PSP GO Is GOing to Be Here Soon

EuroGamer obtained official pictures of the new PSP yesterday. The new PSP GO has a slide out control pad and lacks a UMD. It had 16 gb of memory (more then one of my computers had). This spells bad news for UMD owners, all games must now be downloaded. This means if you don't have wifi, you don't get games for it.

This new PSP also has a not-so-vague resemblance to Sony's failed internet device called the Mylo. You know, a few years ago Sony came out with the Mylo as a "communication device" that had almost know need. Blackberries could do everything the Mylo could do and more, and for $300, it cost a pretty penny.

There is no price yet, but in the coming week Sony is expected to announce one. The new PSP still only has 1 analog stick, meaning that FPS's will be hard to play on it. It is also supposed to pack Bluetooth (which almost no one uses) and a Memory Card Slot.

Weekly Time Waster: Spewer

Spewer is a game about, well, puking. Wait, don't stop reading just yet. It's not the gross cousin-at-Thanksgiving-ate-too-much-turkey barf so much as cartoonified, "cute" barf. You use this projectile to solve the various and puzzling levels throughout the game.

A warning though, this game is hard. If you give up easily on games when the going gets tough you will not be fond of Spewer. It is near impossible to get through some levels on one try (unless you use the nonexistent walkthrough). Luckily, you have many lives though.

The gameplay, surprisingly, is remarkably simple. Within the first 2 levels you will be spewin' like a pro. The addition of a level creator makes the game hard to stop playing. Spewer also has the addition of Newground's new Wide Layout. You can "dim the lights: (like on Hulu) and maximize the game to fill the page, and there's also Achievements (like on Xbox 360). You can start upchucking on Newgrounds.com.

Mcafee's List of Terms Not to Search

Mcafee released a list of search terms that lead to dangerous sites today. My question is, why would someone search the word "Web"?

Comic: Facebook Investment

Facebook confirmed that it received an investment yesterday from a Russian firm. The firm Digital Sky Technologies invested $200 million in the popular social networking site. This investment represents 2% of the company, valued at $10 billion. They're is a Facebook Money Page and a page for this blog.

Wolfram Alpha comic

I figured I draw up a little comic based on this article. You might be able to (hint hint!) expect some more comics in the future. Depends on how much energy I have. (Yes, I know they're not that good, but I was tired...excuse excuses)

Cool Site of the Week: Cubeecraft

Papercraft as found an large following on the internet with blogs such as Paperkraft.net. For those of you who don't know what papercraft toys are, you can check the ever-accurate Wikipedia. Cubeecraft takes this to a whole new level.

Cubeecraft doesn't just show good papercraft models, but it has the actual sheets so you can make them yourself. They have popular characters (Storm Trooper anyone?) original creations and pop culture references.

This will be something good to do over the weekend(yes, I know it's only Thursday). Well, if you have the patience to spend hours trying to find your old art supplies. You can become a cube-head at cubeecraft.com.

Palm Pre Update

Sprint has now confirmed (finally!), that the Pre will launch on June 6th. It will sell for $299 with a $100 rebate available. So get em' while they're hot!

New iPhone May Overshadow the Pre's Release

The Palm Pre, the fabled device that may breath life into the Palm devices, is set to release in "the first week of June"; as the New York Times reports. Whether this is a viable fact, I have no idea, but it is promising. The new iPhone will also (maybe) be launching on June 8th, the day of the Apple keynote at WWDC. The New York Times is now reporting that the iPhone will launch on the 5th, or the 7th, or within the time frame of a year from that(sarcasm). The iPhone may overshadow the Pre's hype, by my guess, the new iPods overshadowed the Zune. But their is still one uncertainty about the Pre. The pricing. The Pre is thought to be selling for $199, but a recent survey now says that Palm may sell it for $542.01; a completely random and insane amount.

Wolfram Alpha Impressions

A few weeks ago I wrote about the new search engine called Wolfram Alpha. It is made by the Wolfram company, that makes mathematics and science software such as Mathematica. So, obviously, this is one nerdy search engine. Yesterday they let beta testers check it out (I...um...forgot to...sign up) and it ran a tad rocky. Today, though, its released to the whole world. And it is cool, not amazingly useful, but still pretty cool.

But, on using it for myself, I now know it will definitely not be the Google killer. It does have a vast amount of information on very advanced topics. But, it is far to complicated for normal users, for people who do not understand how to even email it will be completely useless. But, Wolfram Alpha is not made for those people, it is made for tech savvy teachers, scientists, and geeks(like me!). It can tell you advanced equations, facts about universities, information on historical figures, and much much more.

The interface is incredibly easy to use, surprising on such an advanced search engine. The website runs fast, even under incredible loads of traffic. It also has nice, easy to read type. But, the real reason you want to use it so you can say you didn't use Wikipedia on school projects. I give it an A- (pun intended).

Sony's Losses mount

Even with Sony's CEO, Howard Stinger, trying to stage a comeback for the company. Sony has reported a $1 billion loss for the fiscal year the ended March 2009, it says its losses will mount to $1.26 billion by the end of the year. Sony, like many electronics companies, has been hit hard by the recession. The failing PSP and PS3 doesn't help too much either.

This Thursday, Sony said it would "ramp up its cost cutting measures". After his start as CEO in '05, Stinger's results aren't really that good. In February, Stinger completely restructured Sony's management, including adding the title of President. All this to try and keep Sony aggressive with companies like Apple and Nintendo. Now all he has to do is bring some life into Sony's product line, a elderly home of gadgets, with old technology, failed ideas, and useless innovations.

Sony also said Thursday that it would be cutting 16,00 jobs and close 6 factories to save $2.6 billion(250 billion yen). It will close 4 factories in Japan and the others in The US, Mexico, France, and Indonesia. Hopefully Sony will be able to dig themselves out of this one.

Microsoft's new Useless Ad: Ipod's Cost $30,00 to fill up

Microsoft's new ad for the Zunepass (fork over $14.99 a month for unlimited music) takes aim at iTunes. It's states that it costs $30,00 to fill up a 120gb iPod. There are a bunch of problems with this theory though, and, apparently Microsoft is unaware of an invention called the internet. For starters, many people borrow friend's Cds to get free music. Also, ever since Napster, people illegally download music off of P2P(peer-to-peer) networks such as Limewire. Also, many people don't buy 14 songs a month from iTunes so paying Microsoft in advance for something (as usual) is pointless. Also, the Zune is barely alive anyway, so why would anyone care?

Nerf Tank Tutorial

Instructables has an awesome tutorial on how to make an RC Nerf Tank. It uses a Vulcan Nerf gun, has a wireless camera, speakers+and AV outlet, and a ton more stuff. It seems fairly easy to make (haven't tried yet though!). You can see the tutorial at Instructables.com

Weekly Time Waster: Wizard Defense

Wizard Defense is free online game by the BigPark (recently acquired by Microsoft). Wizard Defense is a tower defense game with a magical twist. It has solid design and the graphics are top notch. It has blistering fast load times, no lag, and has a learning curve of about a minute. When you first start the game you can choose to sign in to an account to play (to save scores and such and such) or you can just get right to the fun part. Once you first start playing (and choose your character) you can choose to take a short tutorial. The tutorial is incredibly simple and will have you playing in about a minute. Once you finish the tutorial you will be plunged right into the magical, and incredibly addicting, world of Wizard Defense. You can play this game, and see your productivity drop by about 75%, at wizarddefense.com.

DJ Hero Controller: First Look

Activision (maker of Guitar Hero) has just released a photo, and a press release, on its new game, DJ Hero. DJ Hero will be in stores this Fall (that's a few months from now so don't get your hopes up just yet).

"SANTA MONICA, Calif., May 7, 2009 /PRNewswire-FirstCall via COMTEX News Network/ — Activision Publishing, Inc. (Nasdaq: ATVI) is set to once again revolutionize how consumers interact with music by releasing three new titles this fall - DJ Hero(TM), Guitar Hero(R) 5 and Band Hero(TM) - that will redefine the company's popular music gaming platform. The slate will transform the way consumers enjoy and engage with music by offering the largest variety of music genres, innovative technologies and new social entertainment experiences for existing fans and millions of new consumers who previously have not joined Guitar Hero's global community of fans.


— The company's groundbreaking DJ Hero expands Guitar Hero's
signature social gaming to all-new consumers with the addition of
diverse music genres including hip-hop, R&B, Motown, electronica and
dance. Introducing an all-new innovative turntable controller, DJ Hero
transforms players into DJs who rule the club scene by creating original
mixes of popular songs and music from the world's most exciting
artists and DJs.

— Letting fans continue to fulfill their rock fantasies, Guitar Hero 5
features the hottest rock and roll artists today as well as classic rock
bands and gives players an unprecedented level of control over the way
they play the game with the ability to drop in and out of songs and
change band members, instruments and difficulty levels on the fly.

— The franchises' first E10+ rated console game, Band Hero delivers
an exciting music collection featuring top-40 hits designed to expand
the appeal to a broad family audience who can play together on the
guitar, drums, bass and microphone and experience a new genre of music.
The game builds upon Guitar Hero's easy-to-play,
difficult-to-master signature gameplay and allows novice players and
expert fans to join together on their favorite songs.

"Guitar Hero has made music social again and has become one of the most popular ways to experience music," said Dan Rosensweig, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Guitar Hero franchise. "Today's fans enjoy a variety of music and are looking for more ways to engage with their favorite songs, artists and fellow fans. These games will let them listen, participate and socialize with music in ways they have never been able to before.""

Apple Adds Integrated Youtube into Snow Leopard: Tries to Bypass Adobe

Apple has already been hesitant to add support for Adobe's widely used Flash plugin on the iPhone but today marks another harsh blow by Apple. Apple will now have integrated Youtube support in its new operating system Mac OSX 10.6 (Snow Leopard). This is good because this will lead to more profits for Apple (and most likely a copycat from Microsoft). But, here's the catch, Apple will only do this if Google(which owns Youtube) will transfer all of Youtube's videos from Flash format to H.264 format. This means even more share is lost to Apple, already Adobe is losing ground due to iTunes. I don't think Flash is going to die any time soon though. Many widely popular sites still use Flash, such as Myspace, Facebook, Apple (suprisingly), and many game sites such as Kongregate. You can read more at 14U. Also, thanks to The Eclectic Skeptic for the tip.

Game Consoles Get X Rayed (NOTE:most likely not a word)

You probably have opened (or broken) game consoles to see there guts before (I haven't , well, on purpose anyway). Technabob has an interesting post that shows game consoles in a way you've never seen them before. You can see the splendor here.

Wolfram Alpha Search Engine may be a Google-Killer

Wolfram Alpha is a search engine that is releasing this month (May 2009 for those of you who are still running Windows NT or Mac OS9). But whys is it a big deal? Well, this search engine like the super-genius child of Google OneBox and Wikipedia. Unlike the strangely named Ask.com, this will actually answer your questions, like Wiki Answers except with instant gratification. It will also ooze with data-y goodness for all the techies out there. You can visit it at wolframalpha.com (its not up and running yet though). The video below this (its a tad blurry) shows how Wolfram Alpha works. But, will it actually be the Google-Killer?