Hi, I'm Molly Wood, and welcome to the Buzz Report, the show about the tech news
that everyone's talking about. And yes, the Buzz Report has a new look! It's a work
in progress, and we're still trying to make it perfect, so please send your feedback to
buzz@cnet.com. And thanks! Also this week, iPhone 4 pre-order woes, the best of
E3, and how to turn your phone into a vuvuzela.
But first, it's the Gadget of the Week.
The Gadget of the Week is the Nintendo 3DS, unveiled this week at E3. It's the first ever 3D portable
gaming system, and it has a 3D display that doesn't require glasses. And if anything should stop you from
buying a big 3D TV just yet, it's that. Couple more years, people. Anyway, the 3DS -- sounds like it will
have tons of games, and it also has two cameras built in so you can use it to take 3D photos. Of things. No,
stop, nobody at all will use it to take 3D pictures of their junk. That would just be incredibly unlikely.
Also from E3, Microsoft pimped the motion-activated controller formerly known as Project Natal, which is
now Kinect. And how better to pimp it than by making everyone wear shiny white ponchos and treating
them to Cirque du Soleil performers at a strange, cult-like press conference? Because after that, flailing
around like a dillhole to control your character is kind of a step up, I guess.
And then there was Sony, which debuted what's being described as a pants-crappingly awesome look at
Killzone 3 in 3D. It's like a lot of killing ... in your face. Sony is also touting the immersion aspect of
PlayStation Move but is ignoring the fact that the controller wand looks like a, um. A Magic Wand.
In the other big buzz of the week, the iPhone 4 -- well, the black iPhone 4, not the white one -- went up for
pre-order June 15. Here's one of the more succinct headlines from Tuesday:
Apple iPhone 4 pre-ordering is a total disaster.
That about covers it. iPhone 4 pre-ordering was a meltdown of epic proportion. All the pre-order
servers crashed. Sometimes there was just an internal server error at the beginning. Other times,
you'd get to the very end of the ordering process and THEN it would crash. People got the wrong
order. People got charged multiple times for one phone. Some people's orders just got canceled
completely. Some people got confirmation emails containing OTHER PEOPLE'S credit card
numbers and shipping information. Stores were using pencils and paper to take orders. And you
know what caused it ALL? You know what the fail point was in the entire iPhone 4 rollout?
AT&T. I'm not joking. It was all due to the pre-order system was running on AT&T's "network".
AT&T, by the way, said Wednesday it was suspending pre-orders because of the "unprecedented
demand" and concern about "inventory." No mention of the "epic meltdown" or anything
approaching "apology."
They've ... got some balls.
Also? Why are Apple and AT&T still together? This is like the most dysfunctional relationship I've ever
seen in my life. Break UP.
And finally, it's time for a NEW segment here at the Buzz Report ... it's called Opportunity Knocks. This is
the segment where we highlight a current trend and the clever entrepreneurs who are ALL OVER THAT.
This week, it's vuvuzela apps. That's right, thanks to the World Cup, mobile apps that replicate the buzz of
a thousand plastic horns are the hot new thing in the App Store and the Android Marketplace. The most
recent was added just 7 days ago, and apparently, "Vuvuzela 2010" is the number one free iPhone app in
almost the entire world, with almost 1.5 million downloads. That's ... genius. Annoying, annoying genius.
And that's the Buzz Report for this week, everyone. I'm Molly Wood, and thanks for watching.
