Filed under ‘what were they thinking’ today, an anti-piracy group in Finland known as CIAPC is going to be sued by The Pirate Bay. It sounds a bit ridiculous, but here’s why – the group has launched a website that completely rips off the design of The Pirate Bay, the exception being the logo is now of a sinking ship.

The Pirate Bay is outraged at the blatant site rip-off, and have said that legal action will be taken against CIAPC, stating “People must understand what is right and wrong. Stealing material like this on the internet is a threat to economies worldwide. We feel that we must make a statement and therefore we will sue them for copyright infringement.”

Oh how the tables have turned.

(via TorrentFreak)

Today is Valentine’s Day, and employees at LinkedIn certainly have a reason to be in love. With their CEO that is.

At a hands-on meeting yesterday, Chief Executive Jeff Weiner announced that the company’s nearly 3,500 employees would all be getting iPad minis. A spokesperson for LinkedIn confirmed this, saying “We wanted to acknowledge the hard work and accomplishments of all of our employees in 2012. During today’s biweekly All Hands meeting, we surprised our employees with iPad Minis as a small gesture of the company’s gratitude for their contributions.” Of course employees then took to Twitter to gush over their new toys, with one employee @darainfaraz tweeting “That awesome moment when your CEO dishes out iPad minis to EVERY employee @LinkedIn @jeffweiner“.

LinkedIn has been enjoying a rather positive feel from the market, reporting last week revenues of around $303.6 million, and net income of $11.5 million – plenty to spare a few thousand iPads.

(via Business Insider)

How many people do you know who don’t use Facebook or anyother form of social media platform – Xing, Google+, Instagram…etc? I think you can count them on your fingertips, and I can’t discount parents and grandparents because my folks are on Facebook too!

Over the last few years, these platforms found a way to integrate into our social scenes, and I find them to be BRILLIANT tools. A bit intrusive at times, but mostly very useful. I recently found out through Facebook that one of my favorite professors from my business program was visiting Dubai. That was a reunion worth a million bucks. Thank you, Facebook. And I’m not the only one who believes that. Daniel Kirkpatrick’s book about Facebook is littered with success stories of how people have met or found each other after several years.

But this blog entry isn’t about general social media reunions. Instead I thought I’d discuss how companies are moving beyond setting up these platforms – more specifically, the monetization of social media and how to make money off the very popular platforms.

It is akin to the government first providing us with roads and then installing toll gates to monetize them. Another potential example could be of how some hotels provide Wi-Fi to differentiate but then charge for it at a later stage. As a frequent traveler I expect Wi-Fi to be a utility like water and electricity – included in the room rate.

Facebook (used as an example purely) introduced several new features since its IPO that seek to make money from the platform. I was both amused and disappointed when I found out about the Pay to Promote mechanism where corporate FB pages have to pay for a message to cover 100% of their existing fan base. Amused and disappointed because companies spend a lot of money advertising to build a fan base only to learn that they have to pay several times to reach out to the same fan base.

Games by Zynga and other developers have become a very popular pastime (I find it quite irritating to see my newsfeed littered with play requests from my friends) and they embody the monetization of the platform spirit. Initially the games start as free-to-play, but once addicted, players are asked to fork out real cash to get extra bonuses or advantages.

I recently read about Facebook testing a system where users pay $1 to message people not on their friends list – as a trial, users could send Mark Zuckerberg’s inbox a message for $100!!! But isn’t Facebook about messaging YOUR Friends, i.e., the existing ones? Maybe there is a business sense in messaging strangers?

This is similar to Linkedin’s Inmail service, which I profess that I use as a valuable business tool, but I wonder if Facebook will start charging to even see the profiles of people not yet in my friends list. Or ask users to pay to download high res pictures from your friend’s profile to print on a 4×6 inch photographic paper. The funniest thing would be if Facebook (or any other platform) started charging for every time you login. I bet that would be a natural dampener for anyone using office time to log on to check his/her FB status.

Manish Punjabi, Marketing Manager (MENA) at AMD. His postings are his own opinions and may not represent AMD’s positions, strategies or opinions. Links to third party sites, and references to third party trademarks, are provided for convenience and illustrative purposes only. Unless explicitly stated, AMD is not responsible for the contents of such links, and no third party endorsement of AMD or any of its products is implied

The Galaxy Camera combines high performance photography with the Android platform and mobile internet connectivity. The result is a powerful point and shoot camera with a familiar, intuitive user interface. It’s a whole new kind of camera that doesn’t just capture smiles, it lets you use voice commands, share images and videos instantly and take full advantage of the Android 4.1, Jelly Bean platform.

Check out our review of Samsung Galaxy Camera to see what makes it so good.

Having Google as the default search engine on Safari in your iOS device means a lot of money trading hands. And despite Apple and Google being fierce competitors  if someone is paying you up to $1 billion just to allow their service to be used on your devices, it’s hard to say no.

Financial analyst Scott Devitt from Morgan Stanley, is reported by Tech Crunch shwoing the amount of money Google gives Apple for being their default search engine on Safari on all iOS devices could be $1 billion for the next year. It seems that the price is calculated on the number of units sold. From 2011 to 2012 the charge per unit went from $3 to $3.2, and for this year and the next the estimate is a marginal increase going from $3.3 per unit in 2013 to $3.5 per unit in 2014.

Of course, this rate can go up or down depending on how well Android devices, Samsung in particularly, are going to do this year and the next. And companies paying for search engine defaults is nothing new. Google also pays Mozilla for being their default search engine, estimated to give them $400 million for 2014. Meanwhile Microsoft also has deals setup with Nokia and BlackBerry to use Bing as their default search engines.

At a press event yesterday in Dubai, BenQ unveiled its full lineup of projectors available in the region, in addition to focusing on two new models, the W1080ST and W1070. The W1080ST is the world’s first full HD short-throw projector, that is capable of projecting a 100-inch screen from a distance of just 1.5 meters. It also supports multiple connectivity options and is powerful enough to use during day and night time lighting conditions. Manish Bakshi, Managing Director, BenQ Middle East & Africa, commented that this year will mark an increased push from BenQ to highlight their projectors in the market, in a time where a lot of consumers are looking at investing in a home cinema experience.

Press Release: Dubai, UAE, 12th February 2012 – BenQ, the global leader in DLP® projector market introduces their latest creation, the world’s first Full-HD short-throw video projector, the W1080ST and the W1070. BenQ which is currently at No. 2 market position with a 13.23% market share in the Middle East and Africa region is a most trusted name in short-throw projector segment as well as has a complete home entertainment and cinema product line-up.

“BenQ has always been at the forefront in bringing more enjoyment to users’ viewing experience. This year, our R&D has combined short-throw technology with Full-HD video projector to level-up home cinema entertainment,” said Manish Bakshi, Managing Director, BenQ Middle East & Africa.

“The launch of W1080 ST and W1070 will strengthen our 3D Full-HD video projectors in the region. We are optimistic that BenQ will continue to lead the projector market in the Middle East as we bring new products with digital lifestyle innovations,” Bakshi added.

The BenQ W1080ST, the first short-throw Full-HD video projector is able to project 100 inch big screen in just 1.5meter which gives big screen fun in any limited space. With ISF certification, supporting multiple 3D forms, a brightness of 2000 ANSI lumen, and a contrast ratio of 10,000:1, W1080ST presents an excellent image quality. Together with Rich connectivity including 2 HDMI ports, built-in 10W speakers and SmartEco power saving feature also make W1080ST a perfect home entertainment projector. The W1070 entails all the superior specs as the W1080ST minus the short throw capability.

The world’s first Full-HD short-throw video projector
As the world’s first Full HD short-throw video projector, the BenQ W1080ST provides a 65” image at a distance of just one meter, and a 100” image at a distance of 1.5 meter, without image obstruction or shadows on the screen, ideal in any situation, but particularly important when for use with motion sensing games.

Brilliant Image Performance
With a brightness of 2,000 lumens and a contrast ratio of 10,000:1, the W1080ST & W1070 showcases Full-HD content in a sharp, 1080p definition image. Blu-ray video, console games and HD broadcasting are displayed in beautiful, high-contrast quality without any downscaling or compression. The two models have ISF Certified Calibration Controls with Day & Night modes and can adapt to the layout and size of any room and any ambient light level. Moreover, the projector also supports different 3D formats and with an HDMI connection, consumers can easily experience the virtual reality of 3D movies and games.

Easy setup
There is no need for setting up with Hi-Fi or external speakers. The W1080ST & W1070 have a built-in 10W speaker that makes setup easy and is free of annoying wires or cables. However, rich connectivity (HDMI x 2, Composite Video in (RCA), S-Video in (Mini DIN 4pin), Component Video in, Audio L/R in (RCA), USB, RS232 (DB-9pin), DC 12V Trigger, etc.) meets all the demands of the home user for different Audio & Video devices.

World-Leading SmartEco™ Technology, Green up your living room
BenQ’s SmartEco technology has provided a perfect DLP projector for use in home entertainment. This special innovation, can save up to 70% of lamp power consumption and lower maintenance costs through its dynamic power saving features while still bringing an ultra-vivid picture quality to your living room.

Among the BenQ video projectors already available in the market are W7000+, the first projector in the world to be accredited with the TUV Rheinland 3D Full HD Certification; and W710ST, world’s first short throw HD-ready home theatre projector. The W7000+ is also compatible with the latest HDMI standard allowing to directly play 3D movies from a Blu-ray DVD player, live sports via cable or satellite and 3D video games on PlayStation 3 without additional setup. It is also packed with BrilliantColor™, Texas Instrument’s DynamicBlack™, and Philip’s VIDI™ lamp technology to deliver a 50000:1 high contrast ratio, and 2000AL to render high quality images.

Meanwhile, the W710ST projector’s unique lens design can deliver 63-inch of cinema quality projection at just one metre allowing users to view any movies or enjoy any motion-control game even in small spaces. It also has a built-in 10W big speaker and can transform any audio-visual entertainment with industry-leading 3D technologies, DLP Link™ and NVIDIA 3D® Vision™.

Android is certainly the OS of choice when it comes to affordable tablets. In recent years we’ve seen tablets of all sizes powered by Google’s OS; some do it well while others are just cheap paperweights. I managed to get my hands on the Prestigion MultiPad 7.0 Prime Duo this week for a quick review, to see if it was a capable Android tablet or just another one to be abandoned in the corner.

Build quality & design

What impressed me most about the MultiPad was its build quality. The sleek little tablet is mostly made of plastic, but despite this feels quite study in your hands. The back is covered with a smooth metallic finish with the Prestigio logo on it, with the rear-facing camera at the top. Around the top of the tablet you’ll find a microUSB port for charging as well as the power button; adjacent to that you’ll find the volume rocker. Oddly enough, the speakers are placed at the bottom, and when holding the tablet horizontally they tend to be covered up, muffling the sound quite a bit. A microSD slot is hidden at the back, behind the large plastic cover near the rear camera.

Despite the somewhat low-end pitch of the MultiPad, it looks and feels much better than any of the cheaper Android tablets that I’ve reviewed over months passed.

Specifications

The specifications on the MultiPad are decent, given that it’s supposed to be an affordable entry-level tablet in the first place. The 1.5GHz processor is more than capable of running Android Ice Cream Sandwich, and the 16GB offers plenty of initial storage space for media. While I didn’t expect the MultiPad to have NFC, I was surprised that it didn’t have Bluetooth, which is something I’ve seen on some other Android tablets. This means you won’t be able to connect Bluetooth hardware such as speakers or headphones, which is a bit of a disappointment.

Benchmarks and Performance

While this may be billed as an entry-level Android tablet, the MultiPad was actually a great joy to use. It took around 48 seconds to boot up from a powered-off state, and once it was up and running it sailed through the screens and apps. Okay, maybe ‘sailed through’ is a bit of a stretch, but it was certainly fast enough to launch apps and get a decent amount of work done.

Browsing on the MultiPad went off without a hitch, with websites rendering fairly quickly and apps launching nearly instantly. As seen in other Android tablets there is a bit of a delay in switching between horizontal and vertical orientation, but other than that you won’t run into any issues running any of the basic apps on the MultiPad. There’s also a cable included that you can connect to the microUSB port to allow you to use full-fledged USB devices such as hard drives, keyboards, mice, and 3G dongles.

UI and Apps

The MultiPad comes with the stock Ice Cream Sandwich UI and a few basic apps pre-installed. In fact, when you first turn on the tablet and set it up, it asks you if you’d like to install the bundled third-party apps, which is a great idea because choosing not to install most of the apps can reduce the amount of bloatware you’re running on the tablet anyway. You get some useful apps such as Skype, Instagram, an ereader, and even a Currency converter, and you’ve got full access to the Google Play store as well.

Screen and Camera

The screen on the MultiPad is certainly better than the ones I’ve seen on other Android, but it won’t blow you away. The 1,024×600 resolution is decent enough to watch videos and HD clips without noticeable pixellation, though the screen’s glossy surface means that you’ll run into a few issues using the MultiPad in bright light or outside.

The camera on the MultiPad certainly won’t impress you, with the 2MP rear camera producing very washed out images overall. Still, I’ve always said that tablets really aren’t suited for taking photos with anyway, and the MultiPad is no exception.

Sound Quality  & Battery Life

The sound on the Multipad is great if you have headphones. The inbuilt speaker is loud enough at full volume, but due to the speaker placement the sound gets very muffled when you hold the tablet horizontally as your hand will most likely cover the speaker. Battery life was rather poor, with the Multipad dying after about 4 hours of usage, which included streaming videos from YouTube, surfing the web, and playing a few Android games. Clearly battery life won’t be the MultiPad’s winning points.

Conclusion

So where does the Prestigio MultiPad sit among the slew of Android tablets in the market? Well it’s neither here or there to be honest – on one hand it does sport a better than average build quality and slighty speedier response time, but on the other hand it doesn’t have a very good battery life, something which is almost crucial for a tablet. Still, the MultiPad is a decent and affordable Android tablet even if it does have a few kinks that need ironing out.

The Samsung Galaxy EK-GC100 is an Android based smart camera, which for all intents and purposes is a smartphone, except for the call making part. Also the body is like a big point & shoot camera. As the name suggests, the Galaxy Camera is part of Samsung’s lineup of Android powered smart cameras (and smartphones), Jelly Bean in this case. The idea is that you have the sensor of capable taking point & shoot quality photos (a step above smartphone cameras) with a large screen on the back that facilitates the camera to be used as an Android powered smartphone or tablet. With a WiFi connection, or better yet, data plan on your SIM card you can share the photos with anyone instantly.

Body

So let’s have a look at the body of the Galaxy Camera, which is mostly white plastic with chrome blue edging. The main body is relatively thin, with the zoom lens housing popping out in the front, and the hand grip protruding from the right.

The miniUSB charge and data port is on the left along with the 3.5mm headphones jack. At the bottom we have a microHDMI port next to the battery flap, inside which also resides the microSD and regular SIM card slot.

Turn to the back and we have a 4.7-inch TFT LCD touchscreen on the back. Thankfully Samsung decided to forgo their popular OLED screen on most of their Galaxy smartphones because it would have been extremely difficult to see anything on the screen, much less a preview of your photos, under direct sunlight.

Specs

The screen itself supports a decent 1280 x 720 resolution, giving it a crisp 306ppi pixel density. Powering the camera is Samsung’s famous Exynos 4412 quad-core Cortex A9 processor running at 1.4GHz with a Mali-400MP graphics processor. Couple this with the 1GB RAM and 4GB built-in memory, the Galaxy Camera is basically a Galaxy S III.

Camera

The differentiating factor is obviously that instead of the 8MP camera on the S III, the Galaxy Camera has a 16.3MP camera with 21x optical zoom. There’s a proper pop-up xenon flash with AF assist light and video recording modes ranging from 1080p @ 30fps to 720p @ 60fps to 768 x 512 @ 120fps.

Usage

After using the Galaxy camera the first thing you notice is that while the camera is definitely better than any smartphone camera, as you can see from the test images below, it lacks the kind of punchy performance from high-end point & shoots such as the Sony RX100. Of course, the RX100 also costs a third more than the Galaxy Camera.

The battery life is pretty average, with just photos and previews lasting 2 seconds giving me an average battery life of 167 photos. The Galaxy Camera has some pretty aggressive power saving options wherein it goes to sleep soon after its inactive. Push the shutter release button and it’ll resume where you left off. A cold boot is required if the Galaxy Camera was inactive for 24 hours, requiring almost 30 seconds to start up! In this regard it’s left far behind modern point & shoots.  Of course, watching YouTube videos, recording and doing minimal editing on videos, taking multiple photos and heavily editing them on Snapspeed along with upload via WiFi drained the battery in about 7 hours, which is not bad at all. If you play games, and use 3G a lot, expect the battery to drain out even quicker.

At the end of the day the results were satisfactory, above average for sure, but nothing remarkable. Obviously the quality of photos really depends on how good of lighting conditions you have.  Thanks to the Android Jelly Bean, however, I was able to edit every picture in Snapspeed and make them look really good.

The fact that these pictures were being processed within a second or two after multiple effects were applied to them is thanks to the powerful hardware inside. Sharing said photos was the same as any smartphone; just connect via WiFi or 3G and upload them on Facebook or Twitter, etc. The difference being that you base photo (assuming you edit it) is going to be much better than what you would have gotten from say the Galaxy S III or iPhone 5.

Conclusion

The idea that Samsung portrays is that you can use the Galaxy Camera anywhere, get better photos than a regular smartphone camera, edit (if needed) and share it online instantly and seamlessly. However, throughout my time spent with it I can’t help but feel that people who have a smartphone will probably not want to lug around something as big as the Galaxy camera, they may as well take a micro 4/3^rd or mirrorless camera with them.

So who is the Galaxy Camera for? Tourists. If you’re going to travel to another country, grab a SIM with decent data package, take (better than smartphone) photos, share photos on the fly, use the Android OS to do everything and anything, and make calls on Skype if need be. You have a fully capable device in the Galaxy Camera; it’s just a matter of using it in the proper environment, which is not day to day, but on those memorable trips where you want to be connected to the world all the same.

Right now the camera sensor on the Galaxy Camera is found wanting, but hopefully with future iterations we see a better sensor, more aggressive noise reduction and a much smaller body. As more and more mirrorless cameras and DSLRs come with WiFi connectivity, there’s certainly place in the market for a decent camera running on smartphone hardware giving you powerful editing tools and instantaneous sharing ability.

What do you do for fun? I find it hard to fathom how someone like you can just disconnect. Disconnect from the emails, calls ,the media. All of it. What would be your definition of a chill and fun day?

I love playing tennis. I am an avid bridge player (a card game if you have not heard of it – it was more popular in the past!). I like to tour interesting things with my kids like power plants, garbage dumps, the Large Hadron Collider, Antarctica, missile Silos (Arizona),… I read a lot and watch courses (online or the Learning Company)..

What emerging technology today do you think will cause another big stir for the average consumer in the same way that the home computer did years ago?

Robots, pervasive screens, speech interaction will all change the way we look at “computers”. Once seeing, hearing, and reading (including handwriting) work very well you will interact in new ways..

Windows 7 or Windows 8?

Higher is better.

How do you measure the success of the foundation?How does the foundation differ from other large philanthropic organizations?

Our goals are focused on helping the poorest (globally) and improving education (in the US). We spend half of our money on global health. One metric to look at is reducing the number of children (under 5) who die. My annual letter talks about the amazing progress that has been made on this. Amazingly as health improves families choose to have less kids so paradoxically population growth goes DOWN as you improve health helping with almost every issue – from stability to the environment..

The Rosling video I posted on Sunday talks about this:http://www.reddit.com/r/videos/comments/189bwr/most_people_still_think_of_the_world_as_being/

What’s your worst fear for the future of the world?

Hopefully we won’t have terrorists using nuclear weapons or biological weapons. We should make sure that stays hard. I am disappointed more isn’t being done to reduce carbon emissions. Governments need to spend more on basic energy R&D to make sure we get cheap non-CO2 emitting sources as soon as possible.
Overall I am pretty optimistic. Things are a lot better than they were 200 years ago..

Since becoming wealthy, what’s the cheapest thing that gives you the most pleasure?

Kids. Cheap cheeseburgers. Open Course Ware courses…
Where are you acquiring these cheap kids from? The stork.

What type of computer are you using right now?

I just got my Surface Pro a week ago and it is very nice. I am using a Perceptive Pixel display right now – huge Windows 8 touch whiteboard. These will come down in price over time and be pervasive… (http://i.imgur.com/1JqrLVc.jpg)

If Microsoft didn’t take off, what would you have done and be doing instead?

If the microprocessor had NOT come along I am not sure what I would have done. Maybe medicine or theoretical math but it is hard to say.

Did you ever own a Macintosh?

Microsoft does a lot of software for the Mac. I mostly use Windows machines but from time to time I have tried all of Apple products.

I’m not Bill Gates, but he has made a huge positive influence. Many wealthy people I know point to Bill Gates as their idol. Not for his Microsoft days, but for his philanthropy. He also simultaneously killed many of my friend’s hundred million dollar trust funds after their parents discovered that Bill was only leaving $10 million for his children.

I definitely think leaving kids massive amounts of money is not a favor to them. Warren Buffett was part of an article in Fortune talking about this in 1986 before I met him and it made me think about it and decide he was right. Some people disagree with this but Melinda and I feel good about it.

How was your relationship with Steve jobs? I always hoped that y’all were really good friends and competitors.

He and I respected each other. Our biggest joint project was the Mac where Microsoft had more people on the project than Apple did as we wrote a lot of applications. I saw Steve regularly over the years including spending an afternoon with him a few months before he tragically passed away…

What do people give you for your birthday, given that you can buy anything you want?

Free software. Just kidding. Books actually.

—

Check out the full AMA here – it’s quite informative and gives an excellent perspective of what he thinks and his plans for the future. Oh, and he also has a small request: http://i.imgur.com/D3qRaty.jpg

With the new release of iOS 6.1 you would have assumed that Apple would have done their homework before releasing such a big patch out to all their devices. Turned out the iPhone 4S didn’t sit well with the new update as news started streaming in that people were having dropped connections, or worse yet, no connections at all. The issue plagued both regular reception and 3G connectivity.

Yesterday, however, Apple released a small patch as told by MacRumors, dubbed iOS 6.1.1 designed specifically for the iPhone 4S which literally “fixes…cellular performance and reliability for iPhone 4S”. So all you iPhone 4S owners should get this update ASAP, the rest of the iOS device owners needn’t bother.