Short version: An excellent casual HD camcorder with superior image quality to pocket cams and a flexible focus system, making it useful for bloggers like me as well. At under $200 this thing is absolutely a steal. → Read More
If hype were to be believed, the Motorola DROID is the pièce de résistance of the mobile world; the conclusive creation sent down by the Great Smartphone in the sky to rid us of our woes. It would prepare your breakfast promptly each morning, tuck you in at night, and, maybe — just maybe — knock the iPhone down a notch or two.
Beginning about a week before its launch (largely due to Verizon’s incredibly intense marketing campaign) I began getting calls and tweets from friends and colleagues asking about the Droid. They always had two questions: the first would be something like “What do you think of the Droid?”, followed by “Would you recommend it over the iPhone?” Same questions, each.. and.. every.. time.
I’ve been using the Droid as my primary phone for a few days now, and I think I’m finally ready to answer them. → Read More
Not that USB 3.0 will be useful anytime soon—how long did it take manufacturers to finally get behind USB 2.0?—but Asus’ U3S6 should be, provided it’s not cancelled, the world’s first USB 3.0 + SATA 6.0 PCI-E card. Better news: it’s only $30. → Read More
Guys! Guys! There’s a killer deal on the Logitech Harmony 1100 remote! It’s the great big one with the touchscreen, and it came out at the beginning of this year so you know it’s still cool, and looks impressive with your A/V setup. Plus, it’s only $300, which is a whole lot cheaper then the $500 it normally goes for. Plus, when we reviewed in back in March, Matt really liked it. → Read More
I’m a sucker for clever desks and organization objects. Sometimes you don’t need a massive Pottery Barn desk to email your parents pics of the kids. All you need is a place to sit and two little shelves from Ikea. (and some handyman skills) → Read More
Jed Stremel, Facebook’s Director of Mobile who has been with the company for four years, has resigned, according to a post on his Facebook profile. Stremel was charged with leading the company’s mobile strategy, and was previously involved in Business Development at Facebook.
Below is Stremel’s bio, taken from last year’s MobileBeat conference page.
Jed Stremel oversees Facebook’s mobile strategy transforming how individuals find and express information relevant to their life. Prior to Facebook, Jed played key partnership, business operations, and strategic roles at high-growth businesses. He spearheaded mobile initiatives for Yahoo! building the company’s efforts to empower seamless communications across SMS, WAP, Java, BREW, and other mobile technologies. At Tellme Jed managed distribution, promotion, and licensing relationships with leading online and telecommunications partners.
This fun little DIY device is labeled as a “crystal radio circuit in a jam-jar.” But that description doesn’t even to begin to do it justice. According to Tesla, this electronic wonder allows you to hear the disembodied, ethereal voices, of the, well, ether, I guess. → Read More
A new white paper authored by Digital Fuel, based off of a study conducted by IDG Research Services, states that over half of IT managers believe their current level of IT cost visibility is lacking and needs improvement. Given that 84% of those polled said that having detailed insight into IT costs is critical, this discrepancy is quite jarring.
The study, based on a sample of over 130 respondents who had direct involvement with managing IT costs and had IT budgets of over $10 million, showcased the fact that IT organizations have a hard time coming up with ways to manage their IT costs. In particular, those surveyed believe that defining a cost-model and breaking down their IT costs in various manners were the most difficult. Additionally, those polled stated they wanted a better way to identify and assess cost inefficiencies in their IT departments as well as giving their business units more information to control their IT demand. → Read More
So GameStop has what I can only call a scheme for Modern Warfare 2. (Have we officially decided to not call it Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2? Less words to type!) If you pre-order the game (Xbox 360 or PS3 version only) from there, and return it by December 13, you’ll receive a $40 in-store credit. In other words, if you pre-order the game, you’ll get to play it for one month for a grand total of $20. → Read More
It’s unusual playing Tekken on anything but a Sony system. (I’m not counting Tekken Advance for the GameBoy Advance, and neither should you.) And yet here I am with Tekken 6 on the Xbox 360, using the same combos, with the same characters (that would be Bryan Fury and Law, if you’ll allow me to consider Forrest Law and Marshall Law the same character because, really, they are), as I did back in 1998 with Tekken 3. I still can’t make heads or tails of the story, and I’m still fighting pandas and tree-men, but then that’s Tekken for you. → Read More
So Juniper Networks makes network hardware. And they want to make an “iPhone of networking?” What could that be? A small networking device that’s insanely possibly and considered polarizing? Nah. It’s just a new logo, faster chips, and new software. This is all the beat Cisco, which is kind of futile.
Essentially what Juniper is doing is creating an app store for their routers, which is actually kind of cool. Sadly, things are a little rough for developers right now: → Read More
I’ll make this quick. I’ve heard two or three independent sources saying that the new iMac’s screen is “better than HD.” Let’s examine that claim for a moment here. If HD is 1920×1080 and the iMac is 2560×1440, then yes, it is better than HD. But why would you make that claim when most monitors over 22 inches are at least that resolution? I’ve been using a fantastic Dell 2407WFP for five years or so, and it goes up to 1920×1200. Better than HD, before HD even came around! That’s all. I just wanted to register a facepalm at this ridiculous talking point. I’m sure the new iMac screen is great (better than mine, to be sure), and actually it looks like a pretty good deal, but “better than HD” is just about the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard. Update: Sorry if it wasn’t clear; by “at least that resolution,” I mean 1920×1080, i.e. HD. That’s why saying “better than HD” is meaningless, almost every monitor is better than HD. Also, I am not criticizing Apple, people. If you read the post, you will find I praised the monitor. I’m criticizing a phrase I’ve seen bandied about recently. Time to chill out. → Read More
YouTube has just posted a series of videos highlighting one the more impressive feats of Mother Nature: the colorful transition from summer to fall. It may sound a bit lame, but if you’ve ever enjoyed the changing colors of autumn leaves or the charming landscape of a local pumpkin patch, the videos are well worth a look (they remind me a bit of the Planet Earth series that came out a few years ago). You can find the four videos featured at the top of YouTube’s homepage, or you can check out the ones we’ve embedded below. → Read More
‘Twas more than two years ago when some dopey radio show in California held a “hold your wee for a Wii” contest. Not the kind of publicity Nintendo wanted, no. A woman died, you’ll recall. Well, now a California jury has awarded $16.5 million to the woman’s family. That’s it, don’t click Read More because there’s nothing else. And there’s no pic because, come on, not necessary. → Read More
There are a few areas of concern to point out about this $24 “USB Paw Heating Slipper” from Brando. For starters, you’re sticking both your feet into one giant slipper. What happens if you get an e-mail saying that there’s free bagels in the break room? In your haste to save $2, you could very easily trip and fall down. → Read More
Twitter tweeted out a message today about a special Halloween feature if you Tweet “#trick” or “#treat.” It was difficult to figure out at first, but if you tweet either from your Twitter home page (this is key, you can’t enable the feature when you are on a client), your home page background will go “ghoulish” and the avatars on the Tweets on your page will turn into zombies and ghouls.
The way to trigger it is by tweeting ONLY “#trick” OR “#treat” with nothing else. #Treat is the top trending topic on Twitter so it looks like the masses haven’t figured it out. If you only post #trick or #treat, it doesn’t actually Tweet it out (if you post from Twitter’s site). Happy Halloween! → Read More
Nobody wants to be the kid who only gets invited to birthday parties because his mom calls up the other mom and asks. Everyone knows that only succeeds in making you even more unpopular.
Our guess is a fair number of the geeky employees at Facebook were exactly that kid. Which is why I’m sort of surprised that they’d think asking people to help out Facebook friends who don’t have a lot of Wall activity, or even many other friends. These people get mocked. Obviously.
We’ve all seen the messages under Suggestions on the Facebook home page. So and so only has two friends on Facebook, suggest friends for him? Others are urged to write on the Wall of unpopular users.
A reader writes to us today with a screenshot: → Read More
British stealth startup Zkatter is launching a real-time microblogging service in the next few months that could be a hit. Similar in theory to Twitter, Zkatter asks users “What do you see now?” vs. Twitter’s “What are you doing?”
The service, which has been in development since 2008, will allow anybody to broadcast and archive ‘live moments’ comprising location, media (image, video and text) to ‘friends only’ or ‘the public’ which can then be discovered instantly via search and friends time-lines. Zkatter’s focus is towards capturing information that you physically see live which offers a interesting addition to the real-time space. → Read More
Tokyo-based Thanko, famous for its plethora of USB-enabled gadgets that make no sense whatsoever, has announced a GPS-enabled watch [JP] today. And this device has a USB (2.0) port, too. It’s compatible with Windows XP and Vista. → Read More
