Apple’s newest iPhone was selling briskly Thursday as thousands lined up outside stores around the world to become among the first to own the device amid concerns of supply shortages.

Poor reception has been reported by owners of the new iPhone 4. Poor or completely absent reception has been reported by users when holding the device without a case.

Apple has claimed that reception issues involve a software problem that incorrectly indicates a bad signal, and that a fix is enroute. Because the iPhone 4 uses a new antenna design integrated into the iPhone body’s edge, some people believe a hardware revision is necessary and/or the bumper cases should be supplied free with the iPhone. Cases, such as the bumpers sold by Apple, may prevent interference caused by a direct hand-to-iPhone contact.

Poor reception problems — even worse than previous versions of the iPhone — have been posted on an Apple support discussion board page on entitled ‘the real reason for bad reception.’

YouTube video showing signal bar indicators changing depending on how the phone is held.

There are suspicions that human skin contact of the antenna that embedded in the body of the phone is interfering with the signal strength reception of the iPhone.

Bill Gillam, a tech enthusiast from Arlington, Washington conducted a test of an Apple iPad on a sunny with 63°F outdoor temperature.

Armed with an expensive FLIR camera — a device that captures images in the infrared spectrum and reports temperatures of surfaces in the image — Bill Gillam checked the temperature of an Apple iPad used in direct sunlight. He took note of the elapsed time when the device shut down. After 11-12 minutes of use in direct sunlight, the iPad screen went dark with a temperature alert displayed on the screen. The device read a temperature of 97°F at the center of the iPad screen with an average temperature on the device of about 100°F. The shutdown is temporary.

Evidence points to the idea that the device is great in the house, in the kitchen, on the coffee table, etc., but it might not be the workhouse for heavy duty mobile workers.

McAfee warned consumers on March 9 that “scareware,” or fake anti-virus software, may be the most costly online scam in 2010, causing significant monetary loss and damage to users’ computers.

Apart from the scareware files themselves, many malware that aid rogue anti-virus programs in attacking computers are grouped into the fake-alert Trojan family. Prior to the first quarter in 2009, the number of fake alerts discovered were under 100,000 per quarter. About 250,000 newly discovered fake alerts were reported in Quarter One 2009, about 350,000 new fake alerts were reported in Quarter Two 2009, and over 600,000 new fake alerts were reported in Quarter Three 2009. Quarter Four 2009 and the current quarter in 2010 are about 350,000.

Why is there a blank space where a Google Street View once appeared?
Google developers recently changed the format and code of Google Street Views. The views have an improved interface, but in early January older ‘legacy’ Google Street View’ disappeared from view in situations where the Street View Code is embedded in a web page or blog. Viewers of web pages published using the older code simply see the blank color of the background of the page — white space, black space, or whatever background color is coded on the page.

Unfortunately the breakdown of Google Street View has affected over 100 pages on Arlingtoncardinal.com (select news reports) and StreetsofArlington.com (intersection view). A Google employee acknowledged the problem in a Google Map forum on January 16, 2010, and on January 23, 2010 announced that software developers are working on a fix that involves re-directing the old code to the new code.

Newly created Street Views after mid-January, 2010 show properly on web pages. The older Street Views should re-appear when Google provides the re-direct fix.

What countries have Google Street View?
Google has provided a world map that shows all of the locations that have Google Street View. Here it is …
Google Street View Location Map

The New and Improved Street View …

View Larger Google Street View of Flamingo Pond at San Diego Zoo.

Here’s and example of the 4th generation camera that Google is using with near HD quality imaging. But, more important is that use of an off-road vehicle — presumably the Google Maps Trike that can go wear the Google camera car cannot.

Screen shot of Twitter.com home page as it was defaced by ‘Iranian Cyber Army’

Twitter blackout. Twitter down. Tweets did not go through early Friday morning. The tweet failure on Twitter was accompanied by defacement of the front page of Twitter using some method of DNS re-assignment most likely.

What did the message from the ‘Iranian Cyber Army’ say?

Iranian Cyber Army

THIS SITE HAS BEEN HACKED BY IRANIAN CYBER ARMY

iRANiAN.CYBER.ARMY@GMAIL.COM

U.S.A. Think They Controlling And Managing Internet By Their Access, But THey Don’t, We Control And Manage Internet By Our Power, So Do Not Try To Stimulation Iranian Peoples To….

NOW WHICH COUNTRY IN EMBARGO LIST? IRAN? USA?
WE PUSH THEM IN EMBARGO LIST
Take Care.

Twitter was back up in about an hour and fixed by 1:30 a.m. CT on Friday.

Tweet from Twitter that acknowledge that Twitter’s DNS was hacked early Friday morning, December 17, 2009 (twitter.com/twitter).

Iranian Revenge for the ‘Twitter Revolution’
The defacement appears to be a reprisal for Twitter’s role in the Iranian election protests in June 2009. Iranian citizen’s used Twitter to provide updates to the world about Iranian government reaction to protests. Iranian protesters beamed images from the violent protests when mainstream media was blocked from entering Iran, and forbidden from broadcasting information if there were journalist inside the country.

Twitter became so important in spreading news of the protests — and in aiding protester communication on the streets of Iran — that the U.S. State Department asked Twitter to delay a planned shutdown for maintenance.

A second site was also hacked with the same home page defacement …

Google search results fro mowjcamp.com … for more information see GLOBALCONFLICTMAPS.COM: DNS Tweet Down: ‘Iranian Cyber Army’ Hacks, Defaces Twitter Home Page

David Pogue, New York Times Tech Columnist: Verizon is absolutely pulling the strings on these false charges because they control the design of the phone — telling manufacturers of phones what features they want on the phone.

Complaints of so-called data charges that are fraudulently being added to your cell phone bill by your cell phone company. Watch out for shortcut keys for “Mobile Me” or “GetItNow” services from AT&T and Verizon Wireless.

David Pogue, New York Times Tech Columnist claims he received a tip from a Verizon employee that Verizon is creating these error-prone features on purpose.

Accidental repetitive hits of a button can bring a dollar-per-click — often unnoticed by cell phone customers, but bringing in extra income to phone companies. With 80 million customers and a good portion making the click errors or pocket dialing, etc. there is a potential for millions of dollars of extra income to the phone companies.

Verizon Wireless claims few people are committing the click accidents.