watch

In an obvious effort to turn YouTube into more of a TV-like experience, Google has created the YouTube Remote app for Android devices. With this free download, you can pair your mobile device with a desktop computer or YouTube-ready television, and use Android to share control of your YouTube playlist.

As great as the concept is for YouTube Remote, in practice, I see some things that need to be ironed out. My biggest gripe is that the device pairing process is not as simple as it should be. You must first navigate to YouTube.com/leanback on your computer or … Read more

When Netflix users in the U.S. are sick of their queue or feel like they've already seen much of what's been offered on "Watch Instantly," they can just scroll down to the "Recently Added" subhead and see if the video service has anything fun and new to watch.

Until today, only U.S. and Canadian users had this feature. Now, people in the U.K., Ireland, and Latin America can see all of the new titles that Netflix has "recently added," announced the streaming service today.

All of the talk surrounding the possibility of Apple launching MacBooks with Retina Displays just got a bit more serious.

A Mac OS X-based application today was updated with support for "Retina graphics." The app, FolderWatch, allows users to automatically keep a copy of a project on an external hard drive or file server. It might not be the most obvious choice for a Retina-ready app, but the very fact that it supports the feature is rather interesting.

For months now, we've been hearing rumors that Apple could launch a new line of MacBooks featuring the Retina … Read more

It used to be easy to find a movie to watch. You would trek down to your local Blockbuster, peruse the aisles, return home with a VHS tape and perhaps a box of Junior Mints. Today, I am paralyzed by choice, and I haven't enjoyed a Junior Mint in more than a decade. I should also note that I have two young children, who have severely decreased my capability to carve out two hours to view and also stay awake for a feature-length film.

So, when the stars align and I have the time and energy to watch a … Read more

I'm addicted to the original British "Top Gear" car show. As much as I love to watch them run a Bugatti Veyron down an airplane runway, though, I know I'll never get within spitting distance of a blazing fast car like that.

With a Max Speed Speedometer Car Watch from Gadgets and Gear, I could at least pretend I'm sitting behind the wheel of a vehicle with nifty light-up gauges.

The LED display glows with blue lights while red needles track the time.… Read more

My watch is an iPod Nano. It's not perfect. In fact, there are many ways I'd like it to be better. But, it works. It also looks cool.

Those are two seemingly small details that are in fact quite major when considering a smart watch these days. "Working" is a matter of opinion and design in some cases, but the point is that the iPod Nano-as-a-watch does exactly what you think it does, and it does it well. So far, that can't be said for Sony's SmartWatch, a confusing remote for Android phones that ends up doing less than you expect it to, yet somehow is hard to even work in that limited capacity. I had a chance to try one out here at CNET, and was surprised at how Sony's solution was good-looking, but a complete slave requiring Bluetooth and an Android phone to get anything done -- even tell the time. That's a problem. A good watch can't mess that part up.… Read more

Facebook's Data Use Policy is more than 7,000 words long, making it a daunting challenge to stay on top of how the company manages data you share with it. Online privacy company Abine wants to simplify that task for you with its new PrivacyWatch service, unveiled today.

For $1.99 per month, PrivacyWatch will warn you whenever Facebook changes its policy. The service will recommend changes on how to keep your information private in accordance with any policy changes. The service comes days before Facebook's IPO is expected.

"PrivacyWatch says, 'Hey, this specific thing has changed, … Read more

Glanceable media -- visual nibbles of information or entertainment that convey meaning without much intervention or interaction -- has rich precedence in the physical world. Signs, clocks, and framed photos can all be considered forms.

These days, Google (and several major Android licensees), as well as Microsoft, have provided ways to tap into this kind of media on the upper levels of their smartphone user interfaces. Since the release of the T-Mobile G1, Android has supported widgets that can live on its multipart home screens, a feature it has expanded to third-party developers.

And while many Android widgets tie back into apps, Microsoft has largely taken this approach by design with Live Tiles in Windows Phone.

Because they are almost always with us and almost always connected, smartphones have a great advantage when it comes to presenting such information at a glance.

But they do have at least one major disadvantage; they are usually stored in a pocket or handbag. Thus, we have to drag them out -- and often unlock them -- to be updated on our latest interests. This drawback has led companies ranging from startups such as WIMM Labs, Allert, and MetaWatch, to giants such as Motorola and Sony, to create smart watches as glanceable portals for content that is retrieved by the smartphone without having to retrieve the smartphone itself. … Read more

Not very many people know that the Windows Event Viewer is a built-in tool that can be of great help in troubleshooting computer problems. Yet, here comes MyEventViewer from NirSoft Freeware, an application that promises to improve on this little-known and not-often used utility.

While the information it provides may prove to be beyond the ability of most people to comprehend, the free tool itself has a simple interface. It allows the user to view multiple event logs, for example, unlike the option offered by the regular Event Viewer. The details of the event are also conveniently seen on the … Read more