RIM are still holding onto the smartphone market and have shown this by debuting a couple of new smartphones that RIM are claiming to be the thinnest and most powerful Blackberry devices yet. The new smartphones are also powered by the new Blackberry 7 OS, the two models? Blackberry Bold 9900 and 9930.

Mike Lazaridis, President and Co-CEO of Research in Motion has said:

In case you live under a rock, or in a multi-acre off-the-grid "luxury" Pakistani compound, Osama Bin Laden is officially dead and accounted for, thanks to a successful Covert Ops mission yesterday. Not only did the news start pouring in on Twitter before mainstream media had time to compose stories and segments of greater than 140 characters, but the announcement saw the highest sustained tweets per second (TPS) ever.

The above is the "first" tweet that alerted the Twitterverse to the impending media onslaught, posted 10:25PM EST May 1, yesterday by Keith Urbahn, former Chief of Staff for Donal Rumsfeld, himself the former Secretary of Defense under the George W. Bush administration, one that made the search for Bin Laden a primary ideological focus. It seems that the news itself was actually broken, retroactively, by a resident of Abbottabad, Soahib Athar (Twitter user @reallyvirtual).

At 11PM EST, the announcement of Bin Laden's death came in at over 5000 TPS, outdoing every other major Twitter event in the social network's history with the exception of the Japanese New Year's Eve 2010, which peaked at over 6000 TPS. The Bin Laden announcement however sustained a 3,440 TPS for over 3 hours, the longest and highest sustained TPS ratio.

Well I'll be damned. This was more enjoyable that most of those crazy trick shot videos you see on YouTube all the time. In my opinion, that's because this stuff would be harder to fake (I know that seems counter-intuitive, but just think about it for a second). For all of you that haven't gotten the chance to try out Valve's new installation of the puzzle-solving, viusally-mesmerizing Portal franchise, then this video is a great way to get hooked.

YouTube user Schrobotindisguise posted this video after he, well, got bored (note: this is a very rare occurrence and I cannot even fathom the amount of time one would need to play Portal 2 before actually getting bored. This dude must be a pro. With a lot of spare time):

As of last Friday you could use augmented reality facial tracking to turn yourself into Prince William or Princess Kate, but Aptronic has done it again with their ZombieMirror AR+ iOS application for the iPhone 4 and iPad 2 (you need the rear-facing camera).

Yes, that includes Scruffy, the family Zombie. Er, I mean, cat.

Much like the Royal Wedding app (also by Aptronic), the ZombieMirror application utilizes the facial-tracking SDK of Paris / Los Angeles-based AR solutions firm Total Immersion to recognize your face (or the face of a friend or random passerby- though I highly discourage trying to take photos of people you don't know) and overlay digital information on top of it- in this case, Zmobification awesomeness. You can also "configure" your Zombie visage to include or omit effects like pockmarked cheek, dangling eye, and, quite simply, hatchet- amongst other things.

Gigabyte have today released a video showing off their new Touch BIOS, it's innovative and user-friendly and available on all Gigabyte Z68-based motherboards. The BIOS has not really changed much in the past few, oh I don't know, decades... but there are a few companies with different takes on what they think the BIOS should be (or at least, how it should look and feel). Gigabyte have taken a path that brings familiarity to the concept in the form of an icon-based user experience. Take a look at the below video and see what you think.

The touch navigation obviously has requirements of a touch-enabled monitor plus Windows 7 in order to work. Mouse navigation is supposed with any monitor along with Windows XP/Vista and 7.

Due most likely to popularity of MMO's like DC Universe and Marvel's own Superhero Squad Online, Marvel and Gazillion Entertainment are banding together to provide what will most likely be an insanely entertaining MMORPG.

From Gazillion's website:

Yesterday at the Guardian Activate conference in New York, Twitter Vice President of International Strategy Katie Stanton confirmed that there are now over 200 Million registered users on Twitter. She commented that over 70% of Twitter traffic comes from outside the US, with around 25% in Japan alone. Also remarkable -but not altogether surprising- is that 40% of Twitter traffic comes from mobile phones.

Stanton noted:

OCZ have today unveiled the VeloDrive PCI-Express SSDs which are designed to meet the needs of small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs), enterprise clients and system integrators. The OCZ VeloDrive optimizes high-performance computing and storage applications, which provides "unparalleled versatility and simplified integration".

Daryl Lang, VIP of Product Management of OCZ Technology Group says:

Boom goes the dynamite. Online content streaming service Hulu is now serving Xbox 360's and the Xbox Live network. It sure took them long enough, but hey! The first week is on them! Yes, that's free! Hulu is offering the Hulu Plus service free for an entire week for all Xbox Live users, silver or gold, Hulu subscribers or not! Usually this sets you back the price of an Xbox Live Gold account and an $US8/month Hulu Plus subscription. Nice.

Even better, Hulu works with the Kinect! Yes I'm serious- we're talking voice and gesture recognition to stream movies and television shows. Hello, the future of remote controls.

Face-tracking app maker Aptronic has devised a clever and timely app to coordinate with the upcoming already-internationally-infamous Royal Wedding. The app, RoyalMirror is available for the iPad 2 and the iPhone 4 (rear-facing camera is necessary), and tracks your face to overlay a stylized and cartoonish depiction of either Prince William or Princess Catherine that you can promptly share on a variety of social network sites.

It's a nice addition to an already overwhelming list of lampoons associated with the Wedding of the Century, but it seems novel enough for a few laughs. I think the $0.99 price tag would be more worthwhile if Aptronic had included, say, more than just two royals (who doesn't want to be the Queen of England?) or even a function that allows multiple faces to be tracked for group photos- but hey, I'm not complaining when a mobile augmented reality application has some visibility potential. Plus, Aptronic should see some decent numbers for downloads.

The app was created using the AR SDK of Los Angeles / Paris-based Augmented Reality Solutions firm Total Immersion, who also has a host of AR iOS apps. Aptronic has similar apps available that utilize facial recognition to turn the user into a zombie, amongst other things.

Man, can we get anymore anagrams in that headline?

Andrew Burnes of Geforce announced today that they will once again be providing AMD motherboards that support SLI. Kick-ass, Andrew. Hit the jump for a photo of one of these shiny new toys, and to check out the rest of the press release.

Well, isn't this an amazing find. A non-typical, original game that isn't a COD-clone. "Depth" is a game where you can choose to be the Predator or Thief. As the Predator, you're a 21-foot man-eating shark and your objective is to find and dismember divers. You get "Shark vision" which lets you experience the sights, sounds and smells of the shark's world. Track prey by the disturbances they make in the water or by the sound of their own heartbeat! As the Shark you have the ability of full-body dismemberment, tear off your victim's limbs one by one and let him bleed to death or take him out with the final bite.

As a "Thief" you obviously play a human diver and your objective is to loot wealth in the form of sunken booty on the ocean floor - the only way to do this is to outsmart the 21-foot Shark enemies that are hunting you. Take cover in dense sea-weed, wrecks or stay as quiet as possible while the Shark's are hunting for you.

A new classifications system for computer games that will "increase protection for children and provide parents with clearer guidance" will be supported by the State Government. Attorney-General John Rau has said today that he supports the Federal Government's national push to create an R18+ classification for games but he would abolish the MA15+ classification in SA.

Mr Rau has been quoted saying:

Acer have hit the market first with a 27-inch, Full-HD, 3D Display. Dubbed the Acer HN274H, Acer have specced it well, Full HD, 100, 000, 000:1 contrast ratio, LED-backlit, 120hz refresh rate and a 2ms response time is not too shabby at all. Yes it's not an IPS-based panel, but for the fast-motion, first-person shooter fans like myself, the 120hz gives you a semi. If that doesn't get the blood pumping, it is also (and obviously) capable of 3D with NVIDIA's 3D Vision technology.

Better yet, the Acer HN274H has the IR emitter built-in! Acer are even throwing in a pair of NVIDIA 3D glasses too. Acer have also added their eColor and Adaptive Contrast Management technologies which work dynamically to (apparently) deliver ultra-sharp and realistic visuals, here I was thinking that was the GPU doing that. The monitor looks great and I would definitely love to try one of these puppies out, Acer. Might be upgrade time for my Surround Vision Alienware setup!

Microsoft are doing a bang-up job on Windows 8, every week theres a new feature leaked and nearly every single one has sounded like a great idea and really adds to the upcoming Operating System. Today we have the "Roaming Option" which looks like it allows a user to link their Windows account to their Windows Live account.

With Roaming Option, there are six types of customizations which you can move to a different computer: Personalization (Desktop background image, glass color), Accessibility (Ease of access control panel, magnifier, on screen keyboard, narrator, and speech recognition settings), Language Settings (Language profile, text prediction preferences, and IME dictionary), Application Settings (Application settings and search history), Windows Settings (Taskbar, Explorer, search, and mouse settings), and Credentials (Wireless network profiles and saved website credentials).

From the screenshot above we can also see that there are two "Network options" within the Roaming Options category. One is "enable roaming on paid networks" whilst the other is "enable roaming on low bandwidth". From these options it looks like Windows 8 will be able to differentiate between network speeds, for example someone on a 3G connection (mobile, smartphone, tablets) will be limited versus someone on a full broadband connection. Nice.

AMD have released the Catalyst 11.4 drivers for Windows with various enhancements and issues resolved. First up AMD have included enhancements to the AMD VISION Engine Control Center / AMD Catalyst Control Center with new task-based Display Management controls (which is meant to simplify the configuration of displays and display settings), a new Eyefinity setup group and AMD Catalyst update notification.

There are various performance gains, which aren't too bad at all:

The AMD Radeon HD 6900 Series and AMD Radeon HD 6800 Series of products will see the following performance gains:

Apple's super-famous iPad 2 is making it's way to Japan on Thursday, April 28 and Hong Kong, Korea, Singapore and eight other countries on Friday, April 29. The iPad 2 will be available at Apple retail stores at 9am local time, select Apple Authorized Resellers, and online through the Apple Store beginning at 1am.

Additionally, the iPad 2 with Wi-Fi will be available in China starting from Friday, May 6. The Wi-Fi only iPad 2 will see the light of day in Hong Kong, India, Israel, Korea, Macau, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, South Africa, Turkey and UAE on April 29 for a retail price of $499 (US) for the standard 16GB model. 32GB will sell for $599 (US) with the 64GB model priced at $699 (US).

As for the Wi-Fi + 3G model, pricing is set for 16, 32 and 64GB as $629 (US), $729 (US) and $829 (US) respectively.

Not a huge story, but if you've ever played this game you know how awesome it is. PopCap, makers of games like the insanely addictive office favorite BeJeweled, have released their highly successful and original title Plants Vs. Zombies for the Nintendo's handheld.

Basically, zombies are trying to attack your house. Whether it's your front door, your backyard (in which you somehow install a pool halfway through the zombie apocalypse), or your roof, the zombies are out to get you. And they'll attach you day, night, even when it's very foggy and visibility conditions are terrible. Especially when visibility is terrible, come to think of it. And they're in wetsuits, dressed like Michael Jackson from Thriller, riding zambonis and bobsleds, and totally out to eat your brains. The only thing standing between you and them is an arsenal of anthropomorphic plants ready to stop them, literally, in their tracks. From IGN's screenshots, it looks as though the DS version even gets some new levels.

PvZ made PC Mag's top 75 iPad apps list, of which only 15 were games. If you've played this epic "stave-off-the-hordes" game, you know why it did so well. It's extremely addictive, and with all sorts of clever achievements, easter eggs, and challenging game formats, this will occupy your DS for a very long time.

Chad Hurley and Steve Chen, founders of YouTube have acquired Delicious. Wait what? Didn't Yahoo acquire Delicious back in 2005 for like $10 million? The answer is yes, but evidently Yahoo is selling off its acquisitions.

Delicious, formerly "del.icio.us" is a social bookmarking site- it allows you to keep track of bookmarks and access them from any computer, thus eliminating the frustration of having to access particular browsers on particular computers. We're not sure about the details of this reacquisition, but it can't an altogether bad thing to be under the auspices of the guys that brought us the most addictive website since.....uh.....ever?

Delcious will continue under Yahoo until July of 2011, and if you're a current user, the transition will be "seamless". Check out their site and/or the press release below for more details.

The leading mobile social game producer on Google's smartphone Android operating system has nabbed $18 Million in Series B funding from Chinese Venture Capital firm Keytone and global VC firm DCM.

Since launching in June of 2010, Papaya has seen a 375% growth rate, so this latest round of funding does not come as a surprise. Papaya provides a diverse suite of free mobile games for Android smartphones, including Whacksy Taxi, Papaya Fish (once again: Mmmmm), Papaya Farm, and about 50 others. And 15 million users is nothing to sneeze at, either.

The funding is geared toward what will be a "staggering" projected growth of Android users in China, where Papaya calls home in Beijing (though they have an office here in San Francisco as well), and will go to expanding the developer network in Europe and North America. And of course, more games. Which means more fun.