Considering Facebook is the largest social network in the world with over 900 million registered members, you could be forgiven for thinking they would place significant emphasis on, and pump huge resources into ensuring the mobile experience of their users was second to none. Unfortunately, any Facebook user who has accessed their account through the iPhone or iPad app will know that the experience is less than satisfactory, something that we know occurs due to the app being built for rollout across multiple platforms.
August is fast approaching an end and it means only one thing to the Apple-loving-smartphone world, we are getting ever closer to the official announcement from Apple regarding the sixth-generation iPhone release. September 12th is the day on which we believe Apple will be holding their press event to introduce us all to the new iPhone, and although, it has yet to be officially confirmed by the world's most valuable company, there has been overwhelming evidence that something is happening, and soon.
Microsoft's logo has remained unchanged for the past quarter of a century, and that simplistic, italic font has found its home on millions of machines, mouses, keyboards and software items in that 25-year period. Now, in-keeping with the Redmond company's change of direction in Windows 8, the most famous of corporate logos has finally been revamped.
Considering Facebook is the world’s largest social network and their mobile apps for iOS and Android are probably two of the most downloaded apps on their respective platforms, you would be forgiven for thinking that they provide an extremely positive user-experience, especially considering Facebook's own statistics show that an enormous percentage of their user-base regularly access their accounts through mobile devices. Unfortunately, the Facebook apps have been the center of a lot of criticism due to the internal decision to build the app primarily using HTML5 for cross-platform distribution.
Last November we were treated to an official confirmation that Rockstar Games were indeed knuckling down and beginning the full-time development process of the fifth iteration of their insanely popular Grand Theft Auto games. Yesterday, the company raised the excitement levels a little further by releasing some official and rather splendid looking screenshots from the game giving us a little glimpse of the adrenaline fuelled capers that we can expect from the fictional city of Los Santos.
Android was known in the past for looking terrible compared to the more elegant looks of iOS and the now dead webOS. Things have indeed improved significantly over the past few months, thanks to a UI overhaul in Ice Cream Sandwich and a significant boost in smoothness with Project Butter in Jelly Bean.
Sony is renowned for delivering a decent television, even if the price is often in excess of what the average consumer can / will pay. The company is set to bring forth an 80-inch XBR LED TV with 4K resolution, and from then on will begin to push 4K into the market, sans 3DTV a couple of years back.
As is typically the case in the run-up to a new Apple product, much media attention has focused on what the Cupertino company will, and won't be including with the next-generation iPhone, dubbed unofficially as the iPhone 5.
Microsoft's Kinect peripheral was the fastest-selling gadget of all time, and has propelled the Redmond company's Xbox 360 console to the summit of the console wars. Sony's PlayStation Move offers similar features, but simply hasn't managed to yield the popularity of Kinect, and for those of you who've yet to get involved in the interaction-fest, you can now grab your very own Kinect sensor for the reduced price of $109.99.
Now that we are nearly into the last quarter of the calendar year, it means that the holiday season is officially coming and we need to be thinking about getting into that gift purchasing overdrive mode that sees us spend our hard earned money on friends, family and loved ones. Alternatively, we could just see it as an excuse to go out and buy ourselves all the great things that we want and blame it on holiday madness. I know which one I'd prefer.
