iPad 2 Has Two Cameras, Better Display, Coming Early Next Year

Coming Early Next Year

We've heard these rumors in bits and pieces before, but today Reuters reports with conviction that the next will have front and rear-facing cameras, a higher res display, and will start production in the early months of next year.
Reuters cites multiple supplier sources, two of whom said that production would begin soon for iPad 2. The next generation of Apple's tablet is expected to be thinner and lighter, with an improved screen resolution that will can hopefully keep up with the iPhone 4's retina display. Most importantly, it will add a front-facing camera to allow for video chat.
It's everything you would expect, given Apple's track record of yearly product updates. But the more confirmation I get about an iPad 2 FaceTime camera, the more I start saving up my pennies.

Source: gizodo

iPad 2 on track for April launch

A report in DigiTimes early Tuesday that Foxconn has been ordered to begin shipping the next generation iPad within the next 100 days -- with initial shipments to reach 400,000 to 600,000 units -- sparked a flurry of headlines suggesting that Apple (AAPL) had shortened its production cycle and might start selling the iPad 2 before the end of February.
But shipping from a Chinese factory is not the same as selling in a U.S. Apple Store, as the rest of the DigiTimes item makes clear.
"Apple currently has no plans to stop production" of the original iPad, DigiTimes reports. Its sources "expect [iPad 1] shipments to drop significantly after the end of the January as the company begins to digest the inventory across the rest of the first quarter and then launch the iPad 2 in April." (emphasis ours)

The report does highlight a discrepancy between the number of iPads Foxconn reportedly shipped last quarter (6 million) and the number Apple reported selling (4.19 million). That suggests that Apple went into the current quarter with nearly 1.8 million iPads in inventory.

"[DigiTimes'] sources forecast that Apple will still place about 1.6-1.8 million units of orders in January, but will start to reduce order volumes in February to allow the remaining inventory to last until the end of March."

Which puts Apple on schedule to release the iPad 2 in early April, exactly one year after it launched the iPad 1.

source:  cnn

Why Did NASA Create a Material Ten Times Blacker than the Blackest Black Paint?

NASA Goddard Space Flight Center scientists have created a new material that is ten times blacker than the blackest black paint in the world. It's made of carbon nanotubes grown on titanium. Why does NASA need this material?

Once it goes through some manufacturing fine-tuning, the new material will be used to coat the guts of cameras and telescopes in space. Right now, these instruments use NASA's Z306 paint, a pitch black painting that reduces photon contamination by absorbing errant light. According to NASA, this light "has a funny way of ricocheting off instrument components and contaminating measurements."

But Z306 is not black enough: 40% of the data captured by space cameras is unusable because of light contamination. With the new blacker than black coating, this is what will happen:

The new material absorbs 99.5 of the light in the tiny gaps between the tubes, practically eliminating the problem. The material is close to final production, and NASA is looking into using it in ORCA, "the Ocean Radiometer for Carbon Assessment, a next-generation instrument that is designed to measure marine photosynthesis."

Source: gizmodo

Google Me, Their Big Social Project, is Now Called Google +1?

 

Initially called a "Facebook killer," Google Me is now said to be a social toolbar/Chrome extension—but don't get too disappointed. Rumormongers are saying the project's so big, Sergey Brin is playing an active part in the development.

TechCrunch has reported several different project names have been bandied about, including "Emerald Sea," but the latest (and greatest, in my opinion) is Google +1, or Google Plus One. You can start to imagine the level of socialness in this project—liking or "plus one-ing" something like you do on Facebook. Supposedly it'll be built into Chrome or come as a toolbar, rather than a social networking site.
When can we expect to see this Google +1? Mashable is claiming it's been delayed until March/April, so we've got some time yet before all is revealed. As a big fan of (most) of what Google launches, I've got to say I'm pretty excited. [TechCrunch and Mashable]

Source: gizmodo