Will Shanklin
Contributing since February, 2011
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117articles
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About Will Shanklin
Will's typical, run-of-the-mill story is that of 'classically-trained actor turned Android smartphone and tablet writer.' If you catch him quoting Shakespeare, it's not because he misses it, but because he desperately wants his Masters in drama to count towards something. Sir William dwelleth in the fair haven Chicago; with his fair maid'n Jess and his trusty cur, Ziggy.
Latest Articles
Just a couple of days ago I was ranting at Best Buy's preposterous announcement that they were going to hike the price of the HTC Thunderbolt, starting on March 20, from its launch price of $249.99 to a staggering $299.99. Apparently someone in the land of BB thought twice about this plan, as the folks over at Droid Life bring us news that the retailer is now changing its tune. Best Buy today announced that they would extend the $250 price tag "beyond the initial [March] 20 end-date outlined in the original announcement."
While we love apps like Titanium Backup that make restoring your data relatively easy when you upgrade phones, buy a tablet, or switch to a new ROM, what if they weren't even necessary? What if all of your apps' data could be stored in the cloud? This would not only make backing up and restoring easier, but it would save you a big chunk of SD card storage, right? It turns out that these capabilities have been present in the Android OS since the arrival of Froyo last year. So why aren't developers using them?
While it may not grab the headlines of the iPhone or iPad, Apple's iPod Touch has been a very successful "kid brother" of sorts to their touchscreen smartphone and tablet. I often wondered if we would ever see an Android-powered equivalent to the Wi-Fi-only media device. Today Samsung announced that they will be giving customers just that with their upcoming Galaxy Player 5. A smaller (by 1") version, the Galaxy Player 4, will be released simultaneously
A video of Ville Heijari, a Rovio "Bird Whisperer" (aka representative), showing off the gameplay of the upcoming Angry Birds Rio popped up on YouTube this morning. While the gameplay looks like much of the same kamikaze fowl-smashing action we have come to know and love, there are a few new additions. The evil pigs and stolen eggs are gone, animal poachers are in, and you now have boss fights.
While there are certainly tablets on the way that are more anticipated than the Flyer, HTC's 7" slate is coming nonetheless - and now we know when. It will launch "mid April," according to UK site Clove, which is now taking pre-orders for the tablet. Accessories that will be available for purchase along with your flyer include a spare digital stylus (£40), a Micro USB to HDMI cable (£24), and a car charger (£17).
Site GLBenchmark showed a very interesting log of a phone, dubbed the HTC Shooter, checking in recently. As this is the device's development codename, the speculation is that this could be Sprint's sequel to the EVO - the EVO 3D - that we will likely hear about at CTIA next week.
Samsung is doing all they can to release just enough information about the upcoming 8.9" Galaxy Tab to create some buzz ahead of its announcement next week at CTIA. After several promo images surfaced on their Facebook page, they have now released a short video.
It's another day, and we have yet another bit of news about the Wi-Fi-only Motorola XOOM. Only, this time, the news is nothing less than concrete and final, as Moto themselves announced that the carrier-free version of the the 10.1" beauty will be hitting store shelves on March 27 for $599.
A couple of super-sneaky members over at Howard Forums have leaked some photos of the upcoming Droid 3, and it's looking much thinner than its most recent predecessor. The Verizon phone, which has not yet been officially announced, popped up in three different pictures today.
The APK for one of the most lusted-after Android apps, Netflix, leaked on to the Internet today. However, whether you can actually do anything with it is another question altogether (the answer to which is not entirely clear yet).
Just when we thought that news about the HTC Thunderbolt was going to die down now that the mystery of its long-anticipated launch has been solved, word comes that Best Buy will only be offering the LTE phone at the $249.99 price until March 20 -after which it will be $299.99. While the phone has generated a lot of buzz, it's hard not to view this price hike as Best Buy shooting themselves in the foot.
Well look what we have here: it appears that the site androidnews.de has stumbled upon some (apparently accidentally) posted apps from Amazon's upcoming Android app store. What were the site's daring investigative journalistic practices that led to the discovery? According to Frank from the site, "This morning, just for funzies, I entered http://www.amazon.com/apps in the address bar and found myself on a site with a horizontal slider. 48 apps were shown there. Clicking on one of them doesnât lead anywhere but the Amazon.com home page. It doesnât matter, if you try it on a desktop or mobile browsers." While the links didn't take him anywhere special, the apps listed were all priced.
Now that there is finally a firm release date for the HTC Thunderbolt (Thursday, March 17, in case you have been in a cave), we thought it would be fun to take a little poll to see just how many of you are willing to forgive the frustration you were put through by all of the delays, or if you have already moved on?
A couple of weeks ago, word popped up of a UK site starting to take pre-orders for the Wi-Fi-only version of the Motorola XOOM, being available in early April. Not long after that images leaked of the same model showing up in a Sam's Club training center with a price tag of $539. Not to be outdone, yet another story arose saying office retailer Staples would be supplying the slate for $600 with employee training starting on March 23. Today the rumors take another step into becoming reality, as site B&H is now taking pre-orders for the Wi-Fi model of the Honeycomb debut for $599, making them the first American site (to our knowledge) to offer pre-orders on the carrier-free model.
They say "talk is cheap" - and these days it seems like every major US wireless carrier is claiming to have the fastest 4G (of course 4G is a highly debatable marketing term that describes three vastly different networks, but that's fodder for another post altogether). It's relatively easy to tune all of the marketing hype out but, when presented with some solid numbers, it gets easier to pay attention. PC World has tried to give us some raw data to work with in their profiling of the data speeds on the four major providers.
We have learned from a number of trusted sources that the much-anticipated HTC Thunderbolt will launch this Thursday, March 17. We have also learned that online retailer Wirefly will be offering pre-orders starting at midnight (PST) tonight. The site's Thunderbolt page has not yet been updated to reflect this, but they announced it via their Facebook page. Verizon's first LTE smartphone lists for $249.99, but Wirefly is promising a "special price" for their customers.
With the recent release of Google's Android Web Market, app discovery site Appbrain's relevance has been threatened and perhaps they see a future in statistical reporting. The website has introduced a new tracking system for the Android Market, which they like to call "Appbrain Android Stats."
Sprint's just announced that the upcoming Kyocera Echo will be released on April 17 and will sell for $199 (on a two-year contract, of course). Customers will be able to reserve the dual-screen flippity doo starting March 26.