You’ve probably heard about the case of a group of priveledged and drunk Pennsylvania teens insulting, beating and killing an undocumented Mexican immigrant. Now I understand that it is the job of a defense attorney to look for ANY possible way to mitigate the guilt of his client, but the lawyers for these thugs have gone as far as to suggest that this MURDER was really just a street fight.

From CNN: “Let’s call it what it was it was — a street fight, a chance encounter with a tragic outcome,” said Frederick Fanelli, who represents Piekarsky.Fanelli told CNN he plans to investigate whether Ramirez has a criminal background. He also questions why the engaged father of three was walking on the street with the girl, and the nature of their relationship. Ramirez’ fiancee says he was walking her younger sister home.

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It may not mean much to many… but it does to me, my brothers, and all those whose lives have been touched by the Society of Jesus. Today is the Feast of St. Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Society of Jesus and the first Jesuit. So… to all you Jesuits out there.

Alrighty folks, a few weeks ago I started our first CareerByte column with an article sharing interview bloopers made by other people. In it, I offered a Speck product giveaway: a shiny new cover for the Apple product of your choice if you are picked as the person with the most embarrassing moment before, during, or after an interview. Come on! It’s all in good fun and you can remain anonymous if you would prefer. All you need to do is comment below, email me your story at melanie@thetechstop.net, or tweet me at www.twitter.com/kewlgirl. Don’t forget to tell me what Speck product you’re craving for and what color! Last day to turn in your story: this Friday, as in August 1st! Winner will be announced early next week. Good luck!

BTW, if you missed the article, check out the link above.

As if slow apps, frozen screens, and shorter battery life weren’t enough…I’ve been hearing from friends and different forums that the new 3G iPhone is also showing little hairline cracks in the plastic backing of the phones. Oy Vay! Most of these reports have been from people who own the white, 16G version, but supposedly this is because it is much easier to spot on the white one. Hmmm…always thought it was easier to spot “webbing” on black cars than on white cars, but I guess materials are different. Anywhoo, if any of you Apple fanboys are experiencing this problem, too…give me a shout at melanie@thetechstop.net or www.twitter.com/kewlgirl .

The top-of-the-line of Samsung’s digital camera refresh, the TL34HD is a monster of tech. It features 14.7 megapixels of resolution, a touch-sensitive LCD screen, night shot, HD 720P movie capabilities and optional HDMI output

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Well not entirely, but almost. I’ve been reviewing some of my posts and it clearly looks that my posts have been decidedly pro-Apple. So let’s try to balance that out, shall we? I have the MobileMe “service”. For contacts, it works great. For my calendar (I use Google Calendar and iCal), it’s hit or miss. My prior experience was with Blackberry where Google had a great and free problem called, niftily enough, Google Sync. It was perfect and I loved it. I could get a new court date while in court, input it into my blackberry and instantly the entire office knew about the calendar change.

Now, it works, but only sometimes, which means it does nothing for me, anxiety-wise. I need to be able to trust a syncing program, otherwise, the stress alone would make the entire experience not worth it. Literally, I have had some appointments make it to the cloud and down to my laptop, and some not. Why? I shouldn’t have to be confronted with this question, much less have to answer it.

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Today was the big premier of ‘cuil‘, a new search engine touted as the next big thing to challenge Google. I’ve been running searches on it all morning, and my friends, sorry to say…it ain’t so kewl. Not only are results lackluster and erroneous at times, but some traditional Boolean searches just don’t quite equate…at all…as in “no matches found”. Yikes! Looks like they need to refine their website before truly opening it up to the mass public.

Why so much hype? It’s three founders are ex-Google employees…ex-heavy hitters to be exact. The husband and wife team of Tom Costello(former Stanford Professor and Xift creator) and Anna Patterson(who sold her company Recall to Google and was the architect of TeraGoogle), and Russell Power( who worked with Anna at Google). They are also backed by $33 million in venture capital.

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From iPod Observer: “A Zune Phone is unlikely, according to Michael Gartenberg with Jupiter Research. In his blog, he explained that the business model for Windows Mobile is totally different than for Zune. Even so, Microsoft may still be mulling over the idea as a way to better compete with Apple.”

The most interesting thing to me about this article is not that Microsoft probably won’t make a Zune phone, but that there’s a perceived need for Microsoft to “compete” with Apple. Last time I checked, Windows holds a 90+% market share. With all the growth that Apple has enjoyed over the post-iPod era, it still hasn’t reached 9% market share. It’s far lower when one factors in worldwide sales since the Apple OS really hasn’t made any significant dent overseas.

Microsoft needs to stop worrying about Apple and start worrying about its own dominant product, Windows. Apple is the cute upstart that will not substantially threaten Microsoft’s market share, so long as Microsoft does not continue to try to be like Apple. Forget about making a phone, grow your core competencies. Geez.

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We’ve already taken a peek at the the budget Samsung SL201 and the more advanced (and more expensive) TL9 — Now we can take a gander and the camera that lies between these to spots in Samsung’s new digital camera lineup.

The SL310W.

This little gadget will run under its MSRP of $229 when it is release in September. This puts it firmly between the SL210 and the TL9 in terms of cost and functionality. It boasts 13.6 megapixels of resoltuion and many of the same features as its more costly brother, but it also has a less powerful optical zoom and it lack night shot. Still… it’s a nice midpoint between the two price points, and it beats both in resolution to boot!

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I’ve said again, and again, and again that Microsoft is the big winner in the aborted buyout of Yahoo. They’ve made a huge impact in the marker by doing nothing more that rattling their acquisition saber and letting Yahoo eat itself. This is a piece of business gamesmanship that rivals Google’s “ha ha” to the FCC spectrum auction, but I’ve been deluged with emails from visitors who seem to think that it was Google that came out on top.

Though I know that Google gains quite a bit from Yahoo’s suicidal thrashing to stay MS-independent, I still think that Microsoft showed its verteran muscle… and now it seems that Dawn Kawamoto from cNet agrees with me.
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A few days ago we took a first look at the Samsung SL201, an entry-level point-and-shoot digital camera that packed a surprising number of goodies into a small and relatively inexpensive package. — However, that was just the start of Samsung’s digital camera refresh.

This is the Samsung TL9 — At a MSRP of $280 it’s a good C-Bill more expensive that it’s little brother, but for that extra cash you buy a stronger optical zoom, MP3, face detection, night shot, dual image stabilization and a host of other high tech toys.

It’s a bit bulkier that the SL201, and it actually has a lower resolution than the cheaper model, but the higher optical resolution and the general increase of quality in the optics should make it something to watch for. Check out the specs after the jump and see if this is something that you might want when it’s availible in September.

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File this under the “this really caught me by surprise.” — It seems that Gateway, the once-mighty retailer that lost its prominence and its market share in the late 90’s to upstarts like Dell, then was bought by a resurgent Acer and has recently put out some high-quality, low price product, has made the decision to pull the plug on their online sales… effective today.

While I can’t pretend to know all the circumstances behind the decision, I have to say that I’m a bit dissapointed that I can’t just go to the Gateway website and buy what I want. Though their product will be availible at many retail locations (Fry’s, Best Buy, Circuit City, etc.) it seems to be a wierd move for a company that was just starting to reclaim a reputation of quality, price and service.

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It’s not over until it’s over, but with Yahoo cleaning house to make up with Carl Icahn, the departure of the Microsoft exec who was leading the takeover charge, and Yahoo’s sadly slipping profits and market share, it looks like the Microsoft Yahoo merger isn’t going to happen…. It’s a shame really, if this had happened six months ago the resulting entity might have been able to challenge Google in search.

From Reuters: “We took the view and we still take the view that Yahoo is essentially a declining asset. We made a credibly generous bid with a very high premium because we were looking for speed,” Liddell said, speaking to Wall Street analysts at the company’s annual analyst meeting at its Redmond headquarters.

He then added that the “chances of us buying Yahoo on a full acquisition basis are so small that they are essentially negligible.”

Need a new point-and-shoot camera that can deliver high-quality pics at an affordable price point? — Well you may want to check out Samsung’s new SL201. This little beauty sports 10.2 Megapizels, a 2.7″ screen and support for up to 8GB of SD/SDHC memory.

The camera will be availible in September and it should retail for under $170.

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World Youth Day 2008 is in the books, but as the attendees return from Australia the stories and lessons learned are far from over. Rather, the young adults and their chaperones are bringing back with them news that this event was surprisingly good. From better logistical planning to more interesting speakers, to messages from Pope Benedict that were inspirational as much as they were challenging, it looks like WYD08 will be a strong stamp of approval for Benedict’s Papacy.

Here are a collection of the highlights from the event… enjoy!

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Thin-client computers and low-power processors are not new. In fact, there have been many attempts to corner the “good enough” computer market, from the more sucessful (like the Asus EEEPC) to the obscure and forgotten. Though the idea of creating a computer that just provides just enough power to do what you need is theoretically a great idea, the practicality of mass-producing such devices has made them less-than-compelling next to their full-featured brothers and sisters.

Still, even though the market hasn’t been all that forgiving to such endeavors, we continue to see new entries into the low-power arena because we KNOW there is a demand for such devices… we just can’t find the proper balance of price, performance and simplicity.

Well… meet the new entry… The CherryPal C100M.

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What in the name of Alexander Graham Bell is wrong with AT&T? Exhibit A: WiFi access for iPhone users. Back in May 2008, AT&T announced free WiFi for iPhone users only to subsequently recant the announcement. Now, only two months later, they’ve done it…again. On its website, AT&T announced [insert gleeful voice here]

“AT&T knows Wi-Fi is hot, and free Wi-Fi even hotter, which is why we are proud to offer iPhone customers free access to the nation’s largest Wi-Fi hotspot network with more than 17,000 hotspots, including Starbucks,” according to the website. “Now users can relax and access music, e-mail and web browsing services with their favorite blend in hand from the comfort of their favorite location.”

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With the sucess of the EEPC and other flyweight devices that give users access to all the most commonly used laptop functions at a fraction of the price and complexity, Acer has introduced a series of mobile Internet devices that integrate web browsing, email, IM, VOIP, streaming video, and media playback capabilities in a series of packages starting at $379.

The Acer Aspire line of mobile devices weight just over 2lb and are smaller than a piece of binder paper. They come packed with Intel’s low-power Atom CPU and a range of memory and storage option from 512MB/8GB Flash, to 1GB/120GB HDD. The two flash-storage units run Linux while the HDD device is loaded with Windows XP.

Though you will not be playing the latest First Person Shooter on these units, the price might be right to make this your second or third Internet-enabled gadget for around the home/office or on the go. Furthermore, we can wait to get one of these units in the lab to see how “hackable” them might be for all you uberGeeks.

Check out the specs after the jump

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