Verizon says 4G-only phones may be here by 2013

During a recent conference in Texas, Verizon CTO Tony Melone talked about his company’s LTE network and its plans for the technology in the future. Melone explained that Verizon plans to include voice over LTE (VoLTE) capability in at least some of its phones by later in 2012 and that by the time 2013 rolls around, we could begin seeing that all phones are 4G-only. If that idea scares you, Melone also explained that Verizon wouldn’t be pushing people off its 3G network. However, Melone also said that Verizon will be covering its 3G network with LTE “and then some,” meaning that folks in the area of the country without 3G, including rural areas, will be getting 4G.

Verizon is being very aggressive about rolling out its LTE network and getting 4G-only phones out on the market, although it’s disappointing that we won’t be seeing 4G-only phones for at least another year. Are you excited?

Via PhoneUplink (my blog)

Grow Your Profile Overnight... for Free?

There are tons of Twitter tools being sold on the internet promising to up your follower count and basically, grow your Twitter on autopilot but let's face it: Why risk an investment on something that might not work? Personally, that is a non-issue. It's the fact that I'm cheap when it comes to ecommerce. But I finally found a tool that actually does what it says it does.

Twiend is an online network of Twitter, Facebook and Youtube accounts where users exchange follows, likes and views. It's incredible and frankly, genius! Users begin with 15 "seeds" which is the currency for getting follows, views or likes depending on how you choose to spend them. You can get more seeds by either buying them or by following twitter users, viewing videos or liking pages.

Skeptics probably want some proof of concept. I have stats proving that my twitter account went from just 262 follows to over 360 in one night of using this site and I only used the site for about a half an hour.

So what are you waiting for? Get started using your social networking account or by creating one on Twiends!

Feel free to check out more posts on my blog at christhurber.tk

Bunt - A New Dictionary

These days if you hear a word you don't know that's not in your standard dictionary, you go to Urban Dictionary or Google and type it in to find out what it is. The problem with sites like Urban Dictionary is that they have too many ads, their themes are cluttered and they don't make it easy to share the funny and well sometimes... interesting words you find on there with your friends. That's where Bunt comes in.

Bunt is a new social dictionary that aims to fix all the problems mentioned above. You'll notice Bunt has a nice, clean interface that whose simplicity is comparable to Twitter. Users can share words they find or create with the click of a button to Facebook and Twitter. 

Signup by using your Facebook or Twitter account on buntt.tk

Stick to what you Know, Apple. Ping Sucks!

iTunes 10 came out yesterday and offered one major change - Ping. Steve Jobs touted it as "a social network for music". You were supposed to be able to follow bands and friends and share what music you were buying, listening to and where concerts were being held. Sounds cool right? Well its not. First, Facebook is blocking Ping so you can't connect with your friends. The only way you can find them is though search or emailing them directly and who wants to bother with that. Second, the software doesn't find similar music to what you like for recommendations, but instead only what's popular. Lastly, the software doesn't seem to filter spam and will let you take whatever name you want. Thus follow me, Kurt Cobain!

Apple even had Facebook connect on its own website yesterday morning. However, Facebook started blocking Ping as there was no contract in place. This would be really funny as Apple is getting some of its own medicine, but without Facebook Ping is terrible as a social network. You can't connect with your friends easily. What good is a social network if you can't easily find the people you want to be social with? When I created my profile I picked Nirvana and Alice in Chains as the only two bands I liked. So whom does Ping recommend that I follow? Lady Gaga and Katy Perry! Obviously the software is just showing you what is popular (Lady Gaga already has over 150,000 followers) rather than what you might like that is similar. Another issue is that you can pick any name so there are already six Justin Biebers. I took the name Kurt Cobain. Yes, I have taste and while I don't see myself using Ping much - follow me for kicks! The other big problem with Ping is it doesn't filter spam in the comments. I followed Rick Rubin and there were 82 comments on an album he liked. At least ten of these were "get a free iPhone at . . ." with a link to the same website. Apple needs to get this under control really fast or Ping might be their biggest flop since the first generation Apple TV. I'm a big Apple fan, but just like Google should never had tried to make a smart phone (sorry to anyone who bought a Nexus One), Apple should stick to what its good at. Unless Apple works out a deal with Facebook and gets a handle on the spam, Kurt Cobain says, "Stay Away!"

You can find other iPhone releated articles and content on my site.

Spotify opens up link to Facebook

I've always loved music and Spotify especially for finding some of the unusual genres. Recently, this past week Spotify released a new version of its software for Mac and Windows (Linux if run under Wine) that spices up the user interface, social connectivity and overall peformance. 

Spotify did 'scrobble' your played tracks over the the Last.fm platform that allows your friends to see what you're playing when you're listening to it. Now, Spotify have extended the usage to social network giant, Facebook. The new UI offers a profile for yourself, along with your Facebook profile photo pulled in and all of your friends using the Spotify application, whether they are part of the Spotify page or not. 

After using it for just over an hour, I have become much a fan to the new changes and even more so to the Facebook feature. You can also import your own music library from the standard operating system music libraries such as iTunes and Windows Media Player. 

You can try it if you live in Sweden, Norway, Finland, the UK, France or Spain and unfortunately I don't have any invitations left.

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