TOP TECHNOLOGY NEWS

TapNav is an upcoming augmented reality (AR) navigation app from mSonar. Unlike other AR navigation systems, which just overlay information onto the camera’s live feed based on GPS and compass positions, TapNav actually reads the input from the camera. This allows it to offer some services that vanilla GPS can’t.

Like other AR apps, TapNav shows you the road ahead and overlays your route. This helps you quickly see where you are supposed to be going, without having to decode a 3-D representation in your brain.

The DSLR Follow Focus kit is a simple, lightweight, cheap and downright ingenious way to add pro follow focussing and racking to your movie-making setup. It costs just $60, and fits into a pocket. Here’s how it works.

First up is the focus lever. This is a sprung loop of steel with two handles. Squeeze these handles and the loop expands. Slip it over your lens, let go and it clamps into position, offering a lever to more accurately turn the focusing ring.

Father’s Day, Mother’s Day, Grandparent’s Day and even Parent’s Day. What do they all have in common? If you answered that they are cynical cash-ins by greetings card companies and a great way for PR flacks to hawk the same plastic crap year after year, then you’d be right.

If you you think that they’re a wonderful way to thank your parents for putting up with you for so many years, then you’re wrong.

Samsung this week released an upgrade for its most popular “Galaxy” smartphone in Hong Kong, following its launch in Europe.

The Wall Street Journal this week reported on the release of the Samsung’s Galaxy S II smartphone in Hong Kong. Samsung released the handset in Europe in early May.

It’s unclear when we’ll see the smartphone in the United States. A Verizon Wireless spokeswoman misspoke when she told Computerworld that the Galaxy S II would be available some time in July.

Kranium is a bike helmet that is made from the same cardboard used for the boxes you find at the supermarket. This material, along with some clever construction, turns out to be a lot better at absorbing impact than the more usual polystyrene-filled lids.

Anirudha Surabhi’s design absorbs four times more impact energy that the polystyrene equivalent, and — unlike regular helmets which break on impact — it survives longer.

Here we have today’s second Kickstarter project. It seems that this community-driven incubator service comes out with more clever new inventions than many companies with big R&D budgets. If I was a manufacturer I’d probably hire somebody just to crawl the site for new ideas.

Anyhow, onto the Red Pop, an accessory button for the iPhone. It slides onto the bottom of the phone, puts its electronic tendrils into the dock connector and adds both a finger-grip and a big red shutter-release button.

Despite the ridiculous amount of iPad text editors in the App Store, none have yet managed to feel like truly iPad-exploiting apps. They may be controlled by touch, but they could exist equally well on a desktop machine, controlled by keyboard and mouse.

Daedalus changes all that. It is a gesture-driven app that could only work on the iPad. It also adds some interesting metaphors for documents and — despite some v1.0 glitches — it looks very promising.

After less than three years of existence, Apple’s App Store has accumulated half-a-million mobile apps.

The iTunes App Store, which launched in the summer of 2008, surpassed the 500,000 milestone Tuesday morning, according to 148Apps, an iPhone app reviews blog that has been tracking the store closely.

To be clear, that’s 500,000 apps that Apple has approved — they’re not necessarily live yet. In the United States, the App Store is just shy of reaching 400,000 apps available for download.

If you’re wondering just what is the point of Google’s Music Beta service, which lets you store all your music in “the cloud” and then stream it to any device, then you may want to take a look at BoxyTunes instead. It is arguably what Music Beta should have been, and it is also a native iOS app.

BoxyTunes does one thing: plays music that you have stored in your DropBox folder. But like DropBox itself, this simplicity — along with a great implementation — is its strength.

Samsung has a new 10.1-inch “retina” resolution LCD panel ready to show off next week. It will demonstrate the 2560 x 1600 panel at the SID Display Week 2011 International Symposium starting Tuesday May 17th. And if you weren’t already thinking it — yes, this is perfect for tablets.

The panel has a resolution of 300dpi, the same as that of print, and the number Apple uses to define its Retina displays.