Google in talks to buy InterDigital: report

(Reuters) - Google Inc (GOOG.O) has held preliminary talks about buying wireless developer InterDigital Inc (IDCC.O), the Wall Street Journal said on Thursday, citing people familiar with the matter.

On Tuesday InterDigital had said its board was evaluating strategic alternatives, including a possible sale of the company or of its patents.

The announcement came weeks after a rival consortium of technology giants acquired Nortel Networks' thousands of patents for $4.5 billion.

Google had made the initial bid for Nortel's assets but lost out to a group comprising Apple (AAPL.O), Research In Motion (RIM.TO), Microsoft Corp (MSFT.O), EMC Corp (EMC.N), Ericsson (ERICb.ST) and Sony (6758.T).

InterDigital holds and licenses around 8,800 mostly telecommunications patents that range from basic wireless system designs and processes to increase network coverage, to saving battery life and the efficient use of bandwidth.

The Journal said that InterDigital expects to fetch a price that not only reflects the value of its patents, but the long-term recurring revenue that stems from licensing patents.

Google and Interdigital have been in touch in recent days but financial advisers for InterDigital will likely approach a wide number of technology companies as part of the auction, the paper said.

(Reporting by Santosh Nadgir; Editing by Greg Mahlich)

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Google 'winding down' Labs, likely due to meddling older sister

Google Labs, that breeding ground for the wacky, sublime, and sometimes useful experiments that Mountain View's scooter-loving employees are so fond of, is getting ready to "wind down." The software giant announced today that the experimental forum for testing out potential features is being sidelined, in order for the company to focus on bigger picture ideas. Some of the more useful experimentation for properties like Calendar and Gmail will stick around, as will the Labs experiments that eventually made their way into the Android market. Google has promised to keep us all in the loop during the transition, so perhaps we can pick up a few secondhand test tubes for our own collections.

AT&T selling refurbished iPhone 3GS now for only $9

Back in January, AT&T slashed the price of the Apple iPhone 3GS to just $49 with a two-year contract. If you’ve always wanted an iPhone but just couldn’t afford it, the $50 outdated model may have been the way to go. That is, until AT&T dropped the price of the refurbished model yesterday to just $9.

AT&T’s drop in January from $99 to $49 hit right before Verizon became a carrier option for the iPhone 4. Anytime we see a major price drop in a product, it’s good reason to believe that we’ll be seeing a new product soon. As we reported yesterday, Apple is rumored to be offering a $349 iPhone 3GS free of contract, as well as continuing to sell the iPhone 4 in addition to a new iPhone 4S, resulting in a three-tiered pricing model for Apple’s iPhone.

So what will you lose if you go with the iPhone 3GS, for just $10, over the iPhone 4, which will cost you at least $189 more? A front-facing camera, so FaceTime is out; a high-resolution retina display; the Apple A4 chip; and two hours less battery life. You’ll also be getting a 3-megapixel camera compared to a 5-megapixel version; no camera flash; and VGA video recording, as compared to HD video recording.

However, if you’re just looking for all the goodness that is an iPhone, and you don’t want to spend a lot on a device, this isn’t exactly a bad way to go.

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Man Uses iPad to Find iPhone Dropped from 13,500 Feet

In a recent CNN iReport, Jarrod McKinney detailed gleefully tumbling and flying through the air with his wife on a tandem skydive in Winsted Minnesota on July 8th. To document the trip, Jarrod brought along his iPhone, which was stuffed into a pocket with a velcro closure.

He didn’t notice anything amiss as he floated safely to the landing area, but on the ground, he reached for his phone and found his pocket empty. Jarrod didn’t know when he had dropped the phone, meaning that it could have fallen thousands of feet, or just a few. Luckily, he had the “Find my iPhone” app installed on his iPad, which he fired up. Incredibly, it found his iPhone, which had fallen 13,500 feet on top of a steel factory roof 1/4 mile away. Most astonishingly, his presumably shattered iPhone was still sending out a clear signal.

At the factory, they helped him onto the roof and using the location features of the app, he was directed right to his broken iPhone, which was still working, despite a ruined screen. Amazingly enough, the iPhone was still able to sync to his truck and make phone calls.

That’s some impressive durability. Extreme sports fanatics and danger aficionados everywhere should consider investing in an iPhone. And kudos to a fantastic use of the “Find my iPhone” app, which was remarkably accurate to allow McKinney to track his phone down to a rooftop. I haven’t had occasion to use the tracking features on my own iPhone yet. Hopefully, I’ll never need to, but at least I know how well the tracking works, thanks to this great story from skydiver Jarrod McKinney.

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FX Photo Studio for iPhone adds masking and other goodies

I continue to be amazed at the functionality that photo apps are adding to the iPhone. FX Photo Studio for US$0.99 is a case in point. The app already had barrels of photo effects, almost 200, but now it has added masking to the feature set. It's an easy way to highlight parts of a picture, and then apply an effect to only those areas. It's easier to understand if you see a demo, so try this video to get the idea.

This latest version of FX Photo Studio has added new effects, performance improvements, and additional editing tools for gamma, saturation and hue. Images can be imported from Facebook, and images can now be shared via Instagram, Twitter, Facebook Flickr, Tumblr or email.

Like any tool, adding effects to photos can really be overdone, but FX Photo Studio can provide filters that run the gamut from subtle to outrageous. The app also provides cropping and printing if you are so equipped.

I played with the masking feature and found it useful and powerful. In the gallery, you can see a landscape photo where I created a black and white background, but left Spider Rock in Canyon de Chelley in color. The masking process could be improved with the option of a smaller brush size. Although you can magnify the image for detailed work, the size chosen for the brush is just too large for some applications.

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Cord from iPhone to Arduino now available

Make has put together an enticing kit for those interested in doing a littleArduino programming alongside the iPhone. The Redpark Breakout Pack is basically a serial cable with a connector on it that will go from an iPhone to an Arduino and let you send signals back and forth, even without jailbreaking.

There's a guide for setting up a simple project, but you'll have to have some previous knowledge of how to connect and run an Arduino, as well as create and run code on the iPhone. Note also that as far as I can tell (I'm not a developer, unfortunately), you still can't create apps for the App Store that work with this product -- at this point, all you can do is program your own iPhone to work with a local Arduino.

Still, anyone interested in connecting up an iPhone to one of these great open source electronics boards will probably find this to be one of the easiest (if not the cheapest) solutions to implement. If you make something cool, be sure tolet us know about it!

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Google+ iPhone app released; no iPad or iPod Touch support yet [Updated]

Google+ has an iPhone app, and it's now available for free download in Apple's App Store.

At first blush, the iOS version of the Google+ app doesn't look all that dissimilar from the Android version.

And that's not a bad thing as the main features between the two apps are in place -- the Stream, Circles and Huddles. 

Of course, the mobile apps are limited and aren't nearly as capable as the desktop in-browser version of Google+. For example, there are no group-video-chat Hangouts available in the apps.

As of about 10 a.m. Tuesday, the Google+ app for iOS was available in the App Store via iTunes but not on iOS devices themselves. Vic Gondotra, who is heading up Google+, said on Google+ that the app "should be rolling out over the next few hours."

The Google+ iOS app works with any iPhone 3G, 3GS or 4 running iOS 3.1 or newer (sorry iPhone 1 users), but as of day-one, there is no support for the app on the iPad or iPod Touch -- which may leave some iOS users feeling left out.

[Updated 11:11 a.m.: Well, that was quick. The Google+ app for iOS has already recieved it first update -- from version 1.0 to version 1.0.1.1809, according to the app's iTunes listing.

So, what's new? In the app's listing Google claims "better support for attaching photos to a post," "various bug fixes and performance improvements" and "better support for blocking unwanted messages in Huddle."

The app also now requires iOS 4.0 or newer. Also, we've gotten a few reports of the Google+ app not working with Apple's iPod Touch or iPad and being restricted to only iPhones (as the listing states). Sound off in the comments below and tell us what you think of the new app.]

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Apple Profits Continue Unrelenting Rise, Thanks to Hot iPad and iPhone Sales

Apple continued its seemingly unstoppable stellar financial results over the last three months, pulling in nearly as much revenue in those three months as Google does in a year.

The Cupertino hardware and software giant is on the march to become the world’s most valuable company. It exceeded analyst’s expectations for this quarter as the iPhone sales were up 142 percent year over year. Meanwhile, the continuing popularity of the iPad also contributed to Apple making a profit of $7.3 billion on revenues of $28.6 billion for the third quarter of its fiscal year, which ended on June 25.

The company’s gross margins — the difference between what it costs them to make an item versus what they sell it for, rose to 41.7 percent, versus 39.1 percent in the same quarter last year.

In a conference call with analysts, Apple COO Tim Cook said the company was doing well thanks to insatiable demand for the iPad 2 and growing enterprise and international sales. The latter now accounts for 62 percent of Apple’s revenue.

“We sold every iPad 2 we could make,” Cook said.

Apple sold more than 20 million iPhones, 9.25 million iPads, 7.54 million iPods and 3.95 million Macs over the last three months. The only decline was in the sales of iPods, which the company attributed to the growing popularity of smartphones as a replacement for dedicated digital music players.

Cook said that the iPad wasn’t likely to face much competition from Android-powered tablets, citing the iPad’s lead in apps designed especially for a tablet-sized device.

“You would be hard-pressed to find more than a few hundred on other platforms,” Cook said. “It also appears that other tablets aren’t getting any traction.”


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Facebook describes how to design the best social games

What’s the key to making a successful Facebook game?

Just ask Gareth Davis, a platform manager at Facebook, who has seen thousands of social games come and go.

If game companies pay attention to the advice, they just might have a chance to challenge the social game industry’s leader, Zynga.

Davis, speaking at the Casual Connect game conference in Seattle, said that there are 200 million monthly active users on Facebook and that the average length per game session is 55 minutes. Facebook is trying to move those players over to mobile platforms such as Android or the iPhone. Zynga has more than 266 million monthly active users on Facebook, but it’s in Facebook’s interest to diversify that and encourage more game companies to make social games.

“My belief is that you can do good social design by taking the collective learnings of people on the platform,” Davis said.

Here are Davis’ tips on how to create the best social games.

1. Start with social from the ground up. Don’t adapt games from older ways of building games. That means it must be easy for gamers to share what they can achieve in the game with their friends. Those players have to be engaged long enough so they can interact with their friends and help the game spread.

2. Optimize for social discovery and distribution. Discovery is a huge problem, but Facebook itself has a lot of different ways to spread news about games, from the news feed to email messages.

3. Focus on engagement. If they don’t come back, it doesn’t matter.

4. Make sure you take advantage of retail-level merchandising of virtual goods. Virtual goods are the primary means of making money in free-to-play social games. Users play for free but pay real money for virtual goods. Merchandising means you should offer discounts or sales to users on a regular basis. And you should target certain virtual goods toward “whales,” or social gamers who will pay lots of money to climb to the top of the leaderboards in a game.

5. Use analytics for business intelligence. Good analytics allows for insight into the way customers think and lets you figure out what to sell to them.

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Facebook Isn’t Sharing Ad Revenue With Zynga, But Could in the Future

Zynga updated its public filing yesterday, disclosing some of the terms of its agreement with Facebook.

The document, which was heavily blacked out due to confidentiality statements, suggested that Facebook was sharing a share of revenues from advertising with the largest game developer on its platform. But Facebook made a statement today which makes it clear that this is not the case.

Facebook told me today it does not share revenue with Zynga from ads that appear on its own social network, but in the future, it could share revenue from advertising if they appear on one of Zynga’s properties and were sold by Facebook.

In a statement, a spokesperson explained, “We don’t have agreements with any developers, including Zynga, to share revenue from ads next to their Facebook canvas apps. We did agree with Zynga to work together in the future on providing ads on their properties beyond Facebook, but we have no current timeline for when we might start working on that.”

In other words, if Zynga launched its own game center, or site, where visitors come to play games, Facebook may sell the ads for that network and share a portion of the proceeds with Zynga. The language in the contract is not clear on whether or not this is an exclusive arrangement.

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This Day in Tech: Apple has best-ever quarter; Anonymous suspects arrested

Too busy to keep up with today's tech news? Here are some of the more interesting stories from CNET (and elsewhere) for Tuesday, July 19. 

• Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt will support key Android partner HTC in its patent fight with Apple. Speaking at a Google mobile conference in Tokyo today, Schmidt didn't specify exactly how Google plans on supporting HTC but said "we will make sure they don't lose." 

• Apple, for its part, isn't losing any steam on the earnings front. The company this afternoon reported a profit of $7.31 billion, or $7.79 per share, for the second quarter, more than double its profit last year, as it prepares to digitally debut the next version of Mac OS X, code-named Lion, tomorrow. "We're thrilled to deliver our best quarter ever, with revenue up 82 percent and profits up 125 percent," Apple CEO Steve Jobs said in a statement. 

• We all might be paying with our mobile phones soon, now that a payment system between major carriers and credit card providers is under way. ISIS, the joint venture between AT&T, Verizon Wireless, and T-Mobile, has formed a new partnership with major credit card companies, including Visa, MasterCard, and American Express. Also in the mix are Google Wallet, expected to debut later this summer, and PayPal technology that would let customers swipe their Nexus S phone to transfer money. 

• Google+ has a plan to get celebrities to join their circle of friends. Sure, the more outspoken of social media-friendly celebrities, including Alyssa Milano and 50 Cent, are already on Google+. However, Google will likely have to work out the impersonator issues before celebrities who are less addicted to social media consider joining the online network. 

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Hands-on with the native Google+ app for iPhone

Three weeks after the public coming-out of Google's new social networking initiative, Google+, Apple has finally approved the native Google+ app for iOS devices. The free app is only compatible with iPhones though—not only is the Google+ app not configured for iPad screens, we're already hearing reports from readers that it straight up won't load on the iPad, nor will it load on the iPod touch. 

This is a confusing decision, and Google's response to our inquiries about it didn't answer the "why." The company did, however, passively indicate that it's working on separate apps for those platforms, so it's possible that we may see multiple versions of Google+ for iOS soon: "We are working quickly to roll out the Google+ mobile app to as many platforms and devices as possible. Today we have only announced availability for the iPhone," Google spokesperson Katie Watson told Ars.

Device compatibility is somewhat of a major issue for us iOS users, but we'll put it aside for now to focus on the 1.0 app's functionality. It's worth noting that the Google+ mobile site works on all devices (iPod touch included!), and is almost perfectly fine for the iPhone as well, save for the lack of image uploading ability. But Google didn't just add the ability to upload images and call it a native app—the app available in the App Store works in slightly different ways than the mobile Web app, and we like what we see so far.

What you can do with this app

The Google+ home screen cuts to the chase and only includes the most relevant items (Huddles notwithstanding)

The Google+ home screen presents pretty much the only things you are likely to find yourself trying to do when you launch the app: check your stream, see recent Huddles that people in your circles have held, look at photos that your circles have uploaded, look at your own profile, manage your circles, and see your notifications (at the bottom). Notice that Google does not include any sort of reference to Sparks, a strange feature that exists in the full-fledged Web version that (according to my very scientific public surveys) barely anybody understands. Because of this, we're glad it's not acknowledged in the iPhone app—more visual space and manpower can be dedicated to more important and easily usable features.

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Facebook’s biggest untapped opportunities for game developers

Zynga may look like the all-powerful, dominant game publisher on Facebook. But Facebook wants you to know it’s not too late to get in on the action: There’s room for more game companies on the social network.

Sean Ryan, the director of game partnerships at Facebook, said that there are roughly 200 million monthly active users playing games on Facebook, out of its total of 750 million monthly active users. About 50 percent of the gamers return daily to the site. Zynga dominates the field with 266 million monthly active users, according to AppData. But there are 375 games with more than 100,000 monthly active users, Ryan said, and there are Facebook developers in 190 countries.

“It’s not a market where 10 apps get all of the users,” Ryan said in a speech at the Casual Connect conference in Seattle on Tuesday. “The market is growing like crazy and you can participate in it.”

Ryan said that it makes sense that more types of games will succeed on Facebook in addition to Zynga’s city-building and farm-building games. He noted that cable TV now profitably supports more than 650 different TV channels.

The huge emphasis on Zynga’s games has obscured the fact that there are only two “hidden object” games on Facebook. Those include web games like Mystery Manor and Disney’s Gardens of Time, where players have to click on a screen in order to uncover a hidden treasure. There are scores of such hidden object games on casual game web sites.

“I think that the market could support more than 50 or 100 games in this genre alone,” Ryan said.

Another emerging category is casino games. There are other “mid-core” games emerging with lightweight combat options that appeal to both hardcore and casual fans. These include Zynga’s Empires & Allies, Kixeye’s Battle Pirates, and Digital Chocolate’s Army Attack. Kabam has also pioneered the hardcore game category with strategy titles like Glory of Rome or Dragons of Atlantis.

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PSL teens who knew accused suspect say 'Facebook invite just felt wrong'

PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. -- The Hadley family home remains a crime scene almost three days after the attack. Police say Tyler Hadley allegedly killed his parents Blake and Mary Jo Hadley with a framing hammer.

A group of teens, who say they know Tyler, tell us they had to come back to the house just to see it in person.

"I think it's crazy. You never expect something from around here to go... I've heard of people all over the country talking about it," said neighbor Frank Dembret.

Frank Dembret and Zach Gleason say they were invited to the party Tyler threw at his house, after police say he allegedly killed his mom and dad. But they say they didn't go because something seemed strange about the situation.

"I heard invite, hit me up all that. It's crazy. I didn't feel like going.... I have no clue. It just felt wrong. You know I had a weird gut feeling," said Gleason.

They say the whole situation seems even more surreal now. This generation is always connected, constantly checking sources all over the world on the internet and Facebook talking about their neighborhood and the events that took place just a few streets from their homes.

Read more: http://www.cbs12.com/articles/hadley-4733895-say-tyler.html#ixzz1Se3RhIXq

Police: Assault victim recognized suspect in newspaper ad, Facebook

A man was in custody Tuesday on a robbery by assault charge after police say his victim identified him through a Crime Stoppers ad and on his Facebook page.

Police arrested 33-year-old Renny Harvard last week and charged him with robbery by assault, a second-degree felony. According to Harvard's arrest affidavit, a woman who worked at a nonprofit, low-income housing organization in the 800 block of East Eighth Street reported that Harvard came into her office in May and asked for some water by writing a note, indicating to her that he was deaf. Harvard then grabbed a stack of money on the woman's desk and her car keys, leading to a struggle, the affidavit said.

 

Harvard grabbed the keys to the woman's Jeep and left the office while the woman continued to fight him, the affidavit said. He entered the vehicle and drove off with her hanging onto the door before she fell off, the affidavit said.

When the woman spoke with detectives, she could not identify Harvard from a photo lineup, the affidavit said. But she saw him in a Crime Stoppers ad in the Austin American-Statesman and located his Facebook page, the affidavit said. She notified investigators, who on Friday identified fingerprints on the note as being Harvard's.

Harvard was in custody Tuesday on multiple felony charges, including three counts of burglary of a habitation, one count of burglary of a vehicle, two counts of theft between $20,000 and $100,000, and possession of a controlled substance.

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More than half of parents snoop on children on Facebook to find out what they're up to .

More than half of parents log onto social networking sites like Facebook to spy on what their children are doing, a study has found.

Some 55% of mothers and fathers thought nothing of snooping around on their children’s profiles to see what they are up to.

They did it to avoid having ‘awkward conversations’ with the children but nearly a quarter admitted it was the only way they could find out about their lives.

The figures show that parents are becoming increasingly crafty in their attempts to keep tabs on their children in the digital age.

Almost one in 20 mothers and fathers even log on with a friend’s account to avoid detection and gain better access to their children’s profiles.

Websites like Facebook and MySpace along with microblogging site Twitter have become immensely popular amongst teenagers and children.

Figures from the Office for National Statistics show that last year among 16 to 24-year-olds 75% posted messages on them.

The majority of 13-16-year-olds have more than 100 ‘friends’ on Facebook whilst more than 750,000 are using the website below the age limit, which is 13.

Experts and parents however have expressed anxiety about how they can monitor what the young are up to when they go on-line.

Now it appears that parents, at least are taking matters into their own hands.

Whilst 55% said they did spy on their children, 40% said they did not but the remaining 5% said they would do if they knew how.

Some 41% monitor their children’s status updates and 39% look at their ‘wall’, which is where they and friends can write things.

Just under one third, 29%, looked at pictures their children had uploaded.
When asked why they behaved like they did, 6% of parents blamed their ‘overprotective’ instincts and 14% admitted they were just being ‘nosey’.

Facebook's huge popularity has made founder Mark Zuckerberg a massive personal fortune

But almost a quarter admitted it was the only way they could find out what their children were doing, and 6% did it to avoid ‘awkward conversations’ with them.

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HTC Status Review: A Phone for Facebook Fanatics

Seriously addicted to Facebook? The HTC Status ($50 with a two-year contract from AT&T), which debuted at Mobile World Congress as the ChaCha, keeps you connected with your family and friends on the world's most popular social network. Targeted toward younger audiences, the Status doesn't have the most cutting-edge specs, but the integration with Facebook within the software and the hardware sets it apart from other messaging phones.

Designed for Status Updates

While the Status might be inexpensive, its design and construction are far from cheap. The slightly curved design feels nice in the hand, and its build seems sturdy and high-end. The AT&T unit we received for review is white with silver accents, which looks quite stylish and sets the phone apart from the legions of black and chrome handsets out there. You can also buy a special mauve edition of the phone from Best Buy Mobile.

RIM might be having difficulty keeping its BlackBerry brand afloat, but the legacy of the BlackBerry design lives on. The Status also sort of resembles the HTC Dash, the Windows Mobile 6.5 phone from about two years ago. The face of the Status is split between a touchscreen and a physical QWERTY keyboard. And as with BlackBerrys, this keyboard is excellent and makes for comfortable, one-handed typing. The keys are sufficiently large and nicely spaced, and they have a satisfying amount of tactility. You get some useful shortcut keys, as well, such as a camera key, a ".com" key, four-way directional arrow keys, and a voice-command key.

The 2.6-inch display feels pretty cramped, however, and the low, 480-by-320-pixel resolution won't do your friends' profile photos any favors. The screen is too small for videos (aside from the quick YouTube clip), and the limited surface makes gaming difficult. It is fine for dashing off email, doing some light browsing, and skimming your Facebook feed.

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Facebook to Google+: 10 Reasons to Make the Switch

As Google+ continues to grow, debate rages over whether or not Facebook users should ditch their favored social network and try out the search giant's option. There are some who say such a shift makes sense, since Facebook isn't as adept at delivering a worthwhile social experience any longer. Others say that sticking with Facebook is the way to go, since it's so big, and that's where everybody's friends hang out.

Admittedly, making that decision is personal. And a solid argument can be made for using both social networks simultaneously. But if folks decide to turn their backs on Facebook and only use Google+ as their go-to social network, it wouldn't be a mistake. After all, there are a host of solid reasons people might decide to ditch Facebook in favor of Google+.

Read on to learn more about why some users are making the jump from Facebook to Google+, and why by doing so, they might find a better social network.

1. Facebook's privacy troubles

Facebook is no stranger to privacy troubles. Last year, for example, the company came under fire for making too much user data readily available to the public. In response, Facebook unveiled new privacy features last year that simplified the process of keeping personal information away from parties users didn't want to share it with. The only problem is the social network continues to come under fire from security experts, including Sophos, which said earlier this year that Facebook needs to do more to keep the privacy and security of data paramount in its plans. Although Google doesn't have the best privacy record either, Facebook's troubles might be enough to warrant a change to Google+.

2. It's all about Circles

When Facebook users share content on their page, it's very difficult to get only certain people to see it. In many cases, all of a person's friends see content, regardless of whether they want them to or not. But with Google+'s Circles feature, that issue is eliminated. Circles lets users put other folks into certain “groups” and then determine what they want to share with each group. Circles are central to the appeal of Google+.

3. Data Liberation is arguably the best feature

The best feature on Google+ is the service's Data Liberation. When employing that feature, users can download all their Google content, including photos, profile information and contacts, to their computers. In other words, a user who shares information in Google+ actually owns that content. On Facebook, that just isn't the case. If ownership matters to users, Google+ is their best bet.

4. Facebook video chat is lame in comparison

Facebook recently announced Skype integration, allowing users to engage in a video chat with a friend. It's a nice addition. The only problem is, when it comes to video chatting, Google+ reigns supreme, thanks to its Hangouts feature. Hangouts allow users to have a video chat with up to 10 people at the same time at no charge. Plus, friends who happen to see others in a video chat can drop in and join the conversation. Facebook can't compete on any level with that functionality.

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