Hasta La Gadget!

Unboxing videos are something of a tease, where you get to see someone tear open a brand new gadget without you experiencing any of the joy yourself. On the upside it lets you know what you can expect in the box, so you know if your box might have left out one accessory, or if it is different from what’s in the videos. We have created several unboxing videos ourselves in the past, such as with the 2013 Nexus 7 tablet which we hope was of immense value to our readers/viewers. Obviously not everyone feels the same way about unboxing videos and YouTube creator, Numberphile, has come up with a parody video of sorts where they unbox a handful of different calculators. According to the video’s description, “We put three calculators through their paces with a series of special tests.” It’s a pretty hilarious video and if you’re feeling the Monday blues, this will definitely cheer you up (no promises!). The video itself is rather lengthy at 13:50 so you might want to grab a drink or a snack, sit back, and enjoy!

Calculator Unboxing Video Parody Is Hilarious original content from Ubergizmo.

Microsoft’s annual proxy filing, made to the Securities and Exchange Commission, reveals that Chairman Bill Gates and outgoing CEO Steve Ballmer are both seeking re-election to the company’s board. The move might not sit well with investors who have reportedly tried to reduce the influence both personalities wield over the company, Reuters reports. Back in August, Steve Ballmer announced that he would be giving up the top slot at Redmond within 12 months. Gates has been out of that chair for a long time, though he has remained at the board since 1981, and is also the largest individual shareholder of Microsoft, owing 4.52 percent.

Steve Ballmer joined Microsoft’s board of directors over a decade ago, when he was given the top job. Apart from BlackRock, an investment firm that holds 5.57 percent of Microsoft shares, all the other directors hold less than 1 percent. Ballmer has 3.99 percent, so he and Gates will continue to have an influence if they’re re-elected to the board on November 19th, at Microsoft’s annual shareholders meeting. Recently it was reported that top Microsoft investors have lobbied to push Gates to step down as chairman of the board, apparently they see his presence as a hurdle in the way of fundamental change at the company. Microsoft hasn’t commented if something of this nature has happened, and Gates himself has not dropped any hints that he intends to step away from the company he co-founded with Paul Allen nearly 38 years ago. As it stands, Microsoft hasn’t nominated Ballmer’s successor. Names of potential candidates have been thrown around a lot, but no one has been finalized as yet.

Bill Gates And Steve Ballmer Seek Re-Election To Microsoft’s Board original content from Ubergizmo.

This article was written on August 21, 2007 by CyberNet.

HD DVD fans are cheering while Blu-Ray fans are booing. The reason? Paramount and DreamWorks have decided that for the next 18-months, they’ll exclusively be releasing movies on the HD DVD format. Paramount has released at least 30 movies so far on both formats which makes sense, but they say that this change and exclusive commitment with HD DVD which includes Paramount pictures, DreamWorks, Nickelodeon, and more, was the result of “extensive evaluation of current market offerings.”

What this means is that the hugely successful movies like Transformers and Shrek 3 which are due for release in the coming months will only be available on HD DVD. Blu-Ray fans aren’t the only ones upset about this, Michael Bay is furious. He’s the director of Transformers, and on his site he says “I want people to see my movies in the best formats possible.  For them to deny people who have Blu-Ray Sucks! They were progressive by having two formats. No Transformers 2 for me.”

Now we know that there really isn’t a clear winner, at least not yet.  While Blu Ray has been out-selling HD DVD, the latter ends up being more affordable for the consumers. Not only that, HD DVD’s are cheaper to manufacture. While plain old DVD’s work for me, I know there are many of you who are just ready for this battle to end, so you know who the “winner” is. And then you can go about buying movies in one format…  enough of the competition already!

So now I’m wondering whether Michael Bay’s threat to ditch Transformers 2 will be enough to sway Paramount back to offering both formats, or if they’ll end up sticking to their guns and potentially lose out on the millions that Transformers 2 could bring in. What are your thoughts on this?

Source (Thanks for the tips Max, Mohan, and Phillip)

Copyright © 2013 CyberNetNews.com

Twitter announced a few weeks back that it had filed a S-1 form confidentially with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The form lists various details about a company’s business, including its financial details, and its filing is mandatory before a company seeks to go public. Twitter IPO is expected to be the second biggest tech IPO in recent times, after Facebook went public last year. Twitter has now made its IPO filing public, revealing that it hopes to raise $1 billion by puttings its shares for trading on the open market.

The S-1 filing also indicates that Twitter has 215 million monthly active users and that in the first six months of 2013, it brought in $253.6 million revenue. Twitter hasn’t made a profit though, its net loss has actually increased by 41 percent and now stands at $69.3 million. The reason why Twitter confidentially made the filing first is because it wanted to suppress the unnecessary hype that would have created, the JOBS act awards this luxury to emerging companies. The filing was actually made back in July, Twitter kept a lid on it until September. The lead underwriter for Twitter IPO is Goldman Sachs, while a number of other major financial institutions are involved as well. Since its now in the public domain, anyone can read the Twitter IPO filing, it will be a particularly interesting read for those who would be willing to invest in Twitter stock once it becomes available for purchase.

Twitter IPO Filing Now Public original content from Ubergizmo.

Nearly a couple of weeks back BlackBerry announced that it had signed a letter of intent with Fairfax Financial Holdings for a buyout worth $4.7 billion. The offer isn’t binding on Fairfax, which has asked for a couple of months to conduct its due diligence. During this time, BlackBerry is allowed to “go-shop,” which means that it is allowed to talk to other potential buyers. Looks like there might be interest from other players in the market. According to WSJ, Cerberus Capital Management, a private equity firm, has shown interest in BlackBerry. The company’s co-founder and former co-CEO Mike Lazaridis is reportedly trying to get involved in the buyout bid as well.

According to the report, Cerberus is currently in the process of getting access to the company’s confidential financial information. Once it studies the books, Cerberus may make a bid for the ailing smartphone manufacturer. Lazaridis hasn’t confirmed as yet if he is interested in becoming part of the bid, but he has reportedly met with a number of groups, even Fairfax, to get involved. An additional bid on the table might result in a favorable buyout, since analysts expect that if Fairfax sees it is the only one interested in acquiring BlackBerry, it might lower its current $9 per share bid to $5. Fairfax is already the largest shareholder of BlackBerry, it seems to acquire the remaining 90 percent of the shares to take the company private.

BlackBerry Buyout Reportedly Draws Interest From Co-Founder Lazaridis And Cerberus original content from Ubergizmo.