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Back in May, Fujitsu asked for some input on phone design from anyone who was interested. Roughly 2,000 submissions and four months later, the company unveiled nine finalists on Tuesday here at Ceatec 2009, including Go’s Gesture.

(Credit:
Scott Ard/CNET)

CHIBA, Japan–Out of 2,000 design concepts for mobile phones of the future, the winning entry in Fujitsu’s Mobile Phone Design competition was not the flashiest or most forward-thinking. Instead, the grand prize was awarded to one that featured the most intuitive interface for users. What a concept.

Photos: Concept cell phones on display

The winning design, titled 'Gesture.'

Ceatec is a treasure trove of mobile phone design, thanks to the sophisticated cell phone culture here in Japan. Tuesday is the first day of the show, so be sure to check back throughout the week for more. And for the rest of the finalists, click on the gallery above.

Jin-Gwon Go, a South Korean college student studying design won the equivalent of about $20,000 for his mobile phone concept titled “Gesture.” Of all the finalists, Go’s design was probably the one that took the form of what most people would expect of a mobile phone. Fujitsu said his design stood out because of the gesture-based commands and touchable icons used to operate the phone using only one hand.

John Chambers, Cisco CEO

But Chambers and his team cautioned that one quarter of positive growth does not make a trend, even though the company is hopeful that the upward momentum will continue. Still, Chambers noted some weak spots. While business trends were positive during the quarter in the U.S., Asia, and Japan, they were not so good in Europe. In particular, the U.K., Spain, and Italy are still showing signs of trouble. Germany, he noted, is in a little better shape.

The company’s results were in-line or slightly above what analysts had predicted.

What all of this boils down to is a return to growth and a return to spending on technology, which is likely a good sign for the economy as a whole. Neither Chambers nor Calderoni believe that the recovery will be quick. In fact, the company is only predicting revenue growth of between 1 to 3 percent from the first quarter of fiscal 2010 to the second quarter of fiscal 2010. But any growth at this point is good.

Cisco Systems CEO John Chambers says the economic recession that’s gripped the world for the past year may have reached a tipping point in the last three months, as he sees the company’s corporate customers return to spending more on technology.

So what are the signs of recovery that Cisco is seeing? During the call Chambers explained that Cisco’s quarters are remarkably predictable from year to year in terms of sequential quarterly growth. He said he often expects at least 10 percent growth in orders from quarter to quarter. But in the first half of fiscal 2009, the company actually saw orders drop about 15 percent. Business appeared to stabilize in the third fiscal quarter, which he noted during the company’s previous quarterly conference call in May.

In the fourth quarter of 2009, Chambers said he saw an actual change. Orders reverted back to normal trends and the company started seeing sequential growth in its business again.

Chambers, himself, is viewed as somewhat of a technology oracle. And investors listen carefully to what he says and the tone of his comments for hints at what to expect from other companies in the technology sector. Cisco was one of the first companies, well over a year ago, to see the economic downturn coming. The company had noted a slow down in spending from some of its biggest corporate customers in the U.S. and Canada.

Cisco reported fourth quarter profits of $1.1 billion or 19 cents a share. This was down from a profit of $2 billion or 33 cents a share during the same quarter a year ago. Revenue fell 18 percent to $8.5 billion compared to the same quarter a year ago when the company reported revenue of $10.4 billion.

“Service providers continue to be challenged,” Calderoni said. “For a number of quarters they’ve been focused on reducing capital expenditures. But it’s also a matter of timing. The service provider market was still growing when we saw early signs of weakness in enterprise sales. So it might take a little longer to see them spending more again.”

Cisco, which makes equipment that powers the Internet and most corporate networks around the world, is seen as a bellwether in the tech industry. Because the company’s products are used by almost every large company, government entity, broadband and telephone service provider, and thousands of small and medium businesses around the globe, the company has a strong pulse on the economy and technology spending in general.

In an interview after the earnings call, Cisco’s Chief Financial Officer Frank Calderoni said Cisco is still seeing weakness in sales to service provider customers, too.

Even though Cisco’s sales and profits were down drastically from a year ago for the fourth fiscal quarter of 2009, Chambers said Wednesday during the conference call with investors and analysts that orders for new products grew for the first time in several quarters.

And as the economy starts to make its recovery, however slow, Chambers said he is focused more than ever on growing what he calls “adjacent” markets. During the conference call he highlighted a couple of new businesses he sees as potential billion dollar businesses in the future.

“It’s still early, but if we continue to see these positive trends in one or two more quarters, there’s a good chance we say the tipping point occurred in the fourth quarter.” –John Chambers, Cisco CEO

Updated 4:04 p.m. PDT with information from the conference call and an interview with Cisco’s CFO.

“We saw a number of positive signs in the economy and in our business over the fourth quarter,” Chambers said. “It’s still early, but if we continue to see these positive trends in one or two more quarters, there’s a good chance we say the tipping point occurred in the fourth quarter.”

The first is smart grid technology. Cisco is helping energy companies better manage their power grids and resources via IP technology. And the next adjacent market is called “Connected Communities.” Cisco is developing new technology and repackaging existing technology to help cities and communities build and refurbish buildings with connected communications technology to better manage energy use and other resources.

(Credit:
Cisco)

“Marie” of Google was quick to note that the crawling for search results “only applies to docs which you explicitly publish using the ‘Publish as Web page’ or ‘Publish/embed’ option, and which are linked to from a publicly crawled Web page” (documents for which users choose only to “allow anyone with the link to view” will not get crawled, she wrote, adding that users can unpublish documents they wish to remain uncrawled).

Some users of the search giant’s suite of online productivity applications expressed concerns about the plan, suggesting better labeling of potentially crawlable documents, spreadsheets, and presentations. For example, how would you know definitively if a publicly crawled Web page has linked to your published document? Is the only way to ensure that your published document does not ultimately show up in search results to actually unpublish it?

As noted by The Register, “Google Apps master view does not tell you which docs are publicly published and which aren’t.” While it may well be obvious to most users how publicly available their Google documents are–and many of those published documents may well be intended to be as publicly available as possible–this seems to be another area where Google needs to find the right balance between transparency and data accessibility.

Users of Google Docs and Spreadsheets accustomed to publicly publishing their documents might want to rethink exactly how publicly available they want to them to be.

Google on Thursday wrote in a blog post that “in about two weeks, we will be launching a change for published docs. The change will allow published docs that are linked to from a public Web site to be crawled and indexed, which means they can appear in search results you see on Google.com and other search engines…This is a very exciting change, as your published docs linked to from public Web sites will reach a much wider audience of people.”

The handset remote control application will only work with Wi-Fi enabled handsets and will use a Wi-Fi network instead of the Verizon cellular network to access the Fios service. Wi-Fi is only available on a select handsets from Verizon Wireless.

Verizon Communications is getting ready to launch a new feature that allows its Fios TV customers to interact with their sets using their Verizon Wireless cell phones, according to a story published by Dow Jones News service.

The company has been talking about the capability for months, and it recently demonstrated an application that will turn Verizon phones into a remote controls for the Fios TV service. The application is expected to be commercially available in the next three months.

Since the cane requires RFID flags along the path to navigate, its use in the real world is limited for now. But the students see this as just the first step of a much larger project.

A speaker on the bag’s strap alerts the user when an obstacle is in the way and tells the person where to walk. For people who can’t hear, a special glove vibrates different fingertips to provide direction on where to navigate.

A volunteer tests the Smart Cane.

Equipped with an ultrasonic sensor, the cane works in tandem with a navigational system inside a bag worn by the user. Together, they detect RFID tags mounted on small flags that stick out of the ground.

“The project has immense potential,” said CMU senior Wil Martin, who worked on the student team. “This was a preliminary effort that I believe will pave the way for future projects and ultimately result in a device that will help the visually impaired move with the same ease and confidence as a sighted person. It can happen if the project continues. I am confident in this.”

“We are one of the first to research the use of RFID technology outdoors,” said Kumar Yelamarthi, a CMU assistant professor of engineering and the project’s leader. “This project started as a way for me to teach students to see and understand the ways that engineering can be used for the greater good. We wanted to do something that would help people and make our campus more accessible.”

The students who designed the system set up a test with volunteers who used it to navigate around campus. CMU said the volunteers found the system to be effective, especially with navigation.

The Smart Cane uses Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) to detect obstacles and alert the user on where and how to navigate while walking, according to a news item published July 29 from Central Michigan University (CMU).

(Credit: Central Michigan University)

A new “smart” cane developed by students at Central Michigan University may be just the first step in helping blind people more easily get around by themselves.

Larrabee, a chronically delayed chip, was originally expected to appear in 2008. It was slated to compete with discrete graphics chips from Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices’ ATI graphics unit.

Intel would not give a projected date for the Larrabee software development platform and is only saying “next year.”

Updated on December 7 at 1:05 p.m. PST: adding comments about actual teraflops versus theoretical teraflops: The one teraflop cited by Rattner was actual, measured teraflops. Whereas the teraflops number that AMD has cited was theoretical. So, a straight comparison cannot be made.

Updated at 4 p.m. PST throughout.

Intel says its plans are unchanged to deliver this month the first chip with graphics integrated onto the CPU. This new Atom processor is referred to as “Pineview” (the platform is called “Pine Trail”) and will be targeted at Netbooks.

Intel said Friday that its Larrabee graphics processor will initially appear as a software development platform only.

Graphics chip analyst Jon Peddie, president of Jon Peddie Research, said Intel is not hitting performance targets and this became apparent at the SC09 supercomputing conference last month.

This is a blow to the world’s largest chipmaker, which was looking to launch its first discrete (standalone) graphics chip in more than a decade.

“Rather, it will be used as a software development platform for internal and external use,” he added. Intel is not discussing what other versions may appear after the initial software development platform product, or “kit,” is launched next year.

“Justin Rattner (Intel Senior Fellow) demonstrated Larrabee hitting one teraflop, which is great but you could walk across the street and buy an ATI graphics board for a few hundred dollars that would do five teraflops.” A teraflop is 1 trillion floating point operations per second, a key indicator of graphics chip performance.

“Larrabee silicon and software development are behind where we hoped to be at this point in the project,” Intel spokesman Nick Knupffer said Friday. “As a result, our first Larrabee product will not be launched as a standalone discrete graphics product,” he said.

For its part, Motorola believes that offering Blockbuster movies on its handsets will help it regain some of its appeal. The company once sat atop the mobile-phone industry. Today, it’s a shadow of its former self. And it’s trying desperately to regain some market share.

After inking a deal with Samsung last month to deliver movies directly to your home, Blockbuster announced on Tuesday that its OnDemand service is also coming to your mobile phone.

Blockbuster OnDemand, to be available on “select” Motorola mobile phones, will provide users with access to “thousands” of films, the company said in a statement. Users of the upcoming application, whose release date is yet to be announced, will also be able to choose films for home delivery or reserve titles for in-store pickup.

The iPhone features a YouTube app, providing users access to just about any video they want.

Rumors are also swirling that Netflix will be coming to the iPhone in the coming weeks. If that happens, the iPhone will become an even more attractive handset for those who want multimedia features. And both Motorola and Blockbuster would be facing an even more powerful juggernaut.

That might be coming through Android-based devices. Motorola has already signed on to deliver Android phones. Blockbuster’s app might become a component in that strategy. But by competing with the iPhone and its many multimedia capabilities, Motorola and Blockbuster will be facing an uphill battle.

According to Blockbuster, the Motorola deal is yet another element in its strategy of providing consumers with options to get its movies anywhere, at any time.

Apple’s handset also has iTunes, through which users can download their favorite films or television shows, then watch them on the iPhone while they’re away from home.

Check out Don’s Facebook profile, Twitter stream, and FriendFeed.

The necklace contains IMEC’s proprietary “ultra-low power analog readout ASIC” (application-specific integrated circuit), relying on a low-power commercial radio/microprocessor platform. A heartbeat detection algorithm is embedded in that processor, and a second ultra-low power microcontroller transmits data wirelessly from the necklace to a computer within 10 miles. (If the computer is not within range, a memory module stores this data until it can be transmitted.)

IMEC's mobile heart monitor uses a low-power amplifier and 2.4 GHz network.

(Credit:
IMEC)

Development and further study of this prototype might finally answer the pressing question: could a mobile heart monitor actually save lives?

IMEC, which partnered with the Netherlands-based Holst Centre to develop this ECG prototype, says the algorithm copes with baseline wander, electromyography (electrical impulses of muscles), movement, and sound. It achieved “best-in-class” performances, with 99.8 percent sensitivity and 99.7 percent predictivity.

I can’t help but pay homage to my former colleague and lunchtime running partner Bill Goggins at Wired magazine, who may have benefited greatly from this kind of technology. Just moments after waving jovially for cameras in the San Francisco marathon in 2006, the 43-year-old former deputy editor collapsed at mile 24 and died of apparent heart failure.

Mobile heart monitoring devices have tended to suffer from inaccuracies due to the nature of being, well, mobile; they’ve always had trouble dealing with inputs such as high-level noises and abrupt movements. The electrocardiogram, or ECG, necklace unveiled by Belgium-based IMEC at the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Conference in Minneapolis Wednesday boasts long-term monitoring of cardiac performance with astonishing accuracy.

While the ECG necklace could be used for the permanent screening of the elderly, and of people with cardiovascular disorders, healthy athletes might also find the data useful in measuring and analyzing their own hearts under the duress of extreme sport.

Services like Artistic Photo Canvas and Canvas Press already print photos onto canvas. But CanvasPop–which just came out of beta–claims to be the only one to turn low-res images from social-media sites and phones into high-quality canvas prints.

(Credit:
CanvasPop)

It’s all part of a promotion by a new company called CanvasPop that lets you print any image at any size on canvas, including pics from Facebook, Flickr, Photobucket, and iPhones. CanvasPop’s first 100 customers will get to beam shots from their personal collections above New York starting next month. Then, for $40, they can get a time-stamped photograph as a memento.

No word on whether CanvasPop will screen images before they show up in Times Square or if you’ll be able to humiliate yourself and your friends at will.

That pic of you with a laptop on your head at the office party could soon replace this scenic shot above Times Square.

You know that picture of you and your cat that features so prominently on your Facebook page? Well, play your cards right and you and Buttons could show up on the 7,400-square-foot Reuters Billboard in New York’s Times Square. Fortunately for the rest of us cynical travelers, the pic will only tower 23 stories above the city for 15 seconds.

The talk was timely. Although political debate in Washington has been dominated by health care over the past few months, the Senate is expected to take up a climate change and energy bill as early as next week, following a House version which narrowly passed in May. The broad House bill proposes a national system for regulating greenhouse gases, introduces higher efficiency standards, and calls for a mandate on renewable energy from utilities.

CAMBRIDGE, Mass.–A change in national energy policies would help spur innovation around green technologies, but policymakers are motivated by power and pet projects rather than energy security or environmental protection, a panel of energy and business experts argued here Thursday.

He also complained policymakers make decisions based on “very shallow knowledge” and are easily swayed by the media. Fears that China is taking over leadership in low-carbon technologies appear to motivate policymakers more than protecting the environment or concerns regarding climate change, Zweibel and Schmalensee said.

“One of the problems with Washington is that they fall in love and then they fall out of love after two or three years,” said Lee. “But you can’t give up on these things after three or four years and in our government we have a tendency to do that. We don’t have a lot of patience and it takes time to make things that really work.”

The panelists argued that the House bill of the version is far from perfect but it’s an important step because it puts a price on carbon emissions. Under a cap-and-trade program–one of which is already in effect in the U.S.– large polluters, such as utilities and manufacturers, are given permits to pollute. Those carbon allowances can be bought and sold among participants so that they stay under a cap set by the government.

Small green-tech start-ups and venture capitalists are now spending a significant amount of time in Washington because energy is heavily regulated. But there’s concern that bills are structured to favor certain technologies, said Alex Kinnier from Khosla Ventures, a Silicon Valley venture capital firm that is making an aggressive push into green tech.

Right now, there are subsidies and tax credits to promote the installation of solar and wind power. In the federal stimulus plan, the Department of Energy was allotted tens of billions of dollars to fund long-term research and promote development of existing technologies, such as plug-in electric vehicles.

For example, incentives to store carbon underground at coal plants will lead many companies into that field. But Kinnier said that policies should also encourage technologies that use carbon dioxide to make a product, such as building materials or chemicals.

Many companies and investors see energy as a promising area of economic growth, with more than $5.8 billion of venture capital placed in green tech last year. But energy is very different from information technology or other traditional tech industries. Bringing new energy products to market requires not only technology breakthroughs but also coordination among start-ups, large corporations, financiers, and government.

To avoid that cycle, the U.S. needs a combination of policies, including tax incentives, research money, and a cap-and-trade program, Lee said. Caps on carbon emissions won’t start to take hold for many years, panelists said. So, abandoning existing supports for solar now would essentially shut that industry down, even though the cost of solar continues to drop, Schmalensee said.

“We can go into the details about the problems with all the subsidy schemes that have been tried but fundamentally there is this common sense that underlies cap and trade, which is that if something is bad, you should tax it and that is, in effect, what cap and trade does. And that puts things that don’t have that bad characteristic in a better competitive position,” said Richard Schmalensee, the director of the MIT Center for Energy and Environmental Policy Research.

“We are not convinced that we have a global warming problem,” said Zweibel. “Let’s face it–that’s the truth.”

Rising oil prices can help drive investments in clean-energy technologies, but the volatility of prices makes sustained investment difficult, said Lee. Another challenge related to energy in the U.S. is the difficulty of locating good spots for wind and solar power projects and the resistance from states over national efforts to build new transmission lines to transfer solar and wind power.

The speakers–three academics with expertise in energy and economics and a venture capitalist from Khosla Ventures–delved into the question of what role government should play in energy at the EmTech emerging technology conference at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology on Thursday. On the whole, they were pessimistic about the prospects of effective legislation for promoting a cleaner energy industry.

No kind words

In practice, policy making around energy is messy business, the panelists said. It’s even harder now, given the fierce partisanship now in Washington and the shaky economic situation, noted Lee.

Updated September 26 at 6:50 a.m. PT with correction to Alex Kinnier’s affiliation.

Ken Zweibel, director of the GW Solar Institute at George Washington University, criticized the trend toward overemphasizing high-risk, high-reward energy research. “Programs to do practical research have shrunk during the last five years and programs to do high-risk, blue-sky research have gone through roof,” he said. Solar photovoltaics are becoming more affordable as prices fall, but proposals to the newly formed ARPA-E are unlikely to yield anything useful, Zweibel said.

The trend in energy policy has to been to promote a set of technologies, such as fuel cells or biofuels, for a while but not stay with it, said Lee. Corn ethanol, for example, has been criticized for questionable environmental benefits and contributing to higher food prices, but maintaining the program makes sense because second-generation ethanol could deliver significant improvements, he said.

“We’re all in agreement we want a price on carbon…The thing that concerns us greatly is that the ways these rules can be written can very much bias who the winners are and who the losers are over the long term and can sub-optimize the ultimate solutions,” Kinnier said.

In the past, renewable energy policies have led to boom and bust periods, which resulted in many failed companies, said Henry Lee, the director of environment and natural resources programs at Harvard University’s school of government.