Ultrasone is spitting in the face of the bleak economy. The German concern has announced a new special edition headphone, dubbed the Edition 8. Ultrasone claims: “Never before has such attention to detail been given to every aspect of a headphone design; every material and component used in the Edition 8 is second to none.” [...]

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Two new music recommendation services have entered the market, both aiming to bring a renewed focus and clarity to a sector that is booming.

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     MUSIC NEWS - Eighties Brit synthpop/funk band Spandau Ballet are planning to make a comeback with a new album and a world tour says manager, Steve Dagger. The group formed 30 years ago and had a run of hits that included True (see video on Today's Video Clip page) Gold and To Cut A Long Story Short (buy CDs here) .  The group broke up in 1999 when singer Tony Hadley, saxophonist Steve Norman and drummer John Keeble sued guitarist Gary Kemp over claims he owed them nearly $1.5 million in royalties !  But the members have now put aside their differences and teamed up with Kemp's brother Martin for a reunion.  Dagger says, "We're not making announcements yet, but yes, basically, the boys are back in town. Not just a nostalgic re-run of the old but a fresh slant on what Spandau Ballet are about."

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     MUSIC NEWS - Orange County, CA rockers, Avenged Sevenfold have extended their current tour, adding March North American tour dates to the second leg, which started last month on January 28^th. The tour, a co-headlining jaunt with Buckcherry that began last fall, has been a big success for the group with demand for tickets and sold-out shows. Filling out the bill are Papa Roach. The tour recently made news in Oakland, CA when guitarist and crew member from opening act, Saving Abel were arrested on felony sex charges. The charges have now been dropped !

The Avenged Sevenfold have been on the road for more than a year, playing to packed arenas on the fourth annual Rockstar Taste of Chaos tour, as well as a European tour with rock legends Iron Maiden. The band is touring behind the self-produced Avenged Sevenfold (buy CD here) , which topped the Billboard Alternative, Hard, and Rock charts the week after its release in October 2007. It also won the award for “Best Album” at the 2008 Kerrang! Awards. The follow-up to 2005’s million-selling City of Evil (buy CD here) , Avenged Sevenfold debuted at No. 4 on the Billboard Top 200, marking the biggest sales week ever for the quintet. Avenged Sevenfold recently captured their spectacular stage show in an acclaimed DVD/CD package called Live in the LBC & Diamonds in the Rough (buy here) , which features the band’s jubilant hometown show at the Long Beach Arena headlining Taste of Chaos in April 2008, as well as previously unreleased b-sides and other never-before-heard material.

Avenged Sevenfold’s upcoming added tour dates -

3/20		Utica, NY, Utica Auditorium (2/14)
3/23		Columbus, GA, Columbus Civic Center (2/7)
3/26		Johnson City, TN, Freedom Hall (2/7)
3/27		Lexington, KY, Rupp Arena (2/7)
3/30		Nashville, TN, Sommet Center (2/6)

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With our editor-in-chief, Dieter Bohn off in Barcelona for Mobile World Congress, the inmates site editors are left running Around SPE this week. So, while he’ll be breaking news and giving us some hands-on observations on all the new software and hardware on display, we’ll be keeping you covered here at home, starting with a quick recap of where we are right now:

CrackBerry.com

In the world of BlackBerry, T-Mobile customers were happy to see the official roll out of the next-generation BlackBerry Curve 8900 this week. With AT&T said to be dropping support for 2G phones, there has been some worry that this new Curve wouldn’t come to AT&T, but with the 8900 SKU now showing up on AT&T systems, it’s likely the device will launch there in the next month.

The BIG new this week comes from the CrackBerry Podcast. Kevin was in NYC on for a RIM Business Solutions Press Preview. While there, him and Craig recorded a podcast and for the first time had an employee from Research in Motion on the show. Joined by Mike Kirkup, Manager of Developer Relations, they tackle a bunch of topics from the upcoming App Store to OS 5.0 and whether or not Flash support will appear in a BlackBerry browser and more! Listen Here.

More after the break!

Android Central

This week Android Central reported that Android Market was leaving beta and finally receiving paid applications. Hopefully we’ll see even more amazing applications such as this recently announced TeleNav turn-by-turn GPS application.

We also wondered why Google would comply with Apple’s request to leave multi-touch out of the G1. Hint: It has something to do with maintaining a great relationship with Apple. Read: Google still wants to play nice with Apple to get iPhone eyes on Google AdSense.

Nokia Experts

News was a bit slow this week as everyone in the mobile space waits for big announcements from Mobile World Congress next week, including some announcements about devices and services from Nokia. We are in our third week of the the launch contest so make sure to get your entry in and look for week four’s entry task. Great input and information is coming in from the contest entries. Also, check out our SBSH Reminders giveaway for a chance to win a free registration code.

Some topics of interest this week on Nokia Experts includes the amazing Nokia Maps 3.0 beta update, Nokia 5800 firmware update, Nokia E63 availability in the US for just $279, and the announcement of the Nokia 5630 with 600 MHz processor.

PreCentral

Over at PreCentral this week, we learned that Bell Canada will be launching the Palm Pre. We heard conflicting launch dates of late Q2 or early Q3 and also the end of Q3-Q4. 

We also had more Touchstone details to emerge when Adam Kaufman, a Product Manager at Palm started answering questions on Facebook.  Plus, many people are wondering if the Palm Pre made an appearance on the TV show “Knight Rider”.  

The iPhone Blog

Is this the first glimpse of the 3rd Gen iPhone? Looks pretty much the same as the iPhone 3G, but then Apple brass re-affirmed that the iPhone market is strong, and they won’t be diluting it with an iPhone nano or keyboard slider any time soon. What with 20,000 Apps in the store, and the iPhone and the iPod touch now owning 51% of the mobile browser space… and growing, who can blame them?

Maybe jailbreakers, as the EFF asking the US government to grant it an exemption from the DMCA has Apple declaring jailbreaking illegal. (Oops, we just jailbroke live for xGPS on the last podcast!). Lastly, Google gave us Spreadsheet editing, but did Apple deny the Android multi-touch and… a 3.5mm headphone jack?!

TreoCentral

This week when Ed Colligan spoke to investors at the Thomas Weisel Partners Technology, Telecom & Internet Conference, he announced that there will be no more PalmOS devices released by Palm (excepting the Centro getting released on other carriers) as they’re focused on WebOS and Windows Mobile. He also said that not only will Palm have an app store when the Pre launches, but Palm isn’t locking down the device so you can only install apps from their app store.

We also learned this week that the Sprint Treo Pro is now targeted for a March 15th launch, and that some Sprint stores are now getting re-stocked with new Treo Pro’s with the new ROM on board. And even though the Sprint Treo Pro is delayed, it was great to hear that Palm’s stock has neared double-digits.

WMExperts

It’s been the calm before the storm over at WMExperts while we wait for Mobile World Congress to get under way, but that doesn’t mean it was a quiet week. We saw more information surface on Windows Mobile 6.5 including a new video, an updated version of Skyfire Beta released while Opera Mobile plans to go turbo. Google offered up contact and calendar sync and brought public-domain books to mobile devices. Mozilla’s Fennec mobile browser hit pre-alpha, and we got a sit-down with developer Brad Lassey. On the hardware side, new Windows Mobile devices were spotted from Garmin-Asus, Gigabyte, as well as the “Hummer” of Windows Mobile Devices from I-Mate.

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Around SPE for February 15, 2009

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Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Hardware, Software, Hacks, Odds and ends, Open Source, Apple, Jailbreak/pwnage

The Electronic Frontier Foundation has posted the news that Apple has filed comments with the US Copyright Office stating that the act of jailbreaking your iPhone is a copyright infringement and a DMCA violation, and therefore illegal. The EFF says that Apple is claiming that jailbreak apps still require modified versions of Apple's software, and Apple apparently believes that those versions are infringing on their copyrights.

The EFF responds, in turn, that "reverse engineering is a fair use when done for purposes of fostering interoperability with independently created software," saying that yes, even though jailbreakers are using Apple's copyrighted code, they are doing so in a way that allows them functionality that Apple doesn't provide access to on their own.

At this point, of course, this is just a complaint in the copyright office, and Apple hasn't made any legal moves yet against anyone responsible for jailbreaking. As the EFF states, it would be extremely hard for them to go after individual jailbreakers -- if you buy an iPhone, it should be your right to "get under the hood," as they say, and do what you want.

But (and keep in mind that this is TUAW, not The Unofficial Legal Weblog, and we are not lawyers) it seems Apple may be able to try and make a case against anyone offering software that does modify or otherwise "misuse" their copyrighted code. We'll have to see if they explore that position more in the future. You can read Apple's full response here (27 pages). You can see the EFF's initial filings here.

Stay tuned for more news and analysis on the issue.

TUAWApple says jailbreaking is illegal originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Fri, 13 Feb 2009 13:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Retail

Microsoft is giving retail stores another try, even after closing its only store at the Metreon in 2001. It plans a "small number" of stores, but did not mention locations or size.

The company is hiring Walmart veteran David Porter -- an expert at negotiating deals between the movie industry and the big-box retailer's expansive DVD sales division. Porter most recently worked at Dreamworks Animation, managing worldwide product distribution for their games and movies.

The stores apparently will be geared for sales and education about Microsoft's product line. Porter said, "I am excited about helping consumers make more informed decisions about their PC and software purchases, and we'll share learnings [sic] from our stores with our existing retail and OEM partners that are critical to our success."

If Microsoft is aiming to compete with Apple on a retail level, they seem to be omitting a key part of Apple's retail success: Service. The Genius Bar is arguably the most crowded area in Apple retail stores, with every store booking appointments well in advance. A Microsoft service bar for both PCs and Zunes could be a very popular destination. If Microsoft stores can offer a competent service experience for the vast diversity of PC hardware, they might have something.

Microsoft has a 20,000 square-foot "Retail Experience Center" in Redmond, on the company's corporate campus. The Center is designed to show how Microsoft products can be used in every corner of a business' operations: from the loading dock to the reception desk. It's unclear if it will serve as the model for Microsoft's new retail initiative.

[Via ifoAppleStore.]

TUAWMicrosoft investigating retail options, hires former Walmart exec originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Fri, 13 Feb 2009 13:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Gaming, iTunes, Developer, iPhone, App Store, iPod touch

There's money in them thar App Store! Smule, the company behind the popular Ocarina and Zephyr apps for the iPhone, has informed us that they raised a whopping $3.9 million from a round of venture funding led by a firm named Granite Ventures. That's a lot of capital -- while a lot of people are aiming to get their hands in the cookie jar in a big way in the burgeoning economy of the App Store, $3.9 million is the biggest single payout we've seen yet (the iFund actually paid out $100 million, but that was split among various companies and people, and we haven't heard specifics on exactly what they got).

The company brags that they've attracted over one million users already, and that they will use the funding to "help people experience music as it's never been experienced before and in turn find new ways of bringing people together." We can't help but wish them well -- hopefully we'll see more high quality apps in the App Store, and hopefully that'll pay off for both investors and consumers.

TUAWSmule raises $3.9 million in funding originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Fri, 13 Feb 2009 08:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Hardware, Rumors, iPhone

There's a new rumor floating around which claims that the case of an upcoming 16GB 3G iPhone has been photographed. The shot, now posted at iPhone Observer with similar images at MacRumors, depicts a matte black iPhone with the model number "A1303." It's also been suggested that the case in question is metallic, not plastic like on current 3G models.

In the end, what do we have here? A photo of 1/3 of a single side of an iPhone (why not post the whole photo?), a unique model number (I'm pretty sure my 5-year-old could come up with one of those) and the word of a rumor-crazy Mac community.

Is this the case of a future iPhone? Could be. But we're not betting the farm on it.

[Via MacDailyNews]

TUAWRumor: New body for the 16GB iPhone originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Fri, 13 Feb 2009 06:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Copyright © 2009 PatrickJ. Visit the original article at http://justanotheriphoneblog.com/wordpress/2009/02/12/review-killer-pool-for-iphone/.

Killer Pool claims to be ‘the most realistic pool experience on the iPhone and iPod Touch’. I’ve only tried one other pool game (the jailbreak app called simply ‘Pool’) - but I have to say it seems to me it would be awfully hard to beat this game in terms of realistic feel. One quick measure of its realism is that in real life I am a mediocre to bad pool player (usually better after a couple beers) and in Killer Pool I’m about the same level of player so far.

Despite not being a very good player, I enjoy playing pool a lot. All my favorite bars have a pool table, a dart board, or both. I don’t get to bars very often anymore though - so I’ve been enjoying pool on the iPhone instead with Killer Pool. Hit the jump for some reasons why I think this is a great game, and plenty of screencaps …

(...)
Read the rest of Review: Killer Pool for iPhone

---

© PatrickJ for Just Another iPhone Blog, 2009. | Permalink | | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: iPhone pool games, Killer Pool, pool games for iPhone

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