Top Twenty Stories

1. Ford unwraps '2013 Mondeo'

   Detroit Motor Show Fusion line-up includes Energi e-car

   The great and good of the Ford Motor Company today whipped the dust covers off the new Fusion at the North American International Motor Show in Detroit. Should we care? Yes, because this is the 2013 Ford Mondeo, give or take a few minor technical details. It is based on Ford's new global C/D platform that will provide the …

2. iOS 5 'crashes more apps' than Android

   Is it an upgrade problem, or a user problem?

   Recent data has shown that iOS apps crash more often than apps running on the Android platform. The data comes from Crittercism – monitoring software that records app crashes as a percentage of app launches and makes money by sending reports and diagnostics to the app's creators. After looking at data taken about app crashes …

3. Kindle Fire: An open letter to Jeff Bezos

   Google no go-go

   Mr. Bezos, I love everything about Amazon. You have created a world where I can sit on my couch, read War and Peace, listen to Lady GaGa and order toilet paper - all from the same company and now, with the Kindle Fire, from a single device. I have raved for months on Twitter, Google+ and on my podcast, Nekkid Tech that in a …

4. iPhone doc will detect cancer, diabetes - boffins

   Touch screen literally meets bleeding-edge science

   A drop of blood or saliva can be analysed using an ordinary touch screen - and once boffins perfect the identification of biological molecules, then diagnosis by iPhone – or indeed any smartphone – isn't far off. The work is being done in South Korea, where researchers at the Advanced Institute of Science and Technology have …

5. Kindle Fire owners named keenest Android app users

   Stats show tablet's usage storming ahead

   Amazon's Kindle Fire has grabbed more than a third of the overall Android tablet usage activity in less than three months on sale. So suggests Flurry, a maker of software usage analysis code built, the company claims, into "tens of thousands of Android apps, including many of the most popular" and able to give a statistically …

6. Windows 8, Windows Phone 8 DNA splice is on - report

   Apple-flavoured future features leaked

   Windows 8 and Microsoft's next major phone operating system will merge, if reports are correct. Windows Phone 8, codenamed Apollo, will reuse code from Windows 8, due this year - specifically the kernel, network stacks, security and multi media. That means Windows Phone 8 will ditch the current Windows Phone 7.5 core that uses …

7. Gamers grumble over Steam outage

   Play postponed

   Steam users are venting frustration at Valve after an outage stopped gamers from accessing their downloaded titles. Many users struggled to launch games, both in online and offline modes, and the Steam forums became overloaded with complaints, many blaming yesterday's client update for their woes. According to Valve, though, …

8. Lumia sales fail to set world alight

   Outsold almost 100 times by Galaxy S II

   Nokia's Lumia handset is barely shifting at all, according to figures from consumer price-comparison site Mobiles Please, though it still manages to be the best selling Windows Phone. Mobiles Please bases the stats on more than 5,000 sales across its family of sites during November, and finds that the Nokia Lumia 800 made up …

9. Dutch retailer spills Nokia 910 beans

   Specs outed

   Confirmation - perhaps - for Russian mobile phone blogger Eldar Murtazin: a Dutch phone retailer has also claimed the Nokia Lumia 910 will sport a 12Mp camera and will sport a 4.3in, 480 x 800 display. The 910 - believed to be Lumia 800 follow-on that Europe will get in place of the 900, the LTE handset Nokia will ship in the …

10. Sony posts PlayStation firmware patch

    Bye-bye, PSN; hello, SEN

    Sony's latest PlayStation firmware - version 4.10 - is now available for download, with the Sony Entertainment Network ready for PS3s from here on. As announced earlier this week, Sony has renamed the PlayStation Network in an effort to streamline all of the company's online services into one sensibly-named bracket. Aside …

11. Amazon's new Kindle Fire stripped naked

    Divining the entrails of the low-cost iPad competitor

    Amazon's Kindle Fire – arguably the most-anticipated fondleslab since Apple's iPad – was released on Tuesday, and already the techno-haruspicationists at iFixit have torn one apart and examined its entrails. The Kindle Fire – can we just start calling it the Fire? thanks – is already a hit among developers and has caused a …

12. Freeview HD will deliver new IPTV channels this month

    Exclusive Mysteries of the >100 data channels revealed

    Dozens of new television channels are coming to Freeview this month, thanks to clever use of the MHEG standard and the connectivity already built into every Freeview HD box. The channels are already appearing on Freeview boxes – at 110, 111 and 120 in the EPG – but rather than broadcasting video streams those channels contain …

13. Steam games forum down amid hack fears

    Valve stays silent, users say they've been spammed

    Computer games outfit Valve has suspended its Steam user forums following unconfirmed reports of a security breach. Eurogamer claims that the official message board for Valve's Steam online games platform, Steampowered, was "defaced" on Monday night shortly before the site was suspended. It is believed the defacement involved …

14. iPhone 5 rumoured to be packed with pay-by-bonk tech

    NFC will have punters running for the tills

    Rumours - fuelled by comments from a MasterCard chief and an iOS developer - suggest that this year's next-gen iPhone could be packing a wireless pay-by-wave chip. The built-in near-field communication (NFC) gizmo would allow the iPhone 5 to make contact-less payments at the tills - a system that has been around on Android …

15. Dropbox rival touts 50GB free cloud storage for iOS fans

    More file space in cyberspace

    Cloud storage provider Box.net has unveiled an unmissable offer for iOS-heads, giving users heaps of free storage - ten times the amount Apple chucks in for nowt with iCloud. Any punter with a free Box Personal account on an iOS device can opt in for 50GB of free storage to keep for eternity. Just remember to write the …

16. Kindle users can 'borrow' an extra book - forever

    That's not what 'library' and 'lend' mean, say publishers

    Amazon will lend Kindle owners a book every month as part of a new ebook borrowing scheme known as the Kindle Owners' Lending Library. The digi-library will only be available to owners of a Kindle device who also subscribe to the £49-a-year Amazon Prime programme. It is not available via the Kindle apps for Android and iPad. …

17. Panasonic chucks rugged compact cams into the wild

    GPS, compass, barometer and more on board

    Panasonic's new Lumix digicam, the DMC-FT4, could be the ultimate camera for outdoors types. The gadget packs in not juts a 12.1Mp sensor with a 1080p HD video recording capability, but also its own GPS pick-up, a compass and altimeter and a barometer. Well tough: the Lumix DMC-FT4 In short, it'll pack your pictures with …

18. Punters to pick up cheap laptops not Ultrabooks

    Consumers too price-wary for skinny tech, says analyst

    Ultrabooks are still too darn pricey for punters, with the new skinny laptops' average selling price during Q4 2011 63 per cent higher than that of regular notebooks. Worse, said UK-based market watcher Context, which released the figures today, Ultrabooks are, on average, more than three times the price of a netbook. Context …

19. Nintendo unveils Network for console connectivity

    Wii U to get NFC tech too

    Nintendo has spilled the beans on its next-gen Wii U console's connectivity capabilities to be built around an online service called the Nintendo Network. Company frontman Satoru Iwata said the Network will offer competitions and communication between users, as well as access to digital content, add-ons and full downloadable …

20. Sky to open net telly channels to all

    Pay to view over the internet

    Sky is to enter the IPTV arena with an internet-hosted TV service of its own. The station will launch before July this year, the satellite broadcaster pledged, and it'll see many of Sky's existing channels, including Sky Movies, being streamed over the net to a range of devices. Sky promised owners of "PCs, Macs, laptops, …