PSP Go straightens tie, knocks on death's door
Playing games on the PSP Go was one of the most annoying experiences possible in a job that can be full of annoying experiences; if it takes you hours to play a game on a portable system out of the box there is something tragically wrong with your product. After only a year on the market, it looks like Sony's experiment in digital distribution is on its last legs.
Finding any sort of sales information on the system for the US has been difficult, although Media Create does track the hardware sales for Japan... and its performance has been abysmal. The PSP has long come in last place in the US sales numbers, and breaking that number down between the PSP and PSP Go doesn't give Sony the possibility of a happy ending.
We called a local GameStop to see what they were offering for trade-in credit on the hardware. Even though you can still buy the PSP Go for $250, the trade-in value was only $50. Just to rub salt in the wound, the latest model of the standard PSP will get you $80 in trade-in credit, and is eligible for a $20 promotional bump. The PSP Go is specifically exempt from that offer.
No, PSP Go. Not yours.
There's nothing wrong with the idea of a gaming system with no physical media—Apple seems to be doing just fine in the gaming space without requiring carts or discs—but Sony's implementation has been disastrous. It may be a while before any company has the gonads to step up and take another crack at the idea.
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Samsung fires first Android-powered salvo at iPad with Galaxy Tab
Apple became the biggest fish in the very small touchscreen tablet pond when it launched the iPad this past spring. But more fish will arrive starting mid-month when Samsung launches its Galaxy Tab mobile device in Europe (US and Asia will get it "in the coming months"). After being rumored and teased for weeks, Samsung officially unveiled its entry into the burgeoning market at the IFA show in Germany on Thursday.The Samsung Galaxy Tab is a 7" widescreen touch tablet powered by Android 2.2. The Tab will use the same TouchWiz UI used on Samsung's line of Galaxy S smartphones, which gives it a very iOS-like look and feel. Also following the iPad's lead, the device has a metal back, black bezel, bottom speakers, and even a 30-pin connector.
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Scammers using fake copyright infringement notices for profit
HADOPI, meet the internautes. The French "high authority" that oversees the country's three strikes anti-P2P file-sharing campaign is now being used by spammers and scammers who attempt to trick people out of their cash by accusing them of copyright violations.The e-mails have appeared in recent days, purporting to come from France's Haute Autorité pour la diffusion des œuvres et la protection des droits sur Internet (HADOPI). This is the government group that will accept file-sharing complaints from movie and music rightsholders, then issue sanctions and fines to users, with Internet disconnection and blacklisting the ultimate penalty.
Scammers hope to capitalize on the publicity surrounding HADOPI, which has pledged to start sending out its first warning letters soon. The e-mails purport to come from HADOPI, charging that the recipient was detected sharing files, and they direct the user to website to make a payment.
"As expected, this is classic Internet," said HADOPI's Secretary General Éric Walter to Agence France Press yesterday. He advised recipients to exercise caution and not to turn over bank details or personal information.
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Feature: Compromising Twitter's OAuth security system
Twitter officially disabled Basic authentication this week, the final step in the company's transition to mandatory OAuth authentication. Sadly, Twitter's extremely poor implementation of the OAuth standard offers a textbook example of how to do it wrong. This article will explore some of the problems with Twitter's OAuth implementation and some potential pitfalls inherent to the standard. I will also show you how I managed to compromise the secret OAuth key in Twitter's very own official client application for Android.OAuth is an emerging authentication standard that is being adopted by a growing number of social networking services. It defines a key exchange mechanism that allows users to grant a third-party application access to their account without having to provide that application with their credentials. It also allows users to selectively revoke an application's access to their account.
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Wagering on warfare: Black Ops multiplayer revealed
Even though it's set to hit PCs and consoles in a little over a month, there has been little in the way of multiplayer details for the Treyarch-developed Call of Duty: Black Ops. This all changed yesterday when Activision held a press event in Los Angeles to reveal the multiplayer gameplay: COD fans can expect bots, enhanced customization, and a new currency that can be used both to upgrade equipment and to gamble in competitive play.Read the comments on this post
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An ISP that knows nothing of "data hogs"
Pop quiz—which US Internet service provider made the following statement about a network upgrade?During the construction of this network we have given a lot of thought... to the business model in the US, and how we could do things in a different and more interesting way. The natural model when you have a simple duopoly capturing the majority of the market is segmentation: maximize ARPU [average revenue per user] by artificially limiting service in order to drive additional monthly spending. But fundamentally this is the wrong model for a service provider like us, and we have looked to Europe for inspiration. The model pioneered by Iliad under the Free brand is a better fit, both for us and for our customers.Yeah... it wasn't one of the major ISPs. Instead, it was Sonic.net, California's largest indie ISP. The company has been in business since 1994, but the FCC's eventual decision to deregulate wholesale broadband services put the company in a tough spot, where it couldn't access the highest-speed components of the network at a competitive price. So Sonic.net has been building out its own "facilities-based" network around San Francisco, though it still requires access to the telco-controlled copper local loop to a customer's home.
As the marginal cost of providing more bandwidth or less, and providing POTS voice or not are both minimal, we have adopted a simple flat rate model instead of the more typical US model of "$5 more goes faster"... I believe that removing the artificial limits on speed, and including home phone with the product are both very exciting.
The new network, called Fusion, allows Sonic.net to offer ADSL2+ service along with its own telephone service (this isn't VoIP, but actual POTS). The company currently sells one offering to residential users through Fusion: for $50 a month, they get uncapped ADSL that runs as fast as their line can handle (up to 20Mbps) along with free nationwide phone service. Users who want more bandwidth can order up a second telephone line and "bond" the two for speeds of up to 40Mbps by simply paying another $50.
Sonic.net CEO Dane Jasper explained his unorthodox approach to selling broadband in a discussion this week with Benoit Felten, a Yankee Group broadband analyst, on Felten's private blog. Felten, who's based in Europe, notes that the US market "is often considered to be a static duopoly," but he points to initiatives from ISPs like Sonic.net as refreshing alternatives.
"In an era where the buzzwords about broadband and the internet seem to be caps and hogs," he notes, "it's reassuring and exciting to see someone trying to buck the trend and offer what customers want as opposed to what he thinks customers should get."
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Feature: Thomas Edison's plot to hijack the movie industry
It was a dark and stormy night on December 18, 1908. Okay—maybe it wasn't so dark and stormy. But it should have been, because that was the night Thomas Edison tried to hijack the motion picture industry."With his beetle brows, long wispy hair, and beatific look, Edison might have seemed the addled inventor," writes the historian Neil Gabler, "but he was a shrewd businessman and a fearsome adversary who was never loath to take credit for any invention, whether he was responsible or not."
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Plan for nationwide free wireless broadband finally shot down
For four years the Federal Communications Commission tossed the idea around like a beach ball: a coast-to-coast free wireless service across the low end of the 2GHz "AWS-3" band. The service would pay for itself via advertisements and by selling commercial access to various portions of the license area. The company that proposed the plan, M2Z Networks, would commit to building out the project in a decade, and pay five percent of its annual revenue to the United States Treasury.But on Wednesday M2Z informed the press that the FCC has told the company and its backers that the Commission is dropping the concept, and that is so:
"We gave careful and thorough consideration to the proposal, but ultimately determined that this was not the best policy outcome," Ruth Milkman, chief of the FCC's Wireless Bureau told us. "We remain vigilant in our efforts to facilitate the universal deployment and adoption of broadband, especially through the much-needed reform to the Universal Service Fund."
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Hot water around giant carbon star creates interstellar mystery
Hot water discovered around a giant carbon star requires a new theory for the chemistry around stars to be explained. The new theory could significantly alter our understanding of what materials exist in interstellar space, and where water and life could exist in the universe."It makes us realize that the chemistry in all stars can be much more complex than we thought it was," said astronomer Leen Decin of the Instituut voor Sterrenkunde in Belgium, lead author of the study published Sept. 2 in Nature. "If we don't understand what is created from these old stars, we don't know what the main ingredients of new stars and planets are made from."
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Microsoft puts final touches on Windows Phone 7, sends it to OEMs
Microsoft has announced that Windows Phone 7 has hit the release to manufacturing milestone. The OS has been finalized and has been sent off to Microsoft's partners around the world, who in turn will put it on their hardware and networks in time for this holiday season. All that's left before release is manufacturer additions and testing. Prepare yourself for a Windows Phone 7 launch event; devices will hit Europe in October and the US in November. "Windows Phone 7 is the most thoroughly tested mobile platform Microsoft has ever released," Microsoft wrote in a blog post. "We had nearly ten thousand devices running automated tests daily, over a half million hours of active self-hosting use, over three and a half million hours of stress test passes, and eight and a half million hours of fully automated test passes. We’ve had thousands of independent software vendors and early adopters testing our software and giving us great feedback. We are ready."
Since the release of the Technical Preview, Microsoft has fixed bugs, fine-tuned performance, polished the interface, and added features. (Side note:Â prototype phones will not be getting an upgrade to the RTM build.)Â Redmond is being secretive about the new features, only disclosing a couple related to Facebook. Users will be able to filter Facebook friends to only those already in the phone's contact list, as well as "like" Facebook posts and write messages on Facebook walls directly from the People Hub. Microsoft also added a more visible search option to the contact list after it found that testers were not aware they could search their contacts by using the phone's physical search button.
There is still one more milestone to reach on the developer side of things: the final SDK is slated for release on September 16. In early October, the Marketplace will start accepting application submissions. This will include applications from the hardware companies and network operators; their software has to go through the Marketplace validation process just like applications will.
This doesn't leave much time for Microsoft to accept apps and populate the online store for the early adopters. Still, with the final RTM code now available, the company should be able to refocus on its partners and third-party developers over the next few weeks.
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Microsoft unveils shape-shifting Arc Touch Mouse
After a month of rumors and leaks, Microsoft has released the Arc Touch Mouse. The device is available for presale on Amazon.com, BestBuy.com, and Buy.com for $69.95. It will ship in early December, and will officially be available online and in stores in January 2011.
Redmond is touting Arc Touch as "the first mouse designed to flatten for portability and pop up for comfort." It's all about portability: less than 15 millimeters thick at its widest point, it collapses to turn off and pops up to turn on. The mouse requires two AAA batteries that Microsoft says give it more than six months of battery life (the two-color battery life indicators will keep you informed).
In addition to its compact form factor (see the Silverlight demo), the Arc Touch has a capacitive touch scroll strip: move a finger slowly on the strip for controlled scrolling, or flick a finger for fast scrolling that can be stopped with a simple tap. The mouse uses a capacitive sensing technique and sensor pads to detect each position and velocity change, and also includes haptic feedback to simulate the bumps of a traditional scroll wheel. The strip also has three tap buttons: page up, page down, and a reprogrammable (Microsoft's IntelliPoint software required) middle click area.
The Arc Touch includes Microsoft's usual mouse features such as a magnetic 2.4GHz wireless Nano transceiver that snaps into the bottom of the mouse and BlueTrack technology to let users use the device on virtually any surface. The only requirements are a USB port, and either Windows XP, Windows Vista, or Windows 7.
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FCC reacts to Google/Verizon deal with decisive action more questions
The FCC's plan for network neutrality—ideas which Chairman Julius Genachowski made central to his tenure, and which were backed by President Obama—has been under direct assault for the last month. Verizon and Google told the FCC that the agency should largely butt out of overseeing network management, leaving it almost entirely up to industry, and that almost no rules could be applied to wireless networks. In addition, "managed services" delivered over the same broadband pipe would be exempted. AT&T recently told the Commission that it has been engaged in paid traffic prioritization for years, and that the FCC had no right to limit such behavior. Private companies including AT&T, Microsoft, and Verizon have been meeting quietly for the last month to hash out their own, much more limited ideas about nondiscrimination.In the face of this coordinated assault, Genachowski has continued his quiet, "data-driven" ways. Today, as the FCC finally reacted to the Verizon/Google proposal, it demanded... even more data.
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iTunes 10 adds "Ping" social network, TV rentals, AirPlay
During Apple's annual music event Wednesday, CEO Steve Jobs unveiled the 10th major version of its iTunes media management software. Since the program now handles music, video, books, iOS apps, and more, Apple has finally revised the logo to eliminate the CD. With a slightly revised UI, the main new features include compatibility with HD TV rentals, the new AirPlay feature, and a new music-focused social network called "Ping."
Jobs noted that one of the most important features of iTunes and the iTunes Store is discovery—that is, enabling users to discover new music from artists they might not already know. Ping is designed to add discovery features directly into iTunes.
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Hands-on photos, observations of new iPods, Apple TV
As you've likely already seen, Apple unveiled all manner of shiny new products at Wednesday's media event. The iPod touch gained cameras and FaceTime, the iPod nano went touchscreen-only, the iPod shuffle got its buttons back, and the Apple TV got a major overhaul. As usual, Ars got a chance to play with the new products following the event, and we have some hands-on photos (as well as observations) to share with you.Read the comments on this post
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No longer a hobby? $99 Apple TV drops storage, integrates Netflix
Apple’s September music event wasn’t entirely about iPods and iTunes this year. Alongside the music players, Apple announced a smaller, black Apple TV that costs $99, has no built-in storage, streams content from iTunes or iOS devices, and fully integrates Netflix into the existing Apple TV interface. Apple's new black box will be available later this month.
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Chrome August's big winner as Internet Explorer resumes slide
As browser competition continues to heat up, 2010 looks like the year when the market was repeatedly disrupted. Internet Explorer has not managed to gain share for a third month in a row. Firefox is leveling out while Chrome and Safari continue to grow. Opera? It's hanging on to relevance.
Between July and August, Internet Explorer dropped 0.34 percent, a drop smaller than June's or July's gain. Firefox, meanwhile, went up 0.02 percent, Chrome gained 0.36 percent, Safari was up 0.07, and Opera dipped 0.08 percent.
IE looks stuck around the 60 percent mark for the time being. At least it's still above its lowest point (59.69 percent) with its best chance of market share gains in the short term coming with the IE9 beta, and the back-to-school season.
The importance of being the default browser in the world's most popular operating system continues to help IE. Microsoft browsers are being used by more than 6 out of 10 people and IE8 is being used by more than one in four on the Web (quickly closing in on one in three)—it is now at 27.90 percent (over 30 percent if Compatibility Mode is included). Unfortunately for Web developers everywhere, IE6 continues to be more popular than IE7, though this month it declined more than its successor. IE6's share can be attributed to businesses still using customized intranet applications, and XP's much bigger installed base than Vista's (especially in developing countries).
If we take a look at the last 12 months, the stabilization of IE is really obvious. Firefox, meanwhile, remains far away from what may be the unreachable 25 percent mark, having lost all the share it gained in the last year. Its market share is actually lower than it was a year ago. Chrome's progress is very noticeable in the chart above, though it seems to have found resistance at the 7 percent mark. Safari's gains are at about 1 percentage point, while Opera's are almost insignificant.
As always, things at Ars are very different. There was no place-changing this time: Firefox continues to dominate, Chrome is second, Safari is third, IE is fourth, and Opera brings up the rear. Last month, Firefox gained share, as did Chrome and Opera. The first-party browsers, Safari and IE, both dropped.
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New iPods abound—including multitouch nano—at Apple event
Apple held its annual fall media event Wednesday. During the event, Apple CEO Steve Jobs unveiled a new line of iPods, as has become tradition, including a new shuffle, a multitouch-enabled nano, and an A4-powered, FaceTime-compatible iPod touch. The company also revealed details of iOS 4.1 for iPhone and iPod touch, as well as iOS 4.2 for iPad.Read the comments on this post
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Cat leaves bag: PSJailbreak cloned, released, freely available
The PSJailbreak hardware may be held up by the Australian courts, but to the surprise of no one, the code behind the project has been reverse-engineered and is now freely available online. You'll need the code, a PlayStation 3, and a USB microcontroller in order to open your system. Oddly enough, sales of such devices seem to be in the middle of a spike.As of this writing, the ability to play backed-up or copied games has been disabled in the code, but that won't last long. The genie is completely out of the bottle, and now that the code is floating around the expected sites, Sony has few options to stop its dissemination.
Once the PlayStation 3 was hacked it was only a matter of time before the software was made available free of charge; there are simply too many risks involved with selling this sort of thing via a standard storefront, and too many people more interested in the software's spread than profit. We have not tried the hack ourselves—and likely never will—so tread very carefully when downloading code from the Internet and using it to attempt to crack your PlayStation 3. There are some very technical details available on how exactly the exploit works if you've ever wondered how the hackers made an end run around Sony's safeguards.
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September Ars giveaway: CanvasPop, DNA11, Griffin, and ThinkGeek
It has been just under a year since we announced Ars Premier 2.0. In that year, we've welcomed thousands of new subscribers, added a new $5 per month plan, had a number of live chats with industry luminaries, rolled out a dedicated mobile site, upgraded our commenting system several times, migrated and relaunched our forums, redesigned and added cool new features to the front page, and lots more. Subscribers also get an advertising-free experience when browsing the site. Signing up is easy.One of the most well-received programs is the giveaways—in which all Premier subscribers are automatically entered. This month we have a monster giveaway thanks to our friends at DNA11, CanvasPop, Griffin Technology, and ThinkGeek. We're splitting this month's festivities into two parts. We have a set of prizes for the first half of the month, and around September 15 we'll be announcing a second set.
The Prizes
First up, we're going to be giving away 10 Griffin Technology Loops. This is a really neat weighted iPad stand. It won't block the connector port, and has rubber pads on the bottom to keep it from slipping around. Each one of these would run you $29.99 in a store.
How to enter
Premier subscribers (and those who subscribe before the end of this giveaway) don't have to do anything. Being automatically entered into all our contests and giveaways is just one of the many benefits of being a Premier subscriber. For everyone else, simply leave a comment on this post (or sign up for a subscription). Please be aware that only citizens of The United States and Canada (excepting Québec) who are 18 years old or older are eligible to win the prizes.This giveaway begins on September 1, 2010 at 12:00am CT and ends on September 14, 2010 at 11:59pm CT, so you must be entered by the end date to be eligible. If you have any questions about the rules, please see the full set here.
One more thing, Premier subs get coupons!
In addition to the cool prizes our partners have supplied, they've also made available a number of significant coupons for Ars Premier Subscribers. Anyone who is a subscriber or becomes a subscriber will have access to these and can begin using them immediately. You can find them by clicking here, and you can always find the link again in the "Premier Subscriber" drop-down menu on any page. Here are the coupons:
- DNA11: Get $50 off at DNA11. Transform your DNA or Fingerprint into a custom portrait on canvas.
- CanvasPop: Get $25 off at CanvasPop. Turn your photos into beautiful large-scale canvas art. Also works with iPhone and Facebook images.
- Griffin Technology: 20 percent off at the Griffin Technology Store. Griffin is your leader in essentials for iPhone, iPad, and iPod.
- ThinkGeek: $5 off $25 or $10 off $40 worth of merchandise at ThinkGeek. ThinkGeek: Stuff for smart masses.
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Sony's new e-readers: who needs wireless?
Sony has just dropped three new e-reader upgrades on the reading public, but the company seems determined not to compete directly with Amazon's new Kindle 3.
Sony has updated its Pocket Edition (5" screen), Touch Edition (6" screen), and Daily Edition (7" screen), and the new devices all look terrific. They use the same, higher-contrast E-Ink screens seen in the Kindle 3, and Sony doesn't have Amazon's infuriating resistance to supporting the common ePub format.
But Sony isn't competing on price. The Pocket goes for $179 and the Touch for $229, and neither model has either WiFi or 3G radios (WiFi-only Kindle 3s start at $139). If you want wireless capabilities, you'll need to shell out $299 for the upgraded Daily Edition (meant especially for downloading and displaying daily newspaper content).
Sony has decided to market its devices as touchscreens, and has extended that functionality across all three new readers. While this might seem superfluous in an e-reader, it does allow easier navigation of menu options and doesn't require button clicks to turn pages.
In addition, bookstore chain Borders has just dropped the prices on its own e-readers (a basic Kobo model can be had for $129), but most exciting are its new offerings. Coming later this fall, Borders is pushing two color readers, one based on Android, and both with 7" touchscreens, for $199 and $299—though neither have wireless.
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