Aurich Lawson

The Wi-Fi Alliance has begun certifying network hardware, chips, smartphones, PCs, and tablets for the new "Gigabit Wi-Fi" standard. But while the certification program covers hardware with speeds of up to 1.3Gbps, vendors can make equipment that goes faster—and at least one already has.

The 802.11ac certification program, announced today, covers equipment pushing 1.3Gbps of data by using three spatial streams of 433Mbps each. This is the speed that has been supported in chips and routers for more than a year. Vendors got an early start with 802.11ac because the standard has been stable for a while, even though certification hadn't begun.

But the real-world limit is not 1.3Gbps. We saw recently that chipmaker Quantenna unveiled 802.11ac Wi-Fi chips that push 1.7Gbps of data by using four wireless streams instead of three. This is possible because while 11ac certification covers only three spatial streams, the 802.11ac standard allows more than that.

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In a previously unseen video clip from 1994, in between his gigs at Apple, Jobs says he expected his life's work to be obsolete by now. [Read more]    

Going for branch offices and big data in two fell swoops

Still not acquired after bragging two months ago of an 80 per cent sequential revenue bump and an $80m annualized run rate as it exited the first quarter, virtual server-storage appliance maker Nutanix is widening its market appeal with new low-end and high-end configurations.…

Sony has temporarily taken down the version 4.45 PS3 system update that was supposed to provide "improved system stability" after a number of users reported the new firmware was bricking their systems.

"Hi guys, we're aware of reports that the recent PS3 update (4.45) has caused," PlayStation Europe tweeted out in a series of updates early this morning. "We have temporarily taken 4.45 offline and are investigating. We will announce when the system update is available for download as soon as possible and we apologise for the inconvenience."

Reports of system bricking problems began filtering in after the required update was released yesterday evening and soon filled up a 92-page thread on the official PlayStation US forums. "I updated my fatty to 4.45 now it just sits at the sparkley [sic] ribbon screen," one user wrote. "I have done multiple file restores and I am not about to reformat, or else I would probably kill myself. PLEASE tell me I am not the only one having this issue?"

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Photo finish for fallen camera giant's race against death

Eastman Kodak's creditors have backed its plan to sell 34 million shares worth $406m as it prepares to exit bankruptcy protection.…

Users of Apple's set-top box who want a game of baseball followed by a "Game of Thrones" are in luck, with popular HBO and ESPN apps now available directly, but you need a pay-TV subscription for most content. [Read more]    

Aurich Lawson

Apple has issued a press release this morning announcing that both HBO Go and WatchESPN are now available on Apple TVs. This is welcome news to customers who have cable or satellite subscriptions and can use the applications; for everyone else, the news means very little.

"HBO GO and WatchESPN are some of the most popular iOS apps and are sure to be huge hits on Apple TV," the press release quotes Apple VP Eddy Cue as saying.

The Apple TV applications will function in the same way as their iOS counterparts already do. For HBO Go, existing HBO customers can enter their subscriber information and watch HBO content (like Game of Thrones or True Blood); those without cable or satellite can continue to not watch HBO content, despite the blindingly obvious opportunity HBO has to take additional revenue out of the growing technologically savvy "cord cutter" demographic.

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The music service finally lands in Windows 8, letting you watch music videos and live concerts from a wide collection of artists. [Read more]    

Um, HOW much did they pay you in the settlement?

Oracle is claiming victory in a case of alleged grey market trading against a US business that sells network, software and services management support to the enterprise. ServiceKey and its CEO Angela Vines inked a settlement deal with Larry's lot at the end of last month.…

That's just five bucks per month for unlimited music streaming to pretty much any device you own. And current PlayStation Plus members can get it for even less. [Read more]    

The Telex machine is kept so clean and it types to a waking world. Still. Arnold Reinhold

The Christian Science Monitor recently reported what many people may have assumed had already happened years ago: the death of the telegram. With the pending closure of Indian national telecommunications company Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited's telegraph service offices, the Monitor reported that "the world's last telegram message will be sent somewhere in India on July 14."

But news of the death of the telegram has been greatly exaggerated. "Somehow they got the impression that this meant the end of telegrams worldwide," Colin Stone, Director of Operations for International Telegram, a telegraphy service based in Canada, said in a phone conversation with Ars. "We'll still offer services in India, even though the state-run service is closing."

Samuel Morse's version of telegraphy—Morse code over the wire—died a long time ago. It was replaced by Telex, a switch-based system similar to telephone networks, developed in Germany in 1933. The German system, run by the Federal Post Office, essentially used a precursor to computer modems and sent text across the wire at about 50 characters per second. Western Union built the US' first nationwide Telex, an acronym for Teleprinter Exchange, in the late 1950s.

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Today's fans have a different "relationship" with artists, one not based on buying music. [Read more]    

Both Apple and Google's voice-control technologies get high satisfaction ratings from half or more users, but Siri has an adoption edge for many tasks. [Read more]    

Goodbye, XrossMediaBar. We hardly knew ye. Hello brand new, Facebook-inspired social news feed, which packs a whole lot of social updates right onto your PS4 home screen, as shown in a new Sony video that showed off the system interface for the first time.

A series of large, text-and-graphics-filled blocks running down the screen in a trio of columns lets a PS4 user see things like new games on the PlayStation Store, friends playing new games for the first time, trophies earned recently by your friends, and players that are broadcasting video of their play sessions. The video shows a user diving in to one of the trophy updates and giving it a quick Facebook-style thumbs up before jumping into a game, then watching a gameplay video before switching straight back to the game itself with a tap of the PS button.

Probably the most intriguing new feature shown in the new interface is the option to "download multiplayer mode first" or "download single player mode first" when buying a game like Killzone online. This follows comments from Sony's Mark Cerny about PlayGo, a PS4 feature that lets games be playable even before their data is fully downloaded or installed from a Blu-ray disc.

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Amazon cloud casts long shadow

Wannabe cloud provider Tier3 has created an object storage service based on the Riak distributed datastore.…

The Nvidia Tegra processors will still be available in some versions, according to Bloomberg. [Read more]    

With the iPhone 5's one-year birthday not far off, it's time to look ahead to the next iPhone. Here's a rundown of the features and design upgrades we'd most like to see. [Read more]    

Samsung will be talking phones, tablets and computers at its event in London on Thursday, June 20. Check out our live blog starting at 6:45 p.m. U.K. time, or 10:45 a.m. PT, for the latest. [Read more]    

Geek-costume creator Mel Hoppe tells Crave about her passion for transformation and the mini cosplay empire she's building from her base in Nevada. [Read more]    

That's right, people are still using us ... bitch

Facebook claimed it has – for the first time – surpassed 1 million active advertisers who used the network in the last 28 days.…