O2 - How to deal with Stock Shortage the right away

O2 have put this statment on their site

iPhone 4 will only be available for existing O2 customers at launch 

iPhone stock will be extremely limited in the UK at launch and not everybody who wants one will be able to get one straight away. We want to make sure that our existing customers get priority so until at least the end of July, only existing O2 customers will be able to get an iPhone 4 from us. 

Whether you're an existing O2 mobile customer looking to upgrade, or one of our broadband customers looking to move your mobile to O2, our iPhone stock is reserved exclusively for you.

I have to say i'm very impressed with how O2 are handling their limited supply of the highly coveted iphone 4's. I fully expected that it would be a 1st come 1st serve basis with the emphasis on getting new customers but no! The focus is to reward loyalty by giving existing customers priority even if you are just a broadband customer bravo O2.

Read the full statement here

1st Iphone 4 camper has started his wait.

Just read a post on Engadget about some crazy dude already set up camp outside an Apple store to be 1st in line for the iphone 4 which isn't released until 24th June! This is the video of the guy's temporary pad.

Now thats dedication!

Iphone 4 - UK Apple store now taking pre-orders

It's Tuesday the 15th and as promised Iphone 4 is appearing on Apple online stores. The UK store has just updated.

So the options for now are 16GB at £499 and 32GB at £599. Disappointingly only black is available at present, customers are limited to just two so no getting greedy! Not seeing anything yet from any of the Mobile companies such as O2, Orange or Vodafone.

So if your waiting for a pre-orders to open now is the time, go, order your shinny new iphone 4 and rejoice!

G

Will you be pre-ordering from Apple directly so you can be free from a contract or will you be getting a subsidized version and possible get in bed with the devil? Leave you comments at the bottom

E3 2010 - Xbox 360 media briefing

There's loads and loads of news coming out of E3 today and it's all abut Microsofts Xbox 360 and Kinect. There's far too much from me to cover all of it but I'm gonna run over as much as possible.

News seems to be in two main area's the Xbox 360 media briefing and news on Kinect (Aka project Natal) so i'll attack it in these area's:

Xbox 360 Briefing

• Briefing Kicked off with Showing of a level on Call Of Duty - Black Opps - Look like a great game but not a Modern Warfare 2 beater.
• Introduced Kinect for Xbox 360
• Metal Gear Solid Rising - Preview video. Looked like a lot of fun. Focus on using a sword as a main weapon with great control over its use.
• Gears of War 3 - We saw a lengthy four player co-op of a mission. Didn't really see anything ground breaking but still looks like another fantastic game.
• Fable 3 - Video footage. I honestly have no interest in this one, I tuned out during this.
• Halo Reach -  1st ever footage shown of campaign mode. Oh man I'm so excited for this! Loved the footage of what I saw, I also played the beta and was very impressed.
• Demmo on Kinect for 360. Signing in by waving, showed finding a video to watch using voice and gestures. Used gestures to fast forward and voice to play and pause. Moved on to how to play music again using voice and gestures. 
• Xbox live will be on windows phone 7
• Demmo'd using Kinect to video chat with other console users and Windows Live Messenger users. Can watched movies together while using video chat as well sports and news. Also show how Kinect tracks you as you move around the room. 
• ESPN - Free with Xbox live Gold membership. Think this is USA only. Will cover College Basketball and Football (American Football to the UK), Major league baseball and NBA basketball. 
• 6 Kinect only Games 
• Kinect Star Wars game coming to Xbox announced. Not too much show game still in development 
• Forza Motorsort - Live demmo of using Kinect to drive the car, look around the interior, walk up to and around the car as if you were stood on the actual track. Even to the point where you can kneel down look at the brake and open the hood to see the engine.
• New Xbox 360 console - Smaller, quieter, built in wif-fi and 250GB HD! Released this week in USA, 14th July in Europe. Here's engadget's close up look of it. Anyone in the audience got one free!

 Keep checking the Xbox dashboard and Xbox.com for video of the entire briefing.

Kinect

Here's are some facts i've gleamed so far

• Voice recognition and gesture control
• Kinect is Compatible with current Xbox 360's (after an update over live) via USB.
• Camera Tracks your face in Video Chat
• Releases 4th November world wide
• Recognizes face and sign you into your account automatically.
• Common feature in Kinect games is having your photo taken at key points in the game then shown at the end. These can then be posted on social networks such as Facebook.
• On multiplayer games Kinect sees the 2nd player set in and it automatically put the new player into the game.
• Can be played in low light conditions.
• Camera recognizes 48 different point on your body
• It can ignore other objects in the frame such a pillow couches coffee tables.

From what i've seen of Kinect I don't think it will be a replacement for an actual game controller. Hardcore gamers will stick with the traditional way of playing your FPS's especially. I feel this is defiantly aimed at mum's who will be buying this for there kids who will then grow up being 'branded' to microsoft, talk about play the long game. Mum's will jump at this just like they did with the Wii safe in the knowledge that their kids is getting at least some exercise. With the Wii you could 'cheat' and just swing your wrist to play a game but with this you have to use your whole body to play, not sure if that a good or bad thing ;-)

Will I be getting Kinect? Erm it's not top of my gadget want list but it's on there. I'm more interested in how I can use it for video chat and to control my dashboard to play music and watch films but i'm sure me and Laura will enjoy the activity games also we've been putting of buying a Wii for a while now I have a better option.

Hope you find this helpful. Any comments welcome.

G

E3 - Project Natal Premiere

Project Natal Premiered last night and the all the star arrived like it was the Oscars led into the event by a familiar red carpet. The event was recorded by MTV and played back on Tuesday, I believe it will also be available on the xbox.com website. During the event Natal finally got it's official name Kinect.

Hilariously people at the event were asked to don white ponchos, the reason thats being reported is the Kinect doesn't see dark suited or "black" people. Hummm I think Microsoft have created a rasist gaming platform??? We already have some games announced Star Wars, Kinectimals (which sounds like Catz for DS), Kinect sports (shocker) Kinect adventure, Joy Ride and Dance central. These all seem like really obvious game to create for a platform such as this the real excitement will come when we see what the game developers do with it. Also show was the ability to video chat which is a no brainer but with Kinects chat you can talk with up to 4 people at once which could be useful.

There's still lots more to be announced on Kinect no least the price but if you want more info check out Engadgets article on the event where they analysis some of what they saw.

Thanks for reading i'll be posting tonight after the Xbox 360 Media Briefing on what we find out there.

G 

E3 2010

Exciting times boys and girls, E3 begins tomorrow. E3 is the biggest event of the year in the gaming world, here you will find every console manufacture and games studio all in one please ready to make their next big announcement. Most highly anticipated at this years event is the World Premier of the "Project Natal Experience" with a little help from Cirque du Soleil. So in anticipation I though I'd do a little run down on some of the big events and where you can get the news as it happens.

•  Xbox 360 media briefing - Monday June 14th at 10am PST - The media briefing will be live streamed on Xbox.com and also on Facebook if your in the UK, Spain and Itally 18:30 UK time and 19:30 Central European time. Also on Spike TV if you have it available. 
• World Premier of the “Project Natal Experience”, imagined by Cirque du Soleil - Tuesday, June 15th starting at 3:30pm PST on MTV

In addition to the official sources i'm sure there will be people streaming the big briefings on uStream.tv and Justin.tv. Twitter will no doubt be on fire with an endless source of news from the event, just search either #xboxe3 for all the xbox realated news or #e3.

I'll be making good use of xbox's Major Nelson as a constant supply of reliable info. Head over to the E3 section of his blog where you will find curated tweets directly from the project natal world premiere, Microsoft Press briefing and everything from the show floor. The page will also have a live blog running for the press briefing so if you can watch it you can still follow also in a text format. 

Here are some of the other big event scheduled at E3

• Monday June 14th at 2pm PST - EA 
• Monday June 14th at 5pm PST - Ubisoft - Very much looking forward to this one, these boys make some great games... true story
• Tuesday June 15th at 9am PST - Nintendo 
• Tuesday June 15th at 12pm PST - Sony

I will be following the event with Twit.TV where the father of the internet Leo Laporte and the entertaining Brian Brushwood will be live streaming from the show floor. Last time Leo live streamed he ended up crowd surfing at a diggnation live show during South by South West, I'm sure this will be just as entertaining especially with mischievous Brian being present this time! 

I'll be posting updates to this site as I can as the news comes to so watch this space.

G

Video - Learn CPR

I don't usually do public service annucments but I feel on this occastion it is my duty, no obligation, to bring you this important informative video. Sit back watch and learn how to do CPR, you never know this may save someone's life one day. I'm deadly serious here!

Enjoy

G

Mobile Phone Charging Wellies From Orange

Yes, you hear me correct. The mobile phone company orange have created a pair of wellies that can charge your mobile phone while you wear them.

These power crazy bad boys were launched at this year Glastonbury festival for the soak soaked revelers to try out.

They work by converting heat generated in the heal off the wellie as you move in them into an electrical charge. It goes without say that these aren't going to charging you phone in a hurry but they could get you out of a pinch if your caught short of a charger or an electrical supply. 12hrs of walking produces around 1hr of charge so if you do need to charge your phone this way you'd better let your feet do the talking and jog on.

G 

Movie Pick of the week (New Feature)

Yoyo, I've decided to make a new feature called, yes you guessed it you cleaver boy and girls, "Movie Pick of the week". The idea is genius in its simplicity! Every Friday i'm going to recommend out of the new movie releases starting Friday which is the must see film!

So here we go...

Ooops little problem, I haven't actually seen any of this weeks new releases so that really wouldn't be an informed suggestion. How about I just tell you what out (UK):

• Brooklyn's Finest 
• Letter to Juliet 

These will speak for them selves really it's down to a simple choice Chick flick or Gritty story of the Hard streets of New York, simples.

I think it's obvious what 95% of people will be watching this week, and the next few for that matter... The World Cup (Starting today)! So get your mates round have a few drinks and enjoy....

G

Movie Trailer - Mortal Kombat (a good one)

Stop your grinnin' and drop your linnen. Check out this trailer for The new Mortal Kombat movie. IMDb has it down for 2013, quiet a while but judging by this trailer it will be worth the wait. I had a quick look for more info on the movie and it seems at this point there's no official word that this is even a movie coming to release let alone when it will be release. Personally looking at this trailer I would guess it's safe to say this is a movie in production and it close to being ready a lot sooner than 2013. 

Here's hoping this one gets released because i'm already pumped!

G

Update on Wednesday, June 9, 2010 at 11:44AM by Graham Royston

Hey read this article from Empireonline.com they have more info on where the trailer came from and how likely the film is to be made.

Cheers

G