Rovio had an impressive Christmas day in terms of the Angry Birds bunch of games. The three games saw a total of 6.5 million downloads on Christmas day alone, many of which will likely to be related to people getting new iOS and Android devices for Christmas.
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Hackers have managed to extract the Silk browser from the Amazon Kindle Fire and port it over to various rooted Android devices. The Silk browser is Amazons attempt to speed up web browsing. It works by calculating some elements of a webpage server side which speeds up processing time. It also attempts to predict what links you will click on so that your next page will be already calculated and ready to download when you want to go to it.
Internet Explorer 6 usage in the US has finally dropped below 1 percent. Last year the company set up a website called ie6countdown that aimed to kill off the 10+ year old browser. Reasons for pushing users away from that browser is that its extremely old now and has a number of security issues as well as outdated code running it. By dropping usage to below 1 percent it allows developers to focus on current browsers when designing websites.
Update: ASUS has provided the following update...
“Regarding the bootloader, the reason we chose to lock it is due to content providers’ requirement for DRM client devices to be as secure as possible. ASUS supports Google DRM in order to provide users with a high quality video rental experience. Also, based on our experience, users who choose to root their devices risk breaking the system completely. However, we know there is demand in the modding community to have an unlocked bootloader. Therefore, ASUS is developing an unlock tool for that community. Please do note that if you choose to unlock your device, the ASUS warranty will be void, and Google video rental will also be unavailable because the device will be no longer protected by security mechanism.” – ASUS
ASUS has started to respond to the concerns about the Transformer Prime having a locked bootloader. Earlier today we reported that ASUS had opted to secure the bootloader by putting 128-bit encryption in front of it which prevents users being able to install custom ROMs on to the device.
Over the last week of 2011 (December 25 to December 31), there were more downloads made than ever before by iOS and Android users. The stats company Flurry has reported that 1.2 billion apps were downloaded through that week.
Apple is planning to hold an event this month in New York City. The event will be held towards the end of the month and is believed to be regarding electronic publishing and media content.
Google has launched Scribbles for Gmail. The new service works on Gmail on the web browser and within the iOS app and allows users to scribble a message to someone rather than typing.
Skype in the US is offering free wifi access for those travelling in the US between December 21 and December 27. The wifi access from Skype will be offered free in over 50 airports in the US.
Last week, Facebook launched Timeline in New Zealand. The reason New Zealand was first to get the new update was that the country speaks English and provides enough data for Facebook to test that all works well.
We now see that Facebook has rolled out Timeline to the rest of the world.
We like the idea of AirPrint and the ability to print wirelessly from the iPad or iPhone to a wireless printer. The problem is that not all printers are compatible. To get AirPrint working you need to choose one of the supported printers.
For those that don't want to replace a printer just so it works with AirPrint, there is another way. The xPrintServer allows you to connect it up to a printer and then print wirelessly to a printer.
Google [GOOG] has updated the web version of the Android Market to include a few new handy features. The first, pictured below, allows you to filter app reviews based on devices that are connected to your account. This will let you more easily spot if a particular app has a bug for your particular device.
Apple has announced that the Mac App Store has just hit a milestone. The company has commented that over 100 million downloads have occurred on the app store which launched less than a year ago.
The App Store was originally launched on iOS devices and quickly became popular on the iPhone and then on the iPad. Over 500,000 apps are available which have been download 18 billion times since launch. This number now averages around the 1 billion downloads each month. The Mac App Store works on a similar principle in that you use your Apple ID to log in with and can find apps from various categories to download on to your Mac.
