IBLOG SPACE

Nokia’s ongoing legal spat with Apple has taken a tablet turn for the worse today, with the news that the Finnish company are now setting their lawyers on the iPad WiFi + 3G as well as the iPhone. According to a Nokia press release, the company alleges that Apple have impinged on five “important” patents, relating to “enhanced speech and data transmission, using positioning data in applications and innovations in antenna configurations.” Those patents, Nokia reckon, are what help them make such small devices, together with improving performance and design. ”We have taken this step to protect the results of our pioneering development” says Paul Melin, general manager of patent licensing at the company, ”and to put an end to continued unlawful use of Nokia’s innovation.” In fact, Nokia reckons they’ve spent €40bn on R&D over the past 20 years, and they think Apple are trampling all over it with their big i-prefixed boots. Previously they’ve alleged that Apple have infringed patent

Hot on the heels of UK pricing for the iPad WiFi and iPad WiFi + 3G comes carrier Orange with 3G data pricing for the cellular-enabled version of the Apple tablet. Unlike in the US, where carrier AT&T offers a $29.99 unlimited 3G data package (and a $14.99 250MB package), Orange UK have a range of pay-per-use and pre-pay bundles, though no unlimited 3G option. Full pricing details after the cut. If you want to merely pay as you go, the Orange iPad play is priced at £0.05 ($0.07) per MB and charged on a monthly basis. Alternatively, there are four bundle-style packages: cheapest is the £2 ($2.93) iPad Daily, which is valid for 1 day until midnight and offers 200MB of data. Next up is a £7.50 ($10.99) iPad Weekly package, offering 1GB of data valid over seven days. Finally there are two recurring monthly packages, iPad Monthly 15 which offers 3GB and unlimited WiFi hotspot browsing for £15 ($22) and iPad Monthly 25 which offers 10GB and unlimited WiFi for £25 ($37). Excess data

The threat of litigation hangs heavy in the tablet world, and in what looks like an attempt to pre-emptively fend off angry retaliations from Apple, Neofonie have renamed their as-yet-unreleased WePad to WeTab . According to the company’s Facebook fan-page (translated from German), “the tablet remains the same, only the name changes.” Pricing for the WeTab has also been confirmed, with the 16GB model (that is WiFi-only) coming in at €449 ($573) while the 32GB version (which has WiFi, 3G, GPS and Full HD 1080p support via HDMI) at €569 ($726). Deliveries are expected to kick off in June 2010.

Having promised international iPad preorders from May 10th, Apple has confirmed that those customers in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Spain, Switzerland and the UK can expect to receive their tablets on Friday, May 28th. Pricing is £429 for the 16GB iPad WiFi, £499 for the 32GB and £599 for the 64GB; meanwhile the iPad WiFi + 3G starts at £529 for the 16GB, £599 for the 32GB and £699 for the 64GB. Greater than expected demand for the iPad in the US led to Apple delaying the international launch of the tablet by a month. Screen shortages were tipped as a key bottleneck, and stocks in the US remain volatile. Meanwhile would-be iPad owners in Austria, Belgium, Hong Kong, Ireland, Luxembourg, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand and Singapore will have to wait until July to get their hands on the device. Apple will announce pricing and specific dates “at a later date”.

When it comes to a real netbook that is portable enough for road warriors on the go constantly the 13-inch segment is often where the best machines are. Toshiba is rumored to be working on a new machine for the 13-inch segment said to be the world’s lightest 13-inch machine and if it looks like the leaked photos here, it is dead sexy. According to the rumors, the machine will weigh less than 1Kg when fitted with a 512GB SSD. It will have a 16:9 aspect ratio screen, USB 3.0 dock, and a Core i5, i3, or i7 CPU. One of the most interesting features according to the rumor is that the little rig is said to be coming with a super-fast charging SCiB battery. The claim for the battery is that it can charge to 90% of its full capacity on only 10 minutes. This type of battery showed up first in 2008, but has yet to hit the market in a big way. The machine is expected to go official soon and pricing should be offered then. It won’t be a cheap machine.

Corsair is one of the most popular companies for enthusiast and mainstream memory products for computers. The firm has been announcing blazing fast DDR3 RAM kits for Intel platforms recently in its Dominator GTX family. Corsair has announced a new GTX4 RAM kit that operates at 2533MHz and is available now in limited quantities. The RAM operates with timings of 9-11-10-30 at 1.65V. To achieve the performance the memory offers the memory modules are hand screened and graded for performance. I have often wondered how the process for selecting these modules happens and Corsair has offered a behind the scenes look at how the GTX4 modules are chosen. You can see exactly how the components for this RAM are chosen here.

Fujitsu Laboratories has announced a new color e-paper display that has what Fujitsu claims to be the world’s highest color image quality. Fujitsu was able to develop the color e-paper display by redesigning the panel structure and image rewrite methods used in previous versions of color e-paper from the company. Other than having the best color image quality in the e-paper realm, the new Fujitsu screen also boasts a 7:1 contrast ratio, which is a three times improvement compared to the previous version of the tech. The screen also has an image rewrite speed that is twice as fast as the rewrite speed on previous versions of the screen at 0.7 seconds. Fujitsu will be showing off the new screen at its Japanese Fujitsu Forum 2010. A color screen for e-paper is a very cool invention and will make e-readers much more popular, but I think this would have been better if it landed on the market ahead of the iPad and similar tablets. The colors in the Fujitsu screen still seem very washed out

Samsung have pushed out the latest beta build of their bada OS SDK for affordable smartphones, and it’s now available for anybody to download. Signing up at the bada developers site gets you access to the integrated development environment (IDE), bada simulator, UI builder, some sample applications, documentation and tutorials; if you’re familiar with C/C++ then Samsung reckon you should be able to quickly get up to speed with bada. While trying to break into the mobile OS space is always going to be tricky, Samsung reckon bada has a few tricks up its sleeve. They include Adobe Flash support, a web browser control, motion sensing, fine-tuned vibration control and face detection, as well as social networking, content management, location-based services and commerce services all handled automatically by Samsung’s back-end bada servers. The first bada handset will be the Samsung Wave S8500, a Super AMOLED touchscreen smartphone with 3G, Samsung’s TouchWiz UI, Bluetooth 3.0 and more. W

Remember the bizarrely-named Thomson PoMMeS media tablet spotted running the FCC gauntlet back in January? The 8-inch touchscreen tablet has returned with a far more sensible Portable Info Center name and plenty of details; Notebook Italia grabbed some hands-on time with what we’re assuming is a potential rival for the Archos 7 Home Tablet. The unit measures 140 x 240 x 32 mm and tips the scales at 800g; there’s a flip-out kick stand at the back but it also looks like Thomson plan a media dock with space to recharge your DECT phone and what looks to be an integrated WiFi router too. That should make hooking up the WiFi-enabled tablet more straightforward. The 8-inch touchscreen runs at WVGA 800 x 480 resolution, and there’s a Linux OS with 256MB of RAM and 512MB of ROM; DivX and H.264 video is supported, as are MP3, WMA and AGG audio formats (among others) while a USB port can apparently be used to load content onto the device. Streaming TV, internet radio and home browsing are the

Given the Archos 7 Home Tablet has been lurking around on Amazon since the beginning of April, it comes as no surprise to hear the French company officially announcing it; still, we’ll happily accept a firm shipping date. Priced at $199.99 for the 8GB version of the 7-inch Android-based slate, Amazon say we can expect it from May 17th. As the name suggests, Archos aren’t expecting owners to drop the Archos 7 Home Tablet into their bags and tote it around the local Starbucks. Instead it’s intended as a domestic tablet, with the ability to cope with up to 720p HD video files (though it only has an 800 x 480 resistive touchscreen), WiFi and internet access. Archos reckon the Archos 7 HT will last for up to seven hours of video playback or 44hrs of audio from a single charge, and while you can’t access the Android Market via the tablet you can at least browse their (much reduced) AppsLib software store. It’s available for preorder now.

After the first-gen iPhone saw its Android hack , it’s now the turn of the iPhone 3G to get some Google magic. Arch hacker David Wang and his team of tinkerers have fettled the port for the second-gen Apple smartphone, and while it’s described as “slightly more rough” than the last achievement, you can still browse the web over the cellular connection, send/receive SMS messages and pretty much use any app which doesn’t require audio support. That last qualification is because, so far, audio on the Android-running iPhone 3G isn’t cooperating, so you can’t actually make voice calls on it yet or listen to music. That’s next on their list of challenges, and they reckon it should be working in a few days time. There’s also a new Android icon to the boot menu, to make it easier to load into the non-official OS, and the WiFi is reportedly more stable too. David promises a set of packaged binaries and some instructions within the next few days, together with further work on power management

Ahh, WWDC 2010 . A serious sit-down with developers and Apple working together to polish up the app landscape for the twelve months to come, or a chance to wear Steve Jobs masks and run around making crass Microsoft jokes? If you haven’t already got your ticket you’ll never know, as this years conference is sold out. That’s pretty fast work, considering tickets only went on sale on April 28th, and were a not inconsiderable $1,599 for the full five days. As well as the new contents of iPhone OS 4.0 to pick over, there will be iAd developer workshops and a hefty dose of HTML5.

Western Digital managed to wrangle up an update that they could release, officially, today, and it’s designed for their WD TV Live HD. Is there anything all that great about this update? There sure is. In fact, this update should make Western Digital pretty happy, considering they can place themselves in the “one and only” category for the time being. With the issued update, the WD TV Live HD is the first networked media hub that is capable of recognizing Windows 7. There’s that one and only category. The update itself is just a firmware upgrade, but it allows you to select media from your computer, and not the hub itself, by showing up as a destination for Windows’ Play To feature. That means you won’t have to load the media player before accessing movies, music, or photos. So you’re basically removing the middle man and saving some time. The WD TV Live HD supports 1080p HD video (as the name should probably surmise), and the system can still recognize the majority of media formats.

ViewSonic ’s latest LCD display has gone up for preorder, and the 27-inch monitor is apparently the world’s first Full HD display with a 1ms response time. The ViewSonic VX2739wm is, unsurprisingly, being targeted at gamers, but it’s also multimedia-friendly with 1080p HD resolution and SRS Premium Sound stereo 2W speakers. There’s also a 100,000:1 dynamic contrast ratio (1,200:1 typical), 300cd/m2 brightness, a trio of inputs – HDMI, DVI and VGA – and a four port USB 2.0 hub for easy peripheral connectivity. Finally, a VESA mount on the back makes for straightforward wall-mounting. The ViewSonic VX2739wm is available for preorder now, priced at $349.99 with a three year warranty. No word on when it’s expected to begin shipping, however.

More details on the ASUS Eee PC 1215N are seeping out, ahead of the netbook’s expected debut on May 13th, and it’s shaping up to be a pretty impressive ultraportable. According to AllAboutEeePC the 1215N will indeed have the new dual-core 1.5GHz Pine Trail Atom N500 processor expected to hit production in July, together with NVIDIA’s Ion GPU. However, unlike the Eee PC 1215PN, the 1215N will support NVIDIA Optimus for automatic graphics switching. That means the 12-inch netbook should be capable of 1080p HD output but also able to scale back its graphics prowess when it’s not required so as to eke out extra battery life. Regular browsing and emailing will rely on the standard Intel GMA 3150 GPU, while multimedia and even gaming will use the 16 core Ion. Actual performance figures are unknown at this stage, as are battery estimates, but the ASUS Eee PC 1215N is predicted to go on sale come July 2010. Pricing is expected to be between $550 and $600, making it expensive for a netbook

In among Intel’s hyperbole for the Atom Z6xx launch earlier this week were some impressive stats for internet browsing performance, contrasting what users of Moorestown-based MIDs, tablets and smartbooks could expect in comparison with rival devices. Steve Paine over at UMPC Portal decided he couldn’t wait for the first Z6xx demo units, and so set up some browser tests of his own; he locked a Menlow -based Viliv X70 MID to 800MHz and pitted it against the iPad for some real-world surfing. Video comparison after the cut “I took the Intel Atom-based Viliv X70, a 7” tablet with a 1024×600 7” touchscreen running Windows XP Home, installed the latest Google Chrome, locked the CPU to 800Mhz and did some random web browsing tests. Remember that the Menlow platform used in the X70 is very close to the architecture used on Moorestown. The CPU are GPU are architecturally almost exactly the same. I side-by-sided it with an iPad which is, according to my tests with the Archos 5, X10 and HTC Desi

It’s looking more and more likely that Flash’s fate will be decided not by technical merit but by market dominance, and with the iPad dominating tablet sales this year it seems companies are content to abandon Adobe’s technology in favor of HTML5 simply to get a foot in the touchscreen door. Online document sharing site Scribd are the latest to jump ship, with CTO Jared Friedman bluntly stating “we are scrapping three years of Flash development and betting the company on HTML5.” “We are scrapping three years of Flash development and betting the company on HTML5 because we believe HTML5 is a dramatically better reading experience than Flash. Now any document can become a Web page” Jared Friedman, CTO, Scribd Scribd’s existing system embeds Flash viewers into a webpage, and obviously isn’t visible on the iPad’s browser or on smartphones that lack Flash support. The new HTML5 system, which has been a six month project for the company, will basically treat documents as webpages using boo

You might not remember the ExoPC what with the fire-hose of tablets we’ve seen in the aftermath of the iPad launch, but the French slate promises to deliver Windows 7 on an 8.9-inch touchscreen display. Now, according to Blogue du Geek’s anonymous source, we also know that the ExoPC will have Broadcom’s Crystal HD BCM70012 chipset, meaning it should be capable of outputting 1080p HD video. In actual fact, the Broadcom BCM70012 can manage 1980 x 1088 resolutions, opening up the possibility of a seriously large desktop display when you dock the ExoPC at home or at the office. The graphics chipset is paired with 2GB of RAM and a 32GB SSD drive, along with Intel’s Atom N270 processor, WiFi, Bluetooth and a 10/100 ethernet port. According to the source, the ExoPC will drop on September 7th, in the US, Canada and France. They also say it’s “very, very fast”, which is likely a side-effect of the graphics being offset from the 1.6GHz Atom chip to the Broadcom Crystal HD chip. Still no wor

Rumors of Apple’s Mac Pro Intel hexacore refresh taking place in mid-March saw the leaked date come and go, leaving us – and, more importantly, the video and media pros waiting to upgrade their Apple desktops to the latest processors – still none the wiser as to when the flagship desktop line might be updated. Now, according to information apparently from Intel’s distribution network, it seems possible that Apple could announce the new Mac Pro models at WWDC 2010. That’s because Intel have apparently warned their partners that the six-core Xeon processor – aka the Core i7-980X – will only be available in limited quantities until the end of the quarter. If the chip delay really is what’s holding up the refreshed Mac Pros, that would put WWDC 2010 – taking place in early June – at the ideal point for the new desktops to debut.

Audiophile-PMPs are a pretty rare breed, especially if you don’t want to empty your entire bank account to acquire one, and so the Nationite S:Flo2 has plenty riding on it. Priced from $119.50 (albeit only netting you a mere 2GB of storage), the S:Flo2’s selling point isn’t its touchscreen, video capabilities or games, but its excellent audio quality. Joker of the MP4Nation forums has reviewed the S:Flo2, and it turns out you really don’t need to spend crazy money to get crazy-good sound. Firmware and the UI in general are a little buggy, apparently, but that’s more than made up for by audio Joker describes as “transparent”. That means very dynamic, clean and clear, with a flat spectrum and – thanks to a rotary volume control – you don’t even need to turn the capacitive touchscreen on (which can apparently introduce a little buzz) to tweak the output. It’s worth pointing out that the rig in the photo above is the S:Flo2 strapped to Joker’s DIY mini3 amp outputting to a set of Beyer

A few things are holding back the wide adoption of 3D home entertainment gear in the home. One of the things is the cost of the 3D sets and the fact that you need glasses to view the content. Another significant issue is the fact that right now there isn’t a lot of content available if you buy 3D gear. DirecTV has announced that it will be the first broadcaster to offer viewers 3D Major League Baseball games. DirecTV will be offering these games in conjunction with YES Network and FSN Network. There are a couple caveats to the 3D broadcasts. You have to be within the YES “home team footprint” to be able to view the 3D game, which will be broadcast from Safeco Field in Seattle. That home footprint covers all of New York State and Connecticut, Central New Jersey, and northeast Pennsylvania. Viewers in the FSN Northwest viewing areas of Washington, Oregon, Alaska and some parts of Montana and Idaho will also be able to see the 3D game. The game will air on Saturday, July 10 at 10pm ET an

The rumor mill is working today and churning out new fodder about Seagate . According to the rumor, the storage firm has a new 3TB HDD on its roadmap for this year. Seagate already has 2TB drives like the Constellation ES that we talked about in February. The new 3TB drive is going to be part of that same Constellation ES family and will have a 6Gbit/s SAS interface and replace the Barracuda ES. The 3TB drive will be for the enterprise class and presumably spin at 7200 rpm. I would expect that we would see a consumer version of the drive pushing 3TB as well. Yet another Seagate rumor has the firm readying a new 2.5-inch Savvio drive with as much as 750GB of 10000rpm goodness.

We have checked out various computers running Windows Home Server like the HP MediaSmart EX487 and theData Vault X510. In fact, we are running a giveaway of the Data Vault X510 right now you can sign up for. We liked Windows Home Server pretty well and the new V2 of Windows Home Server codenamed Vail has been previewed. The new version has many new features, but the fact that the software is in beta right now means those features could change. One of the big features that is missing from the new version of WMS is Media Center integration. Features that are new include Launchpad, Alert Viewer, DLNA compliant media streaming is integrated in the new version and Vail is fully compatible with Windows 7 Homegroups. The number of new features in the Vail update is impressive and you can check them all out at Automated Home.

iHome has gobs of docks, clocks and other gear for the iPhone and iPod. The company has announced that it is updating its flagship iP90 alarm clock docking station for Apple devices for 2010. The dock gets some new features that will make it better. Among those new features are a larger display and better sound quality. The iP90 continues to be able to charge and play music from the iPhone and iPod. Users can wake to playlists from the iPod or other sources. The clock has dual alarms and AM/FM radio presets. A Time Sync feature sets the time on the clock to the time on your iPhone or iPod. The improved sound comes from Reson8 stereo speaker chambers and the bass and treble is adjustable. A switch for changing at the flick of a button to daylight savings time is also featured. All of the buttons on the iP90 are backlit for easy use in a dark room. The clock will sell for $99.

Are you a member of GenUpload? Are you – or your parents – sufficiently loaded to afford a $69.98 monthly agreement for two years? Then you’ll be pleased to hear that Verizon have put the KIN One and KIN Two up for preorder, priced at $49.99 and $99.99 with a new, two year contract. If you want to play before you pay, the two phones should be in Verizon stores on May 13th. To be honest, without even looking at the abilities of the two handsets, the pricing seems way off. At around $1,780 over the course of the two year agreement, they’re very expensive featurephones indeed; for the same money you could pick up a “proper” smartphone. Verizon may have to think twice about their data package pricing, especially with Sprint announcing some incredible deals under their Virgin Mobile brand today. As for the KIN handsets themselves, we’d point you in the direction of SlashGear columnist Michael Gartenbergand our guest feature from 17 year old Chaim Gartenberg, who actually falls into Mi

NEC is a purveyor of a wide range of displays for computers users that run the gamut from small green screens that sip power to massive screens designed for graphics pros with lots of color support and features. The latest offering from NEC called the PA271W falls into the latter category. The screen measures 27-inches and has a resolution of 2560 x 1440. It uses a 10-bit p-IPS panel and has 14-bit programmable look up tabled allowing the reproduction of 1.07 billion colors from a pallet of 4.3 trillion. To get the high color support the user has to connect with 10-bit DisplayPort input. The screen offers a contrast ratio of 1000:1, has up to 360 cd/m2 of brightness, and covers 92% of the NTSC color gamut. The standard version of the PA271W will ship this month for $1399 and a version offering SpectraViewII will be priced at $1649.

Whether or not Microsoft’s KIN handsets have GenUpload appeal or not, one thing just about everyone outside of Verizon agrees on is that the carrier has priced the featurephone’s data plans too highly. Ideal time for Sprint to leap in with some massively impressive prepaid offerings, using its Boost Mobile and Virgin Mobile acquisitions to target the youth market, those looking for affordable, contract-free unlimited service, and even those wanting cheap BlackBerry BIS support (from $35 all-in, voice and text included). The new “Beyond Talk” plans under the Virgin Mobile umbrella are those most likely to give AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon sleepless nights. Kicking off at $25 for unlimited messaging, email, data and web with 300 minutes of voice per month, you can also add in unlimited BlackBerry service for just $10 more. $40 and $60 plans boost talktime to 1,200 or unlimited minutes. It’s all part of what Dan Schulman, president of Sprint ’s prepaid group, calls “a continuing evol

Only the other day, Clearwire were happily trumpeting their latest WiMAX roll-outs; now there’s talk that they may be considering sidling away from the technology altogether. While their financial results press release talked aboutClear-branded Samsung and HTC multi-mode handsets, during the company’s investors call CFO Erik E. Pruschdropped hints that Clearwire were considering converting to LTE. Asked about the state of 4G networks, Prusch said that the ecosystem was converging and that he didn’t expect to see the same sort of technology wars as there have been in the past. A somewhat cryptic comment that Clearwire would “keep evolving as we move forward” together with confirmation that the company had renegotiated their WiMAX agreement with Intel so that they could drop out with just 30 days notice as opposed to the previous November 28th 2011 lock-in added fuel to the speculation. Rather than dump WiMAX altogether, Clearwire could move to support both networks; however, that wou

Lowe Lintas (Bangalore) has unveiled a new campaign for Tanishq, that aims to establish the brand in the wedding jewellery segment, an area that has traditionally been a stronghold of family jewellers. The TVC, written by Deepa Geethakrishnan is a tale of how a mother uses Tanishq's range of wedding jewellery to make her daughter see herself as stunning as a bride. This consequently makes her open up to the idea of an arranged marriage. Speaking to Campaign India , Geethakrishnan who is executive creative director, Lowe Lintas (Bangalore) said, "Tanishq has been a leading player in the jewellery category for the past many years. Despite this, it has never made its presence felt in the wedding segment. It has never been known for wedding jewellery like the way family jewelers are. Also in today’s day and age, women are not too keen on getting married as they want to pursue their careers. Parents meanwhile, are looking at ways to get them married. The two needs fel

Spikes Asia has announced the jury presidents for its Digital, and Direct and Promo Jury. Rei Inamoto, chief creative officer of AKQA will head this year’s Digital Jury and William Rosen, president and chief creative officer – North America of Arc Worldwide will chair the Direct and Promo Jury. “We look forward to welcoming and working with Bill and Rei at Spikes this year. Highly respected individuals with impressive backgrounds, their knowledge in their respective fields will be extremely valuable to the awards and to the region,” said Philip Thomas, CEO of Cannes Lions who with Haymarket are joint organisers of the Festival. As chief creative officer of AKQA, Rei is responsible for delivering creative solutions for the agency’s clients such as Nike, Xbox, McDonald’s and Visa. Commenting on his appointment, Rei Inamoto, said, “In the last five years, our industry has changed more so than it did in the previous 50 years. One thing that caused – forced - that change is Di

The high flying Roshan production 'Kites', marketed and distributed by Reliance BIG Pictures, has already captivated collective psyches, thanks to the winning promos. In the wake of the international exposure of 'Kites', post it's 'first look' unveiling at Cannes in 1999, Hrithik Roshan has been inundated with Hollywood scripts too. Reportedly, Roshan Jr's in the process of surveying six H'wood scripts, no less! "The reason why they probably would like to cast me is because I have light eyes and look like one of them," states HR in a media talk. "But I'm looking to get that one perfect Hollywood film that will excite me to take the plunge." Presently, the hunky star is feverishly buoying up all efforts towards the promotion of 'Kites'. "I'm quite sure that 'Kites' will work because it comes straight from the heart," he asserts. "When Anurag (Basu) first narrated the script to me,

Ranbir Kapoor and clarifications have become rather synonymous. The young actor isn't amused at insinuations that he thumbed down a Dharma Productions venture alongside Shah Rukh Khan. "I loved working for Karan Johar's production 'Wake Up Sid' and it was a great experience," states RK in a newspaper chat. "And honestly, I haven't been offered any other film by Karan, so the question of turning it down does not arise." As regards SRK, Ranby opines that, "I'd love to work with Shah Rukh Khan. I've grown up watching his movies." On the anvil for RK are 'Anjaana Anjaani' helmed by Siddharth Anand alongside Priyanka Chopra; Imtiaz Ali's 'Rockstar' and Anurag Basu's 'Silence'.

Expectedly, Katrina Kaif is all gung ho over her political opus 'Raajneeti.' At a Press con of the Prakash Jha flick convened at a suburban Mumbai hotel, Kat was all charm and armed to tackle a barrage of queries from the scribe tribe. And yeah, the prize query did pop up: Would Katrina Kaif consider pursuing politics actively? And Kat's response was pat. "If I do contest elections, it will be from Bhopal," Kat is reported to have sweetly replied. "We shot 'Raajneeti' there, the locals know me well and will surely vote for me. Whatever little that I do know about politics now, is thanks to Prakash Jha."

Come June 19, and it'll be an august occasion for the Nepali family. Manisha Koirala, 40, will tie the nuptial knot with Sameer Dahal, a Kathmandu based businessman who deals in leather. "It's a semi love, semi arranged marriage," coos Koirala, who incidentally has three flicks in the pipeline: 'Chehere'; ' Do Paise Ki Dhoop…Char Aane Ki Baarish' and 'Ek Second Jo Zindagi Badal De'. Besides, she's also gearing up to return to Nepali cinema after a hiatus of two decades with 'Dharma' and has also signed up for a Telugu flick too. Post marriage too, Koirala has no plans of chucking the Klieg lights. "Samrat is not the interfering type," states MK in a media chat. "He has encouraged me to continue acting. I'll be returning to Mumbai in August, since I do have some films in hand, including one based on Mayawati."

His daredevilry might have earned him countless admirers, the world over. Pity, a Canadian cop didn't rank among them. Akshay Kumar found himself shelling out a fine…and trying to bail himself out of a traffic ticket in Canada! Reportedly, Action Kumar had accidently bumped into a police car while reversing his four wheeler for a scene in Anees Bazmee's 'Thank You'. Says a close source, "Akshay had not realised that a police car was right behind him when he was reversing his car. By the time director Anees Bazmee and the unit members got across to the cop, he had already fined Akshay! But when Bazmee explained matters, the cop laughed and also clicked a picture of Akshay with him. Akshay jokingly told everybody that he'd got his first ticket ever… and he got it in Canada!"

His meticulous attention to detail has been rather well documeted in perioicals. And Ashutosh Gowariker, currently crafting 'Khelien Hum Jee Jaan Sey' is sparing no effort to get every nuance right for the period opus. Reportedly, AG travelled to West Bengal and Bangladesh with his sound designer Stephen Gomes, in tow, to record the background score live for his movie as it would have been difficult to reproduce it in the studios. Reveals producer Sunita Gowariker in a tabloid chat, "The entire sound track is going to be post produced in the studio. Since it's a period film, the costumes, sets and details as regards the sound also have to be in place. We needed to create the ambience of Bengal perfectly." Adds she, "So, we sent our sound designer Stephen Gomes to Kolkata and other neighbouring villages so that we could get an original feel of all the sounds in the environment… the birds, temples and bells, spoken Bengali in villages, sounds of

Samajwadi Party aggrieved politico Amar Singh is reinforcing his celluloid roots. He's already illumined Bengali cinema with 'Sesh Sanghat' and is all charged up about 'Chargesheet', Dev Anand's forthcoming flick, wherein he enacts a pivotal role. Reportedly, Singh is aiming to slake his cinematic thirst some more… and has signed up gleefully to essay a Hindustani classical singer in the Malayalam film 'Bombay Mithai'. And his co actor happens to be the eternally gorgeous Dimple Kapadia, no less! Guess, a certain Jaya Prada is waiting in line…

A teary, emotional moment brought great joy to Kareena Kapoor. The canning of Karan Johar's Indian version of 'Stepmom' was in progress. And all eyes were glued onto KK who was all set to deliver a heart tugging dialogue. Anticipating a minimum of two to three 'takes' for the sequence, unit members were shell shocked when Bebo managed to deliver it in…one swift perfect take. What's better, she managed to move the unit to tears. And bagged a standing ovation for it from K Jo's production, as well! Says a close source, "It was a difficult scene, but when the tape began to roll Kareena surprised everyone by flawlessly delivering it in one 'take'. Everyone's eyes were moist."

Shabana Azmi, crusader for women empowerment, kickstarted a new online campaign recently to spotlight yet another aspect of female concerns. Azmi, ambassador of the international NGO 'Save The Children', initiated the cyber call urging more and more women to become more health conscious. Alarming statistics indicate that there is a growing concern as regards maternal, newborn and child mortality in India. "On the one hand we have India emerging as a global power," states Azmi in a news quote. "And on the other hand, we have shocking statistics on maternal, newborn and child mortality. As a nation we must invest in the health of mothers. Strong, healthy women lead to strong, healthy children."

It might not be Father's day yet but the newly appointed Dads of our industries are revelling in the charm of spending quality time with their Kiddos. Mahesh Bhatt got camera happy and took this amazing shots of Bollywood's proud fathers and their sons and posted them on twitter. This one is of Pritam and his son Salsa (now that's a name only a music conscious person would come up with) as they get into a bear hug in the middle of a recording session. Like father like son, Salsa is known to be an "electronic genius" at a tender age of 3. Another picture taken by Mahesh Bhatt, who probably has made photography his second hobby, is this one of Emraan Hashmi with his son Ayan. We can safely say that the eyes at least have gone on Daddy. Considering that the kid isn't camera conscious at all, does it say there is a hidden actor there? Born on 4th February 2010, this 3 month old bundle of joy to father Emraan and mother Praveen. Happy family this o

Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra who planning his next film on the life of long-distance runner Milkha Singh talks to Subhash K Jha about the film titled Bhaag Milkha Bhaag . What made you decide on Milkha Singh? I was keen on doing a historical love story Mirza Sahiban . But the idea on Milkha Singh worked out better. Prasoon Joshi is writing it. I've been in Gulmarg shooting for a film I'm producing. Right from my childhood we've grown up with Milkha Singh's name. One has heard jokes about him, how he was known as the Flying Sikh, used to run barefoot, how he came from Pakistan. These were anecdotes I grew up with. I've been a sportsman myself during my student days. I used to go practising in the National Stadium in Delhi for swimming every day. Milkha Singh used to practice there every day. Then I came to know more details about his life. How at the age of 13 he watched his whole family being massacred in undivided India. He didn't know where to g

A statutory warning: Please keep your minds in a safe place while you re-reading the latest issue of Hi! Blitz. The reason? Well, it has the eternal Bollywood Greek God Hrithik Roshan on the cover alongwith the extremely gorgeous Miss Barbara Mori ! Any word of info about the phenomenon called Hrithik only means a thousand leap years of info! Hrithik, on his on admission says, "I don't think of my relationship with Sussanne in terms of marriage. Marriage was when we were just allowed to sleep in the same room. The 'Knight in shining armour' story is not true love. Love is when I can be with Sussanne and tell her every single thing on my mind that affects me or gives me joy, not talk (to her) if I don't want to and still be comfortable and happy." Barbara, on her front, says "I love playing various lives. Being a good girl gets boring, but as an actor, I can play the bad girl and kill somebody. I can play an infidel and still not feel bad.&q

In this special four part feature, Joginder Tuteja would be taking readers through the 10 years journey of Hrithik Roshan which has been nothing but a roller coaster ride. Seeing early success, Hrithik saw himself staring at the bottom of the barrel before a great resurgence brought a turnaround in fortunes. Part I of this feature touches upon the phenomenon called Hrithik Roshan and how it came into existence a decade back. In the current decade, if there is one superstar actor who has followed Aamir Khan model of working to the T, it is Hrithik Roshan. Agenda of both the actors is simple. Well, on second thoughts not really simple! They both believe in less films, big risks and bigger gains. If the adage of living on the edge was to be coined for any of the current superstars, that would have to be for Aamir Khan and then Hrithik Roshan. While other men from the top bracket, whether Akshay Kumar or Salman Khan, have believed in working on multiple projects in a sin