Wednesday's Whispered Innuendos

Happy birthday Bilbo! President Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on this day in 1863. The US's first automobile was built in 1893. Today's news includes a cell phone that detects halitosis and city wide Wi-Fi for Philly...

• The gaming wars heat up. Yesterday Nintendo announced pricing and availability for its successor to the best selling game machine of all time, the Gameboy. As expected the Nintendo DS will go on sale in the US November 21 for $149 list. Meanwhile, Sony has announced that it will start selling a slimmed down PS/2 for the same price starting November 1. The new PS/2 is one inch thick and weighs just a pound. The Sony hand-held isn't going on-sale until this spring.
• Silicon.com is reporting speculation that Google might be developing yet another browser. (Do we really need another?) The company registered gbrowser.com in April, has hired away key developers from the Internet Explorer team, and hosted last month's Mozilla Developer Day.
• The ACLU and the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse say Governer Schwarzeneggar should veto a California anti-spyware bill because it's impossible to enforce and offers no serious penalties to spyware vendors.
• Philadelphia has announced plans to turn the city into the world's largest Wi-Fi hotspot. The mesh network would use street lights and thousands of antennas to light up 135 square miles at a cost of $7-10 million. Wonder how Comcast feels about the city offering free broadband?
• Warer Brothers has agreed to participate in the Netflix/Tivo broadband movie trial. Must be because they know the Tivo is unhackable.
• Siemans is developing a new cell phone that will tell you when you have bad breath. But you won't be able to use it in some Mexican churches. They're using telephone jamming systems developed by former Israeli military researchers. Maybe Kevin Spacey will buy a few jammers for the Old Vic - the gadget loving movie star has declared it a cell phone free zone. Reminds me of the time I was in a Broadway show and Aida Turturro's cell phone rang endlessly. I got the distinct feeling she enjoyed the attention.