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Tag: download

  • Flappy Bird- Gone And Back Again

    Are you a fan of the difficult but fun app known as Flappy Bird? As of early this morning, Flappy Bird was no longer available to be downloaded from the Apple App Store or Google Play.

    The game has become increasingly popular over the last few weeks and was among the top games downloaded for both Apple and Android users. The game requires players to use their touch screens to direct their bird through the air and through an obstacle of tubes. If the bird hits a tube, it dies and the player loses a life.

    Players must try to score as many points as they can before their bird dies and although the game may sound simple, it is extremely hard. Players can rack up a score as high as 9,999, but most never make it to double digits. Oddly, the difficulty of the game is what has made it so popular.

    With such popularity, it is hard to understand why the game would be pulled. Developer Dong Nguyen announced his decision to take down the game in several tweets to fans. He did not reveal the reason behind his decision to remove the popular game, and many fans are demanding answers.

    After a backlash from fans, the developer seemed to quickly change his mind. He began tweeting that if he could get several different amounts of likes by the deadline, he would not remove the game. After removing it Sunday morning, he tweeted that he was working on bringing it back.

    Nguyen’s twitter ramblings have led many people to wonder what is going on with him. Was he simply taking the game down for the media attention? Did he only threaten to take it down to get more followers and downloads? Why was he so upset about his successful app?

    We may never know what happened to make Nguyen want to take down the app, but Flappy Bird fans can breathe a sigh of relief knowing that their game will soon be back and available for download.

    Why do you think the Flappy Bird developer chose to remove the game and then bring it back a short time later?

    Image via YouTube.

  • New Anti-Piracy Plan: Kindergarten Copyright Class?

    The United States’ largest copyright lobbies, the Motion Picture Association of America and the Recording Industry Association of America, have initiated a highly controversial program nudging the educational system to shoulder the burden of teaching kids about how evil piracy really is.

    The LA Times reports that a nonprofit group known as the Center for Copyright Information has commissioned a program to teach kids between kindergarten and sixth grade about intellectual property ownership.

    The program is to be called “Be a Creator,” and the proposed curriculum includes lesson plans, videos, and activities that promote “being creative and protecting creativity” with topics like: Respect the Person: Give Credit; It’s Great to Create; and Copyright Matters.

    The president of a nonprofit organization (iKeepSafe) that focuses on helping keep kids safe on the internet, Marsali Hancock, defended the program by saying “It’s important to prepare children to succeed and thrive and learn how to share and create and move files in a way that’s ethical and responsible.”

    Even though nothing of the plan has even been written yet, the idea of implementing it has come under intense scrutiny. Frank Wells, a spokesman for the California Teachers Association, said “While it’s certainly a worthy topic of discussion with students, I’m sure some teachers would have a concern that adding anything of any real length to an already packed school day would take away from the basic curriculum that they’re trying to get through now.”

    In one curriculum draft acquired by Wired a couple months ago, a property attorney described the information being disseminated as “thinly disguised propaganda” because the program omits any mention of the concept of Fair Usage, such as satire, parody, or commentary.

    Corynne McSherry, the intellectual property director for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, said “It sends the message that you always have to get permission before you can copy anything and that sharing is always theft and that if you violate copyright law all kinds of bad things will happen to you. It’s a scare tactic.”

    Stephen Smith, a managing partner with Greenberg Glusker and an expert on copyright law, said “The idea that time would be taken out of kids’ days to teach them copyright law, when they ought to be learning reading, writing and arithmetic, I find to be strange… I just don’t think it’s appropriate curriculum for kindergartners to sixth-graders.”

    Meanwhile, in spite of the MPAA’s constant whinging about immense profit losses caused by online piracy, recently conducted economics studies suggested that their “losses” are sensationally inflated and that the music and film industries are fiscally performing better than ever.

    [Image via ThinkStock]

  • New Downloadable Content For Uncharted 3 April 10

    Naughty dog had announced a new DLC for Uncharted 3, to be released in just a few days: April 10 to be exact.

    The DLC comes in the form of a new map pack that includes four new environments at a cost of $10. If you are a member of the Fortune Hunters’ Club, the download is free. Well, it is included in the $25 fee that grants access to 14 extra downloads for the game. If you are an avid fan of Crake’s adventures, this may be the way to go, but the promotion ends April 17.

    The new maps (pictured at the top of this article) are Oasis, Old Quarter, London Streets, and Graveyard.

    Each of them contain some form of action event that takes place during gameplay. In Graveyard, a patrol boat circles the island launching grenades at the players. In Oasis, passing planes drop supply crates filled with power weapons. Just don’t stand directly under them, you will get squashed.

    This will not be the last of the DLC for Uncharted 3, according to developer Naughty Dog. The company is in communication with forum members to get ideas from fans about future downloads.

    A big nod to Gamestop for this video from the creators and stars about the real historic background of some of Uncharted 3’s inspirations. This doesn’t really have anything to do with the downloadable content; it’s just interesting.

  • Apple Ups 3G Download Limit To 50 MB

    On the heels of their big new iPad unveiling party, Apple has officially raised the size limit on apps downloaded via data network (3G, and now 4G LTE). Before, users could only download an app over 3G if it was under 20MB. If it exceeded that size, users would see a message that ever iOS’er is quite used to: “This item is over 20MB – You must connect to a Wi-Fi network or use iTunes on your computer to download it.”

    Now, that limit has been raised to 50MB, as first spotted by AppAdvice. This new limit now applies to all types of media – music, videos, and apps.

    The reason for this change most certainly has to do with the new iPad that was announced earlier this afternoon. It sports a super high-def Retina display with a 2048×1536 resolution. That means that Apple has crammed 3.1 million pixels into its 9.7-inch screen.

    This upgrade was reported to be a problem for over-the-air app downloads, as many files now had to be larger to support both the new Retina display as well as the older, less-capable displays. This meant that too many apps would cross that 20MB threshold and thus only be available for download via wireless.

    The new iPad will not only have the retina display, but will come with 4G LTE as well. It will hits stores on March 16th and will start at $499.

  • The Pirate Bay Wants You To Download A Car

    The Pirate Bay Wants You To Download A Car

    Remember that old piracy ad that said, “You wouldn’t download a car.” Well, The Pirate Bay is wanting to make that a reality.

    They announced today on their blog the addition of Physibles, data objects that are able to become physical. They believe that 3D printers are leading the charge into a future where we’ll be able to download everything from cars to food.

    Today most data is born digitally. It’s not about the transition from analog to digital anymore. We don’t talk about how to rip anything without losing quality since we make perfect 1 to 1 digital copies of things. Music, movies, books, all come from the digital sphere. But we’re physical people and we need objects to touch sometimes as well!

    The benefit to society is huge. No more shipping huge amount of products around the world. No more shipping the broken products back. No more child labour. We’ll be able to print food for hungry people. We’ll be able to share not only a recipe, but the full meal. We’ll be able to actually copy that floppy, if we needed one.

    The current list of physibles available to download are a Pirate Bay pirate ship, a whistle, a tabletop robot model and a 1970 Chevelle Hot Rod model. As a joke, there is also a 3D printable Chris Dodd.

    They firmly believe that the future of sharing is their new physible data. They joke that they should rename themselves The Product Bay, but they had no graphical artist to make it. They claim that in the future, they’ll be able to download one.

    For those who aren’t aware, 3D printing is considered the future of art and item creation. It allows users to scan in a 3D object and create the same object via a layering technique that creates the parts. The price of 3D printers is expected to come down this year making them financially accessible to regular consumers.

    For a handy primer, here’s a video explaining the power of 3D printing:

  • Comcast Offering 105Mbps Broadband To Major Markets

    Comcast Offering 105Mbps Broadband To Major Markets

    Today, over 40 million homes which have Comcast internet service will be able to sign up for Extreme 105. This is the Comcast offering which will provide users a 105Mbps download speed and a 10Mbps upload speed. The service has been marketed since last year, and it now looks as though Comcast is ready to implement the service.

    Initially, the service will only be available to the major markets: San Francisco, Seattle, Washington D.C., and Philadelphia. There are plans to roll out Extreme 105 to some of the smaller markets at a later date.

    The upgrade presents a much needed speed increase, as the US struggles to catch up with other countries in terms of internet speed. Om Malik, of GigaOm, presents some caveats with Extreme 105. The service will be $105/month if you sign up for the Triple-Play plan which includes television and phone; services that cost extra. If you want the 105MBps plan on its own, it will cost you $199. Along with the price tag, the 250 GB bandwidth cap will be attached to the service as well.

    Extreme 105 is based on Comcast’s DOCSIS 3.0 technology, which they rolled out with the 50Mbps service last year. With the tech, Comcast boasts that users can download HD movies in five minutes and full music albums in a matter of seconds.

  • Firefox 4 Available a Day Prior To Official Release

    Firefox 4 Available a Day Prior To Official Release

    Hot on the heels of the Internet Explorer 9 release, Firefox 4 is officially releasing tomorrow (March 22nd). However, for those who can’t wait another minute, the unofficial download is available. As with things of this nature, WebProNews doesn’t condone unauthorized downloading, and so on and so forth.

    It was discovered that the final release for Firefox 4 was up on their FTP server, which was then subsequently provided to users though numerous websites. Mozilla strongly discourages these direct downloads, as the current location isn’t equipped for massive traffic. So if you feel like being courteous to Mozilla, wait until tomorrow.

    If you visit the index.html file on the FTP server, you’ll be met with the following message:

    Firefox 4 message

    According to the website Fileforum, they’ve already had over 60,000 downloads for Windows since releasing the links on their site. There are also clients for both Linux and Mac.

    It’s been nearly eight months since the original Firefox 4 beta was released publicly. Mozilla has been scrutinized for pushing back their initial release date which was supposed to happen last fall. We’ll all be able to find out either today, or tomorrow, whether or not the wait was worth it.

    The battle for our browser usage has a new chapter, and it will certainly be interesting to see who is able to gain and who will fall back. Though I don’t condone anyone using Mozilla’s FTP server, if you get an early download, feel free to share your thoughts on it below.

  • Internet Explorer 9 Reaches 2.3 Million Downloads In 24 Hours

    Internet Explorer 9 Reaches 2.3 Million Downloads In 24 Hours

    Microsoft announced today their latest version of Internet Explorer reached 2.3 million downloads in 24 hours. Will IE9 be the catalyst to allow Microsoft to gain some ground back in market share?

    The past few years, IE has steadily lost ground to the likes of Mozilla’s Firefox and Google Chrome. In 2007, IE controlled 80% of the market. The latest reports have them sitting at 57%.

    Simplistic interfaces, faster load times, better security, have all been reasons behind IE losing ground. It appears Microsoft has remedied many of these problems, and reviews have pointed out these improvements.

    PCMagazine gave IE9 a 4/5 rating, saying this of the browser, “Microsoft’s new browser is faster, trimmer, more compliant with HTML5—a major improvement over its predecessor. It also brings some unique capabilities like tab-pinning and hardware acceleration, but only Windows 7 and Vista users need apply.”

    Unfortunately I’m unable to provide my own thoughts as I’m on a Mac computer at this time. If you have a Windows computer and use XP, you’ll be left out in the cold as well.

    While it has a small window of platforms for which it’s available, IE9 has these improvements listed on their product page: pinned sites (for Windows 7 users), tracking protection, InPrivate browsing, HTML5 compatibility, and more.

    One feature I’m excited to see in motion is how IE9 will share the burden of graphics rendering with the GPU on more graphic intensive websites. HTML5 is supposed to push the capabilities of graphics integration, and being the go-to browser for this integration could be a strong investment for the browser’s future.

    Firefox 4 will release next Tuesday; this version has been in beta since July 2010. The release certainly will provide IE9 with some staunch competition out of the gate. In a couple of weeks it will be interesting to see how the pieces of market share will be divided up. Many have switched to Google Chrome as well, providing a third option in the market.

    Has anyone had the opportunity to use IE9 yet? If so, are the improvements as great as many reviewers have been letting on? Or are you still waiting for Firefox 4?

  • Data Suggests Mobile Apps Will Surpass CD in Sales By 2012

    Just how big is the market for mobile apps?

    Global mobile apps will be worth $17.5 billion by 2012, according to an independent report commissioned by app store GetJar. Mobile app downloads across all types of handset are also expected to increase from over 7 billion downloads in 2009 to almost 50 billion in 2012 – a year on year growth rate of 92%. 

    This would mean that the value of apps sold would be greater than the projected $13.83 billion value of CDs sold in 2012.

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