Sirens are mythical creatures that all sailors love to hear at the expense of being shipwrecked, so it is no surprise that iRiver’s Siren MP3 player comes in a pretty albeit rectangular form factor in Japan. It supports MP3, WMA and WAV formats, featuring up to 17 hours of playback time per charge. Available in 1GB and 2GB capacities that retail for $65 and $84 respectively, the Siren will come in gold, pink or blue colors when February 1st rolls around.

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We all know how obesity is a huge problem (no pun intended) in developed nations (in part due to all the gadgetry that makes life less inconvenient to move around), and Nintendo has released word that they are currently preparing the Wii Fit for a US release. Out in Japan for some time now (and being a runaway sales hit, mind you - shifting tons of consoles in the process), could this preparation mean translating the manual to English, or changing the weight limit that currently stands at 300 pounds? It would be really nuts for Nintendo to underestimate the weight of potential gamers and risk to lose tons of moolah in any case of a recall due to malfunctioning or broken units. 500 pounds would be a safer bet, methinks.

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Nokia has a couple of new handsets in town - the 2600 Classic (as seen on the right) and the 1209. While both are entry level cell phones, the former comes with colorful, changeable Xpress-on covers, MP3 ringtones, an FM radio and a VGA camera. As for the 1209, this miserly handset comes with a pre-paid tracker (you can’t get any cheaper than that), a cost-tracking application (Hello, Scrooge!) and a multiple phonebook to share with your equally cheap buddies. Imagine having up to five people store their personal contact lists. You won’t have too many friends being that cheap though, and Nokia probably agrees by placing a 200-number limit on the phone. The Nokia 2600 Classic and Nokia 1209 will retail for 65 Euros and 35 Euros respectively before taxes when they are available later this year.

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Filed under: Blu-ray

We’ve been hearing a lot about various Blu-ray vs HD DVD sales figures from the US and Europe over the last year or so, but Japan has been strangely quiet when it comes picking their favorite format for adoption. Until now, that is. At the end of 2007 sales for High-Definition discs and players skyrocketed in the region and, in particular, for Blu-ray.

High definition players made up 35% of the total value of DVD player sales during the three month period. Of that, 90% of HD player sales were Blu-ray. Keep in mind that this doesn’t factor in PS3 sales and took place before Warner’s big bombshell earlier this month. The Japanese have been voting with their wallets and it seems they’re backing Blu.

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Filed under: News

Capcom’s love-it-or-hate-it action adventure, Lost Planet, hits the PS3 in February. The game earned a bit of infamy due to its over-blown promise of satiating PS3 fans’ “feelings of betrayal.” Although the PS3 version includes an additional playable character, launches at a budget price, and includes free online multiplayer, it seems as though nothing will soothe the bitter, broken hearts of the Capcom spiteful. Except for Bionic Commando Rearmed, right?

[Via Joystiq]

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Filed under: Cellphones

It looks like all that shouting AT&T has been doing lately about its “openness” is starting to manifest itself in the way the company does business. It’s come to our attention that the mobile telco has started offering a SIM-only plan, thus providing the ultimate in open options. The idea being, of course, that you can bring any random / crappy / salvaged GSM-compatible handset the provider’s way, and it’ll let you hook a towline onto its satellites. Of course, you could just get one of those cheapo giveaways and pop out the card, but this is so much more open and free, like San Francisco in ‘69, a car-less road, some land of your own, and a good old-fashioned whiskey on the rocks. Oh, you still have a sign a two-year agreement… enjoy your freedom!

[Via The Boy Genius Report]

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Filed under: Cellphones

Pizza Hut has joined rivals Domino’s and Papa John’s in implementing a nationwide order-by-text service, giving customers even easier access to its tasty-but-greasy fare. To take advantage of the “Total Mobile Access” feature, you have to visit the Pizza Hut website for a one-time registration of your mobile number, along with setting up your so-called “pizza playlist” to enable easier ordering. You can also satisfy your pizza jones by hitting up the same site on a mobile browser, which provides an optimized version of the desktop ordering system that has been in place for several years.

[Via InformationWeek]

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Filed under: Cellphones

Just when you think you’ve reached the apex of your iPhone’s capability, there comes another accessory-maker, modder, or developer to prove you wrong. One new feature comes in the form of a piece of software for Jailbroken iPhones (or touches) called PocketGuitar. The premise of this software is simple — it allows you to “play” the phone like an actual instrument, as well as strum along to your stored music — thus fulfilling a number of twisted, rock-nerd fantasies. When you’re done perfecting a version of “Frankenstein,” you can use your phone to stalk your estranged lover… provided you’re using Conice’s 6 x 18 zoom attachment for the phone, a hideous plastic beast that snaps onto your normally trim device. Hey, no one ever said stalking was going to be easy.

[Via Mobilewhack]

Read - Virtual Guitar for iPhone and iPod touch
Read - Conice 6×18 Zoom Attachment for iPhone

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Filed under: Cellphones

C’mon — hop in this nifty time machine here and float with us back to December of 2006. That month, friends, is when Palm initially stated that it was cooking up a Vista-savvy iteration of its Desktop synchronization software, and yet, here we are some 13 months later wondering what took so long. Nevertheless, a finalized version of Desktop 6.2 for Vista has finally been loosed (half a year after the beta was revealed, mind you), and even though it does play nice with 32-bit editions of Basic, Home Premium, Business and Ultimate, 64-bit Vista / XP users are still left out in the cold. For Palm (and Vista) users out there willing to forgive the tardiness, go on and hit up the read link to get the 65.2MB file headed over.

[Via PDAStreet]

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Filed under: Products and services, Google (GOOG)

Google, Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) is famous for just giving things away for free. The company is a large part of the information economy and allows anyone on the planet with internet access free use of its search engine, email, documents, photos and more. In return, it receives lucrative advertising dollars that mostly originate from its search engine. Well, the next free service is about to roll out — to large scientific concerns no less.

Google’s Research website will begin offering the free hosting of those enormous datasets scientists use to predict weather, decipher the human genome and fold proteins. Google will make available terabytes of information on its research website for this purpose. A terabyte is 1,000 Gigabytes. That PC you’re using right now? It probably contains 80 Gigabytes to 250 Gigabytes.

In addition to offering free online storage hosting for scientific purposes, the company will also make available algorithms that can be used to look at and study information contained within those huge, uploaded scientific datasets. In addition to allowing universities unparalleled access to storage and algorithm use for their research needs, those at home who want to explore scientific information never before widely available will have the capability to do so. All that remains will be the large question of how researchers will actually transport their datasets to Google’s system, but for now, the theory is that Google will ship a hard drive array in a suitcase to any interested party so that datasets can be sent to it then shipped back to Google.

Another day, another righteous Google project that seemingly has no monetary impact to the company but does have significant public impact. Isn’t life grand for Google?

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