Hey, the first dual-core Celeron processors are coming. How in the hell do you like that? Two cores?? Now I’ve seen it all. They’ll be here on January 20th. I hope it’s not too cold out that day because I’d hate to be shivering at the ribbon cutting or the inauguration or the parade or whatever’s going to be happening in Boston when these new dual-core Celeron chips arrive. Two cores!! The first model out of the chute will be the seductive E1200. It’ll be running at 1.6GHz with an 800MHz front side bus and 512KB of L2 cache and priced at $53 (in thousand-unit orders). Intel to release Celeron E1000 on January 20 [DigiTimes] → Read More
What’s the best way to deal with having way too many cables running around, tripping you, so that you fall and crunch your teeth together in a bone-jarring bite? Why, make them into one, giant cable, of course! Or so thinks the monsters at Monster Cable, who have put together the Cable•It (their dot, not mine) cable clutter management system. It’s a tube that you run all of your favorite cables through, and has ports along the side to let them out at the appropriate destinations. Genius! And because it’s monster cable, you know it’ll cost them $2 to make, but of course they’ll sell the piece of plastic tubing for $20! Get yours today! Monster Cable Cable•It [Product page] → Read More
We opened up nominations for the upcoming Crunchies Awards a week ago. In that week, over 13,000 nominations have been cast, for thousands of startups and products. Nominations stay open until midnight December 12. At that time, we’ll take a day or two to tally the results, remove any spam and fraudulent votes, and the top five nominees in each category will go up for a general vote. The winners will be announced on January 18 at a ceremony at the Herbst Theater in San Francisco. Remember that some of the awards are specific to new 2007 products startups. Others (most of them) are more general and aren’t tied to the launch date of the company. Tickets will be made available soon. The theater holds nearly 1,000 people, and there will be a big party afterwards. The competition would not be possible without our sponsors. Thanks to Sun Microsystems Business Analytics, Microsoft and Charles River Ventures for sponsoring the Crunchies. Contact us if you’re interested to sponsor an award or other part of the evening festivities. If you are a startup and want to encourage your users to nominate you, blog and website badges are available here. And rememeber that this is not solely a TechCrunch effort. We are partnering with GigaOm, Read/WriteWeb and VentureBeat on this as well. → Read More
It’s cool to have porn on your cellphone. More people do it than you’d think, and that’s ok. But listen carefully: it’s not okay to show your porn to young teenagers, especially if you’re a substitute teacher. Okay? Teacher Accused Of Showing Pornographic Picture [KOTV] → Read More
Pennsylvania startup CeeLite has created some bendable, inch-thin light sources using technology that has, until now, foiled inventors. Making large-scale “Light-Emitting Capacitors” or LECs has been attempted for years but only now have the problems that plagued them been identified and addressed. Now the lights are big, bright, efficient, and if they are anything like their OLED cousins, they should last for years. Their low power consumption and convenient size (up to 30in by 72in at 4 watts per square foot) make them perfect for street signs and overhead lighting – two huge markets – and the inventors see them becoming ubiquitous, even having objects illuminate themselves. And because of the nature of the technology, it shouldn’t cause that imperceptible buzz and annoying flicker that has become so acceptable from fluorescent lights. I sure LEC the sound of that! Okay, that was probably in poor taste. Start-up creates flexible sheets of light [CNET] → Read More
So what’s new in 6.1? Update: Unfortunately the video is jacked up when we try and embed it here so head on over to BGR and check it out. → Read More
You don’t need me to get all snarky about the DRM scheme Western Digital has added to its new My Book NAS-enabled external hard drives, not when Austin at the Register is doing such a good job of it. Austin points out that the new drive won’t let you copy another user’s media files (wma, mp3, etc.) across the network, because it can’t verify your licenses for said media. Look, Western D, I appreciate what you’re trying to do here, saving us from the evils of piracy and all, but it’s not your job. Your job is to make storage, and make it accessible, period. If the RIAA is slipping you a little something-something under the table, well, then I’m going to start looking at Seagate, among others. Western Digital drive is DRM-crippled for your safety [The Reg] → Read More
Nintendo has a problem. It’s a good problem, but a problem nonetheless. See there’s this video game system called the Wii that Nintendo makes and the company can’t seem to keep it in stock. It’s gotten so out of hand that company execs are talking about pulling TV ads for the Wii in the UK. The ads are mostly holiday-themed ads that would instead be run next year. "We are doing everything possible to supply continued levels of stock and meet demand as quickly as possible," said a company spokesperson. "As we are keen to act responsibly we are potentially looking at moving some advertising on some products into early 2008." Nintendo mulls pulling Wii TV ads [BBC News] → Read More
From the “It sounded like a good idea at the time” Dept. Microsoft set up a holiday chatbot (northpole@live.com) on MSN Messenger for kiddies to talk to, play games with, and make holiday requests to. Sounds good, right? Except when you tell the bot to “eat it” one too many times, it replies, “It’s fun to talk about oral sex.“ Way to go, Microsoft. And who do you think found this out? Some white-hat data sleuth? No, a couple of little girls who wanted Santa to eat some pizza they’d “given” him online. Now, I know they can’t check every single possible reply for appropriateness (or relevance) but they could, at the very least, run searches for strings like “sex,” “heroin,” and maybe “murder most foul” so they don’t pop up like that. Redmond has already corrected the problem, but the Reg has photographic evidence of the Chi-Mo-Bot in action. ‘Tis the sleazon. Microsoft’s sex-obsessed RoboSanta spouts filth at children [The Register] → Read More
Looking for the best FPS game on the Wii? This is it. Is it perfect? No. Is it even close to something you could find on Xbox 360, PS3, or your PC? Probably not. But for the Wii, it’s a big step in the right direction. For starters, you can play online. Cool, no? The controls are also pretty intuitive and add to the gameplay experience. They’re not overdone or gimmicky, which is a huge plus. If you’re in the market for a Wii shooter this holiday season, this game is a great choice. Medal of Honor: Heroes 2 [Amazon.com] → Read More
Sony’s console will be getting its Blu-ray firmware updated to version 1.1 later this month, allowing for picture-in-picture functionality and support for discs which require it. I don’t think anyone was clamoring for this just yet, seeing as there is only one disc, the German Neues vom Wixxer, which takes advantage of the 1.1 features. It’s intended to allow for a video commentary track, although personally I could do without Peter Jackson or R. Kelly talking to my face while I watch a movie or “Trapped in the Closet.” The update also adds support for some secondary audio and video decoders, though I’m sure that will be less useful than it sounds. I’ll wait until they have an update that puts hair on my chest. Sony exec confirms PS3 will get Blu-ray Profile 1.1 this month [The Register] Update: The ever-helpful Heise online has some more info on that German movie that uses the 1.1 features. It actually looks kind of cool – check it out, and here’s a screencap (the article has the original resolution one): → Read More
I was born and raised in the 503 and I make sure everyone knows about it. So it’s pretty obvious that I’m a treehugger because, well, Mother Nature never gets old like video games or stupid ass TV shows. But it seems the path we’ve chosen may lead to the deterioration of Mother Earth, which is a shame considering all she’s done for us. But I digress as I usually do when talking about eco-ish stuff. As an Oregonian I try and be as eco-friendly as possible. The same goes for db clay based in NE Portland, who you may remember started the whole duct tape billfold craze way back when. I remember those guys peddling that stuff at Saturday Market. I just wish I was cool enough back then to have picked one up. *sigh* Nevertheless the guys at db have introduced the Version 3 line of wallets made from Tope, which is their custom eco-friendly textile. But what is it? → Read More
A teen being investigated in connection with a murder secretly used the MP3 player in his pocket to record an interrogation that the detective working the case swore under oath never took place. I’ve always wondered whether or not detectives searched suspects before locking themselves in an interrogation room. You’d think they’d at least check for weapons but who knows, maybe finding an MP3 player wouldn’t arouse any suspicion. Whatever the case, this kid not only got himself a free pass on the freedom train but also ended up getting the detective in question charged with 12 counts of first-degree perjury. Gotcha! Teen’s MP3 Catches Cop in a Lie [ABC News] → Read More
3i has invested €2.6 million in European shopping search engine Twenga, which launched in the UK in early November. The service has been fairly successful by focusing all its resources on Europe and comes translated in six different languages (French, German, Italian, Polish, Spanish, and English). The network reached 7 million visitors in November 2007 and indexed over 40 million offers from 25,000 merchants. Because it has no retailer bias product listings are not skewed in favour of one retailer over another, and the inventory of products is large. Consumers can narrow down search results from the largest possible product offering based on brand, colour, material, shop, price and product features. Twenga’s search results include user reviews and images on top of the usual price comparisons. It also has several advanced features include price tracking and user reviews, allowing it to return a more complex result such as a 10% price drop in a product. There are of course a mass of shopping product search engines including The Find, Mpire, Crowdstorm, Bountii, Retrevo, SmartShopper, Pricefight and Ugenie. → Read More
When Oliver Starr (former MobileCrunch writer) attacked employer Sam Sethi (former TechCrunch UK writer), the person who currently controls Blognation, in a 3,000 word diatribe, a lot of people came to the conclusion that Blognation was dead in the water. The chain of screw ups was just too long. Sethi had an emotional explosion and threatened to kill his cofounder over a legal dispute. He reportedly lied to his editors flat out that he’d raised a £1 million (more here) so that they’d continue to work for free. He allegedly forged bank transfer documents to stall for time. To sum things up, even when Sethi had something truthful to say, he apparently lied anyway just to make things more interesting. But he may raise an angel round of funding anyway, and keep Blognation alive for a few more months. We have been emailed a draft term sheet that shows the willingness of Secora PLC, a London based company, to invest £250,000 for 25% of Blognation. Payments would be made in stages, with £130,000 payable as soon as the deal closes. This may or may not be an authentic document. I’ve emailed Secora for comment. If the deal closes, Secora will prove itself to be an investor with a backbone. Not many entities would back a startup with this much baggage. Putting Sethi aside, this is good news. Mostly because the 13 or so Blognation blog editors, some of whom are reportedly due as much as 30,000 Euros for past work, were looking at a bleak holiday season. Now, at least, they may be able to put food on the table and buy gifts for their children. More on this as it develops. Term sheet is below. Update: The financing didn’t close, Blognation is now in the DeadPool. http://content1.docstoc.com/flash/OutlineTerms003_MBamends51207_jgCLEAN.swf?doc_id=271905 → Read More
It struck me kind of funny that the web site Physorg.com ponders aloud whether or not the Cowon Q5W is "the iPhone of Personal Media Players" because of its "long list of features that far surpasses other gadgets of its kind." I can kinda see where they’re coming from but it just sounds a little odd to call a media playing device what basically amounts to a phone-less iPhone and not be referring to the iPod Touch which is, in fact, basically the true iPhone of personal media players. → Read More
In a move that isn’t very surprising, Dell will begin selling computers in Best Buy stores next month. It certainly makes sense considering the general public has become very hands-on. Look at the Apple stores, for example. You can go in at just about any hour (if you live in NYC) and fondle everything Mac. Sure, prices on the Web are cheap, but do you want hardware that reflects the price tag? Dell has been on a downward spiral as of late with declining PC sales and losing the coveted No. 1 ranking for computer maker to HP. Best Buy will carry the XPS, Inspiron and desktop PCs in over 900 stores. They should have made this move before the holiday rush, but that just goes to show the state Dell is in. That’s not completely true and I’m not privy to the details of the deal, but it’s surprising the deal wasn’t made earlier, right? Unless Best Buy wasn’t okay with Dell moving in so they could clear out stock or something of that nature. Who knows, who cares. Dell will sell computers at Best Buy [AP via Yahoo] → Read More
If I were forced to pick one thing I didn’t like about the Wii, other than it being a glorified GameCube, would have to be the wired Nunchuck. Let’s face it, we live in a wireless world and why shouldn’t that apply to everything else in life? I flail around when I box and many time have I lost control of the damn thing because it’s tethered to the Wiimote. Thank the tech gods for Nyko, purveyors of all that is game console accessories. I wish they’d bring back that nacho heater thing, but alas, it cannot be done. So in return they’ve decided to release a wireless Nunchuck for the ever-lovable Wii. A receiver plugs into the normal jack on the Wiimote and will thusly communicate over a 2.4 GHz band. More details at CES. Nyko Reveals Wireless Wii Nunchuck [IGN] → Read More
Okay, thankfully it seems as though Vista SP1 actually will noticeably increase speeds, particularly in the networking department. According to Ed Bott at ZDNet, the tests I told you about last Tuesday were "based on a silly artificial benchmark involving scripting of Office applications." So be it. And yes, those test had nothing to do with networking. I’ll reserve judgment about how much better networking — particularly wireless networking — is until I’m able to get my hands on the service pack. And frankly, I’ll take stability over speed. His initial findings are somewhat reassuring, although not everything’s been fixed. Particularly that pesky Windows Media Player bug that cuts your networking speed in half whenever you listen to music. Vista SP1 will deliver big network speed boost [ZDNet] → Read More
Who doesn’t like a little TV in the tub? I mean these days, being without TV for more than five minutes is considered a sign of weakness, am I right? Well show all those mouth-breathing idiots in your life that you expect to be taken seriously with this $340 waterproof bathtub television. It’s got a 3-hour battery life, so you can hide in the tub for a long time when you have company over and you’ve grown tired of them not respecting you. A good bath and a good TV show! [Akihabara] via Ubergizmo → Read More
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