In spite of Samsung’s best efforts to bury the news by reporting it a couple of days before Christmas, Friday’s disclosure that the Galaxy S and Galaxy Tab won’t get upgraded to Android 4.0 drew a lot of justified ire. Now the company seems to be backtracking like a champ, as reported by ajnews in Korea, by claiming that it will review the viability of updating those two devices in response to strong customer demand. While restating the difficulties of fitting its entire software footprint onto the Galaxy S and Tab’s limited memory capacity, Samsung has been quoted as saying it’ll investigate ways to try and make it work.

SOURCE via AJNews Korea

Two bits of automotive movie history at a Profiles in History auction held earlier this month have drawn massive bids from collectors. As you may recall, Steve McQueen’s racing suit costume from Le Mans was poised to go under the gavel with the auction house estimating the Gulf Oil suit would fetch between $200,000 and $300,000. Hemmings says that by the time the last bid came in, the suit had fetched a staggering $984,000, thereby proving that when it comes to celebrity auctions, few names can draw dollar bills quite like McQueen. The actor’s Porsche 911, which he drove in the film, recently sold for $1.25 million.

McQueen’s Le Mans suit wasn’t the only big draw, however. The same auction also saw a DeLorean DMC-12 used in the filming of Back to the Future III pull sizable bids of its own. The flux-capacitor-equipped gullwing met the auction house’s estimates with a towering final bid of $541,200. Great Scot, indeed.

SOURCE via Hemmings

Unlike most cities, Japan’s capital city plays host to two major automotive exhibitions: the Tokyo Motor Show and the Tokyo Auto Salon. While these terms may be interchangeable when it comes to European expos, in Tokyo, they connote two different shows altogether. The first is the Motor Show, where new concepts and production models are unveiled by the world’s automakers. The Auto Salon is more of a tuner expo along the lines of the SEMA show in Las Vegas. So after Subaru made its long-anticipated splash at the Tokyo Motor Show with its new BRZ, now it’s heading to the Salon with some modified versions.

First up is a version of the BRZ Concept STI, packing some prototype carbon-fiber components, suspension upgrades, Brembo brakes and more. Subaru has also teamed up again with aftermarket tuner Prova (which shares its name with the traditional license plates carried by prototypes in italy) for a BRZ Black Edition. And you can bet there will be a handful or two of other tuners eager to show what they can do with the new rear-drive sports coupe, as well.

Subaru itself will also be showcasing an upgraded Impreza called the G4 STI with all manner of performance enhancements, and will, at long last, announce its return to a number of different motorsport disciplines. The Super GT300-spec BRZ, which we already know about, will be displayed alongside the Legacy-based racer it replaces. But there will also be a WRX STI that’s slated to be fielded at the Nürburgring 24, and Subaru will also be announcing its return to professional rally competition, though not the World Rally Championship series it left years ago, it will contest the Intercontinental Rally Challenge.

Samsung, Sharp and others have offered to pay $539 million to settle an antitrust lawsuit over alleged LCD panel price-fixing. Earlier this month, Samsung, Sharp and six other LCD manufacturers agreed to pay $388 million to settle price-fixing claims made by direct buyers. The settlement was part of a series of antitrust cases brought by Arkansas, California, Florida, Michigan, Missouri, New York, West Virginia and Wisconsin which were consolidated in federal court in San Francisco.

In late 2006, a probe into price-fixing allegations made by direct and indirect buyers was initiated by authorities in Japan, Korea, the European Union and the United States. Eventually many companies and executives stepped forward and pleaded guilty to criminal antitrust violations. Among them were LG, Chunghwa Picture Tubes and Sharp who reportedly agreed in 2008 and 2009 to pay $585 million in criminal fines alone. A total of more than $890 million in fines was paid out from all guilty parties.

A class action lawsuit thus followed in 2007, claiming that the companies allegedly fixed LCD panel prices, thus driving up prices for direct buyers of LCD panels and related gadgets (HDTVs, desktops, notebooks etc) from 1999 to 2006. Sharp paid $105 million, Samsung paid $82.7 million and Chimei Innolux paid $78 million — the other five paid a total sum of $122.3 million.

However now six LCD makers must pay an additional $539 million to settle antitrust claims made by indirect buyers.

In court papers filed in San Francisco on Friday, Samsung has proposed to pay indirect buyers $240 million, Sharp $115.5 million and Taiwan-based Chimei Innolux Corp $110 million. The rest of the $539 bulk will be paid by Hitachi, Chunghwa Picture Tubes, and Epson Imagine Devices. These companies have also agreed to establish antitrust compliance programs regarding the pricing and production of LCD panels, and to help prosecute other defendants.

Meanwhile, the six settling companies are now disputing the allegations. Other defendants have also yet to settle including AU Optronics, LG and Toshiba. The case is In Re TFT-LCD (Flat Panel) Antitrust Litigation, 07-01827, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California (San Francisco).

Beware of smudges on your future Windows 8 machine. With new login methods such as Face Unlock or the pattern from Android, typing in a password seems so last-decade. Microsoft feels the same way and will be adding a new way to log into Windows 8.

Microsoft’s Jeff Johnson, the Director of Development for the User Experience team, followed up on this with a blog post on the B8 blog with some recommendations for best practices for those who plan to use this login method:

• Pick a photo that has at least 10 points of interest. A point of interest is an area that can serve as a landmark for a gesture – a point that you would touch, places you would connect with a line, an area you would circle.
• Use a random mixture of gesture types and sequence. While a line is the gesture that has the most permutations, if you always use 3 lines, that actually makes it easier for an attacker, as they can rule out trying sequences with the other gesture types.
• If you choose to use a tap, a line, and a circle, randomly choose the order of those gestures; this creates 6 times the number of combinations as a predictable order.
• For circle gestures, randomly choose whether you draw it clockwise or counterclockwise. Also consider making the size of the circle bigger or smaller than the “expected” size.
• For line gestures, your instinct may be to always draw from left to right, but it is more secure if you randomly choose the direction with which you connect the two points.
• As with all forms of authentication, when entering your picture password, avoid allowing other people to watch you as you sign in.
• Keep your computer in a secure location where unauthorized people do not have physical access to it.  As with any password entry, be aware of line of sight and potential recording devices that intrude on your screen.

Be aware that smudges on the screen could potentially identify your gestures. Clean your screen thoroughly on a regular basis. Although this increases the risk if you clean, sign in, and then does nothing, the buildup of oils from repeated use is generally easier for an attacker to see (plus, who likes using an oily device?). Note that buildup is more of an issue for entering numeric PINs, when the device is frequently turned on and off and you enter the sequence dozens of times a day (oils can build up in those locations). Periodically look at your screen at an oblique angle while on the picture password login screen and see if there appears to be a pattern pointing to your gesture sequence. If so, either clean your screen or add a handful of additional smudges in the picture password area (which effectively increases the POIs discussed below

Be sure to hit the full post for an in-depth analysis regarding the different security considerations that Microsoft is currently making with Windows 8.

Nielson Media has finally answered one of the pressing mysteries of the age: Why we defriend people on Facebook. Surprisingly, the top reason isn’t overusing played-out memes. The most likely answer: because someone offended us. That data comes courtesy of a study of 1,865 adult users of social media, conducted from March 31st to April 14th. It found that as in real life, behaviors like having creepy friends, insisting on saying terrible things, or simply being a depressing downer play a huge role in choosing with whom we socialize.

By a wide margin, the top reason for removing someone as a friend, cited by 55% of respondents, was “offensive comments”. What, precisely, is meant by “offensive” is unexplained; “political comments” (14%) are considered a distinct reason apart from generally offensive comments. This suggests that the offenses referred to are more personal in nature, unsurprising to anyone fortunate enough to witness a very embarrassing argument conducted for all to see on a Facebook user’s wall.

Not knowing someone well was the second most common reason for de-friending someone, cited by 41% of respondents, and “trying to sell me something” came in at a very close third place, with 39%. Other reasons include “depressing comments” (23%), “lack of interaction” (20%) Breakups and divorce (11%). “Update profile too often” and “they added too many people” are tied with 6% of respondents citing them, a lesson to anyone who thinks that the rest of us are as enthralled by constant declarations of true love, or their children’s latest potty training update as they are.

In addition to de-friending habits, the study also shows that men and women use social media in subtly different ways. Both men and women primarily use such services to keep in touch with family, reconnect with old friends and find new ones. However, men showed a higher likelihood of using social media for professional networking and dating, with a corresponding tendency to approve friend requests if the requesting user is attractive. Women on the other hand had a higher tendency to cite creative expression and positive reinforcement as primary reasons for using social media. Interestingly, the data suggests much higher commonalities among women. The top reasons for approving friend requests or for removing someone as a friend were cited more by women than by men.

The only thing missing from Nielsen Media’s research is a comprehensive examination of people who decide they’ve had enough of Facebook and ostentatiously announce that fact via an angry post to their Facebook wall that contains phrases like “LOL I hate Fakebook!” and “I’m getting back to real life!”. This is most likely due to the fact that such people have also been defriended in real life.

The report can be read in full on the official site.

The tireless miracle workers behind the iOS jailbreak scene have risen triumphant once again. This time, the champion pod2g has released an untethered jailbreak exploit for all currently iOS 5-supported devices except for those running on the A5 chip, which includes the iPhone 4S and iPad 2.

Previously, iOS devices that were jailbroken on the latest firmware had to re-tether to a computer upon each reboot to maintain their functionality. This new exploit is significant because it makes the jailbroken functionality completely self-contained within a device.

Those who are running a tethered jailbreak already on iOS 5.0.1 can simply get the job done through a Cydia package from Chronic Dev Team.

Others who want to start with a fresh package can do so through the more traditional iPhone Dev Team means with redsn0w and PwnageTool.