There are plenty of places where one is able to purchase digital music, although for the most part, many people equate digital music purchases to iTunes, and rightfully so considering that many artists and groups make their songs available on Apple’s digital music platform alongside physical copies as well. However it looks like Blackberry World could catchup to iTunes in terms of digital music purchases, at least that’s what’s being inferred from a statement made by Charlie Miller, Blackberry’s Director of Alliances (via TrustedReviews).

According to Miller, a good 20% of the purchases made from Blackberry World is music, which is pretty significant considering that Blackberry World also plays home to other digital Blackberry products, such as apps for instance. Miller goes on to state that singles are still the most popular form of music purchase, but sales of full albums are starting to catch on as well, and that their music sales are notably higher than their competitors “proportionally”, although he declined to name any of them. Blackberry users out there do you agree with that figure? Do you find yourself purchasing your music from Blackberry World more often than not?

Word on the street has it that Apple has a low-cost iPhone planned, supposedly to help the Cupertino company fight against the competition who are able to offer lower priced products to capture emerging markets. Well it looks like Apple might want to hurry up with that rumored device because in at least one emerging market, India, Nokia and Windows Phone appears to be playing catchup. According to a report from TimesDigit, it seems that Nokia’s budget Lumia 520 is quite a hit in India with the handset reportedly selling out in various online retailers within the country.

While the graph from Statcounter shows that iOS is still dominating the market share in India, it appears to be on the decline albeit a slow one, and we can also see that the Windows Phone market share increasing as well, albeit slowly too. We’re not sure how long it will take for Windows Phone to catchup to iOS in India, but at the rate this is going, and assuming Apple hasn’t released the alleged low-cost iPhone, we’re thinking probably sooner rather than later. What do you guys think? Will iOS eventually lose ground to Windows Phone in India where low-cost offerings will appeal to those unwilling to pay for Apple’s premium device?

While the Nokia Lumia 928 is one of the Finnish company’s latest handsets, it is certainly going up against stiff competition from the like of Apple’s iPhone 5 and Samsung’s Galaxy S4, but it looks like Nokia is not shy when it comes to taking jabs at the competition. Nokia has released a new ad for the Lumia 928, basically touting the phone’s ability to snap photos and videos in low-light with pretty decent clarity, and at the same time taking pot shots at the iPhone 5 and the Galaxy S4, which by comparison photos released by Nokia, seem to do a way better job. In fact Nokia’s jab at the iPhone 5 and the Galaxy S4 weren’t even subtle, bluntly stating that it is “Better than the Apple iPhone 5. Better than the Samsung Galaxy S4.” What do you guys think? Does Nokia really have something worth bragging about, or do you think that the iPhone 5 and Galaxy S4 aren’t too bad when it comes to low-light photo/videography?

Leap Motion, the device built to bring touch-like gesture controls -without a touch screen- will enter into its beta phase soon. Before that, the company has posted a video to show what its vision for Leap Motion on Windows 8: watch the video above. The demonstration shows “real-world” use cases, including web browsing, zooming in and out test, navigating apps, movies and photos.
Read full post →Leap Motion Gesture Controller Windows 8 Preview Ahead Of Beta

Marissa Mayer has announced some big news around Flickr today: starting right now, Flickr users get 1TB of storage for free, “enough for a lifetime of photos” she says (that’s 500,000 full-resolution photos according to Yahoo’s estimate). “Flickr users will never have to worry about running out of space”, Marissa Mayer adds.
Read full post →Flickr Users Get 1TB For Free + New Design [Marissa Mayer]

Apple has a number of records to its name. The iPhone become one of the most selling smartphones around the world after it was released in 2007. Same goes for the original iPad, which can be credited for giving a huge boost to the previously dormant tablet market. According to analyst Horace Dediu, Apple’s latest record comes courtesy of its beautiful Retail Stores around the world, which have achieved a record revenue of $57.60 per visitor during Q1, 2013.

The analyst claims that average revenue per Apple store now stands at approximately $13 million, which is the highest for a non-holiday quarter. A 7% increase in foot traffic was also noted, with average number of visitors per store being estimated at 250,000 per quarter. Comparing the sales per square foot figures of Apple with other major retailers in the U.S., the Cupertino company smokes everyone, performing twice as well as Tiffany in the same quarter. Apple’s Retail Stores are no doubt meticulously designed and fashioned in a way that makes the visitor’s visit worthwhile. One can only fathom how much of an increase will be noted in these numbers once the holiday season comes around.

We’ve covered countless Motorola X Phone rumors here and up till now there has been no confirmation from either Google or Motorola regarding the time frame in which this device will be released. It was widely believed that Google would announce this smartphone at I/O 2013, though merely days before the conference it was reported that Google had pulled its teams from the project because it thought the project wasn’t innovative enough. Motorola reportedly was left with the project on its own, which is considered to be one of the major reasons in the release delay.

A week ago we reported that Motorola XT1058, believed to be the X Phone, had stopped by the FCC for approval, the AT&T version to be precise. According to a new leak, a CDMA version of the same device is also being manufactured, which would enable those devices to be compatible with Sprint and Verizon’s mobile network. The leak also claims that the Motorola X Phone will be powered by a Snapdragon S4 Pro dualcore processor. As per recent reports, the Motorola X Phone is expected to be released around August.

As if the Galaxy S4 didn’t spend much time in the limelight any way, these days a “rugged” version of this smartphone is being heavily rumored. Today we even saw allegedly leaked pictures of this device, which is said to be dust and water proof, carrying the Samsung SGH=i537 model number. The company is yet to comment on the existence of this device, though an impending confirmation hasn’t ever stopped the rumor mill from speculating on alleged specifications.

Rumor has it that the rugged Galaxy S4 a.k.a Galaxy Active will not have the same processor as the original Galaxy S4. Instead of the Snapdragon 600 or Exynos 5 Octa processors, the Galaxy Active may be powered by a relatively slower Snapdragon S4 1.9GHz quadcore processor. It is not entirely clear why the Active may ship with a slower processor. The new smartphone is expected to be shipping in the next few weeks. Apart from that, it will come touting Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean with TouchWiz pre-installed while retaining the full 1080p HD display. Perhaps the processor downgrade is to spread the extra costs associated with manufacturing of this “rugged” smartphone?

It was reported back in February that the Chinese Army apparently has a whole cyber-wing with the ultimate purpose of launching cyberattacks on the U.S., specifically targeting government agencies and major companies. According to an Akamai report, cyberattacks originating from China tripled last year, making China reportedly the biggest culprit of state-sponsored hacking. The Administration has already said that it will take a firm stand against Chinese cyberattacks, there are a number of options that the U.S. might pursue including but not limited to visa restrictions. The New York Times now reports that such attacks against the U.S. have started to originate once again from the People’s Republic.

It has not been revealed which companies have been hit by these attacks, the names have not been made public due to various agreements, though it is said that these same companies were targeted the last time around as well. It has also been reported that this cyber-wing focuses quite a bit on companies that have direct access to the U.S. national power grid. Obviously nothing is known for sure, and with U.S. and China already agreeing to the formation of a working group for cybersecurity, it wouldn’t be the best of ideas to outright blame China without an official confirmation of its alleged actions.

Microsoft will unveil its next generation Xbox tomorrow after what seems to have been an endless cycle of rumors and speculation. The announcement will be made at Microsoft’s headquarters in Redmond, Washington. The full unveil of this console has been scheduled for the E3 conference which starts in June. Electronic Arts has confirmed that at the new Xbox launch event tomorrow, it will be unveiling FIFA 14 as well, a franchise of the hugely popular soccer series: FIFA. For now EA Sports has only posted a teaser on Facebook, which doesn’t exactly give anything away regarding this new game.

As far as the new Xbox is concerned, there have been a lot of rumors about what it may or may not have. Some believe that it might require an always-on internet connection, there has been much debate on that already, we’ll finally know for sure once Microsoft makes the official announcement. We’ve already posted a detailed roundup of the next generation Xbox, take a look and get up to speed about the gaming console that’s finally going to be unveiled tomorrow at Redmond.