Zimbabwe likely to get sponsorship after historic win

Cricketing minnows Zimbabwe after having scrapped Australia by three-wicket in the triangular series could now lure sponsors to support the future of cricket in the country.

According to a report published in allafrica.com, Zimgold expressed interest in sponsoring the game in Zimbabwe. Earlier, Prosper Utseya was named the best Zimbabwean player in the tournament after his dramatic hat-trick and was awarded US $ 1000 prize money from Zimgold.

Zimgold parent company Pure Oil business manager, Vishal Warrialani said that his company is intent on supporting the cricket team in future.

“We want to continue to recognise and appreciate great achievements such as the one by the national cricket team,” said Warrialani. “We would want to improve our relationship with cricket as long as we also get support. They are a talented group and beating Australia is no mean achievement. On an individual level, Utseya did well, hat-tricks are rare and he also went on to take five wickets in that match bef

ore guiding the team to a win with the bat.”

Read more »

Updated iPod Touch still tough to repair, iFixit says

People who attempt to snoop through

the innards of Apple's latest iPod Touch won't have an easy go of it, according to gadget-repair site iFixit.

On Thursday, Apple rejiggered the iPod Touch line by trimming the prices for the 16GB, 32GB, and 64GB models. The 16GB model dropped from $229 to $199, but also got custody of the same 5-megapixel iSight camera already in its two bigger siblings and snagged four additional color options.

Sales of the once-hot iPod Touch have plummeted in the wake of demand for the iPhone and iPad. So Apple's latest move is an attempt to revive consumer demand.

Whether the price cuts will drive average buyers to pick up more iPod Touch devices is the big question. But do-it-yourselfers and others who need to repair the new 16GB iPod Touch will encounter the same challenges that beset the previous versions.

Tearing apart the new Touch, the iFixit troupe had to use its infamous iSclack tool to pop open the cover in the best tradition of skilled clam schuckers.

The effort then got tricky because Apple has crammed a number of components onto a single cable. Specifically, all soldered together are the logic board, front-facing camera, battery, Lightning connector,headphone jack, speaker, and home button.

After poking around the chips integrated into the device, iFixit came up with its final repairability score. And it's not a good one. The 2014 fifth-generation 16GB iPod Touch merits a grade of only 3 out of 10 (10 being the easiest to repair).Peeking at the camera, iFixit found it similar to the one in the other fifth-generation iPod Touch devices, with a five-element lens and a hybrid infrared filter. The camera is capable of producing 5-megapixel photos as well as 1080p video at 30 frames per second.

The dings against the new iPod Touch?

Opening the case and replacing parts are difficult though not impossible. Rather than rely on screws, Apple has used a combination of clips and adhesive to secure the case. Many of the parts are soldered together, a definite monkey wrench in case any one single part breaks and needs to be repaired or replaced. Finally, cables connected to the logic board snake over the top and connect at the bottom, so it's hard to disconnect the cables or remove the board itself.

The new and lower-cost iPod Touch may be a good deal for iOS users who want a solid music player. I once owned an iPod Touch and thought it was a great device. But you'll most certainly want to leave any repairs or internal tours to the experts.

Read more »

Facebook reveals search warrant of hundreds of accounts

Facebook revealed that since last summer it's

been fighting a court order that required it to disclose social-media information involving hundreds of people.

"This unprecedented request is by far the largest we've ever received -- by a magnitude of more than ten -- and we have argued that it was unconstitutional from the start," Chris Sonderby, Facebook's deputy general counsel, wrote in a statement Thursday.

The situation raises concerns over privacy in the digital age, when much of a person's sensitive information is often available online and on mobile devices. This week, the Supreme Court unanimously rejected warrantless searches of cell phones, saying the practice went against the Fourth Amendment's protections against unreasonable search and seizure. The court added that modern cell phones are "not just another technological convenience."

Facebook said 381 people's accounts were subject to warrants out of an unspecified New York court, though only 62 were later charged in a disability fraud case. The company said it was under a gag order, preventing it from discussing the case or notifying the people affected until recently.

Facebook, the largest social network in the world, asserted that the search was "overly broad" and allowed the government to keep the seized photos, private messages, and other information indefinitely. It has called for the government to return the data and claimed the search ignored the Fourth Amendment.

Read more »

No Cellphone Search Without Warrant, Supreme Court Rules

Police need a warrant to search the cellphone

contents of people they have arrested, the United States Supreme Court ruled Wednesday.

Warrantless searches, in essence, would impact privacy to a far greater extent than is acceptable.

The ruling also applies to individuals stopped for questioning by the authorities, Jake LaPerruque, the Fellow on Privacy, Surveillance, and Security at the Center for Democracy and Technology, told TechNewsWorld.

"The Supreme Court properly recognized that digital information is fundamentally different regarding both quality and quantity, and that it requires a greater level of protection," LePerruque explained.

The Court's Rationale

"A search of digital information on a cell phone does not further the government interests identified in Chimel," the Court said. Those interests essentially are concerns about the safety of police officers and the preservation of evidence that otherwise might be destroyed.

Such a search "implicates substantially greater individual privacy than a brief physical," the ruling said.

The scope of the privacy interests at stake "is further complicated by the fact that the data viewed on many modern cell phones may in fact be stored on a remote server," the court wrote. "Thus, a search may extend well beyond papers and effects in the physical proximity of an arrestee, a concern that the United States recognizes but cannot definitively foreclose."

Applying the Gant standard, which allows warrantless searches of vehicles to preserve police officers' safety or evidence relating to the crime of arrest "is not appropriate in this context, and would provide no practical limit at all when it comes to cell phone searches," the Court determined.

Restricting the scope of a warrantless cellphone search to information relevant to the crime, the arrestee's identity, or officer safety, "would again impose few meaningful constraints on officers," the Court said.

An analog rule suggested, under which officers could search cellphone data if they could have obtained the same information from a nondigital counterpart, "would allow law enforcement to search a broad range of items contained on a phone even though people would be unlikely to carry such a variety of information in physical form, and would launch courts on a difficult line-drawing expedition to determine which digital files are comparable to physical records," the Court pointed out.

The decision "will have some impact on the ability of law enforcement to combat crime," but it only generally requires a warrant before a cellphone search and does not render information on the phone immune from a search because the exigent circumstances exception will still apply where appropriate, the Court said.

The warrant requirement "is an important component of the Court's Fourth Amendment jurisprudence."

Possible Impact of the Ruling

Evidence in other cases involving warrantless police searches of arrestees' cellphones now "may be vulnerable to being thrown out," Nate Wessler, a staff attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union, told TechNewsWorld.

The ruling also may provide fresh ammunition for those opposing the U.S. National Security Agency's collection of telephone metadata.

"While it says nothing explicitly about NSA surveillance, the way it discusses technology and the fact that technology can group together lots of information may make a very compelling argument for how NSA surveillance may be problematic," Hanni Fakhoury, a staff attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, told TechNewsWorld.

"The court stated that pooling digital information can cause those data to be more revealing and infringe upon privacy," the CDT's LaPerruque said. "This is one of the most basic problems with bulk collection, and could significantly shift how courts address the constitutionality of bulk collection in the future."

Meanwhile, police departments' controversial use of Stingray phone trackers, which can vacuum up all information from cellphones in the vicinity, also may be challenged on the basis of the Supreme Court's ruling.

"There's some interesting language in the opinion that could be applied to Stingrays," Fakhoury said, even though that's a different legal issue

Read more »

Microsoft Aims to Put Some MacBook Airs Out of Circulation

Microsoft is offering up to US$650 worth of in-store

credit to MacBook Air owners who are willing to trade them in and purchase a Surface Pro 3.

The campaign runs until July 31.

All models of MacBook Air are eligible for the deal, though the value given in the trade will vary, depending on the specific model and its condition.

The offer "is an extension of the existing 'Recycle for Rewards Program,'" Microsoft spokesperson Jonathan Adashek told the E-Commerce Times.

"I doubt Microsoft would have tried this against [late Apple CEO Steve] Jobs, as the risk in that instance would have been too great," Rob Enderle, principal analyst at the Enderle Group, told the E-Commerce Times.

"Jobs would have taken this as an affront and worked aggressively behind the scenes to make it look like a failure," he said. "[Current CEO Tim] Cook doesn't play these games as well, and he's likely to ignore the effort until it's too late. It's likely Microsoft's analysts came to this conclusion."

The Terms of the Offer

Microsoft's pitch is simple: Come on in to a retail store carrying the Surface Pro 3, hand over a MacBook Air in good condition, and we will tell you what it's worth.

Microsoft reserves the right to refuse any trade-in, and limits customers to one trade-in purchase each. Provision of store credit is at Microsoft's discretion.

The offer cannot be transferred, redeemed for cash or gift cards, or combined with other offers.

The credit cannot be applied to taxes, shipping or other fees.

Will Apple Take a Hit?

Apple sold a record 4.8 million Macs in Q1, 2014, with the iMac and MacBook Air leading the charge. That fell to 4.1 million in Q2.

So, might Apple be hurt by the Microsoft campaign?

Not likely, suggested Jeff Orr, a senior practice director at ABI Research.

"ABI Research ... considers the MacBook Air will remain one of the most popular models in the [ultraportable computer] segment," he told the E-Commerce Times.

Owners of MacBook Airs tend to have other Apple products, Orr pointed out.

Further, ABI's consumer studies "suggest that laptop owners looking for an upgrade or replacement are not considering tablets within the choices, as the laptops are seen as performing different tasks from what they expect a tablet or a smartphone to," Orr noted. "People are more likely to trade in a Windows laptop than a MacOS machine for a Windows tablet."

On the other hand, "with the Surface Pro, you get a touchscreen tablet that can also be a notebook," Enderle pointed out.

All About the Marketing

The promotion "is a tricky way to get people's attention," Brian Blau, a research director atGartner, told the E-Commerce Times.

It will not make much of a difference to Surface sales, he said, because iDevice owners love their devices.

"This promotion is really only meant for those few folks who really found no value in the iPad or Apple ecosystem," Blau suggested.

This "is the first-of-its-kind program to see if owners of portable computers agree that the Surface Pro 3 tablet is able to replace a laptop," said ABI's Orr.

Since Microsoft is limiting its offer to MacBook Airs, "it's difficult to gauge the interest in advance compared to if all laptop computers qualified," he pointed out.

High-Stakes Gamble

The move "is most likely a promotion to get people talking about Microsoft being in the tablet market and its corporate positioning and messaging," Orr said.

Whether the promotion succeeds will depend on whether Microsoft's willing to devote the appropriate funds and resources, Enderle suggested.

It "is a highly visible program which will color the perception of [Microsoft's] new CEO," Enderle said.

He'll be a hero if it's a hit and under a cloud if it isn't.

Microsoft "stands to lose face," warned Orr, if it doesn't rack up "significant numbers" of trade-ins by the time the campaign ends. 

---

Richard Adhikari has written about high-tech for leading industry publications since the 1990s and wonders where it's all leading to. Will implanted RFID chips in humans be the Mark of the Beast? Will nanotech solve our coming food crisis? Does Sturgeon's Law still hold true? You can connect with Richard on Google+.

Read more »

Google I/O Offers Devs Big Bonanza

Google on Wednesday announced a plethora of opportunities

for developers at its I/O conference, under way in San Francisco.

The upcoming version of Android, currently known as "L," will have 5,000 new apps.

Android L offers a new design language consistent across Android, desktops, tablets and the Web.

It will enable smooth animations for screens, apps and platforms, as well as seamless transitions among notebooks, smartphones, tablets, TV screens and automobile dashboard screens.

"It's all about developing the ecosystem," Ronald Gruia, director of emerging telecoms at Frost & Sullivan, told TechNewsWorld.

Devs will "love the idea that they can write once and run on many platforms," he continued. "The sheer numbers that will come into play [if that comes about] might attract more developers."

Google's Goodies

Android L will offer material design, which gives images on a screen physical edges users can feel, with shadows. It also will offer element elevations, which render 3D images with real-time shadows.

The material design feature is "interesting, and I found some turning away from the purely flat designs of recent days to really take advantage of device hardware," Al Hilwa, a program director at IDC, told TechNewsWorld.

So is the element elevations feature -- but "most of these features are visual sugar and not about productivity per se," Hilwa opined.

Google also announced the availability of a new, consistent set ofdesign guidelines.

Plus, it unveiled in Google Play services a new API for Google Earth that devs can implement.

Android L Further Examined

Android L will support AOT, JIT and interpreted code, and it has a new runtime.

"This is all about performance, and dealing with the language of virtual machine architectures with garbage collection and pauses," Hilwa said.

The L developer preview SDK, with system images, will be available Thursday.

An Android extension pack leveraging GPUs to boost 3D graphics also was announced.

Google is "embracing more advanced thinking around design" with L, Hilwa said.

Android L will support ARM, x86 and MIPS processors. It will be 64-bit compatible; it will have larger number registers, new instruction sets and increased addressable memory space -- and it will not need modification to run Java.

These improvements will "deal with some of the performance issues "caused by Google's using a VM architecture, Hilwa said.

Wearables, Auto Tech, Television

Google released the full Android Wear SDK, which will let devs build custom user interfaces, control sensors, add voice actions, and send data from wearables to smartphones. They can write code running directly on devices.

Google also announced the Android Auto SDK, with APIs for audio and messaging.

The full SDK will be available with the public release of L later this year.

Google on Wednesday released the ADT1 Android TV developer kit.

Designed for all form factors, it requires only a D-pad and voice input for devs to work with it.

Google also announced a new UI for Android TV with the material theme.

Good News for Devs

It also introduced a new API that lets devs build apps that integrate with Gmail.

Further, Google announced Google Fit, a health data platform that will be available in a few weeks. A platform preview was made available Wednesday.

Finally, Google said it is bringing Polymer to the Web. This is a new type of library that's mainly HTML-based and includes independent polyfills for emerging Web standards.

"It's impressive that Google continues to push the mobile Web almost as hard as its native platform on Android," Hilwa said.

"If I were a developer, I would feel real good about opportunities today, because we have two strong brands -- Google and Apple -- that offer a wealth of opportunities for apps that can be extended to various form factors," Jeff Orr, a senior practice director at ABI Research, told TechNewsWorld.

The two companies are taking pretty much a similar approach, he pointed out, and "I think the way these are implemented would be different."

Read more »

Cruise RP-1 Kit Transforms Regular Audis Into Driverless Cars

Cruise aims to spark a revolution among

autopilot technology with a US$10,000 accessory that consumers can use to create a self-driving car, of sorts.

At the heart of the Cruise RP-1 system is a sensor pod that gets mounted on the roof of a car. It utilizes cameras, data and radar to analyze the vehicle's surroundings. With that information, it can make changes in steering to keep a driver within lane boundaries, monitor nearby vehicles or other obstacles, and move or brake to avoid a collision.

The RP-1, which is meant to be used on the highway during daylight hours only, comes with an app that gives the driver insight into what the sensor pod is seeing and doing. So, a driver could steer a vehicle to the desired lane on a highway, then push a button to allow the RP-1 system to take control. The driver can regain control simply by tapping the gas pedal or grabbing the steering wheel, as with a standard cruise control system.

As of now, the technology is compatible only with Audi A4 and S4 models, but Cruise is working on expanding availability going forward.

Cruise opened preorders on Monday. The first 50 customers to pay the full $10k in advance will become members of the Founders Club. Others can reserve an RP-1 system for $1k.

The company is shooting for launch in the first half of 2015. That date depends on a few factors, though, including the results of third-party testing and ensuring compliance with California's restrictions on such devices.

Sweet Spot

Beyond being safer in general, driverless autos could provide more transportation freedom to non-drivers, such as the elderly or disabled, say proponents. Google is road-testing a driverless car that doesn't even have an interior steering wheel.

Cruise's technology isn't there yet -- it requires a driver at the wheel. It's designed to ease the driving experience and help people avoid mistakes that lead to collision, rather than to do all the driving automatically.

"Google is taking on some of those hard problems like people with a lack of mobility," Cruise CEO Kyle Vogt told TechNewsWorld, "but we're kind of starting from the opposite end, helping people who maybe get stuck in traffic and building on that. We see ourselves tackling those hard problems several years down the road."

New Approach

One of the company's biggest challenges will be winning consumer approval and trust, Vogt acknowledged. Giving up even a little control of a vehicle can be a scary thing, and an established brand like Google might have an easier time getting people on board.

That attitude is understandable, said Vogt, which is one of the reasons Cruise unveiled the RP-1 so early.

"We are working to earn our consumer's trust by doing plenty of demos, being transparent about what we're doing with testing, and bringing in third-party testers," he noted. "We wanted to announce this well before we launched the first prototypes, so that we could have time to win confidence."

That's a smart startup branding strategy, said Alain Kornhauser, professor of operations research and financial engineering at Princeton University, and director of its Transportation Program. It is a great way to get people talking about the potential of a quality product.

"The challenge is trust. It may take a little while, but I'm sure that they'll brand their message so people will trust them more than GM," Kornhauser told TechNewsWorld. "There is a substantial base of drivers that would love to take their hands off the wheel some of the time. This has the opportunity to go viral. If not this effort, it could lead to others sprouting out around it.

Read more »

Nokia X2 Mixes and Matches Android Apps, Windows Phone Services

Microsoft on Tuesday announced the launch

of the Nokia X2, the first device to come out in Nokia's Android-based X line since Microsoft acquired the company earlier this year.

The Nokia X series targets emerging markets with a low-cost family of smartphones offering access to Android apps and Microsoft services.

However, the new Nokia X2 offers an enhanced experience, with more Microsoft services, an updated Fastlane feature, and upgraded specifications including a 4.3-inch ClearBlack display and 5-MP rear camera with autofocus and flash

crosoft on Tuesday announced the launch of the Nokia X2, the first device to come out in Nokia's Android-based X line since Microsoft acquired the company earlier this year.

The Nokia X series targets emerging markets with a low-cost family of smartphones offering access to Android apps and Microsoft services.

However, the new Nokia X2 offers an enhanced experience, with more Microsoft services, an updated Fastlane feature, and upgraded specifications including a 4.3-inch ClearBlack display and 5-MP rear camera with autofocus and flash

Read more »