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T-Mobile Stores Prepare For Samsung Galaxy Note

Although it still has yet to be officially announced by the powers that be at both Samsung and T-mobile, T-Mobile stores across the country have started displaying these co-op advertising posters which prominently display the 5″ Samsung Galaxy Note.

The Samsung Galaxy Note released earlier this Spring and exclusively on AT&T and their new 4G network.

The Galaxy Note was actually announced last year at the IFA trade show in Berlin Germany last September. Samsung introduced the device as a disruptive new category between phone and tablet which were affectionately called Phoneblets or Phablets by the mobile tech media.

The Samsung Galaxy Note was the last Android device that I personally carried and quickly found it was a breeze to post blog posts from it. In fact we used it exclusively to publish content on our old site and this one from SXSW back in March.

Many Android and mobile sites have showed leaked pics of the T-Mobile branded device, however this picture isn’t even a poster in a tube or a back room. Our source snapped the picture directly from the wall of their Texas based T-Mobile corporate store.

Apple May Seek Restraining Order Against Samsung Galaxy S III Launch

Many long time Android enthusiasts have been quite impressed at how the Samsung Galaxy S III launch in the US has gone thus far. Samsung held their event on May 3rd in London and announced an international release of the new flagship device later on that month.

At the time of the press event Samsung had said that the US would see the device later this summer. Based on previous product launches of high end Samsung Android phones, with the four major carriers in the United States, Android enthusiasts feared that we wouldn’t see the device until September, just before the seasons change.

Monday, Samsung and Verizon, Sprint, T-Mobile, AT&T and US Cellular all divulged their plans for the launch of the phone and it’s going to be sooner thrasher than later.

Well now there is a chance that Apple may rain on Samsung’s parade. Apple was in court earlier today, and in court said they may seek a restraining order, as early as tomorrow, against the import and sale of the Samsung Galaxy S III.

Reuters is reporting that Apple attorney Josh Krevitt made that claim at a hearing today before Judge Lucy Koh, who has been presiding over all of the Apple vs Samsung and Samsung vs Apple law suits in the United States.

Apple filed papers on Tuesday seeking to ban the import and sale of the Samsung Galaxy S III. Both parties appeared before Judge Koh in a hearing today. Koh told the attorneys that she wouldn’t rule on anything pertaining to the Galaxy S III as the Galaxy Nexus was the focus for today’s hearing. Koh said that Apple could file a temporary restraining order against the Galaxy S III.

Source: Reuters

Unlocked Samsung Galaxy S III Available For Pre-Order In US

If you absolutely can’t wait to get ahold of the brand new Samsung Galaxy S III, and you don’t mind paying full retail we’ve got great news for you. Thanks to the wonderful folks at Amazon you can now preorder the unlocked version of the Samsung Galaxy S III in the United States.

There are no definite launch dates set for the US carriers. We’re supposed to hear about US carriers at a Samsung event in the US in the coming weeks. However, there is a release date for the unlocked version via Amazon and that date is just a week or so away on June 1.

The unlocked version will be of the GSM variety and work on T-Mobile and AT&T as previous unlocked flagship Samsung Android devices always have.

The preorder will only set you back $799 so go on you know you want to! Hit the link below.

Preorder Link

Source: Phandroid

Samsung Posts First Galaxy S III Commercial

Samsung held an unpacked event May 3rd in London. If you were fortunate enough to be in the audience, like we were, then you got to see not only the Samsung Galaxy S III but the Samsung Galaxy S III commercial as well.

Samsung has taken a break from beating up Apple fan boys and gone after Apple in other ways with their advertising. The commercial for the Galaxy S III is very Apple-esque with a variety of people in all kinds of situations. There are several scenes of a wedding, new born baby and snuggling. Most Apple iPhone and iPad commercials feature some kind of snuggling.

The voice in the commercial is warm and inviting.

What’s supposed to be the final stab at Apple is the official tag line “designed for humans” somehow implying that iPhone customers/fanboys are a little less than human. In a lead up to the Galaxy S III release Samsung posted a teaser video that featured a flock of sheep, that were supposed to be Apple fans.

Samsung may not win any awards for this one but it’s heartfelt and shows off the phone in a great light.The built for humans slogan is a bit of a stretch, but hey there’s a war going on here.

The Samsung Galaxy S III will make it’s world wide debut in two weeks in Europe and Asia and later this summer in the US and Japan.

Check out the commercial below:

Patent Wars: Samsung Accused Of Destroying Evidence

The judge in the Apple vs Samsung patent case has been throwing the book at the Korean manufacturer. They recently went under fire for failing to turn over source code pertaining to a work-around that Samsung has used to protect itself from a patent Apple holds for “overscroll-bounce”.

Samsung didn’t give that source code up in the allotted time frame and Apple asked the presiding Judge Paul Grewal to essentially disqualify any work around source-code from Samsung’s patent defense. Grewal granted that Apple request, laying down these sanctions:

Samsung shall be precluded from offering any evidence of its design-around efforts for the ‘381, ‘891 and ‘163 patents, and shall not argue that the design-arounds are in any way distinct from those versions of code produced in accordance with the court’s order. Samsung must instead rely solely on the versions of code that were produced on or before December 31, 2011

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Samsung Ventures Recruiting New Startups In Northern Texas

Samsung is no stranger to Northern Texas. Their Mobile divisions USA headquarters is located in Richmond Texas and one of their customer support centers is close by. That may be some of the thinking behind Samsung Venture’s recruitment of tech startups in the Northern Texas region.

Samsung Ventures is specifically targeting startups in the following areas: (software & services) wearable computing, mobile photos/video, context awareness, mobile commerce, p2p, computer vision, convergence/smart home, and big data and mobile.

In hardware Samsung is looking for: camera tech, audio, sensor tech and power management.

In B2B: secure Android, and vertical solutions, healthcare, education.

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Developing: Apple To Acquire Twitter Or Samsung Tomorrow?

Apple has had an unprecedented few years on Wall Street. They’ve doubled their valuation three times in as many years. That’s left them with a serious stock pile of cash to the beat of $100 billion (with a b) dollars. Many people are talking about what they are going to do with that cash. The country’s cash wealthiest company is set to announce their plans for that cash tomorrow morning on a conference call.

Some analysts have predicted that Apple may go into acquisition mode. Twitter seems to be one of the most likely acquisitions. Twitter and Apple have aligned themselves tightly over the last year with deep integration into the latest version of iOS and OSX. Recent estimates have put Twitter at a $7 billion dollar valuation, which at this point would be a drop in the bucket for the Cupertino giant.

While he thinks its a possibility, Thenextweb’s Matthew Panzarino does bring up the fact that Apple has never spent more than $390 million dollars for an acquisition. That was the 2011 acquisition of Israeli flash memory manufacturer Anobit.

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Developing: Motorola Mobility wins injunction against Apple in Germany, apparently

“As the patent litigation world turns”

[scribd id=71622154 key=key-2l51dt9nj83mi07adrm2 mode=list]

Apparently, Apple was just handed a major loss in the biggest European market. Unlike the injunctions against Samsung that Apple has won in Germany, the Netherlands, and, most recently Australia, this is not a preliminary ruling. Florian Mueller explains here,

We’re not talking about a preliminary injunction, but this one is in effect now and it could be appealed and lifted.

He also notes:

The court ruling doesn’t say which particular products Motorola Mobility accused of infringement, but since the U.S. equivalents of both patents-in-suit were also asserted by Motorola Mobility in federal lawsuits in the United States, it appears that the entire range of Apple mobile devices is affected by this decision.

So, at this moment, Motorola has the ability to stop Apple from selling any devices within the confines of German borders. This is a very significant win. The damage could be huge. According to Mueller if this were to pan out, Apple will be required to pay damages on any possible infringement from April 19, 2003 to the present day.

The patents that are allegedly being enforced are:

EP (European Patent) 1010336 (B1) on a “method for performing a countdown function during a mobile-originated transfer for a packet radio system”; this is the European equivalent of U.S. Patent No. 6,359,898
EP (European Patent) 0847654 (B1) on a “multiple pager status synchronization system and method”; this is the European equivalent of U.S. Patent No. 5,754,119

Head over to FOSS Patents for a more in-depth (professional) analysis.

Swype Secures Another 6 Million in Financing

Swype, the most popular alternative keyboard for smartphones, announced today that they have received another $6 million dollars in a new round of financing. Leading the pack in this round were Samsung Ventures, Nokia Growth Partners, Benaroya Capital, DOCOMO Capital and Ignition Partners.

Swype is an alternative keyboard to the stock keyboard found on many Samsung and Nokia smartphones. It allows the user to “swype” on their keyboard by drawing a connection between letters for the words they want to type. Nuance’s multi keyboard app called Flex T9 allows for similar technology.

Swype founder Cliff Kushler says he hopes to have Swype on 100million devices by the end of the year. In addition to smartphones and tablets Kushler is hopeful that the technology will adapt to other connected devices like car stereo head units, and home control devices. Kushler is also known for his involvement in the creation of T9 texting, a short form texting language that “dumb phone” users made popular at the beginning of the decade.

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