Microsoft is still confident that the Xbox 360 console will dominate the market for next generation gaming consoles, despite experts pointing out Sony's hardware advantage. At a Q&A session last Thursday, Bill Gates likened the upcoming console war to an actual car race. "Our view is basically we've got a Ferrari, they've got a Ferrari," he said. "Our Ferrari is leaving the starting line substantially before their Ferrari is, and in most races that's a very nice thing."
Indeed the Xbox 360 console does have the timing advantage, set to go on sale in the United States, Europe and Japan at the end of the year. Sony's Playstation 3 console however will not be available until Spring 2006. Gates pointed out to Analysts that the launch of the last Xbox console happened after the PS2 and resulted with sales suffering. "We tried it the other way last time," Gates said.
Some over at Microsoft also dismiss the claim that the PS3's hardware is better. "They're going to be a little faster in a few areas, we're going to be a little faster in a few areas," said Robbie Bach, the Microsoft senior vice president who heads up the Xbox. "The net result from a hardware perspective is going to be kind of a toss-up."
Earlier this week, US computer firm Hewlett-Packard ended a deal with Apple that was in place since early 2004 to resell Apple's iPod device. The deal to sell the devices had been secured by the former HP chief executive, Carly Fiorina, but she resigned earlier this year. Now HP is reshaping its plans for the company under new chief Mark Hurd. iPods sold by HP accounted for about 5% of all iPod sales. The growing popularity of the device has lead to massive profits for Apple.
As well as dropping the iPod, HP will also cut about 14,500 jobs, about 1 in ten of it's entire workforce worldwide. "HP has decided that reselling iPods does not fit within the company's current digital entertainment strategy," said an Apple spokeswoman. However, HP announced last year that it would pack iTunes with it's PC's and has vowed to continue adding the software.
Following last months raids on members Internet "warez" groups, the US authorities have charged eight people in connection with the illegal trading of copyrighted films, music, games and software over the net. The operation spanned over 15 countries worldwide including Australia, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Hungary, Israel, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, the Netherlands, Portugal, the UK and the US. Operation Site Down was aimed at the top members of warez groups.
"The charges strike at the top of the copyright piracy supply chain", said Acting Assistant Attorney General John C Richter. "Cases like these are part of the Justice Department's coordinated strategy to protect copyright owners from the online thieves who steal and then sell the products they work so hard to produce." The Justice Department say the defendants were leading members of major piracy groups in the "warez scene".
According to the Justice Department, as soon as games, software, movies etc… are released, a group makes digital pirate copies which spread to servers around the world in very little time. This is where most of the material on P2P networks originates. "This FBI Charlotte undercover operation was very successful in identifying and collecting evidence against those individuals who were the primary source of pirated digital material around the globe," said Acting Special Agent-in-Charge Robert Clifford. "Those committing the cyber crimes can be identified and located anywhere in the world," he said.
So the story continues now on an international scale. Rockstar Games' Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas is being pulled from shelves in Australia as ordered due to the game being stripped of its MA15+ rating. Of course this is linked to the "hot coffee" modification which unlocks sexual content hidden in the game. The mod was not created nor distributed by Rockstar Games or parent company Take-Two Interactive; it was the creation of a third party.
"Businesses that sell or hire computer games should remove existing stocks of this game from their shelves immediately," said the director of the ratings board, Des Clark. "Parents are strongly advised to exercise caution in allowing children continued access to the game, particularly if they have might have access to the 'Hot Coffee' modification." Game hacks and mods are not uncommon, but the problem in this case is the mod simply unlocks existing code in the game, it does not actually add the extra content.
Due to the availability of the mod alone, Australia's Office of Film and Literature Classification revoked the games earlier MA15+ rating. You have to question whether such a move is justified considering the sex content is hidden in the game and the developers gave no way to access it. Warning are going out to parents about the Hot Coffee mod just in case their children can access it. However I'm sure children could find sexual content on the Internet much faster than they could find the mod.
Windows Genuine Advantage is Microsoft's latest tool in their fight against users who pirate their software. It requires users to check their key using an ActiveX control on the Microsoft download sites before they can get what they are looking for. If running a legit copy, it takes you to the download, if you are running a pirate copy; you are given options to report the source of the copy. You may also be entitled to a free copy or discounted.
But for pirates it must come as great news that Windows Genuine Advantage has in fact been cracked already. It is described as a simple one line hack that turns off the trigger for the key check, allowing users to bypass the test and go straight to a download. This news comes weeks after an Indian man figured out how to use Windows Genuine Advantage to produce legitimate CD keys for Windows XP and XP Pro.
More information on the little hack can be found here. All the user is required to do is paste something into their address bar to bypass the security check. It is important to mention once again that security updates are not included in the mandatory test.
And just when everybody thought this whole thing would start to quieten down, an 85 year old woman from New York has filed a lawsuit against Rockstar Games and Take-Two Interactive over the hidden sex minigames in the code of Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. It seems that she went out and bought a copy of San Andreas for her 14 year old grandson when it had an M rating. Of course as we all know now, due to an investigation the Entertainment Software Ratings Board that rating has since changed to AO for Adult only.
Florence Cohen accused Take-Two of engaging in "false, misleading and deceptive practices". She also claims she is suing them on behalf of all consumers; what a concerned kind caring woman she must be! Despite the fact that the M rating actually meant the game isn’t suitable for a 14 year old, I guess Rockstar's little "error" made her earlier mistake of issuing it to her grandson just that bit worse.
Laurence D. Paskowitz, the lawyer who filed the lawsuit on behalf of Cohen, said no parent would knowingly buy an adult-only video game for their children. "They should really make sure this doesn't happen again," he said. "The least this company can do is offer refunds." However, the thing he is forgetting to mention is that Rockstar or Take-Two never offered a way for these minigames to be unlocked, this was all the work of a third party.
Online music store Napster has teamed up with pay-radio station XM to offer a service that will allow users to "bookmark" songs currently playing for purchase online later. Both companies are hoping to take advantage of next generation MP3 players which can also receive satellite radio stations. Analysts have long said that one day both would be merged to create services like this and Napster was eager to be first to offer something.
Apple is not far behind however, having had discussions with Sirius Satellite Radio IncB in February about adding its service to iPod music players. This is another step towards the upcoming services that will allow users to purchase songs simply with the push of a button while listening to radio. All major digital music businesses are frying their brains trying to think of more and more ways they can offer digital music; some even want to make "music vending machines" (in the UK and some other places, such a machine already exist and are in use).
Major Hollywood studios have reached an agreement on digital projector technology that will change cinema throughout the world. This deal will make movie reels a thing of the past, making way for more modern methods of distributing movies like via fibre optic cables or satellite. Now that a standard is reached, the manufacturing and installation process can begin. Frank Pierson, Oscars President, said that it was an important milestone in the advancement of motion pictures.
It is not clear however who will take the bill for the new equipment. It has been reported that each projector will cost $60,000-$100,000. It is also not clear how this will affect ticket prices throughout the world. Nevertheless it's a sweet deal for the studios who now see a 75% cut on the costs of distributing movies to theatres. Of course the agreement has received praise all around in Hollywood.
"In its first hundred years, our art form made a forceful universal impression, at least partly because worldwide standards for projecting film were adopted early on," Mr Pierson said. "The next hundred years are likely to be similarly affected by DCI's work in defining how digital motion pictures will be presented to world audiences."George Lucas is also delighted with the news. "We have been advocates of digital cinema for nearly a decade, and this is a day we have long hoped would come," he said. "Digital cinema will increasingly become the standard and will change the way movies are made, seen and experienced around the world."
According to Victor Aziz of Cardiff's Whitchurch Hospital (psychiatrist), the increasing exposure of music to human beings through new technology may lead to more people suffering from "musical hallucinations". He explained that a music hallucination wouldn't just simply be like having a song stuck in your head; it would be the musical equivalent of a visual hallucination. It’s like having a song playing in your head that you can’t stop.
However the condition is uncommon and usually linked to people who suffer from epilepsy, psychiatric conditions or brain tumours. "We are now exposed to a barrage of music and it seems that we might well see more cases of this in the future. We'll only know if we test people in 20 years' time." warned Aziz. His original beliefs were that musical hallucinations happened most commonly among people who used to listen to a lot of music at a young age.
His warning is interesting and shouldn't be ignored. It also makes sense when you consider that people probably are listening to far more music when they buy a portable MP3 player. The problem in the past with portable cassette players like Sony's walkman was the limited battery life and you could store a lot less songs on a tape than a HDD-based MP3 player (generally). A Discman is also awkwardly shaped and not something you could usually keep in a pocket. But an iPod or some other MP3 player is ideal to carry with you all the time, so generally people will listen to more music. So going by averages, musical hallucinations will probably rise.
Verbatim plays is safe at least at this point of the next gen format war. And of course as a media manufacturer they have to, as long as the situation remains balanced and neither of the formats dominate the industry. A smooth change of the format generation is vital for companies like Verbatim that hold a major market share and have plenty of brand recognition.
Verbatim Corporation, world-leading optical media developers and marketers, have announced plans to support the development of both Blu-ray and High-Definition DVD (HD-DVD) recordable and rewritable media. Both formats are expected to begin shipping in early 2006, when high-definition drives and recorders are expected to be released.
Verbatim Blu-ray media will be available with 25GB (single-layer) and 50GB (double-layer) capacities. The HD-DVD media will be available with a single-layer capacity of 15GB. Double-layer HD-DVD media is also being developed for release following format finalisation. With premium-quality recordable media that meets the specifications of these new high-capacity, high definition formats; users will be able to record and enjoy the amazingly sharp images that high-definition video provides. The high-capacity discs will also find extensive application in computer data storage.
From listening to the claims from the music industry for the past few years, it is easy to get an impression that all file sharers are thieves hell-bent on the destruction of the music industry and breaking of the law but a research firm has found that this is quite different in reality. The Leading Question found that music downloaders who share music files also are big spenders on legal music downloads. In fact, according to the firm, they spend on average 4 and a half times more on legal downloads than other users.
The music industry seems to send out a message that file sharers are the bad guys but iTunes customers (and customers of the many other download stores) are the good guys. It seems they completely forget about people who both buy and share. The report from the firm suggests that the music industry stops taking legal action and starts focusing on enticing file sharers to use legal alternatives.
The report found that the average user of legal sites who do not download unlicensed music spend an average of about £1.27 a month downloading music. However, those users who do download unlicensed music spend an average of £5.52 a month. "The research clearly shows that music fans who break piracy laws are highly valuable customers," said Paul Brindley, director of The Leading Question. "It also points out that they are eager to adopt legitimate music services in the future. There's a myth that all illegal downloaders are mercenaries hell-bent on breaking the law in pursuit of free music."
Nero approached us with an email telling about the updated NeroLINUX version, which comes with some interesting changes.
We are happy to announce the release of NeroLINUX 2.0.0.2. This upgraded version of Nero's Linux OS solution for CD/DVD Burning features Layer-Jump Recording (LJR), DVD-Video and miniDVD mastering, user interface improvements like selectable ISO track recording options and assignable sounds that alert the user to the burn process results.
The NeroLINUX is offered free for the retail customers of Nero 6 Reloaded.
Also we can spot from the Nero website that the Nero Reloaded installation packages have been updated to v6.6.0.15a. As usual, they have not released a list of changes.
Both of these updated versions can be founf at Nero website.
Microsoft is to step up its fight against piracy by requiring users who visit their download sites to verify their installation of Windows with Windows Genuine Advantage. However, security updates will not be included in the check as Microsoft has learned they are vital when viruses like Blaster and Sasser are on the loose. In those times, even pirated operating systems must be protected, as they will scan all around the net for other vulnerable installations to infect.
Since Windows accounts for 90% of all Operating System sales, there is little room for Microsoft to boost the purchasing of Windows. The piracy check on the site however may boost sales in the long run as people will like to feel safe and limitless with their software. Also it is thought that as many as one third of all Windows installations could be pirated; that represents a huge loss for Microsoft.
However, if you fail the Genuine Advantage test, you will not hear the FBI at your door 10 minutes later or be sued or even receive any threats; in fact, you might just get a free Windows XP CD or a discount off one. If you can fill out a form with details of where you got your pirated installation, proof of purchase and return the counterfeit cd you will get a free genuine copy. If you can’t give all those details, then you will recive a discount of up to half price for XP Home Edition or Professional Edition.
The Blue-ray vs. HD-DVD, once again. I don't know if everything is already said about this - twice. AMR Research has published an article which is if not fresh, but at least a good reminder back from the VHS vs. Beta age. As most of us know the better format lost the fight. The decisive blows were delivered in non-technological fields.
DreamWorks’ recent DVD sales woes reflect the harsh supply chain dynamics of the industry. As studios ready for battle over new hardware standards, supply chain competence may make the difference.
...
The Bottom Line: With super short lifecycles, the big-studio DVD title depends on the supply chain to succeed. Less obvious is that the standards battle hinges on the same thing: demand responsiveness.
Consumer demand patterns for products like video games and home movies sell up to 80% of their total volume in the first two weeks after launch. This past weekend’s Harry Potter release is a case in point (see Nigel Montgomery’s Insight Europe column titled “If Only Harry Potter Was Delivering the PSP”). This front-end loaded demand makes distribution very difficult because of the lack of historical data for demand forecasting, and the extremely short shelf life leaves little room for quantity adjustment after the fact. Add in retailers’ practice of returning unsold product to publishers, and you have the ingredients of a hyper-supply chain.
Anybody who has been tricked into signing up for expensive subscription services while purchasing ringtones will be delighted to hear about new restrictions being placed on ringtone ads in the UK. This comes as a result of complaints about many ringtone companies including Jamster, who are responsible for the Crazy Frog tones. The ads are to buy single ringtones, but in a lot of cases, the small print contains details of subscriptions services.
Icstis has welcomed the new safeguards to protect consumers signing up for premium rate subscription services. The most offending arts of these ads are the fact that they are premium rate services that are often targeted at kids and teenagers who are often unaware of the real prices. "Teenagers are particularly vulnerable as they do not always fully appreciate the conditions attached to such services," said George Kidd, Icstis director.
Under the new rules which have to be fully complied with by August 30th, ads must have prices and conditions properly shown. The rules dictate the font sizes and other methods to showing what you are buying. For example, small font sizes at the end of the advert will no longer be tolerated and neither will scrolling price banners. Customers must also be sent txt messages telling them how to unsubscribe every month or every time £20 is spent.
As I'm sure most of you already know, Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas has been rerated to AO (for Adult Only). Previously the game had been rated M, which means Mature (suitable for persons 17 and older). Now it is rated AO for "Blood and Gore, Intense Violence, Strong Language, Strong Sexual Content, [and] Use of Drugs." This is all a result of the "hot coffee" mod that unlocked sex minigames which could be played after girlfriend missions.
The decision for the rerating of the title is the result of an investigation by the Entertainment Software Ratings Board (ESRB). The biggest difference now is that many huge retailers refuse to sell AO rated videogames. Target and Best Buy already issued press releases saying they are removing the game from the shelves. Take-Two interactive issued a statement about the AO rating.
"Rockstar Games has ceased manufacturing of the current version of the title and will begin working on a version of the game with enhanced security to prevent the 'hot coffee' modifications," the statement reads. "This version will retain the original ESRB M-rating and is expected to be available during the Company's fourth fiscal quarter." The company will also release patches for the existing copies of the game that will lock the sex minigames and prevent the patch from making them playable.
Figures released by the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) have shown that legal music downloading has tripled worldwide. Earlier this month the British Phonographic Industry (BPI) announced that 10 million downloads had been made so far in 2005, more than double the total 2004 figure in the UK. France and Germany are also two more countries that have seen sharp rises in legal music sales over the Internet.
180 million downloads have been made so far worldwide in 2005. This has led the IFPI to claims that they are winning the "fight against file sharing". Illegal filesharing also saw a rise of 3% since January. Those who have turned to legal alternatives often cite fear of litigation for their change. 14,227 cases against illegal file-sharers have been announced in 12 countries (over 10,000 in the United States) since September 2003.
"We are now seeing real evidence that people are increasingly put off by illegal file-sharing and turning to legal ways of enjoying music online," said John Kennedy, chairman of the IFPI. "Whether it's the fear of getting caught breaking the law, or the realisation that many networks could damage your home PC, attitudes are changing, and that is good news for the whole music industry."
Our download server was down for maintenance for a couple of hours today. The downtime was longer than expected, and we apologize for the inconvenience caused.
The server was taken down to add another hard disk drive. After the upgrade we are able to accommodate the growing needs of both the AfterDawn software archive and the MP3Lizard music storage.
Nero, leader in digital media technologies and developer of award-winning Nero applications, announces the release of Nero Digital Pro, audio and video Compression solution bundled with Nero’s top five applications. The package includes full versions of five different applications: Nero Recode 2, Nero ShowTime 2, Nero PhotoSnap, Nero MediaHome and NeroVision Express 3. Nero Digital Pro is an upgrade from the Nero Digital 30-Day Trial version recently offered to provide the user with an opportunity to create, play and share Nero Digital content for a Limited time.
With Nero Digital Pro, the user fully utilizes the potential of the tried and tested video and audio compression technology, along with select Nero applications offering support for Nero Digital technology. With Nero Recode 2, non-copy-protected DVD films can easily be compressed into Nero Digital™ format yet still offer top quality video. Then playback Nero Digital™ format with Nero ShowTime 2. With Nero MediaHome, users can then share Nero Digital™ content through any UPnP™ or DLNA compliant multimedia device, PC or laptop in a home network. With NeroVision Express 3, videos can be captured, edited and exported to Nero Digital™ file format. In addition, Nero Digital Pro also contains the full version of Nero PhotoSnap editor and PhotoSnap Viewer. Nero PhotoSnap offers a variety of powerful functions for digitally processing your favorite photos; Nero PhotoSnap Viewer lets you view and print pictures in different file formats.
Apple has got reason once again to celebrate the success of its hugely popular iTunes music store as the total number of legal download sales is now over half a billion. The store has been open for about the last two years and continues to spread to new countries around the world. It features about 1.5 million songs from over 1,000 labels around the world. Also as Apple promised they gave a nice prize to the buyer of the 500 millionth download.
Amy Greer, of Lafayette, Indiana made the 500,000,000th download, which was Faith Hill's "Mississippi Girl". For that download she has now won 10 iPods (model and colours are her choice), a 10,000 song voucher for the iTunes music store, a trip to see Coldplay and a backstage pass to meet up with the band at the show. iPod prizes were also given to several other buyers of every 100,000th download for the past few weeks.
Steve Jobs surprised analysts also last week by announcing an excellent quarter for Apple. In the three months to June 2004, the California based firm's profit rose to $320m (£262.6m), up from $61m in the same quarter a year ago. Sales surged 75% to $3.52bn. As many of you may have guessed, the biggest factor behind the success was a six-fold increase in the sales of iPods. "We are delighted to report Apple's best quarter ever in both revenue and earnings," Mr Jobs said.
The new firmware is V1.57 for DVR-109/109BK and DVR-A09XLA/B/C. The changelog shows typical quality and compatibility updates to write strategies, but also adds multi border recording for DVD-R DL.
As always we recommend to update your drives to the latest firmware. Read the installation instructions carefully though, as when flashing firmware things can go wrong.
An Australian man has bee found guilty of copyright infringement for posting hyperlinks on his website to other sites offering illegal music downloads. Stephen Cooper ran a site called mp3s4free. He has been ordered to pay costs along with two fellow defendants, Chris Takoushis, of ISP Comcen, and Liam Bal, a director of E-Talk Communications. Takoushis and Bal were accused of aiding and abetting Cooper in order to increase advertising revenues.
Federal Court Justice Brian Tamberlin said he was satisfied that there had been copyright infringement in this case. Coopers legal representative was very disappointed with the decision as he had argued that Cooper couldn’t be guilty for copyright infringement due to the fact that his site hosted no illegal MP3 downloads. The Judge simply explained that the links to the sites offering the illegal files had aided their illegal distribution.
A music industry spokesman said it was a "a very significant blow in the war against piracy". Major record labels including Sony, Warner Music Group, EMI and Universal Studios began proceedings against Cooper, Takoushis and Bal through the ARIA's Music Industry Piracy Investigations (MIPI) group.
The Recording Industry Association of America's annual commercial piracy report has been published. Since it is on the subject of commercial piracy, it does not deal with Internet piracy (e.g. file sharing of copyrighted music). The report shows that trafficking in pirated music is getting increasingly sophisticated with closer ties to organised crime. Pirate music distributors are producing and selling very high quality discs and artwork that closely resemble legit CDs.
The RIAA report claims that criminal enterprises are becoming increasingly involved in the trade, burning massive amounts of music to blank CDs from today's biggest selling artists. "The practice and trade of music piracy have become more sophisticated, cunning and connected to organized crime," said Brad Buckles, Executive Vice President of Anti-Piracy. "Working with law enforcement officials across the country, we continue to develop and implement multifaceted strategies to respond to these emerging threats to artists, songwriters, record labels and others in the music community."
There has been a 58% increase in the seizure of counterfeit CDs (the CDs that are of such high quality they are easily mistaken for legit copies). Working with local authorities in the U.S., the RIAA seized 1.2 million discs in 2004, many of which lead back to CD production plants. The numbers of these "plants" are growing rapidly as technology continues to advance producing more equipment to make high quality copies of music at high speeds.
Steve Jobs is no doubt delighted to report that Apple has had its "best ever" quarter. In the three months to June 2004, the California based firm's profit rose to $320m (£262.6m), up from $61m in the same quarter a year ago. Sales surged 75% to $3.52bn. As many of you may have guessed, the biggest factor behind the success was a six-fold increase in the sales of iPods. "We are delighted to report Apple's best quarter ever in both revenue and earnings," Mr Jobs said.
Jobs also pointed out that the great success of the launch of Mac OS X Tiger. There was also a rise in the shipments of Macintosh computers. On the entertainment side it seems to be good news all around as Apple's iTunes is approaching 500,000,000 legal music download sales. The success of Apple's iTunes Music Store helped the U.S. recording industry to see a massive rise in music downloads so far in 2005.
Bill C-60, which amends the Copyright Act, has only received its first reading on the House of Commons on June 20th this year but experts who read the bill say that it could make Internet search and archive engines like Google illegal. The problem goes down to the wording of the bill, that says could be illegal for anyone to provide copyrighted information through "information-location tools," which actually includes search engines.
Ottawa copyright lawyer Howard Knopf, of the law firm of Macera & Jarzyna Moffat & Co. was startled by reading the bill and realising the possible negative effects it could have. "The phrasing of the proposed law is difficult because at first glance it seems to be a helpful provision in that it limits the liability of companies such as Google to no more than an injunction when they have not received actual notice of infringement. But then the language of the bill works on the assumption that the search engine itself is capable of infringing copyright by having archived copyright material on it." Mr. Knopf says.
Section 40.3 (1) of the bill states that "the owner of copyright in a work or other subject-matter is not entitled to any remedy other than an injunction against a provider of information location tools who infringes that copyright by making or caching a reproduction of the work or other subject matter." According to Knopf, this paragraph implies that information location tools (like search engines) would infringe copyright if they archive any material that is copyright.
In the United States, the sale of legal downloads has jumped dramatically over the same period of last year. Between January 2005 and June 2005, Internet users downloaded 158 million individual songs, compared to 55 million in the same 2004 period. Nielsen SoundScan, a company that tracks the sale of music products in the US, made the report. However it is not all terrific news for the U.S. Recording Industry as the sale of CDs decreased by 7%.
Legal downloads now account for 6% of all music sales. Analysts say the creation of new pay sites is responsible for the giant leap and pointed out that users are still flocking in increasing numbers to Apple's iTunes Music Store (iTMS) to buy music to store on their iPods. The British Phonographic Industry (BPI) also announced excellent results in the UK for this year so far. They saw over 10 million downloads so far, that's double the entire 2004 figure.
As for the decrease in CD sales, this time the recording industry can’t really point the blame completely at illegal filesharing, considering there are now so many legal alternatives that are doing fantastic. In the early days of P2P, it was easy to blame it for losses due to the fact that the recording industry offered no legal alternatives. However that has not put them off perusing file sharers for sharing their music collections with each other.
A recent survey conducted showed that consumers generally prefer the Blu-Ray Disc format over HD-DVD. Both formats are contenders to become the standard next generation DVD format and both sides won’t give up arguing that their technology is the best for consumers and for business. In the survey, 1200 people were questioned and the result was 58% prefered Blu-Ray, 26% were undecided and 16% preferred the HD-DVD format.
Of the consumers questioned, those who actually showed real interest in next generation formats overwhelmingly chose Blu-Ray also. 66% favoured Blu-Ray Disc, 19% were undecided and 15% preferred the HD-DVD format. "While we are still in the pre-launch phase for both formats, Blu-ray Disc is the early front-runner," said Mark Penn, whose firm conducted the poll. "Consumers perceive Blu-ray as the favourite on technology company support, gaming, storage, and disc versatility."
Some of the biggest reasons why Blu-Ray was the preferred format the ability to play the discs in more devices (PCs, upcoming consoles), backward compatibility with current DVD media and the larger disc capacity the format has over HD-DVD. "From day one, we've focused on delivering the best possible consumer experience while building support from the best brands in the world," said Maureen Weber, chief BDA spokesperson. "The result is a format that delivers a consistent, compatible consumer experience across a range of platforms, which is clearly something that resonates with consumers."
Echoing the same result in most countries, the Irish Recorded Music Association (IRMA) which is like the Irish version of the RIAA, has won a battle to get the identities of file sharers it alleges to have shared copyrighted music through P2P networks illegally. The High Court in Dublin ruled on July 8th that ISPs in the country have to hand over the subscriber details of 17 file sharers which ill then be sued by IRMA. The IRMA praised the high courts decision.
"We will now be writing to the 17 individuals informing them of the seriousness of their actions. We will offer them the opportunity of settling the action. If they refuse our settlement terms, we will be forced to pursue the matter through the Courts. This is a last resort for the music industry. We hope that this decision will jolt others, particularly parents of teenagers, to realize that unauthorized file sharing is illegal and has consequences"Dick Doyle, Director General of IRMA commented.
The IRMA blames filesharing for a huge portion of the €28 million drop in music sales in Ireland. The question of privacy is always unanswered in these cases. While these file sharers might have been uploading music illegally to other file sharers, you have to question the legality of inspecting files in a users' shared folders, as a Dutch judge did just days ago when he declined to force ISPs to hand over details to anti-piracy foundation Brein.
Rockstar Games has already been the receiver of many complaints over the past week due to the appearance of the "hot coffee" mod that unlocks sex minigames in Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. If this pressure of an Entertainment Software Ratings Board (ESRB) investigation was not enough, Rockstar will now have to deal with Hillary Clinton. According to GameSpot, sources have said she will call on the Federal Trade Commission to launch an inquiry into the mod.
"Following recent reports revealing that the video game Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas has graphic pornographic content which may be unlocked by following instructions on the Internet, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton will hold a press conference to discuss legislative solutions to keep inappropriate video game content out of the hands of young people." a statement issued by the Senators office said. The game is already rated M which means it is not be sold to minors.
Rockstar denied that hidden sex games existed in San Andreas, blaming it entirely on the creator of the "hot coffee" mod. The investigation by the ESRB is to determine whether the sex minigames actually existed hidden in the code and where unlocked by the mod, or if the mod actually adds in the new minigame itself. The creator of the mod claims that it already exists in San Andreas' code, and that the mod just unlocks it.
Today we celebrate the invention of the so common audio format MP3 which already celebrates it's 10th birthday. As most of you probaply know, the file extension '.mp3' actually stands for files encoded to MPEG-1 Layer III standard format. The compression technology applied scientific advances of various fields: mathematics, psychology, acoustics, human anatomy, etc.
The researchers of Fraunhofer IIS did a bang-up job. Not only that they totally changed the business environment of the music industry, but the MP3 format has proven very well lasting and can still provide high quality compressed audio for years to come. Open sourced LAME MP3 Encoderis tweaked for maximum audio quality, and is very well able to challenge the newer audio formats such as the AAC.
The extension itself was decided by an internal poll at the Fraunhofer research center.
Date: Fri, 14 Jul 1995 12:29:49 +0200
Subject: Layer3 file extension: .mp3
Hi all,
this is the overwhelming result of our poll: everyone voted for .mp3 as extension for ISO MPEG Audio Layer 3! As a consequence, everyone please mind that for WWW pages, shareware, demos, and so on, the .bit extension is not to be used anymore. There is a reason for that, believe me :-)
Following the discovery lately of several security vulnerabilities, Mozilla's next generation open source web browser, Firefox, has been updated to v1.0.5 and all Firefox users are being urged to update now. Along with the security fixes, the update also promises better stability. According to Mozilla, nine security bugs in total were targeted in this update. Secunia, a security notification service has rated the update as "highly critical".
Firefox has been the receiver of a lot of praise since it was released. It quickly became a challenger to the dominance of Microsoft's Internet Explorer, even managing to take a big portion of IE's users. It has been recommended by experts as a replacement for IE as it falls victim to much less spyware problems and is just as easy to use. Firefox's features include a popup blocker, tabbed browsing, a smarter search, better security and privacy options, hassle-free download manager and much, much more.
The Mozilla Foundation has also promised it will release a related set of patches for its email client, Thunderbird.
Dutch anti-piracy organisation Brein (you may remember them for being responsible for the shutting down of ShareConnector) had their plans dealt a huge blow today when a Dutch judge ruled that ISPs did not have to hand over subscriber details of file sharers. The file sharers in question are being accused of sharing copyrighted material illegally on P2P networks, but for now Brein just has the IP addresses of these users. They approached the ISPs first asking them to give the details but were met with opposition.
Not one of the five ISPs gave Brein the details and said that only a criminal trial court could demand such details from them. The case was brought to a civil court in the city of Utrecht where the Judge made the decision that he would not order the ISPs to give the details because he believed the plaintiffs had not met the necessary conditions to warrant such an order.
"Brein has sought help from a research company, which has looked at the shared folders on computers of the file swappers. In that process it may have accessed private files," the judge said in the court ruling. This is yet another case where a Judge has ruled for privacy over piracy. "The judge does not deem this correct, because according to Dutch law, privacy is insufficiently protected in the United States," the ruling said.
Sonic Solutions (NASDAQ: SNIC), the leader in digital media software, today announced that it has founded the High Definition Authoring Alliance™ (HDAA), the first and only worldwide association of top DVD authoring houses dedicated to facilitating the rollout of titles for release in the new high definition HD DVD and Blu-ray Disc (BD) optical disc formats. Building on Sonic’s leading role in DVD authoring solutions and its close, long-standing ties to Hollywood and the consumer electronics industry, the HDAA will increase momentum for successful introduction of the formats, ensuring the timely availability of quality titles by providing members with exclusive access to key information, HD-enabled tools and comprehensive training.
“Sonic’s HDAA opens the door to the entire range of information and tools that will be vital to our professional title creation business as we prepare for the HD evolution of disc-based packaged media,” said Mark Johnson, Director of Research and Development at Thomson Technicolor Creative Services in Burbank, California. “HDAA membership also makes us part of a community that is pulling together toward the same goal, which is to be sure that we’re prepared to make the launch of these new formats a great success.”
In an effort to reform itself as a legal P2P service, iMesh has licensed music from Sony BMG. The efforts of the company behind iMesh, Bridgemar Services, are due to a settlement with the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) last year. Originally the company said it would offer a new legitimate commercial service to users by the end of 2004, but missed its date and now aims to make it available by the end of 2005.
After being sued for copyright infringement in 2003 by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) the company ended up paying out $4.1 million but was allowed to continue operating its service until it made its new service. The service it will offer will be flat rate subscription service that will allow users to make unlimited downloads. The new service will also have access to content from the Gnutella network and others.
So far in 2005, there have been almost double the amount of legal downloads in the UK than in the entire of 2004 according to the British Phonographic Industry (BPI). So far, 10 million songs have been downloaded from legal services in the UK such as iTunes or Napster. The number of downloads has seriously boosted the overall singles sales, but surprisingly, sales of seven-inch vinyl singles were also up 87.3% on last year.
The BPI is delighted with the downloading results, which are pushing single sales, but still not over-hyping downloads just yet. "Despite the incredible growth in download sales it would be wrong to write-off physical formats just yet." BPI chairman Peter Jamieson said. 5.7 million Songs were legally downloaded in the UK in the entire of 2004.
The BPI now says it is beginning to see good results from this resource which is was forced to setup due to massive amounts of illegal music filesharing on legal P2P services like Kazaa or the eDonkey2000 network. "The record industry has enthusiastically embraced the new legal download services since their emergence in the mainstream little more than a year ago, and now we're beginning to reap the rewards," Mr Jamieson said.
Skype has become a hugely popular free service on the Internet that allows you to make free VoIP phone calls all over the world. However one company, Vendex International Ltd, has tackled one major problem with this free service. It requires its users to be sitting at a computer to make the calls (usually). Vendex International Ltd has now released its free software that will allow people to make free calls (or low cost) from their mobile phones to users of Skype.
It achieves all this simply through a standard Bluetooth connection. This is the first time such a service has hit the mobile communications business. "Skype users are not satisfied with sitting at their computers and, in this rapidly developing globalised world, there’s a growing demand for low cost mobile calls across international borders," explains Michael Patrick Dwen, CEO EpyxMobile. "Our software does exactly that; free or low cost calls from your mobile phone to people all over the world."
The new software is also compatible with a pay service offered by Skype. "Furthermore, the software is compatible with SkypeOut, which means that the 1.2 million SkypeOut users will now be able to make their calls from their mobile instead of their PC and continue to benefit from low cost rates." Dwen said. Skype currently offers the SkypeIn and SkypeOut pay services.
A change has been made to the original specs that were unveiled for the Sony Playstation 3 (PS3). Due to the costs of manufacturing, Sony Computer Entertainment boss Ken Kutaragi told publication Nikkei Electronic, that the PS3 will no longer be able to act as a home network router. He admitted that it would simply cost too much to leave the functionality in the console which is expected to be released in spring next year.
Originally the PS3 would have allowed the system's three Gigabit Ethernet ports to be used as a home router. Sony suspects now that users will simply continue to use their existing router hardware, which is becoming more used in homes now for such tasks as sharing Internet broadband connections. It's not yet clear how exactly this will change the look of the PS3.
It has been reported by The Sunday Telegraph that Motorola will unveil the iTunes phone at the UK's V Festival. The V Festival is a music festival set to take place 20-21 August at Hylands Park, Chelmsford and Weston Park, Staffs. Virgin Mobile sponsors the festival, which brings speculation that it will be the first carrier to agree to offer the product in the UK. It is the smallest of the five biggest UK carriers so it is unlikely it will be put off by some details the others have.
One of the biggest problems the other carriers have with an iTunes phone would be the lack of support for downloads over the air. Instead, the downloads would come from iTunes on the Internet, whereas the phone would simply be just able to play them. The other major carriers would much prefer over-the-air download support, which would force users to use a possibly expensive GPRS option to purchase music.
This is good now for the UK music industry however as the BPI (British Phonographic Industry) has said that over 10 million downloads were sold in the UK so far this year which is nearly double the entire amount in 2004. Mobile phones are inevitably set to become not just phones, but entertainment devices like the iPod. While a lot of people have iPods, almost everybody has a mobile phone these days.
While both the Blu-ray and HD-DVD camps continue to promote their technology as the best option for a next generation standard, consumers and businessmen are becoming increasing worried. Whether you are a major movie studio or a businessman tied in some way to Hollywood, the prospect of a format war that would rival the "VHS vs. Betamax" war is undesirable to say the least. Both camps even agree that a unified standard is a much better option and seem to b still willing to keep up negotiations.
"We fully agree and concur that a single format is the best bet," said Mark Knox, adviser to the HD DVD promotion division at Toshiba. "We want to talk--let's talk. We leave everything on the table. We want to find the best single format." Similar belief comes also from the Blu-Ray camp. "Everybody realizes that it is in the best interest of us all not to come to market with two formats, to have just the one," said Victor Matsuda, a vice president at Sony's Blu-Ray Group. "That said, we're not there yet."
First time in the history of DVD a movie is released available for rent before it is released to stores. Online rental service NetFlix gets the honor to be the first to have the Tim Robbins' movie in their selections. The movie tells a fictional story of journalist covering the Iraq war, and features Robbins who also has written and directed the project.
Tim Robbins is making DVD history - his new movie Embedded Live will be available through US library service NetFlix before it's released to stores.
It is the first time the groundbreaking home delivery rental service will debut a DVD before its official release.
While the mass piracy of TV shows on the Internet continues to be an annoyance to content providers and broadcast companies, it now appears that at least the BBC is looking to take advantage of the new found way to view TV shows. BBC Three will premiere comedy series The Mighty Boosh on the Internet before it is broadcast on television. It will premiere on the Internet on July 19th, which is a week before it will air.
This is also just the first in a string of shows the BBC is hoping to premiere on the Internet before air broadcast. Jana Bennett, director of television at the BBC, said it was a "significant step" in offering audiences greater value in a changing television world. "It is one of a number of pilots that BBC Television will be undertaking over the next few months, exploiting the opportunities that new technologies offer to look at how programmes might be delivered beyond the traditional linear broadcast." she added.
The show will be available online up until a week after the final programme of the series transmits on BBC Three. The BBC is trying to take advantage of the growing popularity of broadband in the UK. "It's a natural progression for us to make our programmes available on broadband." said Stuart Murphy, controller of BBC Three,
We reported several days ago that tools had been released to allow the ripping of DVD-Audio using WinDVD 5, 6 or 7. It didn't take long for the legal threats to pour in which forced Rarewares publisher Roberto to remove the tools. Here is his post from a doom9 thread...
...and it's gone
I got a phone call from a big local lawyer office (no fake, I checked the caller ID and the phone number really belongs to a lawyer office). They have been hired to make me stop distributing the DVD-A tools. It was a reasonably big talk, but I can summarize it with
They: we are giving you two choices, either you remove all references to those tools from your site now, or we'll have to take you to court.
Me: I'm already removing!
They: Thank-you for your cooperation.
Oh, well. It's been fun. I'm amazed at how well it spread in these two days (!), and I'm sure from now on you'll be able to find those tools in countless mirrors, p2p and the like.
Shine on!
R.
The removal of the tools won't really help in any way as they have already spread around the net.
According to a survey conducted by a University customer, Napster has managed to make less people buy music from its music store, but has helped its biggest rivals sell more songs. Not one University of Rochester student admitted to purchasing any track from Napster’s catalogue during the Fall 2004 semester but the same people bought from other legal alternatives like Apple's iTunes. This is terrible news for Napster which has tried to dominate sales to students.
Napster offers universities dirt cheap rental services for their students to try to keep them away from illegal music downloading. The students can then download as much music and listen to it as they want to. Napster has been marketing its music rental service to consumers, claiming that its monthly fee beats the hell out of paying $10,000 to fill an iPod with music.
That claim is ridiculous for many reasons, but largely because a massive amount of music stored on iPods usually comes from the user's CD collection or their friend’s collection of music. This attacking strategy led to Napster reporting a $24 million fourth quarter loss.
If there's one site that sells music downloads that has really gotten on the nerves of the major music labels, it is allofmp3.com. The site - based in Russia charges users for their download by amount of data that is downloaded, generally 2 cents per MB. In February this year, the site came under criminal investigation in Russia for copyright violations but later on, in March, it emerged that allofmp3.com wasn't breaking any current Russian laws.
The IFPI swore that it would not give up and it didn't. A Court in Munich has now prohibited allofmp3 from making copyrighted data publicly available within Germany. In the same press release that brought this news, the music industry also stated said it's going to take action against sites that support allofmp3, or similar sites, with advertisement or links.
The IFPI claims that the Russian site is illegally distributing its members' music. "We have consistently said that AllofMP3.com is not licensed to distribute our members' repertoire in Russia or anywhere else," said <>Igor Pozhitkov, regional director of IFPI Moscow.
Apple's iTunes music store is soon to once again show just how much it dominates the market for online legal music downloading when it reaches half a billion downloads. To celebrate the company has decided to give something back to at least a few of its downloaders. Prizes will be given to the purchaser of every 100,000th song until the 500,000,000 download target is reached.
The prize includes an iPod mini and a 50-song gift card. The colour of the iPod and the songs downloaded using the gift card is completely up to the winner. However, the real prize Apple wants to give away will be to the purchaser of the 500,000,000th downloaded song.
That lucky customer will receive not one... but 10 iPods for himself/herself. The models of the iPods (iPod mini, iPod Shuffle, U2 special edition iPod or just a regular iPod) and colours are completely up to the winner. He/she will also receive a gold 10,000-song gift card for iTunes, 10 additional 50-song gift cards to go with those iPods and a trip for him/her and three guests to see Coldplay on their current tour with front row seats and back-stage passes.
While there is a "download counter" on the iTunes page right now, it would be near impossible for a user to use it to sync a purchase of a song with 500,000,000 because the number is increasing so fast. Apple however will be hoping that users will excessively purchase songs to come in with a chance of winning something.
Many of the hardcore gamers who read through this site will have heard of a rumour that the PC version of Rockstar Games' Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas has hidden sex minigames in its code will be surprised to know that it now appears it may be real. San Andreas has been plagued with false rumours of hidden stuff in the game since the initial PS2 release of the game so it would be easy to dismiss the "sex minigame" rumour.
However, a mod called "hot coffee" apparently will unlock these minigames if installed on a PC with San Andreas installed on it. This has lead to the Entertainment Software Ratings Board (ESRB) launching an investigation into the game to determine whether or not it contains hidden sexually explicit content. Basically the investigation will determine whether the mod actually unlocks hidden existing code in the game, or if it was a third party creation.
The reason there is so much fuss over this rumour is simple; an ESRB requirement for full disclosure of pertinent content may have been violated by Take-Two if the game does in fact have hidden X-rated content. "The integrity of the ESRB rating system is founded on the trust of consumers who increasingly depend on it to provide complete and accurate information about what's in a game. If after a thorough and objective investigation of all the relevant facts surrounding this modification, we determine a violation of our rules has occurred, we will take appropriate action," ESRB president Patricia Vance said.
Currently any online music store in the European Union has to deal with 25 different licensing bodies from the states that make up the EU. Now proposals have been made for a Europe-wide copyright and licensing system and put forward to the European Commission. Ultimately, the hope is that music downloading in Europe could compete directly with the United States, which sees millions more legal music downloads currently.
In the United States last year, €207 million (US$248 million) was spent by consumers on legal downloads whereas in Europe, consumers spent €27.2 million (US$32.5 million) on legal downloads. The reason for the dramatic difference in revenue has been blamed on the lack of a single copyright and licensing system in the EU.
"The absence of pan-European copyright licences makes it difficult for new European-based online services to take off," said internal Market and Services Commissioner Charlie McCreevy. "This is why we are proposing the creation of Europe-wide copyrights clearance." Also currently online music businesses have systems set up to collect royalties from each of the 25 states.
The EU believes that a single system governing music rights would be a positive thing all around, mainly, it would boost revenues for artists. The proposal is now to be discussed by Industry bodies and member states, and the hope is that an agreement on a way to implement the idea will be reached by October this year.
Being at the top of the most wanted gadget list is exactly where Sony wants its Playstation Portable (PSP) console to be, but with any gaming console, there is always the fear that piracy might hit... and it usually does. Now Sony is beginning to realise that this time it is no different despite their best efforts to keep piracy at bay. Sony PSP games use Sony's proprietary Universal Media Disc (UMD) format, which gave Sony hope that copying games was impossible.
However, we reported when PSP Firmware v1.50 was cracked and anybody who knew how was able to use an exploit to run homebrew files on the PSP (which Sony likes to refer to as "unauthorised programs"). Since then emulators for other consoles have appeared for the PSP but Sony accepted it (but highly opposed the PSPs use to run unauthorised games) and stuck to the belief that Sony PSP games were still safe.
PSP games spread across net... A loader on the horizon?
Paradox, a well known group on the Internet was first to publicly release several PSP games on the net, which then had no way of being played. However, now it appears that a working game loader is just days away from public release which means that users with large capacity memory sticks may be able to play their PSP games from them.
The EU Parliament has thrown out the controversial software patent bill. The bill was designed give EU-wide patent protection for computerised inventions such as CAT scanners and ABS car-brake systems but would have also given the same protection to software when it was used to realise inventions. The Computer Implemented Inventions Directive was rejected by a 648 to 14 vote by the EU Parliament. Politicians say this was the decision because the bill pleased no-one in its current form.
The European Commission says that it will not submit any more versions of the original proposal following the vote. Some tech firms that supported the bill (including Nokia) believe it was vital to protect their research and development, but opponents to the bill warned of the possible negative outcome. Opponents believed that the software patenting that would have resulted would jeopardise the prospects of small firms and open source developers.
"Patents will continue to be handled by national patent offices ... as before, which means different interpretations as to what is patentable, without any judiciary control by the European Court of Justice," said EU External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner, representing the EU head office at the vote. Intellect, the UK's trade association for hi-tech firms was pleased with the decision.
Opera has added BitTorrent support to its web browser, making it the first browser with native support for BitTorrent sharing. Up until now, an external client like Bram Cohen's BitTorrent or an alternative client like Azureus was needed to initiate BitTorrent downloads. BitTorrent has become widely used to share huge files because of its speed and reliability, making it the biggest way online to share copyrighted material.
However, since BitTorrent has vast amounts of legitimate uses, it's safe from any legal problems from content owners when third parties use the technology to infringe copyright. It makes it very easy to spread large files to literally thousands of people without huge bandwidth costs so it is used by many developers and companies to distribute files on a low budget.
It is likely that many other web browsers will add support for BitTorrent over time as it becomes more widely used. Its use is already growing at huge rates, causing other software companies to write their own sharing technology modelled on BitTorrent. The biggest example is Microsoft's take on BitTorrent, which the company has called Avalanche. However it is unlikely Avalanche would ever dethrone BitTorrent.
Campus networks' performance suffers heavily from the traffic load generated by students downloading pirated content. Networks are running out of bandwidth, while universities and colleges are trying various approaches to tackle the problem.
Dell and Napster are trying to bring the mountain closed to Mohammed in order to lure more students to legal downloads, and save campus bandwidth in the process. Somehow I just have the feeling that this would have worked a lot better with iTunes, but can't blame Napster for not trying.
Napster (nasdaq: NAPS - news - people ) will make its entire music library available to cache, or store, on Dell servers at colleges and universities that participate in the program. The songs will be available on systems locally, on systems managed by Dell, so there will be minimal impact on bandwidth.
The EU Parliament moved towards rejecting a proposed law that would make a single way of patenting software throughout the European Union. The move effectively would kill the legislation since lawmakers have no plans to set forth another version. The vote is set for Wednesday on the so-called patent directive that would give software companies EU-wide software patent protection for computerized inventions.
"It seems the momentum is growing for the rejection of the proposal," said Federico de Girolamo, spokesman for the parliament's legislative committee. Some major companies located in the European Union including Nokia are fighting hard for the adoption of the bill citing a need to invest in research and development whereas open source activists are fighting hard against the bill saying it will hurt innovation.
"We'd miss a golden opportunity if the bill got rejected," said Marc MacGann, director general of EICTA, a group representing 10,000 companies including Nokia and Alcatel SA. "Currently there are 25 ways of interpreting patent. This law would bring harmonization and simplify things." Protestors gathered outside parliament on Tuesday wearing yellow vests with a "No to software patents" logo and holding banners saying "Software patents kill innovation" and "U.S. patents go out,".
Online auction giant eBay has been busy removing counterfeit Live 8 DVDs from its website. The British Phonographic Industry (BPI) asked eBay to be tough on the pirates that were selling unauthorised copies of the event on the website attempting to make money off a poverty awareness concert. This is not the first time eBay has gotten headaches from Live 8; before the event Bob Geldof got furious when he discovered that tickets for the event were on sale on eBay. He then asked people to boycott the site.
"There are too many people out there who believe music is for stealing, regardless of the wishes of artists and the people who invest in them. Sadly we are not at all surprised by this incident." said BPI anti-piracy head David Martin. eBay was quick to remove the DVD auctions as the site does not allow it's users to sell such content. "The unauthorised copies of Live 8 DVDs we have been told about have been taken down because the sale of fake items is not permitted on eBay.co.uk." the company said.
As well as the DVDs and the ticket sales in the past, there are also auctions for ticket stubs, programmes and concert passes handed out by AOL. "We distributed these lanyards to concert-goers as free souvenirs of an amazing event, so it is highly inappropriate if people choose to sell them." a spokesman for AOL said.
A man in the UK has been convicted of chipping and selling Xbox consoles through his website. The 22 year old is the first man in the UK to be convicted for modifying games consoles. He also fitted the new consoles with a 200GB HDD containing 80 games. He was sentenced to 140 hours community service in Caerphilly Magistrates Court in Wales. "This case sets a major precedent which marks a milestone in the fight against piracy," said games industry spokesman Michael Rawlinson.
Since October 2003, modifying your gaming consoles with chips that can be used to bypass copy protection mechanisms has been illegal. Modchips can be soldered (usually - but "no solder" options can also be available) to the main board of the gaming consoles and not only allow you to play copied games, but also allow you to play import games. The man was tracked down by an investigator working with the UK games industry trade body, the Entertainment & Leisure Software Publishers Association (Elspa).
He was selling his chipped consoles with the new hard drives containing 80 games for £380 (€561 - US$668). As well as his community service he must also pay £750 in costs. Thirty eight hard disk drives, three computers, two printers and his three Xbox consoles were seized by Police also. "It sends a clear message to anyone tempted to become involved in chipping consoles that this is a criminal offence and will be dealt with accordingly," said Mr Rawlinson, deputy director general of Elspa. "The modification of consoles is an activity that Elspa's anti-piracy team is prioritising. It is encouraging to see the UK courts do the same."
Sweden has been a fertile ground for P2P filesharing and online piracy. Goverment policy has supported affordable broadband connections, while the copyright laws are very relaxed. Recently the BitTorrent site, The Pirate Bay, has been receiving a lot of attention, but they have persistently continued to stay in operation.
It is possible however that things just turned more difficult for the Swedish file sharers, as their new strengthened copyright laws were put into effect at midnight. The new laws criminalize the unauthorized distribution of copyrighted material on The Internet. However, the law by itself doesn't change anything. It is interesting to see how the Swedish goverment and authorities make use of the new laws, or will they - us neighbouring Finns know that the Swedes get nothing done before they have had their long and thorough discussion about the issue concerned...
"A law in itself changes nothing," said Henrik Ponten, a spokesman for Antipiratbyran, a Swedish lobbying group waging a fierce campaign against the file-sharers. "There is nothing that indicates that (file-sharers) would change their behavior."
Previously, it had only been illegal in Sweden to make pirated material available online for others to download via so-called peer-to-peer networks.
The British Phonographic Industry (BPI) has announced that it is taking MCPS (the Mechanical Copyright Protection Society) to the copyright tribunal over its charging of online music subscriptions and legal downloads. The BPI claims that MCPS is charging too much for music downloads and is supported in this action by Apple's iTunes, AOL, MusicNet, Napster, Real, Sony Connect and Yahoo!. They are all annoyed because the charges set on digital downloads (or "mechanical reproduction") is much higher than charges on CDs.
The charge on downloads is about 50% - 100% higher than the charge of making physical copies of music, such as copies of music on CDs. "The licence that the Alliance is trying to impose for online music is unreasonable and unsustainable. It is charging a royalty rate on a download that is double the rate it charges for a song on a CD. It applies this excessive rate to a whole range of online music services, without taking into account their different characteristics. The Alliance's tariff threatens to seriously harm the development of the legal online and mobile music markets." said Geoff Taylor, general counsel for BPI.
The Shihlin District Court in Taiwan has dealt a blow to the IFPIM's international fight against P2P file sharing. An operator of a P2P file-sharing network called ezPeer was found not guilty of infringing intellectual property rights. The P2P service is subscription based and requires users to pay a fee before they share their files with each other. The court said Weber Wu, President of ezPeer did not engage in the reproducing or distributing copyrighted material.
The court also stated that no limitations are placed on P2P file sharing by the current laws and regulations. "We will keep negotiating with record labels to find a way that would create benefits for us, the copyright holders and consumers," Wu said after the verdict. The IFPI is devastated and shocked with the decision. "This is the darkest day for the music industry," said Robin Lee, secretary-general of IFPI in Taiwan. "We will appeal to the end."
So now that the case is so far lost against the operator of the P2P service, the IFPI will is set to do what it's best at - sue individual users for copyright infringement. Another case against kuro.com.tw, Taiwan's largest file-sharing site is yet to be decided. According to Lee, this decision could batter the music industry mentioning the failure of the nation's first legal online music distributor, iBIZ Entertainment Technology Corp, which lasted just 15 months.
The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) has again launched another wave of lawsuits against file sharers it alleges to have distributed copyrighted songs online through P2P networks. This time, 784 file sharers are on the RIAA's hit list, and will now be forced to settle out of court for thousands of dollars. If they refuse to settle, the RIAA could claim hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars in damages.
This brings the total number of P2P users sued by the RIAA to about 11,000, which is huge figure but quite miniscule when you put it up against the 5 million users that currently use the eDonkey2000 network to share files. This "sue em all" tactic is what the RIAA refers to as a deterrent, and claims from the group are that this deterrent is working. However, P2P monitoring services refuse to believe that and point out that the number of users of P2P networks is rising day by day.
Yesterday we reported on a series of raids targeted against internet "warez" groups whom the FBI claims are responsible for most of the copyrighted works being shared on the Internet. There were over 90 searches internationally, and about $50,000,000 in pirated material was seized. "We have shown law enforcement can find and prosecute those who try to use the internet to create piracy networks," said US attorney general Alberto Gonzales. This raid also followed the infamous decision by the Supreme Court on Monday.
Microsoft is still confident that the Xbox 360 console will dominate the market for next generation gaming consoles, despite experts pointing out Sony's hardware advantage. At a Q&A session last Thursday, Bill Gates likened the upcoming console war to an actual car race. "Our view is basically we've got a Ferrari, they've got a Ferrari," he said. "Our Ferrari is leaving the starting line substantially before their Ferrari is, and in most races that's a very nice thing."
Earlier this week, US computer firm Hewlett-Packard ended a deal with Apple that was in place since early 2004 to resell Apple's iPod device. The deal to sell the devices had been secured by the former HP chief executive, Carly Fiorina, but she resigned earlier this year. Now HP is reshaping its plans for the company under new chief Mark Hurd. iPods sold by HP accounted for about 5% of all iPod sales. The growing popularity of the device has lead to massive profits for Apple.
Following last months raids on members Internet "warez" groups, the US authorities have charged eight people in connection with the illegal trading of copyrighted films, music, games and software over the net. The operation spanned over 15 countries worldwide including Australia, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Hungary, Israel, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, the Netherlands, Portugal, the UK and the US. Operation Site Down was aimed at the top members of warez groups.
