Wednesday 26 February 2014

Messaging app Telegram added 5m new users the day after WhatsApp outage

Facebook may have agreed to pay up to $19bn for messaging app WhatsApp, but that company’s rivals may benefit from an influx of new users as a result.
One, Telegram Messenger, is already feeling the impact. “4.95 million people signed up for Telegram today. Telegram is #1 most downloaded iPhone app in 48 countries,” the company revealed late last night (23 February) through its official Twitter account.
That’s a startling number for an app that as recently as October 2013 had around 100,000 daily active users. A case of WhatsApp users fleeing from Facebook? Perhaps, but it seems no coincidence that Telegram’s 5m signups happened the day after a high-profile outage for WhatsApp, when its service was unavailable for four hours.
Telegram wasn’t immune from technical problems over the weekend though, as it struggled to cope with the huge number of new users. “Due to the insane growth rate our cluster in Europe experienced a 2-hour downtime today. We are adding servers, but it takes time,” tweeted the company.
“We expected 1 million registrations per day max; 5 million daily signups seemed crazy,” its account replied to one user, before telling another that: “Frankly, we’d rather have a gradual organic growth. Our plan was to be ready for this kind of growth in 2 months, not now.”
Telegram launched for iPhone in August 2013, then Android that October. It is run by a team based in Berlin, although its financial backer is Russian entrepreneur Pavel Durov, the founder of Russian social network vKontakte. He worked with his brother Nikolai on Telegram.

WhatsApp: a guide to the future of messaging apps

Facebook’s $19bn acquisition of WhatsApp this week does much more than measure the breadth of Mark Zuckerberg’s spending power and his company’s ambition. It should highlight how important one of the most basic forms of digital communication – messaging – is to the internet’s future.
Here’s the first thing about all of this you should know: while US companies obviously have significant purchasing power, American startups are in some ways behind the global curve; much of the innovation is happening thousands of miles away from Menlo Park. And here’s the second thing: WhatsApp’s competitors make its current revenue model look really, really sluggish.
Messaging is enticing for a few reasons. For one, it’s a medium used by people all over the world. For another, it’s quieter; messages deliver a stream of photos, video or simple text direct from loved ones, without the added noise of everyone else on the internet. Messages provide for the fastest way for people to connect or find each other in a crowd. And messages allow people to buy stuff – lots and lots of stuff – in an almost criminally seamless manner.
Consider the following a 101 guide to some of the messaging apps you may not have heard about, including a brief refresher on WhatsApp. These apps provide services that WhatsApp/Facebook may hope to emulate in the race to make money and literally monopolize the world’s attention. (And if that sounds creepy, that’s because it sort of is.

App: WhatsApp

Short attention span version: Born and bred in Silicon Valley by two ex-Yahoo employees, this app registers one million new users per day, and 450m users per month use the service to send text, photo and video. And now it’s worth a lot of money.

WhatsApp, the messaging service bought by Facebook for $19bn.

Where it’s popular: Europe – up to 80% market penetration in countries including Brazil, Germany, Portugal and Spain – and Latin America, India
Numbers: $19bm is the only number anyone’s paying attention to at the moment
Why it’s worth watching: See above. Also, WhatsApp’s revenue strategy ($1 after a year of free use) looks especially sluggish compared to other apps offering similar services.
More reading: Dominic Rushe’s breaking story on the acquisition also has great background on founders’ visions for the tool – and more numbers, if you need them.

Samsung Galaxy S5 unveiled: Fingerprint scanner, 16-megapixel camera, but still a plastic body

At its Unpacked event in Barcelona, Samsung has released the Galaxy S5 — and, to the surprise of everyone, three new smartwatches: the Gear 2, Gear 2 Neo, and the Gear Fit. We’ll talk about the smartwatches in a separate story and will focus on the Galaxy S5 here.
The Galaxy S5 is, for all intents and purposes, the Galaxy S4 but with a few cool new features: a fingerprint scanner, a heartbeat sensor, and some tech that constantly calibrates the AMOLED screen to compensate for ambient lighting, to ensure that those gaudy super-saturated colors are always present no matter the conditions. The Galaxy S5 is indeed splash-proof (similar to the S4 Active), but not ruggedized. This post will be updated with the release date and pricing when we know it (soon).
Specs-wise, the Galaxy S5 is not a huge step up from the S4. The 5.1-inch 1920×1080 (432 ppi) Super AMOLED screen is as wondrous as ever. Under the hood there’s a top-of-the-range Snapdragon 800 (MSM8974) SoC clocked at 2.5GHz, with the Adreno 330 GPU. There’s 802.11ac with MIMO, and LTE/WiFi aggregation — a relatively new feature that lets you download files over both connections at once.
On the back of the S5 is a heartbeat sensor (it’s close to the camera) — put your finger over it, and S Health picks up your heart rate very quickly. The home button, as expected, is now a fingerprint scanner — and yes, unfortunately, you have to swipe your finger over it (it remains to be seen how stable a 5-inch phone is, when swiping your thumb). There is a special chip that adjusts the screen’s contrast and color gamut, so that it retains the over-saturated AMOLED “pop” under different lighting conditions.

Why Microsoft lost Ford Sync

Ford is calling off the car connectivity relationship with Microsoft that produced Ford Sync. Ford instead will partner with Blackberry and use its QNX operating system. Worse for Microsoft, it’s possible other auto companies might bail on the company in the future. These automakers are looking for a technology partner that is able to lower their costs, improve performance and reliability, and get more third-party apps into the dash, and Microsoft hasn’t been pulling its weight.
Microsoft is far from dead in the water — the software giant counts more than a dozen automakers as clients and we understand that several are happy customers. Bing is picking up support in the dash in response to a power play by Google that may have backfired. And even when Ford pulls the plug, there’s still a decade of revenues coming from Ford because of the need to support and update legacy systems until end-of-life (currently about 11 years). About 7 million Ford and Lincoln Sync cars are on the road.

“Industry’s worst-kept secret”
Here’s what’s happening, according to industry sources, none of whom want to be quoted because Detroit and Silicon Valley love gossip but not gossipers. In 2008, Ford thought it had a winner when it became the first automaker in the US to work with Microsoft for an in-dash infotainment solution providing Bluetooth, USB, voice recognition, a touchscreen interface, and optionally navigation. It shipped first on the 2008 Ford Focus and underwent continual improvement since then, in response to continual griping. Fiat introduced a similar Microsoft product, Blue&Me, a year earlier in Europe.

Ford tried to improve Sync, and leaned on Microsoft to improve the back end, but the improvements apparently weren’t enough, especially as other automakers brought out systems that owners liked better (some ironically using Microsoft software in the background). Rising expectations for functionality rose faster than Ford could make improvements. Satisfaction ratings fell. Some say Microsoft got the basics right — Bluetooth, voice input — but never got past that plateau of core functionality. As a result, Ford will switch from Microsoft to RIM’s QNX. The deal hasn’t been announced but it has also been described as “industry’s worst-kept secret.”

The $629 Blackphone is more anti-Google than anti-government

Silent Circle and Geeksphone announced the Blackphone earlier this year as everyone was still wringing their hands over NSA spying. The stated goal was to make communications private, just like they ought to be. Of course, that was conflated with an NSA-proof phone, which it’s not. Now, the Blackphone is up for pre-order and Silent Circle has explained more about how the handset will work. Spoiler: it’s not doing anything new, but it does come with a full suite of privacy-minded apps and services. With the Blackphone, what it lacks may be just as important as what it includes.

The Blackphone clocks in at $629, which is right up there with the unlocked cost of most flagship smartphones. The device will run on a 2GHz (or higher) quad-core ARM chip, with 2GB of RAM and 16GB of internal storage. Wondering about a microSD card for more storage? What, and let someone walk away with your data? Surely you jest. Buyers will also be treated to a 4.7-inch 720p LCD and 802.11n WiFi. Despite the privacy focus, the Blackphone does still have the usual HSPA+, LTE, and GPS.

The hardware is fine, though likely generic. The real selling point of the Blackphone is the software it runs. The company calls it PrivatOS, and it’s based on the open source version of Android. Most other Android devices you buy have Google’s services woven into the foundation of the OS, but not Blackphone. This device comes bundled with only Silent Circle apps and a few select third-party services for secure file sharing and VPNs. That means you don’t have access to Google’s app ecosystem, cloud platform, or location services. Although, that’s kind of why you’d buy the Blackphone.

Monday 24 February 2014

Google Fiber looks to bring gigabit internet to 34 new cities

At long last, Google has announced that it intends to roll out Google Fiber to 34 new cities in nine metropolitan areas, including San Antonio, San Jose, Portland, Phoenix, and Atlanta (a complete list is included below). Google Fiber has been a big success so far, offering true gigabit (1000 megabits per second) speeds to the populace of Kansas City and Provo. Later this year, Google Fiber will be turned on in the popular tech hub of Austin. Hopefully this expansion to 34 new cities is a sign that Google eventually intends to bring Google Fiber to larger/denser metropolitan areas, like New York City, San Francisco, and Chicago. At long last, America’s incumbent last-mile ISP monopolies, such as Comcast and Time Warner Cable, have something to be afraid of.

Google Fiber is one of Google’s more interesting side projects, bringing gigabit internet access to a few select cities in the US. Gigabit, or 1000Mbps, is about 100 times faster than the average US internet connection. It was first turned on in Kansas City in 2012, expanded to Provo (Utah) in January 2014, and is currently being rolled out in Austin (it’s scheduled to be turned on sometime this year). Google is now looking to expand Google Fiber to 34 cities in nine new metro areas: Atlanta, Charlotte, Nashville, Salt Lake City, San Antonio, Phoenix, Portland, Raleigh-Durham, and San Jose. For a complete list of cities, hit up the Google Fiber website.

Facebook acquires WhatsApp for $19 billion

Facebook acquired WhatsApp for the princely (and ludicrous) sum of $19 billion in cash and stock. This is one of the largest acquisitions in Silicon Valley history — and yet, if you’re American, you probably don’t even know what WhatsApp is, let alone why it’s worth $19 billion. In a sentence, WhatsApp replaces text messaging (SMS) — and it has grown to 450 million monthly users in under five years. While a purchase price of $19 billion might seem like insanity, especially when compared to its $1 billion acquisition of Instagram, it’s actually a savvy (or desperate, depending on your point of view) move to ensure that Facebook remains the world’s predominant messaging platform.

What is WhatsApp?

The short answer is that WhatsApp is a replacement for SMS (texting) for every major mobile platform (iOS, Android, Symbian, Windows Phone, BlackBerry) — but it also allows you to send photos, videos, and audio clips as well. Because it uses the internet, and thus your data package, it avoids the crazy fees that some carriers charge for SMS. WhatsApp has done for instant messaging what Skype did for international calling, basically.

Tesla earnings: Model X

Electric car maker Tesla announced its fourth quarter earnings on Wednesday, and in the process assuaged any fears that last year’s high-profile car fires would be a long-term drag on the company.
Tesla lost big in the third quarter of 2013 when those fires were top of mind for consumers, but the end of 2013 finished strong with record sales of 6892 Model S vehicles. That means Tesla hit the 25% growth target it set for itself in Q3, but it’s being even more confident going forward. The exact amount of money made or lost depends on who you ask. Using non-GAAP standards, Tesla had a $46 million profit, but lost $16 million under GAAP guidelines.
In Tesla’s case, that means the resale value guarantee (RVG) is a substantial drag on the “official” number. When you finance a car from Tesla, the company offers to buy the vehicle back between the 36th and 39th month of the loan at a guaranteed value — 50% of the purchase price. It’s a generous offer, and one that makes a dent in Tesla’s profits.
The Q4 results were certainly strong, but Tesla also feels the trend will continue upward. The car maker expects to increase vehicle delivery growth by 55 percent during 2014. That would take Tesla from 600 cars per week to more than 1000. It’s good news for fans of electric vehicles in general and Tesla in particular, but things are going to pick up even more when Tesla starts shipping cars to China this spring.

Sunday 9 February 2014

Best Android tablets to buy in 2014

1. Samsung Galaxy NotePRO 12.2

Perfect for business folk, the largest of Samsung's tab line-up boasts a laptop encroaching 12.2-inch display with a resolution of 2560x1600 and the nitfty ability to use four apps at the same time. An interface re-jig, named Magazine UX pulls in a load of content in a design that doesn't look that much different from the tiles in Windows 8. As it's part of the Note series, you'll have access to the S-Pen for drawing, making notes and the like. Under the faux-leather hood is a Snapdragon 800 processor, a whopping 3GB RAM, Android 4.4 Kit Kat, while an 8-meg cam takes care of the snaps.
Price: TBA | Samsung

2. Samsung Galaxy TabPRO 8.4, 10.1 and 12.2

Not content with just unleashing one version of its new TabPRO, the latest slate from Samsung comes in three flavours - an iPad Mini and LG G-Pad baiting 8.3 incher, a more traditional 10.1 and an extra large 12.2-inch version. Even with these different sizes, each boast a 2560x1600 resolution, Android 4.4 and a snappy Snapdragon 800 processor, while the larger 12.2 device packs 3GB of RAM (the others still have the reasonable 2GB). A new and rather nice looking Magazine UX displays all your content in an easy to read manner, while there's an 8-meg snapper on the rear to take care of photos. It looks like Samsung has finally stepped up its game when it comes to tablets.
Price: TBA | Samsung

3. Nexus 7 (2013)

Love: Superb value for money with plenty of power, a premium build and great, high-res screen. Added rear camera and stereo speakers. Android 4.3 Jelly Bean
Hate: Limited, non-expandable storage.
T3.com Says: We're predicting a solid upgrade on last year’s beauty. Thinner, lighter, faster and with a pin-sharp display.
Price: £199 (16GB) £239 (32GB) | Google | T3 review

Next Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 (2014 edition)

4. Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 (2014 edition)

Announced along side the Galaxy Gear and Note 3, the Note 10.1 sports an impressive 2560x1600 display, 8-core Octa chipset and 3GB of RAM – pretty fantastic sounding specs. It also features the same faux-leather rear as the Note 3, a nice change from the slimy plastic of old. There’s an 8-megapixel rear camera, a 2-mp one on the front and a range of storage and connectivity options, plus full support for the Galaxy Gear
Price: £480 | Samsung

Next LG G Pad

5. LG G Pad

Following on from the release of the G2, LG are back in the Android tablet game, pinning their hopes on the G Pad. Announced just before IFA, the G Pad boasts a 1920 x 1200 display, powered by a Snapdragon 600 processor. The 8.3-inch display pits it against Apple’s super popular iPad Mini and the lack of bezels give a nice edge to edge feel. Many LG software tweaks are added to Android 4.2.2, including QPair – for connecting your smartphone.
Price: £259 | LG

Next Kindle Fire HDX

6. Kindle Fire HDX

Amazon has really beefed up the specs this year, with a quad-core Snapdragon 800 processor, 2GB RAM and a unique Mayday feature that puts a trained Amazon customer service advisor right onto your screen. You should get 11 hours of battery life, which can be extender further when reading.
Price: £199 (16GB) | Amazon | Learn more about Mayday

Next Sony Xperia Tablet Z

7. Sony Xperia Tablet Z

Love: Slimline and waterproof, just like the Xperia Z smartphone. Solid spec list.
Hate: Screen delivers pale colours
T3 says: Thin, light and hard as nails. A real Android tablet contender
Price: £492 | Sony | T3 review

Next Asus Transformer Pad TF701T

You Can Find Hall Online In Amravati (India)

Mywedhalls is a platform to organizing a successful Wedding event.It is the destination for wedding venue! We are excited to help you and to make the moment willingly in your life.

We have Halls for various purpose in one place to help you plan this joyous occasion.It helps the to couples and their parents to easily and efficiently manage to their big day.

Desktop phones face extinction as smartphones take over

One in eight businesses is already using such services with a third planning to do so within the next two years.

The study also showed a resounding 72% of IT managers believed all business calls would eventually become free within the next ten years.
Charlie Whelpton, Director of Unified Communications at Timico, said: “It’s interesting to see that businesses are increasingly turning towards free services to carry out business calls, although it is strongly recommended that any business of considerable size fully analyses the security risk of using such platforms”.
Archaic landline phones are a thing of the past as smartphones can offer greater cost savings, flexibility and a far wider range of services.
Business smartphones are already being incorporated as personal extension numbers are rerouted directly to the mobile device.
Whelpton concluded: “With Gartner revealing that smartphone sales accounted for 55% of overall mobile phone sales in the third quarter of 2013, it would be foolish for businesses not to prepare for a time when desktop phones will seem archaic.”

Windows 8.1 Update 1 leaks: Boots to the Desktop by default, allows Metro apps to be minimized

A build of Windows 8.1 Update 1 has leaked onto various file sharing websites. The build is a couple of weeks older than the one we covered in the story below, but most of the major changes are there (booting straight to the desktop, the menu bar on Metro apps to make them more mouse-and-keyboard friendly).
The latest build of Windows 8.1 Update 1 has leaked, revealing many of the changes that Microsoft hopes will make Metro less painful for desktop users. The biggest change appears to be that Windows 8.1 Update 1 will boot straight to the Desktop interface by default, reducing Metro to its rightful role as a full-screen Start menu. This, of course, would be a complete 180 from the original release of Windows 8, which defaulted to the Metro interface and lacked an easy way to see the Desktop after logging in.
Other notable changes in the leaked build of Windows 8.1 Update 1 are the addition of a power button to the Metro interface (no longer must you swipe in from the right-hand side!), and the option to “minimize” Metro apps, strongly hinting that Metro apps will be usable on the Desktop. (One of the screenshots shows the Windows Store icon on the taskbar, too.) Apparently, if you have a Windows tablet that’s smaller than 8.5 inches, the power button won’t be present, preventing you from accidentally turning your tablet off.

It appears Microsoft might finally be tackling Windows 8′s issues with high-resolution displays, too. Windows 8 and 8.1 are rather limited in their support for high-resolution (150+ PPI) displays, offering a slider with just three UI scaling options. Update 1 will now include three new scaling options: 200%, 250%, and Custom (up to 500%). This should mean that your Lenovo, Dell, and Samsung laptops with 3200×1800 displays will now actually be usable. This change should also help if you have a 24- or 28-inch 4K display (32-inch displays are generally okay due to their lower PPI).
But let’s get back to the main point at hand: If Windows 8.1 Update 1 really does boot to the Desktop by default, we’re talking about a huge change of direction for Microsoft. Despite massive pushback from consumers over the Metro interface, Microsoft has remained steadfast. If we’re brutally honest, we actually agree that popularizing the Metro interface is vital for Microsoft’s future, and that he Desktop’s days are numbered — but forcing mouse and keyboard users to use the Metro interface was just plain stupid. It would have required almost no effort on Microsoft’s behalf to make the Desktop UI the default for non-touchscreen devices.

IBM is looking at leaving the semiconductor manufacturing industry

IBM doesn’t plan to stop manufacturing its Power-based processors — it simply wants to sell the plants to someone who would operate them, similar to how GlobalFoundries and AMD remain connected via contract despite being independent companies. On the other hand, the less-than-amazing performance of the GF-AMD partnership is proof that this kind of maneuver doesn’t always yield the dividends either company might wish for. When AMD spun GF off in 2009, the expectation and hope was for GlobalFoundries to quickly match TSMC’s 28nm ramp-up, capture a significant portion of the high-margin wins at 28nm, and then push forward to cut Intel’s two-year process lead. None of that happened.
IBM has two major foundries — a 300mm production facility (Building 323) in East Fishkill New York and an older production complex in Burlington, Vermont. The East Fishkill facility uses 300mm wafers and is building 22nm processors while the older Burlington facility may be split between 300mm and 200mm production. Reports differ on this last point.

Upcoming flood of new top-level domains could change how we surf the internet

A big name start-up called Donuts Inc. is finally getting a chance to test its great theory of the internet: URLs matter, and if Donuts just happens to get rich along the way, so be it. That’s the sales pitch, as the company rolls out the first seven of potentially hundreds of new top-level domains (TLDs), insisting that the new approach will change the way we use the internet. The new TLDs (sometimes called generic TLDs or gTLDs), which became available this week through dozens of domain sales companies, are: .bike, .clothing, .guru, .holdings, .plumbing, .singles, and .ventures. That .com of yours seems a little dull now, eh?

So, why do you care? Unless you’d already been planning on starting up a clothing company, you probably don’t in the short term. However, it is true that the new regulatory approach to URLs, first exploited here by Donuts, could be revolutionary — ICANN, the body in charge of administering TLDs, decided a few years ago to allow open season on address endings. If you’ve got $185,000 lying around to buy an application, and another $25,000 per year for administration fees, then you can go register just about any string of three or more letters.

Saturday 8 February 2014

2014 Hyundai Santa Fe review: Driver-friendly tech sets it apart

The yearlong rollout of the redesigned Hyundai Santa Fe SUV is now complete, including the addition of three useful tech-based driver aids. Parking sonar, blind spot detection, and xenon headlamps are available on the 2014 Hyundai Santa Fe, which now comes in a two-row version called the Santa Fe Sport and a longer three-row Santa Fe.
Hyundai is adding the kinds of tech that buyers have on their wishlists. These are features that would make the company late to the game if added a year from now but that are nice to see today. And they come in addition to the existing backup camera option, which has been made standard on some trim lines and cheaper on others. That’s important on a first-class SUV that cries out for better rear vision.
The Santa Fe is one of the best midsize SUVs, more for its mainstream features and cockpit fit-and-finish than fuel economy or smothering levels of tech. Leaders in the mainstream price class offer what Hyundai just added, plus lane departure warning, adaptive cruise control, city safety and pedestrian safety emergency stopping at low speeds. The best SUVs today are the Subaru Forester, our Editors’ Choice among compact SUVs and one of the 10 best tech cars of 2013; the Volvo XC60; and the Ford Escape. Now the Santa Fe is a more serious competitor among tech-savvy buyers. In a few years, it will be rare midsize vehicle that doesn’t offer blind spot detection, lane departure warning, and parking sonar. The rear camera appears likely to be mandated the Department of Transportation.

Microsoft’s new CEO is Satya Nadella – and Bill Gates is officially coming back

Microsoft’s new CEO is Satya Nadella. He will replace Steve Ballmer immediately, becoming only the third ever CEO of Microsoft. As expected, Bill Gates is also stepping down as chairman and assuming the new title of Technology Advisor, which will “substantially increase” his time at the company. Nadella is a Microsoft veteran of 20 years, where he has mostly worked on enterprise-facing products (cloud, server, tools) — but as far as the industry and consumers are concerned he’s a relative nobody.
Nadella, 46, was born in India, where he played a lot of cricket. He obtained a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering in India, and then a master’s degrees in computer science from the University of Wisconsin and business administration from the University of Chicago. He started off at Sun Microsystems in the 1990s, and then moved to Microsoft in 1992 to help develop Windows NT. Since then, he’s worked within a number of Microsoft departments, mostly on the server and enterprise side of things. Before becoming CEO he was head of Microsoft’s Cloud and Enterprise group.

V2V: What are vehicle-to-vehicle communications and how do they work?

Vehicle-to-vehicle communications moved one step closer to reality this week with the Obama administration’s plans to push the technology forward. The February 3rd announcement outlines a set of proposed rules would be announced for comment by the time this administration departs in 2017, with hopes that sometime around 2020, cars will communicate with each other and alert drivers to roadside hazards ahead. What happened this week was a plan by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to have a plan.
Simply put, the first generation of V2V systems would warn the driver but not take control of the car. Later implementations would improve to brake or steer around obstacles and eventually merge with self-driving cars. Here’s our rundown of V2V technologies and some of the implications…

What is V2V?

Vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communications comprises a wireless network where automobiles send messages to each other with information about what they’re doing. This data would include speed, location, direction of travel, braking, and loss of stability. Vehicle-to-vehicle technology uses dedicated short-range communications (DSRC), a standard set forth by bodies like FCC and ISO. Sometimes it’s described as being a WiFi network because one of the possible frequencies is 5.9GHz, which is used by WiFi, but it’s more accurate to say “WiFi-like.” The range is up to 300 meters or 1000 feet or about 10 seconds at highway speeds (not 3 seconds as some reports say).
V2V would be a mesh network, meaning every node (car, smart traffic signal, etc.) could send, capture and retransmit signals. Five to 10 hops on the network would gather traffic conditions a mile ahead. That’s enough time for even the most distracted driver to take his foot off the gas.
On the first cars, V2V warnings might come to the driver as an alert, perhaps a red light that flashes in the instrument panel, or an amber then red alert for escalating problems. It might indicate the direction of the threat. All that is fluid for now since V2V is still a concept with several thousand working prototypes or retrofitted test cars. Most of the prototypes have advanced to stage where the cars brake and sometimes steer around hazards. Why? It’s more exciting for a legislator or journalist to see a car that stops or swerves, not one with a flashing lamp.
Traffic signals or other stationary devices are called V2I, or vehicle to infrastructure. Often they’re just rolled into the V2V umbrella to avoid too many TLAs (three-letter acronyms). Some automakers have their own terms for V2V such as Car-to-X, which encompasses other vehicles and the infrastructure. There’s also a push for the term “internet of cars” playing off “internet of things“ as well as the broader term “connected car” which covers telematics as well and the popular-press term “talking car.” V2V seems to be the phrase that’s winning out.

Moto G comes to India with a starting price of Rs. 12,499

Motorola has finally launched the Moto G in India. The 8GB variant has been priced at Rs. 12,499, while the 16GB variant has been priced at Rs. 13,999. The phone will be available from online retailer Flipkart starting Wednesday.

Motorola has also announced cases and cover for Moto G: the Moto G Back Cover is now available at Rs. 899 on Flipkart, while the Grip Cover is priced at Rs. 1,099 and the Moto G Flip Cover comes at Rs. 1,599.

The Moto G runs Android 4.3 out-of-the-box, but Android 4.4.2 update should be available over-the-air soon. The dual-SIM variant has been launched in India, with Micro-SIM card slots. The Moto G features a 4.5-inch HD 'edge-to-edge' display with a resolution of 720x1280 pixels (translating to a pixel density of 329ppi) and boasts of a Corning Gorilla Glass 3 screen.

Powered by a quad-core 1.2GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 processor coupled with an Adreno 305 GPU, the Moto G features 1GB of RAM. On the optics front, the Moto G sports a 5-megapixel rear camera along with an LED flash and also includes a 1.3-megapixel front-facing camera. The rear camera supports HD (720p) video recording.

LG G Flex with 6-inch curved display launched in India at Rs. 69,999

LG has finally announced the launch of its much-awaited G Flex curved display smartphone in India, at Rs. 69,999. The South Korean major has confirmed that the LG G Flex will be hitting the Indian stores starting Thursday.

In early February, LG had listed the G Flex smartphone on the company's official India site with the same price, and no availability.

Notably, the LG G Flex with a whopping price of Rs. 69,999 has become one of most costly smartphones available in the Indian market leaving behind the Apple iPhone 5s, Samsung Galaxy Note 3 and HTC One Max.

Back in December 2013, along with the launch of the LG 55EA9800 55-inch curved OLED television in India, the Korean consumer electronics giant had announced the G Flex for the country, and given a tentative February 2014 launch date.

LG launched its first curved display smartphone in October last year with much fanfare, and it was rolled out only in South Korea initially.

The Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean-based G Flex is powered by a quad-core 2.26GHz Snapdragon 800 (MSM8974) processor with an Adreno 330 GPU, and 2GB of RAM. It features a 13-megapixel rear camera, and a 2.1-megapixel front-facing camera. The G Flex is powered by a 3,500mAh battery, weighs 177 grams, and is 7.9mm at its thinnest, while being 8.7mm at its thickest.

Nokia X budget Android phone

The Nokia X handset, handset was previously said to sport a 5-megapixel rear camera, however the CamSpeed benchmark hints the handset will arrive with a lower 3-megapixel shooter.

Similarly, contradicting the previous rumours of running a highly customized version of Android 4.4 Kitkat OS, the Nokia X will be running Android 4.1.2 Jelly Bean OS, according to Sofica's Twitter post.

Also last week, a new leak via Browsermark 2 benchmark's database purportedly revealed the alleged Nokia X phone to come with model number RM-980. Unfortunately, the listing did not reveal any details about the device, but includes an image that purportedly showed Nokia X wearing Nexus 5's wallpaper and home screen icons.

Some of the other rumoured features of the Nokia X smartphone include a dual-core Snapdragon processor clocking at 1GHz, a 4-inch TFT display with a resolution of 480x854 (FWVGA) pixels, 4GB storage with microSD card, 1500mAh battery, 512MB RAM, and dual-SIM support.

Wednesday 5 February 2014

Pebble v2.0 and App Store

Pebble has finally released version 2.0 of its smartwatch app, firmware and development framework. The tiny company, which rose to prominence following a record-setting Kickstarter campaign, has been testing its v2.0 framework for several months. The release makes it possible for developers to create more powerful and versatile watch apps. For Pebble users, the refreshed iPhone app includes a new Pebble App Store, which gives them a simple, cohesive way to discover and install new watch apps and faces. The update applies to the original Pebble as well as to the recently launched Pebble Steel.

Nokia X budget Android phone reportedly certified in Indonesia, Malaysia

Nokia's anticipated Android-powered handset, the Nokia X (also known as Nokia Normandy), has continued to stay in the news, and now new reports indicate the handset has been certified in Indonesia and Malaysia.
It is being reported that a Nokia device with a model number RM-980 (previously spotted in a benchmark listing) has been spotted at Malaysia's certification body, soon after it was noted that the same device had been spotted at Indonesia's certification agency.
Recently enough, the Nokia X handset was said to fall under the Nokia's Asha device line-up. Reports state an unnamed senior executive officer from Nokia India, who reportedly also confirmed that the much-rumoured dual-SIM Windows Phone device, aka Moneypenny, would be launched in the country at the same time.

Microsoft Names India-born Satya Nadella as CEO

Software giant Microsoft today named Hyberabad-born Satya Nadella as its new Chief Executive Officer, replacing Steve Ballmer.

“As Satya Nadella becomes the third CEO of Microsoft, he brings a relentless drive for innovation and a spirit of collaboration to this new role,” Microsoft said in a statement.

Nadella, 46, is taking over at a time when the world’s largest software company is expanding its focus to devices and cloud infrastructure.

“The opportunity ahead for Microsoft is vast, but, to seize it, we must move faster, push harder and continue to transform,” Nadella said in the statement.

Facebook launches Internet.org Initiative To Connect The Unconnected World

Facebook announced that it has partnered with Samsung, Nokia, Ericsson, MediaTek, Opera and Qualcomm to launch a project called Internet.org, to make the worldwide web available to two-thirds of the planet still not connected to the Internet with internet access via cheaper devices, better business models and better infrastructure.