Drawing with a mouse is like writing with a cat: The average person can make some marks and possibly express themselves, but to truly create a work of art without scarring is a difficult endeavor.
Drawing with a mouse is like writing with a cat: The average person can make some marks and possibly express themselves, but to truly create a work of art without scarring is a difficult endeavor.
Wacom has a couple of new products that will help you bridge the input display gap, and they’re showing them off this morning at PMA.
Wacom has added two new products to their Cintiq line:
Now that your shiny new ultracompact digicam can capture HD video that 1GB card is going to fill up after about only 15 minutes of recording. Lucky for you, SanDisk just announced their new 32GB SDHC chip at PMA08. The…
Now that your shiny new ultracompact digicam can capture HD video that 1GB card is going to fill up after about only 15 minutes of recording.
Delkin’s ImageRouter is for photogs who are in need of some serious dumpage, and fast. The basic unit lets you unload four Compact Flash cards simultaneously. The thing takes up about as much room as the Xbox 360’s power brick, though fortunately it doesn’t weigh a metric ton. If you want to get stupid ridiculous, you can daisy-chain two blocks together onto the powered USB port to handle a total of eight CF cards. Unfortunately the software doesn’t work for Macs yet, so if you plugged it into one you’d just see four separate drives, killing the convenience factor of dumping about a million pics at once. It’s $149 w/o software, jumping to $249 with the Windows-only utility. [Product Page]
The Maxablaster is a 38-million-candlepower flashlight that was made at home by (mad?) optics engineer Ralf Ottow. Replacing a commercial flashlight’s bulb with a plasma-powered mercury arc bulb, the Maxablaster creates a highly focused beam of light with a high UV content not so different from a star.
So UV-filtering glass was added to block the potentially harmful rays—though evidently this thing is still plenty bright enough to burn skin, as it has Ottow’s on at least one occasion. In real world application, the flashlight can illuminate a cloud that’s four miles in the air, or scare the neighbors by lighting up their home from the same distance.
One things for sure: when the vampires finally come out of hiding (a few hundred years after the robot apocalypse) we’re calling this guy.
And then we’re gonna be all like, “I see your Schwartz is as large as mine.” (Sorry, we held that joke back until our arms were trembling.) [popsci]
History’s Greatest Gadgets It’s not all about circuits, silicon and stock options: mankind’s been making technology since the dawn of time. Here’s ten of the most wonderful gadgets from centuries—and millenia—past. No “ThyPhone” jokes, if you please!
It’s not all about circuits, silicon and stock options: mankind’s been making technology since the dawn of time. Here’s ten of the most wonderful gadgets from centuries—and millenia—past. No “ThyPhone” jokes, if you please!
Antikythera Personal c. 1st Century B.C.
It took scientists a century—and the help of a $500,000 x-ray tomography system—to finally unravel the Antikythera Mechanism’s mysteries. Discovered in 1900 amid the remains of an ancient shipwreck, the device survived only as a heavily corroded mechanism and countless scattered lumps of metal. At first, it played second fiddle to the classical statues found alongside it. With the discovery that it contained a differential gear—thought to be an 18th-century
Intel and Micron are promising zippier gadgets with a fast new variation on flash memory. The companies’ IM Flash Technologies joint operation has come up with an 8-bit NAND memory chip that can read data at speeds up to 200…
Intel and Micron are promising zippier gadgets with a fast new variation on flash memory. The companies’ IM Flash Technologies joint operation has come up with an 8-bit NAND memory chip that can read data at speeds up to 200 million bytes per second and write at 100 million bytes per second, several times faster than current chips.
Chips will start mass production late this year, and devices using them — mostly high-end camera and video devices to start — are already being designed.
While getting a laptop with an SSD inside is still ridiculously expensive, it won’t be that way for long. That’s because the price of flash memory is plummeting, with it dropping 75% in the last 5 months alone. In fact, 1GB chipsets are selling for as low as $2.23, with 4GB chipsets going for as low as $12.30.
What’s that mean for you and me? Well, it means that a, say, 32GB iPhone isn’t too far off, and that the days of platter hard drives in personal are numbered. If the trend of dropping prices continues, within a couple more years they’ll be nearing the low prices of HDDs we’re seeing now, and we’ll all enjoy faster, more reliable, more energy efficient storage in all of our devices. Until then, you’re still gonna have to do what you’ve been doing: wait. [Yahoo via Electronista]
It seems that Bill is going to eat more than one burger before he leaves Microsoft. After countless rumors, it is now official: they want to buy Yahoo for $31 per share, for a total of $44.6 billion in cash and stock. Check The Other Steve’s love letter to the Yahoo board of directors after the jump and take our poll: what do you consider the idea of a MS Yahoo roaming the Intarwebs?
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January 31, 2008
Board of Directors Yahoo! Inc. 701 First Avenue Sunnyvale, CA 94089 Attention: Roy Bostock, Chairman Attention: Jerry Yang, Chief Executive Officer
Dear Members of the Board:
I am writing on behalf of the Board of Directors of Microsoft to make a proposal for a business combination of Microsoft and Yahoo!. Under our proposal, Microsoft would acquire all of the outstanding shares of Yahoo! common stock for per share consideration of $31 based on Microsoft’s closing share price on January 31, 2008, payable in the form of $31 in cash or 0.9509 of a share of Microsoft common stock. Microsoft would provide each Yahoo! shareholder with the capability to select whether to receive the consideration in cash or Microsoft common stock, subject to pro-ration so that in the aggregate one-half of the Yahoo! common shares will be exchanged for shares of Microsoft common stock and one-half of the Yahoo! common shares will be converted into the right to receive cash. Our proposal isn’t subject to any financing condition.
Our proposal represents a 62% premium above the closing price of Yahoo! common stock of $19.18 on January 31, 2008. The implied premium for the operating assets of the company clearly is considerably greater when adjusted for the minority, non-controlled assets and cash. By whatever financial measure you use - EBITDA, free cash flow, operating cash flow, net income, or analyst target prices - this proposal represents a compelling value realization event for your shareholders.
We believe that Microsoft common stock represents a very attractive investment opportunity for Yahoo!’s shareholders. Microsoft has generated revenue growth of 15%, earnings growth of 26%, and a return on equity of 35% on average for the last three years. Microsoft’s share price has generated shareholder returns of 8% during the last one year period and 28% during the last three year period, significantly outperforming the S&P 500. It is our view that Microsoft has significant potential upside given the continued solid growth in our core businesses, the recent launch of Windows Vista, and other strategic initiatives.
Microsoft’s consistent belief has been that the combination of Microsoft and Yahoo! clearly represents the best way to deliver maximum value to our respective shareholders, as well as create a more efficient and competitive company that would provide greater value and service to our customers. In late 2006 and early 2007, we jointly explored a broad range of ways in which our two companies might work together. These discussions were based on a vision that the on the internet businesses of Microsoft and Yahoo! should be aligned in some way to create a more effective competitor in the online marketplace. We discussed a number of alternatives ranging from commercial partnerships to a merger proposal, which you rejected. While a commercial partnership might have made sense at one time, Microsoft believes that the only substitute now is the combination of Microsoft and Yahoo! that we’re proposing.
In February 2007, I received a letter from your Chairman indicating the view of the Yahoo! Board that “now is not the right time from the perspective of our shareholders to enter into discussions regarding an acquisition transaction.” According to that letter, the principal reason for this view was the Yahoo! Board’s confidence in the “potential upside” if management successfully executed on a reformulated strategy based on certain operational initiatives, such as Project Panama, and a significant organizational realignment. A year has gone by, and the competitive situation has not improved. While on the web advertising growth continues, there are significant benefits of scale in advertising platform economics, in capital costs for search index build-out, and in research and development, making this a time of industry consolidation and convergence. This day, the market is increasingly dominated by one player who is consolidating its dominance through acquisition. Together, Microsoft and Yahoo! can offer a credible alternative for consumers, advertisers, and publishers.
Synergies of this combination fall into four areas:
Scale economics: This combination enables synergies related to scale economics of the advertising platform where this day there’s only one competitor at scale. This includes synergies across both search and non-search related advertising that will strengthen the value proposition to both advertisers and publishers. Additionally, the combination allows us to consolidate capital spending.
Expanded R&D capacity: The combined talent of our engineering resources can be focused on R&D priorities such as a single search index and single advertising platform. Together we have the ability to unleash new levels of innovation, delivering enhanced user experiences, breakthroughs in search, and new advertising platform capabilities. Many of these breakthroughs are a function of an engineering scale that today neither of our companies has on its own.
Operational efficiencies: Eliminating redundant infrastructure and duplicative operating costs will improve the financial performance of the combined entity.
Emerging user experiences: Our combined capability to focus engineering resources that drive innovation in emerging scenarios such as video, mobile services, on the internet commerce, social media, and social platforms is greatly enhanced. We would value the chance to further discuss with you how to optimize the integration of our respective businesses to create a leading global technology company with exceptional display and search advertising abilities. You should also be aware that we intend to offer significant retention packages to your engineers, key leaders and employees across all disciplines.
We have dedicated considerable time and resources to an analysis of a potential transaction and are confident that the combination will receive all necessary regulatory approvals. We look forward to discussing this with you, and both our internal legal team and outside counsel are available to meet with your counsel at their earliest convenience. Our proposal is subject to the negotiation of a definitive merger agreement and our having the opportunity to conduct certain limited and confirmatory due diligence. In addition, because a portion of the aggregate merger consideration would consist of Microsoft common stock, we would provide Yahoo! the chance to conduct appropriate limited due diligence with respect to Microsoft. We are prepared to deliver a draft merger agreement to you and start discussions immediately. In light of the significance of this proposal to your shareholders and ours, as well as the potential for selective disclosures, our intention is to publicly release the text of this letter tomorrow morning.
Due to the importance of these discussions and the value represented by our proposal, we anticipate the Yahoo! Board to engage in a full review of our proposal. My leadership team and I would be happy to make ourselves available to meet with you and your Board at your earliest convenience. Depending on the nature of your response, Microsoft reserves the right to pursue all necessary steps to ensure that Yahoo!’s shareholders are provided with the chance to realize the value inherent in our proposal.
We believe this proposal represents a one-of-a-kind chance to create significant value for Yahoo!’s shareholders and employees, and the combined company will be better positioned to provide an enhanced value proposition to users and advertisers. We hope that you and your Board share our enthusiasm, and we look forward to a prompt and favorable reply.
Sincerely yours, Steven A. Ballmer Chief Executive Officer Microsoft Corporation
Delkin’s ImageRouter is for photogs who are in need of some serious dumpage, and fast. The basic unit lets you unload four Compact Flash cards simultaneously. The thing takes up about as much room as the Xbox 360’s power brick, though fortunately it doesn’t weigh a metric ton. If you want to get stupid ridiculous, you can daisy-chain two blocks together onto the powered USB port to handle a total of eight CF cards. Unfortunately the software doesn’t work for Macs yet, so if you plugged it into one you’d just see four separate drives, killing the convenience factor of dumping about a million pics at once. It’s $149 w/o software, jumping to $249 with the Windows-only utility. [
The Maxablaster is a 38-million-candlepower flashlight that was made at home by (mad?) optics engineer Ralf Ottow. Replacing a commercial flashlight’s bulb with a plasma-powered mercury arc bulb, the Maxablaster creates a highly focused beam of light with a high UV content not so different from a star. 
Antikythera Personal 
While getting a laptop with an 
It seems that Bill is going to eat 
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