Gadgetell | Tech News, Reviews, and Interesting Things

With the big June smartphone releases,  everyone is on edge.  Verizon is taking smack to Sprint, Iyaz is covering up again, Google’s got a slew of Android phones headed to you, iPhones track your college experiences,  and finally, MS still

<3's Zune?

Verizon kills Sprint’s woody

With one phrase from Verizon Chief Executive Lowell McAdam, Sprint’s wagon just got the e-brake pulled.  Verizon says they’ll have the hot, sexy Palm Pre in just 6 short months.  Suck on that, Sprint.

Not only that, my money is that Verizon will have the exclusive on the new Palm Ante, a super-sexy all-touch phone featuring webOS that has us all excited.  Pure speculation but the next obvious step (to me, anyway).  Bring on the Ante.  Our Natesh Sood had this to say: “...since they have plans to sell one of the most anticipated phones since the iPhone, Verizon will attract many potential Sprint customers to wait just several months until Verizon can start retailing them”

Iyaz covers up

Thankfully, our Editor Iyaz’s experiment that pitted common sense vs. unsafe computing practices is over.  Iyaz ran a fresh Windows machine naked on the net for a full month to see what horrible virus, click-tracker, or other malware he’d pick up.  Says Iyaz, “I tried to be even more of an idiot than usual for this week.”  The surprising answer: nada.  Zip.  Zero.

So are we being duped by companies like Symantec?  Is all this security really necessary?  Can I finally turn off that stupid wall of protection that seems to interfere in everything I do?  Hallelujah!

Google bringing a sack of Android phones

Our Jodie tells us: “According to Andy Rubin, senior director for Mobile Platforms for Google (as well as being the head honcho for the Android OS), there will be a minimum of 18 and perhaps as many as 20 Android-based phones out by years’ end.”

20 Phones?  What is Google auditioning for the next Survivor???  20 phones, 20 days, 1 tropical island…  Google is intent on getting this OS out there and in folks hands.  Apparently there will be 3 flavors of Android, a light, a medium control, and an app food fight where anything goes.  It will be interesting to see how consumers take to these phones vs. what Apple and now Palm have.  We’ll be watching.

Streaking the quad?  Leave your iPhone off!

What would you trade an iPhone for?  Would you trade your privacy?  Would you give up your right to skip class?  How about the school monitoring where you are at all times?  Sound creepy?  Yep.  And more schools are hooking kids with free iPhones in exchange for all of it.

Jodie posts: “The school maintains that they will be a minimum requirement for course work, and will be used to deliver orientation info to freshman, and also send out other course materials”.  The GPS function keeps track of you and could be used for attendance plus some nefarious purposes such as who really kicked over the sprinkler heads or who really stole the school mascot?

Of course, you could always pay the freshman to take your phone to class for you.  Where there is lazy, there is a way.

Zune to live on, like my Bonsai tree.

It should be dead.  It is universally hated.  It isn’t pretty, nothing seems just right about it and it doesn’t play well with a bunch of stuff I bought.  I am talking here about my bonsai tree but could be referring to Microsoft Zune which Microsoft just confirmed they are producing a Zune HD.  HD presumably stands for Hokey-Dokey?  Hasty Departure?  Half-Daked?  There are all a stretch.

Loyal Zunies will be thrilled by thte OLED screen, the jump-in-the-air-and-heel-click HD radio and HDTV output.  Everyone one else will scratch their head and say, “so?”  Personally, I don’t get it.  Zune is lower than Vista in brand power and they stopped touching Vista with a pole months ago.  So why keep Zune going?

The market is saturated.  iTunes has a stranglehold.  Zune HD doesn’t bring much new to the table.  And no freaking camera?  Even my half-dead bonsai isn’t buying it.