We’ve seen some thin, flexible displays out there (TDK, Sony, LG, HP, and others are working on them), but I do believe this one is the thinnest yet. The others have gotten as thin as 0.3mm, but this one from Taiwanese research company ITRI is a microscopic 0.1mm.
Who knows, that last 0.2mm could be the difference that makes a breakthrough device possible. Hopefully not literally breakthrough, though. → Read More
Short version: Like the Nexus One, the G2 is a unified Google experience, and it excels because of that. The vaunted HSPA+ is fast as hell and there is very little to criticize from start to finish. That said, it’s also a brick and the form factor isn’t for everyone. → Read More
Facebook has just sent us an invitation to a special event that’s happening this Wednesday. The theme? Mobile.
We don’t know what Facebook is planning to launch (though we’ll do our best to find out beforehand), but we have a few guesses. The most obvious is the company’s long-awaited iPad application (it still doesn’t have an official app). It could also include more features that involve Places — Facebook has recently been testing a Deals service that’s connected to Places, and mobile is obviously the best place for users to access those. → Read More
Real Madrid’s Cristiano Ronaldo, the current top scorer in Spain’s La Liga, is a very fancy man. This much we know. But what I didn’t know till just a little while ago was how fancy he was. Nike has designed a new boot, the CR Mercurial Vapor SuperFly II (quite the mouthful, yes) specifically for him. The last time Nike did that for a player was when Ronaldinho was good. (Incidentally, Ronaldinho was just called up to the Brazil squad.) He’ll debut the boots in the Madrid derby (against Atlético, of course) on November 7. → Read More
Just in case you need another reason to forgo this weekend’s festivities, gog has a bunch of games on sale in the name of Halloween. There are some classics on sale and just like the Steam sale, the selection is sort of limited to just limited to zombie/scary/dark games. That’s probably fine with some of you Internet creeps though. → Read More
I’m a fan of iRiver; have been ever since their SlimX MP3-CD player. I’ve admired their other gear from afar, and I suspect that will be how I admire their latest, the Cover Story e-reader. It’s among the cleanest readers I’ve seen, perhaps outdone only by the Plastic Logic Que (R.I.P.). iRiver knows how to make a slick device, that’s for sure. → Read More
Last November, Google announced that it had acquired leading mobile ad network AdMob for a whopping $750 million. Today, less than a year after the deal closed, AdMob founder and CEO Omar Hamoui is leaving Google, we’ve confirmed with the company. Google says Hamoui is leaving for personal reasons.
It sounds like Google is getting the short end of the stick here — Hamoui has actually only been able to work at the search giant for five months, because the AdMob/Google acquisition was held up by an endless federal investigation that stretched on from November 2009 through the end of May 2010 — an eternity in this highly competitive space. → Read More
Today on the Twitter blog, the company wrote a post that was all of three sentences to let people know about their new logos. Yay!
But there’s actually quite a bit more to it then it seems.
If you follow the link they provide to Guidelines page, you’ll find some interesting tidbits. Among them: → Read More
Social sharing site Drop.io has just posted the breaking news of its acquisition by Facebook on its company blog:
“Today, we’re proud to announce that we’ve struck a deal with Facebook. What this means is that Facebook has bought most of drop.io’s technology and assets, and Sam Lessin is moving to Facebook.
In the coming weeks, we’ll be winding down the drop.io service. As of this week, people will no longer be able to create new free drops, but you’ll be able to download content from existing drops until Dec. 15. Paid user accounts will still be available through Dec. 15 and paid users will be able to continue using the service normally. After Dec. 15, paid accounts will be discontinued as well.”
Want to control your devices from afar with something that looks like a mini-Blackberry? Want it to have a crazy name like iPazzPort? Man, today is lucky Friday because that’s what this thing is. Ready to have your mind blown? This thing also has a laser pointer! Want to pay only $43? Click on, McDuff! → Read More
We cover a lot of military research here on CrunchGear, largely because they have the coolest toys. But the truth is that the vast array of gadgets, cameras, sensors, and weaponry available to the modern warrior make him have less in common with your stereotypical G.I. than with a blogger like yours truly. And when Special Operations Command needed to produce a force-wide fleet of devices to coordinate location, communication, and so on, what do you think they opted for? Yep. Score one for the fandroids. → Read More
The move to all-digital distribution is already well under way, and it poses a problem for businesses that have based themselves around the sale of shiny plastic discs. That, combined with the rampant piracy of these discs when they’re released has particularly hurt independent pro-wrestling organizations (to pick something out of thin air). Gabe Sapolsky, vice-president of Dragon Gate USA, owner of Evolve, and former head booker of Ring of Honor, was recently interviewed on Figure Four Daily, a podcast dedicated to pro-wrestling and MMA news, and said that the only way these companies will survive is if a new technology, Internet Pay-Per-View, becomes viable. → Read More
Search engines like Bing and Google will swear up and down that their natural search results are determined by one thing and one thing only: the all-knowing, all-powerful Algorithm. Sure, paid results might pop up at the top or to the side, but they are always highlighted as such. But sometimes the temptation is too great and the natural search results, which are supposed to be sacrosanct, are used to promote a product or service owned by the same company that operates the search engine.
That certainly appears to be what is happening on Bing right now if you do a search for the term “datamarket.” The top result is for Windows Azure DataMarket, a product which just launched a couple days ago. Don’t get me wrong. It sounds like a cool product. It is a cloud-based service where people can upload and sell data in a consistent way. → Read More
There’s a lot of talk about how web apps and the cloud are heralding a new age of computing, but for the forseeable future many people are still going to be relying heavily on desktop software — especially as operating systems start to bake in their own App Stores. And while desktop apps may offer advantages in terms of performance and user experience, in some ways web apps are actually better for developers — it’s much easier to track how people are using your application and iterate accordingly.
That’s where DeskMetrics comes in. The Brazilian startup, which launches today to the public, offers developers a set of components that will allow them to analyze how their desktop applications are being used, down to each click. This means developers can analyze which buttons users are clicking, how far along in various sign-up flows they’re getting, and more — just like web developers have been doing for years. → Read More
While there are a lot of iPhone 4 clones coming out of China, few are even close to the real thing. Here’s another that comes close to Jonathan Ive’s design, see if you can spot the differences in the video. → Read More
Have you heard the news? The Verizon iPhone is coming. Today, Fortune has the 15th or so confirmation that the device will launch in early 2011. There’s way too much smoke now for there not to be a fire. But even more interesting than that tidbit is Fortune’s interview with Ivan Seidenberg, the CEO of Verizon. He wouldn’t speak directly about a Verizon iPhone launch, but he still had plenty to say about the device, and Apple’s CEO Steve Jobs.
The most interesting thing he had to say was the last bit about the iPhone in the piece:
According to Seidenberg, Jobs told him during a December 2009 meeting, “Decisions you made [at Verizon] are decisions we would make at Apple.”
That sounds like it’s Jobs more or less saying that he respects Verizon because they stood up to him. They wouldn’t compromise on their vision. → Read More
Take this with the grainiest grain of salt in all of Grainysaltsville for now, as photoshopping something like this would take little more than 18 seconds and dash of boredom — but according to GizmoFusion, that shot you’re looking at up above is pulled straight off a handset running Android 2.3 (Gingerbread). Fear not! Their source came bearing alleged details, as well. → Read More
The London Underground, commonly known as the Tube, will be getting Wi-Fi. There will be a six-month trial period beginning on November 1 at the Charing Cross station. → Read More
We are hearing reports that Facebook is weeks away from launching a new, redesigned dedicated gaming portal. Details are sparse at this point, but the portal will present a new, more feature rich way to both find games and play games within the social network. We are told that Facebook will launch the portal with a number of game publishers as partners.
With 200 million Facebook users playing games on the site monthly (or 40% of its userbase), it’s not surprising that Facebook is ramping up its gaming initiatives. The company alluded to launching a new dashboard at its gaming press event held in September, with the social network’s product manager for the games team Jared Morganstern telling the press that there will be a wave of innovation around the dashboard. At that time, Facebook announced changes with gaming applications in relation to the news feed and bookmarks. → Read More
It’s pretty easy being green if you’re a Silicon Valley notable apparently. We just got word that Paul Buchheit, creator of Gmail, Friendfeed and now a Facebook employee, has surpassed Facebook co-founder Dustin Moskovitz’s 70K contribution to the Yes on Prop 19 campaign. → Read More
