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- What’s Cooking At Rovio? Angry Birds Cookbooks, Movies And – Gasp – Games (TCTV)
- Daily Crunch: Stress
- Fujifilm’s X-Series EVIL Camera To Be “Premium,” Not Micro Four Thirds
- Upcoming Film Could Be Litmus Test For Theater And On-Demand Release Strategy
- HTC Sensation XL Makes London Debut, Complete With Beats Audio
- Remove The Special Offers From Your New Kindle — For A Price
- Video: Mini Stress Meter Displays Your Stress Level In Real-Time
- Japan To Get 3DS Not Only In “Ice White” But A 3DS Monster Hunter G Bundle, Too
| What’s Cooking At Rovio? Angry Birds Cookbooks, Movies And – Gasp – Games (TCTV) Posted: 07 Oct 2011 04:10 AM PDT  I caught up with Peter Vesterbacka, Mighty Eagle at Rovio, the creators of the successful Angry Birds franchise, yesterday at the Planet Of The Apps conference in London. It wasn’t a huge secret, but I certainly didn’t know this: Vesterbacka tells me you will soon be able to buy Angry Birds-themed cookbooks; actual physical books and ebooks for Kindle, Nook and iPad. Full disclosure: I got one of these limited-edition Angry Birds cookbooks for free (hence the pictures above and below). Also, I’m not much of a cook (hence why I accepted the book in the first place). In all seriousness, Vesterbacka tells me there have been 400 million downloads of the Angry Birds apps to date, and that its merchandising business is chugging along nicely as well, with about 10 million plush toys having gone over the counter already. I also bought two for our baby boy recently. Rovio is on a mission to turn Angry Birds into a brand as iconic as Nintendo’s Mario and Mickey Mouse, Vesterbacka adds. Gotta love ambitious (European) startups. Enjoy the interview:
Rovio is one of Europe’s leading independent developers of wireless games with an ever-growing portfolio of award-winning titles spanning many genres from casual to core next-gen console IP. Their studio has developed games for some of the biggest names in the mobile space, including Electronic Arts, Nokia, Vivendi, Namco Bandai and Mr. Goodliving/Real Networks. The seeds of Rovio were sown in 2003 when Helsinki University of Technology students Niklas Hed, Jarno Väkeväinen, and Kim Dikert participated in a mobile game... Angry Birds is a puzzle video game developed by Rovio, a developer based in Finland. Since its release for Apple’s iPhone and iPod Touch devices, over 6.5 million copies of the game have been purchased, and versions have appeared for other touchscreen-based smartphones. In Angry Birds, players take control of a flock of birds that are attempting to retrieve eggs that have been stolen by a group of evil pigs. The pigs have taken refuge on or within structures made...
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| Posted: 07 Oct 2011 01:00 AM PDT  Here are some of yesterday’s Gadgets stories:
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| Fujifilm’s X-Series EVIL Camera To Be “Premium,” Not Micro Four Thirds Posted: 06 Oct 2011 03:37 PM PDT  Fujifilm’s X100 captivated the photography world during its hype period, and though it wasn’t the ultimate camera some expected (I loved the device but took issue with its controls), it represents an interesting new brand strategy for the company. But they’re still figuring it out. The cheaper but still cool X10 is the logical mid-range version, though the X-S1 superzoom appears to have nothing in common with the brand but the letter X. Some news broke earlier this week, though, that seems more in line with the X series vision. There were almost no details, so we didn’t write it up at the time, but a bit more info from the company’s Fuji Guys Twitter account makes things a little clearer for their new interchangeable-lens system. Follow @fujiguys@fujiguys The Fuji Guys #Fujifilm X Series Interchangeable lens system not = M4/3 nor current mirrorless cams. X series will be "premium" cameras! We heard they were doing an EVIL or at least interchangeable-lens camera, but now we know that it’s going to be “premium,” presumably like the retro/metal X100 and X10. That also means it will carry a premium price. The glass was an expensive part of the X100, though, and that won’t factor into the body cost of the new system. I would speculate that body-only this thing is going to go for a thousand bucks. They also say that it won’t be micro four thirds. That’s a technical decision, but also a branding one &Mdash; the micro four-thirds sensor size is a popular compromise and no one would have blamed Fuji if they went for it. But it sounds like they’re going for a larger sensor, perhaps the APS-C one found in the X100 — or more likely, an updated version that will launch with that camera’s successor. As for availability? Follow @fujiguys@fujiguys The Fuji Guys #Fujifilm X Series family: X100, X10, X100, XS-1, & Interchangeable Camera System. More info at CES 2012 We’ll hear more two months from now at CES. Yes, it’s almost that time of year. We got a nice hands-on with the X100 last year well ahead of its release, so we’ll see what we can do to cajole Fujifilm into doing the same this time around. [via Photo Rumors and PetaPixel]
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| Upcoming Film Could Be Litmus Test For Theater And On-Demand Release Strategy Posted: 06 Oct 2011 02:24 PM PDT  As we all know, movies tend to come in two varieties: in-theater and straight to video. There’s a grey area around indie flicks and festivals, but generally it’s one of those two. When you think about it, that’s a rather old-school and unnecessary limitation. It’s in place because for a very long time, home theaters offered poor viewing environments. Nowadays that’s not as true, and people spend thousands to replicate that theater feel. So why keep the old model? There have been a few experiments on this front, but one is about to take place that is perhaps the most serious attempt yet to break the release strategy mold. Tower Heist, an action-comedy starring Ben Stiller and Eddie Murphy, will be released to on-demand video just three weeks after its theatrical debut. If it’s a success, they can tweak the formula and break the “blockbuster” rut that Hollywood has been in for decades. There’s a catch, of course. It wouldn’t be the movie industry if there wasn’t a catch. In this case (not surprisingly) it’s the price: $60. Yes, $60 to rent a movie. They are hoping to catch families and groups of friends who don’t want to go downtown to the movie theater and buy popcorn. It’s being offered in Atlanta and Portland to half a million Comcast subscribers (people with other providers are out of luck). My prediction? Total failure. Pricing failure, positioning failure, content failure. First, the price is too damn high. It makes going to the theater look like a bargain, and that’s not something you want to do. Hell, I didn’t even think it was possible. Seeing this price will make your target audience get off their couches and eat the parking fee and concession stand pricing. $30 would make sense, since that’s three tickets and people will feel they’re saving money by seeing it at home, people who might have never paid for your movie at all. But $60? Please. Second, this kind of thing needs to be all-out or people aren’t going to care. People are confused enough about movie rollout dates, first run and second run stuff, staggered releases to DVD, Blu-ray, streaming, download, etc. It’s coming to two limited markets, on Comcast only? I realize the cable companies are risk-averse, but if you’re going to do this, go big. Advertise it from the start with the movie, offer it nation-wide, license it to other cable providers if possible, and eat the loss if it doesn’t work out. Can’t be more than ten million in lost ticket sales and setup costs, right? Universal probably spent that much on catering during production. By dipping their toe instead of just diving in, Comcast is going to get inaccurate results and put off the real thing another few years. Third, this is the wrong movie to launch this idea on. People want to go to theaters to see action comedies. You laugh with the other people, you go with friends from school, the sound is super loud. It’s a blockbuster movie, not the kind you want to rent on video at all. Who really doesn’t want to go to the theater? Parents with kids. Driving the kids down, buying them candy, dealing with them crying and monkeying around — it’s a nightmare. The only reason they do it is because there’s no other way to see Kung Fu Panda 2 and all the other kids at school are talking about it. This model should have debuted with a high-profile kids movie. Put the home availability thing right into the preview and ads. Give the theaters the two or three weeks they need to get their initial ticket sales, then drop it into living rooms at $30 for a single viewing. Parents around the country would be ecstatic. I could be wrong, but this just doesn’t look like it’s going to work. Still, they’ve been beating around the bush for so long that even this poor effort counts for something. The hybrid release model is going to happen sooner or later — it’s inevitable — but Tower Heist isn’t going to set the standard.
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| HTC Sensation XL Makes London Debut, Complete With Beats Audio Posted: 06 Oct 2011 10:38 AM PDT  The device once known as the Runnymede has officially received a new name and a bit of spotlight today. HTC has just unveiled the newly-dubbed Sensation XL at their London Beats event, and the package is just as slick as expected. As far as its specs are concerned, the Sensation XL matches up nicely with the leaked feature listing first spotted last month. It still packs that monstrous, Gorilla Glass-covered 4.7-inch WVGA display, as well as a single-core 1.5 GHz Qualcomm processor and 768 MB of RAM. The 8-megapixel rear camera has been fleshed out a bit more, as we now know that it packs a respectable F/2.2 lens and a dual-LED flash. It wouldn’t be a high-end HTC device without a little touch of Sense, and fans of HTC’s UI tweaks will be glad to know that Sense 3.5 is there to gussy up the show. Of course, the big draw (at least for some people) will be the Beats goodies that are packed in with each unit. The included urBeats headphones have a line-in remote and microphone, and are designed to play nicely with the special Beats audio profile loaded onto each device. Whenever the urBeats are plugged in, the Beats profile leaps into action and tweaks the sound quality specifically for those headphones. Really, the only bummer about the Sensation XL is that there’s no word on US availability. Luckily, the wait for customers in the UK will be significantly shorter: they’ll soon be able to snag one from carriers 3 and O2.
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| Remove The Special Offers From Your New Kindle — For A Price Posted: 06 Oct 2011 08:17 AM PDT  Kindle buyers no longer have to decide at point of purchase if they want to forever look at advertisements on their Kindle. The fourth-generation Kindles, announced last week, allows buyers to remove the so-called Special Offers for $30. That’s the same premium Amazon charges up front for the normal, ad-free Kindle. This is smart. The remove process isn’t complicated or hidden. On your Amazon account page, navigate to the “Manage Your Kindle”, click “Manage Your Devices” and then selection the option to unsubscribe from Special Offers. From there, you’ll be charged $30 to remove the honestly unobtrusive ads. This is reportedly only available on the new keyboard-less Kindles and likely on the upcoming Touch model. Previous generation Special Offer Kindles will live out the rest of their days with advertisements (unless you Google on how to remove them). This move makes the Special Offers Kindles look even more tempting. They of course feature a lower cost of admission without locking consumers into ads forever. Amazon doesn’t lose anything in the process. If anything, it gets Amazon’s ad units in front of more eyes and makes the company looks rather charitable by not charging extra for their removal. Expect this feature to be heavily advertised in the future as it suddenly makes the subsidized Kindles more marketable and sexy. Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) is a leading global Internet company and one of the most trafficked Internet retail destinations worldwide. Amazon is one of the first companies to sell products deep into the long tail by housing them all in numerous warehouses and distributing products from many partner companies. Amazon directly sells, or acts as a platform for the sale of a broad range of products. These include books, music, videos, consumer electronics, clothing and household products. The majority of Amazon's... Introduced in November 2007, Kindle is an e-reader developed by Amazon.com to allow easy access to a vast library of electronic books to be downloaded and read on the device. Over 90,000 books were available for download at launch; that catalog grew to over 160,000 by August 2008 and was growing by over 25,000 titles per month. Books, newspapers, magazines and blogs are loaded onto the device wirelessly via Amazon’s free EVDO network (called WhisperNet) and are published in...
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| Video: Mini Stress Meter Displays Your Stress Level In Real-Time Posted: 06 Oct 2011 08:14 AM PDT  You’re constantly feeling stressed out but there’s no way to prove or quantify it? Then this mini stress meter Professor Nitta from the Tokyo Metropolitan University has developed might do the trick for you. The device is basically a pulse-wave sensor and a modified computer mouse rolled into one. The way it works is that users place their finger on the mouse for 10 seconds, let the meter measures stress by analyzing the blood flow in the user’s fingertip and then let the system analyze the variation. The stress level is displayed on a computer screen in real-time on a four level scale. Regarding the definition of the term “stress”, professor Nitta explains:
This video, shot by Diginfo TV (in English), provides more insight: Via Japan Probe
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| Japan To Get 3DS Not Only In “Ice White” But A 3DS Monster Hunter G Bundle, Too Posted: 06 Oct 2011 07:06 AM PDT  Nintendo and Capcom Japan have made two 3DS-related announcements today: first, Japanese consumers will be able to lay their hands on the device in a new color, namely Ice White, on November 3 (for the regular price of 15,000 Yen/US$195). Second, Capcom Japan announced [JP] the so-called “Monster Hunter 3G Special Pack”, which includes a 3DS in white and special design and Monster Hunter 3G. The bundle will hit Japan on December 10 for US$274. The game alone, bundled with that bulky Slide Pad, will cost US$91:
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