Google taking over Youtube?

There have been rumors that Google is teaming up with Sony, Intel and Logitech to put a consumer set up box platform for mixing TV with the internet, based on its android operating system Designed to melt TV with internet content.

Apple Board Member Dies

Apple board member of 13 years, Jerome B. York, died Tuesday after suffering from a massive cerebral hemorrhage.

Formspring

The CEO of formspring, Mark Baxter, was arrested Monday for data phishing and misleading the public after the site was revealed as a social experiment. Which will result in the automatically revealing of the users private data April 1, 2010.

Bill Gates isn't this richest man?

A Mexican telecommunications tycoon, Carlos Slim Helu has stolen the title as the world's richest man, worth $53.5 billion, and Gates only worth $53 billion. He is a self-made billionaire, controlling the interest in several mexican telecommunications companies.

Google-China Revolution?

There are rumors that Google and the chinese government are negotiating internet censorship in China. It's said that they are coming to a solution 'soon'.

MSN Makeover?

Since last year Microsoft has been testing new designs for the venerable portal. One includes a cleaner more video-heavy look for the site. In the next couple of days Microsoft is expected to reveal the new designs to everyone in the US.

Apple bans iPhone app

Techcrunch says that an israeli developer called Tawkon created an app that with a finely tuned algorithm, measures your specific absorption rate, or the rate that your whole body, not just your brain, absorbs energy from a radio frequency magnified field. The Tawkon app then factors in environmental conditions and phone usage in order to give you some accurate sense of your exposure to bad rays.

Apple has rejected the app that enables this feature. This makes me wonder how much radiation your iPhone really transmits

Tivo Series 4 Announced!

On Tuesday TiVo officially announced the release of two new DRS that offer an updated user interface and enhanced integration. The new DVR also comes with an online video search capabilities . The premiere also comes with XL models that will cost $300 and $500, when they ship it in April, like all previous TiVo models, it will require a monthly, yearly, or lifetime service fee as well.

Finding his voice

The famous film critic Robert Ebert lost his voice in a battle to cancer. Diagnosed with thyroid cancer in 2002 over a series of surgeries he lost his voice and lower jaw, taking away his ability to speak, eat and drink anything. To communicate he has been relying on TTS (text-to-text speech), a software that speaks whatever he types. TTS is far from perfect, and only allows a computer voice to talk for him.

While on his website he discovered a new kind of TTS called CereProc that builds voices on a persons actual recordings.

Blockbuster is broke

Blockbuster has announced a 435 million dollar loss for the fourth quarter after a 114 million dollar loss in the third quarter. In September it announced that they would be closing 960 underperforming stores. To revitalize its business, Blockbuster hopes to install 7,000 rental kiosks this year to help it more effectively compete with Redbox. It installed 2,000 kiosks in 2009.

Twitter Phishing

Twitter users were being hit on Wednesday with the second phishing attack this week.

The latest attack: Users received messages saying 'This you????' luring users onto a fake twitter log in page. Messages are being spread directly in bulk using a group tweet, 'according to sophos' .

The Sophos blog entries have videos explaining the attacks. They also warn users not to reuse passwords on different sites. A Twitter phishing attack that steals your log-in credentials compromises your bank and e-mail accounts, if you use the same password on those sites.

Charging for farmville?

All of the rumors of Zynga charging $5.99 a month for farmville are FALSE. After being posted on a blog, rumors of a fee for playing farmville with upgraded levels and more spread all over the internet. Evenn though farmville has 75 million monthly players, Zynga still doesn't think it is appropriate to go public with the game.

Fable 3

The sequel is on it's way. Fable 3 will be here just in time for the holidays. The perfect gift for most gamers.

Avatar 2

Has pre production on an avatar sequel already started? Slash film is reporting that technical crew members are currently being hired to work on avatar 2, and are even having to sign 3-5 year contracts to work on the project. It's not a huge shock that Fox would rush a second film into production. Avatar has just became the highest grossing film of all time.

Mars Rover= Fail

The 900 million dollar NASA project has now been permanently stuck in a sandy rut on Mars, after more than 5 years of scientific exploration, lasting far long than its intended 90 day mission. The Mars Rover has damaged its 2 right wheels. NASA still hopes that it will still retrieve data from it's sandy 'resting place'

Adobe vc. Apple

Adobe has now released an official statement saying, "It looks like Apple is continuing to impose restrictions on their devices that limit both content publishers and consumers. And without Flash support, iPad users will still not be able to access the full range of web content including over 70% of games and 75% of videos on the web." Apple claims that Flash isn't an option because it is a security risk and drains the iPad's resources

Google

Since Apple bought GoogleVoice for their apps store, google has found a new program as a web app. If you're a current GoogleVoice user you can access by looking up google.com/voice into your web browser. GoogleVoice transcribes voice messages and allows free calling over the internet, something iPhone carried by AT&T isn't too happy about. Which is probably why the original GoogleVoice app was originally rejected.

Youtube

Youtube is now in the movie rental business. On Friday the video showing site brought 5 new films from the Sundance Music Festival for rental. The movies will cost $3.99 for a 48 hour viewing period, and will include the much hyped documentary The Cove. And while the earlier offerings are modish, each view of these films could encourage major movie company's to start using Youtube rentals.

Kindle Apps Store

Amazon is going on the fence and opening a Kindle Apps Store. Until now the company has sold e-bits for the Kindle. But now the company is going to allow third party developers to design apps for the Amazon e-reader, and Amazon spoke persons to sell some of the Kindles new apps.

Apple Finally Confirms Tablet

Apple will finally reveal it's long rumored tablet next week. The company officially announced that it will hold and invite only event in San Francisco on January 27th to unveil it's 'latest creation' that everyone assumes is code for maybe a new iPhone 4.0. There have been rumors of iPhone updates and OS upgrades as well.

Ghost Busters!

Ivan Reitman, the two time Ghost Busters director agreed to do the third installment of the series. Reitman and Columbia Pictures have been developing a script with two of the writers on NBC's show The Office, in an attempt to relaunch the franchise. Production is set to start shooting next year.

Google Maps helps Haiti

Google has tamed up with the satellite imagery company GOI to quickly make images of the destruction from the earthquake Haiti available in Google Earth and Google Maps. It is hoped that the images are proved to be an invaluable tool for aid organizations attempting to asses the damage in Haiti's infrastructure. And US donations for patient relief via text messages for organizations like Red Cross have exceeded to 3 million dollars. Thanks to M-Give and mobile giving services with secret codes charged to their cell phone carriers .

Legalizing it

California has voted 4 to 3 to legalize marijuana for non-medical use. The new bill AB390 would put a $50 tax on every ounce of marijuana sold, and would legalize the drug for anyone 21 or older. The bill is now moving over to the heath committee for approval besides the warnings from police chiefs and prosecutors saying that it would increase in crime in Californi.a

World's First Sex Bot

The Adult Industry has now introduced a new 'True Companion' called Roxxxy. Roxxxy is a lady companion now equipped with artificial intelligence that allows her to talk about football and make sexy comments to her human 'companion'. Roxxxy is the first model in a complete line of sex bots that are sold in the US for about $7,000, and there is a male version of the doll name Rocky also being built.

The Healing Powers of Modern Warfare 2

Last year MMA fighter Jamie Varner suffered from a broken hand and a broken foot after getting into the Octagon with MMA fighter Donald Cerrone. After going to the doctor, he was prescribed an unorthodox cure of playing Modern Warfare 2, to rehabilitate his smashed metacarpal. A year later his hand is healed and he will be fighting in the octagon this Sunday.

Microsoft VS. Google

The on going war between Microsoft and Google is finally starting to heat up. Microsoft is now paying major publishers like New corp. to D-list themselves from Google, making Bing the only search engine that could pull content from sites like the Wall-street Journal, and Myspace.