Hasta La Gadget!

Intel Media’s Vice President of Engineering, Jim Baldwin, recently left his position at Intel Media, just months before the company is set to debut its Web TV service. An Intel Media spokesperson told GigaOM that “Baldwin left Intel Media to pursue opportunities outside the company.”, however GigaOM discovered through Baldwin’s Linkedin page that he has retired. Losing a key player shortly before its product is set to launch is sure to be unsettling for Intel Media.

Intel Media said to GigaOM that Baldwin will be missed, “but we have a very strong engineering organization in place with a deep leadership bench,” that will make up for Baldwin’s absence. Baldwin played a crucial work for Intel Media’s TV project. He was previously a key player in the Microsoft Mediaroom project, where he stayed for 8 years. He worked on several other TV projects including WebTV Plus, Echostar Dishplayer, DirecTV, and Ultimate TV.

Baldwin was instrumental to making Intel’s dream of launching its new Web TV service a reality. Intel Media’s Web TV service will be a subscription service that will allow viewers to watch live TV, video on-demand, and also watch TV shows/movies that the viewer may have missed. Intel Media plans on launching the Web TV service in the U.S. by the end of the year.

Intel Media says that its Web TV service will be a game changer, but it has received some criticism from all around, mainly due to the camera installed on Intel Media’s set-top box. The camera will be used to monitor whether a user is in the room, if the user is paying attention to the TV content, and the age and gender of the user. It will use the data it gathered to play targeted advertisements for the users, as well as offering suggestions on TV shows/movies the viewer(s) may enjoy. Consumers and critics feel that the camera is an invasion of privacy, however, Erik Huggers, Intel Media’s CEO, defends the camera by comparing it to the Kinect devices millions of homes have, which people have no problem using.

[via GigaOM]

Intel Media VP of Engineering retires shortly before product launch is written by Brian Sin & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Matthew Keys, the journalist who was accused of conspiring with Anonymous, has been fired by Reuters today. On his Twitter account, Keys tweeted, “Just got off the phone. Reuters has fired me, effective today. Our union will be filing a grievance. More soon.” David Girardin, a Reuters spokesperson, confirmed the firing. According to Keys, his termination from Reuters had no relation to his alleged involvement with Anonymous, but was due to him violating his “Final Written Warning”.

The final written warning was issued back on October 25th, 2012. It was issued to Keys because he created a parody Twitter account named @PendingLarry. It was used to mock Larry Page, CEO of Google. The warning goes on to say that creating the fake account that did not identify Keys as the author violated Reuter’s Social Media Policy. It also stated that his actions “displayed a serious lapse of judgment and professionalism that is unbecoming of a Reuters journalist.” The following sentences may be the reason as to why Keys was terminated,

“For these reasons, we are issuing this final written warning. We must see immediate improvement in your communications with managers and more discretion in your social media practices.”

Keys, who was Reuter’s Deputy Social Media Editor, recently came under fire a few days ago after he was criticized for tweeting misinformation from police scanners. His first tweet stated, “Dispatch: First Boston bomb suspect is Mike Mulugeta,” and his second tweet stated, “Dispatcher: Suspect 2 is missing Brown University student Sunil Tripathi.” Keys defended his position in a Facebook post, stating he was unaware that the police asked people not to publish information from police scanners, and that other social journalists were doing the same thing as he was.

Keys told Politico that his termination from Reuters “wasn’t unexpected”, and that his independent coverage of the Boston bombings was one of the reasons why he was fired. Keys also told Politico that Reuters had a “specific set of reasons for the termination” which he and the union agree “is incorrect and doesn’t hold any water.” He states that Reuters may have just been “looking for an out” and jumped at the opportunity to fire him.

[via Politico]

Reuters fires journalist accused of conspiring with Anonymous is written by Brian Sin & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield has this week returned a request from a couple of high school science students to perform a simple experiment aboard the International Space Station: wringing out water from a wet washcloth. It’s shown first that a washcloth on the ISS is stored in a sort of hockey puck form, smashed down to its smallest physical form to avoid taking up any unnecessary space aboard the space station. From there it’s a lengthy task just unfolding the piece of material for basic use.

The washcloth itself is made wet offscreen as the task appears to spoil the surprise for the viewer. The viewers, mind you, are part of the brand new NFB Space School just revealed this week. This program is housed by the National Film Board in Canada and will continue to make use of the efforts of Chris Hadfield aboard the ISS as well as other Canadians willing to join in on the education.

Once water is released into the station, you’ll see it take on a blob-like form. Once it is (seemingly) inside the cloth, it travels with the cloth. This is similar to what would happen if Hadfield were much closer to the surface of our planet, but were the cloth this wet and he were standing on the Earth’s ground, gravity would have the water dripping down from the cloth.

Because of the surface tension of the materials included here and the extremely low gravity present on the ISS, the water stays together – for the most part – even when the cloth wrings it out. You’ll see the “tube of water” promised to you in the title of this article about 2 minutes in to the demonstration video.

The NFB Space School has been launched today as well – this being an online resource for science enthusiasts and everyday learners online. This program appears at the moment to be prepared for students across the world, provided by Canada’s NFB in support of space exploration and the expansion of scientific knowledge in general. Have a peek at SlashGear’s International Space Station tag portal for more news from our high-flying astronaut friends!

[via NFB Space School]

ISS experiment confirms state of wrung-out wet towel in space is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

While the 2012 NFL Draft was marred online by insider parties using Twitter to announce picks before television broadcasts could so so themselves, sources this week are making clear a new expected etiquette of those present at the event. The word being used this week by news officials is “speculation”: before the NFL commissioner makes an announcement, mum’s the word. Even so, hard-and-fast rules on this situation appear to be able to be bent, just so long as they’re not broken.

It would appear that ESPN is at the tip of this year’s reign-in of “early” news flashes, with several heads noting several different sides of the story this week. ESPN’s Adam Schefter spoke with the Sherman Report about revealing key information on Twitter, saying that “run of the mill” picks will not be touched by him. Quarterback picks or “bold moves,” as he put it, will have no restrictions – Twitter action will continue in that regard.

“Basically. During the second round, only one or two picks are headline worthy. If it is the headline of that day, and I’m fortunate enough to get that pick, I’m going to report it.

I am almost certain–not to put words in someone’s mouth–that the NFL has to spoken to ESPN and ESPN has told me to be more selective about what I’m tweeting in advance. I am trying to be as considerate as possible and [not] tweet everything we’re getting, but I am going to tweet the headline-making items.” – Schefter

The actual dialog between Schefter, his boss Seth Markman, and possibly the NFL itself is not known – what he’s made plain is the fact that someone higher up than Schefter would rather he didn’t use Twitter to speak about any Draft picks at all – at least not until they’re publicly available through the NFL’s own channels. The difference between the NFL posting information, ESPN speaking this information on a television broadcast, and a Twitter post can be a matter of minutes – but sometimes that’s a whole lot longer than one would expect – and a lot more important.

What’s your opinion on the Twitter situation here with the NFL Draft? Are you a follower of those sources that find out picks before they’re made official through the NFL itself? Let us know if you want to see picks first on Twitter, if you’d rather watch them on television, or if you want the NFL to speak directly to you with a telegram!

Twitter spoiler cut-back tipped for 2013 NFL Draft is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

This week the folks at LG have revealed the contents of their soon-approaching press event for New York City: the smartphone known as the LG Optimus G Pro. This device has been released internationally and will be appearing in the United States with 4G LTE capabilities and a set of specifications not unlike that of the international edition. This device will be revealed with full details at the event which will take place on the first of May in the evening at a concert event.

This concert will feature the band known as Atlas Genius. This is the latest in a line of similar events hosted by LG, Samsung, and most recently HTC. Just this past week an HTC mini-concert was held with musician Pharrell Williams in promotion of the HTC One smartphone release. Several months ago, Samsung brought the Samsung Galaxy Note II to the United States with a mini-concert put on by Kanye West.

Even Apple has joined in the fun with an appearance by the Foo Fighters at the iPhone 5 release event this past year. Now with the LG Optimus G Pro, LG will be the bringing an engagement to New York City. It’s not known at the moment if the smartphone will be available at the event for demonstrations or if the company will be revealing any release information before or after the music event.

With the release of the LG Optimus G Pro, LG will have effectively updated their large smartphone nearly-tablet-sized segment while the Verizon Intuition by LG remains out there for consumers looking for a pen-toting experience. Here with the LG Optimus G Pro, Qualcomm has also jumped onboard with the Snapdragon 600 quad-core processor, this being the same processor coming with the HTC One and the Samsung GALAXY S 4.

LG Optimus G Pro appears in press event invite is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.