5 major gripes against iPhone 4S despite its record sales in early days

Nothing is perfect in this world and the same is the story of the Apples's latest product iPhone 4S. It had applauds and very positive reviews so far but as time passes, there have been a number of complaints from the users already using it. Despite it record sales and over-sizing demands, the product to failed to be called a perfect model. Here is a brief detail about the 5 major gripes which iPhone 4S faced in these two weeks.

1. Slow service on Sprint

The big news on the carrier front for the iPhone 4S was that Sprint would be added as an approved mobile carrier, joining AT&T and Verizon. But some Sprint customers didn't get off to a very good start. Many users were reporting slow data speed for the first couple of days.

2. Weak battery

At the October 4 presentation unveiling the iPhone 4S, Phil Schiller , Apple vice president for product management, praised its "fantastic battery life" that would allow people to talk for eight hours before needing to charge the device again. But the user experience completely belied this claim. Users even complained of the new iPhone being more battery draining than iPhone 4.

3. Siri outside the United States

A product like iPhone is surely meant for a global market but not for a particular country or state. But the most discussed feature in iPhone, SIRI, failed to please the customers abroad. The same software which was praised in US for its revolutionary performance but all non-native English speakers faced problems using it.

4. Camera problems

An 8 megapixel camera was another selling point for the new iPhone, but users reported a number of issues not only about picture clarity but also about shutter speed. Some users even reported that iPhone gets stuck while using camera andthey have no other option but to restart the device.

5. Screen appearance

Users have also reported complaints about its display, as a yellowish tint or spots appears on the screen of their phones, making the resolution fuzzier than older phones. This issue was also there in previous iPhone. The tint and glow of the screen fades away in a couple of days.

Robotic sailboats to clean oil spill very soon

There have been a number of oil spills in the last few years including the one in Mumbai ocean this year. But the most severe such accidents took place in Mexico last year when the Deepwater Horizon semi-submersible Mobile Offshore Drilling Unit exploded in the Gulf of Mexico, killing 11 men, injuring 17 others and triggering what is generally recognized as one of the greatest human errors ever made. And by the time, the leak could be capped, around 4.9 million barrels of oil covered the Gulf making it a toxic slick.

After each such tragedies, it becomes a real pain in their head to recover the ocean and the aquatic eco-system from the spreading toxic fluid. Cleaning this up manually with workers is not only less efficient but also risky for worker's life.

Cesar Harada, then studying in MIT Boston visited the tragic site at Gulf of Mexico and decided to leave the college in order to develop an open source oil spill cleaning robot called Protei. Our current available oil spill skimming technologies are only able to collect three percent of the oil in the Gulf of Mexico and carry health risks to humans and heavy economic costs. Whereas, Protei, the unmanned autonomous relatively inexpensive and open hardware, will be a far more potential and powerful weapon in the battle to clean up oil spills while preserving the safety of the workers who would otherwise be exposed to the toxic mess. The other usage of this sailboat drone may also be oceanography and surveillance.

MotoACTV : A tech gadget for fitness freaks

We had discussed in the last post, about the release of Droid RAZR, the retro step taken by Motorola to being back the once best selling smartphone.. The next release the same day was MotoACTV, a gadget by Motorola specially designed for fitness freaks.

MotoACTV is of the size similar to that of iPod nano and it is specially designed to be worn as a wristband. It has a capacity of storing upto 4000 songs and it has got built-in tools for recording workout information. With GPS, Wi-Fi and a heart-rate monitor, the sweat and rain-resistant gizmo is targeted at runners and other outdoor-exercise enthusiasts. Commenting on this launch, Motorola spokesperson said that Motorola has put more technology per cubic millimeter into this than any other device in our history, which shows the capability of this tiny gadget.

Moreover, MotoACTV is Android-based and has a 600MHz processor, which means that you can further hack it as root and deploy the application of your own or from market to add more feature to it in future. Though MotoACTV isn't exactly running an official version of Android; rather, it uses the building blocks of Android but still that enriches its future enhancement possibilities. 

Looks like a watch, works like a music player(listen through a bluetooth headset) which can download songs from your PC and wirelessly uploads your fitness data, with a heart monitor, which can determine which song or music gets your heart pounding the most. To add more to it, there is an FM player as well. The gadget is sweat proof and shock resistant with a fluid touch screen UI.

This smart watch which will surely outrun others existing in the market will come in 8GB and 16 GB models for $249 and $299 respectively and is expected to hit the market by 6th November. Let's see how many of you are going to own it and wear it?

DroidRAZR : The new android release of best selling smartphone from past

Motorola mobility seems to be back in action. This Tuesday, Motorola unveiled two of its very important products.

First being the Droid RAZR, the android version 2.3(Gingerbread) based super slim smartphone which was released first in 2004 (without android) and it captured global markets before the iPhone release. Motorola RAZR was released 3 years earlier than iPhone and it rocked the market for 12 quarters thereafter untill the third quarter of 2007, when iPhone came into a bigger picture. RAZR was definitely the best selling smartphone from any brand ever until the iPhone came along.

Even as per sales records, Motorola sold around 110 million of RAZR in those three years(2004-07), a target which Apple took 4 years(2004-11) to reach. Recognizing its earlier sales records, Motorola will surely have bundle of expectation from its new Android release of RAZR.

With this move, Motorola seems to move retro by bringing back its once best selling smartphone. The next tech gadget to be unveiled the same day was MotoACTV which we will be discussing in the next post.

Buzz to be terminated very soon by Google

Google has its plan to kill off Buzz, which was its first trial towards social networking initiated around 18 months back by Google. Due to its new initiative in social networking i.e. Google plus, now Google is planning to close Buzz in a week or so.

It seems Google is scrapping a number of its products which have not yet achieved a major footprint on www. Dumping such projects to the scrap heap, including Code Search, a tool for finding open-source code on the Web, and Jaiku, a Twitter-like micro-blogging service that Google acquired in 2007, are more such examples. 

Earlier Google had an explosion of wrong steps taken with the launch of Buzz. One of them was that the network's default settings automatically set members to follow their most e-mailed contacts and then posted those contacts publicly after a user "buzzed" about something. Read this blog post for story of one such Buzz victim. Though, Google started altering all such settings and features in order to rectify its mistake but it was too late by then and the damage had already been done.

Closing Buzz will also help Google to focus on its 3 month old effort of social networking Google plus, which according to Google, is going to be a big success and a competitor to Facebook. Google claims that Google plus has now grown up to 40 millions users from the earlier count of 10 million users at the end of last quarter. 

For a not, as per Google's spokesperson, closing Buzz will not allow you to post anything on Google Buzz later on, but you can still view the older posts and they will also be able to download it using Google export tool TakeOut.

The new cricket rule-set from ICC

India's most successful(though some of my friends give this credit to his luck rather than his cricketing skills) captain i have ever seen, MS Dhoni, has won India the first ODI against England yesterday with a large margin. But before the match and even after the win, the only point he was worried about and commented upon was the new cricket rules set by ICC which has been applied on and after 1st Oct this year, most importantly the powerplay rules.

Here is a brief insight of the 9 new rules as set by ICC :

POWERPLAY RULES

Applicable : ODIs only

The batting and bowling Powerplays must be taken between the slots from 15th over to 40th over. which means that Powerplays will have to taken on or before the beginning of 36th over. Earlier they could take Powerplays at any time after the completion of the tenth over of the innings.

Reason : Bowling team does not have lot of options while powerplay is taken in death overs.

RUNNER

Applicable : All formats

Any batsman under any condition will not be allowed to call a runner. They can take retired hurt and return back later to bat if they feel so.

Reason : All the batsman do not have same running skills and capability which makes a difference when a runner is called.

TWO NEW BALLS PER INNING

Applicable : ODIs only

Each fielding team will be given two new balls to be used in alternate overs, one at each end. The mandatory change of the ball after the 34th over of an innings will not take place anymore. 

Reason : Ball changes have brought significant results earlier.

OBSTRUCTING THE FIELD

Applicable : All formats

If a fielding team appeals and the umpire feels the batsman has significantly changed his direction without probable cause, while running between the wickets, and obstructed an attempt to run him out, the umpire can give the batsman out for obstructing the field. The on-field umpires are allowed to consult the third umpire in making the decision. The other circumstances in which a batsman can be out obstructing the field are still applicable.

Reason : Intentional obstruction changes game result.

PENALTY TIME

Applicable : All formats
If a player, who still has some unexpired penalty time, applied due to any reason, remaining from a previous absence, is on the field when play is interrupted by bad weather, light or other reasons, the duration of the stoppage will be deducted from the remaining penalty time.

Reason : To make penalty time independent of weather or other conditions.

ATTEMPT TO RUN OUT AT NON STRIKER END

Applicable : All formats
Previously, the bowler could run out a non-striker backing up only if he did so before entering his delivery stride. But now, the bowler is permitted, before releasing the ball and provided he has not completed his usual delivery swing(that is when his bowling arm passes the normal point of ball release), to attempt to run out the non-striker.

Reason : To prevent unnecessary step out from crease at non-striker end.

EXTRA TIME FOR A MATCH

Applicable : Tests only
The umpires may decide to play 15 minutes (a minimum of four overs) extra time at the scheduled lunch or tea interval of any day if requested by either captain if, in the umpires' opinion, it would bring about a definite result in that session. If the umpires do not believe a result can be achieved no extra time shall be allowed.

Reason : To avoid change in match results due to lunch to certain extent.

LUNCH DELAY WHEN NINE PLAYERS ARE OUT

Applicable : Tests only

If a team is nine wickets down at the time of the lunch interval, the break will be delayed by a maximum of 30 minutes. Previously, only tea was delay-able, while lunch was taken even if a team was nine down. 

Reason : To avoid unnecessary delay caused by two breaks in previous case.

INTERVAL DURATION BETWEEN INNINGS

Applicable : ODIs only
The minimum interval for an uninterrupted ODI match has been increased from 20 minutes to 30 minutes. 

Reason : Time required for planning and executing needed extra time in certain matches.

Denis Ritchie, who laid the foundation for IT companies

On the warm evening of this Wednesday, 12th of Oct, the man behind the current fortress of IT industry passed away. The response from hardware techies for his demise was immense but it nowhere matched the river of praise and ocean of grief that flew after the announcement of death of iconic Steve Jobs. But it really should, the world may not recognize him as much as Jobs, may be because he was not that popular public face but his contribution were at par even more.

Denis Ritchie was not only the father of C Programming language but with his fellow Bell Labs researcher Ken Thompson, he used C to build UNIX, the operating system which is now the backbone of most of the IT empires including Apple. All popular languages, including Java, are based upon C and all operating systems are developed and designed on C's base. Today the application for mobile platforms - Android and iOS apps are also developed in Objective C, which again is based on C.

The contribution of Richie is definitely much more than any IT company's CEO and COO as he laid the foundation for where IT industries stand now. He is the shoulder where Steve Jobs and other IT giants stand upon.

SONY Pictures to bring biography of Steve Jobs

Well, you can call it a quick move as just one week of Steve's demise SONY Pictures is all set to buy the movie rights to an upcoming biography of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs. To add more to it, the talk is already in final stage and Sony is expected to pay $1 million for the rights to the book, which traces Jobs' story from college dropout to CEO of the world's leading tech company.

On the other hand, the leading publisher, Simon & Schuster, from NewYork which was to release the authorized biography of Steve Jobs by 21 November has suddenly shifted its date to 24 October following the demise of Steve Jobs earlier this month.

Comparing both these released, personifying the most iconoclastic personality in IT industry ever on written pages is going to be much simpler task than portraying him on canvass. The major problem when making a biography movie of a popular face is that you could not get a look alike face for the actor playing the lead role. The option is to being out energy and enthusiasm from the actor playing those icons which will bring the character closer to the one expected. For example Ben Kingsley as Gandhi, or more recently, Jamie Foxx as Ray Charles did the same.

Moreover, in Job's case there will be some more added difficulty to Sony as they have to play both Steve of early college days when he started the company in a garage as well as the 50 years old CEO who captivates his audiences with high profile launches of iPhones and iPads. Not only age, the health is also going to be a major concern as Jobs lost his weight dramatically when battling with the pancreatic cancer in his final years. Let's see with whom Sony Pictures comes out to play Steve Job's role.

Apple Co-founder first in line to get the new iPhone

It was so interesting to watch the Apple Co-founder Steve Wazniak standing in the long queue outside the Apple Store on 13th night. 

As the new device was going on sale on Friday, 14th of Oct, Wozniak was first in line when he showed up Thursday at the Apple store in Los Gatos. The line started forming since 2PM on 13th and Steve Wozniak was one among the five people who reached at that time. This shows the craze and commitment of the co-founder with the company and its launches.

Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, the duo behind the most innovative company of the world, who incorporated the idea in 1975 and the company Apple in 1977, have started their first office in Jobs parent's garage at the same city Los Gatos in California where Wozniak was seen to be the first one in line for the new iPhone.

As we all know, Apple's latest iPhone has already broken all records of pre-orders and it will be delivered starting 8AM today for all timezones.

Facebook released its iPad App after long 1.5 years

It has been one year, six months and seven days after the first iPad went into the sale, when Facebook released its app for Apple's tablet iPad. A number of iPad users have been looking for this iPad applications since long and now finally its here.

The long delayed release of this application has been in conversation as well. Some says that the reason behind the delayed launch may be the rift between Mark Zukerberg and the Apple's top executive over Apple's ping social networking site. Some also says that Facebook preferred to be accessed online on iPad as that way it does not need to follow Apple Store strict set of rules.

Former Facebook developer Jeff Verkoeyen, the lead engineer on the the iPad app, wrote on his blog recently that he quit the company after Facebook continually delayed the release of the iPad app. As per him, Facebook was working on it since Oct 2010 and for some reason, which he denied to unveil, the launch kept on delaying. At present, Verkoeyen is working for Google.

Though delayed, the experience of having facebook app on your iPad will surely be great as you will have your entire world on your fingertips. Here in the snap you may see how the app will look like.

What does 'S' stands for in iPhone 4S?

Apple never revealed what exactly 'S' stands for in iPhone 4S. With the success and popularity of its voice recognition tool, it seems that 'S' may well stand for SIRI.

SIRI, the new voice recognition software has received a bunch of positive applauds worldwide. Almost all technical gadget reviewers have appraised and given positive response to the iPhone 4S its new voice-recognition software, faster processing speed and improved picture-taking quality.

Though the new release was earlier criticized by the reviewers for various drawbacks as for example not altering the body design. But now they are widely accepting that the new voice recognition software SIRI make up for all these limitations with its features that lets users ask for weather updates, make calendar appointments or send messages without tapping on the keyboard. SIRI is also recognized as crazy good, transformative, category-redefining speech recognition first of its kind software.

Talking about the sells, iPhone fans did not even wait for the reviews to come. There is already an advanced order of around one million iPhone 4S and by the coming week this number is likely to reach the target of 3 millions. And now after such a positive review by most of the critics, the sales graph is likely to go beyond the expected margin. Good new for Apple...

The connection between Steve's death and iPhone 4S fortunes

Last tuesday, just two days before the death of the legend Steve Jobs, Apple launched iPhone 4S which was definitely not even at par to the expectations of the customers. Actually Apple had to release iPhone 5 but since certain features could not be achieved by then, so Apple had to end up releasing iPhone 4S.

Though, iPhone 4S featured some important specs attributed to the imaginary iPhone 5, like 1 GHz dual-core ARM Cortex-A9 processor, PowerVR SGX543MP2 GPU, an Apple A5 chipset and an 8-megapixel camera. It also had features like a 3.5-inch TFT Retina multi-touch display and is loaded with the latest Apple operating system iOS 5. But at the same time it lagged on features like edge-to-edge design, larger display, 4G LTE and NFC. Responding to these feature limitations, Apple shares responded to the Tuesday announcement of iPhone 4S and stocks lost 5 per cent though it recouped some losses later on.

But at the same time, one event took place that was the death of the man behind iPhone - Steve Jobs. And as its aftermath, iPhone 4S sales started rising from day 3, that is after Steve's death news. As per the present scenario, tech Web sites are predicting that Apple's fifth generation smartphone will become its fastest-selling device ever. This was exactly not the kind of reception the iPhone 4S announcement got on Oct. 4. When pre-orders started, iPhone 4S showed its massive sales potential and is now poised to become the biggest launch day success story from Apple. As per AT&T, there has already been 200,000 iPhone 4S advance orders, raising the prospect of iPhone 4S shattering all previous sales records at Apple. iPhone 4s is scheduled to start delivering from 14th this month.

Even Apple rivals postponed their phone launch after Job's death

There has never been such an iconic figure earlier whose death not only effected his company but also influenced its rivals to postponed their schedules in the wake of the cause. Steve Jobs is no doubt an unforgettable icon and his contribution to the smartphones will be remembered forever.

New nexus with curved screen

Following Steve's death on thursday evening, Apple's major rivals Google and Samsung announced the very next day that the launch of their latest new Nexus phone will be delayed due to the grave news of Steve. They told when the whole world is in deep sorrow, this is not surely the right time to launch a phone, which is a new product of the same line up, to which Steve Jobs has contributed his best of the lot.

While asking about stages of development and if the product is ready, Google Spokesman said that product is ready and well set to be released as announced earlier i.e. on Tuesday 11th of Oct, and the only reason why we are delaying the launch event is the grave news of Steve's death from which the whole world is yet to recover.

As we know, Google was to launch its new Nexus Phone which will be the first ever model with a curved touch screen and running on the latest Icecream Sandwich version of Android. Of course this is going to be major launch from Google and this surely is not the right time to launch an innovative model of smartphone when the person who changed the way smartphones operate died days ago.

Hot air could be the next free fuel for us

It is quite obvious and known to all, irrespective of whether you are a science major or not, you all will be knowing that temperature keeps rising on our planet and also that heat rises upwards. But have we ever imagine that it can come out to be a free fuel alternative for future. I am sure you would be thinking of its feasibility by now but good news is its not only feasible but an Australian company EnviroMission is already working on the same.

We have already seen electronic devices which cools the surrounding because of the heat transfer from hotter bodied to colder bodies like in refrigerator. Depending on the similar concept, the main idea of the entrepreneur Roger Davey from EnviroMission is to design one such solar chimney which will allow the rising air to go out of the building, taking the heat with it. This rising air will turn 32 turbines mounted on the tower and they will be turned to spin fast enough to generate electricity. The goal is to create, capture and control hot air to help power cities. EnviroMission has its plan to build a huge solar updraft tower, 2600 feet tall, in the Arizona desert.

A plus-point for this energy over the other renewable sources of energy is that solar and wind both are subjected to limitation as solar energy is not effective at night and wind energy is suitable only for coastal areas. But the heat air movement is a very common phenomenon is any region at any particular time so the energy generation will be more spasmodic and hence more reliable.

Surely there is lot to be done yet and a number of huddles to overcome but not doubt the concept is brilliant and of course the need for the time as energy sources are depleting day by day.

Alibaba disclosed its interest in purchasing Yahoo

The online giant Alibaba from China has expressed its desire to purchase all of the struggling online services based company Yahoo, whose stakes are falling day by day. Jack Ma, CEO Alibaba shown this interest at the China 2.0 conference at Stanford University last friday.

At present, Yahoo is also having 40% stake in the Alibaba, but the relation between both these companies has always been contentious. The only choice to get the shares held by Yahoo back is to purchase Yahoo itself and that may be one of the reason behind this disclosure. For now, there is no comment from Yahoo on this statement of Jack Ma.

Earlier, former Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz and Jack Ma had a dispute over ownership of AliPay, an online payment unit similar to eBay-owned PayPal. In May, Yahoo disclosed that Alibaba has handover 100% of AliPay shares to a new entity controlled by Jack Ma. 

On the other hand, if we see the future of Yahoo, there have been a huge sliding of Yahoo shares in last few months as the only option for Yahoo shareholders to earn profit was through service like AliPay which had to be executed by both Yahoo and Alibaba but after the AliPay event, this hope was diminished. Yahoo the CEO Bartz was also fired and the only option for Yahoo seems to lie in selling Yahoo. Yahoo's online services have already been hampered by Google and its online publishing services is also being severely harmed by Facebook. In 2008, Microsoft has offered $47 billion to purchase all of Yahoo and with time this value also goes down. In short, nothing is going the right way for Yahoo.

Good news : FB will never charge you for usage

Since the inception of the new features and changes in the Facebook earlier this year, there has been a ubiquitous rumor that one of these changes might be the charges Facebook is likely to put on its usage. But fortunately Facebook has no such plan not only in near future but also in a long run of its business.

I am sure you would like to know the reason behind this. So here it goes...

There are some obvious reasons why Facebook will never do that, first of all Facebook is earning much more than it planned to earn in its projected business plan. Moreover its about to go public in few months after which it revenue is likely to be about $80 billion to $100 billion.

Next big reason for this lie in Facebook's business model. Right from the time when the idea of Facebook originated its target has always been to increase the number of users and not to get money from its actual users itself. Following this strategy Facebook was free of ads for several years. Its just four years back (2007) when Facebook actually started putting ads on its pages.

Of course Facebook business is to make money but not in a direct manner. It has plan to monetize but not fetching money for usage which will do nothing but decrease its number of users. It is using Facebook credit system at present with games like Farmsville, Mafia Wars and others which is in turn building a platform similar to that of Paypal in a long run. It may come out to be one of the competitor of Paypal. Similar there are some other ways facebook is making money for example by selling third party products online etc.

Google Analytics offers real time website tracking for free

If you own and operate your own website, you will surely be aware of the most popular website traffic analyzer tools by Google - Google Analytics. The good news for all you is that Google Analytics has got a major upgrade this thursday and now it will be Google's first free real time traffic tracker.

Google Analytics has been a very useful tool for website owners since long as it offers services to track number of visits, visitors location, time spent by them over your page and various others features which help you optimize your website and popularize it on a global scale. Earlier there was a time lag of upto 24 hours in Google Analytics that is the visits today and its statistics will be shown hours later from actual visit time. But with this major upgrade, you will be seeing live statistics of your website.

Google Analytics was launched by Google in late 2005 after Google acquired the popular analytics software maker Urchin. Since then the service is being used increasingly and at present this free service from Google has millions of users worldwide. It seems that now Google is escalating its analysis services as earlier this week Google had also started Google Analytics Premium as a paid service for comparatively larger website.