Look, BMW -- we appreciate that you were the first automaker to provide seamless iPod integration way back when, but seriously, did anyone on the design squad look at this abomination before shipping it off to France? As the story goes, the aforesaid automaker has demonstrated the first "official" iPad-vehicle integration setup at this year's Paris Auto Show, and to be frank, it's heinous. The idea here is to provide world-class rear-seat entertainment, while apparently destroying aesthetics in one fell swoop. It's just about too hideous to be true, but the iconic "BMW" logo on the mounting brackets all but confirms the authenticity. Perhaps you folks should consult with any number of the skilled DIYers out there before shooting for the stars with version 2.0? ...

In the future gamers will become so canny when forking out their hard-earned cash that bad games will be eliminated, Resident Evil creator Capcom reckons.

"Looking ahead, I believe gamers are going to have a sharper eye and become even more selective," deputy head of consumer games Jun Takeuchi said in a new interview published on Capcom's website.

"This will eliminate poorly made games from the market, and drive down the number of titles released. The market will no longer be one in which a new game grabs people's attention and interest."

Capcom, which has branched out into Western-development in recent years, is responsible for blockbuster franchises Street Fighter, Dead Rising and Devil May Cry.

Looking to the future, Takeuchi predicted that two types of games will emerge: those targeted at core gamers and those targeted at a mass audience.

"I think the demand will be characterized by trends that are polar opposites," Takeuchi, who produced Onimusha 3, Lost Planet and Resident Evil 5, said.

"One of these trends will be games that specifically target a small number of hardcore gamers. The other trend will be popular, big name titles, such as Resident Evil, that target a mass audience and focus on delivering a sense of entertainment.

"Either way, the important thing for us is to carefully cultivate the elements for both types of games in order to put out titles that people can enjoy playing for a long time."

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/20...nate-bad-games ...

After developing and using TaintDroid, several universities found that of 30 popular free Android apps, half were sharing GPS data and phone numbers with advertisers and remote servers. A few months ago, one app was sending phone numbers to a remote server in China but today the situation looks a lot more pervasive. In their paper (PDF), the researchers blasted Google saying 'Android's coarse grained access control provides insufficient protection against third-party applications seeking to collect sensitive data.' Google's response: 'Android has taken steps to inform users of this trust relationship and to limit the amount of trust a user must grant to any given application developer. We also provide developers with best practices about how to handle user data. We consistently advise users to only install apps they trust.'

http://yro.slashdot.org/story/10/09/...king-User-Data ...

Nintendo boss Satoru Iwata has acknowledged that its current platforms have not performed as well for third parties as they do their owner.

Speaking at a press conference yesterday, Iwata noted that "it is true that the third party software sales ratio on Nintendo platforms are comparatively smaller in Japan. Wii's third party software ratio is especially low."

Graphs from Media Create data demonstrated this was approximately 26 per cent of total Wii software sales.

He claimed, however, that in terms of units rather than percentages, the DS was "the platform for which the largest amount of third-party software is selling" (with slides putting it at just under 50 per cent) but admitted this was partially attributable to the sheer size of its install base.

Iwata then attempted to defend interational third party sales as "not inferior" to the situation for PlayStation and Xbox.

Using data from Media Create and NPD, he offered that DS's third to first party ratio for US and Japan combined was around 55 per cent versus approximately 45, and slightly closer to 50/50 on Wii.

However, 360, PS3 and PSP first party sales each accounted for less than 20 per cent of total software shifted on those platforms.

Iwata was thus adamant that matters had to change for the 3DS.

"We need to decrease the concern that only Nintendo software can sell well on Nintendo platforms and third party software cannot sell in the same volume.

"We will not make a trend similar to the one found for Wii in Japan now," he promised. "we feel a need to have closer ties with our third party developers from the beginning."

Iwata then presented pre-recorded enthusiastic statements about the 3DS from third-party Japanese lumanaries behind the likes of Resident Evil, Kingdom Hearts, Metal Gear Solid and Professor Layton.

"The big expectations they hold make me humble," Iwata claimed afterwards. "Together with the third party software people, we aim to expand the sales of Nintendo 3DS, and we will never stop our efforts to expand the gaming population."

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...will-do-better ...

Nintendo boss Satoru Iwata has acknowledged that its current platforms have not performed as well for third parties as they do their owner.

Speaking at a press conference yesterday, Iwata noted that "it is true that the third party software sales ratio on Nintendo platforms are comparatively smaller in Japan. Wii's third party software ratio is especially low."

Graphs from Media Create data demonstrated this was approximately 26 per cent of total Wii software sales.

He claimed, however, that in terms of units rather than percentages, the DS was "the platform for which the largest amount of third-party software is selling" (with slides putting it at just under 50 per cent) but admitted this was partially attributable to the sheer size of its install base.

Iwata then attempted to defend interational third party sales as "not inferior" to the situation for PlayStation and Xbox.

Using data from Media Create and NPD, he offered that DS's third to first party ratio for US and Japan combined was around 55 per cent versus approximately 45, and slightly closer to 50/50 on Wii.

However, 360, PS3 and PSP first party sales each accounted for less than 20 per cent of total software shifted on those platforms.

Iwata was thus adamant that matters had to change for the 3DS.

"We need to decrease the concern that only Nintendo software can sell well on Nintendo platforms and third party software cannot sell in the same volume.

"We will not make a trend similar to the one found for Wii in Japan now," he promised. "we feel a need to have closer ties with our third party developers from the beginning."

Iwata then presented pre-recorded enthusiastic statements about the 3DS from third-party Japanese lumanaries behind the likes of Resident Evil, Kingdom Hearts, Metal Gear Solid and Professor Layton.

"The big expectations they hold make me humble," Iwata claimed afterwards. "Together with the third party software people, we aim to expand the sales of Nintendo 3DS, and we will never stop our efforts to expand the gaming population."

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...will-do-better ...

Pokemon Black and White has continued its dominance of the Japanese software chart, selling another 828,000 copies to bring its two-week sales total to 3,386,358 units.

The closest challenger this week was SEGA's Yakuza: Black Panther, which sold 174,213 units and helped boost the PSP back into second place on the hardware chart.

Sales of the DSi, Dsi LL, and PSP all increased this week, but Xbox 360 figures almost halved after the brief boost provided by the release of Halo: Reach. Reach itself has now dropped out of the top twenty after a fourth-place debut last week.

Software sales chart - last week's sales figures in brackets where appropriate.

1. Pokemon Black & White (Pokemon, DS): 828,580 (3,386,358)
2. Black Panther Yakuza New Chapter (Sega, PSP): 174,213
3. Wii Party (Nintendo, Wii): 43,077 (1,040,102)
4. Durarara!! 3way Standoff (Ascii, PSP): 21,566
5. Monhan Diary Poka Poka Felyne Village (Capcom, PSP): 18,652 (447,329)
6. One Piece Gigant Battle! (Namco Bandai, DS): 14,339 (174,316)
7. Front Mission Evolved (Square Enix, PS3): 10,421 (61,504)
8. Koihime Musou Otome Ryouran Sangokushi Engi Go-hen (Yeti, PSP): 10,240
9. Yu-Gi-Oh Fighters Tag Force 5 (Konami, PSP): 9,805 (55,684)
10. Winning Post 7 2010 (Tecmo Koei, PS3): 9,714
11. Taiko Drum Master DS (Namco Bandai, DS): 9,653 (225,166)
12. Super Mario Galaxy 2 (Nintendo, Wii): 9,414 (834,955)
13. Wii Fit Plus (Nintendo, Wii): 7,720 (2,074,733)
14. Monster Hunter Portable 2nd G PSP the Best Re-release Version (Capcom, PSP): 7,585 (430,362)
15. Inazuma Eleven 3 (Level-5, DS): 7,526 (843,883)
16. Winning Post 7 2010 (Tecmo Koei, PSP): 6,355
17. Painting Classroom DS (Nintendo, DS): 6,314 (180,030)
18. Mario Kart Wii (Nintendo, Wii): 6,191 (2,937,740)
19. Friend Collection (Nintendo, DS): 5,999 (3,424,869)
20. New Super Mario Bros. Wii (Nintendo, Wii): 5,891 (3,996,368)
Hardware sales chart – last week's sales figures in brackets where appropriate.

1. DSi: 49,411 (47,379)
2. PSP: 37,576 (29,866)
3. DSi LL: 32,777 (31,254)
4. PS3: 20,694 (21,096)
5. Wii: 16,908 (14,833)
6. DS Lite: 7,011 (7,137)
7. X360: 2,599 (5,804)
8. PS2: 1,514 (1,390)
9. PSP go: 900 (863)

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...anese-top-spot ...

Microsoft has warned that messy floors "with clothes all over the place" will prevent Kinect from working properly. The company also advised against putting the sensor in "a noisy environment", using the examples "on top of your Xbox" and "on top of your subwoofer".

"We rely on the floor for a number of different parts of the technology," said Mark Plagge, Kinect's senior project manager, during a set-up video.

"You'll see when the sensor first boots up that it actually does this tilt down, and what it's doing is it's looking for the floor plane. Titles use the floor plane as a point of reference for the skeletons as they're moving throughout the title.

"The floor plane becomes very important, so if you have a very cluttered floor with clothes all over the place and we can't get a good look at the floor - it's a great thing if people can clean that up and move things out of the way."

The Kinect sensor should be placed in the horizontal middle of your telly at either the top or bottom. Exactly where will likely be bossed by the location of your telly's speakers, as having the sensor too close will mean audio interference.

"The other thing is that you want to put as much distance between you and the sensor as possible, so [placing the sensor] higher up actually tends to put an extra foot between you and the sensor," explained Tian Lim, director of Kinect development.

"The ideal play space starts about six feet away from the Kinect sensor. Some games will need you to move side to side quite a lot, so you'll want to know there are three-to-four feet on either side of you."
The requirements don't stop there. People with halogen spotlit rooms may encounter difficulties, as the Kinect sensor prefers an even light source throughout.

"To have really bright lighting in one spot and really dark lighting in another spot: as you move between the two you might actually look a bit different to the sensor, [and it will be] a little bit harder for us to keep track of you throughout the play space," said Kareem Choudhry, principal development manager on Kinect.

Don't panic if you can't remember that, as you'll be walked through each of the elements by on-screen Kinect setup tools.

...

Microsoft has warned that messy floors "with clothes all over the place" will prevent Kinect from working properly. The company also advised against putting the sensor in "a noisy environment", using the examples "on top of your Xbox" and "on top of your subwoofer".

"We rely on the floor for a number of different parts of the technology," said Mark Plagge, Kinect's senior project manager, during a set-up video.

"You'll see when the sensor first boots up that it actually does this tilt down, and what it's doing is it's looking for the floor plane. Titles use the floor plane as a point of reference for the skeletons as they're moving throughout the title.

"The floor plane becomes very important, so if you have a very cluttered floor with clothes all over the place and we can't get a good look at the floor - it's a great thing if people can clean that up and move things out of the way."

The Kinect sensor should be placed in the horizontal middle of your telly at either the top or bottom. Exactly where will likely be bossed by the location of your telly's speakers, as having the sensor too close will mean audio interference.

"The other thing is that you want to put as much distance between you and the sensor as possible, so [placing the sensor] higher up actually tends to put an extra foot between you and the sensor," explained Tian Lim, director of Kinect development.

"The ideal play space starts about six feet away from the Kinect sensor. Some games will need you to move side to side quite a lot, so you'll want to know there are three-to-four feet on either side of you."
The requirements don't stop there. People with halogen spotlit rooms may encounter difficulties, as the Kinect sensor prefers an even light source throughout.

"To have really bright lighting in one spot and really dark lighting in another spot: as you move between the two you might actually look a bit different to the sensor, [and it will be] a little bit harder for us to keep track of you throughout the play space," said Kareem Choudhry, principal development manager on Kinect.

Don't panic if you can't remember that, as you'll be walked through each of the elements by on-screen Kinect setup tools.

...

News from the Openpandora Team

More news already!

How many Pandora Boards are out there?
While most of you guys would say "just below 1000", this is not entirely true anymore.

Yeah, there are about 800 - 900 boards in the hands of the users already - but according to a notice we got from Texas today, there are already 1000 more almost finished.
(Almost finished means: They have been populated by the machine and are just missing the manually placed parts like volume wheel, etc.)

So you could say: The boards doubled. It looks like October 18th is a realistic date for them to finish after all!

Cases finished, boards on a good way - what's left is the nubs.

To squeeze the most out of them, they are also trying a way more sturdy, high-grade automotive silicone material.
However, that material needed to be ordered - and won't be there until sometime next week (we don't know for sure when yet, but we're gonna ask).
So on the downside, it still takes a bit longer - but on the other side, it means that the quality of the nubs should be top-notch!
You guys waited so long, you don't deserve nubs that fail after a few weeks!
And be honest: Do you rather want to wait a bit longer and get proper nubs or get your unit NOW the flakey ones? (be careful what you reply, as we could ship one with the old ones to you - but on your own risk)

Of course, we'll make sure to have everything prepared when the nubs are finished to get the Pandoras as fast as possible out to you.

If everything is prepared, we can assemble 200 units per day.

October 17th is my birthday - and my wish is: All boards finished and non-failing, great-working nubs at least ready for mass production.

http://boards.openpandora.org/index....le-2010-09-30/ ...