The World Worm Web » technology

Soundsnap Uses Sound To Trigger Your iPhone’s Camera

drworm — Tue, 12 Apr 2011 02:53:32 +0000

Without a dedicated shutter button on the iPhone, taking photos requires you to press the touchscreen, which is hardly an intuitive option. Some Aussie developers have launched a camera app that instead uses sound as the shutter’s trigger.

Called Soundsnap, the app lets you use any sound, be it your voice or the snap f your fingers, to trigger the camera’s shutter, which is especially useful if you happen to have your camera mounted on a tripod. Even better is the fact that you can use a Bluetooth headset to remotely trigger the shutter from across the room, without having to shout like a fool to get the app to work.

The app costs $1.19 from the iTunes Store.

[iTunes]

gizmodo.com.au.

Soundsnap Uses Sound To Trigger Your iPhone’s Camera is a post from: worldwormweb

Opposition to can Aus $1.3bn school laptops program

drworm — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 10:40:29 +0000

Opposition to can Aus $1.3bn school laptops program

Election fun and games

By Drew Cullen • Get more from this author

Posted in Government, 29th July 2010 10:08 GMT

Australia’s general election is in full swing and disputes over tech funding and tech policy continue to intrude on today centre stage.

In today’s spat, shadow treasurer Joe Hockey said he would scrap the government’s “wasteful” computers for schools initiative if the centre right Coalition wins.

That would mean Year 9 pupils will not get their mitts on laptops as promised by the outgoing Labour government.

Last year, the government agreed a second round of funding worth $91m (£52.5m, US$82.2m) to buy 141,000 laptops for year 9-12 students in 1400 schools nationwide. The idea is to have a ratio of one laptop per two pupils.

At the time, Julia Gillard, then minister of education, and now Prime Minister, costed a full roll-out at $1.3bn (£750m, US$£1.17bn) over six years.

Hockey disputes this – this has now turned into a $2bn program with half the number of promised computers, he told Fairfax Radio Network.

His party has not come up with its own computer for schools program yet.

But really, does Australia’s schools need so many laptops? According to at least one study, admittedly investigating home use, of 150,000 children in North Carolina, computers and broadband for all increases the digital divide. Poor parental supervision of poorer children is partly to blame.

And who can say that schools will be so very wonderful in supervising the computer use of their teenage charges?

Australia goes to the polls on August 21. ®

Related stories

Australian Senate censors print link to cartoon (25 July 2010)

Australia unbans the internet (9 July 2010)

Report reams IT admins for secretly snapping student pics (6 May 2010)

Intel: Think of the children – give them PCs, not e-readers (2 March 2010)

Brown offers free laptops to deprived UK schoolkids (12 January 2010)

via go.theregister.com

Posted via email from drworm’s posterous

Opposition to can Aus $1.3bn school laptops program is a post from: worldwormweb

Vodafone iPhone 4 Pricing Revealed

drworm — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 07:32:04 +0000

Vodafone have released their much anticipated pricing. Excerpt below

Vodafone releases iPhone Pricing

Tuesday, July 27, 2010 in News

Everyone’s been waiting for our plan prices to be released, now we can let you all know. Hopefully it’s been worth the wait!

*Monthly credit can be used for Standard calls, video, TXT & PXT®, International voice, video, TXT & PXT®, Voicemail, Mobile Internet , Calls to 13, 18 numbers
** Unlimited standard national and international TXT, PXT® and video PXT® sent to personal mobile numbers
^ Standard voice calls to Vodafone and 3 in Australia

iPhone 4 features FaceTime, which makes the dream of video calling a reality, and Apple’s stunning new Retina display, the highest resolution display ever built into a phone, resulting in super crisp text, images and video. iPhone 4 also features a 5 megapixel camera with LED flash, HD video recording, Apple’s A4 processor, a 3-axis gyro and up to 40 percent longer talk time—in a beautiful all-new design of glass and stainless steel that is the thinnest smartphone in the world. iPhone 4 comes with iOS 4, the newest version of the world’s most advanced mobile operating system, which includes over 100 new features. The revolutionary App Store provides access to more than 200,000 apps including the new iMovie app built just for iPhone 4.

Vodafone iPhone 4 Pricing Revealed is a post from: worldwormweb

Vodafone to release iPhone 4 details this Wednesday

drworm — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 03:31:30 +0000

In a tweet from the official Vodafone twitter account @vodafone_au, Vodafone has confirmed they will be announcing details of their iPhone 4 plans on Wednesday. The new iPhone is expected to be released in Australia on Friday 30th July.

Posted via email from drworm’s posterous

Vodafone to release iPhone 4 details this Wednesday is a post from: worldwormweb

Qwitter: was it something I tweeted?

drworm — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 10:03:17 +0000

This article titled “Qwitter: was it something I tweeted?” was written by Rob Fitzpatrick, for The Guardian on Wednesday 7th July 2010 19.30 UTC

If you are interested in testing your resistance to psychic pain, may I recommend Qwitter? This is a service that emails you daily to impart who has “unfollowed” you on Twitter in the last 24 hours – who, among all the new friends you have acquired online, has decided they no longer want to read your hilarious 140-character posts. If Twitter is the bright, open heartland of limitless conversation, then Qwitter is the abandoned wheelie-bin behind the boarded-up kebab shop of failure, a place where the limitless conversation ends.

The email arrives heralded by the strapline “Your latest Twitter Qwitters!” – has there ever been a more unwelcome exclamation mark? – and your eye is immediately drawn to that day’s number. Today it was small: just one, a T-shirt company. Why was a T-shirt company following me? More to the point, what did I do to make a T-shirt company unfollow me? Losing something a step up from a spambot (an automated identity that posts malicious links) is nothing; much worse is when the rejections come in groups. Last week I lost six in a day. Six entirely (as far as I can see) unconnected people decided they could live without my sun-bleached pictures of Dulwich park and excitable Spotify recommendations. To be Qwit is to be reminded that someone has stopped listening, stopped caring. It’s as if they have, very quietly, put the phone down on you while you are still talking.

In the past I have unfollowed many people, recently jettisoning a number of blowhard wafflers, a young rapper constantly plugging his CD, and a maddeningly ponderous website editor. I’ve dropped people I have interviewed, worked with and even like, in an attempt to keep the online noise down a little. And not one of those decisions was personal – apart from maybe the website editor. I just wanted something else from my Twitter feed. So I know how ridiculous it is to feel bad about being digitally dumped. Yet this distancing still stings. What did I say? What did I do? Don’t go, you feel like shouting, tomorrow I might tweet a blurry picture of my lunch or even say something mildly amusing about a Coronation Street character.

guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010

Published via the Guardian News Feed plugin for WordPress.

Qwitter: was it something I tweeted? is a post from: worldwormweb

Twitterrific 3 isn’t that good.

drworm — Fri, 25 Jun 2010 04:45:07 +0000

Today I downloaded Twitterrific 3 for iPhone and was left very disappointed. It is clearly a step backward, gone are easy to get to filters for replies, DM’s, favourites and my own tweets. Also gone is the ability to mark tweets within the app. Resizing for easy viewing is gone as is multiple account support on the ad-supported version. Whilst list support has appeared, popular things that are missing include: ability to add personal bit.ly api, ability to geo-tag tweets.

I had a short conversation with someone from the @Twitterrific twitter account, here it is.

Luckily @Twitterrific made this a new download so I can still use the old one, but that doesn’t solve my problem with custom URL shortening. I liked this app as it allowed me to see that i wasn’t missing any tweets throughout the day if @twitter goes off, like yesterday when the Federal leadership #spill was happening here in Australia. Whilst they say improvement is coming, they have stripped it right back to not much more than m.twitter.com can provide. At the end they appear to be going with Twitters new in-house URL shortening, totally leaving out those of us with custom URL’s, is this a good thing? I don’t think so.

Twitterrific 3 isn’t that good. is a post from: worldwormweb

Faster backups with iOS 4

drworm — Thu, 17 Jun 2010 04:30:28 +0000

Ooh faster updating with iOS4.
Find out how:
http://www.loopinsight.com/2010/06/16/itunes-9-2-paves-the-way-for-ios-4-and-iphone-4/

Faster backups with iOS 4 is a post from: worldwormweb

Twitter down AGAIN

drworm — Tue, 15 Jun 2010 04:24:31 +0000

Twitter is down again, here is the post on status.twitter.com, The API’s seem to be down as well. Sadface.

Current Twitter status 15-06-2010 @ 14:18

Twitter down AGAIN is a post from: worldwormweb

iPost

drworm — Mon, 31 May 2010 04:01:15 +0000

Posted via email from drworm’s posterous

iPost is a post from: worldwormweb

The 1st Official World Worm Web Awards – The Wormy’s

drworm — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 07:30:00 +0000

With all the awards going around at the moment I thought I’d run my own awards for the things I like, The Wormy’s. As this is my first go I have made myself the sole arbiter of the awards. There are many varied categories so try to keep up.

Best mobile Twitter client:

Winner – Twitterific
Honourable Mention – Tweetdeck

Best mobile phone:

Winner – Apple iPhone
Honourable Mention – Nexus One (This might have won had it been available here in Australia!!)

Best Office Suite:

Winner – Microsoft Office 2007
Honourable Mention 1 – Openoffice.org
Honourable Mention 2 – Google Docs (its just not quite there yet in my opinion)

Best Browser

Winner – Firefox 3.6
Honourable Mention – Safari

Best desktop twitter client

Winner – Tweetdeck
Honourable Mention – Seesmic for Windows

Best social media tool

Winner – Twitter
Honourable Mention – Facebook

Best Online news source

Winner – Google News
Honourable Mention – SMH.com.au

Best Technology news source

Winner – techcrunch.com
Honourable Mention – mashable.com

Best Radio Station

Winner – ABC 702 Sydney
Honourable Mention – triple j

Best Digital only radio station

Winner – ABC Grandstand
Honourable Mention – Radar

TV Channel of the Year – Free to air

Winner – ONE HD
Honourable Mention – SBS

TV Channel of the Year – Pay TV

Winner –Eurosport
Honourable Mention – UKTV

Australian TV show of the Year

Winner – Packed to the Rafters
Honourable Mention – Offsiders

International TV Show of the year

Winner – Top Gear (UK)
Honourable Mention – QI

Best piece of Technology

Winner – Apple iPod Touch
Honourable Mention – Foxtel IQ2

Australian Sports-person of the year

Winner – Mark Webber
Honourable Mention – Casey Stoner

International Sports-person of the year

Winner – Jenson Button
Honourable Mention – Ryan Giggs

Sports team of the year

Winner – Brawn GP
Honourable Mention – Manchester United

Song of the year

Winner – Muse – United States of Eurasia
Honourable Mention – Lily Allen – Not Fair

Wormy Thing of the Year

Winner – Google Reader

I just can’t start my day with out a browse through my subscriptions on Google Reader.

The 1st Official World Worm Web Awards – The Wormy’s is a post from: worldwormweb

Happy 1st Birthday Tweetdeck

drworm — Sat, 11 Jul 2009 06:58:23 +0000

A belated Happy 1st Birthday to Tweetdeck

Happy 1st Birthday Tweetdeck is a post from: worldwormweb

Microsoft unveils Windows 7 prices

drworm — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 03:41:14 +0000

Microsoft on Thursday announced prices for Windows 7 and offered free upgrades to buyers of personal computers before the new operating system hits the stores in October.

Brad Brooks, corporate vice president for Windows consumer marketing, said Microsoft will offer free upgrades to Window 7 to people who buy Vista-equipped PCs between Friday and the October 22 release date of Windows 7.

Vista is Microsoft’s much-criticised previous operating system and the Redmond, Washington-based software giant is hoping that Windows 7 will help erase bad memories of Vista in the minds of consumers.

Brooks said in a video released by Microsoft that the free upgrades would apply to people who purchase PCs running Windows Vista Home Premium, Windows Vista Business or Windows Vista Ultimate.

The upgrade program will be available until January 31, 2010.

The offer of free upgrades is seen as an attempt to prevent people from putting off a decision to purchase a PC until October. An estimated 90 per cent of the world’s PCs run on Windows.

Microsoft said Windows 7 will be available in 14 languages on October 22: English, Spanish, Japanese, German, French, Italian, Dutch, Russian, Polish, Brazilian Portuguese, Korean, Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese and Chinese (Hong Kong).

It will be available on October 31 in 21 other languages: Turkish, Czech, Portuguese, Hungarian, Swedish, Danish, Norwegian, Finnish, Greek, Ukrainian, Romanian, Arabic, Lithuanian, Bulgarian, Estonian, Slovenian, Hebrew, Thai, Croatian, Serbian Latin, and Latvian.

Because of a European Commission anti-trust inquiry, the Windows 7 version going on sale in Europe will not include Internet Explorer, Microsoft’s Web browser. Microsoft announced earlier this month that it had decided to remove the Web browser because of the regulatory wrangling.

Microsoft said a Home Premium Upgrade of an existing PC to Windows 7 would cost $A199 in Australia while the Professional Upgrade would cost $A399 and the Ultimate Upgrade $A429.

It said the Home Premium version of Windows 7 would retail for $A299 in Australia. The Professional version will sell for $A449 and the Ultimate version for $A469.

Amid slumping PC sales worldwide, Microsoft has been aggressively pushing laptop computers recently in a series of new advertisements in the United States as a low-cost alternative to the more expensive machines of rival Apple.

AFP

From www.smh.com.au

Microsoft unveils Windows 7 prices is a post from: worldwormweb

grrr trying to get google ana…

drworm — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 10:49:21 +0000

grrr trying to get google analytics working can be so frustrating grrr trying to get google ana… is a post from: worldwormweb

grrr trying to get google ana… is a post from: worldwormweb

Nine News making ‘great leap’ into digital with latest hi-tech equipment | The Australian

drworm — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 13:16:26 +0000

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/business/story/0,28124,25635029-7582,00.html

finally some action by Channel Nine on those crappy news pictures.

Nine News making ‘great leap’ into digital with latest hi-tech equipment | The Australian is a post from: worldwormweb

I want an #android phone. I t…

drworm — Fri, 29 May 2009 10:26:33 +0000

I want an #android phone. I think. Maybe. What are they again? maybe it should be Android based phone?

I want an #android phone. I t… is a post from: worldwormweb

I want one of these: http://bi…

drworm — Tue, 26 May 2009 03:15:07 +0000

I want one of these: http://bit.ly/cClT9 I want one of these: http://bi… is a post from: worldwormweb

I want one of these: http://bi… is a post from: worldwormweb

Sony abandons rear-projection TVs

drworm — Fri, 28 Dec 2007 04:32:00 +0000

Sony is dropping its money-losing rear-projection TV business worldwide to focus on two flat panel technologies – liquid crystal display and organic light-emitting diode.

Sales of rear-projection TVs had been declining recently as LCD TVs gain in popularity and get bigger, Sony spokesman Shinji Obana said.

In October, Sony lowered its global sales forecast for rear-projection TVs – which uses a projector to create images on large screens – to 400,000 from 700,000, which is down from 1.1 million the previous fiscal year.

By contrast, Sony expects to sell 10 million LCD TVs this fiscal year through March, up from 6.3 million the previous year.

Sony sells 85 percent of its rear-projection TVs in the US, and about 10 percent in Europe, according to Obana. Production at the three plants that make the rear-projection TVs in Japan, Mexico and Malaysia, will be halted, Obana said.

The decision to abandon rear-projection TVs underlines Sony's strategy of focusing on LCDs and OLEDs at a time when competition is heating up in flat TVs.

In the fiscal half-year through September, Sony lost 60 billion yen ($US526.3 million) in its TV operations, partly because of losses tied to rear-projection TVs. Diving prices of LCD TVs also contributed to the red ink, Obana said.

The world's electronics makers are all working on LCD technology for TVs, as well as another technology called plasma display panels, or PDP.

Earlier this month, Sony began selling a small 11 inch TV that uses a relatively new but expensive flat-panel technology called OLED. Sony's XEL-1 measures just 3 millimeters, or 0.12 inches, thick and delivers clear, vivid images.

Earlier this week, Matsushita Electric Industrial, which makes Panasonic brand products, Hitachi and Canon forged a tie-up in their liquid crystal display businesses – another sign of how Japanese electronics makers are being forced to work together to compete globally.

Sony has an alliance with South Korea's Samsung Electronics in LCDs.

Sharp Corp, another major Japanese LCD maker, formed a partnership with Toshiba Corp last week. Under the deal, Toshiba will buy LCD panels from Sharp for its TVs.

Source – SMH

Sony abandons rear-projection TVs is a post from: worldwormweb