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CUPERTINO, CA—Claiming that he completely forgot about the much-hyped electronic device until the last minute, a frantic Steve Jobs reportedly stayed up all night Tuesday in a desperate effort to design Apple's new tablet computer. "Come on, Steve, just think—think, dammit—you're running out of time," the exhausted CEO said as he glued nine separate iPhones to the back of a plastic cafeteria tray. "Okay, yeah, this will work. This will definitely work. Just need to write 'tablet' on this little strip of masking tape here and I'm golden. Oh, come on, you piece of shit! Just stick already!" Middle-of-the-night sources reported that Jobs then began work on double-spacing his Keynote presentation and increasing the font size to make it appear longer.
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A Congressional candidate in Los Angeles is asking celebrities to plant their carbon footprint somewhere besides Santa Monica Airport.
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Boeing's latest 747, the 747-8, has new computer systems that "may allow the exploitation of network security vulnerabilities resulting in intentional or unintentional destruction, disruption, degradation, or exploitation" of critical systems, according to the FAA. In short, the FAA is making sure that Boeing addresses the possibility that the jets, which can be configured to hold 400 passengers, could be hacked.
Many proud Scotsman celebrate the birthday of the great Scottish poet Robert Burns—January 25, as it happens—with dish of haggis. This is because Burns created the world's foremost, and perhaps only, instance compelling pro-haggis verse. But true haggis imports from Scotland have been illegal in the United States (a tragedy Ilamented in these pages many Burns Nights ago), for the last 21 years thanks to ungrounded fears about mad cow disease transmission.
But this week the World Organization for Animal Health ruled sheep's lungs do not convey a variant of the disease, and the U.S. is expected to reopen the haggis floodgates shortly. (Don't think too hard about the phrase "haggis floodgates.")
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Citing an alleged report from Russia's Northern Fleet, the Venezuelan strongman's state mouthpiece ViVe TV shot out a press release saying the 7.0 magnitude Haiti quake was caused by a U.S. test of an experimental shockwave system that can also create "weather anomalies to cause floods, droughts and hurricanes."
The station's Web site added that the U.S. government's HAARP program, an atmospheric research facility in Alaska (and frequent subject of conspiracy theories), was also to blame for a Jan. 9 quake in Eureka, Calif., and may have been behind the 7.8-magnitude quake in China that killed nearly 90,000 people in 2008.
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The Federal Bureau of Investigation used false terrorism emergencies to illegally collect more than 2,000 phone records between 2002 and 2006. A series of e-mails and memos obtained by The Washington Post details how FBI officials violated their own procedures and strained their communication analysis unit with non-urgent requests. In many instances, approval was granted after records had been collected to justify the FBIâ(TM)s actions.Later this month, the Justice Department is expected to issue a report that will find the FBI violated regulations many times with its terrorism-related phone record requests. FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III did not now about the problems until late 2006 or early 2007 when they were brought to light by an inspector general investigation, reports the Associated Press.The memos do not reveal whose phone records were collected by the FBI, but Bureau officials say that nearly all instances were related to terrorism cases. They added that agents were working under the stress of trying to stop potential terror attacks and did not intentionally violate the law.
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Aliph has just unveiled the Jawbone Icon, which promises to be the company's most sophisticated Bluetooth headset yet. We've had a chance to really put the headset through its paces for the past week, and we have to say it absolutely delivers. Not only does it look and sound great, it offers more flexibility than any other Bluetooth headset due to an industry-first software platform.
It's called MyTalk, and the Jawbone Icon has what Aliph says is an operating system on a chip. This lets Aliph do some really interesting things with this headset. For example, when you pair the Jawbone Icon with the Apple iPhone, you'll see a visual battery meter of the Icon right next to the iPhone's own battery meter on the upper right corner. This way you can easily check on the Jawbone Icon's battery status. While this may strike some people as a small thing, we think it's pretty cool.
The big news with MyTalk, however, is that you can plug the Jawbone Icon into your computer and customize it with a variety of Audio and Dial "apps." Simply log on to the mytalk.jawbone.com Web site (which will be live shortly), plug in the headset via a USB cable, and the Website will automatically detect it. You can then customize it with a variety of Audio apps, which are essentially voice profiles of different personalities.
There are six different voice personalities--The Ace, the Hero, the Thinker, the Bombshell, the Rogue, and the Catch--plus a default that comes with the headset. The voices range from a deep male baritone to that of a sultry female. You can also have it in French, German, or Spanish. The different voice profiles are used for spoken alerts on the headset that announce things like incoming caller ID and the headset's battery status.
As for the Dial apps, they are essentially speed dial numbers you can map to the Talk button on the headset. Some of the Dial apps include Voice Dial; Directory Assistance; 1800Free411; Jott (a service that lets you dictate notes, reminders, and more); and Dial2Do; which is similar to Jott. Though calling these personalization options "apps" is a bit of a stretch, we really have to commend Aliph on the intuitive interface of the MyTalk Web site. Perhaps the best thing about the MyTalk software platform is that Aliph can easily send out firmware updates this way.
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SEOUL, Korea (AVING) --LG Display has developed the world's largest flexible electronic-paper screen measuring 25cm by 40cm, which translates into a 19-inch screen size.
With 0.3mm thickness and 130g weight, it utilizes a metal foil instead of a traditional glass to make itself both flexible and durable. Boasting a high-contrast ratio, it only requires power when the screen is refreshed so the e-paper device features a long battery life.
According to the company, they plan to begin mass production of an 11.5-inch flexible electronic paper screen in the first half of this year via Skiff.
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Three U.S. universities will stop promoting the use of Amazon.com's Kindle DX e-book reader in classrooms after complaints that the device doesn't give blind students equal access to information.
Settlements with Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Pace University in New York City and Reed College in Portland, Oregon, were announced Wednesday by the U.S. Department of Justice. The National Federation of the Blind and the American Council of the Blind had complained that use of the Kindle devices discriminates against students with vision problems.
The complaints about the Kindle were based on the Americans with Disabilities Act, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of disability.
The three universities were among six schools participating in an Amazon.com pilot program testing the use of the Kindle DX in classrooms. On Monday, a fourth participating school, Arizona State University, also reached a settlement with the DOJ and the two organizations representing the blind.
Three other schools announced in late 2009 they will not deploy Kindle in classrooms.
The Kindle DX has the capability to convert text to synthesized speech, but the device does not include text-to-speech functionality for its menu and navigational controls, the DOJ said in a press release. Some reviewers and users of the device's text-to-speech software have also said the speech is difficult to listen to and the conversion can be inaccurate.
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It’s finally here: a soda-powered mobile phone! Sarcasm aside, someone has really developed this.
What was probably just a laughed-off concept before is now a reality: Chinese developer Daizi Zheng has designed a Nokia cylindrical cell phone that is fueled by soft drinks, but especially by Coca-Cola. (I wonder if that partnership was planned, or they’re just going to be getting some free publicity off all this.)
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BEIJING — Google said Tuesday that it would stop cooperating with Chinese Internet censorship and consider shutting down its operations in the country altogether, citing assaults from hackers on its computer systems and China’s attempts to “limit free speech on the Web.”
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