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Redesigned next-generation iPhone parts leak to Chinese vendor
Apr 23rd
To start off what will undoubtedly be a long series of part leaks ahead of Apple’s next-generation iPhone launch, China-based parts retailer TVC-Mall has made what it claims to be “iPhone 5″ home buttons available for purchase on its site. “Are you interested in the iPhone 5 which will come out soon?” the company wrote on its website. “Different from iPhone 4S 4, the iPhone 5 home button is round in the centre and square outside as the pictures show.” The home buttons are available for purchase in both black and white, and no other information regarding the next-generation iPhone was made available. TVC-Mall has sold authentic iPhone parts ahead of official Apple launches in the past. BGR reported last December that Apple plans to launch a redesigned iPhone this coming fall.
[Via MacRumors]
Zach Epstein
Hurt Locker producers file suit against 2,514 BitTorrent users
Apr 23rd
Voltage Pictures, the production studio behind the Oscar-winning film The Hurt Locker, has filed a new lawsuit in a federal court in Florida, according to TorrentFreak. The studio’s latest complaint targets at least 2,514 alleged BitTorrent users, whom Voltage Pictures claims pirated the film and cost the studio millions. The company last year filed a joint lawsuit against more than 30,000 alleged BitTorrent users who illegally downloaded the film. The case closed this past December, with Voltage Pictures collecting an undisclosed number of settlements. The studio’s latest suit looks to obtain a subpoena that will order ISPs to reveal the identities of the defendants. The alleged pirates will then be offered a settlement of about $3,000, the report claims. All of the defendants allegedly downloaded the film in 2010 and are Charter Communications subscribers.
Dan Graziano
Nokia breaks ground on new manufacturing facility in Vietnam
Apr 23rd
Nokia officially starts the development of its manufacturing facility in Vietnam
Reaffirming long-term commitment to the country and the company’s strategy to connect the next billion to information and the Internet
Bac Ninh, Vietnam – In an official ceremony today, Nokia kicked-off the development of its manufacturing facility in Vietnam, to serve the growing demand for mobile phones all over the world. The event featured Secretary of the Central Party Committee, Vice President of the National Assembly of Vietnam, Madam Nguyen Thi Kim Ngan; Minister of the Ministry of Science and Technology Vietnam, Mr. Nguyen Quan; Ambassador of Finland to Vietnam, Kimmo Lähdevirta; and high ranking officials from Central authorities and Bac Ninh province amongst more than 200 others.
Located in Vietnam-Singapore Industrial Park (VSIP) in Bac Ninh province, the Nokia Vietnam manufacturing facility is being developed on an area of 17 hectares. Nokia expects to start the operations of this factory in early 2013.
Today’s event is one step further in reaffirming Nokia’s long term commitment to the Vietnam market, under Nokia’s strategy to connect the next billion people to information and the Internet.
Nokia’s position in high growth economies is strong, and mobile phones play a strategic role. The new manufacturing site is being established to meet the growth in demand for these phones, as well as to help Nokia to deliver a contemporary mobile experience to the next billion consumers all over the world.
“We highly appreciate Nokia’s efforts in making this commitment a reality, which contributes to the growth of foreign investment in Vietnam in general and in Bac Ninh in particular. We also hope this will bring up not only economic value, but also other social benefits for the country like job creation and community knowledge enhancement on information technology
Article source: http://www.bgr.com/2012/04/23/nokia-breaks-ground-on-new-manufacturing-facility-in-vietnam/
Netflix beats estimates in Q1; posts narrower loss on $870 million in sales
Apr 23rd
Netflix posted its financial results for the first quarter of 2012 after the bell on Monday. The company reported a loss of $0.08 per share, or$5 million, on $870 million in revenue, beating analysts’ consensus. Netflix posted a profit of $1.11 per share on $719 million in revenue in the first quarter last year, and Wall Street was expecting a loss of $0.27 per share on $866 million in sales this past quarter. All eyes were on Netflix’s subscriber additions this quarter, and the company said it added nearly 3 million streaming customers in the first quarter, including 1.21 million international streaming subscribers. The company shed more than one million DVD rental subscribers in the U.S. after losing 2.76 million DVD subscribers in the fourth quarter. Netflix’s global streaming subscriber count now sits at more than 26 million, up from 24.4 million at the end of the fourth quarter. In the second quarter, Netflix expects a net loss of between $6 million and $8 million as domestic streaming subscriber totals reach between 23.6 million and 24.2 million, below the Street’s estimates of 24.5 million. Shares of Netflix stock tumbled nearly 15% in after-hours trading on Monday following the release of the company’s earnings report.
Zach Epstein
Article source: http://www.bgr.com/2012/04/23/netflix-beats-estimates-in-q1-posts-narrower-loss-on-870-million-in-sales/
Facebook post Q1 results: $205 million in profit on $1.06 billion in revenue
Apr 23rd
Facebook on Monday filed an updated version of its S-1 that included the company’s first-quarter results. The social networking giant saw $1.06 billion in revenue, up from $731 million in the same quarter last year but down from $1.131 billion in the fourth quarter of 2011. Facebook saw net income of $205 million, down from $233 million in the same quarter last year and down $302 million sequentially. The website now has 532 million daily active users, up from 372 million last year and 483 million in December. Facebook’s monthly active user count rose from 680 million last year to 901 million, and users uploaded 300 million photos per day on average while generating 3.2 billion combined likes and comments. The updated filing also reveals that Facebook acquired Instagram for $300 million in cash and 23 million shares of stock.
Dan Graziano
HTC One X now available for pre-order from AT&T
Apr 23rd
HTC’s flagship One X smartphone is now available for pre-order from ATT for $199.99 on contract. The handset finds itself at the top of HTC’s new lineup of One-series smartphones, which the Taiwan-based vendor hopes will help it turn its sliding smartphone business around. The flagship smartphone features a dual-core 1.5GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon processor, a 4.6-inch 720p HD display, an 8-megapixel rear camera, a 1.3-megapixel front-facing camera, 16GB of internal storage, 1GB of RAM and Sense 4 on top of Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich. The HTC One X is available from ATT in either gray or white, and it will launch on May 6th, three days after Samsung unveils its next-generation Galaxy S III smartphone.
Zach Epstein
Apple to discontinue the 17-inch MacBook Pro, analyst predicts
Apr 23rd
Research analyst Ming-Chi Kuo of KGI Securities predicts that Apple may discontinue the 17-inch MacBook Pro model due to weak sales, MacRumors reported on Monday. The analyst has previously offered accurate information regarding the discontinuation of Mac products, specifically the 13-inch Macbook in 2011. Kuo estimates Apple will sell 5.32 million Mac computers in the second quarter of 2012, representing a 35.2% year-over-year increase. The Cupertino-based company is expected to launch an updated line of MacBook computers this summer that will be will be thinner and may feature Retina-resolution displays.
Dan Graziano
Security firm identifies origins of ‘Flashback’ Mac virus
Apr 23rd
The “Flashback” virus discovered to have infected more than 600,000 Mac computers earlier this month originated on a series of WordPress blogs, security experts have determined. According to Alexander Gostev, head of the global research and analysis team at Kaspersky, the virus began as a trojan hidden within a fake Adobe software update. In March, however, the malware’s creators repackaged the virus in a “drive-by attack” that infected users’ Apple computers when they visited one of thousands of compromised WordPress blogs. ”Tens of thousands of sites powered by WordPress were compromised,” Gostev wrote on Kaspersky’s SecureList blog. “How this happened is unclear. The main theories are that bloggers were using a vulnerable version of WordPress or they had installed the ToolsPack plug-in.” Apple released a system update earlier this month that patched a Java vulnerability and removed most common iterations of the Flashback virus. As of the middle of last week, however, more than 140,000 Mac computers were still infected with the virus, which is capable of intercepting private data and transmitting it without a user’s knowledge.
Zach Epstein
Article source: http://www.bgr.com/2012/04/23/security-firm-identifies-origins-of-flashback-mac-virus/
Adobe looks to the cloud with Creative Suite 6
Apr 23rd
Adobe on Monday announced pre-order availability of its next-generation collection of design applications, Creative Suite 6, which includes Photoshop CS6, Illustrator CS6, InDesign CS6, Dreamweaver CS6, After Effects CS6, Flash Builder CS6 and more. ”Creatives get a ton of innovation across CS6, with milestone releases of all our flagship products,” Adobe’s SVP of Digital Media David Wadhwani said. “With CS6 and Creative Cloud, we’re also introducing new products, new mobile workflows and advanced publishing capabilities that show we are laser-focused on ensuring design, Web and video pros have everything they need for the delivery of high-impact content and apps.” Read on for more.
Pricing ranges from $1,299 for the “Design Web Standard” edition of CS6 to $2,599 for the “Master Collection,” and upgrades from previous Creative Suite versions range from $300 to $550. Adobe also unveiled its Creative Cloud solution, however, which adds online storage and sharing capabilities to CS6 and offers users the opportunity to save money while taking advantage of the new service.
For a monthly subscription ranging from $49.99 to $74.99, users get access to Creative Cloud as well as all of Adobe’s new CS6 Master Collection software. Adobe Creative Cloud is also available for just $29.99 per month for the first year to Creative Suite customers upgrading from earlier versions of the software.
Creative Suite 6 is available for pre-order beginning Monday and it will launch within the next 30 days.
Samsung teases ‘The Next Galaxy’ [video]
Apr 23rd
Samsung recently launched a teaser website, “tgeltaayehxnx.com,” that contained a twenty-four hour countdown. When the clock hit zero Monday morning, the website redirected users to thenextgalaxy.com. Samsung teases its next-generation Galaxy device with an embedded video, and says a “whole new world will soon be unpacked.” In the final frame, the video promises that the new Galaxy device will allow users to “stand out from everyone else,” as hundreds of sheep stand in a field — a clear dig at iPhone users, who are sometimes referred to as “iSheep.” Samsung will unveil the Galaxy S III smartphone, possibly alongside a new Galaxy Tab tablet and cloud service, on May 3rd. The teaser video can be found after the break.
Dan Graziano
Article source: http://www.bgr.com/2012/04/23/samsung-teases-the-next-galaxy-video/