While you may be tempted to install the recently released beta version of iOS 7, you may also be worried that it could brick your iPhone. Never fear: 9to5Mac points us to a new demonstration program from consumer electronics website Recombu that lets you preview iOS 7 without any risk of wrecking your device. How does it do this, you ask? By hosting the entire thing inside your web browser. While this obviously doesn’t give you the exact same experience as actually using iOS 7, it does give you a nice look at the new user interface and lets you see how the redesigned core iOS apps look. 9to5Mac notes that “if you’re using Firefox or Chrome, you can also
Read More...

NEW YORK (AP) — It's a sight that can trigger dread: the low-battery message on your cellphone when there's no charger around.
Read More...

The video game industry continued its downward spiral in May. According to research firm NPD Group, retail sales of hardware, software and gaming accessories in the U.S. fell 25% to $386.3 million last month, their lowest level thus far in 2013. Hardware and software sales fell 31% year-over-year to $96 million and $175.1 million, respectively, while sales of gaming accessories declined 6% year-over-year to $115.3 million. Including sales of used games, rental and digitally delivered content, micro-transactions, subscriptions, mobile apps and social network games, consumers spent a total of $787 million on video games in May. Nintendo’s 3DS was the top-selling platform across hardware and portables, edging out the Xbox 360. The 3DS console had its best year-over-year performance with software sales
Read More...

Don’t mess with Texans’ email. Ars Technica reports that Texas has become the first state in the United States that requires law enforcement officials to get search warrants before snooping on citizens’ emails. The law only applies to state and local law enforcement officials, however, and won’t apply to federal officials who can still access emails without a warrant once they’ve been opened or if they’ve sat unopened in a user’s inbox for more than 180 days. The new Texas law comes at a time when electronic privacy has become a hot-button issue in the wake of revelations about the National Security Agency’s vast data collection program.
Read More...

Don’t mess with Texans’ email. Ars Technica reports that Texas has become the first state in the United States that requires law enforcement officials to get search warrants before snooping on citizens’ emails. The law only applies to state and local law enforcement officials, however, and won’t apply to federal officials who can still access emails without a warrant once they’ve been opened or if they’ve sat unopened in a user’s inbox for more than 180 days. The new Texas law comes at a time when electronic privacy has become a hot-button issue in the wake of revelations about the National Security Agency’s vast data collection program.
Read More...

(Reuters) - Japan's Toshiba Corp plans to cut about 10 billion yen ($104 million) in costs this fiscal year by reorganizing its network of television factories in Indonesia, China and Poland, the Nikkei said, citing company sources. Toshiba wants to make its TV operations profitable this year by overhauling its global production network and raising prices after the business lost almost 50 billion yen on a consolidated basis last business year, the Japanese daily said. ...
Read More...

Huawei on Tuesday announced the Ascend P6, the world’s thinnest smartphone. The handset measures a mere 6.18 millimeters thick and weighs 120 grams, eight grams more than Apple’s iPhone 5 despite the fact that the phone is much larger. The Ascend P6 is equipped with a 4.7-inch 720p display, an in-house 1.5GHz quad-core processor and an 8-megapixel rear camera. The smartphone also includes a 5-megapixel front-facing camera, 2GB of RAM, a 2,000 mAh battery, 8GB of internal storage, a microSD slot and Huawei’s Emotion user interface atop Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean. The Ascend P6 will be available in black, white and pink in China later this month and it will launch on Vodafone, O2 and Orange in Europe in July. Huawei’s press release
Read More...

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Chinese network equipment and cellphone maker Huawei Technologies Co. would consider buying Finland's Nokia to help it expand its smartphone business, according to a story on the Financial Times website. The story quoted the head of Huawei's consumer business, Richard Yu, as saying: "We are considering these sorts of acquisitions; maybe the combination has some synergies but depends on the willingness of Nokia. We are open-minded." Nokia and Huawei were not immediately available for comment. Nokia's U.S. shares were up 26 cents or 7 percent at $3.95 after the report. ...
Read More...

Shares of Nokia surged on Tuesday, mostly because Chinese electronics giant Huawei expressed interest in buying the struggling Finnish smartphone manufacturer. Richard Yu, chairman of Huawei’s consumer business group, told The Financial Times that his company would be open to buying Nokia if it showed a “willingness” to merge. One aspect of Nokia’s current business plan that it will certainly have to rethink if it wants to merge with Huawei is its exclusive use of Windows Phone as its platform of choice. Yu said that Windows Phone was still a risky bet because its market share has not significantly grown in the eight months since the launch of Windows Phone 8. “Whether Windows Phone will be successful is difficult to say,”
Read More...

"Maker of 'Candy Crush Saga' Plans IPO," reports the Wall Street Journal today, which very possibly makes zero sense to you. What's Candy Crush? you might ask. How does something with a silly name like that get big enough for a public offering? And did you say Zynga? Because that doesn't sound good. The Atlantic Wire is here to answer all those questions and more. 
Read More...

It looks as though Apple might be smoothing out some of the iPhone’s sharp edges for the low-cost version of its popular smartphone. Japanese blog Macotakara has posted some pictures of a case designed for the upcoming low-cost iPhone by third-party accessories manufacturer MGM Corp. that suggests the device will feature rounder edges than traditional iPhone models. AppleInsider notes that “the case for the low-cost iPhone is about 2 millimeters thicker than a similar accessory designed for the iPhone 5″ that conforms to the iPhone 5′s sharper edges. The round edges on the leaked case seem to confirm earlier reports about the low-cost iPhone having more rounded edges compared to other iPhone models, and it certainly looks like it could fit over
Read More...

(Reuters) - General Electric Co joined forces with Amazon Web Services on Tuesday to make a wide range of data on products, including jet engines and gas turbines, available online so they can be analyzed. GE said Amazon Inc is the first online "cloud" service on which it will start creating an "Industrial Internet" to tap a market that analysts say could be worth hundreds of billions of dollars by the end of the decade. ...
Read More...

(Reuters) - Billionaire investor Carl Icahn told Dell Inc shareholders that an investment bank would help fund his offer for the PC maker as he sought to assuage concerns over his means to fund the bid. In an open letter to Dell shareholders published on Tuesday, Icahn said a major investment bank had indicated its willingness to make $1.6 billion available. The letter also said he was "proceeding to obtain commitments for $5.2 billion of senior debt financing to be made available to Dell as a bridge loan to guarantee the tender offer. ...
Read More...

Good news for AT&T subscribers who missed having full QWERTY keyboards: You’ll be able to buy the BlackBerry Q10 from your carrier on June 21st for $199.99 with a two-year service agreement. AT&T also says that “consumers who trade in their current smartphone to AT&T will be eligible to receive at least $100 off the purchase of a new smartphone, including the BlackBerry Q10.” The Q10, which is designed to look more like iconic pre-touch screen BlackBerry phones, includes 3.5-inch touch display, a 1.5GHz dual-core processor, an 8-megapixel rear-facing camera, a 2-megapixel front-facing camera, 2GB RAM, 16GB internal storage and a 2,100 mAh battery. Although the device didn’t launch with the same initial fanfare as the touch screen-only BlackBerry Z10, it’s quickly become
Read More...

By Francesca Trianni NEW YORK (Reuters) - New York City unveiled the first of 25 free solar charging stations for mobile phones on Tuesday, installed in response to Superstorm Sandy, which wiped out power and forced residents to walk miles to charge their phones. The Street Charge stations are New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg's latest answer to flaws in infrastructure and operations exposed by the historic storm that ripped into the East Coast in October 2012 and left about 900,000 New York City dwellers and millions of others in the region without power. ...
Read More...

It looks like the initial reaction to Apple’s reworked iOS 7 software might not have been as bad as the loudest naysayers made it out to be. Social media intelligence firm Viralheat analyzed more than 417,000 tweets relating to Apple that were posted during and after the company’s WWDC 2013 keynote, and it compared the sentiment surrounding Apple CEO Tim Cook and design boss Jony Ive, who oversaw the iOS 7 overhaul. Interestingly, 72% of tweets mentioning Ive were positive compared to 64% for Cook, while just 15% of tweets mentioning Ive were negative compared to 24% for Cook. This suggests the initial reaction to Ive’s design work in iOS 7 was far more positive than much of the subsequent
Read More...

LOS ANGELES (AP) — A woman who worked as a stunt double for Angelina Jolie has sued Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. in Los Angeles, claiming she's a victim of a phone hacking scheme to obtain information about the actress.
Read More...

Dreamworks Animation, the studio that is home to Shrek, Kung Fu Panda and Madagascar, is making its way to Germany television under a deal with a children's television operator.
Read More...

In addition to criticisms about the Xbox One’s connectivity policies, its used game policies, its supposedly invasive Kinect sensor and its policies toward independent game developers, Microsoft has also had to deal with criticisms that the Xbox One is overpriced at $500, which just happens to be $100 more than what Sony is charging for the PlayStation 4. Gamespot U.K. has spotted an interview that Xbox boss Don Mattrick had with Bloomberg TV last week where he defended the $500 price point and said that it was cheaper than many analysts had been expecting. “We’re over-delivering value against other choices I think consumers can get,” Mattrick said. “Any modern product these days you look at it [and] $499 isn’t a ridiculous
Read More...

NEW YORK (AP) — Todd Bradley, the head of Hewlett-Packard Co.'s printing and personal computer business, has been appointed to a new position in charge of the company's strategy with a focus on China, the company said Tuesday.
Read More...

FRANKFURT (Reuters) - German industrial conglomerate Siemens is seeking offers from private equity firms to buy its stake in its telecoms equipment joint venture Nokia Siemens Networks (NSN), three sources familiar with the discussions said on Tuesday. Siemens, together with its partner Nokia is reviving efforts to find a buyer and has approached private equity companies TPG, KKR and Blackstone, the sources said. Nokia and Siemens have been looking to exit the joint venture company through a buyout or public offering. Nokia and Siemens declined to comment, as did the private equity companies. ...
Read More...

Apple unveiled its vision for the future of mobile computing last week and the Internet erupted. A new feud was born, not between iOS fans and Android fans or between Apple fans and Samsung fans, but among iOS users themselves. On one side, a legion of iPhone, iPad and iPod touch users were fawning over the redesigned software shown off by Jony Ive and company. It’s a breath of fresh air… it’s amazing… it’s “positively mind-blowing.” On the other side, iOS 7 was panned. Many longtime Apple fans watched in horror as Apple peeled back the layers on its new iOS interface, and all the great features were instantly overshadowed by Apple’s controversial new design. Is iOS 7 a brilliant
Read More...

With a summer full of beach reading (hopefully) ahead of us, we're faced with the technological dilemma of the season: How venture outside without ruining our fragile, not-amenable-to-the-elements e-reading gadgets. We (as in a third of Americans) bought our Kindles, Nooks, and iPads — at least in part — to do all the leisure reading these devices theoretically enable. ...
Read More...

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Hewlett-Packard Co said on Tuesday that Todd Bradley, the head of its largest unit, printing and personal computers, will take on a new job, improving HP's China business and extending channel partner relationships around the world. Bradley is stepping aside as executive vice president of the printing and personal systems unit, which also includes tablet computers, and will report directly to Chief Executive Meg Whitman in his new job as vice president for strategic growth initiatives. ...
Read More...

Of the nine companies supposedly working with the government on PRISM, six and a half — Yahoo, Facebook, Microsoft (which may or may not include Skype), Apple, and Google/YouTube (sort of) — have disclosed the number of government requests they get including the secret FISA court ones, giving us an idea of which tech company the government turns to most often. Only AOL and PalTalk have stayed mum. Of course, the numbers, only give us part of the story. ...
Read More...