NVIDIA’s Shield successor is a tablet
The next version of NVIDIA’s funky handheld Shield console will actually be called the Shield Tablet, according to a listing from a testing body called the Global Certification Forum (GCF). There’s been much speculation about the device, especially after a diagram of what looks like the controller showed up at the FCC. That’s usually a sign that a product is imminent, and we were told last year that a new model could come sooner than expected by NVIDIA CEO Jen-Hsun Huang himself (see the video below). As a reminder, the original Shield is a portable, Tegra-powered console, with a built in controller and 5-inch screen that can run Android games and apps. But it’s main raison d’etre is to wirelessly stream games from your NVIDIA-equipped PC, making it a rather nichey device. The GCF page confirms the “Shield Tablet” name that NVIDIA posted by mistake on its own site, and adds the fact that it’ll have 4G capability.
So why a tablet? The original Shield is just a tablet with a controller (permanently) attached, so separating them makes sense. That way, NVIDIA could market it as a high-end tablet, a handheld gaming device and possibly a home console that’d plug into your TV. It’s also feasible that more than one Shield device is coming, though that seems less likely. Either way, a mysterious benchmark for an NVIDIA Mocha tablet gives us a clue about the specs, which are identical to the new Xiaomi Mii pad. That device has a 7.9-inch, 2,048 x 1,536 screen, with 2GB of RAM and NVIDIA’s new Tegra K1 quad-core CPU. If the Shield Tablet is similarly equipped, it’d be much more capable of running serious games than the original, as shown in the video below (which features NVIDIA’s reference Tegra K1 tablet, by the way). 4G connectivity would also make it much more usable on the road. If all this pans out, it’d make sense — allowing the Shield to be a standalone tablet might be the final carrot to entice gamers into throwing their cash at it.
T-Mobile offers pre-registration for Galaxy Tab 4; tablet due July 16
T-Mobile on Wednesday announced that the Samsung Galaxy Tab 4 is now available for pre-registration. Touching down at the Un-carrier’s website on July 16, the tablet comes with 200MB of 4G LTE data for the life of the device. Anyone who purchases one on a Simple Choice Plan will also get an additional 1GB of data each month through the remainder of 2014. Retail stores are expected to carry the tablet a week later, on July 23.
At $0 down and with 24 monthly payments of $16, the Galaxy Tab 4 ultimately costs $384 for the 8-inch tablet.
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Samsung’s premium Galaxy F leaks yet again, gives us the best look at the phone thus far
Here we go again. We’ve seen this device leak many times before. Galaxy F is allegedly going to be Samsung’s premium offering, metal chassis and all. Let’s get down to it.
Last time this device leaked we’ve seen a part of the phone itself in a render, courtesy of @evleaks. This time we’re getting the same render (though the phone is in a different color), from the same source, but we get to see the whole device, nothing is cut off. It actually feels like we’re assembling a puzzle or something. The leaker also hints that the phone will be released this year. If the last leak is to be believed, the phone will be released September 12, which is 2 days after IFA.
Would you buy the phone if it turns out to be Galaxy S5 (or a beefed up Galaxy S5) with a metallic chassis?
Source: @evleaks
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Analysts Eyeing Record Highs for Apple’s Stock Price, Rushing to Raise Price Targets
Analysts were sour on Apple last year, believing the company’s stock would not climb over the $700 mark it crossed briefly in September 2012. Now with a 7-for-1 stock split and a continuing stock repurchase plan, this negative sentiment is changing with analysts revising their price targets for the again-hot stock, reports Fortune.
Table compiled by Fortune’s Philip Elmer-DeWitt.
In recent weeks, analysts have adjusted their price targets by as much as 30 percent, with prices now ranging from a low of $87 from Morningstar’s Brian Collelo up to a high of $124 from Stephen Turner of Hilliard Lyons. With the recent upgrades, the analysts’ average price targets are now above Apple’s all-time high once the stock split is accounted for.
As noted by BTIG’s Walter Piecyk, some of this optimism stems from new U.S. carrier plans that will expand the number of customers eligible to upgrade to Apple’s next generation iPhone and new leasing options that offer upgrades with a minimal upfront cost.
“Historically we estimate that ~20% of AT&T’s subscriber base was eligible for an upgrade during an iPhone launch quarter. That eligibility dropped to a low of the mid-teens in the second half of 2013 due to the stricter upgrade policies. We expect AT&T’s new Mobile Share Value plan to increase the percentage of AT&T post-paid subscriber base eligible to upgrade to over 65% by the time the next iPhone launches. In absolute terms that is the difference between 10 or 11 million eligible for upgrades and 45-50 million.”
Wireless carriers in the U.S. have been modifying their consumer cellular and data plans, introducing no-contract options and new incentives that make it easier for customers to upgrade to new phones. Much of this change has been initiated by T-Mobile, which started its Uncarrier promotion in early 2013 with a no-contract Simple Choice plan that lets you pay for a phone in installments with a low upfront cost and early upgrades. Other carriers, such as AT&T, have followed suits with similar plans.
Irish court ruling says defacing Facebook and physical property are the same thing
What happens on Facebook doesn’t just stay on Facebook, and your social network activity can be used against you in a court of law. Trolling, bullying and posting offensive content can all land you in hot water, not to mention that your Facebook history can be used as evidence in all kinds of criminal cases. Currently, even the US Supreme Court is trying to clarify legal accountability of social media. Now, in what’s thought to be the first prosecution of its kind, a man in Ireland has been charged with “frape” — the rather tactless term that describes defacing someone’s Facebook page from within their account.
As the Irish Times reports, the man has been fined €2,000 (just over $2,700) for posting a malicious status update on an ex-girlfriend’s account using her phone. He was earlier acquitted of more serious crimes against the woman, but plead guilty in this instance. Interestingly, the man wasn’t charged with any kind of cybercrime, but under the Criminal Damage Act, which is usually the case when physical property is involved. In the US, the equivalent charge would be something along the lines of vandalism, and only time will tell whether this sets any future precedent or remains an isolated judgement. And, if you believe you’ve been the victim of social media humiliation at home or in the workplace, contact our elite team of Facebook prank lawyers now on 1-800-JUSTLOGOUT.
Filed under: Internet, Facebook
Via: The Independent
Source: Irish Times
Engadget giveaway: win a Harmony Ultimate and a Nest courtesy of Logitech!
You’re master of your domain. There’s a chair with your name on it and an impression to match your backside. It overlooks a media center loaded with intelligent gaming consoles and set-top boxes. The rest of the house is also getting smarter, and that chair is still so comfortable. Not to worry, Logitech’s Harmony Ultimate remote is getting brainier too, with support for the Nest Learning Thermostat and a variety of devices like Philips Hue smart bulbs. Logitech was nice enough to provide a Harmony Ultimate and Nest thermostat for this week’s giveaway so one lucky reader can dominate their domicile in style. The remote offers a color touchscreen and tons of customizable features, for flexible, comprehensive control over your home’s devices. There’s also a partner app for both Android and iOS in case some fool lets this smart device fall deep into the cushions. Your chance at winning this powerful package is only a few clicks away, so head down to the Rafflecopter widget below to enter. But remember, with great power comes great responsibility… to get off your butt and exercise or you might not be able to out run the machines — if it comes to that.
- Entries are handled through the Rafflecopter widget above. Comments are no longer accepted as valid methods of entry. You may enter without any obligation to social media accounts, though we may offer them as opportunities for extra entries. Your email address is required so we can get in touch with you if you win, but it will not be given to third parties.
- Contest is open to all residents of the 50 States, the District of Columbia, and Canada (excluding Quebec), 18 or older! Sorry, we don’t make this rule (we hate excluding anyone), so direct your anger at our lawyers and contest laws if you have to be mad.
- Winners will be chosen randomly. One (1) winners will receive one (1) Logitech Harmony Ultimate Remote (915-000201) and one (1) Nest Learning Thermostat (T200577).
- If you are chosen, you will be notified by email. Winners must respond within three days of being contacted. If you do not respond within that period, another winner will be chosen. Make sure that the account you use to enter the contest includes your real name and a contact email or Facebook login. We do not track any of this information for marketing or third-party purposes.
- This unit is purely for promotional giveaway. Logitech, Nest and Engadget / AOL are not held liable to honor warranties, exchanges or customer service.
- The full list of rules, in all its legalese glory, can be found here.
- Entries can be submitted until July 3rd at 11:59PM ET. Good luck!
Filed under: Announcements, HD, Mobile, Alt
What you need to know about social media activism
Protests in the Middle East, known as “The Arab Spring,” echoed around the world. On Friday, December 17, 2010, a fruit vendor named Mohamed Bouazizi covered himself in flammable liquid and lit a match. His body was quickly engulfed in flames and, despite attempts to save his life, Bouazizi died on January 4th, 2011. He was 26 years old. Like how Buddhist monk Thích Quảng Đức’s self-immolation in Saigon nearly 50 years earlier represented the frustration of many Vietnamese, Bouazizi’s action became symbolic of a much larger frustration in Tunisian society.
What happened next, however was a product of modern times: Word spread of Bouazizi’s action through social networks, with Facebook specifically becoming a flashpoint for protest organizations across the country. By the time Tunisia’s former leader, Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, resigned and fled the country in mid-January 2011, over a fifth of Tunisia’s population was on Facebook.
WHAT IS IT?
The term “social media activism” is ambiguous. That’s intentional, as its application varies depending on what it’s connected with. Both Occupy Wall Street and “#CancelColbert” fall under the umbrella of “social media activism,” so the term needs to be ambiguous by its nature. With those two examples, you already kinda know what it is, right? Social media activism can be as simple as a trending topic (“#CancelColbert”) for interested parties to engage in a bigger conversation, and as complex as Occupy Wall Street’s multiplatform, multimedia initiative. As the name implies, there’s no standard social network used for social media activism; YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, Sina Weibo and myriad others are employed as need be.
In the case of Tunisia, Facebook was the social service of choice, with hackers, protesters and everyday Tunisians using the service collaboratively. It served as a message board for sharing images, video and stories, in addition to creating a public forum for communication.
In response to the Santa Barbara shootings by Elliot Rodger, activists and general newsreaders alike used the “YesAllWomen” hashtag on Twitter. The hashtag is still in use over a month later, where it’s become an ongoing conversation about women’s rights versus how women are treated in reality.
WHY SHOULD I CARE?
Beyond the whole “you’re a participating member of human society” thing, social media activism is a fascinating modern version of protest and communication. Because of the internet, social media platforms and the ubiquity of mobile phones with cameras, activism and protest are now truly global events. Not interested in participating? That’s fair!
The other side of the coin is that, sometimes, these movements affect your life whether you like it or not. If you were in Egypt in early 2011, whether you were part of the conversation or not didn’t matter: The president was overthrown.
WHAT’S THE ARGUMENT?
While not an “argument” per se, some say that media coverage focuses on the medium — social media — over the message, and it ends up diluting the protest. Author Malcolm Gladwell argues as much in The New Yorker: “People protested and brought down governments before Facebook was invented. They did it before the internet came along. Barely anyone in East Germany in the 1980s had a phone – and they ended up with hundreds of thousands of people in central Leipzig and brought down a regime.” Gladwell’s also questioned the efficacy of social media in organizing physical protest; it’s easy for people to participate online, but far more difficult to turn those words into action (so the argument goes).
Back in May, a tweet from The Colbert Report‘s official Twitter account made a grave error: publishing a punch line from Colbert’s show that night without including the joke’s setup. In lampooning Washington Redskins owner Dan Snyder, Colbert made the following punch line in reference to a (fake) video that proposed Colbert was caught making racist remarks about Asians. The tweet, since deleted, said this:
In response, writer/activist Suey Park created the “#CancelColbert” hashtag. It became a rallying cry for some Asian Americans to speak about their experiences with racism in America. Except that some Asian Americans — notably Deadspin‘s Tommy Craggs and Kyle Wagner — found Park’s use of “hashtag activism” only served to misdirect the original conversation away from Snyder. It’s not the first, but it’s certainly the most prominent example of social media activism that many believe to be a misuse.
WANT EVEN MORE?
We sure hope you do, because there’s quite a bit on the subject that’s worth reading. The MIT Technology Review has a great piece from John Pollock digging in on the hackers behind Tunisia’s uprising. Al Jazeera America wrote about “#CancelColbert” and whether social media activism is effective; The New Yorker spoke with Park and discussed her background. The New York Times has a thorough background on Bouazizi and similar actions.
And finally, Jehane Noujaim‘s excellent 2013 documentary The Square both demonstrates the use of social media activism in a real-life revolution setting, and grippingly details the movement in Tahrir Square. It’s on Netflix, even! Don’t miss it!
[Image credit: AP Photo/John Minchillo (Zuccotti Park), The White House (Michelle Obama), Ferdinand Delacroix, Comedy Central, Twitter (@ColbertReport), AP Photo/Maya Alleruzzo (Facebook/Twitter)]
Filed under: Cellphones, Handhelds, Internet, Software, Facebook
Listen as a Google-backed piano turns live radio streams into ‘world music’
If Google promised to fund your bohemian lifestyle for six months, in return for some kind of interactive art installation, what would you create? For the New York-based artist, Zach Lieberman, the answer was something totally out of the ordinary: He built the world’s most connected digital piano, which plays notes extracted from our planet’s cacophony of live radio streams.
To our minds, Lieberman’s piano is one of the most interesting offerings at the Google-sponsored DevArt exhibition, which opens at the Barbican in London tomorrow. The show is all about “art made with code,” so its fitting that the amount of programming involved in Lieberman’s project is relatively huge. Servers in the cloud decode and analyze hundreds of live MP3 streams, looking for sounds that match the pitch of a musical note. When someone plays the keyboard, these notes are then recoded back into MP3′s and played through a 360-degree speaker array, so that the direction of the sound matches its geographic origin relative to where you’re standing. Sound complicated? In practice, it’s actually very simple — and also strangely rewarding, especially when you hit an unexpected chord, like a classical cello recording mixed with an Islamic call to prayer and a Greek DJ yelling about something unintelligible.
Filed under: Misc, Home Entertainment, Internet, HD, Alt, Google
Tune your motor skills with Dexteria VPP Fine Motor Skills
Are you in need of a fun way to do occupational therapy? Dexteria VPP Fine Motor Skills offers a fun solution to help you progress your abilities.
Essentially Dexteria is an app that gives users a set of therapeutic hand exercises that will help users improve fine motor skills and handwriting readiness in children and adults. The developer was clear to mention though that they are not games and are really therapeutic exercises and it is recommended to be done on a regular basis, but in short sessions.
Dexteria achieves this by doing special exercises designed in consultation with Occupational Therapists. Some of the exercises help improve finger control and stroke sequencing, let users practice fine motor manipulation and control, and even practice finger sequencing and isolation.
Besides the multitude of exercises that work with either hand, the app offers some nice features including multi-user tracking and automatic tracking and reporting so that it is easy to identify the time on the task and the progress with the ability to email the reports.
This award winning app has finally been released on Android bringing with it all of the features that has built this app its reputation and has been given a special Android exclusive feature of graphed reports.
The app is available in the Google Play Store for a price of $4.99.
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NVIDIA reportedly readying Tegra K1-powered Shield tablet
In addition to releasing a new version of the Shield gaming console, NVIDIA may also soon offer up a tablet counterpart, too. Details making the rounds indicate said tablet could be powered by a Tegra K1 processor and feature a 7.9-inch 2048 x 1536 resolution display. Other specs figure to include Android 4.4 KitKat and 2GB RAM; we would expect nothing but high-end stuff for NVIDIA’s first crack at a homegrown tablet.
If NVIDIA does keep the Shield branding with the tablet then we might look for them to position it around gaming and entertainment. Specifically, it could be sold as a flat panel gaming console that limelights as a tablet. According to details obtained by the Global Certification Forum (GCF) website, it’s also possible the device is a hybrid tablet/notebook or convertible product.
via The Verge
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