Since the PSP Go is coming tomorrow, it was reasonable to expect a firmware update the PSP. We just didn’t expect one this full of content. Will it be enough to get the homebrew people to upgrade? Probably not, but for the casual user it’s quite the step forward.
Can you say tethering? I knew you could. → Read More
National Geographic magazine is running an article about the redwood forest this month, and part of that article included a very special vertical panoramic shot of a 300 foot tall tree. Shooting in the redwoods is particularly difficult because you lose the sense of scale. If there’s not something like a house or a bus next to the tree, you really can’t show how massive the trees really are.
Photographer Nick Nichols traveled out into the forest to do just that: capture a photo of a tree that’s over 300 feet tall, while keeping a sense of scale. Standard photographic techniques just wouldn’t cut it, so Nick had to get creative. → Read More
When it comes to free media streaming, the United States is flush with premium content from great sites like Hulu and MySpace Music. But aside from a handful of exceptions, the rest of the world is out of luck. Today, the balance changes a bit: MySpace has just launched its hugely popular MySpace Music service in Australia and New Zealand, bringing those regions unlimited streaming of songs and albums from all four major music labels, as well as many indies.
AU/NZ users will have access to the same features as the US site, including shareable playlists, artist activity feeds, and other social functionality. But there is at least one notable difference: while MySpace Music launched in the United States with Amazon as its partner for purchasing digital downloads, the AU/NZ version has teamed with Apple’s iTunes. MySpace wouldn’t comment on whether this is foreshadowing a larger partnership, but we may well see the Apple deal extend stateside. MySpace likely had an exclusive partnership with Amazon for the US launch, but it’s been a year (which may well have been the length of the deal), so it may soon be free to explore other options. → Read More
A few weeks ago, we wrote about Swedish startup Twingly and its stealth memetracker Twingly Channels. Tonight, Twingly is launching in closed beta. In the past, Twingly has brought us a microblogging search tool, a search engine for blogs, and a global ranking system for blogs. Twingly Channels essentially lets users to create their own personalized real-time memetracker. To sign up for an invite, click here with the code “TechCrunch.”
As we wrote previously, Twingly is a mix between Digg and FriendFeed. Twingly Channels lets users to create their own personalized social memetracker by collecting feeds and search terms covering any topic or event into a channel they share with others. And the site has real-time functionality. Users can post links posted by users, content from RSS feeds, and real-time search results for terms from blogs and microblogs (i.e. Twitter). The resulting stream is filtered into a Friendfeed-like channel where people can comment on, like, or dislike incoming items. → Read More
So, Justin Timberlake was supposed to be at a party tomorrow night in San Francisco. The “special, private celebration” was in honor of the company Particle (which counts Timberlake as its lead investor), which recently launched its Robo.to service. Myself and fellow writers Jason Kincaid and Paul Carr were so excited that we’ve been gossiping about it all day in back-channel conversations. I believe Paul even bought a JT book for him to sign, earlier today. But sadly, Justin, is bailing on us.
It appears that like most celebrities, Timberlake came down with a case of the “scheduling conflict,” and had to fly back to L.A. (or stay there, not sure if he left or not) to go be a movie star. But we’ll forgive him this time because of the reason for his conflict: He needed to be on the set of The Social Network, yes, the Facebook movie. → Read More
In case you haven’t had enough location-based news tonight, here’s another very interesting bit. It looks like Apple has very quietly bought an online mapping company, Seth Weintraub of Computerworld reports tonight.
Apple’s purchase of Placebase actually took place this past July, and a founder of a partner company that was using Placebase maps tweeted about it. But it slid under most people’s radars as that was the only news out there about it. But Weintraub dug up Placebase CEO Jaron Waldman’s LinkedIn profile tonight, and sure enough, he is now part of the “Geo Team” at Apple. → Read More
When we first got word that Verizon would be announcing the Razzle today, a handful of potential posts popped into our brain almost instantly. Thing is, when it comes that easy for us, it came that easy for everyone else, too. For instance, we could fall back on the fact that “Razzle” rhymes with “dazzle”, making some joke about how, with a 2.2″ screen and 1.3 megapixel camera, the only thing likely to “dazzle” anyone is the crazy twist-and-swivel design. From there, we could play on the idea that the manufacturer, PCD, is “really twisting it up” by having a QWERTY keyboard on one half of the rotating design, and music controls and stereo speakers on the other. But you know, we won’t do that. And if we won’t write that, what’s left to write? → Read More
Aaaand the rumor mill nails it again. Confirming rumors from a few weeks back, Verizon has just announced that their big, beautiful Windows Mobile 6.5 handset, the HTC Imagio, will be launching on the same day as 6.5 itself: October 6th. → Read More
Think what you will, but we’re big believers in “keeping it real” ’round these parts. While we swoon whenever a new smart phone hits the scene, the vast majority are still stuck in the flip phone zone – and you know what? There’s nothing wrong with that. Have no fear, flip fans, Verizon is here to fulfill all your flipping needs with the new Nokia 2705 Shade. → Read More
We hear about holographic storage time and again, but look around — do you see any holographic drive arrays around you? Didn’t think so. At the moment it’s just not cost-effective (compared with plain ol’ HDDs) and not fast enough (compared with SSDs and other flash arrays). That doesn’t mean it’ll be an exotic technology forever, though: GE is hard at work making it more compatible with existing technology, and thinks they’ve come up with something good. Their optics labs have increased reflectivity in their media to the point where a standard Blu-ray laser can be used to read them, though nothing is said about writing. → Read More
While we’re still in the dark as to when it’ll launch or how much damage it’ll do to our wallets, we just got word of where future owners will be picking up their new Nokia-made netbook. You want one? You’ll have to talk to the dudes in the blue polos. At their holiday gift guide event, Best Buy announced that they’ll be the exclusive retailers for the Nokia Booklet in the U.S. That’s great – but look out for the big mean security guards on the way out. → Read More
I noticed something interesting tonight. In the new build of Tweetie 2 (not out yet), a bunch of little red location markers started appearing next to tweets in my stream. Knowing that this new version was built using Twitter’s new Geolocation APIs, I inquired if this mean they had been turned on. Sure enough, they have, developer Loren Brichter just confirmed after talking to Twitter.
But there’s a slight problem. Apparently, the reason these geotags are showing up for all tweets (even those not actually geotagged) is that the documentation was a little unclear on how to handle non-geotagged tweets, Brichter says. The result is that every single tweet is tagged with a location somewhere just off the coast of Africa, south of Ghana. Either this is Atlantis, the Island from Lost, or we have a problem. → Read More
Anyone who plays Warhammer 40K knows how much work goes into your army. The modeling, the filing, the painting, on and on and on. Then you send hours compiling your army list, carefully pack the Emperor’s superhuman servants in foam, take them down to the local game shop, and for what? To have them destroyed by heretics, foul xenos, and unsupervised kids. Such is the glory of tabletop gaming. → Read More
Ah, the Windows install process. Long associated with repeated clicking of the “Next” button, it’s also home to one of the more shady practices to exist in modern software: the bundled application. Hapless users looking to get through the process as quickly as possible inevitably wind up installing some junk software that they don’t really want or need, only to scratch their heads when their browser is suddenly slowed down by a clunky new toolbar. Users may not like them, but many developers don’t want to scrap these bundled software packages entirely because they’re a steady source of income. OpenCandy, a startup that launched last year, may offer the solution by pairing up users with software they might actually want. And today it’s announcing that it’s been integrated with the latest version of PrimoPDF by Nitro PDF, the most popular freeware PDF creator. → Read More
What if the desktop on your computer was just like your actual desktop? That’s the core idea behind BumpTop, a really nice looking graphical overlay for Windows-based operating systems. But as cool as BumpTop looked, you still had to use your mouse and keyboard to manipulate it. As I made clear yesterday, I want those to die. So good news for me today: BumpTop is adding multi-touch support. And the result is awesome.
When we think of multi-touch right now, most of us think of the iPhone. But really, with such a small screen, there are only so many gestures you can do. Multi-touch BumpTop greatly expands that roster, and includes several gestures that it claims to have patents for. Basically, they have gestures that use all of you fingers, and both hands, and even the side of hands. You can “lasso” things, “shove” them, “scrunch” them, and “crop” them. → Read More
If you suddenly find yourself with $300 to burn, an old laptop, and too much time on your hands this weekend, I might suggest that you build a DIY Google Street View-style rig for your car. That’s what West Point student Roy Ragsdale did for his “disruptive technologies” class. And if someone at West Point does it, it’s okay for you to do it. → Read More
One of last year’s TechCrunch50 startups, Bojam, is launching in public beta today and we have 500 invites. Bojam is a Web-based sound studio that lets musicians practice playing music, find other musicians around the world to jam with, and lay down tracks together on the same song. Click here to try out the service.
Bojam is a fully functional music mixer. You can adjust the volume on each track or add effects like distortion and reverb. Similarly, you can solo or mute instruments, loop, cut, copy, paste and trim audio clips. Bojam also includes a plugin that allows you to record and upload directly into the mix, or you can upload tracks recorded in Garage Band or other software. → Read More
Remember the big technology story of the first half of the year? Analog signals were suppose to be shut-off on February 17, but Obama saved millions of households from their procrastination by delaying it a few months. But eventually on June 12, those signals were turned off. You have to imagine that retailers moved loads of analog to digital converter boxes through the shut-off date. Not many have likely been sold since though, which is why *gasp* sales have plummeted. → Read More
Top technology advertisers are finally catching on to the fact that we are kind of obsessive here at TechCrunch in our technology coverage and so are our readers. In fact, they’re want to understand why TechCrunch is such a big deal to so many different types of people (we do too.) To help them get a better understanding of us, we’ve constructed a quick 20-question survey that will help them get a better sense of how today’s leading start-ups and enterprises use social media, business and personal technology, and how TechCrunch influences your thinking about key strategic trends.
Please take 5 minutes to complete our survey. We’ll publish the results here on TechCrunch. → Read More
