Capcom announces Marvel vs Capcom 3, more
Capcom has revealed its upcoming line-up of games, and while we already knew about some of the releases, there are more than a few pleasant surprises. Leading the way is Marvel vs Capcom 3: Fate of Two Worlds. No real details were revealed about the game, though you can get an early glimpse of it in the teaser trailer below. It will be coming to both the PS3 and 360 in spring of 2011.
Also announced was Bionic Commando Rearmed 2, the sequel to 2008's retro remake. Again, few details were revealed, but the game will introduce a jump button to the series for the first time. No word if development will be handled by the newly formed Might & Delight. It's expected to be released in the first quarter of 2011.
Capcom also revealed North American releases for a pair of anticipated Nintendo DS games. ÅŒkamiden, the sequel to the classic PS2 game, is confirmed for a release at some point next year. Meanwhile, Ghost Trick Phantom Detective, a new game from the creator of the Ace Attorney series, is scheduled to hit store shelves next winter.
There's also some new details on the upcoming Dead Rising 2. The game will include co-op play, and a downloadable prologue dubbed Dead Rising 2: Case Zero will be released exclusively on Xbox Live before the full game's August release. The game is set three years prior to the retail release and will introduce players to new protagonist Chuck Greene.
It was also announced that both Lost Planet 2 and Super Street Fighter IV will be getting launch day downloadable content. For SSF4, this will take the form of new costume packs, while a free Tournament Mode will also be available as a free download on June 15. Lost Planet 2, meanwhile, will be getting a new map pack.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Silk substrate hugs brain's curves in all the right places
We've found lots of technically challenging ways to monitor brain activity, but scientists may have come up with an easier one. A paper published in Nature last week describes a new method for placing electrodes onto soft, curvilinear biological surfaces: embed them them on a flexible, silk-based substrate that can be resorbed into tissue. Because of the flexibility, there's increased contact between the electrodes and tissue, enabling scientists to get a highly detailed study of the signals in the underlying cells. However, the longevity of the devices hasn't been studied much, and its ability to hang on through physical changes bears further scrutiny.
Researchers can record the activity of individual neurons in the brain, but it involves the use of rigid electronics that clash with our squishier insides, and embedding monitoring devices can sometimes be difficult and involve complicated surgery. Neuroscientists would have a much easier time if it were possible to just lay electrodes directly over the surface of the brain and watch from there.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Earth's core has its own pole (and it's at the equator)
Modern research techniques allow us to not only study the surface of Earth (and the heavens above it) but also what lies in its depths. Jules Verne wrote about an area alive with mystery and wonder over 146 years ago; modern science indicates that the center of the Earth is a young dynamo powered by the complex interplay of heat transfer, thermodynamics, and fluid mechanics. By accumulating data gathered by bouncing waves off the Earth's core, a team of French researchers have put forth a new theory as to why one hemisphere of the core appears different from the other.
There is a correlation between the seismic wave velocity and attenuation as waves pass through and bounce off the Earth's core. This correlation, to date, cannot be explained in terms of the commonly used viscoelastic attenuation models that are used to represent the Earth's core. When the researchers took the data from a large number of seismic waves and analyzed it in terms of spherical harmonics, they found a dominant signal with a pole (in the sense of the North Pole) close to the equator at a longitude of approximately 80°W. There was an antipole on the other side of the planet.
To explain this, the researchers modeled the inner core in terms of a collection of anisotropic iron grains. Their model predicts a distribution of grain sizes, with larger grains at the antipole (7-15 km) than at the identified pole (300-700m). The authors theorize that convection (movement due to thermal differences) plays a key role in the creation of these differences.
They suggest there's a uniform velocity flow within the inner core, with a return flow via the outer core. These flows are caused, and balanced, by the crystallization and melting of iron near the two poles they've identified (melting on one side, crystallization on the other). The distribution of crystal grain sizes suggest that the velocity of the flow is parallel to the equator and travels in an West to East orientation.
The fact that we can observe this process implies that the inner core is still rather young (in a relative sense), less than one or two gigayears. If the rotation were not present, the outward growth of the inner core would result in uniform grain sizes in all spherical directions.
ScienceExpress, 2010. DOI: 10.1126/science.1186212 (About DOIs).
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Yet another cable fault cripples Middle East Internet
The Middle East unfortunately has limited Internet connectivity to the rest of the world, and that connectivity was slowed dramatically this weekend after the main SeaMeWe-4 cable suffered a "shunt fault" and came into contact with sea water somewhere in the Mediterranean.
The 20,000km SeaMeWe-4 cable provides much of the connectivity between Europe and Egypt, and its disruption made news from Egpyt to the Gulf states to Pakistan and beyond. Service still appears operational in the eastern segment of the cable, which runs all the way to Singapore. Apart from SeaMeWe-4 many states only have access to the much slower and older SeaMeWe-3 and FLAG Europe-Asia cables.
A repair ship is already on-site and should have the cable fixed in the next day or two.
Fortunately, as the Telegeography chart below shows, this dependence on SeaMeWe-4 will come to an end this year. The consultancy says that "five new cables are scheduled to enter service between Europe and Egypt in 2010. The first two, Telecom Egypt’s TE North cable and the IMEWE consortium cable, will enter service in May. Orascom’s MENA cable, the Europe India Gateway consortium cable, and Reliance’s FLAG Hawk cable are all expected to follow before year-end 2010." Capacity will skyrocket, and the new cable will also bring helpful redundancy to the region.
Multiple cable cuts back in 2008 also crippled the region
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Leaked Windows Phone 7 docs describe updates, customization
Additional details on the underlying architecture of Windows Phone 7 have leaked, thanks to a document obtained by the Dutch website tweakers.net. The document is from February 2010 and is marked as Revision 3.0. Beneath the Microsoft Confidential watermark there is a disclaimer: "The Architecture for Windows Phone OS 7.0 describers features that are subject to change, and should therefore be considered preliminary." Microsoft has already disclosed a few of the hardware requirements for its upcoming mobile OS, but the document does give a few more tidbits.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
feature: The keyboardless Office: a review of iWork for iPad
The validity of the iPad as a casual device—something you can use to check your e-mail, surf the Internet on the couch, or watch a movie in bed—has never really been in question. The real question is, "Can I convince my boss to buy me one?" Unless your boss is Michael Scott, chances are he’s going to want to know if you can actually be productive with it. With its port of the iWork desktop suite, Apple is hoping that you can be, and that the iPad can be more than a toy.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Do liberals read only liberal blogs?
On Friday, I received a press release pitching a new book on how to live like a liberal. The book offers helpful suggestions for:
- Watching MSNBC instead of Fox News
- Powering a laptop with a solar power-generating backpack
- Progressive financial investment
- Where and how to find a like-minded mate
... You get the idea. What really caught my eye was item number one: the idea that people of a particular political persuasion should stop watching news produced by those of another. This, it seems, might be a particular problem on the Internet, where the low barriers to publishing mean that anyone can find a viewpoint with which they totally agree, then read only that material.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
South Korea's average 'Net speed plunges 24%, iPhone blamed
In the course of three months during 2009, South Korea's average Internet connection speed dropped by a dramatic 24 percent. Think about the magnitude of the decline here: one of the world's most wired countries suddenly sees its overall Internet speeds reduced by a quarter over a few months while similarly positioned countries like Sweden, the Netherlands, and Hong Kong all saw speed increases.
What happened? Blame it on the iPhone.
According to Akamai's recent State of the Internet report, South Korea's bizarre Internet slowdown can largely be traced to the introduction of the iPhone in that country in November 2009. Akamai saw an explosion of unique IP addresses associated with a particular mobile operator (apparently KT, formerly known as Korea Telecom) soon after the phone's launch, indicating broad new iPhone usage.
Unfortunately, this particular mobile provider is slow. "As the average observed connection speed for this mobile provider was a fraction of that observed from wireline connections in South Korea," says the report, "we believe that this launch was likely responsible for the significant drop in South Korea's average undeserved connection speed in the fourth quarter [of 2009]."
That's... a lot of slow iPhones (well, slow iPhone service, at least). Still, despite a massive drop in average access speeds, Korea remains number one on the worldwide list, with an average of 11.7Mbps. The US, if you were wondering, is at 22nd place with 3.8Mbps.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Your fastest Internet in the world is found in Berkeley, CA
If you want the fastest average broadband speed in the world, don't move to Japan. Instead, buckle up your Birkenstocks and pile into the VW Bus, because it's time for a road trip to Berkeley, California, home of the fastest average Internet speeds on earth.
This nugget of data comes courtesy of the most recent State of the Internet report from Akamai Technologies, which collects and analyzes a unique data set of worldwide speeds and IP address usage. When all of the company's speed data was sorted by city, three US locations top the list before South Korea and Japan begin to dominate.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Zune HD achieves potential with native development crack
The Zune HD may not have set the MP3 player market on fire, exactly, but it's a quality piece of hardware with a slick and attractive user interface. It's also a platform that developers can write games for. Unfortunately, third party games on the Zune are restricted in what they can do; they must be developed using Microsoft's .NET-based XNA Framework. This wouldn't normally be a problem, as XNA usually offers high-performance Direct3D graphics. However, on the Zune HD, XNA supports only simple 2D graphics, and no hardware accelerated 3D. The result is lackluster graphical performance, even though the NVIDIA Tegra powering the Zune HD is highly capable. The restricted environment also prevented third-party applications from accessing the Internet through the device's WiFi connection.
Enter the OpenZDK. Through exploiting a flaw in the Zune's firmware, it's possible to run native applications on the Zune. This exposes the full power of the Zune's hardware to developers: most importantly, programs can use the widespread OpenGL ES 2.0 API (the same 3D API that the iPhone supports) to exploit all the capabilities of the Tegra chip. This in turn allows third-party applications to achieve the same quality as Microsoft's own Zune games like Project Gotham Racing: Ferrari Edition.
As those Microsoft-published games demonstrated, the Zune HD hardware is more than capable of providing a first-rate gaming experience. PGR, in particular, is both fun and extremely good-looking. Until now, however, the restrictions on third-party developers have left that power largely untapped.
It should be fairly easy for developers to get up to speed on native development with the ZDK. The Zune HD operating system is based on Windows CE 6 (as will be the forthcoming Windows Phone 7 platform), so development and deployment is quite easy: this is a widely supported and well understood OS. OpenGL likewise is something familiar to a lot of game developers.
However, the fun may not last long. Just as Apple has fixed exploits allowing jailbreaks on the iPhone, Microsoft might well choose to fix the exploit (or exploits) that are being used to enable native Zune development. In many ways, this would be a pity. The Zune HD clearly has a lot of potential: it's too bad that it requires hacks to live up to it.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Answering a 190-year old astronomical question
Epsilon Aurigae was first given serious, systematic, scientific scrutiny in 1821. Early modern astronomers correctly classified it as an eclipsing binary variable star, with an invisible partner that will periodically dim the light as it eclipses the main star from the perspective of Earth. This happens every 27 years, and Epsilon Aurigae's apparent brightness drops for a period of more than a year. The nature of this partner has remained a mystery, even though we've been observing the star for nearly two centuries.
Over the years, different ideas have come and gone. Early hypotheses as to the nature of Epsilon Aurigae was that it is a F-type supergiant star with a mass of over 15 solar masses. For the darker companion, people have proposed that it is an infrared star, a black hole complete with accretion disk, or (most recently) a disk of opaque material orbiting the companion star. The difficulty with the most recent interpretation is the improbability of the orbits.
For the latter case to be correct, then the orbit of the disk around the darker companion star would have to be in the same plane as the orbit of the darker object (companion star) around Epsilon Aurigae, which would in turn have to be the exact same plane as Earth's vantage point in order to produce the sequence of events we observe here on Earth. New, direct, observations show this is indeed the case—look at enough stars, and you'll apparently see the improbable. (Insert something about a large number of monkeys randomly banging away on a large number of typewriters knocking out this exact Nobel Intent article given enough time.)
New observations of the system are reported in a letter in last week's edition of Nature based on data collected using Georgia State University's Center for High Angular Resolution Astronomy interferometer with the Michigan Infra-Red Combiner. They've produced a series of direct images of the 2009 Epsilon Aurigae eclipse (along with a snapshot from 2008 to use as a baseline).
Combining this data and some that is in press from other research groups, the authors report that the main star has a mass of 3.63±0.68 solar masses (much less massive than earlier estimates), its dark companion has a mass of 5.9±0.1 solar masses. The disk of dust that orbits around the companion has a negligible mass, 0.07 time the mass of the Earth. From the images, they are able to describe the disk, improbable orbit and all, as a cylinder with a radius of 3.81±0.01 AU (the distance from the Earth to the Sun) and a height of 0.76±0.02 AU. The authors conclude that the disk is an optically thick but geometrically thin, suggesting it is a debris disk as opposed to a young stellar object.
Nature, 2010. DOI: 10.1038/nature08968 (About DOIs).
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Desktop management in the cloud with Windows Intune
Microsoft today announced the beta of a new desktop management tool for small-to-medium businesses. Windows Intune provides management and security services to Windows PCs delivered through a web-based front-end. Whereas traditional software of this kind typically requires servers to be installed and configured, Windows Intune is a cloud service, hosted by Microsoft, to provide near-instant management and control.
Windows Intune is designed to be an all-in-one system suitable for organizations with between 25 and 500 desktops, allowing patch management, malware protection, remote assistance, security policy enforcement, and inventory management. PCs managed by Windows Intune will also be eligible for some other benefits; each managed machine can be upgraded to Windows 7 Enterprise, and Intune licenses also provide access to the Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack (MDOP). MDOP provides more advanced diagnostic capabilities, improved group police management, and the MED-V virtualization system.
Being a cloud service offers a number of benefits beyond simplified deployment. The software will always be up-to-date, and will allow management of any Windows machine with an Internet connection, from any Windows machine with an Internet connection.
There is a limited beta available to 1,000 customers in the US, Canada, Mexico, and Puerto Rico. Signing up must be done prior to May 16, and will allow management of up to 20 machines.
Intune will be commercially available within a year. No pricing information has been revealed yet; as to be expected from its cloud service foundation, Windows Intune will be available on a monthly subscription basis.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
iPad fails networking 101; how to earn it a passing grade
Soon after the first iPads started showing up on Princeton University's network earlier this month, the university's network admins noticed strange behavior from Apple's tablet computer: some iPads kept using an IP address after its DHCP lease ran out. That's part of the reason the university "banned" the iPad from its network.
What's really going on here, and how can it be fixed?
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Bionic Commando Rearmed team forms new studio
When Grin—the Swedish developer behind Wanted: Weapons of Fate, Terminator Salvation, and Bionic Commando—closed its doors last August, a number of former staff members formed Outbreak Studios. But the team behind Grin's biggest hit, Bionic Commando Rearmed, have now formed their own studio, dubbed Might & Delight.
"Might and delight is a small group of people that met each other under the roof of former game developer GRIN," the studio's official site reads. "Together we were put to work on a brand new game project called Bionic Commando Rearmed...We are here to repeat our former success! [It's] no secret that Might and Delight loves retro. We adore the delicate simplicity found in many old games. Our goal is to create experiences that [look] to that simplicity while providing something fresh and accessible!"
However, at this point, the studio isn't currently working on any projects. Instead, M&D has plans to continue going the retro remake route, and thus is currently courting various IP holders. And given the success of BCR, both critically and commercially, we can't wait to see what they'll be working on next.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Microsoft KIN: is it for the sexter in all of us?
In an advertisement showing a remarkable understanding of its target market—if perhaps not such a good understanding of the parents who'll probably be footing the bill—Microsoft has been showing and encouraging sexting on its new KIN phones, according to Consumer Reports.
The video shows a bunch of twentysomethings at an advertising exec's typically unrealistic idea of a trendy hipster party; one hipster dude sticks his KIN under his t-shirt to take a picture of his nipple and send it to one of his hipster chick friends. Racy stuff. For more convenient titillation, Consumer Reports' blogger even made a little collage of the offending shots.
Sexting is an increasingly popular activity among teenagers, and the two KIN models, with their high resolution cameras, flash, and easy sharing, will make distributing naked pictures to friends even easier. One could argue that the sexting market could even be a big boost for Microsoft's new phone platform, but we doubt that's the kind of splash the company wants to make with its latest phones.
With a good chance that many of KIN's users won't be paying the bill themselves, the implication might not be so welcome. After all, sexting isn't high on mom and dad's list of priorities.
As a result of Consumer Reports' objections, Microsoft has quickly re-edited the video to remove the offending portion, with a spokesman for the company saying "Microsoft takes the issue of sexting very seriously and it was never our intent to promote it in any way." With this piece of realism safely purged from the advert, parents can breath a sigh of relief, safe in the knowledge that their hormone-addled offspring won't be using KINs for sexting after all.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Microsoft helps users fix Windows in a few clicks
Microsoft quietly launched a beta version of the Fix it Center late last week. The service, which has about 300 fixes already built in (with more to come), is designed to help users diagnose and troubleshoot problems with their Windows PCs. It finds and fixes "many common PC and device problems automatically" and "helps prevent new problems by proactively checking for known issues and installing updates," according to Microsoft. The words "automatically" and "proactively" are the key ones here: the Fix it Center consolidates the many steps of diagnosing and repairing a problem into just a few clicks.
Fix it gives you the option to "Find and fix" or to "Find and report." Even if it cannot solve a specific issue, a Microsoft Support professional (contacted via phone, e-mail, or chat) can access your Fix it Center account and get details about the hardware, the problem, and the solutions you have already tried.
The Fix it Center builds on the diagnostics already offered in Windows 7, bringing an expanded offering to all operating systems still supported by Redmond. The client version is available for Windows XP SP3, Windows XP Pro (64-bit) SP2, Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows Server 2003 SP2, Windows Server 2008, and Windows Server 2008 R2. Users also have the option to sign up for the "Fix it Center Online" during the setup so they can manage all their computers from a single location via various customized settings and options (the company is promoting this especially for SMBs).
Microsoft launched the Fix It brand last year, and so far has been using it primarily on KB articles. The Fix it link offers a quick way to change a setting or apply a tweak that either mitigates a security issue or fixes a bug. Now the company is expanding that effort so that users can use the tool at any point to fix common issues.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Apple to replace problematic headphones with inline remote
Apple began including inline remote controls with its earbuds beginning with the introduction of the third-generation, buttonless iPod shuffle. However, some users complained that the controls were prone to failing after some time, resulting in an iPod shuffle that simply wouldn't work. Now, Apple has identified a potential defect in the inline remotes that may cause this problem and has a new program for replacing defective headphones free of charge.
The problem mainly affects the Apple Headphones with Remote than came with iPod shuffles made between February 2009 and February 2010, which have serial numbers in the range of xx909xxxxxx to xx952xxxxxx or xx001xxxxxx to xx004xxxxxx. If you have headphones that came with an iPod shuffle in the affected range that have stopped working, Apple will simply replace them free of charge for two years from the date of purchase.
Apple notes that Apple In-Ear Headphones with Remote and Mic and Apple Earphones with Remote and Mic may also exhibit this problem, and are also covered by the replacement program. (Apple doesn't specify exactly what causes the issue, but some of us at the Orbiting HQ wonder whether sweat from working out with the shuffle has something to do with it, as we have seemingly ruined a number of our inline remotes this way.)
If you have Apple headphones you think are covered by the program, either make an appointment to see an Apple Genius at your local Apple Store, or you can get service by mail using Apple's Online Service Assistant. Unfortunately, getting a free replacement isn't a possibility if you've already tossed your defective headphones (as many frustrated iPod shuffle users already have), as Apple requires you to give up the defective pair when getting a replacement.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
NASA planet hunters may only be releasing limited data set
Scientific data sharing has become big news in the wake of the theft of e-mails from the Climatic Research Unit and ensuing investigations. Although the CRU researchers appear to have had an attitude towards data sharing that breached generally accepted scientific ethics, the process of actually sharing the data would have been anything but straightforward. The CRU had no procedures in place for data sharing, the data came from a variety of sources with no standardized data format, it was a mix of published and proprietary information, etc. In short, it's one thing to decide to share the data, another challenge entirely to actually do so.
You can contrast this with NASA, which has procedures in place for sharing data and a standard policy for publishing it. But, according to a report produced by Nature News, the agency may only be sharing a deliberately limited version of the data from its planet hunting probe, Kepler.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Reminder: Apple FY2010 Q2 earnings liveblog
The analysts are already weighing in on how many Macs Apple sold in the past quarter. What better time to remind everyone that Ars will be providing live coverage of Apple's FY2010 Q2 earnings call at 5pm eastern on April 20, 2010 (see it in your own timezone).
Sign up for an e-mail reminder below or simply bookmark this page and come back at the time above.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Apparent next-gen iPhone: front-facing camera, better battery
A purported semi-functional prototype of the next-generation iPhone hardware, expected to be launched this June, has popped up recently online. Over the weekend, Engadget published several photos of the device sent from an anonymous source, though Gizmodo has apparently had the device in its possession for the past week. According to Gizmodo's analysis, if this prototype is close to what Apple plans to reveal this summer, it will indeed be the "A+ update" Jobs promised employees at a town hall meeting earlier this year.
The device in question seems quite sleek, with a thinner, flat casing, compared to the iPhone 3G or 3GS. Though the device won't boot—Gizmodo's source says that it ran a version of iPhone OS 4.0 for a short while until Apple ostensibly used the remote wipe feature—the "Connect to iTunes" restore screen seems to indicate that the device has a very high resolution display (perhaps as high as the rumored 960 x 640 resolution). There are some minor changes to button layout, and the device uses the same type of microSIM that the iPad uses.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Major labels go bragh? Irish judge allows 3 strikes
The Irish High Court ruled on April 16 that cutting off the Internet access of suspected P2P pirates was fine, that no data privacy rules would be breached by doing so, and that such schemes are needed because "the mischievous side of the human personality, containing a repulsive aspect as well as an attractive and humorous one, has also come to the fore over the Internet."
When the major music labels in Ireland sued Eircom, one of the country's largest ISPs, the case was eventually settled out of court. The labels wanted Eircom to take some responsibility for the file-sharing behavior of its subscribers, and the company agreed to implement a voluntary three strikes system that would result in Internet disconnection. This made the lawsuit go away, but the Data Protection Commissioner of Ireland raised objections to the proposal, and the country's High Court was asked to weigh in on its legality.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Facebook wants to turn Web "likes" into ad dollars
Facebook could be looking to turn your Web surfing history into targeted ads on the site—but only from the sites that you choose to "like." The rumor comes via the Financial Times, which spoke to "marketers briefed on [Facebook's] plans" ahead of Facebook's f8 conference later this week. And although Facebook wouldn't offer comment on its plans, the company made a vague comment insisting that it doesn't plan to change its policies when it comes to tracking users.
According to FT, Facebook plans to roll out a "Like" button—presumably something that would go in the browser bar, or have its own browser extension—that will let users indicate to their friends which websites they enjoyed that day. This sounds like a boiled-down version of Facebook's already-existing bookmarklet that lets users share pages from around the Internet on their Facebook walls.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Google warns that privacy opt-in rules could create "dystopia"
Imagine an Internet in which every website that uses behavioral advertising has to get your up-front permission to do so—make that double for login-account-informed ads, and triple if the site sells your data to third-party applications.
You might think that something like this would be a pretty cool set up, privacy-wise. So does Congressmember Rick Boucher (D-VA), who has been talking about legislation in this area for almost a year now now.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
No comments:
Post a Comment