Techno-News Blog

by DAN ROWINSKI, ReadWriteWeb

The wait is over. Apple announced its newest iPhone today at an event in San Francisco and, as rumored, it is indeed larger than its predecessors, runs 4G LTE, and has a bigger, better display. After months of speculation and a litany of leaks, the new device is indeed called the iPhone 5 and nearly everything about it is an improvement over the iPhone 4S. The iPhone had a growth spurt. Gone is the 3.5-inch display that has defined previous iPhones, replaced by a 4-inch display. Apple increased the screen resolution as well, improving from 960×640 pixels in the iPhone 4S to 1136×640 for the iPhone 5. The screen now supports a movie standard 16:9 aspect ratio.

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/iphone-5-apples-biggest-smartest-fastest-yet.php

by NANCY SCOLA, ReadWriteWeb

That the FCC would claim jurisdiction over broadband, today’s dominant communications medium, scares the bejeebus out of some people. Same goes for the idea that it wouldn’t. The agency tried to calm roiling waters with a tempered approach to Net neutrality. But that produced only a momentary peace. Verizon is challenging it in court. AT&T is challenging it in the marketplace. What is the government’s role in regulating broadband networks? More unsettled than ever. And that doesn’t benefit much of anyone.

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/more-nicks-in-net-neutralitys-death-by-a-thousand-cuts.php

By Arnold Kling, American.com

A professor from 150 years ago could walk into a classroom today and go to work without missing a beat. Is this about to change? Many entrepreneurs and commentators believe so. Here, I offer my own assessment of the prospects for technologies to revolutionize education. This essay will explain why I label various technologies as winners, losers, and magic bullets in the table below. My opinions are not based on exhaustive research. They are based on my experience both as a high school teacher and as an entrepreneur. My evaluations are based on whether I view these technologies as supporting a model of education that is one-to-many or a model that is many-to-one. The latter is the model I prefer, as will become clear in the rest of this essay.

http://american.com/archive/2012/september/many-to-one-vs-one-to-many-an-opinionated-guide-to-educational-technology

by Jessica Leber, Technology Review

The idea of charging your phone without plugging it in seems appealing, but consumers have been slow to adopt it. At a time of wireless everything—from phones and Internet to headsets and keyboards—it seems tedious that our gadgets remain tethered to an outlet whenever they need a charge. It’s especially galling given that the technology has been available since Nikola Tesla first demonstrated wireless power through magnetic induction in the 1890s. Why hasn’t cord-free charging—where a device gets charged when you place it on a charging surface—caught on? It’s not due to a shortage of products, nor from a shortage of companies that want to sell them.

http://www.technologyreview.com/news/429163/wireless-charginghas-its-time-finally-arrived/

by Tom Simonite, Technology Review

such as Apple’s Siri may be useful, but they are still far from matching the smarts and conversational skills of a real person. Researchers at the University of Rochester have demonstrated a new, potentially better approach that creates a smart artificial chat partner from fleeting contributions from many crowdsourced workers. Crowdsourcing typically involves posting simple tasks to a website such as Amazon Mechanical Turk, where Web users complete them for a reward of a few cents. The tasks are often simple, repetitive jobs that are easy for humans but tough for computers, such as categorizing images. Crowdsourcing has become a popular way for companies to handle such tasks, but some researchers, including the group at Rochester, believe it can also be used to take on more complex tasks.

http://www.technologyreview.com/news/429118/artificial-intelligence-powered-by-many-humans/

by David Gewirtz, ZDNet

If you just add up number of wins for each product, the big Kindle got seven wins to only four for the iPad. So, if you were going purely by the numbers, the big Kindle Fire would be the somewhat surprising winner. But you should never buy something by the numbers. Instead, you should decide based on how you want to use the device. In that regard, it comes down to two key issues: price and media. First, if you’re particularly price sensitive, the big Kindle is a better deal (by a hundred bucks or more) than the iPad. But, since the Kindle Fire is designed around getting you to spend more with Amazon, any savings may well be eaten up if you can’t control your spending. Let’s say you’ve got great One-Click self-control. In that case, the big Kindle Fire has considerably more bang for the buck, and is probably a better deal. Still, Apple products have always sold well against better deals and more bang for the buck, and this is no exception. The Apple ecosystem is vast, with all sorts of aftermarket products, mounts, cases, stands, apps, gimicks, and geegaws. On the other hand, the Amazon ecosystem comes with free movies, free books to borrow, and, well, Amazon.

http://www.zdnet.com/how-to-decide-should-you-buy-a-big-kindle-fire-hd-or-an-ipad-7000003933/?s_cid=e539

By STEVE LOHR, NY Times

Technology tends to cascade into the marketplace in waves. Think of personal computers in the 1980s, the Internet in the 1990s and smartphones in the last five years. Computing may be on the cusp of another such wave. This one, many researchers and entrepreneurs say, will be based on smarter machines and software that will automate more tasks and help people make better decisions in business, science and government. And the technological building blocks, both hardware and software, are falling into place, stirring optimism.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/09/technology/data-driven-discovery-is-techs-new-wave-unboxed.html

by David Zax, Technology Review

No phone calls, please.  It’s the classic request of the non-committal potential employer, but increasingly, it’s the request of all of us. USA Today, equipped with data from the Internet phone company Vonage, reports that voicemail messages are in decline. For Vonage, the number of voicemail messages dipped 8%, comparing July 2012 figures to July 2011’s. And leaving voicemails was just the beginning of it. Even fewer people could be bothered to check such messages. In the same yearlong period, retrieved voicemail plummeted 14%.

http://www.technologyreview.com/view/429135/the-end-of-voicemail/

by David Talbot, Technology Review

Now it’s less about dramatic breakthroughs—such as Apple’s radical embrace of touch-screen-centrism, and its subsequent conceptual leap of opening up devices to app developers—and more about gaining marketing buzz to get consumers zeroing in on marginal advantages: a better camera here, a little longer battery life there. “Although the feature changes are more incremental than they’ve been in the past, that’s normal in a maturing product category—especially when everyone is fixated on copying Apple’s form factor, a big mistake in my opinion,” says Michael Mace, a former product planning vice president at Palm and a former marketing executive at Apple. “When the features become more incremental, users generally focus on smaller feature differences.”

http://www.technologyreview.com/news/429117/the-new-smartphone-incrementalism/

By MATT FLEGENHEIMER, NY Times

One day after a start-up company unveiled an app allowing yellow-taxi drivers and passengers to find one another, New York City issued this gentle reminder: Smartphone apps may be the future of hailing a taxicab, but at least for now, their time will have to wait. In an industry notice released on Thursday, the city’s Taxi and Limousine Commission said it had not authorized the adoption of any apps used for cab-hailing or payment, including a service from Uber, which began offering its new app on Wednesday in about 100 taxis. “The T.L.C. is eager to pave the way for taxi riders to take advantage of the most up-to-date technology, including smartphone apps that may help passengers locate available taxicabs more quickly,” David S. Yassky, the commission’s chairman, said in the statement. “However, current contractual agreements between the T.L.C. and payment processors restrict the use of apps.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/07/nyregion/cab-hailing-apps-not-allowed-by-new-york-taxi-commission.html

by J. Emilio Flores, The New York Times

Amazon announced a barrage of new tablets and e-readers on Thursday that makes its challenge to Apple’s iPad a little more serious. The larger version of the Kindle Fire HD has an 8.9-inch screen. Amazon announced updates to its line of Kindle e-readers, including the Kindle Fire HD, a tablet computer that comes in two sizes, one that is nearly as large as the iPad and that undercuts its price by $200. The company also announced the Kindle Paperwhite, a new version of the black-and-white Kindle that is thinner and turns pages 15 percent quicker than its predecessor. It also has a new high-contrast screen that Amazon says will be easier to read, especially in the dark because it is lighted from the bottom.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/07/technology/amazon-updates-its-kindle-line-of-e-readers.html

by Jeremy Kirk, Macworld

Apple is considering licensing a custom radio streaming service similar to Pandora, according to a report in Thursday’s Wall Street Journal. The company recently started negotiations with record labels for such a service, which would still take months to launch, wrote the paper, citing people familiar with the idea. Streaming music services have been marked by failure due to difficulties in securing deals with record labels, high licensing costs and onerous restrictions on how content can be played or stored.

http://www.macworld.com/article/1168451/report_apple_mulls_licensing_radio_streaming_service.html#lsrc.rss_main

By Jeffrey Burt, eWeek

Enterprises, after some initial resistance, are embracing the bring-your-own-device (BYOD) trend. According to a survey released in May by Cisco Systems, 95 percent of respondents said their organizations allow employee-owned devices in the workplace, and that 76 percent said BYOD was positive for their companies and challenging for their IT departments. The benefits are clear: Employees who are allowed to use their favorite smartphones and tablets for work are more satisfied and more productive. It also can save businesses some money by not having to buy corporate-issued devices. However, enterprises are still struggling with addressing the challenges in the areas of management and security. Officials at security software company Bit9 say that a key loose end in BYOD environments is employees, many of whom don’t think about security on a daily basis or take the needed precautions to protect themselves or their company. Bit9 officials stress the need for good security policies to help avoid pitfalls, and have outlined eight technologies already on the market for mobile devices that should be enforced by the company to protect against mobile malware and other risks.

http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Security/BYOD-Security-8-Steps-Enterprises-Can-Take-to-Limit-Risks-to-Company-Data-608974/

By: Brian Prince, eWeek

McAfee’s threat report for the second quarter spotlights increases in ransomware, AutoRun worms and password-stealing malware. The number of new ransomware samples jumped roughly 50 percent between the first and second quarters of 2012, according to a new report from McAfee. Ransomware restricts access to infected computer systems so that attackers can extort payments in exchange for restoring access. According to McAfee, the number of new ransomware threats increased to more than 120,000 during the second quarter, a significant jump from the first quarter. Just recently, the FBI issued another warning about a scheme that used ransomware known as Reveton along with the Citadel platform to infect users. Once the victim’s computer was infected with Reveton, they would receive a demand posing as a message from authorities that claimed the infected computer had been locked due to a link to child pornography. The attackers would then demand payment.

http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Security/McAfee-Ransomware-Malware-on-the-Rise-705358/

By: Robert Lemos, eWeek

Cyber-criminals have searched for ways of turning mobile phones into illicit cash, and they may have finally found one: toll fraud. Lookout has found that the bulk of criminals are moving to premium-service scams that charge users illegally for services. While malicious software targeting mobile phones has surged, it’s still a drop in the bucket compared with the horde of viruses, Trojan horses and rootkits that plague personal computers. For good reason: Mobile devices are typically of limited value to online criminals, who are driven by dollars. Yet criminals in China, Russia and Eastern Europe have found a model that appears to work well: Using malware to charge for fraudulent premium services. Known as toll fraud, the technique has taken off, accounting for 79 percent of all malware detected by mobile security firm Lookout, the company stated in a report released Sept. 6. Fake installers are the primary method for infecting users and have likely brought in millions of dollars from victims in Eastern Europe and Russia, according to Lookout.

http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Security/PhoneFocused-CyberCriminals-Move-to-Premium-Scams-513272/

by David Zax, Technology Review

Stateside, we tend to think of the e-book wars as mostly a clash between Amazon and Barnes & Noble, with Apple thrown in to the mix. Abroad though, it may not be that simple. TechCrunch’s Ingrid Lunden reports that the retail giant Tesco (it’s the third-largest retailer in the world after Wal-Mart and Carrefour) has bought Mobcast, a digital bookseller. Tesco shelled out a little over $7 million for the deal–more or less chump change for a company of its stature, actually. “We want our customers to have the widest choice in digital entertainment,” the CEO of Tesco Digital Entertainment Michael Cornish said in a release. “We are already one of the UK’s largest booksellers and Mobcast will help us offer even more choice for the large and growing number of customers who want to buy and enjoy books on their digital devices whenever and wherever they want.”

http://www.technologyreview.com/view/429114/would-you-like-an-e-book-with-those-groceries/

by David Talbot, Technology Review

In perhaps its last shot at making inroads in a market dominated by battling rivals Apple and Samsung, Nokia launched a new line of smartphones in New York this morning with the new Microsoft Windows Phone 8 operating system. Among other features, the Lumia 920 includes an enhanced camera with Carl Zeiss lenses and software that works better in low-light situations, smoother HD video technology, and a pad for wireless charging. It also has an augmented reality feature called “Nokia City Lens”—if you point the camera at a building, the phone will give you information about a store or restaurant on the site.

http://www.technologyreview.com/news/429042/new-smartphones-may-be-nokias-last-stand/

by David Talbot, Technology Review

Just four hours after Nokia announced two new smartphones on Wednesday—and a week before Apple was expected to unveil its latest iPhone—Motorola Mobility announced three new devices: the Droid Razr M, Razr HD, and Razr Maxx HD. These smartphones boast more screen area than previous models, plus HDTV display quality, faster performance, and a power management system that promises to greatly extend battery life—long a bane of smartphones generally. These are the first phones Google has announced since acquiring Motorola Mobility for $12.5 billion in May of this year. Competition in the smartphone market is becoming increasingly fierce as the importance of mobile computing grows, and both Motorola Mobility and Nokia seem determined to draw some attention away from Apple’s forthcoming release (see “New Smartphones May Be Nokia’s Last Stand”).

http://www.technologyreview.com/news/429107/motorola-shows-off-first-smartphones-under-google/

by Lauren Goode, All Things D

As smartphone ownership in the U.S. inches upwards, some mobile phone makers are looking to lure feature phone folks with simplified, dual-interface smartphones. Case in point: Samsung’s newest offering, the Galaxy Stellar. The smartphone, which runs Google Android’s 4.0, Ice Cream Sandwich operating system, has both Starter and Standard modes. The Starter mode offers an oversimplified interface with a quick-dial option to make phone calls right from the home screen, while Standard mode looks more like what you’d expect from an Android OS, with customizable apps on the home screen.  Clearly falling into the category of budget phones, the Samsung Galaxy Stellar.

http://allthingsd.com/20120904/samsungs-galaxy-stellar-has-two-interfaces-one-for-techies-and-one-for-newbies/

by BRIAN PROFFITT, ReadWriteWeb

Windows XP, the zombie operating system that refuses to die, may be about to finally receive a killing blow to the head by the company that spawned it eleven years ago. So what will put XP out of its undead misery? Buyers of PCs running Windows 8 Pro will have the ability to downgrade to Windows 7 and Vista, but not all the way to Windows XP.

http://www.readwriteweb.com/enterprise/2012/09/the-last-days-of-windows-xp.php

by David Talbot and Kyanna Sutton, Technology Review

MC10, a startup in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is getting ready to commercialize high-­performance electronics that can stretch. The technology could lead to such products as skin patches that monitor whether the wearer is sufficiently hydrated, or inflatable balloon catheters equipped with sensors that measure electrical misfiring caused by cardiac arrhythmias. Microelectronics have long “depended on a rigid, brittle wafer,” says David Icke, MC10’s CEO. MC10 uses a few tricks to change that.

http://www.technologyreview.com/demo/428944/making-stretchable-electronics/