BlackBerry OS 6 and the New Torch - The UpStream

Scott is a developer who has worked on projects of varying sizes, including all of the PLUGHITZ Corporation properties. He is also known in the gaming world for his time supporting the rhythm game community, through DDRLover and hosting tournaments throughout the Tampa Bay Area. Currently, when he is not working on software projects or hosting F5 Live: Refreshing Technology, Scott can often be found returning to his high school days working with the Foundation for Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology (FIRST), mentoring teams and helping with ROBOTICON Tampa Bay. He has also helped found a student software learning group, the ASCII Warriors, currently housed at AMRoC Fab Lab.

With over ten years of audio engineering experience, Nick's addition to PLuGHiTz Corporation is best served when he is behind the mixing board every Sunday night to produce the audio side of F5 Live: Refreshing Technology, Piltch Point and PLuGHiTz Live Night Cap. While mixing live every week, his previous radio show hosting experience gives him the ability to co-host as well, giving each show a unique flare with his slightly off-center, yet still realistic take on all things tech. An integral part of the show, you can find Nick always enveloped in coming up with new (and sometimes crazy) ideas and content for the show and you can always expect the most direct opinion on the stories that he feels need to be shared with the world. During the few hours where Nick isn't sleeping or working on ways to improve the company, he spends his free time going to hockey and football games and playing the latest titles on Xbox 360. Email him for his gamertag and add him today for a fun escape from the normal monotony and annoyance that the Xbox LIVE gaming community can sometimes be!

Jon is a F5 Live co-host and UpStream contributor as well as the Chief Cash Officer of PLuGHiTz Corporation. We don't know how he wears so many hats so well or how he still finds time to feed his need for all things tech but some questions are best left unanswered. If you're up for a challenge go find him on Xbox Live @shinobiJon and if you figure him out...let us know.

Josh has come from the Brazilian wilds to bring yet another perspective on the gaming industry as well as today's up-and-coming technology. You may have seen him at GameStop over the past two years, or if you're a lover of Largo High School Productions, you have seen him up on stage doing his thing the last 4 years. On occasion, you can catch him on Xbox Live mowing down zombies in Left 4 Dead or making it rain on Madden 2010.

Maygin Theresa is a twenty-something born and raised in Miami, Florida and currently residing in Lakeland, Florida.

Having learned how to sew, knit, crochet, and craft at a very young age, Maygin has developed a love for creating. She tries to learn as much as she can about any new craft she stumbles across that seems interesting.

With a slight disdain for common fashion, even from a young age she has made her own clothes from her own designs and even designed her high school prom dress.

While Maygin likes to supply examples of her work to show and sell, she prefers to make items custom, especially when it comes to costumes, corsets, and hair. She believes that people should get what they want, exactly as they want, and not have to settle for what's available. As such, she tries to have as many supplies available as she can at shows in case anyone is willing to wait a few hours for their very own custom creation.

Allante - also well known as Wolff - is the newest member and co-host for PLuGHiTz Live! Radio. A gifted artist, he is usually found drawing up a character or two or sketching up whatever comes to mind. Do not think that he is not a hardcore gamer because he is about as hardcore as it gets! His favorites range from fighting games to RPGs, adventure and even a racing game here and there. Fighting games are his forte and he relays this message for all who oppose: You mess with the Wolff and you get the fangs!

XB360 - Enigmatic Wolff

PSN - Tsukuyomi_Okami

Have you ever dreamed of living in a place where buses are cool? It might just be time for you to move to China. Beijing's Mentougou District, to be exact. Here, Shenzhen Hashi Future Parking Equipment Co., Ltd has proposed a new type of bus, one they are calling the 3D fast bus, but after seeing the images, I want to call it a tunnel bus.

Chris Paget is not a name you probably know, but you should. He has spent the last few years trying to show the world the vulnerabilities of some of the technology we take for granted. Last year, he demonstrated how easy it is to snag the information off of "secure RFIDs" such as the ones used in US passports. He was able to download the information from the passports without even having to leave his car.

Apple seems to be eying smart phone chip manufacturer Infineon but they aren't the only ones. Other titan tech companies such as Samsung, Broadcom, and Intel appear to be very interested in Infineon as well. The current bid is sitting at $2 billion which is a hefty price tag but all these tech giants and especially Apple have the cash to burn. The real question is, should Apple continue to pursue the merger and acquisition?

Circling for parking accounts for approximately 30% of city driving. Reducing this traffic by helping drivers find parking benefits everyone. More parking availability makes streets less congested and safer. Meters that accept credit cards reduce frustration and the need for parking citations. With SFpark: Circle Less, Live More.

It appears that the NFL and Roger Goodell are finally fed up with bad calls, mundane replay challenges and awful decision making. This week, the NFL has decided to humor the idea of the actual sport of football and possibly decide on inserting microchips into the game balls to determine things like touchdowns and first downs.

Fallout 3 was a huge and critical hit for publisher Bethesda Softworks when it was released back in 2008 and if pre-orders are any indication (which they are i.e. CD:MW2) the follow-up Fallout: New Vegas will be an even bigger. According to an article at MCV, Bethesda is saying that pre-orders for the Obsidian Entertainment-developed post-apocalypse RPG are very high.

This week, another HP exec bit the dust - this time, it's the CEO. HP CEO Mark Hurd (forcefully) resigned from the company following a sexual harassment investigation. Hurd had been questioned about specific interactions with a female contractor that could have been in violation of the company's business standards. Basically, he filed inaccurate expense reports that covered his personal relationship with a contractor who may or may not have actually performed the services she was hired for. Oh yeah, and HP paid for all of it!

It's official - according to Nielsen's calculations, this month marks a passing of the torch, so to speak, from Apple to Google in terms of smartphone sales in the US. New subscribers chose the Android platform 27% of the time and Apple's iPhone platform only 23% of the time. Of course, these numbers still pale in comparison to Blackberry's hold on the market with a full third of all handsets.

BlackBerry, as expected, fully revealed the newest version of their operating system, BlackBerry OS 6, and it has given the OS a much-needed overhaul. They have removed the traditional home screen and sprawling applications list with a simple, clean home screen and categorized application menus.

In what most MMORPG vets and newbs alike are tentatively referring to as "the saddest forum post in the history of all mankind," Blizzard recently informed World of Warcraft players on the Moon Guard server that moderators would now be patrolling the server for... erotic role-playing. Particularly in one in-game town, Goldshire, which appears to be a non-stop, Bacchanalian festival of delights of the virtual flesh and let me tell you that I literally just got a nasty chill typing that out.

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but here it is. Google has announced they have stopped development on Google Wave and will only maintain the servers through the end of the year. What? You don't know what Google Wave is? Well, therein lies the problem. For those who don't know, and I will assume that is everyone reading this, Google Wave was billed as "the future of communication."

A recent report from comScore, a digital statistics company, indicates that women are much more likely to spend time on social sites than men. Now, while this seems like logical information, there are still some real surprises in the numbers. For example, it doesn't matter where in the world we are measuring - Latin America (94% of women), North America (91% of women), Europe (86% of women) or Asia Pacific (55% of women) all spend more time on social sites.

It's safe to say that at this point in time thanks to websites like YouTube anyone who ever gets bored at work or has time to kill waiting in line at the DMV is familiar with vlogging. Every vlogger out there has his/her own reasons to put themselves out there on the Internet for all to see but there is one vlogger out there that is taking it to the next level.