Items tagged with Troll
From the "About Time" files comes a new bill that's aimed at protecting companies from one of their biggest fears: patent trolls. Called the "SHIELD Act of 2013" (no, not this SHIELD, but rather "Saving High-Tech Innovators from Egregious Legal Disputes"), this bill would require those accusing of patent infringement to handle the legal fees of the defendants should they lose the court battle. Inside the bill is the definition of a "non-practicing entity", which could be applied to the accuser if they are A) not the original inventor of the patent and B) have not made any real contribution to make use of it. If a bill like this were to pass, it wouldn't bode well for those trolls who simply stockpile...
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Not content to let Nintendo Wii owners have all the fun with motion-based, wireless game controllers, Asus has just announced its own Wii-like controllers for Windows PCs, called the Eee Stick. It seems that Asus is putting the "Eee" moniker on all of its new products lately, such as the Eee PC and the Eee Box. In fact, the Asus press release made it sound as though the controllers will only be available bundled with some models of the Eee PC and Eee Box, and not as a stand-alone product.Asus states that the Eee Stick "translates users' physical hand motions into corresponding movements onscreen." It will include "a collection of games developed or adapted specifically for use with it." As to...
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One of the biggest laments iPhone users have about the iPhone is that it lacks voice dialing. How and when that key missing feature gets added is still open to speculation, but the engineers at AT&T Labs Research have at least been cooking up a way for developers to easily implement voice controlled applications for "multimedia devices with broadband access," such as the iPhone 3G. AT&T has developed a software framework that it calls the AT&T Watson Speech Mashup. Essentially, the Watson ASR (automatic speech recognition) engine is a Web-based service that developers can provide hooks to into their applications--ergo the "mashup." When someone uses one of these apps on a supported...
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OCZ lays claim to being the first company to bring a "brain-computer" interface to the retail market and they have aimed it squarely at the gamer. The device is called the NIA, which is an acronym that stands for Neural Impulse Actuator, and instead of buttons, sticks, gyroscopes or motion sensors, it reads the body's natural biosignals and translates them into commands that can be used to control PC games. No question, it's a pretty wild product. Go now and see....
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NZXT Unveils Sentry LX High-Performance Fan Controller New Aluminum Fan Controller Features 5 Temperature Probes, Alarm System, Intuitive Interface and LCD Display El Monte, CA – July 1st, 2008 – NZXT, a company built on realizing the dreams of gamers worldwide, is proud to announce the Sentry LX, a high-performance aluminum fan controller. Sentry LX boasts a robust feature set providing gamers and PC enthusiasts with the optimal setup for monitoring and adjusting temperatures throughout the PC. Simple Installation – Sentry LX slides easily into any dual 5.25” drive bay Complete Control – 5 Temperature Probes keep tabs on all areas of your system while the 5 Fan controllers adjust the fans’ RPM...
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A sad statement on humanity, as in Pennsylvania a two-year-old was beaten and killed by her mother's boyfriend - with a video game controller. Still worse, it was reported that the boyfriend had abused the child previously, yet the mother had not left him.It was clear from the bruises and other injuries on the little girl's body that Sunday was not the first time she had been abused, Dauphin County coroner Graham Hetrick told WGAL-TV. He said it was one of the worst cases of child abuse he has ever seen.Baez, 19, called for an ambulance Sunday and said (Harve) Johnson had brought the unconscious child to her, limp and wet from an attempt to revive her in a bathtub, a police affidavit said.Johnson,...
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If you enjoy randomly flaming people on the internet and have been concerned that your anonymity might be maintained, here's a piece of good news for you:“A California judge in the Sixth Appellate District in Santa Clara County last week ruled that anonymous trolls on the Internet are allowed to stay anonymous. Along with remaining anonymous, Internet trolls are able to say what they like, by exercising their First Amendment rights, no matter how belittling is it.”So Trolls are entitled to their opinion, no mater how poorly spelled and/or ill-informed it may be....
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We've just posted a new article here at HotHardware, in which we evaluate X-Gaming's very cool, very retro, X-Arcade Tankstick Dual Controller with Trackball. Just seeing this thing will take you back to your earlier years when gaming meant stopping by the local arcade and dropping quarters into a slot on your favorite machine. Be warned though, after reading this article you may be compelled to connect the Tankstick to a home theater PC. Playing favorites like Mr. Do, Galaga, and Street Fighter II on the big screen would definitely rock! Click the link below and check it out...X-Arcade Tankstick Dual Controller with Trackball...
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Many of us have fond memories of playing video games in the arcade of a local bowling alley, popping 25 cents into the machine on a regular basis to keep the fun going. Back then, that was the main way to get your game on, displaying your skills for all to see. If you can remember dropping quarters into the slot of a machine running Pole Position, Galaga, Missle Command or any other game of that era, you might like the business model of X-Arcade. Reminiscent of the days when quarters ruled the video game market, X-Arcade has built a product base of custom game controllers that are built to the same standards of the video game systems of yesteryear. The company...
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A group of Australian researchers have reportedly developed a device that allows people to manipulate their TVs, DVD players, and other electronics with a simple wave of the hand. The controller box has a built-in camera that can identify seven simple hand gestures and can be used with up to 8 different devices. The development is led by Australian engineers Dr. Prashan Premaratne and Quang Nguyen, who expect the gadget to hit the market within three years. “Dr Premaratne, of the University of Wollongong, said the device is designed to sit on a shelf or table which has a clear line of sight to the television and the owner. Its software recognises simple, deliberate hand gestures and then sends...
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Will seeing the fear in the eyes of an Orc you're about to slaughter in World of Warcraft make you stay your hand? Probably not. Seeing the look of anger and raw fury might actually make the game more fun for countless millions. "Emotiv's technology represents a scientific breakthrough: it is the only brain computer interface solution that can detect and process both human conscious thoughts and non-conscious emotions, including those represented by brain activity patterns unique to a particular individual. Unlike earlier brain computer interfaces, which only detect a limited number of mental 'states' such as concentration (by identifying when the user is focusing on the screen), Emotiv can...
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Nintendo's new console has been a blast for the lucky few folks who were able to get their hands on one of them, however the new technology isn't without a few teething problems. The strap that is supposed to secure the controller to your wrist has been having some problems, and of course, someone has decided to try and sue Nintendo over it. The suit claims that Nintendo's inability to provide a controller free of defects is against their own product warranty. "On December 6th, Green Welling LLP, of San Francisco, California along with Siebken & Siegele of Austin, Texas and Short, Cressman & Burgess of Seattle, Washington, filed...
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The Wii controller is sweeping the nation, while a portion of the nation is sweeping up the glass from broken things when you accidentally let go of it. But how do they work? Scienceline explains the advances in accelerometer technology, and how the Wii controller made them work for fun. The accelerometers used in the Nintendo controller are thinner than a penny, small enough to fit twelve on a postage stamp, and sell for under $6 a piece. They can accurately measure forces more than three times stronger than the pull of gravity in three directions - up and down, side to side, and forward and back. The chips also use gravity to determine the orientation of the controller, whether you're holding...
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SST Announces Single-Chip Controller Targeting Portable Applications Mobile Platform Controller Combines Keyboard Controller, Power Management Controller and 8 Mbits of LPC Firmware Flash SUNNYVALE, Calif. -- SST (Silicon Storage Technology, Inc.), a leader in flash memory technology, today announced the industry's first single-chip, fully integrated mobile platform controller targeting mobile devices. The SST79LF008 Mobile Platform Controller enables designers to reduce overall system cost, enhance reliability and increase security protection by integrating into a single device 8 Mbits of LPC Firmware Flash along with a mobile platform controller for human input devices. The single-chip...
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