Sony America has announced that they will be launching the PlayStation 3 firmware update v3.40 "soon," and the update will bring Facebook integration and the launch of the PlayStation Plus premium PSN service.

PlayStation Plus was announced at E3 and will give users access to new applications and features that standard free PSN users will not have.

Plus is free for the first 90 days, and then users can purchase a three-month package for $18 USD or a full-year package for $50 USD.

For the fee, a user will be able to gain full access to certain PS3 downloadable content and PSN titles, such as the PSone archives and Minis, and be able to play them for as long as the PlayStation Plus membership is valid. Some games will only be playable for a certain amount of time on a trial basis before needing to be purchased.

An extra feature that PlayStation Plus provides is the ability to schedule the PS3 console to switch on and automatically retrieve demos, patches or updates at certain times.

Additionally, says Gamasutra, PSP firmware v6.30 will add the service to the aging handheld.

As for Facebook integration, gamers can integrate their PSN accounts with their FB profiles allowing for easier access to checking online statuses and send PSN invites.

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AT&T has announced the completion of a year-long project to improve their wireless service in New York City, finally dubbing the populated city "iPhone-ready."

Over the years, the carrier has received a bad reputation for dropped calls, slow Internet and overall shoddy service in NYC, where there are the highest amount of iPhone owners outside of Los Angeles.

The carrier has now given more space on the airwaves for its 3G network in the boroughs of Manhattan, Brooklyn, Bronx and Queens, which should lead to less dropped calls and faster data downloads.

AT&T started the project last year and says that service quality has improved over the last six months in the city.

The project was ongoing in NYC and San Francisco, with the California project still in progress.

Apple recently sold 1.7 million new iPhone 4 units this week, so AT&T will likely have a surge in bandwidth usage.

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According to analytics company StatCounter, Google Chrome has surpassed Safari as the third most popular Web browser, although both still remain far behind Internet Explorer and Mozilla's Firefox.

Chrome now has 8.97 percent share in the U.S., passing Safari at 8.88 percent.

IE, all iterations included, leads the way at 52 percent, and Firefox is in second at 28.5 percent.

Internationally, StatCounter says Chrome took third a long time ago, and now holds 9.4 percent, compared to Safari's small 4 percent. The company attributes that to Chrome having language support for 48 languages, while Safari only has support for 16.

StatCounter bases its stats "on an analysis of 3.6 billion page views, 874 million of them in the U.S., captured from its network of counters embedded in the pages of 3 million Websites."

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Samsung has announced that five of the six largest U.S. wireless carriers have signed on to sell Galaxy S Android smartphones.

The Galaxy S range are Samsung's "Superphones," each of which have a Super AMOLED screen, which are 20 percent brighter, with 80 percent less sunlight reflection and add 20 percent more battery life.

Says Morgan Keegan analyst Tavis McCourt of the deal: "It's a good sign Samsung has placement at all the major carriers but a lot of phone sales depend on how much marketing support you can get from the carriers. Exclusive products tend to get more marketing support."

"If you want to make a big splash the exclusive phones tend to sell better at least for the first quarter or two in the U.S. market," he continued.

McCourt cites the smashing success of the iPhone 4, which just sold 1.7 million units in its first 72 hours of availability.

Sprint will sell the Galaxy X as the Epic 4G, Verizon will sell the Galaxy S as the Fascinate, and T-Mobile will sell the S as the Vibrant, loaded with Kindle e-books. AT&T's Galaxy S will sell as the Captivate. US Cellular's device has not been branded yet.

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The free Amazon Kindle app is now available for Android users, giving users a chance to start reading e-books for the popular e-reader on their smartphones and tablets running the popular open source mobile operating system.

The app is still a bit lacking in features compared to the full software available for PC and Mac users, but it serves its main purpose, which is to allow users to shop and download e-books.

Most books sell for $10-12 USD, and users can read the first chapter free before deciding to take the plunge and buying the full book.

Unfortunately, in version 1.0, you cannot browse for titles, but that necessary feature is upcoming in future updates.

The app allows for portrait and landscape orientations, depending on your preference and screen display.

Kindle for Android is free in the Android Market.

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iSuppli has torn down the new iPhone 4, and found that the hardware costs as little as $187.51 to build.

The smartphone's most expensive component is the 3.5-inch LCD display, which was created by LG Display and costs $28.50 per device.

"Over the years, the iPhone has generally tended to hover in the $170-to -$180 cost range because Apple seems to be trying to hit some kind of budget," says Kevin Keller of iSuppli.

Keller notes that the tear down does not include R&D, labor, shipping, advertising and iOS development, which could add a significant amount to the total.

The A4 processor was created by Samsung and costs $10.75 per device. The gyroscope chip costs an estimated $2.60 per device and the accelerometer chip costs 65¢.

It is unclear how much money Apple receives per device from AT&T, which in turn sells the device (with contract) for $199 or $299 depending on the amount of memory, but regardless it seems Apple is making a high profit margin on each device sold.

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Apple has announced this morning that they have sold 1.7 million iPhone 4 units in just 72 hours following the device's launch.

The latest update of the popular smartphone has now become the best selling launch in the company's history.

"This is the most successful product launch in Apple's history," adds Steve Jobs, Apple's CEO. "Even so, we apologize to those customers who were turned away because we did not have enough supply."

The iPhone 4 sold 600,000 pre-orders on its first day of availability, June 16th, even taking down AT&T's servers and forcing orders to take minutes instead of seconds to submit.

Apple and a number of retailers sell the smartphone for $199 (16GB model) and $299 for the larger capacity 32GB model.

The phone is available currently in the U.S., UK, France, Germany and Japan and soon in Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Hong Kong, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, New Zealand, Singapore, South Korea, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland.

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