Apple updated OS X to version 10.7.3 today, which fixed a number of minor issues—but caused many big ones with some users. If you’re finding that apps are crashing as soon as you launch them, here’s how to fix it. More »

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Mac OS X Bug Causing All Apps to Crash in 10.7.3; Here’s the Somewhat Complicated Fix [Troubleshooting]

For now, voice over LTE is but an idea — one with unrealized potential, as Verizon, AT&T and Metro PCS all still rely on their 3G networks for voice duty. Qualcomm has edged us one step closer to a completely 4G future, though, with the first successful test of a mid-call LTE to WCDMA transfer. Using one of its own chipsets, specifically an MSM8960 Snapdragon S4, the company successfully utilized Single Radio Voice Call Continuity to switch from a VoIP-over-LTE connection to a traditional voice channel over WCDMA. It might seem like a small victory, but it’s one that’s an essential step towards and entirely LTE-dependent network. Check out the complete PR after the break.

Continue reading Qualcomm chips complete first successful VoIP-over-LTE to WCDMA handoff

Qualcomm chips complete first successful VoIP-over-LTE to WCDMA handoff originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 02 Feb 2012 10:01:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Qualcomm chips complete first successful VoIP-over-LTE to WCDMA handoff

A French court has ruled that Google’s free Google Maps application API is anti-competitive and has ordered the company to pay €500,000 to Bottin Cartographes, a for-pay map company, as well as a €15,000 fine. Bottin Cartographes argued that Google was only planning to give away the service for free until all the competitors had been driven out of business and then they would start charging. This seems implausible to me, and contrary to Google’s business model (give away services, make money from mining the use of those services). Google says it will appeal.

“This is the end of a two-year battle, a decision without precedent,” said the lawyer for Bottin Cartographes, Jean-David Scemmama.

“We proved the illegality of (Google’s) strategy to remove its competitors… the court recognised the unfair and abusive character of the methods used and allocated Bottin Cartographes all it claimed. This is the first time Google has been convicted for its Google Maps application,” he said.

I wonder what Bottin Cartographes will do when OpenStreetMaps finishes producing high-quality, free, public domain maps of France that can be used to create APIs of the same scope and utility?

France convicts Google Maps for unfair competition

(via Engadget)

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French court rules that it’s illegally anticompetitive for Google to provide free maps API

A U.S. government crackdown on suspected identity thieves filing false tax returns stopped $1.4 billion in bad refunds from being sent out in calendar 2011, the tax-collecting Internal Revenue Service said on Tuesday.

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ID theft investigation stops $1.4B in tax refunds

redletterdave writes “Singaporean researchers have created a miniature robot with a pincer and a hook that can remove early-stage stomach cancers without leaving any scars. Mounted on an endoscope, it enters the patient’s gut through the mouth. It has a pincer to hold cancerous tissues, and a hook that slices them off and coagulates blood to stop bleeding. With the help of a tiny camera attached to the endoscope, the surgeon sees what’s inside the gut and controls the robotic arms remotely while sitting in front of a monitor screen. The robot has already helped remove early-stage stomach cancers in five patients in Hong Kong and India, using a fraction of the time normally taken in open and keyhole surgeries that put patients at higher risk of infection and leave behind scars.”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Crab Robot Helps Remove Stomach Cancer

Mac OS X: CCleaner for Mac has been in beta for awhile, but now Mac users can enjoy the final version of our favorite Windows utilities. If you’re a little starved for disk space or just want to engage in some early Spring cleaning on your Mac, CCleaner is now finished, stable, and ready to help you out. More »

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CCleaner for Mac Comes Out of Beta, Adds New Browser and Disk Cleaning Features [Mac Downloads]

By creating these lights with the exact same form factor as a fluorescent bulb, NetLED has made it incredibly easy to upgrade the lighting in a store or office to its LED tubes, which can also be remotely controlled over Wi-Fi. More »

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Wi-Fi Controlled LED Tubes Make For Easy Office Upgrades [Video]

A single species of bacteria is responsible for tooth decay. But until now, mouthwash has worked by sterilizing your maw wholesale. But why go Death Star v. Alderaan on it when you could just kill off that one bad species? This is exactly what Colgate has done and the result could mean an end to cavities—forever. More »

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New, Targeted Mouthwash Could Eliminate Tooth Decay "Within Our Lifetimes" [Medicine]

Facebook announced new usage milestones in its S-1 filing today: 845 million monthly active users including 425 million users who access the service on mobile devices.

The company had last claimed 800 million monthly active users and 350 million mobile monthly active users at its f8 developer conference in September.

Overall, that means the social network has seen a 39 percent increase in monthly active users since December 2010. It saw particularly strong growth in Brazil with a 268 percent increase year-over-year and India with a 132 percent increase. Notably, both of these markets were strongholds for Orkut, an early rival social networking service from Google.

In the U.S., Facebook is starting to hit its saturation point with 161 million monthly active users, a 16 percent increase from the previous year.

It comes as little surprise that a large percentage of users return regularly. Facebook has long said that half of its users access the site daily. The social network had 483 million daily active users in December 2011, an 48 percent increase since December 2010. According to the company’s IPO filing today, 360 million users were active on at least six days a week in December 2011.

Of course, the larger Facebook gets, the harder it may be for it to grow. “We anticipate that our active user growth rate will decline over time as the size of our active user base increases, and as we achieve higher market penetration rates,” the company said in its filing today. “To the extent our active user growth rate slows, our business performance will become increasingly dependent on our ability to increase levels of user engagement in current and new markets.”

One of the last bastions where Facebook might find an additional 500 million or more users is in China — a country it has explored but never formally entered. In addition to government censorship, it would find many mature rivals there including Sina and Tencent. Prospects there do not look promising, especially considering that Google lost substantial search market share there after a disagreement with the Chinese government. “We do not know if we will be able to find an approach to managing content and information that will be acceptable to us and to the Chinese government,” the company’s statement said.

The company defines active user as a registered user who has logged in and visited Facebook through a website or mobile device in the last 30 days. Facebook also shared stats about activity on its platform. As of December 31, 2011, there were more than 37 million pages with ten or more Likes. More than seven million apps and websites have integrated with Facebook.

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Facebook says it has 845M users with 425M on mobile devices