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Man, Microsoft is all about the teeny-boppers. Ashley Tisdale will serenade (confuse?) Windows 7 shoppers in Scottsdale this Thursday, and now 15-year old popster, Justin Bieber, is locked-in for its second store: Mission Viejo in Southern Cali. Weird. [Microsoft] https://gizmodo.com/microsoft-store-grand-opening-features-giveaways-swag-5384427/ Ashley Tisdale Image: Wikipedia
Kotaku reports that a number of their readers have received invites to an “exclusive pilot rewards program” for Xbox Live. https://kotaku.com/microsoft-explores-xbox-live-rewards-program-5385637 Only a “select few” have been chosen for what looks to be a trial run of the Xbox rewards program starting October 21, using a criteria that no one has deciphered yet (for instance,…
Window Mobile 6.5 was a visual upgrade over all else, which makes the fact that the new UI isn’t very good particularly disturbing. Windows Mobile 6.5.1 takes the interface changes deeper—like they should’ve been in the first place. https://gizmodo.com/windows-mobile-6-5-review-theres-no-excuse-for-this-5374876 Some of the especially jarring UI elements, like the Windows 3.1-esque radio buttons and aging contacts…
Dear Delta, I just saw your touch-sensitive faucet. You call it “Pilar Touch-Activated Single Handle Pull-Down Kitchen Faucet with ToucH2O Technology.” I call it motherfaucet genius. This is how it works: Just touch with any dry, clean part of your body to activate. Any clean body part will work. That simple. Touch to activate. Touch…
In today’s edition of the “steady progress” being made in recovering the data lost in the Great Sidekick Out(r)age of 2009, contacts—and just contacts—are back, after you run a retrieval tool. The rest’s coming! Eventually? [Yahoo] https://gizmodo.com/microsoft-making-steady-progress-on-sidekick-data-rec-5384990
Earth to your iPod: “Single Ladies” has jumped the shark. Time for new music! We want to help. Take this survey, email the last question to [email protected], and you’ll be entered to win a $150 iTunes Gift Card. [Rules]
Everybody complaining in the 1D Mark IV comment thread that there won’t be any more video firmware updates for the 5D Mark II is kinda wrong: Canon is enabling the 24fps and 25fps 1080p video recording that’s found on the 7D and 1D Mark IV, bringing it about up to par. Update’s due sometime next…
Remember the Comcastard-stacked FCC hearing on BitTorrent? AT&T thinks that’s a good strategy, since AT&T’s main lobbyist sent a letter to 300,000 employees U.S. managers “encouraging” them and their families to protest the FCC’s net neutrality rules. Updated https://gizmodo.com/fcc-may-repeat-net-neutrality-hearing-after-comcastards-361704 Update: AT&T says that the letter was sent to “U.S. managers only” and that they “were…
Those Android-powered tablets from Archos are pretty neat, but if you’ve got a UMPC (like Samsung’s Q1UP) lying around, you can try Android thanks to the Android-x86 project. The catch: despite great performance, there are still a few major limitations. The good news is that you can run Android from a USB drive or Live…
Sonos, best known for their premium-priced (but adored) wireless audio systems, announced an all-in-one receiver and speaker recently, and after seeing and hearing it, I’m impressed—but not blown away. https://gizmodo.com/sonos-gets-a-little-more-affordable-with-zoneplayer-s5-5380365 Whether you’re taken with the S5 largely depends on how you feel about Sonos in the first place. If you’ve been itching for an elegant…
And with this, a $100, 40-watt speaker that looks exactly like a stage monitor but nonetheless isn’t quite a stage monitor, the bizarre, alternate universe of rhythm gaming is complete. First things first: you can’t plug your guitar into this. It’s not a guitar amp, and it doesn’t have a 1/4-inch input, and the 6.5-inch…
For thousands of years, none of us quite understood the point of the Surface. Then, a few Carnegie Mellon students armed with but blades and wits developed this D&D game, and they lightning bolted the naysayers away. [Microsoft via Kotaku] https://kotaku.com/dungeons-dragons-on-microsoft-surface-is-for-wealthy-5385175
Do you think you have what it takes to be a Gizmodo graphics intern? If you said yes without reading what it takes, you are already fired. Go on, punk. Read this, and make my day: Requirements You should: • Know how to use Photoshop, especially for collages. • Know how to use Illustrator (not…
UK gadget blog, Electricpig, says a “highly placed source” at Kodak has promised big things at CES. It’s first DSLR since 2004? Something completely different? Either way, it’ll apparently arrive alongside the successor to the Zi8 pocket camcorder. [Electricpig] https://gizmodo.com/kodak-zi8-1080p-pocket-camcorder-review-your-move-fli-5328408
Yanko loves to tease us with all manner of nonexistent cool concepts, but now they’ll sell you the ones that are real products. Gadgets so far include the d°light Huggable Pillow (pictured), and the magnetic spice rack. [Yanko Design] https://gizmodo.com/reihuggable-glow-pillows-275427
I’d put this retro-futuristic prediction in the “why the hell would you do that?” file. The August 7, 1960 Chicago Tribune ran this panel of Arthur Radebaugh’s Closer Than We Think, titled “24-Hour Daylight.” It imagines a world in which miniature artificial suns illuminate cities of the future. To be fair, those people look like…
Ranking the highest according to a sample of 20,000 credit scores and their corresponding email addresses are BellSouth and Comcast, with Gmail trailing right behind. Reasonable enough, but what’s AOL doing anywhere but at the bottom? [Mashable]
The videos are out, and now so’s the camera: $5000 buys you a 16MP DSLR that shoots at a whopping 102,400ISO with a new 45-point autofocus system, 10fps bursts, and oh yeah—suck it D3s, incredible 1080p video. https://gizmodo.com/canon-1d-mark-iv-1080p-night-vision-videos-are-simply-i-5385443 The 1D Mark IV uses an APS-H-sized 16-megapixel sensor that’s “similar in size to a Super 35mm…
Acer’s new AS1410 notebook, a 11.6-incher, may look like a netbook and start at $400, but it’s definitely a step up: It’s got a multitouch trackpad, Celeron proc, Windows 7 and HDMI-out, plus a full-sized keyboard. The AS1410 offers options more powerful than a netbook but not as powerful as what we think of as…
It’s tough to muster excitement over a $130 Bluetooth headset nowadays. It feels like peeling yourself out of bed after a breakup, or laughing at a joke during a eulogy for your best friend. So, Jabra, regarding the Stone: Thanks. https://gizmodo.com/this-is-the-jabra-stone-5366201 About a month ago, Jabra sent a little bag out to its regular reviewers.…
