surfing

Motorola got a jump start on CES when it announced its new crop of phones two days before the show opens. The most high-end of the bunch is the new Surf A3100 smartphone, which offers an expansive touch screen and support for Windows Mobile 6.1. Starting Thursday in Las Vegas, it will join the Earth-friendly Renew W233 and the rugged Tundra VA76r at Moto's booth on the show floor.

Sporting a sleek, attractive design with rounded edges and chrome detailing, the Surf offers three ways for users to interact with it. They can use a stylus, a trackball, … Read more

Video search and identification tool VideoSurf has a new script for Greasemonkey users that lets you see VideoSurf-enhanced results on Google, Yahoo, and YouTube. If a result has been indexed by VideoSurf you'll see its timeline, along with links to each segment which skip you straight to that part of the video.

VideoSurf is advertising this as a way to see video results before you click on them, similar to some scripts and extensions that show you site thumbnails straight from search results or on-site links (like Snap). I found it to work particularly well on mainstream content, although … Read more

The fall CTIA wireless show kicked off Wednesday with a slew of new phones and mobile services, including the first clamshell-shaped BlackBerry and Verizon's first 3G handset. Check out our full coverage here.

A trial switch to digital TV may not have gone very smoothly, but the FCC says it gave them the valuable lessons they were looking for to help prepare for a nationwide switch next February.

And Europe's giant particle collider was officially switched on Wednesday morning. Next up: solving the universe's mysteries of matter. Get those stories and more in today's podcast.

The Internet can be a scary place, with all kinds of bad guys, and even good guys, trying to spy on what information you're sending through the tubes. Even if you have nothing to hide, maybe the thought of folks snooping on you makes your skin crawl. In this Insider Secret, you'll learn how to surf anonymously.

Watch the video to see all of this in action.

For basic Web surfing, there are free services coming and going all the time that allow you to avoid cookies and other tracking while using your regular old Web browser. A … Read more

While not a new idea, AirBed & Breakfast is a fun approach to couch surfing--a time honored tradition that encourages resource sharing between travelers who need a place to stay for a night or two, and people with open couches or a spare room.

The tool is set up like a hotel booking service, allowing people in need of a place to stay an easy way to browse open accommodations by city. As a host you can have people in your house as long as you'd like and set a fee per night or for a specific amount … Read more

There have been other multimedia loungers that hang screens precariously overhead, but usually they try to pack in as many functions as possible for entertainment or even (gasp) work. The "Surf Chair," however, keeps things simple: It just lets you lie back and immerse yourself in the Web.

That simplicity contributes to the classically clean lines of Danish design. And don't worry about all those cords tethering the peripherals in the photo; it actually won the "Internet Collection" competition of the Scandinavian Furniture Fair a few years ago, according to BornRich, so the gear should … Read more

A quick recap of Neil Young's recent announcement at the Sun JavaOne conference, as reported by CNET's Dan Farber. The long-awaited (by fans) Neil Young Archive project is coming out this year. It'll be on Blu-ray, which is the first digital format to satisfy Mr. Young's needs (with a regular DVD, you couldn't watch high-resolution video and listen to music at the same time). He recommends buying a Sony PS3 as a Blu-ray player because the PS3 has an Internet connection and a fat hard drive, and he wants to update the content over time. … Read more

We really didn't think anything like the motorized monocycle "WheelSurf" would ever be marketed to the masses, but now we find out that one is being offered by mainstream gadget shop Hammacher Schlemmer of all places. Of course, it's selling for nearly twice the price listed back in September, for $13,000.

Even if you do have that kind of dough to blow, you won't be able to commute in this unicycle on steroids because it's not street-legal, as BornRich points out. But still, talk about making your buddies jealous: After all, how many … Read more

CULVER CITY, Calif.--One of the things that struck me towards the end of the animated surfing penguin mockumentary, Surf's Up, is that I had forgotten that every bit of water in the film--mainly loads of lovingly rendered surfing waves--was digitally animated.

Even after that realization, I looked at the water in the film and thought the animators had done a remarkable job at recreating one of the things that, like making human hair look realistic, has always been hardest to recreate.

Others must agree, because last month, Surf's Up was chosen as one three nominees for … Read more