RIM sinks, but patents, network have value

WATERLOO, Ontario (AP) â€" Research In Motion Ltd., the maker of the BlackBerry, is in steep decline. The company, once the crown jewel of the Canadian technology industry, is now worth 1 percent of Apple's market capitalization. One way for RIM to stop the downward tailspin: It could sell itself to a competitor or financial firm. But who would step up to buy RIM â€"and why?Late Tuesday, the company said it expects to post an operating loss for the current quarter, a sign that BlackBerry sales are falling even faster than analysts expected. On Wednesday, the company's stock hit its lowest level since 2003, the year RIM went from making two-way...

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ASUS launches new Intel Xeon server lineup

Press Release: ASUS announced today a new range of server systems and boards with Intel Xeon E5-4600, Xeon E5-2400, and Xeon E3-1200 v2 processors. All provide extreme processing power and features that enable convenient expandability, remote supervision, and detailed node management for diverse applications in the cloud and on the ground, including data centers, enterprises with a focus on ERP, and HPC. Accommodating up to four processors for high end computing power, the RS926-E7/RS8 offers enhanced expandability with seven expansion slots. It supports two double-deck GPUs for equally potent graphics processing and...

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Battered BlackBerry maker weighs options

TORONTO (AP) â€" BlackBerry-maker Research in Motion has hired a team of bankers to help it weigh its options as its business erodes in the face of an exodus to the iPhone and Android smartphones.RIM issued a dire warning about its business Tuesday, saying it is losing money for the second-consecutive quarter and will lay off a "significant" number of employees.The company based in Waterloo, Ontario said it has hired J.P. Morgan and RBC Capital Markets to help it evaluate its options. Those including partnering with other companies, licensing software and overhauling its business, it said.RIM made no mention of selling of the company. But...

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RIM loses second executive this week

Things don’t seem to be looking up for Research in Motion this week. First the head of global sales said goodbye to the company. Then the company announced that it would cut around 2,000 jobs worldwide in a desperate attempt to cut costs and streamline its various departments. Today the company announced that its chief legal officer was also going to step down. Karima Bawa has been with the handset manufacturer for the past 12 years, however the company has known of his departure for a while and has already started looking for a replacement. Karima has been a tireless advocate for RIM’s business during more than a...

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Facebook stock pounded, hovers around $30

NEW YORK (AP) â€" Facebook's stock is dropping again, hovering around $30 after it hit a new low in morning trading.Shares of Facebook Inc. are down $1.72, or 5.4 percent, to $30.19 as of late morning on Tuesday. Earlier, the stock hit $30.03, its lowest since Facebook began publicly trading more than a week ago.The social networking company's stock priced at $38 in its initial public offering on May 18. Rather than a seeing a big first-day-pop, it closed just 23 cents higher on the following day. Now, it's about 20 percent below the IPO price.The stock's public debut was marred by technical glitches at the Nasdaq Stock Market that delayed...

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ASUS launches new Intel Xeon server lineup

Press Release: ASUS announced today a new range of server systems and boards with Intel Xeon E5-4600, Xeon E5-2400, and Xeon E3-1200 v2 processors. All provide extreme processing power and features that enable convenient expandability, remote supervision, and detailed node management for diverse applications in the cloud and on the ground, including data centers, enterprises with a focus on ERP, and HPC. Accommodating up to four processors for high end computing power, the RS926-E7/RS8 offers enhanced expandability with seven expansion slots. It supports two double-deck GPUs for equally potent graphics processing and...

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New telescope to be in South Africa, Australia

PRETORIA, South Africa (AP) â€" Australia and South Africa will share hosting of a giant radio telescope made up of thousands of separate dishes and intended to help scientists figure out the make-up of the universe, the international consortium overseeing the project announced.South Africa led an African consortium that included Botswana, Ghana, Kenya, Madagascar, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia and Zambia, and telescopes will be erected in all its partners. In South Africa, dishes will be added to a remote site in the arid Karoo desert where a smaller radio telescope project already is underway.South Africa and Australia, which partnered...

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Silicon Images introduces next version of MHL

Although the MHL (Mobile High-Definition Link) standard has been around for a while and implemented in phones like Samsung’s Galaxy SII. it hasn’t made much a name for itself. Basically MHL lets you connect your mobile device (phone or tablet) to your TV’s HML supported HDMI port and along with sending video signals, charges your device at the same time. Now, Silicon Images has announced the next next generation of MHL which adds faster charging and and 60Hz video vs the original’s 30Hz. Press Release: Silicon Image Introduces Low Power Dual-Mode Transmitter IP Core Supporting Both HDMI® and MHLâ„¢ Connectivity Standards...

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RIM set to lay off 2,000 staff worldwide

Research In Motion is set to lay off at least 2,000 staff worldwide as part of an aggressive plan to revitalize the company. The layoffs will encompass various departments, from HR, finance, sales, as well as other senior positions in the company. It’s been a while coming, but RIM CEO Thorstein Heins looks to finally be coming to his senses and realizes that a company-wide shake up is what RIM really needs. But it remains to be seen if the company will be able to compete with the likes of Apple and Android devices which are currently dominating the market. While the company is putting everything into the launch of its...

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Facebook launches own photo-sharing app

Instagrammers beware! Facebook today debuted its own photo-sharing app on iOS, which allows users to capture, edit, filter, and upload multiple photos directly to Facebook. Users can also flip through photos that their friends are sharing, and comment or ‘like’ them directly from the app. Facebook Camera is currently available in the Apple Store, and rumors are Facebook will be looking at other mobile platforms to launch the app....

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Apple CEO Cook gives up $75M in stock dividends

NEW YORK (AP) â€" Apple says CEO Tim Cook is giving up $75 million in dividends on restricted stock.In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Thursday, Apple Inc. says Cook requested that his restricted stock units not receive dividends.Assuming the company pays dividends of $2.65 over the vesting period of Cook's shares, the company says he will give up about $75 million in value.Cook's total compensation was valued at $378 million when he became CEO in August. That was almost entirely in stock awards. Half of the stock won't be redeemable until 2016 and the rest won't be redeemable until 2021. Over that time the value of...

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Get the Samsung S III experience on S II

The Samsung S III may be the most talked about phone after the rumored iPhone 5. It’s sleek, classy, packs a lot of performance, and just makes you quiver at the knees. And while the device is already available here a whole week before it officially launches, there might be those amongst us who haven’t been saving up for an eternity to buy this new gem. Well if you currently own a Samsung S II, you can be really cheeky and fool people into thinking you have an S III. Okay technically you might not fool a lot of people, but at least you get to experience the awesome interface and launcher of the S III. Thanks to the folks...

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Facebook shares stabilizing, but probes mount

NEW YORK (AP) â€" Facebook's initial public offering is the subject of two congressional inquiries and mounting lawsuits as the social network enters its fifth day of public trading.The shares regained some ground Wednesday, rising $1, or 3.2 percent, to close at $32. They were up another 50 cents, or 1.6 percent, to $32.50 in early premarket trading Thursday. But they are still more than 14 percent below their $38 per share IPO price last week.The stock's rocky inaugural trading day last Friday was followed by a two-day decline.The launch was held up by a half-hour delay, caused by glitches on the Nasdaq Stock Market. It was marred further...

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Shareholders sue Facebook for withholding pre-IPO information

Once Facebook shares started tumbling down immediately after launch, many shareholders questioned the reason behind one of the most troubled IPO launches in history. The main reasons being pointed out are the technical glitches by NASDAQ themselves wherein Facebook shares could not be traded for some time on the day of launch. Then came the inflated price from a previous $28 to $34 per share to the actual launch price of $38. Last but not least, investors soon questioned the actual value of Facebook Inc. being $100 billion because of how poorly their current business profits from their massive user base. Yesterday a class-action lawsuit was filed in the US District Court of Manhattan against Facebook’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg, JPMorgan Chase,...

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Japanese video game author wins Spanish prize

MADRID (AP) â€" Japan's Shigeru Miyamoto, considered the father of the modern video game, has been awarded Spain's Prince of Asturias Award for Communication and Humanities.Miyamoto, 59, is the author of the Mario Bros. series that has become one of the most marketed video game sagas in history.Asturias award organizers praised Miyamoto, saying he converted "the video game into a social revolution and has managed to popularize it among a sector of the population that had not previously accessed this kind of entertainment, while also making it a medium capable of bringing people together regardless of sex, age or social or cultural status."Wednesday's...

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Kinect for Windows v1.5 SDK launching in June

In March, Kinect for Windows announced that an update to the software development kit (SDK) would be coming, which would feature enhanced voice and gesture capabilities for developers, businesses and organizations to create new innovations with the magic of Kinect in Windows environments. Today, v1.5 of the Kinect for Windows SDK is now available for download. Some of the new features include: - Kinect Studio, a new tool that allows developers to record and playback Kinect data. - A set of Human Interface Guidelines (HIG) to guide developers on best practices for the creation of Natural User Interfaces using Kinect....

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UK virtual orchestra puts you in conductor's stand

LONDON (AP) â€" A London museum is putting the conductor's baton in visitors' hands, allowing guests to direct a virtual orchestra using three-dimensional motion sensors.The "Universe of Sound" installation at the British capital's Science Museum uses Microsoft's Kinect technology to capture the hand movements of visitors who stand in specially made pods.Raise your left hand and the orchestra â€" which appears on a set of television screens â€" plays louder. Speed your right hand and the tempo of the music increases.The pods are part of the Science Museum's effort to pick apart the traditional orchestra, using specially shot film footage,...

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ASUS launches first Intel Thunderbolt-certified motherboard

ASUS has announced the launch of its P8Z77-V PREMIUM motherboard â€" the flagship of the P8Z77 Series and the first Intel certified motherboard in the market to offer the latest Thunderbolt connection interface. In addition to the onboard Thunderbolt connection on the P8Z77-V PREMIUM, ASUS also offers the same technology on the P8Z77-V PRO/THUNDERBOLT to give consumers a wider range of choices. “Intel and Asus have worked closely on the implementation of Thunderboltâ„¢ technology onto their motherboards”, said Jason Ziller, Intel’s Director of Thunderbolt Marketing. “It is our pleasure to state the P8Z77-V PREMIUM...

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Yahoo to sell half of its Alibaba stake for $7.1B

HONG KONG (AP) â€" Struggling Internet company Yahoo Inc. has secured a lifeline after agreeing to sell half of its prized stake in Chinese e-commerce group Alibaba for about $7.1 billion, with most of the cash going to shareholders.The deal, announced Sunday in the U.S., calls for Alibaba Group to buy back half of the 40 percent stake that Yahoo owns in the Chinese company for $6.3 billion cash and up to $800 million of Alibaba preferred shares.After paying taxes, Yahoo expects to pocket about $4.2 billion.Chief Financial Officer Tim Morse told analysts in a Monday conference call that the company still hasn't determined how it will distribute...

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Philips launches new wide screen Full HD LED Monitor

MMD (Multimedia Displays) is a wholly-owned company of TPV established in 2009 through a brand license agreement with Philips, today announced the launch of its new monitor from E-Line series, 273E3LHSB, a 27” wide screen, Full HD with touch control LED monitor in the Middle East region. Philips 273E3LHSB is equipped with state-of-the-art LED screen technology that offers Full High-Definition widescreen resolution of 1920 x 1080p that allows the best possible picture quality from any format of HD input signal. The new monitor is powered by Philips SmartImage Lite technology that analyzes the content displayed on the...

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Day after historic IPO, Facebook's Zuckerberg weds

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) â€" For Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg, it was quite a week â€" from birthday, to IPO, to I DO.A day after the historic Facebook stock offering, Zuckerberg on Saturday wed 27-year-old Priscilla Chan, his girlfriend of nearly a decade, according to a guest authorized to speak for the couple. The person spoke only on the condition of anonymity.Zuckerberg gave his new bride a ring he had designed with a "very simple ruby" to end an incredibly eventful week, according to the guest.The couple married at his Palo Alto, Calif. home in front of fewer than 100 stunned guests who thought they would be attending a party...

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Saudi Arabia has largest smartphone usage in the world

In a recent press release by Saudi Telecom, it was announced that the company has recently launched 68 new smartphones for the kingdom.  Each handset will be part of a ‘commitment contract’ which will allw customers to chose from various packages, focusing on talk time, messages and data services. What has also come to light from the press release is the result of a recent study conducted by UN which reports that Saudi Arabia has the highest smartphone adoption rate in the world, at 188%. Press Release STC Group has crowned its relationship with its subscriber base â€" the largest in the Kingdom â€"by...

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Facebook stock finishes flat in debut

NEW YORK (AP) â€" In the hours before Facebook's stock began trading on the Nasdaq Stock Market for the first time, CEO Mark Zuckerberg reminded the company's 3,500 employees not to get caught up in the hoopla surrounding its long-awaited initial public offering."Right now this all seems like a big deal," Zuckerberg said before he pushed a button that rang Nasdaq's opening bell from company headquarters at 1 Hacker Way in Menlo Park, Calif. "Going public is an important milestone in our history. But here's the thing, our mission isn't to be a public company. Our mission is to make the world more open and connected."Facebook's IPO, it turns...

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UK surveillance could yield window into lives

LONDON (AP) â€" British officials have given their word: "We won't read your emails."But experts say that its proposed new surveillance program, unveiled last week as part of the government's annual legislative program, will gather so much data that spooks won't have to read your messages to guess what you're up to.The U.K. Home Office stresses that it is not seeking to read the content of every Britons' communications, saying the data it was seeking "is NOT the content of any communication." It is, however, seeking information on who's sending the message, whom it's sent to, where it's sent from, and potentially other details including a...

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Google celebrates birthday of Omar Khayyam

Google today is celebrating Omar Khayyam’s contributions through a doodle that is visible on Persian as well as Middle Eastern domains. Omar Khayyam is often referred to as a great poet, with his work having been translated into many languages. However, his influence spans far beyond poetry into the fields of mathematics, philosophy, and astronomy. His Treatise on Demonstration of Problems of Algebra is considered a key treaty on algebra. ...

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As Facebook grows, millions say, 'no, thanks'

NEW YORK (AP) â€" Don't try to friend MaLi Arwood on Facebook. You won't find her there.You won't find Thomas Chin, either. Or Kariann Goldschmitt. Or Jake Edelstein.More than 900 million people worldwide check their Facebook accounts at least once a month, but millions more are Facebook holdouts.They say they don't want Facebook. They insist they don't need Facebook. They say they're living life just fine without the long-forgotten acquaintances that the world's largest social network sometimes resurrects.They are the resisters."I'm absolutely in touch with everyone in my life that I want to be in touch with," Arwood says. "I don't need...

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Two precious minutes with the Samsung Galaxy SIII

This week I was invited by Samsung to an event where they officially unveiled their latest flagship phone, the Samsung Galaxy SIII. Needless to say, everyone in attendance couldn’t wait to get their hands on this beautiful phone and play around with its new features. I managed to sneak away for a short while and spent a loving two minutes with the phone before I had to surrender it. Here’s a really quick video to preview the Galaxy SIII: And if that wasn’t enough, here are some quick photos of the phone as well – Samsung have yet to reveal details on pricing or a UAE release date. ...

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Siri still loves Lumia 900, just ask her differently

Apple had rushed to fix an embarrassing goof up by Siri when the voice assistant thought the best smart phone was the Nokia Lumia 900. After Apple’s update, Siri would just reply you’re kidding, right?”, or wait…there are other phones?” when a user would ask what the best smartphone was. But fix Apple how many, Siri still loves the Lumia 900 and would still recommend it you as the best smartphone. You just have to ask her differently…maybe whisper it into her ear so the big angry overlord doesn’t hear it. As discovered by WMPowerUser, ask Siri, according to customer satisfaction what’s the best smart phone ever”, and she...

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Facebook raises IPO price as offering nears

NEW YORK (AP) â€" Facebook on Tuesday increased the price range at which it plans to sell stock to the public, as investor enthusiasm in the offering continued to mount and boost the potential value of the world's most popular social network.The Menlo Park, Calif. company said in a regulatory filing that it now expects to sell its stock for between $34 and $38 per share, up from its previous range of $28 to $35. At the upper limit of $38 per share, the sale would raise about $12.8 billion.The IPO is expected to be completed late Thursday and begin trading on the Nasdaq Stock Market on Friday under the ticker symbol "FB."The increased range...

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Revolving door: Yahoo ushers out another CEO

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) â€" Yahoo still has credibility issues, even after casting aside CEO Scott Thompson because his official biography included a college degree that he never received.The troubled Internet company's next challenge will be convincing its restless shareholders and demoralized employees that the turnaround work started during Thompson's tumultuous four-month stint as CEO won't be wasted.It won't be an easy task, given that Yahoo Inc. has now gone through four full-time CEOs in a five-year stretch marked by broken promises of better times ahead. Instead, Yahoo's revenue and stock price have sagged during a time when rivals such...

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