From Engadget: Man gets served on Facebook, literally

Being unceremoniously dumped online isn’t the only indignation made easier by social networks. For the first time, lawyers in the UK have been granted permission to serve a legal suit via Facebook. Traditionally, documents must be delivered physically, be it in person, by post or even fax. But, in a pretrial for a commercial dispute, these old-fashioned methods proved fruitless. The prosecuting team then decided to check online, and noticed recent updates on defendant Fabio De Biase’s profile. Satisfied it was currently active, they sought permission to send documents via the website, with Justice Nigel Teare duly obliging. Wondering what that noise is? That’s the sound of millions of mice clicking on “privacy settings” all at once.

 

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From Engadget: Ubuntu’s full desktop OS coming to multi-core Android devices

What the Atrix 4G first promised, it looks like the folks at Canonical may deliver. Think back to CES 2011, when Motorola showed us a future where our phone was the only computing device we would need — only to leave us wanting when its webtop app didn’t deliver the requisite functionality for such a future. Well, it turns out Ubuntu now runs on multi-core Android devices and your handset can grant a full desktop experience when docked with a display and a keyboard. It’s a customized version of Ubuntu that plays nice with Android, the two OS’s sharing data and services while running simultaneously. So, you can still access telephony and texts from the Ubuntu environment while enjoying all the computing capabilities it has to offer, including: Ubuntu TV, virtualization tools for running Windows applications, desktop web browsers, and Ubuntu apps built for ARM. It isn’t clear exactly what hardware you’ll need to run Ubuntu on a handset, but Canonical has said it works on multi-core devices with HDMI and USB connections. We’ll get more info next week when it’s shown off at MWC, but until then you’ll have to settle for the source below and PR after the break.

Continue reading Ubuntu’s full desktop OS coming to multi-core Android devices

 

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From Engadget: LightBeam pico projector turns any surface into a display, any object into a remote

Do you ever stop to think about all those plain, unloved surfaces in the world, which go through life without ever once being used to reflect a Flickr feed or Facebook wall? It amounts to hectares of wasted potential, but there is a solution. It’s called LightBeam and it’s a ‘nomadic’ pico projector that uses a webcam to track and reorient its display to suit any ad hoc surface — the piece of paper in your hand, the cover of a book, or the picture frame on your desk. And just when you think you’ve seen it all before, the guy in the video after the break rotates a coffee mug to flip the channel. Handy, no?

Continue reading LightBeam pico projector turns any surface into a display, any object into a remote (video)

 

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