vincent nguyen

Regular readers may be aware that the guys behind SlashGear / SlashPhone / MYiPhone / Unbox.IT (among others) have been involved in a domain name dispute with Motorola since October last year. The URL in question is MOTORAZR.com, which we registered back in July 2004, and has been a source of cellphone related news ever since.

Three aspects of Motorola’s complaint were ruled on: that the domain name is confusingly similar to a trademark in which they have rights; that we, the current owners of MOTORAZR.com, had neither rights nor legitimate interests in the domain, and that we had registered and used it in “bad faith”.

(more…)

Twiddling your memory knobs back to August this year you might remember SlashGear’s coverage of the Onyx concept phone, designed and crafted by bespoke hardware and interface designers Synaptics and Pilotfish. With no physical controls such as the keypad, joystick or scroll wheels found on traditional phones, Onyx instead relies on a system of touch, proximity and gesture.

Built around a high-resolution LCD screen and Synaptics’ ClearPad touchscreen technology, a transparent touch-sensitive capacitive sensor, Onyx can discriminate between one and two finger use and can even tell when it is being held against a cheek. This opens up whole new avenues of interface design: pop-up onscreen scrollwheels for volume and moving through contact and media lists, “flicking away” text messages to send them, dragging photos and files from screen to screen.

SlashGear has been lucky enough to visit Synaptics and get a live demonstration of Onyx, from none other than their Human Interface Architect, John M. Feland. Under the ever watchful eye of Clark Foy, the company’s marketing VP, we filmed some exclusive footage of the prototype in action. The ethos of Onyx is “All About Fun”, about using technology in a humanistic way; hopefully you’ll have fun looking at what might just be the phone of the future.

(more…)

In the world of the future, we’ll all ride on the backs of giant robot weasels, eat food that was grown on Mars and freeze-dried into the shape of Peter Falk’s head, and read our books from the flicker-free screens of electronic books. “Electronic books?!” I hear your scoff, “are you a mad person with the brains of a no-brained idiot?” No, sir, I’m not - and Sony are here to back me up.

(more…)

Readers in the UK will all remember bearded TV “celebrity” Noel Edmunds appearing fresh faced from behind the control stick of his helicopter gunship, gurning at cameras at whichever charity even he had decided to grace with his presence. Well, now us mere peons can pretend to be a celebrity in our own rights with what RadioShack are obviously hoping will be the toy of the Christmas season - the Micro Mosquito RC helicopter. Watch the Micro Mosquito buzz around after the jump!

(more…)

The Palm Treo 700p, the announcement of which we covered earlier this week, is the latest in Palm’s long Treo line of smartphones. Available by the end of this month, the Treo 700p is Palm’s fastest PalmOS-based Treo yet, and brings a number of new features and benefits to the table. The Treo 700p joins it’s Windows Mobile-based cousin, the Treo 700w, the Treo 700p will be available from either Verizon Wireless or Sprint, and we here at Digital Lifestyle Magazine have been given the opportunity to take Palm’s new baby for a ride.

(more…)