This week's Blu-ray releases come in a nice variety of genres as the blockbuster flick 10,000 B.C. leads the way. Its supporting cast ain't so shabby either with ZZ Top Live From Texas, Persepolis, and Step Into Liquid right in there to name a few. Go check them all out when you follow the link below to the full article.

With a whole slew of memory card formats out there it's good news to hear that three big mobile phone companies - Nokia, Samsung and Sony Ericsson - are cooperating to push for a standard unified format. Their plan is to have one single format for mobile phones, digital cameras and other gadgetry that requires a memory card.

Memory card companies are also said to be on board, like Micron Technology Inc., Spansion LLC, STMicroelectronics NV, and Texas Instruments Inc. We might not see the "one card" take over the gadget kingdom in the near future, but with technology running on its current pace it won't be surprising to see it take effect sooner than we expect.

Kyle Monson of Gearlog spoke with several Seagate representatives at the South by Southwest (SXSW) festival at Austin Texas, and he found out that Seagate is talking about the possibility of 1TB 2.5 inch drives (the ones for laptops) by 2013.

This information was given to Monson by an unnamed Seagate representative. Using the same formula in the earlier estimation, and assuming that 40% growth stays as the annual growth rate, it is possible that 1.8 inch drives (the ones used in video iPods) would reach 1TB  by 2014.

At present Seagate has 120GB pocket-size drives that can be used in portable media players.

It's back to the courts for Apple's crack lawyer team again. InfoWorld reports that the Cupertino-based company is among those being sued by a little-known Texas firm for infringing on an mp3-related patent.

The suit by Texas MP3 Technologies, filed February 16 in Marshall, Texas, alleges that Apple, Samsung, and Sandisk are infringing on U.S. patent 7,065,417. The patent was awarded in June 2006 to former iPod chip maker SigmaTel, and covers "an MPEG portable sound reproducing system and a method for reproducing sound data compressed using the MPEG method."

According to InfoWorld, SigmaTel sold the patent to a Dallas-based patent licensing agency shortly after receiving rights because it felt the agency was better equipped to take advantage of its potential value. SigmaTel said it had retained international rights to the patent and has insulated its customers from any legal action associated with the patent.

InfoWorld said that it is still unclear whether Texas MP3 Technologies is the Dallas-based company that bought the patents from SigmaTel or whether it acquired them from somewhere else. In the lawsuit, Texas MP3 Technologies said that it is the "assignee of all rights" of the patent and holds "all rights of recovery."

We thought  the house of the future would look something like the glasshouse in the movie "Thirteen Ghosts". But Popular Science House of Innovation rolled out an example of what they thought future homes would be like, and it doesn't look too sci-fi. In fact, it looks a lot like present-day homes. What makes it futuristic are the hi-tech innovations and products in practically every room.

The kitchen, for instance, have stain-resistant concrete counters. Definitely something homemakers with  messy kids would kill for. It also has a coffeemaker that gives out a weather report on top of its usual job of brewing cup after cup of caffeine.

The bathroom has a programmable shower that can be set to suit different personal preferences - a feature that will save a modern-day Goldilocks a lot of time. Its windows can go from clear to opaque with a touch of a button. Hmmm, this feature would've gone well with that haunted glasshouse.

The star of the house is obviously the media room. It simulates a real theater experience combined with the convenience of
controls over lighting, air conditioning, and even telephone.

Proof that the Xbox 360 is here to stay for a long time, the house's playroom has "a real race car seat, and a wheel designed for the Xbox 360."

For wine connoisseurs, it has a wine cellar that holds 20,000 bottles with a computer that keeps track of each one. Probably the database would also indicate which bottle perfectly matches the status of dinner guests.

Other upcoming technology include in the house of the future is a device that transforms natural gas into electricity.

The state-of-the-art 6,500-square-foot home located in Alamo, Texas comes with $5.5 million price tag (Xbox 360 and 20,000 bottles of wine not included).

Everything's big in Texas. Or so they say. But if you have any doubt about the truth of that saying, the new monstrous HDTV in Texas' Royal Memorial Football Stadium will definitely bring the cows home.

And no doubt about it, their scoreboard - I can't believe, that with its size it's still classified as a scoreboard - is most definitely enormously, gigantically, abso-darn-lutely HUGE! In fact, Godzillatron (as nicknamed by Texas fan websites) is currently the largest HDTV in the world!

The scoreboard, situated on the south end of the field, is 55 feet tall and 134 feet wide - almost just as wide as the field itself! It was built by Daktronics Inc. and costs $8 million.

Well, Godzillatron might be the biggest HD TV in the world for now, but in a few months' time, a slightly larger one will be put up in Asia. Anyways, with this insanely large screen in the stadium, the Texan football players are excited to see their plays being replayed on screen in full high-definition glory. Some of them are actually talking about hooking up their Xbox 360s to the screen. Now, talk about BIG GAMEPLAY!

The iZ3D product page says:

"Neurok Optics, LLC, the makers of the revolutionary iZ3D monitor for gamers has placed the said monitors in strategic gaming centers throughout the US for gamers to test out. The monitors can now be used at web2zone in New York City, CyberJocks in Austin, Texas, NetHeads in Indianapolis, Indiana and CG Centre in Irvine, California. More sites will later be added to this list."

Now what makes this monitor so special that it has to go on tour?

Well, for starters, the iZ3D LCD Monitor is capable of displaying into-screen and out-of screen 3D images, which can be viewed with accompanying passive polarizer glasses. Remember the iMax movie theater? Imagine reducing that to 17 inches and having it sit on your desk. The iZ3D is out to scrap traditional 2D monitors for good.

This monitor is also designed for long-time viewing, so whether it's for sitting at your desk all day long editing your work reports, or for sitting at your desk all day long sieging rival guilds in WoW, you won't have to worry about fatigue or eyestrain, and you can easily switch between your 3D games and your normal, everday 2D applications (but with Windows Vista on its way, who knows what "normal" would be any time soon).

Other vital statistics of this sexy thing would be a 1280x1024 resolution, an 8ms refresh rate, and a 500:1 contrast ratio. The iZ3D monitor currently retails for $1,299.

Montclair State University in Cincinnati implemented a mandatory cell phone rule in which school authorities can locate their students on and off campus. This may easily be seen as an invasion of privacy in that the university is granted the authority to track down their students, thus hampering the students' freedom to go wherever and whenever one wants.

Ron Chicken, a student in the said university, used to hate the idea of him being tracked down by the university administration. But according to him, as time passed, more and more students became used to the idea and even favored its implementation because it also provides them with security. According to the university, nine out of ten of their students carry cellphones and rarely, or no longer, use landline phones. This means that school authorities would have to adapt to this technological development and use it to maintain lines of communication with their students.

However, the Montclair State University made it clear that the tracking program for their students is voluntary, and that even if the students do decide to avail of the service, they can deactivate it any time of the day. Students can activate what they call the "Guardian" service if ever they feel threatened on campus. The said university came up with a voluntary program that offers freshmen a free mobile phone, but the students would have to pay for the services they would avail of. Montclair partnered with Rave Wireless Inc. to develop the software applications for their students' cell phones. Sprint Nextel Corp. provided the handsets as well as the wireless services.

More and more universities are pondering on whether they should drop the traditional use of landline phones to contact their students especially in emergency cases, and move on to tapping into the cellphone as a medium for maintaining communication lines with their students. While email and landline phones still prove to be useful in contacting the students, it is ultimately the cellphone that every student carries with him constantly. The Morrisville State College in New York has also implemented mandatory school-issued cellphone handsets as a replacement for landlines in its dorms.

However, some schools and universities remain ambivalent about the issue because of lawsuits that may ensue if the traditionally reliable landline services are removed from the dormitories. Austin College in Texas is keeping the dorm landlines for safety reasons but will ultimately rely on email to keep in touch with its students.

The cellphone tracking program can prove to be a very useful tool for universities and schools to communicate with their students and guarantee their safety especially within the campus. The important thing perhaps is that the students are given a choice on the issue and are consulted before universities implement such programs.