ASUS enters Canadian premium smartphone market this spring with ZenFone 2

Canadians can expect more choice in the premium smartphone space this spring with the upcoming ASUS ZenFone 2 Smartphone which is being geared as a contract-free option.

Featuring a premium polycarbonate body, a 5.5-inch HD  IPS display with a 72 per cent screen-to-body ratio, the ZenFone 2 is powered by a 2.3GHz 64-bit Intel Atom processor and 4GB of RAM, which is more horsepower than some recently released notebooks. You also get a fast-charging 3000 mAh battery, Android 5.0 Lollipop with the ZenUI user interface.

Stay tuned for more information on ASUS first flagship offering in Canada.

YouTube rumoured to be developing paid video subscription service

Hoping to take on the likes of Hulu and Vimeo, YouTube might be adding another paywall for its service. This time around, they’re focusing on a video on demand service. According to a report from Variety, this service will reportedly offer ad-free streaming of certain content, perhaps from some of the site’s biggest stars under its YouTube Originals umbrella. Not much is known about this report but the rumour started from an unnamed executive of a company that partners with YouTube to produce video content.

YouTube will neither confirm nor deny the report at the moment. But perhaps this is a way to help keep their creators in house and to help boost their bottom line.

Source: Variety + The Verge

BlackBerry introduces security-geared tablet

BlackBerry might not have had much luck with the PlayBook tablet. But that doesn’t mean they aren’t going to stop trying. The brand has teamed up with Samsung and IBM to introduce the SecuTABLET. It’s a modified Samsung Galaxy Tab S 10.5 with high-grade security features from SecuSMART, a company acquired by BlackBerry last year.

This is obviously an enterprise-geared device with the features it has. Users are assured security of corporate or even government data, while being able to use it for personal apps and the like. But it comes at a rather high cost though. The tablet will cost around US$2,360. But for corporate use, that high cost might seem like a sound investment, security-wise.

Source: Mashable + GSMArena

Turn your Mac into an emoji machine with the emoji keyboard

Want to extend your emoji typing ways onto your Mac but want to make it easier? The team behind Disk Cactus has a Kickstarter project that’ll give you an emoji keyboard overlay. It isn’t a physical keyboard per se but rather a silicone covers that fit Apple’s wireless desktop keyboards, 13” MacBook Airs, 13/15” MacBook Pros, and the 11” MacBook Air.

The emoji keyboard works with corresponding software so you just need to press caps-lock key for a one-touch emoji shortcut. But if you play around with pairing shift, control, and option, you get around five characters per button. This’ll give you 150 emojis to play around with. The funding goal for the emoji keyboard is at US$20,000 and they have around 25 days to go. They have raised $4,500 at the moment and you can pledge as little as $5. But if you want the keyboard skin and software, you need to shell out $15.

Source: Disk Cactus | Via: SlashGear