IBLOG SPACE

The  Mob Wives  reunion didn't feature any physical altercations. It wasn't filmed in front of a raucous live audience and nobody got up to scream a point at anybody else. There were no salacious reveals and nobody walked away with wig askew and make-up a mess. In short, it was very unusual for a reality show reunion. While it was pretty damn entertaining, did it live up to what I wanted?

We were left with quite the cliffhanger at the end of last week's episode of  True Blood .  Marnie completely messed with Eric's mind and when Sookie found him he admitted he had few memories. In tonight's new episode you'll see the two of them trying to figure out how to deal with this new version of Eric.  Pam, of course, is not happy about the turn of events with Eric and ends up delivering an ultimatum to Tara, Lafayette and Jesus.  Eric tries to figure out how to live knowing he's a vampire but not really remembering how much of an evil s.o.b. he generally is.  Will his new persona cause Sookie to like him a bit more?  Unlikely.  Especially when he interrupts her reunion with her faerie family. Also, Alcide is back in tonight's  True Blood .  Sookie seeks him out for help and he's got a new roommate that might be a bit unexpected. Jessica, meanwhile, continues to struggle to control her vampire instincts.  After feeding on another woman she goes to Bil

With the American remake coming to NBC in September, it makes more sense than ever to check out the original British version of Prime Suspect . On August 23, you'll be able to experience the first and second series for yourself when they come to DVD from Acorn Media. It's a bit of a misnomer to call the set a 'series,' because both episodes really fit together to form one mystery. All in all, series 1 runs for a little over three hours, focusing on one mystery, while juxtaposing that mystery with the troubled home life of DCI Jane Tennison (Helen Mirren). It's short for a television series, long for a movie, and the way that crime television should be done. Prime Suspect  series 1 will hit DVD on August 23, almost a month to the day before the American remake premieres on NBC on Thursday, September 22. Acorn Media had previously released the series to DVD in the form of a Complete Collection box set back in September 2010, though this is the first time Acorn h

Apple has filed a new ITC complaint against HTC, the second such suit alleging patent infringement. The exact devices covered by the complaint are unknown at present, though Apple’s complaint – “Portable Electronic Devices and Related Software” – looks broad enough to cover not only HTC’s smartphones but tablets and perhaps HTC Sense, the company’s custom interface primarily found on Android handsets as well. Apple’s first suit was filed in early March 2010, alleging that the Nexus One, Touch Pro, Touch Diamond, Touch Pro2, Tilt II, Pure, Imagio, Dream / G1, myTouch 3G, Hero, HD2 and Droid Eris all used design and other technologies that the Cupertino company holds patents in. However, while there was a mixture of Windows Mobile devices and Android devices, the only technologies infringed by the WM handsets covered DSP. This new complaint could well simply be bringing the suit up to date to cover HTC’s more recent handsets, such as the flagship Sensation and the Flyer tablet. In the in

On tonight’s new episode of  Keeping Up With The Kardashians , Kourtney is feeling the heat from Mom Kris Jenner to marry baby daddy Scott.  Kourtney, very much a girl with her own mind, is having none of Mom’s meddling.  At first Kim is quick to point out the irony that once upon time, Kris would have liked nothing better than for Kourtney to kick Scott to the curb. But she soon sides with Mom's "traditions", much to Kourtney's annoyance. What a difference a year makes! Seems like not too long ago when the whole family wanted to show Scott the door.  Whereas Kris describes Scott as having been a “hot mess” at the time Mason was born, she now believes Scott has turned his life around and is worthy of becoming a Kardashian (irony intended).  In true Kardashian form, Kourtney curses her Mom out. Doesn't seem that Kris is going to win this battle anytime soon.  Check out the videos below for a preview of tonight’s  Keeping Up With The Kardashians, airing tonight at

The seventh season of  Supernatural  started shooting a few days ago.  The first episode being shot is 7.03, with star Jensen Ackles directing.  The episode seems to be Sam-centric, from what we hear.  The boys will come across a woman named Amy who knew Sam back when they were teenagers.  Back then, Amy had asked Sam to run away with her, but we all know how that turned out.  Now, though, she has a young kid.  In other words, Amy is Sam's "Lisa".  But let's hope her kid isn't related to Sam in any way, otherwise that's going to pose a big problem for the younger Winchester brother. As it turns out, Amy will be played by  Firefly  alum Jewel Staite.  Staite played the fast-talking spaceship mechanic Kaylee on the Joss Whedon show, as well as appearing on  Stargate: Atlantis . Vancouver photographer Susan Gittins managed to snag some behind the scenes shots of Staite, Ackles and the crew.  It looks like some of the action will be taking place at a motel

George R.R. Martin is infamous for the deliberate nature of his writing. His  A Song of Ice and Fire  series, which was recently adapted into the HBO series  Game of Thrones , became notorious for its multiple delays. The most recent volume,  A Feast for Crows,  was released five years after its predecessor,  A Storm of Swords . Likewise,  A Dance with Dragons , which is slated to hit shelves on Tuesday, July 12, has received similar delays; it comes six years after  Crows . Martin isn't letting his new popularity rush him into starting the next volume, though.  The Winds of Winter  has already been confirmed as the title, but  in an interview with  Sign On San Diego , Martin revealed that he doesn't have plans to even start working on the book until next year. The 62-year-old author, who was given the moniker "the American Tolkien" by  TIME , reportedly just finished the first draft of his episode of  Game of Thrones  season 2, titled "Blackwater."

Piper Jaffray has released some estimates on the Apple App Store. The firm believes that Apple is increasingly dependent on the health of the App Store. The report was written by analyst Gene Munster and he said the App Store is doing well. The App Store recently hit 15 billion downloads. The report claims that the average iOS device owner will download 83 apps in 2011 versus 51 in 2010. That is a 61% increase in downloads per user compared to 2010. The average selling price of the apps is rebounding as well according to Munster. The ASP has gone up 14% from 2010. The App Store is larger than the competing stores like the Android Market as well notes Munster. This is no surprise; the App Store has always been larger. Munster says that the App Store has 425,000 apps and the Android Market has 200,000 apps. Google’s Android Market has had 4.5 billion downloads compared to the 15 billion on the App Store. Granted the App Store has been around for a longer time than the Android Market. The

The Lenovo IdeaPad U1 tablet was talked about a lot previously around here along with the LePad tablet. The tablet looks a lot like a netbook when it is docked inside the keyboard case. We have had our doubts as to whether the U1 hybrid would ever come to market, but those doubts are wiped away now with the U1 hitting the FCC for its needed approvals. The U1 is the dock that fits the IdeaPad K1 tablet. With the FCC approvals out of the way, we might see the U1 land in stores at any time now. The reminds more than a little of the Eee Pad Transformer. The big difference between the two is that the U1 will use Windows and packs an Intel processor. That may make the U1 more appealing to business types and geeks that need to run Windows software on the road. Things have a way of changing though so we will have to wait and see since it has been a long time since this device was talked about. With the Android craze, it might end up a different animal than what we saw last year. It has already

We have talked a lot about iRiver around here; the company has all sorts of gadgets and electronics. The last product from iRiver I mentioned was the cool P8 PMP last week that was heading to Russia first. Google hasannounced that iRiver will have the first eReader that has official Google eBooks integration onboard. The eReader is called the iRiver Story HD and will launch on July 17. The reader will hit Target stores across the country and will be offered on Target.com for sale as well. The eReader will be able to buy books from Google eBooks over the are using WiFi connectivity. The Story HD will sell for $139.99 and has an e-ink screen with high resolution. There are about 3 million free books on Google eBooks that the user will be able to download right away. The reader supports the Google Books APIs that makes it easy for publishers to offer users with devices supporting the Google service access to their entire catalog of digital cooks. The Story HD was unveiled for the first ti

Back during Mobile World Congress Sony Ericsson made a lot of announcements for new smartphones that were due to land early in 2011 running the Android OS. Among the phones announced was the Sony Ericsson Xperia Pro smartphone. The launch time frame for that smartphone was initially pegged as Q2. We are seeing some unofficial reports that Sony Ericsson will be pushing the launch of the Pro back to Q4. There are also other rumors circulating that SE is working on an Android update for the Xperia Play, Arc, Neo, and Pro. The update is said to bring the smartphones up to Android 2.3.4. However, one source claims that the update to the OS is not the reason for the delayed launch of the smartphone. The reason according to a post by Daniel Sandblom on the Sony Ericsson Product Blog claims that the Japanese tsunami disaster has caused the delay. That would not be a surprise at all considering that delays on all sorts of product launches and availability were the result of the tsunami and eart

Anyone that plays video games a lot knows that on occasion you are really tired of playing whatever video game you are using and want to change, but you don’t want to walk across the room to change it. This is where you get into the age old “it’s your turn to change” argument with the other people in the room. Ben Heck has created one of his coolest projects yet that will solve this argument. Heck has created a changer that will hold a bunch of games and change them for you. The project is for a video game disc changer for the Xbox 360 game console. The latest edition of the show follows Heck as he creates the project and focuses on removing the CD player and disc carousel from the CD changer and configures the case and components to ensure that the discs load properly into the Xbox device he created. Heck also has to create some programming to handle the changing. Oddly, Heck doesn’t finish this project. The act of leaving it undone is part of a giveaway that will allow the viewers of

Google may have thought all of the legal wrangling that had to do with the revelation last year that its Street View vehicles were capturing WiFi data was behind it. As it turns out the issue may just not be heating up in the US with the announcement that executive chairman and former CEO Eric Schmidt will testify before the Senate in September. Schmidt will be in front of the subcommittee for anti-trust investigations. The consumer group Consumer Watchdog has been pressuring the Senate to investigate Google over the WiFi capturing scandal. Google has faced legal investigations in other countries over the collection of the WiFi data as well. One of the last investigations we talked about was one launched by Spain last summer. Consumer Watchdog says that it has been calling for Schmidt to give sworn testimony for over a year now. Schmidt and Larry Page had declined to testify before the committee in the past and Consumer Watchdog called for the executives to be subpoenaed. It’s unclear

Alienware has been in the business of making gaming notebooks that are cool and seriously high end since before the gaming brand was part of Dell. Alienware has announced that it has added new wireless tech to some of its popular gaming notebooks from Bigfoot Networks. Several Alienware gaming rigs are now getting the Killer Wireless-N WiFi card inside for faster networking and better online gaming. Alienware will offer the Killer adapter on the M18x, M17x, M14x, and M11x gaming notebooks as an option. The WiFi card allows for less latency and data speeds up to 450Mbps. The card has intelligence inside that recognizes gaming traffic and prioritizes it for less lag and smoother online play. Anyone that has played an online game before will appreciate the reduced latency. The network card inside the notebooks features Advanced Stream detect to classify the traffic and prioritize games. It also has visual bandwidth control to allow the user to see what applications are using the most band

iPad 2 supplies have been constrained since the second-gen slate launched earlier this year – Apple has only just shaved the expected shipping times down to 3-5 days - but according to new leaks the company is hoping to avoid that issue with the new model by adding a second supplier. Quanta and Pegatron are in the running to join Foxconn, DigiTimes reports, after accidents at the company’s Chengdu, western China plant impacted production rates. Pegatron is said to be the most likely new partner, given the company already works with Apple on the CDMA iPhone 4. The company is also believed to be sitting on a 15m unit order for the next-gen iPhone, though there’s speculation over whether Apple is planning one or two such devices. Adding a second assembly plant will remove one bottleneck, but iPad 2 supplies have also been impacted with shortages of the core components that go into the tablet. The IPS LCD screens have been particularly patchy, with reports of suppliers LG Display experienc

If you are in the market for a new feature phone that is easy on the budget the Pantech Pursuit II will be coming to AT&T on July 17. The mobile phone is the follow up to the Pantech Pursuit that we talked about in June of 2010. The new phone runs on the Brew mobile platform and has a nice 2.8-inch touchscreen display and a vertical slide out keyboard. The phone also offers drag and drop shortcuts and a 2MP rear camera with video recording function. Pantech pre-loads social networking widgets on one of three different home screens that the user can slide around to find what they need. The Pursuit II is designed to be a quick messaging phone and it has a full HTML web browser too. Other features include USB connectivity, mobile email support, AT&T Navigator, and more. The camcorder function has a 4x digital zoom lens and the resolution of the screen is 240 x 320. The device uses a QSC 6270 ARM 9 processor at 230MHz and has up to 32GB of storage via a microSD card. The phone will

High-end audio firm Bowers & Wilkins has introduced a new set of in-ear earphones called the C5. The C5 headphones are an in-ear design with noise cancelling properties that promise amazingly clear sounds and a cool design. They are made from high quality materials and are aimed at the audiophile that wants style and performance. The C5 has a Secure Loop Design that keeps them comfortably in place. B&W also uses its Micro Porous Filter to allow the C5 to offer open and natural sounding music that is comfortable for long listening sessions. This filter acts as a diffuser to allow the delivery of better quality audio. The diffuser also allows the headphones to limit noise bleed and with the sealed fit of the ear tips, the audio is precise and clear according to B&W. The Secure Loop design will keep the earphones in place during exercise or other activities where some earphones might fall out of the ears. The design also puts the heavier metals in the build of the C5 closer to

Panasonic has announced that it has given NASA some hardware to take to the ISS aboard the final space shuttle mission with Atlantis that launched last Friday. Panasonic sent one of its new and cool full 3D AG-3DA1 camcorders along with a BT-3DL2550 25.5-inch 3D LCD and a rugged Toughbook notebook computer to NASA. That gear was used to document the training and preparation leading to the final shuttle mission. Only the 3DA1 camcorder made the trip into space. The camcorder will be used to document the ISS in 3D and the astronauts will use the camcorder to document several experiments that are being performed on the ISS. I wonder if the footage that is recorded with the camera will be offered in 3D for us to view after the mission. I also wonder if the astronauts will be forced to allow the camera to burn up on reentry rather than bring it back to Earth, as is often the fate of camera gear that goes into space. Panasonic isn’t the only electronic firm shooting a gadget into space. Sams

Our sling shot making pal Joerg Sprave is back with his latest homemade slingshot. This time around, he’s not flicking saw blades, machetes or even ball bearings as his ammo, he is using iPhones. I think Sprave might be onto something here. In the event of a zombie apocalypse you can collect all the iPhones from the walking dead you kill off with your saw blade slingshot and then use these iPhones to shoot at the next zombie hoard. The slingshot has a custom pouch that holds smartphone with some all important tweaks to keep the thing from backfiring. It would really suck to be bashed in the face by an iPhone. The iPhone really flies, the hang time when shot nearly vertically into the air is 4.5 seconds. Sprave also shoots the iPhone into a block of ballistic gel to see what it would do to a person that was shot by the thing. The results look very painful. My favorite part of the video though has nothing to do with the iPhone chunking slingshot. The part I like is at the end of the iPh

I love design concepts that are cool. We see concept speakers every now and again and of all of the concepts I have seen in the speaker category the Vol Speaker is the coolest. I love the idea of a speaker that looks like a giant volume knob. It looks like the designer ripped the knob off my home theater receiver, sprinkled it with Miracle Grow, and crammed speaker parts inside. The designer of the concept is Hironao Tsuboi. Tsuboi designed the speaker concept for a tobacco company apparently. That seems odd to me, but I really hope that this concept comes to the real world. I can totally see this on my desk as a speaker for my computer or MP3 player. The concept is made from aluminum, the speaker can be turned on and off by turning the giant dial body. The concept is very clean with no buttons and adjusting the volume is accomplished by turning the knob as well. The concept dimensions are 2.2-inches in diameter and 1.4-inches tall. The device is shown in black, silver, and blue colors

The gang over at Pocket-Lint went to the big Christmas in July event Microsoft put on recently in London and spied an interesting sounding mouse in the corner getting little attention. Microsoft has this event each year (if you are wondering) because it takes many print publications a good six months to ramp up their holiday coverage. At any rate, the mouse is rather cool and uses Microsoft’s BlueTrack tech inside. BlueTrack is the special tracking sensor that naturally looks blue when you see the sensor. The big draw to the tech is that it will offer accurate tracking on any surface this side of a mirror. I have used mice with BlueTrack and it works very well, which is a big deal for mobile users that don’t like to travel with a mouse pad. The mouse has a small USB receiver that is paired from the factory to save you time and that receiver stores away on the bottom of the mouse. The rodent has five customizable buttons and a haptic touch scroll pad is the cool feature of this thing. T

About a month ago, I mentioned the interesting Nyko Zoom for Kinect accessory that had debuted. The device is a special clip on lens accessory for the Kinect that greatly reduces the amount of room you need in your space to play Kinect games. I know that in the room where the Kinect was in our house we didn’t have enough space to use it with accuracy so we just never used it. With the Zoom Nyko promises to reduce the space needed to use the Kinect from about 8-feet to about 4-feet. I know that 4-feet of free and clear space is much easier to come by in my house so this is a very welcome accessory. The cool part is that Nyko will sell the Zoom for Kinect for $29.99 making it a bargain. Nyko has offered up the official release date for the device as August 23. Other cool things about the Zoom for Kinect include that it needs no power to operate. It simply clips onto the Kinect and covers the lenses Microsoft built into the device. I would bet that with many people having issues with enou

Software download store GetJar has refused to comply with a Cease & Desist (C&D) demand from Apple,arguing that the contentious “app store” name is not yet an official trademark and that the Cupertino company is little more than a pack of bullies. “We started formally distributing free apps in early 2005 and are among the pioneers of the modern direct-to-consumer (D2C) app store distribution space when the iPhone was just an R&D project in Steve Job’s head” GetJar CMO Patrick Mork highlights, going on to suggest that Apple’s legal attention was only provoked when GetJar helped launch the previously-exclusive iOS game “Cut The Rope” on Android. Mork also runs through the history of the “app store” trademark, or at least Apple’s attempts to establish the term as such. As he points out, Apple was denied the trademark by the USPTO in 2008, and then granted a “provisional” registration as long as nobody else contested it; unfortunately, Microsoft and others did. “GetJar won’t be

The executive arguably behind Samsung’s dominance in Android over the past eighteen months is leaving the company, its been revealed. Omar Khan, who has been CTO at Samsung Mobile and was instrumental in the best-selling Galaxy S and Galaxy S II smartphones and Galaxy Tab series of tablets, is moving to Citigroup, TDG reports, where he will be responsible for the company’s global digital banking efforts. The news will come as a blow to Samsung, which has been facing not only competition from other Android-adopting OEMs like HTC, but an ongoing mobile tech patent infringement lawsuit from Apple. That suit – in which Apple has accused Samsung of being a “copyist” and basically mimicking the iOS interface design and the aesthetic of the iPhone and iPad for the Galaxy range of phones and tablets – has seen Samsung forced tohand over pre-release hardware like the Galaxy Tab 8.9 so that Apple’s legal team can comb through it for any signs of infringement. Meanwhile, there has been speculatio

HTC has announced that it will begin the process of unlocking the bootloaders on its Android phones from August, with the HTC Sensation first on the list. Having confirmed back in May that it was changing its policy on locked bootloaders for future handsets, HTC had been unclear on when – or even if – it would be updating existing devices to support the same third-party ROM flexibility. The news this weekend, however, makes devices like the Sensation and the EVO 3D far more appealing to advanced Android users. “We’re thrilled to announce today that software updates to support bootloader unlocking will begin rolling out in August for the global HTC Sensation, followed by the HTC Sensation 4G on T-Mobile USA and the HTC EVO 3D on Sprint. We’re in the testing phase for the unlocking capability now, and we expect it to be fully operational by early September for devices that have received the software updates. We’ll continue rolling out the unlocking capability over time to other devices a

I am a libra. Like most people I know, I put no faith in the zodiac; I have no magical belief that everyone born within a 30-day block can share the same daily experience, or bear the same personality traits. But as pure amusement, if a horoscope passes in front of me, I may read it, just for fun. I always thought libra meant balance. It is the sign of the scales, after all, and so I believed it meant temperance, and equivocation. That’s not really me. I’d like to be more balanced, but I’m probably closer to manic. Then, while I was teaching at a high school in Brooklyn, a colleague asked for my zodiac sign. When I told her, she nodded: “That makes sense.” “It does?” I asked. “I’m not exactly a balanced person.” “Libras aren’t balanced. Libras are duplicitous. Libras head to the extremes. Libras are two things at once, playing both sides of the scales.” I still don’t read my horoscope regularly, but I was amazed that her description is exactly how I’ve always thought of myself. I’ve al

The market cap for Google’s GOOG-tagged stock grew $20 BILLION in the past week – can you guess why? Investors have certainly thrown in their 2 cents into the believing in Google+ party the past few days, starting on June 27th, the stock closed at $482.80 – on July 7th, the stock has reached $546.60 – that’s a $20.6 billion gain to the market cap (with 322.25 million hares outstanding), as Techcrunch notes. There was also a bit of a dip on Friday, possibly pointing toward a peak the day before. The big dip you see before the giant upturn this past week comes from a Morgan Stanley downgrade which hurt GOOG massively, cutting the stock from a recent high of $645 down to $600. Read more about that at Forbeswhere they mention the Morgan Stanley group having noted that Google’s growth investments in new products would not pay off. Jokes on them, perhaps? I’m sure investors are having a bit better day today than they were a little over a week ago. This comes amid news that Ancestry.com found

We’ve just been tipped by a tipster by the name of fishtoon that the next big iPhone iteration will not only be called iPhone 5, but that it’ll have two cameras on its back. This certainly isn’t the first time we’ve heard of the 3D functionality coming to Apple, as far back as July of 2010 when we heard that the company had hired Poly9 3D experts, inside December of 2010 when we saw Apple patent 3D glasses-free displays and Apple patenting 3D cameras as recently as March 31st, 2011. The most recent talk of 3D in Apple devices calls for a “paradigm shift from the known software-based approaches.” Is this the iPhone 5′s big surprise? The photos we’re looking at here come from 175wan a site we’ve literally never spoken about or referenced before here on SlashGear, so take these photos with a glass of salt, but there’s a first time for everything, right? Are the photos above and below to be believed? Is a big 5 in a lovely swoop font ready to sit after the established iPhone brand name, an