't stand Facebook
In many circles on competing services like Twitter, Facebook is the Nickelback of social networks. People love to discuss how awful it is and to joke about it constantly, mocking various aspects of the service and business such as how fast and loose it plays with users' privacy. Everyone seems to have a Facebook account and yet no one seems to use the service actively. But just as Nickelback manages to sell millions of albums each year despite seemingly having no fans, Facebook — the social network people love to hate — has a billion monthly active users. As a user, I count myself among those who are often very critical of Facebook. To be clear, I do not dislike Facebook Read More »
Asus Launches New 10.1 Inch Netbook, but Calls it a 'Notebook' Instead
Asus, the company that built the first Eee PC netbook, seems to have gotten the memo that netbooks aren't "in" anymore. It's calling its new 10.1-inch laptop the "1015E Series Notebook," and nowhere on Asus' product page does the word netbook appear, even though its screen size and $299 price tag put it in line with pretty much every netbook ever made. Read More »
First Firefox Phone Costs $119 Plus Shipping
In an age where bigger is seen as better when it comes to smartphones, and 5- or 6-inch screens are becoming more common, Mozilla -- the nonprofit organization which leads development of the open-source Firefox web browser -- made it a goal to help smartphone manufacturers produce "entry-level smartphones" with its Firefox OS platform. Most of these gadgets are about the size of the original iPhone, with low-end hardware specs and price tags to match. Read More »
Android predicted to beat Apple in China – thanks to its potential for 'oppression'
We tend to think of an open source operating system as something that gives both smartphone vendors and end users more freedom to customize their experiences. But as Bronte Capital's John Hempton points out, open source software can have a dark side as well if it is changed by authoritarian governments to limit the information that end users can access. Hempton says he bought a Samsung Desire HD off of eBay from a Middle Eastern country a couple of years ago and found that "it did not contain any access to the Google market place (Google's equivalent of the App store)," that "it had limited apps and no possibility of adding more" and "it contained a non-standard web browser and a Read More »
First Firefox Smartphones to Launch This Week
After teasing subscribers to its Facebook page with a photo of boxed smartphones ready to ship in a factory, Geeksphone -- one of Mozilla's partners for the new breed of Firefox smartphones -- announced in an email Wednesday that "Next week at last" its smartphones would finally ship. Once ready, they'll be available in Geeksphone's online store. Read More »
Alienware Launches First Linux Gaming PC
This isn't the first time that Dell has sold PCs with Ubuntu, a free computer operating system based on Linux. Not too long after it bought out Alienware, then an independent maker of gaming PCs, it started selling Ubuntu-powered desktop and laptop PCs, but only online, and only on a limited selection of models. Read More »
Pressure cooker bombs used in past by militants
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Google's Schmidt sees one billion Android phones in use in nine months
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Google chairman says Facebook Home is 'what open source is all about'
Android users may not like Facebook Home very much, but Google chairman Eric Schmidt sounds like an enthusiastic supporter. During AllThingsD's D: Dive Into Mobile conference on Tuesday, Schmidt called Facebook's Android overlay "fantastic" and said it was a creative tweaking of the operating system that was "what open source is all about." Schmidt's endorsement of Facebook Home is particularly interesting because there has been speculation that Google would clamp down on third-party Android overlays in the future so it could keep its own services such as Gmail and YouTube at the center of the Android experience. But if Schmidt's comments are any indication, then Google may be more welcoming of software overlays such as Facebook Home than many had Read More »
Can You Buy Exoplanet Naming Rights? No, Astronomy Group Says
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Microsoft's Android antitrust complaint called 'an attack on open source'
When a Microsoft (MSFT)-led group called Fairsearch Europe filed an antitrust complaint against Google (GOOG) and its Android platform this week, it didn't merely say that the company was rigging its search results to benefit its own products. Instead, it went a step further and said that Google was unfairly promoting Android to device manufacturers by making it free to use, while also accusing the company of employing "predatory distribution of Android at below-cost." Ars Technica's Timothy Lee finds this sort of attack on Android to be very dangerous on Microsoft's part since it seemingly isn't just attacking Google but the entire nature of open-source software. "Apparently, Fairsearch believes that it's 'predatory' for a company to gain market share by giving Read More »
New Thunderbolt Port Could Enable Desktop Retina Display Monitors
Ever since it debuted the first iMac with USB instead of legacy ports -- at a time when not including a floppy drive was also considered daring -- Apple has been ahead of the curve when it comes to the ports and interfaces on its computers. In early 2011, it replaced its DisplayPort technology with the Thunderbolt port, developed by Intel, which let its laptops connect to a new Thunderbolt display along with high-speed external hard drives. Read More » | ||||
Monday, May 20, 2013
Linux/Open Source News Headlines - Yahoo! News
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