X Phone Gadgets

Forums: iPhone 5S, Google Glass, Apple watch, Jailbreak apps

xphonegadget — Wed, 19 Jun 2013 15:07:00 +0000

Interested in iPhone, iPad, or Apple and looking to have some great conversations? Got a burning question or frustrating problem you just want help fixing? Already an expert and eager to share your knowledge? Well, all that and more is just waiting for you in the iMore forums.

Here are today’s hot topics:

iPhone 5S release date

Google Glass

What would you like to see in a Apple watch?

Best jailbreak apps for iPhone 5 and iPad mini

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Apple reportedly talked to Beats about the Project Daisy streaming music service

xphonegadget — Wed, 19 Jun 2013 15:06:48 +0000

Apple CEO Tim Cook and SVP of internet services, Eddy Cue reportedly met with Beats Electronics CEO and Interscope-Geffen-A&M chairman Jimmy Iovine to discuss his and co-founder Dr. Dre’s planned Project Daisy Music Streaming service, among other things. According to Poornima Gupta and Ronald Grover at Reuters:

Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook met with Beats CEO Jimmy Iovine during a visit to Los Angeles in late February to find out more about Beats’ “Project Daisy” [...] The meeting between Cook and Iovine, who is also chairman of music company Interscope-Geffen-A&M, was “informational” and covered a broad range of music-related topics, the sources said.

Apparently, they didn’t discuss specifics of a deal. Apple’s been rumored to be interested in subscription and streaming music services for years, but hasn’t been able to get the deal they want from the music industry, or shape the package they want to offer to their customers.

I imagine Cook and Cue have met with, and will continue to meet with, pretty much anyone and everyone in the industry, both about subscription music and about iTunes’ other interests, of which there are many.

The specifics of this instance are interesting, and a scoop for Reuters, but this is exactly what should be happening.

Anyone holding out hope that 2013 will finally be the year of Apple subscription music?

Source: Reuters

In Wake of Hack, Evernote to Add Heightened Security Features

xphonegadget — Tue, 18 Jun 2013 15:08:03 +0000

Just days after a widely publicized security breach, Evernote said it planned to add additional security features to its product, according to a statement made to Information Week and confirmed to AllThingsD on Tuesday. The plan is to roll out “two-factor authentication” later in the year, which typically involves sending a code to a user’s separate device (often a cellphone) that is then used during login. Google and Facebook both use the security feature.

Groupon CFO: No Changes to Business Model

xphonegadget — Tue, 18 Jun 2013 15:07:56 +0000

Groupon Inc. Chief Financial Officer Jason Child said Tuesday the embattled daily-deals company won’t be shifting its business model as it seeks out a new CEO, and argued the firm is on the right track.

“I would not expect there to be any business model changes,” Mr. Child said during an appearance at a Deutsche Bank conference, adding Groupon’s board of directors is firmly in favor of “the stuff we’ve been working on.”

Read the rest of this post on the original site

Bluetooth Gramophone: The Ideal Way to Stream Your Vintage Albums

xphonegadget — Sun, 16 Jun 2013 15:03:11 +0000

Sure, vinyl has that warm fuzzy feeling that digital recordings just seem to be lacking. But filling a smartphone with hundreds of MP3s of classic albums is a lot easier than filling your basement with hundreds of records packed in crates. So if you’ve still got a soft spot for the vintage sound of a gramophone, but prefer the convenience of digitally storing your music collection, the Bluetooth Gramovox packs the best of both worlds into a lovely accent piece.

Designed by Pavan Bapu and Jeff Parrish—who wanted a more authentic way to enjoy their favorite jazz recordings—the Gramovox’s minimalist wooden base doesn’t have to get cluttered up with patch cables or electronics. You just leave it in a corner, and when you’re ready for some Billie Holiday, you can stream her from whatever modern device you choose. And while the Gramovox will be available sometime later this year, it’s important to remember that sounding authentic doesn’t necessarily equate to sounding good.

[Gramovox via Ubergizmo]

NASA Finds Space Invaders Deep in the Cosmos

xphonegadget — Sun, 16 Jun 2013 15:02:53 +0000

NASA’s Hubble Telescope peered deep into a cluster of galaxies called Abell 68 recently, and found a wicked space invader that looks like it’s headed right for us. Brace for impact!

So what’s a classic video game baddie doing hanging out two-billion light-years away? NASA explains that the gravitational field surrounding the galaxies works like a magnifying glass, brightening and stretching light from far away. So you’re seeing stretched and mirrored images—a phenomenon known as gravitational lensing—that just happens to look like a space invader. Sure, it’s not real, but it’s fun to let your imagination run light-years away and imagine that the old game is actually happening out there in the universe. [NASA]

‘Wow! Stuff’ Unveils AppCoverters to Turn Your iPad into an Aquarium

xphonegadget — Sat, 15 Jun 2013 15:06:07 +0000

I love fish. I love going to aquariums to see sharks, jellyfish, and stingrays. I love visiting the fish section of my local pet shops to see the beta fish, seahorses, and various underwater plant life. What I don’t like is taking care of the little stinkers. The cost of a fish take alone is enough to keep me from ever delving into the world of aquatic pet ownership. Toy maker “Wow! Stuff” has a solution that is more than just an app with virtual fish.

Wow! Stuff has been making the Toy Fair circuit lately, but the company is getting a lot of attention for its AppConverter line of toys. These iPad and iPhone docks turn your plain old devices into real toys. The company has a pinball machine iPad dock that lets you launch the ball with a physical launcher and tap the buttons on the side of the table to trigger the virtual flippers on the app. The pinball machine replica even includes a point display on the headboard for quick view.

Pinball machine docks for the iPad are a dime a dozen. But a physical fish take that you can add your own real-life decorations to is what stands out in this line of AppCoverter toys.

The “iQuarium,” (a nickname that was dubbed by Pocket-Lint) is a display that lets you put real toys inside a specially designed dock and then, using your iPad, projects virtual fish onto the glass so that it looks like you have fish in the tank.

Using a 45-degree angle and glass reflector, the tank holds the iPad in place and reflects the images on the screen. When combined with the real tank, this clever gadget lets you have digital aquatic life mixed with real-life decorations.

When prompted, the fish will swim into formation and display the current time and there is also a companion iPhone app that lets you go fishing for your pets by using the iPhone as a rod to hook them in.

If you’ve been looking for the perfect virtual aquarium, but haven’t been satisfied with the current genre of pay-to-feed tanks available in the App Store, this could be the right fit.

Wow! Stuff’s iPad pinball machine and iQuarium are still in beta and there is no word on how soon or how much the gadgets will cost. We will be sure to let you know when we find out.

[Via: Gizmodo]

GOWEX Releases Free 1Mbit Wi-Fi Across New York City

xphonegadget — Sat, 15 Jun 2013 15:06:00 +0000

GOWEX wants to turn New York into a Wireless Smart City (WSC). The plan is to have free wireless Internet available everywhere and today the company announced the beginning of its push to create “Global Wi-Fi cities for global citizens” by offering free Wi-Fi to nearly 20 million New Yorkers, not to mention more than 50 million tourists.

GOWEX offers free Internet access in hundreds of hotspots between Manhatten, Queens, Staten Island, Brooklyn, and the Bronx thanks to a deployment of 1.953 Wi-Fi smart zones around the biggest neighborhoods in the city.

The launch of New York is just another step in the strategy GOWEX that, in the near future, will be implemented in the U.S. over three cities this year,”said Jenaro Garcia, CEO of GOWEX. “We are talking with various private and public entities that have a high interest in using and expand this project of WSC.”

The company has recently updated their free GOWEX WiFI app to include New York City. Users can download the app and see a map that includes the various free Wi-Fi hotspots the company has to offer.

GOWEX boasts free download speeds of up to 1Mb and points out that their network frees up other 3G networks that have been bogged down by so many users in the New York City area.

Google offers free Wi-Fi in Chelsea and GOWEX promises to deliver the same quality of Internet service to all neighborhoods in New York City, “which will make the city into a paradigm of free wireless connectivity around the world.”

Why Facebook Is Sending Its People to Mobile Coding Camp (And Not Just Engineers)

xphonegadget — Fri, 14 Jun 2013 15:07:10 +0000

Do me a favor — listen to Facebook’s next earnings call and count the number of times CEO Mark Zuckerberg says the word “mobile.” If you played it as a drinking game, you’d be blotto before CFO David Ebersman even got on the line.

That’s no mistake (obviously). It’s the company’s mission to spread the “mobile first” mentality throughout the organization (a maxim oft heard and quickly becoming trite in the Valley), which means thinking about designing for mobile in all of the company’s product development.

How to do that, after the organization already has upward of 3,500 employees, with more being added every day? Part of the solution: Send ‘em to boot camp.

Facebook has contracted the services of Big Nerd Ranch, an 11-year-old outfit responsible for running a week-long, 40-hour crash course in mobile development that any and all Facebook employees can sign up for.

“Eighty percent of those who took the training were software engineers,” Facebook Director of Mobile Engineering Mike Shaver told reporters at a roundtable Monday. But surprisingly, folks from departments other than engineering were willing to sign up for the course, from marketing to sales to disciplines that wouldn’t require a comprehensive knowledge of mobile coding.

The way Shaver describes it, it’s part of Facebook’s grand, yearlong initiative to shift from a Web-centric model of thought to incorporating “native code” — or programming language specific to iOS or Android — into the company’s thinking. In short, it’s crucial in making Facebook’s apps actually perform well. (Remember how crappy the Facebook app was a year ago? I certainly do.)

Which is sort of important, given that Facebook is one of the most popular apps on smartphones across the world.

The program seems to be going well. More than 450 employees have gone through Big Nerd Camp’s sessions since last July, with nearly two-thirds of those opting to focus on Android rather than iOS. And that’s important to note, too, considering Android’s massive reach in the global mobile device market.

I’d imagine as Facebook continues to hire, the program will continue to expand. Facebook doesn’t require that folks have specific engineering experience in certain areas — “generalists are welcome,” Shaver said — but the ones who are already well-versed in either iOS or Android can move through the organization and act as “little seed crystals for different product groups,” Shaver said, which will hopefully beef up the mobile focus overall.

Former Top Yahoo Ad Exec Sues Yahoo, Accusing It of Trying to “Cheat” Him Over Acquisition Compensation

xphonegadget — Fri, 14 Jun 2013 15:07:02 +0000

Michael Katz, a former high-profile advertising exec at Yahoo who sold Interclick to the Silicon Valley Internet giant, has filed a lawsuit, claiming the company tried to “cheat him out of the compensation he was promised during negotiation of the acquisition and to humiliate him as well.”

The filing centers on a retention bonus that Katz alleges was owed him as part of the purchase of the ad-targeting company he sold to Yahoo in 2011 for $270 million.

Katz was fired in a bar by HR head Jackie Reses, the lawsuit states, two weeks before he was due to receive the first large bonus payment of $1.35 million from the company. Three other payments were to follow, along with the vesting of a number of stock options.

As I previously reported, Katz’s exit from Yahoo was not pretty, which has also been the case with several former exec after new CEO Marissa Mayer arrived last year:

Considered a savvy online ad player and a well-regarded entrepreneur, Katz came to the Silicon Valley Internet giant a year ago when it bought Interclick, the ad-targeting company he co-founded and headed, for $270 million.

Yahoo later used Interclick’s technology in its audience-buying platform called Genome. In a reorganization announced in January, Katz was placed in charge of sales operations and data and performance optimization for Genome.

The data unit is at the center of efforts by Yahoo’s new CEO Marissa Mayer to turbocharge its ad business.

But the Katz missive clearly signaled that his departure was not an amicable one, which sources underscored was part of a larger rejiggering of the ad sales staff under new COO Henrique De Castro.

“As some of you are starting to learn, my last day with the company will be today,” wrote Katz on Friday. “Leaving Y! is not the hard part — how it happened and leaving all of you is what makes this difficult.”

How it happened, said several sources, was that Katz was suddenly told by HR head Jackie Reses last week that there was not a place for him, only days before a large 12-month retention bonus was to be paid out to him for the Interclick acquisition.

While it is an unusual thing to part on willfully difficult terms with an entrepreneur, as it sends a bad signal to others considering joining the company, Yahoo’s new leadership has been playing hardball with a lot of top execs it is parting ways with, and is also limiting departure packages.

Asked for comment, a Yahoo spokeswoman responded, “We don’t comment on legal matters.” Katz was unavailable for comment, but referred me to the lawsuit filed.

Here’s the lawsuit complaint and summons, with more to come:

dpny-23850838-v1-Complaint

dpny-23850837-v1-Summons