Michelle Maisto

LG Electronics has taken the Chromebook concept to the next level with the introduction of the Chromebase, an all-in-one desktop running Google’s Chrome OS. Resembling, at a glance, a stockier Apple iMac—a large display on an aluminum foot shaped like half a triangle—this less-expensive, faster-booting desktop is being positioned for LG enterprise customers in verticals […]

Apple has good news for movie makers, game designers and anyone else with 12 cores of processing power on their Christmas lists: The newest Mac Pro will be available Dec. 19. Apple introduced its “most radical Mac ever” alongside the iPad Air, MacBook Pro with Retina display, and its next-generation iWork and iLife apps at […]

Apple, this holiday season, didn’t pull a Nokia, creating the suggestion that it shot its newest Christmas ad with the latest iPhone but fudging some of the details. It instead shot the commercial with the 5S and didn’t overtly mention it. It also didn’t fall into the trap of its summertime “Designed by Apple in […]

The 3D printing market is set to emerge from niche to mainstream, according to research firm IDC, which expects the market to see “tremendous unit and revenue growth” from 2012 to 2017, with compound annual growth rates of 29 percent and 59 percent, respectively. “While traditional print technologies are facing maturity, 3D printers will see […]

Facebook will soon begin including video ads in users’ News Feed. In September, Facebook changed the way many users see friends’ videos in their feeds—videos begin playing automatically, though silently, only adding sound when they’re tapped or pushed to full screen. The new video ads will work the same way. “Marketers will be able to […]

Sprint, after a very transitional 2013, says the stage is now set for a “dynamic” 2014. It expanded its Long Term Evolution (LTE) network into 70 additional markets, it announced Dec. 16, including Orlando, Fla., San Diego and St. Louis—bringing its LTE market total to 300. It has also been launching Sprint Spark, a network […]

Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer offered an apology on Friday, Dec. 13, for an email outage that for some Yahoo Mail users had begun on Monday. “This has been a very frustrating week for our users and we are very sorry,” Mayer said in a post on her Tumblr blog. The outage, which Yahoo was slow […]

Sprint is considering an acquisition of T-Mobile, a move that would consolidate the nation’s third- and fourth-largest wireless carriers. The Wall Street Journal, citing people familiar with the matter, reported the news Dec. 13, setting off not-this-again sighs across the industry. “Let’s pop this trial balloon quickly, please,” John Bergmayer, a senior staff attorney with […]

Wearable Devices: 8 Myths Debunked by Michelle Maisto Myth 1: Wearables Are Just Another Smartphone Form Factor The wearables market extends well beyond smartphones and even smartwatches. There are health trackers embedded in running shoes and smart clothing. One vendor has even exhibited a device, to be embedded in a user’s tooth, that could monitor […]

Nokia has long been offering, and touting the benefits of, dual-SIM phones—phones that can hold two SIM cards, enabling a user to switch between SIMs, whether to separate business and personal plans or to take advantage of a better rate plan when traveling. Samsung now offers a dual-SIM version of the Galaxy S 4, and […]

The Federal Communications Commission hosted a Technology Transition Task Force presentation Dec. 12, as it begins the process of overseeing the phone companies’ desired transition from old copper landlines to IP (Internet protocol)-based networks. The key point about the transition—which all involved parties agree has its benefits—is that legislation regarding the phone networks, which includes […]

Unlocking a smartphone, even a paid-off smartphone no longer tied to a carrier contract, became illegal on Jan. 26 of this year, due to phrasing in the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act. It has not been a popular ruling, and on Dec. 12 the wireless industry moved to undo it. Industry group CTIA said in […]