Honeycomb for Phone

Google have alerted the media ahead of an announcement about their upcoming Android mobile operating system version 3.0, code-named 'Honeycomb'.

In the announcement they have indicated that the system will be designed for both tablets (as expected) and smartphones (a surprise). It will be intriguing to see what features will be on the respective types of device but the preview video (previously posted below) should give you a taste of what to expect from this major milestone in the Android evolution.

A win for the Black Hats

Law firm ACS:Law which caused a stir by sending out letters chasing alleged filesharers for payments on behalf of copyright holders has elected to drop all its criminal prosecutions. At the launch of their letter/invoice campaign, the company came under attack from hackers via a DDoS who exposed corporate e-mails to the internet that seriously undermined the legal process and left it itself exposed to data protection laws.

It now appears that a dirty tricks campaign from the black hat brigade full of threats and subterfuge has tolled and the firm has withdrawn all its actions. It may not be the end of the story for them though as the courts and the SRA law society are investigating their inferred bullying tactics. Also, legal representatives of the accused are now looking to sue for damages.

Where this leaves any future legal process against illegal filesharing remains unclear but yet again the power of the internet has shown its teeth…and once more the black hats fade back to the shadows with a wry smile with their mission accomplished..

The awesome Open Rights Group succinctly summed the whole thing up here

More Atrix Goodness

The above video better outlines the concept behind the development of Motorola's new Atrix phone launching later this year. It's a fabulous idea and it seems to have the hardware to make it work and back up its promise of being one device for all things multimedia! Cost will likely be high though but if it replaces a bucketload of your existing kit it will surely be worth a look...

I can see one potential problem though....if we are to become truly reliant on a single device to do all our multimedia and pc work and be our alarm clock, phone, bath time musical accompaniment etc.....what happens if we leave it in our desk at work overnight for example? It would be a bad start to your day to discover you have left your now vitally-important phone synced in its bedside cradle or, worse, lost it!

This video is also pretty neat...

Android - coming to a desktop near you!

This is a very cool and interesting development. Motorola unveiled their new Atrix phone at this year's CES event in Las Vegas. It is a very high spec Android phone with 1gig of RAM, dual processors, hd video capture, large battery and a very high res screen. However, the most interesting trick it can pull is that when it is connected to a dock it can operate as a web-top pc, outputting to a monitor via hdmi and controlled by a keyboard and mouse. There is also a laptop-style dock where it can connect to a portable screen and keyboard and be used in a bigger but still portable. This modular approach is very intriguing!

The time when our mobile phone is as powerful as a regular desktop pc is fast approaching and this might be the first device of this kind off the grid...

Film of the Year 2010

With the New Year having arrived, the Cyborg Ninja can now reflect on yet another fabulous year of movies in 2010 and come up with the next selection for the coveted 'Ninja film of the year'!

Despite the depth of movies on offer, there were two obvious favourites with one getting the nod by a nose. My choice for film of the year was Knight and Day - a hilarious romp of a movie with a nice slice of tongue in cheek to go along with the rollicking action. The special effects were a bit ropey in parts and the story was ludicrous but I loved it for its humour. Inception was an oh-so-close second - a simply amazing film that had a clever plot, awesome visuals (the Blu-Ray is mindblowing!) and a stunning conclusion but it was the fun of Knight and Day that won out.

Previous winners:

2010 - Knight and Day (runner up - Inception)

2009 - Star Trek

2008 - Vantage Point (runner up - Eagle Eye)

2007 - Shooter & Bourne Ultimatum

2006 - Deja Vu (runner up - V for Vendetta)

2005 - Transporter 2 (runner up - Stealth)

2004 - Bourne Supremacy (runner up - Man on Fire)

2003 - The Italian Job

2002 - Bourne Identity

2001 - Spy Game

2000 - Mission Impossible 2

And if I had to pick a film of the decade...it should probably go to either Supremacy or Ultimatum but the heart says that Vantage Point deserves it....an incredible telling of a gripping story, albeit a far fetched one, but so cleverly told it deserves the recognition!

Google Goggles...find beer here!

It has to be said that Google Goggles is simply amazing! ! It might be the most compelling reason to buy an Android phone. You simply take a picture of something and Goggles recognises it and runs searches based on what it saw.

Now it appears that the latest version (v1.3) will even solve Sudoku for you! The video above should explain the concept but the Ninja would thoroughly recommend getting a new Android phone for this app alone it's that cool!

Honeycomb is here...

In an intriguing twist, Google have unveiled the latest iteration of their world-conquering Android mobile phone operating system - version 3 or 'Honeycomb'. In a twist, however, it is only for the tablet form factor but the UI looks very impressive with 3D elements and obvious speed increases over other mobile OS systems.

What will be interesting is to see what elements of this version are incorporated in to the handheld mobile version of Android, either in the next edition or as an update to Froyo or Gingerbread.

Internet under threat by stealth?

There is a worrying effort underway recently to put the time limit (or at least some from of cap) back on the internet. This goes against the principles of net neutrality and the progress that has been made since the days of dial-up modems. What is perhaps more scary is the stealthy approach that is being taken by both government and major industry players to install this cap.

Mobile phone operators seem content to cap internet use with restrictive data plans rather than supporting its growth with truly unlimited add-ons. Current offerings always have the caveat of fair use and often 500mb or 1gig limits apply. Data costs in the USA seem very high compared to the UK and the recent efforts of Verizon and Google to hash out a supposedly fair compromise over net neutrality seem weak.

Recent UK government efforts have focused on addressing big industry concerns such as piracy (through the much-hated Digital Economy Bill) rather than dealing with the end-users rights. Even the recent effort to make those wishing to access smut have to opt-in seems sneaky. On the face of it seems like a worthwhile effort to protect the vulnerable but this is bound to involve some form of surveillance (packet-sniffing) to monitor web traffic, a far scarier development.

Even BT, the gatekeeper for the internet in the UK has said it will allow content providers to pay for their data to receive higher bandwidths, in essence creating two-tiers on the web. Big guns like YouTube would be able to afford the upgrade but smaller start-ups would be stalled due to the likely prohibitive cost being a barrier to entry.

2011 will likely be the year a number of these issues are clarified but the end user seems to have little in the way of power to influence the decisions and indeed the general public may be completely unaware of the whole issue.