Despite fierce competition for the relatively small Windows Phone market, Nokia is generally pleased by the mounting number of Windows-based smartphones from other manufacturers as it increases the health of the platform overall, according to Vesa Jutila, the company’s head of smartphone marketing. Engadget spoke with Mr. Jutila following Nokia’s Lumia 925 launch event in London this morning. He revealed that “biggest complaint [received by the company over its Windows Phone smartphones] is that customers are missing the apps they
The Most Useful VLC Keyboard Shortcuts for OS X and Windows
VideoLAN’s VLC Media Player is an essential application that almost every computer owner should install. The free multi-platform software, first introduced in 2001, can play nearly all audio and video formats, from MP3s to DVDs to FLAC. While many have installed and used the software, few take the time to master its controls. VLC’s interface has improved over time, but little-known keyboard shortcuts are often the best way to navigate your media files. Here are some of our most-used VLC
Android Dominates Q1 2013 with 74% of Smartphone Shipments
Samsung hardware and the Android mobile operating system dominated the first quarter of 2013, according to new data released Tuesday by research firm Gartner. The Korean electronics giant shipped 64.7 million smartphones during the quarter for 30.8 percent of worldwide market share while Google’s Android was found on 156 million devices shipped during the quarter, for a commanding 74.4 percent market share. Anshul Gupta, principal research analyst at Gartner, explained the results: There are two clear leaders in the OS
Nom Nom Paleo: The Best iOS Recipe App for Any Diet
Just like some people can barely draw a stick figure, or sing “Happy Birthday” without causing a scene, I can’t cook. I just can’t. I simply don’t possess the level of analysis, creativity, and decision-making that allow chefs and kitchen masters to work their craft. That said, after spending some time with a new app and my iPad, now even I can make decent meals. I’m talking about the Nom Nom Paleo app for iOS. Launched last year by Michelle
Amazon Launches Coins Digital Currency, A Bad Deal for Consumers
After teasing the idea in February, Amazon today launched its own digital currency for the Kindle ecosystem. Named “Coins,” the move is being sold by the company as a way to both simplify transactions as well as generate more money for content creators. For customers, Amazon Coins is an easy way to purchase apps and in-app items on Kindle Fire, and for developers it’s another opportunity to drive traffic, downloads and increased monetization. With discounts of up to 10% for
eBooks Account for 23% of U.S. Publisher Revenue in 2012
Last week’s news that Microsoft is considering a $1 billion buyout of the Nook eBook company it formed with Barnes & Noble is less surprising in light of data revealed today by research firm Statista. According to data from the Association of American Publishers, eBooks accounted for nearly 23 percent of U.S. publisher revenue in 2012. On the year, eBooks accounted for 22.6 percent of sales as a percentage of U.S. trade publishers’ net revenue, up from 17.0 percent in
RAM Prices Rise as Shortage Continues
Consumers who have been considering an upgrade to their PC or Mac’s RAM may want to make their purchase sooner rather than later. What began as a mild, but noticeable, uptick in RAM prices during the first three months of 2013 has expanded into shortages that several computer makers state could send prices even higher and hurt sales. For the past several years the price of computer memory fell considerably (reaching, as some pundits have said, “ridiculously low prices”), making
Social Gaming Features Coming to Android with Google Play Games
Apple’s Game Center, the social iOS gaming service introduced as part of iOS 4.1 in September 2010, is about to get a doppelgänger in the form of “Google Play Games,” a new feature coming soon to Android. According to Android Police, which obtained an early build of the service, Google Play Games will likely feature syncing saved games between devices, shared game lobbies for chatting and matchmaking, invites and challenges, icon badges and notifications, score leaderboards, and achievements. The service
Track Wikipedia Edits in Real Time With the Recent Changes Map
Wikipedia is a free, open, and editable encyclopedia that anyone around the world can change. All of these changes are tracked by Wikipedia’s edit history, and now two programmers have created a way to visually represent them. Stephen LaPorte and Mahmoud Hashemi created the “Wikipedia Recent Changes Map,” a tool that uses JavaScript, geolocation services, and the recent changes feed from Wikimedia to plot the edits to Wikipedia articles by unregistered users in real time on a world map. Messrs.
Upcoming Game Watch Dogs Gets Hacking Advice from Kaspersky
Watch Dogs is an upcoming open world adventure game which focuses on the player’s ability to fight (or cause) crime by hacking into a variety of electronic systems in a big city, such as pedestrian smartphones, ATM machines, and traffic lights. But according to the game’s senior producer, the “hacking” aspect of the game may be more realistic than first anticipated. Ubisoft Montreal’s Dominic Guay told the audience during a San Francisco press event for the game this week that
Nokia Announces WP8 Lumia 928 on Verizon, Launches May 16 at $99
After months of teasers and comparison videos, Nokia released the launch details for its upcoming Lumia 928 smartphone Friday. The Windows Phone 8-based device will launch May 16 in the United States exclusively on Verizon. The Lumia 928 is an LTE-capable device and features an 8.7MP camera with a Carl Zeiss lens (the same optics as the AT&T-only Lumia 920), a Xenon flash, three microphones with an “advanced” loudspeaker capable of up to 140db, a 4.5-inch OLED 1280×768 display with
How to Take and Manage Screenshots in Windows 8
Windows users have long known how to use the Print Screen key to copy a screenshot of their desktop that could be pasted into an image editing application. Or how to use the Snipping Tool to take more advanced screenshots. With Windows 8, there’s now an even easier way. To take a screenshot and save the image directly to a folder, press the Windows and Print Screen keys simultaneously. You’ll see your screen dim briefly, emulating a shutter effect. To