The New BlackBerry
The makers of BlackBerry, recently changed its name to BlackBerry Limited so they can have just one brand, it was formerly RIM(Research In Motion). They also named Alicia Keys as its creative director.
Yes, the singer! Which is great since Ms. Keys connects better with the young hip target audience that they need to compete better with iPhone and Android.
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Stickam is shutting down
Stickam has announced that it’s closing down on January 31 at 11:59 PM, that is tonight. The site posted the news 21 hours ago on its official blog. A short notice, and they didn’t state a reason why they were shutting it down. Read more
Will Apple have Fingerprint Recognition on the next iPhone?
This rumor has been circulating since the iPhone 4 came out. The longing for the ability to unlock your iPhone using only your fingerprint. I mean it would be very interesting, but what if a friend needed to use your phone and you weren’t available to put in your fingerprint? Read more
128GB Retina iPad
Apple today just announced a 128GB iPad, that is twice the storage space of the 64GB iPad. The new version will go on sale next month on February 5th. It’s going to cost $799 for the Wi-Fi only version, and $929 for the Wi-Fi + Cellular model. Read more
iOS 6.1 hit’s the update servers!
Apple has just released iOS 6.1 today, the latest update to iOS. It brings LTE to 36 additional carriers on iPhone and 23 additional carriers on iPad. iTunes Match subscribers can download individual songs from iCloud now. A new way to reset your advertising tracking Identifier. Seems like the most exciting feature is now you can buy movie tickets with Fandango using Siri(currently in the US only). Read more
Free Wallpapers!
Today we added a free iGeekable wallpapers section. Check it out here or the “Wallpapers” link at the bottom of the page.
Currently we have a wallpaper that is great for your desktop background, and another one covering the iPad and iPad mini. Then the rest cover some of the popular phones such as the iPhone (both 3.5 and 4 inch displays) and the Samsung Galaxy S3.
What other devices would you like to see iGeekable wallpapers for?
Epson WF-3520 Review
About 2 weeks ago our old family printer, the Epson Workforce 610, started printing smeared pages. I ran the print head cleaner in the menu, and then for a few prints it was fine, but after that it did it again. I then took it to Geek Squad since we had an extended warranty and about a week later they called saying they couldn’t fix it but that we could pick out a similar one. So the agent let us search for one with similar features on their computer, and this one looked interesting, but was out of stock. It turned out more were coming in, so they held one for us.
So here I am with this new Epson WF-3520, it’s a wireless printer all-in-one copier/fax/scanner that works with Mac, Windows, AirPrint and Google Cloud Print which means all the computers in the house are able to print. Even my iPad can print!
Setup was pretty easy and simple. Once unboxed, you just plug it in and load in the ink. It’s the kind of printer where each ink cartridge is separates so you have a separate black, magenta, cyan and yellow cartridge. Read more
Microsoft’s new Internet Explorer Ad
This morning I was browsing Twitter and Microsoft released a new ad promoting Internet Explorer 10. The ad didn’t actually show IE itself, only the icon at the end on a Windows Surface tablet. Even though I doubt I’ll switch to Internet Explorer 10, or Windows 8 as my fulltime operating system I think this is the best Microsoft Ad ever made. This is one of those ads that connect to you emotionally especially if you remember the 90s.
Back when life moved a little slower because we were stuck with 56K dial-up modems and didn’t have Smartphones to always be connected 24/7. Without a smartphone, the only thing buzzing in our pockets was a Tamagotchi. When a troll was your friend. Back before everyone posted pictures of their food on Instagram. Everything was simpler back then. Read more
Camera Phones
Even since before the age of smart phones, camera phones have been pretty popular. But since the new era, they have really taken off. Even the simplest of phones has a camera on it, as shown above. But has it really become to much. I mean, Nokia has a 16 megapixel camera on a phone. To me that’s ridiculous.
100% of the senate and 90% of the house are on Twitter
Twitter reported that 100% of the senate and 90% of the house are on Twitter for the 113th Congress compared to the 112th congress which was only 44% of the senate and 35% of the house on Twitter.
Want to stay connected to elected officials in Congress on Twitter? Subscribe to our lists: twitter.com/gov/us-senate and twitter.com/gov/us-house.
— Twitter Government (@gov) January 18, 2013
Over the past 4 to 6 years, social networks such as Twitter and Facebook have become widely used in American politics. Though people talked about issues and candidates before they were using social networks, it seems that social networks are helping people talk more about politics and brings in people who normally would not talk about politics since social networks give people a larger voice than ever before, and make it simple and convenient. Read more
Atari files for bankruptcy
Atari, one of the pioneers in gaming announced today that they filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy. They are aiming to keep the US operations separate from the french parent holding company Atari SA. Within the next few months they are going to sell their assets such as Pong, Asteroids, Missile Command and other titles. They may even sell their logo, leaving them with just a name.
Watch the Inauguration Live
If you want to watch the inauguration live, There’s an app for that. I’m not an extremely political person, but I do find the Inauguration interesting. The app idea is pretty smart for people who want to watch it on the go or at work. The app is available for iPhone and Android.
Oh, and I’m watching on the app. You can download the app on the Apple App Store, and Google Play store for free.
Source: RedmondPie
Is the iPhone in trouble?
When the iPhone first came out, it was all the rage. In 2007, it was pretty popular, albeit hard to afford with its $500-$600 price point. I remember my youth pastors going and sitting in line for it (and they have had every generation since).
The iPhone was a status symbol. If you could afford it, you were awesome. People would flash it whenever they could. “Oh yeah, I saw that on my new iPhone.” “Oh Check out my new iPhone.” and so on.
But now it’s become pretty easy to get an iPhone. With AT&T, you can sign a two year contract and get an iPhone 4 for free. They are taking away the cool factor of having an iPhone. Heck, someone on unemployment can afford an iPhone now. Read more
Pandora streamed over 13 billion hours of music in 2012!
Pandora, the leading online personalized radio station service released statistics for 2012 recently. Users of the service listened to over 1 million different songs by 100 thousand different artists and 1.6 billion stations were created. Totaling 13 billion hours of music! I wonder how many hours of that music were One Direction, Justin Bieber or Carly Rae Jepsen! Read more
Staff Postitions
Hey Guys, I wanted to talk to you guys about some positions on the site that we have open. We have been looking for a few of these for a while, and some only for a bit, but we need them none the less.
Positons:
•Writers: We are looking for 2-3 writers to write content for the blog.
•Site Manager: We are looking for 1-2 people to do site maintenance and updates. A WordPress and/or coding background preferable or the willingness to learn.
•Publicity Crew: Looking for about 2-5 individuals that are good at marketing and publicity.
•Podcast Crew: Editor: Looking for 1 person to do the Audio editing; Research team: 2 people to do research for content.
•Media Editor: We use images around the site a lot as well as for publicity. Looking for a person, needs to have Photoshop/Illustrator background (or similar programs), to handle this.
For all inquiries, Email Zac Murphy or Kevin Whitman. Click on one of the names to email either of us.
Zac Murphy
Vice President
iGeekable.com
Site Changes
Sorry, no tech post from me today. I’ve been doing a lot of site work and wanted to say be sure to check it out. Also a post will come in the near future for some available staff positions, So please stay tuned.
Zac Murphy
Vice President
iGeekable.com
RIM offers to pay $100 per app that Android developers port over
Research In Motion(RIM) is offering to pay $100 per app that Android developers port over to BlackBerry 10, up to 20 apps per developer in its BlackBerry 10 Last Chance Port-A-Thon that runs for 36 hours. Read more
Online Storage vs. Physical Storage
When it comes to our technology, We like to make sure it’s safe. We use security systems, passwords, cases and more. But nothing is worse than that dreaded moment when your hardware crashes. When that happens you need to go buy a new computer/phone/tablet. But what if you had irreplaceable pictures on there. That’s why Kevin and I live but the phrase “BACKUP, BACKUP, BACKUP YOUR DATA.”
My iDevices back up to my Mac and to my iCloud storage. My Mac also backs up to iCloud.
All of my graphic and video work that I do is kept on my external drives, as well as well as my Dropbox. All of my scripts and idea sheets are typed in Word for Mac and then copied and pasted into Google Drive and sometimes even into Pages which syncs with iCloud. I make sure if, God forbid, any of my hardware crashes, it’s data is safe. Read more
Facebook kicks Voxer off it’s platform after adding voice support to it’s own app
The AllThingsD reports allegations that Facebook turned off the API for Voxer, an app for both iPhone and Android that is a virtual walkie-talkie. It allows you to talk one and one or in a group of people, got it’s Facebook access disabled. Voxer uses Facebook’s API to find friends who are already on Voxer. You can still add friends by username, so this isn’t going to kill their whole product.
According to CEO Tom Katis of Voxer, Facebook emailed the company wanting to hold a phone conference with them to discuss why Facebook killed its API access. This news comes out days after Facebook added voice calling to it’s messager app. I wonder if Voxer friend finding service losing access to the Facebook API is related in any ways? I think it’s very possible, and if this story gets popular we might see a public statement from Facebook about this. Read more
Good ol’ Instagram. I personally love my Instagram account. It allows me to check up on friends, meet new people, even allows out-of-state and even in-state family know what’s going on with my life. I love the ability to customize the photo I’m posting. It’s a great social network to use and is probably my current favorite social platform right now. They have tons of users, 90 million monthly active users and 40 million uploads a day.
Now also with all the controversy surrounding the privacy policy with Instagram, they finally reverted back to the original ones.
