Here are the highlights and specs from the news release:

TV’s resolution is 1280×720.
Preloaded recipes are included. Plus, additional recipes can be copied onto the frame’s internal memory.
Copy digital photos onto the frame’s memory via the memory card reader or by a connection to Google’s Picasa photo sharing Web site.
Messproof design that’s sealed with glass, so it’s protected from water, oil, flour, and other common ingredients, as well as from spills and splatters.
Comes with a countertop stand and an under-cabinet mount, and is also wall-mountable.
Interchangeable faceplates in brushed stainless, black and white to match various kitchen styles.
512MB of internal memory stores up to 3,200 pages of recipes or digital photos.
Calendar and clock functions keep customers informed and allow photos, video and music to be programmed for play at specific dates and times. The alarm function can be set to to noteworthy dates and times, including when it’s time for a favorite cooking show. Integrated 6-in-1 media reader that supports SD, XD, Memory Stick, Memory Stick Pro/Memory Stick Duo, Compact Flash, and MultiMediaCard. Programmable on and off times. Support for JPEG, Motion JPEG, MPEG 1, MPEG 4, and AVI.

(Credit:
Pandigital)

Pandigital’s multifaceted kitchen TV is scheduled to be available in June and carry an MSRP of $399.99.

Pandigital, which is making a name for itself in the digital photo frame market, is branching out into kitchen televisions. As part of the upcoming International Home and Housewares Show in Chicago, the company will be showing off a new 15-inch LCD HDTV that can display digital photos and act as a digital cookbook.

Pandigital's upcoming 15-inch kitchen set isn't just a TV.

This “personal touch” has helped, he says. His song “Low,” recently spent 13 weeks as the top-selling ringtone in the country, a new record for consecutive weeks, according to Nielsen RingScan chart. According to his music label, Poe Boy/Atlantic Records, Rida (a name he chose to honor his home state and his rap style) is also the first ever debut artist to have two Top 10 digital singles prior to an album release. His debut album, Mail On Sunday goes on sale March 18.

In an interview Tuesday with CNET News.com, Rida revealed himself to be a bit of a gadget geek (he’s got two MacBook Pros and four flat screens) and said he sees more computers and high-tech gadgetry in inner cities than ever. He also sent a message to Apple CEO Steve Jobs. He once accidentally dropped his
iPod in the toilet and “if they can make them waterproof, that’d be great.”

(Credit:
Chad Griffith )

Rapper Flo Rida

Q: The technology sector has heard much about the digital divide, and how urban areas lack enough computers and other technologies. Is that your experience?

Rida: In the schools around my (South Florida) neighborhood, they definitely got tons more computers. Before now, they didn’t have anything. The students now, a lot of them have laptops at home…

Q: Are you one of the people that despises file sharing?

Rida: If you’re really in touch with your fans on a personal level then you don’t have to worry about things like that. A lot of times I make sure I go onto MySpace and holler at my fans, looking at them on YouTube, showing love, making sure that I’m in tune more so on a personal level than just having a hot song…cause these are people who just might want to go to the store to get the album as well as download. These are people who might want to put your poster on the wall or see your (album) art.

You won’t hear up-and-coming rap star Flo Rida griping about fans pilfering his songs on P2P sites, or complain that technology is hurting the music industry. Don’t talk to him about so-called digital divides either.

Q: Tell me about ringtones. How do those royalty checks look?

Rida: Oh man, oh man. It’s a blessing. I can do a whole lot of things that I couldn’t do before right now you know? I just put down on another house, got a couple of
cars from all my fans and the ringtones. I definitely bought like four flat screens. I got two MacPros…

As one of rap music’s fastest rising stars, Rida, 28, is new enough to music success that fans are still precious to him. This is a guy who used to shout out his cell number during performances.

Rida is one of a growing number of young performers who are trying to break into a music business dominated by technology.

Q: Have you had the chance to hear some stranger’s phone go off and heard your music?

Rida: Oh yeah, sometimes I might go to Wal-Mart and hear it and say to myself: “That’s my song right there and it’s his ringtone playing.” In October last year, I heard it for the first time. I just told the guy “Thank you.” I never knew the song was going to be this big.

Q: What kind of technology do you see a need for? What does someone need to come up with to make your life easier?

Rida: I remember one time, I accidentally dropped my first iPod into the toilet. If they can make them waterproof, that’d be great.

Well, you were right to doubt it! Because you were wrong!

Todd, maybe you should be taking some notes or…

Anyone who doesn’t cry out for the creation of a Doug Henning tag, that is?

Not only that, Sullivan glosses over the fact that his “math” assumes a situation where AT&T exclusivity is in effect globally. However, here on Earth, 300 light years from planet Jackass, many if not most of the unlocked iPhones are being used in other countries, particularly countries where Apple doesn’t currently have a deal with a cellular provider. Just the other day the lovely and talented Tom Krazit pointed to a report indicating there are 400,000 unlocked iPhones in China alone.

Todd, the Macalope just doesn’t know how many other ways to say this but that is simply one busted-ass 2007 Nissan Premise you’re driving there. Exclusivity is a condition for the revenue sharing agreement. That’s how Apple gets the revenue sharing. You can’t say Apple’s somehow foregoing $1 billion in revenue sharing that it could never possibly get.

Instead of having a product that all carriers were glad to carry and sell, he created an atmosphere in which they embarked on a quest to compete directly with him and his product.

Huh? And since when did this relationship become a zero sum game?

Why does Apple not have a deal in China? Because it’s trying to do something craaaazy like negotiate one of them sweet revenue sharing schemes, that’s why.

Apple’s (AAPL) AT&T (T) tie-up in the US is for another 4 years, meaning the company will continue to not realize monthly revenue, estimated at $120 annually per subscriber from phones “unlocked” for use on other carriers.

At any rate, Apple’s already sold more than 3.7 million iPhones. With the release of a 16GB version last week, more international rollouts coming and a 3G version sometime later in the year, does anyone really think they aren’t going to make 10 million by the end of the year?

What’s so interesting about that link is that it’s to a post where Sullivan just references an unlinked-to previous post about the iPhone and then pulls a big long quote from another blog. Why would that be? Possibly because his opinions about the iPhone have been so fantastically wrong?

Again, we have current Apple products forced to compete against future products from someone else. Why does Steve Jobs even get up in the morning?! And when did the linearity of time get revoked without the Macalope noticing it?

If you click through to the link, it’s really not clear exactly what that component cut report was all about. First of all, Apple already said in its quarterly conference call that it expected the first quarter to be slower than normal. Go one link further and you’ll see CNBC’s Jim Goldman calling the report much ado about nothing.

I think Apple devotees may find themselves in the future wondering “what could have been” if only Jobs had not started out this process so adversarially.

Yeah, well, the Macalope thinks you will find yourself in the future ignoring the uncomfortable fact that you ever wrote this piece in the first place.

Like this one where he seems oblivious to the presence of the rest of the world:

Not that the Macalope would know what that’s like.

Yes. Surely, with iPhone sales perfectly aligned with expectations, Apple has taken it in the shorts.

Well, anyway, the point is that opportunity cost is only relevant if there is, in fact, an actual opportunity, not some imaginary scenario you just pulled out of your butt. For Apple to be “foregoing” this huge chunk of change, you’d have to buy into the jacktastic assumption that it could negotiate the same $120/year revenue sharing with every other cellular provider in the world.

I did a post in May of last year that said AT&T would be the big winner of the
iPhone deal and to date they have been.

The latest estimates have “unlocked” iPhones costing Apple over $1 billion in lost revenue the next 3 years.

OK, so Todd won’t tell us where, exactly, he got that number — you stupid Earth logicians would ask such a question! — but doing the math he’s apparently figuring that there are about 2.1 million unlocked iPhones “in the wild”. That’s a lot more than other estimates, but the number of iPhones and the grand total are pretty irrelevant once you see how inherently flawed the premise is.

Apple has stood by its “10 million phones sold by the end of 2008″ goal, but recent news that they have dramatically cut back on component orders can only mean sales growth has slowed.

But actual figures and logic be damned! Right, Todd? [Note to editor: can you write the Macalope a prescription for a pain killer?]

Todd, honey, after all this time maybe you should just drop this particular subject. Because you still don’t seem to be getting it.

Phew. After reading Sullivan, that voice of sanity is like a soothing liniment applied to a festering rash, isn’t it?

“When you consider that it launched part way through the year, with limited operator and country coverage, and essentially just one product, Apple has shown very clearly that it can make a difference and has sent a wakeup call to the market leaders,” said Pete Cunningham, Canalys senior analyst.

When you also consider we have not seen what Research in Motion (RIMM), the Blackberry maker and clear “smart phone” leader has planned, Apple may face even more headwinds.

Back to the current piece:

Because this $1 billion is magical fairy money that you can only see when it’s reflected in the shiny dew on the Blingo-tree leaves in the virgin wood of the elven kingdom of Willywindle, across the Chocolate River. And then only during the month of Februtuesrarey, which comes once in a 1,000 years, when the snow falls from clear skies and the IRS agents give fabulous deductions for non-asset transactions conducted in previous fiscal quarters. [Note for editor: this could probably use some tightening up.]

This also means that the 10 million units Apple plans to have sold by the end of 2008 will be done to 47 million AT&T subscribers meaning 1 in 5 will have one? Doubt it.

Or this one which the Macalope dispatched with his characteristic aplomb here.

The horny one is a little confused at Sullivan’s definition of the term “leader”, though, as Nokia is #1 in market share, not RIM. And Apple, while at #3, clearly has the buzz, as manufacturers are scrambling to come up with an “iPhone killer”.

But let’s look at some actual market share analysis for a minute.

Well, whatever. That’s fine.

Wow! $1 billion sounds like a lot. How did you come up with that number, Todd?

Seeking Alpha’s Todd Sullivan really doesn’t like Apple’s exclusive agreement with AT&T (tip o’ the antlers to John Gruber). His dislike of it is so intense, as a matter of fact, that his “analysis” of the deal has burst free of the restraining coil of our so-called “Earth logic” and taken flight to a wondrous world of imagination. [Note for editor: is there a Doug Henning tag?]

None of this even takes into account the specter of Google’s (GOOG) gPhone expected later this year.

But Wall Street doesn’t seem to care. To help telegraph its own confidence in its future, Red Hat has now initiated a $125 million share buyback to hold up its share price.

commentary

For the first time I’m scared for open source. Not open source as a global movement and way of doing business and software development – that’s safe. Even Microsoft believes in it.

No, I worry for Red Hat. As I wrote the other day, if Red Hat’s stock continues to tumble it becomes ripe for an Oracle acquisition. Red Hat has been doing exceptionally well selling into a down market, growing quarter after quarter.

Let’s hope it works. Losing Red Hat as an independent open-source vendor would effectively call an end to open source as a standalone software strategy. Some may cheer at this prospect, but I think the software world would be poorer for having open source serve as a minor component in everyone’s arsenal, rather than having Red Hat showcase that it’s a viable business strategy on its own.

* I have not always been perfectly clear on this. China Yahoo is a subsidiary of Alibaba and is no longer controlled by Yahoo itself, despite the name.

I’m all for responsibility with money in politics, but I think this is a stretch. Wu references China Yahoo’s censorship of search results. But Microsoft’s MSN and Google both also censor results in their Chinese versions. Should candidates then be penalized for taking money from Bill Gates or Larry Page and Sergey Brin? Oh right, the question is, should candidates’ spouses be penalized for having any relationship involving money with these three or their companies?

Some activists are trying to tie this money to Sen. Hillary Clinton, saying it conflicts with her statements on China. In addition to claiming she “stood up to” China’s government in a speech while Bill was president, she has said President George W. Bush should not attend the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympic Games in August because of the recent events in Tibet.

China Yahoo posted images of individuals sought by the government.

(Credit: France24 via Rebecca MacKinnon)

Former U.S. President Bill Clinton’s foundation received an undisclosed sum in exchange for his keynote address at an event held by Alibaba, the Chinese internet company that controls China Yahoo* and has been accused of aiding China’s crackdown in Tibet.

Bill’s foundation took Alibaba’s money. Alibaba has been criticized recently for an incident in which Yahoo.cn posted a “most wanted” page with photographs of individuals the government sought in connection with the recent unrest. Here, according to the Los Angeles Times how one activist makes the connection from there to Hillary’s position:

“A former president of the United States received a donation from a Chinese firm that is involved in censorship, and now his wife is running for president. This is a shame of the U.S.,” said Harry Wu, an exiled Chinese activist based in Washington.

Related: Photophlow puts a fresh face on Flickr

DestroyFlickr is not without its quirks. For instance, the app requires you to manually refresh each page to see any changes, even after you upload new shots from it. Also, the refresh option is tucked away in a submenu and the same goes for any sort of back or undo button which I think will confuse novice users. Regardless, if you’re looking for a really fun and engaging way to view Flickr photos outside of your browser this is an excellent alternative to browser plug-ins like Piclens.

The vast majority of Adobe AIR apps we’ve seen thus far have been heavy on the eye candy, so what’s a better service to give the treatment than Flickr? It’s a decidedly simplistic site with jaw-dropping photos uploaded by its users. Some might be looking for a little more though, which is where DestroyFlickr comes in.

In addition to its photo viewer is a drag-and-drop uploader for when it comes time to give something back. You can simply grab a shot or an entire album from your computer and drag it over. While it’s not as comprehensive as Flickr’s own uploader, it’ll get the job done quickly. I still think with Flickr’s recent improvements to its Web uploader, you’re better off using that if only for its post-upload editing tools.

Craigslist founder Craig Newmark was not immediately available for comment.

Authorities eventually found the getaway inner tube (a getaway inner tube!) and suspect that accomplices may have picked up the robber in a boat. According to the NBC affiliate, police hope to track him down by figuring out who posted the Craigslist ad in the first place.

“I came across the ad that was for a prevailing wage job for $28.50 an hour,” one of the unwitting decoys, named Mike, said to the NBC station. As it turns out, they were simply placed there to confuse cops who were looking for a guy wearing a virtually identical outfit.

It gets better: He then escaped in a creek headed for the Skykomish River in an inner tube, and the cops are still looking for him. “A great amount of money” was taken, Monroe police said, but did not provide a dollar value.

It appears to have unfolded this way, according to a Seattle-based NBC affiliate: around 11:00 a.m. PDT on Tuesday, the robber, wearing a yellow vest, safety goggles, a blue shirt, and a respirator mask went over to a guard who was overseeing the unloading of cash to the bank from the truck. He sprayed the guard with pepper spray, grabbed his bag of money, and fled the scene.

But here’s the hilarious twist. The robber had previously put out a Craigslist ad for road maintenance workers, promising wages of $28.50 per hour. Recruits were asked to wait near the Bank of America right around the time of the robbery–wearing yellow vests, safety goggles, a respirator mask, and preferably a blue shirt. At least a dozen of them showed up after responding to the Craigslist ad.

Because this guy sure does…and he might have some communication issues as well. This is a cute ad from iLuv, an
iPod accessories maker with products such as the iLuv i1055, a combo DVD player and iPod video screen enhancer.

Confused by all the companies trying buy or partner with Yahoo? You're not alone. Just follow the numbers in this diagram, and it will start to make a little more sense. Sort of.

By comparison, the “I read Business 2.0, and I want to keep reading!” group had 2,082 members before Time Warner shut down the magazine.

Sure, there have been a few horrified readers. But the majority have either been nonplussed or even pro-Microsoft.

I also have to wonder how much mostly free services like e-mail and instant messaging win customer loyalty. I use Yahoo for both, and I’ll be annoyed if another company messes with it. But am I panicked about it the way I would be if someone messed with my iTunes? Heck no. I’ll deal.

I have to think that Yahoo has just a few more customers than Business 2.0 had readers. So what gives? I suspect a few things: As Yahoo has attempted to become more of a media company, it’s become less of a fascination for the tech set.

A company with a reputation for cutthroat behavior and squashing the little guy tries to buy a pioneer of the Internet, once one of the most beloved companies in Silicon Valley.

To figure out what’s going on, I applied the scientific method: I went to Facebook. So far, I’ve only come up with two “save Yahoo” groups: one with 20 members and the other with 41. There’s also a “Save Yahoo too (sic) Hell with Google” group with seven members.

But the Internet public? Where’s the Yahoo love?

Google has also become the Internet darling of the general public. Ask your parents to name an Internet company, and they’d probably say “Google,” not “Yahoo.” I’d like to think that my parents would say “CNET Networks,” but they’d probably say “Google” too.

It’s easy to understand why advertisers aren’t squawking about Microsoft acquiring Yahoo: they’re a lot more concerned about Yahoo hooking up with Google–or Google just getting more powerful, which could drive up ad rates.

Ultimately, Google, which looks every bit as tough as the Redmond gang these days, is the biggest factor. Microsoft can’t seem to find a way to compete with Google in new markets (or with Apple in old ones). Buying Yahoo? That’s an acknowledgment that Microsoft needs help, not an aggressive act by a corporate predator trying to snuff out the competition.

Those of us covering the Microsoft-Yahoo saga have been amazed at the apparent lack of hand-wringing among Yahoo customers. It’s baffling. Even the comments on stories we’ve written about the Microsoft takeover attempt have been mostly along the lines of, “Let’s get this deal done already.”

And the customers of that pioneer yawn.

(Credit:
Susan Dove/CNET News.com)

E-mails pretending to be from the IRS may link to phishing sites, but they can also launch malware, said Fried. He cited one example where late at night he saw a new IRS-themed e-mail containing malicious code and also found that none of the major antivirus sites had signatures in place to block the sample. He said the antivirus vendors frequently missed malware associated with IRS e-mail spam.

Fried said he expected more IRS-themed Internet activity in May when the U.S. government plans to issue tax rebates to qualified individuals, but declined to specify what he expected.

While he was concerned about ordinary people getting hit, he called upon the antivirus community to immunize their applications before the IRS staff reported for work in the morning. His concern was the IRS itself, which, in the morning would start to get forwarded examples of the e-mail and could potentially infect the IRS with malware.

Washington D.C. — Like the Bank of America brand name, the United States Internal Revenue Service is a brand that also needs online protection. On Wednesday, Special Agent Andy Fried with the U.S. Treasury Department gave a second keynote address to start off Black Hat DC 2008. He said as of February 19 this year, there were 1,630 phishing sites using the IRS name or logo, marking a 12 percent to 17 percent increase over last year.

In January 2008, Fried said that the IRS reached a full one percent of all spam traded on the Internet–a record for the agency.

Fried also warned against using peer-to-peer applications on the same desktop with your tax information on it. He and his investigators will periodically fire up LimeWire and find hundreds of copies of people’s tax returns available for downloading. “If you don’t know what you are doing with P2P,” said Fried, “don’t use it.”