RIM report losses of $125million

source:http://bit.ly/H35HXw

The maker of Blackberry smart phones RIM has reported losses of $125million for the first quarter of 2012, compared to last year when the company made a profit of $934million. RIM suggested that they will refocus their market to businesses instead of the consumer market. This comes due to stiff competition from Apple’s iPhone and Google’s Android phones which outsell Blackberries. As a Blackberry user I hope this does not mean the end of services like BBM which I use every day and find a very useful tool for contacting my friends. What do you think about this move by RIM let us know by leaving us a comment below or sending @leatstechcorner a tweet.

By Robert Leat

Editor in Chief

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Temple Run Review

Temple run is the highly addictive iOS game that everyone is playing. It was created by the Washington D.C. based developer Imangi Studios. It can be acquired for free from the apple app store. It is soon to be released on the Android platform.

Source:http://bit.ly/y4l9LS

The basic premise of the game is that you are running from a temple whilst being chased by demon monkeys, you have to maneuver around corners by swiping your finger left or right, you also might have to jump over gaps or obstacles by swiping your finger upwards.   There are also vicious flames and deep tree roots that you have to duck under by swiping downwards with your finger. The further you get the higher your score.  The game features a store which allows you to purchase upgrades which help you to improve your score; to purchase these upgrades you must collect coins in the game by tilting your device towards the coins.  This game is highly addictive and you will spend a lot of time trying to beat not only your score but your mate’s score.   The game also features achievements that you get by completing tasks such as getting a new high score, or by collecting a certain number of coins.  The game also integrates apple’s game centre system which allows you to view your friend’s high scores and also the top scores in the world.

The main downside I have found to this game is that sometimes after pausing the game it doesn’t give you enough time to recover and continue playing so pausing usually results in me dying straight away. Another downside I have found is that the game doesn’t always respond when you swipe across the screen and this has resulted in some very frustrating games for me.

Overall I would thoroughly recommend this game for hours of fun gameplay and competition with your friends as you try to beat their high scores.  This game will keep you entertained on long journeys and will help to combat boredom.  I would give this game a rating of 8.5 out of 10.

By Robert Leat
Editor in Chief

Steve Jobs Dies Age 56

Steve Jobs the Co-founder and former CEO of Apple has died aged 56. He had been suffering from pancreatic cancer for some time and it was because of this that he stepped down as CEO of Apple.  In his time at Apple he has revolutionised technology, coming up with the iPod, iPhone, iPad, and of course the Macintosh computers. Steve Jobs also co-founded Pixar Animation studios. Google paid tribute to Steve Jobs by putting Steve Jobs 1955-2005 at the bottom of their homepage. Apple has a huge picture of Steve Jobs followed by 1955-2011. Steve Wozniak said he will remember Steve for “knowing what made sense in a product” he also described him as a “visionary”. Steve Jobs will be sorely missed, a grave loss to the tech world.

By Robert Leat
Editor in Chief
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Apple Announces iPhone 4s

Apple's iPhone 4S

Apple has unveiled the iPhone 4S at their Let’s Talk iPhone event.  It will feature the same processor as the iPad2 and upgraded ram. To the disappointment of myself and a lot of tech community Apple did not announce the iPhone 5, the iPhone 4 has instead been upgraded and redesigned. Apple has done this before, with the iPhone 3G and then later the 3GS was released so this is nothing new.  The Screen is the same size as before (3.5inch) and features the same high resolution touch screen but has an upgraded A5-processor. What do you think of the 4S let us know.

By Robert Leat
Editor in Chief
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Apple expected to announce new iPhone at press event

Tim Cook Apple CEO.

 

Apple has invited the press to an iPhone event in California. It is expected that Apple will announce the iPhone 5 at this event. The event will be hosted by the new C.E.O. of Apple Tim Cook. Others believe that Apple will instead announce the iPhone 4S which will be cheaper than the iPhone 4.  In preparation for the launch of a new product Apple have temporarily taken down the online store. Follow us on Twitter to be kept up todate with the latest iPhone and Apple news.



By Robert Leat
Editor in Chief
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Amazon Unveil iPad Challenger

Amazon unveiled their iPad challenger; it is called the Amazon Kindle Fire. It is a 7 inch Android tablet and is set to be released later this year. It was unveiled at a press conference in New York.  The tablet will cost a mere $199 (£127) which is a lot cheaper than $499 (£325). It will ship with Android 3.0 Honey Comb.

 

Spec

7 inch Touch Screen display with Gorilla Glass and a resolution of 1024x600.

Dual core Processor and 8GB internal memory                                                                   

8 hour Battery Life.

Built in WI-FI

Weighs  413g

It will be released in the US on 15^th November for $199, Amazon has yet to announce a UK release date.

By Robert Leat

Editor in Chief

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Images of iPhone 5's inner Workings leaked

Photos have been leaked of the inner workings of an iPhone5. From these photos we can see that it will feature an A5 processor, which is the same processor currently found in the iPad. The pictures were posted anonymously on the Chinese social networking site Weibo.

By Robert Leat
Site Founder and Editor
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HTC to Sue Apple over Patent Infringement

HTC the maker of Smart Phones is going to sue Apple over a patent infringement. HTC is using patents they bought from Google to lodge complaints against the technology giant Apple. HTC’s complaint was that Apple computers and mobile devices breach the patent s for Wi-Fi capability and processor communication technology.

Apple Vs Android (source)

This is the third time HTC have filed a complaint against Apple. Grace Lei has said in a statement "We are taking this action against Apple to protect our intellectual property, our industry partners, and most importantly our customers that use HTC phones”

Apple have also been sued by Samsung before, Samsung’s phones also use the Android operating system. It is clear that this is becoming a fight between Apple and Android.

                                                                   

By Robert Leat
Site Founder and Editor
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Apple iPhone 5 Prototype Left in a bar

It has been reported that an iPhone 5 prototype has been left in a bar in San Francisco. This is not the first time this has happened to an Apple employee; a year ago an unreleased iPhone 4 was misplaced in a bar and sold to a gadget website.  However no spy shots have been found online. Apple has reported the incident to the police.  Apple are desperate to recover the phone so that they can avoid a similar situation to what happened last year in the run up to the iPhone4 release.

By Robert Leat

Editor and Site Founder

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Steve Jobs Resigns as Apple CEO

Apple’s co-founder and CEO has resigned, Tim Cook will replace him as CEO. Steve Jobs recently underwent a liver transplant due to his pancreatic cancer, Jobs has said he can no longer meet his duties and 

expectations as chief executive.                       

Steve Jobs, 56 has been on medical leave since January 17^th. In a statement he said "I have always said if there ever came a day when I could no longer meet my duties and expectations as Apple's chief executive, I would be the first to let you know.

"Unfortunately, that day has come. I hereby resign as chief executive of Apple. Although Jobs has resigned he will still be on the board of directors and be a part of Apple. 

   By Robert Leat
Editor and Founder
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Apple Faces Lawsuit

Apple is facing a lawsuit brought by 27,000 South Koreans who are angry over the collection of location data on iPhones and iPads.

Each is seeking 1m won (£533) in compensation for privacy violations.

Apple has faced criticism since in emerged in April that its iPhones and iPads stored locations which could be used to create a map of the user's movements.

The lawsuit could pave the way for others around the world.

Earlier this month the South Korean communications regulator Korea Communications Commission ordered Apple's local operation to pay 3m won (£1,600) fine for violating the country's location information laws.

Kim Hyeong-seok, the lawyer representing the group, himself took Apple to court earlier this year and was awarded 1m won.

The issue came to light when security researchers found a hidden file on the devices containing a record of everywhere they had been.

Used with certain software, the file could generate a map of all a person's movements with the phone.

Apple denied that it has used the information to track user location, saying that the handsets were simply recording information about mobile phone towers and wi-fi hotspots with a view to using it at a later date to "improve services".

Following criticisms, it quickly issued an update which cut the amount of time stored data was kept to just a week and no longer transferred it to the owner's computer.

It also allows users to disable the location services setting on their iPhone or iPad.

Permission for the tracking was given by users among the many pages of terms and conditions for the iTunes store.

By: Matthew Slack
Guest Writer

Apple Makes record Profit

(C) Apple

Apple’s profits have soared above expectations as sales of the iPhone and iPad double. Apples Net income was $7.31 billion (£4.6 billion), 125% higher than last year. Apple have sold 20million iPhones and 9.25 million iPads, however iPod sales are down 20% with Apple only shifting 7.54 million units. 

By Robert Leat
Site Founder
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Google Android Market reaches 4.5 billion downloads

Google’s Android Market has reach 4.5 billion downloads. But this is still 10 Billion behind Apple.  Google reached its billionth download a year ago , over the past  12 months Google has managed to generate a massive 3.5 billion downloads 

By Robert Leat
Site Founder

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WWDC Keynote 2011 Summary

Yesterday Apple held their annual developers conference. Apple unveiled their new iCloud service which is basically a media streaming service; it syncs media and iTunes music to all iOS devices. The best part is that this service will be free of charge, it will replace Apple’s current Mobile Me service. iCloud allows you to wirelessly sync  photos, documents, apps and games to all of you iOS devices , Macs and PC’s. An interesting feature of the iCloud service is iTunes Match , which scans you music library , it will then log what songs you have and it will make these songs available for download on all your iOS devices ,  if the AAC files Apples’  iTunes store uses are higher quality than the files you have in iTunes it will automatically replace them with a 
higher quality version free of charge

Apple's iCloud service

Apple also unveiled iOS 5 which is the latest mobile operating system for all iOS devices. The beta is available   currently available to developers only, regular consumers will have access to the download later this autumn. The Changes include: Notification centre, a lot of  iOS users  complained about how push notifications interrupted whatever they were doing , forcing you to deal with the notification, the update removes this and instead replaces it with an android style pull down notification centre,    The camera launch time will be much faster, a lot of iOs device users complained about slow camera launch times ; Apple promised  much faster launch times. The volume up button will now double as a camera shutter; imaging focus has also improved with aperture lock and on photo editing. Apple has now Added iMessage an instant messaging service similar to the Blackberry service BBM.

Apple's iMessage service

The next Mac OSX called Lion was announced. The new features include:  Multi-touch gestures this  allows you to swipe between windows, view mission control , pinch to zoom; Full screen apps is another  feature added to Lion; Mission control which “brings together full screen apps , Dashboard, Exposé” and a new feature which allows you to get a “birds-eye view “  of everything on your system. For the full list of OSX features go here.

The Birds-eye view feature of Lion

By Robert Leat

(C) Robert Leat 2011

 Site Founder

 

iPhone 5 release date leaked

It has been revealed that the iPhone 5 will be available for purchase on the 21^st November; this information was leaked by an anonymous Phones4U representative who was speaking to the technology website t3.  The Phones4U representative said “iPhone 5 has been delayed until November following an issue with the handset's software” he also said that “November 21st release, would "be pretty much the same as the iPhone 4 with new software” typical Apple.

By Robert Leat

(C) Robert Leat 2011

 Site Founder and Editor and Chief

HTC Profits Rise by 200 percent

(C) HTC 

HTC‘s Profits have risen by a record 200 percent. They are certainly catching up with Apple’s dominance of the smart phone market; the company posted a record profit of £315 million. HTC’s Products are increasing in popularity, the question remains can HTC overtake Apple?  

iPhones Track your Location

                                                 

                                                              O'REILLY discussion 

It has come to light that iPhones  and 3G iPads regularly record  the devices location in a hidden file.  This has apparently been happening since the release of iOS 4. This has caused a lot of panic; the big question is What is Apple using this data for?    

This is nothing new mobile phone companies have been storing data from your phone for years, but don’t worry the data is protected and in order to access the data you will require a court order.

Post a comment below, are you happy that Apple are doing this?

Android Boosting Smart phone Market

Gartner a research firm predicts that Android will significantly boost smart phone sales over the next 2 years. And windows phone 7 will soon over take iPhone.  Demand for Android will see the market for smart phones grow by 58% this year and 38 %, according to Gartner’s latest report.

windows Phone 7

Gartner foresees Windows phone 7 overtaking the iPhone in popularity by 2015.

(C) Android

Next iPod nano to feature camera?

(c) Apple.pro


The new iPod nano may feature a camera. Apple.pro has apparently got the seventh generation iPod nano case, the case clearly shows a cut out where a cut out where the camera would go. It would appear apple hasn’t realised their mistake and has kept the same size, which is impossible to use because it’s so small.  

iPad 2 sells for $5,000

Apple's iPad2 (c) Apple

On the American auction site Ebay the iPad2 was spotted selling for the hefty price tag of $5,000 (£3,076) in addition to the iPad he is throwing in a case for free how generous. Demand in America has been high with most shops and online retailers selling out of stock and apple have said it will take 4-5 weeks to ship if you order from their website.