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The ITU’s roundtable discussing the controversy over standard-essential patents has wrapped up its first day, and surprise — there wasn’t immediate harmony. While strict press rules prevent discussing exactly which companies said what in the Geneva meeting, the UN’s telecom agency mentioned that the initial, partly publicized discussions saw a “heated debate” that mostly followed party lines. Certain companies kept to their view that bans over standard-essential patents hurt innovation, while others were adamant that bans were harmless and potentially necessary — you can probably guess who’s on each side. The meeting mostly helped whittle down the subjects for the closed meetings, which should focus on how much of a curb there should be on injunctions as well as the definition of just what the “reasonable” in Reasonable and Non-Discriminatory (RAND) patent licensing terms should mean.

ITU officials remain ever the budding optimists, however. They felt that it was tough to leave injunctions “completely unchecked” and that their institution could shape policies, even if it wouldn’t get involved with ongoing talks. Legal Officer Antoine Dore also explained to Engadget that his organization wasn’t surprised at the uncompromising stances early on and expected the companies involved to open up “a lot more” once they weren’t under the watchful eyes of cameras and reporters. If they don’t, we suspect other international organizations could exert their own pressure.

Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile, Apple, Samsung, Microsoft, Nokia, Google

ITU roundtable narrows scope of debate around standard-essential patents, doesn’t create world peace originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 10 Oct 2012 14:34:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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In a move that essentially means RIM is ready for business, BlackBerry App World has begun accepting submissions of BlackBerry 10 optimized apps today. This event marks one of the more important steps that must be taken before BlackBerry 10 may be released in the real world, and RIM is projecting themselves as a group that’s ready and willing to start this engine with a bang. The announcement includes suggestions for developers to get in early so that their app may be featured in the first wave of “preferred carousel placements” at the launch of the operating system in early 2013.

Of course this event doesn’t definitely reveal the final date that BlackBerry 10 will hit the market, but it’s nearly as good when it comes to being a developer. If you plan on dedicating yourself to the BlackBerry universe, you’ll have already made plans to get in on this touch-heavy operating system update in BlackBerry 10. If you’re ready, now’s the time to jump in head-first.

Included in this update is a new set of options in the BlackBerry App World Vendor Portal, that being both a new Family called “BlackBerry 10″ and a new device called “All Touch.” You’ll want to select these both if you’re sending out the good faith in a new app for the futuristic operating system coming early next year. You’ll have also been using the Beta3 Develop SDK launched just this September 27th if you want to do this all correctly.

Also of interest for those of you not intimately familiar with the BlackBerry universe – this submission portal also once again reminds us that the BlackBerry PlayBook will likely continue to work with its own separate operating system made specifically for its unique tablet size. At this time there are no public plans for another BlackBerry tablet other than the PlayBook – though with touch-heavy excellence on the horizon, there’s always the possibility.

[via BlackBerry Devblog]

BlackBerry 10 app submissions open today is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Minecraft Forum member Rumsey made a full-scale replica of the World of Warcraft map made of Minecraft blocks. He wrote a custom application that automatically voxelized every bit of WoW, “down to the last tree stump”, to create a Minecraft map made of 68 billion blocks. I’m still struggling to comprehend how this is possible.

Rumsey said his program took about 24 hours to complete the conversion. Even though the process was automated, Rumsey still had to do a lot of work to prepare for it, saying, “Prior to the conversion process, I needed to match textures from World of Warcraft to the appropriate material in Minecraft. For example, an object with a wooden texture might be converted into wooden planks, while an object with a mossy texture might be converted into mossy cobblestone. I created a special program to help do this assignment, but selecting materials for all 10,000+ textures in the game still required many hours of work.” I can imagine. Actually no, I can’t.

As you might have guessed, the map files are also huge. They’re in a 2.17 GB zip file that balloons to nearly 24 GB when unpacked. YouTuber svmgaming has a guide for Windows users on how to install them if you’ve got the available space. You can see footage of the map about 5:30 in:

Head to the Minecraft Forum for more information and pictures, as well as the link to the torrent file needed to download the map. I’m not sure which is more impressive – this or LEGO Middle-Earth.

[via Nerd Approved]

Now that the Samsung Galaxy S III Mini has been confirmed, the first question you should be asking yourself is this: if the original was too big, will this device be just right? It’s exactly that that Samsung wants you to be thinking – even though the components inside this “Mini” version of the device may be rather different from the original, it really depends on your perspective whether or not you’ll accept the Samsung “Hero” branding that’s taking place here. It worked with the simultaneous launch of the Galaxy S III on multiple carriers in the USA with the same model and name intact – will the “S III” magic continue forth with another nature-toting smartphone?

With the Samsung Galaxy S II, the company made a giant mistake sending out different devices to several different carriers with different names on each of them. Now Samsung retains the good points of having multiple different devices – they made the Galaxy Beam, after all – while they keep one great hero collection in-tact. With the Galaxy S III Mini, a built-in fanbase can be accessed.

Samsung has created a device in the Galaxy S III that works with a variety of 3rd party apps that support sharing. We’ve seen these apps appear on several devices since the Galaxy S III appeared – and in some cases, they existed on devices before the S III as well – but now that the one hero has them, the lesser devices will follow. Have a peek at this hands-on with the Galaxy S III’s sharing abilities and expect them to appear on the Galaxy S III Mini as well:

S-Beam

AllShare Play

Camera Sharing with Share Shot and Buddy Photo Share

Now if you’ve got the Galaxy Note II, the Galaxy Note 10.1, the Samsung Galaxy S III, and the Galaxy S III Mini, you’ll be able to share – almost without exception – back and forth between them with near-exclusive abilities. Sound like another company you know?

This is the way you go big in the smart device industry today – exclusion under the guise of value-added features. Let us know if you feel the same way, and be sure to stay tuned for the Galaxy S III Mini as it either follows the slipstream created by the Galaxy S III or it fades into obscurity.

Galaxy S III Mini indicates Samsung’s hero strategy works is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.