Current date/time is Fri 03 Sep 2010, 1:19 pm
MPEG LA, the firm that controls licensing for a number of video and other standards, announced on Thursday that it will never charge any royalties for Internet video encoded using the H.264 standard that Apple favors, as long as that video is free to end-users.
This is great news, even if it's wrapped in some technical language. When you watch video on your Mac (or your iPhone, iPad, or any other device), it's been encoded using one of many standards. Just as with popular audio formats like MP3 and AAC, video formats aim to find the sweet spot between video quality and file size--they...
Remember wristwatches? With the surge in smartphones and their instant access to time and other information, fewer people seem to wear watches these days.
But that could soon change, thanks to the Bluetooth 4.0 specification, which was approved last month. It specifies ways for making low-power wireless network connections over short distances.
That means a watch or other device with a standard coin-cell or "button" battery that is worn on a wrist, kept in a pocket or worn on a necklace could communicate with a person's smartphone or laptop. Using the wireless connection,...
Google has changed the way it presents real-time search updates, giving those search results their own section and a "conversation" view designed to cluster like-minded updates.
Back in December, Google first introduced into its search results the concept of "real-time" search results from sources like Twitter and news organizations, placing a dedicated window among regular search results that automatically scrolled through links to stories or tweets related to that topic. It still plans to highlight these types of results among regular search results, but it has...
Facebook on Wednesday said it will drop chat support for Microsoft's Internet Explorer 6 in three weeks, the latest effort to stamp out the nine-year-old browser.
In a message on its Web site that also said it was dealing with complaints about the reliability of its instant-messaging Chat feature, the popular social networking site announced that it would stop supporting IE6 on Sept. 15. It urged consumers to upgrade to a newer browser, and pointed them to Microsoft's site for the newer IE8.
"We've decided to make rapid improvements and provide the best Chat experience...
Apple confirmed it is holding a special event September 1 for reporters, bloggers, and analyst for what is likely a media-centric debut of products and services. The invite is not forthcoming about the details of the event, simply giving the date and time accompanying a photo of a guitar with an apple shaped sound hole.
So what could the announcement be? Let's look at some of the options:
New iPod Touch?
Apple has traditionally made new iPod product announcements in September. Rumors have been kicking around for a while about the possibility of an iPod...
Responding to complaints from users, Facebook is promising to revamp its instant-messaging Chat feature, which has become one of the social-networking site's most popular.
"Many of you have told us that sometimes your Chat session comes and goes or even stops completely. We're working hard to end those interruptions so that your experience is stable and consistent," wrote Facebook software engineer Rodrigo Schmidt in an official blog post Wednesday.
Work is already in progress to improve the stability and speed of Chat, which was launched about two years ago, and...
Gmail isn't just about e-mail anymore: it's also a phone.
Google launched the ability to make voice calls to any traditional phone number from a Gmail account Wednesday, which CNET had reported Tuesday was in testing. It's a blend of Gmail and Google Voice technology that allows users to dial numbers from their computers as well as receive incoming calls through one's Google Voice number.
Gmail users can link their Google Voice accounts with their Gmail accounts to have their in-boxes treated like just another line that will ring when people call their Google Voice numbers,...
Thanks to Microsoft's Russian subsidiary, the world now has a pretty good idea of what Internet Explorer 9 will look like.
The Russian folks were kind enough to briefly post an image and some details that had yet to be shared about the browser. And although they pulled it down, ZDNet blogger Mary Jo Foley captured the information and screenshot.
More than anything else, the screenshot shows a browser that attempts to offer a minimalistic user interface and leave as much room as possible for the Web sites. When combined with the browser's hardware acceleration, the hope is...
Adobe Systems patched 20 security vulnerabilities in its Shockwave Player on Tuesday. Most of the flaws could allow an attacker to run their own code on an affected computer.
The vulnerabilities are in versions of Shockwave Player up to version 11.5.7.609, on both Apple's Mac OS X and Microsoft Windows. The patched version is 11.5.8.612, according to an Adobe advisory.
Eighteen of the problems could lead to code execution, while the remaining two are denial of service issues, one of which could possibly lead to remote code execution.
Shockwave Player is used to...
Google's patching of vulnerabilities in its open source Chrome Web browser last week wasn't so much notable in itself; Microsoft, to be sure, is forever issuing patches for the many bugs that afflict its products.
What was notable about the Chrome patch, however, is the many steps Google took to ensure it. It's a testament both to the power of open source and to Google's complementary collaborative mindset.
Linus' Law
Freely downloadable for Linux and Mac as well as Windows, upstart Chrome is now the world's third most-popular browser, behind only Internet...
Mozilla released its fourth beta of Firefox 4 on Tuesday, bringing a new feature that addresses one of the biggest challenges in the new era of the browser: reclaiming control over the burgeoning number of tasks that now happen on the Web.
Available for Windows, Mac, and Linux, Firefox 4 beta 4 introduces a feature now called Firefox Panorama. Today's browsers typically cram tabs in a strip along the top of the window, but Panorama provides a Mac OS X Expose-like interface that groups tabs into related bunches.
Panorama presents an array of thumbnail images, each representing...
The maker of the smartphone, Canada's Research In Motion, faces an August 31 deadline to give India the means to track and read its secure email that officials fear have the potential to be misused by militants.
The source, who is close to the negotiations with RIM, said Indian security and telecom agencies will hold "technical" meetings with the firm on Thursday and Friday for a solution.
"We are hopeful of arriving at a positive solution," the source said.
If RIM fails to comply then it would be cut out of one of the world's fastest-growing...
Google rolled out the latest version of its mobile YouTube site outside the U.S on Tuesday, a browser-based application that is as fast as a client application for mobile devices, according to a product manager.
The upgraded site became available in the U.S. last month but is now available worldwide. Google wanted to improve how YouTube functions through a mobile browser since the site is being accessed about 100 million times a day that way. Traffic to YouTube through mobile devices was up 160 percent in 2009 over 2008.
"We tried to make it so snappy and so fast, but...
Microsoft issued an advisory on Monday about a security issue that could leave many Windows applications vulnerable to attack.
The advisory deals with a type of attack mechanism known as DLL preloading, or binary planting. Although the attack mechanism is not new or entirely unique to Windows, Microsoft acknowledged that there appears to be a new remote-attack vector that could allow more systems to be attacked quickly.
Two researchers at the University of California at Davis published a paper earlier this year on how programs that were vulnerable could be automatically detected....
Google's decision to push Adobe Flash security fixes using Chrome's silent update service has resulted in a seven-fold increase in patching speed, a Google software engineer said.
Adobe issued an update Aug. 10 for Flash Player that patched six vulnerabilities. Within two days, more than 70% of Chrome users were running the fixed Flash, said Panayiotis Mavrommatis, a developer who works on Google's security team.
That update pace was seven times faster than in June, when Adobe shipped a much larger set of Flash fixes. According to Mavrommatis, it took about 14 days for about...
Apple is apparently ramping up its battle to prevent iPhone and iPod owners from jailbreaking their devices.
The company has applied for a patent, titled "Systems and Methods for Identifying Unauthorized Users of an Electronic Device," that covers a series of security measures to automatically protect devices from thieves and other "unauthorized users." Unauthorized users apparently applies to those who engage in jailbreaking, which allows devices to run apps not approved by the company producing the operating system--such as Apple, the main target of such bypasses.
Google has opened its Chrome Web Store to developers.
The web store, which was first unveiled by the search engine earlier this year, is designed to offer a selection of apps that can be downloaded for use with Google's Chrome web browser and its Chrome OS, which isn't expected to launch until Q4 of 2010.
"Since our announcement of the Chrome Web Store at Google I/O, our team has been hard at work preparing for our launch later this year. Today we're making the first step towards this milestone by making available a developer preview of the Chrome Web Store," said...
When it comes to new security issues, the security team for the Firefox browser have the new version of the Web HyperText Markup Language, HTML5, foremost on the mind.
"Web apps are becoming incredibly rich with HTML5. The browser is starting to manage full-bore applications and not just Web pages," said Sid Stamm, who works on Firefox security issues for the Mozilla Foundation. Stamm was speaking at the Usenix Security Symposium, held last week in Washington D.C.
"There is a lot of attack surface we need to think about," he said.
On the same...
In the four years since Sony's PlayStation 3 has been with us, it's never been hacked to play pirated games--until now, that is, if claims by hacker group PSJailbreak prove true.
The group, reportedly operating from China or Hong Kong, claims it's on the verge of releasing a USB dongle (they're implying it's a 'jailbreak' tool) that lets you play pirated as well as homemade games on a retail PS3 by converting it into a "debug" unit, a special version of the PS3 used by developers and others to access non-retail versions of games.
The dongle comes loaded with software...
As we near back-to-school time, parents of high school and college kids are going to be asking just one question: “Do I get them a new MacBook, or new MacBook Pro?” Luckily for them, Apple has a new feature in its online store called “Compare Macs” to help make the decision a little bit easier.
After you select a Mac from Apple’s storefront, you’ll see the compare option in the list of Mac models at the top of the page. Tapping or clicking on it will bring you to a new page, where you can choose from any of Apple’s models to start your comparison. Initially, you’ll see the computer’s...
Google patched 11 vulnerabilities--three critical, seven high-risk, and one medium--in a new version of Chrome released Thursday.
All but one of the problems was in Chrome itself. The additional issue handled in Chrome 5.0.375.127 is a workaround for a critical Windows kernel bug, according to a blog post Thursday by Jason Kersey of the Chrome team.
Chrome has an automated update process that periodically checks for updates, downloads new versions, and installs them when a person restarts the browser. For a quicker update, people can follow Google's instructions to check for...
Not to be outdone by Yahoo Mail’s new iPad-friendly layout released earlier in the week, Google too is making a few improvements to its Webmail interface for the iPad.
The Google Mobile Team announced Wednesday the implementation of a new “stacked cards” interface to make managing multiple messages easier.
Previously, the Gmail interface had two separate (yet similar) toolbars: one on the bottom left (for currently selected message threads) and another top right (for the currently open conversation). That made even simple tasks like deleting a message frustrating. “Sound confusing?...
Google's tablet PC, which will run its Chrome OS and is designed to rival Apple's iPad, could hit US shelves in time for Christmas.
According to a report by tech website DownloadSquad an unnamed source said the tablet PC will make its debut on November 26, which is also "Black Friday" -- the day after Thanksgiving and traditionally the busiest shopping day of the year in the U.S.
The website didn't offer any details on whether the device would be made available in the U.K.or other international markets.
The tablet, which was confirmed by Verizon earlier...
Another day, another compelling yet controversial Facebook feature. Wednesday evening, Facebook held a small press event to announce Places, its new feature that lets users “check in” to a location in the real world, post content about that place, and let friends find them more easily. On Thursday morning, the massive social network released a major update to Facebook for iPhone that adds the Places feature, more privacy control, and better iOS 4 integration.
Facebook Places is slowly rolling out to users in the U.S., and first to users who live in or near major metropolitan areas. Facebook...
Mozilla hopes to release its fourth beta of Firefox 4 on Monday, adding hardware-accelerated graphics for some Windows users but leaving it turned off by default.
Also coming is a major user interface change called tab sets, formerly known as tab candy.
Hardware acceleration, coming to all the major browsers in various forms, is designed to shift some tasks from a computer's main processor to its graphics processor. One way Firefox is tackling the technology is by using Windows' Direct2D interface, which can speed up the display of text and graphics on newer versions of Windows.
Developers of the VLC media player have released a new version that takes care of several bugs and adds other improvements.
The latest version is now 1.1.3, which repairs a memory corruption problem in the TagLib plug-in that is rated as "critical" and affected VLC versions 0.9.0 through 1.1.2.
The vulnerability could be exploited by an attacker to crash the application or execute arbitrary code by tricking a user into opening a malware-laden media file, according to an advisory from Vupen Security.
VideoLan, which is a group of developers who created...
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