At TED 2010, Bill Gates gave a talk that laid out his vision and hope for the world’s energy future, citing the need for what may amount to a miracle to avoid planetary catastrophe, with the goal of zero carbon emissions across the globe by 2050. One of the more interesting, and most talked about, moments involves Bill take out a jar of fireflies (at last years talk, he used mosquitos) to make a point. Definitely a great video to take in, and it gives you a nice idea of what Mr. Gates is up to these days.

Gallery: Bill Gates hits TED, uses fireflies to address our energy future

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Okay, so we’ve hit you with the Windows Phone 7 Series keynote video, which introduced the product. We also gave you the shorter Windows Phone 7 Series demo video, which just gives you a glance at the new hotness from Microsoft. We’ve got one more for you though, as Joe Belfiore, the VP of Windows Phone, as he chats with Microsoft’s Laura Foy on Channel 9. They have a conversation about the new operating system, and it’s a deep 22-minute look at what Microsoft has been cooking up to try and reclaim their mobile crown.

Read More | Channel 9

Gallery: Windows Phone 7 22-minute definitive walkthrough

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So, aside from that Windows Phone 7 Series keynote video, we thought you might want a condensed version that will allow you to just take a look at what all this Windows Phone 7 fuss is all about. Microsoft took the liberty of putting together this much shorter demo video to explain. Here you can get a look at all of the design elements and decisions that have gone into Windows Phone 7, which fundamentally set it apart from other mobile operating systems on the market. Here’s a quick rundown:

• Every Windows Phone 7 device will have three physical buttons on the front: Start, Search, and Back.
• There’s a focus on productivity, simplicity, music, and gaming. Both Xbox Live and Zune are deeply integrated into Windows Phone 7.
• People hub: Pulls in live data feeds, bringing you social networking status updates and photos from services like Facebook, Twitter, and Windows Live.
• Pictures hub: Brings together picture and video assets from your phone, web, and PC, allowing you to view your entire collection.
• Games hub: Check out your Xbox Live messages, achievements, avatar, and even play some games. Achievements can be earned on the phone.
• Office hub: Access to Microsoft Office suite, including OneNote and SharePoint Workspace. Also includes new version of Outlook Mobile for email.

This is definitely the biggest step that Microsoft has taken in the mobile phone space, and they do it over three years after Apple announced the original iPhone. The competition is heating up, and we are super-excited about it.

Gallery: Windows Phone 7 Series demo video

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The big news today is the announcements of Windows Phone 7 Series over at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, and Microsoft has released video of the announcement and reveal of their new mobile OS. Let it be said right now, Microsoft has essentially killed what we all know as Windows Mobile, and has replaced it with what may, in fact, be the slickest interface we’ve seen on a mobile phone. They borrowed heavily from the Zune HD navigation scheme, but made it highly polished and optimized for a device that is constantly connected to a cellular data connection. Also, it looks like that whole Xbox Live Anywhere demo that we saw at E3 a few years ago is finally coming to fruition, as Windows Phone 7 Series includes Xbox Live gaming built right in. Hit the play button on the videoafter the jump for a look at everything, but color us impressed.

Hey, Apple, the ball is in your court.

You can expect to find Windows Phone 7 Series devices in stores this holiday season.

Click to continue reading Windows Phone 7 Series keynote video

Gallery: Windows Phone 7 Series keynote video

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For all of you running the Google Chrome browser on Mac and Linux platforms, you’ll wanna update to the latest version of the beta, which includes support for extensions, as well as bookmark syncing. There are already over 2,200 extensions available in the Chrome Extensions Gallery, so you can get a bunch more functionality in your browser, dare we say, a more Firefox-like experience, just by updating. Seriously, go do it. Oh, and if you need to see how it all works visually, hit the demo video above that Google put together.

Read More | Google Chrome

Gallery: Google Chrome for Mac and Linux picks up extension support, bookmark sync

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In case you didn’t watch that iPad introduction keynote, someone’s gone through the trouble of condensing the entire 93-minute event event into 180 seconds. It does a great job at explaining what Steve Jobs and company think of their latest creation. Check out the iPad announcement video above to see what me mean.

A little excessive?

Gallery: How awesome is the iPad?

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Regardless of how annoying he might be, David Blaine’s TEDMED talk on how he set the world record for holding his breath underwater for 17 minutes is pretty phenomenal. Definitely interesting to see the different ways he thought of to do it as an illusion, using various technological methods and DIY gadgets, before finally deciding that he would do it for real. This one is definitely worth watching, and also worth not trying at home. It’s kind of ridiculous.

Gallery: David Blaine: How I held my breath for 17 minutes

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Oh, we knew the Apple tablet / iPad / iSlate would be good, but we didn’t think it’d be this good. Walt Mosspuppetberg got his hands on an iSlate, and has been using one for a couple of years as it’s gone through its various development cycles. He finally breaks his silence with this review, stating that “this is probably the most completely perfect product to ever be released.”

Wednesday’s Apple tablet event can’t come soon enough!

Gallery: First iPad Apple tablet review

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Remember that awesome iPhone credit card processing device from Square that we told you about a few weeks ago? Well, Kevin Rose just put up a video showing the Square app and iPhone hardware in action. Give the video above a look, as it’s definitely pretty slick. However, we’d love to see them make that credit card dongle a bit more stable before launch. The product is still in beta, but we can’t wait to see this go mainstream.

Read More | Kevin Rose

Gallery: Square’s iPhone credit card swiping device in action

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The Short Version: If you donate to Haiti relief by SMS by texting “HAITI” to the number 90999, or by texting “YELE” to 501501, we will match your donation multiple times. Just leave a comment telling us how much you donated, and we will take care of the rest. We are currently matching donations 14 times.

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Over the past couple of days, while trying to carry on with “business as usual,” I’ve personally found it hard to focus on tech, gadgets, and all of the CES 2010 goodness that we have yet to bring you, as the world is focused on the disastrous aftermath of the earthquake in Haiti. We’re sure you’ve seen the imagery, but if you haven’t, or if you aren’t quite sure, I encourage you to watch this AP report:

Gear Live & Friends Will Match Your Haiti SMS Donations!
We felt it was time to do our part to help, so with the support of a bunch of Gear Live friends, we are announcing that we will match SMS donations made by Gear Live readers and viewers. As many of you know, the Red Cross has made it super-simple to donate $10 to help out by simply texting the word HAITI to 90999. In fact, this has been so successful that it’s already earned $11 million in just a few days. That is fantastic - but the damage to the country is far greater than that, and every little bit helps. So here’s what we’re gonna do:

Starting now, if you send an SMS donation to either the Red Cross (by texting the word HAITI to 90999) or to YELE (by texting the word YELE to 501501) Gear Live will match it, up to $500. In addition, we have a bunch of our friends joining in as well:

• David Geller of Eyejot and WhatCounts will match up to $2500
• Leslie Camacho, President of EllisLab (which makes the fantastic ExpressionEngine CMS) and Roger Rustad (wondering network guru) will personally match up to $600 $1200
• Nate True of Tap Tap Revenge and iPhone hacking fame will match up to $500
• Jeremy, Adam, and the team at Stage Two will match up to $500
• Dave Taylor, the man behind AskDaveTaylor.com, will match up to $250
• Don McAllister of Screencasts Online will match up to $250
• Robert Scoble, the face behind Building43, will match up to $200
• Local Gear Live fan Shauna Causey will match up to $100
• Parnassus Ventures, the folks behind 140: The Twitter Conference, will match up to $100
• Jason Neudecker, a Gear Live Twitter follower, will match up to $100
• Hadley Stern and Apple Matters will match up to $100
• Xavier Lanier and Notebooks.com will match up to $100
• Amisha Gandhi-Lanier and Served Raw will match up to $100
• Kevin Urie from Social Media Club Seattle will match up to $100
• TechieDiva.com will match up to $50
• Eric Siegfriend and DanceHop will match up to $50

In total, so far, that’s

$4500 $5400 $5650 $6550 $6700 in pledged matching donations! For each donation you make, each entity above will match it, until their limit is reached. In other words, with our current eight eleven twelve contributors, your $10 donation will actually be matched six nine eleven twelve fifteen seventeen times, resulting in a $70 $100 $120 $130 $160

$180 payment. So, what do you need to do? This is the easy part. Just scroll down and leave us a comment letting us know that you made a donation, and whether it was a $5 or $10 contribution. If you do it multiple times, let us know that too. Even better, if you want to be on our list as a person or company that will match donations, let us know!

Now, what if you don’t have any money to donate? We will make it easy. Just comment with a link to an article on from any of the following websites that you found interesting or helpful, and we will donate $10 on your behalf:

Gear Live, Notebooks.com, AskDaveTaylor.com, Gear Diary, Mobility Minded, Technologizer, WindowsPhoneThoughts, Served Raw, SlashGear, or GeekRoom.

I have to give a big thank you to my pal Xavier over at Notebooks.com. He came up with the idea and invited me to donate. I then asked a few friends, and never thought we’d get the support that we did, so we kicked off our own campaign. Together with Notebooks.com, we have

$10,500 $11,400 $11,650 $12,550

$12,700 in matching donations for your SMS contributions!

The time is now! Leave a comment after donating, tell your friends, forward this around, and share this on Facebook and Twitter using the buttons at the top of the article. Make us spend every penny of the matching funds that are available.

Gallery: Gear Live & Friends will match your Haiti SMS donations

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