Valve reveals Steam Controller, the companion for Steam Machines

When Valve announced its Steam Machines initiative on Wednesday, the company also said that it would soon reveal more about how gamers would interact with these new consoles, which are designed to bring the PC gaming experience to your living room television. Gamers didn’t have long to wait, as Valve revealed the Steam Controller on Friday as the last announcement in its week-long spree of reveals about Steam in the living room. Valve’s controller is a radical redesign of the typical console controller, designed to work with every single PC game to date and games that have yet to launch as well.

The Steam Controller has two circular, clickable trackpads that Valve says will approach the functionality of a desktop mouse.

“Whole genres of games that were previously only playable with a keyboard and mouse are now accessible from the sofa,” Valve claims.

The center of the controller will be occupied by a touch screen that Valve says “allows an infinite number of discrete actions to be made available to the player, without requiring an infinite number of physical buttons.”

The Steam Controller will keep the ABXY buttons that have been present on console controllers for years, but other than those familiar letters, Valve’s input device looks like something entirely new. The controller will also be hackable, continuing Valve’s theme of openness for its living room products.

Nokia exaggerates discounts on its latest Lumia 925 and Lumia 625 buyback offers

Nokia has extended the buyback scheme it had started with the Lumia 520 and Lumia 620, and has now included the Lumia 925 and Lumia 625. The company claims to now offer up to Rs 10,000 discount on the Lumia 925 and up to Rs 7,000 discount on the Lumia 625 when customers trade in their old smartphones. Under the scheme, the Lumia 925 is available for Rs 28,529 and the Lumia 625 for Rs 14,919. In reality however, the discounts are much lower.

As per the scheme, the said discounts are exaggerated and are given on the phone’s MRP, which is much more than the MOP of these phones. For instance, Nokia mentions the MRP of the Lumia 925 to be Rs 38,529 while in India the phone was actually launched at an MOP of Rs 33,499. Similarly, the Lumia 625 was launched at Rs 19,999 and is already available for about Rs 16,000 at popular online retail stores. So the effective discount for exchanging an old smartphone against a new Lumia 925 or Lumia 625 phone would be Rs 5,000 and Rs 2,000 respectively instead of Rs 10,000 and Rs 7,000 as highlighted by the company.

This is not for the first time that a mobile vendor is misleading a customer, as we had earlier reported about how they exaggerate the discount under buyback schemes by quoting the MRP rather than the price at which its phones actually retail in the market.

Apple started the trend by offering a buyback scheme with a minimum of Rs 7,000 off on the iPhone 4. It worked for Apple with its sales increasing by up to 400 percent. Apple had an advantage that its phones sell on MRP and rarely get a price drop. However, that isn’t the case with other brands and there is hardly any discount extended by the brand. One can get a much better valuation for one’s older smartphone by selling it separately than falling for these gimmicks.

Campaign gone wrong, Microsoft India’s Xbox 360 ad implies gamers’ interest in Xbox could be zero

Talk about a campaign going horribly wrong. On the day when Sony teased its PlayStation 4 pre-orders going live in India soon, Microsoft had its foot stuck in its mouth. In a campaign to highlight zero percent EMI scheme for the Xbox 360, Microsoft’s “Xbox 360 India” Facebook page has this ad up that reads, “After this your interest in an Xbox could be zero!” Of course, the copywriter meant the zero interest when someone buys it on the EMI but was probably having a bad day at work. The timing couldn’t have been worse considering the announcement of PlayStation 4 pre-orders would go live soon in India while Microsoft’s Xbox One is unlikely to be launched here anytime soon.

Chasing the iPad mini isn’t working out as planned for Samsung, others

When Apple first released the iPad back in 2010, rival vendors scrambled to release 10-inch tablets that might compete in the re-emerging media tablet category. Early offerings weren’t well received, however, and Android tablet makers soon discovered that the best way to compete was to scale down to 7-inches and offer less expensive tablets. Following the release of the 8-inch iPad mini, however, Apple rivals again began to chase the new iPad model, believing a balance between size and price could be struck at 8 inches. Initial offerings like the Galaxy Note 8.0 were indeed solid, but a recent report suggests sales have been disappointing all around.

According to unnamed sources at Taiwan-based component suppliers speaking with Digitimes, Android tablet makers are cutting orders for 8-inch tablet parts because sales are falling short of expectations. Samsung and Acer were both named in the report.

Vendors thought that 8-inch tablets would gradually replace 7-inch models as the new mainstream tablet size, but apparently only the iPad mini has seen real success among 8-inch tablets. Demand for competing models from Samsung and other tablet makers has been “weak,” according to the report.

Digitimes says that 8-inch tablet shipments are expected to make up about 10 percent of total global tablet shipments in 2013, though Apple’s iPad mini will account for the lion’s share of that figure.

Google looks to scoop up engineers in BlackBerry’s hometown

Former BlackBerry employees may want to get their résumés in order: Google is coming to town. Reutersreports that Google’s Motorola Mobility division is setting up a new hub in BlackBerry’s hometown of Waterloo, Ontario and is looking to recruit people in the area who have backgrounds in engineering and computer science.

Even though BlackBerry has fallen on hard times, the city of Waterloo still has a thriving startup hub partly thanks to the University of Waterloo’s top-notch computer science program. Derek Phillips, the engineering director at Motorola Canada, tells Reuters that Motorola is looking to “get just as many people who are interested to come out and hire as many people as we can.”

App developers refuse to give up on BlackBerry 10

BlackBerry is not in a good place right now, having just posted a billion-dollar loss for the second fiscal quarter. But there is some good news to be found on Friday — according to a report from Digitimes, application developers aren’t yet ready to bail on BlackBerry 10.

The Taiwan-based website recently surveyed the scene at the BlackBerry Jam Asia 2013 conference this week, and it spoke to a number of developers who said they plan to continue building and supporting BlackBerry 10 apps. Supporting smaller mobile platforms like BlackBerry 10 and Windows Phone 8 is attractive to a number of developers because the iOS and Android app stores are so noisy that it is difficult to break through. BlackBerry is currently in talks with Fairfax Holdings regarding a $4.7 billion buyout that was proposed earlier this week. If the deal goes through, it is unclear what the future will hold for BlackBerry’s handset business.

Fairfax boss helped triple BlackBerry CEO Heins’ golden parachute this year

When it comes to golden parachutes, former Nokia CEO Stephen Elop may have nothingon BlackBerry chief Thorsten Heins. Reuters reports that BlackBerry’s board of directors this past spring agreed to triple Heins’ compensation if he lost his job after a sale of the company, going from a package that was worth $18.9 million to a package worth $55.6 million. What makes this particularly interesting is that one of the board members was none other than Fairfax Financial CEO Prem Watsa, who just months later left the board and announced a potential deal to buy out the company for $4.7 billion.

Joe Sorrentino, the managing director at executive pay advisors Steven Hall & Partners, tells Reuters that Watsa’s role in increasing Heins’ compensation just months before he announced his intention to buy the company could draw some scrutiny from regulators.

“Watsa was part of the committee that was negotiating this agreement,” Sorrentino says. “Did he anticipate that he would make some sort of offer to buy the company? I feel like that’s unlikely, but it’s impossible to know… The only concern I would have is since they structured his compensation equity award so that it all is granted at the beginning … it is all getting captured in a change of control golden parachute, as opposed to if they did a more typical process.”

In response to Reuters’ queries, BlackBerry said that Heins’ compensation package was approved by the entire three-person board and not only by Watsa.

Apple reels in Nike Fuel Band designer to help with wearable computers

Apple’s about to get a big boost in the wearable computing department. 9to5Mac reports that Apple has hired top Nike Fuel Band and Flyknit shoe designer Ben Shaffer to work on the company’s upcoming wearable computing devices such as the long-rumored “iWatch.” This isn’t the first time that Apple has hired a design expert who worked on Nike’s fitness-tracking Fuel Band wrist accessory as earlier this year it hired fitness expert and one-time Fuel Band consultant Jay Blahnik to help work on its mobile accessories. Ties between Apple and Nike have traditionally been strong, especially since Apple CEO Tim Cook sits on Nike’s board of directors.

Alleged photo of Nokia Asha 502 leaked

A few days after leaking what he claimed to be the Asha 500, prolific leaker @evleaks has now posted a photo of what he is alleging to be the Asha 502. This phone is similar to the one that was leaked in February along with the Asha 501. The alleged Asha 502 has a flash flanking the camera and a redesigned speaker at the rear. Like the alleged Asha 500, it too comes in a clear plastic shell but has Line messenger on the homescreen instead of WhatsApp.

The photo clearly shows it is a dual-SIM phone and could be the 3G-enabled variant of Asha 501 that Nokia is expected to launch. Nokia was reportedly working on two Asha devices codenamed Pegasus and Lanai, which could either be the Asha 500 and Asha 502 or the Asha 502 and Asha 503.

Something tells us that it won’t be long before Nokia reveals its cards. Stay tuned.

Beats Electronics ends relationship with HTC

On expected lines, Beats Electronics has bought back the remaining 25 percent stake HTC had in the company for $265 million, Dow Jones reports. Beats Electronics was said to be seeking new investors who could help it branch out into new product categories including speakers, car audio and also a soon to be launched music streaming service, which wasn’t possible given HTC’s current financial condition.

HTC had acquired a 50.1 percent stake in Beats Electronics in 2011 hoping it would help differentiate its smartphones from the competition. However, the Beats Audio branding did not bring the desired results and wasn’t marketed well enough to provide any leverage to HTC’s smartphones in the market. HTC sold off half of its stake back to Beats Electronics in 2012 for $150 million.

Beats Electronics is said to have secured funding of $500 million to buy out HTC’s stake from the Carlyle Group at a valuation of $1 billion, NYT reports.

MobileBench consortium led by Samsung formed to offer better mobile benchmarking tools

When it comes to calculating a device’s hardware performance, there are quite a few apps and services available for use, but more often than not each gives a different result or benchmark. In order to create a more centralized way of assessing the performance of mobile devices a number of tech companies have formed a consortium called MobileBench, Engadget reports.

This consortium includes some big name players like Samsung, Broadcom, Huawei, Oppo and Spreadturm. Its main aim is to offer tools that are more reliable and use a more sophisticated system to provide benchmarks, while reducing the discrepancies every time tests are repeated. The first tools to be offered by the group will be MobileBench and MobileBench-UX, for testing system-level applications. The MobileBench tool, it is said, will assess video and image viewing, camera use and other processes that are often used in our day-to-day lives.

Though the consortium boasts some big names, it also misses out on others like Nvidia and Qualcomm, which are responsible for powering many of today’s well known devices. It will be interesting to follow the rise of this group as it looks for new members and works towards developing that go-to mobile benchmarking tool.

BlackBerry announces Q2 2014 results, takes $934m hit on ‘Z10 inventory charge’

As expected, BlackBerry today announced its dreadful Q2, 2014 results where it reported GAAP loss of $965 million on a revenue of just $1.6 billion, which declined from $3.1 billion (49 percent) from the last quarter. As reported in its preliminary announcement earlier this week, BlackBerry shipped 3.7 million smartphones in the quarter. BlackBerry reported selling 5.9 million smartphones to end consumers in the quarter, easing its inventory a bit. However, most of the sales were of older BB OS 7 devices. BlackBerry says it took a “Z10 inventory charge” of $934 million. Since this week’s announcement, BlackBerry has repositioned the Z10 and has drastically dropped its price, in the guise of festive offer in India.

Since announcing the preliminary result, BlackBerry has accepted a letter of intent from Fairfax Financial, which already owns about 10 percent of the company, for acquiring BlackBerry for $4.7 billion. In the meanwhile, BlackBerry has announced it will exit from the consumer market and will focus on prosumer and enterprise segments only. It intends to lay off approximately 4,500 employees or about 40 percent of the total base. BlackBerry says it has $2.6 billion in cash and has no debt.

“We are very disappointed with our operational and financial results this quarter and have announced a series of major changes to address the competitive hardware environment and our cost structure,” said Thorsten Heins, President and CEO of BlackBerry. “While our company goes through the necessary changes to create the best business model for our hardware business, we continue to see confidence from our customers through the increasing penetration of BES 10, where we now have more than 25,000 commercial and test servers installed to date, up from 19,000 in July 2013. We understand how some of the activities we are going through create uncertainty, but we remain a financially strong company with $2.6 billion in cash and no debt. We are focused on our targeted markets, and are committed to completing our transition quickly in order to establish a more focused and efficient company.”

Intex Aqua i4 and Aqua HD Android smartphones launched for Rs 9,490 and Rs 15,990

After launching the Aqua i7 earlier this month, Intex has added two new Android smartphones to its Aqua series— the Aqua i4 and the Aqua HD. These mid-range smartphones are priced at Rs 9,490 and Rs 15,990 respectively and are available on e-commerce sites and retail stores across the country.

Talking of specifications, the less expensive dual-SIM Aqua i4 sports a 5-inch FWVGA display and is powered by a 1.2GHz dual-core processor paired with 1GB of RAM. Other features included are an 8-megapixel rear camera, 1.2-megapixel secondary camera at the front, expandable memory up to 32GB and a 2,000mAh battery. On the software front, the device runs on Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean and comes pre-loaded with apps like Intex play, Intex Zone, Hungama and Facebook.

The dual-SIM Aqua HD, on the other hand, flaunts a 4.7-inch HD IPS display and is powered by a quad-core processor clocked at 1.2GHz and paired with 1GB of RAM. Other features included are 13-megapixel HDR+ rear camera, 5-megapixel front camera, expandable memory up to 32GB and a 1,800mAh battery, which is said to be good enough for 6 hours of talk time and 300 hours on standby mode.

Like the Aqua i4, the Aqua HD too runs on Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean and comes pre-loaded with apps like NQ Mobile Security, Locate, My Screens, Intex Zone and Opera Mini among others. It also includes features previously seen on the Aqua i7 like the look away to pause a video and using multiple windows under the My Screen feature.

In terms of alternatives, the Aqua HD will go up against the likes of Xolo Q1000, Micromax A116 Canvas HD and the Karbonn Titanium S5 among others. The Aqua i4, on the other hand, is likely to face competition from the likes of Micromax A110 Canvas 2 and the XOLO Q800 among others.

Lenovo launches four new Android smartphones under Rs 16,000

Lenovo has launched four new smartphones, under its newly introduced ‘A’ series of affordable smartphones to tap in to the entry-level smartphone market. All the phones come equipped with dual-SIM compatibility and are placed between the Rs 5,000 to Rs 16,000 range.

Features-wise, the A850 comes with a 5.5-inch qHD (540×960 pixels) IPS display. It runs on Android 4.2 Jelly Bean and is powered by a 1.3GHz MediaTek quad-core Cortex A7 processor. Other features include 4GB of internal storage, which is expandable up to 32GB, a 5-megapixel rear camera and a VGA front camera, and connectivity options like 3G, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, GPS and AGPS. Priced at Rs 15,999, the phone will be available in black and white variants.

The A516 has a 4.5-inch IPS display and also runs on Android 4.2 Jelly Bean. It is powered by a 1.3GHz dual-core processor with 512MB of RAM, 4GB of internal storage, and expandable memory with a microSD card slot. The company claims that the smartphone offers up to 23 hours non-stop talk time. It sports a 5-megapixel rear camera, a VGA front camera and is priced at Rs 10,999. It is available in charcoal grey and white color variants.

The A369i comes with a 4-inch display, runs on 1.3GHz dual-core processor with 512MB of RAM and 4GB of internal storage with micro SD card slot. The phone is priced at Rs 6,999 and is only available in black color.

The fourth phone in the family, the A269i is the company’s most affordable smartphone and comes with a 3.5-inch display. It is powered by a 1GHz dual-core processor. The smartphone comes only in black color and is priced at Rs 5,499.

We have asked Lenovo for more details about all these smartphones. We will update this post as soon as we get more details.

Microsoft to launch Surface 2 and Surface Pro 2 today

About a year after Microsoft entered the tablet segment with the Surface tablet, the tech giant is all set to launch its next generation models of Surface tablet today at its event in New York City. The company is not only expected to showcase the Surface 2 or the Surface Pro 2 at the event, rumors have it that it will also launch a smaller Surface tablet model in order to compete against the likes of Apple iPad Mini, Google Nexus 7, and other dominant players.

Talking about the specifications, rumors suggest the second-generation Surface Pro tablet to be powered by an Intel Haswell processor with a massive 8GB of RAM and run on the recently updated Windows 8.1 OS. It is likely to feature a redesigned dual-position kickstand as well.

The Microsoft’s Surface RT sequel on the other hand is expected to shed the ‘RT’ nomenclature and be named simply the Surface 2. It is rumored to come with a 1080p display, and run on Windows RT 8.1 operating systems. It is also believed to pack in an Nvidia Tegra 4 processor along with twice the RAM of the Surface RT to improve the sluggish performance of the previous model.

Both of these tablets are speculated to be launched in white and black colors. Though we have to wait to know about the confirmed pricing for the devices, rumors suggested that the Surface Pro 2 will be launched for close to $900 for a 64GB version, $1,000 for a 128GB version and $1,300 for a 256GB version. Surprisingly, the tablet is also expected to come in a 512GB version priced at $1,700.

LG announces Vu 3, drops the Optimus branding, but retains the weird aspect ratio

LG has announced the Vu 3 phablet, the successor to the Optimus Vu 2. Just like the G2, the phablet, retains the very powerful Snapdragon 800 CPU, and also a 5.2-inch display. Like, its predecessors the phone retains its 4:3 aspect ratio and has a display resolution of 1280×960 pixels and also has a rubberdium stylus pen. LG is making a big deal of the rubberdium stylus pen as a competitor to S-Pen that is seen in Samsung Galaxy Note.

The device also has a 13-megapixel camera that is accompanied by a LED flash and has a 2.1-megapixel front-facing camera. The phone also packs in 2GB of RAM and runs on Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean.

LG has added a number of software embellishments like the knock on feature that was first seen on the G2. There is also a Notebook feature that allows the user to draw using acrylic and charcoal effects among others. The Vu 3 also has a Guest Mode where users can provide selective access to features when someone else is using the device. It comes with a Quick View case, which is transparent and lets the user change 7 different themes showing glancable data like time, date, currency, notifications and messages.

Like Samsung, LG touts that in spite of the larger screen from its predecessor, the Vu 3 is just 0.2-inches larger. Currently, the phone has been announced for South Korea, but it will not be surprising that if lands in India, sooner than later, considering LG is also expected to launch the G2 on September 30 in the country.

Leaked screenshots of Android 4.4 Kit Kat show new messaging app and dialer

Google has officially announced that the next version of Android will be called Kit Kat and will be Android 4.4. That said, no one really knows a lot of about its feature set considering Google only recently rolled out Android 4.3. 9to5Google is reporting leaked screenshots of the Android 4.4 Kit Kat that show a redesigned dialer screen, a new messaging app and even some new icons.

The screenshots insinuate to a lighter shade on the status bar that also matches the color scheme of the app in question. The messaging app gets its controls repositioned now to the top right corner. The dialer gets a cleaner flatter design, with a new light blue scheme.

It is still not known, if Google is integrating Hangouts with the messages app, but if that happens, it will be a nice touch and give Hangouts a level of seamless integration that is only enjoyed by iMessage on the iPhone, iPad and OS X.

For what its worth, the Android 4.4 Kit Kat is expected to arrive in October, with a new flagship Nexus smartphone. The current rumors point towards it being the Nexus 5, which will also come from LG.

The Nexus 5, is expected to pack a 5-inch 1080p IPS screen, a 13-megapixel camera, and will probably be powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 CPU. We have already seen a few leaked shots of the device, with one coming directly from a Google promotional video. The device has been pictured at the US FCC.

LG G2 up for pre-order in India for Rs 40,499

LG’s latest flagship smartphone, the G2, is already reported to be launching in India on September 30, but now giving more credence to the fact is that an online retailer in India has put the device up for pre-order for Rs 40,499, with the delivery date pegged at September 30.

The G2, of course, is flagship material and will go up against the likes of the Samsung Galaxy Note III and the Sony Xperia Z1. It packs a quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 CPU clocked at 2.3 GHz, a 5.2-inch IPS screen with a resolution of 1080p, 2GB of RAM, and 32GB of internal memory. There is no micro-SD card slot.

It also has a 13-megapixel camera with optical image stabilization, a 2.1-megapixel front facing camera and has an IR Blaster and a 3,000-mAh battery. It also is one of the first smartphones in the world, which will be able to relay 24-bit audio.

The phone has made headlines due to its design idiosyncrasies as LG has placed the power and volume buttons on the back below the camera so that the user can control the device more easily while taking calls. It is running Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean and is incredibly customizable.

Most likely, the phone will compete against the likes of the Galaxy Note III, Xperia Z1 and the Xperia ZU. This is because all the above three devices are running newer and more powerful CPUs than say devices like the LG Optimus G Pro, the Samsung Galaxy S4 and the HTC One.

Cheaper Samsung Galaxy Note 3 aimed at emerging markets reportedly in the works

A week back, Samsung launched its latest flagship— the Galaxy Note 3— in India for Rs 49,900 and now it seems the South Korean company is readying a less expensive variant of the phablet. According to a reporton Korean news site ETNews (via SamMobile), this cheaper variant will sport lesser specifications and will be targeted at emerging markets.

According to the report, the Galaxy Note 3 will be slightly tweaked and its premium-ness slightly toned down. Samsung is likely to replace the Super AMOLED display with an LCD display and will also swap the 13-megapixel rear camera with an 8-megapixel camera. There’s also a chance that Samsung reduces the display size from 5.7-inches to 5.5-inches.

There’s obviously no way of authenticating the above piece of information and we would suggest you take it with a pinch of salt. In the meantime, the Galaxy Note 3, which will be available from September 25 onwards, is already up for pre-orders on various Indian online retail stores.

BBM now available for iPhone

As expected, BBM for iPhone is now available to download from Apple’s App Store. Meanwhile, there is still no sign of BBM for Android, which was supposed to be launched before the iOS version. This could potentially bring BBM to a few hundred million users overnight. BlackBerry currently has about 60 million users on BBM and desperately needs more users if it is indeed considering spinning off BBM into a separate company.

BBM on Android and iOS will bring the legendary messaging service to non-BlackBerry users for the first time but it won’t bring all the features. BBM voice calling, for instance, will still be exclusively available to BlackBerry smartphones only, though it might eventually come to Android and iOS later. Earlier, a video walkthrough and user guide for the app had leaked online.

You can download BBM for your iPhone from here. Let us know in comments below what you think about it.

Video: iPhone 5s easily survives drop test – iPhone 5c, not so much

With the new iPhones having hit the stores in select markets, we have already seen iFixit give it their teardown treatment and now it is time for a drop test video. This particular video comes to us from the team at Android Authority, which bought both the iPhone 5s and 5c in Hong Kong early Friday morning and gave each device chest-high drop tests on a concrete sidewalk. The iPhone 5s fared remarkably well in the drop test and its aluminum body barely registered a scuffle when dropped on its back, side and front. The iPhone 5c, on the other hand, fared less well.

The plastic iPhone’s casing survived the back-end and side drops easily enough but its display cracked in multiple places when dropped flat on its face. The good news, however, is that the 5c still worked even with multiple cracks in its screen of course — though it’s advisable to get cracked screens repaired as quickly as possible despite the fact that you see people using iPhones with broken screens everywhere you go.

Here’s why typing on Android phones is harder than typing on an iPhone

With occasionally unreliable autocorrect software and periodically clumsy fingers, typing on a virtual keyboard has never been easy. Take these issues and couple them with slow response time, and it’s no wonder so many of our text messages end up riddled with errors. Cloud gaming company Agawi wanted to know which phones responded the fastest, and so the company set up a series of benchmarks (called TouchMarks) to measure touch responsiveness.

The first study measured the Minimum App Response Time (MART) on the iPhone 5, iPhone 4S, Galaxy S4, Lumia 928, HTC One and Moto X. The three Android devices and the Windows Phone all had a MART between 114-123 milliseconds, whereas Apple’s iPhone 4S came in at 85 milliseconds and the iPhone 5 took just 55 milliseconds to respond. In other words, the iPhone 5 is more than twice as responsive as the newest Android and Windows Phone devices.

Agawi notes that several factors could come into play when testing latency, such as touchscreen hardware and different methods of coding. Regardless, the iPhone is likely the most responsive phone on the market, although with so much new hardware on the way from every phone company around the globe, the margin may start shrink soon.

Can BBM be relevant once more?

This weekend marks a new beginning for BlackBerry Messenger (popularly known as BBM) as it becomesavailable on iPhones and Android smartphones. With an addressable market of a billion users, BBM has the possibility of becoming much bigger than it could have ever been were it to be stuck with BlackBerry smartphones, sales of which have fallen so rapidly that the company is investigating “strategic options” (read going private or a sale). With just 60 million BBM users and increased competition from services like WhatsApp, WeChat, Line and others, can BBM still be relevant?

A few things I hear regularly from existing BlackBerry users is how their BBM contacts have shifted to WhatsApp and how most of the conversations have moved on from BBM. Then there are also some users who keep a BlackBerry just because of BBM. “I cannot wait for BBM to come to Android. I want to move from BlackBerry but cannot do that right now,” a journalist friend who works for a newswire told me earlier this week brandishing his old BlackBerry smartphone.

While many BlackBerry users have moved on to an iPhone or an Android smartphone and have moved to WhatsApp, they miss BBM. “Unlike WhatsApp, where anyone who has my number can ping me, I find BBM more private and secure. I also miss the whole charm about sharing your BBM PIN with someone so that they could add you,” says a producer for a television news channel.

BBM has the legacy. There are millions of former BlackBerry users who have now shifted platforms and miss BBM. There are hundreds of millions more (yours truly included) who have had friends raving about BBM but could never think of shifting to a BlackBerry smartphone to experience it. Now they will be able to see what BBM is all about. Whether they would stick to BBM or continue with WhatsApp and others is a different matter, they will download BBM once at least. Is BlackBerry late in introducing BBM for iOS and Android? Probably. Is it too late? Probably not.

Don’t be shocked or surprised if your Facebook and Twitter feed is full of people sharing their BBM PIN over the weekend.

Google introduces a new logo and menu bar

Google is rolling out a new, flattened logo along with a tweaked top menu bar, which sheds that old black color and style. The top bar now comes with a differently designed and placed menu bar. The search engine giant has now introduced a new app launcher with links to other Google products. This changed interface was first reported by TechCrunch, though Google made it official soon after.

As a major interface overhaul, the new Google bar does not spread across the top but is placed in a smaller area on the top right side, alongside the share and account information links of a Google page. The app launcher looks pretty familiar. Basically, Google has kept the look of the new app launcher similar to the one on Android devices, and Chrome OS possibly to create a common identity across its platforms.

Those who have not yet received the update, Google has mentioned that it will be rolling out the update across most Google products over the new few weeks. Google has stated in its blog that it has only “refined the color palette and letter shapes of the Google logo.”

Google is the latest to introduce a flatter logo, a trend first started by Apple in its latest iOS 7 operating system. This was then followed by Mozilla and Yahoo.

India gets ‘authorizing nation’ status for IT products

India has been granted the ‘authorizing nation’ status under the international Common Criteria Recognition Arrangement (CCRA) to test and certify electronics and IT products with respect to cyber security.

India has become the 17th nation to earn such recognition among the 26-member CCRA countries like the US, Britain, Germany, South Korea, France, Japan, Canada, Australia, Turkey and Malaysia, the Communications and Information Technology Ministry said Thursday.

The status of ‘authorizing nation’ will enable India to test IT and electronics products and issue certificates, which will be acceptable internationally. The recognition would also enable investment in setting up infrastructure and labs in public and private sectors in India for testing Electronics and IT products.

So far India was having the status of ‘consuming nation’ with respect to certification of electronics and IT products.

For the last five-six years, Standardisation Testing and Quality Certification (STQC) Directorate of the Department of Electronics and Information Technology (DeitY) has been operating the Common Criteria Certification (CC Certification) scheme.

Under it, STQC undertakes certification of electronics and IT products after evaluation of the products at its lab in Kolkata. The certificates issued by STQC Directorate shall now be acceptable internationally by all CCRA member countries.

Apple iPhone 5S teardown reveals Touch ID fingerprint scanner, new camera module and other secrets

Apple’s latest offering has only just hit stores in select markets and already it has been taken apart limb from limb. Not surprisingly the people responsible are the team at iFixit, which gave the device their famous teardown treatment. After completely disassembling the iPhone 5S, the team not only found it relatively easy to repair, but also found the much-talked-about Touch ID sensor and a new Sony camera module among others.

While removing the front panel, the team found a cable running from the Touch ID sensor to the Lightning port assembly. The Touch ID assembly (looks same as what leaked a month back) is essentially a bunch of very small capacitors that creates an “image” of the ridges on your finger.

Like in the iPhone 4S and the iPhone 5, they found that the image sensor hidden in the rear camera assembly again comes from Sony. But the markings on the module are different and hence the sensor is not Sony’s IMX145, but a newer variant made specifically for the iPhone 5S. That isn’t surprising considering Apple had talked about retaining an 8-megapixel camera while having a bigger sensor in place for better photo quality. Lastly, on prying out the battery, they found it to be a 1,560mAh, which is much bigger than the 1,440mAh on the iPhone 5.

Overall, iFixit gave the iPhone 5S 6 out of 10 in terms of ease of reparability, with 10 being the easiest to repair. The device is overall easy to open and repair, barring a couple of parts like the Pentalobe screws, battery attached with a strong adhesive and Touch ID sensor, which make the process a bit tedious.

Check out the complete teardown here.

Mobile apps stores to cross 102 billion downloads in 2013: Gartner

Annual app downloads on mobile app stores will witnesses a growth of over 60 percent to reach 102 billion in 2013 from 64 billion recorded in 2012, according to a new report by Gartner. Despite the present growth, Gartner predicts that the growth will eventually slow down and the average monthly download per iOS and Android device will decline by 2017 as compared to that in 2013.

While free app downloads are expected to take show significant growth, downloads for paid apps are also predicted to grow over 25 percent in 2013. Out of the total downloads of 102 billions, free apps downloads will account for 91 percent of all apps this year. The total revenue generated from app stores will significantly increase from $18 billion in 2012 to a total of $26 billion in 2013.

Apple’s App Store and the Google Play store currently have about 60 percent and 80 percent of free apps of total available apps respectively. Though these two platforms are forecasted to account for 90 percent of global downloads in 2017, the average monthly downloads are expected to decline by 2017.

“The average downloads per device should be high in early years as users get new devices and discover the apps they like. Over time they accumulate a portfolio of apps they like and stick to, so there will be moderate numbers of downloads in the later years,” says Sandy Shen, research director at Gartner.

According to the report, average monthly downloads per iOS device will be down from 4.9 in 2013 to 3.9 in 2017, while average monthly downloads per Android device will decline to 5.8 in 2017, from 6.2 in 2013.

It is predicted that in-app purchases will prove to be a major monetizing method for app developers. The revenue generated from in-app purchases is expected to grow from 11 percent in 2012 to 17 percent of the app store revenue in 2013 and 48 percent by 2017. However, with decline in monthly app downloads, in-app purchases are also expected to slow down in later years. An important reason behind this slow down will be that as compared to the early adopters the mass-market consumers will neither be able to afford these apps nor would be willing to make purchases.

Microsoft says Windows Phone is a ‘distant third,’ admits OEMs were annoyed by Surface

Microsoft is making a big shift from being a software company to being a devices and services company, which means that we should expect the firm to have its fair share of hiccups over the next few quarters. Paul Thurrott reports via Twitter that Microsoft COO Kevin Turner admitted during the company’s financial analyst meeting on Thursday that Microsoft has had its fair share of growing pains with its new business model and said that the company in particular has a lot of work to do with Windows Phone, which he said was a “distant third” behind iOS and Android.

Turner also said that there was some “consternation” among the company’s OEM partners when Microsoft decided to get into the hardware game by developing the Surface. Microsoft emphasized, however, that just because it’s becoming a devices company that doesn’t mean that it will make all devices based on its Windows Phone, Windows RT and Windows 8 operating systems.

Sony expects to sell 5 million units of PS4 this fiscal year: Reuters

Sony’s PlayStation 4 (PS4), which goes on sale in November, is likely to outsell Microsoft’s Xbox One and outshine Sony’s last-generation PlayStation 3, Reuters reports. Sony is feeling optimistic having seen the initial reactions and believes it can sell 5 million units between the date of launch and the end of the first fiscal year.

If Sony manages to achieve that target, it will have sold 40 percent higher than its predecessor, which managed to sell 3.6 million units in the same time frame seven years earlier. Sony couldn’t have asked for a better start having surpassed 1 million pre-orders as of August. In other words, the PS4′s launch-quarter sales have already topped the PS3, and the new console hasn’t even debuted yet.

No wonder then Andrew House, president and group CEO of Sony Computer Entertainment Inc is particularly optimistic and has already said that they expect to earn a profit relatively early, especially since the PS4 is cheaper to build compared to the PS3.

For those waiting, the PS4 will debut on November 15 in the US for $399 (Rs 25,000 approximately) and a launch in India expected around January 2014. You can also find a complete list of launch titles for the PS4here.

Lava Iris 505 launched with 5-inch display and dual-core processor for Rs 9,499

After the Iris 506Q, Lava has also launched the Iris 505 phablet, which was recently spotted selling at an online portal. The company has launched this new 5-inch phablet for Rs 9,499, which is available online at a discounted price for Rs 8,999.

Features-wise, the Iris 505 comes with a 5-inch FWVGA display with 480×854 pixels resolution. It runs on Android 4.2 Jelly Bean and is powered by a 1.2GHz dual-core processor with 512MB of RAM, while the 506Q model comes with quad cores clocked at same speed. Besides, it comes with 4GB of inbuilt storage which is expandable up to 32GB through a microSD card.

Other features in the Iris 505 include a 5-megapixel rear camera and a 0.3-megapixel front camera. Connectivity-wise, one gets support for dual-SIM, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, GPS, GPRS and 3G in the phablet. It comes with a 2000mAh battery, though the company has not mentioned about its battery back time. Besides all this, Lava claims that the Iris 505 supports over the air software updates. The phablet also comes with gesture controls, which the company had first introduced on the Iris 504Q which was launched a few months back.

Cat unlocks iPhone 5S with Apple’s Touch ID fingerprint sensor!

When Apple unveiled its fingerprint scanner equipped iPhone 5S last week, as expected it went at length to discuss how its implementation called Touch ID is the best that anyone has ever seen on a consumer device. The initial reviews agreed with Apple with most reviewers saying Touch ID worked almost flawlessly for them. TechCrunch’s Darrell Etherington, however wasn’t satisfied with unlocking the iPhone 5S with his thumb. So he decided to register the paw of his colleague’s cat and it worked!

Though not as accurate as his thumb he was successfully able to unlock the iPhone 5S by placing the cat’s paw in a precise way to get it to work. Just for the record, Etherington also successfully registered different parts of his body with Touch ID and the system remain accurate, not letting him substitute one limb for another.

Apple CEO Cook: ‘We never had an objective to sell a low-cost phone’

Tim Cook is sorry if you’re disappointed that the iPhone 5c isn’t a budget phone aimed at consumers in emerging markets but he never meant to give you the impression that it would be. In an interview with Bloomberg Businessweek, Cook says that Apple “never had an objective to sell a low-cost phone” that would compete on some level with the dirt-cheap Android handsets that have been flooding into emerging markets. Instead, Cook says that the goal with the iPhone 5c was “to sell a great phone and provide a great experience, and we figured out a way to do it at a lower cost.”

While it’s true that Apple is simply not built to compete on the very low end of the market — “We’re not in the junk business,” as Cook tells Bloomberg Businessweek — many analysts were expecting the lower-cost iPhone to sell for $450 off contract at most and not the $550 off-contract price that the company announced earlier this month. This has led to a drop in Apple’s share price since the iPhone 5c launch because investors believed that Apple’s new device would at least have a mid-range price that would make it more attractive to consumers in China, India and Brazil. As things stand now, however, the iPhone 5c seems to have little hope of cracking key emerging markets at its opening price point.

“It raises the question: Is Apple truly a mass-market provider?” Enders Analysis analyst Benedict Evans tells Bloomberg Businessweek. “Or do they wind up with 40 percent of the U.S. market, a third of Europe, and nothing anywhere else?”

Google announces Calico, a health company aiming to extend human life

Google is no doubt a big company and can do what it wants to. Now led by Larry Page, it seems Google is taking on the Angel of Death himself. The search giant has announced a new company called Calico, which essentially targets the healthcare sector and aims to extend human life.

Larry Page announced the company and described Calico as a moonshot, along the lines of Google’s self-driven cars. “It takes 10 or 20 years to go from an idea to something being real,” Page explained. “Health care is certainly one of those areas. We should shoot for the things that are really, really important, so 10 or 20 years from now we have those things done.”

The new company will be head by Arthur D. Levinson, former CEO of Genentech and current chairman of Apple. At Calico, Levinson will work as CEO and founding investor. Google though didn’t reveal any more details on how the venture would operate or what it would do.

This is not the first time Google has dipped its feet into the healthcare sector. Its Google Health project aimed at digitizing personal health record services, but unfortunately the service was shut down in 2011.