32221483
submission
bobwrit writes:
Let's be honest — we all want a a 3D printer to call our own, right? Price has always been a significant barrier to the dream of printing pretty much everything your imagination can conjure (barring some hardware limitations, of course). For its part, MakerBot has made some significant strides toward tearing some of those barriers, and now Solidoodle, led by that company's former COO Samuel Cervantes, is looking to take the trend even further. The company's current self-tilted model starts at just under $500. The printer, which is now up for pre-order, can print plastic pieces up to 6" x 6" x 6", and "all you need to supply is a computer and power." Also, interestingly, "a 200-pound man can literally stand on top of the machine while it's printing. " So, that's a bonus
32114195
submission
bobwrit writes:
(Note: Other sources: http://assets.sbnation.com/assets/1078445/337_752_ID.pdf and http://www.theverge.com/2012/4/23/2970035/xbox-360-found-to-infringe-motorola-patents-in-preliminary-itc-ruling )
From the article:
" Potential bad news to start out the week for Microsofties: a judge from the US International Trade Commission has issued a preliminary ruling that finds Microsoft's Xbox 360 infringes on five of Motorola's patents. While the decision is by no means final — which means that the Redmond outfit could ultimately prevail — a final ruling would force Microsoft's hand to seek proper licenses for the technologies, most of which relate to H.264 video encoding, or have its gaming console banned from US shelves. For now, the lawyers will go back to the lab to refine their arguments and get ready to present them to a full panel of ITC judges later this year. Who wants to set odds on the outcome?"
31878965
submission
bobwrit writes:
If reports Wednesday are to be believed, one of the tech industry's biggest deals in recent history was hammered out almost exclusively by two 20-somethings over the course of what amounts to a long weekend.
On April 8, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg let the company's board of directors know he was about to spend $1 billion on hot photo start-up Instagram — just hours before the deal was done, according to the Wall Street Journal.
The deal was nailed down, unnamed sources told the Journal, in only three days. Meetings between Zuckerberg, 27, and Instagram head Kevin Systrom, 28, that took place at Zuckerberg's multi-million-dollar Palo Alto, California, home.
It's a move that shows Zuckerberg displaying the hacker spirit that helped him launch a social-media juggernaut in his college dorm room. And that's a spirit that doesn't always jibe with the image of CEO of a corporation expected to be valued at up to $100 billion when it makes its first public stock offering in the next few weeks.
31833787
submission
bobwrit writes:
"Today, Samsung announced that they will be lowering the price of the original Galaxy Tab to $50, with a new Verizon contract. This offer will be sustained until April 22nd. This tablet is still being shipped with Android 2.2 on it. It also has a back facing 3 MP camera, with a front facing 1.3 MP camera. In order to get this price, you will need to order the tablet from the Verizon store."
31719061
submission
bobwrit writes:
Today, Facebook announced that they will provide its users with a download of all of the data it collects on them. In this data, it includes: chat logs, photos, friends. friend's emails, wit all posts, IP Addresses you have used, the previous names you have used, friend requests you have made, and more will be added soon. For the friend's emails, they only show users the emails that their friends have shared with them(so, if their email is listed as only viewable to them, or group you're not in, you can't see it). They also stated that this expanded archive will slowly roll out to all of the sites 845 million users.
31697433
submission
bobwrit writes:
Earlier this week, it was revealed that aerospace firm Boeing was working on a high security mobile device for the various intelligence departments. This device will most likely be released later this year, and at a lower price point than other mobile phones targeted at the same communities. Typically, phones in this range cost about 15,000-20,000 per phone, and use custom hardware and software to get the job done. This phone will most likely use Android as it's main operating system of choice, which lowers the cost per phone, since Boeing's developers don't have to write their own operating system from scratch.
31609591
submission
bobwrit writes:
From the Article:
"
Today, Facebook announced that they will provide its users with a download of all of the data it collects on them. In this data, it includes: chat logs, photos, friends. friend's emails, wit all posts, IP Addresses you have used, the previous names you have used, friend requests you have made, and more will be added soon. For the friend's emails, they only show users the emails that their friends have shared with them(so, if their email is listed as only viewable to them, or group you're not in, you can't see it). They also stated that this expanded archive will slowly roll out to all of the sites 845 million users.
"
31199267
submission
bobwrit writes:
From the article:
"
Global Payments, one of the more popular 3rd party payment processors, revealed today that it had 1,500,000 Mastercard and Visa account's information breached from their servers. The company began showing signs that it had been broken into on Friday, when it announced that 50,000 accounts had been compromised. However, the company claims that the breech is contained to the best of their ability, and not to worry. However, it is largely uncertain what specific pieces of data were affected. We do know, however, that at least the credit card numbers were accessed.
"
31147185
submission
bobwrit writes:
From the article:
" Today, Google announced that for gMail, they will be introducing a new keyboard for the app. This keyboard is called 'Google Tap'. The goal of this keyboard is to make it simpler and easier for the everyday user to use. How Google achieves this, is that it gives 3 buttons to input text: A dot, a slash, and a space. Their reasoning for this is, "What is easier to use than 3 buttons?". How you input text, is you input it using Morse Code. You can also use two separate keyboards, to double your typing speed and to be able to type two separate messages at once. "
31043631
submission
bobwrit writes:
From the article:
"
Today, the Supreme Court declared that, for the current US Patent system, human genes are unpatentable. This opens up the door for the court to declare genes in general to be unpatentable, but it still is yet to be seen whether or not the Supreme Court will take up such a case. This decision largely comes from a decision last week, in which the court threw out a couple more patents for genes.
"
29412717
submission
bobwrit writes:
For the first time since Windows 3.1, released in 1990, Microsoft announced today that the Windows 8 logo will no longer be a waving flag. Instead, the logo will be -wait for it- a window. It will also be a single color, instead of the classic 4 color pattern that has also been used since 1990. The logo will be a light to mid dark, in perspective, so it appears the windows are closer to you on the right side. Overall, the logo takes hints from more modern graphic design techniques.
