Google Buys a Quantum Computer

Kim Stallknecht for The New York Times A quantum computer developed by D-Wave Systems.
Google and a corporation associated with NASA are forming a laboratory to study artificial intelligence by means of computers that use the unusual properties of quantum physics. Their quantum computer, which performs complex calculations thousands of times faster than existing supercomputers, is expected to be in active use in the third quarter of this year.
The Quantum Artificial Intelligence Lab, as the entity is called, will focus on machine learning, which is the way computers take note of patterns of information to improve their outputs. Personalized Internet search and predictions of traffic congestion based on GPS data are examples of machine learning. The field is particularly important for things like facial or voice recognition, biological behavior, or the management of very large and complex systems.
“If we want to create effective environmental policies, we need better models of what’s happening to our climate,” Google said in a blog post announcing the partnership. “Classical computers aren’t well suited to these types of creative problems.”
Google said it had already devised machine-learning algorithms that work inside the quantum computer, which is made by D-Wave Systems of Burnaby, British Columbia. One could quickly recognize information, saving power on mobile devices, while another was successful at sorting out bad or mislabeled data. The most effective methods for using quantum computation, Google said, the quantum computer involved combining the advanced machines with its clouds of traditional computers.
Google bought the machine in cooperation with the Universities Space Research Association, a nonprofit research corporation that works with NASA and others to advance space science and technology. Outside researchers will be invited to the lab as well.
This year D-Wave sold its first commercial quantum computer to Lockheed Martin. Lockheed officials said the computer would be used for the test and measurement of things like jet aircraft designs, or the reliability of satellite systems.
The D-Wave computer works by framing complex problems in terms of optimal outcomes. The classic example of this type of problem is figuring out the most efficient way a traveling salesman can visit 10 customers, but real-world problems now include hundreds of such variables and contingencies. D-Wave’s machine frames the problem in terms of energy states, and uses quantum physics to rapidly determine an outcome that satisfies the variables with the least use of energy.
In test last september, an independent researcher found that for some types of problems the quantum computer was 3,600 times faster than traditional supercomputers. According to a D-Wave official, the machine performed even better in Google’s tests, which involved 500 variables with different constraints.
“The tougher, more complex ones had better performance,” said Colin Williams, D-Wave’s director of business development. “For most problems, it was 11,000 times faster, but in the more difficult 50 percent, it was 33,000 times faster. In the top 25 percent, it was 50,000 times faster.” Google declined to comment, aside from the blog post.
The machine Google will use at NASA’s Ames Research facility, located near Google headquarters, makes use of the interactions of 512 quantum bits, or qubits, to determine optimization. They plan to upgrade the machine to 2,048 qubits when this becomes available, probably within the next year or two. That machine could be exponentially more powerful.
Google did not say how it might deploy a quantum computer into its existing global network of computer-intensive data centers, which are among the world’s largest. D-Wave, however, intends eventually for its quantum machine to hook into cloud computing systems, doing the exceptionally hard problems that can then be finished off by regular servers.
Potential applications include finance, health care, and national security, said Vern Brownell, D-Wave’s chief executive. “The long-term vision is the quantum cloud, with a few high-end systems in the back end,” he said. “You could use it to train an algorithm that goes into a phone, or do lots of simulations for a financial institution.”
Mr. Brownell, who founded a computer server company, was also the chief technical officer at Goldman Sachs. Goldman is an investor in D-Wave, with Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon.com. Amazon Web Services is another global cloud, which rents data storage, computing, and applications to thousands of companies.
This month D-Wave established an American company, considered necessary for certain types of sales of national security technology to the United States government.

I considerate very interest because a quantum computer it is cheaper than super computer and this computer can learn. Now is powerfull and the google and NASA can upgrade from 512-2048 qubits, this computer can preddict the traffic because the quantum computer search to internet and learn patters , and take note. I related to informatic engineer, because it's a supercomputer that it isn't expensive than the supercomputer to save data

http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/05/16/google-buys-a-quantum-computer/?ref=technology

New Apps Arrive on Google Glass

Jeff Chiu/Associated Press Google hopes that apps will make Glass, the company’s Internet-connected glasses, more functional.
Google Glass, the company’s Internet-connected glasses, will soon have seven new apps, including breaking news alerts from CNN, fashion features from Elle, Twitter, Tumblr and Facebook posts and reminder notes from Evernote.
Google announced the apps, which it calls Glassware, Thursday at its I/O developers conference, the largest assembly yet of people wearing Glass in the same place. They join Path and The New York Times as the only apps so far available on Glass. The glasses also offer Google services like search and maps, connect to users’ cellphones for text messaging, take photos and record video.
Just as apps transformed smartphones from cellphones into devices that have become essential to daily life for many people, so Google hopes that apps will make Glass more functional. Still, Google is moving slowly and cautiously in opening Glass to developers. Apps have limited access to Glass users’ data, for instance, and for now, cannot include ads.
Google wants developers to experiment with building apps tailored to Glass, as opposed to just transporting mobile apps to the new device. Glass is different than phones because it is in a user’s line of sight and has a smaller screen. So notifications, for instance, could easily be disruptive or unwanted.
Google has given Glassware developers four pieces of advice: keep it short and sweet for the small screen, make sure alerts are relevant, send timely information people need on the go and make tasks easier and more seamless than they are on other devices.
CNN’s app, for instance, lets people choose which types of news alerts they receive (politics but no sports, for instance), and the time of day at which they are delivered. Then they can read or hear aloud a short summary and watch a video clip.

Google A screenshot from the Elle app for Google Glass.
Similarly, Elle’s app allows people to choose the sections of the magazine they want to see on Glass, swipe through photos from a story, hear a section of a story read aloud, add stories to a reading list for later and share stories with friends. At Elle, there is a team dedicated to taking monthly magazine content and turning it into real-time updates that make sense for Glass, like posts from the Elle Dispatch blog.

Google A screenshot from the Twitter app for Google Glass.
So far on Glass, photos are shareable only through Google Plus. With the Facebook app, Glass users will be able to share photos taken with Glass on Facebook. Twitter’s Glass app lets people tailor their stream to only receive posts from certain people and transcribe new posts using voice. Tumblr’s app shows a user’s full feed or just select updates.
When people are using Evernote on the Web, they will be able to send notes, like a grocery list, to Glass, so it’s accessible when they need it.
Another new app was built by three of the developers who received an early edition of Glass. It’s a game called Ice Breaker that some people could say bridges the divide between the physical and digital worlds — and others might say creates some socially awkward situations. Glass users see a notification of someone who is also playing the game nearby, and the people introduce themselves and take a picture of one another, rate their conversation and earn points.
The Glassware will be available to people who signed up and paid $1,500 for an early edition of Glass. Though other developers are beginning to build apps for the device, there is not yet an app store where anyone can offer such apps.

I considerate this glasses very interesting that you can obtain many informations with this and will can use the police to identify and criminal or sospect due to that you can put data from person and the glasses it has facial recognise and if you have the glasses put you can see the date of birthday, your home and many information that it has relate this person. And if you see a different items the glasses give it information about this item. It's a problem because don't protect the intimity of person but google it is working to limit the information give to the person. I related to informatic engineer because google is a company of informatic engineering.

http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/05/16/new-apps-arrive-on-google-glass/?ref=technology

Which ear you hold your cell phone to may reveal brain dominance

Researchers at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit say that, similar to handedness, most people who hold their cell phones to their left ear are right-hemisphere dominant and vice versa.
It has long been understand that right-handed people -- who make up about 90 percent of the population -- have left-hemisphere dominant brains, and left-handed people the reverse. But the division of labor isn't actually that simple. For some 95 percent of righties, the left hemisphere almost exclusively handles language and the right emotion and image processing, while for lefties, only 20 percent experience such strict division.
Now there may be a new way, apart from handedness, to determine one's cerebral dominance: the cell phone.
In a new study out of Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit, published in JAMA Otolaryngology-Head & Neck Surgery, researchers found that most people who hold their cell phones to their left ear are right-hemisphere dominant, while most who hold their cell phones to their right ear are left-hemisphere dominant.
Now, one might ask, who cares? Lead researcher Michael Seidman, director of the division of otologic and neurotologic surgery in the Department of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery at Henry Ford, said in a school news release that these findings actually have several implications.
Not only could this help us better understand the language center of the brain, he said, but "by establishing a correlation between cerebral dominance and sidedness of cell phone use, it may be possible to develop a less-invasive, lower-cost option to establish the side of the brain where speech and language occurs rather than the Wada test, a procedure that injects an anesthetic into the carotid artery to put part of the brain to sleep in order to map activity."
What's more, the findings suggest that cell phone use may not be linked to brain, head, and neck tumors, given that nearly 80 percent of people studied hold the cell phone to their right ear and yet cancer doesn't appear more often on that side of the brain, head, or neck.
Dr. Seidman first looked into cell phone handedness when he noticed that most people use their right hand to hold their cell phone to their right ear, even though this would make listening on the phone while taking notes or other multitasking harder.

The targets have included several American oil, gas and electricity companies, which government officials have refused to identify. The goal is not espionage, they say, but sabotage. Government officials describe the attacks as probes looking for ways to seize control of critical processing systems.

Investigators began looking at the attacks several months ago, and when the Department of Homeland Security issued a vaguely worded warning this month, a government official told The New York Times that “most everything we have seen is coming from the Middle East.”
Government officials and outside experts on Friday confirmed a report in The Wall Street Journal that the source of the attacks had been narrowed to Iran. They said the evidence was not specific enough to conclude with confidence that the attacks were state-sponsored, but control over the Internet is so centralized in Iran that they said it was hard to imagine the attacks being done without government knowledge.
While the attackers have been unsuccessful to date, they have made enough progress to prompt the Homeland Security warning, which compared the latest threat to the computer virus that hit Saudi Aramco, the world’s largest oil producer, last year. After investigations, American officials concluded that the Aramco attack, and a subsequent one at RasGas, the Qatari energy company, were the work of Iran.
Taken together, officials say, the attacks suggest that Iran’s hacking skills have improved over the past 18 months. The Obama administration has been focused on Iran because the attacks have given the Iranian government a way to retaliate for tightened economic sanctions against it, and for the American and Israeli program that aimed similar attacks, using a virus known as Stuxnet, on the Natanz nuclear enrichment plant.
That effort, code-named Olympic Games, slowed Iran’s progress for months, but also prompted it to create what Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps calls a cyber corps to defend the country.
This week Iran denied being the source of any attacks, and said it had been a victim of American sabotage. In a letter to the editor of The Times, responding to a May 12 article that reported on the new attacks’ similarity to the Saudi Aramco episode, Alireza Miryousefi, the head of the press office of the Iranian mission to the United Nations, wrote that Iran “never engaged in such attacks against its Persian Gulf neighbors, with which Iran has maintained good neighborly relations.”
“Unfortunately, wrongful acts such as authorizing the 2010 Stuxnet attack against Iran have set a bad, and dangerous, precedent in breach of certain principles of international law,” he wrote.
American officials have not offered any technical evidence to back up their assertions of Iranian authorship of the latest attacks, but they describe the recent campaign as different from most attacks against American companies — particularly those from China — which quietly siphon off intellectual property for competitive purposes.
The new attacks, officials say, were devised to destroy data and manipulate the machinery that operates critical control systems, like oil pipelines. One official described them as “probes that suggest someone is looking at how to take control of these systems.”
The White House would not confirm that Iran was the source, but Laura Lucas, a spokeswoman for the National Security Council, said that “mitigating threats in cyberspace, whether theft of intellectual property or intrusions against our critical infrastructure” was a governmentwide initiative and that the United States would consider “all of the measures at its disposal — from diplomatic to law enforcement to economic — when determining how to protect our nation, allies, partners, and interests in cyberspace.”
In the past, government officials have privately warned companies under threat. But Homeland Security was able to issue a broader warning because of an executive order, signed in February, promoting greater information sharing about such threats between the government and private companies that oversee the nation’s critical infrastructure.
An agency called ICS-Cert, which monitors attacks on computer systems that run industrial processes, issued the warning. It said the government was “highly concerned about hostility against critical infrastructure organizations,” and included a link to a previous warning about Shamoon, the virus used in the Saudi Aramco attack last year.
That attack prompted Leon E. Panetta, then defense secretary, to warn of a “cyber-Pearl Harbor” if the United States did not take the threat seriously.
Saudi Aramco and RasGas both said that the attackers had failed in their efforts to infiltrate their oil production systems.
Government officials also say Iran was the source of a separate continuing campaign of attacks on American financial institutions that began last September and has since taken dozens of American banks intermittently offline, costing millions of dollars. But that attack was a less sophisticated “denial of service” effort.
Jeff Moss, chief security officer at the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, the private body that oversees the basic design of the Internet, said: “For the last year, Iran has been focused on disrupting financial institutions’ Web sites. If they are going after energy, and opening a multiprong front, at what point does it cross from annoyance to a threshold?”

It's a proof that the computer engineer it can destroy many structures, and proof that almost all it' s computerized. I relate to computer engineer because it's due to computerized attacks.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/25/world/middleeast/new-computer-attacks-come-from-iran-officials-say.html?ref=technology&_r=0

Apple 1 breaks auction record, goes for $671,400

One of what's thought to be only six working Apple 1 computers -- hand-built by Steve Wozniak -- flies out of a German auction house for a tidy sum. The last one went for $640,000.

One of what's believed to be only six still-working Apple 1 computers set a record at auction Saturday, selling for $671,400 in Germany.
The machine, built by Steve "The Woz" Wozniak in Steve Jobs' parents garage back in 1976, was sold along with the original owner's manual and a signed letter from Jobs to original owner Fred Hatfield.
Breker, the German auction house that handled the sale, sold another Apple 1 in December for $640,000, a substantial jump in price from the Apple 1 sold by Sotheby's in New York last June for $374,500.

(Credit: Breker)
Auctioner Uwe Breker said the appeal of the machine went far beyond the realm of geekery.
"It is a superb symbol of the American dream," he told The New York Times' Bits blog. "You have two college dropouts from California who pursued an idea and a dream, and that dream becomes one of the most admired, successful, and valuable companies in the world."
That can-do spirit is reflected in this brief description of the Apple 1's genesis, given in the Sotheby's notes to last June's auction (PDF):

When Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs presented the Apple I Computer to the Homebrew Computer Club in 1976, it was dismissed by everyone but Paul Terrell, the owner of a chain of stores called Byte Shop. Terrell ordered 50 computers for $500 apiece, insisting that the circuit boards come fully assembled rather than as DIY kits similar to the Altair, and Jobs and Woz managed to produce the requisite computers in 30 days. They continued production, immediately creating 50 additional Apple 1's to sell to friends and an additional 100 to sell through vendors, at a retail price of $666.66, a number that garnered complaints among conservative Christians, but provided a lucrative 33 [percent] markup.

Let's see, 50 computers in 30 days -- that's about 1.67 Apple 1s per day. At today's prices, that would add up to about $1,121,238 for a day's work. Not too shabby.
Sotheby's estimates that another 44 Apple 1s exist, in addition to the 6 that still actually work.

I considerate very interest because it's curious how much cost this pieze of history. i'm not fun of apple because it's more expensive than caracteristics than the have. I related to computer engineer because it have created by students of computer engineer.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13579_3-57586204-37/apple-1-breaks-auction-record-goes-for-$671400/

How to learn the period table in 3 minutes

In high school science classes, students are encouraged to memorize the first 20 elements of the periodic table. There are other methods employed at the university level for all 118 -- many students swear by mnemonics.
When it comes to tremendously catchy fun, though, a new song by AsapScience has them all beat. Called simply "The New Periodic Table Song (In Order)," it's a chemical adventure that romps along to a section of "Infernal Galop" (otherwise known as the Can-Can music) from Jacques Offenbach's opera "Orpheus in the Underworld."
It goes, appropriately, at a fast gallop, but listen a few times, and you'll soon find yourself confidently singing along.

I considerate very interest because many times in our life we have to learn the periodic table but in this video can explate how to learn easily the periodic table. This video is famous in youtube and it have too many visits.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-57586117-1/how-to-learn-the-periodic-table-in-3-minutes/

Apple cuts prices on refurbished iPad Mini and iPad 4

Those of you eyeing an iPad Mini or fourth-generation iPad can now save a bit more money on refurbished models courtesy of Apple.
As of Friday, Apple is offering 15 percent to 17 percent discounts on all flavors of refurbished units of the iPad Mini and the iPad 4.
The 16GB Wi-Fi-only iPad Mini is selling for $279, 15 percent off the usual price. The 32GB Wi-Fi Mini is available for $359, 16 percent off the full price. And the 64GB Wi-Fi Mini can be had for $439, 17 percent off the regular price.
The 16GB Wi-Fi version of the fourth-gen iPad is going for $419, a 16 percent discount. The 32GB Wi-Fi model is on sale for $499, also 16 percent off the usual price. And the 64GB Wi-Fi edition is selling for $579, a hefty 17 percent cut in price.
Apple fully tests and certifies all of its refurbished products. Equipped with a new battery and outer shell, the units come with a one-year warranty.

It's more strange that it's the first time that apple sell products refurbished and i don't think that it is too much sale because 17% for a version refurbished don't it is a sale but it is the same product and it is same dependable. I related to computer engineer because it's a one product that stocks of computer engineer.

GAME OVER FOR USED GAMES

Whether used games will work with the Xbox One remains up in the air.
In case you missed it, Microsoft unveiled a new game console the other day, the Xbox One. We now know a lot about it, but as with most game console launches, we were left with a few unanswered questions that my colleague Dan Ackerman summed up nicely in his "Unanswered questions about the Xbox One" piece.
It's the last one that seems to be generating the most controversy: "Will used games work on the Xbox One?"
Simple question, complicated answer
You'd think the answer would be a simple yes or no, but alas, it's murkier than that. It all started when Microsoft VP Phil Harrison described to Wired how you'd use a game disc to install the game on the Xbox One's hard drive. Once installed, the disc, Harrison said, was no longer necessary. You owned that game and could download it from your account at any time.
That sounds quite convenient on the surface -- and a good feature -- but it also implied that Microsoft had developed some kind of digital signature that locked a specific game to a specific user account, which in turn would make it impossible to install a used game locked to another person's account. And that had folks calling foul. Was Microsoft taking an anti-consumer stance?
As the questions mounted in the hours after the launch event, Microsoft issued the following statement (via the site of Xbox Live head honcho Larry "Major Nelson" Hryb):

We know there is some confusion around used games on Xbox One and wanted to provide a bit of clarification on exactly what we've confirmed today. While there have been many potential scenarios discussed, today we have only confirmed that we designed Xbox One to enable our customers to trade in and resell games at retail. Beyond that, we have not confirmed any specific scenarios. Another piece of clarification around playing games at a friend's house -- should you choose to play your game at your friend's house, there is no fee to play that game while you are signed in to your profile.

Nothing like mixing a little specificity with vagueness to stir the pot. And take note of the wording. Nowhere does Microsoft say that the Xbox One will play used games. Rather, the company says, "We designed Xbox One to enable our customers to trade in and resell games at retail." I'm not sure exactly what that means, but my snap translation is, "We're going to allow some sort of economy for used games to continue, but it may not work the same way it does now."
Would you get a credit for a game you traded in and then have it removed from your account? Could you only trade in a game toward the purchase of a specific other game or games (from the same publisher)? How would games be valued? And would buyers of used games have to pay any additional fees?
Who knows. But as my colleague Dan said, "It's no secret that every major video game company would like used games to go away, largely because they don't get a cut of any of those resale dollars. The Xbox One gives Microsoft a chance to reboot the idea of how game sales work."
Oh, and by the way, Sony faced similar questions when it teased the PlayStation 4 in February. While Sony, too, claimed it would allow for used games, it remains unclear what caveats might be attached to the use of those games. Since Sony's event was much more of a teaser, the company wasn't grilled as aggressively as Microsoft has been. I suspect Sony will encounter tougher questions at the PS4's true unveiling at E3 in a couple of weeks, especially if it doesn't fully explain what the company has in store for used games.
It's no secret that every major video game company would like used games to go away, largely because they don't get a cut of any of those resale dollars.
While it's hard to say exactly what "potential scenarios" Microsoft is weighing, the bigger question is what happens if the used-game economy is altered, perhaps radically, to the point where it's essentially gutted? Will it hurt the game industry or help it?
The $60 question
Sure, there are people out there who don't mind paying $60 for a game, especially a premium title that they plan on playing for months. However, for a lot of folks $60 is a lot to spend on a game, especially with very few truly special titles being released these days (by special I mean something exciting and fresh, not polished retreads), and more and more consumers are turning to mobile (smartphone, tablet) games that cost less than $5 -- and sometimes don't cost anything.
Don't get me wrong, I appreciate the effort that goes into making these games; some of the work being done is incredible and many premium titles cost tens of millions of dollars to make. But a lot of games end up disappointing simply because there's a been-there-done-that feel to them. Plus, because you can find good mobile games for so cheap, people inevitably expect more from a $60 game.
That said, one of the open secrets of the gaming industry is that many people don't really pay $60 for a game. They use trade-in credit at GameStop to buy games or simply sell games after they play them on Amazon or eBay for a good fraction of what they bought them for. If you play through a AAA title quickly enough, you can usually sell it on Amazon for $45 or $50, meaning you only spent about $15 to $20 to play it, including tax.

A small selection of coupons from GameStop's PowerUp rewards program.
(Credit: Screenshot by David Carnoy/CNET)
To give an example, I bought a used copy of BioShock Infinite (Xbox 360) for right around $30 at GameStop shortly after it was released. With my PowerUp reward points, I downloaded a coupon good for $20 off a used game, and got an additional 10 percent discount off the used game for being a "Pro" member. The total, with tax, was a far cry from the $65 or so I would have had to pay for a new copy.
If I'd played it through quickly, I could have actually traded it in at GameStop for right around what I paid for it. And if I had sold it on Amazon or eBay (disclaimer: I don't sell games on Amazon or eBay), I could have probably gotten $45 to $50. (The price for the standard version of the game has recently dropped to $39.99).
Of course, the bad part of all this is that the game publishers get no money from my transactions. Having seen used copies of books I've written up on Amazon selling for a fraction of the "real" price, I'm well aware of being on the creator end of things where the author doesn't get a dime on a used copy sale. It sucks, but then again, someone might not have taken the chance of buying the hardcover in the first place if it weren't possible to resell it after reading it.
In the gaming world, the current system obviously isn't ideal for game publishers and clearly benefits retailers like GameStop and Amazon that have built nice businesses around the used-game market. After all, GameStop wouldn't constantly be encouraging its customers to trade in games if it weren't a lucrative market. Sounds good to me to have a customer trade in BioShock Infinite for $30 and then sell it back to customers for $50. (Note that GameStop's stock is up 88 percent over the past year.)
But if you pull the rug out from under the current system, it could do real damage to the gaming industry. In the personal example I gave, I bought a used copy of BioShock Infinite. It happened to be the last one in the store. In many cases, because the difference in price between the used copy of a AAA title and a new copy is pretty small, a lot of people end up buying the new copy (particularly when no used copies are available), choosing to put their existing trade-in balance toward the new game. So trade-ins definitely fuel sales of new copies of the game and people bank on the fact that they can pull a few older titles out of their collection and get some money for them to put toward a new game.

GameStop CEO Tony Bartel told Forbes recently that it puts $1 billion in trade into the market and 70 percent of that money goes back into new game sales. "It's a recognized way to make these games more affordable," Bartel told Forbes. "All three new platforms understand that."
Addressing concerns that neither the Xbox One nor the PS4 would play used games, which could be very detrimental to his company's business, Bartel said, "Both Sony and Microsoft have said games can be resold, and that's exactly what we anticipated."
Unfortunately, Bartel left out one small detail: while he said you'd be able to resell games, he didn't say anything about being able to buy used ones. I'm not sure if he did that intentionally, but that's the way I'm reading his quote.
Steam the dream?
For the publishers, anyway, the Steam model seems much closer to their ideal. Despite its talk of discs, it seems clear that Microsoft would prefer to move to digital downloads, with it being the retailer. That's the future, although some of these games are huge and many consumers are stuck with slow Internet connections, bandwidth caps, or both.
Games are simply too expensive at $60, particularly for a digital download.
One of the appealing things about Steam is the digital locker aspect to it -- your games are stored in your account and you can download them again when you get a new computer by simply logging into your account (GameStop and EA, among others, also offer digital lockers). Another attractive aspect is all the deals Steam offers. Many of the bargains are on older titles, but there's certainly plenty of quality stuff for reasonable prices, and some interesting indie stuff.
The problem the publishers face is that games are simply too expensive at $60, particularly for a digital download. Often, you get no discount for downloading the digital version, so there's no incentive to buy it when you can pick up the hard copy instead and later trade it in, sell it, or simply swap with a friend for another game. You'd think that if publishers wanted to tamp down the used-copy sales, they'd push people toward digital downloads with pricing incentives. But that would also upset the relationship they have with retailers, so you're left with a backward-looking market.
The long and short of it is that if publishers, Microsoft, and presumably others want to do away with the used-games market as we know it, the pricing for games is going to have to change. At this time, we don't know exactly how much new games for the next-gen systems will cost -- prices could very well go up for AAA next-gen titles -- but they ultimately need to go down, not up.
Somehow I doubt that will happen. But if it doesn't, fewer people will buy games when they're first released. Some will wait till the price drops (as the price for BioShock Infinite did).
But many more will gravitate toward spending their time -- and money -- playing cheap mobile games. Or maybe not getting a new console to begin with.

I considerate very interest because it's the presentation of Xbox One but bad news, Microsoft confim that can't be use used games. We will see if it affect to the sells . I related to computer engineer because it's a new console

http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-18438_7-57585778-82/game-over-for-used-games-how-xbox-one-and-ps4-could-gut-gamers-wallets/

iPhone 5 repairs won't come cheap

iPhone 5 repairs can cost more than other models of the device.
It's happened to a lot of people -- their iPhone drops from their hands, falls off their lap, plunks into a toilet, or gets knocked off a table.
Showing off a cracked iPhone screen is sometimes almost a point of pride. I have one friend who lovingly calls his damaged phone "The Hurt Locker," referring to the 2008 movie about a bomb disposal team working during the Iraq War.
But, many of these damaged iPhones cease to work after going through various mishaps. That's when repairs come into play -- and, they're not cheap.
Currently, Apple charges up to $229 to replace a broken screen on an iPhone 5, according to MarketWatch. That's quite a lot considering a new phone on contract goes for $200 and without contract $650. If iPhone 5 owners have the $99 AppleCare warranty, a screen replacement is $49.
It seems that repair prices are on the rise. Two years ago Apple charged $199 to fix a busted screen. Since the device was first introduced in 2007, damaged iPhones have cost Americans $5.9 billion -- with one third of owners breaking their devices every year, according to a survey last September by gadget warranty firm SquareTrade.
Despite Apple now charging more to repair the iPhone 5, several teardown and repair sites have said that this iteration of the device is the easiest to repair.

El mundo de la ingeniería

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domingo, 26 de mayo de 2013

Noticias 3º Trimestre Miguel Ángel VIcente Ledesma

Google Buys a Quantum Computer

New Apps Arrive on Google Glass

Which ear you hold your cell phone to may reveal brain dominance

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The targets have included several American oil, gas and electricity companies, which government officials have refused to identify. The goal is not espionage, they say, but sabotage. Government officials describe the attacks as probes looking for ways to seize control of critical processing systems.

Apple 1 breaks auction record, goes for $671,400

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