A. B. B.

We don't normally discuss sports in this blog but in honor of the Super Bowl we will today.

I'm in an A.B.B. mood for the weekend. What's that you ask? Anybody But Boston!

I have hated all sports teams from the Boston area since I was a child. It goes back to my parents. My father was an avid Yankees fan which meant, of course, he hated Boston. I inherited those genes.

The second Boston team hatred came about when I was a huge Wilt Chamberlain fan and his main rival was Bill Russell. Boo Russell, yeah Big Dipper.

Then there were the back-to-back Philly Flyers Stanley Cups with big wins against the stinkin' Bruins.

The icing on the cake was Donny Moore and my beloved Angels against the red sox in the MLB playoffs. One more strike and the Angels are in the series for the first time. Instead poor Lefty later killed himself because of the shame of losing to Boston.

As I said... ABB!! Go Seahawks!

Earned Income Tax Credit Awareness Day

In recognition of today being Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) Awareness Day, TaxACT® is reminding Americans that EITC help and federal tax return filing is always free at www.taxact.com.   
                                                     

This year's maximum Earned Income Tax Credit amount is $496 for an individual without children and $6,143 for a family with three or more children. The final credit amount is based on wages, other earned income, adjusted gross income and number of qualified children. One of the EITC requirements is that earned income and adjusted gross income for 2014 must each be less than:

               

• $46,997 ($52,427 married filing jointly) with three or more qualifying children
• $43,756 ($49,186 married filing jointly) with two qualifying children
• $38,511 ($43,941 married filing jointly) with one qualifying child
• $14,590 ($20,020 married filing jointly) with no qualifying children

       

Last year, nearly 28 million Americans received the refundable EITC, averaging $2,407. However, just four out of five qualified taxpayers claimed the credit.

TaxACT Free Federal Edition, available as over-the-web, download and mobile solutions, asks simple eligibility questions and completes the tax forms. With TaxACT's free federal e-file and direct deposit, Americans filing returns for the EITC could have their IRS refunds as soon as mid-February.

LG ships 59.1 million smartphones

Samsung may be stumbling after posting its lowest annual profit for three years. The same can’t be said for fellow Korean company LG, which just revealed that it posted an improved $475 million profit for 2014 after shipping a total of 59.1 million smartphones, a 24 percent increase on its previous year.

LG shipped a record 16.8 million smartphones in Q3 2014 — which was its best quarter of business for five years — but its total for the final quarter of last year dipped a little to reach 15.5 million. That was still its second biggest quarter of 2014.

LG Electronics’s net profit of $474.81 million is up 125 percent year-on-year. Its growing mobile business helped pull in year-long revenue of $55.91 billion, a more modest (but stable) one percent gain on 2013. LG actually posted a net loss of $189.41 million in Q4 2014 however, due to the costs of closing its plasma TV unit.

LG’s mobile business itself reported annual sales of $14.26 billion, up 16 percent year-on-year, for 2014. Its revenue in Q4 2014 rose five percent year-on-year to reach $3.48 billion.

iPhone 6 Sales

The fiscal first quarter was boosted by the bigger-screen iPhone 6 and 6 Plus, with sales rising 46 percent to 74.5 million units, topping analysts’ average estimate of 64.9 million. That exceeded the full-year iPhone sales of 72.3 million that Apple made in all of fiscal 2011, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

“We had the highest number of customers new to iPhone last quarter than in any prior launch,” Cook said on a conference call with analysts.

The iPhones helped boost margins to 39.9 percent. That topped Apple’s forecast in October of 37.5 percent to 38.5 percent and exceeded the average prediction of analysts for 38.5 percent.

MSFT Q2 Earnings

As part of the company’s latest quarterly earnings announcement, Microsoft today revealed Surface revenue increased to $1.1 billion in Q2 2015, driven mainly by Surface Pro 3 and its accessories. The company also revealed phone hardware revenue of $2.3 billion, thanks to 10.5 million Lumia units sold in the quarter.

In Q2 2014, Microsoft reported $893 million in Surface revenue, meaning the figure has slightly increased (up 24 percent, to be exact). More importantly, this is the first quarter that the Surface line has generated more than $1 billion. The company started this fiscal year with $908 million in Surface quarterly revenue, meaning it has already sold $2 billion’s worth of Surface products in the first half of its fiscal year.

Over $1 billion in Surface sales is a lot for a software company that only recently got serious about making its own computers, but we still don’t know the exact number of Surfaces the company is selling. That’s because Microsoft lumps together accessories and older Surface devices along with the Surface Pro 3, which itself has models ranging from $800 to $1,950. That said, it couldn’t have sold much more than a million units, which is a long way off from market leader Apple and its 12.3 million iPads or even its 5.5 million Macs sold last quarter. Microsoft has quite a long way to go before it is a dominant force as a tablet or PC maker.

Clean Out Your Computer Day

Clean Out Your Computer Day is almost here! The holiday falls on Monday, February 9 in 2015 and iolo technologies has long been a huge fan of the holiday and regularly offered tips, promotions and giveaways to media outlets to celebrate the fun day. 

We'll have more on this in the next few days including some give away products!

A New Kickstarter Project

HYPER Launches iPin: World's Smallest Laser Pointer And Wireless Presenter For iOS And Android Via Kickstarter\

Sanho Corporation - the company behind the HYPER line of mobile accessories, in collaboration with Conary Enterprise, an opto-semiconductor company announces its Kickstarter campaign for 2 new iPin Laser Pointer and Wireless Presenter products to follow up on the award winning original iPin for iPhone.

Original iPin Laser Presenter for iOS

The original iPin is the world’s smallest laser pointer attachment for the iPhone, iPad and iPod touch. As the name suggest, it is as tiny as a pin which disappears completely into the audio jack of the iOS device with almost no protruding parts, turning the iPhone, iPad and iPod touch into a laser pointer and wireless presenter.

New iPin Laser Presenter for Android

The new iPin for Android connects to the micro USB port of compatible Android devices and just like the original iPin for iOS, it comes with a free app that can be downloaded from the Google Play store that turns the iPin connected Android device into a powerful laser pointer and wireless presenter. Through the free iPin app and WiFi connection, users can transform their Android devices into a fully featured presentation tool with intuitive gesture based controls to change presentation slides and move the mouse pointer on any Mac and PC computer.

New BTtogo Bluetooth USB Dongle

The new BTtogo adds another level of convenience to the iPin. Traveling to another office and presenting at another site may mean that WiFi connections are not guaranteed or firewalls may be in place. BTtogo solves the issue by allowing users to confidently connect their iPin enabled iOS or Android device to any computer for a reliable presentation, regardless of the WiFi or firewall settings. BTtogo features a USB connector that plugs into any Mac or PC computer and connects to the iPin enabled iOS or Android device via bluetooth with no host software required and almost zero setup. Users can store their presentation files on a micro SD memory card inserted into BTtogo to run presentations on any public computer, even with firewalls present.

HYPER is seeking $50,000 via Kickstarter to launch the 2 new iPin products. Funding begins January 5, 2015 at 8am PST/11am EST and ends on February 9, 2015. Upon successful funding, HYPER aims to ship the new iPin products in the same month of February 2015. This is HYPER’s 4th Kickstarter project after the successful CloudFTP, iStick and Pearl which combined raised over $1.4 million.

Product Specifications

iPin for iPhone, iPad, iPod touch

Length: 16mm (standard version), 17.8mm (extended version, designed for iOS devices with case)

Diameter: 3.5mm (narrowest end) ~ 7.6mm (widest end)

Laser Wavelength: 635nm

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Supported iOS Devices: iPhone 3GS/4/4S/5/5C/5S/6, iPod touch 4/5, iPad, iPad mini

Supported Systems: Mac OS X 10.6 - 10.10 (Yosemite), Windows XP/Vista/7/8

iPin for Android

Dimensions: 47.2 x 14.7 x 10mm

Laser Wavelength: 650nm

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Supported Android Devices: Android devices with micro USB OTG (On-The-Go) specification

Supported Systems: Mac OS X 10.6 - 10.10 (Yosemite), Windows XP/Vista/7/8

BTtogo

Dimensions: 70.6 x 30.2 x 12mm

Bluetooth Version: Bluetooth 4.0 (BLE mode)

Bluetooth RF Frequency: 2.40-248 GHz

Memory Card Reader: microSD

Supported Systems: iPhone 4S or later, Android 4.3 or later with Bluetooth 4.0, Mac OS X, Windows XP/Vista/7/8

Pricing and Availability

iPin for iPhone retails for $49.95 and is currently available.

Both iPin for Android and BTtogo will retail for $34.95 each and will ship in February, 2015.

Special pricing will be available for Kickstarter backers.

Kickstarter Project Page:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/hypershop/ipintm-laser-pointer-wireless-presenter-for-ios-an