Hasta La Gadget!

Sometimes it seems like the worlds of science and marketing are in a constant struggle to present us with the future described in science fiction. Whether its flying cars, the OS from Minority Report, or robots that play “rock, paper, scissors,” the old saw is true: you can’t fight progress. And now it looks like Yahoo Japan has jumped into the fray, with a little help from Comel, a Japanese company that manufactures billboards. The two firms are collaborating on electronic signage that photographs passersby, analyses it using NEC’s facial analysis technology, and guesstimates his or her age. Once the demo is confirmed, the device spits out appropriate advertising content. According to the poorly translated press release, the “face image data” is then erased, saving only a record of the passerby’s age and sex — so you Civil Libertarians can rest easily. Right.

[Via Trading Markets]

Filed under: Displays

Yahoo Japan plans facial recognizing, content personalizing billboards originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 10 Apr 2009 13:11:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Going to Coachella? They’ve released an iPhone app that should be standard for every big music festival ever. Plus, the most addicting iPhone game yet? All in a week’s work in the App Store.

Coachella: I haven’t been to a big festival in a while, but this app really makes me want to go to Coachella, even though Paul McCartney is headlining one of the nights. On top of a complete schedule of who’s playing where and when, the app can also help you and your iPhone equipped friends find each other amidst all the clouds of hash smoke by updating your GPS location. And you can also browse photos taken during the event. Very cool, and free.

Tap Tap Coldplay: It was only a matter of time before megarockers Coldplay got the Tapulous treatment. Now you can pretend to be summoning dulcet mainstream pop with the tap of a touchscreen. Someday it will be that easy. $5.

Doodle Jump: This game has such a great graphic style, I almost wouldn’t care if it was kind of boring or awkward. But it is the opposite of both of those things: using some of the most subtle and accurate tilt controls I’ve yet played with, you guide your little Q-Bert looking guy on his springy journey up, up, up a sheet of graph paper, blasting baddies with nose balls along the way. Laugh with delight as you blow past other players’ actual high score marks scribbled in the margins. This game is so fun. $1

GoodCab BadCab: This is more a fun idea than a great one, as I can’t quite see what functional use this would ever have, but GoodCab BadCab prompts you to enter your cabbie’s medallion number and then rate him or her on driving abilities, friendliness, whether help was given with your bags, and of course, the odor of the cab’s interior, be it pleasant or horrible. What you would then do with this information is anyone’s guess. Maybe a prize for the top-ranked cabbie? It’s free.

Coupon Sherpa: Coupon Sherpa collects scannable coupons for a large assortment of major retailers, letting you browse for currently usable coupons in the store, simply having the cashier zap your iPhone screen with the barcode reader. The list of supported stores is promised to grow—right now according to Brian at Wired it includes several biggies like Walgreens, Target and Macy’s but is lacking essentials like Starbucks, Best Buy or Walmart. $2

This Week’s App News on Giz:

• MLB’s Incredible Web Video Plans: HD With Mosaic Picture-in-Picture, Live Streaming to iPhone

• Giz Explains: All The Smartphone Mobile App Stores

• Nine Inch Nails Shows Every Other Band How to Make an Awesome iPhone App

• Google Voice App Comes to iPhone and iPod Touch Soon

• The Official Star Trek Phaser iPhone App

• Diddy’s Official iPhone App Makes Him Officially Everywhere

• Galaga Remix Lightning Review: Classic Space Shootin’ For iPhone

• Myst For iPhone Preview Video: Hope You Like Tapping

• Apple Counts Down Up to 1 Billion Apps: Win $10,000 iTunes Gift Card, MacBook Pro and More

Also, be sure to check out our new weekly Android App of the Week picks.

This list is in no way definitive. If you’ve spotted a great app that hit the store this week, give us a heads up or, better yet, your firsthand impressions in the comments. And for even more apps: see our previous weekly roundups here, and check out our Favorite iPhone Apps Directory and our original iPhone App Review Marathon. Have a good weekend everybody.

Remember how the portrait QWERTY Cedar garnered FCC approval a little while back? Yeah, well, forget that ever happened. Actually, don’t — it’s a totally valid approval — but that was the Cedar “200,” and now we’re seeing a Cedar “100” come rolling through. It’s really common for HTC to create multiple versions of the same basic device using the same codename, differentiating them only with different three-digit numbers on the tail end, and that appears to be the case here; both versions of the Cedar are CDMA, so we could be looking at models for Sprint and Verizon, for example. Kinda puts the damper on the “why doesn’t [insert carrier here] get any good phones?” complaint for just a moment, doesn’t it?

Filed under: Cellphones, Handhelds

Second version of HTC Cedar graces FCC with its presence originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 10 Apr 2009 12:39:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Apple’s going all out in anticipation of a landmark for the company — the downloading of one billion apps in the App store. Not bad for nine months of work, if you think about it: over 110 million a month, in fact. About 27 million a week… well, you get the idea. Oh yeah, they’re giving away a bunch of stuff too, so be sure to check that out if the mood strikes you.

Filed under: Misc. Gadgets

Apple anxiously awaits the selling of their billionth App download celebration originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 10 Apr 2009 12:22:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The flip-down panel is the biggest drawback to the BD-P1600.

Samsung was the first manufacturer with a standalone Blu-ray player, but in 2008 it often felt like the company was struggling to keep up with Panasonic. When Panasonic released the first Profile 2.0 player, Samsung was still shipping Profile …