iSance Digital - Audio Podcast

Bankole and Lanre
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Current technology news with a motivational twist at the end

  1. 12/12/2007

    Season 2 Episode 1 - Free Vista - 12/12/07

    Summary: This is our 1st episode of season 2. In this episode we discuss: Imeem now offers streaming tracks from all Big Four labels, Get Microsoft Vista Ultimate For Free. What's the catch?, $109 iPod Touch Clone on Sale Now, Why the Apple TV failed, Imagineer Helps Design Cute, Killer Robot, Toshiba's super Li-ion Batteries, Ripping CD's is still unauthorized, LinkedIn Makes Its Move, JetBlue's in-flight e-mail, & Microsoft Opens Beta Of Office Live Workspace The Word For The Day: Revelations 3:14-15: To the angel of the church in Laodicea write: These are the words of the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the ruler of God's creation. I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other.

  2. 08/23/2007

    Season 1 Episode 17 - Virtualization - 22/08/07

    Summary: This is our 17th episode. In this episode we discuss: Paper Battery, British ISPs-BBC iPlayer Backlash, Vmware Goes Public, Facebook Opening Up-Data Feeds, Citrix Buys Xensource, Technorati In Trouble - CEO Steps Down, Dell's Financial Improprieties, Are You Living in a Computer Simulation?, Adobe Flash HD, and Skype Outage. The Word For The Day: Revelations 3:14-15: To the angel of the church in Laodicea write: These are the words of the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the ruler of God's creation. I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other.

  3. 08/10/2007

    Season 1 Episode 16 - BBC iPlayer - 08/08/07

    Summary: This is our 16th episode. In this episode we discuss: Judge throws out $1.52 billion Alcatel-Lucent suit against Microsoft, Researchers crack the secret of levitation, hoverboards imminent?, List of Office 2.0 Web Applications, Navy gears up for unmanned combat aircraft, Google gPhone Rumours, Detergentless Washing Machine, BBC launches iPlayer online video service, Apple iPod to stop charging for thieves, Apple's New iMac, Others, Bourne Ultimatum: $70M Biggest August Weekend Opening. The Word For The Day: John 8-36: So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.

  4. 07/24/2007

    Season 1 Episode 15 - Money, Technology & Wireless - 24/07/07

    Summary: Facebook Buys Parakey, Google Acquires Image-America, U.S. Deploying 1st Robotic Aerial Drones, IGA gets $25M to take on Microsoft & Google, Go2Web20.net, Google 700MHz spectrum bid, Researchers: multi-gigabit Wi-Fi, UK teen stuffed eBay PS2, Think gets $60M, Microsoft releases Windows Home Server RTM. The Word for the day: Romans 3.21-22 - But now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. 22This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference, Facebook Buys Parakey Social networking site Facebook has bought internet start-up, Parakey, run by two of the co-creators of the popular web browser, Mozilla Firefox. Parakey is described as a platform that "bridges the gap between information on the web and the desktop".  As part of the deal, which is for an undisclosed sum, Mozilla Firefox founders Blake Ross and Joe Hewitt will help to develop the Facebook site. A notice on Parakey's site says it hopes to makes consumers' lives easier. "Computers are frustrating," the site says. "Creating documents, finding files, sharing information - why do everyday things still seem so tedious and counterintuitive?" "Give your computer the bird," it concludes. Facebook: Facebook was started in 2004 by then-undergraduate Mark Zuckerberg as a social site for fellow Harvard University students and later opened up to users of all ages. Facebook, once largely confined to American colleges, has grown its audience by more than 500% in the last six months - making it more popular in Britain than in the US. Facebook allows people to list their personal details online and communicate with other people through the website. The site's appeal stems from the controls it gives users over who sees what personal details on each member's profile pages. Firefox: has been downloaded more than 300 million times by computer users worldwide and is the second most widely used web browser behind Microsoft's Internet Explorer. Parakey's founders see their browser operating system as a platform on which other applications could operate. Facebook has recently decided to let hundreds of independent developers build software within the Facebook site, turning Facebook itself into a kind of operating system for internet users. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Google Acquires Image-America Google acquired ImageAmerica, a company, as they say, building high resolution cameras for the collection of aerial imagery. Google hint that they expect this data to be rolled out in Google Earth/ Maps in the future. Already, ImageAmerica provided hi-res New Orleans imagery to Google following Hurricane Katrina. Image-America.com now shows the usual semi-blank acquired page, but Archive.org stored an older version I’ve mirrored here. After Panoramio, PeakStream, Zenter, Feedburner, GrandCentral and Postini, this is the seventh Google acquisition just this and last month. I suppose by now, a typical Google lobby small talk starts with, So, when were you acquired? full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ U.S. Deploying 1st Robotic Aerial Drones It looks like the unmanned aerial drones now on duty in Iraq and Afghanistan will soon be getting a lot more company, with the U.S. reportedly set to deploy its first full-on "robotic" drone squadron. According to the AP, the US will be deploying an unspecified number of MQ-9 Reaper "hunter-killer" drones, which are about the size of a jet fighter and are able to fly at speeds of 300 mph and reach altitudes of 50,000 feet -- each of which can be controlled from a base in Nevada. While further details are obviously scarce, the drones will apparently be deployed to Afghanistan first, with the fleet expected to expand to Iraq sometime between this fall and next spring. MQ9-Reaper: The MQ-9 Reaper (originally the RQ-9 Predator B) is an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) developed by General Atomics Aeronautical Systems for use by the United States Air Force, the United States Navy, and the British Royal Air Force. The MQ-9 is the Air Force's first purpose-designed hunter-killer UAV designed for long endurance high altitude surveillance.[1] The MQ-9 system utilizes a larger and more capable aircraft than the earlier MQ-1 Predator, however, the MQ-9 can use MQ-1's ground systems, making MQ-1 "upgradable" to the MQ-9. The MQ-9 design utilizes a 950 shaft-horsepower turboprop engine in place of Predator's 119 hp piston engine. The increase in power allows the Reaper to carry 15 times more ordnance and cruise at three times the speed of the MQ-1.[1] The U.S. Navy is referring to its MQ-9s as "Mariners". Weapons Specs: the Reaper can carry 14 of the air-to-ground weapons, or four Hellfires and two 500-pound bombs. 8 Hellfires, 2 500-pound JDAMs, and 2 Sidewinder a2a missiles. However, the aircraft can also carry laser guided bombs and other types of ordnance (up to 3,000 lbs worth). USAF officials plan to fit the Reaper with the 250 lb SDB's, enabling it to precision strike 16 targets on 1 mission. You can compare that to the B-2's capability (albeit with smaller ordinance) during the conflict in Kosovo. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ IGA gets $25M to take on Microsoft & Google IGA Worldwide, one of the in-game advertising network operators John Gaudiosi wrote about in his What Works piece for us, Wednesday announced that it has raised $25 million from an assortment of public and private investors. GE/NBC Universal’s Peacock Equity and KTB Ventures led the series B round along with existing investors Easton Capital, Morgenthaler Ventures, Intel Capital and DN Capital. IGA isn't the only player watching those trends; some of the biggest names in digital marketing are betting heavily on the genre. Last year Microsoft (MSFT) bought Massive, the leading in-game ad broker, for a reported $200 million. Earlier this year Google (GOOG) snapped up in-game ad shop Adscape Media for $23 million. Massive and other ad brokers, like IGA, allow agencies to buy space in many games at once, much as they would TV time. Meanwhile, major agencies like Ogilvy, Omnicom (OMC), and Publicis (PUB) are focusing more on games. Publicis has recently expanded its games ad group from two people to 10. These moves aren't just for bragging rights; Parks Associates estimates that the in-game ad market will be worth more than $600 million in three years, up from $120 million last year. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Go2Web20.net This is a web 2.0 directory listing all popular web 2.0 sites on the internet. It was founded by Orli Yakuel and Eyal Shahar. Orli is a Web 2.0 Analyst at AOL/Relegence and the editor of the popular blog go2web2.blogspot.com. Eyal is VP R&D and User Experience specialist in Mantis ltd. this is an Isreali company. The site listing is quite comprehensive and the beauty about it is that it shows you the logo of the web 2.0 companies and a brief summary of what they do. Go2Web20 is sponsored by Amazon Web Services, Techcrunch and Listio. We think it is cool. Please check it out at www.go2web20.net. You might find a very useful web 2.0 service there. Keep up the good work Orli and Yakuel. Web 2.0 Definition: Web 2.0 is a term often applied to a perceived ongoing transition of the World Wide Web from a collection of websites to a full-fledged computing platform serving web applications to end users. Ultimately Web 2.0 services are expected to replace desktop computing applications for many purposes. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Google 700MHz spectrum bid Not that we weren't expecting anything less, but it looks like the bidding in the upcoming 700MHz wireless spectrum auction is set to heat up, with Google now saying that it'll join in on the action, although only if certain conditions are met. Specifically, Google is asking for the FCC to ensure that the spectrum allows for "open applications, open devices, open networks, and open services" -- demands that seem to be pretty much in line with FCC Chairman Kevin Martin's recent statements on the matter. If the FCC follows through on that, Google says it's prepared to put up some $4.6 billion for the wireless spectrum. Well, there goes our plans. Google conditions for bidding:         Open applications: consumers should be able to download and utilize any software applications, content, or services they desire;         Open devices: consumers should be able to utilize their handheld communications device with whatever wireless network they                 prefer;         Open services: third pa

  5. 07/18/2007

    Season 1 Episode 14 - Boeing Dreamliner - 17/07/07

    Summary: This is our 14th episode. In this episode we discuss: Google acquires Postini, Update: FTC Clears Microsoft's $6 Billion AQuantive Buyout, AMD sinks $7.5 million into Transmeta, Nigerian school gets 300 OLPCs, Bloodstream Mini-robot, DARPA laser-guided bullets, Pioneer Computers' quad core laptop, Boeing Dreamliner, Spectec's miniSD GPS with microSD slot, Skinkers LiveStation: P2P live TV broadcasting. The Word for the day: Psalm 126:1 - When the LORD turned again the captivity of Zion, we were like them that dream. Google acquires Postini Postini supplies on-demand communications security and compliance solutions to more than 35,000 businesses and 10 million users worldwide. Google said the deal could enable it provide organizations with more hosted services similar to its Google Apps package, which includes its e-mail service Gmail, Calendar, and Talk, its messaging service. Google said Postini will become a wholly-owned subsidiary. The deal is subject to customary closing conditions. The deal is expected to close by the end of the third quarter. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Update: FTC Clears Microsoft's $6 Billion AQuantive Buyout SEATTLE (AP)--Microsoft Corp.'s (MSFT) $6 billion acquisition of online advertising group aQuantive Inc. (AQNT) has cleared an antitrust regulatory hurdle, the companies said Friday. The Federal Trade Commission mandates a waiting period to review anticompetitive fallout from large mergers. In a Securities and Exchange Commission filing Friday, aQuantive said the waiting period passed without requests for further information from the FTC. "We're obviously pleased," said Tom Phillips, a spokesman for Seattle-based aQuantive. A shareholder meeting to vote on the sale of the company is scheduled for Aug. 9. Phillips said aQuantive is still working out how the organization, which employs 2,560 people worldwide, with 662 in Seattle, will look after the buyout. Microsoft's Live search engine lags far behind sites operated by Google Inc. (GOOG) and Yahoo Inc. (YHOO) in the number of searches performed each month. As a result, Microsoft racks up far fewer dollars from the small text ads placed next to search results. Microsoft's acquisition of aQuantive, announced in May, followed Google's announcement that it would pay $3.1 billion for online ad technology company DoubleClick Inc. Microsoft was reportedly interested in DoubleClick as well; aQuantive's ad-serving technology could help the Redmond-based software maker close the gap with Google.. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ AMD sinks $7.5 million into Transmeta Shortly after months of bickering with Intel, Transmeta finally took its ungraceful bow out of the CPU business, but apparently AMD sees something within the company worth investing in. Yesterday, AMD announced that it would be investing $7.5 million in Transmeta in exchange for Transmeta preferred stock, a move that was eloquently dubbed "a strategic investment in the future of Transmeta." Les Crudele, president and CEO of Transmeta, was quoted as saying that his firm looked forward to "continuing its collaboration with AMD on technology initiatives in the future," and AMD returned the lip service favor by boasting about how vital Transmeta was in bringing its AMD64 technology to market. Aw, how touching. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Nigerian school gets 300 OLPCs It's been a long time coming, but the much-vaunted OLPC XO is now slowly making its way to the people it was meant for, recently landing in the hands of 160 school children in Uruguay, and now finding its way to the Galadima Primary School in Abuja, Nigeria. According the News Agency of Nigeria, the school got some 300 OLPCs but is having a slight problem keeping them powered, as the school has no electricity and power at the students' homes is irregular (still no pull-string, it seems). Despite that setback, the students are apparently "very happy" with the laptop, although we're sure they'll be even more pleased when they discover some of the OLPC's non-educational potential. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Bloodstream Mini-robot Two Israeli scientists may have created the catalyst for a medical revolution with their new project: a tiny, 1-millimeter-diameter robot which is capable of crawling through human veins and arteries. The bot can cling to vessel walls using small, powerful arms which protrude from a hub in its center. Manned control is accomplished by using a magnetic field outside of the body, and the robot is able to swim against the flow of blood, as well as squeeze through a variety of arterial openings. Right now the doctors don't know what the medical applications might be, though they speculate that a large number of the bots could be used to fight certain types of cancer. Other ideas on the table include using the bots to exact revenge on anyone opposing their crazy ideas. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ DARPA laser-guided bullets In case you didn't know, part of DARPA's job is just to think up some totally outrageous stuff and then begin to throw money at it. Well, its brain-trust must be working overtime this month, because as a follow up to the invisible, shoot-through shield, we're getting laser-guided bullets. On the very same "budget item justification sheet" in which the aforementioned sci-fi shield is proposed, DARPA honchos "justify" the laser guided bullet project, which will fund research into a low cost, high performance solution for designing "new guidance technologies" that will enable steering of bullets in flight. The hope with this technology is that compact targeting systems (to be embedded in said projectiles) will enable "overmatching fire power" and increased "first shot effectiveness", in addition to potentially cutting down on friendly fire and collateral damage -- and retroactively making JFK's "one-gunman" assassination plausible. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Pioneer Computers' quad core laptop While it can't claim to be the first quad-core laptop, Pioneer Computers' new DreamBook Power D90 SLI can at least claim to be one of the few. This rebranded 17-inch Phantom D900C hails from Australia, and although it features a lot of the same gear -- like the 2.4GHz Core 2 Quad Q6600, dual 512MB NVIDIA GeForce Go 7950 or 8800 cards in SLI, and up to three (yes, three) hard drives which can operate in RAID 0/1/5 -- it's not exactly identical. The company will build these to order, but the base model is considerably stripped down, sporting a measly Core 2 Duo and only 512MB of RAM. To step up to the full on Quad Core experience it's going to cost you (somewhere near $8000 AU, or $6878 US), but who can put a price on lap-searing, jaw-dropping, nosebleed power?. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Boeing Dreamliner Air travel can be the bane of any well-meaning environmentalist. One flight can spew tons of carbon and other pollution into the air, but let’s face it, there are few reasonable alternatives for jetsetters. So it’s great to hear that when Boeing set out to design their new airplane, the 787 Dreamliner they had a more sustainable focus in mind. Using new technologies, such as using lightweight carbon-fiber for the fuselage and wings, instead of aluminum sheeting, Boeing was able to reduce the airplane’s weight. It also increased the fuel efficiency of its new engines, yielding an overall reduction of fuel consumption of almost 30%. Because of the new materials, the humidity in the cabin can be much higher than before, which will provide for better passenger comfort. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Spectec's miniSD GPS with microSD slot GPS, expanded memory -- how is one to choose? Heck, is it fair to even ask one to choose? Spectec thinks not, and if you're sporting a Windows Mobile device with a miniSD slot, you might just be in luck. Its SD effort w

  6. 06/28/2007

    Season 1 Episode 13 - Darpa - 28/06/07

    Summary: This is our 13th episode. In this episode we discuss: DARPA invisible shoot-through shield, BT new ad-heavy payphones, Joost hardware, Microsoft Mediaroom: IPTV, Archos TV Plus, DARPA Scramjet, Yahoo CEO Quits, Eurocom quad-core laptop, NVIDIA Tesla: GPUs now CPUs and Google vs Microsoft. The Word for the day: Deuteronomy 28:1-8 - If you fully obey the LORD your God and carefully follow all his commands I give you today, the LORD your God will set you high above all the nations on earth. All these blessings will come upon you and accompany you if you obey the LORD your God: You will be blessed in the city and blessed in the country. The fruit of your womb will be blessed, and the crops of your land and the young of your livestock the calves of your herds and the lambs of your flocks. Your basket and your kneading trough will be blessed. You will be blessed when you come in and blessed when you go out. The LORD will grant that the enemies who rise up against you will be defeated before you. They will come at you from one direction but flee from you in seven. The LORD will send a blessing on your barns and on everything you put your hand to. The LORD your God will bless you in the land he is giving you. DARPA invisible, shoot-through shield In a move seemingly influenced in equal parts by Halo and David Lynch's film Dune, Darpa has announced that it's ponying up $15 million to develop one-way-invisible, self-healing, shoot-through shields for use in urban combat. While the Pentagon's research division acknowledges that there are "significant technical obstacles" in the process, it's fairly gung-ho about developing a technology combining metamaterials, 'coded' obscurant systems, and a bunch of other stuff no one really understands. Trust us, you'll thank them if the Harkonens try and overthrow your spice-mining operation. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ BT new ad-heavy payphones It looks like the streets of London will soon be getting an extra dash of advertising courtesy of BT, which has begun the roll-out of some fresh new payphones, marking the first redesign the company's done in more than 20 years. Designed in partnership with advertising firm JCDecaux, the so-called Street Talk 6 kiosks boast illuminated scrolling advertisements on the rear and no walls or doors, with only a small plastic hood provided to protect the cellphone-less among you from the elements. Apparently, the payphone's cost BT about £2,000 (or close to $4,000) apiece, although we somehow doubt they'll have much trouble making that back a few times over. Look for the first of the new payphones to hit the Richmond and Ealing boroughs of London this week, with the roll-out presumably set to slowly expand throughout the rest of the U.K. shortly thereafter. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Joost hardware Joost, the hard-partyin', beta-stage releasin', streaming TV-service you've been watching on your PC appears to be making baby-steps towards integrating their service with somebody's third-party set-top box. Joost began making public statements this week suggesting that it's already in talks with manufacturers, although we don't know who or where. According to their executive VP of global advertising, "You will see Joost in the living room," which really only makes sense. Paradigm-shifting media delivery platform or not, people still seem to typically prefer to watch TV sitting on their couch and with their TV. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Microsoft Mediaroom: IPTV We know Microsoft loves TV, between its UltimateTV and Foundation set-top box businesses, continued commitment to the Media Center platform, impending Xbox 360 IPTV rollout (and current downloadable video content over Live), and its nascent Microsoft TV IPTV biz. In fact, it's pretty clear that connected television is the direction the company thinks the medium is headed, and it seems ready to make another push on its core IPTV platform (Microsoft TV IPTV Edition) to the masses by rebranding it as Microsoft Mediaroom and expanding its functionality. The new version of the platform, announced today, features picture in picture (with "enhanced MultiView"), networked media sharing, interactive services, and finally supplementary digital terrestrial television support. Will it affect you, the end user? Only if you're lucky enough to live in one of the select few markets that has IPTV integration -- none of us are, and we're none too bitter about it, too. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Archos TV Plus Not really a surprise that Archos is finally really tying to break into the set-top box business, given its propensity for DVR-recording functionality in its portables line and partial ownership by Echostar, but it looks like the Apple TV has a new device to worry about: the Archos TV. We're still getting details in, but it looks like the 80 - 250GB box will pull content off your home network via WiFi or Ethernet, as well as grab from external storage, in addition to recording DVR-style with component in (and HDMI out). More on this new media streamer we get it. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ DARPA Scramjet Woomera (AUSTRALIA) – A scramjet fired Friday in southern Australia briefly hit speeds of ten times the speed of sound.  The engine was boosted 330 miles into the air and hit 6800 miles per hour on the way down, fast enough to go from Los Angeles to New York in about 25 minutes. The entire flight lasted 12 minutes 15 seconds with the scramjet sitting on top of a fairly conventional rocket for much of the ride.  The rocket had two stages with the first stage dropping off after six seconds.   The second stage took the scramjet into space.  Scramjets must first be propelled to supersonic speeds before igniting since it rams (like its name suggests) atmospheric air into hydrogen fuel.  The advantage of such a design is that scramjets don’t need to carry as much fuel and can have relatively few moving parts. The scramjet was developed as a partnership between the American Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and Australia’s Defence Science and Technology Organisation.  Both groups hope to do at least ten more flights in five years. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Yahoo CEO Quits The chief executive of internet search firm Yahoo, Terry Semel, has quit his position and has been replaced by co-founder Jerry Yang. In the post since 2001, Mr Semel has been under pressure for some time amid disappointing trading results and the growing dominance of rival Google. The firm suffered a 16% fall in profits in the first three months of 2007. Mr Yang helped launch the business, which now has more than 500 million users worldwide, in 1995. Yahoo has struggled in recent years, losing market share to rivals such as Google and being criticised for poor technology and a lack of innovation. It currently accounts for about 26% of all online searches in the US, well behind Google which has a market share above 49%. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Eurocom quad-core laptop We've definitely seen some shady reports of a quad-core laptop make the rounds, and it looks like geographically misnamed Canadian laptop outfit Eurocom is going to be first off the line with a Intel Core 2 Quad notebook. A Eurocom spokesperson apparently confirmed to Laptoping that the company is prepping a quad-core Phantom D900C -- which probably means that monster-laptop Clevo (or whichever company is their ODM) is working on a quad-core D900C, since the Phantom is yet another rebrand. Laptoping says the 17-inch machine will feature a 2.4GHz Q6600 "Kentsfield" Core 2 Quad and dual SLI-capable GeForce Go 8700 or Quadro FX3500 graphics, an HD DVD drive, and up to three drives that can be run as a RAID 0/1/5 array -- all of which means battery life on this 11.9-pound monster will probably run down faster than a 6-minute mile. Still, the idea of stuffing four cores into a laptop gets us all excited, but the current $3,200 pricetag on the dual-core Phantom doesn't bode too well for the double the power. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringn

  7. 06/06/2007

    Season 1 Episode 12 - London Olympics - 05/06/07

    This is our 12th episode. Quad core laptops, RealNetworks RealPlayer, Google Gears, Microsoft Surface Computing, eBay Buys StumbleUpon, Apple TV 160gb Disk, CBS Buys Last.fm, Gmail Attachment Size Increase, Negroponte vs Intel, Dell Not Direct. Also covered as part of our extended podcast: iTunes Plus and EMI's DRM-free music, AT&T IPTV on Apple TV, Apple iPhone June 29th, iTunes Tracks Personal Data, London 2012 Olympics Logo Revealed. The Word For the day: Acts 10:38: how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and power, and how he went around doing good and healing all who were under the power of the devil, because God was with him.

  8. 05/23/2007

    Season 1 Episode 11 - aQuantive - 22/05/07

    This is our 11th episode. In this episode we discuss: Microsoft acquires aQuantive, LG Philips A4 color e-paper, Amazon drm free music, Belkin network usb hub, Vista sells nearly 40m licenses, Fujitsu's 250GB laptop drive, Buffalo's teraStation 4tb NAS, Plastic blood, Samsung 8GB microSD card, Baffled trial judge. The Word for the day: Revelation 22:16 - "I, Jesus, have sent my angel to give you this testimony for the churches. I am the Root and the Offspring of David, and the bright Morning Star."   Microsoft acquires aquantive REDMOND - Microsoft Corp. announced in a press release that it will acquire aQuantive Inc., for $66.50 per share in an all-cash transaction valued at approximately $6 billion. This deal expands upon the company’s previously outlined vision to provide the advertising industry with a world class, Internet-wide advertising platform, as well as a set of tools and services that help its constituents generate the highest possible return on their advertising investments. aQuantive, which has approximately 2600 employees, will continue to operate from its Seattle headquarters as part of Microsoft’s Online Services Business. The combination of Microsoft and aQuantive takes the Company’s advertising platform to the next level in its ability to serve Microsoft’s first party audience assets like MSN, Windows Live, Xbox Live, and Office Live, as well as for third party publishers and applications such as Facebook and Activision game titles. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________   LG Philips A4 color e-paper South Korea's LG Philips has announced that an A4-sized rendition of the vivid bendable display has successfully been developed in its labs. The panel reportedly measures just 35.9-centimeters diagonally, is 0.3-millimeter thick, and can display up to 4,096 colors while maintaining the energy efficient qualities that inevitably come with using energy only when the image changes. Unsurprisingly, the company plans on marketing the device as one of convenience and doesn't hesitate to promote its greenness in the process. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________   Amazon drm free music Just as the Times Online predicted last month, Amazon.com is set to strike a potentially major blow against DRM by launching a download store later this year that will offer millions of songs in unprotected, MP3-only format. Leading the list of a claimed 12,000 record labels is none other than Apple-buddy EMI, which has been widely praised for its decision to distribute unlocked 256kbps tracks on iTunes -- but the lack of any other participating majors means that Amazon just doesn't have the catalog yet to compete with other established megastores. However, a profitable showing from EMI's 'experiment' may very well convince the other labels to accede to consumer demand and start joining the free music party too, meaning that this move by a player like Amazon is certainly nothing to sneeze at. So, here's to Jeff Bezos for his decidedly anti-DRM philosophy (this time around, at least), and to that wonderful day in the future when we'll actually be able to watch all those Lost episodes from iTunes that don't play right on any of our three computers. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________   Belkin network usb hub Right on cue, Belkin has coughed up the official details surrounding the Network USB Hub that we saw last month. As expected, this five-port USB hub will "work with your existing WiFi router to give you wireless access to printers, media readers, and external hard drives by simulating a direct USB connection that makes your computer think that the devices on the network are directly attached to the computer." Moreover, we now know that "special caching techniques" will enable high-speed USB devices to be supported along with isochronous transfers at full speed. The F5L009 is still on track for a June release here in the US, with launches in Asia, Europe, and, Australia to "follow soon". full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________   Vista sells nearly 40m licenses in 100 days In case you're keeping track, nearly 40 million Microsoft Vista licenses have been sold in its first 100 days. According to Bill Gates, 78% of all sales made since the January 30th launch had been for the software's premium versions. Not bad, in fact, pretty damn impressive leaving little doubt that this is Microsoft's most successful OS (measure by rate of sale) ever with record profits sure to follow. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________   Fujitsu's 250GB laptop drive Slide on over Samsung, you'll need to make room on your "world's biggest" pedestal for Fujitsu's new 250GB, 2.5-inch drive for laptops. The MHY2BH matches Samsung's line-up nearly spec-for-spec: 12-ms average seek, 8MB cache, SATA interface, 5,400rpm, 24dB operational wheeze, and a slightly better 1.9W power draw. Still, neither can match the 300GB capacity of Fujitsu's other 2.5-incher. But Fujitsu's latest, just like Sammy's, measures in at a mere 9.5-mm thick -- a full 3-mm less than the 300GB beast -- making these the highest capacity drives available in the ultra-portable slimsters we all crave. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________   Buffalo's teraStation 4tb nas Buffalo is now offering their TeraStation Pro NAS in capacities up to 4TB. That's right, 4,398,046,511,104 bytes which you can carve up to your RAID 1/5/10 delight. It'll cost you ¥378,000 ($3,142) for the ready-made pleasure. There are two USB 2.0 ports for connecting additional external drives and a gigabit Ethernet connection that allows data transfer at up to 38MB/s. Automatic backup software (Windows only) is included and UPS support means power cuts won't physically damage the disks full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________   Plastic blood Researchers at Sheffield University have developed what they're calling "plastic blood" -- a synthetic blood substitute with the consistency of runny honey they say might be used on battlefields and in disaster areas within the next decade. The polymer blood mimics the structure of hemoglobin, the compound in real blood that transports oxygen around the body, but is only intended for short-term use until a real transfusion can be performed. That's still a huge improvement over carrying around real blood, especially since the plastic stuff can be handled and stored at room temperature and is completely sterile. The fake blood hasn't been tested on humans yet, and won't be until additional funding is secured to further refine the formula, but the potential impact of the idea is enormous. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________   Samsung 8GB microSD card Wow, it seems like we were just marveling over the introduction of the world's first 8GB SD card a few moons back. Ah, that's right, we were. Alas, Samsung took it to heart that SD doesn't cut it for your average cellphone (they run a bumpin' mobile business, after all), announcing that it has managed to pack a full eight gigabytes into the microSD form factor for mid-2008 production. That's particularly timely considering that 4GB examples haven't even gotten into widespread circulation yet -- "8GB" just has a nicer ring to it -- not to mention that the new card handily surpasses SDHC guidelines with 16MB/s reads and 6MB/s writes. For the record, a microSD card rocks a little over 20 percent of the surface area of its SD counterpart, so does this mean we can expect 40GB SD cards, like, now? Not quite. full story | contact us | sponsor [weddingringnetwork] ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________   Baffled trial judge LONDON (Reuters) - A British judge admitted on Wednesday he was struggling to cope with basic terms like "Web site" in the trial of three men accus

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