Archive for July 11th, 2009

The podcast is a little late this week, but for good reason — special guest Michael Gartenberg joins Josh, Paul, and Nilay this week as they sort through the Google-dominated week in news. We’ve got Chrome OS, the myTouch 3G, some more HTC Hero hands-on time (as well as a Magic flashed with the Hero ROM), and the leaked Sony Ericsson Rachael on tap — oh, and to top it all off, Sony backtracked huge and released its first true netbook, the VAIO W. It’s a bit of a wild one, we won’t lie — buckle up.

Hosts: Joshua Topolsky, Nilay Patel, Paul Miller
Guest: Michael Gartenberg
Producer: Trent Wolbe
Song: No Rain

Hear the podcast

00:01:22 – Google announces Chrome OS, coming to netbooks second half of 2010
00:26:37 – myTouch 3G hands-on (with video!)
00:39:35 – New HTC Hero ROM leaked, Flash 10 already chugging along on a few lucky G1s
00:56:25 – Sony Ericsson Rachael UI video leaks out, Kiki comes for the ride
01:04:55 – Android 1.5 gets official SDK for native development
01:12:58 – Sony announces VAIO W… netbook!

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Twitter: @joshuatopolsky @futurepaul @reckless @engadget

Filed under: Podcasts

Engadget Podcast 154 – 07.11.2009 originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 11 Jul 2009 15:25:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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This morning I woke up and saw an interesting headline on Techmeme from Forbes writer Brian Caulfield: Why Google Is Stealing Apple’s Ideas. Wow, a story involving two of the world’s largest technology companies and scandal? This was going to be good.

And then I read the story, which turned out to be a strange hit job on Google for no apparent reason, trying to imply that Google has somehow bypassed Apple’s “renowned secrecy” and used its ideas to foster the development of its new Chrome OS. And somehow, Google CEO Eric Schmidt is behind it.

Caulfield claims that Apple may have “missed a spot” by letting Schmidt stay on Apple’s board. First off, why does everyone seem to assume that Apple isn’t well aware of the fact that Eric Schmidt is the CEO of Google? To paraphrase John Gruber, does anyone actually think Steve Jobs is too shy to confront Schmidt? Of course, Caulfield immediately goes on to say that Schmidt isn’t actually a spy, but rather that somewhere along the line Apple and Google have become “accidental competitiors” who have simply yet to realize it. Right.

digg_url = ‘http://digg.com/tech_news/Former_Gizmondo_exec_Stefan_Eriksson_gets_1_5_year_sentence’; Will this be the final chapter in the infamous and incredibly entertaining tale of former Gizmondo head Bo Stefan “Fiery Ferrari Crasher” Eriksson? Doubtful, but with any luck it’ll serve as a decent thread to wrap up that optioned movie on his life. An Uppsala, Sweden District Court has sentenced the man to 1.5 years in prison for his most recent round of escapades, which include illegal threats, attempted blackmail, and robbery. Assuming he starts jail fairly soon, mark your calendars and place your bets, we’re expecting a whole new slew of comical misdeeds to hit the news feeds by March 2011 — and no, we still don’t think a new Gizmondo will be out by then.

[Thanks, piraya]

Filed under: Misc. Gadgets, Gaming, Handhelds, Transportation

Former Gizmondo exec Stefan Eriksson gets 1.5 year sentence, movie might now have ending originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 11 Jul 2009 14:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The folks at the Hype Machine, the popular music tracking site, think that all of the Twitter music charts out there are “lame,” so they decided to make their own Twitter Music Chart. It encourages people to Tweet out links to their favorite songs on the Hype Machine, where you can listen to the full audio stream. They came up with a formula which gives people with more followers on Twitter more points for every song they Tweet. The songs with the most points, move up the chart.

It seems straight-forward enough, but it is way too easy for people with a large number of Twitter followers to game. I just RickRolled the chart by Tweeting a link to Rick Astley’s “Never Gonna Give You Up” from the TechCrunch Twitter account. The TechCrunch account has 916,735 followers, which gives each Hype Machine Tweet 2,997 points. A single Tweet was enough to put the song at the top of the chart, above Michael Jackson’s and Telepopmusik’s “Remember The Time” (1,972 points). Okay, so maybe it wasn’t fair to use the TechCrunch account, but what else am I gonna do on a Saturday morning plane ride back to New York (gotta love Virgin America’s WiFi in the sky).

Sure, its phone lineup has more or less gone the way of the KIRF, but LG’s other endeavors are decidedly more interesting, and this new X13 netbook (more than likely the X130 when it launches) that’s popped up in the FCC is no exception. Compared with the X120, the body here appears to have a slightly wider form factor and the front doesn’t curve quite as dramatically. All the FCC is testing for is Bluetooth and WiFI — sorry 3G hopefuls — but specs-wise, we’d venture a guess and say it’s sporting a 1.6GHz Atom processor, 160GB HDD, 1GB RAM… you know, the same specs found in virtually every other netbook in existence. Hey, maybe we’ll get proven wrong, but with no clue on when LG’s going official with this one, we might be waiting quite some time for verification.

[Via Boy Genius Report]

Filed under: Laptops

LG X13 netbook spotted in FCC photo shoot originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 11 Jul 2009 13:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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This whole global economic crisis, and its resulting massive loss of jobs got us thinking. We here at Engadget didn’t want to stand helplessly by, announcing every new round of misery without giving anything back — so we decided to take the opportunity to spread a little positivity. We’ll be handing out a new gadget every day to lucky readers until we run out of stuff / companies stop sending things. Today we’ve got eight (8) LG enV3′s (in blue and maroon) for Verizon Wireless up for grabs. Read the rules below (no skimming — we’re omniscient and can tell when you’ve skimmed) and get commenting! Hooray for free stuff!

Special thanks to LG for providing the gear!

The rules:

• Leave a comment below. Any comment will do, but if you want to share your proposal for “fixing” the world economy, that’d be sweet too.
• You may only enter this specific giveaway once. If you enter this giveaway more than once you’ll be automatically disqualified, etc. (Yes, we have robots that thoroughly check to ensure fairness.)
• If you enter more than once, only activate one comment. This is pretty self explanatory. Just be careful and you’ll be fine.
  
• Contest is open to anyone in the 50 States, 18 or older! Sorry, we don’t make this rule (we hate excluding anyone), so be mad at our lawyers and contest laws if you have to be mad.
• Winner will be chosen randomly. Eight (8) winner will receive one (1) maroon or blue LG enV3 for Verizon Wireless. Approximate retail value is $299.99. (Color will be chosen randomly.)
• If you are chosen, you will be notified by email. Winners must respond within three days of the end of the contest. If you do not respond within that period, another winner will be chosen.
• Entries can be submitted until Saturday, July 11th, at 11:59PM ET. Good luck!
• Full rules can be found here.

Filed under: Announcements

Engadget’s recession antidote: win a LG enV3 for Verizon Wireless originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 11 Jul 2009 12:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Okay, you know the drill by now: just because it’s in a patent doesn’t mean it’s happening anytime soon, if ever. With that said, we’d love to see what Nokia had in mind when they concocted this one. As Unwired View recently unearthed, the Finnish phone maker has drawn up a design doc / patent application for comfortable, stretchable material that fits over your skin and is used for device interaction. Gestures and stretches are computed and signaled into nearby computers, phones, or interestingly enough “near-eye displays” — sounds like we’re getting into a bit of virtual / augmented reality territory here — and they are also tailored to provide feedback via vibration. Again, don’t hold your breath on seeing this come to fruition any point in the near (or even long) future, but still, we know what you’re thinking: Nokia’s gonna have to think of a ton of kooky color descriptions to accentuate any future lineup of input wristbands / fingerbands.

[Via Pocket-lint]

Filed under: Cellphones

Nokia interface patent fits like an AR-enhancing glove originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 11 Jul 2009 10:37:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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It’s festival season, so this may be a welcome addition to the gigantic directory of music-related information websites and applications already out there on the Web, particularly for live gig buffs. Setlist.fm is an awesome free wiki site (although they prefer to call it a “wiki-like service”) that aims to become the biggest repository of live performance track lists with the help of music fans across the globe.

The good thing about Setlist.fm is that the goal is to collect the real setlists, meaning which tracks artists and bands actually play at live gigs rather than what the setlist says they will. If you have any basic knowledge about the live music industry, you know that those are two completely separate things.

And you thought self-published books were all rubbish. Author Boyd Morrison sold two books, the first one called The Ark, to Simon & Schuster. Boyd uploaded and sold the books himself and raised awareness for his novels by being a member of Kindle Boards and generally self-promoting.

He will be published in hardcover in 2010 and is working on his next book featuring swashbuckling adventurer Tyler Locke.

digg_url = ‘http://digg.com/gadgets/Looks_like_WeFound_a_total_Kindle_ripoff’; Kindle doppelganger? The gang at Tech-On stumbled upon this little number at this week’s Tokyo’s Digital Publishing Fair, and unless our eyes deceive us, this snowflake’s the spitting image of Amazon’s e-book reader. It comes from Founder International, Inc., the Japanese unit of Chinese Peking University Founder Group Corp., and aesthetics aside, the screen comes from the same manufacturer (E Ink Corporation) and even lets you insert a SIM card and download directly to the device. And yet, despite the evidence, the company claims its gadget was “independently developed” and has nothing to do with the Kindle. Sure, whatever you say, wink wink, nod nod. The so-labeled WeFound is heading to China at the end of 2009 for around $209, with a possible release in Japan sometime after.

[Thanks, Alex]

Filed under: Handhelds

Keepin’ it real fake, part CCXXII: Looks like “WeFound” a total Kindle ripoff originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 11 Jul 2009 07:29:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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