Founder, Publisher and Editorial Director of the 9to5/Electrek/DroneDJ sites.
Seth Weintraub is an award-winning journalist and blogger who won back to back Neal Awards during his three plus years covering Apple and Google at IDG’s Computerworld from 2007–2010. Weintraub next covered all things Google for Fortune Magazine from 2010-2011 amassing a thick rolodex of Google contacts and love for Silicon Valley tech culture.
It turns out that his hobby 9to5Mac.com blog was always his favorite and in 2011 he went full time adding his Fortune Google followers to 9to5Google.com and adding the style and commerce component 9to5Toys.com gear and deals site. In 2013, Weintraub bought one of the Tesla’s first Model S EVs off the assembly line and so began his love affair with the Electric Vehicle and green energy which in 2014 turned into electrek.co.
In 2018, DroneDJ was born to cover the burgeoning world of drones and UAV’s led by China’s DJI.
From 1997-2007, Weintraub was a Global IT director and Web Developer for a number of companies with stints at multimedia and branding agencies in Paris, Los Angeles, New York, Sydney, Hong Kong, Madrid and London before becoming a publisher/blogger.
Seth received a bachelors degree in Industrial and Systems Engineering from the University of Southern California with a minor in Multimedia and Creative Technology in 1997. In 2004, he received a Masters from NYU’s Tisch School of the Art’s ITP program.
Hobbies: Weintraub is a licensed single engine private pilot, certified open water scuba diver and spent over a year traveling to 60 cities in 23 countries. Whatever free time exists is now guaranteed to his lovely wife and two amazing sons.
More at About.me. BI 2014 profile.
Tips: seth@9to5mac.com, or llsethj on Wickr/Skype or link at top of page.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1KyAqhywr0]
For those unfamiliar, CyanogenMod is an aftermarket build of Android for most of the popular Android devices. To install CyanogenMod, unfortunately, you need to have root access to your phone, which is often a little bit of a stretch for novice to intermediate users.
If you are game, head over.
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Getting your Android smartphones upgraded to the latest version is an important factor in considering which carrier to go with, because some carriers push updates quickly while others let things fall by the wayside.
This time around, AT&T is the first carrier to upgrade one of its phones to Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich. Besides the Galaxy Nexus devices, and anything running a hacked version or Cyanogen Mod, Vivid owners will be the first U.S. device owners running ICS.
A version of ICS briefly hit Vivid owners earlier this week, but it was pulled. At the moment, we are not able to do the update, but we are told it is rolling out now.
According to HTC’s Twitter account, the Vivid will also get Beats by Dre audio functionality as well.
[tweet https://twitter.com/#!/HTCUSA/status/182873787665104896]
The full release is below, including AT&T’s full ICS roadmap…
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Not a bad deal on one of the better Android tablets out there. Woot
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One/EVO mashup coming our way? Here’s from Phonearena.com:
The HTC Jet is a smartphone rumored to be an upcoming model for Sprint. It will have a 1.5GHz dual-core Krait processor under the hood along with 1GB of RAM. The 4.7 inch screen weighs in at 720p and is made of Gorilla Glass 2. This will be the third LTE enabled model for Sprint following the Samsung GALAXY Nexus and the LG Viper.
Some more from S4gru.com:
S4GRU has connected the dots and projects the HTC Jet to be the Sprint version of the LTE capable HTC One high end handset introduced at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona last month and a version of which is also soon headed to AT&T. The One X is the only announced HTC handset to utilize the recently debuted and benchmarked Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 MSM8960 chipset and to include Near Field Communication (NFC) capability. The Jet matches both of those specs, suggesting that the Jet will be a CDMA1X/EV-DO/LTE entry in the One X lineup.
Sounds about right; although, an April 4 launch for a June product is not a good idea. Hopefully someone is wrong there.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=4DbgiOCTQts]
This is what desperation looks like. Also this:
[tweet https://twitter.com/jr_raphael/status/181907358618882049]
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Engadget shows us something it pulled from Chinese language forums:
What you see on the right is called the Droid RAZR “Fighter,” and it has a 4.6-inch 720P display much like HTC’s 4.7-inch One and the 4.65-inch Galaxy Nexus.
You will note that it does not have physical capacitive buttons, instead opting for the ICS-y soft buttons. That allows Motorola to push the screen further toward the edges, which is something we complained about in our review.
The smaller bezel and lack of physical buttons allows Motorola to break out a much bigger screen without increasing the footprint…much.
Other probabilities: LTE on board, lots more graphics power, and Ice Cream Sandwich.
Hopefully the Google buyout of Motorola cuts through the blur, but as with all Verizon phones, you will expect that Verizon will have its way with ICS.
As first reported by Venture Beat, and later announced on his Google Plus page, Google’s Vice President of Apps and President of Enterprise Dave Girouard is leaving Google after eight years to form a startup called “Upstart.com.”
It’s true. After eight wonderful and life-altering years, I’ve decided to leave Google to pursue my own adventure. I owe a lifetime of gratitude to +Larry Page +Sergey Brin and +Eric Schmidt and so many others at Google for giving me such an incredible opportunity. I don’t know if I’ll ever match the learning experience I’ve had here, but I’m going to give it one hell of a try!
In recent months, I’ve thought a lot about the younger generation; about the opportunities and challenges they face in navigating their careers and life choices. The result is www.upstart.com, which you’ll (hopefully) hear a lot more about in the coming months.
Thanks to all of you who have made my Google experience so wonderful!
I had the opportunity to interview Girouard a few years ago when I was at Fortune, and I found him to be extremely grounded and dedicated to the apps mission. Make no mistake, as far as apps and enterprise are concerned, Girouard was the pioneer at Google having manned the helm since its inception.
Other rising executives like Amit Singh, who came over from Oracle a few years ago, will continue to the rapid growth that apps have seen over the last eight years.
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Hot off the wire from AllThingsD:
Rose’s mobile app incubator Milk yesterday announced it was shutting down its only product, Oink.
Google is not outright buying or “acqhiring” Milk, the sources explicitly said, but Rose and some others from the company have been hired. It’s not clear what will happen to Milk after Rose joins Google.
His social and more recent local background would seem to make him a natural at Google+. Rose is also an Angel investor having thrown in with Fab, Zynga, ngmoco, Foursquare, and Twitter.
Interestingly, Google was very close to acquiring Rose’s Digg four years ago, but the deal never went through.
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Here’s the scoop. HTC is updating most high-end devices that have existed over the past year and a half. It would have been nice to see the original EVO on this list. We are checking our Sensation daily as rollouts have already begun. Although, T-Mobile might not be the quickest carrier to pull the trigger. The HTC One (pictured, right) will ship with Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich later this year.
The following HTC devices are confirmed to get a tasty treat of ICS:
- DROID Incredible 2 by HTC
- HTC Amaze 4G
- HTC Desire S
- HTC Desire HD
- HTC EVO 3D
- HTC EVO Design 4G
- HTC Incredible S
- HTC Sensation
- HTC Sensation XL
- HTC Sensation 4G
- HTC Sensation XE
- HTC Raider
- HTC Rezound
- HTC Rhyme
- HTC Thunderbolt
- HTC Vivid
As for timing, we’re in the early stages of rolling out Android 4.0 for the HTC Sensation and HTC Sensation XE and upgrades will be more widely available in the next few weeks. The update for the HTC Sensation 4G and HTC Sensation XL will follow. Please note, once we start pushing out updates it will take time for all carriers in each country to get the update. We are working closely with our carrier partners to nail down update schedules for our other smartphones and will have more to share very soon.
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Google opens its registration for its annual I/O conference on March 27. Remember, tickets sold out last year in under an hour so set your alarms!
The conference also moved from May to June this year where Google will debut many new technologies, including some Glasses hopefully. While we do not have official word on the Glasses “Project WingFront,” we were told by a Google employee that this year’s I/O was going to be “totally insane.” Perhaps so insane that Google moved from a two-day format to three days this year.
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Google also updated its I/O website with some fun and games.
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[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=CGvzF56CRwI]
Samsung offers Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich upgrade for GALAXY S II
We’re thrilled to announce that Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich will be served to GALAXY S II users in the European countries including Poland, Hungary and Sweden, as well as Korea today, and gradually roll out to other markets.
ICS for GALAXY Note, GALAXY S II LTE, GALAXY Tab 8.9 and 10.1 will follow soon.
In addition, we’ll also offer Android 2.3 Gingerbread firmware upgrades for GALAXY S, GALAXY Tab 7″, GALAXY S Plus, GALAXY S SCL (Super Clear LCD) and GALAXY W from end March. The firmware upgrades for GALAXY S, for example, include Face Unlock, Snapshot, Photo Editor, and others.
The availability and scheduling of the software update and specific models upgradeable to Android 4.0 will vary by market and wireless carriers’ requirements.
That last sentence is the killer. How long until the carriers get around to upgrading their phones? Verizon just upgraded the Samsung Continuum to Android 2.2 last month. It is nice is that we now have a four-horse race on our hands to determine which carrier is the fastest. My money is on Sprint.
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O.K., really that headline is a bit misleading. We have no idea what the now-former DARPA head has been hired to do at Google, and the department would only tell us the scripted:
“Regina is a technical pioneer who brought the future of technology to the military during her time at DARPA. She will be a real asset to Google and we are thrilled she is joining the team.”
Besides pulling off designer jeans, Wired profiled her other qualifications:
Dugan’s emphasis on cybersecurity and next-generation manufacturing earned her strong support from the White House, winning her praise from the President and maintaining the agency’s budget even during a period of relative austerity at the Pentagon. Her push into crowdsourcing and outreach to the hacker community were eye-openers in the often-closed world of military R&D. Dugan also won over some military commanders by diverting some of her research cash from long-term, blue-sky projects to immediate battlefield concerns.
“There is a time and a place for daydreaming. But it is not at Darpa,” she told a congressional panel in March 2011 (.pdf). “Darpa is not the place of dreamlike musings or fantasies, not a place for self-indulging in wishes and hopes. Darpa is a place of doing.” For an agency that spent millions of dollars on shape-shifting robots, Mach 20 missiles, and mind-controlled limbs, it was something of a revolutionary statement.
You will recall that Google’s Driverless cars were born from the DARPA Grand Challenge, so perhaps we will see her join the ranks of Google’s X team. The videos below of Dugan talking feature her deep knowledge on the type of cyber-hacking that Google has accused China of in the past.
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If there is ever a time to upgrade to a Sprint Android phone, now is a good time—and Amazon is the place. All Sprint phones are a penny with free activations for new customers. Amazon had the penny-pincher sale across all lines for Black Friday last year.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zH5bJSG0DZk&feature=player_embedded]
A lot of interesting information for developers here.
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Bloomberg reports:
In a regulatory filing this week, Google said it sold 29.4 million Clearwire shares for $2.26 each without identifying the buyer. The sale price valued the stock, Google’s entire 6.5 percent stake in Clearwire, at $66.5 million.
Google invested about $500 million in Bellevue, Washington- based Clearwire in 2008 as part of a $3.2 billion investment by a group of communications and technology firms including Sprint Nextel Corp. (S), Comcast Corp. (CMCSA), Bright House Networks LLC and Time Warner Cable Inc. (TWC)
The announcement by Google was made earlier. Thus ends the hope of Google becoming a Wireless ISP, unless the Fiber its building in Kansas and Stanford grows into something bigger.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5q9w0dxosTE]
The best 7-inch hardware to date: Galaxy Tab 7.7
Google appears to be ready to go after the smaller tablet market, according to a report today. The next lead device will be a 7-inch tablet built by Asustek, and it will be delivered before Google I/O in June. The timing seems a little strange, and I would not be surprised to see it delivered at I/O—hopefully to all the attendees.
As more and more reports of this Google 7-inch product hit, it seems more and more real. I think Google has to go with a 720P display to beat Amazon’s Fire, which is eating the 7-inch tablet for lunch at the moment. Google also needs to keep prices below $200 to keep pace with Amazon’s product.
If you have had a chance to check out Samsung’s Galaxy Tab 7.7, you know it is a really nice form factor.
One thing to note about 7-inch 16:9 tablets compared to bigger 10-inch 4:3-ers is that they can be held with one hand from behind. So, they do not need that same huge bezel that most tablets currently employ. I would like to see a 7.7-inch tablet with the bezel of a Galaxy Note and lots of thinness all around.
Samsung just sent this over for fun.
I haven’t played with the 10.1 but will say one thing: the screen on the Galaxy Note at 5.3 inches (284 PPI) has more PPI than the iPad Retina display (264PPI). I’m sure a bunch of experts will compare them in coming days. And you can put the 5.3 in your pocket.
We know a few things by now. One, Google uses deserts to denote its Android versions and it is going alphabetically through the alphabet through its delicious desert voyage. Ice Cream Sandwich would naturally be followed by something that begins with J. That would be Jellybean though Google wouldn’t confirm that. They did have a big glass enclosure full of Jellybeans at MWC as a tease however.
Moving on to K, you don’t have too many options. Doing a search for desserts that begin with K yields few usable results:
Key Lime Pie, Kustard, Koen, Kugel, KrumKake
Given the above, the Verge’s tipster isn’t going too far out on a limb saying the winner is “Key Lime Pie”.
Android names moved in points (Donut, Eclair, Froyo, Gingerbread) up until Honeycomb (3.0) and now Ice Cream Sandwich (4.0). Therefore Jellybean would likely be 5.0 and Key Lime Pie (6.0) if the current trend continues.
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[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FxOIebkmrqs]
We are coming to a sad realization right now. Smartphones are actually computers that allow applications to do the same things that Mac OS or Windows can do. As we demonstrated earlier on the iPhone, an App can upload your pictures without any provocation.
[tweet https://twitter.com/reckless/status/175290894717689856]
It turns out that Android also allows applications to upload photos.
A Google spokesperson told me:
“We originally designed the Android photos file system similar to those of other computing platforms like Windows and Mac OS. At the time, images were stored on a SD card, making it easy for someone to remove the SD card from a phone and put it in a computer to view or transfer those images.
As phones and tablets have evolved to rely more on built-in, non-removable memory, we’re taking another look at this and considering adding a permission for apps to access images. We’ve always had policies in place to remove any apps on Android Market that improperly access your data.”
The problem here is best exemplified by the Mac vs. PC ad you see above. If you ask permission every time an app needs to do something that could potential violate privacy, it gets pretty messy and it ends up:
“a future where it takes 10 minutes to open your Facebook app.”
According to a Forbes interview, Samsung has passed the 2 million mark on its Galaxy Note tablet internationally…
But consumers seem to like it. Samsung says it has already sold 2 million Notes since last October’s launch, and plans to sell another 10 million by the end of 2012.
Samsung passed 1 million at the end of last year.
I still have my Galaxy Note review unit and truth be told, it is still my “go to” device. I have it tied to my Google Voice along with my iPhone and Galaxy Nexus but I’d rather have that 720P 5.3 inch screen than the more portable, popular devices. In fact, my Galaxy Nexus has been sitting in the charger for about a week now.
There was a lot of hatred from bandwagon reviewers when the Note launched, but those consumers who have seen it in person are picking it up in droves. I like this quote:
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[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SBmf5UqZUjU]
It has been a busy week for Google with scores of Android phones tablets and accessories launched culminated by a keynote from Eric Schmidt. The next big event is Google I/O in June.
Chrome expected to pass IE in the summer according to StatCounter
Google’s Chrome is yet to have been hacked at the annual Pwn2Own conference but that might be because it has flown under the radar for so long. With its market share now approaching Microsoft Internet Explorer for the lead the global browser war, Chrome now has a bigger target on its back.
Still though, Google wants hackers to try to find vulnerabilities in Chrome and more importantly disclose them to Google and is now offering big rewards to anyone who can crack Chrome.
Originally, our plan was to sponsor as part of this year’s Pwn2Own competition. Unfortunately, we decided to withdraw our sponsorship when we discovered that contestants are permitted to enter Pwn2Own without having to reveal full exploits (or even all of the bugs used!) to vendors. Full exploits have been handed over in previous years, but it’s an explicit non-requirement in this year’s contest, and that’s worrisome. We will therefore be running this alternative Chrome-specific reward program. It is designed to be attractive — not least because it stays aligned with user safety by requiring the full exploit to be submitted to us. We guarantee to send non-Chrome bugs to the appropriate vendor immediately.
Reuters reported that France-based carrier Orange would launch Intel Medfield-based Atom smartphones in the United Kingdom and French markets this year. This is notable for a number of reasons.
Although long time Intel MoBo partner Gigabyte will build the device, there is no manufacturer listed on the device besides Intel. Moreover, Intel will provide some proprietary software.
The phone is based on Intel’s prototype Medfield Android phone shown off most recently at CES 2012 and now MWC 2012. Orange’s version will house Intel’s Atom Z2460 processor that clocks at 1.6GHz. It will also have a 4-inch 600-by-1024 display with an impressive 8-megapixel camera that will shoot 1080P video. IT will also ship with Android 2.3, but it will be upgradeable to Ice Cream Sandwich OS (which is strange, because the prototypes at CES ran ICS.)
The phone will market as a low-cost prepaid device and not a high-end device, even though Medfield chips usually blow away anything in the ARM camp on power (not power consumption).
I get the feeling Intel grew tired of smartphone manufacturers passing it over for cheaper ARM chips and just decided to build the phone itself.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tFdInvU1w4Y]
We learned all the details over the past week, but now it is official. We will have a hands-on tomorrow morning for you.