http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=efE2k2gGFPM
UK carrier Three has posted a youtube video giving a quick look at the Samsung S4 mini, officially announced yesterday …
Expand
Expanding
Close
A quick video look at the S4 mini
Author
Ben Lovejoy is a British technology writer who started his career on PC World and has written for dozens of computer and technology magazines, as well as numerous national newspapers, business and in-flight magazines. He has also written two novels.
He thinks wires are evil and had a custom desk made to hide them, known as the OC Desk for obvious reasons.
He considers 1000 miles a good distance for a cycle ride, and Chernobyl a suitable tourist destination. What can we say, he’s that kind of chap.
He speaks fluent English but only broken American, so please forgive any Anglicised spelling in his posts.
Fiber to be a profitable business, not a tech experiment, says Google
Credit: CNET/Marguerite Reardon
With Google Fiber promising 1Gb speeds for $70 a month – a dramatically better deal than anything else currently available in the USA – there had been a pretty widespread assumption that it was a tech experiment on Google’s part, to see what kind of services could be offered on a really high-speed link, rather than a money-making business. But not so, says a Google Fiber exec speaking at a Fiber-to-the-Home Council meeting covered by CNET …
Expand
Expanding
Close
The future of military sensor systems: self-powered, wireless Android boxes
It may not look like much, but this anonymous-looking plastic box could represent the future of military sensor and surveillance systems. It’s a prototype of a DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) design for a modular sensor system for military applications called ADAPT, an acronym DARPA somehow manages to get from Adaptable Sensor System …
Expand
Expanding
Close
Controversy as Google shifts to publicizing critical vulnerabilities after just 7 days
Image: krebsonsecurity.com
The Verge spotted a controversial post on Google’s Online Security Blog in which the company says it will now publish security vulnerabilities discovered by its security researchers after just seven days rather than the existing sixty.
The policy affects what Google terms “critical vulnerabilities under active exploitation” – in other words, weaknesses that can do Bad Stuff to users and which are already being used by attackers …
Expand
Expanding
Close
Russian site posts claimed specs of Samsung S4 Zoom and S4 Active
Russian site hi-tech.mail.ru (via Unwiredview) has posted what it claims are the specs of two more products it says will be unveiled at Samsung’s press event in London (whose star will be the S4 mini): the S4 Zoom camera and S4 Active, the ruggedized version of the company’s flagship phone.
Samsung Galaxy S4 Zoom, will look a lot like Galaxy S4 Mini and will come equipped with:
- 4.3” 540x960px Super AMOLED display
- 1.6 GHz dual-core CPU, no LTE support
- Android Jelly Bean OS
- 8 GB of built-in memory, micro-SD support
- 1.9mpx fron facing camera
- 16 megapixel main camera, with 10x Optical Zoom
- Bluetooth 4.0LE, Wi-Fi 802.11a/b/g/n, A-GPS
- 1900 mAh battery …
Expand
Expanding
Close
Hit pirates where it hurts – in their pockets, argues Google
Image: Voxindie.org
Google has responded to calls from entertainment companies to block torrent sites from search results by arguing that it would make more sense to starve them of ad revenue.
TorrentFreak (via BGR) reported on a debate in which Google’s UK Policy Manager, Theo Bertram, said that attempting to block pirate sites from search results is ineffective, because the same content immediately reappears on a new site.
“Blocking websites, I don’t think is as effective as going after them as a business,” he said, using the now-defunct Megaupload as an example.
“The supply that was going to Megaupload had simply shifted to a whole new range of middle-ranking pirate sites. My worry is if we’re going after them one at a time with blocking, you start getting into the whac-a-mole thing.” …
Expand
Expanding
Close
Samsung Galaxy S4 Mini specs and images released, screen bigger than the iPhone 5
We’ve known for some time that it was coming, with the leaks starting back in March and further confirmations since then, but Samsung has now finally made it official: the phone is being launched at a press event in London on June 20. We’ll be there to bring you the hands-on.
It’s interesting to see the different paths taken here by Samsung and Apple where phone sizing is concerned: the screen on Samsung’s mini phone is actually larger than the iPhone screen. So it may be ‘mini’ in Samsung’s eyes, but it’s not an especially small phone.
No pricing info is yet available, but the specs are, as expected, almost identical to its bigger brother: same processor, same super AMOLED screen technology (in a smaller size, of course), same connectivity (with exact mobile data specs varying by market). There are a couple of compromises in what will presumably be a significantly cheaper handset: the main camera is 8MP instead of 13MP, and while the S4 comes with either 16, 32 or 64GB of on-board memory, the S4 has just 8GB – though offers the same microSD card capacities of up to 64GB …
Plex 3.0 for Android ‘rewritten from scratch’, with greatly improved UI
[vimeo http://www.vimeo.com/59469593 w=500&h=281]
The complete rewrite of the Plex for Android app, which has been in beta for a while, has now been released on Google Play, with a greatly improved user-interface and a lengthy list of other improvements and fixes detailed over on the Plex blog. Beta users have reported that it works well with most Android HDMI sticks as well as on tablets and phones.
Existing users get the update free, while it’s $5 for new users.
Americans spend almost an hour a day on their smartphones, most of it social
New data from Experian, who sampled 12,770 American smartphone owners, reveals that the average person spends 58 minutes a day using their phone, with the majority of that usage social.
On average, smartphone owners devote 26% of the time they spend on their phone talking and another 20% texting. Social networking eats up 16% of smartphone time while browsing the mobile web accounts for 14% of time spent. Emailing and playing games account for roughly 9% and 8% of daily smartphone time, respectively, while use of the phone’s camera and GPS each take up another 2% of our smartphone day …
Expand
Expanding
Close
European Commissioner “almost 100% certain” to reject Google’s antitrust proposals
EU Competition Commissioner Joaquin Almunia has told the European Parliament that he is “almost 100% certain” to reject the proposals Google has put forward to address concerns that it is abusing its dominant position in web search to stifle competition, reports Bloomberg.
Google’s proposals, described in more detail in our previous coverage, effectively amount to a commitment to:
- clearly separate sponsored links from organic search results, and to link to rival search services
- allow publishers to choose what content is included in Google’s various search results
- allow website owners to sell advertising from competitor companies alongside Google ads
- allow advertisers to manage search advertising campaigns across competing platforms …
Expand
Expanding
Close
White Nexus 4 confirmed – rollout starts tomorrow, in Hong Kong
The Nexus Swan, a white-cased version of the Nexus 4 which was leaked back in January, has been confirmed by LG …
Expand
Expanding
Close
Latest Opera desktop browser powered by Chromium – interesting Stash & Smartbox features
Opera has released what it describes as a ‘sneak preview’ of its latest browser, Opera 15, available for both Windows and Mac. As we reported last month, it is powered by Chromium rather than the Presto engine Opera had used for earlier versions.
While Opera is still a significant player in the mobile market, it has fallen out of favour in the desktop market, with a market share of just a few percent, well behind Chrome, IE, Firefox and Safari. Version 15 introduces a couple of new features that Opera hopes may change that …
Expand
Expanding
Close
Six more European countries get Google Maps cycling routes
Google has introduced cycling routes to six more European countries, generating bike-friendly routes on the web version and allowing voice-guided turn-by-turn navigation in the Android app.
Cycle routes are now available in France, Ireland, Germany, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg and Poland, bringing the total number of countries to 17. Cycle routes were launched in the USA in 2010, and rolled out to a further 10 countries last year.
Even in the USA, three years after launch, cycle routes are still officially in beta, Google warning that they may include routes not suited to cycling.
(Via Engadget.)
Talking Schmidt: I’m rather perplexed by tax avoidance debate
In the latest in our Talking Schmidt series, Google exec chairman Eric Schmidt has told the BBC that he is “perplexed” as to why anyone should debate why a company that “tries to do the right thing” would route all its UK adword sales via Ireland to halve its tax bill.
What we are doing is legal. I’m rather perplexed by this debate, which has been going in the UK for some time, because I view taxes as not optional. I view that you should pay the taxes that are legally required. It’s not a debate. You pay the taxes …
Expand
Expanding
Close
British broadcaster Sky has Google Play and Twitter accounts hacked, but existing apps unaffected
British TV broadcaster Sky has had both its Google Play and Twitter accounts hacked by The Syrian Electronic Army. Screenshots in the Play store were replaced with SEA graphics, and a tweet was sent out claiming that the company’s Android apps had been hacked …
Expand
Expanding
Close
More proof of Galaxy S4 mini briefly appears on Samsung website
More evidence that a Samsung S4 mini is on the way emerged in the form of a filtering option discovered by Engadget on Samsung’s Content & Services page. The filtering option was quickly removed after the report appeared …
Expand
Expanding
Close
An amusing look at a possible Google Glass world …
I want to believe: more rumors of stock Android HTC One – from the guy who called the stock S4
When seemingly pulling rumors out of thin air, it helps to have a track-record. Geek.com‘s Russell Holly does: he was the guy who told us that a stock Android version of the Samsung S4 would be announced, a day before it was. So when he claims claims rumors that a vanilla version of the HTC One is on the way are true, we pay a little more attention than usual to such things …
Expand
Expanding
Close
Production version of Google Glass to use Samsung OLED displays? Maybe …
The not-always-reliable Korea Times (via The Next Web) is reporting that the production version of Google Glass will use Samsung OLED displays to create the images instead of the projector system used in the Explorer Edition.
Google will use Samsung Display’s organic light-emitting diode (OLED) technology in its upcoming Google Glass, a wearable computer with a head-mounted display, sources said Thursday.
The sources said that the company’s top management has recently approved a business proposal by Samsung Display to use its OLED screens for Google Glass …
Expand
Expanding
Close
Google has best business outlook, say employees
A survey of employees by job-search company Glassdoor (via Business Insider) found that Google topped the rankings for business outlook, with 86% of employees saying the company is getting better, only 14% saying it’s staying the same and – perhaps most impressively of all – none at all rating it as getting worse.
Note, though, that the number of employees sampled may be small: Glassdoors ranks all companies with at least 20 employee reviews.
Kindle Fire HD now available for pre-order in 170 countries
Amazon, which recently dramatically expanded its Appstore to 200 countries, is now following suit with its Kindle Fire HD 7″ and 8.9″ tablets, making them available for pre-order in 170 countries. Pre-orders will be shipped on June 13 …
Expand
Expanding
Close
Latest Chrome for Android offers full-screen browsing and easier search refinements
Just a day after adding conversational voice search on the desktop version of Chrome, Google has revamped its Android version of the browser to support automatic full-screen browsing and making it easier to refine search queries …
Expand
Expanding
Close
Galaxy S4 shipments hit ten million, ahead of Samsung’s forecast
Samsung, which recently said it expected to his 10m shipments of the Galaxy S4 by the end of May, has announced that it has now hit this figure – with a week to spare.
Whilst the number is extremely impressive, contrasted with 50 days for the S3 and five months for the S2, it’s important to note that Samsung is quoting shipments rather than sales. As The Verge observes:
Expand
Expanding
Close
Five senior employees leave HTC, one urging others to follow
HTC appears to be in somewhat of a tailspin at present, with The Verge noting that five senior employees have left the company recently, while Gizmodo spotted a tweet from former product strategy manager Eric Lin in which he suggested that his former colleagues would be “much happier” if they followed his example …
Expand
Expanding
Close