EU to re-launch aid to Guinea after vote date set

 The European Union says it has agreed to re-launch €174.3 million in development funds to Guinea.
The move comes after the West African nation finally set a date for long-delayed legislative elections.
The announcement on Friday said Guinea's government had "presented a credible timetable for the organization of legislative elections."
The head of Guinea's electoral commission announced earlier this month that the vote will go ahead in May, though 10 members of the 25-member body later released a statement criticizing the move.
The West African country has not had a functioning parliament for four years, and only held its first democratic presidential election in 2010.

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Mali militants seek peace after UN backs force

The al-Qaida-linked group that controls much of northern Mali and other rebels agreed Friday to cease hostilities in the areas they control, a day after the United Nations backed a regional plan to oust the Islamists from power in a military intervention next year.
Ansar Dine, which controls the northern cities of Timbuktu and Kidal, and a secular rebel group known as the NMLA made the concessions following talks in neighboring Algeria.
The two groups vowed "to refrain from all actions that would cause confrontation and hostilities in the areas that they control."
They also vowed to work to free hostages in northern Mali, where al-Qaida's North Africa branch has made millions of dollars through ransoms and is currently holding seven French nationals captive.
The U.N.'s most powerful body on Thursday authorized an African-led force, but made no mention of size and set no timeline for military action.
U.N. peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous said recently he does not expect a military operation to begin until September or October of next year.
Ansar Dine had previously met with government representatives in talks that were facilitated by the government of Burkina Faso. As a result, other militants in the north have sought to join Ansar Dine recently including members of the secular NMLA group.
Malians living under the grip of al-Qaida-linked militants expressed dismay Friday that it could be nearly a year before a regional military intervention to oust the Islamists from power.
"We want rapid military action to liberate our cities," said Alphadi Cisse, who lives in Timbuktu. "There is no school, there is no work and no money. We are fed up with this situation."
The mayor of Timbuktu, which is controlled by the Islamist group Ansar Dine, has described conditions there as "a living hell." The al-Qaida-linked militants have imposed their version of strict Islamic law known as Shariah.
They have stoned to death a couple accused of adultery, hacked off the hands of thieves and have recruited children as young as 12 into their ranks. Heavily armed men also have attacked bars that sell alcohol, and banned men and women from socializing in the streets.
The turmoil has decimated the economy of Timbuktu, once a thriving tourist town.
Thursday's resolution adopted unanimously by the U.N. Security Council welcomes troop contributions pledged by the West African regional bloc ECOWAS and calls on member states, including from the neighboring Sahel region, to contribute troops to the mission.
Council diplomats say the best-trained African troops in desert warfare are from Chad, Mauritania and Niger.
The resolution stressed that there must be a two-track plan — political and military — to reunify the country, which has been in turmoil since a coup in March. Islamist groups were able to take hold of northern Mali, an area the size of Texas, after the March coup created a power vacuum.
Coup members created new political turmoil earlier this month when they arrested the country's prime minister and forced him to resign — a move that raised new concerns about the ability of the Malian military help regain control of the north.
The U.N. resolution also emphasizes that further military planning is needed before a force could be sent and it asks Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to "confirm in advance the council's satisfaction with the planned military offensive operation."
France's U.N. Ambassador Gerard Araud told reporters Thursday that it's premature to say when the military operation will take place because African and Malian troops must be trained and much depends on the political process and the country's extreme weather.
Northerners in Mali say the longer the world waits, the more entrenched the militants are becoming.
Hamadada Toure, a teacher from the city of Gao, urged the international community to follow through swiftly on its pledges to help free the north.
"If the resolution is not acted upon to chase the Islamists out of towns, all the comings and goings of diplomats and the mobilization of the international community are a bluff," he said from southern Mali where he sought refuge earlier this year.

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Mozambique highway collision kills 14

Police in Mozambique say 14 people died when a tire burst on a speeding minibus, causing the driver to lose control and collide with an oncoming vehicle.
Radio Mozambique cited police as saying 11 people were also injured in the accident on Friday. It happened 50 kilometers (30 miles) north of the capital, Maputo.
Police say all of those killed were on the minibus that had been going too fast, and that the driver was among the injured. Some passengers in the other vehicle, also a minibus, had minor injuries.
Traffic on some highways in Mozambique is heavy at this time of year as people working in South African mines return home for the Christmas season. Many South African tourists also visit Mozambique over the holiday period.

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South African president visits Mandela in hospital

 South Africa's president has visited former leader Nelson Mandela in a hospital, and the presidency says Mandela continues to respond to treatment.
The office of President Jacob Zuma says he saw Mandela on Saturday morning in Pretoria, the capital, and assured the anti-apartheid icon that he has the support of all South Africans and the world.
Mandela, who is 94, has been hospitalized since Dec. 8. He was diagnosed with a lung infection and also had gallstone surgery.
Zuma said Thursday that Mandela had been seriously ill but had steadily improved.
Zuma is urging South Africans to continue praying for Mandela, who was imprisoned for 27 years for his role as a leader of the struggle against white racist rule. He served one five-year term as president.

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Patent agency rejects Apple "pinch-to-zoom" patent in initial ruling

Reuters) - U.S. patent authorities rejected Apple Inc's key "pinch-to-zoom" patent in an initial ruling, the second setback in less than two months for the iPhone maker in its patent battle with Samsung Electronics Co Ltd.
Apple's shares have taken a beating recently, with investors worried about rising competition from Samsung and other mobile device makers using Google Inc's Android platform.
Apple scored a sweeping legal victory over its South Korean competitor in August when a U.S. jury found Samsung had copied critical features of the hugely popular iPhone and iPad and awarded Apple $1.05 billion in damages.
Samsung and Apple, the world's top two smartphone makers, are locked in patent disputes in at least 10 countries as they vie to dominate the lucrative mobile market and win over customers with their latest gadgets.
The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office on Wednesday temporarily invalidated the "pinch-to-zoom" patent, which had been contested at the trial in August. The jury had ruled that Samsung had infringed six of seven Apple patents.
The "pinch-to-zoom" feature distinguishes between single-touch and multitouch gestures on a mobile device screen and allows the user to zoom in or out by moving two fingers apart or closer together while touching the display.
A U.S. judge denied on Monday Apple's request for a permanent injunction against Samsung's smartphones.
Samsung won a preliminary invalidation of Apple's "rubber-banding" patent in October that had the "bounce" feature. The patent allows a user with a touch screen to bounce back to the image on the screen if the user goes beyond the edge.
When the U.S. patent office rules against a patent, the full process involves multiple steps and can take years. It can also often be appealed in court, further tying up the process.
The ruling by the U.S. patent office after Samsung requested an examination of the patent was included in documents filed by Samsung in a federal court in San Jose, California.
Apple's claims were rejected on the grounds that prior patents covered the inventions.
Representatives for Apple and Samsung were not immediately available for comment.
A Dutch court ruled in October that Samsung did not infringe on Apple's patent by using certain multi-touch techniques on some of the Samsung Galaxy smartphones and tablet computers.

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Samsung to be charged with breaking European antitrust laws

The European Commission will charge Samsung (005930) for breaking “EU competition rules by filing lawsuits against Apple (AAPL)” according to Reuters. The watchdog’s vice president for competition policy Joaquin Almunia told Reuters it will be issuing a “statement of objections very soon.”  The investigation comes after Samsung announced on Tuesday it was dropping its lawsuits against Apple for “standard essential patents pending in European courts.” The company has been under investigation by the European Commission since January for violating antitrust laws related to licensing patents that are considered essential to implementing European mobile telephony standards.

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NFC projected to thrive, but not because of mobile wallet apps

Near Field Communication (NFC) is one of those technologies that sounds revolutionary on paper, but in reality, is much more complicated than just slapping a chip inside of a smartphone. Apple’s (AAPL) decision to not include NFC in the iPhone 5 is grounded around the fact that “it’s not a solution to any current problem.” Meanwhile, companies such as Samsung (005930) and Nokia (NOK) have already embraced NFC and are marketing it as more than just a mobile wallet replacement. And although Apple’s reluctance has been called a “serious blow for the technology”, several analysts from different firms say consumers are warming up to the feature, albeit very slowly, according to ComputerWorld.
[More from BGR: RIM, HTC and Nokia could all be headed the way of Palm]
[More from BGR: BlackBerry 10 browser smokes iOS 6 and Windows Phone 8 in comparison test [video]]
The immediate use for NFC is a mobile payment system, but several analysts and experts believe it’ll be NFC’s non-payment uses that will drive its growth; namely sharing data between devices, replacing security ID, time punch cards and QR codes. Other ideas such as using NFC-equipped phones to open door locks, starting up cars or pairing devices to audio speakers could also see NFC adoption speed up.
Why non-payment uses? Cost. Installing new NFC-enabled point-of-sale systems is expensive, especially for small businesses. One of the many reasons why Google Wallet hasn’t completely replaced our wallets is because there are few places that support using a phone to buy things.
While most analysts predict NFC will become more common over the next three to four years, especially if Apple ever decides to back it, Gartner analyst Avivah Litan says “it will take a decade before it’s mainstream across the globe.

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Nintendo’s amazing triumph in Japan may doom the company

According to Japanese gaming bible Famitsu, Nintendo 3DS sold 333,000 units in the week ending December 16. Sony’s PS Vita limped along at 13’000 units. The new Wii U did an OK 130,000 units and PS3 managed 46,000 units.  The utter hardware domination of the 3DS is reshaping the Japanese software market. Franchises that were thought to be fading have been revitalized in their portable versions. The 3DS version of the ancient “Animal Crossing” series, famed for being the game where nothing happens, hit a staggering 1.7 million units last week in Japan. “Inazuma Eleven” sold 170,000 units in its launch week, up from 140’000 units its DS version managed in 2011.
[More from BGR: RIM, HTC and Nokia could all be headed the way of Palm]
Nintendo’s portable console 3DS had a muted start in its home market in the spring of 2011. Many thought that Sony would have a fair shot at competing with Nintendo once Playstation Vita launched at the end of 2011. But once Nintendo executed an aggressive price cut for 3DS in the summer of 2011 and then launched a large-screen version of the console in mid-2012, the gadget has grown into a godzilla in Japan, demolishing both Sony Vita and aging tabletop console competition.
[More from BGR: BlackBerry 10 browser smokes iOS 6 and Windows Phone 8 in comparison test [video]]
3DS is doing well also in America, where its lifetime sales are moving close to the 6 million unit mark this holiday season. According to NPD, the 3DS sales in the US market topped 500,000 units in November. That’s a decent number, though far from the torrid volume the portable is racking up in its home market. The US November video game software chart was dominated by massive home console juggernauts: new installments of Call of Duty, Halo and Assassin’s Creed franchises  shifted more than 13 million units in retail. At the same time, the Japanese software chart remains in a Nineties time warp,  dominated by Nintendo’s musty masterpieces: Super Mario Brothers, Pokemon, Animal Crossing, etc.
Japanese and American tastes have always been different. But what we are witnessing now is a particularly fascinating divergence. American consumers are spending more of their time and money on smartphone and tablet games, while console game spending is increasingly focusing on massive, graphically stunning blockbuster titles on Xbox360 and PS3. The casual gamers are shifting to mobile games, while hardcore gamers remain attracted to sprawling epics on home consoles. The overall video game spending in America keeps declining month after month, as casual titles and mid-list games slide. But the Triple A whales like Call of Duty series are doing better than ever.
In Japan, Nintendo has been able to battle back iPhone and Android game invasion with a nostalgic series of portable games that basically recycle the biggest hits of Eighties and early Nineties. Mario, Pokemons and other portable heroes are slowly losing their grip on US and European consumers. But in Japan, some form of national nostalgia is keeping Nintendo on track.
The problem here is that the Japanese success of the 3DS may now be convincing Nintendo that it does not have to rethink its business strategy. The smartphone and tablet game spending continues growing explosively across the world. Unlike console games, mobile game sales in China are legal. The global gaming spending is shifting towards new hardware platforms even as console mammoths like Halo still reign in America. At this critical juncture, Nintendo has managed to cocoon its home market in a web of nostalgia, turning the 3DS console and its Eighties left-over franchises into epic bestsellers yet again.
This means that there is no sense of urgency to push Nintendo into rethinking its long-term plans. The company may continue simply ignoring the smartphone and tablet challenge, designing new portable consoles and the 28th Mario game to support it. 20 years ago, Japan’s insularity doomed its chances to succeed in the mobile phone business. Ithe idiosyncratic nature of Japan may now be leading its biggest entertainment industry success astray.

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How times have changed: Microsoft now eagerly courting Apple developers for Windows Phone 8

A decade or so ago, Apple (AAPL) was the company that had to work its tail off trying to get developers to port their Windows-based games and applications over to its desktop operating system. But with the rise of mobile computing, it seems that the tables have turned and Microsoft (MSFT) finds itself in the same place with Windows Phone 8 that Apple once did with OS X back in the days when it was still codenamed “Jaguar.” Technology Review reports that Microsoft last week invited several iOS app developers over to its Mountain View campus in an effort to persuade them to port their iPhone and iPad apps over to Windows Phone 8 and Windows RT devices.
[More from BGR: RIM, HTC and Nokia could all be headed the way of Palm]
The good news, Technology Review reports, is that developers at the conference seemed quite receptive to Microsoft’s courtship. Tim Burks, who founded the iOS app development and consulting company Radtastical and who helped organize the Silicon Valley iOS Developers’ Meetup group, told the publication that he was particularly impressed with how Microsoft organized its mobile developer tools, which he said were cleanly designed and intuitive to use.
[More from BGR: BlackBerry 10 browser smokes iOS 6 and Windows Phone 8 in comparison test [video]]
“If you’re a professional dancer, would you want to dance on a stage with broken boards and holes on the floor?” he said. “No, you want to dance on a stage that’s clean and organized. That’s what these guys — especially Apple, and it looks like Microsoft — are like.

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Samsung Display will show off a 5.5-inch flexible screen at CES

Samsung’s (005930) impending Galaxy S IV may not feature an unbreakable or flexible screen, but that doesn’t mean the company isn’t working hard to get such high-tech displays onto its phones within the next year. Engadget reports that Samsung display panel spin-off Samsung Display is preparing to demonstrate a 5.5-inch, 720 pixel flexible screen at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Engadget cautions us not to set our expectations too high, however, because the display at CES will be “merely a component that could one day find its way into a smartphone, rather than a finished product that’s meant for consumers.” Even so, anyone looking for the next big innovation in smartphone tech has to be excited that Samsung is inching closer to getting these displays ready for primetime.

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