Netflix has sent word today that they will be launching a Streaming Only service of Netflix to Canada later this year. While no platforms were mentioned in the press release, we wonder which video game consoles it will be on. Most likely the Xbox 360 as there is already Netflix in the United States for that and Windows PC. The only oddity we found was the service will only be available in English at first, but that shouldn’t be a problem since you wouldn’t want to watch the latest action flick dubbed in French would you?

Netflix, Inc. the leading Internet movie subscription service, today announced it will expand into Canada this fall offering unlimited movies and TV episodes streamed instantly to TVs and computers for one low monthly fee. The Canadian launch will mark the first availability of Netflix outside the United States.

Canadian Netflix members will be able to instantly watch a broad array of movies and TV episodes right on their TVs via a range of consumer electronics devices capable of streaming from Netflix, as well as watching on PCs and Macs.

In addition to representing its inaugural international market, Canada will also mark the first streaming-only service promoted by Netflix.

At the time of launch, the Netflix Canadian service will be available in English only, but the company said it expects to add French language capability over time.

Canadians interested in Netflix can go to www.netflix.ca and sign up to receive an email from the company when the service launches in Canada this fall.

While we normally don’t post random YouTube links on Gametactics and then copy them over to TechMamba, this one caught our eye which claims that you can get an old lady to give you one heck of an earful and then she instantly kills you. The video claims it is from the PlayStation 3 version and is in the Underpass level.

Some comments on the Youtube video say they did it after a dozen tries only but we’ve pretty much calling this one fake.

Edit from Malcolm Owen: I don’t think this is a real bug. A quick search on Youtube turns up empty except for this video, the old lady that appears in-game shares her accent with the video makers, we can’t quite see whom gets the claim for the kill, and the video ends with a promotional URL featuring the word “film”. I have serious doubts that this is real…

Apple has released iPhone O/S. 4.0.1 which address signal bar display with the new iPhone 4.

Not sure if this firmware update will resolve the “left handed” signal cutting issue, but we’ll find out soon enough with tons of youtube videos I’m sure within hours of people installing it.

Firmware: 4.0.1
* Updated Carrier Signal
o Increasing the signal bar length of the smaller bars

Google have decided to up the possible resolution of YouTube to 4K video (That’s 4096 x 2304 pixels, or 8 times larger than my desktop) to support future high resolution cameras and higher bandwidth internet connections that we will have in the year 2525…

If you were to go to any of the videos on this playlist, you will be able to select “Original”, which is what Google got as the original resolution of the video. Of course, you can use it for lower resolutions than 4K which happen to be higher than 1080p, but no-one really cares about that.

You will have issues playing the video if you are on a slow connection (except if you can stand the buffering, in which case I suggest you get cable or DSL) and you will not be able to view the glorious full resolution version without a stupidly high end display setup (I dread to think the multi-screen layout some people will try to watch this) and your computer may balk at the idea of doing this much work, but if you feel brave (or at least want to see if your processor starts to die), then feel free to check out the playlist.

[YouTube Blog]

Mamba Query returns with a fairly obvious question, which I hope spawns from you all fairly obvious answers.

The question:
What aspects of technology do you wish were not used inappropriately?

My answer:
Most mobile phones have a speakerphone function. Most mobile phones will play music as well. However, it doesn’t help when you’re on a train in a semi-empty carriage being forced to listen to the music from the Coke World Cup advert and something by Rihanna on loop.
Granted, the looping two songs caused by a lack of memory due to them being cheapskates that spends too much on booze instead of improving their non-consumable items, but using the low quality speakerphone on a cheap Nokia as a surrogate ghetto blaster just seems like an inappropriate use of technology that really should be banned.
And yes, I know I sound old and pathetic with that tone of answer, but I feel it’s true.

Your answers for your unwanted misuses of tech in the comments please…

Can’t afford those $99 or $79 stand alone iPhone apps, but have a decent data plan on your iPhone? MapQuest has your solution with a FREE MapQuest 4 Mobile iPhone app that includes turn by turn directions with spoken street names. Can you really beat free? Just remember that it requires a data connection so if you have those skimpy 500 megabyte per month plans or roaming, this might not be a good idea unless you are totally lost.

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It’s not often that Tesco’s advertising makes me want to say good things, let alone Tesco warranting a blog post on a tech site, but they’ve done it.

In this advert, Tesco Mobile manages to pastiche the generic empowerment and “blue sky thinking” that you get in the average mobile phone adverts and give a basic message at the end…

The fiasco with the interfering granny that aired for far too long is forgiven, but it does raise the question as to why the UK mobile phone industry continues to batter us with “inspirational” claptrap in order to hawk phones.

And yes, I’m ignoring the advert’s focus on 12 month adverts instead of the 18 or 24 months you get with most other suppliers if you want a phone, because we all know what the answer to that would be…