Everyone’s found themselves in this situation at one time or another: you’re in a picture-perfect setting, but a selfie at arm’s length won’t cut it. You want to be in the picture, so you wait for a friendly looking passerby and ask them to take it. But, now it’s out of your control, and chances are the resulting snap won’t turn out exactly as you’d imagined. Samsung knows you’re too polite to hold the stranger up while you convey your vision, so it has come up with a camera feature that does the explaining for you. It’s described in a recent patent filing, and the gist is that you select the backdrop and take an initial snap that acts as a guide for the next, similar to how some panorama modes work. With a silhouette of the desired scene now showing atop the live view, the designated stranger just needs to let you get in the shot, line the overlay up with the live scene, and hit the shutter release.

The patent application also talks of editing the overlay, such as adding a circle to show the photographer where you’d like your face to be in relation to the backdrop. If you want the passerby to know how well they’re doing, the claims explain an on-screen “composition score” that would rate their lining-up skills. And, if you’d rather trust the final decision to the camera, a ball-in-the-hole scenario is described that’ll automatically engage the shutter release when the live view matches your ideal layout. This is just words and a few diagrams at this stage, mind, but if the patent gets granted, we could eventually see such a feature added to Samsung’s smartphones or Galaxy cameras. Until then, you’ll just have to put your trust in strangers and hope they have at least a basic understanding of the rule of thirds.

Filed under: Cellphones, Cameras, Software, Mobile, Samsung

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Source: USPTO (1), (2) (PDF)

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Former Microsoft Corporate VP and current EA Chief Technical Officer Rajat Taneja has claimed in a LinkedIn post (thanks, GamesIndustry) that the Xbox One and PS4′s architectures are “a generation ahead of the highest end PC on the market.”

According to Taneja’s assessment, the Xbox One and PS4′s “systems-on-a -chip (soc) architecture” not only outdoes the previous consoles with “magnitudes more compute and graphics power,” but also the current generation of PCs. “Their unique design of the hardware, the underlying operating system and the live service layer create one of the most compelling platforms to reimagine game mechanics,” he writes.

Given his position (which also makes his claim more than a bit suspect), it’s fair to assume that Taneja has had access to both systems, and may be referring to specifics and not overall performance. Aside from “raw horsepower,” he praises the consoles for new opportunities to create “dynamic, living worlds” with real time updates, better social features, and the potential of cross-device play. But why make the PC comparison at all?

During the launch of the PS3 and Xbox 360, we heard predictions from people such as analyst Michael Pachter and CNET Executive Editor David Carnoy suggesting the new generation would cause a decline in PC gaming. I’ve had a hard time, however, finding PC comparisons coming from game producers at the time—if I remember 2006 correctly, it was generally accepted that PC gaming offered a different experience, and that comparing raw power was futile outside of “console vs. PC” flame wars.

As for Pachter and Carnoy, well, hindsight is 20/20. PC hardware has shot leagues ahead of Xbox 360 and PS3 hardware. The rise of large-scale digital distribution has created new opportunities for smaller developers to create both niche games and massive phenomena like Minecraft. Over 4 million gamers are logged into Steam as I write, and smaller distributors like GOG are seeing success, too. eSports have increased in popularity, and new free-to-play business models exploded—Dota 2 recently boasted 329,977 simultaneous users. PC gaming is thriving.

So, when EA and others use PCs as the benchmark for consoles to surpass, it sounds rather insecure. I understand their excitement to have new hardware to work with—the Xbox One and PS4 dramatically expand what they can offer the console market—but claims of technical superiority over PCs are just as futile as during the last gen’s launch. It might validate the hopes of those already planning to purchase a new console, but my ears won’t perk up until I hear phrases like “mod support” or “a better market for indie developers.” Raw power is part of PC gaming’s appeal, but it’s also about using that power without restriction.

Now, to be fair, we do occasionally enjoy showing off our processing biceps, too, so let’s just wait and see what the benchmarks say.

The post EA CTO: Xbox One architecture is “a generation ahead of the highest end PC on the market” appeared first on PC Gamer.

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A busy week has nudged us off of our regular roundup schedule, but don’t fret because we’ve still got a smattering of links to consider — regardless of the day. A duo of Dell wares hit the list with a 24-inch UltraSharp display and Inspiron 15R SE laptop. Details on that pair and the remaining items rests on the other side of the break.

Filed under: Displays, Gaming, Laptops, Peripherals, Storage

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Source: Slickdeals

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How the heck did this happen? In the “offline” world, the “spray and pray” approach never works. Imagine if Romeo went up to Juliet at that first party and just started shouting why he was perfect for her and that they needed to get married before it was too late. What if Gatsby blasted Daisy’s house with letter after letter about how they needed to rekindle their relationship? 

Now we know that these examples are both from literature, not real life, so you must be wondering … are genuine social media relationships even possible today? The answer is yes — and we’ve got a real-life example to prove it. By truly engaging with someone in social media, one company was able to turn a happy customer into a passionate evangelist. 

A Tweet Come True

Have you heard about the time Morton’s Steakhouse sent Peter Shankman a steak at the airport after a long flight? Although it happened a few years ago, it’s one of the best examples of going the extra mile to delvelop real relationships with customers through Twitter. If you’re not caught up, here’s what happened:

Peter Shankman (founder of Help A Report Out, social media marketer, and steak lover) had a long day. He woke up at 3:30 a.m. and flew to Miami for a lunch meeting, only to catch the 5 p.m. flight back. While boarding his flight back, Peter started craving food from one of his favorite restaurants, so he jokingly tweeted:

Hey @mortons - can you meet me at newark airport with a porterhouse when I land in two hours?K, thanks.

— Peter Shankman (@petershankman) August 17, 2011

To Peter’s surprise, as he walked toward his car, he was met by a man in a tuxedo. The man worked for Morton’s Steakhouse. He had brought Peter a Porthouse steak, an order of Colossal Shrimp, a side of potatoes, and bread. 

Peter was so floored, he turned to Twitter again to share his excitement: 

Oh. My. God. I don’t believe it. @mortons showed up at EWR WITH A PORTERHOUSE! lockerz.com/s/130578715 # OMFG!

— Peter Shankman (@petershankman) August 18, 2011 

Talk about going above and beyond for your customers! Even though Morton’s knew it had Peter’s business already, the restaurant went the extra mile to delight him and strengthen their relationship — all from one tweet. Now that’s a great example of how you can use social media to delight a customer. 

With the right strategy and tools, your business could be using social media to form real relationships with leads and customers, too. The Morton’s example only gives you one piece of the pie — delighting a exisiting customer — but there’s more to this story. You can use social media to help develop relationships with prospects, leads, and customers throughout the entire marketing funnel. Check out the infographic below to see how social media relationships can develop like real relationships to benefit your entire business.

The Social Part of Social Media: A Love Story

(Embed This Infographic)

Have you encountered any true, human, relationships on social media? Do you have ideas for how to create them? Share your thoughts with us in the comments!

Image Credit: Brandon Christopher Warren

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After almost a three year hiatus, Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn—Square Enix’s second go after botching the first attempt in 2010—is releasing on Aug. 27, 2013 on the PC and PlayStation 3.

A Realm Reborn is Square Enix’s do-over of the original Final Fantasy XIV, which we criticized in our review as being riddled with bugs and glitches, having an indecipherable user interface and just being an overall mess.

Game Director Naoki Yoshida’s solution was to wipe FFXIV from existence with a meteor shower and build Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn from the smoking ashes of its predecessor. A Realm Reborn has an entirely re-written server structure and graphics engine, new jobs, both 1v1 and large scale PVP support, and an overhauled interface.

You don’t need to buy the infamous, three-year-old version of Final Fantasy XIV to play A Realm Reborn. But if you did happen to accidentally buy it, then A Realm Reborn will be available to you for free.

Pre-orders are already expensive gambles with little payoff, so we urge you to wait for our review of A Realm Reborn before putting any money on it. But if you’re really hungry for Final Fantasy content of any kind, you can snag it for $29.99 along with a $12.99/ £7.69 / €10.99 monthly fee.

Those who want to double down on their gamble can grab the collector’s edition for $69.99 on the Square Enix Online Store. The higher price tag will net you an 80-page art book, a development video, an album of songs from Final Fantasy composers, and a few other goodies. But again, proceed at your own risk.

Yoshida’s bluntness about FF XIV’s failures and his goals for the game are promising, but we’ll have wait until August to see if his promises ring true.

The post Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn release date announced appeared first on PC Gamer.

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Tags are so 2008. Google doesn’t want you to waste time tagging your photos, except for the people in them. The web giant wants to be able to recognize more abstract concepts like “sunset” or “beach” automatically and attach that metadata without further input. In yet another post I/O update, Google+ photos now uses computer vision and machine learning to identify objects and settings in your uploaded snapshots. You can simply search for “my photos of trees” or “Tim’s photos of bikes” and get surprisingly accurate results, with nary a manually-added tag in sight. You can perform the searches in Google+, obviously, but you can also execute your query from the standard Google search page. It’s pretty neat, but sadly Mountain View seems to have forgotten what cats looking like.

Filed under: Internet, Google

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Source: Inside Search

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Samsung will be releasing developer editions of the Galaxy S 4 for AT&T and Verizon, according to the company’s site. At least for now, the phone will only be offered in Black Mist, and internal storage is listed as 16GB. It’s not clear exactly when the devices will come to their respective carriers, but they likely won’t be offered with a subsidy when they do. For those considering purchasing Sammy’s latest flagship handset, this offers an alternative to the several carrier variants, not to mention the stock Jelly Bean version announced at Google I/O. Hit up the source link for more info.

Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile, Samsung

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Via: Phandroid

Source: Samsung

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Huawei’s upcoming Ascend P6 must be as slim as we’ve heard, because it just keeps slipping out — this time, in an official rendering obtained by @evleaks. The imagery appears to validate what we’ve previously seen in photos, including the wafer-like 6.2mm thick body, a metal chassis and an iteration of the Emotion UI layer that we just saw on the Ascend Mate. And in case there’s any lingering doubts, we’ve even received a possible launch window from the company itself. In a quickly deleted Sina Weibo post, Huawei Device Chairman Richard Yu told his followers that the leaked device is indeed part of the P series, and should be revealed at the company’s June 18th event in London. At this rate, all that’s left for the company is to walk on stage and make its skinniest Ascend official.

Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile

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Via: Engadget Chinese (translated)

Source: @Evleaks (Twitter)

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Leica seldom updates its camera lineup, so we’re especially intrigued to discover that it’s teasing a completely new model, the Mini M. On the camera maker’s website, this TBA model is represented by only a black box, tucked in between the full-frame M and the APS-C-loaded X2 (Micro M). There’s no other official info aside from its June 11th unveiling date, but Leica Rumors is poised to bet that this is the company’s first mirrorless entry. The site’s sources claim this model will thankfully not be a re-badged Panasonic Lumix — Hasselblad and Sony’s Lunar (a leather-adorned NEX-7) already did enough damage on that front.

Filed under: Cameras

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Via: Leica Rumors

Source: Leica

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Google’s Street View Trekker has already captured some dramatic scenery in its young life, but we haven’t seen it venture far beyond US borders. The company is making up for that in style through its recently completed image-gathering expedition to the Galapagos Islands. The visit will produce 360-degree shots of 10 representative areas chosen by the Charles Darwin Foundation and the Galapagos National Parks Directorate. There’s more involved than just stunning Google Maps imagery, however: the panoramas will help document any threats to the local climate and wildlife. While we’ll only see the results of the Galapagos trip later this year, it’s good to know that they should help both humans and slow-moving reptiles in equal measure.

Filed under: Internet, Google

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Source: Google Official Blog

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