Shopping around for a good broadband company or mobile carrier may soon be as easy as shopping for cereal, thanks to the introduction of broadband consumer labels by the FCC for both fixed and mobile broadband.
Whether you have AT&T, Verizon, Sprint, T-Mobile, or any other mobile carrier, chances are your smartphone is sold locked to only work on that specific carrier's network. Sure, you could unlock your carrier-subsidized device, but that would mean breaching the Library of Congress' latest Interpretation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act—making the whole process illegal. As softModders, boundaries and regulations are things that we don't take lightly, although many times we have to begrudg...
UPDATE (February 26, 2014) Yesterday, the U.S. House of Representatives passed H.R. 1123 with a 295-114 vote decision. The ruling repeals the 2012 Library of Congress (LOC) decision that limited the ability to legally "unlock" your smartphone (see below).
In years past, the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) mostly dabbled in the future as far as the long-term vision for augmented reality was concerned. This year, however, objects in the future are much closer than they appear.
If there's any lingering uncertainty as to the mainstream viability of augmented reality, a list of the top mobile apps and games of 2019 serves to dispell those doubts.
While a viable version of consumer-grade smartglasses has yet to find mainstream success, two more contenders emerged this week, as Vuzix confirmed that a leak of a fashion-forward design is legitmate and Vivo introduced tethered smartglasses designed to pair with its new 5G smartphone.
The annual Augmented World Expo (AWE) typically packs the front page of Next Reality with new products and services from companies in the augmented reality industry.
A year after making a splash at the annual Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas with Amazon Alexa integration, smartglasses maker Vuzix is bringing a notable weather app to its Blade smartglasses for the 2019 edition of the conference.
The recent announcement of a $480 million US Army contract awarded to Microsoft over Magic Leap for supplying 100,000 augmented reality headsets shows just a how lucrative the enterprise (and government) sector can be for AR.
Augmented reality was recently named the "Mobile Disruptor of the Year" for 2017 by Mobile Marketer, but the technology is showing no signs of slowing down as we head into 2018. In fact, the technology appears to be gaining momentum.
When a firm like Techstars believes that augmented reality is an attractive industry to invest in, there's a high probability that it's right.
The Kinect is finally here, poised to make game consumers forget the Wii ever existed. If you've got a Kinect, gotten it all plugged in, but are wondering what to do next, watch this video. It will walk you through the process of setting up and configuring your Kinect on the XBox so that it works as well as possible.
As far as the world of consumer electronics goes, it doesn't get much greener than recycling solar panels. In this video tutorial, you'll learn how to solder together broken solar panels, giving them new life as a functional AA battery charger, which produces about 6 volts in direct sunlight and about 3 volts indoors. In order to get started on this hack, you'll need a number broken solar panels (which can be had cheap for cheap on the Internet), a low-temperature soldering iron, silver-beari...
In this video tutorial, we learn how to listen to audiobooks on a portable MP3 player like the Apple iPod. For more information, including a complete demonstration and detailed, step-by-step instructions, watch this consumer electronics how-to from the folks at CNET.
Do you like to try out the latest electronics before they come out? Do you hate it when you have to send back test products you do get your hands on? Watch this video to learn how you can get companies to send you products to review and let you keep them afterwards.
If you have created a product and want to start selling it, watch this video. It will give you some general ideas for steps you can take to market your product and attract interest from consumers and investors.
Adobe Photoshop Elements is the consumer version of the Adobe Photoshop raster image editing product. In this video tutorial you will learn to use the cookie cutter tool in Photoshop Elements 4.0 to create shapes out of your photos. The tool is great for creating signs and logos.
This week's Apple earnings offered a report of solid performance and guarded optimism about future iPhone sales, which may be impacted later this year by issues around the current coronavirus epidemic in China.
While consumer-grade smartglasses are the holy grail for tech companies, smartglasses maker Vuzix knows where its bread is buttered, and that's in the enterprise segment.
Despite the launch of ARKit a year ago, and ARCore this year, a true killer app has not arrived for either platform, that's according to the head honcho for one of the leading development environments for 3D applications.
Bokeh (which translates to "blur" in Japanese) is a photography technique referring to the blurred areas of a photograph. Basic bokeh photographs often have one point of focus, while the background falls away into a dreamy, blurred haze.
The iPhone 4 is one of the most divisive pieces of consumer electronics ever released. Its defective antenna has ruffled the feathers of even the most diehard Apple enthusiasts. This video will show you how to fix the antennagate issue using only some Scotch tape, which when applied to the proper place, will keep the antenna from grounding itself on the metal piece below, which is what causes the phone to lose signal when you hold it.
Learn how to care for your pet with help from VetVid. See how to prepare an insulin syringe to inject a diabetic cat with this video tutorial.
Learn how to care for your pet with help from VetVid. See how to give your diabetic cat an insulin injection with this video tutorial.
Etsy is the place to get all your handmade needs and wants met. Etsy encourages personal connections between sellers and consumers. On Etsy you can connect with the handmade and crafty communities, and learn more about the process of making handmade goods like soaps, candles, invitations and more.
With the consumer edition of its Nreal Light headset, scheduled to ship in 2020, Nreal is prepared to bring the entire Android app ecosystem into augmented reality.
Did Google CEO Sundar Pichai kill Google Glass for non-enterprise users? That's the obvious first question following news that non-enterprise Glass users will no longer have access to Google's core apps after February 2020.
Suddenly, Magic Leap's lawsuit against Nreal, as well as its barrier to entry in the Chinese market, appears to be as insurmountable as The Great Wall itself.
The landscape of augmented reality marketing is growing by leaps and bounds nearly every month, with Hollywood and the cosmetics industry leading the way.
Just over two months ago, smartglasses startup North opened the doors at its two brick-and-mortar retail locations in Toronto and New York and began accepting orders for Focals. On Thursday, the company announced that those initial customers can get ready to pick up their wearables, as the first shipments have now arrived in stores.
Last year at CES, RealMax blew away the AR headset competition with a prototype AR headset surpassing 100 degrees field of view.
Smartglasses maker Epson remains the top gun in the drone market with its Moverio line of wearables, and the company is further elevating its offerings with its new Drone SoAR app for DJI drones.
The rite of passage for every tech product, formally known as Federal Communications Commission (FCC) certification, has come for the Magic Leap One: Creator Edition.
While Vuzix is beefing up the processing power of its next-generation smartglasses with the Qualcomm Snapdragon XR1, the company will also give its devices an upgraded display engine.
Confirming a previous report from last week, Qualcomm announced its Snapdragon X1 platform designed for augmented and virtual reality devices during an event at the Augmented World Expo in Santa Clara on Tuesday, with Meta and Vuzix among the first manufacturers to adopt it.
The price tag for the Microsoft HoloLens might be out of range for the average consumer's budget, but for enterprises, like BAE Systems, adopting the AR headset is yielding a return on the investment. And for those with even slimmer wallets, Best Buy just made the Lenovo Mirage, part of the Star Wars: Jedi Challenges package, more affordable.
On Thursday, waveguide maker WaveOptics announced that semiconductor and microelectromechanical systems supplier EV Group (EVG) will provide the manufacturing infrastructure for the production of its waveguide displays designed to support lower-cost, third-party augmented reality wearables.
In an effort to help its advertising partners close sales with its sponsored augmented reality camera effects, Snapchat has launched a set of e-commerce tools designed to encourage users to buy products directly in the app.
Among consumer brands, cosmetics companies rival furniture retailers as the quickest to adopt augmented reality as a means to help customers visualize how products will look before they buy them.
Rabbit ears and dog noses are fun and all, but Kay Jewelers is here to class up Snapchat.
