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It’s been a while since NVIDIA announced its game-changing Project SHIELD handheld gaming system, but the wait is finally over gang as NVIDIA is finally taking pre-orders will begin as early as next week, May 20th. In case you’ve forgotten about this puppy— the Jelly Bean-powered handheld gaming system features a boatload of sweet features including the killer Tegra 4 chip + 2 gigs of RAM, a 5-inch 720p retinal multi-touch display, custom bass reflex tuned port audio system and a full-fledged control pad.

Oh and for those of you that want to stream the sweet gaming content to a larger display, SHIELD will also give you the power to wirelessly access your NVIDIA GeForce GTX GPU-powered computer from the comfort of your couch with GeForce game streaming– while NVIDIA promises to bring PC streaming to SHIELD devices at a later date. Speaking of games, it’s looking like there will certainly be a nice lineup of titles for gamers to choose from once SHIELD is finally available. Among the games that will be headed to TegraZone are Broken Age, Costume Quest, Flyhunter: Origins, Skiing Fred and Chuck’s Challenge. Naturally, there will be more titles released as time moves forward and all that good stuff.

And now for the important deets— pricing and availability. As mentioned earlier, the device will be available for pre-order from Newegg, Gamestop, Micro Center and Canada Computers on May 20th, while devices will ship around sometime in June. Additionally, SHIELD will cost $349, so it won’t break the bank too much.

Come comment on this article: NVIDIA announces SHIELD pre-orders will begin May 20th and will have a cost of $349

The word ‘hipster’ has taken on many meanings over the years, from jazz potheads to ironic 20-somethings, but whatever Americans currently believe it to mean, they are now turning on the subculture in a big way. A new poll has found that 42% of American voters have an “unfavorable” opinion of hipsters.

The poll, conducted by Public Policy Polling (PPP), surveyed 571 U.S. voters who, overall, did not have a favorable picture of hipsters, though 43% “aren’t sure” what the think about them. While 23% of the voters polled thought hipsters had made “a positive cultural contribution to society,” a full 46% chose the polling option that said, “They just soullessly appropriate cultural tropes from the past for their own ironic amusement.”

The results were split slightly between Democrats and Republicans, with 34% of Democrats having an unfavorable opinion of the group and 18% having a favorable one. 48% of Republicans had an unfavorable opinion and only 9% had a favorable one. Only 2% of Republicans stated they would be more likely to vote for a hipster for political office, while 27% of independent voters stated they would be more likely to vote for a hipster.

The results were even more disparate when taken by age group. 43% of voters 18-29 actually have a favorable opinion of hipsters, to 29% who have an unfavorable opinion of them. Only 6% of voters over age 65 have a favorable opinion, while 37% of them have an unfavorable one.

By race, Hispanics were generally most favorable toward hipsters (46% favorable) while only 8% of white voters were favorable toward hipsters. A full 33% of the Hispanic voters polled considered themselves hipsters, while only 6% of white voters and 10% of black voters considered themselves hipsters.

(Jeff Martin, National Women’s Law Center)

During his State of the Union address in February, President Obama called on Congress to expand access to high-quality preschool to every four-year old in America. As the President put it that day:

In states that make it a priority to educate our youngest children, like Georgia or Oklahoma, studies show students grow up more likely to read and do math at grade level, graduate high school, hold a job, form more stable families of their own. We know this works. So let’s do what works and make sure none of our children start the race of life already behind. Let’s give our kids that chance.

Yesterday, I had the pleasure to meet with mothers, leaders, and tireless advocates that understand that the best investment we can make as a country is in our children’s future.

The coalition came to the White House to deliver 30,000 letters and art work thanking the President for his proposal to make high-quality preschool available for all children – and I used the opportunity to thank them for all their hard work, and to hear from them about the work they continue to do advocating for children.

They understand that for every dollar spent on high-quality early education, we save more than seven dollars in the long run by boosting kindergarten readiness, graduation rates, reducing teen pregnancy, and even reducing violent crime. They also understand that providing our children with the best start possible in life is not only a moral imperative, but an economic imperative that will benefit our communities and our nation far into the future.

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The question of which hurts more (childbirth or a kick in the balls) continues to plague the curious, as it has for generations. Well, here a couple guys you might be able to ask.

They say it was worse than they expected, with reactions like, “That was not good,” and, “It sucked.”

But the real evidence is in the clear agony that they are feeling as it is happening. Having witnessed two childbirths firsthand, and now this video, I have to lean toward childbirth as the more painful scenario.

[via reddit]

At BlackBerry Live 2013, BlackBerry and Skype have announced that the famous calling app will be available on all BlackBerry 10.1 devices. BlackBerry has said that by the end of the week, all Z10 devices should have a 10.1 update pushed out from the carrier making the device ready for Skype.

Keep an eye out for your 10.1 update and download Skype from BlackBerry World.

Android and iOS have been neck and neck battling for the title of “leading smartphone OS” for years now, but this month’s numbers don’t suggest a tight competition whatsoever. In the first quarter of 2013, Android-powered smartphones accounted for about 75% of all smartphones sold in this time-frame. Apple’s iOS came far behind, selling only 18.2% worth of the market share. Surprisingly the failing RIM (Blackberry) was able to outsell Microsoft’s Windows 8 Phones by 0.1%. It isn’t a big difference, but that’s definitely saying something about Microsoft’s success in the smartphone market.

Perhaps the most interesting of all this is that Android’s flagship for the year, the Samsung Galaxy S 4 hasn’t even been released yet. Android’s dominance over the market is expected to surpass that of 75% in Q2 2013.

Of course quarter-based numbers need to be taken with a grain of salt, because timing is indeed everything. Because a new iPhone hasn’t been released since last September and Androids are released with the newest technology seemingly every week, it is pretty much expected that Android rules the market. It’ll definitely be interesting to see these market share numbers following the release of the highly anticipated iPhone 5S or iPhone 6.

Source: Gartner

Come comment on this article: Smartphone sales in Q1 2013 great for Android, amasses whopping 75% of market share

With graduation season upon us, it’s important to remember that as a manager you must often be a teacher too. A major part of your role is instruction — which means that you need to pay attention to the massive disruption going on in higher education and what it means for company learning.

The most visible part of educational disruption is the proliferation of online learning through MOOCs, or massive, open, online courses. These programs, sponsored by elite universities such as Harvard, Stanford, Berkeley, and Wesleyan, have enrolled thousands of students around the world in high-level courses developed by top-notch faculty. And although the dropout rate is high, the business model is uncertain, and learning outcomes are not yet clear, these MOOC’s are rapidly evolving new technologies that will certainly change the higher education landscape, and dramatically increase access to learning.

The other force that is disrupting higher education is the expectations of students. One of my clients recently took a trip with her sixteen year old son to visit colleges. While my client was impressed by the schools with extensive libraries and physical facilities, her son was focused on the extent to which the institutions were enabled with wireless capability, video streaming, readily available collaboration tools, and more. This suggests that higher education is also being disrupted by the demands of digital natives. Having grown up in an online world, they won’t be satisfied with traditional lecture-oriented and paper-based education, especially as K-12 schools become more digital as well.

For universities, the changing landscape will mean a fundamental rethinking of the educational experience. For example, the classroom probably will be used more to discuss and internalize content that has already been provided digitally, a concept known as flipping; students and faculty will communicate not just in person, but also through continuously available digital channels; and teachers will have access to more data about student performance and learning, giving them the ability to track progress and participation throughout both a course and a curriculum.

These same trends are likely to affect corporations and the way knowledge is transferred to employees, customers, and other partners. For example, instead of starting new hires with a traditional orientation workshop, companies might require them to complete an online preparatory course and pass a test before even meeting their new boss. The same process could be used when someone moves to a new job or a new division within a company. Digital learning tools also could be used more extensively with customers, replacing instruction manuals and help desks; while remote diagnostics and smart products, with embedded instructions (what GE calls the Industrial Internet) will replace service calls. Companies are experimenting with all of these approaches and many more — so while we don’t know the exact shape of the future, we do know it will be different.

As a result, if you’re in a managerial position today, it’s probably time to get ready. Here are two things you can do:

First, if you’re not completely comfortable with the digital world, get yourself a digital mentor — someone under the age of 25 who can teach you the language and help you understand what’s possible. GE did this for all its senior people a number of years ago when the internet was just emerging, and it accelerated their learning curves tremendously.

Second, take an online course, either in your own company’s virtual university if you have one, or through one of the MOOC providers such as Coursera, EdX, or Udacity. There are an astounding array of topics already available — from “Introduction to Artificial Intelligence” to “Aboriginal World Views” to “Songwriting” — so pick something of interest and go through the process at your own pace — both to get exposure to a new subject and to get familiar with a new way of learning.

Disruptive transformation is always painful and challenging. But when you know it’s coming, it’s usually better to be a few steps ahead than a few gigabytes behind.

The storage industry headlines from this week included:

HP Unveils New Storage System and Partner Program.  HP (HPQ) announced new offerings that include the next generation of its MSA entry disk array, enhancements to the HP StoreEasy Storage portfolio, and a new program for HP channel partners. Available under its Simply StoreIT program, the new HP MSA 2040 Storage system is up to four times faster than similarly priced solutions. The MSA 2040 is built to support increased bandwidth, along with a high-performance controller and solid-state disk (SSD) performance, which will support increasing workloads and maximizing dollar per input/output operation.  An enhanced HP StoreEasy Storage portfolio enables customers to store, manage and protect unstructured data for thousands of concurrent users. The products are aimed at small and midsize businesses (SMBs) and government agencies to help them maximize storage investments. “Virtualization and other emerging workloads threaten to drown SMBs in a sea of complexities that hinder, rather than support, growth,” said David Scott, senior vice president and general manager, Storage Division, HP. “Simply StoreIT allows our partners to serve their small and midsized customers who are stressed for time, budget and resources.”

StorageQuest Announces Flash Storage Appliance. StorageQuest announced the public availability of its StorageQuest Flash Storage Appliance (FSA). The new hardware provides high throughput storing and retrieval over the network to an array of sixteen removable Compact Flash chips, with capacities ranging from 1GB to 256GB per Compact Flash for a total online capacity of 4TB.  Each device includes an optional copy of StorageQuest Archive Manager, which includes advanced features such as Read and Write Caching, Remote Replication (Cloud, RAID, Optical Libraries or even additional Compact Flash mediums). “This new product leverages the popularity, availability and price of industry standard Compact Flash media and transforms it into a portable archival and retrieval storage system,” according to Brendan Lelieveld-Amiro, Director of Product Development. “It’s current application lends itself well to the Security and Intelligence communities looking for portable, automated long term archiving of evidence data.”

IceWeb Selected by NASA. Unified Data Storage appliance provider IceWeb announced that it has made a sale to the National Aeronautics & Space Administration (NASA). NASA chose the IceBOX cloud collaboration platform because it meets the NIST FIPS 140 encryption requirements which will allow them to implement a Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) solution that keeps the agency FISMA (Federal Information Security Management Act) compliant. The IT administration and auditing features of IceBOX were also instrumental in winning this business. ”There are three major constituencies with mission critical requirements in every BYOD implementation whether it’s in a large enterprise or a small business—the End-User community, the Internal IT community and the Legal/Regulatory community,” said Rob Howe, IceWEB CEO. ”You don’t get to cherry-pick which community you are going to serve. You must serve them all if you are to be a truly viable BYOD solution. Obviously, all those communities were represented in this sale, and all of them gave IceBOX their ‘thumbs-up.’ So it’s clear that with IceBOX, we pass the usability, the security/administration and the auditability tests. That’s what makes the IceBOX such an exciting and useful product for any size organization no matter how critical and complex the data.”

For more storage news, visit our Storage Channel.

YouTube is having Comedy Week starting May 19th, and who better to promote this than the king of comedy, Arnold Schwarzenegger (just try to watch Commando and not laugh at everything he says)?

“You may know me for being the most muscular man in the world, or maybe for being the action star that kills a bunch of bad buys and predators, but what you didn’t know was that I’m a big fan of comedy,” he says.

Predictably, he also turns out to be a Terminator.

YouTube Comedy Week will include: The Lonely Island, Vince Vaughn, Epic Rap Battles of History, Tim & Eric, Seth Rogen, Key and Peele, Colllege Humor, Reggie Watts, Smosh, Jenna Marbles, Michael Cera, Grace Helbig, Epic Meal Time, Lil Bub, Jash, Pete Holmes, Craig Robinson, Rainn Wilson, Jeff Ross, Sarah Silverman, and Ben Stiller, to name a few. There will be new comedy videos, live events, and “fan challenges”.

Jerimiah Clyde Hartline, the man who fled zombies in a stolen truck back in April, has pled guilty after being offered a plea deal.

For those just joining us, Hartline was arrested back in April after he stole a semi-truck and caused a wreck that injured numerous people. The story got weird when he told officers that he was trying to escape zombies that were clinging onto the truck. It was later revealed that he was under the influence of an unnamed substance during the time.

Going back to the plea deal, Hartline pled guilty to charges of assault with a deadly weapon, hit and run causing death or injury, and vehicle theft. The charges carry a maximum prison sentence of five years. That being said, it’s much better than the original charges which included three counts of causing great bodily injury. The extra charges would have upped the maximum prison sentence to 12 years, but the plea deal saw prosecutors throwing out those charges.

The last remaining question in all of this must be what happened to the strawberries being transported in the semi-truck. Said fruit was reportedly undamaged and donated to local food banks and nonprofits. It just goes to show you that zombie hallucinations not only lead to massive wrecks on the interstate, but free strawberries for lower income families.

[h/t: UT San Diego]

The BlackBerry Q5 has just been announced at BlackBerry Live 2013 and it’s billed as a device for emerging markets. Essentially, the Q5 is to the Q10 in the same way that the Curve is to the Bold. It comes in a variety of colors including BlackBerry, White, Pink and Red. Stay tuned for more updates from BlackBerry Live.

We’ve also heard that BlackBerry Q10 will be available in early June in the US and BlackBerry 10.1 available for Z10 users by the end of the week.

There’s no doubt the Google Glass headset is one unique and potentially revolutionary device, but it appears it’s about to get something really special— facial recognition technology thanks to an app called MedRef. Using special facial recognition software, MedRef allows hospital employees to easily access patient records and can actually allow medical workers to keep a log of their patient with all sorts of info and notes to help make things easier. The app works in a simple and straightforward way really— it simply takes advantage of Google Glass timeline cards that are managed through voice commands, giving medical employees to do things like ”Set Patient” or “Add Note”. Here are some thoughts by programmer Lance Nanek and his team on the significance of the app:

“Some people I talked to said hospitals are full of very busy people, often with their hands full, working with a lot of information. “So Google Glass making it wearable is especially looked forward to there… Hopefully in the future, we’ll have super advanced versions of this hardware that’ll be doing this constantly”.

Well said Lance. Well said.

source: PC Mag

awdf

Come comment on this article: MedRef aims to help the medical field better, oh and it brings facial recognition to Google Glass in the process

Here’s an interesting tidbit: Microsoft is making it easier for users of its Outlook.com email to chat and collaborate with Gmail users.

Or, as the Microsoft blog post announcing the move put it:

“… you can already chat with your Facebook and Skype friends. But we heard that some of you who switched over from Gmail still want to chat with friends stuck on Gmail. Today, we’re excited to announce that you can now also chat with your Google friends.” (Emphasis is mine.)

And lest you still think we’ve entered a new era of good feelings, remember that Microsoft’s Scroogled campaign is still active, as I was reminded by one of my colleagues.

So, if you’re reading an email from a Gmail user, you can reply with a chat icon from your Outlook.com inbox. Or, if you and your Google-oriented buddy are collaborating on a document in Microsoft Skydrive (as opposed to, say, Google Drive), you can send an instant message to your Google contact with the click of a button. Microsoft is also rolling out Google Chat integration.

Basically, Microsoft is asking its Outlook.com users to use its automated process to connect with all their contacts on other services.

The timing is interesting here. Tomorrow, Google kicks off its big Google I/O conference in San Francisco. And, Microsoft is coming off a rather rocky migration of millions of its Hotmail users to Outlook.com. (To be fair, Google Drive has seen its own share of snafus lately.)

To be sure, Microsoft Office remains the desktop productivity giant but given this move, it’s clear it’s feeling pressure from Google Apps and Gmail.

This story was updated at 7:07 PDT to add the Scroogled reference.

Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
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You don’t see people catching flying birds in midair everyday. FB-Rambo uploaded this video of a hunter that does just that to LiveLeak on Monday, and it has quickly become one of the top videos currently on reddit.

It seems that Nokia is taking a rather novel approach to making sure its devices are on every carrier. Instead of making one phone available on every carrier, it’s building separate, but still largely the same, flagship devices for each major carrier.

After announcing the Lumia 928 for Verizon last week, Nokia announced today that its next flagship device – the Lumia 925 – will be available on T-Mobile later this year. The Lumia 925 is very similar to the Lumia 928 with the only differences seemingly appearing in the camera.

Before we get to that, however, you should know that the Lumia 925 has the same 4.5-inch OLED display that the 928 has. It also features the same 1GB of RAM, 8.7MP camera and 32GB of internal storage.

As for the camera differences, the Lumia 925 features a dual-LED flash – the same on the original Lumia 920. The Lumia 928 went with a Xenon flash instead. The 928 will have the best flash out of the three, but a dual-LED flash isn’t too shabby.

Speaking of cameras, Nokia also announced today new camera software for the Lumia 925 called Smart Camera. As its name implies, it allows users to do some pretty sophisticated photo editing work from within the camera app:

So, when will T-Mobile customers be able to get their hands on the Lumia 925? The carrier isn’t saying yet. The same goes for the price.

[h/t: Engadget]

One year ago, The U.S. FTC fined shoe manufacturer Skechers $40 Million over its ads for “Shape-Ups” shoes. The shoes were marketed as being able to help users lost weight and tone the muscles in their lower bodies. Skechers was banned from running the ads further and customers who bought the shoes could receive refunds from the FTC or join a class-action lawsuit against the shoe company.

“Skechers’ unfounded claims went beyond stronger and more toned muscles,” said David Vladeck, director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection. “The company even made claims about weight loss and cardiovascular health. The FTC’s message, for Skechers and other national advertisers, is to shape up your substantiation or tone down your claims.”

This week, a federal judge approved the $40 million class-action settlement between Skechers and “Shape-Ups” customers. According to an Associated Press report on the lawsuit, more than 520,000 people can claim up to $80 for a pair of “Shape-Ups,” $84 for a pair of “Resistance Runner” shoes, $54 for a pair of “Podded Sole” shoes, and $40 for a pair of “Tone-Ups.” $5 million of the settlement was awarded to the lawyers in the case.

Skechers has denied that its ads are misleading and stated that it settled to avoid a drawn-out lawsuit. The company’s “Shape-Ups” ads featured celebrity endorsements from the likes of Brooke Burke and Kim Kardashian.

As the BlackBerry Live keynote news keeps flowing in I’m happy to introduce you to the youthful and fun BlackBerry Q5 smartphone, running BlackBerry 10. With a QWERTY keyboard and a confident design, this new BlackBerry smartphone has been built to provide a fast, effortless experience that helps you explore, create and share while on the go. Thorsten Heins just revealed the device onstage at BlackBerry Live, but we’ve got all the details ready to share with you below.

I’ve been using this device for a few days now and I’m already in love. It fits into my lifestyle perfectly offering the powerful experience I need and allowing me to flow seamlessly from task to task throughout my day.

Highlights and features of the BlackBerry Q5

• The evolution of the classic BlackBerry Keyboard:
  The BlackBerry Q5 features a classic BlackBerry Keyboard with discrete keys that has been re-engineered and elegantly designed to help you type fast, accurately and with the least amount of effort. Plus with Instant Action shortcuts you can type to perform tasks faster. The BlackBerry Q5 smartphone gives you the best of both worlds – a classic QWERTY keyboard for optimized communications and a 3.1” touchscreen for all the rest.
• Create the perfect shot with BlackBerry Time Shift mode and Story Maker
  Create the picture perfect shot with BlackBerry Time Shift mode, then create and share your story, weaving together your photos, videos and music into a movie with BlackBerry Story Maker.
• Share and be seen with BBM Video with Screen Share
  Instantly switch your BBM (BlackBerry Messenger) chat to a BBM Video conversation and catch up face-to-face. You can even share your screen, whether it’s a photo, a page in the browser, an idea, or a view from your camera.
• Stay close to what’s important to you with BlackBerry Hub
  With BlackBerry Hub, all of your messages and social conversations are only one swipe away. There’s no need to stop what you’re doing. Simply peek into the BlackBerry Hub from anywhere with a swipe to effortlessly flow in and out of your messages and conversations.
• BlackBerry World delivers a rich, thriving app and content ecosystem
  Discovering and sharing great apps and content is easier than ever with recommendations based on similar purchases, and access to more than 100,000 apps on the BlackBerry World storefront.

Here’s what Thorsten had to say in a recent press release on the new BlackBerry Q5 smartphone:

“BlackBerry is excited to bring the new BlackBerry Q5 smartphone to our customers in selected markets around world,” said Thorsten Heins, President and CEO of BlackBerry. “The BlackBerry Q5 gives you the best of everything with its cutting-edge BlackBerry 10 functionality and a physical QWERTY keyboard. It is for youthful fans that are passionate, confident and bold, and it makes it easy for them to have fun, create, share and stay connected.”

Pricing and Availability
The new BlackBerry Q5 smartphone will be available in selected markets in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Asia (including the Asia Pacific region), and Latin America, with availability beginning in July.

There you have it folks – if you live in the areas listed above, you can look forward to getting your hands on the new BlackBerry Q5 with BlackBerry 10. What do you think of this phone? Let us know your thoughts on this stunning new BlackBerry device in the comments below.

Onstage at the BlackBerry Live conference in Orlando, Thorsten Heins, President and CEO, BlackBerry just announced that all of you BlackBerry Z10 customers are in for a treat. An update to BlackBerry 10 software has been released with new features designed to keep you moving. BlackBerry 10.1 is a free update that will be rolling out with carrier partners over the coming weeks.

I’ve chatted with the product development team about what you can expect in the update and there are definitely some exciting changes and features to highlight, and best of all updating is free and easy to do over a WiFi® network.

New BlackBerry 10.1 Features:

• BlackBerry Hub: The BlackBerry Hub lets you access all your messages and notifications in one place. With BlackBerry 10.1 support for PIN to PIN messages for direct communication between BlackBerry smartphones has been added to the BlackBerry Hub. Plus, improved attachment support in the BlackBerry Hub makes it easier to view emails which have been sent as attachments to other messages.
• Notifications: With BlackBerry 10.1 you can personalize the notifications for your accounts and contacts so you always know what is happening around you. Customize ringtones, vibration and the LED light by contact or by account for more personalized notifications.
• Fine Cursor Control: BlackBerry 10.1 makes it easier and more accurate to pinpoint exactly where you want to type. Tap once to bring up the cursor. Grab the blue circle and drag it around to place it exactly where you need it. Tap either side of the circle to move left or right by just one character. It’s easy to move around with speed and precision.
• Camera: BlackBerry 10 lets you create the perfect shot by moving parts of your picture backwards and forwards in time with Time Shift mode. BlackBerry 10.1 adds an HDR shooting mode for beautiful images in tricky lighting conditions. A standard image takes a picture at one exposure level. Where you have high contrast between light and dark areas of the photo, fine details can be lost. High Dynamic Range (HDR) mode takes multiple pictures at different exposure levels and layers them automatically to produce a single photo that combines the best of the dark and light areas.
• Lots more to discover: You’ll find lots of new improvements across the BlackBerry 10 OS like landscape support for the calendar, easier international dialing, improved red eye reduction in the picture editor and much more. The first step to discovering these new features is to update your BlackBerry 10 software.

How to update to BlackBerry 10.1:

Updating to BlackBerry 10.1 is free and easy to do. To update your BlackBerry Z10 smartphone to BlackBerry 10.1 look for the alert in the notifications section of the BlackBerry Hub. You can also check for software updates through the settings menu by visiting the software updates section. The download will happen in the background and the update will be applied without needing to back up your smartphone. All of your information remains safe. As always, we recommend you have a current backup of your BlackBerry Z10 smartphone readily available. For more information on how to update your BlackBerry Z10 smartphone, visit www.BlackBerry.com/update

There you have it – BlackBerry 10.1 will soon be available for your BlackBerry Z10 device. Please let us know what you think of these features and refinements in the comments below.