It was bound to happen. And this is why we can’t have nice things. Five of the largest ISP’s in the U.S., including Comcast, Verizon, Time Warner, AT&T and Cablevision, have finally decided enough is enough with these damn pirates.

That’s right, the infamous “Six Strikes” anti-piracy program, also known as the Copyright Alert System (CMCSA), is going live on an Internets near you. Among the five ISP’s who think this is a good idea and will have some effect on limiting online piracy, Comcast is first out of the gate with the launch of its system today.

The rest are expected to follow suit later this week. According to those who support it, the new system is designed to “educate” users of the consequences of copyright infringement. Yes, because education has done such a great job so far.

Don’t worry, though, the new program won’t allow ISP’s to completely cut off your service if they happen to think you might be a pirate. It does, however, allow them to temporarily reduce your internet speed or block popular websites after “repeat offenses.”

Just when you thought there we weren’t going to get any tech news today (except for the PS4, of course) along comes Google. That’s right, the company just announced two new laptops which continue their idea that all your data should be on the “cloud.”

The new hotness, dubbed the Chromebook Pixel, sport a 12.85″ Gorilla Glass touch display with 239ppi (2560 x 1700), the highest pixel density of any laptop screen on the market. The Pixel also features an Intel i5 processor, 4G LTE (from Verizon), a backlit keyboard, two USB 2.0 ports, a mini-display port, 2-in-1 card reader, 4GB RAM, 32 or 64GB solid state drive, a headphone jack, microphone, and battery life of up to 5 hours with active use.

The Chromebook Pixel is already available at the company’s Play Store. Prices start at $1299 for the WiFi-only version and $1449 for the 4G LTE one.

Check out a video with more details after the break.

When I left Apple and AT&T for Verizon several years ago, the VZ iPhone had yet to be announced. So, my first Verizon experience was with an HTC Droid Incredible.

In short, I really liked it and from that moment on, I was a fan of HTC and their products. In fact, they continue to be my favorite Android smartphone manufacturer. Sorry Samsung.

So, good news for me (and the rest of you HTC fans out there) because this morning the new hotness known as the HTC One was finally unveiled. The device comes with a 4.7 inch Full HD 1080p display at 468 PPI, is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 600 1.7GHz quad-core processor, an UltraPixel camera, Sense 5.0, 2GB of RAM, NFC, and a 2,300mAh battery.

Sounds great, right? The only downside for me, so far, is the list of potential carriers. At this point it looks like T-Mobile, AT&T, and Sprint will have the One, but no Verizon. Not that I was planning on switching to an HTC One from the iPhone 5, but it’s nice to have options.

Check out the full press release from HTC after the break as well as a shiny video that tells you more about this cool device.

Are you a smartphone or tablet user? If so, have you unlocked your device or are you planning on it? If you’ve hesitated up to this point, you not wait any longer.

Why? Well, it seems the Librarian of Congress has determined that certain actions involving mobile phones are illegal under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Basically, this means it will be illegal to jailbreak tablets and illegal to unlock phones without permission from your wireless provider. Good times.

This goes into effect on Januray 26th so if you still need to get this done, and you care about violating the law, you might want to hurry. Of course, you could always buy an iPhone from Verizon which is already unlocked, or a Nexus 4 (if you can find one), which is also unlocked, to avoid this problem.

Otherwise, you’re on your own. Good luck.

Well, surprise surprise. It seems Verizon has decided that if you’re willing to pay for an iPhone 5, you should be able to use it on other carriers besides theirs if you wish.

What am I talking about? Well, according to a report, the iPhone smartphones coming from Verizon are unlocked and can be used with any GSM carrier in addition to Verizon’s network.

I’ll let that sink in a minute. Okay, but what does it mean? Well, it means you can slap in a SIM card from AT&T or, most likley T-Mobile or another GSM carrier in Europe or wherever, and use the iPhone 5 on their networks as well.

Unfortunately, you won’t get 4G LTE due to the differences in the way the carriers work, but you will get 3G and the ability to make calls, text, etc.  Not bad. Not bad at all.

Now if only AT&T would do this too.

Even though some may think the new iPhone 5 isn’t a revolutionary device or a “must” upgrade, others obviously feel (and think) differently. That’s right, after only a short time being available, pre-order stock of the iPhone 5 has sold out at Verizon Wireless, AT&T and Sprint.

The devices went on sale this morning at 3:01 AM Eastern, 12:01 AM Pacific and shortly thereafter the company’s initial stock of iPhone 5s was exhausted for all three carriers. Shipping time for new orders placed on Apple’s website reportedly slipped to two weeks just before 4:00 AM Eastern, where it now sits.

For those of you lucky enough to get your order in early, all three carriers are reportedly quoting launch-day delivery, at least for any orders placed as of 8:15 AM Eastern Friday morning.

So, were you one of the lucky ones to get an order in before they ran out? Or, are you gonna wait and see how things go before you jump in?

As expected, at an event in San Francisco today, Apple VP Tim Schiller took the wraps off the company’s newest mobile device: the iPhone 5. In addition, the company announced a new version of iTunes, an update to its mobile iOS software, dubbed iOS 6, and more.

But really, the more isn’t that important. What people are really interested in is the new iPhone. So, here’s what we know:

The iPhone 5 is 18% thinner than the iPhone 4/4S. It is also 20% lighter than the previous model. It’s made of all aluminum and glass. Since the display is taller, with a 1136 x 640 resolution (aka 16:9 like your HD TV), there’s an extra row of icons and the pixels per inch are 326.

All of Apple’s apps are updated to support the larger resolution, and apps that aren’t yet updated will simply run at normal resolution with small black bars surrounding them. In other words, letterboxed.

The iPhone 5 supports almost every cellular and Wi-Fi band in the world including GSM/GPRS/EDGE/CDMA/EV-DO/HSPA/LTE and Wi-FI a,b,g,n with dual-band. It also features a new Apple A6 processor that’s twice as fast as before, and offers twice the graphics performance with 22% less physical footprint.

The new device will also sport an 8 megapixel camera with improved low light, color processing and lens, and, panorama mode. As for battery life, Apple claims better performance than the iPhone 4S, which is actually pretty good. It remains to be seen how that will stack up during real world tests with 4G LTE on all the time, however.

Pricing for the device, which will be available in both black and white, starts at $199 for the 16GB version, $299 for the 32 GB and $399 for the 64GB model. You will be able to use it with Verizon, AT&T or Sprint in the U.S.

iOS 6, the latest version of Apple’s mobile software, will be available on September 19th for current iPhone, iPad and iPod touch users.

If you’re looking for an alternative to the Samsung lineup of Android smartphones like the Galaxy S III, HTC has got you covered. That’s right, the DROID Incredible 4G LTE is now available from Verizon Wireless.

It features a 1.2GHz dual-core processor, 4″ screen, NFC chip, 4G LTE radio, runs Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich and uses HTC’s Sense 4.0. The price? $149 with a two year contract (after the mail in rebate). Not bad.

Before the iPhone came to Verizon I used the original Incredible and it was a good device. This new one looks to be a worthy successor. Although, for $50 you could get the Galaxy S III so I’ll bet this one isn’t the hit HTC needs it to be.

Still, it looks like a nice, midrange device for those of you wanting the latest features (like Verizon’s 4G network) but not wanting to pay a big price for them. . . until you have to start paying for Verizon’s data plans that is.

After being announced during the CTIA event in early May, it looks like Verizon is finally getting around to launching a new smartphone that isn’t the Samsung Galaxy S III. That’s right HTC fans (myself among them), the Incredible 4G LTE is finally coming to a Verizon store near you.

The magical day is said to be July 5th, which has seemingly been confirmed by a screen cap of an internal Verizon’s website obtained by the folks over at Droid-Life. Pricing for the device looks to be $199 on 2-year contract, but there is still a chance that a $50 rebate will be attached, dropping the price to $149.

So, if this internal document is to be believed, we HTC and Sense 4 fans can pick up one of these beauties next week. Let’s hope it pans out because I, for one, would like to try one out.

In yet another display of near complete disregard for its customers, Verizon Wireless announced this week it plans to eliminate the $30/Month unlimited data plan any user subscribed to prior to the company’s transition to tiered data plans last July. Verizon CFO Fran Shammo said at the 40th J.P. Morgan Technology, Media and Telecom conference that once unlimited 3G data plan customers upgrade to 4G LTE, they will be forced to purchase the company’s shared data plan.

“Everyone will be on data share,” Shammo said. The carrier’s shared data plans are scheduled to launch in the coming months, and will allow users to share a single pool of data between multiple devices. “If I can add as many devices as I want, that is more efficient from a family perspective and a small business perspective,” the CFO said.

When asked how Verizon will migrate customers off their unlimited data plans, Shammo said that LTE will draw customers away from it. “A lot of our 3G base is on unlimited,” he said. “When they migrate off 3G they will have to go to data share. That is beneficial to us.”

Sure, beneficial to you, but how does that benefit customers again? Oh yeah, it doesn’t. It just means people should get ready to pay ever increasing costs for mobile data.

How do we feel about this?

Not sure what we were really hoping for here, but regardless, it’s nice to see the HTC Droid Incredible 4G LTE finally make an “official” appearance. That’s right, today HTC and Verizon made the new device official this morning, complete with specs.

However, they didn’t announce a price or release date just yet, saying only that it would be arriving “In the coming weeks.” As we discussed previously, the device has the following specs: 4-inch qHD Super LCD display, a dual-core 1.2GHz Snapdragon S4 processor, 1GB of RAM, expandable storage, 1700mAh battery, 4G LTE, an 8-megapixel camera, Beats Audio and Sense 4 atop Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich.

Not bad but, not earth shattering either. This is obviously being positioned as a mid-range device and isn’t really supposed to be direct competition for HTC’s flagship One X or even the One S.

Still, if you’re looking for a solid Android device on Verizon’s network for what will most likely be a reasonable price point (think $199 with contract) this could be a great option. Check out Verizon’s full press release after the break.

Well, this is a bit disappointing. Granted, it will probably only affect a small percentage of you out there, but it’s still kinda lame.

According to reports, even if you have Apple’s shiny new iPad and want to engage in a little FaceTime with a, um, friend, you won’t be able to do it, even if you have super fast 4G LTE. It will only work over Wi-Fi.

If you try, you will be prompted to connect to an available Wi-Fi network. Curiously, if you are using your iPad as a Wi-Fi hotspot, which you can with the Verizon version, FaceTime will work if you initiate a call using an supported iPhone or iPod.

Apple has so far been moot on this issue but you can be sure people are going to be asking about it. After all, in many cases 4G LTE is as fast (or faster) than available Wi-Fi networks so the fact that FaceTime isn’t supported is difficult to understand.

Again, this isn’t a critical point for most of you, we just found it interesting as it gives a bit of insight into how Apple deals with wireless carriers. Of course, it could be a decision on Apple’s part. . . but we kinda doubt it.