Anyone who works in events will understand why me (Kerry) and Chloe are very tired this morning! However, I must say we are rather pleased with ourselves…

Over 2 months of planning, 6 weeks of promoting and 1 day of printing, producing and organising led to one good Tech Talks!

(For those who haven’t been, Tech Talks is a technology themed event for small business to learn, network, and be inspired).

The first of our speakers was Jo Reid of Calvium who spoke to us about mobile phone apps. Jo gave us some great ideas about how we could go about having a mobile app for our business and of course, why.

Some tweets throughout Jo’s talks:

#techtalksbristol over 50% of uk now have smartphones! (@arthursoft)

Jo Reid @appfurnace talking about app games company RedWasp & their new gameow.ly/1HmVRA #TechTalksBristol (@DickieArmour)

#techtalksbristol excellent parallel between the liberating effect of the early PCs & now with smartphone apps. (@kevleighton)

#techtalksbristol Great to know Bristol is such a creative and technology hub!!! (@IanThorneBrown)

Up next was Fred George who came across from London to deliver his talk: Developer Anarchy.  He spoke about the organisation Forward, and their approach to management systems; which is, they have none. This one sparked a lot of intrigue!

Some tweets throughout Fred’s talks:

#techtalksbristol I am glad there is a development methodology that describes the way I work. Anarchy. (@JeremyBassett)

@fgeorge52 talking about ‘programmer anarchy’ at#TechTalksBristol – looks and sounds crazy! (@mattrowntree)

Programmer anarchy! Awesomeness!#techtalksbristol (@CVC_Wizard)

Loving Fred George’s passion for his developer anarchy!! #techtalksbristol (@DickieArmour)

Our final speaker, Geoff Roberts, gave an information-packed talk about the vast opportunities in data.

Some tweets throughout Geoff’s talks:

The greatest barrier to success is fear of failure! Like it! #techtalksbristol (@KevLeighton)

Geoff Roberts recommending NetBase for social search ow.ly/i/u5i3 #TechTalksBristol (@DickieArmour)

How to maximize revenue using the RFM model at#TechTalksBristol (@Mattrowntree)

And the tweets continued!

Sadly the venue needed us to vacate at 6 so networking was cut slightly short. Some ventured to the pub afterwards though, Chloe and I included (can we get away with claiming that as expenses…?).

If you wish to get involved in the next Tech Talks on the 25th April you can book your place now, the line-up is a little special…

Thanks to all that came to Tech Talks #2 we hope you enjoyed it as much as we did… And our under-eye bags are not in vain

The new UK police crime map website, www.police.uk, has supposedly become one of the most used government websites ever.

According to the Home Office’s official twitter account, they tweeted that their website received a staggering 5,000 hits per second or 18-million hits an hour.

Sources online say that the most violent street in the UK is a quiet street in Portsmouth. With four crimes every day in December alone, the street which is supposedly no longer than a football pitch has made locals rather ‘flabbergasted’ that their quiet neighborhood was a crime hotspot.

Read the rest of this entry »

Avatar Kinect

Revealed earlier this morning by Steve Ballmer at his CES 2011 keynote speech, Avatar Kinect is Microsoft’s new online chat service for all Xbox Live Gold members. The new service allows Microsoft Live members to talk to one another in a cyber environment whilst their Kinect is tracking their expressions – raise your eyebrows and your avatar’s is raised.

The service is ready for release in spring 2011 and available for all Xbox users with the Kinect peripheral.

Avatar Kinect has definitely hit a new milestone for Microsoft’s gaming but will avatars stop there? Will Second Life (online platform for users to create an avatar and live in a cyber world where they can meet other avatars, have cyber marrige and more) start to incorporate a ‘Kinect’ peripheral to make gaming online more realistic?

-Via YouTube

Apple is definitely in the swing of festivity with ’12 Days of Christmas’. Compatible with the iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch, the app gives downloaders of the app a free download a day.

Available to download now, the app doesn’t officially start giving users the free downloads until the 26th December but you will be notified when a new download is available.

Apple say on their website:

“The 12 Days of Christmas app will allow you to download a free gift from iTunes every day from 26 December to 6 January direct from your iPad, iPhone or iPod touch. Like the music, TV, iBooks, apps and films you receive?

The app also offers recommendations of other content that you might like. Download this free app now and be sure to turn on Push Notifications when prompted.

You’ll receive an alert every day when your new gift is available.”

So get downloading the app and start receiving all of the free goodness – last year was a mix of movies, music and apps, could we see iBooks this year?

Download App

-Via TechRadar, TipB

Ever heard of the new Infinity scheme running through the high street name Dixons Retail? – Well if you’re sick of purchasing computers outright, Infinity allows members of the public to get a computer under a hire agreement which the buyer pays a set amount each month.

Under the two year hire agreement, you are supplied obviously with a computer but alongside the computer, you receive a two-year subscription of Norton 360 (for windows PC’s only), 24-hour technical support and a setup service – on top of this, Dixons provide clients with an insurance cover for breakdowns and accidental damage to the computer. The service will be available through PC World and Curry’s Shops which are both owned by Dixons.

PC World said ‘selecting a netbook computer costing £200 out-right would cost the buyer £22.55 a month, which works out at £541 over the lift of the contract’.

Now there obviously seems to be an increase in price by a phenomenal £341 – a Dixons Retail representative explained that the difference in price is off-set by what the included software and services would otherwise cost if bought separately. A full list of prices is available on the PC World website here.

Tim Fairs, head of marketing at Dixons Retail said: “This is a cost effective way to stay up to date with the latest products. Technology advances so quickly and Infinity will allow our customers to upgrade every two years so they are constantly able to keep up to date”.

Now it’s not just Windows computers Dixons Retail are going to be offering on a monthly subscribed service. An Apple iMac with a list price of £1,500 would cost the buyer £109.50 per month under the new Infinity Scheme – or in total…..£2,268!

Either way, with the massive price you pay at the end of the two-year contract, the buyer is entitled to a 25% rebate on the value of the original computer which is less than the full amount paid under the scheme if the buyer signs up for a new model at the end of the two-years.

The finance company running this scheme with Dixons Retail is ‘Thinksmart’ – and in all honesty, if you Thoughtsmart about buying a PC like this – you wouldn’t.

So does this mean that it’s more luring for businesses purchasing a PC this way? How would you feel about buying a netbook with an RRP of £200 and paying in total at the end £541? – wouldn’t you feel a little ripped off? We would like to hear your feedback upon this.

-Source Computer Active

It’s a de-facto in life that everyone will go on out and buy a brand new PC from PC World, Dell UK or Currys, take it home just to realise that it is full of unwanted ‘crap’ programs and trials.

I know myself that after purchasing a new laptop from PC World it seemed to come with a whole array of applications from McAfee trials through to child games just taking up wanted space on my hard drive. Now if there were ever to be an application we hoped for on a brand new laptop, it would be one that would get rid of all those free trails simply and effectively – the term for these programs can often be referred to as ‘crapware’. PC Decrapifier lets you save time otherwise spent in the computers Control Panel’s Add/ Remove meny and within a few mouse clicks users can clear their PC of any unwanted crapware – well most of it.

After agreeing to the terms and conditions of the software, PC Decrapifier prompted us to save a restore point – a smart and good safety precaution for this type of software.

The next step will bring you to the software-deletion process. In here a list of preloaded applications appear with a checkable box to the left of the programs name, so you can decide what stays and what goes. The only downside, which was a little frustrating was that PC Decrapifier didn’t realise all of the applications pre-installed on the laptop but a great little feature which has been included in the program is the option to reset Internet Explorer’s homepage and clean up your registry. PC Decrapifier also gives users the options for changing start up programs saving less technical users from having to go into ‘msconfig’ and tamper around with a few settings there.

After a few minutes of waiting for the applications to remove and cleaning up Internet Explorer, PC Decrapifier was all done. Everything defined was successfully removed, Internet Explorer was reset to bing.com instead of Acers own homepage and after rebooting the laptop, I noticed that the boot time for the laptop decreased making it nice and fast.

Well there is supposedly a first for everything – and thanks to Microsoft they have finally allowed MAC users to plug their smart phone with Windows Phone 7 on into their PC.

Windows Phone 7 Connector for Mac does exactly what it says on the tin – enabling OSX users to sync their content from their Apple to their Windows Phone 7. Being called the ‘iTunes Lite’ application, supposedly most Apple users have been asking Apple for this type of software and just for Microsoft to put their foot in it a little bit more – they develop it.

What’s the purpose of it?

Simple – one thing and that is to sync media to your device.

Now it’s still currently in beta, but reviews say that it works quite well. The software looks for an iTunes library and offers users to sync whatever content they have inside that folder to their Windows Phone 7.

Playlists, specific artists, individual songs or a selection of specific songs can all be synced seamlessly.

Once you copy the media, it will just simply appear in your Zune app.

I know what you are thinking – ‘beta software, must only sync one way?’ – nope. The Windows Phone 7 connector software syncs back to iTunes too. If for example you were to listening to a bit of cheesy music from Lionel Richie, just to embarrass you that little bit more, the iTunes play count will actually increase on your mac – not only is this compatible with songs but with podcasts too.

According to Microsoft, the software will also hook into your iPhoto library allowing users to sync albums as well as iPhoto-specific “Events” and “Faces”. Once the phone is plugged into your mac, photos can be synced in reverse just like iTunes so therefore any photos you take on your Windows Phone 7 will be imported automatically to iPhoto (you can disable this function – same as the iPhone and any other smart phone).

So summing it up, for a little piece of software still currently in beta – it works pretty well from what reviews say. If you have Windows Phone 7 and want to download Windows Phone 7 Connector for Mac – you can grab it here.

- Source Wired

The smart pad market seems to be moving so incredibly fast over the past few weeks and big manufactures have announced some pretty interesting products to compete against Apple and their iPad.

Targeted more directly at the SME and Business market, Blackberry have announced their new ‘PlayBook’ which can be the answer to some businesses prayers – in terms of reliability and performance.

What makes the PlayBook different to the rest?

‘Well, each run a different OS.

• Blackberry with Blackberry OS QNX
• iPad with iOS
• HP with either webOS or Windows 7

Each will have their own division of the market, for example we would expect that the PlayBook will target business users with the facility of BIS and BES, whilst the iPad is more of an entertainment device, and the HP Slate purely for developers as far as we know right now.’

What it has against competitors?

Blackberry have one over on Apple straight away as not only does it support multi-tasking but it supports multi-processing.

Spec

In terms of whats inside the slate, it packs a dual-core 1GHz processor, a luctrative 7″ LCD display with full multi-touch and gesture support and a 1024X600 resolution.

To compliment the rest of the hardware the PlayBook has, Blackberry have managed to cram:

• 1GB of RAM
• HDMI-Out
• Micro-HDMI
• Micro-USB
• Wi-Fi which can connect to a/b/g/n
• Bluetooth
• dual HD camera on the device capable of a 1080p recording quality
• a rear 5MP camera complimented by a 3Mp front facing camera – possible FaceTime facility?

No only does the smart tab have all of the hardware, the software just works! Compatibility with HTML5, Adobe Mobile Air, Java, OpenHL and Flash10.1 for probably one of the best web browsing experiences.

Summing it up

In terms of spec – it is pretty fantastic and lets hope Blackberry can deliver with this! In all honesty though, for Blackberry to compete against all of the other tablets on the market and knock off ones, they will have to produce something grossly over powered and looks pretty good at the same time – but isn’t all Blackberry devices like this?

Rumor has it that Blackberry are developing this with 3G/4G connectivity which is all well in USA, but the UK? (read more)

Well first the release of the Blackberry Torch with OS6 and now this – what do you think of the idea of a PlayBook? Do you welcome more competition for Apple or do you just think that the PlayBook could be an overpriced luxury toy?

‘Back in December there were a host of rumors leaked about the next version of the perhaps decreasingly popular, yet still massively dominant Windows OS, appropriately named successor to Windows 7, in the form of Windows 8. Well, now it seems that Microsoft Kitchen, the team who got a hold of the Windows software road map in the first place, have leaked a presentation detailing some further, possibly more concrete rumors detailing some exciting features to come in Windows 8.’

With Windows 8, who knows what Microsoft have in-store for their users – could it be the ability to store all of their documents, music and other information in the cloud nice and secure? Hosting applications such as Photoshop and providing it on subscriptions?

This wouldn’t be a first Microsoft having a cloud based system encorporated with an Operating System. We’ve seen in the ASUS netbooks an app store where users can download applications straight from the Cloud to their laptops – pretty cool huh?

At the moment, with Windows 8 not being due until 2012, it’s a little hard to try and depict what will be on the Cloud service but I would probably go with something like Games and programs like FileHippo.

-For more information go to the original article source here at Zath

The Design

In terms of design, every conventional Windows Phone will have three buttons at the front of the phone situated at the bottom below the screen: this will include a Start, Search and Back button. Having the three buttons allows for user consistency between different smart phones e.g. the Nexus One.

The software

Microsofts introduction of ‘integrated experience hubs’ is one of many features they have incorporated with their new market smashing smart phone. Starting with People – this allows you to sort the people you know from various sources e.g. Outlook, Facebook and more.

The section is split into various panes separating recent contacts from personal information and social networking updates through Twitter, Facebook and other social network sites.

Pictures – this shows galleries and synced items along with a social network pane that allows you to view recent pictures from your friends on Facebook – you can see that Microsoft have gone on the integration synergy with Facebook and Twitter an awful lot with this phone. Pictures allows you to upload and manage Facebook albums directly from your phone – pretty cool huh?

A bit more predicatble more than anything but Yes – Microsoft have called their business tool hub ‘Office’. Once opened from the main screen, users are prompted with an option of creating new pages, view most recent open documents, spreadsheets and more.

Users can find a full list of documents in the middle panel followed by a final panel which manages SharePoint – that’s if you are a SharePoint user.

Games and Music + Video hubs – these Hubs pretty much sell themselves hopefully. Microsoft have incorporated Xbox Live so you can manage trophies, user profiles and friends from your Windows Phone 7. Not only allowing users to manage their Xbox Live account, users can sync their Windows Phone 7 games with Xbox Live.

Music + Video is Zune HD and from reviews the Music + Video hub works pretty damn well.

Summing up Windows Mobile 7

Windows Phone 7 in comparison to its predecessor Windows Phone 6.5, it is a completely different experience from the interface through to the integration with Hubs and Social Networks. I have a feeling we haven’t seen everything from Windows Phone 7 as hopefully a new firmware update in the new year will give the handset that cutting edge it needs to compete against other smart phones enabling – copy and paste.

With HTC, Samsung and LG already pumping phones out with Windows Phone 7, Microsoft will simply start to pick up on the smart phone market and who knows – Microsoft could increase their market size.

-For more information go to the original article source here at Zath