Barclays Bank computer theft: Eight held over £1.3m haul

Eight men have been arrested in connection with a £1.3m theft by gang who took control of a Barclays Bank computer.

Searches are currently being carried out at addresses across London where property has been seized, including cash, jewellery, drugs, thousands of credit cards and personal data.

The men, aged between 24 and 47, were held on Thursday and remain in police custody.

Blackberry reveals date BBM messaging will go to rivals

Until now the BBM app had been limited to Blackberry's own devices

 

From this weekend, users will no longer need to own a Blackberry device to access its BBM messaging service.

 

Blackberry has confirmed BBM will be available as a free download for Apple and Android devices but not for Windows phones.

 

The move comes as the Wall Street Journal reports that Blackberry will lay off 40% of its staff before 2014.

 

Widening the appeal of BBM could be a clever way for the company to reinvent itself, said experts.

 

"Blackberry is having a tough time, sales are down, it is losing market to Windows phones and it needs to do something to stop the rot. This is as good a move as any," said Chris Green, principal technology analyst at Davies Murphy Group Europe.

 

"Offering it across other platforms broadens the appeal of BBM," he added.

 

BBM will be available for Android devices running Ice Cream Sandwich and Jelly Bean while iPhones running iOS 6 or iOS 7 can also download it. It will be available for Android from Saturday and for iOS from Sunday.

 

"With more than a billion Android, iOS and Blackberry smartphones in the market, and no dominant mobile messaging platform this is absolutely the right time to bring BBM to Android and iPhone

customers," said Andrew Bocking, vice-president for BBM in a blogpost.

 

Reinventing itself

 

BBM has been described as Blackberry's "crown jewels" and the service hit a chord with a mass consumer audience.

Offering it to a wider public will not make any money for the company.

"It could even cost it money," said Mr Green.

"The firm is having to reinvent itself and whether that will be by focusing on software, monetising BBM, licensing its products or joint ventures is not yet clear. At the moment it is throwing everything out there," said Mr Green.

Blackberry chief executive Thorsten Heins revealed the plan at the company's annual developers conference in May.

At the time, Mr Heins said that the move was a "statement of confidence" and would allow Blackberry Messenger to "become an independent multi-platform messaging solution".

It could prove disruptive to other messaging services such as Skype and Whatsapp.

Google revamps logo and search page

Google's old logo (above) had drop shadows, but its new one is flatter

 

Google has begun rolling out a redesign of its homepage - the world's most visited web address.

The revamp features a flattened, reshaped logo and replaces the previous menu bar with a smaller range of links on the page's right-hand side.

The move comes in the same month that Yahoo's logo and Microsoft's Bing search tool have also been updated.

A Google spokeswoman said that similar changes would now be "slowly rolled out" across its products.

A blog post added that the firm intende to "streamline" users' experience of its services to prevent "distractions".

It is the first change to Google's logo since 2010. Not all users will be able to see the redesign yet.

"This is the season for consumer tech updates and whether you sell a product or it's free everyone wants to look fresh ahead of the Christmas shopping season," said Sarah Rotman Epps, an analyst at the tech consultancy Forrester.

"What they are doing is actually pretty subtle and that's because these software companies depend on user loyalty - they don't want to do anything that would alienate their customers."

Another analyst suggested that cutting down the number of links would encourage people to use Google's social network, Google Plus.

To reveal other products - such as Google Drive storage, YouTube videos or the Android app Play Store - visitors to the firm's search page must now click on an icon made up of small squares.

"I do think that there is a move to try to make Google+ more central to everything its users do," said Carolina Milanesi from the tech advisors Gartner.

"It might be the case that it is not obvious to some people that they need to click on the box to reveal the firm's other services."

Grand Theft Auto 5 in Amazon embargo breach

Grand Theft Auto 5 is due for official release on Tuesday 17 September

 

Amazon.co.uk has delivered copies of the eagerly awaited Grand Theft Auto 5 (GTA5) video game ahead of the official launch on Tuesday, breaching a strict embargo set by its maker.

Some customers who had pre-ordered the title received it days before the launch day.
Rockstar North, the title's Scottish creator, is reportedly investigating but has yet to comment publicly.

Amazon said only "a small number" of customers had been affected.
"We have established processes in place to deliver new titles to customers on their release date and are looking into the circumstances that led to a small number of customers receiving this game earlier than intended on this occasion", an Amazon spokesman told the BBC.

Will Guyatt, spokesman for video and entertainment site IGN.com, told the BBC: "I got an early copy on Saturday, which I paid for myself, and was delighted on a personal level. But it's obviously going to cause problems for Rockstar.

"There are about 2,000 shops stocking the game ready for launch on Tuesday, so the number of people posting spoilers online is a bit sad", he said.

Grand Theft Auto 5 may turn out to be the most expensive video game ever made

Mr Guyatt said he had ordered his copy of the 18-rated violent crime game in March, but others in his office who had ordered it at a later date had not yet received their copies.

"This kind of thing has always happened in the games industry, but with the rise of social media a lot more people know about it now", Mr Guyatt said.

"I can't see what Rockstar can do about it."

Some retailers, such as Cex, have been selling pre-release copies of the game for up to £75, the BBC has learned, nearly double what other stores are planning to charge.

One Cex employee confirmed that there were 13 copies of the game available in a north London outlet, and 25 available in an east London store.

 

iPhone shortages frustrate networks on launch day

Short supply of the latest Apple iPhone has left mobile networks "frustrated" and "concerned", the BBC has learned.

Several networks said that stock of the latest premium model - the 5S - was severely limited in the UK, and would likely cause disappointment.

None of the networks contacted wanted to be identified over worries they could be further disadvantaged when supplies were replenished.

Apple told the BBC it did not comment on stock levels.

However, networks contacted by the BBC pointed out that supplies of the new 5C, a lower-cost phone and newcomer to Apple's range, were plentiful.

Insiders from two of the companies told the BBC they suspected Apple was trying to drive sales of the cheaper 5C model, but that their own figures suggested customers had been hesitant to place orders.

Apple has prevented networks and retailers from allowing customers to pre-order the 5S.

One network spokesman said they had "crates and crates" of the 5C, but that the higher-end 5S was being "drip fed" into the market, and networks and retailers had been left "in the dark" about Apple's schedule for replenishing the stock.

He added that he was concerned that customers would be angry at the networks for the delay, rather than at Apple.

Less than one hour after going on sale in the UK, the 5S was listed on Apple's website as being unavailable for 7-10 business days for the UK.

 

 

Voyager probe 'leaves Solar System'

Voyager will live out its days circling the centre of our Milky Way Galaxy

The Voyager-1 spacecraft has become the first manmade object to leave the Solar System.

Scientists say the probe's instruments indicate it has moved beyond the bubble of hot gas from our Sun and is now moving in the space between the stars.

Launched in 1977, Voyager was sent initially to study the outer planets, but then just kept on going.

Today, the veteran Nasa mission is almost 19 billion km (12 billion miles) from home.

This distance is so vast that it takes 17 hours now for a radio signal sent from Voyager to reach receivers here on Earth.

"This is really a key milestone that we'd been hoping we would reach when we started this project over 40 years ago - that we would get a spacecraft into interstellar space," said Prof Ed Stone, the chief scientist on the venture.

"Scientifically it's a major milestone, but also historically - this is one of those journeys of exploration like circumnavigating the globe for the first time or having a footprint on the Moon for the first time. This is the first time we've begun to explore the space between the stars," he told BBC News.

Sensors on Voyager had been indicating for some time that its local environment had changed.

The data that finally convinced the mission team to call the jump to interstellar space came from the probe's Plasma Wave Science (PWS) instrument. This can measure the density of charged particles in Voyager's vicinity.

Readings taken in April/May this year and October/November last year revealed a near-100-fold jump in the number of protons occupying every cubic metre of space.
Scientists have long theorised such a spike would eventually be observed if Voyager could get beyond the influence of the magnetic fields and particle wind that billow from the surface of the Sun.

When the Voyager team put the new data together with information from the other instruments onboard, they calculated the moment of escape to have occurred on or about 25 August, 2012. This conclusion is contained in a report published by the journal Science.

"This is big; it's really impressive - the first human-made object to make it out into interstellar space," said Prof Don Gurnett from the University of Iowa and the principal investigator on the PWS.

On 25 August, 2012, Voyager-1 was some 121 Astronomical Units away. That is, 121 times the separation between the Earth and the Sun.

Breaching the boundary, known technically as the heliopause, was, said the English Astronomer Royal, Prof Sir Martin Rees, a remarkable achievement: "It's utterly astonishing that this fragile artefact, based on 1970s technology, can signal its presence from this immense distance."

Although now embedded in the gas, dust and magnetic fields from other stars, Voyager still feels a gravitational tug from the Sun, just as some comets do that lie even further out in space. But to all intents and purposes, it has left what most people would define as the Solar System. It is now in a completely new domain.

Voyager-1 departed Earth on 5 September 1977, a few days after its sister spacecraft, Voyager-2.

The pair's primary objective was to survey the planets Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune - a task they completed in 1989.

They were then steered towards deep space. It is expected that their plutonium power sources will stop supplying electricity in about 10 years, at which point their instruments and their 20W transmitters will die.

Voyager-1 will not approach another star for nearly 40,000 years, even though it is moving at 45km/s (100,000mph).

"Voyager-1 will be in orbit around the centre of our galaxy with all its stars for billions of years," said Prof Stone.

  In 1990, Voyager-1 looked back and took a picture of Earth - a "pale blue dot"

The probe's work is not quite done, however. For as long as they have working instruments, scientists will want to sample the new environment.

The new region through which Voyager is now flying was generated and sculpted by big stars that exploded millions of years ago.

There is indirect evidence and models to describe the conditions in this medium, but Voyager can now measure them for real and report back.

The renowned British planetary scientist Prof Fred Taylor commented: "As a young post-doc, I went to [Nasa's Jet Propulsion Laboratory] and worked for a while with the team that was doing the science definition study for the Outer Planets Grand Tour, which later became Voyager.

"It seemed so incredible and exciting to think we would see and explore Jupiter and Saturn close up, let alone Uranus and Neptune.

"The idea that the spacecraft would then exit the Solar System altogether was so way out, figuratively as well as literally, that we didn't even discuss it then, although I suppose we knew it would happen someday. Forty-three years later, that day has arrived, and Voyager is still finding new frontiers."

The Sun sits in an extensive bubble of hot gas called the heliosphere

Samsung backs Apple's 64-bit chip smartphone chip switch

Samsung has indicated that the successor to its Note 3

 handset will have a 64-bit processor

 

Samsung has confirmed its next high-end smartphones will feature 64-bit processors.

 

The announcement follows the launch of the iPhone 5S, the first handset to include the technology.

Apple boasted its A7 chip offered "desktop-class architecture".

 

However, experts say most apps are unlikely to see much immediate benefit from the shift from 32-bit tech and that it could introduce compatibility problems in the future.

 

The Android operating system would need to be updated before Samsung's Galaxy devices could take advantage of a shift to 64-bit.

 

Faster work

 

The number of bits in relation to a microprocessor affects the size of the numbers that can be handled by it registers - a type of storage that can be read very quickly.

This has implications for the amount of memory that can be directly accessed without data having to be swapped back and forth to slower storage.

In the case of 32-bit architecture, the amount of memory than can be addressed is two to the power of 32, in other words 4.3 billion values, or four gigabytes of memory.

In the case of 64-bit architecture the processor can theoretically address 18,400,000 trillion values.

 

If a program has been written to take advantage of a 64-bit operating system, it should mean the processor can access data that is in this larger memory rather than retrieving it from, for example, the hard disk.

 

This speeds up the whole processing chain.

Another advantage is that the processor can take advantage of machines with more physical memory.

Operating systems written for 32-bit chips can only access up to 4GB of RAM, but those written for 64-bit processors can, in theory, support up to 16 billion gigabytes of RAM.

 

Boosting the amount of RAM allows software to become more complex and the computer to run more programs simultaneously without having to swap as much data to other types of slower memory.

However, it also makes the equipment more expensive and power-hungry.

For that reason, smart-device makers have tended to shy away from taking advantage of 32-bit chips' upper RAM limit.

Samsung's forthcoming Galaxy Note 3 handset goes the furthest, with 3GB of RAM. The device also features a bigger-than-normal 3,200 mAh battery.

Incompatible apps

Samsung Electronic's co-chief executive announced its plan to use 64-bit chips, in an interview with the Korea Times newspaper.

"Not in the shortest time," said Shin Jong-kyun. "But yes, our next smartphones will have 64-bit processing functionality."

Apple dedicated part of its iPhone 5S launch to highlighting its shift to a 64-bit processor

 

 

However, bearing in mind there will remain many iOS and Android handsets on the market that still rely on 32-bit chips, this may deter developers from taking advantage of the switch in the short-term.

"People who have the old 32-bit processors will not be able to run software that is built specifically for the 64-bit processors because the latter uses a different instruction set," explained Prof Alan Woodward, from the University of Surrey's computing department.

"However, if people write in 32-bit, it will run on many of the 64-bit processors because they still support the old instruction set.

"So, you can get the whole market by writing the app in 32-bits, but you can only get a very small part of the market if you write specifically for 64-bits."

Once sales of the new devices do grow, makers of video games and software to create 3D-animations might be among the first to make the switch since their programs are among the most processor-intensive and thus most likely to see the biggest benefit.

One iPhone and Android developer welcomed the move.

"Yes, many apps won't be able to take advantage of 64-bit at the outset," said Stephen Lum from Visual Candy Apps.

"But the beauty of what Apple did is that they said it takes an iOS developer, like me, two hours to convert to 64-bit. That is awesome."

However, one industry watcher warned that the switch might create compatibility problems unless app stores continued to offer two different versions of the same program to accommodate both types of chip.

"When app makers do decide to transition to fully 64-bit, it will create a divide in the market," said Chris Green, from the Davies Murphy Group consultancy.

"We saw exactly the same thing happen in the Windows world when software makers moved from 32-bit to purely 64-bit."

Rise of ARM

For now British chip designer ARM may prove the biggest beneficiary.

ARM's shares rose following news that Apple was licensing its 64-bit chip architecture

Smart-device makers are able to offer 64-bit tech because they have licensed the firm's ARMv8 architecture, which it first announced in 2011.

The news means the company will enjoy bigger fees. ARM's share price has risen about 10% since the start of the week.

Some have speculated that Apple's announcement might foreshadow the US firm ditching Intel chips in its laptops and desktop computers and moving to its own processors.

"Apple's new A7 chip is not powerful enough to be a PC chip, but the architecture is going that way," said Prof Woodward.

"They might be readying themselves. I think this is the beginning of a long road."

 

 

Twitter plans stock market listing

The BBC's Samira Hussain says it is hoped Twitter will "learn some lessons"
 from Facebook's stock market listing

Twitter says it plans to join the stock market in the most hotly anticipated flotation since Facebook's last year.

Referring to the official paperwork needed to join the market the company tweeted: "We've confidentially submitted an S-1 to the SEC for a planned [initial public offering]."

Investors value Twitter, founded in 2006 by Jack Dorsey, Biz Stone and Evan Williams, at more than $10bn (£6.3bn).

Twitter gave no further details as to the timing or price of the offering.

It is on track to post $583 million in revenue in 2013, according to advertising consultancy eMarketer.

Once a company has filed paperwork with US regulators for a planned IPO it enters a so-called "quiet period" when it is not allowed to speak with the press.

According to the Securities and Exchanges Commission's website, a company can file a confidential prospectus for a public share sale if it is classified as an "emerging growth company" with revenue of less than $1bn.

Mobile first

On Monday, Twitter said it had acquired MoPub, a mobile-focused advertising exchange, for a reported $350m, as part of its continued push to boost advertising.

"Twitter was more or less a mobile-first platform from the start and so the company built its experience to work relatively well across devices," Clark Fredriksen of eMarketer told the BBC.

"Ultimately, they did a good job of monetising their mobile user base."

Some speculate that the timing of the IPO has to do with the company's desire to further grow - as well as with its desire to reward investors, who have poured more than $1bn into the company.

"For one thing it gives its investors a way to get some of the money back that they put into the company at the beginning," said Andrew Frank, social media expert at tech advisors Gartner.

"It gives the employees a similar kind of event to reward them for the success they've had so far.

"It gives Twitter itself extra funds to invest in new projects and innovation. It also gives it the status of having a position on the stock exchange, which of course puts the firm in a different league to a start-up."
Learning from Facebook
"Twitter is one of the last of the major developed social networks to file [for an IPO] - we've already had Facebook and LinkedIn," said Colin Gillis, a New York-based tech specialist at BGC Partners.

Demand for Facebook shares was high when they first listed,

but the share price has disappointed investors since then

Facebook listed on the stock market in May last year. Although it initially created excitement among investors, its share price performed poorly, before recovering this summer.

Mr Gillis said it was impossible to say how great the demand for Twitter shares would be until the company released a valuation.

"There's a few issues [such as] how many revenue streams can be developed beyond just advertising, the impact of more people accessing the service via smartphones," Mr Gillis said.

Analysts say Twitter must continue to innovate under the scrutiny of public ownership.

"One of the things they will have to focus on is making sure that they keep their users very actively engaged," Nate Elliott, an analyst at the tech consultancy Forrester, told the BBC.

"One of the things Facebook has done very successfully over the past year and a half has been to show that not only is the number of users growing, but that those users are becoming more active."
'This tweet is going public?'
Twitter's tweet announcing its filing immediately went viral - it was re-tweeted more than 8,000 times within an hour of its posting.

For many users, it seemed apt that the company would use its own platform to announce the news.

"Naturally Twitter announces its IPO via Twitter. What other way?" one read.

Twitter later sent a follow up tweet, which read simply: "Now, back to work."

Apple's shares fall on emerging market concerns

There are worries the new cheaper iPhone may still be

relatively expensive for emerging market buyers

 

Apple's shares fell more than 5% as investors worried that the firm's latest iPhone models may not help it increase its share in emerging markets.

It launched two models on Tuesday, the iPhone 5S and a cheaper iPhone 5C.
But the basic 5C model, with 16 gigabytes of storage, has been priced at £469 ($740), which analysts said was still expensive for emerging markets.
Apple has found it tough to boost its share those markets against competition from firms such as Samsung and Huawei.
"Investors were put off that Apple's price point didn't go low enough to attract a new market," said Mark Luschini, chief investment strategist at Janney Montgomery Scott.
"It doesn't have the same range in price that Apple's competitors have," he added.
Apple shares closed at $467.7 on Wednesday, down by 5.4%.

 

Intel Bay Trail Atom chips challenge ARM for tablets

  Bay Trail introduces the 3D transistors previously used on Intel's Ivy Bridge PC chips

 

Intel has launched Bay Trail - a family of chips it hopes will help it make further inroads against processors designed by its rival ARM.

The chips are designed for use in low-power devices, including tablets.

They incorporate what the US company calls "3D transistors", which it introduced to its PC chips in 2012, designed to boost computational power while using less energy.

One analyst said Bay Trail could pose a serious challenge to ARM.

Unlike Intel, the British company does not make chips of its own but rather makes money by licensing its designs to other companies, including Qualcomm, Apple and Nvidia, which then adapt them for their own uses.

ARM's designs currently dominate central processing units (CPUs) used in smartphones and tablets, while Intel's x86-based architecture is far more common in desktop and laptop computers.

This has been a consequence of ARM having the reputation of being the more energy efficient of the two.

But the new Bay Trail chips may cause some tablet manufacturers to think again, according to one industry watcher,

"I actually do think they have what it takes, but it's not going to be an overnight transition for Intel," said Chris Green, principal technology analyst at the Davies Murphy Group consultancy.

"It has huge ground to make up against ARM who really still have a stranglehold on the mobile market.

"But this is a great chip on paper for Intel to mount a challenge. Certainly, the fact that it has got backing from the likes of Samsung - who we know is very enthusiastic for the prospects of this chip - I think speaks volumes for its chances in the months to come."

Samsung surprised the tech industry in June when it announced that the 10in (25.4cm)-screened version of its Galaxy Tab 3 tablet featured an Intel chip - Bay Trail's Atom-series predecessor, Clover Trail+.

The South Korean firm had previously relied on ARM-based chips made by itself or others to power its Galaxy smart devices.

Intel says the new quad-core chips double the computing performance and treble the graphic performance of Clover Trail+.

It also introduces the company's Burst Technology 2.0, which can vary which parts of the chip receive the most power to maximise performance without breaching temperature limits.

"You might want to take 15 to 20 photos in a touch application and apply some filters to them to get them ready to post to a blog," explained Intel manager Chris Walker.

"That's a situation where you'd be doing less with the display, might not be using the camera at all but you'd need to apply the effects very quickly. The CPU can dynamically adjust for that.

"Now in a different application, maybe a 3D-rich game which is more compute and graphics intensive, what can happen is dynamically the graphics [processing parts] can go up and take power from other areas. It's just responsive to the user."

Mr Walker also highlighted the fact that Bay Trail can support both Android and the full Windows 8 operating systems, allowing manufacturers to offer hybrid tablets that allow their owners to swap between the two environments.

ARM-based processors can support Android and Windows RT, however the latter does not support as many applications as Windows 8. Missing ones include the full version of Photoshop and many bespoke programs written for companies.

According to a recent study by analytics company Net Applications, Windows RT - which was launched in October - still accounts for less than 0.5% of the global operating system market.

Asus recently announced it was stopping making Windows RT tablets because of weak sales and the lack of backwards compatibility.
"I would argue ARM should be very worried," said Mr Green.

"Intel has started to wake up and realise they were about to lose this race which is why they have really put their foot down and come back with some interesting products."

However, the British firm is not resting on its laurels.

On Tuesday it released a video showing how Samsung's forthcoming ARM-based Exynos 5 Octa chip - which has eight CPU cores - makes use of its Big-Little design while being used to play video game Angry Birds.

Big-Little refers to the fact that four of the CPU cores are more powerful but also more power-hungry, while the other four offer less computing power but are less demanding on batteries.

According to what the user is doing, different ones can be switched on and off to ensure the owner gets the best mix.
 

Nissan launches Nismo smartwatch for drivers

The smartwatch aims to unite driver and car

 

 

A smartwatch that monitors the performance of a vehicle as well as the driver has been launched by car manufacturer Nissan.

Like many other smartwatches, the Nissan Nismo measures the user's heart rate, temperature and other biometrics.

But it also allows users to keep an eye on their car's performance - including average speeds and fuel consumption.

Experts say that the watch could be an important step towards greater connectivity in cars.

"Connectivity is the new battleground for car manufacturers," said Chas Hallett, editor-in-chief of What Car?

"In-car internet is coming and now with consumer electronics focusing on watch-based connections, Nissan is getting ahead of the game and joining the two together very cleverly."

The Nismo watch can be connected to the car's on-board computer system to allow users to monitor vehicle telematics and performance data. Users can also receive tailored messages
 from Nissan via the gadget.

It was unveiled ahead of the Frankfurt Motor Show, which runs until 22 September.

samsung has just released its first smartwatch - the Galaxy Gear

 

Concentration levels

 

"Wearable technology is fast becoming the next big thing and we want to take advantage of this innovative technology," said Gareth Dunsmore, marketing communications general manager at Nissan, Europe.

A glut of smartwatches has hit the market recently, including Samsung's Galaxy Gear and Sony's Smartwatch 2.

Car-connected watches could be even more useful than those offered by consumer electronic firms, thinks Mr Hallett.

"Imagine if you could heat up your car on a cold day before you got into it or shut the roof of your convertible when it started raining and it was parked outside," he said.

The Nissan Leaf electric car already allows users to interact with it via their mobile phone, said Mr Dunsmore, and such functionality should be available in the firm's next-generation watches.

The current gadget is one of the first products to come out of its Nismo laboratory, which captures live biometric and telematics data from Nissan racing cars and their drivers.
The lab plans to use electrocardiograms (ECG) and electroencephalograms (EEG) in the future to capture a range of heart and brainwave data.

The eventual aim would be to create wearable technology for drivers that can spot fatigue, monitor drivers' levels of concentration and emotions and record hydration levels.

The Nismo, which comes in three colours and has a battery life of around a week, can be controlled by two buttons on the screen.

Sony unveils 'casual' PlayStation Vita handheld

The refreshed console is available in six colours

 

Sony has unveiled a new version of its PS Vita handheld gaming console.

Revealed at the Tokyo Game Show, Sony said the PCH 2000 series consoles were aimed at casual gamers.
The gadget is 20% thinner and 15% lighter than earlier models, is available in six different colours and has a battery life of about six hours.
The device goes on sale on 10 October in Japan. Sony has given no date for when it will be available in other countries.
The PS Vita 2000 has 1GB of memory and will be able to use the bigger 64GB memory cards Sony is making for it. All versions of the revamped gadget will communicate via wi-fi only.
The launch comes soon after Sony cut the US and European price of the original PS Vita in a bid to boost sales. The price of the handheld was cut in Japan in February. Sales of handheld games consoles have slumped as people play more and more games on their smartphones.
In addition, Sony also showed off a tiny set-top box called the PS Vita TV. The device can connect to a television so owners can play their Vita games on a bigger screen. It can also be used to stream games being played on a PlayStation 4 console to another TV.
The Vita TV console can also pipe streamed media services such as Hulu to a display.

Virgin Media pilots Netflix video-on-demand on Tivo

The Virgin deal gives Netflix another route into UK customers' living rooms

 

Virgin Media is to pilot Netflix's video-streaming service with 40,000 of its Tivo set-top box subscribers.

The cable firm will send letters this week inviting a selection of its UK customers to download and test the TV and movie on-demand app.
Those participating in the pilot will need a Netflix subscription to be able to view the content.
Virgin Media said it planned to roll out the app to all of its 1.7 million Tivo customers by the end of the year.
The BBC understands that Virgin may offer Netflix as part of a bundled service.
The tie-up could strengthen the position of both companies, according to one media analyst.
"It's a win-win situation," said Toby Syfret from Enders Analysis.
"It's a positive move for both, and should help them in any competitive tussles they've got."

The deal comes as Netflix faces competition Rakuten's new Wuaki.tv service

 

On-demand competition

 

Virgin Media would benefit from being able to offer a broader range of content, and Netflix would potentially gain a larger UK audience, suggested Mr Syfret.

 

Virgin's digital set-top competitors include Sky, BT and TalkTalk.
Netflix is up against established services such as Amazon's Lovefilm and Tesco's Blinkbox.
It also faces competition from a more recent entrant, Wuaki.tv. The new business is currently offering its service at half the price of Netflix's. It is owned by the Japanese e-commerce giant Rakuten which is best known in the UK for its ebook brand Kobo.
Virgin Media has previously shown its willingness to create a partnership with what might be seen as a competing service.
The company struck a deal in August to offer BT's sports channels to its cable customers.

Indian diarist Sushmita Banerjee shot dead in Afghanistan

Sushmita Banerjee in 2003. Photograph: Deshakalyan Chowdhury/AFP/Getty Images

An Indian author famous for her dramatic account of escaping Taliban-ruled Afghanistan nearly two decades ago, and who later returned to the country, has been shot dead by the hardline group after being dragged from her home.
It was the latest in a string of attacks and intimidation campaigns against prominent women. One senator lost a daughter in a recent ambush, and a popular MP remains missing weeks after she was kidnapped on a main highway.
The author Sushmita Banerjee, who married an Afghan and lived for years in a remote rural area, became a celebrity in India when her story was made into the Bollywood film Escape from Taliban.
She chose to move back to Afghanistan several years ago and was living with her husband, Janbaz Khan, in his family home just outside the main town in Paktika province, near the border with Pakistan, where she did healthcare work.
The Taliban apparently tracked her down to her old home and burst into the compound in the middle of the night. They dragged the 45 year-old away and left the rest of the family unhurt.
"Last night around 1.30am the Taliban came to their house, broke down the door and took her alone to a different area called al-Jihad, where there is a madrassa," Daulat Khan Zadran, the provincial police chief in Paktika, told the Guardian. "After that they opened fire on her, there were 15 bullets in her body."
Zadran said locals knew that Banerjee had "made a movie about the Taliban and Afghan culture", but he said there was no clear motive for the attack. The BBC said a Taliban official had denied any responsibility for the attack – spokesmen for the hardline Islamist movement frequently disown operations. In Afghanistan violence often stems from tribal, family or other disagreements or may be conducted by semi-autonomous groups acting without orders from senior insurgent commanders.
However there were plenty of reasons for the Taliban to target Banerjee. In an article in the Indian magazine Outlook the writer, who had converted to Islam, described how villagers she lived with were "terrorised" by the movement.
Some analysts have linked a series of attacks on Indian targets in Afghanistan to regional rivalry in south Asia in which India and Pakistan fight for influence in the country. The imminent withdrawal of international troops from Afghanistan has given the contest a new edge, they say.
Benerjee's book, A Kabuliwala's Bengali Wife, detailed the harsh lifestyle of women in rural Afghanistan that she had been expected to embrace when she moved there with her husband in 1989. The Taliban swept to power some time after he returned to India to work, and she decided to escape a life that had gone from difficult to unendurable when soldiers closed her small pharmacy.
"The members of the Taliban who called on us were aghast that I, a woman, could be running a business establishment. They ordered me to close down the dispensary and branded me a woman of poor morals," she wrote years later.
"They also listed out dos and don'ts. The burkha was a necessity. Listening to the radio or playing a tape recorder was banned. Women were not allowed to go to shops. They were even prohibited from stepping out from their houses unless accompanied by their husbands."
Extreme even by the standards of the radical group, the local commanders also forced women in her area to get a tattoo of their husband's name on their left hand.
Her first escape attempt was foiled by her own brothers-in-law, who were enraged that she had brought shame on their home by trying to flee. During the second attempt she was caught by Taliban soldiers and nearly executed, but persuaded them that as an Indian she had a right to leave the country.
Despite that harrowing experience, she chose to move back to Afghanistan with her husband, apparently believing that she had put the Taliban years behind her.

Kevin MacDonald signs to direct Elvis Presley biopic

The Last King of Scotland director Kevin MacDonald has signed up to direct the Elvis Presley biopic Last Train to Memphis, according to Variety.

The film follows Presley's early years and is based on the best-selling 1995 Peter Guralnick biography.

Film company 20th Century Fox have launched an open casting call for a young actor to play Elvis.

At the Young Elvis Casting website actors aged between 18 and 22 can submit audition tapes.

The site describes the film as the story of Presley's "against-all-odds success due to his uncanny gift for self-invention, his unstoppable drive, and the new sound he created that changed the music world forever".

MacDonald directed the 2012 documentary Marley about the life, music, and legacy of Bob Marley.

The film is being produced by Mick Jagger and Victoria Pearman at Jagged Films along with Steve Bing's Shangri-La company.

Jagger is also producing the up-coming James Brown biopic Get On Up.

A Jimi Hendrix biopic, All Is By My Side - starring OutKast musician Andre 3000, is showing at this year's Toronto Film Festival.

Xbox One console release date set by Microsoft

The Xbox One faced a frosty reception when it was first announced

 

Microsoft will launch the Xbox One, its latest games console, on 22 November.

It will initially be available in 13 countries - UK, US, Ireland, Canada, Germany, Spain, France, Italy, Austria, Brazil, Mexico, Australia and New Zealand.
Remaining markets will follow in early 2014, the company confirmed.
The timing of the launch will mean it beats close rival Sony's PlayStation 4 to the shelves in much of the world by one week.
The exception is North America, where Sony's console will be available on 15 November.
The releases set up the first new console war since 2006, the last time both firms had fresh gaming machines on the market.
Xbox's marketing vice-president, Yusuf Mehdi, announced the firm's rollout plans in a statement.
"The culmination of many years of listening to you, our fans, developing innovative technology, and partnering with the best game and entertainment partners in the industry has brought us to this point," he said.
"There is still a lot more work to do, but the teams are making excellent progress and are focused on launch."
He confirmed that the console recently entered full production in preparation for the launch. Pre-orders had sold out faster than any of the company's previous gaming products, Mr Mehdi said.
He also confirmed that the console's CPU had been upgraded by around 10% - from 1.6Ghz to 1.75Ghz.


Rocky road

It has been an uneasy few months for Microsoft in the run-up to this major launch.

In July, the company lost its head of interactive entertainment, Don Mattrick, to social gaming company Zynga.

He left at a time when Microsoft was still bruised by a damaging performance at E3, the biggest gaming event in the calendar.

Gamers had reacted angrily to Microsoft's policies

The company had announced that the Xbox One would be more expensive than the PlayStation 4, and controversy surrounded various decisions regarding the firm's policy on playing pre-owned games on the system.

Microsoft's console will retail for £429 in the UK, while Sony's will be priced at £349.

In a dramatic U-turn a week later, Microsoft said it would drop heavily criticised restrictions on the console, was seen as a somewhat embarrassing exercise in damage limitation.

But that will all ultimately be forgotten by gamers once the consoles go on sale, and the Xbox One's games line-up looks to set it up in good shape for the crucial first Christmas.

In particular, big-name exclusive titles and additional content on best-sellers such as EA's Fifa football series are likely to drive sales.

Sony launches lens accessories and Z1 handset at Ifa

The Z1 handset with the QX100 lens attached weighs 349g (12.3oz)

 

Sony has confirmed plans to sell two stand-alone lenses that connect to smartphones by wi-fi, allowing them to take higher-quality photos.

The devices are compatible with Android and iOS handsets and mark the creation of a new product category.
The Japanese company announced the products alongside a new smartphone which features a 20.7 megapixel camera and a larger-than-normal image sensor.
The launches should help the firm challenge Nokia's top-end handset.
The Finnish company - which is in the process of being taken over by Microsoft - unveiled the Lumia 1020 in July. Reviews have suggested that it has the best smartphone camera on the market, but were critical of its price,
Sony told the BBC it would target its Z1 handset at a wider audience than what it called the Lumia 1020's "super-premium category".
It confirmed details of the devices at the Ifa consumer tech show in Berlin - much of the information had already leaked via tech news sites.
One analyst suggested the lenses in particular would struggle to find buyers.
"The concept is interesting, but when you think about using it, will users want to carry them around?" asked Francisco Jeronimo, mobile devices research manager at tech consultancy IDC.
"The problem is that for those wanting top-quality photographs, the experience of having a DSLR [digital single lens reflex] offers a better experience than a phone with an add-on camera.
"Meanwhile having the lens attached to a phone makes it feel quite bulky compared to a compact camera or stand-alone handset.
"If the lenses were priced under £100, then I could see photography geeks buying it, or operators bundling it with the phone, but these lenses will be quite expensive."
Sony itself acknowledged that it did not know how strong demand would be.
"Always we're discussing: 'How many pieces should we prepare,'" Yosuke Aoki, a digital imaging spokesman for the firm, told the BBC.
"We're waiting for after the Ifa announcement to see what the feedback will be to the models."

 

Making a statement

 

The QX10 lens offers a 10x optical zoom and 18.2MP resolution which Sony says makes it ideal for taking shots of distant landmarks or close-ups of people. It will cost about £170,

Sony is bundling movies and games with the Z1 to help it compete

 

 

The QX100 features a smaller 3.6x zoom but a bigger sensor with a resolution of 20.2MP. Its aperture goes as wide as f1.8 - allowing more light in - meaning it should be more adept at taking photos in low light or with a very shallow focus. It also offers manual focus as an option which is not possible on the other lens. It will cost about £380.

Once fitted with a battery and memory stick, the QX10 weighs 105g (3.7oz) and the QX100 179g (6.3oz).

Both devices:

• include technology that compensates for shaky hands
• activate a link-up to a phone or tablet if it has an NFC (near field communication) chip
• can attach to different-sized handsets via an extendable clip, or - in the case of the Z1 - using a special case
• can be operated while a short distance away from the smart device

Neither has a built-in screen.
Sony Mobile's head of sales and marketing said they were intended to send a message to consumers, including those who would never buy them.
"It's a statement as one piece of many things that are starting to come together under the umbrella of Sony," said Dennis van Schie.
"The PlayStation 4 is coming out. In 4K [ultra-high resolution] TVs, we're the leader - from the formats to the cameras to recording capabilities [that will appear] quite soon in mobile.
"Now we're the first ones to dare to create a lens-type camera with a new kind of user interface. It contributes to what Sony is standing for."
Sony posted a 3.5bn yen ($35m, £23m) profit in the April-to-June quarter, reversing a 24.6bn yen loss the previous year.
Stronger sales of smartphones helped achieve the turnaround.
However, IDC says the firm still only had a 4.1% share of global smartphone shipments over the three months, putting it behind Samsung, Apple, LG, Lenovo, Huawei and ZTE.

'Additional value'

Sony is hoping the new water-resistant Z1 handset will help it boost that figure.

  Nokia has boasted that its Lumia 1020 with a 41MP sensor is the best smartphone camera on the market

It says the device features an exclusive sensor which is the same size as that found in its Cybershot cameras.

It also features new software including the ability to provide live video streams to Facebook, and Info-eye - an app that provides information about books, wine and landmarks among other objects the phone is pointed at.

The company is also taking advantage of its other assets to help the device stand out from the Android crowd. UK shoppers are promised five Sony movie downloads and a selection of free PlayStation mobile games.

"They've done quite a good job of differentiating the phone," said Mr Jeronimo.

"That's what operators want - to be able to provide additional value from what Sony offers.

"That's why they are looking at Sony as a better prospect for the future than other vendors like Blackberry and HTC."

 

 

 

Samsung unveils Galaxy Gear smartwatch accessory

Samsung has unveiled a smartwatch with a colour screen that can show alerts, be used for voice calls and run apps.

The Galaxy Gear had been highly anticipated since the firm is currently the world's bestselling smartphone maker and has beaten Microsoft, Apple and Google to unveil such a device.
Samsung called it a "fashion icon".
However, analysts warned that a decision to limit the watch to working as an accessory to other Galaxy Android devices might limit its appeal.
Samsung has previously said growth in the sales of its handsets was slowing, so investors are eager to see if it can find another successful product.

The Galaxy Gear is being made available with a range of colourful watch straps

It unveiled the the watch - which will go on sale from 25 September - at the Ifa consumer tech show in Berlin.
"The introduction of the Galaxy smartwatch comes as no surprise to the industry, which has been expecting Samsung to beat the likes of Apple - as well as watch makers and other consumer electronics companies - to market," said Chris Green, principal technology analyst at the consultancy Davies Murphy Group.
"Consumers might be a bit disappointed to find that the smartwatch is a partner device reliant on being paired with a Samsung Android smartphone or tablet, rather than being the completely autonomous device media and communications device many consumers were expecting and hoping for."
The South Korean firm's approach contrasts with that of Sony whose forthcoming Smartwatch 2 can be paired with any device running Android 4.0 or higher.

 

But one industry watcher said Samsung's decision should not be a surprise.

"Samsung is trying to build its own ecosystem, so why do something that brings value to somebody else?" asked Carolina Milanesi, an analyst at tech advisors Gartner.
"Although the price of the Galaxy watch is high there's not going to be great margins as there's lots of technology going into it.
The Galaxy watch will cost about $300 (£192) making it more expensive than Sony's device which costs £120.
Start-up Omate is planning to release a watch in October that matches Samsung's in price, but its device is set to feature a 3G chip meaning it can make calls and work as a standalone device.
Qualcomm has also unveiled Toq, a watch using the firm's Mirasol colour display technology which should mean better battery life than its rivals. It also links up to a range of Android smartphones, will go on sale next month at a suggested retail price of $300