Weekend tech reading: Microsoft to reveal Xbox "Smart Glass" tablet?

Matthew DeCarlo

Posts: 5,271   +104

Microsoft set to reveal 'Xbox Smart Glass' tablet at this years E3 The last couple of weeks leading up to E3 have been good for anyone that loves insider information. Today’s leak is the largest one yet, and comes from Microsoft. The people behind "Xbox" and "Xbox Live" will be revealing the Xbox Smart Glass tablet behind closed doors to a select group of people. In the official “Microsoft Confidential” presentation, they specifically noted this: Will allow users to control their Xbox 360 remotely. Will be available cross platform on multiple operating systems including Windows, Windows Phone, Android and iOS... Examiner

How Alexis Ohanian built a front page of the Internet In 2005, Alexis Ohanian and Steve Huffman co-founded Reddit, one of the first start-ups launched from the Y Combinator program. A year later, the social-news site was acquired by Condé Nast—and Ohanian was a 23-year-old multimillionaire. Others might have kicked back, but not Ohanian: Over the past five years, he has launched a social enterprise (Breadpig), helped found a travel-search site (Hipmunk), and founded an investment firm (Das Kapital Capital) that has stakes in 25 start-ups. Meantime, he has also proved a savvy political activist, taking the lead in organizing opposition to SOPA and PIPA... Inc.

Google's Sundar Pichai confirms that offline Google Drive 'coming in five weeks,' hints at ad-supported Chromebook During the closing session here at D10 in California, Google's on Senior Vice President of Chrome & Apps Sundar Pichai was joined by Susan Wojcicki (SVP of Advertising at Google) at Walt Mossberg. Sundar was able to drive the majority of the conversation in the realm of Chrome and Chrome OS, and quite a few interesting nuggets were dropped. For one, he made an offhand comment that "offline Google Drive [is] coming in five weeks," a clue that it'll be revealed and launched in full at Google I/O next month. Engadget

Fear and loathing and Windows 8 I was very excited when I saw the first demos of Windows 8.  After years of settling for mediocre incremental improvements in its core products, Microsoft finally was ready to make bold changes to Windows, something I thought it had to do to stay relevant in computing.  What's more, the changes looked really nice!  Once I'd seen the clean, modern-looking videos of Windows 8, the old Windows looked cramped and a little embarrassing, kind of like finding a picture of the way you dressed when you were a senior in high school. Mobile Opportunity

Dell XPS One 27 review: the premium all-in-one The last time we reviewed an all-in-one from Dell, our impressions were decidedly less than favorable. Dell delivered a polished software experience, but the Inspiron One 2320 we saw had serious issues virtually across the board in terms of both hardware and configuration. As a family appliance (the market typically targeted by all-in-ones), the Inspiron One 2320 was a bust. Yet with the XPS One 27 (along with the impending Inspiron One 20 and Inspiron One 23) they're looking to reverse their fortunes. AnandTech

Firm applies for .sucks domain A new company is planning to operate .sucks as a top-level internet domain, and its CEO says he expects big brands to embrace the concept. Vox Populi Registry is one of several companies to today announce that they have paid domain name gatekeeper ICANN a $185,000 application fee to try to get their hands on a new gTLD. The .sucks suffix, should ICANN approve it, is about creating "valuable dialogue", not just about ripping off companies that want to protect their image, according to CEO John Berard. The Register

Intel announces breakthrough in plastic chassis design, makes cheaper ultrabooks possible Intel's all-out effort to make Ultrabook the mainstream personal computing device is faced with several hurdles, pricing being a big one. The ultra-sleek notebooks need rigid materials, turning manufacturers to monolithic aluminum chassis, driving up costs. Intel did its partners' homework, by achieving what it calls a breakthrough in structurally-rigid plastics and chassis design, which will help make the Ultrabook more affordable. VR-Zone

Pictures and vision Okay, I’m going to argue that the futures of Facebook and Google are pretty much totally embedded in these two images. The first one you know. What you might not know is just how completely central photos are to Facebook’s product, and by extension its whole business. The company’s S1 filing reports that, in the last three months of 2011, users uploaded around 250 million photos every day. For context, around 480 million people used the service on any given day in that span. That’s like… quite a ratio. Robin Sloan

Facebook smartphone? Dumb idea There are two ways to make money in the smartphone business. There's Apple's way: 1) Make premium products that people clamour for; 2) Sell the devices for substantially more than it costs to make them; 3) Figure out what to do with your rapidly accumulating stockpiles of cash. And then there's everyone else's way: 1) Spend a lot of money to make lots of different kinds of phones; 2) Sell them for rock-bottom prices, sometimes even for free; 3) Chalk your losses up to long-term strategy. The Age

Multiple monitors on Windows 8 Release Preview: better, but still rough The Consumer Preview of Windows 8 had a number of rough edges in its user interface, and Microsoft promised to address at least some of them in the Release Preview. The most prominent unpleasantness with the Consumer Preview was the handling of multimonitor systems, and specifically the interaction with the hot corners. The work done for the Release Preview makes the experience better, but some concerns remain. Ars Technica

Over-55s pick passwords twice as secure as teenagers' People over the age of 55 pick passwords double the strength of those chosen by people under 25 years old. That's according to the largest ever study of password security, which also found that most of us choose passwords that are less secure than security experts recommend. Joseph Bonneau, a computer scientist at the University of Cambridge, analysed the passwords of nearly 70 million Yahoo! users. New Scientist

Ari Emanuel, this is where I work At this week's All Things D conference -- D10, which marked a decade of these retreats -- Walt Mossberg and Kara Swisher were gracious enough to invite Hollywood agent Ari Emanuel on stage to talk about the changing entertainment market as it relates to technology. Ari is an incredibly powerful player in film, TV, and increasingly even web content -- he's the kind of guy who can say things like "you'll never work in this town again" and actually make it happen. The Verge

Plastic clamshell packaging is the worst If you've recently opened up -- or, more specifically, tried to open up -- a CFL light bulb, like this poor woman above, or countless other products, you probably read the headline of this article and thought, oh hell yes. Consider yourself validated: In response to a question posted on Quora last year, "What is the worst piece of design ever done?" the site's users have given resounding support to one answer: plastic clamshell packaging. The Atlantic

Why screenwriters fail at game writing This weekend I was down in Santa Monica, enjoying a nerd-powered tapas breakfast with a group of friends and a few film/TV folks I had never met before. As is customary when meeting new people, the subject of my profession came up. It’s a conversation I’m familiar with, and it usually goes something like this... TJFIXMAN

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I haven't had any trouble opening the Clam-shell designed packaging. It was a hilarious video, but the scissors man, use the scissors! Cut around the packaging at two of the sides and the hinge or top.

Control a xbox 360 remotely through a tablet? Woohoo... guess I will have to wait to see what is so special... doesn't seem like a 'giant step' to me.

.sucks, kinda expensive if you ask me. I suppose they could make their money back, but seriously?

Assign me a password and I wont ever use your site, until I can change it to what I want- which I may be 55+ by then... I don't remember phone numbers since I got a cell phone, I barely remember my phone number.

Holy crap, I'm negative today, guess having a slung rod can ruin your day... darn car.
 
Well actually clamshell is not the worst kind of design when you look at its purpose, which is meant to be cheap, display the product, and most importantly be impossible to open inside the store by a thief. Our ease of use probably wasn't the priority when it was designed.
 
Clamshell packaging has a purpose.
The worst kind of design ever done is juice packages with a too small opening so you always get juice everywehere except where you want it!
It's not exactly rocket science to make something that works, especially when 4000 working designs already do exist!
 
Plastic clamshell + good pair of scissors = 99.9% Success. Find the right tool for the job and you can't go wrong.
 
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