Review: Sonic Generations reminds us that Sonic used to be cool

Sonic the Hedgehog has seen better days. After instant icon status and four classic Sega Genesis games in the early 1990s, he’s been steadily running downhill. The Saturn console never gave him a worthwhile showing. The Dreamcast suddenly died out from under him. Since then…well, it’s only gotten worse. Sonic has become synonymous with terrible 3D camera control and the strange fascination he holds for certain breeds of Internet crazy people.

Still, his 20thbirthday is … Continue Reading

In time for Black Friday: A holiday gift guide for gamers

The holiday season is coming fast. Before you know it, it will be Thanksgiving. People will be doing their Black Friday shopping early the next morning, and then it’s just a few short weeks until the gift-giving season arrives.

That said, it’s time to start looking into what to get for the gamer in your family. Whether they own an Xbox, a Wii or a PlayStation 3 (or all three) there is something great for … Continue Reading

Pink slips galore: Nokia Siemens to cut 17,000 jobs by 2013

Telecommunications equipment company Nokia Siemens plans to eliminate 17,000 jobs (or 22 percent of its workforce) to save money and remain competitive, the company announced today.

Nokia Siemens Networks, which is a joint venture between Finland-based Nokia and Germany-based Siemens, has failed to turn a profit, which has caused both parent companies to reassess the venture’s future. The company was launched in 2007 to compete against telcom equipment manufacturers Ericsson, Huawei and others.

The job … Continue Reading

Samsung Galaxy Nexus will launch in Dec.

Samsung’s hyped Galaxy Nexus smartphone will launch in the U.S. in December on Verizon Wireless, according to a Business Insider report.

We contacted Samsung for more details, but a representative declined to provide us with anything exact, saying: “The Galaxy Nexus will be available later this year. Samsung/Google/Verizon Wireless are on track to launch the handset, but we don’t yet have a firm date.”

The Galaxy Nexus went on sale in the U.K. last week. … Continue Reading

Apple Black Friday deals include big discounts on iPad, Macbooks and more

It’s time to finally treat yourself to that MacBook Air.

Apple is gearing up for Black Friday in a big way this year, with planned discounts for MacBook laptops, iMacs, iPads, iPods, and plenty more, reports 9to5 Mac.

According to leaked Apple flyers, the company will offer a $101 discount on Mac computers (bringing the Air down to a tempting $898 entry price), $41 to $61 discounts on iPads (depending on size), and smaller discounts … Continue Reading

Big Fish Games first to offer an “all you can eat” gaming subscription on iPad

Big Fish Games has become the first publisher permitted to offer a subscription gaming service on the Apple iPad, Bloomberg reports.

Customers will be asked to pay $6.99 per month in order to access dozens of games, such as Mahjong Towers and Mystery Case Files, through the Big Fish app, which will initially require Wi-Fi access to operate. If it works, it could be a new source of ongoing revenue on a platform where it … Continue Reading

Amazon selling every smartphone, except the iPhone, for $0.01

Amazon is selling every smartphone it carries (except the iPhone) for one cent, from now until Monday, when buyers sign up for a new two-year contract.

Among the smartphones being offered in this pre-Cyber Monday sale are the Motorola Droid Razr 4G, the Samsung Galaxy S II 4G Touch.

In October Amazon listed all its Verizon phones for one penny, with the notable exception of the iPhone 4.

Android devices are quickly outpacing iPhones as … Continue Reading

Ceva doubles down with investment in motion-gesture recognition firm

Chip and hardware designer Ceva made a minority equity investment in gesture recognition firm EyeSight Mobile Technologies, the companies announced today.

While more mobile technology companies are exploring gesture recognition options, the implementation of touch-free solutions further taxes the processors of mobile devices, leading to reduced battery life. Any alternative that can extend the battery life of mobile electronics while implementing new gesture recognition software is a welcome innovation in the field.

Ceva manages a … Continue Reading

Microsoft will make a Kinect just for Windows hackers

Microsoft is embracing the DIY future with a special version of the Kinect hardware and firmware made just for Windows.

That means it will soon be even easier for tinkerers to create PC-based programs that turn them into giant blob-men or give them enormous virtual breasts. Or, on the less silly side, developers could more easily use Kinect to give robots 3-D vision using Windows-based development tools instead of janky code downloaded from god knows … Continue Reading

FCC Chairman Genachowski seeks hearing on AT&T/T-Mobile merger

Federal Communications Commission chairman Julius Genachowski has requested a trial-like hearing for the proposed AT&T and T-Mobile merger after deciding that the deal would hurt consumers.

The FCC’s hearing would be yet another roadblock to the beleaguered telecom merger. On top of the Department of Justice seeking to block the deal, the attorneys general of seven states took legal steps to stop the merger back in mid-September. AT&T rival Sprint has also filed its own … Continue Reading

Google to Wave, Knol, and Gears: Get off my lawn

Google is canning Wave, Knol, Search Timeline and Google Gears, along with a slew of other features in order to build up fewer products with more integrated features.

“Our aim is to build a simpler, more intuitive, truly beautiful Google user experience,” the company explained in its third blog post concerning the sweep.

These products did not take off for Google as originally anticipated, so the company is axing them, leaving room for more important … Continue Reading

Pandora stock dips despite meeting Q3 earnings expectations

Streaming music service Pandora‘s third quarter earnings met Wall Street’s expectations  but still suffered a drop to its stock price in after-hours trading.

The company made a total of $75 million in revenue for the quarter (beating the $71.4 million estimate from analysts), which is up $8 million compared to the previous quarter. As for net income, Pandora stayed flat — also beat analysts’ estimates of a 1 cent per share loss.

Pandora’s guidance for … Continue Reading

Southeast Asian online game market expected to be worth $1 billion by 2015

The Southeast Asian online game market is expected to generate revenues of $1 billion by 2015, a figure that is effectively double the $474 anticipated revenues in 2011, according to research group Niko Partners.

Free-to-play games, where users play for free and pay real money for virtual goods, were the most successful within the region, Lisa Comas Hanson,  managing partner of Niko Partners, said. Many of the games are played in internet cafes known as … Continue Reading

RuneScape, the world’s most popular free-to-play MMO, gets a facelift

Jagex has today announced a brand new website and logo for its free-to-play massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG), Runescape. The browser-based game currently has over 175 million registered accounts, and is recognized by Guinness World Records as the world’s most popular free-to-play MMORPG.

The makeover is about how to keep users coming back, which in turns leads to better monetization. Despite being free-to-play, RuneScape offers players the option of purchasing a monthly membership, which … Continue Reading

Loosecubes updates its office-sharing portal with new review and ranking features

Loosecubes, a website that lets companies sublet empty office spaces by the day or week, launched new ranking features today aimed at gathering detailed review information from renters. That data will be used by the office-sharing startup to make its workplace listings more effective.

Renters can now review a space’s potential for productivity with categories such as noise and Wi-Fi strength. There are rankings for “coolness,” which include the overall vibe of the space and … Continue Reading

Heroku debuts SQL database-as-a-service for developers

Major platform-as-a-service provider Heroku has expanded its offerings with the new Heroku Postgres standalone service for developers who work with SQL databases, the company announced today.

Heroku has offered developers already using its service tools with PostgreSQL for several years, but now any development team wanting to use Heroku’s database service can use it regardless of where their applications are hosted.

The company claims the service is battle tested because it has “successfully and safely … Continue Reading

Google+ is now coming to Google News

Google is bringing its Plus social tools into Google News, one of the company’s more popular web search tools.

Previously, Google News had been showing users the unobtrusive +1 button next to articles to let users upvote or recommend particular items.

With the addition of today’s features, signed-in Google+ users will easily be able to see the articles their friends have been reading and sharing, as well.

In the Google News Spotlight section, users will … Continue Reading

Asus Transformer Prime is the first Android Ice Cream Sandwich tablet

The Asus Eee Pad Transformer Prime might end up being the first tablet to feature Android 4.0, a.k.a. Ice Cream Sandwich.

Although Lenovo was reportedly rolling out an Ice Cream Sandwich-powered tablet by the end of 2011, Asus is saying its newest offering will be the first to feature Ice Cream Sandwich. While the tablet will ship with Android 3.2 (a.k.a. Honeycomb), the manufacturers say it will be upgradable to Android 4.0 immediately.

The Transformer … Continue Reading

iPhone 4S already the second most popular cameraphone on Flickr

Apple’s fast-selling iPhone 4S is now the second-most used cameraphone on the popular photo-sharing service Flickr, according to the site’s Camera Finder page.

The iPhone 4 is actually the most-popular camera of all on Flickr now, but the iPhone 4S has yet to crack the top 5 list of most-used cameras on Flickr, which features traditional cameras like the Nikon D90 and the Canon EOS 5D Mark II in second and third place. But give … Continue Reading

Oracle, Amazon, IBM, Nimbula and more to speak at CloudBeat 2011

VentureBeat’s conference on the revolutionary potential of cloud computing is coming up fast. There’s still time to join us and learn how companies are using internet services to empower employees, serve customers, and deliver tangible value to investors.

Cloudbeat 2011 takes place next Wednesday, November 30 and Thursday, December 1 at the Hotel Sofitel in Redwood City. We’re really proud of the world-class lineup of speakers we have planned.

Here’s the latest batch of experts … Continue Reading