Skype is really not having the best holiday season. With no reason as yet revealed for the service outage that lasted more than a day last week (Although CEO Tony Bates blogged that technicians “now understand the cause of the problem and we believe it was not caused by a malicious attack”; a post-mortem has been promised in the near …
Twitter Moves To Eradicate All Non-Twitter Twitter Sites
2011 might be the year when Twitter stops being nice and starts being real… Or real litigious, at least. Following September’s request from the company that social community “Twitter Moms” change their name so as to avoid any trademark infringement, Ad Age checked in to find out whether this was the start of a new pro-active regime, …
Joint Venture 105: The Venture Bros. from the Very Beginning
Here at Techland, only one television program manages to tie into so many of our geeky obsessions all at once. Superheroes, mythical creatures, action figures and barely believeable sci-fi all flop onto each other on the glorious cavalcade that is The Venture Bros. Cartoon Network’s just started airing the series from the start and …
Too Much Choice Is Bad For The DVD Industry
Variety is killing DVD sales, if 2010 sales figures are to believed. While sales for Blu-Ray and VoD have “exploded” this year, DVD sales are estimated to have fallen 12% when compared with 2009 numbers, which were already down on previous years. According to the CEO of retailer chain Hastings, John Marmaduke, the problem may have been …
Third Generation Kindle Is Amazon’s Best Selling Item
Move over Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: The third generation Kindle is now Amazon’s number one selling item of all time. According to a press release from Amazon, on the peak day, Amazon shipped out nine million units alone, and the Kindle has been shipped to 178 countries. The company won’t reveal exactly how many units …
Facebook Forecast 2011: Mobile & E-Commerce, But What About China?
There’s no denying: Facebook had a hell of a year.
From a media standpoint, its copious (and sometimes scandalous) headlines were a dream – even Hollywood agreed. There have been few stories to match Facebook’s, and when they come along, the world seems to pounce. But mistaking the company (or its 26-year-old billionaire CEO) as …
The Easiest Ways To Return Your Unwanted Presents
The holidays are over (except for you out there who celebrate Kwanzaa: The fun is just beginning for you), and you’re probably over oooing and ahhing over the loot you got this year. Since the dust has settled, you’re starting to see things a little more clearly. You actually got two or three of the same thing in slightly different …
Samsung Prepping Android-based iPod Touch Competitor
Samsung is apparently readying an Android-based music player based on its popular line of “Galaxy S” smartphones.
The Galaxy Player will be similar to Apple’s iPod Touch in that it’ll basically be an Android phone without the phone part, much like the iPod Touch is more or less an iPhone without the cellular chipset.
What We’re Looking Forward To in 2011: Comics
We don’t know a lot yet about the comic books due to appear next year–the mainstream publishers tend to play their cards close to the chest until a couple of months before release dates–but a lot of 2011’s big graphic novels have already been announced. Here are some of the ones we’re most excited about.
Takio – Brian Michael Bendis …
Gorillaz Reveal What Apps They Used To Make Their iPad Album
If you’re a huge fan of the virtual band, you’ve probably heard the Gorillaz’s latest album The Fall, which was released on Christmas day. In their recent interview with Billboard, Damon Albarn dished on how he created the album and which apps he used, including Speak It!, SoundyThingie, Mugician, Funx Box Drum Machine, Gliss, AmpliTube …
Sony Exec Says Next PlayStation Portable Will Appeal to the Hardcore
Handheld gaming fans may want to save any holiday money they get in the next few days, because it seems like Sony will be rolling out two very different devices in the near future. According to the New York Times, Kaz Hirai–head of the Playstation division–recently made remarks that shed a tiny bit of light on how Sony’s …
Behind The Grid: Tron FX Supervisor Explains Your Favorite Scenes
This month’s blockbusting hit Tron: Legacy is something of a cult phenomenon – a phenomenon that glows in the dark. Special effects supervisor Eric Barba was kind enough to talk us through the mind-bending, CGI world of Tron, spilling the secrets behind the magic of our favorite scenes.
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“It all starts with some of the knowledge …