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Sony -finally- slashes its e-reader prices

After everyone assumed that Sony just didn’t care about its Reader devices, it has finally cut prices of all three models to respond to its new competitors and increased pricing pressure.

The pocket version of Sony’s Reader is now $149, in line with the low-end Nook Wi-Fi and Borders Kobo devices. It used to cost $169. The touchscreen Touch Reader went from $199 to $169.
The top-end Reader, the Daily Edition model, is now $299, down from $349.

Sony’s Reader used to have a monopoly on the e-book market, but it was always a niche industry until Amazon came out with its Kindle device. Since then, the Reader has fallen by the wayside.

Instead of aggressively trying to compete against the Kindle, though, Sony seemingly did nothing. Then Barnes & Noble’s Nook and Borders’ Kobo were released. That spurred a price war among the three bookstore devices, but even still Sony just did nothing.

Now it is finally following suit, but it may be too little too late. The Reader does not have a mobile data connection and its e-ink is based on older technology. The Reader has pretty much fallen out of the e-book discussion.

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Be the first to comment - What do you think?  Posted by swood - July 10, 2010 at 5:39 am

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ISPs Don’t Have To Block The Pirate Bay, Court Rules

Two ISPs have won their court battle against an anti-piracy group which had demanded that they block subscriber access to The Pirate Bay. Yesterday a judge at the Antwerp Commercial Court rejected the blocking demands and labeled them “disproportionate”. The Belgian Anti-Piracy Federation has reacted angrily, accusing the ISPs of siding with The Pirate Bay.

pirate bayFaced with a huge BitTorrent site that simply refuses to comply, give in, or die, anti-piracy groups have been trying other methods to take The Pirate Bay offline.

With 2009′s “guilty” verdict in hand, a common theme in recent times has been to put pressure on ISPs to block the site, but most are refusing to comply.

Similar negotiations have been going on in Belgium between two ISPs, Belgacom and Telenet, and the Belgian Anti-Piracy Foundation (BAF) for some time now, but reached deadlock.

“There should be an efficient and quick procedure to be able to act fast against illegal foreign sites. We’ve tried negotiating with the internet providers for over a year, but to no avail,” said BAF’s Christophe Van Mechelen. “A list of illegal foreign sites was also sent to the public prosecutor’s office, but was classified without result.”

Inevitably the negotiations with the ISPs transformed into legal action and this week a court was left with a decision – should it officially order the service providers to block the world’s most resilient tracker?

For the Belgian Anti-Piracy Foundation (BAF) the outcome was bad news.

Yesterday the Antwerp Commercial Court refused to order ISPs Belgacom and Telenet to make the The Pirate Bay inaccessible to their subscribers and labeled such a blocking requirement as “disproportionate”.

BAF reacted angrily against the ISPs, stating that by taking the side of The Pirate Bay they had effectively given protection to “an illegal site”. The ISPs, however, said that the decision to block websites is not theirs to make.

“It is not the role of Telenet to decide which sites should be available or not to our users,” said a spokeswoman for the ISP. “As a service provider, this is not within our competence.”

Belgacom also defended its stance in a comment. “The judge considered that immediate action to block this site was not necessary and that BAF’s application was disproportionate to the offense, especially since the site has existed for several years and that the request comes only now.”

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Be the first to comment - What do you think?  Posted by swood - at 5:32 am

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Dev Team jailbreaks Apple iPad 3G

A member of the iPhone Dev Team known as “MuscleNerd” has successfully jailbroken Apple’s iPad 3G.

According to the Dev Team blog, MuscleNerd hacked the device with a userland (@comex) jailbreak app known as “Spirit” – which was originally deployed in April to crack the WiFi-only version of the iPad.

The Spirit jailbreak is most useful for newer devices: iPhone 3GS, iPod Touch 3G, and the iPads. Unfortunately those devices are the same ones that Apple can prevent you from downgrading unless you’ve got a backup of your personalized SHSH blobs,” explained a Dev Team blog post.

“Unless you’ve backed up your SHSH blobs for vulnerable firmware versions, you’ll lose the ability to use the current Spirit jailbreak if you accidentally upgrade. If you currently are using a tethered jailbreak, you have to restore to use Spirit. Do not upgrade if you use an unlock on an iPhone 3G or 3GS.

“You can, however, restore to 3.1.2 if you have SHSH blobs for that version. On iPad, all this is still sort of beta. Some packages in Cydia, not designed for iPad, might screw up your system and require you to restore. Be careful. And no, Cydia’s appearance is not final.”



Other key Spirit features include:

•Untethered jailbreak.
•Functions on all devices – however, the redsn0w and PwnageTool flows will continue to work on those devices they’ve always worked on.
•Does not include a carrier unlock.
•Requires device to be activated or hacktivated.


Spirit can be downloaded here.

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Be the first to comment - What do you think?  Posted by swood - June 23, 2010 at 4:05 pm

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iPhone Dev-Team jailbreaks iOS 4 for 3GS

The iPhone Dev-Team has successfully jailbroken Apple’s recently launched iOS 4 for the 3GS, 3G and second-gen iPod Touch.

However, PwnageTool 4.0.1 does not work with the iPhone 2G, first-gen iPod Touch or iPod Touch 3G.

iPhone Dev-Team jailbreaks iOS 4 for 3GS “Currently, PwnageTool [for 3GS only functions with] previously jailbroken devices [that have an] old bootrom,” Dev-Team explained in an official blog post.

“If you have a Jailbroken iPhone 3GS with the OLD BOOTROM and you DID NOT use Spirit to jailbreak then you can create the ipsw with PwnageTool 4.0 and restore with your jailbroken recovery mode. If you have an iPhone 3GS with the NEW BOOTROM this is NOT supported by PwnageTool 4.0 PwnageTool 4.01.”

The Dev-Team also instructed 3G owners with a jailbroken iPhone at 3.1.2 (NOT Spirit) to create the ipsw with PwnageTool 4.01 and restore from recovery or DFU mode.

“If you have an out of the box iPhone 3G you should restore using a PwnageTool 4.01 ipsw using DFU mode…And if you have a Jailbroken 3.1.3 iPhone 3G it is very possible that this can fail from recovery mode, if this failure happens you will need to restore using DFU mode.

“As an alternative to PwnageTool, you can use redsn0w on iPhone 3G (on both Windows and Mac).”

Meanwhile, AppleInsider’s Sam Oliver questioned whether the latest iteration of the hack would work with the iPhone 4.

“It is likely that the new handset will include enhanced security measures designed to thwart hackers. Late last year, Apple became more aggressive against jailbreak attempts when it silently updated the BootROM in the iPhone 3GS,” wrote Oliver.

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Be the first to comment - What do you think?  Posted by swood - at 4:04 pm

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New $100 bill uses thousands of lenses, has a 3D effect

The US Treasury Department has introduced a new makeover to the $100 bill, which now has moving images, 3D effects, and changing colors as the most robust anti-counterfeit note in the country’s history.

The department says the process of creating one of the new $100 bills is technologically leaps and bounds beyond anything it has tried before.

The printing process involves embedding thousands of tiny lenses into the bill that make a bright blue security ribbon seem to have a 3D appearance.

Additionally, pictures of tiny bells and little “100″ insignias move side-to-side and up-and-down as the bill is tilted. An emblem of the Liberty Bell has also been added to the face of the note next to Benjamin Franklin, which disappears when viewed in certain light.

Other new additions include a picture of a quill pen at the top of the bill and a tinge of yellow on the right side. And to comply with a new federal ruling that requires bill denominations to be more apparent to the visually impaired, there is a giant gold “100″ on the back.

Although the $20 bill is the most commonly counterfeited bill inside the US, it is the $100 note that is the most common overseas target. And Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke says that as many as two-thirds of all $100 bills are actually circulated outside the US.

When the new $100 bill begins to go into circulation in February of 2011, it will be the third time in the past 15 years that the bill has gotten a makeover. No other bill has been resigned so frequently.

ap credit picture

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Be the first to comment - What do you think?  Posted by swood - May 25, 2010 at 12:27 pm

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Iron Man 2 …opening weekend

The Robert Downey Jr.-starring sequel takes in an estimated $133.6 million in its opening weekend.

The “Iron Man 2″ opening is the fifth highest of all time, not accounting for ticket-price inflation, and a sign that audience interest in the Marvel Entertainment character has grown significantly since the original “Iron Man” opened with $98.6 million in 2008.

It grossed an estimated $100.2 million during its first five days of release, inclusive of all territories where it debuted, representing a gigantic opening. Its gross was the largest international opening of 2010 yet, surpassing Alice in Wonderland’s $94 million haul, which in made when it opened in March.

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Be the first to comment - What do you think?  Posted by swood - May 13, 2010 at 5:40 am

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Free Comic Book Day….all day What is Free Comic Book Day

Downtown Comics

Hurry time is running out. 

here is the link. 

http://freecomicbookday.com/

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Update……  CoComic book day was incredible.   I took my 6 year old and my 15 year old and we picked up over 25 comic books….free.  If you have a chance to go next year…Do not miss it.

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Be the first to comment - What do you think?  Posted by swood - May 1, 2010 at 10:26 am

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Steve Ballmer previews Windows Live Messenger in Brazil

On April 28 in Sao Paolo, Brazil, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer previewed the new Windows Live Messenger in his “Five Dimensions of the Cloud” presentation at the Universidade de Sao Paulo. This is the first official announcement around new features in the next generation of Windows Live. Video: Watch a demo of the new Windows Live Messenger Images: View Messenger screenshots, Brazil event photos coming soon

Video: Watch a demo of the new Windows Live Messenger
Images: View Messenger screenshots, Brazil event photos coming soon

 Source   http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/presskits/windowslive/

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Be the first to comment - What do you think?  Posted by swood - April 28, 2010 at 5:24 pm

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Get on the Bus. Get a free copy of Windows 7.

The Get On the Bus Tour is back and we’re taking our 10-city road tour to the East Coast toward New Orleans and Tech-Ed 2010. Register for a tour stop near you, where we’ll dive deep into both Windows 7 and Office 2010, and present specific learning paths for the latest Microsoft Certifications. All at no cost to you.

 FREE SOFTWARE! We are giving away 50 copies of Windows 7 Ultimate for the first 50 Get On the Bus event attendees through the door at EVERY STOP! Don’t miss your chance to win a copy of Microsoft’s newest software offering – register today at www.thebustour.com. Disclaimer: *To receive your free copy of Windows 7 Ultimate, be one of the first 50 people who are US residents (includes D of C) or Canada 18+ to arrive at a Microsoft Get On the Bus Tour afternoon event. 50 copies of the software title are available. Limit one gift per person. This offer is non-transferable and cannot be combined with any other offer. This offer ends on June 4, 2010 while supplies last, and is not redeemable for cash. Taxes, if any, are the sole responsibility of the recipient. There is no shipment of your gift – all gifts will be distributed onsite. Check out http://microsoftbustour.com/

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Be the first to comment - What do you think?  Posted by swood - April 27, 2010 at 10:19 am

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Microsoft Fix it Online Beta announced

MSFixitOL7a

Microsoft has announced the Microsoft Fix it Online Portal. Microsoft Fix it Center makes getting support easier than ever because automatic troubleshooters solve the issues you have now and prevent new ones

As easy as “Click, click, fixed!”

You can use any computer with Internet connection to get started with Fix it Center. Simply download the Fix it Center client and follow the on-screen instructions to complete the setup. You can install Fix it Center client on as many PCs you like.

MSFixitOL10

Check it out now – http://fixitcenter.support.microsoft.com/Portal

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Be the first to comment - What do you think?  Posted by swood - April 16, 2010 at 7:19 am

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