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Gadget Rewind 2005: Sony PlayStation Portable (PSP)
Engadget was lucky enough to get ahold of one before the end of 2004, but the Sony PlayStation Portable (PSP) was officially launched in the US in March 2005. This made picking a portable a difficult decision for impatient consumers who were wavering between the Nintendo DS and the PSP. The DS had already arrived by late 2004 and details about the Sony release were still a bit fuzzy. So, you decided to wait and snag the PSP, and according to the 2004 Engadget Awards, both editors and readers agree that you made the right decision. It offered several options including external storage, a 1.3-megapixel camera add-on and the ability to handle an array of image, audio and even video formats. The PSP also had a high-resolution 480 x 272 LCD and content looked great ... at least as long as the battery held out. The PSP had a rechargeable 1800mAh battery, but all the bells and whistles led to rapid depletion if you used it as a truly portable device.
10 years of social media's biggest players and payouts by the numbers
Facebook launched ten years ago in February 2004. A month later, so did this site. Social media hasn't, doesn't and won't stay still. As Myspace rises, Friendster declines. The pattern's repeated itself a few times already, and even Google hasn't quite cracked the magic social network formula, at least not yet. The crown currently belongs to Facebook, a company that's made some big, big startup purchases on the way, although Twitter continues to pack (arguably) more influence. A whole lot has happened in the last decade, but we've tried to squeeze the more interesting parts into something a little more visual. Check out the full 'graphic, right after the break.
Gadget Rewind 2004: Apple Cinema HD display (30-inch)
You managed to pick up one of the aluminum G5s or PowerBook G4s back in 2003, but that bubbly polycarbonate Cinema display was ruining the whole look. Enter Apple's 2004 display refresh. This time the monitors were wrapped in a sexy anodized aluminum skin to harmonize your workstation's vibe. The line included 20-, 23- and 30-inch models with varying resolutions, but the big boy of the bunch was rocking 2,560 x 1,600 and would vastly increase your screen real estate (and geek cred). Always the salesman, Steve Jobs said, "you can even run two of them side-by-side to get 8 million jaw-dropping pixels." If you did that, you'd be down about $6,600 (the 30-incher was a wallet-scorching $3,299 at launch), but your digital workspace would look good.
Life in 140 characters or less: My first eight years on Twitter
"I am sick of cell phones." I posted that on Twitter on November 16th, 2006, during a time in my life when I made a living writing phone reviews. It was a one-off rant during a particularly busy week, and I didn't expect anyone to read it. Little did I know that Twitter would grow into the social media titan that it is today, and that particular missive would live on as my first-ever "tweet." I confess, I didn't particularly like the term "tweet," even if it was unofficially adopted by the community early on. Even Twitter itself didn't acknowledge the word until the company trademarked it in 2009.
Gadget Rewind 2004: Motorola RAZR V3
It's our 10th birthday, and to celebrate we'll be revisiting some of the key devices of the last decade. So please be kind, rewind. Motorola had been slinging its "hellomoto" campaign for several years by the time the RAZR V3 hit the scene in 2004. It's likely that you'll remember the iconic design of this handset, either as your communicator of choice or with a faint twinge of envy at never having scored one yourself. This ultra-slim flip phone had a backlit keypad that screamed Tron and its magnesium and aluminum outer shell gave it a lightweight, yet solid build. Motorola made the right move by providing an array of colors to choose from -- not quite the rainbow of flavors that today's Moto X offers, but it was enough to satisfy those with funkier tastes. As its name implied, the RAZR V3 was the switchblade of cellphones and cut a strikingly sharp figure, especially when flipped open. A minor downside to the design was its width; at just over 2-inches it was an exception at the time, although still a few notches below what most of us are pocketing today.
Where are they now? The travels and trash talk of Myspace Tom
It was 2009 and things weren't looking good for Myspace. According to comScore, Facebook logged 307.1 million visitors globally that April, while Myspace failed to reach even half of that with 123.3 million users. One month later, Facebook inched out ahead of its predecessor for the first time in the US. There was no turning back. Today, Myspace is showing growth with 36 million users last October, up from 32.6 million the previous June, but it's largely lost its cultural cachet and barely resembles the site that captured the world's attention years ago. Under new ownership, Myspace has refocused its vision as a platform for musicians, re-upped its design and landed itself a hot new celebrity spokesman/investor. Justin Timberlake is bringing the sexy back to the social network, but whatever happened to Myspace Tom?
10 Years in Social Media
It's our birthday! And there's a good chance you found out via one of two social networks. However, back in 2004, when Engadget launched, Facebook was in its infancy and Twitter still hadn't hatched. While the former catered to Harvard's elite, Friendster and Myspace were still schooling us in the ways of social networking. Fast-forward 10 years, and Friendster is a social gaming platform, Myspace is a sounding board for musicians, Facebook and Twitter are both publicly traded companies and hashtags aren't just a thing, they're an epidemic. Every week in March, we'll bring you a new story that explores how the social landscape has changed since our inception. So grab a glass of bubbly, raise a toast and dig in. Here's to 10 Years in Social Media! Where are they now? Our first time By the numbers In Pictures . . . .
10 Years In: The birth of Engadget
The evening of June 23, 2005, wasn't especially hot in New York City, at least by historical standards. The day's high was a mere 79 degrees, slightly below average for late June, and well below the record for the day of 96. But inside Compact-Impact, a Japanese gadget store on the city's Lower East Side, things were downright steamy. As more than 200 sweaty fans packed the tiny storefront, it quickly became stifling, crowded and noisy. It wasn't an appearance by a hot local band or political activist. It was a meetup. For a blog. Engadget had arrived. "I didn't know if anyone would come," recalled founder Peter Rojas. "The fact that people would show up and hang out with the guys from a gadget site kind of blew my mind."
Today is Engadget's 10th birthday!
Ten years ago today (in fact, exactly 10 years ago, if you're reading this post in real time), Engadget was born. Our first post featured T-Flash, a new memory card format created to serve cellphone users who wanted extra storage -- as long as they were willing to cap their needs at 128MB.
