Welcome to the latest edition of the SlashGear Week in Review! Monday bought with it news that Nintendo was set to unveil a replacement for the Wii console at E3 this summer. The console itself is due to land for purchase sometime next year according to reports. The biggest story of the week has been the Sony PSN outage. Sony admitted that the Dev accounts and user accounts were hacked by outside sources.

A really cool LEGO helmet that looks like the ones the Minifig astronauts wear that is sized for kids to be able to put on turned up. The helmet is very cool and has speakers inside to read LEGO comics to the kids via a digital file right off a USB drive plugged into the back of the helmet. Apple is facing its first class action suit over the tracking of user location details on the iPhone. The suit is seeking class action status and is asking for compensation.

Sony showed off two new Android tablets running honeycomb. One of the tablets is a traditional design called the S1. The other tablet is the S2, and it uses an unconventional dual screen folding design. Kodak unveiled a new AIO printer this week. The cool part about the new Office 2170 is that it can print files from mobile devices, and it can print 3D photos too.

Chris reviewed the Samsung Galaxy S II smartphone this week. In the end, he thinks that the Galaxy S II might be the best Android smartphone on the market today. I really like the products that Quirky and its users come up with. The latest produce is a really cool Fender Bumper for the iPad 2, and it is designed to work along with the Apple Smart Cover.

Sony offered upset PSN users a bit more information Tuesday when it officially said that a hacker was the cause of the outage. Sony also said that the user information stored on the PSN had been compromised. The long running SETI program that uses the massive Allen Array that scans the skies for signs of extraterrestrial life has been shut down. The array was terminated after congress cut the funding for SETI from NASA’s budget.

Users of the Xbox 360 game console have another entertainment option now. Hulu plus landed on the Xbox 360 last week for members to view all the content they want. Sharp unveiled a gigantic video screen room it had designed for a Japanese theme park .The room has a total of 156 60-inch screens arrayed all around the room on walls and ceiling to completely immerse users in the video.

New PS3 models have hit the FCC, and they have new model numbers on them. The new numbers are CECH-3001A and 3001B, at this point we don’t know what the difference between the new consoles and the old ones already on the market are. AT&T issued another warning to users who are tethering the iPhone 4 that it will automatically charge $25 if they unofficially tether their device. AT&T had previously sent out warning messages via text to users suspected of tethering.

The massive breech of the Sony PSN could well end up costing Sony literally a fortune. The estimated cost of the breech could end up totaling $24 billion. Pepsi has unveiled a very cool new social vending machine that uses a big touchscreen. The cool machine will let user’s gift drinks to a friend or to complete strangers, talk about pay it forward.

Foxconn doesn’t take kindly to people that leak designs from its factory. Three Foxconn workers have been arrested and charged with leaking the iPad 2 design that was used to create cases and shells for the iPad 2 well ahead of the official unveil of the tablet. Another chunk of bad news came Friday for users of the PSN. Security experts warned that the credit card data for users of the PSN was apparently up for sale on the black market.

The white iPhone 4 smartphone landed in stores this week and some geeks already have the white iPhone at home. Some have discovered that the white iPhone 4 is thicker than the black one making some cases not fit. Chris posted up his review of the HTC Wildfire S on Friday. The smartphone may be a very good choice for the mainstream user on a budget.

Square has announced that it will be launching a new credit card reader this summer. The new reader will have encryption at the read head, which is something that its competitors said the reader needed from the get go. The HBO Go app has landed on the Android and iOS platforms. The app lets subscribers stream original show and movies to their smart devices.

Amazon has undercut iTunes on the price of new and popular songs on its music store. Amazon is now selling popular tracks for 69 cents each. Thanks for reading this week’s edition, see you next time!

Relevant Entries on SlashGear

• SlashGear Week in Review – June 23rd
• SlashGear TV Week in review Episode 1
• The Daily To Erect Paywall Next Week
• Angry Birds hits PSP/PS3 as PlayStation mini game this week
• RIM’s BlackBerry 7 a simple OS 6.1 rebadge?

123456
password
12345678

Simple passwords are subject to brute-force cracking in a matter of minutes by the average desktop machine, never mind a workstation or cluster systems that a computer forensic lab will have available to crack a system.

For example, below is the time needed to crack a password consisting of 36 characters: The full alphabet, either upper or lower case (not both in this case) plus numbers.

0123456789 and either ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ or abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz

Password Length	Combinations	Class A	Class B	Class C	Class D	Class E	Class F
2	1,296	Instant	Instant	Instant	Instant	Instant	Instant
3	46,656	4 Secs	Instant	Instant	Instant	Instant	Instant
4	1.6 million	2½ Mins	16 Seconds	1 Second	Instant	Instant	Instant
5	60.4 million	1½ Hours	10 Mins	1 Min	Instant	Instant	Instant

Versus the time to crack a password that contains 96 characters: Mixed upper and lower case alphabet plus numbers and common symbols.

0123456789AaBbCcDdEeFfGgHhIiJjKkLlMmNnOoPpQqRrSsTtUuVvWwXxYyZz <SP>!”#$%&’()*+,-./:;<=>?@[\]^_`{|}~

Password Length	Combinations	Class A	Class B	Class C	Class D	Class E	Class F
2	9,216	Instant	Instant	Instant	Instant	Instant	Instant
3	884,736	88½ Secs	9 Secs	Instant	Instant	Instant	Instant
4	85 Million	2¼ Hours	14 Mins	1½ Mins	8½ Secs	Instant	Instant
5	8 Billion	9½ Days	22½ Hours	2¼ Hours	13½ Mins	1¼ Mins	8 Secs
6	782 Billion	2½ Years	90 Days	9 Days	22 Hours	2 Hours	13 Mins
7	75 Trillion	238 Years	24 Years	2½ Years	87 Days	8½ Days	20 Hours
8	7.2 Quadrillion	22,875 Years	2,287 Years	229 Years	23 Years	2¼ Years	83½ Days

Note: Class D is a typical desktop machine, or next year’s high-end smartphone.

Taken from: Password Recovery Speeds. A full breakdown of password security is available from Lockdown.co.uk.

So as should be painfully clear, choose a strong password.

What has become painfully clear is that there is no chance whatsoever that I will be able to remember a password that can't be broken instantaneously.  If you can, you're a better man than I am, Gunga Din.  There's also a matter of encryption, and Keith provides some suggestions for that as well.

There are three alternatives, however, worthy of consideration.  The first is to have nothing incriminating or private on your electronic device as you enter the United States, making the search and seizure nothing more than wrong and inconvenient.  The second is to continue to argue that laptop searches bear no connection to the historic bases for causeless border searches in the hope that the federal courts will eventually apply the rationale rather than the rubric and distinguish opportunistic law enforcement searches that properly fall under the ambit of the Fourth Amendment.  Good luck with that.

The third is to fundamentally undermine the scheme concocted by the government to subvert and circumvent the reasonable expectation of privacy in our papers and effects by employment of special tools designed to thwart the government's efforts to use any excuse to delve into our secret computer life:  A pen and paper.

No, Apple doesn't make the iPen, and you won't need a password to use one.

Company to Display New Professional 3D HD Imaging Solutions, XF Series Professional Camcorders, HD Broadcast Lenses, EOS Digital SLR Cameras and High-Resolution REALiS Projectors

April 11, 2011 – Canon U.S.A., Inc., a leader in digital imaging, is exhibiting a wide range of products for broadcast HD television production, HD video content creation, and high-resolution image display at the 2011 NAB Show, booth # C-4325, April 11th to 14th, in the Las Vegas Convention Center. On display will be the most comprehensive display of the Company’s professional broadcast and HD imaging equipment including special guest presenters talking about the latest developments and techniques in the professional real-world application of Canon equipment. Included in the booth’s exhibit will be Canon’s HD broadcast lenses and robotic pan-tilt HD cameras, the new Canon XA10 professional camcorder, XF300-series and XF100-series professional camcorders, the Company’s popular line of EOS DSLR cameras with full-manual HD video capture, the REALiS WUX4000 Installation LCOS projector, and large-format imagePROGRAF printers.

Also on display during the show will be the new Technicolor CineStyle for the Canon 5D Mark II, a custom picture style which provides cinematographers with the image latitude for digital intermediate color-grading and delivery.

A Word on Canon

• Alex Buono
• Russell Carpenter
• Rodney Charters
• Allen Daviau & Bill Bennett
• Bruce Dorn
• Vincent Laforet
• Patrick Moreau
• Joe Pontecorvo
• Kevin Shahinian
• Gale Tattersall

Two New PL-Mount Canon Lenses

These two new lenses from Canon offer a performance level in accordance with emerging 4K production image format standards, which inherently ensures the very highest performance in contemporary 2K and HD digital 35mm motion-imaging.

New HDgc Portable HD zoom lens with 2x Built-in Extender

New Firmware for the XF305 and XF300 Professional Camcorders

Canon XA10 Professional Camcorder

Canon XF-Series Professional Camcorders

The XF105 and XF100 Professional Camcorders are ideal for mobile HD video capture in a compact form factor. The XF105 and XF100 utilize the same Canon XF Codec featured in the Canon XF305 and XF300, yet they are less than half the size and weight of those larger models. The XF105 and XF100 camcorders are ideal for Electronic News Gathering, documentary and independent filmmaking and event videography. The Canon XF105 and XF100 Professional Camcorders feature a Genuine Canon 10x HD Zoom lens and Canon’s built-in infrared low-light feature enabling the capture of HD video in complete darkness.

All XF-series models record to Compact Flash (CF) cards and feature hot-swappable card slots for maximum performance. Canon’s XF305 and XF105 models feature industry-standard HD-SDI output, genlock, and SMPTE time code (in/out) terminals for multi-camera or 3D productions.

The Canon XF Codec is an MPEG-2 4:2:2 50Mbps codec used for exceptional high-definition image quality, full non-linear editing (NLE) systems compatibility and efficient, robust workflow. The Canon XF Codec is currently compatible with leading software programs widely used within the video production and broadcast industries including those available from Adobe, Apple, Avid, and Grass Valley.

Now, with the new firmware announcement for the XF305 and XF300 models, all four Canon XF-series camcorders will include in-camera features to enable the easy set-up and capture of high-definition 3D video when two camcorders are paired.

Canon 3D Solutions for Broadcast Lenses

Most of Canon’s HDTV Zoom Lenses are equipped with 16-bit resolution Rotary Encoder Devices, which provide precise synchronous lens control by simply connecting the two lenses with a 20pin-20pin single cable. This 3D Bridge Cable will allow simultaneous control of a pair of lenses from one zoom and focus controllers.

The "3D Lens Adjustment Software" is intended to make stereoscopic tracking of the zoom, focus and iris even more precise, and allow appropriate offsets to be easily made using the Digital Drive Unit's display to compensate for minor zoom and focus tracking differences between any two lens pairs. Together with the 3D Bridge Cable, the software will also make it possible to use standard lens controllers. The software can be installed to the conventional lenses at Canon service centers for the customers who purchased the 3D Bridge Cable.

Additional Canon HD Lenses, Robotic POV Cameras, and the Canobeam

Canon EOS Digital SLR Cameras

Now capable of 24p (23.976 fps) and 30p (29.97 fps) image capture (when updated to Canon Firmware version 2.0.4 or higher), the Canon EOS 5D Mark II digital SLR provides cinematographers and videographers with a versatile HD camera designed for creative, high-quality production work. Featuring a 21.1-megapixel full-frame 24 x 36mm CMOS sensor for 1920 x 1080 HD resolution capture, the Canon EOS 5D Mark II digital SLR delivers a sensitivity range from ISO 50 to ISO 25600, superb low-light performance, excellent color reproduction, a shallow depth-of-field, and spectacular HD image quality.

The EOS-1D Mark IV Professional Digital SLR features Full HD capture and full manual exposure control, plus selectable frame rates on an APS-H-sized image sensor that’s larger in size than a Super 35mm motion picture film frame. The Canon EOS-1D Mark IV allows for three video recording resolutions – 1080p Full HD, 720p HD and Standard Definition. The camera will record Full HD at 1920 x 1080 in selectable frame rates of 24p (23.976), 25p, or 30p (29.97); and 720p HD or 480p SD video recording at either 50p or 60p (59.94).

Also on display will be the Canon EOS 7D digital SLR featuring Full HD video capture at 1920 x 1080 resolution with selectable frame rates of 24p, 25p or 30p, as well as 720p HD and 480p SD video recording at either 50p or 60p (59.94).

Canon imagePROGRAF Large Format Printers

REALiS WUX4000 Installation LCOS Projector

SOURCE Canon

NFC, or near field communication, is an emerging technology that will power mobile payment systems and mobile wallet solutions, like those in development by Apple, Google, RIM, mobile operators, banks and others. But NFC itself is just a way to send data wirelessly between devices, meaning it can be used for far more than mobile payments alone.

One way to take advantage of a phone's NFC capabilities is to make your own NFC tags. These tags, when read by your phone, can perform a number of actions, like open a map, launch a website, change your phone's settings and configurations, plus dozens of other tasks. Wouldn't it be fun to make tags like that? Well, now you can. Here's how.

Sponsor

One of the most popular phones to have NFC built in is Google's flagship device, the Samsung Nexus S. However, it's not the only one. There are many phones you can buy today that have NFC built in, and there are several more than are coming soon, like the Nokia Astound (C7) or Samsung's Galaxy S II, which will include NFC in some models. You can check out a more complete list of NFC phones here for details.

But for our purposes, this project will focus on using Android phones, specifically the Nexus S.

Where To Get NFC Tags

Of course, before you can make your own NFC tags, you first have to acquire them. These aren't available on the shelves at Best Buy, so you'll have to order them online. Thanks to software developer Joshua Krohn, who made the NFC Task Launcher app described below, we have a good list of sites selling NFC tags.

These include the following:

• Tagage: This Finland-based store ships NFC stickers worldwide to many countries, including Australia, Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Canada, Chile, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hong Kong, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malaysia, Malta, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, Thailand, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States. U.S. shipments take about 5-7 days.
• Sparkfun: For U.S. customers, Sparkfun sells laminated U.S. tags.
• Touchtag: Also U.S.-only, Touchtag sells various starter kits of 10, 25 or 500 tags.
• CoreRFID: In Europe, this U.K.-based RFID shop sells different types of tags, like these sticker discs and more.
• BuySmartCard: Serving the Asian market, this store sells tags that ship from Hong Kong. (Details from XDA Developers forum here.)

Write Tags with NFC Task Launcher for Android

As noted above, we're focusing on making tags using your Android phone. There are actually several apps that allow for this now in the Android Market. One such app, to give you an idea, is the NFC Task Launcher from developer Joshua Krohn. We were introduced to this app via an NFC World interview.

In detailing the potential uses for NFC tags, Krohn told the website:

You could have a tag that enables Wi-Fi, configures your wireless network and then connects — so visitors would never have to enter your security key to use your wireless connection. They would not need to have an open network, they would only need to scan the tag and the rest is done for them.

He personally uses NFC tags in his car, his home and his workplace, where he uses them to put the phone into different modes. For example, in the car, a tag enables Bluetooth, disables Wi-Fi, sets the media volume to max and launches the Car Home application. And all with just a tap!

Meanwhile, at the office, another tag enables Wi-Fi, disables Bluetooth and connects to his work's secure network.

Currently, his NFC Action Launcher application supports these tasks:

• Enable / Disable / Toggle Wifi
• Enable / Disable / Toggle Bluetooth
• Launch any installed Application
• Connect to any known SSID
• Configure a new Wifi Connection and connect
• Configure and enable Portable Hotspot
• Enable / Disable Auto-sync
• Launch any Tasker Task (for users of Tasker)
• Changing Phone Ringtone
• Change Notification Tone
• Changing Ringer Mode (Normal/Silent/Vibrate)
• Changing Ringer Volume
• Changing Media Volume
• Changing Alarm Volume
• Changing Notification Volume

You can also use it to create task tags, profile tasks, vCard tasks, Smart URL tags, text tags and URI tags (Tel, SMS, Mailto). Originally launched on the XDA Developer forums, the app is now availalbe in the Android Market here for $1.99.

Similar apps in the Market include Touchtag's client (free), NXP's TagWriter (free), taglet (free), Write a Tag (free), AnyTag (free), NFC Classic Tag Reader Writer (free) and others, mostly in Japanese.

For experimental purposes though, it's nice when the developer is hanging around in the forums, responding to user questions, like Krohn does here. That may be worth the $2 to you when choosing what app to try.

To see what tag reading and writing looks like in action, check out this YouTube video.

Plus Russia's government to go Linux?, scientist v scientist on TSA X-rays, Android's coming explosion and more

It's not that different for girls. Photo by mariahagglof on Flickr. Some rights reserved

A burst of 7 links for you to chew over, as picked by the Technology team

Google's Marissa Mayer: Girls Can Be Geeks, Too >> Newsweek
"..one of the things I care a lot about is helping to remove that stigma, to show girls that you can be feminine, you can like the things that girls like, but you can also be really good at technology. You can be really good at building things."

PC Repair Rip-Offs: Don't Get Gouged by Fix-It Services >> PCWorld magazine
"These aren't scams, to be sure--as far as we know, these are all legitimate services from legitimate businesses. But the actual value of these services - relative to the work involved and the likely benefit to the consumer - can be highly questionable in many cases."

Facebook Track and Cookies >> termid
"Numerous websites have implemented the Facebook Like button to let Facebook members share their interests, therewith promoting websites or news items. It is, thus, an important business tool for content providers. However, this article shows that the tool is also used to place cookies on the user's computer, regardless whether a user actually uses the button when visiting a website. As an alternative business model this allows Facebook to track and trace users and to process their data. It appears that non-Facebook members can also be traced via the Like button."
Oh, Facebook, just when you're starting to be nice, we find you not being so nice.

Apple to ship 5-6M Verizon iPhones in Q1 2011 >> Vator.tv
"Apple is gearing up to ship 20-21m iPhones next quarter, an increase of 1-2m from the company's previous goal of 19m units, according to unnamed sources with Taiwan-based component suppliers who spoke to DigiTimes. Among those shipments will be the CDMA iPhones for Verizon, set at 5-6m units."

One Time Only: Scientist-on-Scientist TSA Smackdown >> The Atlantic
Got your Taylor series expansion of exponentials ready? Then it's time to read two scientists disagreeing about whether the US TSA's X-ray backscatter poses a risk or not.

2011 will be the year Android explodes >> Fortune Tech
"In 2011, we might see half a billion phones sold worldwide. Smartphones will likely blow by traditional computers next year as the way most of the world gains access to the Internet."

Putin Orders Russian Move to GNU/Linux >> opendotdotdot
Translated from the original Russian report: "Prime Minister Vladimir Putin signed a plan for transition of power structures and the federal budget [to] free software. According to the document, the introduction of Linux in government should begin in II quarter 2012."
Is it to annoy Microsoft, or to protect the Russian government against hacking, or to protect the Russian government from Microsoft investigations over licensing, or to cut costs?

You can follow Guardian Technology's linkbucket on delicious

To suggest links, tag articles on delicious.com with "guardiantech"

Section: iPhone / iPod touch / iPad, iPad, iPhone, iPod touch, iDevice Apps

iPhone, iPod and iPad product updates and announcements for December 20, 2010:

• Apps
• Accessories

Apps

• Pilots worldwide will welcome the newest, free app for the aviation industry: FlightBOX. This comprehensive utility app features the only fully customizable pilot logbook on the market. The app features logbook, checklist, route planning, weather, converters and calculators. iApps have developed a website to accompany the app which is a full resource centre for pilots, both professional and hobbyists.
• Adva-Soft has announced TouchRetouch 2.0.1, its latest release for iPhone, iPod touch and iPad. TouchRetouch 2.0.1 is a unique photo editing tool designed for mobile devices. It allows the users to remove objects from freshly captured or saved photographs easily, with finger swipes and taps only, without affecting any other elements of the picture. Version 2.0.1 features many important updates which add even more outstanding functionalities to this revolutionary photo-editing software.
• Bauwerk Hampel GmbH has released iVilla 1.0 for iPhone, iPod touch and iPad users. iVilla is a tool for easily designing a home and garden, just by swiping elements on their device’s screen, or shaking it for random ideas. iVilla offers nineteen billion possibilities and provides examples, video tutorials and the option of ordering plans and models. Users are also able to get ideas from the app’s album of design examples.
• iNewsApps has announced Celebrity Gossip and Soap News 1.0, their new app for iOS. Celebrity Gossip and Soap News contains the best sources of news for UK and Hollywood celebrities and UK soaps. No need to scan dozens of newspapers, magazines or websites, it’s all here brought together in one app. If there’s a top story, whether it’s about your favorite pop star or movie star, you’ll be the first to know.
• PhenomenArts Inc. has released Sonitaire 1.0 for iPhone, iPod touch and iPad users. Sonitaire is a new launch and a truly unique application. Based on the classic card game of Solitaire, this app uses thirty cards with six suits of color with each suit consisting of five gradient colors. Every colored card has a musical note associated with it, which is heard when tapped. A stack of cards plays all the notes in the stack; a win plays the entire song created by the cards used.
• Davander Mobile Corporation has released a teaser trailer to mark the imminent release of CatPaint version 2.0 for iOS. CatPaint is their popular cat-based iPhone image editing app. Version 2.0 promises eight brand new cats, enables lasers and makes using CatPaint even more intuitive and enjoyable. The upcoming major update will be a complete redesign of the program from the ground up to allow for a vastly improved user interface and an unparalleled user experience.
• Light Studios has announced an update to Quick Quote 1.1 for iPad. QuickQuote allows you to create and follow up quotes accurately, quickly and professionally. It is suitable for tradespeople, small business owners, creative industries and media businesses, real estate, retail, consultants, interior decorators, landscapers and more. Version 1.1 offers a new range of international settings for the growing Quick Quote community.
• Bibi Blocksberg - The Broom Race is now published for the iPhone/iPod touch and iPad. It is time to take your seat on the witches’ broom and enjoy this fast-paced ride. This game is writing a new chapter in the long success story of the popular storyteller series. Two months after the Nintendo Wii-release, the German Games development company Nurogames will finally launch the game for iPhone and iPod touch, which is available on the iTunes App Store now.
• Digital Reality has introduced Liberty Wings 1.0, their new air fighter game for iOS. As an air officer from the US Navy, take control of a World War II air fighter and fight your way through enemy lines in this action-packed shoot-em-up. Your mission is to hunt and take down all elements of the German Atom Bomb Project. Liberty Wings features ultra high-quality art content, with 3 different gameplay modes integrated into one action package, as well as campaign and free mode.
• Crawl Space Games has announced Zombies Ala Mode HD 1.0 for iPad. Zombies Ala Mode offers career-minded young Zombies a great business opportunity. A superb tilt sensitivity game, the player is a hard-working zombie trying to make it as an ice cream parlor assistant. Zombies Ala Mode HD contains 50 levels and 3 different games modes, Career, Survival and Bug Attack. Benefits include fresh air, personal satisfaction of a job well done, a chance to see the city, and Free Ice Cream.
• BCNmultimedia has announced Children’s Tales 1.0, a free app for iPhone, iPod touch and iPad which contains a selection of high quality illustrated books and comics for children from 3 to 9 years old. Children’s Tales is an easy way to help your child become a lifelong reader. And a good tool for sharing a wonderful storytelling time with your kids. Every week the app provides you free access to a complete illustrated book.
• Beanheads Consulting Inc. has announced an update to Sort Shots - iPad Edition 2.2. Sort Shots - iPad Edition allows users to import images while retaining previously assigned metadata/EXIF keywords automatically. Instantly find and view photos by simply tapping on a word. It’s the first iPad app to utilize EXIF/Metadata keywords/tags with Apple iPhoto and Aperture. Additionally, File Transfer Protocol, file renaming and a search feature have been added.
• Combined Media has announced FYI Magazine 1.0, a new and interactive magazine app for iOS devices. The FYI magazine app allows users to download issues right into their devices and browse through the entire magazine. Users can get up to date with the latest technology trends and gadgets as well as Apple’s latest developments and news. Instead of carrying a large magazine around, users can now browse through pages of a magazine with the swipe of a finger.
• Opedo Software, has announced its highly anticipated First Try Fridays a is now available on the App Store. With Opedo’s revolutionary, state of the art game engine, the iPhone and iPod touch gaming experience will never be the same. The graphically superb First Try Fridays App features intense skateboarding moments. Intuitive multi-touch controls, using only two fingers, allows players to unlock the freedom that is skateboarding. With over 14,430 different combinations of flips and grinds, a large practice area and 11 different levels, players are only limited by their own skills.
• Dave Enns has released Dave the Horn Guy 1.0, a unique new music game for iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad. Dave the Horn Guy has twenty-five horns strapped to his orange suit, but only two arms and two legs. Can you honk like he can? Test your skills in the Honk Test. See how well you honk and unlock challenges. The app includes a library with songs for weddings, birthdays, Christmas, and more. Let the Horn Guy do the caroling for you.
• JackFruit Digital Media has announced SlapTheApp 1.0, the ultimate stress reliever for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch. Designed to facilitate everyday life and focus on entertaining, SlapTheApp provides many laughs and hours of entertainment at work, a party, or at home. This app allows the user to put any face into the male or female characters dressed in a classy suit and taking out the stress on them. The high quality video makes the characters realistic and their movements fully natural.
• NTT Resonant and Berzerk Studio have announced that Berzerk Ball, the iPhone version of popular Flash game Homerun in Berzerk Land, is now available in the Apple App Store for US$0.99. The game, which has players smashing Comeau the annoying geek across over-the-top Berzerk Land, aiming for boosts that will send him flying further into oblivion, had over 150 million unique geek smashes in its Flash format.
• Digital Poke has announced 360 Web Browser 2.0, an update to their popular mobile browser for iOS. 360 Web Browser is a feature rich, intelligent and highly praised browser. 360 Web Browser is highly praised and recommended by Macworld, App Advice, 148 Apps, Appolicious among various others. Version 2.0 brings Firefox Sync, Download Manager and the ability to view and download Flash Videos using Clip Converter.
• EmirBytes today announces iQuikD.o.F 1.0 for iOS devices. The app was created specifically for iPhoneographers and it emphasizes creating selective focus in a photo. Currently iQuikD.o.F features 12 depth of field presets, manual drawing, and a special “Stack” function. Effortlessly produce macro lense effects, Tiltshift effects, Miniature effects and Bokeh effects. The blur effects produced by the app are also very smooth.
• Big Blue Bubble, Inc. has announced that their faithful recreation of pure, classic tabletop hockey, Vintage Hockey, has arrived on the iPhone, iPod Touch, and an HD version for the iPad. Who better to handle this than a Canadian company, eh? It’s the fast and furious original which inspired modern table top hockey! With authentic sounds, the original table layout and even the ability to flick the ball around with your fingers all there for you to enjoy. Vintage Hockey is a faithful recreation of a time when games were made of wood and classics were born, filled with addictive game-play (and in this case free multiplayer).
• Laranea has announced Duty 1.0 for iPad. Duty is a clean, elegant and efficient Google Tasks client especially designed for iPad. It provides a real-time interface to your Google Tasks in your GMail, Google Calendar or Google Apps account. Add, delete, move and edit multiple lists and tasks just like you would do in the browser. Simple, designed from scratch for the iPad to mimic the Google Tasks interface in Gmail to its fullest.
• James Hollender has released his iSugars app for the iPhone, iPod touch and iPad. The iSugars app is one of 7 Nutrient Apps based on the USDA National Nutrient Database for Standard Reference. The others include iCarbs, iProteins, iCals, iFiber, iCholesterol & Vitamin K. The iSugars app allows users to easily find out the quantity of Sugars in a large number of food servings, which is critical for those trying to restrict their sugar intake.
• Deutsch Creative has announced Abracadial 1.2, an update to its flagship app for iPhone and iPod touch devices. Abracadial was specifically designed to make it easier for iPhone users to organize and access their contacts. Sort your contacts into easily accessible groups with only a few clicks. Easily group contacts into folders or shortcuts to similar contacts, place groups within groups, color-code groups or create speed-dial buttons and much more.
• Inkstone Software has announced QuickReader 3.0 for iOS, an update to their eBook Reader with Speed Reading Technology. Rated first in sales of all iOS Speed Reading apps, QuickReader incorporates advanced technology, not simple skimming, to painlessly break old reading habits, improving both reading speed and comprehension. The app features extensive Settings, giving the user total control over all functions. The 3.0 update makes it the first and only speed reading app to run native on iPad.
• Global Delight has released Photo Delight 1.1, an update to their feature-enriched color splash app for the iPad. Photo Delight has a beautifully designed virtual canvas to place your color photographs on. Add colour to any part of the automatically converted black-and-white photograph with simple swipes of your finger and see the effect. Version 1.1 introduces “Smart Touch”, a new feature of PhotoDelight which will change the way people bring out the colors of their photos.
• Big Blue Bubble, Inc. announced today that their genre defining sequel, Home Sweet Home 2: Kitchens, has arrived on Apple’s iPhone and iPod Touch. Home Sweet Home 2: Kitchens puts you in charge of redesigning the Kitchens of eclectic characters whose tough demands and crazy requirements will have you designing for hours. Use your master designing skills to give them the kitchen of their dreams.
• Motivapps has announced their first coaching product for iPhone and iPod touch: Goal-Setting Workshop. The Goal-Setting Workshop app is a series of exercises that guide users through the process of setting resolutions. The workshop consists of four parts: brainstorming, narrowing a list of goals, committing to a few, and getting motivated to meet them. The app contains a goal tracker, too.
• IcyBlaze has announced iDocument 1.5 and iDocument iPhone, its latest update with the powerful sync function between the Mac and iPhone/iPod touch. iDocument is a documents management application on your Mac, and iDoc iPhone is a small documents tool box for mobile devices. The iDocument system supports WIFI transfer between Mac and iPhone, so you can easily sync your documents with two applications on Mac and iPhone separately.
• Sinusoid Pty Ltd has announced Snappix 1.0, a new photographic App for the iPhone. Snappix allows you to quickly take four shots from the camera in quick succession, put them in the same frame, and quickly send them via email to friends or to facebook directly without leaving the App. The picture frame can be either 2 x 2 as in a passport photograph, or in a 1 x 4 strip as in a photo booth strip of pictures. Both portrait and landscape shots can be mixed within the one frame.
• D7 Games has announced the release of DiscoTech, a silver-studded 3D labyrinth game for Android, iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad, bringing back memories of afros, roller-skates, and luminous 1970s dance floors. Players jive with DiscoTech’s stone groovy tracks while maneuvering their character, a silver disco ball, through 15 vibrant levels and squaring off against smooth-operating bosses along the way! Can ya dig it?
• Free The Apps! has announced Panorama Free 1.0, their new and free a camera app. Panorama Free upgrades an iPhone or iPod touch camera for panoramic photography. Take a few photos in sequence and then the Panorama Free merges all of the photos into one, creating a panoramic photo. The possibilities are really endless, and very useful for anyone who wants to take exquisite photos in a panoramic format.
• Pogmo Productions has introduced Charlie Wonders Milk 1.0, their new interactive children’s book for the iPad and iPhone. The first book to be released in the Charlie Wonders series, Charlie Wonders Milk explores where milk comes from and the process involved in its production. Targeted at children aged 4 to 10 years of age, The Charlie Wonders series aims to promote the importance of good nutrition and healthy living. Tilt Touch Learn from the Cow to the Carton.
• CBS Mobile and interactive entertainment company Ludia have announced the release of The Amazing Race - The Game, the official mobile game based on the multi-Emmy Award-winning series.  Now available at the App Store for iPhone, iPod touch and iPad, the game allows players to experience the thrills of traveling around the globe in their quest to be the first team to arrive at the final pit stop.  The Amazing Race - The Game, hosted by Phil Keoghan, includes all of the television series elements as players grab clues, choose their transportation, make their way to pit stops and complete Detours, Roadblocks and Fast Forwards. Additionally, using one iPad, players can interact via multiplayer challenges with family and friends head-to-head, or compete solo against their computer.
• Flowd is a location-based mobile app that facilitates closer connections between music acts and their fans. The brand new Flowd Events feature is now available as a free update to the application on the iTunes App Store and Android Market. By using the phone’s in-built GPS, Flowd Events allows users to “check-in” to concerts, festivals and other live events while bands and artists can run contests and promotions that award fans for attending their gigs.
• Oneapp Application Studio Inc. has introduced Word Crunch 1.0 for iOS. Word Crunch is the perfect fusion between a word game and an action game for the iPhone and iPod touch. If you enjoy games like Boggle, Scrabble, Word With Friends, Bookworm, Text Twist and MASH you will love Word Crunch. People of all ages can test their reflexes and vocabulary skills. Play 3 modes each containing 3 levels of difficulty! With all these possibilities, you’re sure to find your match.
• Big Blue Bubble, Inc. is pleased to announce the release and immediate worldwide availability of Burn the Rope, their new original game for iOS devices. From the team that brought you Thumpies comes one of the most original games this year. Burn the Rope is a unique game for the pyro in all of us. All you have to do is feed the fire. Burn the Rope is a challenging game where you try to burn as much rope as you can in each level. There’s a catch! The fire only burns upwards, leaving you to tilt and turn your phone to keep your flame alive!
• TapOne Technology has announced VideoCard 1.1 for iOS. Developed to offer users a quick and easy way to send creative and customized digital greeting cards, this is the first app available that fully utilizes the iPhone’s front facing camera to let users send full video-based greeting cards. Users are able to input customized text messages into the body of their greeting cards and pick appropriate theme music either from within the app’s included song catalog or from their music library.
• AssistiveWare has announced Pictello 1.1, which adds full iPad support. Pictello is a simple way to create talking photo albums and talking books. Each page in a Pictello Story can contain a picture, up to five lines of text, and a recorded sound or text-to-speech using high-quality voices. Stories can be shared using iTunes File Sharing or via WiFi with other Pictello users through a free account on the Pictello Sharing Server.
• The iPhone version of GoodReader has just been updated to include the newest features added to the iPad version earlier this month. The newest version includes a new PDF displaying engine, offering a much smoother experience when zooming/panning a file, plus AirPrint support for wireless printing. GoodReader now also offers more features for annotating files
• DistinctDev and Bolt Creative, are partnering to give The Moron Test and Pocket God fans a special holiday treat. The #1 and #2 Paid Entertainment apps of Apple’s Rewind 2010 have teamed up to give The Moron Test an extreme makeover, Pocket God style. With the latest update, The Moron Test now contains a new themed-section called “Ooga School,” which features the adorable Pygmies, dodo birds, and dinosaurs that Pocket God fans know and love. In addition, both Lite and Paid versions of The Moron Test have received a winter makeover in celebration of the joyous holiday season!
• National Geographic Kids’ Dinopedia is the ultimate guide to dinosaurs. It contains beautiful art, videos, and information on over 700 different dinosaur species—a port from the award-winning Dinopedia book NatGeo published in October.
• In Railroad Constructor it is your task to clear a path for a train to reach its destination by constructing a path of travel that is cleared from obstacles and other hazards: It’s a highly unique and interesting puzzle game in which every level is randomly generated, making each experience different and fun. You basically use various pieces of railroad at your disposal to connect and build a track for the train by selecting a piece from the available (track) pieces visually available in the lower left corner of the screen, and by placing those said pieces at your convenience and placement.
• The Shikarna Music application keeps you up to date with all the newest music and talent emerging right now. By uploading two brand new tracks every day, it enables you to stay on top of what’s happening in the modern unheard music scene. With little more than the tap of a button, you can listen to the songs at your convenience, and buy them in seconds, straight from your iPhone.

Accessories

• ClayWare has announced the launch of their crowd-funding campaign through Indie GoGo. The campaign will raise the funds necessary for the start-up to set up a booth at the MacWorld Expo to share their invention, the Pad Bracket iPad Wall Mount, with the Mac user community. If ClayWare reaches their goal of $10,000, they will randomly choose one person who will get a 16GB iPad. For every $5,000 above their goal, they will give away another iPad. Every single person who contributes to the campaign, at any level, will have a chance to receive a thank you gift of an Apple iPad.

Full Story » | Written by Kirk Hiner for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

• 1Password: Password storage software
• MacFamilyTree: Family information storage
• DEVONthink: Media file storage and organization
• Flux: XHTML and CSS web design assistant
• Default Folder X: Additional Open and Save dialog options
• Art Text + Fonts: Heading, logo, icon, and banner creation assistant
• Swift Publisher: Publishing software
• Chronories: Electronic diary
• Interarchy: File transfer app
• Typinator: Text auto-completion
• Star Wars Jedi Knight II: Action adventure game
• Mail Stationery: E-mail templates for Apple Mail

• 1Password: Password storage software
• MacFamilyTree: Family information storage
• DEVONthink: Media file storage and organization
• Flux: XHTML and CSS web design assistant
• Default Folder X: Additional Open and Save dialog options
• Art Text + Fonts: Heading, logo, icon, and banner creation assistant
• Swift Publisher: Publishing software
• Chronories: Electronic diary
• Interarchy: File transfer app
• Typinator: Text auto-completion
• Star Wars Jedi Knight II: Action adventure game
• Mail Stationery: E-mail templates for Apple Mail

• onSale.com: Checkout the best deals during the 60 hour Black Friday Sale, best prices of the year! Plus receive Free Shipping on most of the orders.
• LaCie 2TB External Hi-Speed USB 2.0 Hard Disk for only $99.99
• Dell Inc. 1320c Color Laser Printer for only $139.99
• Apple 8GB iPod touch for only $224.00
• HP Pavilion Slimline s5414y AMD Athlon II X2 215 2.70GHz Desktop for only $339.99
• HP Smart Buy ProBook 4520s Intel Core i3-370M 2.40GHz Notebook for only $549.00
• Apple 13.3" MacBook Intel Core 2 Duo 2.4GHz Notebook for only $969.99

Along with games from Sega, Gameloft and more

If you're looking for games for your iPhone or iPad, there's no better time than now. Thanks to, well, Thanksgiving, and the Black Friday sales several of the major app studios, and some minor, have heavily discounted many of their titles, including massive faves such as Fruit Ninja and ChuChu Rocket.

Gameloft has, perhaps, made the most broad-ranging cuts in its games library, with many iPad and iPhone titles slashed to 59p until Sunday 28 December. For example, both versions of the action game Iron Man 2 are now 59p, as is the iPad's Splinter Cell Conviction HD.

And both of the company's Shrek games are included.

Sega has joined in the fun with massive reductions on several games, with, among others, the brand new Sonic the Hedgehog 4 Episode 1 being available for ?2.99, and ChuChu Rocket HD (for the iPad) available at ?1.79.

The newly acquired Electronic Arts offshoot label Chillingo has a selection of its Apple device titles on sale, including Cogs HD and Parking Mania HD. But we suspect that it will be Halfbrick Studios' massive hit Fruit Ninja that will be shooting to the top of the charts (again) as the iPad version, Fruit Ninja HD, has been discounted to ?1.79 - 40 per cent off its usual retail price.

Now, if only we'd bought the 64GB iPad...

The discounted games in full

Gameloft

-?Asphalt 5 (iPhone - 59p)

-?Iron Man 2 (iPhone - 59p)

- Iron Man 2 for iPad (iPad - 59p)

- Splinter Cell Conviction HD?(iPad - 59p)

- Shrek Forever After: The Game HD?(iPad - 59p)

-?Hero of Sparta 2 (iPhone - 59p)

- Hero of Sparta 2 HD?(iPad - 59p)

-?Brothers in Arms 2: Global Front (iPhone - 59p)

- Brothers in Arms 2: Global Front HD?(iPad - 59p)

-?The Settlers (iPhone - 59p)

- The Settlers HD?(iPad - 59p)

-?Let's Golf 2 (iPhone - 59p)

- Let's Golf 2 HD?(iPad - 59p)

-?Shrek Kart (iPhone - 59p)

- Shrek Kart HD?(iPad - 59p)

-?NFL 2011 (iPhone - 59p)

-?UNO (iPhone - 59p)

Plus, not part of the deal, but also discounted at present:

- Assassin's Creed - Altair's Chronicles (iPhone - 59p)

Sega

- Sonic the Hedgehog 4 Episode 1 (iPhone - ?2.99)

- Super Monkey Ball 2 (iPhone - 59p)

- Super Monkey Ball 2: Sakura Edition (iPad - ?1.79)

- Phantasy Star II (iPhone - 59p)

- Golden Axe (iPhone - 59p)

- ChuChu Rocket (iPhone - 59p)

- ChuChu Rocket HD (iPad - ?1.79)

Halfbrick Studios

- Fruit Ninja HD (iPad - ?1.79)

Chillingo

- Cogs HD (iPad - ?2.99)

- Billabong Surf Trip (iPhone & iPad - ?1.79)

- Radio Flare REDUX (iPhone - ?1.79)

- Radio Flare REDUX HD (iPad - ?2.99)

- Parking Mania HD (iPad - ?1.79)

- Defender Chronicles - Legend of the Desert King (iPad - ?1.79)

- Master of Alchemy (iPhone - ?1.79)

- Master of Alchemy HD (iPad - ?2.99)

- Fiona’s Flowers HD (iPad - ?1.19)

Tags: Mobile phone apps Gaming Fruit Ninja Black Friday Fruit Ninja HD Gameloft Sega iPad iPhone iPad apps iPhone apps

Black Friday sales hit App Store as iPad Fruit Ninja HD heavily discounted originally appeared on http://www.pocket-lint.com on Wed, 24 Nov 2010 15:48:08 +0000

The author of the web's first worm-virus, teamed with a man who dresses as a medieval warrior and goes to battle on the weekends and a woman who follows World of Warcraft, acupuncture and ballet, have raised $24 million dollars to storm the gates of the Google Castle. They got incredible press coverage when their new search engine, called Blekko, launched this week - but they are probably going to get slaughtered.

In the meantime, they have provided an opportunity for countless other freaks and geeks to use the magical tool they've built to grow our stature wherever we work; to cut through information overload, to shine a bright light on opportunities and to augment our minds with the snap of a finger. Read on for my advice about how to use Blekko and we'll use it well - for as long as it lasts.

Sponsor

What is Blekko?

Blekko was the name of company CEO Rich Skrenta's first networked computer. Skrenta was 15 years old when he wrote the Elk Cloner virus that infected Apple II machines in 1982; it is believed to have been the first large-scale self-spreading personal computer virus ever created. Skrenta went on to work on the Amiga at Commodore, then at Sun Microsystems, then co-founded the Netscape-acquired Dmoz and the Tribune/Gannett/Knight Ridder-acquired local news search engine Topix.

Now he's raised funding from a group of investors that include Marc Andreeson, to build Blekko. His band of freaky geeks include CTO and Society for Creative Anachronisms member Greg Lindahl and community manager Cheralyn Watson, who prioritized being ready for the WoW and ballet communities in the days leading up to Blekko's launch. (I found that quite charming.) The entire Blekko team includes more than 20 people.

What have these people built?

Blekko, simply put, is a social Custom Search Engine creation service with RSS feeds. It lets users curate and subscribe to mini-search engines that return results only from selected websites, thus increasing the signal to noise ratio and tightly controlling the context of search results.

If you've used Google Custom Search, really used it, that very powerful tool has been improved upon in Blekko because the latter was built to search large groups of sites and to have those groups shared and edited.

I used Google Custom Search all day, every day, to query my defined sets of blogs from technology analysts, geolocation specialists, semantic web scientists, youth marketing bloggers, English-language Asian tech bloggers and more, about whatever topics we're writing about here at ReadWriteWeb.

These Custom Search Engines are like dynamic reference books, populated by the blog archives of topical experts. They are things of magic - but Google CSE has never caught on beyond its widespread use as an embedded search box for a single website. That's tragic, if inevitable: the most powerful magic on the web will never be appreciated in its making, only in its results. Those of us who appreciate its making get to make some it ourselves. But more on that in a minute.

Blekko launched this week to big write-ups in the Wall St. Journal, the New York Times, TechCrunch and a flood of other outlets all over Techmeme. Frankly, I think it got all that press because it's backed by Andreeson, makes big claims about improving on Google, talks smack about red-hot content farm Demand Media as part of its pitch, has founders with very credible pedigrees and has good PR. But the general response to the company's product has been confusion and doubt.

As a regular and heavy user of Custom Search Engines, I've got some ideas about why most people are unlikely to appreciate the beauty and power of Blekko. But cynicism is cheap. Strategic advice on how to most effectively use a good tool is far more valuable and interesting.

How to Be a Blekko Power User, For Fun and Profit

I'd like to share a few thoughts about how I'm planning on using Blekko, based on the strengths and weaknesses of Google Custom Search. But first some assumptions:

• I'm going to assume that you work in a field where high-quality information is valuable.
• 
  
• I'm going to assume that you can imagine the value of first mover's advantage, when it comes to information.

I believe that everyone works in a field like that, most people just don't know it.

First step, compile yourself a magic collection.

A searchable collection of your industry's top blogs and websites allows you to quickly put any topic in context, based on what the most knowledgeable people in your field have written about that topic in the past.

I've built scores of Custom Search Engines, but the first one I put into production is something I call my Magic Search. It's a collection of 25 of the top Web 2.0 news and review blogs on the web - all our competitors here at ReadWriteWeb.

I do a Magic Search whenever I see a new company or website, to see if and what our competitors have written about it. Last week, for example, someone sent us a link to the incredible website MapCrunch (like StumbleUpon for world-wide Google Street View views, try it!) and I was impressed. I did a Magic Search for it and with a snap of my fingers found that two of our biggest competitors had already written about it 3 weeks prior. (I hate to tell you how the sausage is made, readers, but if any of the leading tech blogs finds out that something has been written about by a competitor 3 weeks ago, then that would mean that we are 3 weeks behind if we write about it afterwords. There is nothing a leading tech blogger hates more than being considered behind the times. So I tweeted about it, and I'm telling you about that wonderful site now.)

If I'm writing about a company and I am being a good blogger who wants to mention competitors in providing the same type of search, I Magic Search it. For example, this week Nick Bilton wrote about the new email snooze-button service Nudgemail at the New York Times and got slammed in comments for failing to mention another service that had been providing the same kind of service for years. I reviewed Nudgemail after Bilton, and I made sure not to make the same mistake. I Magic Searched the neglected competing company and found that it had been written about by my competitors a number of times, along with still other companies providing the same type of service. So I included links to all of them in my write-up and I think it made for a pretty snazzy article.

If I want to know what startups provide a particular kind of service, I Magic Search it. If I want to know what my competitors have written about a person in our sector, I Magic Search them. If I want background on anyone or anything I'm looking at, background drawn from the archives of specialists in my field, I Magic Search it.

It's awesome. I've got it on my phone, I've got it on my browser toolbar and I've got it a couple of other places I won't mention here.

I've built that and my other Custom Search Engines with Google CSE, but Blekko is a very nice alternative. It provides a clean, sharable URL. It can be collaboratively edited. It handles search across hundreds of domains in one collection very nicely. It offers date-based search in a click. Blekko is a better service than Google CSE and I plan on moving all my engines there, as soon as the company offers a way for me to share them privately with my co-workers and no one else. Blekko's management says that's on the development road-map but not available yet.

Quick tips:

• Build a collection of top blogs on any topic using any of these methods, or others - or just Google for "top blogs in X" and grab someone else's list to turn into a custom search engine.
• 
  
• If you find a list on a page - try putting that page through LinkLeecher or some other way to quickly scrape the URLs off the page and into your Custom Search Engine creation tool. Sometimes I'll open a text editor next to a browser page, drag the URLs onto the text editor, then find and replace all instances of "http" with "[linebreak] http".
• 
  
• If you've got a collection of the top blogs on any topic built, there are any number of things you can do with that, if you're creative.

Next step: Building Collections on the fly.
Content on the public web is searchable and the savvy searcher will manipulate that content to search it the way they want it.

Both Blekko and Google CSE are well-suited for carefully curated collections. Blekko in particular encourages the creation and maintenance of high-quality custom search engines with its easy collaborative editing, subscription to updates and more.

Sometimes you've got to do it quick and dirty, though.

Here's a story. This Spring I was hired to be one of the official event bloggers at a crazy conference called Techonomy. Bizarrely creative and accomplished people from all around the world came to speak at the event about how to use technology to solve the world's great problems (water, food, poverty, pollution, etc.)

The night before the event, a co-worker and I scraped the names and associated URLs from the pages listing the speakers at the event. I then threw those URLs into a Custom Search Engine that I used to do super-fast research while blogging on the conference floor. "Speaker X says A,B and C. That's something that Organization Y, also participating at the event today, has posted the following white papers about in their website archives." That worked really well.

While I was at it, I also put the names and URLs into a .csv file, uploaded them into Amazon's Mechanical Turk and paid $50 to have people around the world collect the Twitter handles, country-of origin and gender for each of the several hundred event participants. It took them about 90 minutes. I then created Twitter lists of all the participants, the women participants and the international participants, in part so I could put all three lists into Tweetdeck and make sure that as I was covering the event, I could track what people with different backgrounds were saying about the day. I also envisioned those lists being loaded into Flipboard, so you could have an iPad magazine made up of all the links shared by women who had attended the Techonomy conference, for example.

A few years prior, I did the same thing (and more) with companies launching at the DEMO conference, so whenever I was thinking about one, I could quickly search the websites of all the others and determine who else was working in the same sector.

Last week my mother emailed me to ask if I knew the educational technology speaker visiting her school that day. I didn't, but it took about 5 minutes to create an EdTech CSE and find what some of the most respected edtech bloggers online had said about the man. He and my mom ended up having lunch together and talking about the internet, which was pretty cool.

These on-the-fly CSEs are particularly well-suited to Blekko because anyone can then suggest revisions later. More importantly: it's a social community where you may find that someone else has already built the engine you're looking for and you can just grab it and go.

Quick Tips:

• I've trained myself to see a list of anything and think CSE. If you've got, or want to create, folders in an RSS reader - it's relatively simple to export your subscriptions, open the OPML file in a text editor, see how simple it is and delete all the subscriptions except for the topic folder in question. Resave it, then you can upload the new .OPML file into Blekko. That's a very nice feature, OPML import.
• 
  
• The more you think in terms of URLs, the content they hold, the other URLs they are linked-to and the feeds that are associated with them - the more permutations for searching you can think of. The sky is the limit and it's a very rational system.

Finally, CSEs plus RSS equals a key to any inner sanctum. RSS feeds have been my bread and butter since becoming a professional blogger, and they are really what captured my interest more than anything when I first discovered social media. When I was just getting started (ok, sometimes I still do this), I would take the RSS feed of one or more blogs I really admired and I'd run them through an RSS to Instant Messaging service. These days, my favorite is Notify.me.

I'd get an IM within minutes of any post going up on a blog I really admired, and if I could make a meaningful value-add to the conversation, I'd jump right over and be the first person to leave a comment on the post. I'd do that just often enough to get their attention but not often enough to be annoying. (But where do you find interesting things to add to the conversation? If only there was some way to quickly search for keywords and tidbits in the archives of a collection of topical experts in any field!)

I used to do a whole lot of hitch-hiking and developed the ability to listen and converse with just about anyone, regarding just about anything. Participating in blog conversations is a much safer way to do that.

So - let's say you've got a good collection of topical expert blogs built up and you've got it put into Blekko so you can search against their archives. Guess what? Blekko offers RSS feeds for your search queries! That's awesome.

Take what parts of this you will, but I'll tell you what I'm going to do: I'm going to make sure that all the hundreds of geolocation experts who blog online know that I'm interested in geofencing and history because I'm going to subscribe to a feed for those two search terms in my big Blekko search engine of geolocation blogs. I'm going to read everything they write on the topic and I'll probably leave a comment whenever I can do so appropriately. Thank you, Blekko.

Google Custom Search does not offer RSS feeds. It has to be given a cookie and told to roll over just to get it to try to show you something close to the most recent search results inside your collection.

What Does it Mean?

These are just the ways that I intend to use Blekko, based on my experience using Google Custom Search and the ways that the two services are different. Maybe you've got other strategies in mind.

But here's how I see the three strategies above:

This is how I will assemble a magic reference book, a Dictionary, Encyclopedia and Atlas of the Past, Present and Future of...any topic I want.

This is how I will see a field, or a group of people and companies described online, and with a quick scrape be able to query deep into their online histories. Imagine looking at a set of people's names online, using find and replace to build a set of Google Social Graph query URLs to discover their blogs, bookmarks, Twitter accounts and more, then putting those URLs into Blekko. If that works, that's like 5 minutes of set-up to enable yourself to ask "who in this room has ever bookmarked or tweeted a web page about topics X, Y or Z?" Hello dreamy social search engine!

This is how I will hone in on conversations in the future, among any set of experts, on any topics of interest to me. That's going to be very high signal and very low noise. That's like pulling a sliver of knowledge from the future and putting it straight into your brain - then sliding down it to arrive exactly where the conversations emerge, so that you can participate in them.

Will Blekko Succeed?

Clearly, only the ten people still reading this article and I are ever going to do the above - and we're going to have to click on a whole lot of ads to keep this puppy in business!

The rest of the world is unlikely to build Blekko-collections of their own because the cognitive overhead of curation is of a fundamentally different quantity and quality than the simpler requirements of consumption. People have compared Blekko to the recently launched Cuil because of the hype, but better comparisons could be made to the valiant but failed roll-your-own search engines like Rollyo, Swicki and Hittery. Not enough people with good intentions (not spammers) were willing to put the time in to use these tools well.

Blekko will attempt to compensate for this by automatically serving up search results from hand-curated custom search engines on big popular topics. That will help direct searchers to the Mayo Clinic's webpage for "cure for the common cold" instead of Demand Media's eHow page on the subject, which is of clear commercial intent and questionable worth if you ask the Blekko team. Mayo Clinic doesn't have SEO people on staff, but Demand Media does, Blekko points out - so they built a health "slashtag" that includes Mayo's site but excludes Demand sites. Health search queries are performed inside that slashtag by default.

Will that matter, though? Will millions of people rush with open arms into the unfamiliar, even if it's clearly superior upon the slightest investigation? Will people choose what's best for them? Will they choose what's most powerful and beautiful, instead of that which is easy and must remind itself constantly to "Not be Evil?"

I would submit that if people were likely to make such choices, the world would be a very different place than it is today.

But in the meantime, fellow benevolent hackers, fellow dreamers of antiquity who find ourselves on the web, fellow fans of ballet, acupuncture and other romantic, unorthodox pursuits --- when we find ourselves with a need to search, in a cruel and banal world, may we use tools like Blekko. May we use them to dive deep into the archival knowledge of the finest writers and thinkers in our respective fields. To survey quickly what any set of people online have said before. And to track what our most trusted sources say regarding any topic, anytime in the future.

Even if no one else understands. They don't all need to understand, because in the hyper-linked, flash-curated, streaming social world of the future - those of us who know how to dance among the links and the fleeting, beautiful startups that overestimate most of humanity's capacity for intellectual engagement before crumbling into craven ad networks just to keep the lights on - those of us who can do the power user's dance in those circumstances will know that our positions are secure and that the web will be ours to create on. And we'll treasure beautiful things like Blekko, whether the rest of the world does or not.

Mariah Carey won't just be sitting at home waiting for the stork to drop by. She is seriously ready to promote her new album Merry Christmas II You.  She's recently announced a new TV special and we have those deets inside, plus the scoop on whether Lil' Wayne will perform at Drake's last show.

Mariah Carey has announced the production of an ABC special “Mariah Carey: Merry Christmas to You,” set to air next month.  The special, airing December 13 at 9pm Eastern Time, will be taped at the historic Orpheum Theater in Los Angeles.  Can't f'in wait.

Lil Wayne will be released from prison on Thursday and is rumored to be appearing at the final stop of Drake's "Light Dreams and Nightmares Tour" two days later on November 6th in Vegas.  Stirring up the rumors is Drake himself who told MTV News, "I would just advise you to book a ticket out there. If you can get tickets to that show on the 6th, I would strongly advise it."  After release, Weezy is expected to travel to Miami to reunite with his family.  

"I think what's important, we want to see family first," said Bryan "Baby" Willams, Cash Money Records CEO, when asked about a rumored Big Apple concert on the day of Wayne's release.

"If the concert happens, it happens. But right now, we just want to come home and see our family and party, I think. That's what we gonna do: just come to Miami, and just party for a minute. Work and party and play. Have the whole team out here, and we gonna do it up. Miami is gonna be Weezy world. Weezy weekend."

Lil' Wayne has managed to remain successful while away from the spotlight. His current album debuted at #1 on the Billboard Top 200 albums and his collab with Drake, "Right Above It" is steadily climbing up the top 20 the Billboard "Hot 100" chart. 

Here's what Drake said to MTV News:

Photos via Getty

The milky-hued magic of Old World Spirits' La Sorcière absinthe

PHOTO BY VIRGINIA MILLER

virginia@sfbg.com

It's a thrilling time in Bay Area spirits. The same players who've made us proud in years past continue to reinvent themselves, while newcomers add flavor — literally — to the scene. In visits to four local distilleries, I came away inspired by their inventiveness and skill. And while none of the spirits I tasted use extracts or flavorings (like many of their big-brand counterparts), they do manage to fit in countless pounds of local, unexpected fruits, even natural herbs.

Even more exciting to the small batch booze enthusiast? Most of the following distilleries open their tasting rooms by schedule or appointment so the tippling public can discover for itself the motto emblazoned on the bottles of Old World Spirits: "Good stuff needs no special effects."

ST. GEORGE'S SPIRITS

At the mighty St. George, inventiveness reigns, with a rock star attitude to boot. The distillery's small staff experiments broadly and distillers Lance Winters and Dave Smith drive this license into genius. A behind-the-scenes journey through their labs unveiled nothing short of a wonderland apothecary: test tubes and bottles of spirits flavored with herbs, fruits, vegetables, foie gras — even beef jerky. You may (rightly) love their eaux de vie, absinthe, agave spirits, rum, vodkas, and whiskeys, but have you heard they're toying with a carrot brandy? Clear and vegetal, it showcases the essence of the orange vegetable with a delicate hand. We can only pray they'll bottle this one.

I also sampled St. George's bourbon aging in charred American white oak that was a few years away from being officially bottled. Only five months young and made from the required minimum amount of corn (it needs at least 51 percent to qualify as bourbon) plus barley, crystal malt, wheat, and rye, it's full of malty, rich promise. The same holds true of its white dog (clear-white whiskey) made from the same grains — one we could possibly see sooner on the shelves.

St. George's next single malt whiskey, Lot 9, has been aging five to 12 years in barrels blended with 17 woods, including used American bourbon oak, sherry refills, port refills, and French oak. If you're lucky, you soon may be able to purchase (in limited quantities) a single malt-single barrel selection that has been aged eight years in bourbon barrels then finished for four years in French oak apple brandy barrels. It is a wonder of complexity compared to their regular whiskey releases.

Only the brave attempt to down the scorching fire that is St. George's in house habanero vodka. Grown men confessed of crying or throwing up just sipping it — only a handful of people have downed a legitimate amount and have been permitted to sign the distillery's bottle of the burn. But my name is on that bottle — no tears, no throwing up, just a raging habanero sizzle.

2601 Monarch, Alameda. (510) 769-1601. www.stgeorgesspirits.com

CHARBAY

On a winding road above St. Helena and under peaceful Spring Mountain pines, there's more going on than this distillery's impeccable line of vodkas. Thirteen generations have gone into this family business, founded in 1983 and run by Miles and Susan Karakasevic, their son Marko, and his wife Jenni. The distillery's lineage is evident to the discerning tippler who sips their port, rums, pastis, brandy, grappa, wines — even their herbaceous tequila. Charbay's father-son distilling duo traveled to Mexico to painstakingly learn traditional tequila-making technique, which they expertly riff on to make their distinct blends.

Don't even get me started on Release II of Charbay whiskey! 110 proof, aged six years with a pilsner beer base, it's a stratospheric $325, but one of the most exceptional things I've ever tasted. From its astounding complexity, I caught everything from hops to echoes of the pine trees surrounding the distillery. I also sampled an unreleased 12-year version of Release II: higher proof, rich, a stunner.

But there's no rest for the Karakasevics. Future whiskeys are already aging in French oak barrels — the one I'm most thirsty for, a stout whiskey, won't be ready until 2012. If early tastes are any indication, it's already brilliantly complex with coffee, spice, and dark chocolate notes. Made with neighboring Bear Republic's stout in copper alembic stills, it'll age for two years to reach 90 proof and is expected to retail around $90 — part of a younger, more affordable line of whiskeys compared with the divine but costly Release II. The bold explorer spirit that propels Charbay to Mexico to make a fine tequila shines in their future whiskeys.

TEMPUS FUGIT SPIRITS

These importers have already made waves with their Swiss-produced Gran Classico Bitter, which I hailed for reinventing classic cocktails like the Negroni. They also import some of the best French and Swiss absinthes in existence. Absinthe historians and spirits experts Peter Schaf and John Troia are the masterminds behind Tempus Fugit — and owners of one of the finest vintage absinthe poster collections in the world. It was a thrill to check out these rare pieces while tasting the history and forward-thinking vision in their bitters and liqueurs.

Tempus Fugit's modus operandi is reinventing classic recipes and distilling them locally. Petaluma-produced Liqueur de Violettes is next up for the duo, a taste along the lines of Creme de Violette and other violet liqueurs yet somehow unlike any of them. Made with less sugar, the liqueur is a more appropriate cocktail ingredient — it's less cloying, more purely floral and light. Each time I sample it, its bouquet blossoms like a layered wine: a sophisticated, botanical aperitif.

Tempus Fugit future project (a two-man team, after all, only has four hands) is Crème de Cacao-Chouva, a chocolate liqueur that will change chocolate cocktails the way St. George's Firelit transformed coffee liqueur. It's dark, lightly sweet, lush and earthy. Tasting it, I envision a resurgence of my guilty pleasure cocktail, the Grasshopper, refined and grown up with Crème de Cacao-Chouva and creme de menthe. It came alive with soda water — an elevated egg cream soda materialized in my cocktail windshield.

Keep an eye on these guys. They have more spirits and bitters as exciting as the ones I've listed in the works. Their dizzying knowledge of the history and intricacies of forgotten or neglected spirits, along with refined taste, suggests revelatory possibilities for the future pours of Tempus Fugit.

(707) 789-9660, www.tempusfugitspirits.com

OLD WORLD SPIRITS

Just north of San Carlos in a nondescript smattering of office buildings, is Old World Spirits, which has been in production since 2009. Davorin Kuchan, its third-generation distiller from Croatia, says family plays an irreplaceable part in the operation, as is evident from the photos lining the walls of the distillery. The whole clan is involved — Kuchan's young daughter even drew the girl peeking out from foliage that graces Old World's playful absinthe label. The output of both Davorin and business partner Joseph Karakas is astounding for a two-person operation, with two absinthes, a gin, a black walnut liqueur, three eaux de vie/brandies, and more liquors slotted for future release.

Old World uses custom-made German stills and local fruits like the Indian blood peach, which Davorin calls the "heirloom tomato" of stone fruit. As with the best natural fruits, the Indian blood has cracks and flaws, its lower sugar content imparting a lush understatement of taste. Though he grew the peaches himself in Croatia, in California Davorin orders in from Placerville's Goldbud Farms. The clear blood peach eau de vie impresses with notes of ripe, juicy fruit flesh and spicy skin. I found Old World's eaux de vies well-balanced, both the pear-inflected Poire Williams and the three- to seven-months oak-aged O'Henry Peach. I sipped a raspberry eau di vie it has yet to release: clear and lightly floral, free of the cloying sugar common in raspberry liqueurs.

Watch for Old World's sold out dark black walnut liqueur — another batch is out in two years. Kuchan's Blade Gin stocks the shelves of many a Bay Area bar, journeying down a nontraditional, California-inspired gin route with whispers of ginger, citrus, cilantro, lemon verbena, and black cardamom. Two kinds of absinthe, a green (verte) and clear blanche/white (referred to as Bleue, as in Switzerland), take cues from classic absinthes but resound with Davorin's interpretation of 20 percent more herbs than what enlivens a traditional absinthe. Old World's next release: a Cognac-style double barrel brandy aged in French and American oak and finished in Kentucky bourbon casks, which they hope to release soon. My early taste straight from the barrel yielded an already rich, spicy brandy.

Thirsty yet? Visit Davorin and Joseph during their monthly Friday Flight nights. Davorin will turn on some fine French pop tunes as both pour spirits, transforming the distillery into a warm familial party.

121 Industrial, Belmont. (650) 622-9222. www.oldworldspirits.com 

You can also find these spirits at Cask (17 Third St., SF), John Walker & Co. (175 Sutter, SF), and K&L Wine Merchants (638 Fourth St., SF).

The milky-hued magic of Old World Spirits' La Sorcière absinthe

PHOTO BY VIRGINIA MILLER

virginia@sfbg.com

It's a thrilling time in Bay Area spirits. The same players who've made us proud in years past continue to reinvent themselves, while newcomers add flavor — literally — to the scene. In visits to four local distilleries, I came away inspired by their inventiveness and skill. And while none of the spirits I tasted use extracts or flavorings (like many of their big-brand counterparts), they do manage to fit in countless pounds of local, unexpected fruits, even natural herbs.

Even more exciting to the small batch booze enthusiast? Most of the following distilleries open their tasting rooms by schedule or appointment so the tippling public can discover for itself the motto emblazoned on the bottles of Old World Spirits: "Good stuff needs no special effects."

ST. GEORGE'S SPIRITS

At the mighty St. George, inventiveness reigns, with a rock star attitude to boot. The distillery's small staff experiments broadly and distillers Lance Winters and Dave Smith drive this license into genius. A behind-the-scenes journey through their labs unveiled nothing short of a wonderland apothecary: test tubes and bottles of spirits flavored with herbs, fruits, vegetables, foie gras — even beef jerky. You may (rightly) love their eaux de vie, absinthe, agave spirits, rum, vodkas, and whiskeys, but have you heard they're toying with a carrot brandy? Clear and vegetal, it showcases the essence of the orange vegetable with a delicate hand. We can only pray they'll bottle this one.

I also sampled St. George's bourbon aging in charred American white oak that was a few years away from being officially bottled. Only five months young and made from the required minimum amount of corn (it needs at least 51 percent to qualify as bourbon) plus barley, crystal malt, wheat, and rye, it's full of malty, rich promise. The same holds true of its white dog (clear-white whiskey) made from the same grains — one we could possibly see sooner on the shelves.

St. George's next single malt whiskey, Lot 9, has been aging five to 12 years in barrels blended with 17 woods, including used American bourbon oak, sherry refills, port refills, and French oak. If you're lucky, you soon may be able to purchase (in limited quantities) a single malt-single barrel selection that has been aged eight years in bourbon barrels then finished for four years in French oak apple brandy barrels. It is a wonder of complexity compared to their regular whiskey releases.

Only the brave attempt to down the scorching fire that is St. George's in house habanero vodka. Grown men confessed of crying or throwing up just sipping it — only a handful of people have downed a legitimate amount and have been permitted to sign the distillery's bottle of the burn. But my name is on that bottle — no tears, no throwing up, just a raging habanero sizzle.

2601 Monarch, Alameda. (510) 769-1601. www.stgeorgesspirits.com

CHARBAY

On a winding road above St. Helena and under peaceful Spring Mountain pines, there's more going on than this distillery's impeccable line of vodkas. Thirteen generations have gone into this family business, founded in 1983 and run by Miles and Susan Karakasevic, their son Marko, and his wife Jenni. The distillery's lineage is evident to the discerning tippler who sips their port, rums, pastis, brandy, grappa, wines — even their herbaceous tequila. Charbay's father-son distilling duo traveled to Mexico to painstakingly learn traditional tequila-making technique, which they expertly riff on to make their distinct blends.

Don't even get me started on Release II of Charbay whiskey! 110 proof, aged six years with a pilsner beer base, it's a stratospheric $325, but one of the most exceptional things I've ever tasted. From its astounding complexity, I caught everything from hops to echoes of the pine trees surrounding the distillery. I also sampled an unreleased 12-year version of Release II: higher proof, rich, a stunner.

But there's no rest for the Karakasevics. Future whiskeys are already aging in French oak barrels — the one I'm most thirsty for, a stout whiskey, won't be ready until 2012. If early tastes are any indication, it's already brilliantly complex with coffee, spice, and dark chocolate notes. Made with neighboring Bear Republic's stout in copper alembic stills, it'll age for two years to reach 90 proof and is expected to retail around $90 — part of a younger, more affordable line of whiskeys compared with the divine but costly Release II. The bold explorer spirit that propels Charbay to Mexico to make a fine tequila shines in their future whiskeys.

TEMPUS FUGIT SPIRITS

These importers have already made waves with their Swiss-produced Gran Classico Bitter, which I hailed for reinventing classic cocktails like the Negroni. They also import some of the best French and Swiss absinthes in existence. Absinthe historians and spirits experts Peter Schaf and John Troia are the masterminds behind Tempus Fugit — and owners of one of the finest vintage absinthe poster collections in the world. It was a thrill to check out these rare pieces while tasting the history and forward-thinking vision in their bitters and liqueurs.

Tempus Fugit's modus operandi is reinventing classic recipes and distilling them locally. Petaluma-produced Liqueur de Violettes is next up for the duo, a taste along the lines of Creme de Violette and other violet liqueurs yet somehow unlike any of them. Made with less sugar, the liqueur is a more appropriate cocktail ingredient — it's less cloying, more purely floral and light. Each time I sample it, its bouquet blossoms like a layered wine: a sophisticated, botanical aperitif.

Tempus Fugit future project (a two-man team, after all, only has four hands) is Crème de Cacao-Chouva, a chocolate liqueur that will change chocolate cocktails the way St. George's Firelit transformed coffee liqueur. It's dark, lightly sweet, lush and earthy. Tasting it, I envision a resurgence of my guilty pleasure cocktail, the Grasshopper, refined and grown up with Crème de Cacao-Chouva and creme de menthe. It came alive with soda water — an elevated egg cream soda materialized in my cocktail windshield.

Keep an eye on these guys. They have more spirits and bitters as exciting as the ones I've listed in the works. Their dizzying knowledge of the history and intricacies of forgotten or neglected spirits, along with refined taste, suggests revelatory possibilities for the future pours of Tempus Fugit.

(707) 789-9660, www.tempusfugitspirits.com

OLD WORLD SPIRITS

Just north of San Carlos in a nondescript smattering of office buildings, is Old World Spirits, which has been in production since 2009. Davorin Kuchan, its third-generation distiller from Croatia, says family plays an irreplaceable part in the operation, as is evident from the photos lining the walls of the distillery. The whole clan is involved — Kuchan's young daughter even drew the girl peeking out from foliage that graces Old World's playful absinthe label. The output of both Davorin and business partner Joseph Karakas is astounding for a two-person operation, with two absinthes, a gin, a black walnut liqueur, three eaux de vie/brandies, and more liquors slotted for future release.

Old World uses custom-made German stills and local fruits like the Indian blood peach, which Davorin calls the "heirloom tomato" of stone fruit. As with the best natural fruits, the Indian blood has cracks and flaws, its lower sugar content imparting a lush understatement of taste. Though he grew the peaches himself in Croatia, in California Davorin orders in from Placerville's Goldbud Farms. The clear blood peach eau de vie impresses with notes of ripe, juicy fruit flesh and spicy skin. I found Old World's eaux de vies well-balanced, both the pear-inflected Poire Williams and the three- to seven-months oak-aged O'Henry Peach. I sipped a raspberry eau di vie it has yet to release: clear and lightly floral, free of the cloying sugar common in raspberry liqueurs.

Watch for Old World's sold out dark black walnut liqueur — another batch is out in two years. Kuchan's Blade Gin stocks the shelves of many a Bay Area bar, journeying down a nontraditional, California-inspired gin route with whispers of ginger, citrus, cilantro, lemon verbena, and black cardamom. Two kinds of absinthe, a green (verte) and clear blanche/white (referred to as Bleue, as in Switzerland), take cues from classic absinthes but resound with Davorin's interpretation of 20 percent more herbs than what enlivens a traditional absinthe. Old World's next release: a Cognac-style double barrel brandy aged in French and American oak and finished in Kentucky bourbon casks, which they hope to release soon. My early taste straight from the barrel yielded an already rich, spicy brandy.

Thirsty yet? Visit Davorin and Joseph during their monthly Friday Flight nights. Davorin will turn on some fine French pop tunes as both pour spirits, transforming the distillery into a warm familial party.

121 Industrial, Belmont. (650) 622-9222. www.oldworldspirits.com 

You can also find these spirits at Cask (17 Third St., SF), John Walker & Co. (175 Sutter, SF), and K&L Wine Merchants (638 Fourth St., SF).

It seemed like the right forum, but the CIPA Xmas Party took its toll ...

Climate change: not yet blamed on IP ...

Legal scholarship starts early these days

Is the Digital Economy Act 2010 the most effective and proportionate way to reduce online piracy?

It’s Wednesday, which means it’s time to start fasting in order to make room for the parade of gustatory delights that awaits at the Grub Street Food Festival. And it’s also time to come up with a game plan — as much as you’re going to want to, you’re not going to be able to bite into every bun, tuck into every taco, pound every empanada, tear into every tequeño, and bask in every biscuit. (If you somehow manage to do so, please blog about it so we can link to you!) So to help you along, here’s a look at just some of what will be spilling out of the cornucopia this Saturday from 10 a.m. till 6 p.m. Expect surprises, and remember it’s free; it’s at the intersection of Hester and Essex Streets; and it’s rain, hail, or shine!

Macao Trading Co.
Mushroom and truffle croquettes
Chicken dumplings

The Commodore
Pork dogs: a foot-long version of a popular sandwich on rotation at the restaurant featuring slow-roasted pork, cole slaw, pickles, and baked beans

Grandaisy Bakery
Fresh rustic Italian breads
Roman-style pizzas
Pastries
Non-perishables like biscotti pratessi

Purple Yam
Chicken adobo with rice and cucumber salad
Pork adobo with rice and cucumber salad
Fresh lumpia (stir-fried Napa cabbage, leeks, jicama, and beansprouts) with garlic caramel sauce
Kian’s pork-belly buns
Buko (young coconut) pie

Cheeky Sandwiches
Braised short ribs with wild arugula and cherry tomatoes topped with horseradish sauce
Fried chicken on a buttermilk biscuit with coleslaw and gravy

Pain D'Avignon
Fresh Artisan bread

Mile End Delicatessen
Smoked-meat sandwiches

Pies N Thighs
Chicken biscuit: fried chicken cutlet with honey-butter and hot sauce on our biscuit
Concord Biscuits: homemade Concord grape jelly with cream cheese on our biscuit
Autumn Salad: cabbage, apple, toasted spicy almonds, red onion, and cilantro
Mini-Molasses-Cookies: spicy and chewy molasses cookies
Lemonade: our classic lemonade
Sweet Tea: our classic sweet tea
Renegade: lightly sweetened fresh ginger tea

Patacon Pisao
Cachapas (sweet-corn "crepes" stuffed with fresh mozzarella cheese, topped with creamy "nata")
Patacon (crispy plantain sandwich stuffed with chicken or beef layered with piece of white cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, and special sauce)
Tequenos (white cheese wrapped in dough and fried)
Empanadas (three kinds: chicken, beef, and black beans with cheese)

Luke’s Lobster
Lobster rolls

The Smile
Mini-version of our tickler grilled cheese with pickled red onions and tomato jam
Mini-version of our balsamic roasted chicken (pousson) with thyme-roasted red potatoes

Ditch Plains
Ditch dogs, sloppy dogs, clam chowder

Moo Life
Shrimp sliders with a mango cole slaw

Cascabel Taqueria
Fresh Soft Corn Tacos
Pollo Chipotle: amish chicken, avocado, green onion, chicken chicharron
Carnitas: slow roasted bershire pork butt, pickled red onion, roasted chili de
arbol
Churros: cinnamon-spiced Mexican doughnuts (three per order)
Chocolate Caliente: ancho-spiced hot chocolate

Employees Only
Balkan burger
Lime rickey
Pomegranate mint cooler

Pako Taco
Korean tacos

AnChoi
Caramelized pork-belly banh mi
Vietnamese beef meatballs on a bed of cucumber
Sweet rice stuffed with Mung bean (vegetarian friendly)

La Sonrisa
Savory Empanadas
1. Classic beef
2. Pulled pork
3. Roasted chicken
4. Vegetarian

Dessert Empanadas (Mini)
1. Feta and mint
2. Raspberry and dark chocolate

Sides
1. Saffron rice with guandules
2. Yuca (cassava) chips
3. Cuban corn
4. Sancocho (Stew)

Malbon Brothers BBQ
BBQ pulled-pork sandwich

Nijiya Market
Taiyaki/teriyaki

Georgia's Eastside BBQ
Applewood-smoked-chicken sandwich
Applewood-smoked-pulled-pork sandwich
Potato salad
Banana pudding
Sweat tea

Il Buco
Panna Cotta all’ Aceto Balsamico: “cooked cream” drizzled with ten-year-aged balsamic vinegar

Gloria's II & III
Doubles

Rhong - Tiam
Grilled duck breast wrapped with tamarind sauce
Coconut lemongrass chicken wrapped
Shrimp-mix chicken dumpling with ginger vinaigrette
King of Mushroom dumpling with Tamari chili sauce
Jasmine Thai iced tea
Beanthread and earwood mushroom summer roll and curry-infused peanut sauce

Wafels & Dinges
Belgian waffles

Sigmund Pretzelshop
Hand-rolled pretzels

Hot Blondies
Blondies: classic, butterscotch white chocolate, oatmeal raisin, peanut butter chocolate chunk
Brunettes: classic, s'mores, espresso white chocolate, Nutella hazelnut
Tarts: butter tarts, apple-pie tarts

Melt Bakery
Ice-cream sandwiches:
1. Jack: molasses cookies with pumpkin-pie ice cream
2. Kareem: pistachio baklava with pistachio gelato
3. Grog: chewy nutmeg cookies with eggnog ice cream
4. Classic: chocolate-chip-walnut cookies with vanilla bean ice cream

Fried Pies:
1. Original apple pie tossed in spiced sugar
2. Pumpkin pie with a graham-cracker crust tossed in ginger sugar

Macaron Parlour
Macarons: dig, apple-cider caramel, pumpkin, lemon, Thai chili, earl grey, and honey.
Hot chocolate

Green Brown Orange
Grilled Jamison farms lamb sausage with cranberry bean and shaved fennel salad
Roasted cauliflower soup with caramelized apples and rocket greens
Southold, Long Island seafood paella
Hot cider

BaconMarmalade
Original BaconMarmalade
Spicy BaconMarmalade on brioche toasts and pumpernickel toasts

Skim Kim
Skim's personal favorite Skimchee
BeetRabi Skimchee: Chioggia beets, white, and purple kohlrabi
Kimchee butter
Goguma Shepherd's pie
Served individually. Featuring smokey savoy cabbage skimchee and tons of pork. A Korean adaptation of a Scotch-Irish Favorite.

Kickstand Coffee
Iced coffee: Cafe Grumpy El Salvador Finca El Carmen
Pourover hot coffee: Ethiopia Suke Quto

Bao Bing
Mango and mango sorbet
Strawberry, mango, kiwi, and mango sorbet
Grass jelly, watermelon, red bean, and green tea ice cream
Fruity Pebbles, watermelon, mango, and green tea ice cream

Choose three toppings and a scoop of ice cream/sorbet:
Toppings: strawberry, mango, kiwi, watermelon, grass jelly, red bean, mochi, soft peanuts, taro
Scoop: mango sorbet or green tea ice cream

Char No. 4
Smoked short rib and pork shoulder chili with hominy
Bourbon-spiced peanuts

La Newyorkina
Popsicles

Arancini Bros.
Arancini Alla Zucca e Mascarpone: roasted pumpkin arancini with mascarpone cheese
Arancini Al Ragu: saffron rice, meat ragu with peas, and mozzarella
Arancini Al Tonno e Capperi: arancini stuffed with tuna and capers
Arancini Alla Scarola e Fagioli: sauteed escarole, white beans, and stracchino cheese

Naya & Milas Organic Dog Treats
Grass-fed beef liver treats:
Organic chicken liver treats
Organic ginger snaps
“Un-chocolate” chocolate-chip cookies

P&H; Soda Co.
Hibiscus, lime, ginger, and cream sodas plus one or two seasonal flavors. These depend on what the Greenmarket has that week.

Kelvin Natural Slush Co.
Step 1: Choose your base slush: Citrus, Ginger, Tea
Step 2: Choose your mix-in: A variety of fruit purées and fresh chopped herbs including: mint, basil, white peach, strawberry, raspberry, blueberry, mango, caramelized pineapple, pear

Mexicue
Tacos:
Oak-Smoked Short Ribs
-oak smoked, salsa verde, aged white cheddar, salsa fresca
House Chorizo
-goat-feta cheese, habanero aioli slaw, cilantro
(chorizo substitute: smoky pinto beans)
BBQ Beets
-fiery BBQ sauce, spiced goat crumbled cheese, watercress

Sliders:
BBQ Brisket
-mexicana rub, alder smoke, arbol BBQ sauce, spicy slaw, avocado
Smoked Chicken
-chipotle rub, cherry smoke, charred poblanos, salsa verde
Pulled Pork Shoulder
-mexicana rub, alder smoke, arbol BBQ Sauce, pickled red onions, avocado

Previously: SaveSaturday for the Grub Street Food Festival

Read more posts by Daniel Maurer

Filed Under: foodievents, grub street food festival

Scosche has added a new product to its bag of tricks for the iPhone and the iPad today called the sneakPEEK II Switchable Component and Composite A/V cable for iPad, iPhone, and iPod. That name is seriously long, but the thing offers a cool way to connect your beloved Apple gear to TVs that support HD inputs and those that don’t.

The cable is shipping right now for $59.99 and has the standard Apple docking connector on one end and six RCA jacks on the other for you to use for whatever connectivity method floats your boat. As you can figure out on your own, the cable will support any Apple gadget that has a standard docking port on the bottom.

The docking connector also has a little micro USB port on it so that you can plug in an included USB AC adapter allowing you to play content back on your TV while you charge your device. This will be perfect for streaming some Netflix to your TV or using Hulu Plus.

Relevant Entries on SlashGear

• Scosche revive II Dual USB Car and Home chargers for iPad available for purchase
• Scosche unveils new revive II dual USB chargers for iPad and iPhone
• Scosche flipSYNC Keychain USB cable and charger ships
• First iPad kickstand emerges kicking
• Scosche announces its CES 2010 gear lineup

QNAP has outed its latest network media player, the NMP-1000P, a compact STB that offers Full HD 1080p video, Dolby and DTS digital surround sound, optional NAS functionality and internet media streaming.  Able to gobble up a 3.5-inch hard-drive in its internal bay – either for storing local content or acting as a backup drive for networked computers – the NMP-1000P uses Sigma Designs new 667MHz SMP8643 SoC video/audio decoder.

That means it’s capable of handling MPEG1, MPEG2, MPEG4, XVID, H.264, H.263, WMV9 and VC1 encoded media in a vast number of different container formats (AVI, MPEG/MPG, VCD (ISO, MPG, NRG), DVD (VOB, IFO, ISO, NRG), WMV, ASF, TP, TS, TRP, M1V, M2V, M4V, M2P, M2T, M2TS, BDMV/ BD ISO, MTS, MOV, MP4, RMP4, MKV, MOD and 3GP), which is before you get to the various image and audio file types supported.  Then there’s the online media support, including Flickr and Picasa photos, Apple movie trailers, Internet radio, Mediafly and weather forecasts; you can also use the NMP-1000P as a standalone BitTorrent downloader.

Connectivity includes ethernet (wireless is optional), two USB 2.0 host (for hooking up external storage, optical drives or even keyboard/mouse peripherals), a USB 2.0 device port (for treating the QNAP as an external drive), two eSATA (one Host, one Device), HDMI v1.3a, component (Y, Pb, Pr), composite, analog stereo out and an S/PDIF optical port.  No word on pricing or availability.

Press Release:

QNAP New NMP-1000P Delivers Digital Home Experience with Premium-quality Video, Audio, and the Ease of File Sharing and Backup Capabilities

New NMP-1000P Networked Player with High Performance Wolfson Stereo DAC is Ideal for Audio and Video Enthusiasts Looking to Playback Wide Range of Multimedia Content while Enjoying the Crisp 1080p Videos and Dolby® and DTS Multi-Channel Surround Sound in Addition to the NAS Features and Internet Media Streaming Capability.

Taipei, Taiwan, September 2010 – QNAP Systems, Inc., a leading manufacturer of world class NAS servers, NVR Video Surveillance Systems, and Network-based Media Players today announced the NMP-1000P Network Multimedia Player, a unique new product for audiophiles and AV enthusiasts. NMP-1000P features the latest Sigma Designs® video/audio decoder that is capable of displaying ultra realistic full HD movies with advanced menu navigation, crystal clear next-generation Dolby® and DTS multi-channel surround sound, high-quality lossless music, digital pictures with background music, and other multimedia content. NMP-1000P is also powered by a high performance Wolfson stereo digital to analog converter for truly outstanding audio experience.

What’s more, the intuitive user interface of NMP-1000P makes it a snap to download movie covers and related information, and to discover and catalog content from any connected storage device or network drives. NMP-1000P retains Turbo NAS functionality for backup of all networked computers, convenient cross-platform file sharing among Windows, Mac, and Linux/UNIX, multiple user accounts and access right management, and remotely access to media files with the built-in Web File Manager and FTP. NMP-1000P even streams thousands of TV shows, news, podcasts, music, photos, and other content from Mediafly™, Apple Movie Trailers, CNN, SHOUTcast, Internet radio service, Flickr, Picasa, and more.

“NMP-1000P is truly the missing piece in today’s digital homes for enjoying premium-quality picture and sound,” said Jason Hsu, Product Manager of QNAP Systems, Inc. “Today’s users demand that contents be available on the fly and they don’t want to deal with a multitude of different devices and interfaces to make it happen. NMP-1000P is the culmination of QNAP’s extensive experience in developing network appliances and software applications which can satisfy the consumers’ need to get the content they want from virtually any source, and play it with the best video and audio quality on the living room TV using a single networked device.”

NMP-1000P can be connected to a home network via wired or wireless 802.11b/g/n (a variety of compatible wireless USB adaptors are sold separately) network connection. NMP-1000P can host a user-supplied 3.5-inch SATA hard drive with up to 2TB capacity for local content storage plus hi-speed USB and eSATA external connections for storage expansion, as well as directly connected to PC via USB and eSATA for fast data transfer, all within a sleek compact set-top box with a remote control and friendly user interface for easy navigation.

Relevant Entries on SlashGear

• Samsung Looks to Exit the Dual-Format Market
• Polaroid introduces new Portable Media Player
• Eminent EM7075-DTS network mediaplayer launches
• PrimeDTV unveils PHD-HM5 HD media player
• QNAP extends its mid-range line with TS-239 Pro II and TS-439 Pro II NAS servers

By now you’ve seen the “Facebook is doing a phone” and “No we’re not” headlines. Just check out this grouping on Techmeme if you haven’t. Techcrunch started it, with a post by Mike Arrington, that said that Facebook was secretly working on a phone.

Arrington was right that Facebook is working on mobile with some very smart folks, but the headline overreached and MG Siegler’s followup assumes that a smart team is working on a device. Well, I think that’s horsepucky until Facebook actually ships an innovative mobile app that works on all the modern platforms.

Truth is, while a Facebook-branded device would be popular it won’t get most of us to switch off of the phones we already have. Even Google demonstrated the difficulty of doing that as it launched its Nexus One and then killed that effort within a few months.

I’ve been talking with folks high up in Facebook and they deny it. But one did say “our strategy is to integrate and make all phones social, not build any specific device or integration.” Also said that the only public statement they are making on the record is the one they made in Mashable, which is why I can’t use the exec’s name.

Well, OK, now that we’re clear on that, let’s talk about what I hope Facebook is doing by looking at what’s missing from Facebook’s mobile strategy:

1. Great contact support is missing. Most people don’t even know there is ANY contact support on the iPhone app. There is. Click on “Friends” on the Facebook app’s home page and then you’ll see a button named “Sync.” But does it do much useful? Not really. It puts your friend’s photo into your phone’s contacts and it also adds a link to their Facebook profile. Does it add their phone numbers? No. Email addresses? No. Other things? No. Really lame.

2. Great photo support is missing. It’s still too hard to upload a group of photos. Heck, go to the UI in the iPhone app and figure out how to upload a photo to Facebook. It’s not that intuitive. First you have to click on “Profile” and then notice the little camera icon to do it. But what if you were thinking of uploading photos that you’ve already taken? Then clicking on a camera icon doesn’t make sense, but that’s what you need to do. Plus, I need to upload my photos to other services like SmugMug and YouTube too. Why doesn’t Facebook’s app do all of those at the same time?

2. Great video support is missing. I’d love to upload a video to Facebook AND YouTube at the same time. I can’t, at least not with the Facebook app. I don’t even think Tubemogul does that yet.

3. Location support is severely lacking. Why doesn’t Facebook’s Places hook up with other location-based services in a good way yet? They announced it but I still don’t see much integration between Facebook, Foursquare, Yelp, or Gowalla. Plus, Facebook’s main platform is still very poor when compared with other services. The one thing it does have is a TON of people on it.

4. It’s still hard to figure out how to granularly route messages to the right place. Why is it easier to post to a Facebook Page from Seesmic than it is from Facebook’s own mobile app? Why can you use Pip.io to send a status message just to your family, but I can’t figure out how to do that with Facebook’s own app? If I post something from a press conference that message needs to go to a different group of friends than my baby photos, yet Facebook treats them all the same.

5. Facebook’s own app doesn’t do anything with phone sensors. Why can we use RedLaser to point our phone at a barcode and learn where to buy that product, but we can’t do anything like that on Facebook? Why can we “bump” our phones and exchange contact info on the Bump app, but not on Facebook? Why can we exchange payments on PayPal’s app by bumping phones, but not on Facebook’s app? Why can we find a new restaurant by shaking our phone on some apps, but not on Facebook? Why can we see how to walk to the bar we’re seeking on Yelp’s augmented reality feature but not on Facebook? Why can I use Runkeeper to keep track of my bike rides, but I can’t do that with Facebook’s mobile app?

6. Facebook doesn’t do anything with location proximity. At Arrington’s own conference next week DeHood will show off some new proximity-based features for you to keep in touch with your neighborhood but Facebook can’t show you who else is at the party you’re at, or who is within walking distance of you.

7. Facebook doesn’t do anything with geofences or, really, anything innovative with location that Foursquare didn’t show us two years ago. Yet just last week Footprint Feed announced support for geofencing your friends. Why doesn’t Facebook do this yet? Geofences would let you do cool location and proximity-based alerts. Imagine getting an alert anytime you got within 1,000 feet of Arrington, for instance! Or, anytime you’re close to an In-n-Out.

8. Absent on casual game mobile platform war. Facebook let Apple and Google get into the casual games market. Hell, they are even letting Microsoft and Nokia get back into that game! Why? Because Facebook doesn’t have a trusted payments system yet, and doesn’t have an app store on mobile phones. I bet that’s driving Mark Pincus over at Zynga nuts because now he has to hire three times the number of business development folks to cut deals with all these companies. Facebook could outstrip all of the other company’s efforts. Where did I learn about Angry Birds from? Not Facebook, and that should really be troubling to Facebook’s execs.

9. Lame real-time search and filtering features. Facebook is letting DataSift come into the market, which brings real-time filtering that is much more advanced than anything Facebook has done yet. Really surprising since Facebook bought FriendFeed more than a year ago (FriendFeed had great real-time search and filtering). Those kinds of features will really be important on mobile phones, due to the smaller screen available there.

10. No innovation in feed design/layout for quite some time. Facebook let Flipboard demonstrate that there’s a way to lay out Facebook feeds in a new, and more productive, way. Yet Facebook doesn’t even have an iPad app out yet. And I won’t even go into the other innovative apps and services that have hit Twitter or RSS lately like Flud, Twitter Times, Paper.li, etc.

11. Startups are kicking Facebook’s ass on info filtering. Look at the video I filmed last week with My6Sense (Part I, Part II) that shows just how far that company has come in bringing you interesting information from your Facebook and Twitter streams. Why hasn’t Facebook done that?

So, MG or Mike, tell me again why Facebook would do a device, or even an OS, BEFORE they’d fix all these things on their iPhone, Android, iPad, Blackberry, Nokia, and Windows Phone 7 apps?

It just doesn’t make sense.

 This article originally appeared at Scobleizer and is republished here with permission.

Join the conversation about this story »

See Also:

• Here's Why Facebook Is Secretly Building A Phone: It Needs To Be A Platform, Not Just A Service
• Facebook Mobile Boss: "A Truly Socially-Informed Mobile Experience" Coming In 2011
• FLASHBACK: Here's Facebook Mobile Whiz Joe Hewitt Trash-Talking Android

The Overview

For over a year and a half since Mike Shanahan was let go from the Denver Broncos franchise as the head coach and President of Football Operations, the office in Dove Valley has been under attack. 

Realistically those missiles started hitting Dove Valley shortly after Brian Griese replaced Bubby Brister on coach Shanahan's intuition or whim, however you slice it.

Since that time the war for righting the ship has been on like Donkey Kong.

Once coach Shanahan departed it was expected that the peppering controversies would be there, but the all out assault that was about to take place probably could not be predicted by a clairvoyant, something super-natural, or Nostradamus himself. 

Who would have thought that the top flight offensive talent that coach Shanahan worked hard on cultivating would also follow his departure so quickly?  It was like World War II meets The Rhyme of The Ancient Mariner.

One after one by the star dogged moon

Too quick for groan or sigh

Each turned his face with a ghastly pang

And cursed me with his eye

Four times fifty living men

(And I heard nor sigh nor groan)

With heavy thump a lifeless lump

They dropped down one by one

You could call all this accursedness a slew of misguided missiles on the direction the Broncos franchise could be going.  It’s more than just one or two pointed missiles however.  It’s far more than the young new head coach Josh McDaniel's numerous controversies and personnel moves that have placed this ancient football ship in a place of possible ruin. 

The teams’ fate as well as that of Josh McDaniels hangs in the balance but currently resides in Davey Jones locker deep in the Abyss of poor management.  It’s a management that has shown itself to be poor, sloppy, dull, and anything but sharp.

One could draw parallels between the University of Colorado football program and all of its own independent controversies with that of the Denver Broncos, but that would be a misguided missile as well.  It is one which is the equivalent of comparing an apple to an orange.

What’s the Point?

The Denver Broncos kicked off the 2010 NFL campaign in Jacksonville, the land that is the home of Gator Nation and NCAA Football prominence of the last decade.  It’s a land that won’t soon forget Tim Tebow. 

Somehow that set the tone just right as Tebow returned to Jacksonville like the Prodigal Son who had done no wrong, as in has never done wrong.  Tebow was supposed to be drafted by the hometown Jacksonville Jaguars and yet they had him pegged around the fourth round. 

Enter Josh McDaniels and his controversial set of draft moves.

It would seem that for a coach like McDaniels who had gone the extra mile to get Tebow on the roster that he would somehow find a better way to use him.  After all it was the most important game of Tebow’s short NFL career and one the Broncos should have won. 

Instead Broncos and Jaguars fans alike had to settle for a moot set of play calls that mitigated all of Tebow nation into the realization of “What’s the point?”

So what is the point in giving the son of Gatorville Nation his chance to shine only to not support him in that role?  This is where the rubber meets the road with the current coaching staff, when Tim Tebow was in the game it was an obvious poor set of play calls that helped no one but the Jacksonville Jaguars. 

Perhaps Josh McDaniels felt obligated to get Tebow in the game, and yet it was a strikeout.  Three ineffective plays and out.  It was the definition of a strikeout and brought about the same disgrace to the Broncos and Tebow nation.

Incoming!

You see it’s with that staunch pride of Josh McDaniels that Broncos fans are supposed to believe that he has more mental sense, more genuine football know how, more ingenuity, more pure genius than an average football fan.  That is where the message coming from Dove Valley is deserving of more pointed missiles however misguided.

So in between the mixing and the misfiring on the missile lines attacking the coach and his regime is a misguided defense system of Broncos nation coming out of Dove Valley. 

The Broncos have a tradition of winning that was built over 30 plus seasons of team football and the 2010 team are currently missing the mark. 

One might think for as many sharpened missiles and arrows that have been barraging Dove Valley that the coach who emphasizes team play and being smarter than the average bear would in fact be sharp on game day, let alone opening day.  After all this is now officially Josh’s team with his numerous roster moves the last year and a half. 

The Broncos Are Not Sharp Right Now

Against the struggling Jacksonville Jaguar franchise (mind you) on Sunday the Broncos were dull and calling it like it is: not sharp at the point of attack. This does count for players and coaches alike, but the greatest responsibility is Josh’s and he somehow sweeps it under the carpet as being a part of “the plan”.

Prior to getting to the point it’s time to clarify some things as they are for the good of the franchise.

Don’t misinterpret the Broncos effort or ability; they are a strong football team in a number of areas.  The Denver Broncos football players gave a full effort in Jacksonville, the tape clearly reflects that.  That has to at least be something to hang their hat on moving forward.  The Broncos played hard for the most part. 

This is where the team should take it to heart; they are playing at a good level.  However, keep in mind the word used was good and not great.  What literally kept the Broncos from executing at a higher level on Sunday was that they were not sharp.  Let’s all say that again so we can get that point solidified.

The 2010 Denver Broncos are currently not a sharp football team.  That brings this point home; they are therefore not living up to realistic expectations.  This is where the culpability on and off the field starts to take shape but the Broncos are a team that should assume full responsibility at the player level, at the coaching level, and in the front office. 

So let’s say it again, the Denver Broncos franchise is not sharp right now as it stands.

We saw hints of what this team could become in the preseason against the Pittsburgh Steelers when they put it all together against one of the NFL’s top teams.  What is a clear miss here is that the Jacksonville Jaguars are not the Steelers and they tried to give the game to Denver but the Broncos found a way to come up short… again.

The Hard Evidence

So here are the cold hard facts listed to reinforce the point.

• Defensively the Broncos had a hard time keeping contain on the corners versus the Jaguars.  The problem here is that the contain was so poorly structured that there are high school teams that hold the edges better than the Broncos did in Jacksonville.

• Down the stretch when the Broncos needed to have a stop from the defense Ryan McBean was flagged for not one but two facemask penalties on the Jags game winning drive.  Solomon Wilcox called it best on the broadcast; he said “That’s what you call a double agent.”

• The Broncos seldom put good pressure on Jags QB David Garrard and he tore the Broncos apart when he needed too.  So what’s going to happen against better offensive lines and better quarterbacks?

• The Broncos were good but not excellent in their technique and positioning.  I think a good case in point was with Brian Dawkins, tied with Champ Bailey as fan favorites to watch.  Dawkins had pretty good position on a late touchdown against Jaguars receiver Kassim Osgood but it wasn’t good enough to break up the 24-yard touchdown pass from David Garrard.  That’s part of the mental edge this team is missing right now.  They are close, but they aren’t there yet.

• Offensively Kyle Orton, Eddie Royal, and Brandon Lloyd were probably the stars of the game and yet they still mental lapses as well.

• The new improved offensive line struggled in the run game and in the screen game as well.  They also gave up three sacks and numerous pressures.  On the whole their effort was better than expected in some areas, but they must find ways to produce over 100 yards rushing on a regular basis.

• The team has now lost five in a row dating back to last season.

• The coaching was as poor as it has been since Josh McDaniels became the head guy and that is saying a whole lot.  Think about last years special team’s blunders against New England and on the road in Washington.  The Jaguars destroyed the Broncos kick return coverage and set up short scoring drives.  That is poor coaching combined with poor coverage.

• Coach McDaniels blew up on his tight end Richard Quinn and his coaches when Quinn lined up wrong and failed to cover the tackle on his side of the field and became very animated about the mental lapse.  That sort of calling out of a player is not something that will sit well in the long run if the Broncos don’t win.

• Finally as mentioned previously the play calls on Sunday were not reflective of a confident coach or a confident football team.  The Broncos have awesome plays and even excellent execution within their scheme.  What seems to be lacking is a cohesive method of attack.  Numerous times on Sunday the Broncos had to settle for a couple of short, virtually useless plays, only to be bailed out by the big play.  Outside of two big runs from Knowshon Moreno the Broncos big plays all came out of the passing game.  That doesn’t cut it and it doesn’t get the job done as evident on Sunday.

• The last point leads to this one, the offensive scheme still needs tweaking and improvements.  By no stretch of the imagination could the Broncos coaches assume that their offensive and defensive schemes have arrived.

So there you have it, an outline of where this team is at right now.  Yes there were poor calls and substitutions that worked against the Broncos, but this is about having a standard and living up to it.  The guys who step in must be ready to go and when bad calls happen against you as a team you have to move on.

So far the Broncos seem to be cutting corners and not as disciplined or as sharp as they should be right now.  Not being sharp at this juncture is misguided and that message starts at the top.

--- 

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http://twitter.com/Chaz_Mattson

TUAWApple Newton to be reborn as iPhone case originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Thu, 09 Sep 2010 16:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Section: Gaming News, Features, Lists, Mashups, Handhelds, iPhone & iPod Touch & iPad, Updates, Apple App Store

The Apple App Store gaming update is Gamertell’s weekly look at the previous week’s Apple App Store game releases. We cover them all - good and not so good - in their respective categories with a breakdown of the great games and the free games right where you want ‘em, at the top and in your face. The list is available every Monday, right as you are about to start that long work week.

Netflix finally comes to the iPhone and all these great games, this is certainly the best iPhone week we’ve had in a while. With the upcoming September 1, 2010, Apple event, next week isn’t looking too bad either. Soak it up my friends.

What You Might Want To Check Out

iOcarina: Free Version
“The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, great game or GREATEST GAME EVER? Did you remember all the great songs of this game? With this app, you can play the Ocarina of Link, and try to remember the songs of the Game. In this free app, only a few of this songs are available, but if you like this, be sure of download the FULL Version, with all the Ocarina of Time and Majora’s Mask songs!”

Knight’s Rush: Price: $2.99
“From the developers of the hit app A QUEST OF KNIGHTS ONRUSH comes the groundbreaking full game, KNIGHT’S RUSH! This huge sequel by Chillingo and MoreGames puts YOU in the suit of armor, as your Knight rampages through eight incredible worlds and takes on a host of deadly enemies with over-the-top skills and attacks aplenty! KNIGHT’S RUSH is bigger, badder, and better than ever before!”

Dodonpachi Resurrection: Price: $4.99
“The Legendary shooter, now for iPhone and iPod touch! Two fully-featured game modes: iPhone Mode, an exclusive adaptation tailored to the iPhone/iPod touch portable format, and Arcade Mode, a port of the arcade shooter classic.”

Toy Story 3: Operation Camouflage: Price: $1.99
“Code Red Soldier! Operation Camouflage: Execute! Let’s Move, Move, Move! Heads up recruit, it’s time for Recon Basic Training! Your mission is to find top secret items camouflaged throughout Andy’s Room, Bonnie’s Room and Sunnyside Daycare. Only the best of the best can find them all. Are you up for the task soldier? Operation Camouflage has 20 missions throughout four locations: Andy’s Room, Bonnie’s Room, Caterpillar Room and Butterfly Room!”

What’s Free

WordFive Lite
“WordFive is a simple five letter word game where players are given five guesses to determine a randomly chosen five letter word. WordFive combines the fun aspects of word jumbles and word guessing games to create a wildly exciting, mind boggling adventure. Solving word puzzles has never been so thrilling!”

CasinoVegasSlots
“This is a standard three slot machine. Eye appealing user interface, very smooth roll of slots, smileys and sound effects. User can bet 1, 2 and 3 coins and get the credits based on the winning combinations.”

DJ Music Free
“Think you have what it takes to be a DJ for the techno scene? With DJ Music you’ll be able to move the paddles to the spin of the beat plate while working your rhythm to catch the music pellets around you. As you progress through each stage you’ll unlock hidden songs depending on how well you DJ. In DJ Music Free, spin 3 separate techno tracks in various stages to test your DJ skills. Be sure to catch as many music pellets you can or else your gig is up.”

Beemer Trivia
“Beemer Trivia, for the iPhone and iPad, is a trivia game designed by and for BMW Motorcycle enthusiasts.”

Galaxy Golf
“Galaxy Golf is the first game ever on the iPhone that brings your Facebook friends and photos into the game and allows you to save or eject them into the deep cold of space! Galaxy Golf is a game about exploration that plays like a mix between mini golf and croquet. The player chooses a galaxy unveiling a group of courses to play; each course consists of 9 or 18 holes like a normal golf course. Instead of just one hole like in normal golf, a Galaxy Golf level can have multiple holes that are represented by stars. The player needs to connect the stars in order to finish the hole. Travel through space at warp speed is not free…it creates a lot of heat! The player needs to watch their heat and how much force they use to travel around on each hole in order to get the highest ranking possible.”

TIC TAC B
“You can now play TIC TAC B on your IPhone Tic Tac B doesn’t required internet connection to be always ON. You can play against your IPhone . TIC TAC B, the game has more X B’s in it than your last letter from your old Aunt Sofie, has been around for a long long time, In fact TIC TAC B was probably the first strategy game that most of us ever played.”

Phase Words
“A unique, fun, and addictive word game that is the antidote to boredom. This game introduces a new strategy among word games…use them or lose them.”

Corsair
“Take to the skies and take out your opponent! Corsair is a game that harkens back to the retro arcade shoot-em-ups, and brings in a good bit of social competition too. Configure your ship with your choice of equipment and weapons, then dogfight against the ships that other players have made. Then, use the spoils of victory to buy even better gear!”

Nano Tank Free
“Free version of the retro-awesome Nano Tank, featuring three levels of silky smooth vector-style goodness. Drive your tank around a maze, dodge enemy gliders, and destroy enemy bases. Intuitive multi-touch control scheme, simple and indisputably retro, but incredibly fun.”

Word Quest Lite
“Word Quest Lite - the coolest and absolutely free word search game on the App Store! Play unlimited, super exciting word search puzzles to your heart’s content. Slick user interface, cool bookworm theme, online leaderboards and intense GRE-GMAT/Top American Words/Birds wordlists will challenge you for sure!”

Lazy Joe’s Warehouse
“Challenge yourself by helping Lazy Joe sort out the mess in his warehouse with the least effort possible. In this tricky puzzle game you push crates and use elevators to solve problems on two floors! Includes high resolution graphics for iPhone 4! Comes with 27 free levels of varying length and difficulty, and more available through in app purchase.”

iOcarina: Free Version
“The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, great game or GREATEST GAME EVER? Did you remember all the great songs of this game? With this app, you can play the Ocarina of Link, and try to remember the songs of the Game. In this free app, only a few of this songs are available, but if you like this, be sure of download the FULL Version, with all the Ocarina of Time and Majora’s Mask songs!”

Winners Circle - Horse Race Game
“Horse racing excitement comes to life. Jockey your horse in this dynamic graphical virtual horse race game. Only the skilled with the best time make it to the winners circle. Our simulated racing game puts you in the saddle as you go head-to-head against other players for bragging rights. Go solo to challenge yourself and attain the best time record. Finally, your chance to become a superstar athlete riding your top thoroughbred on the track.”

FRONTLINE Plus Fleas & Desist
“Fleas, eggs, larvae, and ticks are on the attack. Match them up in sets of three or more to destroy the suckers. And when the going gets tough, be sure to enlist the help of FRONTLINE Plus.”

Guggle Lite
“Step into a forgotten magical kingdom and guide Bubble through cursed levels where danger lurks at every corner of this puzzle arcade-adventure game. Easy to learn, but tricky to master controls make Guggle a blast to play for all ages as they test their eye-hand coordination and dexterity. Are you up to the challenge?”

Domacy
“Why check in when you can break in? Domacy uses your iPhone’s GPS, and nearby local businesses as the base for a game of Risk-style multi-player world conquest. Buy items, use them to attack or defend your fortresses, form a clan, and conquer the globe. Achieve Domacy today!”

Alpha Fall Lite
“Guide the letter blocks down the board to spell words and score big. Anyone can spell “cat” but it will take a true master to put together combos to reach that top score. But whatever you do, don’t let the letters reach the top or it’s game over! For an extra challenge, try playing hard mode.”

Car Rush
“Car rush is a simple driving game. Avoid other cars, and survive as long as possible. Also do not forget to watch the fuel gauge. When make it run out of fuel, the game is over.”

Travel City
“Tap the arrows to direct and park the Asia Miles-branded cars. You only have a limited amount of time to park the cars - so hurry!”

Jean’s Boutique Lite
“Jean’s Boutique Time Management Game for the iPhone and iPod Touch. Manage your own virtual Jean’s Boutique. Run your own Jean’s Boutique, a great fashion game combined with the fun of serving customers. To make it in the fast-paced world of fashion, Jean will need to be fast on her feet, dedicated to her customers, wise in her upgrades. For fast fashion fun, there’s no place like Jean’s Boutique! Recommended for fans of Time Management Games.”

BlockDude Lite
“BlockDude is back! This remake of the TI-83 game that many have played throughout their time in school stays true to the original with a few new additions such as themes and sounds. Relive the glory days and see if you can still remember how to beat BlockDude!”

Jow Chaos Ver.
“Begins at Day-1 the Chaos Day. Player should control “Hoffen” to deliver the potion to the customers the frantic and picky zombies. After drinking the potion, the zombies will be purified, and they will pay for it. Else they will infect Hoffen when they reach the end of the table. After three times, game is over. With the touch feature of Iphone, player uses finger (first finger is recommended) to slide from right to left to deliver the potion.”

What’s New

Action

Knight’s Rush: Price: $2.99
“From the developers of the hit app A QUEST OF KNIGHTS ONRUSH comes the groundbreaking full game, KNIGHT’S RUSH! This huge sequel by Chillingo and MoreGames puts YOU in the suit of armor, as your Knight rampages through eight incredible worlds and takes on a host of deadly enemies with over-the-top skills and attacks aplenty! KNIGHT’S RUSH is bigger, badder, and better than ever before!”

Zombies Ate My Baby: Price: $0.99
“You better prepare yourself for the great amount of fun! Defend yourself from the hordes of zombies in the greatest action game on your iphone/ipod. Enjoy the high quality comics who will lead you through the entire game. Be the best in survival mode!”

Al Rambone - Hussein in the Membrane: Price: $1.99
“Classic run and gun combat game. You are Al Rambone, washed up war veteran whose only skill is to kill. Command him through different insane levels, crawling with the deadliest foes and their teddy bear grenades. Fight your way through four gargantuan bosses in order to reach the final Evil. With amazing visuals and addicting game play you will find your self lost in this peculiar War Zone. Get involved in this insanely funny adventure!”

Adventure

NOTHING

Arcade

R TYPE: Price: $1.99
“Get back to the ‘80s video-arcade experience! Play the relentlessly challenging side-scroller shoot ‘em up on iPhone & iPod touch for retro-gaming at its best. Why mess with a classic? R-Type for iPhone & iPod touch stays true to its roots, re-capturing the look and feel of one of the biggest arcade game hits from back in the day. Blast off and strike the evil Bydo Empire! Pilot your futuristic fighter, the R-9a “Arrowhead,” and attack wave after wave of Bydo baddies in old-school side-shooter style. It’s R-Type just the way you remember it, and it totally rules!”

Worldy Wings: Price: $1.99
“Join the Worldy Wings fleet in the ultimate flying adventure! Sail through uncharted worlds fighting wicked enemies! Select the right plane for each world and score as many points as you can! Take advantage of the Bonus Round and reload your plane after each world!”

Dodonpachi Resurrection: Price: $4.99
“The Legendary shooter, now for iPhone and iPod touch! Two fully-featured game modes: iPhone Mode, an exclusive adaptation tailored to the iPhone/iPod touch portable format, and Arcade Mode, a port of the arcade shooter classic.”

The Princess Road: Price: $1.99
“The devil who kidnapped the princess,a symbol of peace and hope, undermined morale. And the devil is occupying the kingdom as surging waves. The sly devil shattered hearts of the princess and spread then around the castle. Then the devil ordered his inferiors to keep pieces. Be a warrior. You wake the princess as you collect all pieces of her heart with her friend fairy. Break through throwing knives and steel shells from the inferiors. Rescue the princess and liberate the kingdom from the devil’s hands. The beautiful fantasy world - beautiful graphics and musics lead you the world of fantasy fairy tale. The stunning action of knives - feel to elliminate all throwing knives from everywhere with your sppedy and accurate touching.”

Super Mega Worm: Price: $2.99
“Mother Earth is on the brink of extinction and has released her last defense, the Great Death Worm, Wojira. Wojira is on a revenge mission to destroy all the Human parasites. Crawl and eat your way through waves of humans and their robots of destruction. Grow and evolve into the ultimate weapon of destruction. You are the last line of defense, can you save the world?”

Airfight Heroes: Price: $0.99
“AirFight Heroes is a mobile game of vertical shooter.The game has outstanding 2D graphics and high quality music and sound effect.There are two player jet-fighters available with respective unique bullet style and firing means as well as three optional safety bullets in the game. Players can elevate weapon levels via obtaining energy props and can also choose weapons by taking advantage of alternating props. Six stages of the games available: Island Base Battle, Town Upper Air Battle, Railway Line Battle, Yellow Sand Base Battle, Gear of War Plant Battle and Experiments of Variation Base Battle. Different level has distinctive and various enemy fighters, weapons and bosses. With provocative battle graphics, gorgeous bullet scenes, gradual upgrading levels, mighty boss in every level and expanding weapons, the overall quality of the game competes with arcade vertical shooting games.”

Wing Era: The Golden Flight: Price: $0.99
“Wing Era is a line-drawing control game and contains more elements of fun. Just touch and draw a path, and you can control your propeller aircraft fleet to Fly, Take off, Landing, Obtain Bonus Items, Dodge Colliding with other Aircrafts, and etc. However, not only the flight control, but also the fuel and shields of aircrafts need to be noticed. There are also some useful bonus items to help you playing this game. Gather more Stars to gain higher score records!”

Board

NOTHING

Card

Freecell Classic - insanely addictive card game: Price: $0.99
“Playing freecell on your iphone is now a feast to your eyes with cool grpahics and 3D fireworks. A must have freecell game on your iphone if you are a card game lover. The beauty of the game matches your iphone beauty.”

Casino

NOTHING

Dice

NOTHING

Educational

Mathstronaut: Price: $2.99
“Mathstronaut is a fast paced maths game for kids. Questions play out in a variety of crazy, colourful and funny animations as players blast their way into space. The game features addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. There are four difficulty levels, based on the Australian school curriculum, and two great ways to play the game. In Blast Off, players must answer questions correctly to power their spaceship towards a distant alien planet, pushing past their best scores to get deeper into space. In Countdown, players have a set time limit to answer questions at the selected difficulty level. Ideal for standardised tests or for teachers to run an exciting live leaderboard using the App-titude online system. Mathstronaut interfaces with the App-titude online assessment system, where teachers can view up-to-the-minute student progress and participation. Mathstronaut has been evaluated by middle school students and provides fun challenges for younger learners as well as consolidation of skills for older students.”

Family

Toy Story 3: Operation Camouflage: Price: $1.99
“Code Red Soldier! Operation Camouflage: Execute! Let’s Move, Move, Move! Heads up recruit, it’s time for Recon Basic Training! Your mission is to find top secret items camouflaged throughout Andy’s Room, Bonnie’s Room and Sunnyside Daycare. Only the best of the best can find them all. Are you up for the task soldier? Operation Camouflage has 20 missions throughout four locations: Andy’s Room, Bonnie’s Room, Caterpillar Room and Butterfly Room!”

Music

DJ Music: Price: $1.99
“Think you have what it takes to be a DJ for the techno scene? With DJ Music you’ll be able to move the paddles to the spin of the beat plate while working your rhythm to catch the music pellets around you. As you progress through each stage you’ll unlock hidden songs depending on how well you DJ.”

Katy Perry Revenge: Price: $4.99
“The party has landed! Introducing KATY PERRY REVENGE, the smash new app from the makers of Tap Tap Revenge, the number 1 most-downloaded music game for the iPhone/iPod Touch. Tap the targets flying down your touchscreen to the beats of her biggest hits, and soak in the gorgeous themes and graphics inspired by the albums, videos, fashion, and fun of Miss Katy herself! All tracks included in the app are importable to Tap Tap Revenge 3 !!!”

Puzzle

No, Human: Price: $1.99
“No, Human” is a physics based action-puzzle game, taking place during the latest conflict between mankind’s puny struggle for meaning and the universe. With your skillful finger, a delight in destruction and some patience, you will demobilize the human presence outside of planet earth in a joyful way.”

White Knight HD: Price: $0.99
“For years the white knight has been trying to get his noble steed to learn new moves. He’s trying to make his horse run straight and diagonal lines. Unwilling to break the traditions of his ancestors, horsey refused. Help the young horse prove that he can get anywhere using the steps he already knows. Show the white knight that you can guide horsey though any obstacle, complex as it may be. Using the classic L shaped chess-knight movement, navigate your horse to safty. Don’t forget that time is short so fast thinking is required. Seeing the bigger picture and planning ahead will lead you to success. The more you practice - the faster you get.”

A Super Fisherman: Price: $1.99
“A Super Fisherman is the fun puzzle game, you are a fisherman, tap anywhere on the screen to throw the spinning rod, you need catch some target fish to enter next level, and earn enough money to buy some items.”

iRobbo HD: Price: $3.99
“This application became number 1 PAID PUZZLE GAME for iPhone in Poland, and now it is available on iPad! The iRobbo HD is a game where You, Robbo the robot, have to collect needed amount of bolts and leave the planet on a warpship. This of course is not as easy as it sounds. The game, after all, is a mixture of action and puzzle genres. The game contains 50 levels of increasing difficulty. Some levels require good reaction and fast decision making, some can not be complete without careful deliberation. The goal of the game is to reach Robbo’s home world - planet Zyyr. To get to Zyyr, You must complete all 50 levels. You have to find keys to open locked doors, get bolts, move though the laser beams at the right time, avoid dangerous enemies, position objects in the right place and move explosives to a useful place so that you can create a path when you detonate them.”

Racing

NOTHING

Role Playing

Rhythm Knight: Price: $1.99
“Rhythm Knight- music action rpg game! A long time ago, in a kingdom called Cadence far far away… An unfortunate Knight, Luke Born with a curse of misfortune, until one day… Rhythm Knight is a story-driven, action-oriented music game in which you fight with enemy using classic music cue. Unlike most music games, which focus on instruments, Rhythm Knight integrates classic music, Action and RPG elements, creates a unique game experience for all the people who love music and comedy.”

Phantasy Star II: Price: $2.99
“An epic RPG with turn-based battles that is hailed as one of the greatest games of all time. Build your characters, select the right weapons and armor, and take on the forces of evil through turn-based battles. Fight against over 100 bio-monsters and mechanical creatures to save the Algo Star system from the evil Dark Force and Mother Brain.”

War of the Titans: Price: $1.99
“Zeus raged because of the defiance by King and Queen of Argos. Hades provoked Zeus to punish Argos, then Zeus ordered monster Kraken to destroy Argos. At this moment Perseus came out to save Argos with his companions and they wanted to find out how to defeat Kraken together.”

Sports

Field & Stream Fishing: Price: $2.99
“Field & Stream Fishing is an exciting, arcade-style fishing game that is faster and more satisfying than any “simulation-style” fishing game in the iTunes Store today. Its target-like casting, reeling action, and wily fish population give every caster a chance hone their skills and haul in the big ones. Fish in famous real world locations like Whitebear Lake, Lake Amistad, and Kenai River. Why be limited to just the top-of-the-lake view? Field & Stream Fishing takes you underwater where the ‘reel’ action is! You can lure, scare, and witness the fight first hand.”

Strategy

Knight Defense: Price: $0.99
“Knight Defense combines action and strategy in a dynamic re-imagining of the tower defense genre. It’s bold, intelligent, challenging and fun. Defeat all waves of enemies without losing your King. Your pieces fire at enemies in distinct patterns reminiscent of chess pieces. Each time a piece fires in a particular direction there is a short delay before it can fire again in that direction. If an enemy hits one of your pieces it explodes and damages that piece (and sometimes the pieces around it). Combos: destroy multiple enemies at once to greatly increase your score. Each of your pieces can be upgraded 7 times, increasing health and attack, as well as healing the piece back to full health and allowing it to fire immediately in all available directions. Each piece has a unique special ability with a cooldown before it can be used again. Example: making nearby pieces fire twice as fast or healing nearby pieces. Enemies vary in health, speed and attack power. Enemies home towards your King, so where you position him determines their movement. Pieces can protect each other, reducing the damage they take. Tap the skip button make the next wave arrive immediately.”

Trivia

Word

iPhone and iPod Touch Links of the Week

Appletell: [Free apps roundup for August 27th, 2010] [iPhone, iPod and iPad product news - August 27, 2010]

Full Story » | Written by Kris Rosado for Gamertell. | Comment on this Article »

Grace Potter and the Nocturnals :: 08.19.10 :: Bryant Park :: New York, NY

Grace Potter by Dino Perrucci

Grace Potter and the Nocturnals' last-minute Thursday night show, hosted by The Artist's Den, was packed. An announcement about ticketing for the secret show was released Tuesday by Relix Magazine, where fans were able to submit their names all day Tuesday and Wednesday to a free ticket raffle and the winners were emailed the event details on Wednesday night. The announcement soon ended up all over Twitter and music blogs, and by Wednesday's end, hundreds of names had been submitted for a tight guest list. Showtime Thursday proved Potter's popularity in New York with a line that stretched for three blocks, moving into the rest of the park and its surrounding area.

The show kicked off with the fitting "Hot Summer Night." Bassist Catherine Popper and drummer Matt Burr threw down a funky rhythm section until Potter, looking like a goddess with her white dress and long hair, jumped on stage with her hands in the air and her voice bringing everyone all over the park to their feet. The band then moved into some older material, with a kickin' "Ah, Mary" that set the tone for what Potter described as "the saddest happy breakup song," "Goodbye Kiss," from the band's self-titled album released this past June on Hollywood Records.

The selection of old and new material, along with some narration by Potter, established a pretty clear theme for the setlist, namely heartbreak that is always followed by a strong return. "That Phone", "Apologies" and "Low Road" highlighted not only Potter's incredibly soulful chops but also her ability to engage a crowd; Potter's banter with the band is always witty, and her choice of stories is always relatable. New Yorkers can be a tough crowd, but you would never guess Potter was from anywhere else. She loves New York, even though sometimes there's dog poop on stage, a problem the band faced Thursday night with good humor. Only in New York, Potter lamented, will you get dog poo on your shoes when you're onstage at your own concert.

Nocturnals by Dino Perrucci

"Sexy" is the word that most accurately describes everything about Grace Potter and the Nocturnals. Even when she isn't making out with Catherine Popper onstage - although it's definitely a plus when she is - she and the band pour a passion into the show that leaves the audience a sweaty, exhausted, fulfilled mess. Songs like "Paris," "Oasis," "Medicine" and "Nothing But The Water" highlight Potter's unapologetic confidence, while also spurs the rest of the band to showcase their own talents and extremely good looks. When it came time for the drum jam, the whole band intertwined over the drum kit, and the sheer amount of physical attractiveness onstage was slightly overwhelming. Somehow all six band members won the genetic lottery, so their live show is a pleasure even for the deaf.

The spirit of Grace Potter and the Nocturnals brought a breath of country air to a stagnant New York City summer. The surprise, secret nature of the show lent a VIP feel to a great venue and consistently incredible live act. If summer has to end, this is a great way to blow it out.

Setlist: Hot Summer Night, Ah, Mary, Goobye Kiss, Only Love, Tiny Light, Apologies, One Short Thing, Low Road, That Phone, Oasis, White Rabbit (Jefferson Airplane cover), Paris (Ooh La La), Medicine > Drum Jam. E: Heart of Glass (Blondie cover), Stop the Bus, Big White Gate, Nothing But the Water Part I > Nothing But the Water Part II > Drum Jam

Grace Potter and the Nocturnals Tour Dates :: Grace Potter and the Nocturnals News :: Grace Potter and the Nocturnals Concert Reviews

JamBase | Big Apple
Go See Live Music!

Section: Features, Lists, Handhelds, iPhone & iPod Touch & iPad, Updates, Apple App Store

The Apple App Store gaming update is Gamertell’s weekly look at the previous week’s Apple App Store game releases. We cover them all - good and not so good - in their respective categories with a breakdown of the great games and the free games right where you want ‘em, at the top and in your face. The list is available every Monday, right as you are about to start that long work week.

Unlike previous week’s this week’s App Store additions are pretty decent. Meowcenaries, Madden, Pinball HD, and while it’s not a game, GrooveShark FINALLY got accepted into the App Store. Enjoy your week folks!

What You Might Want To Check Out

Meowcenaries Lite
“In this smaller, free version of Meowcenaries, you control an elite squad of combat kittens as they try to rescue the president from the maniacal evil cat Evilcat and his Badkatz soldiers. Guide your platoon through two action-packed missions from the full version, dispatching enemy cats from wherever they emerge, leveling Evilcat strongholds and upholding justice! Evilcat must be stopped. The time for yarn balls is over. Good luck!”

GHOSTS’N GOBLINS GOLD KNIGHTS 2: Price: $4.99
“We’ve heard what users had to say and we’ve made Ghost’ N Goblins Gold Knights II the most thrilling and accessible GNG game yet! In Ghost’N Goblins: Gold Knights II players, take control of the legendary Arthur or powerful Perceval as you once again battle against the minions of the Ghoul Realm. To survive the deadly descent, you have to make optimum use of your weapons and gear as you encounter ever more deadly foes.”

MADDEN NFL 11 by EA SPORTS™: Price: $7.99
“Enhanced visuals bring the game to life in lush detail, especially when viewed through the remarkable iPhone 4 Retina Display. Watch the players rumble onto the stadium floor in electrifying detail. Capture the atmospherics of the weather effects. Even see the blades of grass on the field. TDC (“Total Defensive Control”) makes playing defense pure fun. Press the TDC button to pause the action, position your defensive players, and feel the thrill of delivering game-changing hits like never before. As always, get the authentic football experience that only MADDEN NFL can deliver. Match up all 32 NFL teams featuring updated rosters and nearly 2,000 real players.”

Pinball HD 4 iPhone: Price: $1.99
“Pinball HD 4 iPhone - This game will change your idea of Pinball on the iPhone. Each table - Wild West, The Deep, and Jungle style - are masterpieces. You’ll be stunned with the level of realism. This is a REAL Pinball simulator with stunning 3D graphics both with or without 3D glasses.”

What’s Free

Meowcenaries Lite
“In this smaller, free version of Meowcenaries, you control an elite squad of combat kittens as they try to rescue the president from the maniacal evil cat Evilcat and his Badkatz soldiers. Guide your platoon through two action-packed missions from the full version, dispatching enemy cats from wherever they emerge, leveling Evilcat strongholds and upholding justice! Evilcat must be stopped. The time for yarn balls is over. Good luck!”

Flight Attack Lite
“Flight Attack Lite is the FREE Lite Version of one of the MOST ADDICTIVE and AMAZING games, which are available at the App Store.
The INTUITIVE CONTROL, by using the motion-sensors and touchscreen, are simply AWESOME and make HUGE FUN! In this LITE version, you have the choice between more than 5 DIFFERENT BONUS Levels of the full version !!!!”

GunShooting
“Touche shooting game”

Asteroid Math
“Asteroid Math is a side scrolling space shooter where the player must destroy asteroids to collect numbers to complete an onscreen equation. Tests addition, subtraction and multiplication.”

Max Vector LITE
“The evil robot warlord Z-80 has stolen the world’s high definition. It’s up to Max Vector and his trusty C64 Type R spaceship to destroy Z-80 and restore resolution! Will Max be able to rescue the world’s HD? Will he finally be able to see his wife Berta’s true beauty? That’s up to you! Take the controls in… Max Vector: Resolution!”

Ultraviolet Dawn Lite
“From the makers of critically-acclaimed “Project Phoenix” comes a new, exciting creation. “Ultraviolet Dawn” is a hybrid space-shooter/trading game with a completely open Universe comprising over 1,000 stars to explore. “Ultraviolet Dawn” is our most beautiful and refined game to date. Please note that the Lite version is limited to five space flight levels.”

Lambi Islands
“Lambi Island is home to the exceptionally short sighted and incredibly fragile Lambi’s, these poor water based creatures have mistakenly found their way onto land through abandoned pipes and need your help to direct them back to safety. The problem is they are so delicate that if they touch anything they explode! Place directional tiles onto the ground to guide them around the nasty sharp objects lying around. But be quick because once they start appearing its going to get mad crazy! Work your way through 25 different levels each harder than the next using your tiles to guide the Lambi’s to the portal which takes you to the next island, whilst building a network of gaming friends and challenge them to beat your score. Our Lambi’s are not the sharpest knife in the draw, but they are very, very cute and also very, very endangered, so this original puzzle game mixing stylish 3D graphics with a challenging set of puzzles to solve saving the precious Lambi’s from self-destruction will keep you going for hours. We also let you design your own way to get the Lambi’s home and buy additional tiles to aid the journey. Publish your achievement to Social Networks like Facebook and OpenFeint and compete on our Geo-locational leader boards and once you’ve mastered the game you can collect all the achievements and challenge your friends to beat your score!”

Zombie Infection FREE
“The infection is spreading and fear is everywhere in this non-stop survival shooter. Head to South America as a soldier and reporter try to uncover the origin of another zombie outbreak.”

Shoot To Kill
“Surrounded by evil fiends and armed to the teeth with grenade launchers, chainsaws and lightning guns you must blast, hack and blaze your way through the demon horde and complete your escape back to the overworked.”

Wordable
“Wordable is a fun and addictive word game where users race against the clock to create words from eight random letters. Ninety second games make it easy to pick up and play when you need to kill a couple minutes.”

My Little Restaurant Lite
“Try the Litest version of My Little Restaurant: charge-free, ad-free but still so much fun! Grab a taste of what it’s like to work in My Little Restaurant. Test your skills in this fully playable preview.”

City Story™
“Welcome to City Story™ where you and your friends can create the world based on your imagination. Build and decorate your own dream city with cafes, boutiques, bakeries, hotels, and landmarks. Watch your population skyrocket as you create the ultimate living, breathing city. City Story™ includes FREE updates with new businesses, houses, parks, landmarks and more EVERY WEEK!”

What’s New

Action

Dinosaur Hunter: Price: $1.99
“Dinosaur Hunter is the 3D arcade hunting game with great 3d graphics.”

Doodle Sky Pro: Price: $0.99
“New released Doodle Sky! Press your finger on the screen, and the aircraft will follow your instructions to fight against the enemies! There are different missions in different stages. For example, you can destroy the enemies, protect the VIP, and take part in the decapitation strike and so on. You will feel enjoyable and excited about different missions. There are eight aircrafts with different attributes for the players to control. You will find it easy to play if you can take advantages of the different attributes and abilities. Besides the gorgeous and exciting battle, the game system will give corresponding scores based on the players’ performance. There are also medal of honors and titles for you to take! Different attributes to choose from. Various stage design. Up to 40 addictive stages。Mighty air defense artilleries. Whether it be your right hand or not? It’s all up to you.”

Adventure

A Vampire Romance: Price: $2.99
“After the sudden disappearance of Uriel, Leila will do her best to find him. She will even venture in the darkness of the catacombs… The secret they hide turn out to be more than dangerous. To discover the end of the story, play alternately Leïla then Uriel ! Examine different famous places in Paris: the subway, the banks of the Seine, Montmartre neighbourhood, the Champs Elysée, the Père Lachaise cemetery, the Trocadero gardens, the catacombs, etc.”

GHOSTS’N GOBLINS GOLD KNIGHTS 2: Price: $4.99
“We’ve heard what users had to say and we’ve made Ghost’ N Goblins Gold Knights II the most thrilling and accessible GNG game yet! In Ghost’N Goblins: Gold Knights II players, take control of the legendary Arthur or powerful Perceval as you once again battle against the minions of the Ghoul Realm. To survive the deadly descent, you have to make optimum use of your weapons and gear as you encounter ever more deadly foes.”

Arcade

Gravity Runner: Price: $0.99
“Take control of Colin as he automatically runs through levels filled with pitfalls and spikes. Tap the screen to make Colin jump over obstacles in his world. But this alone won’t keep him alive. If you tap the screen while Colin is in mid-air, gravity will be flipped! Master this gravity flipping ability to help Colin jump, glide and evade all obstacles placed in his path. Gravity Runner not only plays fantastic, but looks and sounds great too. The game has retro graphics, and charming sound to give a new twist to the classic platform game. You’d be crazy to miss out on Gravity Runner, especially for such a small price! Gravity Runner is nauseatingly addictive and will always leave you wanting just one more go!”

Pinball HD 4 iPhone: Price: $1.99
“Pinball HD 4 iPhone - This game will change your idea of Pinball on the iPhone. Each table - Wild West, The Deep, and Jungle style - are masterpieces. You’ll be stunned with the level of realism. This is a REAL Pinball simulator with stunning 3D graphics both with or without 3D glasses.”

Space Creepers Black Edition: Price: $0.99
“Shoot as many objects coming at you to earn yourself a high-score.”

SpinCycle-R: Price: $0.99
“SpinCycle-R is a revolution in simple addictive retro arcade game design. You have 60 seconds to make as many color matches you can from the spinning wheel. Earn massive bonuses for speed, streaks, and accuracy. Compete against the entire world for high score.”

Space Miner: Price: $0.99
“With Space Miner go through the space to exploit the subsoil rich in minerals of unknown worlds. With the captain and his assistant Lin Kad, the cat-robot, take control of the module Drilling TJTP and explore 5 different planets. Copper, Cobalt, Silver, Gold also await you! But mining is not everything, you will also fight bosses, improve your module, get acquainted with indigenous tribes and complete various missions. A blend of action, strategy and adventure game that will leave you hooked to your iPhone!”

Love Battle Princess: Price: $1.99
“Tired of playing clones? Love Battle Princess is a fast paced arcade game, featuring a fresh, simple and unique gameplay concept. It doesn’t play like anything you’ve seen before. It is accessible to all, yet challenging and sophisticated at high level for hardcore gamers. Team up with one of our four sexy princesses from the Love United Front and catch as many flowers as you can while destroying the agents sent by the evil Skull Agency. It’s that simple! But over time you’ll discover many advanced techniques, exciting power-ups and unique character abilities. Plus the beautiful ladies and colorful flowers are great for anyone looking for an alternative to gore and zombies.

Board

NOTHING

Card

NOTHING

Casino

NOTHING

Dice

NOTHING

Educational

Akshara: Price: $0.99
“Akshara - ìThe Alphabetî - is a very interactive and FUN way of learning the English Alphabet. Kids and other non-English people will find it a very Effective & Quick way of Mastering the English Alphabet ñ the letters, their sequence, pronunciation and objects displayed using it. The Game has the following options: The PLAY mode has the letters of the alphabet randomly scattered on the screen. The player picks the next letter in the right Alphabetical sequence from A till Z. On touching the right alphabet, the letter flips and displays a picture. In the LEARN mode, the player learns the letter, sequence & pronunciation. The HELP offers a brief description of the Game with related Awards for getting the Alphabets right.”

Family

Carnival Games for iPhone: Price: $3.99
“Step right up to Carnival Games™! 2K Play and Carnival Games™ for iPhone and iPod Touch brings you a collection of midway favorites designed to lighten your summer stresses and sweep you square into a country fair. Over ten games and attractions bring the fairgrounds to life including Star Shoot Out, Balloon Darts, Spilled Milk, Test of Strength, Nerves of Steel, Frog Leap, Wild West, Great Swami, Clown Bonk, Shooting Gallery, Bumper Boats, and more. Create your personalized character to play the games and earn tickets to redeem great prizes! Tap the map key for quick access to your favorite attractions. You can also roam the grounds to to make new friends and stumble upon hidden challenges that will unlock Wacky Wearables for your character.”

Amy’s Froyo: Price: $0.99
“Summer is sooooo hot. Want some cold delicious deserts and keep your body in shape for the beach? Decorate your own froyo to your heart’s desire with tons of flavors and toppings while sharing it with your family and friends. Oh and if there’s any flavors/toppings you’d like, please post us a review and we’ll work on it!”

Music

Say What You See: Music Fest: Price: $0.99
“Once you fall under its mind-bendingly addictive spell you may never again have time to talk to friends, answer the phone or sit on the toilet for less than 30 minutes as you unravel its mysteries. Our first release, Say What You See: Music Fest is an access all areas pass to puzzling pleasure. Hidden within this cryptic canvas is a whole music festival’s worth of chart-topping bands and artists. You’ll need sharp eyes and a good imagination to spot and name all 50. Once you download it, you’ll enter the inventive imagination of internationally renowned artist Aime Bolissian, whose beautiful hand-painted canvas take you to a world where nothing is quite as it seems. This is a work of art that pleases the brain as well as the eye, as you find and solve the 50 rebus riddles it contains. If you’ve not seen one before, a rebus is a kind of word puzzle that uses pictures to represent words or parts of words. A combination of Where’s Waldo: The Fantastic Journey™ and board game classic Dingbats™, you’ll need to use lateral thinking as well as your hidden-object finding skills. Suitable for the whole family, young and old, Music Fest is a brand new concept in addictive brain teasing. If you get stuck, don’t worry, just remember the golden rule: Say What You See!”

Puzzle

Mayan Puzzle: Price: $0.99
“A match 3 puzzle game. You can choose between 4 game modes (classic, time trial, challenge, marathon). The action takes place in a beautiful Mayan surrounding spiced up with a lot of special FX and original Mayan soundtrack. Depending on the mode selected it’s a mind-boggling action/puzzle game which will keep you on your feet, but it can also be a tough brain challenge in a classic/strategic mode. It’s a MUST-HAVE for a serious competitor.”

Akhenra Enigma: Price: $0.99
“Are you smart enough to defeat the perfidious Akhenra? Find the right combination and solve the enigma of the pharaoh!”

Tetra Defense - Attack of the Tentacle!: Price: $0.99
“Bogey The Tentacle has sworn to take over the world and is invading earth in his Positronic-Piece-Dropping ship! As he attacks with multiple pieces, you have to place them in an isometric 3D grid to form Quads. Each Quad you form returns damage to Bogey (which makes him angrier!). You must prevent Bogey from overloading the grid by constantly forming Quads, or else Earth is doomed! As you progress, you earn gold in the game! You can use that to purchase and upgrade Earth’s defenses to ward Bogey off and slow down his invasion. But watch out! Bogey is as fiery as his color and will unleash relentless attacks as he gets angrier!”

Aero World: Price: $0.99
“Try to reach the exit in the shortest time possible! Aero World is a game that will test your skill and your patience, controlling the ball throughout the different areas and solving their puzzles, your mission is to find the exit and beat the record of each area. Drag objects, activate machinery, avoid obstacles, solve puzzles, jump, and more, each area will be a different challenge. Enjoy with a full 3D world and 3D sound, combined with realistic physics thanks to the Bullet physics engine and sio2.”

Super Fashion Puzzle: Price: $0.99
“Super Fashion Puzzle. The puzzle game where pieces are accessories from various girls. Pair off the accessories belonging to each girl to earn points and extra time. You can also use the joker (a heart). When you‘ve matched several pairs, the board will regenerate and, after a few regenerations, a new girl will appear. Be careful when matching pairs! if a pair does not belong to the current girl, you will be penalized in time. Hurry up! Time flies! When you finish playing, upload your score to Facebook and the Internet. Check if you are good enough to be in the regional or global ranking!”

Racing

MotoGP 2010: Price: $3.99
“Start your engine, twist the throttle and get ready to push your limits with MotoGP™ 2010! Do you have what it takes to win the World Championship? Prove it with the only official iPhone game of the world’s premier motorbike racing series. MotoGP™ 2010 takes you across the world to compete against this season’s best riders. Rack up victories in the 18 official Grand Prix events of the year and get ready to light up the track!”

Role Playing

NOTHING

Simulation

NOTHING

Sports

MADDEN NFL 11 by EA SPORTS™: Price: $7.99
“Enhanced visuals bring the game to life in lush detail, especially when viewed through the remarkable iPhone 4 Retina Display. Watch the players rumble onto the stadium floor in electrifying detail. Capture the atmospherics of the weather effects. Even see the blades of grass on the field. TDC (“Total Defensive Control”) makes playing defense pure fun. Press the TDC button to pause the action, position your defensive players, and feel the thrill of delivering game-changing hits like never before. As always, get the authentic football experience that only MADDEN NFL can deliver. Match up all 32 NFL teams featuring updated rosters and nearly 2,000 real players.”

Darts Hero: Price: $0.99
“Quick flick the darts and hit the center of the darts board! Interesting, cool, addictive!!”

Greyhound Racing: Price: $0.99
“Feel the buzz at the track, let your adrenaline build as you risk it all to make your fortune. Have you got the instincts to make it in the world of Greyhound Racing? Simple, easy to pick up and play betting to fulfil your gambling pleasure and maximise your betting techniques. Check the greyhound’s history, pick your lane and away you go. Spend your winnings wisely once you have won a few races or risk going bankrupt! Check out the classified adverts and pick yourself up a bargain with your winnings. Arcade Action - Is the pressure getting too much? Take a break from the track and beat your high score at the arcade. This arcade shooter will keep you coming back for more.”

Strategy

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Trivia

Lord of the Rings Trilogy Trivia Game: Price: $1.99
“This is the fun and challenging trivia game covering ALL 3 MOVIES in The Lord of the Rings Trilogy. This trivia game contains OVER 500 QUESTIONS from the three movies.”

Bamboozle! - The Classic Teletext Quiz Game: Price: $0.99
“The cult Teletext quiz is back! Join your host and resident quizmaster, Bamber Boozler, for some of the most entertaining and challenging trivia questions you’ve ever seen.”

Word

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iPhone and iPod Touch Links of the Week

Appletell: [iPhone, iPod and iPad product news - August 13, 2010] [Free apps roundup for August 13th, 2010]

Gamertell: [Final Fantasy VII Larger-than-Life iPhone app costs $6]

Full Story » | Written by Kris Rosado for Gamertell. | Comment on this Article »