We might have our own digital rights to worry about, but our northern cousins across the pond have troubles of their own too. The company behind The Hurt Locker, Voltage Pictures, is once again looking to make a dime by targeting fans of its products, as it prepares to take …
Read More »4G auction applications begin in UK
Finally the ball is starting to roll with next-generation British mobile broadband, with the auction applications for the 4G spectrum beginning in earnest. Mobile providers have until 4PM today to submit their bids, as well as a £100,000 deposit. Regulator OfCom will be vetting the bids and handling the auction, …
Read More »Brand loyalty, is it really such a good idea?
Most of our regulars know me as CARL, im just a skinny, everyday geek from Germany who is currently living in England. It is important that you know because a lot of the opinions we post here are just mine, and not an opinion of Kitguru.net. Anyhow, enough boring introduction …
Read More »Theresa May and Nick Clegg clash over ‘snooper’ bill
The UK and other countries around the world have been threatened by overreaching digital communication legislation many times in the past few years and we aren't done yet. The latest one is known as the “snooper” bill and it's being championed by home secretary Theresa May – fortunately, coalition partner …
Read More »Samsung advises us to “get ready” for CES 2013
While many of are more concerned about what technology related gifts, or cash for technology, we are going to receive for Christmas, the Consumer Electronics Show is quickly drawing closer. Samsung is one company that will be present that may have more than just new products to show off to …
Read More »Intel and IBM papers detail latest 22nm tech
IBM and Intel announced their latest 22nm technologies in papers at the International Electron Devices Meeting yesterday. EE Times said that a top Intel fab executive commented on ‘increasing wafer costs and the companies foundry business'. The Intel paper showed support for “high drive current across the spectrum of leakage …
Read More »Lenovo release touch version of Thinkpad X1 Carbon for Win 8
Lenovo have announced that they are releasing a touch screen version of the ThinkPad X1 Carbon. Kitguru reviewed the ‘non touch' version of this laptop back in October, you can read it here. This release targets the Windows 8 audience who want to enjoy touch screen capabilities. The 14 inch …
Read More »John McAfee sells life rights for movie, TV
It has been a heck of a year for John McAfee. The U.S. antivirus pioneer was recently arrested in Guatemala and is facing deportation to Belize as part of a murder investigation. He has sold his life story to Montreal based TV production company Impact Future Media. The Hollywood Reporter …
Read More »Facebook goes down in a big way – GMail joins it
Watching ‘The Social Network', you can see just how much Facebook's founders value ‘up time'. They are almost maniac about it. In the real world, the globe's second biggest site does a great job of staying up and running, but something strange seems to have hit the interwibble this evening. …
Read More »Homebrew Wii U channel now available
Well that didn't take long. In just over three weeks, the team behind the HomeBrew Wii channel have managed to get it working on the Wii U. It wasn't easy though, as Nintendo closed up the hole used to hack apart the original Wii. According to the release info of the …
Read More »Pirate Party UK threatened with BPI legal action
Following up from its request last week for the Pirate Party UK to remove the Pirate Bay (TPB) proxy from its website, The British Phonographic Industry (BPI) has now threatened the political party with legal action if it doesn't comply. While so far PPUK has only received a letter, informing it …
Read More »German law responsible for Wii U watershed
Last week we reported on how Nintendo was restricting its Eshop in the EU, making it impossible for anyone to access information, purchase options or trailers of 18+ rated games, unless they visited between 11PM and 3AM. Now Nintendo has explained why and it's because of a single German law. …
Read More »Australian police describe Apple Maps as “potentially life threatening”
It shouldn't be news to you that Apple Maps was a mess upon its launch a couple of months ago, nor should it surprise you that the Apple Maps director was shown the door last week. However, Victorian Police are now warning users to avoid Apple Maps as there have …
Read More »Patriot and CM Storm Competition – win hardware!
December is a crazy month for giveaways, but I doubt too many people are complaining ! Patriot are working with CM Storm and are giving away a Scout 2 case, Patriot Intel Extreme Master 16GB memory, An Inferno mouse and a Supersonic Rage 32GB USB 3.0 pen drive. If you …
Read More »Gabe Newell – Steam console PC coming for home users
Gabe Newell has been speaking with Kotaku about their plans to enter into the hardware sector. We have already discussed Valve's plans to release a console style computer for the home and this could go head to head against the upcoming Sony and Microsoft consoles. Valve seem keen to release …
Read More »Password security, you should care!
For the last couple of weeks, I have been getting many calls from friends and family members about their computers giving problems. This is nothing unusual, but I have been noticing a plethora of security issues on the computers I have been fixing. One of the computers I have to …
Read More »IBM optical chip heading into standard manufacturing
IBM have been working on new optical communications advances. They are due to outline today how this is possible with a standard 90 nanometer semiconductor manufacturing process. ZDnet posted an article on this today which makes for interesting reading. IBM have called the technology ‘silicon nanophotonics' which they outlined in …
Read More »NZBmatrix closes doors due to takedown notices
One of the scenes biggest newsgroup indexing sites NBZmatrix have closed their services. They posted on their homepage “The End… It is with our regret to announce that NZBMATRIX has closed. We have had to make this decision due to a very large takedown request from a company called Wiggin …
Read More »Arbitrators rule against severely injured Foxconn worker
A Foxconn worker that needed half his brain removed after an accident at one of the company's manufacturing facilities, has been ruled against by Chinese labour arbitrators, making it now seem likely that he will be forced to undergo disability testing in an area that offers far less support than …
Read More »Aria offers XFX 7870 with EIGHT game bundle
We're all aware of AMD's ‘Never Settle' campaign for Xmas, where the purchase of any decent spec card is accompanied by some cool new games for your stocking – free of charge. But it seems that the chaps at Aria have taken this one or two steps further. KitGuru plays …
Read More »Breaking The Taboo uses Youtube as political launch platform
For a site that began with a man talking about his trip to the Zoo, Youtube has evolved into something much bigger in the past half a decade – in terms of viewer numbers and in what it's used for. We've seen everything from drugged up kids after the dentist, …
Read More »Judge Lucy Koh urges ‘global peace’ between Apple & Samsung
Judge Lucy Koh who ruled over the $1bn award of patent damages to Apple against Samsung in August has made a plea for both companies to consider ‘global peace' yesterday at an appeal hearing. The companies argued for three hours over the scope and consequences of the earlier ruling. In …
Read More »IHS says 2012 was terrible – but 2013 should be better
While IDC and Gartner battle it out to produce the best overall estimates of the market in terms of how many units will ship into the various markets, other analysts focus on a specific set of components within those systems – and use that as a way to predict overall …
Read More »Google will charge small businesses for Gmail
Google have had success with their free online Google Apps suite, a package designed to challenge Microsoft Office in the mainstream sector. Google say that if they charge $50 per user per year (around £33 in UK) it can provide support to businesses. They said “Businesses quickly outgrow the basic …
Read More »Spotify pays out $500m in royalties – sounds sweet
Should artists be paid for their work? If so, how much? Should it be, at any stage, OK for people with little/no money to enjoy the artist's work without paying? Should IP be policed harder or is sharing the fault of middle-man companies that want to charge too much. These …
Read More »NZ spy group must reveal details to Kim Dotcom
Following on from a reveal in August that the New Zealand intelligence agency, Government Communication Security Bureau (GCSB), illegally spied on Megaupload founder Kim Dotcom before his arrest in January, it has now been granted that the file locker millionaire will be able to sue the organisation for damages. While …
Read More »Apple, can we have the cheap iPad now? please?
I was shopping today for some Christmas presents and I have to pick up an iPad Mini for my girlfriend. It's not an option. I think I have told you guys before that my girlfriend is a Macintosh fanatic. Its scary. Buying her something else for Christmas would cause problems …
Read More »Apple CEO Cook says company will manufacture Macs in USA
Apple CEO Tim Cook has said that Apple will spend more than $100 million next year on building Macintosh computers in America. They are moving a portion of their manufacturing away from China, the country which handles the majority of their product range. Cook spoke to Bloomberg Businessweek and said …
Read More »John McAfee arrested in Guatemala
The man behind one of the most well known names in home PC security, John McAfee has been arrested in Guatemala for entering the country illegally. He has been on the run for several days in neighbouring country Belize, after being described as a person of interest by the authorities, …
Read More »Intel-Microsoft target Apple tablet dominance: slow start
Bloomberg have reported that the joint Intel-Microsoft attack on the tablet market is off to a slow start. Both companies initially announced a dozen tablets which would run Windows 8. Only five of these can be purchased for immediately delivery. Craig Berger, an analyst at FBR Capital Markets has said …
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