Earlier this month, I warned readers not to enroll -- or encourage their children to enroll -- in for-profit colleges.
New student loan default rates from the U.S. Department Education highlights in more detail why these institutions are such a bad idea. According to a Wall Street Journal analysis of the data (subscription required), 21% of students who use federal loans to attend for-profit college go into default within three years. That compares to 7% at public four-year colleges and 16% at public two-year colleges.
Not wanting to feel left out of the festival of updates for GPS apps, AT&T has given AT&T Navigator[iTunes link] some new features that are sure to please people who use the app.
Here's what's new:
Full landscape view integration
Enhanced iPod controls with the ability to search through your songs, artists, etc. from within the app
Inclusion of AT&T Wi-Fi Hotspots in the POI listings
Seamless blending of navigation prompts and music for easy listening
The app itself is free, but you have to sign up for a U.S. $9.99/month subscription or get a $69.99 annual subscription. You can see some more details on the upgrade and watch a video of the Navigator in action here.
One nice feature of the app is you can just sign up for a month to take you through holiday travel, and then drop your subscription. Unlike many of the GPS apps for the iPhone, this app requires a cellular signal, because all the maps and info are streamed in over the network.
Apple today filed a countersuit against Nokia for patent infringement as a response to the lawsuit Nokia filed against Apple back in October. The countersuit is over the 13 patents that cover many different communication technologies that are used in the iPhone, which Nokia clams to hold the patents. These patents cover the GSM, UTMS 3G, and Wireless-LAN standards used in the iPhone since early 2007.
Bruce Sewell, General Counsel and senior vice president for Apple stated: "Other companies must compete with us by inventing their own technologies, not just by stealing ours."
We'll post any more details on these lawsuits as this develops, so stay posted.
Update #1: Engadget's Nilay Patel has, of course, pointed out some interesting things. Notably: while this is about patent infringement, the majority of claims are around some insane licensing terms Nokia felt it was entitled to. Read his post for the breakdown and a PDF of the paperwork.
Daily deals are back! Hope you enjoy the latest offerings and deals from around the web. These deals are time-sensitive, so check them out before they disappear. You can check out more deals here.
iTunes Music Store: [iPhone / iPod Apps] Asian Painting for iPhone / iPod touch downloads for free
Dell Small Business: [Laser Printers] Dell 1230c Color Laser Printer for $99 + free shipping
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'Tis the season shop until your brains melt (or skip it all entirely, depending on your interpretation of the term holiday). In that spirit, for the next few weeks we'll be rounding up a dozen daily deals courtesy our friends at DealNews.com. Each afternoon tune in to TUAW for this handy summary. Keep in mind that while our posts will live on, the deals won't. Each is lovingly generated by the deal-bot every day, so get 'em while they're hot. Enjoy!
iTunes Music Store: [iPhone / iPod Apps] App Store Freebies: GravBall, iWore, Cyclic Dial, JingleToe, TanSafe, more
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OfficeMax: [Office Furniture] Office Chair Roundup: Sofronio Manager Mid-Back Chair for $130 + free shipping, more
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Skinit: [Notebook Accessories] Skinit.com coupon: 50% off sitewide
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"Give in to the power of the tea," the male model, Hansel, whispered as he seduced the overcome reporter in the epic comedy, Zoolander. That's what we thought of as we entered Armani/Casa, an ultra-hip interior design locale in SoHo where fashionistas shop for their postmodern couches and Eastern-influenced coffee tables. It wasn't a home makeover mission that brought us to Never Neverland, however, as we were there to preview Dell's XPS One, the newest all-in-one home computer, which came out on November 19th and is the latest entry in the growing area of stylish, all-in-one computers.
Picking our way through the hotly attired models and Dell executives that dotted the sleek Armani/Casa homescape, we began to understand the nature of this particular computing beast... Home computing is undergoing a transformation in character, style or that je ne sais quoi these days, and the XPS One is Dell's attempt to get sexy. And make no mistake, the folks at Dell will sell their stock to Apple before letting the competition's Gateway One and the Sony Vaio L Series overshadow their own product's libido.
All black, the machine is comprised of a 20-inch, high-definition widescreen monitor that houses the computer itself, with just one cable to plug in. The only other components are a wireless mouse and an old-school infrared wireless keyboard that triumphs over the inconsistent Bluetooth keyboards from former XPS models. In addition, the XPS boasts a built-in TV tuner, whereas most PC models of this size and type, including the Gateway One, have an external tuner or none at all, like the Sony Vaio L Series.
A couple of things that we really liked were the motion sensors that, when triggered, light up the media keys and a half-circle of blue light that illuminates the slot-loading drive on the lower, right hand corner of the monitor. We also dug the great speakers that come stock with every XPS as well as the option to include a Blu-ray drive (as long as you're willing to pay more). While the cheapest XPS One goes for $1,499, the version with all of the bells and whistles maxes out at $2,399.
Overall, this computer seems to have the it sexy factor that Dell wanted to develop. Whether you're an artiste whose closet includes clothing in black or black, or just a regular consumer looking for a home computer that looks smokin' and futuristic while doing it all without the complications, this is the all-in-one product for you.
The only downside is that the models we saw at Armani/Casa are not offered with the XPS at this time.
Granted, I make this assertion not as one of those folks who saw the movie in the last day, just as someone who has seen the early footage from Comic Con and Avatar Day and the other clips released so far.
An interesting thing about seeing the footage at Comic Con: hours before the audience's first trip to Pandora, we got to see another 3D motion capture preview, scenes from Robert Zemeckis' A Christmas Carol. You can almost see the gears turning in Zemeckis' head when he introduces a new movie, the tweaks he made to try to improve his particular brand of mo-cap aided animation. Casting Jim Carrey, a man famous for being able to act beneath five pounds of makeup, in multiple roles was an inspired attempt to remedy the notorious flatness of his animated characters. But it proved impossible to forget that these characters were simply sophisticated digital puppets, with Ebenezer Scrooge nearly as ethereal as the ghosts he's scheduled to encounter.
While watching the Avatar footage, by contrast, it was so easy I was watching an animated movie. Certainly it's jarring to see a giant blue person standing next to humans when Sully is first connected to his Avatar body. But when the Na'vi step into their animated native habitat, it's easy to suspend that disbelief that so stubbornly hangs over Zemeckis' animation. Pandora and the Na'vi may be shy of photorealistic (although there are some incredible moments, especially during the Thanator chase and when Jake engages with his Banshee for the first time), but they do feel alive, the way their facial muscles move, the sometimes distracting way their ears twitch to convey emotion, the play of light in their eyes. At times, it almost looks like we're seeing actors in blue makeup rather than the motion capture mask. Cameron has very nearly crossed the uncanny valley and that's an achievement in itself.
But it's Pandora itself that's truly thrilling, thanks to a combination of multilayered 3D technology and Cameron's obsessive nature. Cameron has talked a great deal about how he and his army of concept artists and biologists designed every plant and creature on Pandora. It's an impressive feat (and I can't wait to see that bioluminescence again), but it's only a small component of what makes the planet seem real. Early viewers are describing Avatar as akin to a nature documentary on an alien world, and it goes far beyond glowing flora. When a Banshee lands on a tree or a Thanator runs through the forest, leaves fall. If a creature pounces on a stalk or branch, it splinters. These aren't small details Cameron and his team have inserted for the sake of realism; they're present throughout the early clips. More than that, in 3D, these components exist on different planes, each obeying the laws of physics independent of the others. When Sully first encounters Neytiri, the air is simply stuffed with bugs, embers, and bits of dust, and their depth is such that you imagine you could stick your hand in it and swirl it around. I've been fairly 3D-agnostic until this point; I enjoy the novelty of movies where the 3D reaches out and grabs you, but I've never found it adds much to the experience. Avatar's 3D, which pulls you in instead of reaching out, does create a special experience, that sense that you are actually present, looking inside an entirely invented world.
However, the technology, as amazing as it is, leaves us with a lot of questions. Is there a point to all this spectacle? Is this good filmmaking? Avatar is antithetical to the Hitchcockian mode of filmmaking, where the director carefully controls the audience's gaze. In Avatar, Cameron gleefully surrenders that kind of control, inviting us instead to look all over the screen and try to drink in as much as humanly possible as we go along. In fact, I imagine that a good deal of Avatar's repeat business will come from a sense that viewers missed a lot the first time around. I haven't seen the film in its entirety yet, but I can't help but wonder if all that spectacle distracts from other aspects of the movie. And, if it works well with Cameron's particular brand of filmmaking, will it work equally well with others'?
As for its purpose, Cameron has set it to worldbuilding — and the idea that you can create a global, digital set that you can return to any time. And you can extrapolate big things from that — incredibly detailed video games, franchises set and filmed on many worlds by many filmmakers. But it's important to remember that Cameron and his team built this technology as they went along. Early reviews indicate that Avatar stands up as a movie on its own, but it's also a proof of concept. I can't imagine that Cameron has found the exhaustive — or even the best — uses for his remarkable motion capture and animation technologies. I would love to see what happens when this technology lands in the hands of someone whose craft is animation. Avatar itself might not change all movies forever, but I'll wager that the technology that birthed it will give rise to something wonderful — and stranger than we could have imagined before.
Earlier this month, I warned readers not to enroll -- or encourage their children to enroll -- in for-profit colleges.
Not wanting to feel left out of the festival of updates for GPS apps, AT&T has given 
Apple today 
