>> Amazon gets publishing rights to the First Lady. We have lots of news about Mobil, and a new survey from Nielsen shows just how
good kids have it these days. It's Thursday, September 11th, I'm Natali Del Conte and it's time to get Loaded.
^M00:00:13
[ Music ]
^M00:00:18
>> Natali: Amazon scored big with exclusive publishing rights to the biographies of Michelle Obama and Cindy McCain. Both titles will
be exclusively released on the Amazon Kindle. Michelle Obama, Grace and Intelligence in a Time of Change by Elizabeth Lightfoot, already
available on the device while Cindy McCain, Elegance, Goodwill, and a Hope For a New America by Alicia Colon, will be available on
September 15th. Only the biography of the winning candidate's wife will be available in traditional paperback form for $14.95. Amazon
says they'll be printing the title as soon as they know who the winner is. I think we would all like to know that. The HTC Touch Pro
has a new home. The Touch Pro is the company's version of the Diamond except it has a full slide-out keyboard. The Diamond has been
available here in the US for some time, but no carrier was offering it directly so it was ridiculously expensive. Starting in
October the orphaned phone will have a home with Sprint which will sell the touch screen device for $299.00 with a contract. The
HTC is a sexy little iPhone competitor, it runs Windows Mobile, has a 3.2 megapixel camera, WiFi, GPS, video [inaudible], and a business
card scanner. AOL launched an e-mail aggregation feature this week; it lets you check your Yahoo mail, GMail, Hotmail, and AOL mail
all from one site. You can see your various e-mail messages from different clients but you can't manage them all together if you decide
to read a response you say a Yahoo message within AOL, you're then redirected to your Yahoo mail site where you can e-mail from there.
This is a good idea because who really uses AOL mail anyway, but I would like it if I didn't have to be redirected to the other mail
sites, I'd rather just manage them all together. This capability will likely come in the next few weeks as AOL tweaks its new site,
so I will be patient. Microsoft is enlisting a team of customer service reps to work in electronic stores around the country. Sound
familiar? The company is dispatching 150 Gurus to stores like Best Buy and Circuit City to help customer queries on PC's or Microsoft
products. The company says it's different from the Genius Bar, Apple's in-store customer help and support team, Gurus will act
as sales people to translate the technology to the average customer but they won't assist with products that customer's have already
purchased. I really don't get this. Microsoft is basically taking Apple's idea and making it less efficient by eliminating it only to
direct sales on Microsoft products. A few weeks ago I mused about the fact that there are no Yahoo iPhone applications, Yahoo
must have been listening because they finally launched one. Yahoo oneConnect is available on the iPhone now and it lets users access, pretty
much, all things Yahoo, mail, chat, Flicker, contacts, and search. It's about freakin time. I would like to see something like this
from Google now, a portal will I can access mail, calendar, contacts, etcetera. Google -- get on that please. Google may not have an
all-in-one iPhone out but they do have one out for Blackberry, they released it yesterday, it's called Google Mobile App for Blackberry
and it lets Blackberry users get mail, maps, news, search, RSS, and more all from one convenient application. At least I have a
Blackberry and an iPhone. I can get Yahoo apps on the iPhone now and Google apps on the Blackberry -- it's the tech version of being
bi-mobile. Speaking of Blackberry Research in Motion made their flip-phone available. The new Blackberry Pearl Flip 8220 is the
company's clamshell model and I think it's pretty good looking. It comes in red or black, has the Pearl scroll wheel and keypad, and
will run on Edge not 3G, surprisingly enough. It has WiFi, music and video players, but no GPS. It will be released sometime this fall
through T-Mobile but we don't have pricing just yet. Air Canada is the next airline to get mile-high WiFi. The company announced that it will
be using Aircell which is the same provider that US airlines have chosen. Air Canada's wired flights will be the first international
trips to have WiFi. The company will install routers on its Airbus A319 aircraft by next spring. Virgin Mobile will release its first
3G phone and it will integrate some functions from their recently purchased Helio. The Shuttle is a black and red slider phone that will
run on a 3G EVDO network, it offers a 1.3 megapixel camera, 2 inch screen, stereo Bluetooth, and streaming music support. Even cooler,
the phone will feature Helio's Buddy Beacon which will use the built-in GPS to locate friends in close proximity to you. Yeah -- I know --
kind of big brotherish -- Looped on the iPhone 3G already bothers me a bit, thankfully, it, pretty much, never works. Did you know that
the average child gets a cell phone between the ages of 10 and 11 these days? Spoiled brats. I'm kidding, of course, or maybe I'm just
jealous because I didn't have even a Gameboy when I was 10 or 11. Kids these days have it so much cooler. Nielsen released a new survey
this week called the Mobile Kids insight. It's about pre-teens which they call tweens, some of the more interesting findings include the
fact that 46% of tweens use cell phones which they received around the ages of 10 or 11. The most popular phone among tweens
is the Motorola Razor, so, not a smart phone. These kids aren't just downloading games and music to their hearts content though, 68% are
not allowed, so maybe they aren't so spoiled anyway. I can spare my -- when I was your age lecture. The state of Virginia is involved
in a very cool science project of sorts. The state is asking for help to compile an open-source physics text book which they're
calling a FlexBook. The Secretary of Education and Technology and the Department of Education are asking for submissions related to
21st Century physics. The result will be a free open-sourced technology platform where the FlexBook will be live as an adaptive
web base set of instructive materials. This is such an innovative approach to text books, which really become dated quite quickly. I'll
be interested in seeing the finished product which will actually never be finished but, rather, a constantly evolving collaboration. If
you want in on the project visit www.kc12.org. Those are all your headlines for today and that wraps up your week of getting loaded,
but if you've missed any episodes you can catch up at www.loaded.cnettv.com. I will see you on Monday. I'm Natali Del Conte with
CNET TV and you've just been Loaded.
^M00:06:07
[ Music ]
