Hasta La Gadget!

Buildings made from metal and glass look pretty sleek and futuristic, but it seems that the result of such designs have led to unintended consequences over in London. According to a report from City A.M., reflections of the sunlight from the building have been so intense to the point where a Jaguar XJ that was parked nearby was reportedly damaged by it and showed signs that certain areas of the car had been melted by the intense sunlight. There were also reports of smells of melting plastic and a photo taken by the BBC revealed some pretty obvious distortions on the vehicle.

If you were thinking that this was some kind of freak accident, it wasn’t as there have been earlier reports of another van in the area that has fallen prey to the intense glare as well. City of London officials are currently investigating the matter and have since cordoned off several parking spots in the area that would fall under the glare just to be on the safe side. The building’s developers have also agreed to cover the repair costs of the damage done to the car. If you want to get an idea of how bright the glare is from the building, this Instagram photo should be able to provide you with a clearer picture.

Reflections From London Skyscraper Melts Car original content from Ubergizmo.

The Hemisphere Project has been described as a partnership between local and federal drug officials and U.S. telecom giant AT&T, they’re said to have an “extremely close association.” The New York Times reports that this project was started back in 2007 and has been carried out in great secrecy. Drug Enforcement Administration agents reportedly have access to decades worth of phone call records from AT&T’s enormous database, records are said to go as far back as 1987. The records contain logs of every call that passes through an AT&T switch, it is irrelevant if the call was made by an AT&T subscriber or not.

According to the report, the government “pays AT&T to place its employees in drug-fighting units” in the U.S. These employees work alongside DEA agents as well as detectives from local drug enforcement agencies, their job is to supply them with phone data. The data is said to include location of callers as well. AT&T stores all of the phone records, not the government. When it needs access, the government uses an “administrative subpoena” which is issued by a federal agency, the DEA in this particular case. The report claims that the “scale and longevity” of this program appears to be “unmatched” by other programs that are being run by the government, particularly the National Security Agency. As per the documents obtained by the Times, among other achievements, the Hemisphere program has helped track a ring of drug dealers in 2011 who rotated between prepaid phones, the bust lead to 136 kilos of cocaine and $2.2 million being seized from their possession.

AT&T Apparently Providing DEA With Decades Of Phone Call Records original content from Ubergizmo.

Sky has added yet another feather to their proverbial hat by virtue of being the first company to broadcast live 4K video to folks who live in the UK. It was as recently as October last year when Sky first experimented with Ultra HD, that is, 4k, but it was also during that corresponding time last year when Sky owned just a pair of handheld Ultra HD cameras, placing their staff on an upward learning curve. The past weekend’s Premier League clash between West Ham and Stoke saw another Sky first, where Sky officially became the first UK broadcaster to complete a live broadcast successfully.

This proved to be a fully-fledged live production, where Sky made use of multiple cameras and a full outside broadcast. Before this, UHD sports broadcasts remained under one of the following two categories – they had either been recorded and played back ‘as live’, or distributed via closed-circuit networks, so to take neither of these paths proved that real progress had just happened, and history had just been made. Ultra high resolution bone crunching tackles as well as spectacular goals and saves would make ‘the beautiful game’ all the more engrossing to fans of soccer/football, don’t you think so? [Press Release]

Sky First To Broadcast Live 4K Video In The UK original content from Ubergizmo.

There has been a lot of speculation about BlackBerry’s future ever since the company announced that it was forming a Special Committee to probe “strategic alternatives” for it’s survival. The alternatives may include alliances, partnerships and a possible sale of the company as well. According to various reports, there hasn’t been much interest in the market in acquiring BlackBerry as a whole, analysts believe that it might be broken up and sold off in parts. Independent director and member of the Special Committee, Bert Nordberg, who has served as Sony Ericsson’s CEO in the past, believes that BlackBerry might be able to survive if it trims some proverbial fat and becomes a niche player.

In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, Nordberg said that there are “subsets” within the company that BlackBerry can get rid of, but only if it decides to become a niche company. It has always had larger ambitions, Nordberg says, adding that battling giants such as Apple, Samsung and Google is “tough.” To become a niche player, the company will have to revise its entire business plan. Nordberg didn’t point out exactly which subsets BlackBerry could get rid off, but there has been chatter lately that BlackBerry Messenger might be spun off as a separate company. BBM is a popular product and might be able to sustain itself against competition from behemoths such as WhatsApp. The company can’t simply switch it’s devices to Android, after its new BB10 platform failed to make a dent, because that would weaken its position with enterprise customers, which are quite essential for BlackBerry. Nordberg seems hopeful that the committee will be able to “piece something together” at the end of the day.

BlackBerry Director Says Company May Survive As A Niche Player original content from Ubergizmo.

A bit of drama has unfolded over at HTC. Several top designers of the company based in Taiwan were arrested after they were suspected to have made fraudulent expense claims and stolen trade secrets. The designers were leaving HTC to set up a new mobile design company in mainland China as well as Taiwan. Five people were taken into custody and interrogated, Vice President of Product Design Thomas Chien, R&D director Wu Chien Hung and senior manager of the design team Justin Huang, who sketched out the design for HTC One, were among those who were arrested, their offices were also raided during the investigation. Thomas Chien and Wu Chien Hung have been kept in custody while the others have been released on bail.

HTC chairwoman Cher Wang reportedly filed a complaint personally with the Taiwan Investigation Bureau. In it’s investigation the Bureau found that Chien, Wu and Huang were setting up a new mobile design company, registered already as Xiaoyu, and that they would have resigned after receiving mid-year bonuses from HTC. The company reportedly discovered that Thomas Chien had downloaded Sense 6.0 design files and sent them to external contacts over email. All three of them are also accused of falsely billing HTC for over US$334,000 in commission fees for an external design firm, while the design for HTC One was done in-house. They are accused of splitting the money between themselves. HTC has said in a statement that it expects all employees to “observe and practice the highest levels of integrity and ethics.” It is refraining from making any further comments as relevant authorities are in the process of conducting investigations.

Several Top HTC Designers Arrested Over Allegations Of Fraud And Stealing Trade Secrets original content from Ubergizmo.