By Paul Thomson :: 12:34 PM
New York-based Atari Inc., the U.S. arm of the company, and maker of famous video games like “Pong†and “Asteroids,†has submitted filings today in U.S. Bankruptcy Court, according to a statement released by the company. The company is seeking a separation from its unprofitable French parent holding company, and has filed independently from its parent.
The filing comes after the French holding company, which has not turned a profit since 1999, even in the face of asset sales and restructuring attempts, had forecast a significant loss for 2012-2013.
In a statement, the company said,
The Chapter 11 process constitutes the most strategic option for Atari’s U.S. operations, as they look to preserve their inherent value and unlock revenue potential unrealized while under the control of Atari SA (ATA). During this period, the company expects to conduct its normal business operations.
Shares in the French parent company shares fell nearly 6% in on the Paris stock exchange this morning. This brought the company’s overall stock drop to 50% over the past year.
Atari,one of the oldest video game makers, was founded in 1972.
By Cynthia Herbert :: 1:05 AM
It’s at least the third such leak in as many weeks, but this time, combined with what the tech press is saying is information straight from the sources, the rumors might be true. The flagship handset coming from HTC, said to be the M7, has had render images leaked that might be right on target.
Now remember, these are not from HTC, these are renderings pieced together from source information. The front of the M7 will likely look close to the same as it does in the render image – note that the home button is toward the right, not in the center – a change from current HTC handsets.
Sources are saying that the M7 will have  a 4.7-inch 1080p display, a 13MP camera, and a quad-core processor clocked at 1.7GHz, with 2GB of RAM under the hood.
On the OS side, the handset seems to be running Sense 5.0, the latest version of HTC’s Android skin. Note that the time on the widget for the weather application reads 10.31am on January 21st. This may suggest that the pictures were taken recently in HTC’s home county of Taiwan.
Many had expected HTC to make an announcement of the M7 and perhaps demo it at CES earlier this month, but that did not happen. Now, all eyes will be on Mobile World Congress in Barcelona at the end of February to see what HTC may have for show and tell time.
Below: Front/screen render, OS screenshots.
By Gilbert Falso :: 7:19 PM
Although it isn’t likely that Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg will lose much sleep over this, Google’s CEO, Larry Page said in an interview for Wired Magazine that Facebook is doing “a really bad job on their products.”
The interview was conducted just before the announcement of Facebook’s new Graph Search feature, and the statement by Page was said just as Google announced the development of a brand new U.K. headquarters in London. Page went on to explain that he was happy with the way Google had developed its own social network service, Google+.
The company recently bought a 2.4 acre site at King’s Cross, a neighborhood in north London, where it plans to build a large complex between 7 and 11 stories tall. After completion of the new headquarters in 2016, Google plans to move its staff from two current London offices in Victoria and Holborn to the new location.
By Cynthia Herbert :: 2:12 PM
With the United States celebrating slain civil rights activist Martin Luther King’s birthday tomorrow, and the one-year anniversary of the Stop SOPA/PIPA protests occurring on Friday, online copyright and Internet freedom advocates have released the full version of King’s famous “I Have a Dream Speech” to protest the issues with copyright today.
The only problem with this, is that the copyright to King’s speech is held by EMI publishing and cannot be used without their permission and the payment of royalties. The availability of King’s speech is being orchestrated purely as a protest action to bring attention to the issues of the U.S. copyright system in a digital age.
On Friday, Fight For the Future published the video on the Vimeo video sharing service, and used Twitter to get the word out with the hashtag #InternetFreedomDay. Vimeo was likely selected as the platform for release because YouTube has a long history of removing the speech as soon as it is posted, due to a standing agreement with EMI publishing.
Internet Freedom activists believe that by posting the video online for all to see, they are taking an action that is similar to King’s calls for civil disobedience during the race relations struggle of the 1960s. However, EMI did not agree, and within 12 hours, the video had been removed from Vimeo. A Fight for the Future spokesperson released the following statement, “We suspect the video was removed for copyright reasons, since its frequently removed from YouTube by EMI, who has a licensing agreement with the King Family.”
Another copy of the video was posted later that day to YouTube, and it has not yet been pulled from the service. That copy is below:
By Paul Thomson :: 7:08 PM
Although they were slow to get a hold of the handset, Sprint customers may be the first Samsung Galaxy Nexus
The OS update is not coming automatically yet, known as an “over-the-air update.” Users have to manually download and install the 98MB file, and Sprint has yet to make a formal announcement about its availability.
This latest version update for Sprint means that its phone is four version updates ahead of the same phone on Verizon’s network. This is interesting considering the fact that Sprint did not carry the Galaxy Nexus until after Verizon began making it available to its customers.
For now, Google is hosting the 4.2 software file on its servers, but it is likely that Sprint will push the update out onto users phones within the next week or so. Currently, those who are upgrading are doing so by flashing the ROM on their handsets.