transparent

Both President Obama and the U.S. Congress get failing grades for not allowing the public to learn through the Internet what's actually happening in Washington, D.C, according to a forthcoming report.

It might seem like a surprising conclusion after Obama launched Data.gov and endorsed greater transparency on his first day in office, saying at the time that he's committed to an "unprecedented level of openness in government."

But since then, says the report from the Cato Institute scheduled to be released next week and reviewed by CNET, there's been an "Obama … Read more

Twitter released its first ever Transparency Report detailing statistics on international requests for user data and content removal today, the same day news came out that it would have to hand over user information in a court case in New York.

The Twitter Transparency Report breaks down the countries from where such requests come and specifies how many requests it has received, what percentage it complied with, and numbers of user accounts affected, all spanning the first six months of this year.

The company has received more government requests in the first half of this year than in all of … Read more

Japanese wireless carrier NTT DoCoMo and Fujitsu showed off a sensational prototype device at the 2012 Wireless Japan expo sporting a feature unlike any other on the market today: a transparent dual-sided OLED touch screen smartphone. In other words, science fiction meets reality.

The latest take on the barely there touch screen concept appears slightly more practical than ever before, as one could control the user interface from the front or rear of the phone. For example, one could pull down the notifications bar or select an icon with the unused index finger behind the phone, meaning less finger obstruction over the screen. The prototype shown at the expo featured a 2.4-inch OLED screen (320x240) and used an unidentified version of Android. … Read more

Google is removing URLs from its search function, but before anyone cries foul, it's letting people know about it.

The tech giant released a new edition of its Transparency Report today, which shows who is requesting URLs be taken down, the copyright owners, and all the targeted domains since July 2011. Everything that's being deleted is allegedly copyrighted or pirated material -- mostly from software and entertainment companies.

Google has been releasing the Transparency Report for the last two years, but before today the only available information was government requests to remove content and disruptions in the search … Read more

In 2002, Hollywood imagined that we'd have the cool 3D computer systems Tom Cruise used in "Minority Report" by the year 2054. Now it's only 10 years later and a patent application from Microsoft reveals it has not only invented the foundation of such technology, it's gone a step further and made it portable.

The recently published application for a device with a transparent display was detailed by Patent Bolt and looks to be the portable version of a desktop with a transparent 3D display seen from Microsoft in February. The demos for that system focused on the use of 3D gestures and head-tracking to navigate through files and applications a la "Minority Report."… Read more

A computer monitor and keyboard are so yesteryear.

At Microsoft's annual TechForum expo earlier this week, the company showed off several amazing concept products that will have you thinking far into the future. Luckily, we have some great pictures and videos of some of these devices, which deliver a computer experience unlike anything commercially available today.

Buckle up and click on our gallery below to see innovations including a 3D augmented-reality desktop, software that tracks the history of the world, a mirror with holograms, and much more. … Read more

I've been meaning to write about Pixable, an excellent mobile app for keeping up with Facebook images on your iPhone or iPad. Unlike Facebook's own mobile app, which I find slow, complicated, and crash-prone, Pixable lets you dive into your social photo stream in a snap, see what friends are posting, and get out fast. There's more to it, too, and it's all good. It's a great app to pull up on that short elevator ride.

At least it was, until today's update of the app, which adds Facebook Timeline integration. Now whenever you … Read more

Chrome comes to Android with one gigantic caveat. Or maybe two. And we are joined by cell phone expert Jessica Dolcourt who gives us her personal opinion of Android.

NEWS:

-Three years on, Chrome at last arrives on Android

-Verizon Galaxy Nexus loses Google support

-Google Voice gets the Ice Cream Sandwich treatment

-Motorola patent license will cost Apple 2.25% of sales

-Google secretly testing pair of connected devices

-An Android tablet for the tub

-Superslim Samsung Galaxy S III could drop in May… Read more

Using real-time camera trickery, Transparent Screen for Android makes your mobile device "see-through" so you can use it to text or check e-mails while you're walking. It's a fun tool that could definitely come in handy for the multitaskers among us.

After downloading the free app from the Android Market, fire it up and adjust the settings. You can manipulate resolution, camera orientation, and transparency level. Once you're done, tap Start and you'll be able to use your device as normal, but you'll see a semitransparent layer of whatever your camera sees in … Read more