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last minute tech news from around the net

Saturday, Jan 28th

Last update08:11:13 PM GMT

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Salsa hack

Salsa hack

Salsa and picante sauce have been giving ketchup a run for the money for awhile now. Even when you could buy HOT salsa it wasn't really hot (IMO) but at least locally it can be difficult to find anymore. Usually I just add some habanero hot sauce to ...
Company turns to bribery for 5 star Amazon reviews

Company turns to bribery for 5 star Amazon reviews

In a world where word of mouth and the judgment of the hive mind is worth more than any ad or the ruminations of many professional reviewers, companies will do just about anything to ensure a strong rating on outlets like Amazon . It's clear that dummy ...

Papercraft Viewmaster and Etch-a-Sketch

Marshall Alexander made these free downloadable papercraft Etch-a-Sketch and Viewmaster models. He notes, "Instead of creating exact paper replica's I chose to do very simple interpretations that fit on a single page and are very easy to construct." ...

Android App of the Week: Talking Puppy Is Guaranteed to Melt Your Heart

28.01.12
Not ready to take the leap into owning a real pet yet? Well Talking Puppy features an unbelievably adorable baby husky who will repeat your words back to you in an equally adorable...

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Windows Phone App of the Week: Custom Lock Screen Lets You Get Creative With Bing Search Images

28.01.12
Custom Lock Screen is a remarkably well-named app that lets users search through Bing or private images to create custom backgrounds for the Windows Phone lock screen. Users can choose between preset ...
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BlackBerry App of the Week: Beat the Intro Serves Up Name That Tune Action

28.01.12
Beat the Intro is a game that mirrors the old Name That Tune game show of old – hear a few seconds from the beginning of a song, and try to name it....

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iPad App of the Week: Pixlr-o-matic Gives Your Photos a Little Style

28.01.12
iPad and iPhone users can dress up their photos with Pixlr-o-matic, a photo editing app that allows users to add effects, overlays, and borders to pictures in their libraries. You can try your...

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iPhone App of the Week: TrapCall Reveals Blocked and Restricted Numbers For Incoming Calls

28.01.12
Picking up your phone and seeing that the phone number is blocked or restricted is never really a preferable experience. Granted, it could just be your mom calling on a landline. Or, it...

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Molly Bot Turns Your Retweets into Sweets

28.01.12
Here is one gadget that is tweeter than sweet! Molly is a little robot that turns your retweets into sweets! Designed to sit on your desk along side your computer while you work,...

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China’s Wealthy Women Want Women Bodyguards – Sorry Guys!

27.01.12
To start off, yes – that picture is of a bodyguard-in-training getting a glass bottle smashed on her head. I have never had a glass bottle smashed on my head, but I don’t...

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Twitter Introduces Censorship Policy on Country-By-Country Basis

27.01.12
On Thursday, Twitter announced on its blog that it will begin a new censorship policy that works on a country-by-country basis. Content that breaks laws, such as pro-Nazi material in Germany or percei...
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Intel Gets in Bed With RealNetworks, Buys $120 Mil in Codecs and Patents

27.01.12
Intel and RealNetworks, maker of RealPlayer (yes, it still exists) have entered into an agreement where Intel will purchase many of the media company’s patents and next-generation video codec so...
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The Monster Case Turns Your iPhone into a Cuddly Pet

27.01.12
At the very least, holding onto your phone will be a little more comfortable. The Monster Case is a snap-on hard case for the iPhone 4S that comes with a chunk of fake...

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Siri Freaks Kellie Pickler Out!

27.01.12
Oh Siri, causing trouble again are you? You would think that after being on American Idol, nothing would freak out Kellie Pickler, but apparently Siri does – and she has shut it off....

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7 Reasons Why Windows Phone is the Best OS No One is Using

27.01.12
Windows Phone has been out for a while now, and while we’ll admit that the first generation of Windows Phones weren’t all that, ever since the second generation of Windows Phone devices ru...
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Hot Deal: 17.3″ Dell Vostro 3750 Laptop for $874

27.01.12
The 17.3″ Dell Vostro 3750 Intel 2nd Gen Core i7 laptop is on sale today for just $874 after $225 off plus a $75 off coupon code. This Quad-core PC is running on...

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Man Blogs About One Year of Buying Only American Made Goods

26.01.12
The United States job market has fallen on rough times, to say the least. A popular, and certainly legitimate, cause that many point to is the ever-increasing practice of outsourcing jobs to other...

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So It Begins, the One-Size-Fits-All Google Privacy Policy

26.01.12
As you might know, Google has a lot of different products scattered around the web – Google Search, Gmail, YouTube, Google+, Google Calendar; the list goes on and on (don’t forget about An...
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LG Prada 3.0 Phone Goes on Pre-Order

26.01.12
Phone fashion collaborations have come and gone over the years. But most of these fashion phones have been flops. Yet somehow, LG is just about ready to launch their 3rd LG Prada phone....

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These Kitty Cases will Make Your iPhone 4 Purr

26.01.12
There is a dizzying amount of iPhone 4S cases available for you to purchase, especially considering that the phone really didn’t come out that long ago. That said, there might not be a...

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IKEA Loves Their Cardboard Boxes in New Ad Campaign

26.01.12
A brand new IKEA marketing campaign is about to kick off, and it looks like a celebration of the DIY culture that the self-styled “Life Improvement Store” has established. AUGE HEADQUARTER...
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Barbie Fabulous Glam Video Camera Has Far From Fabulous Specs

26.01.12
They say that thanks to the smartphone, the cheap camcorder is dead. But that doesn’t mean it has to be dead for your little ones – or anyone who just really likes Barbie....

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Doxie Go + Wi-Fi Does Wireless Scanning with Eye-Fi Card

26.01.12
At Macworld, Doxie has just unveiled the new Doxie Go + Wi-FI. This is essentially the same old Doxie Go, but now it can send your documents to your devices wirelessly. With more...

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Speck CandyShell Grip iPhone 4S Case Review

26.01.12
We love our iPhone 4 but there was something to the 3G/3GS design that the 4/4S lacks. The older iPhone had a more ergonomic in-hand feel with its tapered edges and smooth corners....

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Hot Deal: 82″ Mitsubishi WD-82740 3D DLP Projection HDTV for $1,649

26.01.12
The 82″ Mitsubishi WD-82740 120Hz 1080p 3D DLP Projection HDTV is on sale today for just $1649 after $1,850 in instant savings! It may not be a super thin flat panel TV, but...

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Bill Gates’ 2012 Annual Letter Calls For Innovations in Agricultural Research

25.01.12
Bill Gates has posted his 4th annual letter on behalf of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, detailing his ideas about global humanitarian aid and his plans for the foundation in the coming...

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IDAPT S1 Universal Speaker Wants to Charge ALL of Your Devices

25.01.12
IDAPT is known for making their multi-charger stations. These devices are becoming more and more essential in homes with multiple smartphones. Now with the new IDAPT S1, the company is expanding into ...
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Tiny DLP Pico Projector for iPhone 4S in the Works

25.01.12
A few years ago, talk about putting projectors into smartphones was all the rage. Back then, a few phones were trickling out with built-in projectors, and everyone expected that by now most phones...

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Printer malware: print a malicious document, expose your whole LAN (Cory Doctorow/Boing Boing)

Printer malware: print a malicious document, expose your whole LAN (Cory Doctorow/Boing Boing)

02.01.12

Cory Doctorow / Boing Boing :
Printer malware: print a malicious document, expose your whole LAN   —  One of the most mind-blowing presentations at this year's Chaos Communications Congres...

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Viewpoint: AI will change our relationship with tech (Genevieve Bell/BBC)

Viewpoint: AI will change our relationship with tech (Genevieve Bell/BBC)

02.01.12

Genevieve Bell / BBC :
Viewpoint: AI will change our relationship with tech   —  Interaction and experience research director, Intel Labs  —  The coming year may bring came...

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Facebook hands out White Hat debit cards to hackers (Elinor Mills/CNET)

Facebook hands out White Hat debit cards to hackers (Elinor Mills/CNET)

02.01.12

Elinor Mills / CNET :
Facebook hands out White Hat debit cards to hackers   —  This is the Visa debit card Facebook is giving to some security researchers for reporting bugs.  —...

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What happened with Uber on New Year's Eve? (Dom Anthony Narducci/Quora)

What happened with Uber on New Year's Eve? (Dom Anthony Narducci/Quora)

02.01.12

Dom Anthony Narducci / Quora :
What happened with Uber on New Year's Eve?   —  Answer: Some things went wrong and some things went right last night.  —  As for how the pric...

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H.P.'s TouchPad Tablet Was Bound to Be a Flop, Some Say (Brian X. Chen/New York Times)

H.P.'s TouchPad Tablet Was Bound to Be a Flop, Some Say (Brian X. Chen/New York Times)

02.01.12

Brian X. Chen / New York Times :
H.P.'s TouchPad Tablet Was Bound to Be a Flop, Some Say   —  The TouchPad tablet from Hewlett-Packard was one of the most closely watched new gadgets of 20...

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Redesigning the Uber Surge Pricing Screen (Brenden Mulligan/Starting Up)

Redesigning the Uber Surge Pricing Screen (Brenden Mulligan/Starting Up)

02.01.12

Brenden Mulligan / Starting Up :
Redesigning the Uber Surge Pricing Screen   —  Uber is awesome.  My wife and I have been happy customers for almost 2 years.  It's been a joy to ...

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Text Messaging Is in Decline in Some Countries (Brian X. Chen/Bits)

Text Messaging Is in Decline in Some Countries (Brian X. Chen/Bits)

01.01.12

Brian X. Chen / Bits :
Text Messaging Is in Decline in Some Countries   —  Perhaps to the chagrin of cellphone carriers, all signs point to text messaging's continuing its decline in sever...

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Sony cuts Tablet S price by $100, now starts at $400 for 16GB (Dana Wollman/Engadget)

Sony cuts Tablet S price by $100, now starts at $400 for 16GB (Dana Wollman/Engadget)

01.01.12

Dana Wollman / Engadget :
Sony cuts Tablet S price by $100, now starts at $400 for 16GB   —  New year, new pricing strategy?  We just got word that Sony's cut the price of its 9.4-inc...

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First Siri, Now Threat Detection: Inside SRI's Amazing R&D (Christina Bonnington/Gadget Lab)

First Siri, Now Threat Detection: Inside SRI's Amazing R&D (Christina Bonnington/Gadget Lab)

01.01.12

Christina Bonnington / Gadget Lab :
First Siri, Now Threat Detection: Inside SRI's Amazing R&D   —  Pat Lincoln, director of SRI's Computer Science Laboratory, stands next to a huge displa...

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Video game industry still supports anti-piracy bill (Stephen C. Webster/The Raw Story)

Video game industry still supports anti-piracy bill (Stephen C. Webster/The Raw Story)

01.01.12

Stephen C. Webster / The Raw Story :
Video game industry still supports anti-piracy bill   —  Despite a flurry of reports suggesting that the world's largest video game companies have drop...

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Where to watch New Year's on Times Square live online (Janko Roettgers/GigaOM)

Where to watch New Year's on Times Square live online (Janko Roettgers/GigaOM)

01.01.12

Janko Roettgers / GigaOM :
Where to watch New Year's on Times Square live online   —  What would New Year's be without the traditional Times Square party?  People in New York City hav...

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Lenovo teases IdeaPad S110 Cedar Trail netbook (Dieter Bohn/The Verge)

Lenovo teases IdeaPad S110 Cedar Trail netbook (Dieter Bohn/The Verge)

31.12.11

Dieter Bohn / The Verge :
Lenovo teases IdeaPad S110 Cedar Trail netbook   —  While netbooks seem to have largely given way to ultrabooks, the new Cedar Trail chips that Intel just began s...

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Google Pulls

Google Pulls "Official" Siri for Android App (Matt Brian/The Next Web)

31.12.11

Matt Brian / The Next Web :
Google Pulls “Official” Siri for Android App   —  Just hours after it emerged that “official” Siri for Android applications had made the...

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10 things we learned about Apple this year (Dan Frommer/SplatF)

10 things we learned about Apple this year (Dan Frommer/SplatF)

31.12.11

Dan Frommer / SplatF :
10 things we learned about Apple this year   — Apple did have a succession plan — an obvious one.  There were a lot of big Apple stories this year, but Steve J...

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Lenovo, ZTE said uniting to stop Apple, Microsoft lawsuits (Electronista)

Lenovo, ZTE said uniting to stop Apple, Microsoft lawsuits (Electronista)

31.12.11

Electronista :
Lenovo, ZTE said uniting to stop Apple, Microsoft lawsuits   —  Lenovo and ZTE may lead Chinese patent defense  —  Chinese smartphone designers are quietly ...

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China urges tighter Internet security after hacking attacks (Reuters)

China urges tighter Internet security after hacking attacks (Reuters)

31.12.11

Reuters :
China urges tighter Internet security after hacking attacks   —  (Reuters) - The Chinese government is working with domestic Internet search engines like Baidu Inc and Sohu.com,...

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Apple sends takedowns to stop pirate-friendly iOS apps (Electronista)

Apple sends takedowns to stop pirate-friendly iOS apps (Electronista)

31.12.11

Electronista :
Apple sends takedowns to stop pirate-friendly iOS apps   —  Apple shuts down cracked iOS app culture  —  Pirate app haven Apptrackr revealed in an update fo...

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Hackers plan space satellites to combat censorship (David Meyer/BBC)

Hackers plan space satellites to combat censorship (David Meyer/BBC)

31.12.11

David Meyer / BBC :
Hackers plan space satellites to combat censorship   —  50 years after Russia's first piloted mission, hackers plan to send their own people beyond orbit  —&...

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Silent Hill HD Collection split up for digital distribution?

27.01.12
HD collections are becoming a popular way for game publishers to re-release older titles with a fresh coat of paint. Gamers get a shiny new HD version of the games they like, while publishers and deve...
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Charge 16 gadgets at once with the PowerPad 16

26.01.12
How many portable gadgets do you own that need charging on a regular basis? A typical user may have a smartphone, a tablet, an e-reader, and a digital media player. Most will have fewer than those fou...
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UK mobile network O2 sends every website your phone number

25.01.12
The majority of us treat our mobile phone number like a closely guarded secret. We only give it out to a trusted few, and hope we never get added to any lists that lead to unwanted marketing/sales cal...
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Neo-Geo Portable device leaks, pre-loaded with 20 games

25.01.12
With smartphones becoming a serious competitor in the portable games market, no one really expects a new handheld gaming device to be released unless it comes from a Nintendo or Sony. But it looks as ...
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Microsoft to phase out Microsoft Points?

24.01.12
Most people who own an Xbox 360 have connected it to the Internet and loaded up Xbox Live to find some things are bought using Microsoft Points. The next inevitable question is “How much is a po...
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FileSonic disables file-sharing following MegaUpload takedown

23.01.12
When the federal authorities took MegaUpload offline, it achieved two things. The first was millions of files and links no longer being accessible online. The second has only just started to rear its ...
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Brainstorm reveals how much Boardwalk Empire relies on visual effects

22.01.12
Watch a movie, TV series, or documentary that’s been produced in the last couple of years, and chances are it contains some form of visual effects. The bigger the budget for each production, the...
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NTT wireless module transfers data at 15 Gbps with 50cm range

20.01.12
The wireless transfer of data is becoming ever more important and widespread, especially in the home. We now all typically connect to the Internet through a router capable of wireless transmission. Ou...
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AT&T introduce 3GB and 5GB data plans this weekend

19.01.12
AT&T has decided to respond to the fact subscribers are using more data every month on contract, and have increased their data allowances accordingly along with the cost of a data subscription. U...
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Alienware announce X51 gaming PC in console-size case

18.01.12
Alienware has a long history of packaging high end components into blisteringly fast computers that let you play games with the settings turned to 11. But until now you’ve only really had two ch...
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MIT cuts Media Lab energy use by 24 percent with clever prototype wristband

18.01.12
With every passing year technology becomes more personal and offers us more choice and control over our data and increasingly our surroundings. MIT is working to increase that control even further by ...
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The most dangerous remaining parts of SOPA and PIPA

18.01.12
SOPA, in its original form, is all but dead. The White House spoke up last weekend, saying that it would oppose (veto) any legislation that reduces freedom of expression, increases cyber security risk...
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Cubelets means robotics without programming or soldering

17.01.12
One of the coolest advances in recent years has been the consumerization of robotics. Whether it’s the Roomba or the Pleo, we’ve seen robots go from only being in movies and auto factories...
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Intel-based Windows 8 tablets to cost more than the iPad?

17.01.12
Nearly every tablet not named “Kindle Fire” has had a rough time getting any significant market share next to the iPad. Microsoft, however, is betting big on Windows 8. The Kindle Fire has...
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Is RIM being shopped to Samsung?

17.01.12
RIM has seen better days. After steadily declining in market share since the launch of the first iPhone, the bottom fell out in 2011. The Blackberry Playbook, which the company was pinning its hopes o...
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Transparent Apple Store to be built in France

17.01.12
Apple products are instantly recognizable and yet remain quite minimalist in their design. Now it seems that brand recognition is slowly being translated into the actual design of Apple Stores too, wi...
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iPad 3 to be announced in early February?

17.01.12
Apple fans all the world over are each setting aside $500 or so for the iPad 3. As is always the case with Apple, everything is based on speculation; but we’d be shocked if the company’s l...
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Samsung reinvents the window using a transparent touchscreen display

16.01.12
CES is as much a treasure hunt as it is a technology showcase. You have to weave your way through the me-too gadgets to find some genuinely interesting and novel tech. I think Samsung’s Transpar...
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China now has over half a billion Internet users

16.01.12
According to the China Internet Network Information Center, at the end of 2012 the population of China with access to the Internet had surpassed the half a billion mark. In total, some 513 million peo...
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Qualcomm creates wireless electric vehicle charging system

16.01.12
Electric vehicles have yet to start appearing on our highways in significant numbers, mainly due to how much they cost and how few manufacturers offer them. But eventually all cars look likely to use ...
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Artist uses resin to create beautiful 3D goldfish paintings

15.01.12
For many of us, watching movies or TV in 3D either isn’t really of interest or causes us to have some serious headaches or feel sick. But 3D is being used in other ways to create some truly stun...
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Apple Stores remove iPhone 4S from sale in China

13.01.12
Apple has managed to make a lot of consumers eager to get their hands on the iPhone 4S very angry in China. Many lined up over night outside the Apple Store in the Saniltun district only to find the f...
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EverQuest II player base up 300 percent since free-to-play switch

12.01.12
EverQuest II has been experimenting with free-to-play models since 2010, but it wasn’t until December last year that Sony properly switched the game to free-to-play. As with other MMOs that have...
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Sony says no PS4 at E3

11.01.12
Last week we got a little more excited about E3 this year as MCV had it on good authority from a “100% solid” source that both the PS4 and next Xbox would make an appearance. In so doing, ...
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The Raspberry Pi is being manufactured

10.01.12
The Raspberry Pi Foundation has today confirmed that its tiny, cheap Linux PCs have started being manufactured. In total, an order for 10,000 Model B units (the $35 version that includes the extra RAM...
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