Panasonic joins with Best Buy to promote and sell its 3D TV in the U.S.

After unveiling its 3D enabled Plasma television at CES 2010, Panasonic is going to launch its 3D television in the U.S. in partnership with Best Buy, one of the largest electronic retail outlets in the country. The company will launch its 3D TV on March 10, 2010.

Panasonic, which specializes in plasma technology, unveiled its VT25 series 3D-compatible flat-panel HDTV at CES 2010. The company first showed off its 3D TV at CES 2009. The VT25 series 3D TV won CNET’s Best of CES 2010 award.

Panasonic said that its 50-inch Viera flat panel television would be priced at $2500 and the company set targets to sell half-a-million units in the U.S in the first year of its launch which accounts for half of the company annual worldwide sales target.

Under this partnership, Best Buy would have a special section at its retail outlets where perspective customers would be able to try out the company’s new 3D TVs. Panasonic would also offer discounts up to 50% on various models. Once a leading TV manufacturer, Panasonic lost its leadership to Samsung, LG, and Sony. With the launch of the 3D TV, the company aims to improve its position in the television market. In Japan on March 8, 2010, shares of Panasonic rose 2.8% to 1307 yen.

Related article:

Reuters

YouTube will provide video captions for people with hearing problems

Now, people with hearing problems and deaf are going to be able to enjoy YouTube as the company is going to provide captions with video clips using Google’s proprietary speech-to-text technology. Initially, this service will only be available for English language video clips and would be expanded to other services later this year.

In November 2009, Google started developing its own speech-to-text technology in partnership with PBS, Stanford University, University of California, Berkeley, Yale University, and National Geographic. YouTube uploads more than twenty hours of video every day. With this new technology, not only Google would be able to add more users to its video search engine but would also create new market for its search business.

Previously, captions were provided to a small number of contents but now it would be offered on a large number of video clips. According to Hunter Walk, product manager, Google said that a core part of YouTube’s DNA is access to content. YouTube said that by opening all these contents to those who had not been able to access it in the past should democratize information and foster greater collaboration and understanding.

Related articles:

BBC

Business Week

Google acquired photo-editing website Picnik

Google, the Internet search engine giant, acquired photo-editing website, Picnik. This is Google’s third acquisition this year. On February 12, 2010, the company bought Ardvark, a social search service, for $50 million. Ardvark connects users live with friends or friends-of-friends who are able to answer their questions. Users can directly submit questions on Ardvark website, or e-mail or IM. On February 17, 2010, Google acquired reMail, an email search service, founded by Gabor Cselle in November 2008.

Google did not disclose the details of the acquisition deal of Picknik. Picnik is a five year old Seattle based start up. It is an online photo editing service that can import photos from Facebook, Myspace, Picasa Web Albums, Flickr, and Yahoo Image search. It also allows users to upload photos from a computer or a website. Many of the website’s photo editing tools are free to use. For more editing options, users can subscribe to the website on monthly, 6-month, or annual subscription cost. Picnik attracts 40 million visitors per month each of which stays for an average of 17 minutes.

Picnik has a partnership with Flickr under which, Flickr website contains a version of Picnik with minimal feature as its built-in photo editor. The two websites also have deals to do photo editing with “free website creator Webs.” Now, Picnik will remain in Seattle but would move near Google’s office in that city. Its twenty employees will now work for Google’s Picasa.

Related articles:

BBC

Techtree

Google will launch Android 2.1 to all the Android based handsets

Google will push its latest Android OS, Android 2.1, to all the Android based phones. One of the major complaints against Google Android is that Android phones do not have any conformity regarding its operating systems. When Google released Android 2.0, many phones were not compatible with it. Moreover, there were many applications that would run on some Android based mobile phones and not others and the applications even damaged the phones. This had been a big obstacle for Android application developers. With the release of Android 2.1, Google will change that picture. Currently, there are twenty handsets in the market that are running on Google Android OS.

Google will update all its existing Android based phone including the first Android phone, the T-Mobile G1, which was released back in 2008. However, not all phones could be updated the same way. Some phone sets are required to be connected with PC to receive the update. Some would be updated automatically. Users of T-Mobile G1 and other older Android handsets would have to format their phones to install the Android 2.1.

In addition, the “live wallpapers” option that comes with Android 2.1 would not work on many phones.

Related articles:

TG Daily

Palm Web OS 1.4 with video capture, edit and uploading features

In January, at the CES 2010, Palm Inc. first unveiled its new WebOS1.4. It released the new OS on February 26, 2010. The new WebOS1.4 would only be available for the Palm Pre and Palm Pixi smartphones. Users would automatically receive the update within the next few days. They can also manually update the WebOS through their phones’ update application. In the U.S., initially, the WebOS 1.4 will only be available to Sprint subscribers. In Europe, it will be available for the subscribers of O2 in Germany, Ireland and the U.K. It would also available to subscribers of Movistar. It is not mentioned when Verizon, Bell Canada and Telcel subscribers would receive the update. For more information about the WebOS1.4 visit Palm’s official website.

The new version WebOS 1.4 has many new features including:

• Support for Adobe Flash 10.1 beta. The plug-in will come as a “standalone app” that will be available in “App catalog.” However, Palm did not say when the plug-in would become available.
• Video capture, editing, and sharing to Palm Pre and Pixi smartphones.
• Users can edit their video clips and upload them to YouTube, Facebook or share them via e-mail or MMS message.
• Palm WebOS 1.4 improves battery life and “application launch time.”
• It also increases performance of some applications.
• The Palm WebOS 1.4 has an LED messaging systems that alerts users upon receiving new voice mails, e-mails and other messages even when the phone is turned off.

Here is a video clip of the new Palm WebOS1.4

Nintendo will release 100 e-book titles for Nintendo DSi XL

Nintendo Co.’s latest handheld gaming device, Nintendo DSi XL, will serve as a game player and an e-book reader. Nintendo will offer a cartridge that will contain 100 public domain books including classics written Mark Twain and William Shakespeare.

Nintendo introduced the upgraded Nintendo DSi XL in Japan in November. On February 24, 2010, Nintendo announced the device at a press conference in San Francisco. Priced at $190, the device will be launched on March 28, 2010. The new Nintendo DSi XL has a larger screen with wider viewing angles which makes it suitable for gaming and reading books. Nintendo will launch “100 Classic Books” on June 14, 2010, and will cost $19.99.

Cammie Dunaway, executive vice president of sales and marketing for North America Nintendo, said that they are not trying to get into the e-book market. It is just another way to enjoy the device.

Unlike Amazon, Apple or Sony, who has their own e-book store, Nintendo has none. However, this shows that Nintendo is now feeling the hit from Apple iPad which would serve as a portable game player and an e-book reader.

Nintendo DS is one of the most popular sold handheld gaming devices around the world. The Nintendo DSi XL is the third edition of the Nintendo DS. In 2009, Nintendo sold 125.1 million units of DS around the world.

Related articles:

Bloomberg.com

Palm Inc.: A tough future ahead

In mid-2009, with lots of hype Palm Inc. launched its Palm Pre smartphone. Palm’s future depended on the phone and that future is not looking so bright. Due to poor sales of the Palm-Pre, on February 25, 2010, the Sunnyvale, California based company announced a cut in its revenues forecast for the third quarter of the fiscal year of 2010 and the entire year. This sparked a merger speculation among industry experts. Business Week reports:

Fiscal third-quarter sales will be no more than $310 million, Palm (PALM) said, blaming "slower-than-expected consumer adoption of the company's products." That's about $100 million less than the $409.3 million expected by analysts in a Bloomberg News survey. Shares plunged 19% to $6.53.

At this stage, it would be better if the company goes for a merger. Potential acquirers include Dell, Nokia, Motorola, Cisco Systems and RIM. Dell last year, rolled out their first smartphone. Nokia could gain from acquiring Palm because it had been trying to establish itself in the U.S market but failed to do so. North America alone accounted for 3.8 million or less 3% of the 126.9 million handsets it sold worldwide in the fourth quarter. RIM is also another potential buyer for it would be able to acquire Palm’s touchscreen technology, an area where RIM failed miserably.

However, finding a buyer would not be easy and many industry experts believe that the company earlier looked for buyer but they backed down because Palm uses a new operating system called Web OS and it would take at least two years to integrate this new OS into their own product portfolio.