Daily Marauder

TECHNOLOGY

NASA, Google, and some of the foremost authorities in science and technology have teamed up to create a new school, dubbed Singularity University, that is looking to solve “humanity’s grand challenges”. The university is named after the idea of the singularity – an extremely rapid period of technological progress. And damn if it doesn’t sound like the coolest school ever. (http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/02/02/world-renowned-scientists-team-with-google-and-nasa-to-launch-singularity-university 2/2)

Microsoft Windows, which is used by 88.26% of computers accessing the Internet, saw its share of the operating system market fall more than four-tenths of a percentage point in January compared with the previous month, according to Web tracking firm Net Applications. On the plus side, Apple’s Mac OS X, which has 9.93% of the market, was up three-tenths of a percentage point. InformationWeek (2/3)

Panasonic in April will debut a pair of plasma TVs that are thinner and consume far less electricity than its current offerings. The 50-inch version will be about an inch deep, use an estimated 260 kilowatt-hours of electricity a year and, along with a 54-inch model, initially be available in Japan before migrating to North American markets this summer. Reuters (2/3)

For all those oldies-but-goodies trapped on audio cassettes, Alesis has come out with a system to transfer recordings from the bygone platform to today’s digital devices, such as CDs, iPods and flash memory drives. The new TapeLink USB is a dual-cassette gadget that connects to a computer via USB port and can collect audio from either metal or CrO2 tapes. Electronista (2/2)

Verizon has introduced its $200 “Hub” VoIP phone, which works over any broadband connection, calling it the first custom-made device that integrates with such Verizon Wireless services as text messaging, navigation and Chaperone. The telecom disclosed several partners for the touch-screen Hub: OpenPeak, Fandango, Navteq and Time. Wireless Week (2/2) , TVWeek.com (2/2)