Hasta La Gadget!

So what if Barack Obama managed to bring the vast majority of US tech leaders in for a private meeting recently? Nicolas Sarkozy can do it too! The French président and soon-to-be host of the next G8 gathering is said to be preparing some rather handsome invitations to Mark Zuckerberg, Eric Schmidt and a few other big timers from the internet in order to discuss the world wide web’s future direction. The input from these web sages is to be filtered down into a volume of extremely precious wisdom, which is to then be conveyed to the multinational meeting taking place in Deauville near the end of May. Sarkozy just needs to make sure the other seven participating nations don’t object before sending out the official invites. We have a pretty good idea of what Eric Schmidt thinks our future will involve, but Zuckerberg and the others? That’ll be interesting to hear.

Heads of Google, eBay, Facebook and Twitter will advise G8 summit on how to search, sell, poke and RT originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 07 Mar 2011 14:53:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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So the UK is finally catching up with the fine money-grubbing nations of this world and allowing product placement in British-made TV programming, starting from next Monday, February 28th. Advertising embedded in internationally sourced films and shows has long been tolerated as a necessary evil within the Queen’s realm, but now that the telecoms regulator Ofcom is opening up locally farmed TV content to the blight of commercialization, it’s come up with a suitably austere logo to warn us of its dangers. Basically, any future episodes of Hollyoaks that may contain a “stray” Diet Coke or Nokia N8 within the frame will be preceded by the above P placed within a P, which will prep you for the pernicious potentiality that the programming you are perusing may provoke you into purchasing new property. Capiche?

Product placement gets a logo of its own, turns the world inside out originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 21 Feb 2011 03:09:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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When tax expert Bob McIntyre’s daughter bought a cellphone for $25, he was surprised to learn she ended up paying almost $60 in total, once taxes were added in. What followed was his adventures into the messy world of the government’s cellphone taxing scheme, which is calculated based on the original sticker-price of a phone, and not the post-rebate and discount price. More »

Ah, funding. So necessary, yet so tedious to get. Aptera — an automotive startup that has warmed our hearts with its eco-friendly, three-wheeled prototypes — has been seeking government funding to take things “next level” ever since 2008. After being laughed out of the building at first, the company reapplied and managed to get its 2e certified as a “car” by the US Department of Energy. Unfortunately, miles (and miles) or red tape have held Aptera back ever since, and even today, they’re still waiting to see if Uncle Sam will be shelling out to further their initiatives. Rather than putting its head down and realizing it’s no GM, the company has pushed out a newsletter explaining the current situation. Essentially, it’s dead-set on holding out for more funding — be it from the DoE’s coffers or elsewhere — in order to maintain quality and keep the per-unit costs down to a reasonable level. According to Aptera: “We would obviously love to accelerate the process, but the government has to make sure they complete their comprehensive evaluation and we have to let the process run its course.” Bummer.

Aptera: no production vehicles until we get funding, from the government or elsewhere originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 07 Feb 2011 04:47:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We don’t know what exactly is going on over in Egypt, but the country’s government seems to have decided that keeping in touch with the outside world is no longer desirable and has almost completely shut down internet, SMS, and BlackBerry communications. It’s not surprising, therefore, that reports are emerging in rather piecemeal form at the moment, though Renesys has hard data showing that almost all routes for exchanging internet traffic with the country have been shut down, with only Noor Group excepted from the block — a move the internet analytics company theorizes might have been motivated by a desire to keep the Egyptian Stock Exchange online. The reasons for this blackout remain open to speculation and interpretation — most of which, we remind you, has better destinations than your favorite tech blog — but its content is clearly an extreme step for any government to take. Check out the links below for further details.

[Image credit: seandenigris.com]

Egypt enters communication blackout with disruption to internet, SMS, and BlackBerry messaging originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 28 Jan 2011 04:44:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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