Tech News Today 185

Tech News Today Episode 185

Tech News Today 185: Cylon Children Make Demands

Cell Phone radiation, AT&T upload problems, Google disables Facebook contact sync, and more.

Hosts

• Tom Merritt (@acedtect)
  • TomMerritt.com
• Dan Patterson
  • danpatterson.com
• Jason Hiner
  • techrepublic.com

Top Stories

• Intel's Light Peak I/O Due Thursday. Intel hosting a press briefing tomorrow to discuss "new technology that is about to appear on the market" CNET reports that technology is LightPeak.
• Apple brands Intel 'Light Peak' as Thunderbolt
• 13-Inch MacBook Pro Specs, Photos, Light Peak Known As Thunderbolt?. MacRumors has a picture of the specs on a new MacBook Pro. Not a huge update. dual-core i5 processors, Intel graphics processor. Brand Name of LightPeak is Thunderbolt and delivered through the displayport. Looks like there may be an SDXC card slot too.

• HP’s new business laptops offer up to 32 hours of battery
• HP ups workplace sex appeal with new Sandy Bridge notebooks
• HP EliteBook 8460p - To get to 32 hours, you have to buy the HP BB09 ultra-extended life notebook battery and download the latest Intel graphics driver and HP BIOS (or startup software). The notebook can get to 32 hours if you use Intel graphics, a 160-gigabyte Intel flash memory SSD drive, an HP LED HD display and Windows 7. So it costs more and it adds one pound to the overall weight. New design for EliteBooks and ProBooks is called FORGE. EliteBook p-series and ProBook b-series and s-series models. - Magnesium and Aluminum chassis - Bottom panel is a single large piece removed by squeezing a latch and sliding off. Can be secured with a single screw.
• Priced starting at $999, HP's new 14- and 15.6-inch p-series notebooks come standard with Intel HD graphics, but an option will be available for AMD Radeon HD 6470M discrete graphics.-The more budget-minded ProBook b-series, which starts at $799- Multimedia s-series models Priced starting at $579 - Shipping March 15

• Google disables contact sync in Facebook for Android, but only Nexus S for now
• Android 2.3.3 now available for Nexus One, Nexus S
• In Android 3.3 the feature of the Facebook for Android app to provide the social network's stored contact information to your Nexus S has been revoked.-- Google claims they are only enforcing the rules that they had given Facebook an exemption to. Nexus 1 will not be affected.

Discussion Stories

• FTC to Look Into In-app Purchase Process for Virtual Goods
• FTC says it will look into Apple's marketing of in-app purchases to kids
• The Federal Trade Commission will investigate Apple's marketing of iOS games with in-app purchases to children. FTC Chairman Jon Leibowitz acknowledged in a letter to US Rep. Edward Markey.--Markey had written an open letter (PDF) to the FTC last week over Apple's (and Google's) use of in-app purchases to sell gaming add-ons to kids. Parents are able to turn off in-app purchases completely on their iOS devices by going into Settings > General > Restrictions.

• Google yanks request for kids’ social security numbers
• Google requested identification for children participating in the Doodle-4-Google art contest. Open to kids Kindergarten through last year in High School. Google opened the contest to any child even if their school had not registered. To keep entries distinct Google asked for parental consent as well as city, birth year and last 4 digits of social. Googlehas removed the request for social.

• Cellphone Radiation Increases Brain Activity

Work to be published in the Journal of the American Medical Association Feb. 23 by Nora Volkow National Institutes of HealthDardo Tomasi of Brookhaven National Lab. What it says: Use of a cell phone on average showed about a 7 percent boost in sugar usage in the side of the head where the cellphone was. Several times less the activity than visual brain regions show during an engaging movie. What they did: Monitored 47 subjects over 50 minutes. One phone was off on one side of the head the other side had an active call. . Subjects used a Samsung Knack with a specific absorption rate (SAR) of 1 watt per kilogram (iPhone 4 has a SAR of 2) The sun's avaerage SAR is 5.

• AT&T's brewing HSUPA-gate: the inside story
• 4G phones on AT&T having upload issues - Engadget source says Essentially all handsets for AT&T (except iPhone 4) are required to handshake as 3GPP release 5 phones. Release 5 lacks support for HSUPA (High-Speed Uplink Packet Access - with up-link speeds up to 5.76 Mbit/s.) source believes that the Release 6 certification may happen within a "month or two,"

News Fuse

• In what must be the worst Phone software update ever, Microsoft has decided to stop sending updates to Samsung phones. Widespread reports of the update bricking the phones led to the decision. Microsoft has identified the issue and is working on a fix. The worst part is the update didn't even add new features, it just updated the software updater tool.

• Chinese workers injured while making touchscreens for mobile devices, including iPhones, have written to Apple asking it to do more to help them. Some 137 workers suffered adverse health effects following exposure to a chemical, known as n-hexane. The chemical is no longer being used. The workers feel they have not received enough compensation for the adverse health effects.

• At Apple’s annual meeting today, shareholders defeated a proposal, opposed by the board, that would have required the company to report openly on the executive succession planning it now keeps to itself. The proposal, brought by the Laborers’ International Union, took on additional import with the indefinite medical leave of CEO Steve Jobs.an

• Modders rejoice! If you can afford the Motorola Xoom, you won't get the usual Motorola restrictions on what you can do with the device you shelled out the big bucks for. Liliputing's Brad Linder reports Motorola left the bootloader unlocked, on purpose, allowing devs and modders to gain "deep access" to the device, for the coding of custom ROMs and alternative apps for the Xoom.

• You know what's cooler than $1 million? 500,000 dollars. If you're trying to buy advertising that is. Apple has cut in half the minimum purchase of $1 million for advertisers on its mobile iAd network, in an effort to attract smaller companies that couldn't afford the initial asking price. Still, it's too pricey to use iAd to push that macrame you've been pumping out for Etsy.

• Well look at that. One year after it started asking prospective employees and reapplyers for their Facebook passwords, the Department of Corrections in Maryland has changed their stance. The practice had been temporarily suspended for 45 days, though the department points out supplying the password was voluntary and did not affect your evaluation. Riiiiight.

• The movie business has—yet again—run up record numbers at the box office. In 2010, theaters around the world reported a combined total revenue of $31.8 billion, up 8 percent from 2009. While the industry certainly has its share of piracy problems, they aren't affecting box office receipts. Those receipts are up even as the number of people buying tickets has declined. In the US and Canadian markets, the total number of tickets sold fell by 5 percent last year, but theater owners made up for the decline by raising prices an average of 39¢.

• You know that weird data center that Aplpe bought out in North Carolina, that everybody suspects will be used for expanded Mobile Me and an online version of iTunes? Well it turns out that Apple told its shareholders this morning what's REALLY going on out there. According to Apple Insider and Electronista the center is ACTUALLY for iTunes and MobileMe! And will open this spring.

Kickers and Weird Science

• New Way to Check Out eBooks
• Internet Archive (disclosure: I'm a board member) has joined with 150 US and Canada libraries to develop a cooperative collection of (mostly 20th-century) eBooks that library patrons can "borrow" on a laptop, an e-reader or a library computer while visiting a participating branch. Go to openlibrary.org for more info. OverDrive Inc. released OverDrive Media Console for the iPad, a free app from Apple’s App Store. With the app, you can now borrow eBooks for reading on the go with a tablet.
• Archive.org and 150 libraries create 80,000 lendable ebook library
• Both these services allow copies of digital books to be checked out by one person at a time and must be returned by a dues date.

Calendar

• Apple Announces March 2 Special Event - Yerba Buena Center for the Arts at 10:00 am ( oh look at that, it's at the same time as Nintendo CEO Satoru Iwata's keynote. And right next door to boot!

• Final Android 3.0 Platform and Updated SDK Tools
• Sprint renames the HTC 7 Pro the Arrive, launching it tomorrow, Feb. 24 - first WP7 CDMA phone
• Ruling in the extradition of Julian Assange due tomorrow 2/24
• The Daily’s Apple-Only Days Are Numbered: Android Coming This Spring
• Toyota to start selling home battery chargers in 2012, sate the electrical appetites of the Prii
• SXSW coverage Saturday and Sunday 3/12-13

Email

"The future! Just shoot me now. I like computers, but stupid kids being obnoxious will leave me behind, as an old fashioned computer user.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P81bb0Tzwbo&feature=youtu.be

tadeusz"

"Hey TNT,

One of the most interesting aspects of the Amazon Prime Streaming announcement yesterday is that Netflix runs mostly on Amazon Web Services. What this means is that Netflix has stopped building its own server farms and is relying on Amazon to provide its computing infrastructure. This is a BIG DEAL for Amazon because although its web services are popular with start ups, not many large companies have taken the plunge. (Can you plunge into a cloud?). Anyhow, Netflix and Amazon have been working very closely to make this thing work, as it is proving that Amazon Web Services can indeed work for a big company using lots of bandwidth.

A good read: http://techblog.netflix.com/2010/12/four-reasons-we-choose-amazons-cloud-as.html

Mark from Pasadena"

"I noticed this Tigo Facebook Phone sales booth at the Shoprite mall in Accra last weekend. I did a double-take because you guys have repeatedly reported that Facebook is not making a phone.

I don't know who the manufacturer of the handset is. The phone looks low-end by US and European standards. Tigo is one of the smaller mobile telcos in Ghana. I don't believe they offer 3G data service at all and this handset seems to only have GPRS for data. - Brian"

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Production Information

• Edited by: Jeff
• Notes:

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