Sony released Cyber-shot point

In an attempt to stanch the flow of consumers leaving digital cameras for their phones to take photos, Sony released its first wave of ultra slim Cyber-shot point-and-shoots that feature 18 megapixel sensors that lessens the "noise" in low-lit scenes and auto-focuses faster.

Dugan said that meant Sony has to focus on things phones can't achieve, such as "high optical zoom, low light shooting, full HD video." Sonyhas outed a trio of new Cyber-shot digital cameras, including a slimline flagship, the DSC-TX200V, and a pair of affordable point-and-shoots, the DSC-WX70 and WX50.

There’s also support for 1080/60p video recording, and up to 10fps full-resolution continuous shooting of stills. Sony has also made the TX200V dustproof and waterproof to 16 feet. As for the Cyber-shot DSC-WX70 and WX50, they each have a 16.2-megapixel sensor, 25mm 5x optical zoom and full HD video recording. They can also capture 12-megapixel frames while simultaneously recording video. Both have an XtraFine LCD touchscreen – 3-inches on the WX70 and 2.7-inches on the WX50 – and optical image stabilization.

The Sony Cyber-shot DSC-TX200V is up for pre-order now, priced at $499.99, and available in silver, violet or red from March 23. The Cyber-shot DSC-WX70 and WX50 are priced at $229.99 and $199.99 respectively. The new Sony Cyber-shot TX200V's photo and movie capabilities will make any smartphone camera look like a toy.

Exmor R backside-illuminated sensor, a 5x f3.5-4.8 26-130mm Carl Zeiss lens, and a 3.3-inch 1.2-million-dot-resolution touch-screen OLED display. Also, Sony's developed a new extra-high-sensitivity technology that minimizes unwanted noise in low-light shooting conditions. If you like your cameras to look more like cameras, Sony also announced the WX70 and WX50. Both are 16-megapixel cameras with Exmor R backside-illuminated CMOS sensors, 5x f2.6-6.3 25-125mm lenses, and full HD movie capture at 60i in AVCHD format.

They have a ton of shooting options, just like their predecessor, the WX9, but get some new things, too, like the enhanced low-light shooting capabilities and creative picture effects that can be found in the TX200V.--The $230 WX70 has a 3-inch 921K-dot resolution touch-screen LCD and will be available in silver, black, pink, and violet, and the $200 WX50 has a 2.7-inch 460K-dot resolution LCD and will come in black and silver.

Google announced new privacy settings

Seeking to blunt a sharp backlash to recent privacy policy changes, Google has offered to share "the real story" about a system that compiles information about users based on their activity on all of Google's sites and products. This week, Google announced new privacy settings. The lawmakers also noted that because of Google's global reach, the change "potentially touches billions of people worldwide."

In a post on the company's public policy blog, Google's Betsy Masiello wrote that there have been misconceptions about the changes. "Some have praised us for making our privacy policy easier to understand. _ Users don't have to be logged in to use many of Google's products, including search and YouTube. _ When logged in, users can edit or turn off their search histories, switch Gmail chat to "off the record," use "incognito mode" on the Google Chrome browser or employ other of Google's privacy tools. Quite simply, Web users don't have to use all of Google's products.

She noted that Google won't be collecting any more data about users than it was before. Following a flurry of criticism over its privacy policy revamp, Google is attempting to clear up misconceptions about its actions.--Users still have control over what information Google sees; Google is not collecting any more data about users than it has in the past; and users can use as much or as little as they want of Google, Google Policy Manager Betsy Masiello declares in a company blog on Thursday. For services that require logins, a number of tools and options are available to reduce the data being collected by Google.

Google isn't collecting more data from its users under the new policy, Masiello maintains. "Period." Not everyone buys Google's "simpler" line. Rep. Ed Markey (D-Massachusetts) has called on U.S. Federal Trade Commission to investigate whether the policy changes violate Google's privacy agreement made with the FTC earlier this year. Google was also initially rapped by an independent watchdog of the federal cloud, SafeGov.org, for creating privacy risks for government workers with the new policies. Google quickly responded that the new policies do not apply to government workers using Google Apps.

By consolidating information about its users and refining target audiences for a product, Google can charge more for its advertising, argue critics of the policy. U.S. lawmakers asked the Federal Trade Commission whether changes announced this week by Google to its privacy policy violate terms of a 20-year settlement the company reached with the agency last year. Google announced in a blog post Tuesday that it will create a uniform set of privacy guidelines for more than 60 products.

Twitter has played an instrumental role in protests throughout the world

Twitter, a tool of choice for dissidents and activists around the world, found itself the target of global outrage Friday after unveiling plans to allow country-specific censorship of tweets that might break local laws. Twitter has played an instrumental role in protests throughout the world, including in last year's Egyptian revolution.

Twitter insisted its commitment to free speech remains firm, and sought to explain the nuances of its policy, while critics — in a barrage of tweets — proposed a Twitter boycott and demanded that the censorship initiative be scrapped. In China, where activists have embraced Twitter even though it's blocked inside the country, artist and activist Ai Weiwei tweeted in response to the news: "If Twitter censors, I'll stop tweeting."

One often-relayed tweet bore the headline of a Forbes magazine technology blog item: "Twitter Commits Social Suicide" San Francisco-based Twitter, founded in 2006, depicted the new system as a step forward.--Previously, when Twitter erased a tweet, it vanished throughout the world. Under the new policy, a tweet breaking a law in one country can be taken down there and still be seen elsewhere. Twitter said it will post a censorship notice whenever a tweet is removed and will post the removal requests it receives from governments, companies and individuals. The critics are jumping to the wrong conclusions, said Alexander Macgilliviray, Twitter's general counsel.

Some defenders of Internet free expression came to Twitter's defense. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland credited Twitter with being upfront about the potential for censorship and said some other companies are not as forthright. Reporters Without Borders, which advocates globally for press freedom, sent a letter to Twitter's executive chairman, Jack Dorsey, urging that the censorship policy be ditched immediately. "Twitter's position that freedom of expression is interpreted differently from country to country is unacceptable." Twitter said it has no plans to remove tweets unless it receives a request from government officials, companies or another outside party that believes the message is illegal.

"If it is applied, there will be a Twitter for democratic countries and a Twitter for the others." "Twitter will remove messages at the request of governments," she tweeted. Some Twitter users said this could be done by employing tips from Twitter's own help center to alter one's "Country" setting. Other Twitter users were skeptical that this would work. Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt declined to comment on Twitter's action and instead limited his comments to his own company. "In China, there are other issues that we call censorship. On one hand, he said, Twitter could put its employees in peril if it was deemed to be breaking local laws.

"Twitter could have taken a stand and refused to enter any countries with the most restrictive laws against free speech." Bloggers and activists from China, the Middle East and Latin America said Friday that they were concerned that new Twitter policies could allow governments to censor messages and stifle free expression. Thursday's announcement that Twitter had refined its technology to censor messages on a country-by-country basis raised fears that the company's commitment to free speech may be weakening.

Twitter sees the censorship tool as a way to ensure individual messages, or tweets, remain available to as many people as possible while it navigates a gauntlet of various laws around the world. Twitter Inc. has played a central communications role in protests from Egypt to Wall Street, but the microblogging service became the target of an uprising this week after announcing a new way to censor individual tweets in specific countries.  Officials of the San Francisco company stressed Friday that despite the move, Twitter remains committed to protecting free-speech rights and pledged that the "tweets must continue to flow."

But critics questioned whether Twitter had succumbed to pressure from governments or its new investor from Saudi Arabia, and some Twitter members called for a one-day boycott against the company. "I love @twitter but will join the #TwitterBlackout," said one tweet. "Freedom is above everythin I wont tweet on Saturday." "I feel betrayed by@Twitter! As with any Internet company that does business across international borders, Twitter faces the delicate act of balancing its need to expand with obeying local laws.--Until Thursday, Twitter could only block individual tweets from view for all of its 100 million active users worldwide.

When Twitter does block a tweet, it would still be visible to members outside the affected country.--Spokeswoman Jodi Olson said the change was "not at all about Twitter censoring tweets." Some Twitter members in the Middle East noted that the company last month received a $300 million investment from Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal. Twitter has run into government censorship problems before in China, which began blocking the service in 2009, shortly before the 20th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square democracy protests. China also blocks access to Facebook, and battles over the country's restrictive censorship policies caused Google to pull out in 2010. Jillian York, the Electronic Frontier Foundation's director for international freedom of expression, wrote in a personal blog that Twitter's action was "censorship. York said she is confident that Twitter's current management will adhere to their principles of free speech and transparency.

Nokia has lost position in the global cell phone market

Mobile phone maker Nokia Corp. on Thursday posted a fourth-quarter net loss of €1.07 billion ($1.38 billion) as sales slumped 21 percent even as the company's first Windows smartphones hit markets in Europe and Asia. Nokia said net revenue — including both its mobile phones and its network divisions — fell from €12.6 billion in the fourth quarter of 2010 to €10 billion, with smartphone sales plunging 23 percent.

Nokia has lost its once-dominant position in the global cell phone market, with Android phones and iPhones overtaking it in the growing smartphone segment. The Finnish company is attempting a comeback with smartphones using Microsoft's Windows software, a struggle that Nokia CEO Stephen Elop characterized as a "war of ecosystems." Including other models, Nokia sold 19.6 million smartphones in the quarter. Nokia shares rose more than 2 percent to €4.15 ($5.37) in afternoon trading in Helsinki.

Michael Schroeder, analyst at FIM bank in Helsinki, said markets had welcomed Elop's comments on sales of Lumia. "Nokia is not necessarily dead in the water. The average selling price of a Nokia handset rose by €2 from the previous quarter to €53 but was down by €16 from a year earlier, reflecting a higher proportion of cheaper mobile phones in Nokia's product mix. The company also reported a 4 percent drop in sales for Nokia Siemens Networks, its joint network equipment unit with Siemens AG of Germany. After selling four in 10 cell phones worldwide in 2010, Nokia has steadily lost market share to competitors including Apple and Samsung. Nokia is currently selling two Windows models, the Lumia 800 in Europe and parts of Asia, and the Lumia 710 in the United States.

“The massive marketing investment to promote the Nokia Lumia 800 contributed to ship better-than-expected volumes.” Stephen Elop, the former Microsoft executive who is directing Nokia’s transition from its own Symbian operating system to Windows, said the company planned to widen its aggressive selling of Windows devices, which I.D.C. estimates had only a 1 percent share of the global operating system market in the fourth quarter, far behind the leading operating systems, Android, made by Google, and iOS, made by Apple. The company announced planned to sell a third Windows phone, the Lumia 900, through AT&T Mobility in the United States.

Mr. Elop said Nokia would also start selling Lumia devices in China and Latin America by June. The average selling price of a Symbian phone slid 23 percent to €53 in the quarter from €69 one year earlier.--Sales fell 38 percent in Europe, Nokia’s largest market, and 40 percent in China, its third-largest market, during the quarter. Mr. Elop said that Symbian devices were being undercut by lower-priced smartphones. Mr. Elop said Nokia expected to sell fewer Symbian devices than originally anticipated when he announced the decision to adopt Windows in February 2011. At the time, Mr. Elop predicted Nokia would sell 150 million Symbian devices as Nokia ramped up production and made the transition to Windows phones.

Nokia began selling its first Windows model, the Lumia 800, in October in selected markets in Europe and Asia. By 2015, Windows and Nokia will be the second-largest smartphone operating system in the world, I.D.C. estimates, with 21 percent, trailing Google’s Android with 47 percent but ahead of Apple, with 19 percent. The company sold 19.6 million smartphones during the quarter and 93.9 million feature phones. Nokia also saw prices for its handsets fall. Profit margins also fell considerably on mobile handsets to 3.4 percent. A year ago, Nokia reported profit margins of 12.7 percent on devices.

On the bright side, the company's new Lumia smartphones that use the Windows Phone operating system are selling well. Nokia CEO Stephen Elop said in a press release that the company has already sold well over 1 million Lumia handsets. Nokia, once the worldwide leader in cell phone sales, has seen sales slip since the introduction of Apple's iPhone in 2007. The company launched the Lumia line of devices in October in Europe with two devices, the Lumia 800 and Lumia 710. Nokia began selling the Lumia 710 this month on T-Mobile USA.

The Dasient team joining with Twitter's

Dasient was founded in 2008 by a team of security experts and ex-Google staff. Its technology scans web addresses to detect harmful content, and the company also operates a service aimed at keeping online advertising free of malware. "By joining Twitter, Dasient will be able to apply its technology and team to the world’s largest real-time information network."

Twitter's long been plagued by malware and spam attacks, and this isn't its first security-related acquisition.--Twitter has acquired Internet security firm Dasient, the Sunnyvale, California startup said on its blog on Monday. Dasient, which describes itself as a cloud-based Web antimalware technology company, introduced in 2010 a service to protect advertisement networks and publishers from malicious ads.--The acquisition fits with Twitter's plans to expand revenue from advertising including promoted Twitter messages and accounts.

The Dasient team is joining Twitter's "revenue engineering" team, he said. Twitter said in a message that "Dasient is joining the flock!", and referred to Daswani's blog post. In 2009, Dasient launched its web anti-malware platform, capable of scanning URLs and websites for the presence of harmful content.

In 2010, Dasient launched the industry’s first anti-malvertising service to protect ad networks and publishers from the scourge of malicious ads. Over the last year, we have been very active in securing the ads and content of the some of the industry’s largest ad networks and web sites.” Twitter advertising’s most likely use of a full staff trained in anti-spam and anti-malware strategy is to protect a product (like Twitter’s self-serve ads for example) from fraud and attempts at abuse.

Facebook, MySpace and Twitter has released a new bookmarklet

Its most senior lawyer, Alex Macgillivray, branded the launch a “bad day for the internet” and accused Google of “warping” searchThe site provides examples of search results using the tool, Google was unavailable for comment. We think that's bad for people, publishers, news organizations and Twitter users.” Google responded via Google+, entering into an extraordinary public argument with Twitter.

Twitter does have a deal with Microsoft to allow Bing, Google’s biggest search engine rival, to index tweets.--A gang of engineers from Facebook, MySpace and Twitter has released a new bookmarklet designed to expose how Google’s People & Pages service favours the ad giant’s own Google+ results at the expense of the rest of the web. Once dragged onto a user’s bookmarks bar, it functions as a kind of search bar for the social web, unlike People & Pages, which as part of Google’s Search Plus Your World service only returns results from Google+.

As Search Engine Land explains, Google also favours its home-grown social networking service in autocomplete results in Google Instant and in sitelinks on its search page. Google, Facebook and Twitter have of course not been the best of pals since Google unveiled its latest attempt to crack the social networking market. A team of engineers at Facebook, Twitter, and some other Web sites have created "Focus on the User," featuring a "don't be evil" bookmarklet that eliminates Google's emphasis on its own Google+ social network.

On Jan. 10, Google launched Google Search Plus Your World, which attempts to reorder search results, factoring in a user's social network. The problem, according to Twitter and others, was that the redesign favored responses and input from only Google's Google+ network—not Facebook and Twitter, both of which offer larger social networks with presumably more relevant content. (By contrast, Focus on the User claims that Google itself buries links to relevant Google+ pages, several results pages down.) Although Google's new search features can be turned off, those sites still protested Google's favoritism.

For example, a video accompanying the Focus on the User site notes that a search for "cooking" turns up a chef Jamie Oliver as a suggested Google+ user, but then links to a Google+ page that hasn't been updated in months. "Would Google's search features return more relevant results if they included the entire social Web, rather than only Google's social network?" the video asks. Google representatives did not respond to requests for comment. Facebook, and Twitter representatives declined to comment.

After visiting Google and performing a search, the bookmarklet can be clicked, reordering the results whether they be on Flickr, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace, Quora, Tumblr, Foursquare, Crunchbase, FriendFeed, Stack Overflow, Github, or Google+. As long as the user doesn't leave the Google page, all subsequent results will be reordered according to the bookmarklet. Focus On the User seems to have concentrated almost exclusively on the right-hand column of results, where Google's Search Plus Your World suggests Google+ users to follow, based on the query.

Social searches still favor Google+ results in the main page. In some cases, the indented "social result" in the main column of search results will also be replaced with what Focus on the User says is a more relevant Facebook or Twitter page. To generate the results for a given query, the bookmarklet does a Google search for each person affiliated with the search terms, looks at the top 10 pages of Google's results, and then picks out the highest-ranked social result as judged by Google. Focus on the User also shows images from networks like LinkedIn, which the site claims Google inexplicably blocks.

Apple Inc. make the iPad a replacement for a satchel electronic versions

The popularity of iPad in the education field was revealed in the pilot study conducted by the textbook publishers Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, a partner of Apple in the e-textbooks platform. For the study, they have analyzed a middle school students situated at Riverside, California for a period of Spring 2010 to Spring 2011 using HMH’s Fuse: Algebra I app. After the course, they found that 20 percent more students using iPads scored ‘Proficient’ or ‘Advanced’ for the subject than the paper textbook material.

This type of pilot courses and iPad programs are conducted in private and boarding schools, and select universities across the country. More than 600 school districts in the public school sector have accepted a 1:1 iPad program. This shows that students are friendlier with the iPad while studying the content. Coleman Kells, principal of Amelia Earhart Middle School commented that students normally prefer iPad for studies as it provides a simple understandable interface. Meanwhile, Marita Scarfi, CEO of digital-focused marketing agency Organic feels that student love tablets more as it is less daunting.

Along with this, a study focused on an iPad game, Motion Math has proven the role of the iPad in developing the fundamental math skills. The iPad will reach more heights in the education field as Apple’s latest products such as iTunes U, iBooks 2, the iBookstore and iBooks Author will help the educators and students. It is considered that iBooks learning will be successful as the e-books are less costly than the normal textbooks. Out of the 20,000 projects listed on the site, presently there are 418 iPad-related requests. Apple Inc. has launched its attempt to make the iPad a replacement for a satchel full of textbooks by starting to sell electronic versions of a handful of standard high school books.

The printed books are bought by schools, not students, and are reused year after year, which isn’t possible with the electronic versions. New books are subject to lengthy state approval processes. iPads and other tablet computers work well, but iPads cost at least $499. Apple didn’t reveal any new program to defray the cost of getting the tablet computers to students. All this means textbooks have lagged the general adoption of e-books, even when counting college-level works that students buy themselves.

Forrester Research said e-books accounted for only 2.8 percent of the $8 billion U.S. textbook market in 2010. The third one, Boston-based Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, also plans to supply books to Apple’s store.--The textbooks will cost $15 or less, said Phil Schiller, Apple’s head of marketing. Schools will be able to buy the books for its students and issue redemption codes to them, he said. Albert Greco, a professor of marketing at Fordham University in New York and a former high-school principal, said schools would need to buy iPads for its students if it were to replace printed books.

It wouldn’t work to let students who can afford to buy their own iPads use them in class with textbooks they buy themselves, alongside poorer students with printed books. iBooks 2 Apple kept that feature relatively basic and focused on function. iBooks Author The interest in iPads will increase further as Apple has recently introduced their improved digital books platform with developing tools and student textbooks. More than 600 school districts in the public school sector have accepted a 1:1 iPad program. This shows that students are friendlier with the iPad while studying the content.

Facebook unveiled more than 60 new apps

Facebook Inc. is adding more than 60 partners to a service that lets users tell friends what they’re currently doing online, from listening to music to reading news. The company is working with Pinterest, Ticketmaster, Rotten Tomatoes and other applications to let users publish their activities on their Facebook pages, Carl Sjogreen, director of platform products, said yesterday at an event in San Francisco. For instance, if someone is researching a travel spot on TripAdvisor, they could post the details to Facebook.

The activities can be seen on three parts of Facebook’s site: the Ticker, News Feed and Timeline. The service lets Facebook developers create applications that are better customized to their users, said Andrew Dreskin, chief executive officer of San Francisco startup Ticketfly Inc., another partner. “It’s the evolution of Facebook.” Ticketfly, which sells tickets to music concerts and other events, has added new buttons to its website to let users “Like” specific artists on Facebook after they purchase tickets. The world's largest online social network unveiled more than 60 new apps Wednesday that let users share the tiniest details of their lives on their Facebook profiles, now known as their Timeline. Facebook users can already share the music they are listening to through apps such as Spotify, or the articles they are reading through Yahoo News and other services. Facebook is calling it "frictionless sharing."

It means once you sign up for the apps, they will automatically share your activity through Facebook.--Facebook expects developers to create thousands more in the coming weeks and months.--Joining "likes" on Facebook, the social network has added dozens of new types of posts, including "bought," "read" and "want." Sixty applications that let users publish information automatically to Facebook launched at a news conference held at a trendy nightclub here on Wednesday. Apps for foodies, like Foodspotting and Foodily, can publish to a user's Facebook profile when she updates her digital diary of meals. Ticketmaster can publish to Facebook when customers buy concert tickets.

Some 400,000 people coming from Facebook have signed up for MOG accounts since September, and each day, Facebook sends an average of 4,000 people who have never visited MOG before, David Hyman, the music company's CEO, said in a phone interview. Facebook programmers have created a mathematical algorithm that will examine the types of posts a person has chosen to give prominent placement to on his or her profile, Facebook CTO Bret Taylor said in an interview. Eventually, every user will be required to use that version of the site profile. Zuckerberg, who is now Facebook's CEO, did not attend the event Wednesday. Despite some early opposition, Facebook wants to encourage all developers to adopt the new tools. In characteristic Facebook ambition, Sjogreen added, "We're even more excited about the thousands of apps to come."

Skype coming to Windows Phone

The instant messaging and video calling application was to have been built in to windows Phone by the end of the year, Windows Phone boss Joe Belfiore had said. Now, however, vice-president of the Skype division at Microsoft Rick Osterloh says it will be available “soon”. The move is controversial partly because Windows Phone, despite being owned by Microsoft, is the only mobile operating system to lack a fully-fledged Skype client. Apple has already introduced video calling with its Facetime service.

Osterloh also said that integrations with Microsoft’s Xbox and Windows 8 technology would be made available in due course, and that the company was working on integrating Facebook contacts into the main Skype interface. Microsoft's next push to make Windows Phone differentiated and relevant will revolve around deep integration with Skype. Skype, which Microsoft acquired in October, has a mediocre presence in the mobile space right now. It is not very welcome by the major carriers, which feel threatened by Skype's ability to place phone calls through data channels instead of the traditional mobile phone spectrum. Microsoft is nevertheless pushing forward and hoping that by making Skype an integral part of its mobile experience, people will realize there's something unique and special about Windows Phone.

Skype has again promised to slip its eponymous telephony application into Windows Phone handsets real soon - while integrating with Facebook and working out what people might actually pay for. Facebook integration means staying within the Skype client to open up calls and chats to Facebook contacts. Integrating Skype into mobile telephony will almost annoy Microsoft's carrier partners as Skype minutes aren't contributing to their profits, but there's only so long that Windows Phone can be the only smartphone without integrated Skype if Redmond is going to justify the $8.5bn price tag

The apple recycling program, extended to iPads and iPhones

Apple has launched a recycling scheme that could help you make money from your old iPhone, iPad, Mac or even Windows PC. If it doesn't, you can recycle it responsibly through one of our free recycling programmes." You can also now recycle old iPods and mobile phones through Apple.
An audit released by Apple on Friday reveals widespread violations of worker rights and environmental practices by manufacturing partners for the company’s wildly popular iPhone, iPad and other gadgets around the world.

Five facilities employed underage workers. The list of 156 companies includes such household names as Intel, Samsung and Sony as well as smaller suppliers in China, Malaysia and Singapore. Apple’s change of heart follows a highly publicized string of factory worker suicides in 2010 and deadly explosions in two Chinese factories in 2011. Sterne Agee analyst Shaw Wu said that disclosing the supplier list is indicative of a shift in thinking at the company that focuses on maintaining Apple’s positive image with consumers who have been demanding that Apple take more responsibility for problems at companies in its supply chain.

Apple said it represents about 97 percent of its supply chain. Wu said that the list did not include subcontractors or companies that provide materials or components to Apple suppliers. The recycling program, extended to iPads and iPhones in the United States this summer, allows customers with older-model iOS devices to send them in to Apple and receive an Apple gift card in return for the remaining value of the device. In Germany, France, and the U.K., customers will get a direct deposit into their bank accounts for the value as opposed to a gift card, according to Apple's German Web site.

The best part of the recycling program is that Apple takes care of everything. PowerON will determine the fair market value for your device and issue an Apple gift card in that amount. German Mac site Macerkopf describes the process in Germany, France, and the U.K., where local subcontractors (Dataserv in Germany) will take care of assessing the fair market value of the device in question and the monetary value is deposited directly into a bank account.  "When you recycle with Apple, your used equipment is disassembled, and key components that can be reused are removed. With materials reprocessing and component reuse, Apple often achieves a 90 percent recovery rate by weight of the original product."

Apple is on the losing end of an initial ruling with Motorola

Apple is on the losing end of an initial ruling by the U.S. International Trade Commission in the company’s battle with Motorola. On Friday, an administrative law judge at the ITC made an initial determination that Motorola does not infringe claims in three Apple patents. The ITC took on the case in November after Apple asked it to forbid Motorola from importing certain phones to the U.S. that Apple alleged infringe the patents.

Apple declined to comment on the ruling. Motorola said it was pleased with judge’s decision. The ruling follows a win for Apple last month when the commission decided to block HTC from importing phones that infringe Apple patents. Apple and Motorola are also battling in courts in Europe, where German authorities recently awarded Motorola an injunction that would prevent the sale of Apple products in that country. Motorola is also fighting in court with Microsoft over patents. Motorola recently agreed to be acquired by Google.

Droid X, BackFlip
Motorola Mobility, which was spun off from Motorola Inc. last year and then later agreed to be bought by Google, filed three patent lawsuits and an ITC complaint in October 2010 targeting Apple’s iPhone, iPad and MacBook. Motorola Mobility was accused by Apple of infringing three patents, including two that cover touch screen technology.

Microsoft Case
A trade commission judge in Motorola Mobility’s case against Apple is scheduled to release his findings April 23. Motorola Mobility also is fighting with Microsoft Corp. over patented technology. Redmond, Washington-based Microsoft claims Motorola Mobility refuses to pay royalties for use of patented technology, while Motorola Mobility has accused Microsoft of infringing patents on video-game systems.--Judge Essex last month said that Motorola Mobility infringed one Microsoft patent, and cleared it of violating six others.

Facebook launches its own simultaneous music listening group chat room feature

Look out Turntable.fm, Facebook today launches its own simultaneous music listening group chat room feature. The new feature will force Turntable.fm to concentrate on public listening rooms and celebrity DJs, as synchronous listening with friends will now be Facebook’s domain. Update: Turntable.fm responds – “Turntable.fm Founder Says He’s Flattered By Facebook Listen With, But They’re Different”

Also, check out Facebook “Listen With” Artist Page Links Will Help Musicians Monetize
The feature could boost streaming service signups, because users won’t want to miss out on shared listening experiences with their friends. A chat sidebar spotlights current listening opportunities with a music note. To listen, users hover their cursor over the user's name and then click the "Listen With" button. Users will also have the ability to control who sees when they are listening to a song with a Facebook friend. "Only the people you've shared your listening activity with can see when you're listening with a friend," Facebook said in a Help Center post. Facebook on Thursday began rolling out a new feature aimed at ramping up the social experience of listening to music online.

The feature, called “Listen With Friends"—lets users listen along with any friend that playing music. When a Facebook user is listening to a song, a music note will appear next to their name in the chat sidebar and the real-time news ticker. To listen in, users can simply hover over that friend’s name, then click the “Listen With” button. Currently, Spotify and Rdio are the only two music players that support Listen With Friends. The feature is part of Facebook chat, so users can chat online about what they are listening to. Users can also listen in as a group while one friend acts as a deejay. When a user begins listening to music with a friend, Facebook will post a story to friends’ tickers and/or news feeds. “Only the people you've shared your listening activity with can see when you're listening with a friend,” Facebook said in a Help Center post.--Users will also be able to remove songs they have listened to from their timelines.

Dancing robot from Vietnamese robotics firm TOSY Robotics

The teen superstar made an appearance at the annual convention to promote a new robot from Vietnamese robotics firm TOSY Robotics. The 'mRobo Ultra Bass' is a state-of-the-art portable speaker that doubles-up as a dancing robot. Pop star Justin Bieber showed up on the CES show floor today to introduce the mRobo Ultra Bass, a portable speaker that doubles as a dancing robot.

The device, from Vietnam-based Tosy Robotics JSC, includes 2GB of internal storage, or about 500 songs. In speaker mode, mRobo weighs about 3.3 pounds and measures 4.3 by 6.3 by 7.9 inches (WLH). The mRobo Ultra Bass launches in the fall for $199. Whether Bieber can turn his 16.3 million Twitter fans into mRobo buyers remains to be seen.

#gadgetNERD."
Justin Bieber caused a minor scrum on the floor of the Consumer Electronics Show Wednesday when he stopped by to launch a dancing robot for Vietnamese toy and robotics designer Tosy. Bieber looked ready for the spotlight in his Louis Vuitton denim jacket as he greeted fans in Las Vegas. The mRobo is designed as a speaker that can also dance to music uploaded from a USB stick. Tosy said the mRobo will be available for purchase this year.

The T-Mobile Nokia Lumia 710 has been prepared up for sale

Nokia Lumia 710

The T-Mobile Nokia Lumia 710 has gone up for sale today, though you wouldn’t know if it you dropped by the US carrier’s site: there’s no mention of the Windows Phone 7 handset until you dig through the smartphone range. Priced at $49.99 with a new, two-year agreement and available in black and white, the Lumia 710 runs Windows Phone 7 Mango on a 1.4GHz single-core CPU with a 3.7-inch WVGA screen.

There’s also a 5-megapixel main camera with 720p HD video recording though, unlike the AT&T Lumia 900 announced earlier this week, no front-facing camera. Preloaded apps include Nokia Drive and ESPN, along with T-Mobile TV for streaming video and Nokia Music for streaming audio. We grabbed some hands-on time with the Lumia 710 when Nokia initially announced the smartphone, back at Nokia World 2012, which you can see here. We’re hoping T-Mobile wakes up soon and starts pushing the new Lumia a little more, if only for Nokia and Microsoft’s sakes. Earlier this week Nokia confirmed it would be offering the original Lumia 800 in the US, albeit as an unlocked, SIM-free device with no carrier subsidy. The Nokia Lumia 710, the company's first Windows Phone smartphone to come to the U.S., is now available for purchase from T-Mobile.

The Lumia 710 features a 3.7-inch, WVGA ClearBlack LCD display and is powered by a 1.4Ghz Qualcomm processor. At that price, the Lumia 710 is a very attractive option for new smartphone buyers.--Analysis Humiliatingly, Nokia was forced to deny rumours last week that it was planning to break up and sell its crown jewels to Microsoft. Normally a company can remain impervious to Twitter-born gossip, particularly from a known antagonist. Redmond has got an excellent product, for the first time, and people who have a Windows Phone love using it.

The phones aren't shifting. It's the phone that leaves no footprints. So that makes Nokia's American comeback all the more challenging. Either the operator gets cold feet or Nokia gets cold feet first. Yesterday Nokia launched what's probably its most competitive US product for a decade. The greater problem for Nokia - and Microsoft - is the nagging idea that there's no room for Windows at the smartphone table, no matter how fabulous it is. Remember that Elop's great gamble at Nokia is to make Windows the 'third ecosystem'. Nokia has yet to throw its best designers (assuming they haven't all left) or radical innovations at Windows Phone yet.

Lenovo K91 Smart TV

Lenovo K91 Smart TV

It also pack in 1GB of Ram, and either 16GB, 32GB or 64GB of Flash storage. Lenovo is all set to make a grand entry into Television market with the very first TV set powered by Google 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich. Named as Lenovo K91 Smart TV, this Ice Cream Sandwich TV will be released first in China followed by other countries.

Famous for their ThinkPad series of laptops, Lenovo may likely take the TV technology to another level with the latest Ice Cream Sandwich TV. This entertainment device is a 55 inch screen device running on Qualcomm's 8060 Snapdragon dual-core CPU with 1GB of RAM, a 2GB SD card and 8GB storage capacity. The TV will also be compatible with Lenovo smartphones and tablet computers.

Lenovo is entering the TV business at this year’s CES, and it’s doing so with a splash: The company announced the world’s first TV set running Android 4.0, a.k.a. Ice Cream Sandwich, Sunday. Here’s what the TV will offer aside form the latest version of Android: It will have 1 GB of RAM, 8 GB of storage and 2 GB SD card.--Parental control, of course, Owners of the device will be able to access Lenovo’s yet-to-be-launched cloud services from the TV to stream personal media stored in the cloud. Lenovo instead chose to customize Android 4.0.

2012 is to be the year of the ultrabook For CES

A company at the Consumer Electronics show wows the tech crowd in Las Vegas with its new product. Despite the massive size and reach of CES, the show can actually be quite insular. Well, no one can be sure until the products hit store shelves. "CES is not a great bellwether for success," said Michael Gartenberg, an analyst at research firm Gartner. It's not an indicator of what consumers will buy."

Sure, CES can boast its fair share of hit products that make their debut at the show. Microsoft's original Xbox was shown off for the first time at CES in 2001. DVDs and Blu-Ray were both highlights of past shows. Plus, there are few other venues where a company can reach so many industry taste-makers, media members, and analysts at one time. But for all the past successes, consumers have rebuffed a lot of recent trends that have emerged from the show. Avatar had hit theaters a month earlier, giving companies something to point to as a potential killer app for consumers. Yet consumer response was tepid, and 3D never accelerated sales past the normal pace of replacement cycles.

Two years later, and the Kindle remains a dominant product in its category, while many of the products that debuted at that CES never actually reached the market. "Microsoft has a long history of announcing things at CES keynotes that either never see the light of day or were outright flops," said Avi Greengart, who covers consumer products for Current Analysis. Speaking of tablets, they were one of the biggest trends last year as company after company scrambled to catch up to Apple's blockbuster iPad. Motorola also wasn't alone in its lack of tablet success. Motorola wasn't the only mobile-device company to make a big splash at CES.--The next great hype: Ultrabook For CES, 2012 is shaping up to be the year of the ultrabook. It's a response to Apple's MacBook Air, which the company has never tried to define as a whole new product (hence sticking with the MacBook name).

"It's not a new product category. It's a laptop."
Price, in particular, will be a major factor, since the products tend to sell at a premium to normal laptops.
Vegas is where the tech biz congregates for the annual International Consumer Electronics Show, a showcase for the latest innovations in smart televisions, tablets, digital cameras and a whole lot more. The 2007 introduction of the iPhone took place during CES, just not at CES. If one of themes of the 2011 Consumer Electronics Show was the rise of Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) Android tablets, this year's CES event will be the year the Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) Windows laptop market is revitalized with so-called ultrabooks. Ultrabooks are not supercomputers packed in small frames, or super electronic reading devices.

At between $700 and $1,000 apiece, and between 3 and 5 pounds, ultrabooks are this year's hot-ticket item at CES. PC-making powers such as Lenovo, Hewlett-Packard (NYSE:HPQ), Acer, Asus, Dell (NASDAQ:DELL) and every other computer maker under the sun are expected to tout their ultrabooks at the show in Las Vegas this week. Tablets and netbooks, the darlings of past CES events, are both less expensive. In a September survey of 5,130 U.S. online consumers, we found that 22 percent of PC shoppers said they'd be interested in buying an ultrabook at the current prices. "If ultrabooks are only thin, light Mac Air knockoffs, they won't be very successful," industry analyst Jack Gold told eWEEK. Gold sees ultrabooks evolving over the next couple years.

Of course, the arrival of Microsoft's Windows 8 platform, a touch-oriented interface for tablets, will lead to touch-enabled ultrabooks and convertible tablet/notebook form factors with flip-over covers and extended slide-out screens. In the meantime, analysts such as Current Analysis analyst Avi Greengart see ultrabook pricing as a challenge:  "The consumer notebook market is extremely price sensitive, and even if vendors do significantly undercut the MacBook Air pricing somehow, ultrabooks will still come at a premium above regular notebooks. NPD DisplaySearch said in its recent mobile PC forecast that the current premium price points of ultrabooks will temper demand, with some supply limitations in the production of displays thin enough for these computers. To wit, tablet PCs will remain the growth accelerant in the overall mobile PC market in the short term.

XO 3.0 new tablet for education in the developing world

Marvell and One Laptop Per Child today introduced the XO 3.0, a tablet designed for education in the developing world. The XO 3.0 uses Marvell's 1Ghz PXA618 processor and runs both OLPC's custom Sugar Linux OS and Google Android Honeycomb, said Jack Kang, Marvell's director of technical marketing. Marvell's focus on providing very low-power-consumption, low-cost processors helped it land the OLPC business, with OLPC laptops beginning to switch over from x86-based processors last year.

It isn't made from a "single sheet of flexible plastic," though, as the original OLPC tablet spec said. According to The Verge, the tablet has an 8-inch, 1024-by-768-resolution screen. The tablet will be on display at CES Unveiled on Sunday afternoon; we'll get a hands-on, For American Students, Plugs, Not Tablets Teachers can control students' devices through the plug, Kang said. In terms of tablets and phones, Marvell continues to plug along. The company's chip powers the low-cost Vizio Android tablet as well as the new rugged Panasonic Toughpad A1 Android tablet which was announced in November, and which we're going to see at CES. OLPC's mission is to provide one connected laptop or tablet to children who have little or no access to education because of insufficient resources.

The XO 3.0 integrates a 1GHZ Marvell Armada PXA618 system-on-a-chip, delivering low power consumption at low cost.
Other features of the Wi-Fi capable tablet include:
• Circuitry that allows it to be charged directly by solar panels or hand cranks.
• A Pixel Qi sunlight-readable display.
• Android and Linux operating system support.
The tablet comes on the heels of the news that India’s own mass-market tablet, the Aakash, has garnered serious interest, selling thousands and producing interest potentially in the millions of units. One Laptop Per Child's XO-3 tablet is ready to ship after years in the making, and working units will be shown next week at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, OLPC founder and chairman Nicholas Negroponte said.

The tablet has an 8-inch screen and will be priced at less than US$100 as originally planned, Negroponte said via e-mail. Like OLPC's XO-1 laptop, the XO-3 will be offered as an educational tool for children in developing countries. "[The XO-3] price will be $100 or lower. The tablet provides about eight to 10 hours of battery life, though some audiences may choose a smaller battery capacity to reduce the purchase price, said Ed McNierney, chief technology officer at OLPC. The charging options include solar panels or hand cranks, and a study is under way to see if the battery can be detached and the tablet powered directly through a solar cell.

The tablet is also available with a traditional LCD screen. But the optional Pixel Qi display absorbs ambient light to brighten the screen, reducing power consumption and extending battery life. Microsoft's Windows will not run on the device, only Linux-based OSes, Negroponte said. Negroponte has said the tablet on display at CES will run Google's Android OS. The XO-3 ultimately will replace the XO-1.75 laptops that are currently shipping, Negroponte said.

OLPC is not dependent on a specific manufacturer for the tablet and will work with "whomsoever wants to roll-out the tablet, for whatsoever purpose, at a very large scale," Negroponte said, adding the objective is to see prices plummet. Software on the tablets will record audio and video and adapt a reading platform to the needs of the children without human intervention. The project will study how children interact with the tablet and will aid in the study of tools for self-learning and critical thinking among children.

White Galaxy Nexus

Curious as to what that white Galaxy Nexus looks like? Retailer Clove has joined the UK retailers listing the vanilla variant of the Ice Cream Sandwich smartphone, and has shared some official images so you can see just how much white you’re getting.--Other white Samsung handsets, such as the white Galaxy Note, have matching display bezels, as they use more traditional flat panels.

Still, we imagine there’s still enough to like about the white Galaxy Nexus for people to cope with the black fascia. Retailers have started listing a white version of Google’s new flagship Galaxy Nexus,-Like the previous Nexus S, the new model also features a white back, while the curved glass front remains all-black. Yummy. The latest version of the Google-optimized smartphone line may have Sprint in its future.

The ad boasts a "4.65-inch HD Super AMOLED screen" and a "1.5 GHz Dual-Core Processor." Sounds like a Galaxy Nexus to us. The Galaxy Nexus, which Google had an active role in developing and is currently the only phone that runs on Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich), is only available on Verizon at the moment. The Galaxy Nexus is an NFC-enabled phone, which means it has the technological power to use Google Wallet. So making its flagship NFC phone available on a carrier that actually supports Google's full NFC functionality makes complete sense.

A new memory card format, courtesy of Sony

 A new memory card format, courtesy of Sony. It's the XQD card, and it comes in 16GB and 32GB capacities. Sony is also offering USB 3.0 and ExpressCard adaptors. Sony claimed the XQD format can deliver data transfer rates of up to "1Gbps (125MB/s) write and read" through the PCIe interface. That enables "stable continuous shooting of RAW images", Sony said, with an XQD memory card writing "approximately 100 frames in RAW format in continuous shooting mode".

XQD's write speed is 1.4 times that of a Compact Flash A card, Sony said. The 16GB XQD costs $130 (£84) and the 32GB card is priced at $230 (£148). The XQD memory card format was only announced last month, but already we’ve got a camera that uses it – in the shape of Nikon’s D4 DSLR - and a 16GB and 32GB cards from Sony.  What we do get is a new USB 2.0/3.0 Sony MRW-E80 XQD card reader and a QDA-EX1 XQD ExpressCard Adapter for your ExpressCard 34 slot, to help you get your images and footage off the card.

The 16GB Sony QD-H16 card will be priced at $129.99, while the 32GB QD-H32 will be $229.99. The MRW-E80 USB card reader will be $44.99, as will the QDA-EX1 ExpressCard Adapter. The 16GB Sony QD-H16 card will be priced at $129.99, while the 32GB QD-H32 will be $229.99. The MRW-E80 USB card reader will be $44.99, as will the QDA-EX1 ExpressCard Adapter. Sony said Friday it will begin selling memory cards with write speeds of 125Mbps, the fastest in the industry, from February.

Shine HD-capable smallest 'projectors

According to the company, the Shine's claim to fame is that it's the smallest HD-capable projector with a native resolution of 1280x768 (WXGA). Tha said, Velocity Micro would be smart to offer an easy connectivity option for Apple users at launch. Note: The Shine is listed as "3D Ready" on Velocity Micro's Website. The CES shower of Ice Cream Sandwich tablets has begun. Today Velocity Micro announced the Cruz T507 and Cruz T510, two low-cost tablets that will run Android 4.0 "Ice Cream Sandwich."

It has pretty basic specs, as you'd expect for something at this price point: a 1.2-GHz single-core, Cortex-A8 processor, an 800-by-480 LCD screen, 512MB of RAM, and 8GB of storage plus a MicroSD card slot. It lacks the Android Market or Google's apps, offering the Amazon AppStore instead. The tablet has a single VGA front-facing camera, and an HDMI output port. Velocity Micro is pretty hacker-friendly, too, so expect this tablet to be relatively easily modded. The slightly larger Cruz T510 is a slim tablet, only 0.35 inches thick, with a 9.7-mm screen. Velocity Micro said the tablet will cost under $249. Best known as a maker of high-quality, value-priced PCs, Velocity Micro has also made e-readers and Android tablets for a few years now.

We reviewed the company's Cruz T408 and criticized it for having a low-quality screen, old OS, and lack of Google apps. They’ve got a pair of budget tablets that won’t really blow anyone away, but their new Shine pico projector looks really nice. Both run Android 4.0, mercifully. Any tablets at CES that don’t are plain crazy. Then there’s the Shine, a small projector that’s certainly bigger than the early, ~20-lumen pico-projectors, but definitely smaller than the loud, hot, 1000-lumen “real” projectors. Price?  “Under $400,” which like $399. But we’ll see Then there’s the little VMUltra drive – optical drive, 500GB of storage, and a few USB hubs to boot.