Hasta La Gadget!

This morning we’re getting in down and dirty with such a variety of technological breakthroughs your brain is going to flip. Start your mind-blowing off right with an announcement of the official Google Glass Explorer Edition coming to developers “in a couple of months.” Next be sure to see Audi’s own super strange Swarm lighting for their futuristic cars of tomorrow. Amazon has brought forth in-app purchases for all manner of software – Mac, PC, and web games included.

Over at Intel you’ll find a new batch of budget-friendly Ivy Bridge processors from all angles. The group known as Kantar World Panel has made it clear that the 2012 Q4 smartphone champion is the iPhone by a giant margin as Android appears to gain a lot of deserters – strange way to put it! AT&T has made an announcement that they’ll be bringing on a full purchase of Alltel for a cool $780 million USD.

Those of you in love with HTC’s user interface for smartphones will be glad to see Sense 5 leaking in full with a lovely aesthetic that’s utterly pared-back compared to past iterations. Verizon has announced a hearty Q4 2012 loss and blamed it on Hurricane Sandy as well as pension costs. It’s time for Firefox OS to hit the smartphone universe with a couple of developer smartphones you’re going to Orange. I mean love!

MySpace’s relaunch is in a bit of trouble – maybe – as they’ve been accused of using music that may not be theirs – dear, oh dear. Paypal has announced that they’re making a full overhaul a reality in the coming months. The folks at MSI have announced a budget tablet with the name Enjoy 71 for the masses, and SteelSeries has unveiled their newest gaming keyboard with aspirations for colorful game-on action.

SlashGear Morning Wrap-up: January 22nd, 2013 is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Dell Wyse – the cloud computing company acquired by Dell in May 2012 – may soon be entering its bet on the emerging PC on a stick genre. While the previous examples of these flash drive computers we’ve seen use Android as their primary operating system, Dell’s product will also run on Android, but will give customers the freedom to choose from different OSes to actually use.

Currently known as “Project Ophelia,” the computer is meant to be used mainly as a gateway to Dell Wyse’s cloud services. According to Quartz, “It allows access to Windows, Mac OS, Google’s Chrome OS, Dell’s custom cloud solutions, Citrix cloud software, and even Google’s Chrome OS, using virtual instances of those operating systems running in the cloud.” The PC will plug into (and draw power from) a display via USB. Then it will connect to Dell Wyse’s servers via Wi-Fi and to hardware peripherals via Bluetooth.

Dell’s vice president of cloud operations Tarkan Maner said that they’re planning to sell Ophelia for only $50 (USD) each, though he didn’t mention how much the cloud services would cost. That’s probably where they’ll generate most of their revenue.

From a tech support perspective, this could make it a lot easier to secure and manage a large number of computers. But I wonder if it also poses a risk of data theft, disconnection or lack of access on a massive scale should things go wrong. It also takes away a lot of control from the user in return for the convenience it provides. Either way, it’s too early to see what kind of effect Ophelia may have on the PC industry.

[via Quartz via Boy Genius Report]

There’s nothing worse when you learn that your job is about to be outsourced to another country. Apparently, one U.S. software developer took matters into his own hands and outsourced not just his own job, but a couple of his jobs to China – raking in the profits.

*Not the actual programmer who pulled off this scheme.

No matter what you think about this, you have to admit that this was a clever scheme, especially since the employee had this con going on in a couple of different companies, earning him a couple of hundred thousand dollars a year. While he was at work, he checked Reddit, surfed the net, watched videos, and checked up on Facebook and LinkedIn.

Verizon noticed this after a company asked them about some odd activity on the firm’s VPN logs. The records show that the employee was logged in from China, while at the same time he was sitting in front of his monitor at work. While he was running his scheme, the employee received great performance reviews, and was considered an expert in C, C++, Perl, Java, Ruby, PHP and Python. Apparently, he paid the the Chinese firm about $50,000 a year.

Today Intel reported their fiscal fourth quarter results for 2012, noting a full year revenue of $53.3 billion and a fourth quarter revenue of $13.5 billion USD. These amounts are down 1.2% (for the year total) and 3% (for the quarter) year-over-year – certainly encouraging in a year where PC sales weren’t exactly booming. Intel also reported operating income of $14.6 billion USD for the year and $3.2 billion operating income over the fourth quarter.

This report of the quarter flows, as Paul Otellini, Intel president and CEO noted, “largely as expected” as the company “continued to execute through a challenging environment.” Otellini reminded investors today that Intel entered the mobile market with hardware for tablets and smartphones and “worked with partners to reinvent the PC.” This is referring to the wave of touch-friendly machines working with Intel processors that’ve been revealed as Windows 8 came to fruition.

Full year statistics continued with Intel’s PC Client Group’s revenue set at $34.3 billion USD, down 3 percent year-over-year. The company’s Data Center Group’s revenue hit $10.7 billion, up 6 percent year-over-year, while their “Other Intel architecture group” had revenue of $4.4 billion, this down 13 percent compared to the year before. As far as the quarter went, PC Client Group, Data Center Group, Other Intel architecture group had revenue of $8.5 billion, $2.8 billion, and $1.0 billion respectively in their fiscal Q4 2012.

In Intel’s fiscal Q4 they report they’ve had R&D plus MG&A spending ending up at $4.6 billion, this specifically noted as being rather close to their projected amount of $4.5 billion. Intel is reporting that they expect revenue to grow in 2013 over the full year by a “low single-digit percentage”, while R&D plus MG&A spending is expected to land at $18.9 billion, plus or minus $200 million.

Intel also expects that they’ll have a revenue of $12.7 billion (plus or minus $500 million) in their fiscal first quarter 2013 report, with a gross margin percentage of approximately 58 percent. Intel also expects that they’ll have a net loss of approximately $50 million USD in their fiscal Q1 2013 due specifically to the impact of equity investments and interest (and “other”). What a wild and most-excellent earning party this is going to be!

[via Intel]

Intel Q4 2012 earnings down but still massive at $13.3 billion in revenue is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

This week it’s all about the after-shocks of CES, and that means apps galore, denials of wrongdoing, and lots of super fun reports of malware. New devices continue to flow after CES’s departure including the iriver ULALA smartphone, Genius Gila gaming mouse, and Satechi USB 3.0 aluminum external hard drive enclosure. You’ll want to be following the Aaron Swartz story as well – this isn’t over yet!

Microsoft has released a multi-OS app by the name of HelpBridge for emergency relief – Windows Phone, iOS, and Android included. The folks at NTT DoCoMo have tipped January 22nd for the release of the Sony Xperia Tablet Z. ASUS has made it clear that they’re thinking about a Windows 8 smartphone for the near future.

Canada has decided they’ll be denying the USA access to Megaupload server data. Insiders have tipped the idea that AT&T will be acquiring Europe – or at least a mobile carrier therein. Domo the Journey is chomping it’s way to the USA with big ol’ teeth.

Hero Image: have a peek at our Review of the Beta release of AirDroid 2 – take photos remotely, but don’t expect them to be extremely hot!

Restaurant inspection scores have been added to Yelp in an effort to clean up New York and San Francisco. The Amazon MP3 store has been added to the iPhone and iPod touch. And above all else, be sure to check out Chris Davies’ column on if every phone is the Facebook phone.

SlashGear Morning Wrap-up: January 17th, 2013 is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.