WARNING: FOLLOWING THIS PERSON WILL BLOW UP YOUR TWITTER FEED…but it’s worth it. Did you know that HP had a liquidation sale yesterday to sell all of their HP Touchpads (HP’s version of iPad) for $99?  It’s true.  BestBuy Canada along with other HP-selected retailers pulled the sale by early afternoon yesterday after they sold out.  My guess is that you probably didn’t know and neither would I if I wasn’t following Chris Luzader (@TechZader) on … Read More

via On the Verge of Something Epic

iOS4 was released to the general public today, with over 100 new features! iTunes 9.2, released last week, is required to download this update.

According to Apple, iTunes 9.2 now allows:

• Syncing iTunes content with iPhone 4
• Syncing and reading e-books (with iBooks 1.1 installed)
• Syncing PDF documents as books
• Utilizing new folders feature for organizing apps
• Faster syncing

Naturally, we all want to know what’s

changed in iOS4, so here’s the primary features:

• Multitasking: You can now multitask with third party applications, ie. listen to music from Pandora in background, while on Safari or a game*
• Folders: Organize all of your favorite apps into folders of 12 applications, expanding the number of visible applications on the home screen from 176 to 2160.
• Custom Wallpapers: Use your own favorite pictures as the home screen background*
• Mail: Now supports threading, and a unified inbox
• iBooks: Works and Syncs with iPad, iPhone, and iPod touch
• Bluetooth Keyboard Support – You can now pair your iPhone with a Bluetooth keyboard, which will make typing long documents much easier.
• Better Spell Check – The spell check utility now works across Mail, Notes, Safari and other apps.

Some of the more minor features include Custom Playlists, 5x Digital Zoom*, Tap to focus video*, Faces and Places in Photos, Gifting Apps, locking screen orientation, and *

*iPod Touch 3G, iPhone 3GS, and iPhone 4 can only use these features.

iPod Touch 2G and iPhone 3G users can’t utilize the *’d features due to unsupported hardware. The iPod Touch 1G is not compatible with iOS4 at all.

And here’s the FULL changelog:

• Multitasking support for third-party apps*
- Multitasking user interface to quickly move between
apps
- Support for audio apps to play in the background
- VoIP apps can receive and maintain calls in the
background or when device is asleep
- Apps can monitor location and take action while
running in the background
- Alerts and messages can be pushed to apps using
push and local notifications
- Apps can complete tasks in the background
• Folders to better organize and access apps
• Home screen Wallpaper*
• Mail improvements
- Unified inbox to view emails from all accounts in one
place
- Fast inbox switching to quickly switch between
different email accounts
- Threaded messages to view multiple emails from the
same conversation
- Attachments can be opened with compatible third-
party apps
- Search results can now be filed or deleted
- Option to select size of photo attachments
- Messages in the Outbox can be edited or deleted
• Support for iBooks and iBookstore (available from the
App Store)
• Photo and Camera improvements
- 5x digital zoom when taking a photo**
- Tap to focus during video recording**
- Ability to sync Faces from iPhoto
- Geo-tagged photos appear on a map in Photos
• Ability to create and edit playlists on device
• Calendar invitations can be sent and accepted wirelessly
with supported CalDAV servers
• Support for MobileMe calendar sharing
• Suggestions and recent searches appear during a web
search
• Searchable SMS/MMS messages**
• Spotlight search can be continued on web and Wikipedia
• Enhanced location privacy
- New Location Services icon in the status bar
- Indication of which apps have requested your location
in the last 24 hours
- Location Services can be toggled on or off for
individual apps
• Automatic spellcheck
• Support for Bluetooth keyboards*
• iPod out to navigate music, podcasts and audiobooks
through an iPod interface with compatible cars
• Support for iTunes gifting of apps
• Wireless notes syncing with IMAP-based mail accounts
• Persistent WiFi connection to receive push notifications*
• New setting for turning on/off cellular data only**
• Option to display the character count while composing
new SMS/MMS**
• Visual Voicemail messages can be kept locally even if
they have been deleted from the server**
• Control to lock portrait orientation*
• Audio playback controls for iPod and third-party audio
apps*
• New languages, dictionaries and keyboards
• Accessibility enhancements*
• Bluetooth improvements
• Better data protection using the device passcode as an
encryption key* (Requires full restore.)
• Support for third-party Mobile Device Management
solutions
• Enables wireless distribution of enterprise applications
• Exchange Server 2010 compatibility
• Support for multiple Exchange ActiveSync accounts
• Support for Juniper Junos Pulse and Cisco AnyConnect
SSL VPN apps (available from the App Store)
• More than 1,500 new developer APIs
• Bug fixes

Bebo also sent out a staff memo which said, “Bebo, unfortunately, is a business that has been declining and, as a result, would require significant investment in order to compete in the competitive social networking space …“

Social networking is a tough market these days with the dominance of Facebook and Twitter, and the slowly declining Myspace, which have the backing of large companies such as Microsoft.

Bebo is quite popular in Ireland, New Zealand and the UK, however it has failed to make any real impact in the United States. It’s hard to predict whether a larger organization will acquire Bebo, as it may seem much to tough of a challenge to take up.

I imagine AOL will sell it – perhaps some enterprising venture and private equity investors will swoop in to buy it at a discount, as happened with Skype? Or maybe Facebook should acquire it to conquer Europe in exchange for stock?

Only time will tell.

We’re grateful to all of our customers for helping us reach this amazing milestone,” said Eddy Cue, Apple’s vice president of Internet Services. “We’re proud that iTunes has become the number one music retailer in the world, and selling 10 billion songs is truly staggering.

Apple notes in the press release that the iTunes Store currently offers a catalog of over 12 million songs, over 55,000 TV episodes and over 8,500 movies including over 2,500 in high definition.

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The two companies have created an exclusive, easy-to-use Skype mobile offering for 3G smartphones. Verizon Wireless 3G smartphone users with data plans can use Skype mobile to:

• make and receive unlimited Skype-to-Skype voice calls to any Skype user around the globe on America’s most reliable wireless network
• call international phone numbers at competitive Skype Out calling rates
• send and receive instant messages to other Skype users
• remain always connected with the ability to see friends’ online presence.

Initially, Skype mobile will be available on millions of best-selling Verizon Wireless 3G smartphones with data plans [an unlimited plan is obviously critical], including the BlackBerry Storm 9530, Storm2 9550, Curve 8330, Curve 8530, 8830 World Edition and Tour 9630 smartphones, as well as DROID by Motorola, DROID ERIS by HTC and Motorola DEVOUR.

Skype mobile on Verizon Wireless changes the game. For Verizon Wireless’ more than 90 million customers, Skype mobile adds great value because they’re effectively giving customers with smartphones and data plans the option to extend their unlimited calling community to hundreds of millions of Skype users around the globe. They are taking aim at AT&T. Whether they precisely hit the target is yet to be determined.

Josh Silverman, chief executive officer of Skype, noted, “People want to take their Skype conversations with them wherever they go, whether it’s on a PC, TV or, increasingly, mobile phones. Verizon Wireless will give U.S. consumers the best Skype experience on mobile phones and will truly change the way people call their friends and family internationally.”

Additional information about the service will be available next month, but you can read more about ‘Verizon Wireless with Skype Mobile’ here.

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Note: This is far, in fact from another realm from what I normally post, but I felt the need to put this out there.

Since WordPress won’t allow me to directly embed videos, you have to click this link and watch the video on ABC’s site. Click on this: http://abcnews.go.com/Health/video/nodar-kumaritashvili-video-fatal-luge-crash-9823485

News report:

On Friday of last week, just hours before the Opening Ceremonies, the collective world held its breath upon news that Olympic Luge Athelete, Nodar Kumaritashvili, had tragically died in an accident during practice on the luge course. And while some were later mourning the unexpected passing of an Olympic hopeful, others across the Internet chatted with each other and sought answers. What had happened?

As Kumaritashvili’s luge crash was caught on video, it did not take long for the infamous footage to find its way onto the screens of those who wanted to view it. In fact, it has been reported that the video of the accident appeared on YouTube an hour and a half before Kumaritashvili’s death was ever announced. Since its creation, the luge video has been a hot topic amongst the Internet crowd due to its easy availability among news sources and copy cat posters.

The search “luge tragedy video” is currently number 6 in Google’s hot trending searches, with a rating of “volcanic” with “luge accident abc” coming in at number 16.  On February 13th “video of nodar kumaritashvili’s death” was the 10th hottest search and “nodar kumaritashvili” came in at number 4 on Friday the 12th. As you might have guessed, the trend is reflected on Twitter.

Videos of the luger’s death are banned on YouTube.

Whether or not people viewed luge accident footage for mundane or even macabre reasons, not all the chatter on the Internet was grim as well wishers erupted en masse to pass messages of peace and condolence to the family of the fallen athlete.

But the question remains, is having the easy availability of such a tragic video a benefit or burden on our society? For accident investigators that want to prevent further tragedies from occuring, it is truly a benefit. But for others just wanting to satisfy their curiosity, perhaps it is not.

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With bada, which means “ocean or sea” in Korean and is meant to represent the “limitless variety” of the platform, Samsung is taking the TouchWiz system used on its touch-screen non-smart phones and making it the basis of a smart phone platform to take on the iPhone and BlackBerry.

The new phone, dubbed the Wave (S8500), is a touch screen phone like the iPhone. It features a highly saturated, high-resolution screen using organic light emitting diodes, or OLEDs. Samsung said the Samsung Wave will be offered “within an affordable price range and be distributed globally.”

The Wave sports:

• A 3.3 inch wide Super AMOLED display
• A 1GHz application processor
• More than 512MB of RAM
• TouchWiz 3.0 – Full Multitasking, Fully customizable home page and menus
• A seamless aluminum onebody – no parting lines, a tempered glass display, ‘anti-smudge technology’

To support the Wave and existing phones using TouchWiz, Samsung is launching online applications stores in 50 countries this year, including the U.S. and the U.K. Most major phone makers now operate applications stores, or ones administered by others, like Google.

Samsung revealed the phone in Barcelona a day ahead of the start of Mobile World Congress, the world’s largest cell phone trade show.

~

You can view a hands-on, as well as several pictures by clicking here or here.

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As seems to be the norm for Facebook at the moment, even with such big numbers, the growth rate is huge – in September it had 65m mobile users. That suggests the number is likely to double annually.

“We work with every major device manufacturer and many operators to ensure that we can provide the best possible mobile experience across the thousands of different devices, mobile operating systems and carriers you rely on,” wrote Chamath Palihapitiya on Facebook’s blog. (Chamath is the VP for “user growth, mobile and international”)

Subscribers to more than 80 independent operators in 32 countries can update their Facebook page via a text message. In the UK, Facebook is by some distance the most popular mobile internet site with 5m monthly uniques, according to the GSMA.

Like most operators and half of the tech world, Facebook will be in Barcelona next week for the wireless industry’s annual love-in, Mobile World Congress.

Along with excitement around iPad apps, a plethora of Android devices and the car as computing platform, and Opera Mini for iPhone, I predict strongly hope that Facebook will produce its own mobile handset in the not-too-distant future.

As a player with a global phonebook and the communication platform and applications platform that Facebook provides, I don’t see any reason why they couldn’t move into phones in a couple of years.

Facebook could easily follow the path blazed by Google, who somehow managed to convince most of the tech world that there was a material difference between the Nexus One and all the other Android handsets HTC has built.

And Facebook’s user numbers – already around 400 million and targeting 1 billion – mean they’d only need to convince a small percentage of people to buy their phone to become the size (if not bigger) of a small UK operator.

The numbers are so large and in these high-value handsets the profits are also enormous.

Sadly, a thought/concept is all it is likely to be. Given so many operators and handset makers are already incorporating Facebook services, why would it need to go to the expense and risk of making its own phone? For example, INQ has been making handsets tuned for Facebook and Twitter for years.

On the other hand, the lock-in factor, the convenience of importing what is already a living contacts book, and the greenfield potential for mobile advertising all lend the idea credible plausibility.

With Google coming after Facebook so squarely with Buzz, a buffer against a more “social” Android just makes sense, as Google’s mobile efforts parallel its increasing rivalry with Apple.

Would you buy a Facebook phone? Tell us in the comments!

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As useful as it is, Shazam has kind of been a one-way street: It identifies (or “tags”) the song and then links the user out to other services. For example, the user can then purchase the song, go to YouTube to watch related videos, or go to the artist’s MySpace page, all where applicable. But up to now, the app ended there, and the list of songs a user has tagged didn’t get used anywhere.

Today, though, Shazam’s company announced that the Shazam Encore and (Shazam)red apps for the iPod Touch/iPhone can be used to create stations in Pandora, which will include additional songs by the same artist and similar ones as well. When a song is tagged, an icon appears in the “Tag Results” page which takes the user directly to their radio station.

A user’s tag list has also been incorporated into Last.fm to generate a list of upcoming shows made from their favorite tagged artists, with suggestions based upon the user’s location.

You can also listen to Last.fm stations directly from your tagged Shazam tracks, and create new stations from those tracks in Last.fm, provided you have the Last.fm and/or Pandora iPhone app installed. [iTunes links]

The updated versions of Shazam Encore and (Shazam)red [iTunes links as well] are available in the iTunes App Store now.

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It’s safe to say that some of the content hosted on YouTube is questionable. Either because the YouTube filter police haven’t found it yet, or there’s just content that you wouldn’t want you kids or brothers and sisters to see there. Google has reacted to such content being available by introducing ‘Safety Mode‘.

Basically, Safety Mode is the equivalent of a parental filter for YouTube video content. Scroll to the bottom of any YouTube page and click the “Safety Mode is off” link on the left corner. Sign into your YouTube account and turn it on. Then, even when you are logged out, YouTube will filter inappropriate content for anyone using your computer. You can do this without logging in/making an account too, but then it’s incredibly easy to turn it back off without your knowledge.

The filtering will stop searches for specific words showing results, filter results for other words, and turn comments off by default. Turning them back on will see profanity blanked out.

Read more at the YouTube Safety Mode support page.

My Opinion

This is the video equivalent of Google’s SafeSearch feature and is sure to be welcomed by both parents and those who just don’t like mature or inappropriate content being presented as part of YouTube search results. It is limited, however. Safety Mode currently doesn’t work on Mobile devices, meaning you can’t filter video on a phone. It also looks as though YouTube videos embedded on other sites won’t be filtered as well.

The lack of embedded filtering is understandable, but adding this filtering to YouTube Mobile would surely have gone down well with users too. If this initial version proves popular, no doubt Google will consider and possibly extend the implementation.

I have to admit I have only seen one video on YouTube I found to be inappropriate; I think Google  manages to filter 99% of the content falling into that category pretty quickly.

~

Will you be turning Safety Mode on for anyone in your family?

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