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Face Recognition Coming to iOS 5 [REPORT]

(By: Mashable.com)

Apple is planning to include face detection capabilities in the next version of its smartphone/tablet platform, iOS 5, 9to5Mac has discovered.

It is too early to tell exactly how the face recognition in iOS 5 will work, but it appears Apple plans to open it up to developers via several API controls, including a call for recognizing the position of the person’s eyes and mouth. This means that in the future we’ll be seeing iOS apps utilizing face detection from third-party developers and possibly from Apple itself.

The technology behind this feature probably comes from Polar Rose, a Swedish face recognition company, which Apple acquired in 2010.

Check out this video showcasing an augmented reality app called Recognizr, which Polar Rose co-developed.

History of Android

Infographic by Android Developers at [x]cubelabs

Google Buys Motorola Mobility for $12.5 Billion

(by: Mashable)

Google announced Monday morning that it will acquire Motorola Mobility for $12.5 billion.

Motorola is one of 39 manufacturers of handsets that use Google’s Android operating system.

Buying a hardware company is an unusual move for Google. The acquisition, Google said in a statement, “will enable Google to supercharge the Android ecosystem.”

SEE ALSO: Nokia & RIM Shares Jump Following Google’s Motorola Mobility Acquisition

Google CEO Larry Page expanded on what that might mean in a blog post. In addition to citing Motorola’s home devices and video solutions business, Page references recent patent wars that Google believes to be anti-competitive.

“The U.S. Department of Justice had to intervene in the results of one recent patent auction to ‘protect competition and innovation in the open source software community’ and it is currently looking into the results of the Nortel auction,” Page writes. “Our acquisition of Motorola will increase competition by strengthening Google’s patent portfolio, which will enable us to better protect Android from anti-competitive threats from Microsoft, Apple and other companies.”

Google's big deal pushes stocks higher

(By: MSN Money)


Stocks have started the week with a sharp rally, thanks to the excitement of Google's(GOOG) agreement to buy Motorola Mobility (MMI) for some $12.5 billion, in cash no less. 

Google's deal for Motorola set off a lot of excited buying in other makers of mobile phones, especially Nokia (NOK) and Research In Motion (RIMM). 

Also helping stocks was relief that European markets were higher, a day ahead of a meeting between German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy about how to shore up Europe's banking system. In addition, Japan said its economy pulled back less than expected in the second quarter. Analysts had expected the March earthquake would result in growth falling 2.5%; today's report put the decline at 1.2%. 

If there's a worry about the rally, it's this: The Standard & Poor's 500 Index ($INX) has been unable to break 1,200.

At 1:40 p.m. ET, the Dow Jones industrials ($INDU) were up 138 points, or 1.2%, to 11,407. The blue chips had been up as many as 174 points at 10:45 a.m. ET. The S&P 500 was up 17 points, or 1.4%, to 1,195. The index peaked at 1,199.60 when selling suddenly hit the market. The Nasdaq Composite Index ($COMPX) was up 23 points, or 0.9%, to 2,531; the index had been up as many as 38 points. 

The Dow has risen or fallen by at least 100 points for six straight sessions and eight out of the last 10.

The market gotten some lift overall from tech stocks. But the real fuel was gains in energy and financial stocks. Energy shares moved higher as crude oil (-CL) moved up to $86.79 a barrel from Friday's $85.38. Exxon Mobil(XOM) was up 2.5% to $73.77; Chevron (CVX) added 2.4% to $98.17.

Gold (-GC) was up $13.60 to $1,756.20 an ounce. Silver (-SI) was up 25.6 cents to $393.37 an ounce. 

The dollar was lower as European stocks moved higher. That's helped shares of companies with big exposure to Europe. Caterpillar (CAT) rose 1.7% to $91.37. 

Google gets into the hardware business
The Google-Motorola deal has a lot of meaning. One reason Google wanted Motorola is that it is one of the biggest licensees of its Android operating system. It has deep relationships with many component makers, according to Kt Eaton, writing on FastCompany.com. 

The company, for all its faults, understands how to manufacture devices in big numbers, something Google does not. 

Plus, Motorola owns a lot of patents that it has used to protect its devices, and Google wants those as well. Actually, there's been a debate all day over whether patents are more important than the manufacturing expertise. 

The bottom line is that Motorola shareholders are big winners today. Shares are up 56% to $38.18. The biggest winner among Motorola's shareholders may be corporate raider Carl Icahn, who owns about 11% of the company. His stake was worth more than $1 billion today, up from $655.8 million on Friday.  

What's not clear is what will happen to Samsung Electronics, which has helped build Android-based devices into formidable competitors against the Apple (AAPL) iPhone. Apple was up 1.6% to $382.86.

Investors are betting today that the Google/Motorola deal means more consolidation in the wireless manufacturing world. That's why Nokia is up 12.8% to $6.05 in New York. It's why Research In Motion is up 4.3% to $25.61. 

Leaders and laggards
Bank of America (BAC) rose 7% to $7.69, tops among the 30 Dow stocks. The banking giant said it will sell its approximately $8.6 billion Canadian card unit to Toronto Dominion Bank (TD). It will also exit U.K. and Irish card markets as the company limits international consumer lending. 

Estee Lauder (EL) dropped 7.3% to $93.53. The maker of Clinique and Bobbi Brown makeup lines forecast adjusted earnings in 2012 to be no more than $4.20 a share, below the average analyst estimate of $4.35. 

Impax Laboratories (IPXL) gained 11.1% to $18.67. The experimental Parkinson’s disease drug being developed by the Hayward, Calif., company and GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) helped patients in a clinical trial more than a generic product, the companies said in a statement. GlaxoSmithKline rose 1.6% to $41.95. 

MetLife (MET) increased 1.2% to $33.65. Ralph Whitworth’s Relational Investors raised its stake in the largest U.S. life insurer last quarter. Relational bought 9.44 million shares to bring its holdings to 11.6 million shares, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission filing.

Transatlantic Holdings (TRH) rose 1.6% to $50.95. The reinsurer that has received three takeover offers has begun talks with Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.B) about the company’s $3.25 billion bid. The company has received no less than three offers.

Zagg (ZAGG) climbed 15% to $16.97. The distributor of electronics accessories forecast 2011 revenue of at least $160 million, more than the average analyst estimate of $147 million. 

T-Mobile myTouch 4G review

By Paul Miller posted Nov 5th 2010 5:45PM

Review

Coming hot on the heels of the ultra-impressive G2, T-Mobile has returned to its myTouch series with the myTouch 4G. While the G2 is the natural enthusiast flagship, the 4G represents a flagship in its own right of a skinned, curated Android experience. If the G2 is the Droid 2 killer, T-Mobile probably sees the myTouch as the iPhone 4 killer (even the name has a similarity to the popular "iTouch" misnomer, and the 4G / 4 mirrors T-Mobile's matchy matchy naming sense with the myTouch 3G / iPhone 3G... we're just saying, is all). So, what does that mean in practice? Some impressive functionality inside and out, including a front facing camera for video calls, HSPA+ network speeds, and WiFi Calling. How does it all play out in the real world? Let's find out.

T-Mobile myTouch 4G hands-on

Hardware

The myTouch 4G is very "premium." Unfortunately, it's "premium" in the worst way. It screams over effort, has an incomprehensible jumble of design languages and materials, feels simultaneously heavy and cheap in the hand, and manages to bear a too-striking resemblance to the iPhone 3G to boot (at least in the white edition of this phone we have, the handset also comes in red, plum, and black flavors). Lest you think we just have iPhone on the brain, a non-techy family member actually made the look-alike comment offhand, unprompted. What's sad is that there are actually a lot of redeeming qualities to the external hardware that, when taken one at a time, would be pretty welcome in a phone.

Take the brushed metal battery cover, for instance. It has an ultramodern look and feel, and HTC (responsible for the hardware, though they clearly departed from their traditional design language) heightens this impression with a slightly darker metal up above, around the camera. Unfortunately, this two-tone metal area is surrounded by white plastic, which makes both elements look cheap and out of place. For overall feel we actually love the hefty weight of the device (some might differ, it's a personal preference), but there's a discontinuity of contour everywhere that would make a car designer blush. If you run your finger from screen, over a side edge, and onto the back you go from glass to metal to plastic back to metal, with all sorts of odd angles and abrupt edges en route. This might sound silly to be worried about, but we found that with all this inconsistency the phone just never "settled" into our hand in a satisfying way.

Another personal preference, but one which actually swings the other way, are the large, clicky face buttons and the optical track pad which doubles as a button as well. We just love clicking things. They're all nestled in the "chin" of the device, an ode to the G1 / myTouch 3G heritage, and a little touch that we love as well. Unfortunately, this friendly set of buttons is marred slightly by T-Mobile's replacement of the traditional search button with the "Genius Button" to enact voice searches. We'll talk more about it in software, but basically we're unenthused by this switcharoo.

Finally, don't even get us started on the horrific earpiece speaker grill.

Other hardware details that aren't so polarizing: an excellent camera shutter button in the usual spot; a lock button in the usual spot, which might be just slightly too recessed; and a volume rocker that's a little "loose" and plastic, but otherwise unoffensive. There's the typical micro-USB jack on the lower left-hand side, 3.5mm headphone jack up top, and some intriguing docking pins of some sort one the middle of the left side that seem primed for accessorizing.

Speaking of accessories, the myTouch 4G's retail packaging is actually pretty swank. Once you get the simple cardboard sleeve off, it's simply a zipper case with foam-lined spots for the USB wall plug adapter, USB cable, headphones (with remote / mic), manuals, and, of course, the phone.

myTouch 4G accessories

Internals

Spec-wise, the myTouch 4G pretty much has it all. The 3.8-inch 800 x 480 really "pops" color and brightness-wise, although the viewing angles don't quite match Super AMOLED or the best LCDs we've seen. It's also very readable outdoors, though our current weather patterns didn't allow for testing it under direct sunlight.

Under the hood there's the same second-gen 1GHz Qualcomm QSD8255 "Scorpion" Snapdragon processor that powers the Desire HD, and the same 768MB of RAM. A sizable 1400mAh battery provides plenty of juice to get through a day of pretty hefty use. We even left it off a charger overnight and still had some room in the tank to make it to noon the next day. Of course, if you're doing anything that really taps into the processor -- 3D gaming, or the oddly demanding Angry Birds (which kills our iPhone battery as well, and makes both handsets run inexplicably hot) -- you should probably keep your charger handy.

Storage-wise there's an 8GB microSD card included (which is nicely accessible without removing the battery), and 4GB of built-in storage, though there's only about 1GB of that available to the user.

The real standout feature is a front-facing camera, which still only a few handsets on the market can lay claim to. Of course, the VGA sensor won't do your ugly mug any favors. With HSPA+ onboard (what T-Mobile's calling "4G" these days), T-Mobile is confidently pushing this phone as a "video calls anywhere" number, and luckily HSDPA works fine as well -- which is extra-nice because HSPA+ signals are still pretty scarce in NY where we tested this. Around back there's a 5 megapixel camera, complete with LED flash, which is also usable for video calling.

One of our favorite little tidbits is the 802.11n WiFi, which blissfully supports our 5GHz-only home router in addition to regular 2.4GHz shenanigans (2.4GHz is horribly saturated in Manhattan).

Phone / speakerphone / call quality

This is an intensely mixed bag. The excellent connection we got on T-Mobile meant people could hear us vastly better than they typically can on a AT&T / Verizon / Sprint connection in our usual haunts. This writer's apartment in particular is a sort of concrete bunker, and T-Mobile blasts right through it (of course, your mileage may vary, T-Mobile's network is well known for its inconsistent nature).

Better yet, T-Mobile has included WiFi Calling on this phone, which Just Works. Basically, you just run the WiFi Calling app, register your current WiFi network, and select if you prefer WiFi calls or cellular calls in absence of the other, or want to go WiFi only. Then, for as long as you're on the WiFi, your incoming and outgoing calls will be routed through WiFi. Unfortunately, this app solution doesn't have any sort of handoff method for moving to cellular if you leave the WiFi area, but it's still a far sight better than resorting to tack-on VoIP solutions when you can't get a signal.

So, with great connections at our back, everyone we spoke to on the phone were positively ecstatic about our voice quality. Unfortunately, they don't sound so good on our end. Basically, the earpiece (that ugly, ugly earpiece) is too quiet. It's not like we can't hear people, but we like to have the capacity to turn up the volume to an uncomfortable level, in case we're in a noisy environment, or the person on the other end is quiet for some reason. Sadly, the speakerphone is even worse. Not only is it very quiet and rather tinny, but it distorts terribly at its higher volume levels. Speakerphone music playback is painful as well.

The included headphone / headset is alright, and at least solves the volume problem on our end, but the remote / mic that's built into the cable is a little too low for optimal voice pickup.

Camera

The 5 megapixel camera is alright. Interestingly, it seems to do a pretty good job with indoor lighting, but has a tendency to have a too-slow shutter speed for overcast outdoor shots. We have some pretty shaky hands, and had difficulty getting a sharp image of the scenery -- the heavy JPEG compression doesn't help, either.

myTouch 4G sample shots

At least the UI is very nice, with tap-to-focus, relatively in-depth image adjustments (ISO, exposure, saturation, contrast) and some built-in filters

The 720p video is becoming a must-have feature in this class of phone, and we're happy to report that the myTouch handles it ably. You can switch in-between camera and video modes nearly instantly, and recording starts instantly as well. Footage is nicely saturated and not too terribly compressed, and even quick pans and tilts look fine, although there's no avoiding the regular shake of a non-stabilized handheld camera like this. Check out a sample below:

Software

Ugh. Please, T-Mobile, make it stop. We can hear the gears turning in the T-Mobile HQ's hive brain: "We'll make a mostly vanilla G2 with a slide-out keyboard for those hardcore users, but Regular Joe Consumer? He can't handle straight-up Android. Let's take this paintbrush loaded up with plastic and cruft and inconsistencies and a little bit of HTC Sense and smear it all over Froyo."

Does it sound like we're taking this a little too personally? Because we are. Android has gotten too good for these shenanigans, and while the basic consumer might never know the difference -- might even like some of these HTC-built widgets and T-Mobile themes -- we can't unsee the excellent elements of Froyo that have been trampled on to make way for their inclusion. T-Mobile went to the trouble of putting seven different themes on this device, each which packs a different background image, a slight alteration of the UI's "chrome," and swaps the color of various buttons and other elements. To be honest, we wouldn't be that offended by all of this if there was just a blessed eighth option that said "none." As it is, we're stuck with T-Mobile's idea of a good UI (which naturally clashes with a half dozen other UI styles present in various apps and the original Google look that peeks through now and then), and the added weight it adds to the experience.

For instance, when you grab for the notification tray, there's a subtle lag that breaks the illusion of pulling something down and sometimes made us feel like we'd mis-touched -- despite the fact that the processor on this phone is incredible, and blazed through regular applications. Swiping between home screen areas can slow down slightly at times, and the swipe gesture to unlock the phone (a downward pull on a horizontal bar) feels unsatisfying and lacks the swipe-to-mute option.

Do we sound nitpicky? Good, let's continue. Another big gripe is the loss of Google's own Calendar app for HTC's similar but inferior one. In fact, HTC's calendar app versus Google's is sort of a case-in-point for what we're talking about UI-wise. The week view on Google's version is very "chromeless," you might even call it ugly. HTC spruces it up with some rounded corners, pastel versions of the different calendar colors, and gradients through each item to make events look a little bit like pieces candy. The problem? HTC decided to excise the text out of every single event, no matter how large, making the view basically useless. This isn't a new problem for HTC Sense, but we're going to keep railing against it until Google / manufacturers / Regular Joe Consumer wise up.

On the bundled application front, T-Mobile goes for the "more the merrier" angle, with games, productivity applications, and T-Mobile's own "My Account" and "App Pack" additions. Here are the notables:

Swype: It's set as the default keyboard, though you can revert to the Android original if you'd like. Opinions in the staff are split over Swype, but it's definitely grown on this writer over time.

WiFi Calling: We already talked about this above, but we just wanted to mention it again because we love it so much.

Media Room: A nice UI for browsing through your music and video library, FM radio, and Slacker all in one place. We're still surprised Google doesn't offer something better by default, but this is one place where it's nice to have a third party step in.

Screen Sharing: A DLNA media pushing app from Twonky.

Faves: A pretty ho-hum implementation of T-Mobile's famous / infamous Fave Five service. We probably wouldn't mention it if it wasn't bolted to the bottom of the home screen to the right of the app drawer.

Genius Button: This is an unfortunate carry-over from the myTouch Slide. In place of the typical search button, there's a stylized "G" that launches a voice-controlled app. The voice control is powered by Nuance, the guys behind Dragon Naturally Speaking, and to their credit, it's some of the best voice recognition around. It differentiates between affect and effect, and even recognizes "Engadget." Unfortunately, we just don't want voice recognition in lieu of good old fashioned text searches. There's no easy way to switch the button to a search button that we've found, which would be an acceptable compromise, and instead we've got a nice gimmick to show off to friends, but are short a core feature of Android in payment.

Video Chat: A slightly-branded version of Qik. Obviously, this is one of the phone's most important features, and we're glad that it doesn't feel entirely tacked on, despite the 3rd party creator. Most importantly, it ties into the HTC social network amalgamation functionality (which is mostly useless otherwise... we prefer the actual Twitter and Facebook applications, thanks). The phone finds Facebook profiles that might match up with phone numbers or email addresses you have in your address book, and asks you to "link" them by hand. It's not a hard process, but we were surprised when it popped up again for another round. Only, this time it was for adding Qik users we already knew. Once you've added someone to your Qik buddy list, you get a concise list of contacts from within Qik that only shows the people that have Qik, with a video icon next to them and (here's the best part) a green lit-up icon if they're online! If you make a call with someone that's not on your buddy list, you can add them after the fact, and then the magical-contact-linker will prompt you to associate the Qik buddy with a contact card if it pulls up a match. FaceTime should really take notes.

Calling-wise, Qik was quick to establish a connection over 3G. For an incoming Qik call, the phone rings just like a regular phone call, even if it's locked. Unfortunately, Qik seems to have a capped quality level that presents pretty blocky video to both ends, even if you have WiFi. Hopefully this will improve in the future. For now, it works, and you can indeed brag to your iPhone friends that you can make video calls wherever without a jailbreak or other hackery. Better yet, we like the fact that we already know a lot of people with Qik video chat-capable devices, and that they aren't all using the same device. Check out a demo below:

One last thing that should be noted is that most applications perform brilliantly on this phone. The browsing experience is pretty much butter, even with the embedded Flash, with almost iPhone-level pinch-to-zoom and scrolling responsiveness. In other apps we noticed that some of the typical lag we had come to expect in that particular application's performance was all but erased. Kudos to Qualcomm for the processor, and a grudging thanks to T-Mobile and HTC for not putting so very much cruft on here to actually slow down the handset -- though we'd love to see how much it would scream with stock Froyo.

Network performance

We've got some good news and some bad news. The good news is that we typically get blazing fast internet, on par with a low-to-mid-level home broadband connection (2 to 3Mbps down and 1.3Mbps up, with similar speeds on our laptop when tethered with the phone over WiFi). There's actually little difference in browsing between our cell connection and WiFi. Video calls are as clear as Qik can make them at this point (not very clear), and our voice call quality is perfect.

The bad news? As far as we can tell, we've rarely strayed from HSDPA. Basically, T-Mobile has a very good "3.5G" network in NY, which is either vastly underutilized or just plain good. This excites us for the potential HSPA+, and indeed, we've probably bumped into it unwittingly on occasion (you have to dive pretty deep into the phone to know what sort of connection you're getting, the menu bar simply displays an "H" next to the signal bars). Still, when buying a "4G" phone you have to be aware to what extent a "4G" network exists to support it, and T-Mobile has a ways to go.

Wrap-up

Overall, the myTouch 4G hits almost every checkbox when it comes to features and functionality, but sadly misses the mark completely when it comes to aesthetic and "purity" of the Android vision. In T-Mobile's attempt to make a consumer-friendly phone, we'd argue they've driven in the other direction. Luckily, many of our qualms with the phone can be chalked up to personal preference, and a power user could potentially finagle a stock Android ROM onto here, so we'd encourage any prospective buyers to check out the phone for themselves before we fend them off entirely. For the rest of us, we'll keep dreaming of the Nexus Two that this phone most assuredly isn't.

Google+ Could Have More Users Than Twitter & LinkedIn in a Year [STUDY]

12 minutes ago by Todd Wasserman0

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Google+ has signed up 13% of U.S. adults so far and could hit 22%, in a year, passing Twitter and LinkedIn as the number two social media network, according to a new study.

The report, based on a Bloomberg and YouGov poll of 1,003 U.S. adults from July 29 to August 2, revealed that 71% percent of U.S. adults use Facebook, but that number will drop to 69% a year from now. Among people who use both services, 30% say they plan to cut the time they spend on Facebook. However, 31% of Google+ users say they’ve abandoned their Google+ accounts or never posted anything on them.

Twitter and LinkedIn will continue to grow, however.

Twitter is set to add 3% of the U.S. population over the next year for a total of 20% of the U.S. population. LinkedIn, which is expected to add 2%, will also hit 20%. Meanwhile, 45% of respondents who signed up for Google+ said they read content on the site every day. For Facebook, the figure was 62%. For Twitter it was 42% and for LinkedIn, 8%.

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