u.s

U.S. Cellular unveils voice-mail-to-text service for a fee

Teaming up with Nuance, U.S. Cellular just unveiled a voice-mail-to-text solution that unfortunately is not free.

In the Chicago-based carrier's defense, the big boys like Verizon, AT&T, Sprint, and T-Mobile all charge for the privilege of using their visual voice mail software, typically $2 to $3 a month. U.S. Cellular's product is right in line with the market, and expects to tack on an extra $2.99 to monthly phone bills if customers subscribe.

Don't get me wrong, visual voice mail is a technical achievement right up there with sliced bread in terms of convenience. I personally don't feel, however, that I should have to pay for a carrier-branded service when Google offers its Google Voice application for free. In fact, besides not having to cough up a red cent for it, Google Voice is much more capable. Not only does it list calls in an e-mail-style inbox, it transcribes spoken messages to text--or tries to, at least. … Read more

Should Apple heed Chrysler's, GE's Super Bowl make-it-here message?

One unmistakable theme in Super Bowl ads this year was manufacturing in America. Is it time for Apple to reconsider all of the production it does abroad?

GE's ad, which highlighted Appliance Park in Louisville, KY, tried to show that the U.S. is still perfectly capable of making big-ticket consumer products.

"We're on the forefront of revitalizing manufacturing," a production line worker says. "We're proving that it can be done here and it can be done well," he adds.

The Chrysler ad starring Clint Eastwood echoes the same theme of making things … Read more

U.S. Cellular launching 4G LTE in March with Galaxy Tab, Aviator

U.S. Cellular is getting into the 4G LTE network game, launching a tablet and a smartphone as its first LTE devices in March.

The nation's sixth-largest wireless provider will inaugurate its LTE network with the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 4G LTE tablet, followed by the Samsung Galaxy S Aviator smartphone.

Samsung's Galaxy S Aviator features a 4.3-inch WVGA Super AMOLED Plus touch screen, an 8-megapixel rear-facing camera, and a front-facing camera for video chats. It runs Android 2.3.6 Gingerbread. For its part, the Galaxy Tab 10.1 (reviewed) runs off the Android 3.… Read more

Supremes to Congress: Bring privacy law into 21st century

Editors' note: This is a guest column. See bios of Berin Szoka and Charlie Kennedy below.

Last week's unanimous decision of the Supreme Court in U.S. v. Jones (PDF) marks a major victory for constitutional rights.

While the justices split in their rationale, they agreed that protecting Americans' privacy in the digital age will require the Court to do a great deal more to untangle its confusing Fourth Amendment jurisprudence. That will likely take several more decisions -- and many years. Meanwhile, Congress should heed Justice Samuel Alito's call for legislation limiting government's ability to track … Read more

Doomsday Clock moves 1 minute closer to catastrophe

Tick, tock. The infamous Doomsday Clock, which represents how close mankind supposedly is to its annihilation, has been moved one minute closer to midnight.

The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists (BAS), which created and maintains the symbolic clock, announced its decision yesterday.

"It is five minutes to midnight. Two years ago, it appeared that world leaders might address the truly global threats that we face. In many cases, that trend has not continued or been reversed. For that reason, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists is moving the clock hand one minute closer to midnight, back to its time in … Read more

Reddit to go silent in SOPA protest

All across Twitter these days, you can find people who are standing up to the bipartisan Congressional coalition behind the Stop Online Piracy Act. But one news site is taking its protest a whole lot further than simply plastering a "STOP SOPA" banner across its Twitter profile picture.

Reddit, a popular news aggregator, said today that it will be "blacking out" its entire site for 12 hours on January 18.

"The freedom, innovation, and economic opportunity that the Internet enables is in jeopardy," Reddit's editors posted this afternoon. "Congress is considering legislation … Read more

U.S. Cellular: We'll have LTE phones by April, we swear

CES, shmee-ee-es. Why wait for the country's largest consumer electronics show to announce new products and services when you can break the news yourself over Twitter?

That must have been the logic behind U.S. Cellular's tweet this afternoon promising a 4G LTE smartphone and tablet by March and April, respectively.

Although the nation's sixth-largest carrier hasn't shared much more about its product plans, U.S. Cellular does advertise on its Web site that its forthcoming 4G LTE network will launch in Iowa, Maine, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Texas, and Wisconsin in early 2012, keeping on-track with … Read more

Quanta sues AMD over defective chips

Quanta has sued Advanced Micro Devices over a defective chip used in an NEC laptop.

Quanta Computer, the world's largest contract manufacturer of laptop computers, sued AMD for breach of contract, alleging the chipmaker sold defective products, as first reported by Bloomberg.

The suit is centered on the ATI RS600ME, an integrated graphics solution, an AMD spokesperson told CNET. Integrated graphics chips include other circuitry and also act as a chipset, which supports the main central processing unit or CPU.

"AMD and its ATI Technologies Inc. unit sold chips that didn't meet heat tolerances and were unfit … Read more

Hummingbird robo-drone gets 1.8-gigapixel camera

Starting in the spring, the Hummingbird will be on sentry duty in Afghanistan.

The U.S. Army is getting ready to deploy a trio of prototype A160 Hummingbird drones as it evaluates the aircraft for a more full-fledged development program. One key characteristic that sets these unmanned air vehicles apart from others, such as the Predator, already more famously serving in the war zone is that the Hummingbirds are rotorcraft--that is, they fly like helicopters rather than planes.

The Hummingbirds will be equipped with DARPA's Argus-IS sensor system, which features a 1.8-gigapixel color camera--gear that the Army a … Read more

Sony releases impressive list of Vita U.S. launch titles

Just a few days after releasing the PlayStation Vita in Japan, Sony is now focused on the U.S. debut of the system, disclosing the entire launch and launch window lineup.

According to a post on Sony's PlayStation.Blog, games will range in price from $9.99 to $49.99, and all be available on the PlayStation Store as well. An impressive 25 games will launch side-by-side with the system on February 22, 2012. Gamers can get started shopping a week earlier on February 15 when Sony first-party games and accessories will go on sale, including the complete First Edition Bundle.

While I still think the Vita should come with a small-capacity Vita memory card, give Sony a lot of credit for putting together such an impressive and diverse collection of software for launch. There's something for everyone on this list and also what I think are at least three must-buy titles. It's a night-and-day comparison to what Nintendo offered earlier in the year with the 3DS.

I'm also happy to see that Sony is going to debut the all-but-necessary proprietary format Vita memory card at a lower-than-expected price, starting at $20 for 4GB. Sony also announced that inside each Vita box will be six AR play cards (sound familiar?) and a voucher for more AR mini-games from the PlayStation Network.

Read on for the entire launch and launch-window list and accessory dates and prices.… Read more