Canon to enter mirrorless camera market from September

A logo of Canon Inc is pictured at the 3D and Virtual Reality Expo in Tokyo June 20, 2012. The expo which showcases the latest technology will be held until June 22.
Credit: Reuters/Yuriko NakaoTOKYO | Mon Jul 23, 2012 12:38am EDT
TOKYO (Reuters) - Canon Inc said on Monday it would sell its first mirrorless camera from mid-September in a bid to tap a growing market for small, interchangeable-lens cameras that rival Nikon Corp entered last year.
Canon will manufacture 100,000 of the cameras a month, the company said in a statement.
Mirrorless models have large sensors, providing good picture quality, but no optical viewfinders. That enables manufacturers to keep the camera body smaller and lighter.
In Japan, where consumers tend to value easily portable products, mirrorless cameras account for around a third of all interchangeable lens models. In the United States, their market share is closer to a tenth.
Canon's move will ratchet up competition with Nikon, its main rival for hefty single-lens reflex cameras used by professional photographers and enthusiasts.
Shares of Canon were down 3 percent and Nikon was 2.6 percent lower on Monday afternoon, underperforming Tokyo's broad Topix index, which lost 0.9 percent.
(Reporting by Reiji Murai, writing by Tim Kelly; Editing by Chris Gallagher)

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Powered by Blogger. Facebook Pageviews Nokia Lumia 900 vs. HTC Titan II vs. Samsung Focus 2: AT&T's Windows Phones Go Head-to-Head-to-Head

So for those that are looking for a Windows Phone 7.5 (aka Mango) experience with a little 4G LTE flavor, which of these three phones is the best choice? We compare the build, performance, display, camera, and battery life of the phones in this breakdown to determine which one comes out on top.
Build
Admittedly, this is a tough category to judge objectively, as it's almost entirely a matter of preference. On the one hand, you've got to give points to Nokia for trying something very new and different with the bizarre build of the Lumia 900. But on the other hand, that's exactly the problem: it's incredibly bizarre. The combination of rounded sides with sharp corners looks and feels so weird, and it's not particularly comfortable to hold either, in my opinion. Top that off with the fact that the giant polycarbonate body is as slick as all get-out and Nokia is just asking for its massive abomination of a phone to be dropped on a regular basis.

Now, in defense of the Lumia 900, the Titan II is just as big (it's slightly thinner, but also slightly longer), but it takes on a much more graceful shape. HTC didn't try as hard as Nokia to come up with something so distinctly unique, instead opting for a much more subtle approach; there's a gentle upward slope at the bottom of the phone, bringing the microphone closer to the speaker's mouth and creating a nice sort of pocket for your thumb to fit in while using the capacitive buttons on the bottom of the handset.
Then there's the Focus 2, with its extremely traditional build. It's relatively sleek -- though it's no Droid RAZR or Ascend P1 -- and it sports a shiny white body with silver trim, giving it a nice, clean aesthetic. Unfortunately, the body of the Focus 2 is also very slick. I wish that at least one of these handsets had some sort of textured finish to add some grip, but none of them do.
Now, I'm a pretty boring person, so my initial thought was to go with the safe, traditional, and comfortably-sized option of the Focus 2, but I'm going to give the Titan II the slight edge here. My primary issue with the Titan II is its size, but I recognize that most people don't care about that as much as I do, so I'm putting that aside and saying that its slightly unique (but not off-the-wall) design ranks above the plain (but much more manageably-sized) build of the Focus 2. The Lumia 900 finishes way behind the other two because, while I appreciate Nokia's attempt to mix things up, the result is just too ugly in my opinion.
Display
This one's a no-brainer. Though all three handsets have the same 800 x 480 resolution, the Lumia 900 easily takes the cake thanks to Nokia's ClearBlack display technology. Essentially, this reduces the reflectiveness of the screen, creating deeper blacks and beautifully saturated colors on the AMOLED display of the Lumia 900. The slick look of the Corning Gorilla Glass certainly doesn't hurt, either.
So what about the remaining two? Once again, the choice is pretty clear. The display of the Focus 2 is far and away one of the worst that I have ever seen on a Windows Phone (or any phone, for that matter). Due to the fact that it is a Super AMOLED display and not Super AMOLED Plus means that it uses PenTile screen technology. And while the PenTile descriptor has to do with the layout and size of the individual subpixels on the screen, all you really need to know about it is that PenTile displays look worse as resolutions get lower.
The PenTile display on the new Galaxy S III, for example, looks fine, but that's because it's a 1280 x 720 resolution. The display on the Focus 2 is only 800 x 480, compounding the issues with the PenTile display and resulting in a screen in which you can easily see individual pixels without even having to hold it all that close to your face. Don't get me wrong, the WVGA Super LCD display of the Titan II is no stunner either, but it definitely does not look as rough as the one on the Focus 2. The Lumia 900 wins here by a country mile, with the Titan II in a distant second and the Focus 2 in dead last.
And one final note: I'm personally not into massive screens, as this obviously results in equally massive phones, but I know that not everybody is of the same opinion. So if you're all about size, the Titan II has the largest display, measuring 4.7 inches, while the Lumia 900 is 4.3 inches, and the Focus 2 is an even 4 inches.

Part 2 of this comparison covers the performance. camera, and battery life of these three Windows Phones, and then draws some conclusions.

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Nokia Has 'Something Amazing' on the Way in September

Nokia's partnership with Microsoft may not have produced any resounding success yet, but it appears that the Finnish company may still have something up its sleeve. Come September 7, Nokia promises to unveil something "amazing" to its customers.
Photos of a sign outside a currently-closed Nokia store in Helsinki have surfaced on MyNokiaBlog, telling customers "Something amazing is coming," with the September 7 date next to it. There is also a QR code on the ad that, when scanned, takes users to a website that features similarly vague hype like, "Prepare to be amazed at all the things in your new Nokia store." The timing of the announcement is interesting, since it comes right on the heels of Nokia World, which is scheduled to take place in Helsinki on September 5 and 6.
But what exactly Nokia will be unveiling is a mystery. One possibility is an announcement of a new lineup of Windows 8 Lumia phones, as it was recently announced that Windows 8 will be released not long after on October 26. Another possibility is that the announcement may have something to do with Nokia's efforts to become a leader in the field of location-based services.
Nokia CEO Stephen Elop recently stated that the company's goal is to become the "Where?" company, much like Google and Facebook have become the "What?" and "Who?" companies, respectively. He stressed the importance of smartphones and mobile devices, saying, "The mobile device will become the nucleus for collecting real-time data from sensors," including location, orientation, speed, social media preferences, etc.
When it comes to location-based services, "[Nokia] could be a leader," said Elop, specifically mentioning the potential behind the releases of Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8. "We expect the launch of Windows 8 for tablets and PCs, and Windows Phone 8, to be a catalyst for Lumia."
Source: CNET and SlashGear

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Apple heads into choppy waters as new iPhone awaited

A man shows a photograph he took on his iPhone of an Apple store in Beijing June 6, 2012.
Credit: Reuters/David GrayBy Poornima GuptaSAN FRANCISCO | Mon Jul 23, 2012 7:06am EDT
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Apple Inc faces an unusual phenomenon when reporting earnings this time around: low expectations.
Few are expecting the world's most valuable technology company -- which surpasses Wall Street expectations with near regularity -- to deliver a bumper quarter once more on Tuesday.
The main reason: consumers holding out for the new iPhone.
Apple may still surprise market watchers, but many Wall Street analysts and investors remember how chatter over the launch of a new iPhone last year caused Apple to miss quarterly expectations in the fall, for the first time in years.
The iPhone 5 is only expected to hit store shelves around October -- just in time for the holidays -- with a thinner, larger screen and fine-tuned search features. Couple that pre-launch lull with slowdowns in Europe and China, Apple's biggest markets outside of North America, and sentiment on the Wall Street darling is more muted than many can remember in a while.
"No longer is Apple the company that beats every time," said Tim Lesko, portfolio manager at Granite Investment Advisors, which owns Apple stock. "I expect Apple to beat Apple's guidance, but I don't know whether they will beat Wall Street's guidance."
Tony Sacconaghi, analyst with Bernstein Research, sees a reasonable chance Apple will miss expectations on revenue, citing "macroeconomic weakness in China and Europe, a product cycle lull in the iPhone, a later than expected introduction of the new iPad into China, and the late quarter introduction of new Mac notebooks."
Any hiccup in demand for the best-selling smartphone can have a big impact on both revenue and profits as the five-year old device accounts for nearly 50 percent for Apple's revenues. And it comes at a time Samsung and other manufacturers that use rival Google Inc's Android software are chipping away at its market share.
Apple is expected to report fiscal third-quarter earnings of $10.35 a share on revenue of $37.2 billion, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.
Top Wall Street analysts are betting the numbers will undershoot that. Apple may miss the average sales forecast by about 0.2 percent, according to Thomson Reuters Starmine's SmartEstimates, which places greater emphasis on timely forecasts by top-rated analysts.
IPAD'S LAUNCH IN CHINA
But some analysts also think the Street is underestimating the impact of a late iPad launch in China, a focal point of intense expansion for the company and a huge driver of growth.
Apple began selling the tablet there on Friday, but many had expected it to ship last quarter.
Sales in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan jumped threefold to $7.9 billion in the second quarter, accounting for about 20 percent of Apple's $39.2 billion in total revenue.
The company typically introduces a new iPhone every year, but has yet to reveal any details on the next model.
However, people familiar with the situation have told Reuters the new iPhone will have a bigger display and that Apple has begun to place orders for the new displays from suppliers in South Korea and Japan.
Meanwhile, Apple's iPhone 4S is just three quarters old, which is relatively new by any standard. But many fans of the phone now see it as a cyclical product with somewhat predictable launch timeframes, preferring to wait a few months to buy the new model, analysts said.
Wall Street estimates Apple sold about 29 million iPhones, down from 35.1 million sold in the March quarter. Sales of the new iPad, expected to be 14 million to 15 million, is likely to offset part of the anticipated sequential drop in iPhones sales.
Apart from concerns about iPhone purchases, Wall Street is worried about the rising prominence of Google and Amazon.com in the mobile market, particularly with the launch of Google's smaller and cheaper Nexus 7 tablet, which is gaining popularity.
Still, no one is bearish in the longer term on the world's largest technology company by market value and most Apple watchers believe the company will make up any lost iPhone volume during the holiday season.
"Big picture, it doesn't matter," said Sterne Agee analyst Shaw Wu. "They are still the share gainer in the larger scheme of things. This is clearly a timing issue."
BIG HOLIDAY SEASON EYED
Wall Street expects that the outlook for this year's holiday season will be enormous for Apple as it may include the launch of a new iPhone as well as a potential new "mini iPad."
Apple has been working on a smaller tablet, a person familiar with the matter told Reuters.
It is unclear when Apple will launch such a tablet, but some clues are emerging on the timing of the new iPhone.
When Verizon -- one of the wireless carriers that work with Apple -- was asked on Thursday why customers have been holding back on handset upgrades, CFO Fran Shammo said: "There is always that rumor mill out there with a new phone coming out in the fourth quarter and so people may be waiting."
Investors will pick apart executives' comments for clues to new product introductions. While Apple has a policy of never giving advance details or timings on new products, Chief Financial Officer Peter Oppenheimer has often hinted of "product transition" in earnings conference calls preceding a launch.
Wall Street estimates Apple sold about 4 million Macintosh computers as the PC market saw growth sputter in the quarter.
The lackluster expectations do not appear to have affected Apple's stock, which is up nearly 50 percent so far in 2012. The stock has been choppy since a high of $644 in April. It closed Friday at $604.30 on the Nasdaq.
"Of all the quarters, this is the one that seems to have widest range of opinion," said Granite's Lesko.
(Reporting by Poornima Gupta, Editing by Gary Crosse)

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Youku, Tudou shares fall on China content crackdown

n">(Reuters) - Shares of online video companies Youku.com Inc and Tudou Holdings Ltd fell on what some analysts said was a reaction to a planned crackdown by the Chinese government on what it considers to be inappropriate content.
China plans to target material on websites, including pornographic and violent videos, according to media reports.
Youku's shares were down 6 percent at $17.86 in early afternoon trading on the New York Stock Exchange, while Tudou was down 9 percent at $26.67 on the Nasdaq.
Youku does not have much exposure to user-generated content, the main target of the government campaign, but Tudou, which Youku bought in March, gets a large percentage of its revenue from such content, ThinkEquity analyst Henry Guo told Reuters.
Founded in 2005, Tudou — which means potato in Mandarin and alludes to the image of an Internet couch potato — focuses on user-generated content and makes its own drama serials. It went public on the Nasdaq in August last year.
Oppenheimer analyst Andy Yeung said the new regulation would require website operators to hire and train more staff to self-censor content uploaded by users.
Youku.com agreed to buy Tudou in an all-stock deal worth more than $1 billion in March, creating an industry leader with more than a third of China's online video market.
Youku currently leads the fragmented Chinese online video market with a 21.8 percent share, ahead of Tudou's 13.7 percent, according to internet researcher Analysys International.
China heavily filters the Internet, and blocks popular foreign sites such as Facebook, YouTube and Twitter and in 2011, it shut 50 microblogs for distributing pornography and carrying "vulgar content.
In March, Chinese regulators made it mandatory for Beijing-based microbloggers to register on the Weibo platform using their real identities or face unspecified legal consequences, in a bid to curb what Communist officials call rumors, vulgarities and pornography.
(Reporting by Sruthi Ramakrishnan in Bangalore; Editing by Anil D'Silva, Saumyadeb Chakrabarty)

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Samsung Galaxy S III Lands at U.S. Cellular

With the past few weeks bringing the Samsung Galaxy S III to Verizon, AT&T, Sprint and T-Mobile consumers, it looks like the smartphone is now available to U.S. Cellular customers too, as the device is now available for purchase online.

The Galaxy S III from U.S. Cellular is essentially identical to the version offered by the larger carriers. It runs the same Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich operating system, is equipped with Samsung's own TouchWiz flavor, and features an 8 megapixel camera on the back. Packing a 1.5GHz dual-core Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 processor, the device sports a 4.8-inch HD Super AMOLED 1280 x 720 resolution display. Just like its Verizon, Sprint, and AT&T counterparts, U.S. Cellular's version is 4G LTE capable.

The 16GB version of the Samsung smartphone is currently selling online for $200, after a $100 mail-in rebate, in either white or blue, with the phone hitting store shelves later this week. The 32GB iteration of the device will be available soon after, with a price tag of $250, after a $100 mail-in rebate.

While the four major national networks have been offering the Samsung Galaxy S III for weeks, it's rare that regional carriers get new devices so quickly.

U.S. Cellular customers interested in buying the smartphone, be sure to check out our hands-on review to get all the details before you buy!  

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No Samsung Galaxy S III Has Spontaneously Exploded

Facebook logos on a computer screen are seen in this photo illustration taken in Lavigny May 16, 2012.

Credit: Reuters/Valentin Flauraud

By Dan Levine

SAN FRANCISCO | Wed Jul 11, 2012 4:36pm EDT

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - A judge recused herself from overseeing a privacy lawsuit against Facebook over the social networking service's "Sponsored Stories" feature, one day before she was set to hold a hearing on a proposed settlement.

District Judge Lucy Koh in San Jose, California, federal court did not provide a reason for the recusal in a brief order on Wednesday.

Five Facebook members filed a lawsuit seeking class-action status against the social networking site, saying its "Sponsored Stories" feature violated California law by publicizing users' "likes" of certain advertisers without paying them or giving them a way to opt out. The case involved over 100 million potential class members.

As part of a proposed settlement, Facebook agreed to allow users more control over how their personal information is used. The value to Facebook members resulting from the changes is about $103 million, in the opinion of one economist hired by the plaintiffs.

However, the amount Facebook will actually pay to settle the case is just over $20 million, according to court documents filed last month.

Any settlement must be approved by a judge. In the order on Wednesday, Koh vacated all pending dates for motions in the case, and asked that it be reassigned to another judge.

Koh had overseen the lawsuit since it landed in federal court last year. In an order last December, Koh rejected Facebook's attempts to dismiss the case, saying plaintiffs had shown economic injury could occur through Facebook's use of their names, photographs and likenesses.

The case is Angel Fraley et al., individually and on behalf of all others similarly situated vs. Facebook Inc, U.S. District Court, Northern District of California, 11-cv-1726.

(Reporting By Dan Levine; Editing by Gary Hill and Tim Dobbyn)

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