Official Google Blog: More wood behind fewer arrows

Official Google Blog: More wood behind fewer arrows

iPhone 5 Release Date: July 2011

Despite reception issues, somehow iPhone 4 has been able to be on top of the smartphone industry. However it is still a big scandal of Apple and sure people don’t forget it. According to some reliable sources, the iPhone 5 is going to be released in July 2011 and solve the issue on reception completely.

Many people expected Apple would announced it sooner in the Apple September Event 2010 but it didn’t happen. At this point it’s very clear that Apple is still passing some tests and pre-production stage carefully for this iPhone 5 so that the device will be flawless.
Here are some expected features of the iPhone 5:

• A new, thinner and sleeker body design.
• Time (Video chat) on 3G and 4G (no longer restricted to WiFi only).
• as a payment method in various stores and establishments (no additional phone attachment required).
• the NFC technology using a hardware from NXP Semiconductor.
• recognition.
• projector.
• E-mail alerts with ability to assign different tones to each email address.
• screen.
• proof and shatter proof screen.
• battery life = 14 hours talk time on 3G and 7 hours on 4G. Standby 600 hours.
• Definition audio.
• indicator light.
• GPS built in.

Take a look at the iPhone 5 concept with futuristic hologram projector, that looks great but really I don’t think it will appear on the iPhone 5.

Nokia N8 available in China already

Nokia N8 available in China already

Google Maps Add Events to Places Pages

A nod to the Tenacious Frog for first spotting this one….Google Maps is now integrating events and the opportunity to display time sensitive information into your Places Page. Businesses can now add events, specials & time sensitive activities to their listing.

Claerly Google has long had an interest in gathering additional and more granular information at a local level. The ability to create local event information is a feature that Google has included in their Map Maker for some time. The implications of this move are not yet clear.

For this to have an impact and generate significant interest on the part of SMBs, the information has to be visible and actionable. If it is buried like the Coupons, after an initial trial, most businesses will move to other means of announcing events. Currently the information is only visible from within a business’s Places Page. It is not visible from the 7-Pack, the business Onebox, the List view with Maps nor from the top level view within mobile. Since Places Pages are not currently in the index and exist at least two clicks away from the main search results, the information as it is currently displayed will not get much exposure.

Unless Google pushes this data to a more visible level, it will languish in the nether lands of Maps, away from public visibility and will quickly fall from favor. An API would be the ideal compliment to this information as would a mobile app that allows a user to see the what, when and where of these events.

Google has a strong incentive and the power to incent businesses at the local level to share this information. If it is shared and is actively displayed it could alter the playing field for event promotion but if it ends up like coupons it will have little if any affect.

Internet Connection Speed: The Top 10 Countries

At the end of 2008, approximately 19 percent Internet connections around the world were at speeds greater than 5 Mbps — a 21 percent increase over the average global connection speed at the end of 2007.

This is according to the State of the Internet quarterly report by Akamai Technologies, the US-based Internet content distribution giant. The State of the Internet report tracks average connection speeds for countries around the world.

Check out these top 10 countries in terms of average Internet connection speed.

1. South Korea

South Korea rules supreme when it comes to Internet connection speed and broadband connectivity. It is the world’s No.1 with average connection speed of 15 Mbps, ten times the global average!

During 2008, South Korea’s rate of quarterly change appeared to be locked into a cyclical pattern, with quarterly decreases being recorded in the first and third quarters, and increases seen in the second and fourth quarters.

For the whole year, South Korea saw a modest 7 percent rise in their levels of high broadband adoption. South Korea is also ranked first in terms of high broadband connectivity with 69 percent connections above 5 Mpbs.

2. Japan

Japan ranks 2nd in terms of Internet connection and high broadband connectivity. Japan ranks 2nd in terms of high broadband connectivity. About 54 percent of the connections in Japan are above 7 Mbps.

3. Hong Kong

Hong Kong ranks third with an Internet connection speed of 6.9 Mbps. The country ranks fifth in terms of high broadband connectivity with 38 percent of the connection above 5 Mbps.

4. Romania

Romania is at the fourth position with a Internet connection speed of 5.7 Mbps. The country ranks third in terms of high broadband connectivity with 45% of the connection above 5 Mbps.

5. Sweden

Sweden is at the fifth position with a Internet connection speed of 5.6 Mbps. Sweden ranks fourth in terms of high broadband connectivity with 39 percent of the connection above 5Mbps.

6. Switzerland

Switzerland has bagged the sixth position with an Internet connection speed of over 5 Mbps. The country however does not figure in the top ten list of countries with high broadband connectivity.

7. Netherlands

Netherlands ranks 7th with an Internet connection speed of 4.9 Mbps. The country ranks 7th in terms of high broadband connectivity with 28 percent of the connections above 5 Mbps.

8. Belgium

Belgium is at the 8th position with an Internet connection speed of 4.7 Mbps. The country ranks sixth in terms of high broadband connectivity with 31 percent of the connection above 5 Mbps.

9. Slovakia

Slovakia bags the ninth position with an Internet connection speed of 4.5 Mbps. The country does not figure among the top ten in terms of high broadband connectivity.

10. Norway

Norway ranks tenth with an Internet connection speed of 4.5 Mbps. The country ranks fifth in terms of high broadband connectivity with 38 percent of the connection above 5 Mbps.

In terms of Internet connection speed, China is way behind leading economies with an average Internet connection speed of 833 kbps.

United States is at the 17th position with an Internet connection speed of 3.9 Mbps, up approximately 8 percent from the average connection speed for the first quarter of 2008.

India has been ranked at a dismal 115th among 223 countries in terms of average Internet connection speeds. India has an average Internet connection speed of just 772 Kbps compared with the global average of 1.5 Mbps.

Now Google Earth with Features Rome Reborn 2.0

How did people live thousands of years ago? The University of Virginia’s Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities asked this exact same question. As a result, they decided to digitally rebuild the revolutionary city of Rome during the peak of its development (around A.D. 320 - the time of Constantine The Great). They figured this would be the best way to try and understand how humans lived so long ago.

The very first version of the Rome Reborn product went under construction 10 years ago, and finally the task had finished at last year. Included in it were 250 highly detailed structures, and a total of over 7,000 structures in all. They used a 1:250 scale model of Rome that took forty years to create (from 1933 to 1973). This smaller scale Rome was actually constructed out of Plaster of Paris. Using laser scanners they scanned the Plaster of Paris model and created the virtual model. The original use of this model was to be utilized in a theater at UCLA. Since last year the Rome Reborn Project has seen many faces, it’s most recent being Rome Reborn 2.0 which improved the detail significantly. Google had joined in and offered to include Rome Reborn in Google Earth.

With Rome Reborn in Google Earth, it’s the equivalent of a virtual time machine, which can be used to study the history of Rome and other great cities of the world. If you currently have Google Earth, you can enjoy touring ancient Rome. You can also go in them, and enter areas like the Colosseum and even the Roman Senate. With more time, more information will be added researches believe. They also hope that by pioneering this research into the past - other researchers will catch some inspiration and create 3D models of other forgotten cities.

Does Chrome Frame have a target audience?

Google launched Chrome Frame last week. It’s a browser plug in for Microsoft’s Internet Explorer browser that, if the website you’re visiting prefers so, turns it into Chrome. At first glance, this looked to me like a great solution and a well-deserved slap in the face for Internet Explorer, but then it hit me. Nobody will use this.

Recent versions of IE aren’t so bad. They’re slow, look a little silly and are still not as safe as the alternatives, but they render most pages OK enough. The real issue to us developers is the continued market share of IE6. If you’d add up all the money spent supporting IE6 in new, innovative web projects I’m sure you could save the economy of a small 3rd world country.

However IE6’s current user base is made up out of two types of users. Corporate employees who are not allowed to install or modify the software on their company computer, and people who don’t give a damn. If you care even a little and are allowed to upgrade your browser you have a better browser, if only for the tabs. Neither of these two groups will be likely to install Chrome Frame. Sad as it is, Frame offers no real solution to what is a very real problem.

10 Temporary Disposable Email Services

There are several free temporary disposable email services, however we will list the top 10 services, that allow you to create temporary disposable email services that you can use for a minimum of 10 minutes and a maximum of 24 hours.

MyTrashMail – Probably the most advanced temporary disposable email service provider, MyTrashMail allows you to create temporary email addresses, forward emails to your real inbox, get your emails as a RSS feed and use a toolbar for Firefox and Internet Explorer, to quickly create temporary disposable email addresses.

Temporary Inbox – Allows you to create a temporary disposable inbox with a email address ending with @temporaryinbox.com, the emails in your account will be deleted after 6 hours.

YOPMail – YOPMail is a unique disposable email service, where you can create email addresses without even visiting the site, simply use ‘anyusername’@yopmail.com while signing up at forums or websites and emails to your account will be received at a yopmail account. To view the emails visit yopmail.com and enter the username you used to check the emails in your temporary inbox. Make sure to choose a unique name, since all the emails can be accessed by practically anyone who types in the username into yopmail.com.

Spamgourmet – Spamgourmet allows you to create a shield above your actual email address, once you create a account, new emails allowing at your spamgourmet account will be forwarded to your actual email address.

10 Minute Mail – Like the name suggests, you will be able to create temporary disposable email addresses that will work for 10 minutes, pretty useful when you want to validate your forum account.

MintEmail - MintEmail.com gives you a three hour temporary email address, pretty useful when you want to validate your forum account.

MailCatch - MailCatch is an another disposable email service that allows you to create temporary disposable mailboxes, in a completely anonymous way.

MailExpire - Mailexpire is still the simplest, cleanest way for you to keep your inbox spam-free. Mailexpire allows you to create a free email alias for yourself. For a period you choose, from 12 hours to 3 months, anything sent to this email alias will be passed on to you at your actual email address.

NowMyMail – NowMyMail is another service which will allow you to create temporary disposable email addresses.

TempEmail – TempEMail is The place where you get a Free, Temporary, Disposable, Anonymous,

email address, keeping your own email address Spam and Virus Free.

Samsung Reveals First Google Android Phone

Samsung has now officially announced the i7500.


The phone all has support for most of the network bands out there. There is quad-band EDGE and dual-band HSDPA. On the memory front, we have an adequate (not colossal!) 8GB of capacity. The display is a largish 3.2-inch capacitive OLED one. On the imaging front, we have a well-equipped 5-megapixel camera. Apart from these, there are the usual stuff that includes WiFi, Bluetooth
and GPS.

As for the OS, it will feature the latest version of Android (cupcake!). A 528Mhz Qualcomm CPU does the number crunching inside. At 11.9 mm thick, the phone is compact and is lightweight. And yes, it is coming this June!

See Video

SAYA- The world’s first Robo Teacher

SAYA is the world’s first robo teacher appointed in Japan in March 2009.

This robot is created by a science Professor Hiroshi Kopayashi. With a toiled work, the professor took 15 years to design this robot. The professor had already designed many robots such as ‘Face robots’, ‘Receptionist robots’ and so on. He had also published many journals on face robots and artificial muscles of robots.

This robos face is designed like a typical japanese girl. It also performs as a well trained receptionist in requirement. The students enjoy the class as it gives a new experience for them.

This robo not only takes class, but also registers the attendance. This robo can show the feelings like a human. It can exhibit happiness, fear, hatred, excitement, worry and anger. For exhibiting the feelings it is fixed with 18 motors. Instantly, the robot is made to work at a school in Tokyo for test. If it hits, the robot will be made to work as a full time teacher” – says the Japan researchers.

The humanoid was actually designed to replace a variety of workers, including secretaries, in a bid to allow firms to cut costs while still retaining some kind of human interaction.

Jabra Halo - World's first wireless stereo headset with dual microphones

GN Netcom has announced the Jabra Halo, a Wireless Bluetooth stereo headset, featuring A2DP technology.


The Halo gives users the ability to seamlessly connect to any Bluetooth music-playing device - and all 3.5 mm music-playing devices - including mobile phones, Mp3 players, Laptops, and TVs. In addition, ensuring that users won't miss phone calls while listening to music, the headset fades out music to allow for incoming calls.

Developed by GN Netcom, the Halo features an over-the-head design with an intuitive on/off functionality, a discreet display to reveal battery and connectivity status, and a touch volume control. With a foldable headband, it is lightweight - just 3 ounces. The Halo can also switch between wireless and wired connectivity if a device doesn't support Bluetooth stereo (A2DP) technology.

Featuring Jabra's Noise Blackout technology, the Halo removes ambient sound, using dual microphones to capture sound while filtering background noise and delivering premium audio quality. Used together with advanced DSP technology and Audio Shock Protection that monitors incoming audio volume, sound is balanced to block out background sound, leaving both sides of the call with a natural-sounding voice quality.

The Jabra Halo will be available on May 1, 2009 and will have a suggested retail price of $129.99.

Key product specifications of the Jabra Halo include:

- Bluetooth wireless technology
- Zirene Power Bass for audio enhancement
- Multiuse, for connection to two Bluetooth devices
- Auto-pairing to mobile phone
- Remote control music with touch sensors
- Noise Blackout technology with dual microphones
- Foldable headband and carrying pouch
- Talk time - 8 hours
- Music time - 8 hours
- Standby time - 13 days
- Weight - 3 ounces
- Dimensions - 0.2in (L) x 0.5in (W) x 0.7in (H)
- Micro USB Charger

Google's Training Presentation to building a Google Friendly Site

The webmaster team at Google has put together this nice 20 minute video presentation with tips on how to improve your site’s presence on Google and how to deal with common issues like duplicate content, fluctuating page rank, image search, etc.

You can download the presentation slides used in this video directly from Google Docs.

Internet Disrupted across Asia and Middle East as Undersea Cables Cut Again

The undersea cables linking Europe and Asia, which were damaged by ships early this year, have reportedly been cut again causing severe disruption to internet and voice traffic in the Middle East and other parts of Asia.

India seems to have been particularly hit with around 82% of voice traffic getting affected. I have been experiencing slow connection speed on my Broadband line from last 3 days so this could be a possible reason.

France Telecom is estimating that the cables would be repaired by December 25th but the Internet traffic can only be restored by December 31st.

The current series of faults is reminiscent of the submarine cable faults that occurred in January 2008. Today’s events have the potential to create worse disruptions: while the January 2008 accidents broke two of the three cables connecting Europe with Asia via the Middle East, Friday’s cable failures have caused faults on all three. France Telecom projects that service on all cables will be restored by December 31. Until then, many carriers in the Middle East and South Asia will need to route their European traffic around the globe, through South East Asia and across the Pacific and Atlantic oceans.

Pocket Video Cameras

Gone are the days when you had to carry a heavy camcorder strapped to your hand that recorded video on a tape and required at least a firewire port for transferring video from the camera to the computer.

The year 2008 saw the emergence of some great pocket video cameras that are no larger than your mobile phone, inexpensive, they shoot good-looking video and are almost as easy to operate as an iPod - no confusing controls, just a single record button. These pocket camcorder attach to the computer via the USB port and record video in a straight-to-web format perfect for YouTube and other video sharing websites.

If you looking to buy one this holiday season, you have three pocket video cameras to choose from - Flip Video Camcorder, Creative Vado and Kodak Zi6.

Did you seen a Flat Light Bulb Design

flat bulb' is designed by korean designer joonhuyn kim. unlike ordinary bulbs its volume is 1/3 smaller, reducing the cost of packaging and transport. its slim shape allows bulbs to be easily stacked and prevents breakage as it does not roll. his work was on display as part of 100% design tokyo

ErgoRest Mouse Stand

The ErgoRest Mouse Stand and Pad is the ultimate complement to your workstation. Ideal for frequent mouse users, it mounts to your ErgoRest® arm support and provides maximum flexibility and ergonomic support.

Constant Garden Speakers: Make Your Desk Look Like Shrek Crop Field

As far as concepts go this device, known as the Constant Garden, is certainly one of the more fascinating we’ve come across of late in serving not only as an appointments manager capable of reminding you of important meetings but also a ambient background audio device that plays ‘nice garden sounds’ (such as birdsong, we assume) designed to act as a calming influence to lower anxiety in the office as well as remind you that there’s more to life than just work.

Create 3D photos with Stereo Holga camera

it's a beautifully modded Holga toy camera capable of creating 3-D photos. Randy Smith, who's made a career out of customizing the toy cameras, took two perfectly good Holgas, introduced them to a diamond-tipped bandsaw and emerged with a stereoscopic Frankenstein, with the build quality of a factory-made piece.

Taking shots like this was especially popular in the early 20th century, and was carried on with toys like the Viewmaster into the present day. The gimmick doesn't come cheap, though, and with each build taking about six man-hours in Smith's one-man factory, who would expect them to? Pricing starts at $250 and each craftsman-quality camera is built to order.
The fused camera ends up with lenses roughly the same distance apart as human eyes, creating two slightly different angles of the same subject. These sample images taken by the hydra Holga can be viewed with crossed eyes (really! try it!). For those who can't make that technique work (or don't want to), following animated GIF made from the pics also gives the illusion of perspective.

Read Online Documents in Google Docs or Gmail account

Gmail has this nice feature where you can open PDF files and Office documents directly in your Google Docs account bypassing the need of any desktop software like Acrobat Reader or Microsoft Office.

If you find this Gmail feature handy, you’ll probably also enjoy using the "Send to Google Docs" extension for Firefox.

This extension (download link) lets you read online documents directly in your Google Docs account with a simple right click (see screenshot).

It works with popular file formats like PDF, Excel, Word, PowerPoint and all Open Document formats. "Send to Docs" can also import HTML web pages in Google Docs provided they have the right extension.

You right click any document link on the web, choose "Send to Google Docs" from the context menu and the file will immediately open as a Google Document. The file also gets saved permanently in your Google Docs account.

Double LCD monitor additional small screen

This LCD monitor Korean production company Woojin unique in that the top is another small monitor. Quite unusual decision to comply.The display is 19 diagonal inches, resolution 1280 x 1024, contrast ratio, brightness of 300cd/m2 and response time 8ms. Additional 8,4-дюймовый same display with a resolution of 800 x 600, 350:1 contrast and brightness of 200cd/m2. Mystery remains only what it (additional display) purpose? There are ideas?