Filed under: Cell PhonesVerizon is finally paying up for disconnecting users over an unpublished download cap on its cellular broadband service known as BroadbandAccess. Following a nine month investigation by New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, Verizon has agreed to pay a fine of $150,000 to the state as well as reimburse users the price of laptop cards or cell phones they purchased to use the service.In April, Verizon stopped disconnecting users over data usage, but maintained the right to throttle traffic for users who exceed a five-gigabyte limit, which they clearly disclose.So users of these services should be wary of downloading bigger files like music, since that stuff can easily eat up a monthly five-gigabyte limit.From the AOL Money & Finance (AP)Related Links:Best Buy Sued for Being ScummyNew York Attorney General Sues Dell Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments

  Filed under: Video Games Earlier this year, not long after Sony's PlayStation 3 launched in the U.K., Sony found itself on the receiving end of some stiff words from Church of England representatives thanks to a battle sequence in 'Resistance: Fall of Man.' The specific battle takes place in a virtual rendition of Manchester Cathedral. The Church took offense and Sony was quick to semi-apologize, saying it really hadn't done anything wrong, but was sorry just the same. Now, months later, and a day after the game was snubbed at the British Academy Video Games Awards, the Chuch of England is saying that it forgives the company ... sort of.Seeming to relish in the game's failure to win an award, the Dean of Manchester Cathedral issued the following statement, which we wouldn't say is any more forgiving than Sony's apology was apologetic:"I think some important lessons have been learnt. So we do forgive Sony for what they have done, even though they still believe they have done nothing wrong. In an industry that is breaking new frontiers, it is important that long held traditions of film and television are maintained. These traditions include having courtesy, respecting the dignity of your subject, and admitting when mistakes have been made. In so many ways Sony have failed to live up to these standards by disrespecting people of faith and the victims of gun crime here in Manchester."As we pointed out earlier, many other games, like 'Call of Duty' and 'Hitman' have featured spectacular gun battles in churches without raising the ire of any religious figureheads. With the Dean extending the scope of the story to include television and film, well, we don't even know where to begin, but we're guessing the Dean has never seen flicks by Quentin Tarantino or Robert Rodriguez, nor any episodes of 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer' for that matter.From BBC NewsRelated Links: Sony Apologizes to Church of England Sony Vs. Church: The Holy War Continues Parish Vs. PlayStation  Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments

  Filed under: CamerasFew companies do tiny cameras better than Sony, which has made dozens of pocketable Cyber-shot models over the years. The company's latest pocket-worthy wonder is the Cyber-shot DSC-T2, a brightly colored eight-megapixel point-and-shoot camera that sports four-gigabytes of on-board Flash storage. This means that this thing is actually good-to-go for a gazillion pix right out of the box and may never require a memory card at all -- not a bad feature consider the camera only supports Sony's generally unloved Memory Stick format. The front sports a tiny 3x optical zoom lens which, like all Cyber-shots, is made by Carl Zeiss. The lens also features optical image stabilization, something not typically foundon a cam of this size. The back is covered with a 2.7-inch touchscreen LCD for scrolling through menus of features like the odd-sounding smile detection, which is supposed to automatically snap shots whenever someone is smiling -- hopefully this function will work better here than it did on Sony's last entrant, the T200. The DSC-T2 drops this December for $350, and is available in a range of holiday colors that are just perfect for attracting peoples' attentions while trying to snap those candid family pictures.From Engadget%Gallery-9080%Related Links: Olympus' New E3 for High-End Shooters Just Tell Me What to Get: A Sub-$200 Cam A Video Cam No Bigger Than a Pack of Gum!  Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments

  Filed under: Cell Phones, AdviceThis one is for the love lorn in our audience. PlayerBlock is a new text messaging service that aims to let you avoid the hassle of dealing with that predatory, promiscuous menace of the dating world -- the player.For some people, the hassle of dating and weeding out the womanizing, lying, and just plain undesirable is just a bit to much. So Global SMS, the company behind PlayerBlock, is hoping to utilize the power of the social web to make the whole process as painless as possible. For $4.99 a month, you can send and receive up to 100 text messages. You can check up on potential companions by sending in your potential suitor's cell phone number and find out what others have to say about him or her (let's be honest... it's probably a him). You can send in your own feed back as well, and let others know about your experience. Let others know if said player doesn't call don't call, or if said player is a bit too forward (if you catch our drift).What's to stop a jilted lover from smearing some pour sap? Absolutely nothing. Is there something unsettling about the idea of people handing over another persons cell phone number to a texting service? Definitely. Couldn't you just (wo)man up and do the dating thing the old-fashioned way? Of course, and you probably should!From CNETRelated Links:Online Dating -- Five Things to AvoidMap Sex Offenders on Your Cell PhoneOnline Tools for the Criminally Minded Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments

  Filed under: Audio/Video, ComputersEarlier this week we reported on speculation that Comcast was blocking or at least seriously crippling certain types of Internet traffic. The content in question was peer-to-peer, or P2P, network traffic, the bandwidth-hogging type of data (read: movies, TV shows, and songs). Tests run by AP reporters showed that file sharing applications either didn't work at all or were seriously slowed down when using Comcast Internet access. Comcast has now issued a response in which it fesses up to filtering the applications in question but also denies that they were actually blocked. Senior VP of Comcast Online Services Mitch Bowling said that there is no blocking going on, and that any filtering in place was "temporary and intended to improve surfing for other users." In other words, they're trimming down the bandwidth hogs so that others get a share. That sounds fair enough, but there are better ways of doing that then disabling P2P traffic altogether. Any blocking, Mr. Bowling says, was "unintentional and due to a software bug that had been fixed." So, if the bug is already fixed, Comcast users should be good to go ... we hope.From EngadgetRelated Links: Comcast Blocking Certain Types of Internet Traffic Iran Blocks Access to Google and Gmail Is it Wrong to Block Web Site Ads?  Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments

  Filed under: Audio/Video, Computers, TVAnother major BitTorrent site has been shuttered... for now. This time it's the U.K.based tv-links.co.uk. TV-Links was closed down for providing links to illegal copies of major motion pictures and TV shows. The closing of the site was accompanied by raids and the arrest of a 26-year-old man from Cheltenham, England for facilitating copy right infringement.Officers from the Gloucestershire County Council Trading Standards Service, the Gloucestershire Police, and FACT (Federation Against Copyright Theft) worked together to bring the popular Torrent site down. In addition, this week saw the closure of OiNK BitTorrent Tracker, an invite-only site that specializes in leaking albums before their official release.TV-Links and OiNK BitTorrent Tracker are just latest target sin the fight against piracy. In 2003, popular site SuperNova.org closed up shop due to mounting legal pressure, as did the "world's largest" BitTorrent repository, The Pirate Bay. Both services returned, though, to their full illegal glory after only a fairly short closing, and it is likely that the same will happen with TV-Links and OiNK. From the Guardian Unlimited and Ars TechnicaRelated Links:LimeWire Music Site Goes LegitFBI Busts '24' BootleggerBitTorrent in Your Browser Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments

  Filed under: Computers, GoogleWe reported yesterday about a few locals using instant status service Twitter to send updates about the Southern California wild fires burning wildly north and east of San Diego. Now it seems Google is getting in on the action, too, by offering up a list of the most popular custom Google Maps that have been created to track the fire.Top of the list is the San Diego County Fires map, provided by local station KPBS. It's updated at least every 15 minutes to show the current location of the fires, as well as status updates for evacuations and which evac stations are already full. Another map is provided by the 'Los Angeles Times', showing stats about total acres burned, as well as injuries and property damage.Unfortunately these maps can't help to contain the fire, but as we said yesterday, keeping informed is what's most important, and these should help you do just that.From Official Google BlogRelated Links: Twitter Users Tracking the Latest California Fire News Comcast Blocking Certain Types of Internet Traffic Google Plans to Digitize Your Medical Records  Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments

  Filed under: Cell Phones, iPhoneWell, AT&T investors certainly have something to cheer about. The company revealed its third quarter profits had climbed 41 percent, from $2.17 billion to $3.06 billion, primarily through its wireless division, and with the help of the iPhone.The wireless division managed to add two million subscribers, which helped offset the loss of subscribers on the company's landlines. AT&T said that it had activated 1.1 million iPhones, and that roughly 40 percent of those were new subscribers, making up a large chunk of that gain.Guess those naysayers that were low-balling original iPhone sales have some serious egg on their faces.From the New York TimesRelated Links:Apple Profits Soar, 73%, Shares on the RiseHarry Potter Levitates Amazon RevenueMike Tyson Loves His iPhone Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments

  Filed under: Cell PhonesThe juggernaut of new iPhone-killers continues on a pace with today's official unveiling of the Samsung BlackJack II, which will be out for AT&T by the end of the year. None other than Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer walked his audience through the super-slim smart phone's first public appearance.The first BlackJack was super-slim and sexy, but ran on that pesky and sometimes glitchy Windows Mobile 5 operating system. The BlackJack II is just as slim and sexy (and comes in two different, two-toned color schemes), but runs on the more powerful and stable Windows Mobile 6.Compared to the iPhone (and the original BlackJack), the BlackJack II boasts a seriously impressive list of features, including: AT&T Video Share, which lets you do live, one-way videoconferencing with other AT&T-Video-Share-enabled phones.Built-in GPS and TeleNav GPS Navigator software that can reroute you if you get lost.A 2.0 megapixel camera that doubles as a camcorder.An RSS ReaderWorld-phone high-speed 3G capability (UMTS/HSDPA) for data, downloading, and Web surfing.An improved speakerphone.Microsoft Direct Push with Outlook Mobile, for faster reception of most types of e-mail (plus over-the-air syncing of contacts, tasks, and calendar appointments).XM Radio Mobile (requires $8.99 per month subscription)AT&T Mobile Music (direct-to-phone Napster, eMusic, and the like)AT&T's TV streaming service.The BlackJack II -- out by the end of the year for $149.99 (with a two-year AT&T contract) -- is just one of many new smart phones to hit the market, but it's the second major one to include Windows Mobile 6, which we have to say we've been enjoying with the HTC Touch we're testing out. More smart phones will be announced in the days to come, no doubt, from the CTIA conference in San Francisco. We'll keep you posted.Related Links:AT&T and Napster Join Forces to Offer Direct-to-Phone Wireless Music DownloadsIs the HTC Touch Better Than the iPhone?New T-Mobile Sidekick LX and Sidekick Slide Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments

  Filed under: Computers, MySpaceDespite efforts to replace him, MySpace's Tom is still the most popular and most default friend on the ridiculously popular social networking site. Tom is, of course, Tom Anderson, the creator of the site, whose profile lists him as 32 years old. However, in what may be the most glaring example of why you shouldn't trust a thing yousee on MySpace, (or online in general), reports are surfacing that Tom may be as old as 40.His Wikipedia page echoes the 32 age, stating his birthday as October 13, 1975, and his undergraduate date from U.C. Berkeley of 1998 seems to jive with that. But apparently Julia Angwin, a writer for the Wall Street Journal, is working on a book that uncovers, among many other juicy items, Anderson's real age to be 40.We can't wait to read that book, but in the meantime, we were able to get some confirmation on Anderson's age discrepancy from some industrious online bloggers. It turns out that an unnamed "senior person" at MySpace confirmed to TechCrunch that Tom is really "36 or 37." Why lie, and why continue the lie for so long? (Tom's birthday on the site hasn't changed since 2003.) And, is this a big deal? Well, lying about your age isn't exactly a felony, especially for a Californian, but it is kind of creepy, especially when you've got a bunch of kids wanting to be your friend. What do you think? If Tom Anderson is lying about his age, is it a big deal?From TechCrunchRelated Links: MySpace and Skype Join Forces Kids Spend Too Much Time Online, Say Parents Mobile MySpace To Launch Any Moment Now  Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments

  Filed under: Video GamesJust like the new $399 PlayStation 3 model, which we knew about over a month in advance, Microsoft's new Xbox 360 lost some hype around its announcement when the thing was listed on Amazon.com three weeks ago. But, the company is moving on, and has now officially announced the new Xbox 360 Arcade bundle. It will replace the former $279.99 Core model, which is the cheapest, stripper version that came with a wired controller but no hard drive. The new Arcade version also lacks a hard drive and will also sell for $279.99, but at least it comes with a 256-megabyte memory card for game saves, a wireless controller, and five games from the Xbox Live Arcade ('Pac-Man', 'Boom Boom Rocket', 'Feeding Frenzy', 'Luxor 2', and 'Uno'). It's a much better deal than the Core package and is targeted toward the more casual gamer set -- those who are buying up every Wii in sight. However, serious gamers who want to be downloading game demos or renting videos from the Xbox Live Marketplace will still want to cough up the extra $70 to get the Premium bundle with the hard drive. From EngadgetRelated Links: Amazon Slips, Leaks the New Xbox 360 $399 PlayStation 3 Coming, But It Won't Play Old Games Xbox 360 Gets Better, Darker  Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments

  Filed under: ComputersUsing your digits to type out innumerable amounts of LOLs and ROFLMAOs on crumb-laden keyboards is something most people take for granted. But the physically disabled, or, more specifically, those without the use of their hands and fingers, have a much more difficult time navigating a computer keyboard.Voice-recognition programs such as Dragon Naturally Speaking have gone a long way towards helping people who can't use a keyboard with a computer, but it looks like there will soon be some other options: Japanese company Actbrise recently developed a touch-free keyboard for people without the use of their hands. Using a head-mounted sensor, the keyboard, which hangs over the top of your screen, picks up your noggin's movements and transmits the data to the computer as text. The system can also simply be used as a mouse to navigate your computer's windows and documents. Now, here's the annoying part: The system costs $2,567, which makes Dragon Naturally Speaking suddenly seem like the bargain of the century. From Akihabara NewsRelated Links:Target Sued Over Site's Visually-Impared Accessibility Inventors Use Hand Gestures to Kill the Mouse (and Keyboard)  Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments

  Filed under: Computers, Video Games, MySpaceNews Corp has its hands in just about everything these days, it owns the Fox film and TV outlets, including Fox News and National Geographic, it has significant holdings in DirecTV and the UK's SKY TV, an absurd number of newspapers including the New York Post, and soon, the prestigious Wall Street Journal, mega publisher Harper Collins. It also owns popular online destinations Rotten Tomatoes, and, of course, MySpace.It's the last property in that list that has been one of our constant targets for both well deserved and occasionally frivolous reporting. MySpace is trying to become a one-stop portal for everything you could possibly need on the Web. What began as a simple social-networking site has expanded to cover music, video, comedy, news, ringtones, Internet telephony, and even past episodes of Fox television shows.Now you can add video games to MySpace's list of offerings that you won't have to go anywhere else to find. MySpace Games is set to launch in January of 2008 as part of a partnership with casual-games publisher Oberon Media. The target audience, naturally, is casual gamers who play Flash versions of word, puzzle and board games on sites like PopCap and AOL Games.MySpacers will be able to play games with other MySpacers on the Games channel, as well as embed scaled down versions on their MySpace profiles for instant gaming and even slower load times!From GigaOMRelated Links:MySpace TV: A Better YouTube Competitor How to Spot Fake Friend Requests on MySpace MySpace to Absorb PhotoBucket MySpace Bans 29,000 Sex Offenders  Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments

  Filed under: Cell Phones, Computers, iPhoneSome of us have been hoping for or expecting it since the announcement of the iPhone, while some of the rest of you, like Farhad Manjoo of Machinist, are just realizing the possibilities. A touch-screen Mac, or the more traditional rumor route, a Mac Tablet.It's not as crazy as it seems, the iPhone is built on OS X, it shares the same core operating system with your desktop and notebook Macs. So why not port over the awe inspiring multi-touch interface to the iMac? According to a recent article in the New York Times, Steve Jobs certainly thinks his new touchscreen is impressive. When interviewer John Markoff suggests that "there have been no obvious radical innovations to jump-start growth," Job's counters that the iPhone's multi-touch interface is exactly that sort of innovation. "People don't understand that we've invented a new class of interface," the Apple demigod is quoted as saying in the Times.Imagine using multi-touch technology to manipulate an image in Photoshop, or twiddle with virtual knobs and faders in music creation programs such as ProTools or Apple's own Logic (the more likely initial candidate). So Mr. Jobs, we know it's technically feasible, and you seem to think it's revolutionary, so get moving and bring the world's best touch-screen technology to your desktop computer line... please?How about you? Would you want a touch-screen Mac?From Machinist and New York Times.Related Links:Is Europe Getting a Better iPhone Next Week?Netflix Style Rentals Coming From Apple iTunes?iPhone Nano: Is it Coming or What? Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments