NDM

Motorola Moto X review: less 'hello Moto', more hello Google

The Motorola Moto X is the first flagship smartphone from the inventor of the mobile since it was acquired by Google, and as such is a Google phone through and through.

Motorola hopes that the Moto X, together with the excellent Moto G budget smartphone launched in November 2013, will be enough to turn the company's fortunes around from a sustained loss over the past six quarters since it was acquired in May 2012.

The Moto X was originally launched solely in the US in August 2013, and has taken almost six months to reach the UK. It was originally touted as the "self-driving" smartphone, due to its ability to respond to the keywords "OK Google Now" triggering searches, controlling music and making calls even while the screen is off.

Motorola says it spent several months fine-tuning the Moto X's speech recognition to handle the varied accents around the UK - an important point if it is to function, as Andrew Morley, director of Motorola UK stressed, so you "really can use it without your hands, through the natural communications medium of voice."

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Privacy concerns raised as Google+ makes it possible to send email via name search

Google is integrating its Gmail service and Google+ social tracking network so that people without your Gmail address can send you emails by a name search.

The move has raised questions about its privacy implications, after similar moves with Gmail and its then-new Google Buzz social network in 2010 led to a row over alleged privacy invasion. Those in turn led to Google being bound to a 20-year privacy oversight by the US Federal Trade Commission.

Google has also made the change opt-out, so that users will have to change their settings to prevent unknown people emailing them. The senders will not see the email address of the person they are sending the message to unless the recipient replies.

Announcing the move in a blogpost, Google product manager David Nachum wrote:

Have you ever started typing an email to someone only to realize halfway through the draft that you haven't actually exchanged email addresses? If you are nodding your head 'yes' and already have a Google+ profile, then you’re in luck, because now it's easier for people using Gmail and Google+ to connect over email.

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LG's texting washing machine? Tech firms are asking the wrong questions

The annual vapourware games – otherwise known as the International Consumer Electronics Show – took place last week in Las Vegas. As ever, it brought fascinating glimpses inside the fevered imaginations ofmarketing and engineering executives.

One of the most hilarious was LG of South Korea, which promised that we would be able to text our washing machine or dryer to ask how it's doing.

Pause a moment to let that sink in, and then ask yourself: when was the last time you actually cared how far through its wash/spin/dry cycle your washer and/or dryer was? Personally, if that does happen, then I get up and go and look at it. It's not as if my home is so large that it requires a special expedition.

The nonsensical belief that people will text their appliances is typical of what emerges from a technology industry that simply tries to answer "What can we…?" As in, "What can we add to this toothbrush?" To which the answer, apparently, is "Bluetooth", plus a smartphone app so that your toothbrush can tell your smartphone how well you're brushing your teeth. (Depending on the definition of "well".)

NDM

Let's Play – the YouTube phenomenon that's bigger than One Direction

For the past five years, a silent army of video makers have been populating YouTube with clips of themselves playing computer games.

What might once have seemed an unlikely sub-genre has proliferated across the network and been rewarded with its own channel, called Let's Play, or LP. For gamers, it's a chance to combine their video production skills with an innate understanding of the connective power of the internet to create channels dedicated to clips of their game-play. 

The goal is not to get laughs, create a viral hit, or even to be competitive; gamers and their subscribers simply love games enough to want to watch other people play. Playing well helps, as does focusing on a popular game – MineCraft channels are particularly popular.

The figures speak for themselves; 24-year old Swedish gamer Felix Kjellberg’s channel, PewDiePie, is the most successful Youtube channel ever with more than 17 million subscribers. He has left One Direction’s channel, with its measly 10 million subscribers, for dust.

But it's not all about the unifying love of gaming. Youtube, which is owned by Google, runs a Partner Program which means that the owner of a video channel can earn a share of the money made from video ads on the site. 

This will encourage a lot of professional gamers to try and make their own youtube channel talking about new games coming out. This will help non gamers understand the features of each console and what you can do in the game to improve your skills. Making the videos on a youtube channel will help the people gain more publicity and views; making it more world wide. The target audience for this story would be teens and young adults. 

NDM

Technology predictions for 2014: smarter cities, bigger games

This is the year that cities become even smarter. Local authorities and councils the world over have invested in social capital and connected infrastructure with the aim of better understanding the needs of their citizens.

The Watershed arts venue in Bristol, for example, organised a Playable City Award in 2013, whose aim was "to commission an original, future-facing work, that used creative technology to explore the theme of the playable city." London, meanwhile, has introduced bins that send text messages when they are nearly full and has used sensors installed under parking bays in the West End to relieve congestion in the area – and the city is manually moving Boris Bikes to bays people are cycling from but not cycling towards (generally, if it's at the top of a hill).

In 2014, more cities will iterate and experiment. They'll implement new technologies to not only create a better connected city but to enhance the environment. That could include street lights switching on due to residents complaining about the lack of light on Twitter. There's a great number of opportunities available – and that's an exciting prospect. 

This makes alot of NDM fans excited for the new year of 2014, as we all know there are going to be high expectations due to the level of technology last year. There were many amazing new digital media technology created last year such as the IPhone5C and 5S etc. They have already started making a bin which has a sensor that can text you to tell you when the bin is full, that will attract many adult customers and sell quick because it is an outstanding creation. This makes all NDM users excited and anxious to see the outcomes of 2014's NDM.

NDM

Snapchat reacts to hacking group releasing millions of phone numbers

The creators of Snapchat have responded to the release of millions of users’ details, exposed when hackers published a partially redacted database matching usernames to phone numbers, but have stopped short of issuing an apology.

The database of millions of US users was uploaded by an anonymous group called SnapchatDB. The last two digits of phone numbers were redacted “to minimise spam and abuse”, but the group said it would consider releasing the unredacted data “under certain circumstances”.

Snapchat has acknowledged a security flaw – first pointed out to it several months ago – and said it would release an update of the app to let users opt out of the vulnerable “Find Friends” function which searches for users in your phone’s address book.

A report about the potential abuse of the Find Friends function was released in August 2013. On Christmas Eve an Australian security research group, Gibson Security, revealed further details of vulnerabilities and said Snapchat had not responded to its warnings.

This usually happens to IPhone apps when they are starting to get very popular,  i believe that many of target audience (which would be young adults and teens) will be more careful with the way they use Snapchat and increase their privacy. This could cause a lot of people to delete the app just in case of any further hacking with other accounts, this could also affect Snapchat financially. 

NDM

Alicia Keys, BlackBerry and how the #KeepMoving project stopped

She's survived wave after wave of redundancies. But finally this week, BlackBerry's grim reaper caught up with Alicia Keys - and axed her job as Global Creative Director.

The appointment in January 20134 of Keys - better known as a singer and songwriter who has won multiple Grammy awards - at the launch of the Z10 phone, puzzled many. Was she getting paid? Almost certainly. Was she a fantastic advertisement for BlackBerry? Well, given that soon after being appointed, she tweeted from an iPhone - the horror! - it looked for a few minutes as though things would come to an embarrassing end. But she blamed it on hackers, so that made it all right, and she got on with.. what did she do again?

According to BlackBerry, it certainly wasn't a sinecure - not at all. BlackBerry told us: "We thank Alicia for her many contributions including providing creative direction for the BlackBerry Keep Moving Project which attracted more than 40 million visits, advocating for women in STEM [science, technology, engineering and mathematics] and launching the BlackBerry Scholars Program. We have enjoyed the opportunity to work with such an incredibly talented and passionate individual."

I believe that Alisha Keys was a good person to choose for advertising the new blackberry because the is a world known singer with thousands of fans. She has won multiple grammy awards and has sold hundreds of albums, she would attract the main target audience for Blackberry which is teens and young adults because many people of that age love her music and look up to her; but it would attract more females of that target audience. However i thought that they way she was advertising for Blackberry then suddenly tweeted with her IPhone was a humorous mistake and she is lucky that her excuse got her out of financial trouble.