OnLive cloud gaming service demonstrated on Apple's iPhone

OnLive, the Internet-based interactive streaming service hyped as "the future of video games," is also capable of running on mobile devices such as Apple's iPhone, the company has claimed.

At the Wedbush financial conference in New York, OnLive CEO Steve Perlman demonstrated his company's game streaming service simultaneously on two iPhones. Perlman detailed the event on his company's official blog.

"While we only showed a tech demo today, it was great to give people in the audience a chance to try out OnLive on an iPhone," he said. "The large tiles that make up the OnLive user interface work perfectly on the iPhone touch screen, allowing easy access to all of the features of the OnLive game service."

OnLive is an ambitious gaming service that intends to offer the gaming equivalent of cloud computing. In theory, the service would allow gamers to utilize an inexpensive "thin client" at home to access a catalogue of current games with high-end graphics needs.

The service aims to eliminate the need for costly PCs capable of running system-intensive modern games like Crysis. Instead, all of the computing would be handled remotely, and the game itself would be streamed as video to the user at home, eliminating the need to have the expensive horsepower to render a game locally.

OnLive was previously demonstrated on TVs, via a "MicroConsole," and PCs and Macs. But the latest demonstration would bring the service into the mobile market, streaming interactive games to devices like the iPhone as low-latency video via a broadband Internet connection.

Perlman cautioned that console and PC-style gaming is not ideal on a device like the iPhone. He said the initial plans call for users to be able to track their friends online and spectate their live gameplay on the go. However, he said that the company will "eventually" bring new games to mobile phones.

No release date for OnLive on the iPhone was given. Perlman said the recent showing served only as a proof-of-concept technology demo.

"But, for those of you who have been asking about OnLive on cell phones, the answer is yes, it is coming," he said. "And, it is REALLY cool."

Games on the iPhone have recently been in the spotlight, most notably last week when AppleInsider detailed a job listing for a game and media software engineer at Apple. Though the Cupertino, Calif., company has only produced one game, Texas Hold'em, to date for the iPhone and iPod touch, the hiring could suggest it is looking to expand its first-party software.

In September, Apple debuted the new 64GB iPod touch with a faster processor. It portrayed the hardware as a fun device meant for media and games, and highlighted a number of high-profile releases for the platform. This year, some of the biggest names in game publishing have come to the iPhone and iPod touch, bringing blockbuster franchises.

Battery-less remote gets power from button presses, aims for production in 2011

You know what you'll be doing in 2011? Everything that you've ever wanted, that's what, 'cause the world as we know will unquestionably end in 2012. Amazingly enough, one of those bucket list items that you'll be able to achieve is to change the channel on your tele without ever slipping a battery into your remote. A prototypeclicker was recently shown over in Japan utilizing technologies from NEC and Soundpower; essentially, the remote turns the small vibrations from button presses into power, which it then uses to beam out signals to the nearby set. If all goes well, the two hope to have battery-less remotes shipping with televisions in just two years -- a proposition that surely exasperate the likes of Duracell and Energizer (and enraptures us to no end).

Video of the Week – Louis C.K. on Hipsters!

This video contrains LOTS of profanity.

Viewer Discretion is Advised.

Watch Louis C.K. talk about his embarrassing encounter with a hipster at a "cool" coffee shop. This clip comes from Louis' HBO special, Shameless, which was filmed at L.A's Henry Fonda Theater and aired in 2007.

200 POSTS!

For my 200th post I decided to talk about the holidays. And some of my favorite posts of this week

Well, sort of…

Apple's Black Friday sales "supposedly" leaked.

Here it is.

I JUST REALLY HOPE THIS IS TRUE!

Google Chrome OS WIll Be Unveiled In Two Days

Surprise! Friday's report that the Chrome OS "launch" for this week was almost true: Google's OS will be shown in "complete overview" on Thursday. In other words, we'll finally get to see it.

According to Techcrunch this isn't is a launch, but a chance to give us a first look at the OS, and for Google to detail the real launch plans (for now, we're still hanging on the "late 2010" projection from the initial announcement):

The plan is to give some technical background information as well as show off some demos, we're told. More notably, they will be giving a "complete overview" of the new OS, which they say will launch next year.

Knowing what Chrome OS will look like is only half the fun anyway—three months after it was announced, we still don't really know what the hell it is, or how it's going to work. [Techcrunch]

Samsung Behold II Non-Review: Oh God, the Ugly

Samsung's Behold II is the most impressively ugly Android phone in existence. The custom interface is so bad, so gaudy and so confusing it turned my brains into ooze.

TouchWiz is the first custom Android interface that's worse than the standard one, and shows what kind of horrible things emerge when Samsung's interface designers are left unchecked. Here's how I think the design process went, roughly: The designers dropped a bunch of acid, stared at old Atari games while binging on Taco Bell, then proceeded to shit all over the phone for hours and hours.

If it's not inherently ugly, like text input screens with awful '80s neon orange and blue, it's gratuitous and redundant, like the 3D app cube. Or an entirely separate menu of Samsung icons for apps. And some things, like moving the slide-out menu to the left instead of its traditional place on the bottom, actually work against the way you use the phone—the menu gets in the way now, since I'd often bring it out by accident while changing between desktops. It's just... terrible. Worse, Home Switcher, an app that reverts phones back to the stock Android home screen, can't erase Samsung's disgusting mojo. The Behold II would be 10x better with a vanilla build of Android 1.6.

Even the phone hardware is a mess. The front of the phone is an orgy of buttons: seven, to be precise, not including a d-pad, with a dedicated button for the app cube. The lock key isn't just on the side but it's kind of hidden, flush against the bezel. The USB port is weirdly shoved on top. And, uh, what the hell is up with the back plate?

Two things are good about the Behold II—Samsung's custom camera setup comes straight out of their point-and-shoot cameras, and is packed with features, like extensive manual controls and burst shooting, and it's very fast, unlike the rest of the phone. The other is the AMOLED display which is nice, though marred by the same kind of bluish tint as Samsung's other AMOLED Android phone, the Moment.

Take a good long look at the Behold II though: It's a warning to other developers what not to do, and a scary look at one dark possible future for Android, in its infinite permutations. Not just deep fragmentation of the platform, but customized crimes against humanity, perpetrated in the name of Android. It makes me want to cry, except that my brain's too mushy to make my eyes work.

Microsoft Co-Founder Paul Allen Diagnosed With Cancer

Paul Allen, known both as the co-founder of Microsoft and for his multitude of philanthropic pursuits, has been diagnosed with non-Hodgkin Lymphoma, a form of cancer.

We don't know much about his prognosis, though a letter from his sister says he's "feeling OK." Allen came down with Hodgkin's Lymphoma back in 1983 and beat it, and we're all hoping he can do it again