But you kind of have to hold the iPad 2 to really get the redesign. It’s thinner by a third, plus its edges taper to a thin line of metal. It’s almost inconceivable that this thing you’re holding is a multicore tablet computer. The Xoom tablet is trim, light, and very pretty … but when you place it next to the iPad 2, it looks as though it was designed and built by angry Soviet prison labor instead of by Motorola.

Yep, design matters.

Intel released a statement to the media today saying that on Thursday in San Francisco it will “host a…press briefing to discuss a new technology that is about to appear on the market.”

I wonder who will have machines with it built-in first?

But as competing manufacturers trip over themselves to out-spec each other, I have to wonder if they’re missing the point. In fact, it feels a little like deja-vu after spending the past four years watching companies wage a failed battle of specs against the iPod.

• Thursday: Verizon = 909, AT&T = 539
• Friday: Verizon = 916, AT&T = 680
• Saturday: Verizon = 660, AT&T = 471
• Sunday: Verizon = 796, AT&T = 701
• Monday: Verizon = 711, AT&T = 618

Looks like AT&T has everyone already under contract—expect to see higher numbers for the next iPhone.

In order to participate in the creation of, and determine licensing terms for, a joint VP8 patent license, any party that believes it has patents that are essential to the VP8 video codec specification is invited to submit them for a determination of their essentiality by MPEG LA’s patent evaluators.

Wow, that didn’t take long.

Super cute.

Even though pre-orders opened to existing Verizon subscribers at 3AM, the Verizon website is reported to have generated problems for over five hours afterward, including error messages or slow orders taking about an hour.

Can’t wait to see the number of pre-orders when this is all said and done.

Rovio and 20th Century Fox join forces to create a new game, Angry Birds Rio! The game will launch with 45 dedicated levels based on the highly-anticipated motion picture, with regular updates lined up for the future. The game will be available for download on smart phones and tablets worldwide.

Samsung Electronics is seemingly poised to quadruple the shipment of its advanced mobile processor chips to its most outstanding partner and rival in the United States ― Apple.

Not double, quadruple. 

Ahead of the Screen Actors Guild awards on Sunday, Fox Searchlight this month became the first studio to have nearly 100,000 SAG voters view new movies such as “Black Swan” through a free download from Apple Inc.’s iTunes store. Paramount Pictures, Focus Features and other studios did the same later with movies such as “The Fighter” and “The Kids Are All Right.”

Awesome.