We’ve talked before about what it takes for an app to truly be a competitor to Apple’s Siri. 

1. It needs to be easily accessible, and launch quickly. Very quickly.
2. It needs to actually understand what you’re saying.

If you’re a dyed-in-the-wool modder, here’s a great weekend project — modifying your Verizon Galaxy Nexus to work with the HP Touchstone.  I’ll tell you right up front — this one isn’t for the faint-hearted.  It involves breaking the case open and voiding your warranty.  But AC member ohiomoto has a beautiful step-by-step to guide you through, and there’s no need for a soldering iron.  Things are always fine if you don’t have to break out the soldering iron …

Remember last year when Virgin Mobile USA said they would be delaying their plans to throttle data for users who used more then 2.5GB in one month? At the time, they never gave any reason as to why they were delaying it but it was mentioned that they would be re-visiting the plans in 2012 and now — it’s 2012.

Think back to last summer, when the weather was warm and we all expected a formal announcement about LightSquared and Sprint launching their shared LTE network.  Back to today, and we find out that the National Space-Based Positioning, Navigation and Timing Executive Committee (some of the folks who decide all this stuff) have determined that none of the proposals submitted by LightSquared will ever work without affecting GPS.  Last year during preliminary testing, it was discovered that LightSquared’s LTE plans greatly affected GPS, and after a handful of re-submittals, changes, and more testing that didn’t alleviate the problems, the feds have said enough is enough.  

Think back to last summer, when the weather was warm and we all expected a formal announcement about LightSquared and Sprint launching their shared LTE network.  Back to today, and we find out that the National Space-Based Positioning, Navigation and Timing Executive Committee (some of the folks who decide all this stuff) have determined that none of the proposals submitted by LightSquared will ever work without affecting GPS.  Last year during preliminary testing, it was discovered that LightSquared’s LTE plans greatly affected GPS, and after a handful of re-submittals, changes, and more testing that didn’t alleviate the problems, the feds have said enough is enough.  

I love CM, but unfortunately it was also very buggy… I tried XRON’s rom and it has been nothing but amazing for me. I still have MINOR issues but nothing that would keep it from being my daily driver! When CM9 comes out, of course, i am going right back! I love CM!!!!

Motorola made it clear before CES even kicked off that this year’s focus would be on connecting your entire home, or “staying unplugged.” This morning we got a look at Motorola’s approach to making live television accesible in every room: Televation. It’s a handy little system that differs a bit from what we’ve seen from other manufacturers: instead of streaming content from your main TV, Televation brings cable subscription right to your Xoom or Xyboard tablet. That means that you’ll be able to choose what show you want to watch directly from your tablet, as your device will have its own dedicated cable feed. Everything is wireless, and it’ll work as long as you’ve got a WiFi connection. It’s built for Moto tablets, but big M says that it’s working on making the system available on different manufacturer’s device. If you’re still hooked on live TV and prefer appointment viewing to Netflix, Hulu, and DVR, this might be what you’ve been waiting for.

Google has updated the Google Earth app, fixing a pesky-as-hell bug that caused the app to crash during startup on Tegra 2 devices.  NVIDIA uses special instructions for the Tegra chip, and while they work amazingly well when used properly (check out some Tegra games if you haven’t yet), sometimes different specialized hardware makes it difficult for the generic “works everywhere” app to use the full set of features.

The Silk browser on the Amazon Kindle Fire may or may not be to everyone’s liking, but that hasn’t stopped the community efforts to port it across to other devices. The ever helpful folks over at the XDA forums have successfully managed to port the browser to work with the Cyanogenmod custom ROM.