Engadget.com reports that LG mobile has confirmed that a 12 megapixel phone will soon be produced. Sony Ericsson was the first to demonstrate they could put a 12 megapixel camera in a phone, but LG is the first provider to officially announce one is coming. Don’t get too excited, though, as LG’s UK head of marketing, Jeremy Newing, admitted, “it’s important that people realize when taking 12mp images, they’ll be using huge amounts of data, and it will be more difficult to do things like send such files”. Plus, as lifehacker.com has pointed out, megapixel size is not directly proportional to picture quality. While you’re waiting for over an hour for your phone to send that picture of a daisy to your mom, don’t expect the end result to look nearly as good as your DSL with less megapixel resolution but far superior optics and sensors.

Despite all the hype, at $360 the upcoming Kindle 2 is still going to inhabit a very small niche market. Of the 50% of Americans who read books at all very few are ready to make a digital switch. Just like the visceral pleasure we experience from holding a newspaper keeps them in print, a fair amount of the literary class enjoy perusing a bookstore, reading back flaps and skimming contents. But for those who are ready to adopt the digital model, the Kindle itself, or even Sony’s $300 Reader Digital Book, are not the only game in town. A more affordable option may be Indigo’s Shortcovers – a digital ebook app that will run on iPhone, BlackBery, and Android operating systems – devices that many potential Kindle buyers already own. Shortcovers lets users read the first chapter of a book without charge with the option of buying additional chapters individually or the entire book at rates comparable to Kindle and Sony. The difference between Shortcovers and other ebook readers already available on many mobile platforms is the relationship Indigo has with publishers. Shortcovers will initially offer over 50,000 titles, only a third of which are public domain titles. Indigo will also offer news and magazine articles – ala Kindle. Until prices drop dramatically – which may depend on advances in thin displays – the Shortcovers model may make more inroads in popularizing digital formats than Amazon and Sony can only dream of.

Almost ten years ago I moved to the D.C. area for the second time and finally broke down and purchased my first cell phone. Once I arrived in my new home, all my business contacts, friends, and family knew my new cell number and used it exclusively. It wasn’t until many years later that I signed up for a VOIP line for my home. Perhaps most of you haven’t been without a landline that long – but in late 2008 how many of you still have a physical line to a local telco? Click to visit a TechCrunch.com and answer their poll ‘Do you still have a landline?’ and see where you fit in with the rest of the tech crowd.

Peter Bright has posted an article on ars technica reporting that the upcoming Internet Explorer 8 from Microsoft will default to “standards mode”. Though not exactly fully W3C compliant, IE8 will be a huge leap from earlier versions of IE. This is good news to frustrated web developers who have struggled with developing web pages that work and display equally across the major browsers. IE has notoriously not been standards compliant in the past and Microsoft has tried to muscle they’re own “standards” into the development community. It’ll be interesting to see if Microsoft continues down this path, or succumbs to the temptations of the past.

Technorati Tags: social network,steven spielberg,paranormal

According to techcrunch.com, Steven Spielberg is involved in building a new social network which will focus on the paranormal. According to insiders, the site will let users research and share ghostly and extraterrestrial stories. Expect a video component as well. Is this a good idea in the already crowded social media space? Normally we would say no, but perhaps Spielberg’s name is the ‘X’ factor that will draw visitors. Still, we doubt a crush of visitors will crash the servers when the site goes live.

Only a few weeks after it was announced they were giving up on Yahoo! 360, it’s reported Yahoo! is launching “MyM”, a new, self-described “social messaging” service. Currently in private beta, MyM is a web based portal for accessing multiple instant messaging and social media sites in one place. Valleywag.com is reporting that Yahoo! insiders are saying that MyM is far from ready and many are concerned that the sites Yahoo! wants to access through the service will block MyM since Yahoo! is a social media competitor. Is Yahoo! grasping at straws and stretching themselves too far? Come on Microsoft, buy Yahoo! and end the pain.

 The Associated Press looks at ways new technology helps more digital books make they’re way online.

arstechnica.com has posted an article about a Computer Security Institute report that finds the biggest security threats to employees may be the employees themselves. The decade long report is a yearly survey by CSI that asks network and security admins what threats they face and how much each threat cost they’re companies bottom line. While fraud and viruses had the greatest financial impact, issues caused by both witting an unwitting employees were the most numerous. Such employee created issues include downloading pornography, email abuse, and illegal software. For more information about the report click here.

Technology website gizmodo.com is reporting today that Apple is pushing TV networks for a lower episode price of $.99. Currently, TV episodes on iTunes are $1.99, a price that hasn’t changed since Apple began offering television downloads. According to the article there’s no word if the networks would accept such a deep cut into they’re iTunes profits, but the articles author is pessimistic such an agreement can be reached. This news comes on the heels of a report that Apple kicked NBC off of their iTunes lineup after NBC’s demand for a $2.99 per episode rate. Looks like Apple wants the other networks to know that they control prices and won’t be bullied by Hollywood. Read the full article here. 

Last.fm has announced that CBS has purchased the London-based music site. Reportedly, CBS payed $280 million to bring Last.fm’s user base into their fold. With Last.fm, CBS gains a foothold in the trendy social networking scene thats exploding across the net. Last.fm not only lets user’s listen to music, but it also provides music suggestions based on what other users with similar tastes are listening to. In addition to music suggestions, Last.fm makes it easy to find info about artists and find local gigs by musicians a user may enjoy. What’s interesting about this story is that CBS chose to go through with the purchase at the same time the FCC is expected to approve higher copyright fees for websites that stream music. Many sites fear they’ll have to stop offering free music streaming if these changes go through since few sites could cover the increased rates with current advertising revenue. To make back their investment and cover the new fees CBS will have to make some changes to Last.fm unless they expect to run the site under a deficit. At the very least, Last.fm users can expect more advertising and possibly the addition of a premium subscription service. But CBS would have to be very careful to keep from driving away too many users under a pay to play scheme.