Kodak calls it quits on cameras

Ancient American imaging company Kodak announced yesterday that it's pulling down the shutters on its long-standing camera business. By the end of June this year, Kodak expects to have phased out its range of digital cameras, pocket video cameras and digital picture frames.

The news follows the company filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy last month. It marks the end of an era for Kodak, which enjoyed a dominant position in the industry for most of the 20th century, and is renowned for pioneering mass-market and amateur photography.

Kodak's Gallery service will remain online, as will its retail-based photo printing and range of inkjet printers, but the company will primarily focus (nope, not even sorry) on licensing, which makes sense considering it holds over 1,000 digital imaging patents.

"For some time, Kodak's strategy has been to improve margins in the capture device business by narrowing our participation in terms of product portfolio, geographies and retail outlets," Kodak consumer business president Pradeep Jotwani said in a statement.

"Today's announcement is the logical extension of that process, given our analysis of the industry trends."

It's a sad moment for Kodak, as the company has a long history of producing revolutionary cameras -- including the first digital camera, which was developed by a Kodak engineer in 1975. The Brownie box, launched in 1900, was the first camera that had widespread mass-market appeal and popularised low-cost, casual photography by introducing the concept of capturing a spontaneous snapshot of everyday life -- 'a Kodak moment'.

Kodak has always followed a 'razor-blade' sales strategy, selling simple and inexpensive cameras and making profit from pricier paper, chemicals and films. This was not a tactic that translated well into the new digital era, and despite being early to the party, Kodak was slow to implement its digital change strategy and got left far behind by Japanese rivals and, later, camera phones.

The company has been given until February 2013 to dust itself down and concoct a reorganisation plan, and from the looks of it, it's not messing about. We harbour a soft spot for venerable old tech companies, so we do wish it the best of luck.

Are you sad to see the back of Kodak cameras? Let know in the comments below or on our Facebook page.

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Phones 4u JUMP contract lets you hop phones, at a price

Phones 4u wants mobile users to take a running JUMP. Nothing to do with scaring you to death with zombie children -- or the eponymous 1992 hit single by Kris Kross. Oh no. The mobile retailer is launching a new contract called JUMP -- for people who just can't bear to wait a whole year (or more) to get their hands on the latest and greatest phones.

The 'Just Upgrade My Phone' contract -- see what they did there? -- lets mobile users upgrade to "a selection of the latest smart phones on the market" as often as every six months. Think of it as the Doodle Jump of mobile tariffs, allowing you to hop from shiny new handset to shiny new handset, leaving a trail of yesterday's models in your wake like a mobile Casanova.

There are no upfront fees for each upgrade, which Phones 4u reckons makes JUMP more accommodating than other flexible tariffs on the market. However, the monthly tariff price rises with each JUMP -- so you'll need to shell out an extra

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Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1N cleared as Apple loses case

Things have swung Samsung's way again in its ongoing court battle with Apple. A German court has ruled Samsung's redesigned Galaxy Tab doesn't infringe any of Apple's patents, meaning the tablet is cleared for sale, Reuters reports.

The ruling affirms a preliminary assessment, and states there are "clear differences" between the redesigned tablet (known as the Galaxy Tab 10.1N) and the iPad 2.

Apple accused Samsung of "slavishly copying" its iPhone and iPad, and sued the Korean company in countries all over the world, succeeding in imposing a ban in Germany. (Though that was overturned, then subsequently upheld. Come on, keep up.) The Tab was also banned in Australia.

Samsung redesigned the Galaxy Tab in November, giving it a new metal band around the edge that bleeds into the front of the device. And it seems that's done the trick, with Apple's patent claims rejected in a preliminary hearing. And now this.

Samsung -- which supplies parts for the iPad -- has counter-sued, claiming infringements of its patents for mobile tech, making the whole farrago all the more strange. A court in Mannheim has ruled against Samsung in two of the patent cases, and will decide on the third on 2 March.

Motorola also threw its hat into the ring, succeeding in having several models of iPhone and iPad banned in Germany because of -- you guessed it -- a patent injunction. This one related to Moto's wireless intellectual properties. Just a few hours later Apple managed to overturn the ban though. It's a full-time job keeping track of these legal wrangles.

Steve Jobs saw Android as a stolen product, and declared "thermonuclear war" on Google. The search behemoth is in the process of acquiring Motorola, so don't expect these legal tussles to go away anytime soon.

Has anyone copied anyone else? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below, or on Facebook.

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How to stream Google Music on your Samsung Galaxy S2

When it comes to listening to music on your mobile, you never seem to have enough space to store all your tracks. Fear not, because we'll show you how to use the cloud-based Google Music storage service to stream tunes to your Android mobile, or any Apple iDevice, for that matter.

The Samsung Galaxy S2 -- which we used for this guide -- comes with 16GB of storage and a microSD card slot. Even so, true music lovers will find that to be woefully inadequate for holding their entire library of much-loved tracks. Thankfully, the way we store data on our phones and tablets is slowly shifting online and away from our hardware.

Cloud storage is already a reality for all Android users as contacts, email, photos and videos are uploaded to remote servers, freeing up valuable memory on your mobile device. Google is even said to be working on a cloud-based file storage option, which would allow you to upload pretty much anything.

It was only a matter of time before music followed suit. With iTunes launching its Match service and Amazon pushing its Cloud Player (in North America, at least), the competition to store your songs in the ether is hotting up.

Google's contribution to this technological craze is Google Music, an online service that lets users upload 20,000 tracks free of charge, as well as purchase new content. The big stumbling block is that it's currently only available in the US. Luckily, we're at hand to show you how to cunningly bypass this limitation and enjoy the benefits of cloud music storage.

Step 1: Grab the Google Music Android app

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ICS updates slowed by complex hardware, says Motorola exec

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Frustrated the latest version of Android is taking an age to come to your phone? Don't blame Google, or even the manufacturer for putting its own UI on top of the Android operating system. No, the complexity of modern hardware is to blame. According to a Motorola executive, that is.

Christy Wyatt, senior vice president and general manager of Motorola's Enterprise Business Unit, told PC Mag: "When Google does a release of the software... they do a version of the software for whatever phone they just shipped. The rest of the ecosystem doesn't see it until you see it.

"Hardware is the long pole in the tent, with multiple chipsets and multiple radio bands for multiple countries. It's a big machine to churn."

She went on to describe the process of upgrading the software, saying it's complicated. First comes hardware support, then the layering in of custom software from manufacturers, and then the phone has to be re-certified by the networks, which adds time.

Fine, we can get on board with all that. But it's still down to Google, isn't it? It doesn't have to release the code at the same time as the latest Nexus phone, it could release it earlier. The whole operation could also be much better handled in terms of setting users' expectations.

Wyatt wouldn't be drawn on exactly when Moto's handsets will get the jump to Ice Cream Sandwich. "I would have to know that every single operator I have is going to want to upgrade every single product, and sometimes they'll want to control the timing," she said. "It's just not easy to make that blanket statement."

Motorola announced it was "planning on upgrading as many of our phones as possible" in a blog post in December. It listed the Razr, Xoom and Droid Bionic, though there's a full list here. Seeing as Google is acquiring Motorola, we'd expect it to update ahead of everyone else. HTC announced its Sensation range will get ICS in the next six weeks, with the Desire line following later in the year. Sony also announced all its Xperias will upgrade.

Are you fed up of waiting for Ice Cream Sandwich? Let us know your experiences on our Facebook page, or below in the comments.

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Samsung Galaxy S2 Ice Cream Sandwich update on 1 March?

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Take this with a fistful of salt, but the Samsung Galaxy S2 will be getting updated to Ice Cream Sandwich on 1 March, if one industry speculator is to be believed.

Frequent tweeter on the subject of all things tech Eldar Murtazin took to the micro-blogging service to say, "Android 4 aka ICS for SGS2 will be officially available from March 1."

Murtazin went on to qualify that the date of the much-anticipated upgrade would depend on your country and network operator, and that the bump to Android 4.0 would be available as as an over the air update, or using Samsung's Kies software.

Murtazin doesn't say what his sources are, and the prolific tweeter's futuregazing missives don't always seem to be on the money -- recently he tweeted a link to an image of what looked to be a new Samsung Galaxy phone, but we reckon that was just a dodgy Photoshop.

Still, if 1 March isn't when the S2 gets updated, it can't be far off the truth -- Samsung Norway has said it will update the S2 and the Galaxy Note in the first quarter of 2012, which means it should be sporting Ice Cream Sandwich by the end of March.

Murtazin later tweeted that the Note would be getting updated to Ice Cream Sandwich "from March to May". What would really help in this situation is for Samsung to be upfront with S2 owners about when they can expect an update. C'mon folks, put us out of our misery!

Motorola big cheese Christy Wyatt recently went on record blaming complex and diverse hardware for slowing down the rate of ICS updates.

Are you desperate for a scoop of Ice Cream Sandwich? Do you think Samsung has been communicative enough? Tell us in the comments or on our Facebook wall.

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Pink Samsung Galaxy Note en route, looking rosy

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A pink version of the Samsung Galaxy Note could be coming soon, delighting anyone who loves both massive phones and the Financial Times.

Word of the rose-tinted goliath comes via GSMArena, which claims it's been sent an image of the pink Note by an industry insider, showing the cheery-lookin' blower alongside the sombre black and white versions.

Unfortunately that image isn't particularly high on the ol' resolution front, but you can see that the front and back of the gargantuan Note have been given a lick of pink paint. There's no word on whether the stylu... -- sorry, the S Pen -- will be tinted pink as well.

The marketing name for the pink Note appears to be 'berry pink' though the bad news is it won't be arriving in time for Valentine's day -- instead it's reckoned to be made publicly available in the ninth week of the year, which is in three weeks' time.

On the plus side, the Note probably wouldn't make a great gift for your special someone -- it's extremely expensive, and while we were impressed with the 5.3-inch screen, the phone itself is so big, there's every chance you'll wind up frustrated with its pocket-swelling antics.

The pink version is also even more conspicuous than the existing black Note -- meaning this isn't an ideal choice for spies, or those who like to sneakily text their mates under the dinner table.

Fingers crossed we see some official pictures of the pink Note soon. While we wait, why not tell us whether you're keen on the pink edition in the comments, or over on our Facebook wall.

Image credit: GSMArena

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