FocuSoft Tech Blog

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• How would you change ASUS’ Eee PC Seashell line?
• Garmin-ASUS nuvifone M20 and G60 shipping to Singapore in August
• In the Future, Metroids Will Provide Our Internet [Concepts]
• LG’s GD910 watch phone clears the FCC, makes beeline for American wrists
• Consumer electronics sector expecting its first annual revenue drop since 2001
• With Plans to Recast Futurama, Fox Infuriates Fanboys Everywhere [Futurama]
• Tata Motors moves first $2,500 Nano in Mumbai
• The Week In iPhone Apps: Augmented Everything [IPhone Apps]
• Full-Size Gundam Get Attacked by Laser During Inaugural Ceremony [Robots]
• Stealth Mobile Startup MOBshop Has Serious Backers, Big (Secret) Plans

How would you change ASUS’ Eee PC Seashell line? Posted: 17 Jul 2009 09:13 PM PDT In the past month and change, ASUS has found time to issue not one, but two new Seashell netbooks. Originally shown to the adoring public at CeBIT in Germany, this fresh take on the Eee PC was a welcome change to the drab netbooks we were accustomed to falling asleep on. We managed to have a look at both the ultraslim 1008HA as well as the more business-oriented 1005HA, but now we’re eager to hear your opinions on the matter. What would you do differently with the Eee PC Seashell line? Would you beef up the battery? Add a few ports? Swap in a different display or processor? We know Microsoft’s Windows XP limitations are holding PC makers back, but who says your imagination has to abide by those same guidelines? Detail your dreams in comments below. Filed under: Laptops How would you change ASUS’ Eee PC Seashell line? originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 17 Jul 2009 23:13:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink Share this on del.icio.us Share this on Reddit Buzz up! Stumble upon something good? Share it on StumbleUpon Share this on Technorati Share this on Mixx Share this on Facebook Tweet This! Email this to a friend?

Garmin-ASUS nuvifone M20 and G60 shipping to Singapore in August Posted: 17 Jul 2009 07:33 PM PDT After a patently absurd amount of delays, it actually feels like the Garmin-ASUS n Share this on del.icio.us Share this on Reddit Buzz up! Stumble upon something good? Share it on StumbleUpon Share this on Technorati Share this on Mixx Share this on Facebook Tweet This! Email this to a friend?

In the Future, Metroids Will Provide Our Internet [Concepts] Posted: 17 Jul 2009 06:00 PM PDT UK Internet provider TalkTalk asked a team from Goldsmiths, University of London to come up with some concept router designs focused around four areas: signal strength, energy efficiency, home design, and “pure enjoyment.” These are the four routers that spawned from the idea. • The Route O’Clock concept will tell you how much bandwidth is available depending on the time of day (hence the clock design). • The Hybrid Router concept turns your router into a mid-century piece of furniture that puts aesthetics over functionality. • The energy saving router uses keyhooks to determine how many people are in the house. When there are no keys on the hook, it will shut itself down. • Last is the Jelly Fish router, pictured up top. That thing is meant to be a social hub of sorts, offering a link to the web from each of its eight tentacles, and using a fluorescent glow effect to denote signal strength. It’s meant to be the focal point of a room. It also just looks amazing. TalkTalk is currently conducting a poll to see which router is the fan favorite, and said they might consider producing which ever one takes the vote. [Gizmag] Here is the original post: In the Future, Metroids Will Provide Our Internet [Concepts] Share this on del.icio.us Share this on Reddit Buzz up! Stumble upon something good? Share it on StumbleUpon Share this on Technorati Share this on Mixx Share this on Facebook Tweet This! Email this to a friend?

LG’s GD910 watch phone clears the FCC, makes beeline for American wrists Posted: 17 Jul 2009 05:46 PM PDT It’s about time, wouldn’t you agree? After finding that Orange would become Europe’s first carrier to sell LG’s luscious GD910 watch phone, every closet Dick Tracy fan in America began wondering when (and if) LG would make a similar announcement here on US soil. Regrettably, we’re still waiting for the official line from the company, but this will certainly suffice for now. The image you see above is being provided courtesy of a freshly released FCC filing, which means precisely one thing: this here watch phone is destined for America. Of course, we suppose LG could have just made the filing for kicks and giggles, but our optimistic imagination simply won’t let us believe such a tragedy could ever occur. Hang tight, Yanks — your dream device just got a lot closer to clearing customs. Filed under: Cellphones, Wearables LG’s GD910 watch phone clears the FCC, makes beeline for American wrists originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 17 Jul 2009 19:46:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Read Share this on del.icio.us Share this on Reddit Buzz up! Stumble upon something good? Share it on StumbleUpon Share this on Technorati Share this on Mixx Share this on Facebook Tweet This! Email this to a friend?

Consumer electronics sector expecting its first annual revenue drop since 2001 Posted: 17 Jul 2009 05:34 PM PDT Samsung Electronics Booth at CES 2009. Credit: Alex Pham / Los Angeles Times. It's bad all over. A day after the video game sector posted its worst year-over-year decline in nearly nine years, the consumer electronics industry today said it was expecting its first annual revenue drop since 2001. Shipments to U.S. retailers and consumers are projected to Share this on del.icio.us Share this on Reddit Buzz up! Stumble upon something good? Share it on StumbleUpon Share this on Technorati Share this on Mixx Share this on Facebook Tweet This! Email this to a friend?

With Plans to Recast Futurama, Fox Infuriates Fanboys Everywhere [Futurama] Posted: 17 Jul 2009 05:30 PM PDT But seriously—why in the hell would you go and do that, Fox? It’s like the time Vince McMahon tried to pawn off a fake Razor Ramon and Diesel on us. Or the time the Fresh Prince’s Aunt Viv inexplicably became four shades lighter over the course of a season (Vitiligo?). Or maybe more relevant, the time Cartoon Network aired all those new episodes of Dragonball Z, and Goku sounded like he was severely constipated. The point is this: if you’re bringing the show back for the rabid, already-established fanbase who knows the show best, how are you going to recast all the main voices and think the fans won’t care or notice? It wont work. [CrunchGear] Original post: With Plans to Recast Futurama, Fox Infuriates Fanboys Everywhere [Futurama] Share this on del.icio.us Share this on Reddit Buzz up! Stumble upon something good? Share it on StumbleUpon Share this on Technorati Share this on Mixx Share this on Facebook Tweet This! Email this to a friend?

Tata Motors moves first $2,500 Nano in Mumbai Posted: 17 Jul 2009 05:01 PM PDT We’ve been following the development of Tata Motors’ Nano — a teeny little car whose main claim to fame is its tiny price tag of about $2,500 — since way back when it was only an announcement. Well, today the cycle is complete: the first Nano has officially been sold to Mumbai resident Ashok Vichare, who says he bought the car (his first) because it’s the smallest and cheapest sold in India. The company held a lottery to decide who could purchase the first 100,000 Nanos, and says its got a waiting list of about a year for further cars. Filed under: Transportation Tata Motors moves first $2,500 Nano in Mumbai originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 17 Jul 2009 19:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Read Share this on del.icio.us Share this on Reddit Buzz up! Stumble upon something good? Share it on StumbleUpon Share this on Technorati Share this on Mixx Share this on Facebook Tweet This! Email this to a friend?

The Week In iPhone Apps: Augmented Everything [IPhone Apps] Posted: 17 Jul 2009 05:00 PM PDT In a very special late night edition of your weekly iPhone apptacular: Apps that make things that are already good—FM radio, video games, shopping, spouses, the city you live in—a little bit better. Priceless Picks: Don’t let the advertising-crap-app appearance of Priceless Picks turn you off—this free download, branded all over with Mastercard, is great. It combines loads of data collected from a number of sources, including user submissions and Amazon’s Mechanical Turk army, to give wide-ranging recommendations for things to do, eat, drink or experience wherever you happen to be. There are other apps that do similar things, yes, but the dataset on this one already seems strong, the scope—not just restaurants, not just a particular company’s establishments—is healthy, and the 3D map presentation is fantastically cool, and surprisingly smooth. Griffin iFM Radio Browser: A lot of people will download this assuming it’s a streaming radio app—it’s something else entirely, and actually quite exciting: iFM polls your location to come up with a list of local terrestrial radio stations, providing you with access to song titles, album art, artist info and purchase links for whatever’s playing on your FM station of choice. Think of it as augmented radio. It’s also one of the earliest examples of accessory integration for OS 3.0, featuring a software interface for Griffin’s Navigate inline iPod remote, which has a built-in radio. Free. (The app, not the accessory. Sorry.) Snore Patrol: Leave this app running overnight and it’ll provide a decibel readout of whatever weird nostril/sinus/lung business goes down in the duration. The idea is to present a snoring partner with graphical proof of their terrible flaw, which will in turn guilt them into doing something about it. It’s funny, but the pink interface and lady-oriented marketing is disheartening. Women snore too! MUST WE MEN SUFFER IN SILENCE? Your gynocentric passive aggressiveness: Free. Squash the Street : If the economy’s got you down, and you’re vaguely upset about some fatcats on Wall Street, or at your banks, or something, why not direct a little bit of your pent-up aggression and/or depression into your iPhone? That’s what Squash the Street is for: Pure, possibly misguided venting. Neat 3D-ish graphics give this ultra-timely voodoo doll a bit of longevity. A dollar. Cyclops: Barcode scanning apps are a no-brainer for modern smartphones: just snap a picture of a product’s label, and they’ll pull down a plethora of information. That’s exactly what Cyclops does. It’s not the first, but it’s the first designed around the iPhone 3GS’s new camera, which has good enough macro skills to make such an app truly useful. Free. [Via TUAW] iMetal: There are many rules by which app developers live, some written, some not. One of the most powerful is the mandate that no hardware feature on any version of the iPhone shall go unused, or perhaps more accurately, unexploited. The iPhone 3GS utilizes a magnetometer for its compass, meaning that it can detect when certain metals are nearby, and that someone could theoretically make an app that acts as a sort of makeshift metal detector. And since nothing stays theoretical for more than a week in the App Store, someone has: it’s called iMetal, and it’ll tell you when you’re iPhone is next to a giant piece or iron, or hovering somewhere near a neodymium magnet. As an actual metal detector, it’s basically useless; as a party trick, it’s pretty neat. A dollar. The Typography Manual: To most, this app will seem esoteric, or at worst, plain boring. To type nerds, however, this is like kerned, serifed manna from heaven. As its name implies, it’s something of a typography primer and history lesson, but on top of that, it’s a visual glossary, a collection of clever type tools, a directory of keyboard combinations for special symbols, and quite a bit more. Five dollars. World of Warcraft Mobile Armory: Anyone who doesn’t play WoW won’t know what this is, and doesn’t need to. Anyone who does can download it for free. This Week’s App News On Giz: • Portal Gets Played On an iPhone, Sort Of • Comcast’s iPhone App Does More Than TV Listings • Google Now Finds Stuff Nearby Using Your Location in Mobile Safari • Pizza Hut’s iPhone App Makes Pizza Ordering Easier, More Gimmicky • iPhone Server Farm Puts Old Models To Good Use • TwitVid for iPhone 3GS: Guess What It Does? • TomTom’s GPS-Enhancing Car Adapter Should Work With The iPod Touch • Worms For iPhone: Same Game, Worse Controls • TuneWiki for iPhone Is Now Fully Armed and Operational This list is in no way definitive. If you’ve spotted a great app that hit the store this week, give us a heads up or, better yet, your firsthand impressions in the comments. And for even more apps: see our previous weekly roundups here, and check out our Favorite iPhone Apps Directory and our original iPhone App Review Marathon. Have a good weekend everybody. Read more from the original source: The Week In iPhone Apps: Augmented Everything [IPhone Apps] Share this on del.icio.us Share this on Reddit Buzz up! Stumble upon something good? Share it on StumbleUpon Share this on Technorati Share this on Mixx Share this on Facebook Tweet This! Email this to a friend?

Full-Size Gundam Get Attacked by Laser During Inaugural Ceremony [Robots] Posted: 17 Jul 2009 04:30 PM PDT I am not a full-size Gundam in Tokyo—although I want to be one when I grow up—but if I were attacked with greeeeeen lasers during my inauguration ceremony, I would get pretty damn pissed off. Then I would destroy everything in sight, and go to have a carrot cake and coffee afterwards. [Mainichi Daily News] More here: Full-Size Gundam Get Attacked by Laser During Inaugural Ceremony [Robots] Share this on del.icio.us Share this on Reddit Buzz up! Stumble upon something good? Share it on StumbleUpon Share this on Technorati Share this on Mixx Share this on Facebook Tweet This! Email this to a friend?

Stealth Mobile Startup MOBshop Has Serious Backers, Big (Secret) Plans Posted: 17 Jul 2009 04:09 PM PDT I’m not sure exactly what MOBshop (the company name is Cross-Platform Corp. but will likely change) co-founder Cyriac Roeding is up to, but he’s convinced some very serious people to invest time and money into his idea. And he has put together a killer core founding team. The company has raised $2.5 million in an initial round of financing from Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and entrepreneur/angel investor Reid Hoffman. Hoffman also joined the board of directors of the company, and Kleiner actually added two board members: Matt Murphy and Aileen Lee. It’s rare for a fund to spend two partners’ time on a single investment. And Hoffman has said he rarely invests in startups any longer, let alone taking the time to sit on the board. Clearly, they think there is something under the hood at the secretive MOBshop. But just what that something is, we don’t know. Roeding, a German-born entrepreneur and former EVP of CBS Mobile, most recently did a stint as an entrepreneur-in-residence at Kleiner. He will only say that the company will hit the intersection of mobile and physical worlds. That doesn’t really narrow things down much, but Roeding says that it’s still way too early to start talking about the product. They don’t even have a website up yet. Hoffman described the project to me as ” extraordinarily interesting” but wouldn’t go into any further detail at all. He’s not generally one to gush, so I assume he’s genuinely impressed. Roeding has also put together a strong core team. His co-founder is Jeff Sellinger took over CBS Mobile after Roeding left to join Kleiner. He has also pulled senior people from Loopt (Evan Tana) and Six Apart (Aaron Emigh) to complete the team One thing the company is being very vocal about is hiring. “Right now we're looking for a small group of the Valley's best and brightest developers for the iPhone, other smartphones, and backend systems,” Roeding says. Email resumes to makecontact@mobshop.net. CrunchBase Information Cross Platform Corp. Information provided by CrunchBase Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware. Original post:  Stealth Mobile Startup MOBshop Has Serious Backers, Big (Secret) Plans Share this on del.icio.us Share this on Reddit Buzz up! Stumble upon something good? Share it on StumbleUpon Share this on Technorati Share this on Mixx Share this on Facebook Tweet This! Email this to a friend?

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