With 2012 and January 2013 real estate data coming in, we have been cautiously optimistic about what has been going on in the Southern California market. Foreclosures are down, prices are going up and inventory is low. This trifecta in our post Great Recession world should create demand, however even we weren’t prepared for what has been happening at Woodbridge Pacific Group’s Brightwater Huntington Beach this week.

Campers. No, you’re not reading something from 2004. Brightwater has eleven sets of campers in line awaiting the first sales release of neighborhood Capri this Saturday. Thirty are expected by week’s end.

And Brightwater is making the news. Check out this week’s coverage by CBS Los Angeles (shown below), NBC LA, Fox 11 LA and KTLA 5.

Located a few short blocks from Pacific Coast Highway, Brightwater offers new beach-close homes, many with unobstructed views of the coast and Bolsa Chica Wetlands. The three Brightwater neighborhoods encompass eleven new floor plan designs. Living spaces will range from approximately 1,992 to 2,685 square feet at Capri; 3,192 to 3,732 square feet at Seaglass; and 3,751 to 4,764 square feet at Azurene. Emphasizing indoor/outdoor living enjoyment and an array of luxury amenities, the homes will provide 3 to 6 bedrooms and 2.5 to 6.5 baths.

The iCache Geode was announced in April and interested parties have been patiently waiting for this product to actually become available.  The iCache Geode “is an iPhone case with a particularly wonderful twist — in addition to just wrapping a protective layer of plastic around your phone, it also sports a rewritable magstripe card on its rear end.”  Once users install the corresponding app, they can store their credit card information and turn this case into a GeoCard.  Additionally, there is a small e-ink display on the back of the Geode which stores information for your loyalty cards.  In order to make sure your credit card information is secure, there is a small fingerprint reader that only allows access to you.

With rumors of the new, slimmer, redesigned iPhones on the way, users will want to make sure that they are sticking with their iPhone 4/4s for a while longer before making the $199 investment. Will you go out and buy one?

For more information and a great introductory video, check out the full article at: http://techcrunch.com/2012/06/01/icache-geode-now-available/

Amazon and Xbox have teamed up to take on Netflix.  Amazon announced today that they will be providing an Instant Video service that utilizes the Xbox 360.  The Amazon Instant Video App costs $79-per-year (“Prime” service), but allows users to stream more than 17,000 movies ant TV shows from their Xbox 360.  Although there are no additional Amazon costs, besides the yearly $79, users will need the Xbox Live Gold Membership from Microsoft, which costs about $50.

This announcement is a big deal because Xbox 360 accounted for nearly 25% of Netflix’s traffic last year.  The partnership between Amazon and Xbox 360 not only benefits Amazon but also aims to get more people hooked on the media console, especially with Amazon’s Whispersync technology, which lets you start a movie or show on your Kindle Fire and switch to you Xbox 360, without interruptions.

For more information about this partnership, and the implications for Amazon Prime and Netflix, go to: http://techland.time.com/2012/05/29/amazon-instant-video-challenges-netflix-with-app-for-the-xbox-360/

Google’s Project Glass first made its way onto the scene this past April, when the company announced that they would be bringing the world the first augmented reality glasses.  These glasses will project augmented reality images into the wearer’s field of vision, as well as having the ability to take pictures & video.  A great example of the glasses functionality is that when someone is wearing them, they will be able to see weather forecasts and what’s on their calendar for the day, as well as send texts and emails as projected in front of you.

Mashable got its hands on the first video as taken from these goggles.  Check it out here

For a great look into what Project Glass offers, including photos & videos taken from the glasses, check out: https://plus.google.com/111626127367496192147/posts

Additionally, Project Glass is developing a feature on the glasses that will offer text alerts for hearing impaired users.  Read all about how these glasses are working towards overcoming hearing obstacles: http://www.digitaltrends.com/cool-tech/google-glasses-may-translate-directional-sound-speech-for-the-deaf/

Google’s self-driving car got its first license this week in the state of Nevada.  If you’re not totally up-to-date with this amazing computer-driven car – there is a great video here.  Google believes that this car will help save lives, because a majority of the 30,000 people killed each year in car crashes are due to human-driver error, and the addition of computer-driven cars could significantly reduce the number of deaths.

Google’s self-driving car uses sensors to watch cars, pedestrians and other obstacles, with additional technology and software that allows the car to read street signs and signals.  Google’s car also combines a number of technologies included in cars already, such as GPS tracking, wheel motion sensors and radar.

These modified Toyota Priuses are not available to the public yet, but the testing stages are proving that driver assisted technologies are working.

For the full story, go to: http://money.cnn.com/2012/05/10/autos/google-driverless-cars-safety/index.htm?source=cnn_bin

Amazon knows that it loses hundreds of millions of dollars each year on free shipping and free returns, and to be honest, the company is happy to do it since it keeps customers happy.   To make up some of those lost dollars, the company has decided to enter the high-end clothing business.  The reason for this is, shipping costs are about the same, whether it’s a $10 toy or a $5,000 gown, so why not go after the selling items like the gown with the much higher gross profit dollars per unit.  The company is courting designer brands to work with them and not against them.  They currently work with a few big names including: Michael Kors, Vivienne Westwood, Catherine Malandrino, Jack Spade and Tracy Reese.

This past Monday Amazon sponsored and provided a live-stream from the Costume Institute Benefit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the accompanying exhibit as a way to let designers and brands know their additional fashion-focused direction.  What Amazon has that is very desirable to these clients is a deep back pocket.  So if a designer needs models, photographers, nicer packaging, etc to highlight their clothes, Amazon can provide them.  One of the features being tested is an interactive product image, where the model is spinning and posing to show off the clothes.

The company’s success in this market will not be a slam dunk, as they’ve unsuccessfully tried to make a splash in this market before.  But with a bevy of fashion-focused sites (Zappos.com, Endless.com and MyHabit) they’ve gotten some practice.  For more information, check out the full article at: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/08/business/amazon-plans-its-next-conquest-your-closet.html

There have been rumors and leaks for the past few weeks, but Google Drive has officially launched.  Google Drive, is Google’s new 5GB cloud-storage service that stores 30 different file types including PDFs, HD Video, and Illustrator & Photoshop images.  This product also integrates directly with Google Docs and allows you to access and collaborate on files (in real time) from anywhere.  The ability to work with others in real time (adding to and commenting on PDFs, images, video files, spreadsheets and documents) is going to be a huge advantage for the company. 

The product will also include a smart tagging feature, which allows users to tag items stored on their drive, so that the next time you do a search for a similar file or image, the tagged item will show up in your search.   

Finally, Google Drive will user image recognition, so when you drag and drop photos from a recent event or vacation and you want to do a search for that location later, those photos will show up, and Optical Character Recognition (OCR) which will also allow Drive to recognize text in scanned documents, making your searches easier and less time consuming.

Google is giving all users 5GB of storage for free! But if you need more, there are several tiers to choose from: 25GB for $2.49/month, 100GB for $4.99/month or 1TB for $49.99/month. When you upgrade to a paid account, your Gmail account storage also expands to 25GB.

Check out Mashable’s full walk through of the product at: http://mashable.com/2012/04/24/google-drive-hands-on/

Fresh on the heels of PayPal’s ‘Here’ dongle announcement, Intuit’s GoPayment application has some news of it’s own. The GoPayment mobile application will be releasing updates today that allow US based fundraisers to easily accept credit card donations directly from a smart phone or tablet.

This announcement and venture also suspiciously follows Square’s partnership announcement with the Obama and Romney fundraising camps. Square will be providing each organization with dongles that allow their teams to accept donations wherever, whenever. But GoPayment’s donation upgrades are boasting that they do not require customization or the creation of a new app, per the “Obama Square App,” and it’s use isn’t limited to the presidential election either. All users will have to do is install the upgraded software and then switch the app into donor mode when they make a donation. They can then just as easily flip the switch and go back to normal mobile payment mode.

Additionally, since Intuit is the company behind the very successful Quickbooks, Mint and TurboTax financial programs, the back-end of their app will be very user/business friendly. The GoPayment app will easily allow each user to input their donations from the year into Intuit’s financial software, so that small businesses and donation based organizations can easily keep track of their finances. A big win for this mobile service that neither Square or PayPal Here can offer yet.

For more information, check out: http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2012/03/intuit-gopayment-mobile-donations/

Which program or dongle do you use for your business? We would love to get Rox readers pros and/or cons with their dongle experiences!