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BBC News - Technology
Call to check on mobile security
Owners of mobile phones are being asked to test the security of their network to see if enough is being done to stop eavesdropping.
Owners of mobile phones are being asked to test the security of their network to see if enough is being done to stop eavesdropping.
UK troops use iPad app for fire mission training
Newsbeat's had an exclusive look at new training being given to UK soldiers at the Royal School of Artillery in Wiltshire.
Newsbeat's had an exclusive look at new training being given to UK soldiers at the Royal School of Artillery in Wiltshire.
Facebook data hoarder speaks out
Security researcher Ron Bowes tells BBC News why he collected and published the personal details of 100m Facebook users.
Security researcher Ron Bowes tells BBC News why he collected and published the personal details of 100m Facebook users.
Chip sales boost Samsung profits
Samsung Electronics reports record quarterly profits thanks to higher sales of smartphones and components such as memory chips.
Samsung Electronics reports record quarterly profits thanks to higher sales of smartphones and components such as memory chips.
Google cleared of wi-fi snooping
No "significant" personal data was grabbed by Google when it snooped on wi-fi networks, says the UK data protection office.
No "significant" personal data was grabbed by Google when it snooped on wi-fi networks, says the UK data protection office.
Amazon offers new look UK Kindle
Online retailer Amazon launches its popular Kindle e-reader into the UK market for the first time, with a new look and more books.
Online retailer Amazon launches its popular Kindle e-reader into the UK market for the first time, with a new look and more books.
Nintendo game copiers 'illegal'
A High Court has ruled that devices that allow gamers to play pirated video games on the Nintendo DS console are illegal in the UK.
A High Court has ruled that devices that allow gamers to play pirated video games on the Nintendo DS console are illegal in the UK.
Government's £6m web search bill
Four government departments spent almost £6m ensuring their websites appeared on search engine results pages, new figures show.
Four government departments spent almost £6m ensuring their websites appeared on search engine results pages, new figures show.
Legal action on 'zombie cookies'
Lawsuit filed in San Francisco district court after firms resurrected deleted browser cookies.
Lawsuit filed in San Francisco district court after firms resurrected deleted browser cookies.
State of global internet revealed
Asian countries top the charts when it comes to internet speeds, according to a global survey by network giant Akamai.
Asian countries top the charts when it comes to internet speeds, according to a global survey by network giant Akamai.
Latest
HP Pavilion dm4-1050ea
The Pavilion dm4-1050ea's all-metal chassis makes it feel like a high-class piece of kit, as does its high-resolution, 14-inch screen. Its lack of a dedicated graphics card means you won't be playing the latest games on this machine, but it offers decent performance in other areas
The Pavilion dm4-1050ea's all-metal chassis makes it feel like a high-class piece of kit, as does its high-resolution, 14-inch screen. Its lack of a dedicated graphics card means you won't be playing the latest games on this machine, but it offers decent performance in other areas
Panasonic Lumix DMC-G2
The 12.1-megapixel Lumix DMC-G2 is a great Micro Four Thirds camera. It feels very well made and it shoots vivid, sharp pictures. Its heaps of complicated features can make it disorientating to use, but there's plenty to get your teeth stuck into, and the touchscreen is a welcome extra
The 12.1-megapixel Lumix DMC-G2 is a great Micro Four Thirds camera. It feels very well made and it shoots vivid, sharp pictures. Its heaps of complicated features can make it disorientating to use, but there's plenty to get your teeth stuck into, and the touchscreen is a welcome extra
Acer Stream
The Stream is Acer's best Android handset so far. The customised user interface and 720p video-recording capability aren't all they're cracked up to be, but the large touchscreen is wonderful, and you can play back movies and photos on your high-definition TV via the HDMI output
The Stream is Acer's best Android handset so far. The customised user interface and 720p video-recording capability aren't all they're cracked up to be, but the large touchscreen is wonderful, and you can play back movies and photos on your high-definition TV via the HDMI output
ZTE Racer
The Racer is an impressive Android handset at a rock-bottom price. It feels plasticky and its resistive screen doesn't support multi-touch, but ZTE's made precious few other cost-saving cuts. Running version 2.1 of Android and offering loads of features, it's well worth a look for broke folk
The Racer is an impressive Android handset at a rock-bottom price. It feels plasticky and its resistive screen doesn't support multi-touch, but ZTE's made precious few other cost-saving cuts. Running version 2.1 of Android and offering loads of features, it's well worth a look for broke folk
Sigma DP2s
The DP2s is a compact camera with a big sensor, a minimum of controls and a distinct lack of bells and whistles. If you're an experienced photographer who wants a camera that does what you tell it to and takes great pictures, you should check it out
The DP2s is a compact camera with a big sensor, a minimum of controls and a distinct lack of bells and whistles. If you're an experienced photographer who wants a camera that does what you tell it to and takes great pictures, you should check it out
Nokia C6
The C6 is a Symbian-based smart phone that packs a slide-out Qwerty keyboard, a resistive touchscreen and heaps of connectivity options. From a distance, it looks like Nokia's flagship phone of yesteryear, the N97. But does it cut the smart-phone mustard?
The C6 is a Symbian-based smart phone that packs a slide-out Qwerty keyboard, a resistive touchscreen and heaps of connectivity options. From a distance, it looks like Nokia's flagship phone of yesteryear, the N97. But does it cut the smart-phone mustard?
Panasonic HM-TA1
The HM-TA1 is the latest affordable, high-definition mini-camcorder to hit town, and we took a sneaky peek at it during a recent jolly with Panasonic. Its lack of Wi-Fi connectivity is disappointing, but it's a solid effort otherwise, and you can use it as a webcam when it's hooked up to your PC
The HM-TA1 is the latest affordable, high-definition mini-camcorder to hit town, and we took a sneaky peek at it during a recent jolly with Panasonic. Its lack of Wi-Fi connectivity is disappointing, but it's a solid effort otherwise, and you can use it as a webcam when it's hooked up to your PC
Sony Alpha DSLR-A390
The 14.2-megapixel Alpha DSLR-A390 is a decent digital SLR, even it is essentially the same as last year's Alpha DSLR-A380. Its budget price tag is about right, its live-view mode is simple but effective, and its pictures are perfectly passable. It's worth a look if you're not feeling flush
The 14.2-megapixel Alpha DSLR-A390 is a decent digital SLR, even it is essentially the same as last year's Alpha DSLR-A380. Its budget price tag is about right, its live-view mode is simple but effective, and its pictures are perfectly passable. It's worth a look if you're not feeling flush
Nintendo 3DS
We recently grabbed a cheeky hands-on session with the Nintendo 3DS portable games console. We were really impressed with how the 3D effects have been implemented, without the need for glasses. This could well be the device to bring 3D gaming to the masses
We recently grabbed a cheeky hands-on session with the Nintendo 3DS portable games console. We were really impressed with how the 3D effects have been implemented, without the need for glasses. This could well be the device to bring 3D gaming to the masses
Sky+ Remote Record Android
Looks very similar to the iPhone version, but without the grid view for a channel when you rotate the phone to landscape mode. But it works well, and it's essential for Sky+ and Sky+HD owners.
Looks very similar to the iPhone version, but without the grid view for a channel when you rotate the phone to landscape mode. But it works well, and it's essential for Sky+ and Sky+HD owners.
Wired Top Stories
FBI Defends Disruptive Raids on Texas Data Centers
Two FBI raids on Texas data centers last week took hundreds of innocent businesses offline, in a slash-and-burn investigation into $6 million in unpaid phone bills.
Two FBI raids on Texas data centers last week took hundreds of innocent businesses offline, in a slash-and-burn investigation into $6 million in unpaid phone bills.
Aussies Announce Sweeping National Broadband Network
The Australian government promises all its citizens a superfast internet connection in an ambitious, US$31 billion plan to connect the country with fiber optic cables and wireless broadband. A private, but government-owned company will build out the network over the next eight years and lease it to ISPs.
The Australian government promises all its citizens a superfast internet connection in an ambitious, US$31 billion plan to connect the country with fiber optic cables and wireless broadband. A private, but government-owned company will build out the network over the next eight years and lease it to ISPs.
Schizophrenic Brains Not Folled by Optical Illusion
A bad connection in the brains of schizophrenic patients seems to leave them unaffected by a common optical illusion that turns the concave backside of a mask into a convex face. The difference may be a disconnect in the schizophrenic brain between what it actually sees and what it expects to see based on past experience.
A bad connection in the brains of schizophrenic patients seems to leave them unaffected by a common optical illusion that turns the concave backside of a mask into a convex face. The difference may be a disconnect in the schizophrenic brain between what it actually sees and what it expects to see based on past experience.
Hands-On With the Ortlieb Velocity Backpack
If you've got more gear than you can shovel into a shoulder bag but don't want the graceless un-coolness of a typical backpack, the Ortlieb Velocity is a good choice.
If you've got more gear than you can shovel into a shoulder bag but don't want the graceless un-coolness of a typical backpack, the Ortlieb Velocity is a good choice.
Report From Antarctica: Nations Do Advance Work for 2041 Land Claims
Our first-hand account from Antarctica gives a scientist's perspective on the political maneuvering among countries hoping to position themselves for a potential land grab when the moratorium on mining expires in 2041.
Our first-hand account from Antarctica gives a scientist's perspective on the political maneuvering among countries hoping to position themselves for a potential land grab when the moratorium on mining expires in 2041.
G.M. and Segway Build an EV Only Woz Could Love
General Motors and the people who make the world's coolest scooter unveil a EV two-seater that's essentially a big honkin' Segway. Your move, Woz.
General Motors and the people who make the world's coolest scooter unveil a EV two-seater that's essentially a big honkin' Segway. Your move, Woz.
Nimoy Stuns Austin Crowd with Secret Star Trek Premiere
While a world of Trekkers believed the new J.J. Abrams Star Trek would premiere in Sydney, Australia Tuesday, Leonard Nimoy made a surprise appearance in Austin, Texas Monday night to screen the film for an unsuspecting audience.
While a world of Trekkers believed the new J.J. Abrams Star Trek would premiere in Sydney, Australia Tuesday, Leonard Nimoy made a surprise appearance in Austin, Texas Monday night to screen the film for an unsuspecting audience.
Reznor's Innovative Run Continues With Nine Inch Nails iPhone App
Musical rebel Trent Reznor puts even more power into his fans' hands with a new iPhone app and a seriously upgraded website.
Musical rebel Trent Reznor puts even more power into his fans' hands with a new iPhone app and a seriously upgraded website.
Gadget Gallery: The Zippy 370Z, Finger Clickin' Keyboards, and 8-megapixel Infused Camphones
: Weighing just 140 grams, the handset offers some of the best optics we've ever found crammed into a cell phone: sharp, noiseless pics (3,264 × 2,448 pixels) and decent image stabilizer punctuate video capture that puts full-figured handicams from 2008 to shame. You can even shoot VGA at 30 fps or QVGA at a whopping 120 fps (yes, 120!), including slow motion footage in 1/4 and 1/8 speeds. Amazing, sure, but not a picture perfect phone. The i8510 functions almost exactly like a standard point-and-shoot, except for the zoom button, which is placed inexplicably, and awkwardly at the bottom of the device. WIRED Beaucoup codecs, including ? wait for it ? DivX! 2.8-inch screen excellent for playback. Intuitive photo/video editing suite. Equally intuitive navigation. Automatic lens cover. MicroSD slot good for 16 GB (enough for aspiring Scorseses to go epic). All the usual smartphone suspects: 3G, Wi-Fi, USB, Bluetooth, accelerometer, GPS. Decent earbuds with ample cord. 3.5mm audio jack. Most excellent: TV-out capability. TIRED Side-mounted headphone jack makes phone harder to pocket. Optical control pad is a tad sensitive (between us and you ? we don't want to hurt its feelings). Most bogus: Metal shell retains enough scratches to fill a DJ Shadow album. A little on the clunky side. Most bogus: Flash needs to be brighter. $500, samsung.com Read our full Samsung i8510 INNOV8 review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : As the successor to Logitech's G11 and G15, this huge hunk of plastic comes with gaming hardwired in its DNA. Like its relatives, it has a blocky aesthetic that harkens to the days of the Model M. There are, however, a handful of very modern flourishes that make this latest G-board a distinctly modern marvel. In the end, the G19's main drawback is the same one that has plagued fancy keyboards since the days of yore: It's freaking huge. That swiveling LCD? It actually requires a tiny onboard Linux computer to run, which in turn requires its own power source. Should you choose to make use of the two self-powered USB ports, you'll potentially have more wires shooting out of this thing than your computer. WIRED More customizable than a box of Legos. Two self-powered USB ports. Dedicated D-pad and menu keys let you control LCD directly from the keyboard. Convenient cable management lanes carved into bottom of unit lessens clutter ? slightly. Choose-your-own-color adventure with adjustable backlighting. Keys are pleasantly clicky and responsive. TIRED Limited desktop space? This is not your keyboard. Price tag to match gargantuan footprint. Requires power brick to run. After its novelty wears off, built-in LCD becomes more of a distraction than a useful tool. $200, Logitech.com Read our full Logitech G19 Keyboard review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : Want to catch the last episode of Battlestar Galactica while hanging out in the local java joint? Going to download a season of The Simpsons for viewing on the plane? Giving an impromptu screening of your vacation photos at a friend's house? The Mini 10 is your machine. But there are infuriating shortcomings to the Mini 10. The trackpad is one of the worst we've seen. Dell's decision to integrate the buttons underneath the pad itself makes using it both unpredictable and challenging. When you click on a button, the cursor may hit the target, wiggle off a centimeter or two, or teleport off into a remote corner of your screen. While it got easier to use after a week of practice, our advice is to invest in a cheap travel mouse. WIRED Bright, responsive screen. Integrated 1.3-megapixel webcam. Not gunked up with crapware. HDMI-out port shows charming, if unwarranted, optimism about the netbook's video capabilities. Light weight: Just 2.6 pounds. TIRED Infuriating trackpad with integrated buttons hidden underneath. Excessively glossy screen produces distracting glare. Windows XP is starting to look pretty tired. What, no solid-state option? Despite the HDMI port, the netbook can't deliver HD video without fits and starts. $470 (as tested), dell.com Read our full Dell Mini 10 Netbook review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : The new 370Z upgrades come in the form of a sexy body with a hood, hatch and doors of lightweight aluminum and a chassis significantly stiffer to reduce performance-robbing flex. To make up for the beefier chassis, Nissan's engineers pared more than 225 pounds from the rest of the car ? even the audio system lost 3.5 pounds ? and the result is a car that weighs 88 pounds less than the previous 350Z. Every model gets the same 332-horsepower V6, an engine that makes this Z the quickest yet with a zero-to-60 time of 4.6 seconds. That kind of performance, however, is contingent on your skills as a driver. If you don't posses Lewis Hamilton levels of talent don't fret. The Z's abundant power and excellent handling will let you think you do. WIRED Insanely easy to drive, insanely quickly. You'll run out of nerve before you run out of grip. Rev-matching transmission makes heel-toe shifting more obsolete than a gramophone. TIRED Rev-matching transmission makes heel-toe shifting more obsolete than a vinyl record. Tympani-like tire roar, piccolo-like exhaust note. Hummer-sized blind spots make lane changes a gun-it-and-go-for-it leap of faith. Fake brushed-aluminum interior bits don't fool anyone. $33,970 (as tested), nissanusa.com Read our full Nissan 2009 370Z review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : Using the BookReader is simple: Just plunk a novel on the platen, punch a button and you're relaxing to the dulcet sounds of Jill, a computerized voice with a voracious appetite for literature. All the menus read themselves off when you mouse over them, and they have keyboard shortcuts, which is useful if you have reduced vision. Jill is pretty good at recognizing words. We tried out several books, including one heavy with medical jargon, and she held her own with just a few exceptions. Useful as it is, we could not help noticing that the BookReader seems to be slightly undercooked. A few of the buttons don't really do anything, and you can't customize the dictionary to alter Jill's interpretation of commonly used, but horribly flubbed words, acronyms or numbers. The unit seems to be terribly overpriced as well. Plustek wants $600 for the BookReader, despite the fact that the OpticBook only costs $250 ? and has its own text-to-speech function. WIRED Reads books to you at the push of a button. Platen glass goes right to the edge to accommodate books without strain. Turns text into MP3s for portability. Includes several accessibility features to help the visually impaired. TIRED The included software lacks polish and seems rushed. Squat, ugly looks make it seem at home in a cubicle farm. The reader voice may not screw up often, but when it does, it's a doozy. High price nears gouging territory. $600, plustek.com Read our full Plustek BookReader V100 review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : Photo: Dylan Tweeny/Wired.comApple's newest Shuffle (almost 50 percent smaller than previous Shuffles) could easily be mistaken for a stick of Trident, features no buttons, and pimps voice-identification technology. But even given its apparent readily consumable stature, there are a few features on the Shuffle that are a bit tough to swallow. The biggest gripe on the 4-GB Shuffle we tested is definitely the control set. First off, it's completely counterintuitive; Apple says you can easily use it without looking. We still don't have the hang of it after a few days of testing. What's worse, if you have a decent set of earbuds (say, a pair of Shures or Ultimate Ears) you're totally hosed — you'll have to endure the 'buds that come with the Shuffle or pick up specially made third-party headphones. Our recommendation? Pick up a new Shuffle only if you're prepared to deal with proprietary headphones and ambiguous controls. WIRED Thumb-drive size. Can double as a tie clip. Battery life lasts for 12 freaking hours. Short USB sync cord is sexy. Yes, we'll admit, it's another beautifully designed piece of hardware from Apple. Battery bonked out after 11 constant hours of blasting Thunderstruck on loop. TIRED Proprietary headphones required. Control set awkward to use, hard to get used to. So small, it nearly gets lost in the packaging it comes in. $80, apple.com Read our full Apple iPod Shuffle 3rd Gen review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : Rather than foam, gel or compressed-air cushioning, the soles on Newtons have a series of "actuator lugs" just below the ball of the foot. The lugs are designed to help encourage you to land on your forefoot, to protect that part of the foot, and (best yet) to propel you forward. When you land, the lugs push into hollow chambers in the midsole. This cushions your landing, and helps make it comfy to land midsole or forefoot rather than on the heel as you might be accustomed. As your foot moves forward, these lugs then essentially lever out, and as you lift your foot, they return the energy by pushing up and out in the same direction as your stride. Newton claims this makes them more efficient than traditional foam or gel soles that simply absorb energy but don't return it. WIRED So cozy they're like a Snuggie for your feet. Actuator lugs get you off your heels better than a La-Z-Boy. Lightweight at 10.2 ounces. Designed for all stride types. Stomps cold weather like global warming, and keeps out the drizzle for shizzle. TIRED Not waterproof. Worse on single-track trails than a skateboard. $175??? OMG, for that much money I could just pay somebody to run for me. $175, newtonrunning.com Read our full Newton All Weather Trainer review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : The Firebird features a hybrid design — using 2.5-inch hard drives (two 320-GB models) and dual graphics cards originally designed for laptops — but powers it all with a desktop CPU and desktop-sized DIMMs. As with a laptop, wireless is built in, but the power supply is not: To save on wattage, HP breaks out the (enormous) power adapter instead of integrating it into the box. As cool as the Firebird is on the whole, it isn't without some foibles. The inclusion of an ExpressCard slot is on the baffling-to-useless side, and the external power supply (it's huge) is more annoying to deal with than it sounds. But our biggest gripe is that the Firebird's streamlined shell means it includes no front-mounted ports at all, not even a single USB slot for your thumb drive. Seriously HP, even the Mac Pro finds room for that. WIRED Amazingly quiet and conscientious in its power consumption. Outstanding design; belongs on top of the desk, not beneath it. Solid all-around performance at a fair price. TIRED No front USB port. Curvy design means you can't put anything on top of the case. Functionally locked down, with no real upgrade path. $2,100 (as tested), hp.com Read our full HP Firebird 803 review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : I shouldn't love this truck. I should hate it. I purposely do not own a car, and this all-black behemoth represents everything I hate about SUV culture: conspicuous consumption, insensitivity to our rapidly shrinking world and crowded cities, middle finger raised at global warming. You could slap a cold fusion generator under Big Poppa Cadillac's hood and the first two issues would still apply, but I was kind of wrong about that last one. Have you ever seen Godzilla vs. Megalon? Where Godzilla fights on behalf of the people of Japan against a giant rhinoceros/cockroach? Sure, Tokyo's favorite monster still smashes a bunch of buildings and steps on some people, but he's trying to be good. Same goes for this Hybrid Chromedaddy. WIRED Decent pickup for a motorized bomb shelter. Combined ABS and regenerative braking system do a terrific job of hauling the beast down from speed. Trick motorized step makes it easy for shorties to climb into your rolling condo. TIRED Thing has a car phone. No, not Bluetooth, but an actual phone built into infotainment system. (It's actually just Onstar, but there was no other option for hands-free calling.) What is this, 1989? Cadillac — God love 'em — uses the fact that this is a hybrid as an excuse to bling up the truck even more: Hybrid badges are plastered on every hard surface, on the sides of the door, even the windshield. —Joe Brown $74,085 (as tested), Cadillac.com Read our full Cadillac Escalade Hybrid review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : The Kindle 2 is zippier, with pages turning 20 percent faster (yes, you can tell the difference). It has more memory (2 gigabytes, enough for storing more than 1,500 books onboard). And it flaunts a more powerful built-in battery: Amazon claims that the Kindle lasts four to five days with the wireless on (we got 4.5 days in our first test) and up to two weeks with it off. After a week of limited wireless, my meter is around 50 percent. Amazon also says that after 500 charges, it will hold 80 percent of its original juice. That means that most users won't have to replace the battery (a $60 procedure) for about a decade or so. Looking over the horizon, it's clear that Amazon's biggest competitor in selling digital books will be Google, whose recent agreement with publishers and authors will make it the virtually exclusive seller for millions of books in copyright but not in print. But right now at least, the Google and Amazon formats aren't compatible: I was unsuccessful in getting a PDF of a public-domain book downloaded from Google to appear in readable form on my Kindle. WIRED The best e-reading system on the market. Welcome improvements to aesthetics, more functional industrial design, better graphics and longer battery life. Sleeker than the original: One-third of an inch thick and 10 ounces. TIRED Quite expensive. Book content shackled with DRM. Interface is improved, sure, but it could be even better. $360, amazon.com Read our full Amazon.com Kindle 2 review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : The iWOW adapter from SRS Labs promises to coax more "immersive" sound from your iPod, and it actually delivers — provided you're listening to the right kind of music. Setup is easy: Snap on the slick little 1-inch extension, plug in some spendy headphones, press a button, and you do indeed get a fuller sound with more depth — especially if you enjoy songs like Sting's "Fragile," a track hand-picked by SRS to highlight the effect. But when iWOW was applied to songs that were heavy on low-end thump or had multilayered sound (Exhibit A: Beck's "Cold Brains") the iWOW performed more like iMeh. At top volume, bass beats splintered, while at lower volumes tracks sounded muddled and crowded. SRS claims the device "dynamically locates and restores audio detail" and creates a more natural sound. We're not buying it — most of the audio we threw at the iWOW was punctuated with a subtle hiss and fuzzy bass. WIRED Relatively small adapter. Snaps easily onto your iPod and lends some oomph to certain tunes. TIRED The effect is nearly lost when using ear buds, the device won't work with older generation iPods, and music that already has a fair share of bass sounds muffled. $70, srslabs.com Read our full SRS Labs iWOW Adapter for iPod review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : Leaps ahead of other cam phones, the Memoir's not limited to the 8 megapixels it captures. In shooting mode, the touchscreen has shutterbug controls — zoom, brightness, timer and flash — that float around the image. And just hitting the shutter will take you into camera mode. The Memoir includes a 1-GB microSD to augment the phone's 100 MB of storage (and it's an easy-access slot, rather than hidden under the battery). But for all its convenience, the Memoir simply isn't a competitor for even the lowliest of dedicated cameras. First off, it's pokey: slow to focus, slow to snap and very touchy when it comes to movement. And though it touts a 16x digital zoom, it has no optical-zooming option. WIRED Cool touchscreen and accelerometer helps you shoot or view pictures. Compact, pocket-friendly shape, even for hipsters in painted-on jeans. TIRED Vampiric light sensitivity makes for washed-out shots. Slow to focus, shoot and recover. E-mail functions are even slower. The screen is hard to see in sunlight. Lens cover doesn't close all the time, so the lens can get dusty. $300 (with 2-year contract), t-mobile.com Read our full Samsung Memoir. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : From the outside, the 1000HE doesn't look much different from other netbooks. But it's the machine's heart — the brand new 1.66-GHz Atom N280 processor — that makes it faster, stronger, smarter than its opponents. Intel claims the silicon slab boosts computing power across the board, especially HD video playback — something that has been woefully horrid in past machines using Atom processors. It's not lying. This is the fastest netbook we've tested (by about 7 percent) in our benchmarks. And HD video playback was noticeably smoother and devoid of chop. WIRED The first netbook to feature the new Atom N280 chip. MMC and SD media reader slots. Attractive, pearly finish. Decent 1.3-megapixel webcam. TIRED At 3.1 pounds, it's one of the heaviest puppies in the netbook litter. Lame keyboard. $400 as tested, asus.com Read our full Asus Eee PC 1000HE review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : The R50 is remarkably easy to set up and use. As you program each component into the remote using the setup wizard, you test a few controls to make sure it has the right code. The remote instantly recognized all our components, and it took us about 10 minutes to get the AV rig up and running. As part of the setup, you name each component, which then appears as an icon on the screen: in my case, a Sony HDTV, Yamaha amp/receiver, Squeezebox, Oppo DVD player and Soundmatters speaker. WIRED Cool, reddish backlight perfect for nighttime navigation. No computer or web connection needed for operation. No charging cradle required. TIRED No user manual means gizmo novices might get lost in setup. $150 price point isn't super pricey, but then it's not the cheapest universal remote out there. $150, universalremote.com Read our full Universal Remote Digital R50 review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : Like other watches in the 25-year-old G-Shock line, the MTG-1500 is forged with Mr. T levels of toughness: It can easily survive being banged clumsily against tabletops or whacked against a surfboard in a wipeout. And it's water-resistant to 200 meters. But unlike most other G-Shock watches, which are primarily plastic, the MTG-1500's body and band are stainless steel, with a few tasteful black plastic accents. We half expected to find the MTG-1500 lacking in minor features. Surprisingly, it didn't. It's got a stopwatch mode, dual time-zone support, five different alarms and a countdown timer. Free abundant sunlight or bright artificial light recharges the battery as you wear the watch. Once fully charged, the battery should be able to power the watch for 6 months without additional light. WIRED Handsome, two-toned steel-and-black styling doesn't blare "nerd," "Swatch-wearing poser" or "too lazy to take off my gym watch." Self-syncs with superaccurate official time stations. Gives you an excuse to say "solar" and "atomic" in the same sentence. TIRED Digital display too small and can be obscured by watch hands. LED provides uneven illumination in the dark. $500 can buy a timepiece that's much fancier, albeit not atomic. $500, casio.com Read our full Casio G-Shock MTG-1500 review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : The skinny on this countertop unit is pretty straightforward: It's the touch-based kitchen computer that won't put you out of house and home. Don't go rushing out to cash in that 401(k), though ? despite a recession-friendly price, the Eee Top still feels a little light in the loafers. The glossy white, semi-opaque keyboard and mouse look stylish out of the box, but after extended handling their light, plastic-y build became annoying. The slim chassis sat solid on our countertop, while the bright, 15.6-inch screen and the integrated speaker bar make up the majority of the Top's sleek profile. Rounding out the device are six USB ports, memory card reader, 1.3-MP web cam and integrated Wi-Fi. We were pretty bummed at the lack of an optical drive, though. WIRED An all-in-one for the Top Ramen set. Quick, responsive touch interface. Compact design has integrated storage for both keyboard and stylus. Integrated 802.11n and gigabit ethernet ensure throughput thrashings. One-touch shutoff button for hiding porn er, convenience. Runs whisper-quiet. TIRED Underpowered for heavy web video. A wired keyboard and mouse ? on an all-in-one?!? Heats up after extended poke/prod sessions. Anemic 160-GB hard drive. Even a cheapy, noisy optical drive would've been nice. No battery means no mobile computing. $600 (as tested), asus.com Read our full Asus ET1602 Eee Top review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : This camera is about the size and shape of a pack of chewing gum, and weighs just 0.68 ounces. It records videos at 352 x 288 pixels, encoding them in the 3-GP format used by many cellphones (the videos can be played on your computer using most media-player software, including QuickTime and RealPlayer). But the MovieStick is oozing with design flaws. The pinhole-sized lens is located on the long side of the device, rather than the short end, limiting your ability to go truly undercover. Add to that a confusing series of lights that supposedly indicate when the cam is charging, turned on or recording, and you end up with more than one inadvertent video of the floor. WIRED The smallest video camera we've seen yet. Simple to set up and use. Makes you look like a double agent. TIRED Location of camera lens makes it hard to go covert. No internal storage or memory card included. Recorded video is shakier and blurrier than outtakes from The Blair Witch Project. $120, swannsecurity.com Read our full Swann Micro-VideoCam Recorder review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : Kodak?s Theatre HD's raison d'être is straightforward: to shuttle the contents of your PC directly to your television using ethernet or Wi-Fi. Pictures, videos, podcasts, music or any other digital content that may be living on your hard drive (as long as it's not squelched by some DRM straightjacket) can be whisked away by this tiny little box to your television with little to no fuss. What really sets the Theatre HD Player apart from the rest of the field is how immaculately it performs its tasks. Once you've downloaded Kodak's EasyShare display software, everything is pretty much taken care of. Have a hard drive filled with extra content? No problem. Simply hook it up to one of the player's USB ports and you're ready to go. WIRED Intuitive UI coupled with a handy RF remote makes setup and playback of multimedia a Zen-like experience. Wealth of connectivity options: component, HDMI, optical or RCA audio, dual USB ports. Transforms crappy YouTube video into semi-watchable content. TIRED Requires Kodak EasyShare software to get the streaming party started. No Mac compatibility (for now). Pricey, especially for a device without a hard drive. Needs more internet content. $300, Kodak Read our full Kodak Theatre HD Player review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily.: Skidding in at 53 pounds (on the lighter side for this category), Ohm's mountain bike-inspired geometry and its nine-level power-assist and regeneration system make it a smart, nimble and efficient two-wheeler. On pavement and trail the BionX power plant, mounted on the rear hub, employs a unique sensor technology that is constantly adjusting the level of assistance it gives you based on the terrain. Encountering some mushy road? More power is delivered to the gears. Gliding down paved asphalt? The juice is dialed back. And if your thighs are flushed with lactic acid on a sheer hill, a flick of the trusty thumb throttle cracks the whip and the motor totally takes over, no pedaling required. But for all this innovation and comfort, you will, however, have to part with a spouse-enraging $3,450. Is it worth it? Well, it is a ton of fun. WIRED Excellent Shimano parts mix with disc brakes and RockShox suspension fork. Lockable battery compartment hides space for mobile phone, wallet, media player and your other little stuff. Regeneration mode gives extra on-bike battery life. Comfortable suspension seat post. Four- to six-hour charge time. TIRED Throttle position needs to be improved for optimal bike handling. Price steeper than any hill the bike can handle. $3450, Ohm Cycles Read our full Ohm Cycles XS700 review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : For about $300 more than the average netbook, the UC7807u offers a scintillating array of grownup specs. Intel 2.0-GHz Core 2 Duo CPU? Check. 250-GB hard drive? Yep. 3 GB of memory, a glossy 13.3-inch display, a slot-loading optical drive and ports galore (three USB and an HDMI)? You betcha! Best of all, with its fetching brushed aluminum chassis, no one will mistake this for a budget notebook. Unfortunately, the UC7807u also has all the telltale signs of some obvious corner cutting. Forget about gaming. Due to Intel's torpid integrated GMA 4500MHD graphics card, even moderately intensive titles won't run properly. But our main beef with the UC7807u is the feeble 6-cell battery which clocked in at a disappointing 3 hours, 25 minutes — a full hour shorter than most other notebooks in this category. WIRED Recession-worthy price. Built like a tank. Slick, touch-sensitive volume and multimedia controls. TIRED Tips the scales for a notebook in this category. Battery drains faster than an ATM at a strip club. Epic fail on the tiny circular touchpad. It's cramped and serves no discernable purpose. Onboard speakers spit out tinny, distorted sound. HDMI, but no Blu-ray? $800 as tested, Gateway Read our full Gateway UC7807u review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : It's no wonder this watch ran away with my heart; for the competitive runner or multisport athlete seeking a personal best in 2009, the Polar RS800CX is the required training device. Because of incredibly robust desktop software, tracking of obscure performance metrics, and a wide variety of add-on sensors, the RS800CX can help you measure, analyze and improve nearly every aspect of your training program. WIRED Offers better heart-rate monitoring than your average hospital. Incredibly customizable from in-watch display, to software interface, to training programs. GPS and barometric altimeter combined with location tracking mean you'll never wonder where you wandered. Extensible pods make watch more sport-versatile than Lance Armstrong. TIRED Even beer goggles won't pretty up this ugly watch face. May need to hire a coach anyway — just to teach you how to use the PC-only desktop software. $500, Polar Read our full Polar RS800CX MULTI review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : The pocket rocket we've been packing in our pants recently (full name: Optoma DLP EP-PK-101 Pico Pocket Projector) is one of the first mini projectors to hit the market. It's also one of the best, even though a number of flaws spill from the tiny device. Styled like a '40s-era Zippo, the piano-black portable feels more natural in the hand than a lot of cellphones. But it's not size that matters to us, it's the video components! The projector is comprised of a combo-rig LED lamp and a DLP chip (courtesy of Texas Instruments) that sets the resolution at 480 x 320 pixels with a range output of 9 lumens. Yes, we know this is low compared to full-bodied projectors like Benq's gargantuan MP512 ST 2500-lumen projector but for something this small, it's remarkable. WIRED Perfect projector for parties. Rectangular lens creates wide image that keeps the image from stretching. Fine picture quality, 8-96 inches. Startup time > 4 seconds. Dead-sexy hardware. TIRED Lithium-ion batteries die after 2 hours' use; how are we supposed to watch our Battlestar marathon? Battery recharge time 4 frakkin' hours. Suck-tastic speaker. Unless you have a video-out adapter, you can't project Office docs from your PC. Projector gets hot enough to fry bacon after running 30 minutes. $400, Optoma Read our full Optoma EP-PK-101 Pico Pocket Projector review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : Are you the schlemiel who's always dropping his cellphone or camera at parties? Or maybe you're the schlemazel who always gets the drink spilled on him? Either way, if you're looking for a camera to fit a clumsy or accident-prone lifestyle, the shockproof, waterproof, and cold-resistant Stylus 1050 SW can take the beating from fumbles, faceplants or full-speed crashes, and still keep clicking. About the size and shape as a pack of smokes, the 1050 is equipped with an accelerometer letting you tinker with settings by tapping on the top and the sides. This lets you do useful stuff like turn the flash on and off with a gloved mitt or preview pictures with one hand while you fend off a tiger shark with the other. WIRED Shockproof to 5 feet and waterproof 10 means you can bang it on the edge of the pool as you fall in with no harm done. Tap feature lets you change settings without futzing with buttons, and the camera can handle alpine frigidity with aplomb. Comes with a microSD adapter for greater media versatility. TIRED Lens cover slides more easily than Ricky Henderson. The battery is easily inserted backwards, making you think it's dead or the camera is malfunctioning. Weak zoom and poor macro ability; this camera could use a bifocal upgrade. $300, Olympus Read our full Olympus Stylus 1050 SW review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : Touted as the thinnest and lightest BlackBerry yet, the Curve 8900 has some much-needed upgrades over its predecessor, but also some disappointments. Wi-Fi is hot and easy to set up, the camera got a bump to 3.2 megapixels, the 16 GB MicroSD storage can hold up to 20 hours of video, and the high-res screen is fantastic in any light. On the other hand, callers were hard to hear, documents were difficult to create, and RIM's revamped proprietary browser is good for surfing the Internet but isn't as smart about automatically resizing webpages as the browsers on competing smartphones. WIRED Slick, sexy design mashes the best of the Bold and Curve 8830. Brilliant, high-resolution screen is one of the best we've seen on a RIM device. Full HTML-rendering on websites. 3.2-megapixel camera is even better when paired with video-recording capabilities; 3.5mm headphone jack means no clumsy adapters. Near 5-hour battery life is most impressive. TIRED 3G is MIA. Despite the powerful 512-Mhz processor, the software still lags. New website and software don't perform as well as they should. Phone quality was mixed and loud speakers fail to compensate for somewhat distorted music playback. $200 with a two year contract, RIM Read our full RIM BlackBerry Curve 8900 review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : This handset (which arrives in some of the most gorgeous packaging I've ever seen a consumer electronic encased in) is almost laughably banal in its actual construction. A silver slider with wide-spaced keys, it posses a passing resemblance to the Nokia 5200, albeit with a larger (2.2-inch) screen. But, once you switch it on and start using it, things begin to get interesting. The operating system orbits around Facebook synchronization. Basically you take the phone online, pair it with your Facebook account, and all of your various Facebook applications become active on the mobile. Your Facebook address book syncs up with the phone's address book. Events from your Facebook calendar become part of the phone's calendar. Take a picture with the 3.2-megapixel camera, and you can automatically upload those shots to a Facebook album. WIRED Brightly hued, easy to use, easy-to-sync OS pairs perfectly with your Facebook account. Skype integration is thoughtful. Thoughtfully spaced keys make texting, entering URLs rather pleasant. Camera takes photos that are sharp enough to be a profile picture. Extremely cheap for an unlocked device. TIRED Humdrum hardware punctuates novel OS. Not offered in the United States ... yet. Battery life is clinically depressing when surfing the web, using Skype. $112 (estimated), Three Read our full INQ1 Facebook Phone review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : HP has been tinkering with touch tech for a couple of years. But they have yet to nail the bull's eye with a machine that mixes mature hardware with a haptic interface that feels like more than just a half-assed effort. So, we were cautiously optimistic with the TouchSmart tx2z. The good news? As HP's first multitouch convertible tablet, it's got a lot of potential. Converting from notebook to tablet proved painless, thanks to a solid hinge and the included pen. After swinging the 1280 x 800 screen around (and folding it back), we found two goodies. First, using the pen automatically disables the touchscreen (to prevent palm-related havoc), and second, HP included an active digitizer for handwritten input. This made reckless activities like e-mailing while strolling around the block surprisingly easy. Even jotting down quick notes using a finger (instead of the pen) gave us minimal hassle. WIRED Fully baked as both a touch and tablet device. Travels well with its compact and stylish chassis. Includes quick keys for rotating screen orientation. Mini media remote and pen conveniently hide away in chassis. Altec Lansing speakers strike decent balance between volume and clarity. Extra goodies aplenty: biometric security, webcam, dual headphone jacks, 802.11n compatibility and 5-in-1 card reader. TIRED Bloated OS hinders performance of otherwise decent specs. Occasionally laggy switches between notebook and tablet mode. No multitouch love for the trackpad. Terrible viewing angles and weak visibility in direct sunlight. Fan sounds like a leaf-blower at a My Bloody Valentine show. $1550 (as tested), HP Read our full HP TouchSmart tx2z review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : Nero's LiquidTV TiVo PC looks like a TiVo and acts like a TiVo, but, brother, it ain't no TiVo. Actually, the package makes your PC act like a TiVo by adding a USB TV tuner and the same TiVo software that drives the set-tops. You also get a for-reals TiVo remote and an IR receiver so you can command content from the couch. Ironically, that's where you're gonna get pissed. The remote can't launch the software, so you'll have to physically walk over and mouse it open. The remote can be programmed to turn your TV on and off, but it can't put your PC in standby mode or wake it up again. If you do that manually, the IR receiver fails to wake up with the rest of the system. WIRED Includes a one-year TiVo subscription, and after that it's a cheaper-than-set-top $99 per year. The software can auto-convert recordings to iPod or Sony PSP format. Integrates with any TiVo boxes you already have. Extra storage is just an external hard drive away. TIRED The remote lacks necessary PC controls. Not measurably better than Windows Media Center — which, incidentally, is free. The tuner supports ClearQAM, but the software doesn't, so forget digital channels unless you hook up the antenna. $125, Tivo Read our full Nero LiquidTV TiVo PC review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily.
: Weighing just 140 grams, the handset offers some of the best optics we've ever found crammed into a cell phone: sharp, noiseless pics (3,264 × 2,448 pixels) and decent image stabilizer punctuate video capture that puts full-figured handicams from 2008 to shame. You can even shoot VGA at 30 fps or QVGA at a whopping 120 fps (yes, 120!), including slow motion footage in 1/4 and 1/8 speeds. Amazing, sure, but not a picture perfect phone. The i8510 functions almost exactly like a standard point-and-shoot, except for the zoom button, which is placed inexplicably, and awkwardly at the bottom of the device. WIRED Beaucoup codecs, including ? wait for it ? DivX! 2.8-inch screen excellent for playback. Intuitive photo/video editing suite. Equally intuitive navigation. Automatic lens cover. MicroSD slot good for 16 GB (enough for aspiring Scorseses to go epic). All the usual smartphone suspects: 3G, Wi-Fi, USB, Bluetooth, accelerometer, GPS. Decent earbuds with ample cord. 3.5mm audio jack. Most excellent: TV-out capability. TIRED Side-mounted headphone jack makes phone harder to pocket. Optical control pad is a tad sensitive (between us and you ? we don't want to hurt its feelings). Most bogus: Metal shell retains enough scratches to fill a DJ Shadow album. A little on the clunky side. Most bogus: Flash needs to be brighter. $500, samsung.com Read our full Samsung i8510 INNOV8 review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : As the successor to Logitech's G11 and G15, this huge hunk of plastic comes with gaming hardwired in its DNA. Like its relatives, it has a blocky aesthetic that harkens to the days of the Model M. There are, however, a handful of very modern flourishes that make this latest G-board a distinctly modern marvel. In the end, the G19's main drawback is the same one that has plagued fancy keyboards since the days of yore: It's freaking huge. That swiveling LCD? It actually requires a tiny onboard Linux computer to run, which in turn requires its own power source. Should you choose to make use of the two self-powered USB ports, you'll potentially have more wires shooting out of this thing than your computer. WIRED More customizable than a box of Legos. Two self-powered USB ports. Dedicated D-pad and menu keys let you control LCD directly from the keyboard. Convenient cable management lanes carved into bottom of unit lessens clutter ? slightly. Choose-your-own-color adventure with adjustable backlighting. Keys are pleasantly clicky and responsive. TIRED Limited desktop space? This is not your keyboard. Price tag to match gargantuan footprint. Requires power brick to run. After its novelty wears off, built-in LCD becomes more of a distraction than a useful tool. $200, Logitech.com Read our full Logitech G19 Keyboard review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : Want to catch the last episode of Battlestar Galactica while hanging out in the local java joint? Going to download a season of The Simpsons for viewing on the plane? Giving an impromptu screening of your vacation photos at a friend's house? The Mini 10 is your machine. But there are infuriating shortcomings to the Mini 10. The trackpad is one of the worst we've seen. Dell's decision to integrate the buttons underneath the pad itself makes using it both unpredictable and challenging. When you click on a button, the cursor may hit the target, wiggle off a centimeter or two, or teleport off into a remote corner of your screen. While it got easier to use after a week of practice, our advice is to invest in a cheap travel mouse. WIRED Bright, responsive screen. Integrated 1.3-megapixel webcam. Not gunked up with crapware. HDMI-out port shows charming, if unwarranted, optimism about the netbook's video capabilities. Light weight: Just 2.6 pounds. TIRED Infuriating trackpad with integrated buttons hidden underneath. Excessively glossy screen produces distracting glare. Windows XP is starting to look pretty tired. What, no solid-state option? Despite the HDMI port, the netbook can't deliver HD video without fits and starts. $470 (as tested), dell.com Read our full Dell Mini 10 Netbook review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : The new 370Z upgrades come in the form of a sexy body with a hood, hatch and doors of lightweight aluminum and a chassis significantly stiffer to reduce performance-robbing flex. To make up for the beefier chassis, Nissan's engineers pared more than 225 pounds from the rest of the car ? even the audio system lost 3.5 pounds ? and the result is a car that weighs 88 pounds less than the previous 350Z. Every model gets the same 332-horsepower V6, an engine that makes this Z the quickest yet with a zero-to-60 time of 4.6 seconds. That kind of performance, however, is contingent on your skills as a driver. If you don't posses Lewis Hamilton levels of talent don't fret. The Z's abundant power and excellent handling will let you think you do. WIRED Insanely easy to drive, insanely quickly. You'll run out of nerve before you run out of grip. Rev-matching transmission makes heel-toe shifting more obsolete than a gramophone. TIRED Rev-matching transmission makes heel-toe shifting more obsolete than a vinyl record. Tympani-like tire roar, piccolo-like exhaust note. Hummer-sized blind spots make lane changes a gun-it-and-go-for-it leap of faith. Fake brushed-aluminum interior bits don't fool anyone. $33,970 (as tested), nissanusa.com Read our full Nissan 2009 370Z review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : Using the BookReader is simple: Just plunk a novel on the platen, punch a button and you're relaxing to the dulcet sounds of Jill, a computerized voice with a voracious appetite for literature. All the menus read themselves off when you mouse over them, and they have keyboard shortcuts, which is useful if you have reduced vision. Jill is pretty good at recognizing words. We tried out several books, including one heavy with medical jargon, and she held her own with just a few exceptions. Useful as it is, we could not help noticing that the BookReader seems to be slightly undercooked. A few of the buttons don't really do anything, and you can't customize the dictionary to alter Jill's interpretation of commonly used, but horribly flubbed words, acronyms or numbers. The unit seems to be terribly overpriced as well. Plustek wants $600 for the BookReader, despite the fact that the OpticBook only costs $250 ? and has its own text-to-speech function. WIRED Reads books to you at the push of a button. Platen glass goes right to the edge to accommodate books without strain. Turns text into MP3s for portability. Includes several accessibility features to help the visually impaired. TIRED The included software lacks polish and seems rushed. Squat, ugly looks make it seem at home in a cubicle farm. The reader voice may not screw up often, but when it does, it's a doozy. High price nears gouging territory. $600, plustek.com Read our full Plustek BookReader V100 review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : Photo: Dylan Tweeny/Wired.comApple's newest Shuffle (almost 50 percent smaller than previous Shuffles) could easily be mistaken for a stick of Trident, features no buttons, and pimps voice-identification technology. But even given its apparent readily consumable stature, there are a few features on the Shuffle that are a bit tough to swallow. The biggest gripe on the 4-GB Shuffle we tested is definitely the control set. First off, it's completely counterintuitive; Apple says you can easily use it without looking. We still don't have the hang of it after a few days of testing. What's worse, if you have a decent set of earbuds (say, a pair of Shures or Ultimate Ears) you're totally hosed — you'll have to endure the 'buds that come with the Shuffle or pick up specially made third-party headphones. Our recommendation? Pick up a new Shuffle only if you're prepared to deal with proprietary headphones and ambiguous controls. WIRED Thumb-drive size. Can double as a tie clip. Battery life lasts for 12 freaking hours. Short USB sync cord is sexy. Yes, we'll admit, it's another beautifully designed piece of hardware from Apple. Battery bonked out after 11 constant hours of blasting Thunderstruck on loop. TIRED Proprietary headphones required. Control set awkward to use, hard to get used to. So small, it nearly gets lost in the packaging it comes in. $80, apple.com Read our full Apple iPod Shuffle 3rd Gen review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : Rather than foam, gel or compressed-air cushioning, the soles on Newtons have a series of "actuator lugs" just below the ball of the foot. The lugs are designed to help encourage you to land on your forefoot, to protect that part of the foot, and (best yet) to propel you forward. When you land, the lugs push into hollow chambers in the midsole. This cushions your landing, and helps make it comfy to land midsole or forefoot rather than on the heel as you might be accustomed. As your foot moves forward, these lugs then essentially lever out, and as you lift your foot, they return the energy by pushing up and out in the same direction as your stride. Newton claims this makes them more efficient than traditional foam or gel soles that simply absorb energy but don't return it. WIRED So cozy they're like a Snuggie for your feet. Actuator lugs get you off your heels better than a La-Z-Boy. Lightweight at 10.2 ounces. Designed for all stride types. Stomps cold weather like global warming, and keeps out the drizzle for shizzle. TIRED Not waterproof. Worse on single-track trails than a skateboard. $175??? OMG, for that much money I could just pay somebody to run for me. $175, newtonrunning.com Read our full Newton All Weather Trainer review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : The Firebird features a hybrid design — using 2.5-inch hard drives (two 320-GB models) and dual graphics cards originally designed for laptops — but powers it all with a desktop CPU and desktop-sized DIMMs. As with a laptop, wireless is built in, but the power supply is not: To save on wattage, HP breaks out the (enormous) power adapter instead of integrating it into the box. As cool as the Firebird is on the whole, it isn't without some foibles. The inclusion of an ExpressCard slot is on the baffling-to-useless side, and the external power supply (it's huge) is more annoying to deal with than it sounds. But our biggest gripe is that the Firebird's streamlined shell means it includes no front-mounted ports at all, not even a single USB slot for your thumb drive. Seriously HP, even the Mac Pro finds room for that. WIRED Amazingly quiet and conscientious in its power consumption. Outstanding design; belongs on top of the desk, not beneath it. Solid all-around performance at a fair price. TIRED No front USB port. Curvy design means you can't put anything on top of the case. Functionally locked down, with no real upgrade path. $2,100 (as tested), hp.com Read our full HP Firebird 803 review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : I shouldn't love this truck. I should hate it. I purposely do not own a car, and this all-black behemoth represents everything I hate about SUV culture: conspicuous consumption, insensitivity to our rapidly shrinking world and crowded cities, middle finger raised at global warming. You could slap a cold fusion generator under Big Poppa Cadillac's hood and the first two issues would still apply, but I was kind of wrong about that last one. Have you ever seen Godzilla vs. Megalon? Where Godzilla fights on behalf of the people of Japan against a giant rhinoceros/cockroach? Sure, Tokyo's favorite monster still smashes a bunch of buildings and steps on some people, but he's trying to be good. Same goes for this Hybrid Chromedaddy. WIRED Decent pickup for a motorized bomb shelter. Combined ABS and regenerative braking system do a terrific job of hauling the beast down from speed. Trick motorized step makes it easy for shorties to climb into your rolling condo. TIRED Thing has a car phone. No, not Bluetooth, but an actual phone built into infotainment system. (It's actually just Onstar, but there was no other option for hands-free calling.) What is this, 1989? Cadillac — God love 'em — uses the fact that this is a hybrid as an excuse to bling up the truck even more: Hybrid badges are plastered on every hard surface, on the sides of the door, even the windshield. —Joe Brown $74,085 (as tested), Cadillac.com Read our full Cadillac Escalade Hybrid review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : The Kindle 2 is zippier, with pages turning 20 percent faster (yes, you can tell the difference). It has more memory (2 gigabytes, enough for storing more than 1,500 books onboard). And it flaunts a more powerful built-in battery: Amazon claims that the Kindle lasts four to five days with the wireless on (we got 4.5 days in our first test) and up to two weeks with it off. After a week of limited wireless, my meter is around 50 percent. Amazon also says that after 500 charges, it will hold 80 percent of its original juice. That means that most users won't have to replace the battery (a $60 procedure) for about a decade or so. Looking over the horizon, it's clear that Amazon's biggest competitor in selling digital books will be Google, whose recent agreement with publishers and authors will make it the virtually exclusive seller for millions of books in copyright but not in print. But right now at least, the Google and Amazon formats aren't compatible: I was unsuccessful in getting a PDF of a public-domain book downloaded from Google to appear in readable form on my Kindle. WIRED The best e-reading system on the market. Welcome improvements to aesthetics, more functional industrial design, better graphics and longer battery life. Sleeker than the original: One-third of an inch thick and 10 ounces. TIRED Quite expensive. Book content shackled with DRM. Interface is improved, sure, but it could be even better. $360, amazon.com Read our full Amazon.com Kindle 2 review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : The iWOW adapter from SRS Labs promises to coax more "immersive" sound from your iPod, and it actually delivers — provided you're listening to the right kind of music. Setup is easy: Snap on the slick little 1-inch extension, plug in some spendy headphones, press a button, and you do indeed get a fuller sound with more depth — especially if you enjoy songs like Sting's "Fragile," a track hand-picked by SRS to highlight the effect. But when iWOW was applied to songs that were heavy on low-end thump or had multilayered sound (Exhibit A: Beck's "Cold Brains") the iWOW performed more like iMeh. At top volume, bass beats splintered, while at lower volumes tracks sounded muddled and crowded. SRS claims the device "dynamically locates and restores audio detail" and creates a more natural sound. We're not buying it — most of the audio we threw at the iWOW was punctuated with a subtle hiss and fuzzy bass. WIRED Relatively small adapter. Snaps easily onto your iPod and lends some oomph to certain tunes. TIRED The effect is nearly lost when using ear buds, the device won't work with older generation iPods, and music that already has a fair share of bass sounds muffled. $70, srslabs.com Read our full SRS Labs iWOW Adapter for iPod review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : Leaps ahead of other cam phones, the Memoir's not limited to the 8 megapixels it captures. In shooting mode, the touchscreen has shutterbug controls — zoom, brightness, timer and flash — that float around the image. And just hitting the shutter will take you into camera mode. The Memoir includes a 1-GB microSD to augment the phone's 100 MB of storage (and it's an easy-access slot, rather than hidden under the battery). But for all its convenience, the Memoir simply isn't a competitor for even the lowliest of dedicated cameras. First off, it's pokey: slow to focus, slow to snap and very touchy when it comes to movement. And though it touts a 16x digital zoom, it has no optical-zooming option. WIRED Cool touchscreen and accelerometer helps you shoot or view pictures. Compact, pocket-friendly shape, even for hipsters in painted-on jeans. TIRED Vampiric light sensitivity makes for washed-out shots. Slow to focus, shoot and recover. E-mail functions are even slower. The screen is hard to see in sunlight. Lens cover doesn't close all the time, so the lens can get dusty. $300 (with 2-year contract), t-mobile.com Read our full Samsung Memoir. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : From the outside, the 1000HE doesn't look much different from other netbooks. But it's the machine's heart — the brand new 1.66-GHz Atom N280 processor — that makes it faster, stronger, smarter than its opponents. Intel claims the silicon slab boosts computing power across the board, especially HD video playback — something that has been woefully horrid in past machines using Atom processors. It's not lying. This is the fastest netbook we've tested (by about 7 percent) in our benchmarks. And HD video playback was noticeably smoother and devoid of chop. WIRED The first netbook to feature the new Atom N280 chip. MMC and SD media reader slots. Attractive, pearly finish. Decent 1.3-megapixel webcam. TIRED At 3.1 pounds, it's one of the heaviest puppies in the netbook litter. Lame keyboard. $400 as tested, asus.com Read our full Asus Eee PC 1000HE review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : The R50 is remarkably easy to set up and use. As you program each component into the remote using the setup wizard, you test a few controls to make sure it has the right code. The remote instantly recognized all our components, and it took us about 10 minutes to get the AV rig up and running. As part of the setup, you name each component, which then appears as an icon on the screen: in my case, a Sony HDTV, Yamaha amp/receiver, Squeezebox, Oppo DVD player and Soundmatters speaker. WIRED Cool, reddish backlight perfect for nighttime navigation. No computer or web connection needed for operation. No charging cradle required. TIRED No user manual means gizmo novices might get lost in setup. $150 price point isn't super pricey, but then it's not the cheapest universal remote out there. $150, universalremote.com Read our full Universal Remote Digital R50 review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : Like other watches in the 25-year-old G-Shock line, the MTG-1500 is forged with Mr. T levels of toughness: It can easily survive being banged clumsily against tabletops or whacked against a surfboard in a wipeout. And it's water-resistant to 200 meters. But unlike most other G-Shock watches, which are primarily plastic, the MTG-1500's body and band are stainless steel, with a few tasteful black plastic accents. We half expected to find the MTG-1500 lacking in minor features. Surprisingly, it didn't. It's got a stopwatch mode, dual time-zone support, five different alarms and a countdown timer. Free abundant sunlight or bright artificial light recharges the battery as you wear the watch. Once fully charged, the battery should be able to power the watch for 6 months without additional light. WIRED Handsome, two-toned steel-and-black styling doesn't blare "nerd," "Swatch-wearing poser" or "too lazy to take off my gym watch." Self-syncs with superaccurate official time stations. Gives you an excuse to say "solar" and "atomic" in the same sentence. TIRED Digital display too small and can be obscured by watch hands. LED provides uneven illumination in the dark. $500 can buy a timepiece that's much fancier, albeit not atomic. $500, casio.com Read our full Casio G-Shock MTG-1500 review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : The skinny on this countertop unit is pretty straightforward: It's the touch-based kitchen computer that won't put you out of house and home. Don't go rushing out to cash in that 401(k), though ? despite a recession-friendly price, the Eee Top still feels a little light in the loafers. The glossy white, semi-opaque keyboard and mouse look stylish out of the box, but after extended handling their light, plastic-y build became annoying. The slim chassis sat solid on our countertop, while the bright, 15.6-inch screen and the integrated speaker bar make up the majority of the Top's sleek profile. Rounding out the device are six USB ports, memory card reader, 1.3-MP web cam and integrated Wi-Fi. We were pretty bummed at the lack of an optical drive, though. WIRED An all-in-one for the Top Ramen set. Quick, responsive touch interface. Compact design has integrated storage for both keyboard and stylus. Integrated 802.11n and gigabit ethernet ensure throughput thrashings. One-touch shutoff button for hiding porn er, convenience. Runs whisper-quiet. TIRED Underpowered for heavy web video. A wired keyboard and mouse ? on an all-in-one?!? Heats up after extended poke/prod sessions. Anemic 160-GB hard drive. Even a cheapy, noisy optical drive would've been nice. No battery means no mobile computing. $600 (as tested), asus.com Read our full Asus ET1602 Eee Top review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : This camera is about the size and shape of a pack of chewing gum, and weighs just 0.68 ounces. It records videos at 352 x 288 pixels, encoding them in the 3-GP format used by many cellphones (the videos can be played on your computer using most media-player software, including QuickTime and RealPlayer). But the MovieStick is oozing with design flaws. The pinhole-sized lens is located on the long side of the device, rather than the short end, limiting your ability to go truly undercover. Add to that a confusing series of lights that supposedly indicate when the cam is charging, turned on or recording, and you end up with more than one inadvertent video of the floor. WIRED The smallest video camera we've seen yet. Simple to set up and use. Makes you look like a double agent. TIRED Location of camera lens makes it hard to go covert. No internal storage or memory card included. Recorded video is shakier and blurrier than outtakes from The Blair Witch Project. $120, swannsecurity.com Read our full Swann Micro-VideoCam Recorder review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : Kodak?s Theatre HD's raison d'être is straightforward: to shuttle the contents of your PC directly to your television using ethernet or Wi-Fi. Pictures, videos, podcasts, music or any other digital content that may be living on your hard drive (as long as it's not squelched by some DRM straightjacket) can be whisked away by this tiny little box to your television with little to no fuss. What really sets the Theatre HD Player apart from the rest of the field is how immaculately it performs its tasks. Once you've downloaded Kodak's EasyShare display software, everything is pretty much taken care of. Have a hard drive filled with extra content? No problem. Simply hook it up to one of the player's USB ports and you're ready to go. WIRED Intuitive UI coupled with a handy RF remote makes setup and playback of multimedia a Zen-like experience. Wealth of connectivity options: component, HDMI, optical or RCA audio, dual USB ports. Transforms crappy YouTube video into semi-watchable content. TIRED Requires Kodak EasyShare software to get the streaming party started. No Mac compatibility (for now). Pricey, especially for a device without a hard drive. Needs more internet content. $300, Kodak Read our full Kodak Theatre HD Player review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily.: Skidding in at 53 pounds (on the lighter side for this category), Ohm's mountain bike-inspired geometry and its nine-level power-assist and regeneration system make it a smart, nimble and efficient two-wheeler. On pavement and trail the BionX power plant, mounted on the rear hub, employs a unique sensor technology that is constantly adjusting the level of assistance it gives you based on the terrain. Encountering some mushy road? More power is delivered to the gears. Gliding down paved asphalt? The juice is dialed back. And if your thighs are flushed with lactic acid on a sheer hill, a flick of the trusty thumb throttle cracks the whip and the motor totally takes over, no pedaling required. But for all this innovation and comfort, you will, however, have to part with a spouse-enraging $3,450. Is it worth it? Well, it is a ton of fun. WIRED Excellent Shimano parts mix with disc brakes and RockShox suspension fork. Lockable battery compartment hides space for mobile phone, wallet, media player and your other little stuff. Regeneration mode gives extra on-bike battery life. Comfortable suspension seat post. Four- to six-hour charge time. TIRED Throttle position needs to be improved for optimal bike handling. Price steeper than any hill the bike can handle. $3450, Ohm Cycles Read our full Ohm Cycles XS700 review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : For about $300 more than the average netbook, the UC7807u offers a scintillating array of grownup specs. Intel 2.0-GHz Core 2 Duo CPU? Check. 250-GB hard drive? Yep. 3 GB of memory, a glossy 13.3-inch display, a slot-loading optical drive and ports galore (three USB and an HDMI)? You betcha! Best of all, with its fetching brushed aluminum chassis, no one will mistake this for a budget notebook. Unfortunately, the UC7807u also has all the telltale signs of some obvious corner cutting. Forget about gaming. Due to Intel's torpid integrated GMA 4500MHD graphics card, even moderately intensive titles won't run properly. But our main beef with the UC7807u is the feeble 6-cell battery which clocked in at a disappointing 3 hours, 25 minutes — a full hour shorter than most other notebooks in this category. WIRED Recession-worthy price. Built like a tank. Slick, touch-sensitive volume and multimedia controls. TIRED Tips the scales for a notebook in this category. Battery drains faster than an ATM at a strip club. Epic fail on the tiny circular touchpad. It's cramped and serves no discernable purpose. Onboard speakers spit out tinny, distorted sound. HDMI, but no Blu-ray? $800 as tested, Gateway Read our full Gateway UC7807u review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : It's no wonder this watch ran away with my heart; for the competitive runner or multisport athlete seeking a personal best in 2009, the Polar RS800CX is the required training device. Because of incredibly robust desktop software, tracking of obscure performance metrics, and a wide variety of add-on sensors, the RS800CX can help you measure, analyze and improve nearly every aspect of your training program. WIRED Offers better heart-rate monitoring than your average hospital. Incredibly customizable from in-watch display, to software interface, to training programs. GPS and barometric altimeter combined with location tracking mean you'll never wonder where you wandered. Extensible pods make watch more sport-versatile than Lance Armstrong. TIRED Even beer goggles won't pretty up this ugly watch face. May need to hire a coach anyway — just to teach you how to use the PC-only desktop software. $500, Polar Read our full Polar RS800CX MULTI review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : The pocket rocket we've been packing in our pants recently (full name: Optoma DLP EP-PK-101 Pico Pocket Projector) is one of the first mini projectors to hit the market. It's also one of the best, even though a number of flaws spill from the tiny device. Styled like a '40s-era Zippo, the piano-black portable feels more natural in the hand than a lot of cellphones. But it's not size that matters to us, it's the video components! The projector is comprised of a combo-rig LED lamp and a DLP chip (courtesy of Texas Instruments) that sets the resolution at 480 x 320 pixels with a range output of 9 lumens. Yes, we know this is low compared to full-bodied projectors like Benq's gargantuan MP512 ST 2500-lumen projector but for something this small, it's remarkable. WIRED Perfect projector for parties. Rectangular lens creates wide image that keeps the image from stretching. Fine picture quality, 8-96 inches. Startup time > 4 seconds. Dead-sexy hardware. TIRED Lithium-ion batteries die after 2 hours' use; how are we supposed to watch our Battlestar marathon? Battery recharge time 4 frakkin' hours. Suck-tastic speaker. Unless you have a video-out adapter, you can't project Office docs from your PC. Projector gets hot enough to fry bacon after running 30 minutes. $400, Optoma Read our full Optoma EP-PK-101 Pico Pocket Projector review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : Are you the schlemiel who's always dropping his cellphone or camera at parties? Or maybe you're the schlemazel who always gets the drink spilled on him? Either way, if you're looking for a camera to fit a clumsy or accident-prone lifestyle, the shockproof, waterproof, and cold-resistant Stylus 1050 SW can take the beating from fumbles, faceplants or full-speed crashes, and still keep clicking. About the size and shape as a pack of smokes, the 1050 is equipped with an accelerometer letting you tinker with settings by tapping on the top and the sides. This lets you do useful stuff like turn the flash on and off with a gloved mitt or preview pictures with one hand while you fend off a tiger shark with the other. WIRED Shockproof to 5 feet and waterproof 10 means you can bang it on the edge of the pool as you fall in with no harm done. Tap feature lets you change settings without futzing with buttons, and the camera can handle alpine frigidity with aplomb. Comes with a microSD adapter for greater media versatility. TIRED Lens cover slides more easily than Ricky Henderson. The battery is easily inserted backwards, making you think it's dead or the camera is malfunctioning. Weak zoom and poor macro ability; this camera could use a bifocal upgrade. $300, Olympus Read our full Olympus Stylus 1050 SW review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : Touted as the thinnest and lightest BlackBerry yet, the Curve 8900 has some much-needed upgrades over its predecessor, but also some disappointments. Wi-Fi is hot and easy to set up, the camera got a bump to 3.2 megapixels, the 16 GB MicroSD storage can hold up to 20 hours of video, and the high-res screen is fantastic in any light. On the other hand, callers were hard to hear, documents were difficult to create, and RIM's revamped proprietary browser is good for surfing the Internet but isn't as smart about automatically resizing webpages as the browsers on competing smartphones. WIRED Slick, sexy design mashes the best of the Bold and Curve 8830. Brilliant, high-resolution screen is one of the best we've seen on a RIM device. Full HTML-rendering on websites. 3.2-megapixel camera is even better when paired with video-recording capabilities; 3.5mm headphone jack means no clumsy adapters. Near 5-hour battery life is most impressive. TIRED 3G is MIA. Despite the powerful 512-Mhz processor, the software still lags. New website and software don't perform as well as they should. Phone quality was mixed and loud speakers fail to compensate for somewhat distorted music playback. $200 with a two year contract, RIM Read our full RIM BlackBerry Curve 8900 review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : This handset (which arrives in some of the most gorgeous packaging I've ever seen a consumer electronic encased in) is almost laughably banal in its actual construction. A silver slider with wide-spaced keys, it posses a passing resemblance to the Nokia 5200, albeit with a larger (2.2-inch) screen. But, once you switch it on and start using it, things begin to get interesting. The operating system orbits around Facebook synchronization. Basically you take the phone online, pair it with your Facebook account, and all of your various Facebook applications become active on the mobile. Your Facebook address book syncs up with the phone's address book. Events from your Facebook calendar become part of the phone's calendar. Take a picture with the 3.2-megapixel camera, and you can automatically upload those shots to a Facebook album. WIRED Brightly hued, easy to use, easy-to-sync OS pairs perfectly with your Facebook account. Skype integration is thoughtful. Thoughtfully spaced keys make texting, entering URLs rather pleasant. Camera takes photos that are sharp enough to be a profile picture. Extremely cheap for an unlocked device. TIRED Humdrum hardware punctuates novel OS. Not offered in the United States ... yet. Battery life is clinically depressing when surfing the web, using Skype. $112 (estimated), Three Read our full INQ1 Facebook Phone review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : HP has been tinkering with touch tech for a couple of years. But they have yet to nail the bull's eye with a machine that mixes mature hardware with a haptic interface that feels like more than just a half-assed effort. So, we were cautiously optimistic with the TouchSmart tx2z. The good news? As HP's first multitouch convertible tablet, it's got a lot of potential. Converting from notebook to tablet proved painless, thanks to a solid hinge and the included pen. After swinging the 1280 x 800 screen around (and folding it back), we found two goodies. First, using the pen automatically disables the touchscreen (to prevent palm-related havoc), and second, HP included an active digitizer for handwritten input. This made reckless activities like e-mailing while strolling around the block surprisingly easy. Even jotting down quick notes using a finger (instead of the pen) gave us minimal hassle. WIRED Fully baked as both a touch and tablet device. Travels well with its compact and stylish chassis. Includes quick keys for rotating screen orientation. Mini media remote and pen conveniently hide away in chassis. Altec Lansing speakers strike decent balance between volume and clarity. Extra goodies aplenty: biometric security, webcam, dual headphone jacks, 802.11n compatibility and 5-in-1 card reader. TIRED Bloated OS hinders performance of otherwise decent specs. Occasionally laggy switches between notebook and tablet mode. No multitouch love for the trackpad. Terrible viewing angles and weak visibility in direct sunlight. Fan sounds like a leaf-blower at a My Bloody Valentine show. $1550 (as tested), HP Read our full HP TouchSmart tx2z review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily. : Nero's LiquidTV TiVo PC looks like a TiVo and acts like a TiVo, but, brother, it ain't no TiVo. Actually, the package makes your PC act like a TiVo by adding a USB TV tuner and the same TiVo software that drives the set-tops. You also get a for-reals TiVo remote and an IR receiver so you can command content from the couch. Ironically, that's where you're gonna get pissed. The remote can't launch the software, so you'll have to physically walk over and mouse it open. The remote can be programmed to turn your TV on and off, but it can't put your PC in standby mode or wake it up again. If you do that manually, the IR receiver fails to wake up with the rest of the system. WIRED Includes a one-year TiVo subscription, and after that it's a cheaper-than-set-top $99 per year. The software can auto-convert recordings to iPod or Sony PSP format. Integrates with any TiVo boxes you already have. Extra storage is just an external hard drive away. TIRED The remote lacks necessary PC controls. Not measurably better than Windows Media Center — which, incidentally, is free. The tuner supports ClearQAM, but the software doesn't, so forget digital channels unless you hook up the antenna. $125, Tivo Read our full Nero LiquidTV TiVo PC review. Check Wired.com's latest Product Reviews, updated daily.
April 7, 1933: Gimme a Tall, Cold One
1933: Although it will be another eight months before Prohibition is officially repealed, this is a red-letter day for beer drinkers. Suds containing up to 3.2 percent alcohol by weight are legally obtainable again, without having to get the glad eye from some guy behind a peep hole and telling him, "Louie sent me." President Franklin D. Roosevelt's signature repealed the Volstead Act, legalizing 3.2 percent beer. It also paved the way for the December ratification of the 21st Amendment, which repealed the 18th Amendment and deep-sixed Prohibition altogether. The Volstead Act, which is how the National Prohibition Act was widely known, was pushed hard by religious and temperance groups and passed Congress in 1919 over the veto of President Woodrow Wilson. The prohibition movement had been active in the United States for 80 years before its adherents finally succeeded in ramming through an outright national ban on alcohol. The original movement lost some steam during the Civil War (soldiers drink; deal with it) but was revived with a vengeance by the Prohibition Party and Woman's Christian Temperance Union. Conservative Protestant groups formed the backbone of the prohibition movement, although dissenters popped up within that branch of Christianity. Scandinavian Lutherans, for example, favored proscribing alcohol, while their German brethren opposed any ban. The Baptists? They loved the idea, Northern and Southern alike. In any case, Prohibition was another instance of a motivated minority forcing its self-righteous views on the amorphous mass that is the unthinking, perhaps nonthinking, American public. Passage of a prohibition act, however, did nothing to slake the drinking man's thirst for alcohol. So the practical effect of Prohibition was to serve as a boon to organized crime during the Roaring '20s, with bootlegging and illegal speakeasies flourishing all over the country. Al Capone began his criminal career as a bootlegger, before diversifying his portfolio. Bootleggers smuggled legit booze, but could also get pretty creative in concocting home-brewed liquor. The quality of this stuff, known generically as bathtub gin (gin being the most popular distilled beverage of the day), varied widely. The worst of it could be lethal. With the stock market crash in 1929 and the coming of the Great Depression, opposition to Prohibition intensified. Plenty of people needed a drink now. The so-called Noble Experiment had run its course, and FDR was more than happy to heap dirt into its grave. Except for the bluenoses and the crooks, Prohibition's repeal was greeted enthusiastically by most Americans. Source: Various
1933: Although it will be another eight months before Prohibition is officially repealed, this is a red-letter day for beer drinkers. Suds containing up to 3.2 percent alcohol by weight are legally obtainable again, without having to get the glad eye from some guy behind a peep hole and telling him, "Louie sent me." President Franklin D. Roosevelt's signature repealed the Volstead Act, legalizing 3.2 percent beer. It also paved the way for the December ratification of the 21st Amendment, which repealed the 18th Amendment and deep-sixed Prohibition altogether. The Volstead Act, which is how the National Prohibition Act was widely known, was pushed hard by religious and temperance groups and passed Congress in 1919 over the veto of President Woodrow Wilson. The prohibition movement had been active in the United States for 80 years before its adherents finally succeeded in ramming through an outright national ban on alcohol. The original movement lost some steam during the Civil War (soldiers drink; deal with it) but was revived with a vengeance by the Prohibition Party and Woman's Christian Temperance Union. Conservative Protestant groups formed the backbone of the prohibition movement, although dissenters popped up within that branch of Christianity. Scandinavian Lutherans, for example, favored proscribing alcohol, while their German brethren opposed any ban. The Baptists? They loved the idea, Northern and Southern alike. In any case, Prohibition was another instance of a motivated minority forcing its self-righteous views on the amorphous mass that is the unthinking, perhaps nonthinking, American public. Passage of a prohibition act, however, did nothing to slake the drinking man's thirst for alcohol. So the practical effect of Prohibition was to serve as a boon to organized crime during the Roaring '20s, with bootlegging and illegal speakeasies flourishing all over the country. Al Capone began his criminal career as a bootlegger, before diversifying his portfolio. Bootleggers smuggled legit booze, but could also get pretty creative in concocting home-brewed liquor. The quality of this stuff, known generically as bathtub gin (gin being the most popular distilled beverage of the day), varied widely. The worst of it could be lethal. With the stock market crash in 1929 and the coming of the Great Depression, opposition to Prohibition intensified. Plenty of people needed a drink now. The so-called Noble Experiment had run its course, and FDR was more than happy to heap dirt into its grave. Except for the bluenoses and the crooks, Prohibition's repeal was greeted enthusiastically by most Americans. Source: Various
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Motorola latest to reap the benefits of Android
Shaun Nichols in San Francisco, V3.co.uk, Friday 30 July 2010 at 03:59:00 Strong sales help to bolster quarterly profits Motorola posted strong quarterly numbers on the back of solid sales for its mobile handsets. The company reported some $87m in profit from its mobile device brand. Much of that was from the 2.7 million smartphone units the company moved and 8.3 million total handsets shipped over the quarter. Revenues were listed at $1.7b. In total, Motorola logged some $5.4b over the quarter, leading to earnings per share of $0.07. The company also reported strong sales from its enterprise mobility and networks businesses. Earlier this month the company released its Droid X handset in the US with many locations reporting selling out of the device within days of the release. "As we continue to execute on our business strategy, we are in a strong position to continue improving our share in the rapidly growing smartphone market and improving our operating performance," said Motorola mobility chief executive Sanjay Jha. "The Mobile Devices and Home businesses remain focused on developing next-generation products to capitalize on the convergence of mobile experiences and home entertainment." Motorola is not the only Android vendor to credit the platform with driving up profits. Earlier this month HTC rode sales for its Android devices to record a 54 per cent jump in its quarterly revenues.
Shaun Nichols in San Francisco, V3.co.uk, Friday 30 July 2010 at 03:59:00 Strong sales help to bolster quarterly profits Motorola posted strong quarterly numbers on the back of solid sales for its mobile handsets. The company reported some $87m in profit from its mobile device brand. Much of that was from the 2.7 million smartphone units the company moved and 8.3 million total handsets shipped over the quarter. Revenues were listed at $1.7b. In total, Motorola logged some $5.4b over the quarter, leading to earnings per share of $0.07. The company also reported strong sales from its enterprise mobility and networks businesses. Earlier this month the company released its Droid X handset in the US with many locations reporting selling out of the device within days of the release. "As we continue to execute on our business strategy, we are in a strong position to continue improving our share in the rapidly growing smartphone market and improving our operating performance," said Motorola mobility chief executive Sanjay Jha. "The Mobile Devices and Home businesses remain focused on developing next-generation products to capitalize on the convergence of mobile experiences and home entertainment." Motorola is not the only Android vendor to credit the platform with driving up profits. Earlier this month HTC rode sales for its Android devices to record a 54 per cent jump in its quarterly revenues.
Black Hat: Android wallpaper apps could be stealing data
Iain Thomson at Black Hat 2010 in las Vegas, V3.co.uk, Friday 30 July 2010 at 02:43:00 Too many apps accessing personal data experts warn A team of mobile security researchers has found that a popular wallpaper program is capable of harvesting large amounts of personal data on users. The researchers at Lookout found that several Android wallpaper applications were capable of harvesting the device?s phone number, subscriber identifier (e.g. IMSI), and the currently entered voicemail number on the phone. ?While this sort of data collection from a wallpaper application is certainly suspicious, there?s no evidence of malicious behavior,? said the company in a blog post. ?There have been cases in the past on other mobile platforms where well-intentioned developers are simply over-zealous in their data gathering, without having malicious intent.? The apps came from two developers: ?jackeey,wallpaper? (whose developer name has changed to ?callmejack? since the research was released) and ?IceskYsl@1sters!? Their applications do send money back to a central server but the company says this is not necessarily suspicious. Lookout has also been giving details of its App Genome Project, which will scan 300,000 mobile applications to build the biggest dataset on mobile applications. The preliminary results show 47 per cent of free Android apps contain 3RD party code, compared to 23 per cent on the iPhone. Overall 29 per cent of Android applications can access a user?s location, while a third of Apple applications use that data. Nearly twice as many free applications have the capability to access user?s contact data on iPhone (14 per cent) as compared to Android (8 per cent)
Iain Thomson at Black Hat 2010 in las Vegas, V3.co.uk, Friday 30 July 2010 at 02:43:00 Too many apps accessing personal data experts warn A team of mobile security researchers has found that a popular wallpaper program is capable of harvesting large amounts of personal data on users. The researchers at Lookout found that several Android wallpaper applications were capable of harvesting the device?s phone number, subscriber identifier (e.g. IMSI), and the currently entered voicemail number on the phone. ?While this sort of data collection from a wallpaper application is certainly suspicious, there?s no evidence of malicious behavior,? said the company in a blog post. ?There have been cases in the past on other mobile platforms where well-intentioned developers are simply over-zealous in their data gathering, without having malicious intent.? The apps came from two developers: ?jackeey,wallpaper? (whose developer name has changed to ?callmejack? since the research was released) and ?IceskYsl@1sters!? Their applications do send money back to a central server but the company says this is not necessarily suspicious. Lookout has also been giving details of its App Genome Project, which will scan 300,000 mobile applications to build the biggest dataset on mobile applications. The preliminary results show 47 per cent of free Android apps contain 3RD party code, compared to 23 per cent on the iPhone. Overall 29 per cent of Android applications can access a user?s location, while a third of Apple applications use that data. Nearly twice as many free applications have the capability to access user?s contact data on iPhone (14 per cent) as compared to Android (8 per cent)
Black Hat: Gang uses high tech in low tech crime
Iain Thomson at Black Hat 2010 in las Vegas, V3.co.uk, Friday 30 July 2010 at 01:08:00 Cheque fraud enabled online A criminal gang thought to be operating out of Russia has used technology to revive a very old form of fraud ? writing bad cheques. The criminals broke into three cheque archiving image sites, which are used to store pictures of all cheques that are passed through retailers. They downloaded 200,000 examples and used the banking information, sort codes and signatures to write cheques for over 1,200 legitimate accounts. A team at SecureWorks, an Atlanta computer security company, uncovered the fraud, which is thought to have netted the gang at least $9m. It is working with the FBI but so far none of the gang have been arrested. Counterfeit cheque writing is a very old form of fraud but the gang had put a high tech twist on it said John Stewart, chief executive of SecureWorks. He said that the sites involved had been notified but others were no doubt being targeted. The gang sent out the bogus cheques to ?money mules? around the world using overnight shipping paid for with stolen credit cards he said. The company said that six mules had been contacted and all denied sending money to the gang. The gang wrote 3,285 cheques against 1,280 accounts since June 2009 he said. Most were for less than $3,000, as an attempt to evade banks' anti-fraud measures.
Iain Thomson at Black Hat 2010 in las Vegas, V3.co.uk, Friday 30 July 2010 at 01:08:00 Cheque fraud enabled online A criminal gang thought to be operating out of Russia has used technology to revive a very old form of fraud ? writing bad cheques. The criminals broke into three cheque archiving image sites, which are used to store pictures of all cheques that are passed through retailers. They downloaded 200,000 examples and used the banking information, sort codes and signatures to write cheques for over 1,200 legitimate accounts. A team at SecureWorks, an Atlanta computer security company, uncovered the fraud, which is thought to have netted the gang at least $9m. It is working with the FBI but so far none of the gang have been arrested. Counterfeit cheque writing is a very old form of fraud but the gang had put a high tech twist on it said John Stewart, chief executive of SecureWorks. He said that the sites involved had been notified but others were no doubt being targeted. The gang sent out the bogus cheques to ?money mules? around the world using overnight shipping paid for with stolen credit cards he said. The company said that six mules had been contacted and all denied sending money to the gang. The gang wrote 3,285 cheques against 1,280 accounts since June 2009 he said. Most were for less than $3,000, as an attempt to evade banks' anti-fraud measures.
Black Hat: Cyberspace is the new domain of the military
Iain Thomson at Black Hat 2010 in las Vegas, V3.co.uk, Friday 30 July 2010 at 00:51:00 Former NSA boss details militarisation of the internet General (retired) Michael Hayden, the longest serving head of the NSA and a former director of the CIA, has been warning of the dangers of cyber-war on the internet and how the military is preparing for online war. During his keynote presentation he said that traditionally the US military had operated in four spheres: ground, air, water and space. The internet is now the fifth domain, and was the first man-made location for warfare, since the others were made by God. "God did a better a job,? he said. The problem with the internet was that it has no real security systems in place. He compared it to the North German plain that had been used by invading armies throughout history. Everything online is in the attacker?s favour, while there is virtually nothing for the defending team he said. Hayden expressed irritation at the ease with which some people bandied around the term cyber-war, saying the term was overused. Steal documents is not cyber-war he said, it?s espionage that is as old as the nation state. An actual cyber-war could have dramatic real-world fallout he said, and suggested that the leading nations should band together to outlaw online warfare, for fear that it could cause immense damage. One of the problems of online attacks is that you often can?t determine who is carrying out the attacks, making it difficult to bring the perpetrators to justice he said. Much more work was needed in beefing up both defence and also attacking skills.
Iain Thomson at Black Hat 2010 in las Vegas, V3.co.uk, Friday 30 July 2010 at 00:51:00 Former NSA boss details militarisation of the internet General (retired) Michael Hayden, the longest serving head of the NSA and a former director of the CIA, has been warning of the dangers of cyber-war on the internet and how the military is preparing for online war. During his keynote presentation he said that traditionally the US military had operated in four spheres: ground, air, water and space. The internet is now the fifth domain, and was the first man-made location for warfare, since the others were made by God. "God did a better a job,? he said. The problem with the internet was that it has no real security systems in place. He compared it to the North German plain that had been used by invading armies throughout history. Everything online is in the attacker?s favour, while there is virtually nothing for the defending team he said. Hayden expressed irritation at the ease with which some people bandied around the term cyber-war, saying the term was overused. Steal documents is not cyber-war he said, it?s espionage that is as old as the nation state. An actual cyber-war could have dramatic real-world fallout he said, and suggested that the leading nations should band together to outlaw online warfare, for fear that it could cause immense damage. One of the problems of online attacks is that you often can?t determine who is carrying out the attacks, making it difficult to bring the perpetrators to justice he said. Much more work was needed in beefing up both defence and also attacking skills.
Microsoft makes cloud deal with South Korean telco
Shaun Nichols in San Francisco, V3.co.uk, Thursday 29 July 2010 at 23:36:00 Company teaming up with LG Uplus on new efforts Microsoft has signed a deal to bring cloud computing applications to customers of the LG Uplus telecommunications service. Under the deal, Microsoft will work with the Korean telco provider to offer cloud computing services for both enterprise customers and consumers. The services slated to be made available to users are enterprise cloud computing platforms as well as improvements to television and mobile services for consumers. As part of the rollout, Microsoft will offer its Online Services platform as part of the LG Uplus Smart Workplace service. "We envision a partnership that will help South Korean businesses improve productivity and boost their competitiveness while delivering integrated services across the PC, TV and mobile phone to consumers," said Microsoft chief executive Steve Ballmer. "The cloud represents a remarkable opportunity for Microsoft and our partners such as LG Uplus where together we can connect users to their favorite people, places and things in more seamless ways than ever before." The deal comes as part of a large-scale campaign by Microsoft to push into the cloud computing market. With cloud computing services such as Google Docs taking aim at its Office in the productivity suite market, the company has moved not only to bring its applications to the web, but also to port its expertise in operating systems to the cloud with the Azure platform.
Shaun Nichols in San Francisco, V3.co.uk, Thursday 29 July 2010 at 23:36:00 Company teaming up with LG Uplus on new efforts Microsoft has signed a deal to bring cloud computing applications to customers of the LG Uplus telecommunications service. Under the deal, Microsoft will work with the Korean telco provider to offer cloud computing services for both enterprise customers and consumers. The services slated to be made available to users are enterprise cloud computing platforms as well as improvements to television and mobile services for consumers. As part of the rollout, Microsoft will offer its Online Services platform as part of the LG Uplus Smart Workplace service. "We envision a partnership that will help South Korean businesses improve productivity and boost their competitiveness while delivering integrated services across the PC, TV and mobile phone to consumers," said Microsoft chief executive Steve Ballmer. "The cloud represents a remarkable opportunity for Microsoft and our partners such as LG Uplus where together we can connect users to their favorite people, places and things in more seamless ways than ever before." The deal comes as part of a large-scale campaign by Microsoft to push into the cloud computing market. With cloud computing services such as Google Docs taking aim at its Office in the productivity suite market, the company has moved not only to bring its applications to the web, but also to port its expertise in operating systems to the cloud with the Azure platform.
E.ON backs Carbon Trust?s Offshore Wind Accelerator
Andrew Charlesworth, BusinessGreen, Thursday 29 July 2010 at 18:31:00 Now there are eight investors E.ON is the latest investor to join the Carbon Trust?s Offshore Wind Accelerator (OWA). The five founding members of the OWA - DONG Energy; RWE Innogy; ScottishPower Renewables; SSE Renewables and Statoil ? were recently joined by Mainstream Renewable Power and Statkraft. E.ON joining the party brings the total investment into the project to £9.2m so far. The OWA is an R&D initiative designed to reduce the total cost of offshore wind energy. Giant offshore wind structures need to be installed at a rate of around two per day for the next decade if the UK is to meet its target of deriving 15 per cent of energy from renewable sources by 2020. Currently less than one turbine a week is installed, but the OWA aims to reduce costs by 10 per cent over the next decade which would enable deployment to happen faster. Collectively the OWA partners represent 61 per cent of the offshore wind capacity licensed in UK waters (30GW). ?E.ON has installed 64 per cent of all offshore capacity in Europe so far this year, and we have another 4000MW of offshore wind in our project pipeline, so reducing the cost is of vital importance to us,? said Michael Lewis, European managing director of E.ON?s Renewable business. ?The OWA will help focus the industry?s efforts to tackle the big issues in a coordinated way and the results will benefit us all.? A report to be published soon by consultancy Arthur D Little criticises the government?s fixation with wind energy. ?Given that offshore installation is dependent on favourable weather conditions, [two turbines a day] seems like a physically impossible schedule, even if all the supply ships and engineering equipment were available on the scale required for such an undertaking, which they are not yet,? Nick White co-author of the report and energy practice leader at the consultancy. ?Policy makers seem to gloss over these real-world engineering constraints.?
Andrew Charlesworth, BusinessGreen, Thursday 29 July 2010 at 18:31:00 Now there are eight investors E.ON is the latest investor to join the Carbon Trust?s Offshore Wind Accelerator (OWA). The five founding members of the OWA - DONG Energy; RWE Innogy; ScottishPower Renewables; SSE Renewables and Statoil ? were recently joined by Mainstream Renewable Power and Statkraft. E.ON joining the party brings the total investment into the project to £9.2m so far. The OWA is an R&D initiative designed to reduce the total cost of offshore wind energy. Giant offshore wind structures need to be installed at a rate of around two per day for the next decade if the UK is to meet its target of deriving 15 per cent of energy from renewable sources by 2020. Currently less than one turbine a week is installed, but the OWA aims to reduce costs by 10 per cent over the next decade which would enable deployment to happen faster. Collectively the OWA partners represent 61 per cent of the offshore wind capacity licensed in UK waters (30GW). ?E.ON has installed 64 per cent of all offshore capacity in Europe so far this year, and we have another 4000MW of offshore wind in our project pipeline, so reducing the cost is of vital importance to us,? said Michael Lewis, European managing director of E.ON?s Renewable business. ?The OWA will help focus the industry?s efforts to tackle the big issues in a coordinated way and the results will benefit us all.? A report to be published soon by consultancy Arthur D Little criticises the government?s fixation with wind energy. ?Given that offshore installation is dependent on favourable weather conditions, [two turbines a day] seems like a physically impossible schedule, even if all the supply ships and engineering equipment were available on the scale required for such an undertaking, which they are not yet,? Nick White co-author of the report and energy practice leader at the consultancy. ?Policy makers seem to gloss over these real-world engineering constraints.?
Council takes specialist skills back in-house
Miya Knights, Computing, Thursday 29 July 2010 at 17:56:00 Middlesbrough extends outsourcing deal, but limits scope to non-specialist and IT services Middlesbrough Council has extended an existing business process outsourcing contract, but has chosen to leave some specialist services out of its scope. The North England local authority said its partnership with business services group Mouchel has delivered in excess of £38m in savings over the past 10 years. It signed a five-year contract extension last week, which it said is expected to deliver a further £12m in savings. But the deal will see a number of services returned to council control in June 2011. The partners told Computing today that the new deal still included most of the technology originally outsourced to Hyder Business Services (which was acquired by Mouchel in 2007), in a deal involving the transfer of nearly 900 personnel in 2001. But while Mouchel will continue to provide all the council?s IT development, support and maintenance, the people who provide the direct service for the council will move back in-house. The functional business areas affected include accountancy, enterprise centres, environment quality management, facilities management, leisure business development, the press office, procurement, non-contact centre reception services and valuation and estates. In the case of its accountancy processes, for example, Mouchel confirmed its team will continue to manage the council?s SAP system and all the related infrastructure, networks, PCs, laptops and servers. A Mouchel spokesperson added that this would allow the council to continue its transformation programme around a series of jointly owned objectives, which are underpinned by IT. ?We are working on such projects as voice over IP technology, complex desktop management strategy including thin clients, mobile working technology and web site development and strategy, as well as electronic document and records management." Mouchel will continue to provide frontline customer services and administration services, council tax and housing benefits administration, finance services including accounts payable and receivable, payroll and pensions administration, as well as human resources and IT services. A Middlesbrough Council spokesperson confirmed the deal, but said they had nothing to add to comments already made by the council chief executive. Ian Parker, chief executive of Middlesbrough Council, stated: ?We will continue to work together with Mouchel to improve working practices and value for money for the people of Middlesbrough.? Rachael Stormonth, senior vice president at market intelligence firm NelsonHall, told Computing that, where the original contract was fixed-price, this extension has more flexible arrangements for the council, being based on a maximum price and with the capacity to reduce it. ?This demonstrates the fact that councils will be needing the IT expertise of service providers, having made as many efficiencies as possible,? she added. ?They will be looking to the providers to make service delivery even cheaper and move beyond just efficiencies to additional savings.?
Miya Knights, Computing, Thursday 29 July 2010 at 17:56:00 Middlesbrough extends outsourcing deal, but limits scope to non-specialist and IT services Middlesbrough Council has extended an existing business process outsourcing contract, but has chosen to leave some specialist services out of its scope. The North England local authority said its partnership with business services group Mouchel has delivered in excess of £38m in savings over the past 10 years. It signed a five-year contract extension last week, which it said is expected to deliver a further £12m in savings. But the deal will see a number of services returned to council control in June 2011. The partners told Computing today that the new deal still included most of the technology originally outsourced to Hyder Business Services (which was acquired by Mouchel in 2007), in a deal involving the transfer of nearly 900 personnel in 2001. But while Mouchel will continue to provide all the council?s IT development, support and maintenance, the people who provide the direct service for the council will move back in-house. The functional business areas affected include accountancy, enterprise centres, environment quality management, facilities management, leisure business development, the press office, procurement, non-contact centre reception services and valuation and estates. In the case of its accountancy processes, for example, Mouchel confirmed its team will continue to manage the council?s SAP system and all the related infrastructure, networks, PCs, laptops and servers. A Mouchel spokesperson added that this would allow the council to continue its transformation programme around a series of jointly owned objectives, which are underpinned by IT. ?We are working on such projects as voice over IP technology, complex desktop management strategy including thin clients, mobile working technology and web site development and strategy, as well as electronic document and records management." Mouchel will continue to provide frontline customer services and administration services, council tax and housing benefits administration, finance services including accounts payable and receivable, payroll and pensions administration, as well as human resources and IT services. A Middlesbrough Council spokesperson confirmed the deal, but said they had nothing to add to comments already made by the council chief executive. Ian Parker, chief executive of Middlesbrough Council, stated: ?We will continue to work together with Mouchel to improve working practices and value for money for the people of Middlesbrough.? Rachael Stormonth, senior vice president at market intelligence firm NelsonHall, told Computing that, where the original contract was fixed-price, this extension has more flexible arrangements for the council, being based on a maximum price and with the capacity to reduce it. ?This demonstrates the fact that councils will be needing the IT expertise of service providers, having made as many efficiencies as possible,? she added. ?They will be looking to the providers to make service delivery even cheaper and move beyond just efficiencies to additional savings.?
Microsoft bangs the Office for Mac 2011 drum
Lawrence Latif, V3.co.uk, Thursday 29 July 2010 at 17:33:00 Entourage personal information manager finally being replaced with Outlook Microsoft is trying to generate interest in its upcoming Office for Mac 2011 productivity suite by drip-feeding information about new features. The company has released the first in a series of videos showing that it will finally replace the cumbersome Entourage personal information manager with Outlook. Other additions include the debut of the ribbon interface on the Mac, and a template gallery. For years Microsoft decided not to port Outlook to its Mac suite, instead sticking with Entourage. While the application had many functional similarities with its Windows cousin, poor integration with Mac OS resulted in a program which was difficult to use over prolonged periods. Users will be delighted to hear that Outlook for Mac will properly integrate with Sherlock, the built in search for Mac OS. At this point it is unclear whether Outlook will be able to handle large mailboxes more efficiently, avoiding the common database corruption suffered by users. The demonstration sees the appearance of the much maligned 'conversation view' from Outlook 2010 on Windows. Whether it will work more reliably remains to be seen, but it is nice to see Mac users having some sort of feature parity on Microsoft products after all this time. Microsoft has also updated PowerPoint's template gallery, which now allows for easier browsing. The firm also mentions that it will integrate with third-party template web sites, allowing users to easily manage their library. Again, there was no mention of increased compatibility between versions, vital for those times when presentations have to be loaded onto another machine. In this preview Microsoft made no references to increased stability or inter operability among Windows and Mac versions. Those who use Word and Excel will have experienced first hand how poor the applications work in an enterprise environment, where documents are shuttled among users with different versions and operating systems thrown in. Instead, the firm mentions that it combines the best of Apple design with its software development expertise. The problem for heavy users of Office on Mac is not design flourishes, but the ability to rely on a piece of software which, rather than helping to reduce their workload, adds to it. So far, little of what Microsoft has announced in Office for Mac 2011 points to an easier life for Mac users. Its decision to ditch Entourage is a positive one, but major improvements to Word, and especially Excel, will be needed if Microsoft's claim of Office 2011 being the "definitive version of Office" holds true.
Lawrence Latif, V3.co.uk, Thursday 29 July 2010 at 17:33:00 Entourage personal information manager finally being replaced with Outlook Microsoft is trying to generate interest in its upcoming Office for Mac 2011 productivity suite by drip-feeding information about new features. The company has released the first in a series of videos showing that it will finally replace the cumbersome Entourage personal information manager with Outlook. Other additions include the debut of the ribbon interface on the Mac, and a template gallery. For years Microsoft decided not to port Outlook to its Mac suite, instead sticking with Entourage. While the application had many functional similarities with its Windows cousin, poor integration with Mac OS resulted in a program which was difficult to use over prolonged periods. Users will be delighted to hear that Outlook for Mac will properly integrate with Sherlock, the built in search for Mac OS. At this point it is unclear whether Outlook will be able to handle large mailboxes more efficiently, avoiding the common database corruption suffered by users. The demonstration sees the appearance of the much maligned 'conversation view' from Outlook 2010 on Windows. Whether it will work more reliably remains to be seen, but it is nice to see Mac users having some sort of feature parity on Microsoft products after all this time. Microsoft has also updated PowerPoint's template gallery, which now allows for easier browsing. The firm also mentions that it will integrate with third-party template web sites, allowing users to easily manage their library. Again, there was no mention of increased compatibility between versions, vital for those times when presentations have to be loaded onto another machine. In this preview Microsoft made no references to increased stability or inter operability among Windows and Mac versions. Those who use Word and Excel will have experienced first hand how poor the applications work in an enterprise environment, where documents are shuttled among users with different versions and operating systems thrown in. Instead, the firm mentions that it combines the best of Apple design with its software development expertise. The problem for heavy users of Office on Mac is not design flourishes, but the ability to rely on a piece of software which, rather than helping to reduce their workload, adds to it. So far, little of what Microsoft has announced in Office for Mac 2011 points to an easier life for Mac users. Its decision to ditch Entourage is a positive one, but major improvements to Word, and especially Excel, will be needed if Microsoft's claim of Office 2011 being the "definitive version of Office" holds true.
F5 Networks adds VADition for storage push
Doug Woodburn, CRN, Thursday 29 July 2010 at 17:12:00 Niche distributor joins Computerlinks, Avnet and Westcon Security in UK line up F5 Networks has moved from three to four UK distributors after appointing VADition to push its fast-growing ARX storage line-up. The vendor launched a pan-European distribution review earlier this year and at that time revealed it was considering appointing storage specialists to help push ARX out to market. VADition will focus on ARX, which is based on F5's 2007 acquisition of Acopia, although it will have access to the full portfolio. Barrie Desmond, business development manager at VADition, said the distributor would initially focus on recruiting the 15 or so specialist storage VARs it already works with around Isilon. ?This is fantastic news for us. VADition is associated with disruptive technologies but it can also add value to established vendors looking to punch above their weight in specific markets,? he said. However, F5's existing trio of distributors gave the move a lukewarm reception, with each talking up their skills around ARX. Laura Harman, sales director at Avnet Technology Solutions, said: "With the integration of Bell, Avnet becomes the premier distributor for storage solutions in the UK, with an unrivalled portfolio of leading storage vendors. Avnet already provides the perfect channel environment within which F5 can grow their ARX business." Dave Ellis, director of new technology and services at Computerlinks, said: ?F5 is growing really well for us. We would have preferred it if they hadn?t appointed a further distributor but we are still focused on taking them into new markets,? he said. Niall McGrane, general manager at Westcon Security said: ?We are focusing on ARX and have developed a pipeline for it so we are confused as to why it needed another partner in that space.? Another source, who wished to remain anonymous, said the partnership had echoes of VADition?s short-lived relationship with rival Juniper, which signed it up for its storage products in 2007. ?They tried this with Juniper and it didn?t work out so it will be interesting to see if this is any different.?
Doug Woodburn, CRN, Thursday 29 July 2010 at 17:12:00 Niche distributor joins Computerlinks, Avnet and Westcon Security in UK line up F5 Networks has moved from three to four UK distributors after appointing VADition to push its fast-growing ARX storage line-up. The vendor launched a pan-European distribution review earlier this year and at that time revealed it was considering appointing storage specialists to help push ARX out to market. VADition will focus on ARX, which is based on F5's 2007 acquisition of Acopia, although it will have access to the full portfolio. Barrie Desmond, business development manager at VADition, said the distributor would initially focus on recruiting the 15 or so specialist storage VARs it already works with around Isilon. ?This is fantastic news for us. VADition is associated with disruptive technologies but it can also add value to established vendors looking to punch above their weight in specific markets,? he said. However, F5's existing trio of distributors gave the move a lukewarm reception, with each talking up their skills around ARX. Laura Harman, sales director at Avnet Technology Solutions, said: "With the integration of Bell, Avnet becomes the premier distributor for storage solutions in the UK, with an unrivalled portfolio of leading storage vendors. Avnet already provides the perfect channel environment within which F5 can grow their ARX business." Dave Ellis, director of new technology and services at Computerlinks, said: ?F5 is growing really well for us. We would have preferred it if they hadn?t appointed a further distributor but we are still focused on taking them into new markets,? he said. Niall McGrane, general manager at Westcon Security said: ?We are focusing on ARX and have developed a pipeline for it so we are confused as to why it needed another partner in that space.? Another source, who wished to remain anonymous, said the partnership had echoes of VADition?s short-lived relationship with rival Juniper, which signed it up for its storage products in 2007. ?They tried this with Juniper and it didn?t work out so it will be interesting to see if this is any different.?
MP slams prepaid credit cards in House of Commons
Tom Royal, Computeractive, Thursday 29 July 2010 at 17:07:00 Labour MP tells Commons that prepaid credit cards are used to buy child pornography, but says evidence is only "anecdotal" Labour MP Geraint Davies has presented a bill in the House of Commons demanding an end to anonymous prepaid credit cards and proposing fines for credit card companies whose products are used to purchase child abuse images. In a bill presented under the Ten Minute Rule on the 21st of July Mr Davies told the House that since 2002 ?credit card companies? have invested heavily to stop the use of conventional credit cards, but that particular horse has, of course, bolted. Few abusers would now risk their identities being known, so now they use prepaid cards instead." However, when Mr Davies was asked what evidence there was showing that prepaid cards were being used in this way, he said his evidence was ?anecdotal?. ?Anonymity breeds criminal behaviour?, he added. Mastercard?s Mikael Svensson said his company had no evidence of an increased use of prepaid cards to purchase child abuse images. ?We don?t have the data that Mr Davies is suggesting?, he told us. ?If somebody does have that data we?d be more than willing to do anything we can to shut them down?. He said Mastercard constantly ?crawls? the internet for abuse sites claiming to accept Mastercard. If any are found it contacts both the police and the bank in question, demanding that it stop the payment service. ?We?ve been doing this for a number of years?, he said ?and we?ve seen the problem migrate away from traditional payment methods, such as credit cards, to alternative methods.? In its most recent Strategic Overview report, the Child Exploitation & Online Protection Centre (CEOP) noted an ?apparent wholesale move by child sexual offenders to the use of peer-to-peer technology? for the distribution of child abuse images. In a statement, Visa said that it too scoured the internet to find and close down sites selling child abuse material. It said its ?position on the issue of child abuse is unequivocal - Visa Europe deplores the commercial exploitation of child abuse images and we do not allow Visa cards - debit, credit or prepaid - to be used to purchase child pornography.? ?This challenge is complex and constantly evolving, and we will continue to remain vigilant to ensure that we are doing everything we can to protect the exploitation of children online?, it said. We asked Mr Davies to confirm that he had only ?anecdotal? evidence suggesting that prepaid cards were being used to purchase child abuse material. He said: ?There is substantial, documented evidence, coming from several different sources, of prepaid cards being used illegally by persons under the age of 18 to buy goods online which they could not buy in the High Street ? There is anecdotal evidence of these cards being used to facilitate other kinds of criminal behaviour, including the purchase if child pornography. ?The credit card companies were bang out of order to jump into this market without thinking it through, or if they did think it through for not caring enough to reach the right conclusions", he added.
Tom Royal, Computeractive, Thursday 29 July 2010 at 17:07:00 Labour MP tells Commons that prepaid credit cards are used to buy child pornography, but says evidence is only "anecdotal" Labour MP Geraint Davies has presented a bill in the House of Commons demanding an end to anonymous prepaid credit cards and proposing fines for credit card companies whose products are used to purchase child abuse images. In a bill presented under the Ten Minute Rule on the 21st of July Mr Davies told the House that since 2002 ?credit card companies? have invested heavily to stop the use of conventional credit cards, but that particular horse has, of course, bolted. Few abusers would now risk their identities being known, so now they use prepaid cards instead." However, when Mr Davies was asked what evidence there was showing that prepaid cards were being used in this way, he said his evidence was ?anecdotal?. ?Anonymity breeds criminal behaviour?, he added. Mastercard?s Mikael Svensson said his company had no evidence of an increased use of prepaid cards to purchase child abuse images. ?We don?t have the data that Mr Davies is suggesting?, he told us. ?If somebody does have that data we?d be more than willing to do anything we can to shut them down?. He said Mastercard constantly ?crawls? the internet for abuse sites claiming to accept Mastercard. If any are found it contacts both the police and the bank in question, demanding that it stop the payment service. ?We?ve been doing this for a number of years?, he said ?and we?ve seen the problem migrate away from traditional payment methods, such as credit cards, to alternative methods.? In its most recent Strategic Overview report, the Child Exploitation & Online Protection Centre (CEOP) noted an ?apparent wholesale move by child sexual offenders to the use of peer-to-peer technology? for the distribution of child abuse images. In a statement, Visa said that it too scoured the internet to find and close down sites selling child abuse material. It said its ?position on the issue of child abuse is unequivocal - Visa Europe deplores the commercial exploitation of child abuse images and we do not allow Visa cards - debit, credit or prepaid - to be used to purchase child pornography.? ?This challenge is complex and constantly evolving, and we will continue to remain vigilant to ensure that we are doing everything we can to protect the exploitation of children online?, it said. We asked Mr Davies to confirm that he had only ?anecdotal? evidence suggesting that prepaid cards were being used to purchase child abuse material. He said: ?There is substantial, documented evidence, coming from several different sources, of prepaid cards being used illegally by persons under the age of 18 to buy goods online which they could not buy in the High Street ? There is anecdotal evidence of these cards being used to facilitate other kinds of criminal behaviour, including the purchase if child pornography. ?The credit card companies were bang out of order to jump into this market without thinking it through, or if they did think it through for not caring enough to reach the right conclusions", he added.