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Optical character recognition purveyor IRIS has launched its next-generation IRIScan Book 3 and the IRIScan Book 3 Executive. These portable scanning solutions are battery‐powered, enabling mobile users to easily capture paper documents, receipts, photos and more without the use of a computer.
Flickr Pro users have been informed by Yahoo about the future of the once-premium accounts. As long as the user's account is kept in good standing, customers paying $25 per year for unlimited storage will be allowed to keep the plan indefinitely, with no plans for the Pro benefits to be purged.
Unity has announced that its mobile game development tools are now free to use for smaller developers. The Unity platform is popular amongst iOS and Android developers, but its creator previously charged $800 to publish a game to the App Store or Google Play. Under the new rules, that barrier has been lifted.
CS Odessa has posted a minor update for ConceptDraw Project, the developer's project management software. The v6.4 release adds new resource types, which should let organizers better describe both resources and resource behavior. Separately, new filters can be used to generate custom views of a project, which in turn can be saved for later use.
Escape Motions has released Flame Painter 2.0, an update of the developer's illustration software. The v2.0 upgrade brings in a host of new features, such as smoother antialiasing, unlimited layers and editable vector layers in the Professional edition. Brush options include new Flame, Follow, and Ribbon brushes; presets; Normal, Lighten, and Darken modes; gradient transitions; and lastly, the ability to drag-and-drop brushes from a website.
Seagate Technology has announced the new Seagate Video 3.5 HDD -- the industry’s first 4TB, 3.5-inch hard disk drive engineered specifically for use in video applications such as digital video recorders, set-top boxes, and surveillance systems. Purpose-built for video solutions, the Video 3.5 HDD can store up to 480 hours of high-definition (HD) content. The drive supports up to 16 simultaneous HD streams or 20 standard-definition streams as well as 24-hour operation capabilities optimizing it for video content applications.
Apple remains in first place on an annual BrandZ ranking of the world's most valuable brands, notes MarketingWeek. Apple's brand is estimated to be worth $185.071 billion, putting it well ahead of next-closest rivals Google ($113.669 billion) and IBM ($112.536 billion). Other companies in the top 10 include McDonald's, Coca-Cola, AT&T, Microsoft, Marlboro, Visa, and China Mobile.
Intel has noted that it has appointed Mike Bell to lead its emergent technology and product trend group, which includes ultra-mobile products. The new division will be "tasked with turning cool technology and business model innovations into products that shape and lead markets," according to Intel.
Smith Micro has launched Poser 10 and Poser Pro 2014, updates of the developer's core 3D rendering and animation tools. Both apps have gained a number of new features, such as subdivision surfaces, which let users set subdivision levels for props, figures, or body parts using Pixar's OpenSubdiv library. The technology should improve aspects like bending accuracy and object smoothness.
Starting this year, IBM's Watson intelligent agent technology will debut as a customer service assistant. Customers of Australia's ANZ Bank, Celcom, The Royal Bank of Canada, and Nielsen can query the system for general questions related to accounts with the companies. IBM claims to have the technology ready for deployment and integrated into consumer apps for computers and smartphones in the second half of 2013.
Apple has posted the opening statements two of its executives -- CEO Tim Cook (PDF) -- and CFO Peter Oppenheimer (PDF) -- made during their testimony in front of the US Senate earlier today. The documents don't reveal anything new, but do constitute a record of Apple's stance during the Senate hearing. "We pay all of the taxes we owe -- every single dollar. We not only comply with the laws, but we comply with the spirit of the laws," Cook's statement reads.
Apple is aiming to integrate Flickr and Vimeo into iOS 7, a source tells 9to5Mac. The integration is expected to work in much the same way as Facebook and Twitter support does in iOS 6, allowing single sign-ins via the Settings menu. In the case of Flickr, at least, signing in may not only add another option to iOS' built-in sharing menus, but also simplify apps with their own hooks for the service, such as Instagram. Flickr is already integrated into OS X Mountain Lion and the iOS edition of iPhoto.
A ruling yesterday in the Northern District of California may have repercussions on the smartphone patent battles raging across the US court landscape. A federal judge granted a user of a standards-essential patent a preliminary injunction against enforcement of a possible US International Trade Commission (ITC) sales injunction. This decision by Senior District Judge Ronald Whyte is the first time a US district court is preventing the ITC's only option to combat patent infringers in conjunction with standards-essential patents.
In a brief sidetrack during his Senate testimony today, Apple CEO Tim Cook voiced his opinion on US intellectual property law. Sen. Kelly Ayotte (R-NH) asked Cook about the IP benefits of running a company in the US versus other countries, but appears to have been surprised when Cook took a critical tone. "I actually think that we require much more work on IP in this country," he said.
During his testimony before the Senate on Apple's tax strategies, CEO Tim Cook restated an earlier promise that a forthcoming Mac model -- not identified -- was going to be built in the United States, and further revealed that it would be assembled in Texas. While the exact site wasn't specified, Apple has established and is expanding an administrative campus in Austin, and manufacturing partner Foxconn has facilities in Houston.
During Tim Cook's appearance on Tuesday before the US Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations (which is presently looking into the tax code), Chairman Carl Levin (D-Michigan) accused Apple of "exploiting an absurdity [in US tax laws] that we have not seen other corporations use," referring to a loophole he believes should be closed. Cook maintained that Apple pays US taxes on its US profits as it should.
Microsoft has revealed its latest iteration of its Xbox game console at a media event. The Xbox One, codenamed Durango during its development, is billed as an all-in-one system for the living room, with a greater focus on allowing users to watch live television and other media, along with heavier Kinect integration, Skype calling, and gaming improvements.
Yesterday in the MacNN forums, Mac Elite "abbaZaba" started a thread discussing a few new features they believed would be beneficial to add to the iOS Remote app. Senior User "RobOnTheCape" is looking for suggestions for good tripods to use when taking HDR pictures with an iPhone.
At Apple's online store, take advantage of low prices on refurbished MacBook Air models. Save $300 on the 13.3-inch MacBook Air with a 1.7GHz Intel dual-core i5 processor, 4GB of RAM and 256GB of flash storage, now $1,099. For $1,059 is the refurbished 11.6-inch MacBook Air with a 1.8GHz Intel dual-core i7 processor, 4GB of RAM and 256GB of flash storage.
Newegg.com is celebrating Memorial Day with price cuts on a wide selection of items. Included in that list is the Mac mini which retails for $799. Until the 27th, use coupon code 'MEMRDAY22' at checkout to drop the price to $774. That earns it the title of lowest price by $4. The Mac mini features a 2.3GHz Intel Core i7 processor, 4GB of RAM and a 1TB hard drive along with HDMI port, built-in speaker and support for iPhone headset with speaker. A one-year warranty on parts and labor is included from Apple.
A new Broadcom chipset spotted on a Chinese website may be a component of future Mac updates, bringing 802.11ac (known as "Gigabit Wi-Fi") and Bluetooth 4.0 to new models on a single chipset. Not only will the chip handle all wireless communication for future Mac models, but the new chip appears -- at first glance -- to be backward compatible with similar parts in recent models, opening up the possibility of aftermarket upgrades.
Vudu has launched an update for its iOS video player that adds support for downloading movies for offline viewing. Previously, users were required to stream all of their content from within the app, however, now they may select to download any content at various qualities for offline use. Other changes include closed captioning support for the iPhone, a simplified Player, and numerous bug fixes. VUDU Player is a free Universal app that can be downloaded from the App Store.
Sales of prepaid smartphones in the US consumer market have risen dramatically, doubling in the last year and "continuing a string of more than 12 quarters of triple-digit sales increases" according to a new report from market analysts NPD. Prepaid phones -- defined as either premium smartphones such as the iPhone bought outright to avoid a contract or low-end smartphones aimed at lower-income consumers -- increased 11 percent in year-over-year in the first quarter of 2013.
In the aftermath of the devastating tornado that cut a path of destruction through Oklahoma City on Monday, wireless carrier AT&T announced that overage charges would be suspended for the area until June 30 as part of an effort to assist victims, many of whom lost everything. Due to high call volumes as friends and family check on their loved ones, the company said it would add additional resources to relieve cell congestion.
Apple is preparing to open a new Apple Store in Adelaide, Australia on May 25 at 10AM. The Rundle Place outlet will not only be Apple's first in Adelaide, but also by extension the first in the state of South Australia, which is otherwise sparsely populated. The company has 19 other stores in the country, most of which are in New South Wales or Victoria.
Today, Google made it known to its array of merchants that it is discontinuing the Google Checkout functionality, and migrating some existing users to Google Wallet. In a blog post announcing the move, Google called the Wallet product "a platform that enables merchants to meet the demands of a multi-screen world where consumers shop in-stores, at their desks and on their mobile devices." Users have six months to find an alternative solution, if not migrated automatically.
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