Tech Droids | Technology News

By Roy

The search giant has been accused by the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry ( IFPI ) for failing to deliver on promises to tackle illegal file sharing. The IFPI said in a statement that Google had promised changes to clamp down on copyright infringement a year ago,  but they have remained unfulfilled and that Google was allegedly profiting from piracy. In response, Google declined to comment on what is called a " press stunt".

By Roy

By Roy

The world's largest electronics show, CES, is losing its anchor exhibitor, Microsoft. The company has announced that the upcoming show in January will be its last. Microsoft said it decided to pull out of CES as the exhibition has no longer fits its needs and its timing with its product announcements. The decision follows in the footsteps of other prominent tech companies, such as Apple, Amazon and Facebook, which have opted to host exclusives private conventions instead of being part of the show exhibitions. 

By Roy

By Roy

Sony's next generation portable, the Playstation Vita, has been been launched with a myriad of glitches. Users have reported problems when powering up and shutting down the hand held console, unresponsive touchscreens, crash and freezes.

By Roy

Google has launched a new facial recognition service for its social networking website Google +. Find My Face scans photos of users and identifies familiar faces in the same way Facebook's Photo Tag Suggestions utility does. 

By Roy

A team of engineers from the University of Bristol in England has developed the world's first programmable, multi-purpose quantum photonic computer chip - a big step towards making quantum computing a reality. 

By Roy

California teen Angela Zhang, 17, won the top individual honors at a United States high- school science competition for inventing a nanoparticle which delivers cancer drugs directly to tumour cells -  without affecting the cells' surrounding healthy tissue.

The particle, which she describes as the " Swiss Army Knife of cancer treatments ", is able to release a drug when activated by a laser. It also allows researchers to monitor the effects of the treatment in real time using current imaging techniques, although it may be decades before it can be used in humans. 

By Roy

Massachusetts Institute of Technology ( MIT ) researchers have created an imaging system which can acquire visual data at the rate of one trillion exposures per second. 

By Roy

Tis the season of giving and it seems that Google know it and is doing it in style. Each Google's employees will be receiving a special limited edition of the Galaxy Nexus. Cool right?

Meanwhile in London and Zurich, employees are already snapping up the mobile phone fast. In order to get one, Google's employees have to line up a long queue but their patience will be rewarded. Google's employees around the world will have to wait but with five days to go, each one of them will get their Galaxy Nexus in time.

Source From Tech Crunch

Wow!

They must be breaking mirrors, opening umbrellas and walking under ladders over at RIM because this is starting to get unbelievable. A big rig, carrying around 5,000 BlackBerry PlayBooks, was stolen in Indiana.

The PlayBook has been a rough product for the Waterloo-based company. While RIM did quite a bit right with the little tab, lack of native email and calendar support made it a tough sell. The price tag didn’t help either, though RIM’s done what it can to squash that issue. In fact, PlayBook sales are actually looking up compared to what they’ve been.

Of course, the truck had no tracking software included, so at this point your guess as to where it may be is as good as mine. But the FBI’s guesses are a bit more informed, and they think that the truck may be headed to Miami, a popular spot for stolen goods.

So if you happen to see about 5,000 BlackBerry Playbooks being sold in a shady store in Miami, call the cops. Not out of the moral goodness in your heart, but out of sheer sympathy for RIM. The company has already lost around $485 million due to PlayBook inventory write-offs (translation: we can’t sell ‘em), but according to Electronista, this extra $1.7 million can’t hurt that bad.

By Roy

Amazon's Kindle Fire is not the only one gearing up for a major update. Its mortal enemy, Barnes & Nobles announced yesterday that it will release an update for its Nook Color E-Reader. The update known as version 1.4 will include popular apps like Netflix, Pandora and Flixter.

The update will be the biggest ever for the Nook Color which has been in the market for about a year. What's new are NookComics – which adds a large collection of full-color comics and Marvel graphic novels and - PagePerfect Nook Books with ebooks focused on images, such as cooking and art books.

Source From Mashable

Rich Warren, a software engineer from Houston, Texas, never imagined his daughter would be brought to tears by Google. Sadly, that’s exactly what Warren claims happened — via a post on Google+ — when Google shut down his daughter’s account Sunday morning, because according to the company’s policy she is too young.

Google’s decision raises an important discussion about how young is too young for using the Internet, particularly in this increasingly digital age.

Warren started a Google account for her daughter so she could stay in touch with her grandparents and friends. Haruko, Warren’s daughter, also started a Blogger account as part of a class project. She’s now lost access to those blog posts, homework saved on her Google account and the contact information of far-away friends.

Under Google’s Terms of Service, you can’t use Google’s services if you’re not “of legal age to form a binding contract with Google,” or if you’re prevented from using Google’s services by the law of the country in which you live. In the U.S., Google must comply with the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), under which children younger than 13 must provide the permission of a parent or guardian before giving out personal information online. Google doesn’t collect permissions for its services, and many other U.S.-based companies take this route to avoid dealing with COPPA.

Because Haruko was younger than 13 when her account was created, Google decided to shut down her account without warning. And then came the tears. Google’s Terms of Service clearly state their age requirement, but Warren argues Google had many ways to deal with his daughter’s account other than deletion.

What does Warren want?

“An apology would always be nice,” he wrote. “I’d like to know what my options are. Can I download her contacts and e-mails? Quite a few other people have had similar problems. Is Google doing anything to solve [the problem]?”

By Roy

Blackberry 10 will now be the official name for RIM new generation of OS. The BBX name will no longer be used after losing a lawsuit battle against BASIS International, a company that has been using the name for its software products.