IBLOG SPACE

One of the product categories that is always out in force during CES is the HDTV. Over the last few years, the normal HDTV has been joined by the 3D TV too. In the future, the resolutions that we know as HD today will look as bad as comparing SD to HD shows today. LG has a new set that will be at the show that is dubbed the largest 3D UD TV at CES 2012. It’s a bit early to call that “largest” title since makers are known to wait to the last minute to roll out devices that will grab attention at CES. This TV is massive with an 84-inch screen. It also uses passive 3D glasses so you don’t have to spend hundreds of extra dollars to outfit a family with glasses. The UD resolution is four times that of normal 1080p HD at 3840 x 2160.

A Japanese scientist named Toshiyuki Nakagaki, a professor at the Future University Hakodate, is working with amoeboid yellow slime mold. That sounds gross, but what he is saying about the slime mold is very interesting. Nakagaki says that the simple yellow slime mold might hold the key to designing bio-computers that are capable of solving very complex problems. According to Nakagaki, the yellow slime mold is able to organize its cells to create the most direct path to its food through a maze. The cells have some sort of information-processing ability according to Nakagaki that lets them reach their food while avoiding stressors that might damage them along the way. The yellow slime being studied in this experiment is cultured in a petri dish. In the wild, the mold lives on rotting leaved or logs and eats bacteria. The specific slime is Physarum polycephalum known by the common name grape-cluster slime. It is used because it grows large enough to be seen without a microscope. The

Anonymous has hit an online supplier of military goods operated by a former special forces Lt. Col. named Dave Thomas. The hacker group was able to infiltrate the server of the supplier and claims to have stolen about 20,000 credit card numbers and passwords from the servers of the website. Anonymous posted to Pastebin claiming the hacking victory. Anonymous said that it has stolen 14,000 passwords to accounts and 8,000 credit card numbers for the users. All of the data was apparently encrypted, but that encryption was no help since Anonymous stole the encryption keys from the servers too. Thomas said that most of the card number that were stolen had already expired. Thomas has noted that it has seen no evidence so far of credit card fraud with the lost numbers. Anonymous targeted the website because most of the people that buy there are military and law enforcement personnel. Anonymous also announced the hack of security firm Stratfor this week.

The App Store has hit a milestone that is very impressive. According to the latest stats from a firm called Fiksu, the Apple App Store served up 5.65 million free app downloads per day in November. That was up from 4.91 million in October. With a typical app coming in at 4MB and 5.65 million downloaded, that is a huge amount of data. Before October and November, the number of daily downloads of the top free apps had been declining. That decline was blamed on the anticipation of the iPhone 4S and the fact that new users weren’t purchasing the iPhone 4. Part of the big climb in downloads is also said to be thanks to iOS 5. The updates for apps to run on iOS 5 prompted a lot of downloads. Compared to November of 2010, app downloads were up 83% for 2011. The downloads should keep growing as well with an estimated 30 million new iPhones come in online in Q4 2011.

A few days back some photos of what was thought to be the Samsung Galaxy S III surfaced. It didn’t take long for Samsung to come back and say that the photos that leaked and were thought to the S III were in fact nothing more than concept devices that are not indicative of what the actual S III might look like. Those “leaked” shots were found on a Russian social networking site. We have more rumors about the S III that have surfaced over the last few days. According to this rumor Samsung is set to debut the S III at MWC in Spain this coming February. That would put the debut at just about a year after the S II launched. Samsung has done very well with the S II so we have big hopes for the S III. The rumors point to the S III going on sale in Q2 2012. Samsung is also rumored to have another smartphone coming to market called the Galaxy S 3D with the device said to land in the second quarter as well.

If you are the user of a Nokia Lumia smartphone that packs Windows Phone inside, you may have noticed a new section on the Windows Phone Market that is called the Nokia Collection. Apparently, the new section is rolling out to Lumia users right now and was first spied in France. Interestingly, the section has been seen under two different names so far. It has surfaced as the Nokia Collection and as Apps from Nokia on devices. The section is the place where all the apps made by Nokia just for its phones reside. The section is apparently showing up without the user having to do anything as far as downloading an update. It’s worth noting that The Verge says that the new section hadn’t shown up on their WinPo. The section has five apps inside according to those that have it on the smartphones. The five apps include Nokia Maps, WRC Live, TuneIn Radio, App Highlights, and Contacts Transfer.

It’s always fun for geeks to peruse the ads that are placed by the big tech firms looking for help in specific areas. The ads and the sort of people that they are looking to hire hint strongly at features that are going to be added to various products. Microsoft had a new ad up a few days ago that was seeking a new worker for the windows Phone Backup, Migrate, and Restore team. The ad doesn’t come out and say that the backups will be done using the Skydrive cloud, but that would be a safe bet. The ad is seeking someone in the Redmond area to “help users restore their wiped phones to their user-customized states.” The backups could be done using the Zune interface on the user’s computer too. I think the cloud option makes more sense so the user can restore and back up when they are away from the computer. That sounds like a great job for Skydrive.

In my area, there are no hotspots to use for free anywhere. You can get access in some restaurants, but just being able to pick up a WiFi signal doesn’t happen. In Japan on the other hand, even the vending machines are tossing out free WiFi signals to people walking by on the streets. A beverage company in Tokyo called Asahi soft Drinks pulled the wraps off its new vending machine that not only puts out tasty beverages; it also offers free WiFi. The WiFi signal is strong enough to reach people within 50M. The access is free too, there is no need to pay for the service or buy a drink to get online. The time limit on access is 30 minutes before the connection boots you. However, you can just log back on if you get booted. Once the user logs in the homepage that opens tells you what stores are nearby for shopping and directs you to sightseeing locations as well. Starting in 2012, there will be 1,000 of these WiFi packing vending machines set up around Tokyo, Sendai, Chubu, Kinki, and

DigiTimes is citing sources that are claiming we will not have to wait long to see two new iPad version be unveiled by Apple. According to the sources, Apple will be rolling out the two new iPad versions at iWorld set for January 26. The tip comes from supply chain sources that DigiTimes so often cites. The sources claim that the two new versions will go into the line with the existing iPad 2. With two new models, Apple is said to be aiming at the entry-level, mid-range, and high-end markets. The sources claim that the existing iPad 2 will compete directly with the Kindle Fire. Presumably, that will require a price cut to make that happen and with the Fire at $199, which is a bit hard to believe. The two new devices will be the mid-range and high-end offerings. The sources claim there is no smaller iPad coming, and the new versions will use the same 9.7-inch screens with very high resolution of 1536 x 2084. The new products are using dual-LED light bars, and Sharp is supplying the

vThere is no shortage of iPad holders and cases on the market today. Typically, you can find plenty of cases that will prop your iPad up on a table or desk for watching movies and other content comfortably. The big problem with that sort of case is that if you aren’t sitting at a desk there is nothing you can do to prop the iPad up. A company called Standforstuff has a case called the Swingholder that looks like a microphone stand. It has an articulating arm with a counterweight on one end. You clip your iPad into the holder part and then you can adjust the iPad to whatever position you need and it will stay. The counterweight makes it easy to adjust the position if you need to. You can put the tablet exactly where you need it for hands free reading or watching streaming content with ease. The are a couple downsides I can see. The big one is the SwingHolder is rather bulky. The other is that the holder is expensive at $239.

HP has already made the decision to open source its WebOS platform, but according to a VentureBeat insider source, the company had initially wanted to sell WebOS along with other Palm assets for $1.2 billion. This is the same amount that HP paid when it acquired Palm back in 2010, meaning it was trying to offload a failing purchase without taking a loss. It’s no surprise then that HP had a hard time finding any takers. The value of Palm had dropped significantly since HP’s purchase and the WebOS platform flopped with HP’s TouchPad fiasco and smartphone fumbles with the Pre 3 and Veer. HP was rumored to be in talks with Amazon, Samsung, Intel, Facebook and several others. The initial asking price of $1.2 billion was likely lowered, but the source suggests that the value would have to be lower than $500 million for any serious considerations. It probably didn’t help that HP also demanded continued access to WebOS for use in its printers.

If you’ve not yet experienced the unmitigatedly satanic screaming of the hoards of ungrateful kids across the nation at not getting the iPhone they wanted for Christmas, now’s your chance – and if you’re a parent of one of these whining little pukes, you’ve got one option, and one option only: take back everything else you gave them. There’s a song that goes with this sudden collecting of Twitter status updates that sums it all up quite nicely, you can watch it below. When you do, please, for the love of Pete, check your kid’s Twitter account and make sure they’re not a horrible, horrible person. And you boyfriends and girlfriends out there – don’t you DARE ignore the fact that your significant other just spit in your face because you didn’t pick them up the gift they say they very obviously deserved, having gotten them the wrong color iPod instead. Take it back and return it, or take it back and toss it down a flight of stairs. You’ve only got one choice for the start of this respon

Sony’s PS Vita sales have taken a nose dive, selling a disappointing number during the crucial holiday season. The PS Vita sold only 72,479 units in its second week ending on Christmas, December 25. The figure is a rather dramatic drop from its initial sales of 321,000 units in its first two days hitting shelves in Japan. Second week sales of the PS Vita is unusually low for game consoles and is also a 78 percent drop from its first week sales. It puts Sony’s next-gen portable game console in fifth place after the PS3, Wii, PSP, and the 3DS, which is still flying off the shelves, selling 482,200 units during the same week. In comparison, second week sales for the 3DS dropped only 45 percent from 374,764 units to 209,623 units when the portable debuted in late February priced close to the PS Vita’s WiFi-only model. The poor sales may be due to the quality of the initial selection of game titles as well as to the slew of bugs, including system freezes and unresponsive touchscreen i

We’ve seen several downtimes this month in just about the least opportune time for Verizon of the entire year, this most recent downtime (today) being just between Christmas and the New Year, without a doubt a time when masses of everyday citizens are on holiday break and would rather be browsing the web than doing their post-Yule cleanup. Users from everywhere, from San Francisco to New York City, are experiencing downtimes in data and are pointedly noting 4G LTE to be the pressure point for this outage. Verizon has confirmed this status and tells us to remain warm. There’s not just one whole heck of a lot to comment on here outside the fact that this outage includes 4G LTE connectivity and shouldn’t be affecting your phone calls or your 3G data. Verizon noted the same in a statement being sent out to several networks (including us) which says just the basics. Meanwhile the Galaxy Nexus hoards out there fume as the feature phone device users across the nation remain oblivious: “We

There’s no denying that the virtual world is one lucrative enough for people on both sides of the equation to dedicate their lives to it – and in no more relevant a place today than a pre-release auction of virtual goods for a game by the name of Age of Wulin, this auction selling a man a sword for $16,000 USD. Of course he didn’t drop USD on this weapon, and the only physical representation of it he’ll see is a plaque (generous of them!) that he can hang in his room while he uses the “real” thing in the game when it’s released in the Spring of 2012. This game will also be released in the USA soon after the Chinese Beta, but it’ll only be this one lucky fellow who’ll be slaying his opponents with this one sword. Can you believe this situation? It’s not just the sword in question that banked a hefty price, either, the Snail Games auction fetching masses of bills for items created uniquely for the auction. There was a sheath for Hook of Departure that sold for $1,600 and a Lordly Spear

Earlier this week we were treated to some basic numbers on what it means to own a device with the upcoming Intel 32nm Medfield chip on it, and today we’ve got our own source stepping forward with a few images and a hands-on account of the Intel reference tablet that’ll be showing off the SoC in the near future to developers. What our source has here is a lovely tester tablet he’s picked up from either a very foolish Intel worker or someone who found it and had no idea what it was worth because a mere $50 USD brought this tablet to our new buddy’s hands. What you’ll see here is a few slightly blurry photos (taken with a Galaxy S II Epic 4G Touch, mind you) of the tablet in all its glory along with a few words on its quality. This tablet, again, represents the next generation of chips as made by Intel to provide the world with futuristic computing prowess in the mobile environment. This tablet runs Android and is out-clocking every dual-core processor on the market today from what we u

It’s an odd situation we’re in here with HP’s webOS mobile operating system now being open sourced and its TouchPad tablet having had such a summer that we’ll never forget – and it’s all come to a new strange point as the folks at webOSNation have gotten their hands on a tester unit of the smaller version of the tablet for a full review: HP TouchPad Go for the win! What’s found, in short, is that this is essentially the same tablet as its larger relative, it’s just presented here in a smaller package and at much cuter ratios. They’re running webOS 3.0.5, Beats Audio is fully incorporated, and this device’s dual-core 1.5GHz processor is in full swing. You’ll get a full hands-on treatment with this device courtesy of the Nation right below this paragraph, including no less than benchmarks, Ken Burns effects sliding in and out, and Asphalt 6 running quite nicely for superior racing action. As they say, webOS 3.0 works “without compromise” on this smaller device, and it’s a pretty big bu

We’ve spoken about the Raspberry Pi computer a few times before, earlier this year it seeming to get closer and closer to a real release: the time is now essentially set in stone, and the ultra-cheap PC is upon us: $25 for Linux on an ARM processor toting computer with USB, HDMI out, video and audio out, and an SD Card slot, coming this January! Can you imagine such a thing? Its creators have spoken again of this magical device as being available in the first month of 2012 with only tiny software and hardware testing required before that release date – joy! There will be a couple of configurations for this machine available at the launch, the larger having a bit more RAM and an ethernet port – we’ll certainly be opting for that. That one costs $35 USD, while the $25 version has half the RAM (128MB) and no ethernet port, and another board has been announced alongside these two as a bit of a bonus: the Gertboard! This bit is an expansion board that can be added to either model Raspberr

Even though the bulk of the population out here in Android Land aren’t yet updated to the newest version of Google’s Mobile OS, modifications on the basic user interface of Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich are in full force, shown here with the CyanogenMod team’s Trebuchet launcher, made to make your experience as lovely as possible. What you’re seeing is a hacked version of the newest version of Android made perfect as the developer / hacker team CyanogenMod sees it. They’ve got their newest version, CyanogenMod 9, under development now, and inside you’ll find this new look at Ice Cream Sandwich complete with improved widget resizing, auto-rotate, home screen modification, and a whole lot more! This build is only in pre-alpha mode at the moment, this meaning that if you’re going to use it, you’ll certainly be a part of the tester group working to improve it for a full release. At the moment, Trebuchet only works on hacked devices running Android 4.0.3 ICS, and even then you’ve got to