SAN DIEGO (Press Release)–The Anti-Defamation League disseminated the following press release urging attendance at the annual All People’s Breakfast , in which ADL is a participant.

“On January 18, 2010, 7:30am people throughout San Diego County will gather together for The 22nd Annual All People’s Breakfast.  Hosted by the YWCA of San Diego County, the theme for this year’s breakfast is Living the Dream; a time for gathering to celebrate the gains of the Civil Rights Movement, as well as the continued push for diversity and inclusion, equality, and peace.

“The breakfast will be held in Golden Hall at the San Diego Concourse. The program will focus on youth and include exciting performances from The Gospel Signing Choir, Collective Purpose, and Eveoke Dance Theatre. The event will also feature a community space where attendees will have an opportunity to learn about local social justice and advocacy organizations.

“Speakers for the 2010 breakfast will be Ashley Walker (Chair of the 2010 All Peoples Breakfast Dream Team-Host Committee), Christopher Yanov (founder of Reality Changers), and Rustin Lewis (President of National Cares Mentoring Movement).

·         “Christopher Yanov saw that poor academics among the youth increased the pre-existing delinquent issues and felt drawn to be the change in the harmful reality for most urban Latino youth. And so started Reality Changers, a positive culture for students with strong personalities, high energy self-discipline, and focus.  The program has seen its high achieving alumni gain entrance and full scholarships to Ivy League schools such as Harvard, Brown, and Yale, as well as prominent local and regional universities.

·        ” Dr. Rustin Lewis is the current president of National Cares Mentoring Movement, a mentoring organization established by Susan Taylor (Editor Emeritus of Essence magazine). National Cares Mentoring Movement is a nationwide organization that provides mentors and resources to agencies that maintain mentoring relationships. Dr. Lewis was the CEO of College Bound, a college prep program for public school students in Washington, DC, prior to joining National Cares.

·         “Born into the oppression of Blacks in the segregated south, Ashley Walker integrated an all White-male Jesuit university under a federal court order as a young woman. Her life experience led her to a career in social justice, which culminated as the Executive Director of the Human Relations Commission (City of San Diego). Recently retired, she also established many of the Domestic Violence prevention programs in the Southern California area through her work as an administrator at the YWCA of San Diego Count for 13 years. Ashley is also responsible for establishing the first civilian mediation team to work with the SDPD in the mid 90’s and the domestic violence protocol for the US Navy Western Region’s Family Service Centers.

The 2010 All People’s Breakfast, coinciding with celebrations of Martin Luther King’s birthday,  is sponsored by Qualcomm, ACLU of San Diego and Imperial Counties, Sycuan Casino, San Diego Community College District, Sempra Energy, Unified Port of San Diego, Tariq Khamisa Foundation, and the Inspire Fund. For additional information, please call 619-209-8241, send an e-mail to allpeoplesbreakfast2010@yahoo.com, or visit www.allpeoplesbreakfastsd.org. 

*
Preceding provided by the Anti-Defamation League

Not sure who has or hasn’t seen this yet, but this phone looks like it kicks some serious butt, due to it’s 1 Ghz Snapdragon Processor – not to mention the pico-cell projector attachment Very excited to get my hands on one

LG Expo Specs

LG Expo Videos

With the evolution of Smartphone and exponentially growing market for high speed multimedia services the network needs to be smarter for delivering an exhilarating user-experience. .The transformation of mobile devices industry led by advent of successful smartphones such as Blackberry, Apple iPhone the users have become more data hungry and demanding more interactive services loading the mobile network operator’s network.Multicast and Broadcast services (MBS) is the solution that will not only cater this need efficiently but also attract a large subscriber base. MBS offers real time streaming services, audio-video on demand, multiplayer online gaming, localized services, news advertisements, stocks bringing the most anticipated services at your finger tips.

MBS in 3rd Generation and 4th Generation Wireless systems requires efficient network resource utilization in access and core networks along with scalable and reliable service platforms. Also, it should incorporate the mobility aspects to continuously deliver multimedia information over an efficient air interface.

The major MBS technologies used in various 3G/4G deployment models are Media FLO by Qualcomm, DVB-H (Digital Video Broadcasting-Handheld) by DVB, MBBS by 3GPP and BCMCS by3GPP2. These technologies have garnered much attention for the revenues they can bring to terminal suppliers, network equipment suppliers, mobile operators, broadcast operators, service providers and even governments.

The main analysis considering the different old as well as new evolving use cases with the MBS technologies supporting these different services can be mapped as follows:

Considering the above use-cases we can draw insights:

1. Selection: The selection of particular MBS technology by the mobile network operator should be based on following criteria

2. Cost: For heavy duty broadcast applications the resources required would be greater in a 3G network compared to a Broadcast only network such as MediaFLO or DVB-H and hence the cost.
Whereas for light applications and highly interactive applications MBMS or BCMCS would be the ideal choice saving on resources by multicasting to the subscribed group of users instead of broadcasting it to every user in the network. Also, due to availability of an uplink channel, highly interactive applications can be easily supported on the mobile terminal providing a better user experience. Also, from unicasting perspective, with Multicast usage there is a considerable resource savings in core network and radio access network where the radio bearers are lesser than number of users compared to the number of bearers which is equal to number of users in unicast transmissions

3.Reach: MediaFLO and DVB-H have a larger cell size and hence a larger footprint which again thus requires lesser base stations covering groups of subscriber services. But again due to the existing vast coverage of the 2G/3G cellular network, these base stations can be easily upgraded to MBMS/BCMCS capabilities with a comparatively greater reach though smaller individual footprint.

4. Interactivity: Broadcast only networks are limited due to the lack of backward channel and hence no interactivity. But the interactivity can be implemented by using network operator’s feedback channel.

5.Mobile Terminal: In the current scenario, for specific applications such as Live TV, broadcast only technologies like MediaFLO or DVB-H might prove to be more efficient but the downfall is the corresponding handsets should be available to receive such broadcasts so that is an additional cost to the MNO’s.

6.Business Implicaitons: The broadcast and multicast are complimentary technologies where broadcast can be used for stimulating users to subscribe to the services and multicast services are used to cater specific endusers which eventually subscribes t ospecific services which generate revenues for the operators.

7.Mobile Trend: There is a significant growing trend towards a large number of interactive applications with the advent of modile web due to the availability of smartphones with a larger form factor and advanced capabilities. So most of the NGN will be equipped with cutting edge resource efficient technologies supporting heavy duty streaming and at the same time supporting a higher level of interactivity and a richer user experience with a better continous data connectivity and seamless mobility

Thus with a strong MBS technology selection by the MNO and a lucrative business model a smart telecom value chain is possible and with higher order benefits.

Tu 1/5 – W 1/6, Th 1/7 – Su 1/10
CONSUMER ELECTRONICS SHOW
110,000 expected, 2500 exhibitors, 800 speakers, 250 conference sessions incl Digital Hollywood, Connections, and Digital Media Wire, it’s the largest digital media event of the year!
Las Vegas Convention Center, Hilton, Venetian, spanning the Las Vegas Strip
www.cesweb.org

Tu 1/5
12-4, V Titian 2202, LVCC S229 – press room open
1:30, V Murano 3301-3 – ASUS press event
2-3, V Bellini 2105 – CEA US Trends
3-4, V Bellini 2105 – CEA Global Trends
4-7, V Ballroom – CES Unveiled: Best Buy, Hannspree, Lenovo, Powermat…
7-10, Sands Expo shuttle – StartUp Debut – VCs, press, eats, drinks,startupdebut@gmail.com

W 1/6
7:30-9, V Titian 2202, LVCC S229 -press room open
8-8:45, V Casanova 501 – LG press event
9-9:45, V Marco Polo 706 – Monster press event, V Sands 201 Netgear press event
10-10:45, V Casanova 504 – Toshiba press event
11-11:45, V Sands 206 Pioneer press event
12-12:45, V Sands 102 – Sharp press event
1-1:45, V Bellini 2105 – Casio press event
2-2:45, V Marco Polo 801 – Samsung press event
3-3:45, V Marco Polo 705 – JVC press event
3-3:45, V Bellini 2101 – Panasonic press event
*****
8-10:30, LVCC N262 P2P Breakfast, N260 Paramount, BitTorrent, N262 Snacks
11:30-12:30, LVCC N261 NVP Saatchi,N253 SpikeTV BBDO MTV,N258 A&E, TwitVid
12:30, LVCC N262 Lunch
1-2, LVCC N253 Lego, IMVU, Gaia, WW Biggies, N258 IODA, Napster
1:30-2:15, LVCC N260 Melike Amjarv, WB, BMI, SAG
2:30-3:30, LVCC N258 Discovery, Paramount, N253 ngmoco, N261 NBCU, MTV
3:30-4:15, LVCC N256 Qualcomm, Ericsson
4-5, LVCC N253 Viximo WB,N258 Fandango, Flixster, Freeverse,N261 TiVo
5-7:30, LVCC N262 P2P Cocktails
4:15-5:30, LVCC Central Hall 14200 – Sony press event
6:30-7:30, Hilton Center – Keynote – Steve Ballmer, Microsoft

Th 1/7
8-5, LVCC S229, V Titian 2202 -press room open
8:30, Hilton Theater – Keynote, Alan Mulally, Ford
10-6, Exhibit Hours
10-12, Hilton Shimmer Cabaret – Jen-Hsung Huang, NVIDIA press event
10-11, LVCC S227 DISH press event, S224 4G Verizon, Samsung, Clearwire
10-12, LVCC N250* Autonet, Pandora
10:30, LVCC N264* CEA Outlook, , N255* Kodak, Scoble
10:30-11:30, LVCC N256 AVOD, TiVo, Panasonic, N259 DISH, Merv Griffin, Starz
11-12, LVCC N253* ABC, LeapFrog, Vtech, Build-A-Bear, Lunch
11:20-12:10, LVCC N260* 3D – WB, Disney, CinemaNOW, Dolby
12-1, LVCC N254 Autonet, N259 Hearst, Rovi, N262* WaPo, N256 Roku, Z, Intel
12-1, LVCC S224 EA, RIM, ATT, TI, Sony
12:20-1:10+, LVCC N260* 3D RealD, LG, Panasonic, Sony, N253* MyYearbook
1:30-2:15+, LVCC N250* CBS counting viewers, N262* CBS, Pampelmoose
1:30-2:30, LVCC N259 Lionsgate, YouTube, FB, Fox, Disc, N261 Fremantle
2-3, LVCC N253* Cartoon Network, PBS, Nokia
2:30-3:20, LVCC N260* Y!, NBCU, Vizio, WB, DIVX
3-4, LVCC N259 Interactive – Sony, Sharp, Y!, N256 LG, Samsung, Sharp, Panasonic
3-4, LVCC S224 Netbooks – Lenovo, Laptop Mag, Intel, Microsoft, AMD
3-5, LVCC N253* Toy Demos, KAPi Awards – Sesame Workshop
3:45-4:30, LVCC N250 Monetizing Content – Tubefilter, FOD, NBCU, CJP
4:30-5:30, LVCC N250* CESup Search – TiVo, CBS, CTAM
4:30-5:30, Hilton Theater – Keynote, Paul Otelini, Intel
5-6, LVCC S227 – Sanyo press event
6-7, LVCC N237* CESup Reception
7-9, LVCC MGM shuttle* Tour of CBS Television City
6-10, Wynn Lafite Ballroom – Showstoppers (invite only)
6:30, Mandalay Bay – Tech & Engineering Emmy’s, events@emmyonline.tv

F 1/8
TBD AllThingsD short program
8-5, LVCC S229, V Titian 2202 -press room open
8:30-9, LVCC N250* Ben Silverman, Electus
9-10:15, LVCC N250*Illeana Douglas, Thomas Schlamme,ShoeMoney,NBCU
9-11, LVCC N262* MommyTech-GMA, Tina Sharkey, BabyCenter, N260 HBO
9, Hilton Theater, Keynote – Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo, Nokia
9-6, Exhibit Hours
10:30-11:30, LVCC N250* Scripps, NBCU, N253* EnergyTech
11, Hilton Theater, Keynote – Dr Paul E Jacobs, Qualcomm
11:30-12:30, LVCC N250* Ken Howard, SAG, Sony, LG, Nielsen
12-1, LVCC N262* Lunch – MySpace, N255* FCC Chair, N261 Bravo, N259 FLO TV
12-1, LVCC S225 Powermat, S224 Handango, ATT, Intel, Samsung
1-2, LVCC N262* Mommy Memorykeepers – Eye-Fi, N255* CinemaNow
1:30-2:30+, LVCC N262*OnStar,Fox,N261 Z, Arts&Labs,N259 Metacafe,Redbox,JWT
1:30-2:30, LVCC S224 Untethering TV – Qualcomm, Broadcom, Sony
3-4, LVCC S224 ION, FLO TV, MobiTV, NatGeo, LG, S225 Samsung
3-4, LVCC N260 GPS Garmin, TomTom, N261 Lionsgate, MSNBC, N259 Blip.tv
3:30-4:15-5, LVCC N262* Marketing to Digital Moms/Gala Product Showcase – Kodak
4, Hilton Theater – Keynote – Zhou Houjian, Hisense
4:30, LVCC South Hall EHX CE PRO reception
6-7, LVCC North Hall – Kenwood press event
*****
3, V Casanova 501 – Shuttle press event, wearenotalienbware.com
3-7:30, V Ballrooms 3001-3101, Digital Media Insider
3:15, CES scoop – CEA, Parks, Intepret, Wired.com, Ogilvy 360
4, Distribution – Oxygen, MyDamnChannel, CMSG, redbox, withoutabox
5, Monetization – NVP, Vindica, IBM
5:45, Keynote
6:15 – 7:30, Awards for 25 Executives to Watch in Digital Entertainment

• David Anderman, General Counsel, Lucasfilm
• Rob Barnett, Founder & CEO, My Damn Channel
• Rio Caraeff, President & CEO, VEVO
• Kevin Conroy, President, Univision Interactive Media
• Allen DeBevoise, Chairman & CEO, Machinima Inc.
• Denzyl Feigelson, CEO, AWAL (Artists Without a Label)
• Ashley Fenwick-Naditch, Producer, Sesame Workshop
• Kristin Frank, General Manager, MTV.com and VH1.com
• Ed Leonard, CTO, DreamWorks
• Zahavah Levine, Chief Counsel, YouTube
• Mitch Lowe, CEO, redbox
• Robb McDaniels, Founder, President & CEO, INgrooves
• Tero Ojanpera, EVP, Services, Nokia
• Jean-Briac Perrette, President, Content Distribution Strategy, NBCU
• Mark Pincus, CEO & Founder, Zynga
• John Pleasants, CEO, Playdom
• Nanea Reeves, SVP, EA Online Group
• Rohit Bhargava, SVP, Digital Strategy & Marketing, Ogilvy 360
  (Author, Personality Not Included)
• Avner Ronen, CEO, Boxee
• Richard Rosenblatt, Co-Founder, Chairman & CEO, Demand Media
• Sheryl Sandberg, Chief Operating Officer, Facebook
• David Straus, Co-Founder & CEO, Withoutabox (IMDB/Amazon)
• Robert Tercek, President, Digital Media, OWN
• Phil Wiser, Co-Founder, Chairman & President, Sezmi
• Philip Yun, CEO, NHN USA

Sa 1/9
8-5, LVCC S229, V Titian 2202 -press room open
9-6, Exhibit Hours
10:30-11:30, LVCC S224 Revision3, N261 Big Fuel, N255* Last Gadget Standing
11, LVCC South Hall Lobby 3 CNET Stage – Best of CES
12-1, LVCC N260 Napster
1:30-2:30, LVCC N258 Warren Packard, DFJ, Kuk Yi, Best Buy, S224 Sprint, Comcast
2:15-5:30, LVCC N253* Silvers Summit Gadgets – Fox
3-4, LVCC N260 Netbooks – Harris Interactive

Su 1/10
8-3, LVCC S229, V Titian 2202 -press room open
9-4, Exhibit Hours

*FREE
**Shuttles:  http://cesweb.org/docs/2010_CES_Shuttle_Map_for_CESweb.pdf
***Maps: www.cesweb.org/exhibits/facilities/default.asp,  http://www.cesweb.org/docs/2010_CES_Show_Locations_Map.pdf
*** Parties:  http://www.thomas-pr.com/01/ces2010.html

The The Wall Street Journal reports that Google will sell Nexus One directly as an unlocked unsubsidized model. It’s thinner than an iPhone, with no physical keyboard and will run Android on Qualcomm’s Snapdragon chip. Manufactured by HTC , the Nexus One will have two microphones, a 5 megapixel camera and a scroll wheel.

Google employees have already started using the Nexus One and it should be available to the pubic directly through Google, starting in January 2010. Specs filed with FCC: microSD expansion, 802.11b/g Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR, and covers quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE with UMTS/HSUPA on 850/1,700/1,900 frequencies.

Sorry, Google. The apps (and by that we mean appetizers) won out.

At long last there is proof of Google’s (GOOG)  long-anticipated smartphone. Late last week, the online advertising giant started handing out an Android-powered phone to employees. While refusing to detail the specs, the official Google mobile blog refers to it as a “mobile lab.”

The Googley vagueness continues on the blog, where it is described as, “A device that combines innovative hardware from a partner with software that runs on Android to experiment with new mobile features and capabilities.”

Of course, the gadget-obsessed immediately ran to the Federal Communications Commission to get those specs, and photos have been popping up all over. So, we now (mostly) know that it is a sleek-looking touch-screen phone made by HTC, powered by a high-end Qualcomm (QCOM) processor and featuring the latest Android 2.1 OS. From the looks of things, this GSM phone could operate on any number of networks abroad, but seems destined at least for T-Mobile in the United States.

With all the Googlers eager to show off their new gizmos, and this, the calendric peak of the holiday party season, it was inevitable that in the Bay Area at least, the two would combine.  Sure enough, a friend attending a holiday party over the weekend in San Francisco with a number of Google folks making merry was presented with the new phone. “Mostly, I wanted to see the photo of the engagement ring that was on it,” she says, requesting anonymity. “It wasn’t an iPhone, and besides, there were pigs-in-a-blanket and these really good mini-cheeseburgers, and I was hungry, so I didn’t pay too much attention. “ So there you have it.

Table stakes: iPhone quality hardware

Discounting for a moment that this occurred in gadget-jaded Silicon Valley (and that the mini-cheeseburgers were really good), it does offer a point worth examining. Great hardware is the minimum starting point in the smartphone market these days, and it doesn’t get anyone’s blood racing by itself. As a piece of hardware, the Google phone, dubbed the Nexus One according to employees, had better be on par with an iPhone. If not, as we have seen time and again with would-be competitors, it will be a non-starter.

Let’s assume Google’s phone is tip-top in the hardware department. What sells smartphones these days has as much to do with the software running the phone and the applications available as the hardware. Again, Apple (AAPL) leads the pack by a wide margin with its mobile apps store.

Google’s open-source mobile OS Android has been getting mostly good reviews, especially in its latest incarnation running on Motorola’s (MOT) Droid phone. What Google needs to do, however, is get more Android phones out there to attract more developers and get the critical application mass it needs.

What has everyone most excited at the moment is the (rumored) prospect that Google will sell its Nexus One as an unlocked, carrier-agnostic piece of gear starting in January. Fine, as long as the phone is still relatively cheap. If Google comes out with a $500 unlocked phone, it will fade as quickly as all of Nokia’s similar unlocked and pricey efforts.

But if Google sells its phone contract-free for the same $199 the iPhone sells for (with a two-year AT&T (T) contract) it will have a monster on its hands. How could that happen? Google, rather than a carrier could subsidize the phone, and make up the cost via mobile advertising (it just bought AdMob), or maybe just take a hit to build a market. Google can certainly afford it. Either way, Android gets very huge, very fast, and that is what Google really wants.

Would that upset Google’s roster of current Android customers, including Motorola, Samsung and some of the wireless carriers? Sure it would, but this isn’t about the old-school wireless ecosystem, it’s about the mobile Web and Google’s designs to own it. If Google wants it, it needs to step up. If not? Those pigs-in-a-blanket sure look good.

This is it!  The last week of conferences for the year and what a way to go out. Digital Living Room will be celebrating connected devices at Sun Microsystems, Santa Clara tomorrow and on Wednesday HRTS is lunching with the showrunners of Modern Family, Glee, Mad Men, How I Met Your Mother and Rescue Me at the Hyatt Regency Century Plaza. Try catching the stream if you can’t make it live.  Below are the guides to these events as well as CES which is now just around the corner:

Tu 12/15
DIGITAL LIVING ROOM
PSN, Sezmi, Epix, Y!, ZillionTV, Vimeo, ClipSync, Dolby, Panasonic..
Sun Microsystems, 4030 George Sellon Circle, Santa Clara 95054
12/14 Tech Supper Club-SF, Blumberg Capital, 580 Howard
12/15 Tech Supper Club-Santa Clara
12/16 Tech Supper Club-Santa Monica, Playground Media, 1813 Centinela
www.digitallivingroom.com

8:45  Welcoming Remarks

9:00  Competitive Landscape
An examination of how cable, satellite and telco providers are faring in the pitched battle for consumers.
- Ben Bajarin, Director of Consumer Technology, Creative Strategies
- Colin Dixon, Senior Analyst, The Diffusion Group

10:00  Keynote
- Susan Panico, Senior Director, PlayStation Network

10:30  3D’s Televised Future
3D television sets will be on display at this year’s CES, and models without glasses may be just a few years away. Jeffrey Katzenberg, for one, has said that 3D TV is inevitable.
- Joshua Greer, President and Co-Founder, RealD
- John Rubey, President, AEG Live
- Patrick Griffis, Senior Director, Technology Policy, Dolby Laboratories Inc.
- David Broberg, Vice President of Consumer Video Technology, CableLabs

11:30  Social TV
The connected living room makes seamless the interaction consumers are already having about their favorite programming over the Internet and on mobile devices. How long until Facebook Television?
- Blake Whitman, Community Director, Vimeo
- Itzik Cohen, founder and CEO, ClipSync
- Emil Rensing, Chief Digital Officer, EpixHD
- Bill Binenstock, Vice President and Manager, CBS.com
- Moderator: Michael Stroud, Founder, iHollywood Forum

12:30  Lunch

1:30- 2  Keynote
- William O. Leszinske, Jr., GM, Digital Home Group, Intel

2  Cloud in the Living Room
The ability to access any content, any time is fundamentally changing the dynamics of television watching and the economics of broadcasting and cable. As DVRs and subscription VOD become standard, are ad-supported television networks at a fundamental disadvantage? Can cable and satellite companies keep their iron group on the consumer’s wallet when a la carte offerings are available over the Internet?
- Pat Dunbar, Director, Advertising TV, Video & Music Business Group, Microsoft Corporation
- Mitch Berman, Co-Founder & Executive Chairman, ZillionTV
- Mitch Weinraub, Executive Director – Business Development, Comcast Media Center
- Rob Schonfeld, VP, Pay Television and Interactive Media, Disney ABC Domestic Television
- Buno Pati, Co-Founder and CEO, Sezmi
- Moderator: Jimmy Schaeffler, Chairman & CSO, The Carmel Group

3  The Music Powered Living Room
Description: The music business has gone from wondering where the next paycheck is to how many ways can the same song be monetized. The new album is the Rock Star music pack and the new single is a mashup. This panel will explore how interactive music technology – from video games to mashups – are creating new revenue opportunities for the music, video game, video entertainment and marketing industries.
- Gilles Babinet, Chairman, MXP4
- Jason Henderson, Games Product Manager, Verizon Communications
- Jordan Greenhall, Co-Founder and former CEO, DivX
- Carmen Rizzo, two-time Grammy Nominee and electronic musician
- Moderator: Ephraim Cohen, President, Fortex Group

4  The Connected Living Room
The long-heralded integration between TVs, the broadband Internet, DVD players, game consoles, telephony, portable devices and wireless data is beginning to happen. What type of content will pull in consumers and what are the roadblocks to mass adoption?
- Russ Schafer, Senior Director of Product Marketing, Yahoo! Connected TV
- Alan Hoff, Vice President of Product Marketing, SeaChange International
- David Bryant, Senior Director of Java Marketing, Sun Microsystems
- Tushar Saxena, Director of Home Networking Technologies, Verizon Communications
- Moderator: Amy Friedlander Hoffman, President, Priority Digital Media

5  Venture Forum
Startups pitch products for the digital living room to a panel of venture capitalists and strategic investors
- Len Rand, Managing Director, Granite Ventures
- Brad McManus, Director of Investments, Panasonic
- David J. Blumberg, Managing Partner, Blumberg Capital

6  Reception

*****************************************************************
W 12/16  12-2
HRTS HITMAKERS LUNCHEON
Hyatt Regency Century Plaza, 2025 Avenue of the Stars, Los Angeles
www.hrts.org
(1pm Live-stream: HRTS Online Video Central)

• Peter Tolan, Rescue Me
• Matthew Weiner, Mad Men
• Steven Levitan, Modern Family
• Ryan Murphy, Glee, Nip/Tuck
• Carter Bays, How I Met Your Mother
• Craig Thomas, How I Met Your Mother
  

*******************************************************************
Th 12/17 6-9
SGN MOBCLIX MIXER
Silicon Valley
(invite only)

******************************************************
Tu 1/5 – W 1/6, Th 1/7 – Su 1/10
CONSUMER ELECTRONICS SHOW
110,000 expected, 2500 exhibitors, 800 speakers, 250 conference sessions incl Digital Hollywood, Connections, and Digital Media Wire, it’s the largest digital media event of the year!
Las Vegas Convention Center, Hilton, Venetian..
www.cesweb.org

Tu 1/5
12-4, V Titian 2202, LVCC S229 – press room open
1:30, V Murano 3301-3 – ASUS press event
2-3, V Bellini 2105 – CEA US Trends
3-4, V Bellini 2105 – CEA Global Trends
4-7, V Ballroom – CES Unveiled: Best Buy, Hannspree, Lenovo, Powermat…
7-10, Sands Expo shuttle – StartUp Debut – VCs, press, eats, drinks, startupdebut@gmail.com

W 1/6
7:30-9, V Titian 2202, LVCC S229 -press room open
8-8:45, V Casanova 501 – LG press event
9-9:45, V Marco Polo 706 – Monster press event, V Sands 201 Netgear press event
10-10:45, V Casanova 504 – Toshiba press event
11-11:45, V Sands 206 Pioneer press event
12-12:45, V Sands 102 – Sharp press event
1-1:45, V Bellini 2105 – Casio press event
2-2:45, V Marco Polo 801 – Samsung press event
3-3:45, V Marco Polo 705 – JVC press event
3-3:45, V Bellini 2101 – Panasonic press event
*****
8-10:30, LVCC N262 P2P Breakfast, N260 Paramount, BitTorrent, N262 Snacks
11:30-12:30, LVCC N261 NVP Saatchi,N253 SpikeTV BBDO MTV,N258 A&E, TwitVid
12:30, LVCC N262 Lunch
1-2, LVCC N253 Lego, IMVU, Gaia, WW Biggies, N258 IODA, Napster
1:30-2:15, LVCC N260 Melike Amjarv, WB, BMI, SAG
2:30-3:30, LVCC N258 Discovery, Paramount, N253 ngmoco, N261 NBCU, MTV
3:30-4:15, LVCC N256 Qualcomm, Ericsson
4-5, LVCC N253 Viximo WB,N258 Fandango, Flixster, Freeverse,N261 TiVo
5-7:30, LVCC N262 P2P Cocktails
4:15-5:30, LVCC Central Hall 14200 – Sony press event
6:30-7:30, Hilton Center – Keynote – Steve Ballmer, Microsoft

Th 1/7
8-5, LVCC S229, V Titian 2202 -press room open
8:30, Hilton Theater – Keynote, Alan Mulally, Ford
10-6, Exhibit Hours
10-12, Hilton Shimmer Cabaret – Jen-Hsung Huang, NVIDIA press event
10-11, LVCC S227 DISH press event, S224 4G Verizon, Samsung, Clearwire
10-12, LVCC N250* Autonet, Pandora
10:30, LVCC N264* CEA Outlook, , N255* Kodak, Scoble
10:30-11:30, LVCC N256 AVOD, TiVo, Panasonic, N259 DISH, Merv Griffin, Starz
11-12, LVCC N253* ABC, LeapFrog, Vtech, Build-A-Bear, Lunch
11:20-12:10, LVCC N260* 3D – WB, Disney, CinemaNOW, Dolby
12-1, LVCC N254 Autonet, N259 Hearst, Rovi, N262* WaPo, N256 Roku, Z, Intel
12-1, LVCC S224 EA, RIM, ATT, TI, Sony
12:20-1:10+, LVCC N260* 3D RealD, LG, Panasonic, Sony, N253* MyYearbook
1:30-2:15+, LVCC N250* CBS counting viewers, N262* CBS, Pampelmoose
1:30-2:30, LVCC N259 Lionsgate, YouTube, FB, Fox, Disc, N261 Fremantle
2-3, LVCC N253* Cartoon Network, PBS, Nokia
2:30-3:20, LVCC N260* Y!, NBCU, Vizio, WB, DIVX
3-4, LVCC N259 Interactive – Sony, Sharp, Y!, N256 LG, Samsung, Sharp, Panasonic
3-4, LVCC S224 Netbooks – Lenovo, Laptop Mag, Intel, Microsoft, AMD
3-5, LVCC N253* Toy Demos, KAPi Awards – Sesame Workshop
3:45-4:30, LVCC N250 Monetizing Content – Tubefilter, FOD, NBCU, CJP
4:30-5:30, LVCC N250* CESup Search – TiVo, CBS, CTAM
4:30-5:30, Hilton Theater – Keynote, Paul Otelini, Intel
5-6, LVCC S227 – Sanyo press event
6-7, LVCC N237* CESup Reception
7-9, LVCC MGM shuttle* Tour of CBS Television City
6-10, Wynn Lafite Ballroom – Showstoppers (invite only)
6:30, Mandalay Bay – Tech & Engineering Emmy’s, events@emmyonline.tv

F 1/8
TBD AllThingsD short program
8-5, LVCC S229, V Titian 2202 -press room open
8:30-9, LVCC N250* Ben Silverman, Electus
9-10:15, LVCC N250*Illeana Douglas, Thomas Schlamme,ShoeMoney,NBCU
9-11, LVCC N262* MommyTech-GMA, Tina Sharkey, BabyCenter, N260 HBO
9, Hilton Theater, Keynote – Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo, Nokia
9-6, Exhibit Hours
10:30-11:30, LVCC N250* Scripps, NBCU, N253* EnergyTech
11, Hilton Theater, Keynote – Dr Paul E Jacobs, Qualcomm
11:30-12:30, LVCC N250* Ken Howard, SAG, Sony, LG, Nielsen
12-1, LVCC N262* Lunch – MySpace, N255* FCC Chair, N261 Bravo, N259 FLO TV
12-1, LVCC S225 Powermat, S224 Handango, ATT, Intel, Samsung
1-2, LVCC N262* Mommy Memorykeepers – Eye-Fi, N255* CinemaNOW
1:30-2:30+, LVCC N262*OnStar,Fox,N261 Z, Arts&Labs,N259 Metacafe,Redbox,JWT
1:30-2:30, LVCC S224 Untethering TV – Qualcomm, Broadcom, Sony
3-4, LVCC S224 ION, FLO TV, MobiTV, NatGeo, LG, S225 Samsung
3-4, LVCC N260 GPS Garmin, TomTom, N261 Lionsgate, MSNBC, N259 Blip.tv
3:30-4:15-5, LVCC N262* Marketing to Digital Moms/Gala Product Showcase – Kodak
4, Hilton Theater – Keynote – Zhou Houjian, Hisense
4:30, LVCC South Hall EHX CE PRO reception
6-7, LVCC North Hall – Kenwood press event
*****
2:30-7:30, V Ballrooms 3001-3101 – Digital Media Insider sessions/awards party
3, V Casanova 501 – Shuttle press event, wearenotalienbware.com
5:30-8:30, Atomic Museum, It Won’t Stay in Vegas party
TBD Paris Hotel, Monster 2010 Dealer Awards – John Legends Concert (invite)

Sa 1/9
8-5, LVCC S229, V Titian 2202 -press room open
9-6, Exhibit Hours
10:30-11:30, LVCC S224 Revision3, N261 Big Fuel, N255* Last Gadget Standing
11, LVCC South Hall Lobby 3 CNET Stage – Best of CES
12-1, LVCC N260 Napster
1:30-2:30, LVCC N258 Warren Packard, DFJ, Kuk Yi, Best Buy, S224 Sprint, Comcast
2:15-5:30, LVCC N253* Silvers Summit Gadgets – Fox
3-4, LVCC N260 Netbooks – Harris Interactive

Su 1/10
8-3, LVCC S229, V Titian 2202 -press room open
9-4, Exhibit Hours

*FREE
**Shuttles:  http://cesweb.org/docs/2010_CES_Shuttle_Map_for_CESweb.pdf
***Maps: www.cesweb.org/exhibits/facilities/default.asp,  http://www.cesweb.org/docs/2010_CES_Show_Locations_Map.pdf
*** Parties:  http://www.thomas-pr.com/01/ces2010.html

Probably one of the hippest music conferences earlier this year was the SanFranMusicTech conference that packed 600 into the swanky Kabuki at 1625 Post in San Francisco.  Well they’re back by popular demand this Monday with Third Eye Blind – how cool is that!  There will be live streaming on the site at www.sfmusictech.com and you can follow along on Twitter at #SFMT.  On Tuesday, VentureBeat delivers DiscoveryBeat workshops for developers seeking to chart in the apps stores.  Best kept secrets shared by Playfish, Playdom, Zynga, RockYou, IGN, SGN, Smule, ngmoco…looks pretty awesome.  Not sure of the hashtag, guessing it’s #DB.  For those of you looking for money, the place to be is on Sand Hill Road for two fantastic days of the AlwaysOn Venture Summit, they’re using VSSV on the site so I’m assuming #VSSV is the hashtag, and they usually live stream.  And then on Friday at Microsoft, SD Forum hosts the Business of New Media:  Where’s the Money with Tim Chang, Guy Kawasaki, Zynga, Gaia, Yahoo!, The Wrap.. .also no official hashtag yet, not even attempting to guess this one.  For those of you in LA, Digital Media Wire’s Future of Film at the Sheraton Delfina in Santa Monica – recap AFM, prep for EFM, and meet all the key players – the lineup looks incredible. Follow at #FOFILM.  Agendas are posted below:

M 12/7 9-6
SF MUSICTECH SUMMIT
Hotel Kabuki, 1625 Post, San Francisco
www.sfmusictech.com

Tu 12/8
FUTURE OF FILM
Sheraton Delfina, Santa Monica
www.lafilmconference.com

Tu 12/8  2:30-7:30
DISCOVERY BEAT
Guide to discovery in the App Store!
Auttomatic Lounge, Pier 38, San Francisco
http://discoverybeat2009.eventbrite.com/

2:30pm – 3:00pm | Registration

3:00pm – 3:05pm | Welcome

3:05pm – 3:15pm | “Make or Break: How to successfully leverage publicity and social media to drive awareness and downloads of mobile apps”

3:15pm – 3:30pm | “Should driving app discovery require hemorrhaging money?”

3:30pm – 3:45pm | “Social Gaming: The evolving technology platform & monetization”

3:45pm – 4:00pm | “Building Social Games: Games at the speed of light”

4:00pm – 4:40pm | “Discovery 1.0: Starting from scratch”

Randy Angle (Director of Game Design, SGN)
Julian Farrior (CEO, Backflip Studios)
Ge Wang (Co-Founder, CTO, & COO, Smule – maker of Ocarina iPhone app)
Peter Farago (VP Marketing, Flurry)
Matt Marshall (Editor in Chief, VentureBeat)

With more than 119,000 apps in the Apple AppStore, discovery is a huge problem. Facebook is just as tough. And to make it worse, you’re at a disadvantage because large networks have the upper hand of experience in platform strategy and a louder voice to get their products heard.
• If you’re a two-person garage development shop and starting from scratch, how do you create an app that can go viral?
• If you’re not a giant company, how do you exploit your newness and focus, using the key ingredients of success?
• How can the smaller developers team up with bigger brands that have name recognition? When should they go it alone?
• How do they build a company that bigger investors will notice?
• What are some of the platform tools at your disposal that can be used to get your apps noticed?
• How does discovery fit with the right business model for your app?

4:40pm – 4:55pm | “Super-sizing the app economy by moving it beyond the iPhone”

4:55pm – 5:35pm | “Discovery 2.0: Moving to the next level”

Sebastien De Halleux (COO, Playfish)
John Pleasants (CEO, Playdom)
Roy Sehgal (GM, Zynga & Executive Producer of Cafe World game)
Neil Young (Founder & CEO, ngmoco)
Dean Takahashi (Lead Writer for GamesBeat, VentureBeat)

The social app companies, those successful application companies that came of age on Facebook and the iPhone, have created their own ecosystems with successful titles that feed on each other. Now what do they do?
• How many different types of monetization schemes do they need? What can they learn from the bigger companies?
• Should they recruit executives from the “old world” companies, to help with partnering or organizational discipline?
• What sort of analytics process should they have in place?
• Can anyone catch up with them?
• What will the social/mobile/gaming look like in two years?

5:35pm – 6:00pm | “Discovery 3.0: Bringing in the big guys”

Jon Vlassopulos (CEO, Moderati – maker of the virtual light Zippo iPhone app)
Alex St. John (President & CTO, hi5)
Michael Chang (Founder & CEO, Greystripe)
Lisa Marino (VP Sales, RockYou)
Roy Bahat (President, IGN Entertainment)

Established video game companies and entertainment giants are eyeing the social networking and mobile platforms as a source of future growth. For success, the big guys need to apply the secret ingredients in different proportions.
• How much should they invest in these areas, and how should they do it?
• Which kinds of partners should they recruit? Which business models are the best?
• Who has made the transition already?
• What’s the right mix of social networking, marketing, analytical measurement, advertising and web design ingredients they should apply?

6:00pm – 6:05pm | Closing remarks

6:05pm – 7:30pm | Reception

Tu 12/8 – W 12/9
AO VENTURE SUMMIT
Rosewood Sand Hill, Menlo Park
http://alwayson.goingon.com/ecom/productview/19291

Tu 12/8

W 12/9

You heard it folks! The Eastlake Titans are advancing to the Finals at Qualcomm Stadium next Friday night at 8:00pm!!! They beat Escondido in a fantastic victory 35-14 last night at home.

More details to follow, but I wanted to keep you all in the loop!

ARM licensees comprise big and small IC vendors. They can be broadly classified into two groups: those that build around ARM cores and those that develop their own CPU implementation compliant to ARM instruction set architecture. The former group covers implementation licensees such as TI, Broadcom, and NXP, just to name a few, and foundry licensees. The latter comprises architecture licensees such as Marvell and Qualcomm. The architecture licensees need a lot of expertise and can bring in their know-how to differentiate on performance.

It would be a daunting task to go through all the ARM ecosystem partners and their offerings in markets that Intel is vying to get into. Let us look at a few examples to illustrate.

Qualcomm acquired AMD’s graphics and multimedia assets. Although it has been less than a year since then, Qualcomm’s Snapdragon line of system-on-chips (SoCs) is showing a lot of promise. Qualcomm recently demonstrated Adobe Flash 10 on an ARM-based netbook and took the fight directly to Intel’s turf. The approach is similar to Intel’s offering integrated graphics on PineView Qualcomm’s Snapdragon line has a lot of in-house know-how.

Ironically Marvell, whose application processor efforts went into overdrive after the company acquired Intel’s Xscale division, will be one of the least affected firms if Intel were to some how get its hands on ARM. Marvell bequeathed RIM as a customer along with Intel’s Xscale division and gained increased brand recognition. Marvell has successfully taken its application processors to several markets and recently announced a fleet of SoCs called ARMADA. These processors target a variety of markets ranging from e-book readers to smartphones to personal navigation devices (PNDs) to TVs — all markets Intel would love to conquer. Marvell is known to have invested heavily in developing a strong team of about 1,000 employees to work on ARM instruction set compatible processors. This team is said to rival ARM’s own in its engineering know-how.

TI’s OMAP line of SoCs has been very successful. Many of the best-selling smartphones are powered by OMAP, which is a major triumph for ARM.

Before ARM announced the availability of 2GHz capable high-speed hard macro implementation of the Cortex A9 (Osprey) and declared it an Atom competitor, Samsung collaborated with Intrinsity to take Cortex A8 beyond 1 GHz at the 45nm process. The ARM ecosystem is thus moving into Intel’s territory of higher processing power.

Competition for Intel’s embedded hopes comes from several quarters. It is a multi-horse race — an unfamiliar ground for the chipmaker.

In tomorrow’s concluding post, we will look at the prospects of an Intel takeover of ARM and the consequences of such a move.

A copy of this article also appeared at Sramana Mitra on Strategy.

I love watching the Chargers win. I especially love watching them win with my family and AT the game. What a wonderful conclusion to a WAY too short Thanksgiving holiday. I cannot give thanks for a long weekend as many can and did, but I can give thanks for time well spent.

DigiTimes, según les han informado unas “fuentes del mercado”, informó el lunes que Qualcomm y Apple están tienen un “interés en la cooperación futura”. Qualcomm, es un suministrador de redes GSM y chips 3G a compañías como Samsung, LG y HTC.

Algunos rumores anteriores han sugerido que Qualcomm podría tener entre manos la fabricación de un “híbrido” de chips destinados a que el iPhone pueda ser compatible con los operadores GSM y CDMA, compañías como Verizon Wireless.

Los rumores también sugieren que Verizon desea tener el iPhone en su catálogo en algún momento de 2010, lo que exigiría que el iPhone pueda conectarse a la tecnología CDMA, que Verizon utiliza.

Enlace | Apple and Qualcomm in Talks Over Future Cooperation

Comparte este post:

The landscape of computing is undergoing a fundamental change. Mobile computing is gaining ground at the expense of traditional desktop-based computing. Computers are no longer merely productivity tools; they are increasingly being used for communication, networking, and entertainment on the go. To be sure, powerful desktops will still be around; but their use will be limited to developing content, R&D, technology, and businesses. For the average consumer, processing power to meet lifestyle computing needs is now available on mobile phones and other mobile Internet devices such as netbooks (or smartbooks, as Qualcomm and others prefer to market them).

In the now fading era of tethered computing, Intel, AMD, and others raced to produce ever more powerful processors. First, they pushed processor speed, then bundled multiple cores together. Attention was paid to raw computing power and not to the amount of electric power these processors consumed. All was well as long as these processors were running devices connected to AC power outlets or in case of laptops running for just a few hours. Mobile phones, netbooks, and embedded devices, on the other hand, are powered by a battery and need to run much longer – at least a full workday – between recharges. Intel’s portfolio of processors does not fit this low-power consumption bill. Processors powered by ARM cores excel at it.

Atom is the Pentium for non-PC platforms. Realizing that processors built for PCs will not cut it in the power-conscious markets, Intel designed a scaled-down architecture called Atom. But the first crop of processors from the Atom family is not as power efficient as the current offering from ARM. Most of the current Atom processors have total power dissipation (TPD) of over 2W. The golden rule of mobile computing is a TPD of 500mW under prevailing battery technology.

The road map for Atom promises power consumption levels comparable to ARM offerings. Both ARM and Intel plan to move to smaller transistors via smaller manufacturing processes to reduce current leakage and thus improve power efficiency. Intel is investing $7 billion across several facilities to migrate from 45nm to 32nm process technology. Intel earlier offered discrete graphics to provide powerful graphics processing alongside the main CPU. To cater to this, Intel is now pushing ahead its system-on-chip (SoC) effort by offering integrated graphics in PineView — the latest Atom offering. Intel is closing on ARM’s offerings and integrated approach.

The Cortex-A series of ARM processors are powerful enough to support a full version of Linux OS. For some time, prior offerings from ARM ran trimmed versions of Linux in embedded environment. Now, Cortex-A processors already power some of the top smartphones. With the new entrants in Cortex-A series (A9 MP, A5), ARM processors can now target netbooks and eventually laptops.

A majority of netbooks today are powered by Atom. ARM ecosystem partners intend to change this and are collaborating with Taiwanese computer manufacturers to build ARM-based netbooks. Nvidia Tegra, which powers the latest Microsoft Zune HD player, is built around the ARM11 core. Tegra aims to bridge the gap between a smartphone and a netbook. Qualcomm is taking on Intel with its own ARM-based Snapdragon processors. The experience gained in developing for 3G connected devices has given companies such as TI, Qualcomm, and Nvidia the confidence and know-how to take on Intel in the netbook market.

The current crop of netbooks does not make the cut for some; the next crop promises to be powerful enough to convince many more.

In tomorrow’s post, we will look at the software availability and OS ecosystems of these competing platforms.

A copy of this article appeared at Sramana Mitra on Strategy

Another week passed by, and here we are again, at the weekly linkfest. Today on the linkfest:

• Juniper research is predicting that mobile augmented reality will by a $750 million industry by 2014, which is a lot more than the previous $350 million estimate by ABI research. Just a quick reminder – Twitter is valued at one billion dollars.
• Tish Shute preaching for Wave powered augmented reality infrastructure at Mobile Monday Amsterdam.
• Thomas Carpenter reveals Qualcomm’s plans to use face recognition to create augmented social networks.
• We had quite a few marketing campaigns this week:
  • Target uses AR markers to spin a virtual wheel, but I wouldn’t call it augmented reality otherwise.
  • InStyle magazine has an augmented version of its December cover (using Total Immersion’s tech).
  • And more of Total Immersion – augmented albums for some Brit and French bands.
  • Play with a virtual Dodge Avenger, I think it’s the first time anyone used augmented reality to sell a car [via Development Memo for Ourselves]

This week’s video is of a photo booth at Las Vegas that lets you try different hats. I just find this guy’s reactions really funny (and the augmentation is quite good) [via DMfO]

Have a great week!

While Qualcomm for many is synonymous with wireless, the company acquired Atlanta-based mobile banking startup Firethorn two years ago with an eye to also becoming a major player in the mobile payment space. More importantly, it acquired Firethorn founder Tripp Rackley — the man it hopes will make Qualcomm the Western Union of mobile.

An engineering graduate of Georgia Tech, Rackley first combined technology with banking in 1995 when as a 25-year-old he founded nFront, an Internet banking firm he took public in 1999. In 2002 Rackley founded Firethorn, for which Qualcomm paid $210 million five years later and made a standalone division. Firethorn has gained substantial traction in the space, inking partnerships with the three largest U.S. mobile carriers and compiling a list of more than a dozen banking partners.

Ask Rackley to describe Firethorn’s play in the mobile banking space, and he will talk about what he calls “the Costanza wallet,” that huge, leather-bound mass of stuff that Jerry Seinfeld’s pal notoriously lugged around in his back pocket. That scenario, according Rackley, now a Qualcomm senior vice president and division president of Firethorn, is what Qualcomm is trying to address as it vies for space in the ultra-competitive field. As he explained to me:

“Your phone has 30 different applications to mimic your wallet today, with different user names, passwords, UIs, and feature functionality. It’s really nothing more than a physical wallet that has a rubber band wrapped around it because it’s overloaded.”

Indeed, the mobile payment field today is a remarkably fragmented space, where apps and services vary from bank to bank and handset to handset. Rackley hopes to leverage Qualcomm’s deep pockets and strong relationships in mobile — along with his own financial background — as the segment slowly moves from one of novelty into the mainstream.

There’s no shortage of players in mobile payments, either, which has long been seen as a potential goldmine but has yet to gain much real traction. The tie-up with Qualcomm gives Firethorn substantial street cred in mobile, enabling the former startup to build an m-commerce ecosystem that eventually fuels Qualcomm’s silicon business. And Qualcomm’s massive bankroll can continue to fund Firethorn while the segment gets legs.

“We continue to invest heavily in the chip side of the business,” Rackley said. “We have something that I wouldn’t be able to say we had before with Firethorn. We were by far the best-capitalized private company in the mobile space, but we didn’t have billions of dollars of cash.”

That cash will be necessary to fulfill Qualcomm’s long-term vision of a thriving mobile payments space built on its chipsets. Mainstream consumers in the U.S. are beginning to embrace basic features like checking their accounts on the mobile web, but the industry has a long way to go before the mobile wallet becomes a reality through contactless payments and other apps. So Qualcomm is continuing to invest in a space that it hopes will become a pillar of its business several years down the road. As Rackley said:

“It’s going to be a long time before mobile payments take off; there will be a lot of people trying to make that happen. But until we go into a grocery store and see people pulling phones out to pay, we won’t be there.”

Firethorn faces stiff competition from Obopay and a host of other startups; meanwhile PayPal and Google (s goog) are both expanding their online payment businesses into mobile as well. And Mastercard (S ma) and Visa (S v) have competing programs, furthering splintering the market for mobile payments.

Just as importantly, it’s far from clear that consumers actually want their phones to do everything from conducting online transactions to paying for a soda at the convenience store. Sub-segments of the space seem to be getting legs, but an all-encompassing mobile-payment ecosystem seems far off indeed. So the patience of investors — including Qualcomm — may be needed for a very long time indeed.

Is this the G-Phone?

There is strong news around the tech blogs that a HTC-made, Google Phone is in the wild amongst Google employees. Google did confirm that there is something brewing. This is very important because currently Google just develops the Android OS, while it is up to manufactures (like HTC, Motorola, etc.) to make the hardware. With the so-called Google Phone (or G-Phone) it would mean a phone fully developed by Google to their liking. You can expect tight integration between the hardware and software. For manufactures who implement the Android OS it could be uneasy news.

Here are the facts from TechCrunch: The hardware manufacturer of the “Google Phone” is HTC, and it will be sold as an unlocked GSM phone (so technically it would work on both T-Mobile and AT&T). The phone will be running Android 2.1. It will be powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon processor and it will have a beautifully bright-lit OLED touchscreen. It has no physical keyboard, two mics (one mic will try to eliminate background noise), and a camera. Rumors are that it is thinner than the current iPhone. A projected release date of January 2010 has been mentioned.

For cell phone manufactures who are Android partners, this could take away from their sales. If the reports are true, the G-Phone definitely makes Apple’s iPhone 3GS look silly and dated. Where the Droid was equal to the iPhone, the G-Phone should eclipse both. Nokia and Symbian need to innovate now in order to keep their market share lead. For Palm and Microsoft, this marks the beginning of irrelevancy in the smartphone market. Lastly, Verizon gets left out on what potentially could be the best phone on the market.

The real winner? Google. It is the correct move for the company. It ensures extremely tight integration of software and hardware that rivals the iPhone. They can create their own branded phone and no one will stop them because they have the manufacturers by the balls with their amazing Android OS. This is something Microsoft never dared to do in the PC market…but then again this is what separates Google from the rest.

They did it! Eastlake Titans are the Division 1 CIF Champions for San Diego County. They beat Vista tonight in a nail biting game that ended with an Eastlake interception in the endzone to squash any hope Vista had of sending the game into overtime.

It was an exciting game to watch. This was the first time in Eastlake’s history they have made it to the championship game. They have lost in the semi-final games the last three years, so this victory is especially sweet!

There is definitely thunder in South County tonight!

WAY TO GO TITANS! WE ARE PROUD OF YOU!!!

We got an awesome deal on the Gateway LT2016U netbook from Verizon Wireless recently. $50 for the netbook and reused an existing line that already had mobile broadband, so there were no real additional monthly costs. The netbooks shipped with Windows XP Home pre-installed, which is all well and good for basic usage, but I wanted something better.

First task was getting Linux installed on the netbook. Since there’s no cd-rom, my options were limited to installing from USB, SD Card, Netboot or External Media Drive. I tested out using the USB and SD Cards, but either I’ve got bum cards or there’s other difficulties with these that I’d never encountered. Regardless, speeds reading from these devices to attempt an installation were incredibly slow. Since I’ve got an external dvd-burner, I opted to go with this route just for it’s easiness.

The distro I decided on was the Ubuntu Netbook Remix 9.10 Karmic Koala x86. Available at the time of writing here http://www.ubuntu.com/GetUbuntu/download-netbook

Installation was a breeze. Since the netbook utilizes a hidden partition to restore the machine to it’s original state, I split the Windows XP partition in half, leaving the original system intact and installing Ubuntu to the remaining space. This gives me approximately 80GB on the windows side and about 66GB on the Ubuntu side. Since I have no plans on using this for storing mass amounts of data, this configuration was optimal.

After installation, the netbook remix edition works flawlessly short of no connectivity for the Verizon Wireless Broadband internal adapter. Desktop and menu layouts have been optimized for the small screen size of the netbook and rapid access to common applications.

Now to the good stuff.

Getting the Verizon Wireless Broadband adapter to work is pretty straight forward, though will require a minor amount of command line usage.

The chipset used for the broadband card in my particular model of netbook’s was the Qualcomm 9212. This card will register as a 9211 until it’s firmware is loaded. Firmware only stays resident while power is being applied. So if the netbook is powered off, then booted into linux, the firmware will not be present on the card and as such the card will not be registered in the OS as a valid device for communication. To overcome this, I had to use the Gobi Loader – http://www.codon.org.uk/~mjg59/gobi_loader/

First verify that you are in fact using the 9211 chipset by running ‘lsusb’ from the terminal. You should see a device listed as ‘ID 05c6:9211 Qualcomm, Inc.’
If your chipset differs, these instructions will not work for you.

Download the current version, at the time of this writing it is 0.3 http://www.codon.org.uk/~mjg59/gobi_loader/download/gobi_loader-0.3.tgz

You will need to decompress the archive, run a make and then make install. This will produce a binary file called ‘gobi_loader’. I then moved gobi_loader into /usr/local/bin

You will need the firmware provided on the windows installation to allow the card to run. In my installation, the files on the windows side were under \QUALCOMM\QDLService\Packages\1\  (Your path may be different. There were 10 different sets of firmware included on my windows partition, it took a bit of trial and error to determine which firmware worked and which didn’t. What appears to be the case is the amss.mbn for GSM is roughly 9MB and the amss.mbn for CDMA is roughly 5MB. For Verizon, you want the CDMA file and it’s associated apps.mbn.

The two files amss.mbn and apps.mbn will need to be copied into /lib/firmware/gobi/ If this folder does not exist, you will need to create it.

Once these files have been copied, test the gobi_loader with the following command ‘gobi_loader /dev/ttyUSB0 /lib/firmware/gobi’. Then run ‘lsusb’ and check to see that you now show the QUALCOMM device as ‘ID 05c6:9212 Qualcomm, Inc. ‘

If that is the case, then you are almost done. If that is not the case, something went wrong, repeat the steps above and try again.

All that is left now is to modify rc.local to include our loader, so when we boot from a full power down, the firmware will be loaded the first time. Modify /etc/rc.local and add ‘gobi_loader /dev/ttyUSB0 /lib/firmware/gobi’ anywhere below the comments and above the ‘exit 0′ line Be sure to add a carriage return to the end of your command so that it will execute the exit 0 and properly run at boot.

Save your rc.local, fully turn off the machine. Power the machine on from a powered off state, boot to the OS and login. Bring up a terminal and run ‘lsusb’. You should again see the Qualcomm device listed as ‘ID 05c6:9212 Qualcomm, Inc. ‘

You should now be able to click on the network icon on the menu bar and you should see an item labeled “New Mobile Broadband (CDMA) connection…”

Select this option and begin the wizard to establish the new connection. Selecting Verizon as your wireless provider. Upon completion, you will have a new Verizon Connection option under the network menu bar option, however we need to make a final modification to this connection before we can call this complete. Edit the Verizon Connection and insert the following information: For Username, you will need to enter your mobile broadband tel# @vzw3g.com i.e. 1234567890@vzw3g.com. The password is ‘vzw’. Apply these changes, then click back to the network menu, then select the ‘Verizon Connection’ to establish the connection to the verizon network.

You should show a notification of a connection established and that’s it, you’ve successfully connected to the verizon wireless broadband network. The only other thing you should do now is purchase a stick of 2gb pc2-5300 ram for that netbook to replace the installed 1gb and you’ve got a rockin mobile workstation

FLO-TV Personal Television Device

ABC and Disney are making their video available through Qualcomm’s (s QCOM) FLO TV mobile video service, in a deal that will add popular shows like Grey’s Anatomy, Desperate Housewives and Lost to the service. In addition, FLO TV will add select content from ABC Family, SOAPnet, and short-form content from ABC Entertainment and ABC News, as well as a live simulcast of the Disney Channel.

This isn’t the Walt Disney Co.’s (s DIS) first foray onto FLO TV; the company also makes its ESPN Mobile TV available through the service. That partnership was extended to include even more live event coverage, with previously unavailable games from ESPN being made available on the ABC Mobile Channel.

With the latest deal, FLO TV now has mobile video from 17 different content providers, including all four major broadcast networks. The full channel lineup also includes NBC Mobile, NFL Network, A&E Mobile, Discovery Mobile, and Fox Business, among others.

Consumers can subscribe to watch mobile video on FLO TV through a number of ways, including its personal television device, on AT&T’s (s T) Mobile TV or Verizon’s (s VZ) V CAST, or through its in-car Auto Entertainment system.