It's almost that time of the year again. No, I'm not referring to the release of the iPhone 5 tomorrow in San Francisco, but an even longer-standing institution among tech fans. Of course, I'm talking about the FIFA series, and as any ardent football fan (or soccer fan, if you reside in America) will tell you, it's most certainly the ultimate simulation of The Beautiful Game.
The iPhone 5 is only a day away from announcement, but such is the veil of secrecy around upcoming Cupertino products, that we've still only had a few sightings of the device at this late stage. Plenty of dummy models have also been doing the rounds throughout much of Europe and Asia, and it now appears those non-working replicas are beginning to filter through to the United States.
Although Apple is planning on taking to the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts tomorrow to hold their much anticipated press event, we can't be exactly sure what they are going to announce. It's pretty much nailed on that we will see the new iPhone appearing as well as some announcements surrounding the availability of iOS 6. But as yet, we don't have any indication on whether Apple will make it all about the iPhone or introduce some additional hardware such as the rumored miniature iPad or possibly a couple of new iPods. Thankfully we don't have long to wait to find out.
Although a large number of people were a little disappointed when the news came through that Apple would be removing the native YouTube app with the launch of iOS 6, but the blow was softened a little with the news that Google would release their own official app that would offer all that video viewing goodness to iPhone and iPod touch users. We are still waiting for the official launch of iOS 6, but Google have made good on their promise, with their official YouTube app landing in the iOS App Store today.
One of the main issues with Samsung devices that run Android - or any device that is powered by that particular operating system in fact - is the huge fragmentation issue that accompanies it. More often than not, powerful and high-end devices are often running outdated versions of Android, meaning that consumers are often missing out on features that have been integrated into new builds. This issue is something that we will likely see in the future as we continue to move forward and won't go away anytime soon.
Seldom a year goes by when a new iPhone is about to hit the market, and at least one of the carriers doesn't appear to pull out all the stops in an effort to reel in as many new customers as possible. In fact, each mobile data provider pulls at least one uncharacteristic stunt annually, but T-Mobile's latest promotion is one of the most intriguing we've ever seen.
Scarcely does a major software update release without bringing problems for at least some users, and whilst not everybody would consider OS X Mountain Lion as "major," it certainly presented many MacBook users with something of a headache.
The battle for supremacy in the cloud-based services has definitely stepped up a notch or two over the past few months, with a host of companies joining a territory manned mainly by Dropbox. Apple kicked things off by launching iCloud along with iOS 5 back in October of last year, and Microsoft finally brought SkyDrive to the mainstream in the early stages of 2012 - laying the foundations for the eventual release of its so-called "Cloud OS" - Windows 8.
Samsung is the number one smartphone manufacturer in the world right now, and having yielded huge success with the Galaxy S and Galaxy S II, few could have foreseen the impact of the Galaxy Note, which although seeming to look far too large for most pockets, actually sold in impressive numbers.
Microsoft’s motion sensing Kinect has so far been used in plenty of novel ways. We’ve seen, among other things, developers add Minority Report UI-style features to Windows, allow 3D videochatting, and help consumers select dresses by virtually wearing them, but allowing people who have trouble reading to send emails with a few gestures is something very new that we’ve come across today. Check it out after the jump.

