This series is brought to you by HTC EVO 4G, America’s first 4G phone. Only from Sprint. The “First to Know” series keeps you in the know on what’s happening now in the world of social media and technology.

 

Welcome to this morning’s edition of “First To Know,” a series in which we keep you in the know on what’s happening in the digital world today. We’re keeping our eyes on four particular stories of interest today. Google Is Going into Gaming Google is going into social gaming in attempt to win over some of the ad dollars that have gone to social networking sites, sources familiar with the matter have told The Wall Street Journal. The company has reportedly been in talks with top developers like Playdom Inc., which was acquired by Disney this week, as well as Electronic Arts’s Playfish and FarmVille creator Zynga. Checkins Coming to Google In further Google news, the company has indicated that it is working with developers to bring checkins to location-based applications via its Places API. Google Places is the new version of the company’s Local Business Center, designed to help local business owners gain an edge in search engine marketing. Facebook May Put Off IPO Until 2012 Three sources have informed Bloomberg that Facebook may postpone its initial public offering until 2012. “At some point along the path, I think it’ll make sense to have an IPO. But we’re not running the company to do that. We’re running the company to serve more people,” CEO Mark Zuckerberg told ABC’s Diane Sawyer recently. Spotify’s U.S. Launch Faces Further Delays Negotiations between free music streaming service Spotify and U.S. record labels are faring none-too-well; the company is reportedly “back to square one.” The startup is still aiming for a late 2010/early 2011 launch in the U.S. Further News Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer says the company is hard at work making Windows 7 a great OS for tablets; Redbox is adding Blu-ray rentals to its kiosks [via Variety]; Samsung confirms it will the Galaxy S smartphone will get Froyo in September [via Engadget]; and Google dispelled rumors that it was fully blocked in China. Disclosure: Microsoft is a Mashable sponsor.

This series is brought to you by HTC EVO 4G, America’s first 4G phone. Only from Sprint. The “First to Know” series keeps you in the know on what’s happening now in the world of social media and technology.

More About: facebook, facebook ipo, first to know series, geolocation, Google, google places, spotify

For more Social Media coverage:

• Follow Mashable Social Media on Twitter
• Become a Fan on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Social Media channel
• Download our free apps for iPhone and iPad

View full post on Mashable!

This post is part of Mashable’s Spark of Genius series, which highlights a unique feature of startups. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here. The series is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark.

Name: slydial

Quick Pitch: slydial is a free voice messaging service which connects you directly to someone’s mobile voicemail.

Genius Idea: If you’ve ever dreaded making a phone call and anxiously wished for a voicemail greeting as you dialed, you know exactly why this app is a genius idea. It strips away the awkwardness of a voice-to-voice call while still letting you claim to have attempted direct communication.

How perfectly passive-aggressive! We can imagine this app going over well for:

• Breakups,
• Firings,
• The-morning-after apologies,
• Stalling on or avoiding a meetup,
• Making excuses to a boss,
• “Duty” calls to chatty friends and relatives,
• “Just touching base” reminder/nagging calls,
• 3 a.m. calls that don’t need to be wake-up calls, as well,
• And ever so much more.

Essentially, the app “creates the illusion of communication” without making you actually have to listen to other people, play politics or hear someone else’s side of an argument. In theory, it works just as well for the incurable narcissist as for the cripplingly antisocial.

Before you protest, it’s true that slydial isn’t the Ghandi of applications. But it plays into a powerful part of the human psyche: Our desire to avoid conflict. The makers of slydial have paved the path of least resistance beautifully, and we can imagine that quite a few people will be traipsing down that path in the months to come.

To use slydial, which is free and audio-add supported, just dial 267-SLYDIAL (267-759-3425 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting              267-759-3425      end_of_the_skype_highlighting) and enter the mobile number of the person you want to leave a voicemail. You can also try slydial’s mobile apps, which include offerings for iPhone, Android, BlackBerry and Windows Mobile.

We gave slydial a try, and it worked just as promised; the other person’s phone didn’t so much as twitch while slydial connected me to the voicemail box in question.

What do you think of this app? It is something you’d use when you don’t have the personal fortitude or wherewithal to make voice-to-voice contact?

[img credit: djou]

Sponsored by Microsoft BizSpark

Entrepreneurs can take advantage of the Azure Services platform for their website hosting and storage needs. Microsoft recently announced the “new CloudApp()” contest – use the Azure Services Platform for hosting your .NET or PHP app, and you could be the lucky winner of a USD 5000* (please see website for official rules and guidelines).”

For more Mobile coverage:

• Follow Mashable Mobile on Twitter
• Become a Fan on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Mobile channel
• Download our free apps for iPhone and iPad

View full post on Mashable!

YouJoomla Proudly Presents YouGrids. First Joomla! Template Based on YjSimpleGrid Joomla! Template framework. Loaded with full set of YJSG features , 2 beautiful styles and unique layout options. YouGrids is free Joomla! template and it can be adapted to  any web concept.

Template Options

* YjSimpleGrid powered
* PSD files included
* Joomla 1.5 template
* CSS dropdown menu
* SMooth dropdown menu
* Dropline menu
* SmoothDropline menu
* Split menu
* 2 beautiful styles
* 51 module positions
* Native RTL Support
* Server side Compression
* Demo starter
* Free Joomla! Template
* IE6 png fix
* and more…

Demo: http://www.joomla1.5.youjoomla.info/yougrids/
Home: http://www.youjoomla.com/yougrids-free-joomla-template-yjsg-powered.html
Download: http://www.youjoomla.com/free-joomla-templates/yougrids-free-joomla-template.html

Joomlafan Box – designer and webmaster resources share-center

View full post on Joomlafan Box

Cleanpress is the answer to all your blogging problems. It’s clean, it’s light, it’s well organized and boy, let me tell you: It looks great. But you know the old saying: “Don’t judge a theme by it’s cover”.

With Cleanpress, you can go deeper, and look under the ‘hood’, but before you do that, be sure to delete that old theme of yours because, let’s be honest, you won’t need it no more. It’s not just a theme, it’s a tool, a tool that not only gives a pleasant look to your blog, but it also integrates it with the latest social network websites.

Demo: http://dpxmag.com/cleanpress/

Download CleanPress Free Premium WordPress Theme
http://dpxmag.com/cleanpress-a-free-premium-wordpress-theme.html
http://rapidshare.com/files/409706188/cleanPRESS-theme.zip

Joomlafan Box – designer and webmaster resources share-center

View full post on Joomlafan Box

I’m sure each and everyone of us were pretty excited when we first got our DSLR. I mean, who’s not right. And the next thing most of us will do is – start abusing the shutter and snapping non-stop. That’s just how we learn.

Image credit

Photography is a beautiful form of art with no hard rules. It’s all about creativity and individual style. And that’s what makes it so interesting. There are lots of tips and tricks to be learnt, and certainly lots of experiences to be gain before one becomes an expert. If you are new to photography, here are five ways to create cool photos to impress your friends.

1. Long Shutter Photography

Long shutter photographs are always amazing. While playing with the shutter speed, you can come up with super amazing photographs beyond your expectations. And the specialty of long shutter photographs are that they present the world around you in a unique way like you’re never seen before. To get a feel of what exactly it is, have a look at the following examples.

examples

Photo credit

Photo credit

Photo credit

Photo credit

So, you got a rough idea on what exactly is long shutter photography. Now, how to take them?

Technique

To take amazing long shutter photographs, you have to first learn and completely understand what exactly Shutter Speed is. Shutter speed for a camera is for the time the light sensitive film is exposed to the light outside. Getting back to shutter speed, camera metering instruments measure them in a range of reciprocal of time. Eg: 1/30, 1/500, 1/1500 sec. etc.

These are the time for which your shutter will be open while taking a particular photograph. Higher the shutter speed, you’ll have to handle the camera well to avoid any jerk as a slight jerk in this setting can ruin your photograph. For this, use of a tripod is recommended. Some cameras have bulb mode that enables you to let your shutter open as long as you keep the button pressed.

2. custom bokeh shapes

According to Wikipedia, the definition of bokeh is:

“In photography, bokeh is the blur, or the aesthetic quality of the blur, in out-of-focus areas of an image, or “the way the lens renders out-of-focus points of light”

Bokeh is a word derived from Japanese, which means “blur” or “haze”, or boke-aji, the “blur quality”. The Japanese term bokeh is also used in the sense of a mental haze or senility.

Without a doubt, bokeh is one of the most interesting and sort after thing in digital photography. And it’s indeed evident from the following photographs.

Examples (Bokeh)

Photo credit

Photo credit

Photo credit

Photo credit

Technique

By default, bokeh shapes are only circular in shape (owing to the fact that the shape of your lens is circular). But can we also make custom bokeh shapes? Well, yes that’s possible and for that you need the following:

1. Camera lens (preferbly large aperture),
2. Cardboard sheet
3. Some duct tape.

To start with, draw any shape which you want in the middle of the cardboard sheet and cut that portion out. Next, wrap the remaining cardboard sheet around your camera lens carefully and with little practice.

Photo credit

Start shooting something and you’ll noticed your bokeh will have the shape just like the one on the cardboard. Here are some beautiful custom bokeh to inspire you.

Examples (Custom Bokeh)

Photo credit

Photo credit

Photo credit

Photo credit

Further Reading

• How to Make a Custom Bokeh – wikihow
• DIY Your Own Bokeh – diyphotography
• Make Your Own Bokeh Shape – shutterskills

3. High Dynamic Range (HDR) Photography

HDR stand for High Dynamic Range photography. Normally, even our natural vision is incapable of seeing all the dynamic ranges in any photographs. So, HDR is more of a post processing trick rather than a photography trick. Nevertheless, following photographs show what we’re talking about.

Examples

Photo credit

Photo credit

Photo credit

Photo credit

Exiting, isn’t it? Watching these amazing HDR, you must be thinking would you be able to take such photographs ever? And the answer is, you’ll be able to do that in the next five minutes. But for that, you have to first understand the exposure bracketing language that your camera understands.

Technique

Most cameras understand the exposure of images in bracketing measures which normally range from (-2) to (+2) stop (both being the extreme ends of exposure respectively). In simpler terms, a photograph shot at (-2) exposure bracketing will be under-exposed and the one shot at (+2) exposure bracketing will be over exposed.

Ok. Now you have the idea what exactly does exposure bracketing means. Bring out your camera and click three shots of the same subject in three exposure brackets viz:

• First shot at (-2) stops.
• Second shot at (0) stops.
• Third shot at (+2) stops.

As I already told you, HDR is more of a post processing trick than being a photography trick, you’ll need a software to merge and level the three photographs you just took. If you have Photoshop with you, it will work fine. If not, there is a special and dedicated software for HDR image processing and is called PhotoMatrix. You can just download the software and merge the above three photographs you took. A little bit of channel tuning and color correction, and you’ll have your first HDR photograph ready.

Further Reading

• HDR Photography Tutorial – raven-photography
• HDR/Photomatix tutorial – abduzeedo
• Create HDR Images in Photoshop – yanik photoschool

More HDR photos:

• HDR Photography: Tutorials, Tips and Stunning Examples – hongkiat

4. Burst Zoom Photography

Burst zoom is a very interesting trick in digital photography. Everyone knows what is a zoom (there are two of them, optical and digital) and any kind of zoom just does one thing, makes distance objects appear nearer to you so that you can catch more of the subject in focus than the surroundings. But burst zoom is a very interesting trick that may take quite some time to practice and master. To get an idea, check out the photos below.

Examples

Photo credit

Photo credit

Photo credit

Photo credit

Technique

With these amazing examples, it is evident that not always a sharp and crystal clear image is required and sometimes adding a good amount of blur and burst makes the photograph stand out from the rest. Getting back to the burst zoom technique, to be able to take burst zoom photographs you have to follow the following steps:

1. Set your camera to slow shutter speed and a wide aperture.
2. Try to shoot in manual mode.
3. Get ready for the action

Now, the execution part comes in. As you’ve already set your camera up in manual mode with slow shutter, you’ll get plenty of time to execute the burst zoom. To do that, as soon as you press the button to take photograph, zoom your lens quickly to the subject and get back. This should be done in a split second otherwise you won’t get the desired effect. If you’ve done everything right, you’ll be very happy to see the results.

5. High Speed Photography

Who doesn’t like action? But when it comes to capturing the action in your camera, you need to know certain tricks of trade or you’ll end up with only blurry and out of focus photographs. As a matter of fact, the high speed photography also requires a good amount of knowledge about shutter speed, camera aperture and ISO settings so that you are able to get the desired shots. Here are some examples.

Examples

Photo credit

Photo credit

Photo credit

Photo credit

Technique

High speed photography can be categorized in different categories like:

• Macro photography
• Sports photography
• Action photography

But all these have one thing in common, the high shutter speed involved. As I’ve already explained you above what exactly shutter speed is, you’ll not face much trouble figuring this one out. To get started with high speed photography you just have to:

1. Choose your action subject (or set the stage up if you’re going for macro high speed photography)
2. Set your camera to a high shutter speed
3. Set a higher ISO (not too high otherwise you’ll end up with grainy pics)

Well, that’s with the settings and now you’re good to go to capture the action. Just go out in the wild and capture everything that appears to be moving. After some amount of practice, you could be a high speed photography expert.

More high speed photography photos:

• High Speed Photography : Frozen in Time – hongkiat
• 40 Stunning Examples of High Speed Photography – smashingapp

View full post on hongkiat.com

We’ve got some freebies for you! This week we are giving away 5 copies of ClassiPress premium Wordpress themes to Hongkiat readers, courtesy of Appthemes.

ClassiPress is a premium theme that turns the entire Wordpress blog into a classified site. It takes care of the technology so you can focus on the listings ans sales. If you are looking to create a classified website, this is something you probably don’t want to miss.

Here are some examples created with ClassiPress, or check out the entire collection at AppThemes.

• http://taiwandeal.com/
• http://runninghorses.net/
• http://tutorlink.co.nz/

We are giving away 3 Personal Editions, 1 Professional Edition and 1 Ultimate edition of ClassiPress – 5 copies in total. Click here to find out the differences of each edition.

How to win

If you are interested in winning yourself a copy, drop a comment below. It’s that simple. Contest will start today, ends 2nd August 2010. Good luck.

View full post on hongkiat.com

Attractive, visually appealing cover is probably one of the foremost step for a PS3 game company to persuade gamer for another good sale. Thus, the company must be putting a lot of effort in working their designers to create the most attractive and promising cover for their product.

That’s why we grab a chance of a post to showcase 63 purely attractive PS3 game covers for you to get inspired, and who knows, you might grab yourself a copy!

Aliens vs Predator

Nicely designed game cover with appealing color scheme and absolutely different typefaces to distinguish 2 unique species.

Alone in the Dark

Character portrait is very nice that it evokes you a will to discover the story inside the game.

Alpha Protocol

A futuristic design with awesome graphic and typography effects that make this game cover stand out from others.

Armored Core for Answer

Probably one of the most persuading cover in the Armored Core series that expects you to have the coolest 3D machinery combat experience.

Assassin’s Creed II

Well designed mysterious assassin, that’s all enough for you to pick the game up and check out its back cover for more info.

Batman: Arkham Asylum

Batman series did exceptionally well to attract customer on its design for movie poster, so is its game cover.

Battlefield: Bad Company 2

Besides the attractive design, the cover designer placed nickname above each character to effectively indicate that the game would be more fun with its multiplayer mode.

BioShock

Named ‘Big Daddy’ (the big machinelike creature in the cover), this genetically enhanced human has done a really good job in attracting the gamer.

BioShock 2

The sequel of the series that showcases another type of eye cathy ‘Big Daddy’.

Borderlands

Very creative use of splatter effect, the overall design also shows how annoying would the game be.

Dante’s Inferno

Nicely blended design that catches your eyes with horrible elements.

Darksiders

Strong color scheme, strong house and strong rider, there’s no reason for this game cover to be less attractive.

Dead to Rights: Retribution

Good combination of splatter and grunge effect that expresses violent gameplay, appealing to fierce gamer.

DiRT

Grunge and splatter effect were used to increase overall messiness that grabs a lot of attention.

DiRT 2

Sequel of the series, this cover applied more ‘dirty’ elements on the design to make itself looks far more different from other, mostly neat designs.

Eat Lead

Massive use of gun elements makes the cover really appealing to wargamer, I thought it’s the sequel for the return of Serious Sam before.

Fairytale Fights

I’ve never seen Fairytale as this bloody before…and this cover really tempts me to check out what’s going on in the game.

Fallout 3

Good use of old photo effects which suits this game’s conspiracal topic, looks tasty for wargamer.

Final Fantasy XIII

Instead of using beautiful background design, Square Enix made Final Fantasy XIII’s cover to be so minimal that gamer can see how impressive the rendered game character is.

Second version of cover that shows you how detail the character rendering that you can expect from the actual game.

Front Mission Evolved

Another Square Enix’s cover design that attracts you with its cool in-game machinery model.

God of War 3

Probably one of the most eye cathy cover design, but it might be tricky for someone who’s new to the series to know that it’s the 3rd installation of the series.

Gran Turismo 5: Prologue

Elegant cover design makes this series of Gran Turismo looks really gorgeous, worth a buy.

Guitar Hero: World Tour

Good job on the character design to show how crazy would the game be, rocker!

Heavy Rain

Mix of emotional character and mysterious origami makes the cover itself nice enough for gamer to check out its content.

inFamous

Infamous people with special ability doing extraordinary things are always a heating topic for gamer.

Killzone 2

Wargamer never resisted to check out this kind of cover with fierce game title and character illustrated.

LittleBigPlanet

You can’t hardly ignore to stare on this cover with one of the cutest illustrated creature in this planet!

Lost Planet 2

Impressively designed logo, characters and monster get this cover a lot of impression.

MAG

Guns, missiles, war scenes, that’re all what you need to attract wargamer.

Medal of Honor

Medal of Honor focuses solely on portraying 1 character with monochrome color scheme, which acutally makes it looks unique from other war related titles.

ModNation Racers

Another game with cute and charming characters, greatest hit for kids and girls.

Naughty Bear

You must be wondering what makes this extremely cute bear so naughty!

Another version of cover that looks bloody, yikes.

Need for Speed: Prostreet

Prostreet series’ car has always done well on grabbing gamer’s attention in its every platform’s cover.

Nier

A very realistic cover design that features promising graphics from the game.

Prototype

Despite the mutated arm, covered face is really the effective yet overused element to attract gamer.

Quantum Theory

Quantum Theory looks fantastic to play with its beautifully crafted character and weapon.

Red Dead Redemption

A game cover presented in totally different way of illustration which suits American gamer’s taste very much.

Reflex: MX vs ATV

Nice application of modern design skill on this game’s cover, which makes it absolutely different with common motocar racing game’s cover design.

Resident Evil 5

Resident Evil series never failed to create terrible atmosphere from its cover design.

Resident Evil 5: Gold Edition

Gold edition’s cover which features 2 of the most welcomed character in the series, Chris Redfield and Jill Valentine.

Resistance: Fall of Man

The unique concept of putting a mutated human skull in the cover makes it uncommonly attractive.

Ridge Racer 7

Another gorgeous cover design for a car game that focuses more on racing car.

Sacred 2: Fallen Angel

The cover highlighted the battle between the holy being and evil creature, which is the kind of story that never failed to entertain gamer.

SAW

This terrible mask can probably catches your attention…and a cold breath.

Silent Hill: Home Coming

Absolutely the most horrible-looking cover among all PS3 games that summarizes the game would deliver you horror, horror and more horror.

Skate 3

An inspiring and cool cover design for skating title which always want you to act cool in the game.

Star Ocean: The Last Hope

Very beautiful and promising characters for a fantastic role playing game.

Tekken 6

This sequel’s cover shows that the character is far more realistic than its prequels.

The Club

Very nice use of splatter effect that converts common looking faces into very different pieces.

TimeShift

Visually impressive game title and character.

Trinity Universe

All charming characters from 3 titles gather in 1 game with extra features, looks like a must have collection for those series’ fans.

Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune

Remarkable design of character and cover that promises you amazing storyline and gameplay.

Uncharted 2: Among Thieves

Sequel of the series which its cover design looks as irritating as the prequel.

Second version of the cover which features another irritating game scene.

Unreal Tournament III

Deadliest Unreal engine hardly disappoint gamer.

Viking: Battle for Asgard

Nicely portrayed character in a rare setting, looks nice to check it out.

Wanted: Weapons of Fate

Just look like it would be another thrilling adventure with guns and bullets.

WET

Girl is the rare appearance as a main character in shooting game, so this is probably the outstanding piece from shooting titles.

White Knight Chronicles

I would say it’s one of the most beautiful white knight I’ve ever seen, and it’s really good to put it in the game cover for aggresive attraction.

Another version of cover that showcases the better portrait of the white knight.

Reflection

So you arrived to the end of this showcase, did you get your favorite cover? Or do you have a nice PS3 game cover to share with us?

Besides, what do you think a game cover should get to attract gamer efficiently? We’re exciting to hear from your sharing!

View full post on hongkiat.com

If you are born around the 80’s, chances are this video game had been your favorite pass time, or maybe it still is. It’s been 23 years since world-renowned video game Street Fighter was released by Capcom. The series silently set the standards in fighting games genre and eventually became one of the highly successful franchise that continues to this day. Not many video game franchises have both the deep history and significance of Street Fighter today.

With so many interesting characters SF have, we picked those very famous ones. These Illustrations below are created by artists, professionals and fans around the world. You’ll see artworks portraying the Street Fighter cast in a wide array of styles and designs, from powerful to passive, sexy to silly, extremely detailed to sketchy. Enjoy!

Ryu

Born in Japan, Ryu is one of the most beloved and favorite character in the SF series. He typically dressed in a traditional white gi, red fingerless gloves, a black belt and a red headband. Ryu is also famous for creating the memorable scar on Sagat’s chest, resulting from an advanced version of Shouryuuken during the first World Warrior tournament.

RYU: The Rising Dragon (via Mgnz)

Marvel VS Capcom 2: Ryu (via Udoncrew)

Evil Ryu (via Fightersgeneration.com)

Ryu vs Sagat (via Braders1986)

Ken

Ken, the 2nd most popular character in the series also wears a traditional gi in red color. Like Ryu, Ken’s objective is to test his skills against many different fighters and make every effort become the best.

SF4 Ken (via SFgalleries)

Ken vs Vega (via O-beto-O)

Chun Li

Chun Li is the first female playable character to show in a 1-on-1 fighting game. While not as physically powerful as the other characters, she was by far the quickest. She usually dressed in a blue qipao, a traditional Chinese dress. Her hair is styled-up in “horns” adorned with brocades and ribbons.

Chunli Style (via Artgerm)

Chun Li (via Mike Thompson)

Chun Li (via Ddd111)

Chun-Li (via Erina)

Guile

Guile is a Major in the United States Air Force. Guile leaves his family and country to join the World Warrior tournament to take revenge on the death of his beloved friend Charlie, who was killed by M. Bison.

Guile Rendition (via Michael Ryan Kime)

Guile Wall (via M16)

Street Fighter Tribute 1 (via Mgnz)

Blanka

Blanka’s beastly look is a product of Shadoloo genetic experimentation. Blanka is also famous for his shocking orange hair. He was trapped in the Brazilian jungles as a young child and was raised by animals.

Wild Blanka (via Castello)

Dhalsim

Dhalsim, who is a pacifist, was born in Kerala, India. This yoga master is known for his bald head painted with red stripes, the string of skulls around his neck.

Character Select- Dhalsim (via Udoncrew)

Dhalsim vs Necro (via DXS Infinite)

Dhalsim Wall (via Manywallpapers)

Dhalsim: Yoga Blowfish (via Zatransis)

E-Honda

E. Honda is a sumo wrestler who typically seen a blue mawashi with red paint art in his face. Although he never earned the highest rank in sumo (Yokozuna), he got the second highest (Ozeki).

Little Honda (via Dennisbell)

E Honda C2 (via Fightersgeneration)

E Honda C2 (via Creativeuncut)

Sagat

Sagat is frighteningly tall, a natural gift he uses to his advantage with his long-reaching assaults. His natural size earned him to become a powerful and ferocious fighter. He is totally bald and wear’s an eyepatch to cover his damaged eye. This giant has hands and feet larger than most of his opponents.

Sagat SF (via Umagafan84)

Cammy

Cammy White or Cammy wore a green thong leotard and was a member of a British special forces team known as Delta Red.

Sexy Cammy (via Markovah)

Yummy Cammy (via Artgerm)

Cammy (via Omar-dogan)

Zangief

Zangief is a national hero in Russian with a nickname, “Red Cyclone” He became acquainted with Gorbachev towards the end of Alpha 2. After meeting Gorbachev, Zangief is sent to train in the Siberian wastes, wrestling bears.

Zan Da Maaan (via Mon3m)

Zangief vs Blanka (via Kuroitora)

Zangief Street Fighter Fan art (via Giaci78)

Zangief SF (via Leeyiankun)

Zangief fan art (via Jy-kim)

Vega

Vega is an interesting character, not only for his fascination with beauty, but also for his unique fighting style using a claw he wields. He’s one of the few SF characters to continuously carry a weapon. He learned bull fighting and ninjutsu, and became a cage fighter.

Vega – Detalles (via Varges)

PF Vega (via Udon Crew)

Vega vs Cammy (via Jujika)

Balrog

Balrog is an African American boxer who was banned from boxing for permanently injuring his opponents and accidentally killing one. Balrog join the Shadaloo criminal organization, and worked his way up from the bottom, eventually becoming M. Bison’s close disciple.

Balrog (via Syclown)

M. Bison

M. Bison is usually dressed in a red military uniform, large silver shoulder plates, and a grey cape. Master Bison’s ambition is to gain power over the world’s governments through his secret crime syndicate, Shadaloo.

M. Bison Zbrush (via Rv_el)

Sakura

Sakura is a Japanese schoolgirl who has a strong interest on Ryu. She has managed to copy and learn some of Ryu’s techniques. This cute student usually fights in her school’s uniform, a short-skirted sailor fuku.

Sakura Sunshine (via Artgerm)

Cute Sakura (via Markovah)

PF Sakura (via Udon Crew)

SF Legends Sakura Issue 1B (via Udon Crew)

Akuma

Akuma’s fighting style integrates the trademark moves of Ryu and Ken. He is famous for his death technique called, Shun Goku Satsu or “The Raging Demon”. Akuma has red hair, wears a black gi, and wears prayer beads around his neck.

Evil Akuma (via Nefar007)

Akuma Shungokusatsu (via Hekoo)

Akuma Sign (via Comicvine)

Akuma vs Dan (via Omar-dogan)

More Street Fighter Artworks

Street Fighter cover (via Diablo2003)

Street Fighter II 2 Cover (via Udoncrew)

Street Fighter (via Benlo)

Street Fighter Tribute Cover (via Udoncrew)

SF Alvinlee Tribute (via Fiboy)

Street Fighter Art Book (via Imaginism)

Street Fighter Tribute Book (via Imaginism)

Street Fighter Cover 2 (via Udon Crew)

Street Fighter no.3 COVER (via Alvin Lee)

Chibi Street Fighter Group (via Shauno)

Street Fighter Street Jam (via Udon Crew)

View full post on hongkiat.com

Apple has sold over 3.3 million iPads so far, but Microsoft is still waiting for those Windows-based tablets to start capturing the hearts and minds of users. Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, however, is confident the company has a bright future in this space.

Speaking to analysts on Thursday, Ballmer said Microsoft is hard at work to make Windows 7 a great OS for tablets. “We have got to make things happen. We’re in the process of doing that as we speak. We’re working with our hardware partners. We’re tuning Windows 7,” he said.

Ballmer also recognized the success of Apple’s iPad, saying the company has “sold certainly more than I’d like them to have sold.” However, at a later Q&A session he took a jab at one of iPad’s drawbacks. “When you get your Windows 7 machine, it will print. Some people actually like to print every now and then,” he said.

Ballmer is right: printing on iPad is a problem. But Microsoft might encounter far more problems adapting Windows 7 for tablets. Apple’s iOS was designed for a touch screen device from grounds up, while Windows 7 was primarily created with a regular keyboard-and-mouse-equipped PC in mind. And while Windows 7 was a clear win compared to the disaster that was Vista, Microsoft’s track record of late – remember Kin? – tells us that a great Windows 7 tablet, while not an impossibility, might not be right around the corner just yet.

[via CNET]

More About: microsoft, Steve Ballmer, tablets, Windows

For more Tech coverage:

• Follow Mashable Tech on Twitter
• Become a Fan on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Tech channel
• Download our free apps for iPhone and iPad

View full post on Mashable!

This comes as no surprise as Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has always been very careful on the subject. “At some point along the path, I think it’ll make sense to have an IPO. But we’re not running the company to do that. We’re running the company to serve more people,” he said recently.

Facebook’s IPO has been one of the burning topics in business circles in the last couple of years. With the company’s revenue (and valuation) rising swiftly, Facebook () is poised to become the next Google (), whose initial public offering in 2004 was wildly successful, with the company increasing its market capitalization fivefold over the coming years.

Despite the pressure to go public, Facebook’s IPO seems to be pushed further into the future every year. The wait, however, will give 26-year old Zuckerberg more time to gain more users, sort out the privacy issues that have been plaguing Facebook and, most importantly, boost sales and increase earnings.