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08 Aug 2008 19:10:05 GMT

By Andrew Webster | Published: August 08, 2008 - 02:04PM CT The recently released Xbox Live Arcade title Braid has been receiving a lot of praise since its release, but the game's designer has said that the XBLA certification process may have actually ...

08 Aug 2008 15:10:32 GMT

When Facebook sued the German leader in social networking, StudiVZ, last month, it contended that the company had illegally copied Facebook?s ?look and feel? with similar graphics and features.

08 Aug 2008 13:59:50 GMT

by Peter Cohen, Macworld.com Canon has introduced three new High Definition (HD) camcorder models. The Vixia HF11 Dual Flash Memory Camcorder, Vixia HG21 and Vixia HG20 Hard Disk Drive camcorders are expected to debut next month and will cost $1199, ...

8 Aug 2008 17:10:18 GMT

Yesterday, we reported that BitTorrent was laying off over 20 percent of their workforce. The original source was ValleyWag which has since updated their article with a statement from BitTorrent in which the company called the news "irresponsible journalism." Part of the statement reads, "Contrary to published reports, we reduced less than 20% of our team and those impacted were distributed across our organization, rather than focused on a single department. Also contrary to published reports, the layoffs were unrelated to any ongoing discussions to divest a portion of our business." From what can be assumed from the statement, a large percent of workers were indeed laid off, but not as high as the percentages posted yesterday. In addition, they were from across the board and not only in the marketing division, as was originally posted. The company continued by pimping its "DNA" service and says high demand will mean less likelihood of layoffs for the future. "BitTorrent is seeing healthy demand for its Delivery Network Accelerator (DNA) service and its Software Development Kit (SDK), which brings rich Internet media to the TV. We are working with many online video, gaming, software and hardware companies to integrate BitTorrent technology. As such, our top priority is to deliver the most valuable and efficient solutions to the BitTorrent community and technology marketplace," the statement concluded.

8 Aug 2008 17:35:05 GMT

Ubisoft has filed a lawsuit against Optical Experts Manufacturing (OEM) over the leak of Ubisoft's hit PC game Assassin's Creed which hit torrents a full two months before it hit retail shelves. OEM had been contracted to reproduce copies of the game disc however Ubisoft claims "an extraordinary breach of trust and gross negligence" led to an employee of OEM taking a copy of the game home and posting it on the Internet 6 weeks before it was set to hit retailers. The publisher also claims that OEM had contractually agreed to security procedures to prevent any leak but that they admitted to not following through on these "security commitments." One obvious security procedure was to never allow the game to leave OEM premises. Ubisoft tracked where the pirated copy of the game came from online and found it to match the address of an OEM employee. A subsequent search of his home revealed a copy. The NPD Group says the game was purchased 40,000 times through retailers as of June, but Ubisoft claims the leaked version has been downloaded over 700,000 times, costing the publisher a fortune in possible sales. The publisher also claims its "reputation was hurt" by the leak, as consumers were confused by reviews of the leaked (and apparently bug-equipped edition) and the retail edition. Ubisoft is suing for copyright infringement, breach of contract, and negligence and is asking for $10 million USD for each breach of contract.

8 Aug 2008 17:54:19 GMT

Three teenagers in Atlanta, Georgia have been arrested on 57 counts of firebombing cars with Molotov cocktails over the last week. Six vehicles were bombed and each teenager faces 19 counts including arson, criminal damage to property and possession of explosive devices. When arrested however, the teens, ages 15 or 16, each said they learned "how to do it from playing the video game 'Grand Theft Auto'." After the incidents, investigators went to the local Wal-Mart and found receipts containing Sprite bottles, red rags and lighter fluid. Surveillance footage did the rest. The incident is the second in under a week in which real life crime has been linked to 'Grand Theft Auto', Rockstar's exceptional PC and console game. In Thailand earlier this week, the game was pulled from shelves after a taxi driver was killed in what the murderer called a "recreation" of a scene from the game.

8 Aug 2008 18:13:03 GMT

Warner Music Group has said that they want more money to paid out to have their songs licensed in music-based video games like the blockbusters "Guitar Hero" and "Rock Band." Warner is the world's third-largest music company, behind Universal and Sony, and Chief Executive Edgar Bronfman compared the games to "MTV's launch 25 years ago or Apple Inc's iPod launch five years ago," and added "the amount being paid to the music industry, even though their games are entirely dependent on the content we own and control, is far too small." If Bronfman has his way, downloadable content may become more expensive, most likely slowing down a great source of revenue for the music industry. Thanks to its Guitar Hero franchise, Activision reported last month that sales were up 32 percent year on year and Harmonix also recently announced that over 12 million downloadable tracks for Rock Band had been sold.

8 Aug 2008 18:29:58 GMT

If you are one of the millions of Americans who have received a voucher for a government subsidized DTV converter you may be thinking you can just drive down to the store and pick up the unit you want. As I've recently found out first hand it's not quite that easy. The availability and selection of converters isn't nearly as good as the public service announcements make it seem. In fact you might not be able to find what you need locally at all. Let's start with supply problems. After spending the better part of an afternoon tracking down a store near me that actually had them in stock, I've been calling various local retailers weekly to find out if this was simply a fluke. It's not. In fact when I've inquired at various Walmart, Target, and Kmart locations the answer has been that they're out of stock most of the time. In just a couple of cases they indicated that the units come in at least once a week. At the majority of these national chain stores they apparently only receive them sporadically, and most of the time they fly off the shelves, often in less than a single day. The good news for me is that I was able to find one retailer that seems to have them in most of the time. Based on my admittedly unscientific research it seems that Best Buy is doing a much better job of keeping DTV converters in stock. Although there isn't one in the area, I've also been checking Circuit City's website and they also appear to have them in stock as a general rule. I contacted Best Buy and Walmart hoping to find out if there's a shortage of coupon-eligible converter boxes. Best Buy's Brian Lucas was quite candid about the situation, indicating that they experienced a shortage in July, but have since dealt with the issue. He said the problem was a result of upgrading to newer models with more features. He also assured me that even if they run out at your local Best Buy you can order over the phone and still use your voucher. Their DTV Hotline and Order Center can be reached by calling 1-877-BBY-DTV9 (1-877-229-3889). Walmart was less responsive. Although a company representative told me she'd look into the problem and let me know if there's some sort of supply problem, after four days no one has gotten back to me with any information. S-Video Now for the really bad news. If you're looking for a box with S-Video support your choices are even more limited. The only store I contacted where a DTV converter with S-Video out was even sold was Best Buy. Even if one of the other stores happened to have a box in stock they would be unsuitable for my use since I would be forced to switch my home theater computer to a composite video connection. Analog pass through If you happen to live in an area where low power broadcasts are available you may find that not all the local broadcasters will be upgrading to digital. In order to receive both analog and DTV signals you'll want a box that can tune DTV broadcasts while passing analog signals untouched to your TV. This feature, known as analog pass through, is only available on a few newer converter boxes. I found converters with analog pass through at both Best Buy and Circuit City. Of course if you want both S-Video and analog pass through Circuit City's boxes won't do the job. Why the rush? Maybe you're asking yourself why worry about it now? After all there are nearly 200 days until analog signals are turned off next February. You have all kinds of time right? In fact that depends on how confident you are about receiving the DTV signals in your area. Unlike analog signals, DTV transmissions suffer from something called the cliff effect. While analog TV reception gets gradually worse as signal quality degrades, DTV reception goes straight from excellent to no reception. If analog reception is anything less than spectacular where you live there's good reason to be concerned that you won't be able to watch the same channels in digital form without upgrading to a better antenna; perhaps even to a roof mounted unit. If you've ordered a voucher from the federal government the clock has already started ticking. Vouchers are only good for 90 days from the issue date. If you wait until the last minute you may have a hard time using yours before they expire. The best advice right now is be prepared. There's no need to panic, but that doesn't mean the picture is as rosy as the FCC would have you believe. If you watch over the air broadcasts make sure you're ready to receive them well in advance of the transition and you should be fine. Update: Hobbit112 correctly brought up my omission of Radio Shack as a national retailer carrying DTV converters. Like the majority of retailers it seems they often don't have them in stock, but unlike most they can and will order one for you at no charge. Like Circuit City's converters they feature analog pass through, but not S-video.

08 Aug 2008 10:05:00 EST

Desktops, Lego computers are about as old as the case mod scene itself, but while many have qualified as interesting, we've never seen a truly sexy Lego box before Luke Anderson's all-black "Lego Computer," which seems to distill all we've ever loved about high-end workstation boxen into lovable Lego form. Bonus points for full documentation of the project released under the Creative Commons license. Time-lapse vid is after the break.[Via SlashGear]Continue reading Monolith-esque Lego computer makes us want to pick up a Brick Separator and build a civilization

08 Aug 2008 11:48:00 EST

Desktops, There are cheaper computers out there, and even smaller computers out there, but the ASUS Eee Box seems to strike a similar chord to that of its laptop counterpart -- solid minimalism, just a dash of design sense, and a lovable price point. J&R has started selling a $350 version the computer in the States, complete with Windows XP, a 1.6GHz Atom processor, WiFi, memory card reader, 1GB of RAM and an 80GB hard drive. We're especially into the prospect of quick-boot Express Gate Linux tomfoolery, with a seven second boot time all that's keeping us from web browsing, Skype and IM -- oh, and buying one. Black and white versions are available now.[Thanks, Mike]

08 Aug 2008 19:19:51 GMT

Google has updated yet another one of its products to work better on Apple's iPhone. On Thursday the company launched a new version of its Translate service that lets anyone convert their native tongue into one of the other 23 available languages.

08 Aug 2008 16:48:53 GMT

by Mark Hachman Transmeta said Thursday that the company had licensed its LongRun technology to Nvidia Corp., providing the graphics chip maker access to low-power technology.

08 Aug 2008 19:30:21 GMT

Developer Cryptic Studios has revealed new information from the ongoing development of Star Trek Online, the studio's MMO adaptation of the classic sci-fi franchise.

08 Aug 2008 08:21:28 GMT

By Eric Lai August 8, 2008 (Computerworld) Our fascination with the prospect of asteroids smashing into the Earth is as deep as the craters that can result from such cosmic fireballs.

08 Aug 2008 18:44:31 GMT

The US Patent and Trademark Office has reversed course on its earlier move to grant Dell trademark rights to the term "cloud computing.

08 Aug 2008 23:48:45 GMT

The dog days of August lend themselves to kicking back and letting the world slide by. Since the advent of the Web 2.0 ecosystem, they?

08 Aug 2008 17:51:12 GMT

By Joe Rao Every August, just when many people go vacationing in the country, where skies are dark, the best-known meteor shower makes its appearance.

08 Aug 2008 20:04:29 GMT

By Eric Auchard, Reuters The former Google engineers roll out Cuil, which they say will index a larger portion of the Web than Google, and more quickly and at less cost.

08 Aug 2008 23:48:44 GMT

As part of the ongoing integration of its DoubleClick acquisition (yesterday it sold off Performics), Google will be placing an additional DoubleClick cookie on the browsers of everyone who visits a site that is part of Google's current AdSense network ...

08 Aug 2008 15:09:22 GMT

The technique to measure the chemical composition of a sample isn?ta new technology but, writing in Science, R. Graham Cooks has identified a variation that will allow crime labs to identify not only the identity of a fingerprint but also the ...

08 Aug 2008 18:17:20 GMT

Electronic Arts' latest lets gamers expand their turf beyond the Big Apple to Florida and Cuba. By Brendan Sinclair, GameSpot Even before the first Godfather game was released in 2006, Electronic Arts was already talking sequels.

08 Aug 2008 16:49:09 GMT

The $1000 application on Apple's App Store, which lets people know how rich you are simply for buying it, has been removed without explanation, making some developers wonder what it takes for Apple to pull the plug.

08 Aug 2008 05:42:01 GMT

NEW YORK (Associated Press) - Nissan won't be coming out with a model available only as a hybrid, opting instead to focus on electric vehicles for its green strategy, according to a senior executive.