Sometimes it’s a platform, sometimes it’s an app, sometimes it’s software.

But looking at the biggest events in social in 2011, it became clear that social media, and the technology that powers it, has an amazing ability to help shape our lives.

The year started off with the Day of Rage against Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and the Arab Spring protests, both powered by social media. The ability of people in oppressive regimes to express themselves anonymously and powerfully through social apps such as Twitter and Facebook meant the world could see not only the conditions these people lived under, but also that they didn’t like it, no matter what their governments might say.

It ended with the end of Gowalla — its acquisition by Facebook will end the service and absorb its staff into the social behemoth’s location applications, changing how we share where we are and what we’re doing.

This infographic from Flowtown looks at the biggest news out of social media in 2011.

• Does technology turn us into loners?
• Facebook Feel the Pressure from New Social Networking Bill
• One in Ten British Pets have their own Social Networking Profile
• Twitter now offering Geotagging services
• Zuckerberg is TIME’s “Person of the Year” – Does he Deserve it?

The tablet came of age, Siri came to life and Spotify finally came to the U.S.

The year also saw an end to Gowalla, Michael Arrington’s departure from TechCrunch and the loss of Steve Jobs, Dennis Ritchie and John McCarthy.

Udemy put together this terrific interactive timeline that pulls together all the major tech news of the year, from Wikileaks’ document dump on Jan. 1 to Salesforce’s announcement Dec. 19 that it would acquire startup Rypple in the first quarter of this year. Take a look:

Image via stock.xchng

• WikiLeaks Suffers from Multiple DoS Attacks
• Document Extractor converges monitor, scanner, printer
• Sony Dash – more than just an alarm
• Analysing the DNA of Successful Internet Start-Ups
• Acknowledge and Obey – E-Mail is Now Email

The original Asus Eee Transformer tablet was one of the most popular offerings this year, although it is fair to say it didn’t really blow anyone away with its charms.  While the spec sheet was reasonable enough, it didn’t really do enough to differentiate itself from the competition.

The original Transformer tablet also featured an uninspiring design, something which has been fixed with the new version.  The Asus Eee Pad Transformer Prime features an aluminium casing and an extremely thin and light design.  It measures in smaller than the iPad at 8.3mm and is also lighter at only 586 grams.

To top it off, the Transformer Prime is also slightly larger than the iPad, with a 10.1 inch display in comparison to the iPads 9.7 inches.  The display is a Super IPS+ under Gorilla Glass with a resolution of 1280 x 800 pixels, with Asus promising 178 degree viewing angles.

Just like the original Transformer, the Prime comes with a separately sold keyboard dock, although this one is aluminium to match the casing on the tablet.  In terms of battery life, Asus are promising 12 hours of real usage, although real world tests may prove a little smaller.  Once the tablet has been attached to the keyboard dock however, this figure goes up to about 18 hours.

Other features include dual cameras (8MP on the back and 1.2MP on the front), a microHDMI port, and a standard USB and SD card slot on the dock.  Android 3.2 is the officially supported operating system at the moment, although there are plans to support Ice Cream Sandwich within the next month.  December is the official launch month (no exact date given), with the 32GB version selling for $US500 and the 64GB model for $US600.

• Asus Unveil The Transformer 2
• Asus Starts Selling The Transformer Prime In The US
• December launch for the Asus Transformer tablet
• Asus New And Lighter 1002HAE Eee PC Netbook
• ASUS Reveals the Exotic PadFone

Many of the apps will be available through Amazon’s one click payment system, including offerings by Pandora, Facebook, Twitter, Netflix, Zynga, EA, and Rovio.  Other niche apps will also become available right away, although the big question is whether Amazon has the ability to cater to everyone.

While thousands of apps may seem like a lot, with the iPad having hundreds of thousands, Apple may still seem like the logical choice for many.  It is also important to note that the iPad and Kindle Fire and not in the same price range, not by a long shot.  Many commentators believe the Kindle Fire is being sold low as a way to stimulate the sale and use of Amazon content.

“Beyond the Amazon content — which is the focal point for the Kindle Fire — the question is what else can you do with it?” said Jeff Orr to TechNewsWorld, group director of consumer research at ABI Research. “What type of games will be available? Amazon has a good start with that. It appears to be complete. So the question becomes, how will people feel about it 90 or 120 days after they get it? Will they still adore it?”

However, Amazon are also testing Android apps with the Kindle Fire, which will open up the numbers considerably.  This will also make the Kindle Fire seem less like an isolated device, and turn it into one of the cheapest Android tablets on the block.

However, in such a competitive market, nothing can be taken for granted, with Amazon also having to deal with the very promising Barnes & Noble Nook tablet which will enter the market with the same price tag of $199.

• The Amazon Kindle Fire Tablet Introduced at $199
• First Reports of the Amazon Kindle Tablet
• Amazon Calls Press Conference. Is the Kindle Tablet Coming?
• Amazon Getting Ready to Launch a Tablet
• The Amazon Appstore for Android is Here

The Tegra 3 offers about three times the performance of the previous dual-core Tegra generation.  While many people expect this massive increase in power to have a negative effect on battery life, Nvidia are using Variable Symmetric Multiprocessing (vSMP), so processors are only used when they are needed.

The first device to feature the Tegra 3 will be the Asus Eee Pad Transformer Prime, which is an improved version of the existing Transformer tablet.  However, the Transformer Prime comes with better cameras, more storage, and faster overall performance.

The Tegra 3 is actually built with five CPU cores, not four, with one “companion core” used for low performance activity.  This is a clever design decision, as most people do not require all of their processing power all the time.

Nvidia says performance improvements will be obvious and come in many ways, including smoother webpage scrolling, smoother video, faster HTML5 and Web GL, faster photo editing, smoother frame rates, and better gaming performance.  The inclusion of the 12 core GPU is also great news for gamers, with 15 Tegra 3 games already under development for Tegra Zone.

The Asus Eee Pad Transformer Prime will be released some time in December, with prices starting at $499.  However, this will certainly not be the only device to feature Tegra 3, with numerous tablets and mobile devices likely in the first half of 2012.

• Asus Unveil The Transformer 2
• The Asus Eee Pad Transformer Prime Sets a New Standard
• Asus Starts Selling The Transformer Prime In The US
• Details Released on the Asus Transformer 2 Tablet
• ASUS Reveals the Exotic PadFone

The Getac X500 is the kind of computer you can use anywhere, even coming with steel support pegs to provide additional structural rigidity.  In fact, the entire chassis is made from thick magnesium alloy, although this does have one major drawback.  The X500 weighs in at about 12 pounds, which is heavy by anyone’s standards.

The X500 meets a number of military specifications, including MIL-STD-810G and MIL-STD 461F.  It is also IP65 compliant with its magnesium alloy case and shock mounted hard drive, and comes with sealed I/O caps and doors to prevent the intrusion of dirt, sand, and moisture.

In terms of performance, the Getac X500 comes with a 2.67GHz Intel Core i7 processor, 160GB solid state drive, and Nvidia GeForce GT 330M discrete graphics.  The screen is a 15.6 inch backlit LED display, with a resolution of 1366 x 768 pixels.  Along with the standard screen, Getac also offer an optional 15.6 inch FHD display at 1920 x 1080 pixels, which is fully sunlight readable and features multi-touch technology.

In terms of connectivity, the Getac X500 comes with 3 USB 2.0 ports, an extra USB 2.0/eSATA combination port, a docking connector, VGA, HDMI, Ethernet/LAN, ExpressCard, two PCMCIA Type II or one Type III expansion slot, and a SmartCard reader.  While the lack of USB 3.0 is disappointing on a computer in this price range, everything else is well represented.

Prices for the Getac X500 start from $5000, and go up to well over $8000 for fully featured versions.

• The Ultra-Rugged Getac B300 Laptop
• Getac launches the X500 rugged laptop
• Upgrade for the Panasonic Toughbook CF-19
• The Panasonic Toughbook 53 Semi-Rugged Laptop
• The Armor X10gx Rugged Tablet

The new autonomous behaviour control technology allows Asimo to move independently, although obviously this comes with limitations.  There are also a number of improvements to the robot’s intelligence and physical features, with new and improved sensors allowing it to respond more readily to the surrounding environment.

“The design of [Asimo] is meant to make interacting with it easier,” said Ken Goldberg, a professor at University of California, in an interview with TechNewsWorld.  “The biggest improvement to Asimo is in the hands, Asimo’s old hands were very crude, whereas the new hands … allow Asimo to [perform] tasks which require more dexterity.” said Goldberg.

The combination of new visual and auditory sensors will allow Asimo to recognise faces and voices, even when a number of people are speaking at the same time.  The designers say the robot will even be able to predict the movement of people based on spatial information and past behaviour, which combined with the physical improvements, will allow Asimo to respond in a more realistic way.

Asimo’s legs have also been greatly improved, allowing the robot to walk, jump, run forward, and even hop.  The hands are the biggest improvement however, with Asimo now able to perform subtle tasks through a tactile and force sensor in each finger.  With these improvements, Asimo has become the clear leader in the consumer robot race, although Fujitsu’s EMIEW2 robot, Toyota’s humanoid robots, and Sony’s QRIO walking robot are not far behind.

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• Meet Nao, the first ‘emotional’ robot
• Google Involved in ‘Robot Car’ Design and Testing

“With the Nook Tablet we are delivering the best media device ever created in a portable form factor,” said Barnes & Noble CEO William Lynch at the launch event in New York.  Lynch went on to say that the tablets biggest selling points were the screen resolution and battery life, which is said to go for 8 hours when watching movies.

The display is a proprietary design called “VividView”, with a resolution of 1024 x 600 pixels.  Other features include 1GB of RAM, 16GB of storage, a 32GB expandable SD card, and a 1GHz dual-core OMAP4 CPU.  In most ways, the specs of the Barnes & Noble Nook are a step up from the Amazon Kindle Fire, a fact which certainly didn’t escape the attention of Lynch.

“The Kindle Fire is deficient for a media tablet,” he said. The Kindle Fire’s 512MB of RAM does not provide enough room to play a game app while reading a magazine or running another app, he said. Its 8G bytes of storage is not enough to hold media for those situations where the user is not connected to the Internet. “You’re not always going to be connected to the cloud,” said Lynch.

In terms of price, both the Kindle Fire and the Nook tablet will retail for $199, so the spec sheet and availability of media are likely to play an important role in peoples decision making process.  The interface and overall usability will also be an important factor, and with both devices coming out in the next week, we will soon find out which tablet the market prefers.

• Nook Color Updated to a ‘Readers Tablet’
• Amazon Announce Thousands of Apps for the Kindle Fire
• The New Barnes and Noble Nook E-reader
• First Reports of the Amazon Kindle Tablet
• The Pandigital SuperNova 8 Inch Tablet

The HP 3115m runs on a dual-core AMD E-450 chip, with 2GB of RAM and a couple of hard drive options.  Graphics come from an AMD Radeon HD 6320 GPU, which powers the 11.6 inch, 1366 x 768 pixel display.  The hard drive can either be a 320GB HDD, a 500GB HDD, or a 160GB SSD.

In terms of connectivity, the HP 3115m features 3 USB 2.0 ports, HDMI, VGA, and a Gigabit Ethernet port.  There is also Bluetooth 4.0, an HD webcam, an SD card slot, and the usual audio connections.  However, HP has put more attention on the audio experience with this notebook, which one of the first products to feature ‘Beats Audio‘.

“Beats Audio” DSP (digital signal processing) chip and will be packaged with special, in-ear Beats Audio headphones. The combination is supposed to counter the “degradation of sound” caused by music digitization, says Beats Audio founder/music producer/Interscope Geffen A&M Records Chairman Jimmy Iovine. who has designed this technology with musician Dr. Dre.

“Artists spend millions of dollars to make their records sound a certain way,” said Iovine in an interview. “But [mobile] technology moves so fast, sound got left behind.”  The HP 3115m laptop is one of the first products to feature Beats Audio, along with the HTC Rezound smartphone.

• The HTC Rezound Smartphone
• Will AT&T Market The iPhone To Business Users?
• NEC launches new ultra mobile notebook
• ASUS U3S-3P092E Laptop
• Kindle Users Can Now Download Audio-Books Directly Over Wi-Fi

The HTC Rezound will run Android 2.3 upon release, although the company have said they are “Ice Cream Sandwich ready”, with an update likely in early 2012.  The Rezound will hit the stores on November 14 and sell for US$299 with a Verizon contract.

The HTC Rezound features a 4.3 inch 720p display, a dual-core processor, and a camera.  However, much of the marketing material is focused on the bells and whistles, including the ability to record and play back video in slow motion.

The other key marketing angle revolves around the inclusion of Beats Audio, a start-up created by musician Dr. Dre and record producer Jimmy Iovine.  The HTC Rezound is the first US phone to feature Beats Audio, and even comes with its own beats-branded headphones that can also be used as a headset.

“I suspect that will be the big marketing angle for this handset and what consumers respond to. The included Beats headphones will help to make this stand out as a music phone, and I expect that will be what the salespeople emphasize in the stores,” said Bill Morelli, director of mobile technologies & convergence at IMS Research, in an interview with TechNewsWorld.

While the HTC Rezound features a spec sheet much like many other phones, the marketing of this phone is a perfect example of how manufacturers are trying harder to differentiate themselves in an increasingly crowded market.

• The HP 3115m Notebook with Beats Audio
• Windows Phone 7 Launch Figures not that Impressive
• The HTC Rhyme Android Smartphone
• Is This Dell’s New SmartPhone?
• World’s most powerful smartphone uses fingerprint recognition

According to Strategy Analytics Senior Analyst Alex Spektor: “Samsung shipped 28 million smartphones and overtook Apple to become the world’s largest smartphone vendor by volume with 24 percent market share. Samsung’s rise has been driven by a blend of elegant hardware designs, popular Android services, memorable sub-brands and extensive global distribution. Samsung has demonstrated that it is possible, at least in the short term, to differentiate and grow by using the Android ecosystem.”

However, while the rise of Samsung and Apple’s fall may seem like a big deal, these results have a lot to do with timing and release schedule differences between the two companies.  Because the iPhone 4S did not come out until the end of the quarter, most of its sales were not included in these results.  In contrast, Samsung’s results were helped along with strong sales of Galaxy phones during the quarter.

Samsung’s rise to the top position is still impressive however, although there is also a lot of excitement surrounding the HTC results in what is the largest global market for smartphones.  “However you count it, HTC has become a deserved leader in the US smart phone market,” said Canalys analyst Chris Jones in a statement.

“This is an awesome achievement for HTC, which has built a premium brand in a highly competitive market in just a few short years. It now has a strong range of 4G Android products, with devices ranged by each of the major carriers, and offers some of the most compelling and differentiated products found on the platform today.”

• Android Becomes the Number One Smartphone OS
• Smartphone Sales Continue to Rise
• Android Becomes the Number One Smartphone Platform in the US
• Apple Become Third Largest PC Vendor
• When you Include the iPad, Apple Dominates the Mobile Computer Market

“We will be very late to market, but we will have some advantages and will play those cards to the best of our ability,” said Canonical founder Mark Shuttleworth, who is obviously very excited about the expansion of Ubuntu.  Shuttleworth went on to say this move is “probably the most significant broadening of scope in Ubuntu’s history.”

The company has already been designing their touch framework and Unity interface over the last few years, and this technology lies at the heart of this expansion.  “A key in the design of Unity was that we wanted to expand the scope of Ubuntu to a much broader range of form factors and categories of computing. Today it can stretch to a full range including tablets, TVs and all sorts of smart screens.”

“We think the time is right for a free software alternative to emerge as a partner for industry,” said Shuttleworth, adding “We think Ubuntu can be a de facto standard starting point for those building the next generation of devices around Linux.”

The new Ubuntu devices will be powered by hardware technology from Intel, ARM, and AMD, with the Ubuntu cloud service and Ubuntu Software Centre delivering storage, sharing, and syncing between multiple devices.  While individual products have not been announced, and Ubuntu has a lot of competition from Apple and Android devices, they offer a significant and very different take on mobile computing.

“We are determined to bring more free software to more people around the world, and building that future hand in hand with device manufacturers is the best way to do it,” wrote Shuttleworth in a recent blog post, adding: “There is no winner in place yet. This opportunity remains wide open, but only to products that deliver excellent experiences for users, across a full range of device categories.”

• Ubuntu Linux Ain’t Easy As Dell
• Skype
• Dell Releases Linux Desktops, Notebooks
• Microsoft Getting Ready for Tablets in 2011
• What You Should Know When Migrating From Windows to Linux

The Samsung Galaxy S II Skyrocket

The Samsung Galaxy S II Skyrocket features a 4.5 inch Super AMOLED display, with a resolution of 800 x 480 pixels.  It has a 1.5GHz processor and runs Android 2.3.5, also known as Gingerbread.  Other features include an 8MP rear facing camera with 1080p HD video recording, a 2MP front facing camera, and the ability to use microSD cards of up to 32GB.

The Samsung Galaxy S II Skyrocket will sell for $250 with a contract, which is not exactly the budget end of the smartphone market.  However, the spec sheet is quite impressive, and together with the AT&T network coverage, they may be able to get away with this price.

HTC Vivid

The HTC Vivid also features a 4.5 inch display, although it has a higher resolution at 540 x 960 pixels.  The processor on board the HTC Vivid is only 1.2GHz however, which is less than the Galaxy S II Skyrocket.  Other features include an 8MP camera, 1080p HD video recording, and 16GB of on board memory which is expandable to 32GB.

The HTC Vivid will sell for $199 under contract, which is still not a budget phone.  While both of these new offerings do look promising, many commentators were expecting AT&T to also release a budget 4G LTE option.  “I had hoped AT&T would come screaming out of the gate with something really cheap, like the Verizon Pantech, which is a $99 LTE device. We’re not seeing that at AT&T right now, and I think they’re missing the boat just a bit,” said Llamas from IDC in an interview with TechNewsWorld.

• Rumours and Spec Sheet for the New Samsung Galaxy Q Device
• Samsung Galaxy R, Almost As Good As Galaxy S II, Only Cheaper
• The Samsung Galaxy Tab 7 Plus
• Samaung Galaxy Tab 10.1 with Touchwiz UX Update
• The New 7 inch HTC Flyer Tablet

While Microsoft has not even released Windows 8 yet, ITG do have a history of running PC operating systems on mobile devices.  They released the original XPPhone a few years ago, which was capable of running Windows XP.  The new version will be capable of running the PC versions of both Windows 7 and Windows 8.

The big question is whether anyone really needs Windows 8 in their phone, especially considering the other dedicated options already out there.  However, some users will benefit from a powerful PC operating system in a mobile casing, and ITG have made sure that the hardware is up to the task.

The XPPhone 2 will feature a 1.6GHz processor, 2GB of RAM, and 112GB of storage on board.  The ITG website even mentions the possibility of an even more powerful 2GHz version to be released in the future.

Giving all this power, it is no surprise that ITG are calling this the “smallest notebook PC in the world”, as well as marketing it as a phone.  The XPPhone 2 will measure 140mm x 73mm x 17.5mm.

The marketing material for this device makes for some interesting reading, with the company seemingly happy with a dodgy translation for its official press release.  They also seem to have an unhealthy admiration of Apple and an interesting take on the state of mobile computing.  From the press release:

The Apple Inc. leaded by Steve Jobs has achieved an epoch-making breakthrough within only a few years. The design concept of it is to enjoy the music with ipod, to play games with iPad, to make calls with iPhone as well as to do the work with MacBook Air. All the products designed by the Apple are exquisite beyond compare; however, who is willing to go out with four pieces of devices. You should realize that there is some kind of weight although they are so eye-catching.

The design concept of xpPhone is “3C into one” integration, with one terminal device to integrate four equipments of the Apple Inc. When at home, xpPhone runs as a desktop PC host; in the outdoors, xpPhone works as a smart phone; in the office, xpPhone acts as a notebook connecting with Projector for lecturing;in the car, xpPhone can be used for GPS navigation.

• Windows Phone 7 Launch Figures not that Impressive
• The Likely State of Mobile App Development in 2011
• Samsung Seek Access to Next Generation iPhones and iPads
• Nokia Announce the “Sea Ray” Smartphone with Windows Phone 7
• Nextreaming NexPlayer brings HTTP Live to Android

While the Nokia Kinetic Device is only a prototype at this stage, it is certainly getting a lot of attention on the Internet.  It is not everyday that you get to see a completely new way of interfacing with a mobile device, especially one that is so tactile and immediate.


The phone shown off by Nokia featured a 4 inch flexible OLED display, which could be squeezed, bent, and twisted to control the software inside.  Different movements allow for familiar functionality, such as scrolling, zooming, and rotating.

While Nokia did not seem too keen to let their secrets out of the bag, the phone seems to be using a plastic substrate instead of glass.  There is not much more information about this technology available at the moment, although you can see a video of the Nokia Kinetic Device in action here.

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• Nokia Announce the “Sea Ray” Smartphone with Windows Phone 7
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• Apple to Switch from LCD to OLED Displays for iPad 3?