Technology
Google, that witty, funny, and unwaveringly supportive search engine that has continued to bring us novel ideas and products, has, quite frankly let their greed overtake them. If you heard that Google employees were actively helping a man advertise illegal drugs online you’d be shocked right? Well what if you heard that Google executives were in on it as well? Appalled? You should be because it is true, according to wsj.
Back in 2009 a federal prisoner by the name of David Whitaker was the lead actor in an investigation of Google’s advertising operations. The United States government took action against the internet giant and had David Whitaker (an experienced con artist) pose as an agent for online drug dealers. Mr. Whitaker then spent over four months contacting Google (and being contacted in return) about advertising narcotics, steroids, and other illegal and controlled substances. +Continue Reading
IPv6 is an extended addressing system for networks. It provides 3.4 x 1038 addresses (about 670 quadrillion addresses for every square mm of the entire surface of our planet), compared to 4.29 x 109 for IPv4, the existing protocol (not even one single IP address per person on Earth). Herein lies the justification alone for converting existing networks to the new IPv6 protocol.
IPv6 was announced and then disappeared. Today it is back again, but is not going anywhere this time. The Internet Society gave a public announcement Tuesday of the “World IPv6 Launch Day”. It is the beginning of the last stage of transitioning out of IPv4 and into IPv6. This launch day is still a little more than five months off, due June 6, but it is quite nearly a year following a 24-hour test run of the IP protocol. At that time quite a number of high profile businesses activated IPv6 AAAA record resolution on the domain for their main websites. +Continue Reading
Last year, in March 2011, the iPad 2 was released by Apple. Just a few months after that device was released the iPhone 4 was revamped and the iPhone 4S was released on October 4, 2011. Thousands of consumers flocked over to purchase these new gadgets – marveling in their capabilities and features however the new-ness quickly wore off and they began anticipating the release of something else: the jailbreak.
After months of waiting the Chronic Dev Team (a team of iOS hackers dedicated to freeing Apple products from their obnoxious constraints) began teasing followers with tidbits of information on the release of the jailbreak.
At first it was just tweets stating they were working on it tirelessly and that they “were close” and then, much to everyone’s delight, a video was released showing an untethered iPhone 4S sporting Cydia (see it here on YouTube). +Continue Reading
Apple is pushing to get the momentum going on another digital revolution. It is a revolution that has been trying to gather enough steam to get going for some time. Think ebooks and education. Apple has launched a new publishing software for creating textbooks.
Textbooks are a real problem that desperately needs addressing. For centuries they have been printed and little has changed. Textbooks require too many tangible resources to produce and once they are published, the information is outdated almost instantly.
A more recently acknowledged problem is that the backpacks of school children are now 25% of their own body weight. Back problems and bad posture are the school children’s disease in this day and age. Something must be done about it and Apple has taken it on. +Continue Reading
Windows has taken the brunt of attacks from hackers over the decades. No one will argue against that statement. Very few, however, in the Open world give Microsoft credit from not locking down the hardware Mac-style. This liberal mindset has allowed alternatives to flourish, particularly in the Linux world. The bell may be cracked however, in this ringing of liberty and it may all soon come to an end.
Microsoft has developed a newer tradition of requiring hardware manufacturers to meet certain requirements in order to be able to advertise themselves as “Designed for Windows”. Typically these requirements have not interfered with the user customizing their own system. After all, “The PC” is short for what used to be called the “IBM Compatible PC” and designated a modular, interchangeable and basically open system, customizable by the owner. Microsoft began changing this when made their licenses a lease of the operating system, essentially retaining full ownership of your copy of their software. This was the first step toward the closed universe, and many technicians were prophesying such. +Continue Reading
A year ago Samsung unveiled a new series of laptops known as the Series 9 laptop at the Consumer Electronics Show 2011. These incredibly thin laptops are known as ultrabooks became popular ever since their first release. Now every major laptop manufacturer is producing ultrabooks this year for the CES 2012, and Samsung is adding to the collection as well.
Revisiting their original Series 9 laptops Samsung decided to spice the collection up with two new Series 9 laptops. These two are not actually termed “ultrabooks” however they are incredibly thin and weigh next to nothing. The two laptops are a 13.3 inch and a 15 inch laptop. The 13.3 inch model weighs just 2.5 pounds while the 15 inch model weighs only one pound more.
These two new Series 9 laptops boast beautiful dark aluminum cases that make them sleek, lightweight, and incredibly durable. Additionally Samsung is using a new trick that will delight customers: fitting a larger display on a smaller chassis. Their 15 inch display model is set in a 14 inch chassis while the other 13.3 inch display is fit on a 12 inch chassis. +Continue Reading
In the United States there is fierce competition between e-readers, especially between the two biggest names in the business: Amazon and Barnes & Noble. While both the Kindle and the Nook have incredible features and are fantastic e-reading devices, a new contender recently emerged overseas and was just announced at the Consumer Electronics Show on January 10th.
Qualcomm Chief Executive Paul Jacobs had the pleasure of announcing the thinnest and lightest e-reader at the CES 2012 the other day. It’s called the Hanvon C18 and Hanvon utilized Qualcomm’s new energy efficient mirasol display for their new e-reader.
Mirasol is a technology Qualcomm has been working on for several years and it is a solution to the energy consuming LCD displays that other devices utilize. Mirsol is a type of display screen that utilizes soft indirect light which is then tuned and reflected back at the viewer. Overall the Mirasol display uses 1/10th of the power to create a vivid image than an LCD screen does. +Continue Reading
Google, that witty, funny, and unwaveringly supportive search engine that has continued to bring us novel ideas and products, has, quite frankly let their greed overtake them. If you heard that Google employees were actively helping a man advertise illegal drugs online you’d be shocked right? Well what if you heard that Google executives were in on it as well? Appalled? You should be because it is true, according to wsj.
