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By 5 November 2010 | Categories: news

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Google Maps error leads to conflict in Central America
 
According to Search Engine Land, a former Nicaraguan military commander is putting the blame on Google Maps for his troops’ incursion in Costa Rica. Eden Pastora ordered his troops to move into an area near San Juan Lake along the border between his country and Costa Rica. They set up camp, took down a Costa Rican flag and raised the Nicaraguan flag. They also cleaned up a nearby river, dumping the sediment in Costa Rican territory.
 
Costa Rica’s largest newspaper La Nacion stated that the Nicaraguan commander made use of Google Maps to defend the ‘invasion’ even though the official maps used by both countries indicate the territory belongs to Costa Rica.
 
“See the satellite photo on Google and there you see the border. In the last 3,000 meters the two sides [of the river] are from Nicaragua. From there to El Castillo, the border itself is the right bank, its clear” Pastora argued.
 
The paper also pointed out that Bing Maps showed the border more accurately.
 
 
Galaxy Tab to be updated with next Android versions?
 
Samsung’s highly anticipated Galaxy Tab tablet might have only been launched in India this week, but according to the Android Community, Samsung India has reportedly confirmed that it intends to upgrade the Galaxy Tab.
 
The Android 2.2 (Froyo) running Galaxy Tab, might be powered by Android Gingerbread (Android 3.0) and Honeycomb (Android 3.5) in the future, once Google releases each version of the updated OS. The origin of the reports is an article by Samsung Hub, who attended the Galaxy Tab launch event in India, and claimed that an unnamed Samsung executive confirmed the company’s upgrade plans.
 
Samsung Hub has now updated its article, stating that it has been contacted by Samsung India who has said that “they cannot assure about the future upgrades but will be working hard to keep the Galaxy Tab updated”. The Korean company is looking to sell a million Galaxy Tab devices before the end of the year. 
 
 
AMD and Nvidia GPU shipments are almost equal 
 
Market research firm Mercury Research has released its PC Graphics Market Share Update report for Q3. According to TechSpot, this report shows that AMD (50.30%) has maintained a slender lead of almost 1% in the graphics market over rival Nvidia (49.60%). Matrox took up the remaining 0.1%.
 
Within the notebook GPU segment AMD has the lion’s share of the market with 61.9% in the recent period, whilst Nvidia claimed a 38.1% share. Nvidia leads the charge in the desktop segment with 58.8%, compared to AMD’s 41% market share.
 
AMD recently introduced its Radeon HD 6800 series, whilst specs and pics of Nvidia’s next generation GeForce GTX 580 have been leaked by two Chinese websites.
 
 
Dell wants its workers to ditch their BlackBerry smartphones
 
PC manufacturer Dell announced this week that it is going to move thousands of its employees off of Research in Motion's (RIMs) BlackBerry smartphones, in order to switch them over to its own smartphones. According to Reuters, this switch will effect a quarter (around 25 000) of the company's workforce, who employ a Dell-issued BlackBerry smartphone. 
 
The switch is slated to start soon and according to Dell spokesman David Frink will take some time to complete. It isn't only its own employees that Dell aims to ween off BlackBerry devices, as it is also launching an campaign in order to convince its business customers to make the move to its smartphone. 
 
 
R10 million fine for illegally downloading and sharing music
 
An American woman, Jammie Thomas-Rasset, has been fighting the music recording industry over 24 songs that she illegally downloaded and shared online four years ago.
 
According to Cnet, she has lost another round in court this week as the third verdict in the case was handed down. A jury in Minneapolis decided that she was liable for $1.5 million (more than R10 million) in copyright infringement damages to Capitol Records, or $62 500 (almost R426 000) for each song she illegally shared in April 2006.  

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