ETRO robot wears its heart on its face, promises to love you

We prefer our robots stick to the household cleaning chores, a little DJing action even, and then go right back to the closet. But, when we first glimpsed this emoting automaton from Korea's Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute, our fears of the day of robot reckoning subsided slightly. The ETRI-built robot (or ETRO for short) is currently "employed" as an ambassador for human-robot relations at Daejon's National Science Museum, treating amused passersby to outspoken professions of love backed by its LED-lit facial expressions. Originally designed as a reading robot back in 2003, version 2.0 of this humanoid helper was created with a greater cause in mind -- showcasing robotics as promising Korean growth industry. Rather than let those economic concerns muddle our whimsy

Google TV coming to the UK within six months

Hey! Britain! Guess what? You're getting Google TV! Try to temper your excitement, we know this is a big day for you, but there's still a bit of a wait ahead. According to the Telegraph and the Daily Mail, Google is aiming to deliver its set-top software to the UK sometime in the next six months. Eric Schmidt is expected to announce the plans at the Edinburgh Television Festival (which starts today), likely including integration of BBC's iPlayer and ITV's Player. Sadly we don't have any more details yet regarding a specific launch date or hardware, but we wouldn't be shocked if it's timed to coincide with the release of the Honeycomb version of Google TV.

Facebook makes its privacy settings act more like Google+

When Google's not-the-Facebook social network, Google Plus, launched earlier this summer, one thing stood out for many tech pundits: privacy settings. On Facebook, users had to navigate confusing lists on settings pages in order to control seemingly simple and important things, like who could see their photos or status updates or which books they like.
Google Plus made such decisions easier since it let users decide who would receive a given post or photo right when they created and then posted it.
Facebook seems to have taken notice of this subtle but significant difference. The world's largest social network on Tuesday announced changes to its privacy settings that allow users to choose who will see a photo or status update right when they post it -- much like was already the case on Google Plus.
"You have told us that 'who can see this?' could be clearer across Facebook, so we have made changes to make this more visual and straightforward," Facebook's Chris Cox writes in a blog post on the topic.

Privacy groups take on Facebook

2010: Facebook's growing influence

"The main change is moving most of your controls from a settings page to being inline, right next to the posts, photos and tags they affect. Plus there are several other updates here that will make it easier to understand who can see your stuff (or your friends') in any context."
An example will help make sense of all this social-media-speak.
Say you want to post a photo from a friend's recent birthday party -- and you only want your good friends to be able to see it.
Before, you would need to go to Facebook's "Edit Friends" page. Then you'd need to set up a list of your Facebook friends who you consider to be "good friends." That can take a while. Then you assign certain properties to that group, allowing them to see photos or status updates or wall posts made by other friends etc. Instead of deciding which pieces of content these people will see, you choose the category.
Confusing much?
After the change, Facebook users decide who gets to see a photo right as they post it. Right next to the "post" button on Facebook, which users click to post something new to the site, there's a little lock icon. Click on that and you can choose where to send that post. Click "customize" to get the most control.
Google Plus is similar, but it uses friend "circles" instead of "lists."
In comments on Facebook's blog post about the privacy change, some users said they were impressed: "Well done, slowly getting better," one wrote.
Many, however, referenced Google's new-ish social network.
"Glad to see that competition is finally forcing Facebook to improve," one person wrote.
"Looks like, FB is transforming to G+..." wrote another.
And there were more than a few jokes in the comments, too: "hahahaha... if you want this functionality, and want it to actually work, just use Google+!"
Tech pundit Robert Scoble chimed in, too:
"It effectively will keep people from moving to Google+ because it takes away many of the advantages of Google+ Circles."
There were some other Facebook privacy changes, too. Among them:
-- Users now can approve photo tags before they go onto their News Feeds, where friends would see them. Before, friends could identify you in a photo without your knowledge and post that on the network.
-- A button called "view profile as..." now appears in the top right corner of Facebook profiles. Click it and then enter a name of a friend or co-worker to see what your profile looks like when they view it.
-- Users can change the visibility of a post after it's up.
-- Facebook now says "public" instead of "everyone" in its privacy-setting lingo. Both terms mean everyone on the public Internet -- not just friends or other Facebook users -- can see that piece of content.

Twitter founders fund new project: Lift

Twitter's co-founders announced this week that they are throwing their money and support behind a new app called Lift, which, according to a blog post that sounds like it was written by "Lost's" Dharma Initiative, is "an interesting new application for unlocking human potential through positive reinforcement." "We love this software for what it does, and because we've tried it and it works. Our plan is to build something extraordinary together," the post says.
Right. Well. But what is Lift, exactly? And what makes it so awesome that every tech blog on the planet is writing about it despite the fact the app is in "alpha testing" and isn't open to pretty much anyone.
Perhaps it's the fact that Evan Williams and Biz Stone, author of Tuesday's aforementioned welcome-to-the-future announcement, are such rock stars in the tech world. This is the first investment for the Obvious Corporation (yes, that's the real name), which the Twitter alums started this year. Obvious' goal, as stated on its website -- which, obviously, is obvious.com -- is to make "systems that help people work together to improve the world."
The partnership between Obvious and Lift is "more interesting" than the "scant details" about the app itself, writes Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry at the blog the Silicon Alley Insider.
ReadWriteWeb, a tech blog, offers some analysis about what the new Lift app may look like.
In a word? It's like Twitter.
"It sounds like Twitter in its simplicity and from what I've seen it looks a lot like Twitter too -- but with more structure," Marshall Kirkpatrick writes in a post on that site. "What's called Lift today was apparently called Mibbles just weeks ago and was described then as 'a very simple tracking and encouragement tool.' "
Williams and Stone are funding Lift, but the app's creators are Jon Crosby and Tony Stubblebine, who are also big names in the tech world.
In a blog post called "Uplifting News About an Obvious Partnership," Stubblebine writes that he and Crosby "do have a prototype" of the app, "but we're a long way from opening the doors" to the public.
"Our intention is to create a long-lived company. But unlike my last company, we're not set on doing this alone. Enter Obvious," he writes.
TechCrunch, another tech blog, did some digging in the code of the Lift website and found a humorous clue about the app's future.
Hidden in the code is this statement: "Lift. Achieve anything (assuming we finish building this app)."
Robin Wauters, the post's author, gives Lift the benefit of the doubt:

"I assume they will (finish the app)," he writes. "Can't wait to finally be able to achieve anything!"

Could better mobile networks create more U.S. jobs?

Job growth is widely hailed as a necessary component of the U.S. economic recovery. A new Deloitte report contends that by 2016, faster 4G wireless networks could directly create from 371,000 to 771,000 U.S. jobs. These would mainly be jobs at wireless carriers and other telecommunications companies. Deloitte expects that these companies will invest $25 to $53 billion in building 4G networks over the next few years.
But wait, there's more: As with the growth of the Internet, widely deployed 4G wireless networks may spur the development of entirely new businesses and professions that capitalize on this infrastructure. As Deloitte vice chairman and U.S. media and telecommunications sector leader Phil Asmundson recently told Marketplace Tech Report: "4G is really going to be that opportunity to literally leave your computer behind."
This could have profound implications for job creation in rural areas, many of which have been hit especially hard by the recession. Conventional "wired" broadband providers have generally lagged in connecting rural areas. This in turn has impaired educational and economic prospects for many rural residents.
"To bolster the nation's economic recovery, it will be important for the U.S. to compete effectively in the global race to deploy 4G networks," says the Deloitte report.
That could be a problem, given the current U.S. mobile broadband landscape.
First, consider the growing global competition. Deloitte noted: "More than 150 carriers in 60 countries are committed to 4G deployments and trials. ... South Korea and Sweden already have substantial 4G deployments. China is a driving force behind the development of a competing version of LTE and is pushing to develop an ecosystem around the technology that could give Chinese vendors a competitive edge. Consequently, the U.S. cannot underestimate the competitive threat from abroad, particularly in a high-visibility area such as mobile broadband."
Also, "U.S. mobile broadband use is pressing against the limits of available spectrum, and other countries are on track to exceed U.S. spectrum supply."
U.S. spectrum availability is a highly controversial topic. Some experts, such as Onyeije Consulting, contend that the problem can be solved with better technology for wireless networks and devices. Others claim it's mostly a manufactured limitation based on how the FCC has handled allocation and licensing of the spectrum (particularly in terms of military spectrum allocations).
One thing is clear: Current U.S. wireless technologies and spectrum-licensing practices probably won't support the kind of robust mobile broadband growth -- and job growth -- that Deloitte's more optimistic outlook envisions.
Then there's the competition issue. In a market economy, competition is generally seen as a virtue because it breeds innovative solutions. But the U.S. wireless industry is becoming steadily less competitive -- and perhaps less innovative -- with each passing year.
Currently the lion's share of U.S. wireless carriers offering mobile broadband are consolidated into two giant and two medium-sized companies -- AT&T, Sprint Nextel, T-Mobile and Verizon -- and we're rapidly converging toward an AT&T/Verizon duopoly.
Also, the major U.S. wireless carriers have already "slowed down" 4G networks by diluting the very definition of 4G. The networks that U.S. carriers currently are deploying are a long way from meeting the 4G data-speed standard, making "4G" little more than a marketing term.
As Christina Warren explained in Mashable, "Most of the systems billed as '4G' could be more accurately called 3.5G, or 3.75G. But the plan is for these systems to upgrade to full 4G in the future. 4G data can move faster, and it can get to more people.
"The promise of 4G is twofold: Cellular data speeds will be faster -- 10 times faster than current 3G speeds. And the technology can help solve the 'last mile' dilemma (the difficult final leg of connecting customers to a network) that prevents rural areas from getting service."
As long as mobile broadband continues to be something that Americans access mainly through smartphones and tablets (which typically come with pricey, lengthy carrier contracts), decreasing competition among U.S. wireless carriers may ultimately end up slowing the deployment, affordability, and accessibility of 4G networks.
It is possible that alternative mobile broadband retailers, such as Clearwire, may play a growing role in U.S. mobile broadband. But Clearwire currently doesn't offer roaming over cell phone data networks, so if you're out of their range you're out of mobile broadband, period. Also, Clearwire works via separate modems that connect to Wi-Fi-enabled devices, not directly via cell phones -- which means its users must carry, connect, and pay for yet another device.
Then there are players like Lightsquared, which is seeking FCC approval to deploy a nationwide wholesale mobile broadband network. This in turn could support many retail mobile broadband providers, even cell-phone carriers such as Sprint. But as the National Journal reports this week, that plan is beset by problems related to the propensity of Lightsquared's technology to interfere with Global Positioning System (GPS) technology.
CNET reports that even the Dish Network satellite TV provider is considering deploying a 4G data network. But so far this looks more likely to apply to location-based customers such as homes or businesses, rather than mobile users.
Historically, wider geographic access to infrastructure -- from telephone lines and power grids to highways, airlines, and shipping -- has usually yielded a sustainable net creation of jobs.
Whether Deloitte's hopeful vision comes to pass depends largely on whether U.S. wireless carriers, regulators, and technology companies decide to cooperate and compromise for the greater good, rather than carving out turf. And whether U.S. consumers, and workers, can learn and organize enough to lobby effectively for their own long-term economic interests.

Walking could power your next cell phone, researchers say

Will you be able to charge your next mobile phone simply by walking around? A group of researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison hope so.
In an article this week in the journal Nature Communications, they unveiled a technology that would harness part of the energy people generate when they walk and push it to a phone or other mobile device.
"Humans, generally speaking, are very powerful energy-producing machines," Tom Krupenkin, a UW-Madison professor of mechanical engineering, said in a news release from the school. "While sprinting, a person can produce as much as a kilowatt of power."
He said harvesting even a small fraction of that power is enough to power a cell phone, laptop, flashlight or other electronics.
Under the system, an "energy harvester" that would be installed in a person's shoe would capture some of the mechanical energy that typically burns away as heat and convert it to up to 20 watts of electrical power for a personal device.
The harvester would act as an intermediate transceiver, or Wi-Fi hot spot, to serve as a "middle man" between a mobile device and a wireless network, thereby reducing the amount of energy the phone needs to send and receive signals.
Researchers call the process "reverse electrowetting," transferring the energy via nano-tubes containing thousands of liquid "micro-droplets."
(We're pretty sure that's a good description, at any rate. Read the report, by Krupenkin and J. Ashley Taylor, for yourself here.)
The researchers say making their technology widely available would have a positive environmental impact, reducing society's need for batteries and the pollution that ensues when they are disposed of improperly.
It would also have an impact in poor and developing countries, where charging electronics is often either impossible or expensive, and could benefit soldiers and police officers needing to power things like communications equipment and night-vision goggles, they say.
But what about everyday smartphone users who are tempted to yank their hair out after a few hours of using their phone without a charger handy?
Krupenkin said "reverse electrowetting" would conserve enough energy to make a typical cell phone battery last 10 times longer.
"You cut the power requirements of your cell phone dramatically by doing this," he said.

The technology was developed with a grant from the National Science Foundation. Now Krupenkin and Taylor hope to make some money with it through a company they've created, InStep NanoPower.

Steve Jobs' resignation letter

To the Apple Board of Directors and the Apple Community: I have always said if there ever came a day when I could no longer meet my duties and expectations as Apple's CEO, I would be the first to let you know. Unfortunately, that day has come.
I hereby resign as CEO of Apple. I would like to serve, if the Board sees fit, as Chairman of the Board, director and Apple employee.
As far as my successor goes, I strongly recommend that we execute our succession plan and name Tim Cook as CEO of Apple.
I believe Apple's brightest and most innovative days are ahead of it. And I look forward to watching and contributing to its success in a new role.
I have made some of the best friends of my life at Apple, and I thank you all for the many years of being able to work alongside you.
Steve  

Samsung's N102 is an N100 clone, ditches MeeGo for Windows 7 Starter

Were you mostly on board with the N100, but wished Sammy would have held the MeeGo? Those of you in India or Russia are apparently in luck, as Notebook Italia has spotted its Windows-toting twin: the N102. Identical to the N100 in every other way, 10-inch netbook kicks the open source OS to the curb, opting instead for the pared down Windows 7 Starter Edition. Naturally, you'll pay a little extra for the privilege, as the 8,930 Roubles (around $320) gizmo is about 50 bones more than its MeeGo-wielding doppelgänger. Or, you know, you could just buy the N100, bask in open-source goodness and then put that half-Benjamin toward the purchase of a real copy of Windows.

Intel talks up next-gen Itanium: 32nm, 8-core Poulson

It's been a long time since Intel tried to tempt the world with a new Itanium chip. The VLIW 64-bit processor last received a serious update in 2008, with the 2-billion transistor Tukwila. Now Chipzilla is upping the ante -- moving to 32nm process, adding up to four more cores, and tacking on more than one billion additional transistors. Poulson also adds a new feature called Intel Instruction Replay Technology, which adds a buffer for more quickly recovering from errors, allowing the chip to pick up from the last known good instruction instead of having to completely flush the pipeline. Those looking to upgrade will also be happy to hear that the upcoming IA-64 CPU is pin compatible with Tukwila, so customers can simply drop the new processor in to existing systems. Check out the full PR after the break.

Opal: the 7-inch HP tablet that almost was

Shoulda, woulda, coulda, but alas, HP ultimately didn't. Such is the tale of the behind-the-scenes gaffes that almost saw webOS launch on a path to success, and instead, ended in the platform's corporate disavowal. The story may be all too fresh in our memory, but did you also know we were this close to a fire sale for a lesser-sized tablet? According to a report on gdgt, HP's QA team had in its possession a production-ready model of the "Opal" tablet, and were in the process of debugging the unit. The aborted 7-inch little brother to the TouchPad had reared its head at the FCC only two weeks ago, en route to a future AT&T home in both 16GB and 32GB versions as the TouchPad Go. Though the passing days bring further bits of this muddled HP puzzle into perspective, it appears likely this mini webOS tab may never know the appreciative touch of consumer hands. And with the recent news of an overseas-only bow for the Pre 3, all that remains to be seen is what'll happen to our recently adopted TouchPads.

ATSC commences 3DTV standard development, better get your glasses ready

After multiple spec and picture leaks, we seem to have finally hit the mother-lode with even more details of Sony's soon-to-be-released A77 DSLR. With a reported Exmor HD CMOS sensor, the camera is said to work at ISO 100-16000 with an expandable ISO 50 option and 1/8000 shutter speed. Rumors are swirling that the camera has a 19 point AF sensor and 12fps burst, rather than the previously leaked specs citing an 11 point AF and 10fps burst. It reportedly runs on a Bionz processor and has built-in flash and GPS as well, and has enough juice to capture 500 shots on a single charge. Word on the street is that there's a TrueBlack 921k swiveling display round back and a three million dot OLED viewfinder. Of course, we won't be able to separate fact from fiction until the camera launches later this week. If you can't hold your breath that long, check the source for more leaked pics of Sony's slick new shooter.

Ben Heck tackles Android ADK, whips up car trip-simulating baby seat

We've been wondering what would happen if the infinitely resourceful Ben Heck got his hands on the powerful Android ADK. Thankfully, in the most recent episode of the accomplished modder's show, our curiosity is satiated. The crafty Wisconsinite tackles a reader request -- to recreate the soothing motion of a car ride and help put a three-month-old baby to sleep. Mr. Heck uses the accelerometer in his phone to record the bounce and sway from the backseat as he drives around. He then draws up some code that will feed that data to the Arduino-powered ADK and move a series of servos that will tilt and shake a child's car seat. Sadly, the completion of the project will have to wait till the next exciting episode, but by the end of the installment embedded after the break you do get to see a scale model. What are you waiting for? Click that little read more link for PR and video... you know you want to.