By Sean Captain

Having grown infamous as the bland-box company, Dell is pushing hard to break out of the old stereotype. This evening in Manhattan, the company held something of a coming-out party to celebrate its new design direction.

The most style shows up in the Dell Studio 15 and Studio 17 laptops, which now offer about 220 cover designs infused into the plastic lid of the PC – both solid colors and fanciful illustrations created by dozens of visual artists.

Under a new Dell Studio program, the company recruits artists four times each year to design notebook finishes that follow a theme. The first 200-odd designs are all meant to reflect the theme "Today."

I must confess that the only way I perceived that theme is that I saw them all "today." Otherwise, the designs are all over the map. Not that it's a bad thing, though. "It was basically each artist bringing their interpretation of the word 'today,' which was pretty great," said Deanne Cheuk, who created a collection of four geometrically psychedelic designs called "Pyramid." She praised the wide latitude that the mandate gave her.

By Ravit Lichtenberg (blog)

[OnHollywood] Avatar and alternate self solutions had a prominent presence at the OnHollywood conference here in West Hollywood:

Club Cooee (above) combines online and offline social experiences via 3D environment and characters. Club Cooee users can create their avatar and fully customized 3D rooms—fully furnished and accessorized—and keep them running on their desktops. Artifacts in the room can be linked to other websites users like, the environment can be integrated into other websites, and members can be invited to spend time in each others’ rooms for a real-time chat. Club Cooee dubs their solution “the next generation messaging and communication system, which adds visual, emotional, and personal experience The application is <3 MB in size which enables it to run seamlessly and stay “always on” on users’ desktop. Users meet, chat, flirt, share media files and make new friends from all over the world within 3D rich media chatrooms including video and pictures screens, music streams and direct links to websites. As you can imagine, opportunities for monetization are immense—from branded elements in rooms to micro-transactions on media content to user-generated-content.

By Ravit Lichtenberg (blog)

Bill Gurley, General Partner, Benchmark capital gave the Keynote address at the OnHollywood conference this morning. Bill is the author of Above the Crowd; coming from design engineering and analyst background; he brings a truly unique perspective to his VC role at Benchmark. Within a matter of 15 minutes, Bill articulated the key trends, barriers, and success factors in the video tornado. Below is a summary of Bill’s talk.

AdTech is happening next door, so we thought that we would check it out. The Moscone center has been turned into a digital marketing temple for this week, but there were some interesting talks and demos. One of them was intelevision (not to be confused with the classic "intellivision" game console). There's large crowd that browse the web while watching TV, and Intelevision is a website that tries to provide more information (and ads) about what's currently on TV.

It's a funky idea and to be honest, we're a little skeptical, but it was well presented. Personally, when I watch 24 on Monday evenings, I'm not sure that I want to tune in to get additional information on nerve gas or FBI entry room tactics (I wonder what the related ads would be). Check it your for yourself. What do you think?

Tonight's VLAB event is being held at the Stanford Business School and the theme is "New Music Models": New Paths to Revenue and New Opportunities

We're in the middle of the panel discussion that is moderated by Paul Bonanos (Tech Journalist). The panelists are: MC Hammer (Multi-Platinum Artist), Jordan Kurland (Artist Manager), Jessica Kahn (Director of Engineering, Tapulous), Dorrian Porter (CEO & Founder, Mozes), Larry Marcus (Venture Capitalist, Walden Partners) and Jeff Yasuda (CEO and Founder, Blip Inc)

Keep an eye on live.ubergizmo.com as we'll upload a few more things tonight.

If you have an interest in the hottest startups out there, you might want to keep an eye on live.ubergizmo.com, where we'll keep you up to date with what's being unveiled at DEMO in Palm Springs right now.

Our regular coverage of DEMO is located in the DEMO category. Check it out, we've already published many posts about new products released minutes ago!

[Mobile World Congress] Here are some photos of the event held by Microsoft and LG today during Mobile world congress. Microsoft’s Steve Balmer (CEO) talked about Windows Mobile 6.5 (details here), while LG was providing its vision of a greater, more interactive and 3D user interface. Both event were blogged live (live.ubergizmo.com) from a mobile phone and while we our camera phones, we also know that the image quality is sub-par, so here are some photos shot with a decent camera.

Microsoft Press Event Photo Gallery
LG Press Event Gallery

Ubergizmo is a media partner of eComm, the emerging communications conference. This leading-technology conference focuses on telecom, mobile and communications industry innovation.

On March 03-05, come with us at the San Francisco Airport Mariott to meet the thought-leaders, developers and executives and share about the future of communications technology, across the telecom and the internet spaces.

Register here .

Ubergizmo is a media partner of eComm, the emerging communications conference. This leading-technology conference focuses on telecom, mobile and communications industry innovation.

On March 03-05, come with us at the San Francisco Airport Mariott to meet the thought-leaders, developers and executives and share about the future of communications technology, across the telecom and the internet spaces.

Register here (early bird rate ends on January 19th, save $400)

Major Topics will include:

• Mobile Social Networking (MoSoSo) .
• Open Handsets & the Open Ecosystem
• Social Computing and the Social Web
• Voice and Video Evolution
• Convergence of Media with Personal Communications
• Open Spectrum
• Open Communication Platforms
• Leveraging Cloud Computing .
• Towards 4G Wireless
• P2P and Decentralization of Telecoms
• Communications Enabling Business Processes, Especially B2C
• New Forms of Contactability and Connectability
• Emerging Markets

Speakers include executives from T-Mobile, Nokia, Skype, Adobe, Cisco, Symbian, BT, Google, Qualcomm as well as founders of leading start-ups such as Phonetag,Telio and Voxmobili.

[CES 2009] Check this comparison between my old Black Berry and the new Curve 8900. It features a better camera: 3.2 MP with autofocus, I tried it! The weight is lighter, only 110g, the finish is more stylish and the display has a higher resolution 480x360.

Specifications

• * Camera (3.2 MP)
• * Wi-Fi® Support
• * Built-in GPS
• * Enhanced Media Player
• * Video Recording
• * BlackBerry® Maps
• * Wireless Email
• * Organizer
• * Browser
• * Phone
• * Corporate Data Access
• * SMS/MMSHeight:
• 4.29 x 2.36 x 0.53 inches
• 109 x 60 x 13.5 x mm
• 3.87 ounces (109.9 grams)

[CES 2009] Optoma is no stranger when it comes to home theater projectors, and CES is where the company has decided to unveil its HD8200 Home Theater Projector. As with many projectors, the HD8200 will be powered by Texas Instruments' DLP DarkChip3 DMD Technology, and will also see Optoma’s very own PureShift and PureMotion technologies inside as well. Specially designed to function even in the most demanding custom installation environments, the HD8200 boasts installation friendly features and ISFccc Day & Night certified modes. Some of the HD8200's features include :-

• 20,000:1 DynamicBlack contrast ratio
• Pixelworks PW9800 co-processor with DNX MotionEngine technology
• 1,300 ANSI lumens
• Simple installation process
• ISFccc (Imaging Science Foundation Custom Calibration Configuration) certifiable
• Two HDMI v1.3 with Deep Color inputs connectivity
• DVI w/HDCP, S-Video, component video RS-232, and +12V trigger and IR receiver connectivity
• Efficient cooling technologies

[CES 2009] Casio has introduced a couple of digital cameras from its EXILIM line that features reduced circuitry size as well as image sensor units, turning them into extremely small point-and-shoot cameras that ought to be a joy to tote around if you are a casual shutterbug. Both models will feature high-speed 30 shot-per-second burst rate as well as the ability to record movies at a maximum frame rate of 1,000 fps - that's certainly unheard of for an entry level digital camera of today. The EX-FS10 is card-sized and measures no more than 0.64", while the EX-FC100 will fit snugly into your palm - we wonder whether smaller Asian palms are the benchmark here. Both models will be out this March, with the EX-FS10 and EX-FC100 retailing for $349.99 and $399.99, respectively.

[CES 2009] All three Casio Exilim models above will feature the high-speed image processing abilities of Casio latest EXILIM Engine 4.0, and we're particularly interested in the new Dynamic Photo function that enables the photographer make immediate image edits on-the-fly in a particularly striking manner - one can cut out the main subject of interest in a captured image and merge it with another image to form the background, giving you the opportunity to perform visual surgery like how North Korea does with its propaganda images. Not only that, users are able to cut and paste several rapid-succession images so that a moving subject can be superimposed onto a still background. Casio has specially set up a website to demonstrate the many creative ways one can utilize its Dynamic Photo function. The Casio EXILIM EX- Z400, EX-Z270, and EX-S12 will retail for $299.99, $229.99 and $249.99, respectively, when they arrive this March.

[CES 2009] Very little is known about the Casio EXILIM EX-S5 digital camera other than the fact that it comes with a compact body based on a new design concept, and is meant to turn high-quality photographic functionality into a simple experience. The EXILIM EX-S5 will be out this March for $179.99, coming in a bevy of colors including blue, black, gold, silver, pink and purple. Guess this is another point-and-shoot for the masses, so those with a more serious slant towards photography will want to give this a miss.