Google’s “X Phone” Becomes “Regular Phone”
Boy Genius Reports is sending out word today that, based on some notes from a Chinese analyst, the rumored Google X-developed Motorola phone that’s due to be announced this month at Google I/O will not move stars, save Leonardo DiCaprio’s character from Titanic, or even have stock Android. No, it’ll just be a regular phone with a big battery. That might still be cool, right?
An Android User Buys An iPad Mini For Games; Impressions From A First-Time iOS Owner
I bought a Nexus 7 nearly a year ago to, perhaps unconsciously, prove the point that you could sell a good tablet at $200. Amazon’s efforts to dip below the $499.99 entry barrier for the iPad with the Kindle Fire were critically lukewarm, even if people bought a number of the things. I didn’t even really need a tablet, but it finally got me out of hauling out my Chromebook or new laptop while I sat in bed, waiting to fall asleep. It’s the perfect nightstand device. Of course, since I’ve been doing the FleshEatingZipper thing for real, I felt a little left behind in the mobile gaming scene, so I finally bit my lip and picked up my first iOS device, a 16GB iPad Mini. So how does it feel to be on the other side? More and less, more or less.
Google Timelapse Is The Coolest Thing You’ll See Today
A lot’s changed since I was born in the Year Of Orwell. Primarily, I grew up and become a cool guy. While that was happening, the world was shifting and moving at such a massive scale that it’s been hard to grasp. Until today, that is. Google unveiled Timelapse, a feature mined from decades of satellite information gleaned from the United States Geological Survey that shows the world changing before your eyes.
U Mad? Windows 8 Isn’t The Flop People Want It To Be
It’s not really a surprise to me that people want to see Microsoft with a huge wad of egg on its face for merely suggesting that Windows 8 should exist. Microsoft is the old guard now; aside from Xbox, their products feel outmoded. Their late Zune and their current Bing exempify how their ‘second to bat, first to lead’ charge isn’t working so well anymore. But let’s not fall for the rhetoric: Windows 8 is doing pretty well, far from being the perceived disaster of Windows Vista.
Ferrari Chairman Says They Won’t Build Electric, I Guess I’m Stuck Waiting
Okay, you got me: the subject line is a joke. You may be able to afford one of these curvaceous trademark-red motor vehicles, but a Ferrari is way out of my league. You know what’s out of Ferrari’s league? Building electric vehicles while Luca di Montezemolo is their Chairman. It’s just out, way out.
Klout Adds “Experts”; It’s Like Quora, But Weirder
If you’re still scratching your head, wondering what the point of Klout is, amen!, we’re in the same boat. By plugging in your identity from various networks, Klout gives you a “Score” based on your contributions. If you plug in your Facebook and have no friends, you won’t see much of a bump compared to someone who has a lot of friends and is constantly getting likes and attention. If your score is high enough, you’re even eligible for sponsor-provided Perks because you’re obviously that cool talking about whatever. How does the Score even work? I don’t know, no one knows. Does it even mean anything? No one knows!
So today I get an e-mail to try out their new Experts feature. It’s… well, interesting.
80,000 People Apply For One-Way Trip To Mars, Including A Valve Programmer
When MarsOne announced they would be vetting a crew of astronauts from applicants from around the world for a one-way trip to the red planet, did you jot out your first speech since high school and fire up that webcam? Well, nearly 80,000 people did, far short of the expected 1 million, but still an impressive number when you consider that 80,000 individuals uploaded applicants to their web site, all pretty happy with the prospect of a trip to Mars from which there is no return.
Tesla’s Electric Cars + Google’s Self-Driving Tech = Profit!
While our nation’s streets and highways aren’t quite the violent, ultra-fast transit lines of I, Robot (or even the dash cam-friendly roads beyond the Iron Curtain, for that matter), automobile accidents still kill 35,000 people per year. How do we avoid these? In many, many cases, you need to remove the human driver from the equation. Tesla’s Elon Musk is a big proponent of that, too, but he doesn’t want the marketing to replace humans to sound so brusque.
Stop Pirating Photoshop And Pay $49.99 Monthly, That’s Adobe’s New Plan For Creative Cloud
CS out, CC in. No longer the Creative Suite, a big expensive box you pirate pick up from a specialty retailer, Adobe announced today that they’re done with the box strategy; they want to move everything to the cloud. This also means you’ll save money buying Photoshop, Flash, Illustrator and all those other Adobe tools you love. Seriously, it’s true.
Would You Pay $2 A Month For A YouTube Channel? YouTube Thinks You Will
It wasn’t all that long ago when YouTube sought a bunch of partners to develop original content for them. It also wasn’t that much later that YouTube yanked a lot of those Channels’ funding when they weren’t making any money. Now YouTube has a new idea for these content providers: monthly subscriptions between $1-$5 a month. It kinda makes sense.