Could future Lumia handsets come with Canon lenses?
As smartphone imaging gets better, the market for point-and-shoot cameras has evaporated. Perhaps sensing this shift in the wind, Canon has signed a patent-licensing deal with Microsoft where both companies will have easy access to each other’s technological secrets. Dour-minded individuals may say that this is just some legal mutual arse-covering which is commonplace in these litigious times. That’s probably true, but wouldn’t it be great if we saw Canon’s imaging technology wind up in a future generation of PureView device? After all, the company does need some new expertise after its last expert defected to the other side.
Filed under: Cellphones, Cameras, Mobile, Microsoft, Canon
Via: Pocket-lint
Source: Photography Blog
The Big Picture: NASA flies massive SOFIA telescope to the stratosphere
It’s a catch-22: the lenses of ground-based telescopes can be made huge, but are hamstrung by distortion from the atmosphere. Hubble-type telescopes don’t have that issue, but must be small to be launched into space, and good luck fixing them. That’s where NASA’s SOFIA (Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy) comes in: by sticking a 17-ton telescope into a Boeing 747, you can launch it up to 45,000 feet and get past 99 percent of our atmosphere’s water vapor. That way, SOFIA astronomers can scan infrared signals to study planetary atmospheres, comets and interstellar star chemistry, to name a few projects. Naturally, it’s a science- and gadget-lovers smorgasbord — check the gallery and video below, or head over to NASA’s SOFIA mission site.
Via: Wired
Source: NASA
Apple recruits one of the watch industry’s most important sales execs
Apple’s recent hires in wearable tech have largely taken place outside the watch industry, which is slightly odd for a company rumored to be making a watch of its own. However, it just addressed that discrepancy in style — LVMH’s watch division has confirmed that Apple has snagged Patrick Pruniaux, TAG Heuer’s sales and retail VP, as part of a broader campaign to poach talent from watchmakers. We’ve reached out to Apple to learn more about its plans, but LVMH group head Jean-Claude Biver tells CNBC that Pruniaux will be working on the “iWatch.” Clearly, the team in Cupertino wants someone who can market wristwear to a large audience.
Biver says he’s relieved that Pruniaux is leaving for Apple, since the California firm isn’t a “direct competitor” to LVMH’s luxury-oriented TAG Heuer, Hublot and Zenith brands. While that’s true, the move suggests that Apple may creep on to their turf by marketing its future wearable more like a conventional watch than a phone accessory. If so, that’s a sharp break from the approaches we’ve seen so far — even the relatively stylish Moto 360 and Pebble Steel are more often pitched to tech-savvy types than the fashion-conscious.
[Image credit: Andreas Knudsen, Flickr]
If you’ve researched online privacy then the NSA may already be tracking you
When the Edward Snowden revelations began flowing (and flowing, and flowing), the first thing many people screamed was “get on Tor!” Unsurprisingly, an analysis of the NSA’s XKeyscore system has revealed that simply visiting the website of the privacy service is enough to get you registered as an “extremist.” A report by German television found that the NSA’s packet-sniffing targets anyone interested in online privacy — with those outside of the US, Canada, UK, Australia and New Zealand marked down for extra surveillance. If, however, you’ve ever searched for (privacy-focused operating system) Tails or even Linux Journal, wherever you are, you’re still likely to wind up on the NSA’s naughty list.
The agency is, apparently, obsessed with Tor, the network designed by the US Navy to promote online anonymity and is used in plenty of countries where state surveillance and censorship go hand-in-hand. Some believe, however, that the agency may have overstepped the mark in this case, with the EFF’s Kurt Opsahl telling Wired that he doesn’t believe this activity is covered by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. On the upside, you can be glad that you haven’t spent the last few months researching and writing about online privacy, unlike your humble narrator…
Filed under: Internet
Via: Russia Today, Wired
Source: Panorama / DasErste
Apple Planning to Wipe CloudKit Data for iOS 8 and Yosemite on July 7 Ahead of Beta Updates
Apple has notified developers of plans for a server-side data wipe on CloudKit public and private databases for both the beta versions iOS 8 and OS X Yosemite. The wipe, which will take place on Monday, July 7, will erase data for iCloud Drive, iCloud Photo Library, and Mail Drop.
The wipe comes just a day ahead of the rumored launch date of iOS 8 beta 3 and also the likely launch date of the third Yosemite Developer Preview. Apple commonly seeds early versions of its iOS beta operating systems on roughly two-week intervals, moving on to three-week intervals later in the testing period. OS X beta updates have followed a similar update pattern in the past as well.
Apple’s second iOS 8 and Yosemite betas came approximately two weeks after the software was first provided to developers at the Worldwide Developers Conference, and it has now been three weeks since those updates were seeded.
Both iOS 8 and OS X Yosemite are expected to be released to the public in the fall, after an extended beta testing period.
Thanks, Daniel!
The forgotten losers of the console wars
History is written by the victors, but for all those generations of console wars we’ve managed to weather through, what about the other guys? Opening this week, a new games museum in southern Japan houses 56 different consoles of varying fame (or infamy). For every NES / Famicom, there’s curiosities like the huge “Pocket Home PC”, failing on the very definition of its name. Remember the Sega Game 1000? We didn’t, but we should probably cut these (mostly) beige consoles some slack. While most of the devices toured here weren’t a commercial success, each helped gently push gaming towards its current state — if only by firmly demonstrating what we didn’t want. And yeah, we wish the Dreamcast was still around too. Here’s to the games consoles we’ve loved and lost over the last 40 years.
Filed under: Gaming, Peripherals, Apple, Sony, Microsoft, Nokia, Nintendo
This stackable media hub plays your old 16-bit game cartridges
The set-top box market is currently flooded with many cheap Android boxes, but they tend to offer limited remote access plus expansion capability, so it’s about time that something more exciting popped up. One such candidate is the EzeeCube, which aims to be an idiot-proof media hub with three main selling points: Auto-sync content across multiple platforms (Android, iOS, Windows and OS X); simple initial setup for accessing hub content from anywhere; and cable-free expansion that lets you stack up to four modules. We’re talking about slapping on an extra hard drive, a Blu-ray drive, a TV tuner and even a retro gaming module that will bring your dusty SNES and Sega Mega Drive / Genesis cartridges back to life. No messy cables here.
The EzeeCube itself is a 140 x 140 x 45mm box packing a dual-core 1GHz Cortex-A9 processor, 1GB of DDR3 RAM, 4GB of flash storage (for the XBMC OS, version 13.1) and a 2.5-inch 5,400 RPM 1TB hard drive. All the ports are on the back, including an SD card slot, a USB 2.0 socket, a micro-USB port (for OTG accessories and hacking purposes), an HDMI 1.4 port, an optical audio socket and an ethernet port. For networking, you get the usual 802.11n WiFi plus Bluetooth 3.0 for data and device connection, as well as DLNA plus AirPlay for either wired or wireless streaming within your home network. The five pins on the top side are obviously for the stacking expansion, and they supply a total current of up to 5A (hence the maximum limit of four stacking modules).
Since this is an open source product, manufacturers can easily design an EzeeCube module after obtaining a free license (for the sake of enforcing its stacking patent). Ashok Jaiswal, the Hong Kong-based system architect behind this project, expects to see others jump in with Qi wireless charging pads, smart home hubs and more for his little box. As mentioned earlier, Jaiswal’s Indiegogo campaign currently offers an optional hard drive module (either empty or with a 2TB drive), a TV tuner and a retro game cartridge module at relatively affordable prices. The campaign will soon add a Blu-ray module as well, which will let you easily rip your DVDs onto the EzeeCube, in addition to playing Blu-ray movies.
On the software side, the TV interface and the EzeeSync mobile app share the same design language, which should help users quickly familiarize with the system. The relatively straightforward setup process involves the registration of your mobile number, which is later used as your unique ID for remotely and securely accessing your EzeeCube’s content. This saves you from having to manually set up UPnP port forwarding, which can be rather daunting for the non-technically minded — especially Jaiswal’s wife and mother-in-law, in this case. Of course, if your mobile device is connected to the same home network as your EzeeCube, then the app will automatically search for the box.
At Jaiswal’s office, we got to see a working live demo of accessing content on both iOS and Android, as well as viewing photos, video and music on the TV while simultaneously — and independently — playing the same content or other content on the mobile devices. The app also serves as a remote control for navigating around the TV interface; you can toggle those buttons by tapping the downward arrow near the top. Sadly, we didn’t get to see a working “EzeeGame” cartridge module, as this is a very fresh collaboration with the team behind XBMC’s RetroPlayer emulator.
Jaiswal told us that while the software requires further tweaking, the hardware is good to go, so now it’s just a matter of getting the funds for the tooling as well as initial production of 500 units. If you’re interested in helping the EzeeCube become reality, head over to the Indiegogo page to pick a backing option, and you’ll be able to get a hacker edition (no hard drive, but you can obviously stack one on later) for as cheap as $99 due December this year, before it officially rolls out for $299 towards Q2 next year — just as when the $50 gaming module is ready as well.
Filed under: Gaming, Home Entertainment, HD
Source: Indiegogo
‘Range’ iOS Food Thermometer Launches New Bluetooth LE Version on Kickstarter [iOS Blog]
Last year, the company behind the popular Twine Kickstarter project launched a new iOS-enabled food thermometer called Range. That thermometer raised more than $175,000 and now the team is back for more.
While not in time for this year’s Summer grilling season, Supermechanical has launched a new, an upgraded version of the Range on Kickstarter. The new Range Oven/Grill Intelligence adds Bluetooth LE wireless connectivity as well as a magnetic storage unit that acts as the thermometer’s base. The old Range needed to be physically connected to an iPhone, iPad or iPod Touch, but with the new wireless version, users won’t need to leave their iPad sitting next to the oven or outside by the grill.
The magnetic base of the Range OI includes additional temperature and vibration sensors — it’s designed to be attached to the front of an oven, detecting when the oven is in use, when it’s preheating and when it’s on normally. It runs for a year on a single AA battery and the thermometer can measure from -40F to 450F (-40C to 230C).
There are three Range OI models available:
Oven Intelligence ($98) – including a 3″ sharp thermometer
Chef Intelligence ($129) – including both a 3″ sharp thermometer and a 6″ round thermometer designed for candy making, home brewing and other needs, and both thermometers can be used simultaneously.
Grill Intelligence ($160) – including a 3″ sharp thermometer and an ambient temperature probe for slow cooking and smoking, as well as an upgraded fiberglass cable for durability even in direct flame.
The OI wirelessly connects to iOS and Android smartphone and tablets, as well as the Pebble smart watch. There are bundles available to purchase multiple versions of the Range OI as well as higher Kickstarter levels that include priority shipping or special grilling aprons. Shipping is anticipated to begin next Spring.
The Kickstarter campaign has raised more than $80,000 with a goal of $250,000 with just over two weeks to go.
Morph’s crowdfunded comeback premieres on YouTube today
It’s been a long time since Morph came out with any fresh material, but thanks to a lump of crowdfunding cash, the comical clay character’s put together a new sketch show that premieres on YouTube today. Shape-shifting Morph first appeared on a children’s art show in the late ’70s before starring in several of his own, but his career’s been stagnant for several years now. In an attempt to revive it, the stop-motion specialists at Aardman Animations — who also created Wallace and Gromit — pulled a Veronica Mars and took to Kickstarter for funds. They raised enough to bankroll a new 15-part series featuring Morph and friends, the first episode of which has just been released on YouTube (and is embedded below). If you’re interested in future episodes, hit the subscription button on Morph’s channel, where you’ll also find a wealth of classic footage to eyeball.
Filed under: Home Entertainment, Internet
Via: The Next Web
Source: Aardman Animations, Morph channel (YouTube), Kickstarter
Accessory of the Day: Lepow Moonstone 6000mAh External Battery
Need some extra juice for your smartphone but can’t get to a power supply? That stinks, bro. We can’t really help you today, but we can do you a solid for the future. Next time, take an external battery with you and you’ll avoid the hassle of hugging a wall.
The Lepow Moonstone 6000mAh External Battery offers enough juice to power your typical smartphone 2-3 times over, maybe more. What’s more, the Moonstone 6000 has two output speeds of (1.2A, 2.1A) and lets you charge up two devices at once. Maybe a tablet and a smartphone. Or a digital camera and an MP3 player… or a…well, you get the point.
Available in a variety of colors, this one looks good in any shade.
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