According to sources close to the talks, Warner Music Group and Google Inc.'s YouTube video-sharing website are finalizing an agreement that will allow Warner music videos to be featured on the website. YouTube had to pull all video content owned by Warner from the website in December over a dispute over licensing rights.
Sony Music Entertainment, Universal Music Group and EMI Music have all previously renewed deals with YouTube, keeping their content on the website. If the negotiations between Warner and YouTube are successful, then music from the likes of Madonna and Green Day will appear on the website again.
The deal may also open the door to Warner being involved in the new music video venture from YouTube, called Vevo. The new service is backed by Universal Music Group and Sony Music Entertainment. Talks of Warner being involved with Vevo are at "early stages", according to Reuters sources.
Music industry insiders have said that web video is rapidly catching up with radio and television as one of the most important music discovery tools for the market.
The SD Association will lead a public technical discussion at CEATAC on October 7. Secure Digital eXtended Capacity (SDXC) cards come in the same size card as regular SD cards, but have the potential to offer up to 2TB storage on a card the size of a stamp. SDXC accelerates SD interface read/write speeds up to 104 megabytes per second.
The SD Association will have a road map for data transfer bus interface speed up to 300 megabytes per second in the coming months. "The SDXC memory card specification creates innovative content and media opportunities for manufacturers and service providers and transcends removable memory’s traditional role in consumer electronics strategies," said James Taylor, president of the Alliance.
"At CEATEC, we'll reveal the SDXC memory card specification from the perspectives of memory card and device manufacturers and users. We'll also look at the many benefits and opportunities manufacturers and service providers win by implementing this new technology."
Nero has unveiled the Nero MobileSync software for smartphones. MobileSync is the first offering from Nero's new "hardware-agnostic" platform of products for mobile handsets, Netbooks, gaming consoles and Ultra-Mobile PCs. Nero MobileSync for smartphones is designed to allow the management, sharing and creation of content between the desktop, the mobile handset, and the Web regardless of the mobile device in use.
"The ability to easily move content between the desktop, the Web and the handset has the potential to become a source of competitive differentiation in the mobile marketplace," said Irene Berlinsky, Research Analyst, IDC. "Consumers increasingly want to access personal content across multiple screens –such as the PC, TV, and wireless phone – and Nero MobileSync positions Nero as a player in the fixed-mobile convergence space."
By allowing users to easily move PIM, music, videos and photos of their choice between the mobile handset, the desktop and the cloud, Nero is providing an opportunity for distinct financial benefits to select network carrier and handheld device partners. Nero MobileSync is available to mobile OEMs now.
Several hundred comments have been posted on an official Sony blog post announcing the v3.01 firmware release. Some of these comments are complaints, and seem to focus on issues with the console's Blu-ray drive after updating. Users report that the console no longer boots games or Blu-ray discs following the updates but some say that DVD-Video functionality still seems to work properly.
Other problems are being reported too, such as regular problems with sound, some with specific games. "I just cannot understand why Sony says its a hardware failure. If it was hardware, then wouldn't BR discs not even work? Playing a BR movie for 10 minutes then freezing does not sound like hardware to me. Same with PS3 games, why work for 10 minutes then freeze?," one upset poster wrote.
"Does anyone else have the freezing problem with only BR? I just tried a DVD and watched the whole Step Brothers movie." The next user says that while he can still play games, the interface for media listings is "screwed", as he has to constantly scroll a list of content or it will "disappear".
Palm's webOS 1.2 update for the Pre didn't launch as expected last week, but is expected to become available sometime during this week. It is reported that a test of a revamped App Catalog is what triggered the delay. A PreCentral source said that the software update will provide native sync for the iTunes 9 software when it is released, which will undoubtedly up the tension between Apple and Palm over the Pre-iTunes dispute.
The source said that Apple's blocking of iTunes syncing has never caused a delay in the release of new software. In fact, the source claimed that the first attempt to break sync between the software and the device was fixed in just five minutes, by simply changing the USB VendorID to mimic Apple's ID.
JVC has introduced the new PICSIO GC-FM1 in Japan. The 5.8x2-inch camera features an 8-megapixel still photo sensor that can record video at 2.03 megapixels in a 4:3aspect ratio at 1080p (or optionally 720p, VGA and QVGA). It records content in the H.264 video format at 30 frames per second and stores the content on SD or SDHC flash memory cards. It has a 2-inch LCD screen.
The Federal Communication Commission (FCC) in the United States is seeking input from industry players before October 23rd on an attempt to expand the wireless spectrum as part of the National Broadband Plan. The regulator is seeking comments on whether the "prime bands" below 3.7GHz are sufficient for near- and long-term demands. The bands are considered ideal for wireless data and video transmission.
The FCC wants to get input on the ability of the current spectrum to support future build-outs and what bands would suit mobile or fixed broadband connections best, and what issues could potentially stand in the way of moving spectrum.
AT&T, ClearWire, Ericsson, T-Mobile and Motorola have already expressed the need for a new spectrum as demand in the area continues to grow in the country, whereas others have said the best solution is to seek methods to more efficiently utilize the spectrum that is currently licensed. T-Mobile in particular wants to see the re-auctioning of the 700MHz band.
As if things weren't bad enough for the proposed acquisition of the Pirate Bay by Global Gaming Factory X, the company's chief executive officer Hans Pandeya has lost control of his assets. A Swedish court found that Pandeya owes about $400,000, including interest, to Johan Sellstrom, a former business partner in Global Gaming. The court ruled that the state will take control of his assets until enough can be sold to pay back Sellstrom.
"I was pleased to find that the Court has ruled that my promissory note is indeed genuine," Sellstrom said in an e-mail to CNET. "More importantly, they agreed that a lien against Pandeya's net assets had to be put into effect immediately in order to prevent evasive measures on his part. I look forward to a hasty process in order to minimize the damage that Hans Pandeya has caused the share holders of GGF and wish them all the luck with the acquisition."
Pandeya called the claims "bogus" and says he paid back Sellstrom already in a property deal that eventually went bad. He went on to say that the court's decision may harm GGFX' acquisition of the Pirate Bay website, since affect his ability to raise capital. Pandeya had said he would use his own assets as security on any loan he received to help the company acquire the Pirate Bay.
Toshiba UK announced the new Qosmio X500 intended to be used by gamers. The Qosmio X500 offers high performance processing power, combined with the latest graphics capabilities, to deliver a great mobile gaming experience. It is powered by Intel's latest Quad Core processors and the latest nVIDIA GeForce graphics, and sports a large 18.4-inch TruBriteFull HD LCD screen with 16:9aspect ratio at a resolution of 1920x1080.
It includes stereo speakers made by audio specialists Harman Kardon. The Qosmio X500 also features a rewritable Blu-ray drive (BD-RE) and Toshiba's Resolution+upscaling technology, enabling the standard definition DVDs and video files to be upconverted to near high definition quality. It also features an HD web camera, allowing users to record HD video and webchat in wide screen 16:9 format.
The people at Xiph.org have released Theora 1.1, a year after releasing Theora 1.0. The format itself hasn't been altered; existing Theora videos will be decoded fine with the new decoder and the new encoder will produce bitstreams that work with existing Theora players.
The update is largely an improvement for the Theora encoder which improves video quality over v1.0, brings rate control for live streaming, two-pass mode, consistent CPU usage and a more efficient decoder.
The Theora 1.1 release fixes a problem for its users, which was the production of "fuzzy video". The following pictures are from Xiph developer Monty. Click to open both in new tabs and flick between them to see the difference.
Microsoft Corp. has reportedly informed wireless carriers by letter that they can no longer use the Musiwave mobile tunes service once their contracts expire, a source told The Register. Musiwave drives more than 50 million downloads a year for the likes of T-Mobile, Vodafone, and Orange. It has licensing deals with the major record labels covering 3.3 million tracks and 250,000 artists.
The service underpins music, video and ringtone services operated by wireless carriers around the world (but not in the U.S.). The report seems to indicate that Microsoft is incorporating Musiwave into the Zune Marketplace and Xbox 360 games console - making it a Microsoft-exclusive technology that compares somewhat to Apple's iTunes exclusivity.
Musiwave's withdrawal from wireless carriers opens up the market for rivals such as RealNetworks and Livewire Mobile. "We're building a team in Redmond to help power Zune Marketplace," reads another Musiwave listing. "This job would work towards the overall strategy and collaborate closely with the Zune Redmond team and the Musiwave Paris team."
A meeting that was called for British musicians to discuss UK government proposals on how to tackle illegal file sharing has come to a consensus that file-sharers should have their bandwidth"squeezed" for persistent copyright infringement. The congregation of more than 100 artists came to the agreement that file sharers should not have their Internet accounts suspended.
Artists including Lily Allen, George Michael, Annie Lennox, Radiohead guitarist Ed O'Brien and Pink Floyd drummer Nick Mason signed a statement. It calls for two warning letters to be issued to users when they are caught sharing music illegally before their bandwidth speeds are restricted for certain purposes.
The idea would be to "render sharing of media files impractical while leaving basic e-mail and web access functional."Lily Allen, who was the target of quite a large amount of criticism for running her mouth on the issue while technically breaching copyright law on the exact same website, was applauded by the audience for her campaign to "alert music lovers to the threat that illegal downloading presents to our industry."
Sales of Sony's PlayStation 3 (PS3) consoles last week in Japan totaled 51,055, toughly an 8 percent drop from 55,344 units the week before. The result is relatively stable considering the release of the PS3 Slim had driven sales up to 151,000 units suddenly in the country, leading to some speculation about whether the console would see a lasting boost from the new model.
The only gaming hardware to outperform the PS3 last week was, unsurprisingly, the Nintendo DSi handheld console, which moved 66,073 units during the week. The older DS Lite, sold 13,555 units. Nintendo's Wii console dropped to 16,698 unit sales from the 17,568 sales the week before. Xbox 360 sales sunk from 7568 sales to 4965.
Pokemon Soul Silver and Pokemon Heart Gold, both for the DS platform, topped the gaming charts in the country, followed by Tales of Vesperia for the PS3 and Jikkyou Powerful Pro Yakkyuu Portable 4 for the PSP.
Intel Corporation showed off three high-performance quad-core Core i7 mobile processors (code name Clarksfield) at the Intel Developer Forum. They debuted alongside the new Intel PM55 Mobile Express Chipset. The company claims the CPU-chipset combination of Core i7 and PM55 easily provides the best laptop experience for gaming, digital media, photos and other multi-threaded tasks.
"With intelligent features like Intel Turbo Boost Technology, Intel Hyper-Threading Technology and a host of others, Intel has revolutionized the laptop PC processor, delivering performance when you need it, energy efficiency when you don't," said Dadi Perlmutter, executive vice president and general manager, Intel Architecture Group.
"For the first time, mobile users can choose a laptop that delivers Internet-server like speed, right in their laps for the most demanding tasks, from intense gaming to digital video editing and social media applications."
In a letter to the Federal Communication Commission (FCC), AT&T accused Google of ignoring FCC regulations and called the company a hypocrite over its policies with the Google Voice application. Long-distance providers, such as AT&T, are required to pay fees to local phone companies for access to their landline networks, and FCC regulations ban long-distance providers from call blocking.
The result is that if AT&T, or another long-distance provider, wants to continue operating as a long-distance provider, then they cannot ignore local/rural areas and simply have to pay fees to the local phone companies. The rule, which has been in place since 2007, is seen as unfair by the providers who say the fees they are charged are too expensive.
In AT&T's letter, the company asked the FCC to review this decision. However, the letter is mostly aimed at Google Voice. Google Voice does not connect to all markets - the company blocks the application from connecting phone calls in certain rural areas. To AT&T, this is an unfair advantage over AT&T and other long-distance providers that are not allowed to block calls to select rural areas.
"By openly flaunting the call blocking prohibition that applies to its competitors, Google is acting in a manner inconsistent with the spirit, if not the letter, of the FCC's fourth principle contained in its Internet Policy Statement,"Robert Quinn, senior vice president of federal regulatory affairs at AT&T, said. "Ironically, Google is also flouting the so-called 'fifth principle of non-discrimination' for which Google has so fervently advocated."
Earlier this week, AMD launched its most powerful processor to date (based on raw compute horsepower measured in FLOPS), found in its next-generation ATI Radeon HD 5800 series graphics cards. The Radeon HD 5800 series is the first to fully support Microsoft DirectX 11, which will be shipping with the Windows 7 operating system. AMD will initially release two cards: the ATI Radeon HD 5870 and the ATI Radeon HD 5850, each with 1GB GDDR5 memory.
The 5800 series will be supported by a handful of add-in-board companies, including ASUS, Club 3D, Diamond Multimedia, Force3D, GIGABYTE, HIS, MSI, Multimedia, PowerColor, SAPPHIRE Technology, VisionTek and XFX. "With the ATI Radeon HD 5800 series of graphics cards driven by the most powerful processor on the planet, AMD is changing the game, both in terms of performance and the experience," said Rick Bergman, senior vice president and general manager, Products Group, AMD.
Users of Apple's iPhone 3G and 3GS are finally able to use the MMS functionality added to the handset with the iPhone 3.0 software update on AT&T's network. The capability came at 1pm Eastern Time, meeting the time announced earlier this week by AT&T. Activation of MMS requires that the iPhone OS 3.1 along with a carrier settings update be installed on the device. MMS is not available for the first generation iPhone.
The updates allow iPhone users to send pictures and videos using the phone's messaging applications. MMS is available with the standard text messaging plan from AT&T; 200 messages per month for $5, 1,500 messages per month for $15 or $20 for unlimited messages.
On Friday, AT&T also updated the pricing for refurbished iPhone 3G models, setting the price at $49 for an 8GB model, and $99 for a 16GB model.
Apple has added a support page for MMS activation.
Apple is reportedly ready to introduce a new 2009 Mac product line with a new family of iMacs, according to AppleInsider sources. The new iMacs were reportedly finalized early in September and have been in production at Taiwanese product lines for about two weeks. The systems are expected to feature a thinner industrial design, and to offer more affordable models for consumers.
The new models are expected to take design cues from Apple's relatively new LED-lit Cinema Display products. Rumors about the new line-up suggest that support for Blu-ray - which Apple CEO Steve Jobs once referred to as a "bag of hurt" from a licensing perspective - would finally be present. That would possibly be a feature of a premium iMac model.
Apple's corporate and educational sales teams have been offering volume customers discounts of between $100 and $200 this month on existing iMac models, according to reports. Representatives allegedly stressed to buyers that the offer would only be available for a week or so, possibly anxious to clear existing inventories before showing new products.
In yet another bizarre demand, the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP) is demanding that mobile operators pay licensing fees because their customers use ringtones. In a nutshell, according to ASCAP, when your mobile phone rings with a copyrighted ringtone, it counts as a public performance.
The EFF is urging a federal court to reject the "outlandish" claim made by ASCAP. Mobile carriers pay royalties for ringtones that they sell to their customers, but even in that case, ASCAP told a federal court that each time a phone rings and plays these recordings, the phone user is violating copyright law.
Intel Corporation demonstrated the anticipated Larrabee graphics processor earlier this week at the Intel Developer Forum. Sean Maloney, chief sales and marketing officer for Intel, showed off a working version of the chip rendering a game environment built on ray tracing, a resource demanding technique for generating high-quality 3D graphics and often used with professional animated features.
The Larrabee chip was used in conjunction with the hexa-core "Gulftown" processor scheduled for release next year. The graphics processor is based on "Westmere" 32-nanometer architecture. Intel's first Westmere-based chip is due to ship in the final quarter of 2009.
Maloney said that Larrabee will eventually be used for a discrete graphics card used in high-end gaming PCs and workstations. "We've got a discrete product coming up," he said. It will be incorporated in system-on-a-chip (SoC) products for handheld devices, according to Maloney. He said it will be an easier programming platform for developers since it is built on x86 architecture.
Valve is appealing a decision by Australia's Office of Film and Literature Classification that denied Left 4 Dead 2 a rating in the country, effectively banning the game in the territory. In all other territories, the game has received an 18+ or Mature rating, given by ESRB, USK, CERO, KGRB etc. but in Australia there is no 18+ certificate for videogames on the market.
"The title has been rated in the majority of the world and awaiting final ratings in the UK and New Zealand, where final ratings are expected in the coming days. Meanwhile, the ruling in Australia from the OFLC has been appealed by Valve,"a statement from the Valve reads.
The OFLC said that the game depicts "unrelenting violance" and is unsuitable to be given a rating of 15+, the highest it could be given in the country. "It's funny that a place like Australia, which has come up with some pretty violent material in the past with something like Mad Max, can effectively ban videogames for the same reason," an Electronic Arts spokesperson said.
Sony Computer Entertainment America (SCEA) has confirmed to Kotaku that PlayStation Portable (PSP) owners will not be able to exchange their games on Universal Media Disc (UMD) media to PSPGo digital copies before the launch of PSPGo next week. The PSPGo does not feature a UMD drive, and relies on Internet purchases to download games that can be installed on the system.
"We were evaluating a UMD conversion program, but due to legal and technical reasons we will not be offering the program at this time," a Sony Computer Entertainment of America spokesman told Kotaku. The statement is in contrast to comments from this year's E3 in Los Angeles where Sony officials said they hoped to have a plan in place to transfer customers' UMD titles to PSPGo at launch.
The European Commission is preparing a mandate for the manufacturers of portable media players (PMP), to address concerns about consumer hearing loss due to noise levels of players. Meglena Kuneva, European Commissioner for Consumer Affairs, will present details of the mandate to develop standards for personal music player manufacturers, which will apply to MP3 player makers and music-capable mobile handset makers.
The details are not available yet, but it will emphasize the need for manufacturers to take steps to protect the hearing of their customers. The EU Scientific Committee on Emerging and Newly Identified Health Risks reported recently that between 5 percent and 10 percent of listeners are risking permanent hearing loss by listening to a PMP for an hour a day over the course of several years.
The Royal National Institute for Deaf People in the UK is supporting the Commissioner's Mandate, and confirmed to The Register that the document will be presented before the European Parliament.
Nintendo has revealed a new Wii Sports Resort bundle that includes two MotionPlus accessories instead of the previous one. The extra controller will add $10 to the price tag, which would be a saving of $10 over buying an additional MotionPlus accessory after getting the original bundle.
"Shoppers are looking for value as we head into the holiday season, and this Wii Sports Resort bundle is a gift that players of all ages and experience levels can enjoy," said Cammie Dunaway, Nintendo of America's executive vice president of Sales & Marketing. "Best of all, it instantly gets multiple members of the household engaged in playing as soon as the package is opened."
The new bundle will sell for $59.99. The MotionPlus accessory alone sells for $19.99. Nintendo's Wii console has easily led the generation (of home consoles) in terms of unit sales, but lately has seen a price drop in response to the new PS3 Slim and Xbox 360 price cuts. Additionally, motion control technology for both is on the horizon, leading to some speculation of a new Nintendo console in a couple of years.
Intel Corporation has invested in TransGaming's GameTree.tv service, which will provide games-on-demand for High-definition television (HDTV) screens from the second quarter of 2010. It will deliver the content through consumer electronics products and set-top boxes, based on Intel CE Media processors.
"Innovation is at the heart of TransGaming's GameTree.tv Service which represents the culmination of technology, user experience, and the economic model required to realise sustainable innovation in the digital home," commented Vikas Gupta, CEO of TransGaming.
"We are extremely pleased to be working with Intel on this important and exciting initiative. We are driving new monetisation models for content developers, OEMs, and operators around the world." TransGaming is already working with Electronic Arts and Ubisoft to produce titles for the service, available for sale, rental and subscription.
"The GameTree.TV service provides the platform to bring PC games to TV, which in turn offers new opportunities to the consumer electronics industry," said Eric Kim, SVP of the Intel Digital Home Group.
Apple Inc. has updated its main websites with information about the environmental impact of its products, and what the company has done, and is doing, to improve its line of products from an environmental perspective. Some of the details are pretty interesting too, such as the details of Mac OS X regulating the processor even between keystrokes in order to save power.
The information includes details such as the emissions produced per hour of using a certain product, and the recycling efforts related to them. It also gives details on what the company is doing in its own facilities to cut down power consumption. "Designing green products includes considering the environmental impact of the materials used to make them," reads Apple's Web site.
"From the glass, plastic, and metal in our products to the paper and ink in our packaging, our goal is to continue leading the industry in reducing or eliminating environmentally harmful substances." Another interesting piece of information is a comparison between the packaging of the 2006 13-inch MacBook and the 2009 13-inch MacBook.
The company notes that by reducing the packaging by 40 percent between the 2006 and 2009 products, it can ship 50 percent more boxes in each airline shipping container, saving one 747 flight for every 32,000 units that are shipped.
Toshiba Corp.'s first television to feature the Cell processor (also used with the PlayStation 3 console) is on track for its intended release this year. The product is to hit the Japanese market first in Q4 2009. The company first promised a Cell-based TV in 2007 and then showed off a prototype at CES 2008 in Las Vegas.
Toshiba said it uses the Cell processor to provide exceptionally high-quality video playback, picture upscaling and picture-in-picture (PIP) functionality capable to extend to dozens of channels simultaneously.
Masaaki Oosumi, President of Toshiba's Digital Media Network Company, confirmed that the TV with market under the company's Regza brand, and it will be the company's flagship model. He likened the impact of the Cell telly's appearance to the arrival of color television, but did admit it will be pricey.
At the Intel Developer Forum, Intel Corporation executives Eric Kim and Justin Rattner discussed what is needed when the full Internet converges with broadcast networks, laying out the opportunities to make the TV experience more visual, more personal and more interactive.
As the senior vice president and general manager of Intel’s Digital Home Group, Eric Kim unveiled the Intel Atom processor CE4100SoC, the newest in a family of consumer electronics (CE) media processors, and announced efforts with several key industry players including Adobe, CBS, Cisco and TransGaming which are helping to make the vision of interactive TV a reality in the short-term.
"At the center of the TV evolution is more processing power, which we deliver with the CE4100 media processor, built on the Intel Atom core and optimized for IPTV digital set-tops, connected media players and digital TVs," said Kim. "With its performance and high-resolution graphics capabilities, CE manufacturers and software developers now have a platform for real innovation."
Finnish mobile handset giant Nokia has found itself in the midst of a legal dispute in Brazil over its Ovi brand. Brazilian firm Ouvi Divulgacao e Marketing em Celulares Ltda claims that Nokia is abusing the Ovi brand in the country to compete directly with Ouvi. Nokia believes the brand, introduced in 2007, is different enough from Ouvi to co-exist, and points out that it is a Finnish word with a different meaning (windows, doors).
"What Nokia apparently has not realized is that the 190 million inhabitants of Brazil speak Portuguese and not Finnish," said Tore Haugland, chief executive of Ouvi told Reuters. "We are sure that the Brazilian court will rule in our favor and we look forward to Nokia removing the Ovi brand from all the phones that have been shipped in Brazil and stopping using and mentioning this brand in Brazil."
Ouvi also registered the ovi.com.br domain name in 2004 because the pronunciation of Ovi and Ouvi in Brazilian Portuguese is the same. "We have our brand name also as part of the company name, which in Brazilian law counts higher than a registered trademark," Ouvi's Haugland said. A court decision on the case is expected any day.
Microsoft Corp. has responded to the release of Google's Chrome Frame for Internet Explorer with criticism. The company has argued that the plug-in, which adds support for HTML 5 and speeds up Javascript, could double the security woes of users if installed.
"It's not necessarily that plug-ins aren't or can't be secure, but that running a browser within a browser doubles the potential attack surface in a way that we don't see is particularly helpful,"saidAmy Bazdukas, Microsoft's general manager for IE.
She claimed that by installing Chrome Frame, Internet Explorer users are essentially breaking the private browsing protections included with IE8. "Chrome Frame breaks the privacy model of IE. Users are not going to be able to use IE's privacy features, something that's not made apparent to users. They're essentially circumvented."
She also responded to Google's claim that IE users are looking for faster Javascript support and HTML 5. "HTML 5 is not a completed standard,"she noted. "We're working on it very actively, and we see a lot of promise in it. But it's premature to support it."
At the Tokyo game show press conference on Wednesday, Gran Turismo producer Kaz Yamauchi jumped on stage to give out new details on the anticipated PlayStation 3 (PS3) title. The biggest detail by far of course was the announcement of a March 2010 launch of the title in Japan. Unfortunately, it was not clear whether other regions would have to wait until later, or if it would be a worldwide release.
Gran Turismo 5 was originally speculated to ship in 2009. Kaz revealed that the game will include an impressive 950 cars to choose from (including all the newest hybrid and electric cars), along with 20 courses with 70 variations. A new physics system is included with car damage features and movable objects on the track.
Game modes include single player, split screen, two player arcade and GT Mode. In GT Mode there is a world map, My Garage, Car Dealer, Tuning Ship, Championship Race and License Test. An online replay album is also features, with the ability to export replays to YouTube. Text and voice chat is also included in online features, along with a photo album.
Microsoft has dismissed rumors that the company is planning to bid for game publisher Electronic Arts. "We have no plans to acquire EA,"Phil Spencer, corporate vice president of Microsoft Game Studios, told Reuters. "They remain a very important partner to us. No acquisitions."
Shares in Electronic Arts jumped 8 percent on speculation that the software giant was interest in acquiring the company.
Spencer declined to comment to Reuters on whether Microsoft and Electronic Arts have had held talks at some point about such a move. EA tried and failed last year to buy up rival Take Two Interactive. The Madden maker is often named as a target for Time Warner and Walt Disney Co. by traders.
The Redwood-city publisher has a market value of roughly $6.5 billion.
Lily Allen appears to have decided to completely gut her music career because she apparently cannot make any money from recorded music anymore. The performer said she has no plans to tour or make a new album. "Just so you know, I have not renegotiated my record contract and have no plans to make another record," she said on their anti-file sharing blog.
"The days of me making money from recording music has been and gone as far as I'm concerned, so I don't (at this point) stand to profit from legislation." The move comes after Lily Allen found herself on the opposite side of artists in the UK such as Radiohead and Robbie Williams over proposed measures to tackle illegal file sharing that included disconnecting pirates from the Internet.
The brief controversy was entertaining though, not least because Lily Allen found herself accused of copyright infringement too. Torrentfreak called out Allen for 1:1 copying an article from Techdirt without attributing it to the site on her blog. She responded with, "I THINK ITS QUITE OVIOUS [sic] THAT I WASNT TRYING TO PASS OF THOSE WORDS AS MY OWN , HERE IS A LINK TO THE WEBSIITE I ACQUIRED THE PIECE FROM," seemingly misreading the accusation as plagiarism.
Nintendo has issued a press release confirming that the price of the Wii console will be cut $50 to $199 in the United States starting on September 27. Nintendo finally made cuts to the price of the Wii after Microsoft and Sony made changes to their offerings in the market.
Key upcoming releases for the Nintendo Wii console include Wii Fit Plus, launching on Oct. 4, and the first truly multiplayer Mario title, New Super Mario Bros. Wii. "Wii has reached more video game players than any game system before because it attracts everyone—both men and women, and people of all ages," said Cammie Dunaway, Nintendo of America's executive vice president of Sales & Marketing.
"Our research shows there are 50 million Americans thinking about becoming gamers, and this more affordable price point and our vast array of new software mean many of them can now make the leap and find experiences that appeal to them, whatever their tastes or level of gaming experience."
Appeals court judges have called the $290 million damages awarded to i4i in a patent infringement lawsuit against Microsoft. i4i had originally won its case against Microsoft, which resulted in $290 million damages to be paid by Microsoft and an injunction against the sale of Microsoft's Word 2003 and Word 2007 applications.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit stayed that injunction earlier this month. Judge Kimberly Moore of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit took issue with the calculation of the damages; specifically that it assumed that users who bought a $90 version of the software from Microsoft would have paid considerably higher to pay for an alternative.
"Not everyone who is willing to pay $90 or $200 for a product is willing to pay $500,"she said. The grilling wasn't just for i4i's side however, as Judge Alvin Schall pressed Microsoft's representatives on a claim that there is "no direct evidence" that anyone at Microsoft actually read the patent in question.
"I find it hard to believe that Microsoft didn't read the patent,"the Judge said. i4i claims it approached Microsoft in 2000 for licensing negotiations, and that the two companies made joint presentations but never reached an agreement. Microsoft has acknowledged being in contact with i4i about the XML patent, but it has asked the appeals court to overturn the lower court's decision.
John Donahoe, Chief Executive of auction-giant eBay Inc., said that despite recent lawsuits over the underlying technology used in Skype, the $1.9 billion sale of majority interest in the Internet communication service will go ahead. "This deal is going to close," Donahoe told the annual summit of Shop.org, adding that Skype will be very successful under the "right ownership structure."
Joltid Ltd, a Swedish company owned by the original creators of Skype, Joost and Kazaa, Niklas Zennstrom and Janus Friis, sued eBay for allegedly using its software without authorization.
There had been some fears that the lawsuit could derail the $1.9 billion deal with Netscape founder Marc Andreessen's Andreessen Horowitz, Index Ventures, Silver Lake and the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board.
However, Donahoe showed Reuters an e-mail sent on Wednesday morning to him by eBay Chief Financial Officer Bob Swan that said no "show stoppers" had been identified in the recent litigation. "We're marching along," Donahoe said, adding that he expected that by November, the deal will have been completed.
AMD has confirmed to Maximum PC that it will release a Hexa-core (6 cores) processor (codename Thuban) next year that will be backwards compatible with AM3 and AM2+ socket-equipped motherboards. The confirmation comes after numerous rumors suggested that the company had a new 6-core chip in the works. "We are all about platform longevity and long-lived upgrade paths," an AMD spokesman said.
The comment is likely a jab at Intel for offering three different incompatible socket infrastructures currently for Desktop computers. The "Thuban" chip is expected to be marketed as the Phenom II X6, and is derived from the Opteron chip that surfaced earlier in the summer. It will feature all six cores on single 45nm die.
Thuban is likely to pack 904 million transistors in a 346mm2 chip, compared to Intel's Core-i7-975's 262mm2/731 million transistors and the Core i5-750's 296mm2/774 million transistors. It is expected to feature 3MB of L2 cache and 6MB of L3 cache.
There have been some calls lately for fees to be introduced for viewing TV shows episodes and other content on the BBC's popular iPlayer. Lorraine Heggessey, chief executive of TV production company Talkback Thames, said that users of the site should be charged "micro payments" to use the online catch up service.
Tony Cohen, chief executive of Talkback's parent company Fremantle Media, is also conducting a feasibility study of the concept. The increasing support in the industry to introduce fees for the service come as advertising revenue in the commercial TV sector falls.
However, while research conducted by Fremantle allegedly suggests that consumers would be willing to pay up to £2 for some shows, the BBC says that it has no plans to introduce fees to use the service, on the grounds that viewers already pay for it. "The cost of the BBC iPlayer is covered by the licence fee, so UK users have already paid for this service,"said a spokesperson.
The service was launched on Christmas day in 2007 after £6 million was spent developing it. Now, during peak hours, it pumps out approximately 12GB of data per second to UK viewers. Media industry expert Steve Hewlett says that the idea of paying to watch TV programmes online makes sense, in theory.
UK retailers GAME has announced that in the six months to July 31, it earned GBP £177.3 million in sales of pre-owned game titles, accounting for a quarter of all revenue during the period. "We achieved year on year growth in pre-owned sales, which increased 12.3 percent and now account for 25.7 per cent of total sales,"said chairman Peter Lewis.
"In our online business we increased revenues by 12.1 per cent. Our Reward Card membership has increased by over 1 million customers since the start of the year to more than 13.3m,"he added. Total sales for the 33 weeks to September 19 were down 8.8 percent, with like-for-likes down 16.6 percent in the period.
However, Lewis said the company is optimistic about the results that will come from the second half of 2009. "In the second half, the installed base of third generation consoles will continue to build. The recent manufacturer price reductions on the Microsoft Xbox 360 Elite and Sony's new model PlayStation 3 are helping to stimulate the market for hardware."he said.
Apple Inc. and Eight Mile Style LLC, Eminem's music publisher, are set to decide a 2007 lawsuit by a jury-less trial later this week in Detroit unless a late settlement is reached. Eight Mile claims that Apple did not have the appropriate permissions to sell 93 songs in a downloadable format through the iTunes music store. Also being sued is Aftermath Entertainment for approving the digital downloads.
"The case did not settle today and we are expecting to start trial first thing tomorrow morning,"Howard Hertz, a lawyer for Eight Mile Style, said on Wednesday. The lawsuit alleges that Apple wrongfully gained $2.58 million from iTunes downloads, including $466,916 from sales of the track "Lose Yourself".
In a stunning demand, the lawsuit also seeks a cut of $16 million in iPod sales profits it alleges could be attributed to the 93 tracks. Eight Mile is also seeking $4.03 million from Aftermath Entertainment. Eight Mile agreed in 1998 and 2003 that "Eminem would create master sound recordings embodying compositions, and that Aftermath would own those masters,"Apple's attorneys said in a court filing.
Intel has surprised some industry experts by showing off working 22-nanometer SRAM chips, proving that Moore's Law still has some fight left in it. Moore's Law, applied to chips, predicts a doubling of the number of transistors in chips roughly every 2 years.
Some industry experts admitted that they didn't believe that it was possible - considering that the new Intel chip contains three billion transistors in an area the size of a fingernail. Even with that, Intel said that there could be chips coming that push the physical limits even further.
"Moore's Law is not a law of physics, it's a law of human inventiveness," Intel president and chief executive Paul Otellini told BBC News. "There is nothing that says that humans can't continue to invent." The company is currently producing and selling chips based on 45nm technology, and will move to 32nm later in the year.
"We have at least four generations of what we are shipping today in development. That is as far out as we have ever been able to develop things," Otellini said. "Not everything is done but it gets harder for sure. It requires more invention and more money and it's our job to continue that pace."
The Federal Communication Commission's (FCC) proposals to ensure all traffic on the Internet is treated equally has come under fire from some wireless providers and politicians. The FCC wants to ensure that Internet Service Providers (ISP) cannot slow down or block bandwidth-hungry usage such as video streaming.
However, mobile operators claim that this new regulation would serve to damage innovation in the industry. FCC chairman Julius Genachowski said that doing nothing was not an option, and previously stated that the rules were "not about government regulation of the Internet".
"History's lesson is clear. Ensuring a robust and open internet is the best thing we can do to promote investment and innovation,"he said. "And while there are some who see every policy decision as either pro-business or pro-consumer, I reject that approach; it's not the right way to see technology's role in America."
However, the inclusion of wireless Internet traffic upset some in the industry. "We are concerned the FCC appears ready to extend the entire array of net neutrality requirements to what is perhaps the most competitive consumer market in America - wireless services," said AT&T's Jim Cicconi.
A letter sent by the USB Implementers Forum to both Apple Inc and Palm has stated that Apple has the right to alter its iTunes software to block Palm's Pre device from syncing. When the Pre was launched, Palm said it would be iTunes-compatible; and it was. However, Apple had warned that the iTunes capabilities would only last weeks, and then kept its promise by blocking the Pre with an update.
Palm wasn't going to sit still over the issue however, and a wrote a letter of protest to the USB Implementers Forum (USB-IF), the non-profit organization that maintains the Universal Serial Bus (USB) specification and promotes the interface. Apple had blocked the Pre from syncing with iTunes by checking the idVendor descriptor when connected.
The Palm letter informed USB-IF of the WebOS update, which would change the Pre's Vendor ID to the same as Apple's in order to regain iTunes support. "Interoperability is central to any standard-setting organization," the letter read, "because, without widespread interoperability, many of the benefits of standardized (as opposed to proprietary) technologies are lost."
Microsoft has confirmed that it is working on a new wireless adapter for the Xbox 360 console that is compatible with the new 802.11n specification. The current (original) WiFi adapter is compatible with 802.11a, 802.11b and 802.11g wireless networking, but the new speedy 802.11n will soon be available to Xbox 360 users should they choose to buy the additional component for the console.
Over the past few weeks, several photographs and other source of information (such as FCC filings) have shown up and been examined thoroughly - pretty much revealing that Microsoft had such a product in the works.
The company has not yet revealed all details about the new adapter (not least how much it costs, or whether or not it will completely replace the existing adapter).
No launch date or potential price has been revealed by the company either.
Having already seen changes to the palette availability in the Nintendo DSi range in the United States and Japan, Nintendo has confirmed that it will offer the NintendoDSi in more colors in Europe.
Currently, the DSi is only available in the traditional black and white flavors in Europe, but recent reports and leaked information had suggested that Nintendo would be making a change to the available models in Europe soon.
The company will offer DSi handheld consoles in metallic blue, light blue and red from October 23 on in the region. All of the new models will arrive with Flipnote Studio and Facebook features pre-installed.
As an added bonus, users of the new DSi consoles that access the DSi Show before March 31 2010, will receive 100 DSi points for nothing.
A leaked Sega U.S. document has indicated a date for the release of motion control technology for the PlayStation 3 (PS3) console. It also additionally included details on the availability of PS2 games through the PlayStation Network (PSN) online service and the availability of Dreamcast titles for download as well.
The document is a summary of a meeting held between Sega and Sony on August 5 this year. It pinpoints a March 2010 launch for PlayStation 3 motion control initially in Japan, with the goal of selling between 4-5 million units.
While the document suggested that price and bundle details may have been clarified by September 1, it doesn't hint any of that information.
It is likely that Kaz Hirai's keynote speech at the Tokyo Game Show this week will include talk of the Motion Controllers in more detail. As for the PlayStation Network (PSN) predictions, the document stated that Sony intends to sell PS2 titles (such as GTA: Vice City) via PSN, and may also sell popular Dreamcast titles with marketing support in exchange for a long period of exclusivity.
British artists have been commenting on some proposed measures to tackle illegal file sharing of music in the region, with the likes of Radiohead and Annie Lennox being opposed, and Lilly Allen and James Blunt supporting. The debate is about the plan to force Internet Service Providers to punish "repeat offenders" by slowing down Internet connections, issue warnings and eventually cutting off a connection.
The Featured Artists Coalition, or FAC, which touts Annie Lennox, Radiohead and Robbie Williams among its members, is opposed to the plans. "By demanding blanket suspension powers from the government, the industry is in danger of cutting off a promotional tool that is of great use to fledgling artists who seek to create a buzz around themselves yet don't have the financial support of a major label,"the group stated.
FAC went on to say that the proposed measures could not be possible without widespread invasion of personal privacy - but don't get it wrong, FAC is opposed to illegal file sharing itself, branding sites that benefit from it as "thieving rascals" that should be prosecuted. Lilly Allen however, disagrees with FAC, and has the backing of James Blunt in doing so.
News Corp.'s MySpace is to launch a new video service within the next several months with the help of Hulu.com. Rupert Murdoch had commented earlier this year that he plans to reshape MySpace into an entertainment hub.
News Corp. owns MySpace and a large chunk of the Hulu video service. Sources told CNET that Murdoch plans to push the MySpace video service through content including feature films, TV shows and other things.
News Corp. intends to transform MySpace into something that is more attractive and useful to users, while also attracting advertisers.
Currently, MySpace does host some of Hulu's TV shows and a small number of feature-length films, but it is nowhere near the level of competitors such as Netflix's Watch Now service.
"MySpace's intention is to do a much better job of monetizing the video area,"said one source. It will be interesting to see whether MySpace will offer downloads and subscription services, as Hulu is considering offering a pay-per-view option to users to gain revenue.
NEC Electronics has announced its new USB 3.0 (or, SuperSpeed USB) system-on-a-chip (SOC) design solution that could bring forth USB 3.0-equipped hardware very soon. The company's new SOC is designed to work with NEC's USB-IF Certified USB 3.0 Host Controller.
NEC Electronics expects rapid adoption of the solution by customers developing mass storage, display and video applications, especially as the need to transfer larger and larger amounts of information from PCs to external hard-drives, portable electronics devices, and flash-based drives continues to grow.
"NEC Electronics has earned a reputation for delivering dedicated customer service and high-quality, reliable custom products. In fact, these qualities are cornerstones of the NEC Electronics culture," said Osamu Matsushima, general manager, ASIC Solutions Division, NEC Electronics Corporation. "Combining our USB leadership with our years of experience delivering custom SOC and standard solutions, the new SOC design solution provides customers with a one-stop-shop for implementing their system solutions on time and within budget."
LucidPort Technology, a semiconductor company developing SuperSpeed USB and Wireless USB controllers, leveraged NEC Electronics USB 3.0 SOC design solution in the development of its USB300, a single chip USB 3.0 to SATA-II bridge designed for external storage devices.
Corel Corporation announced the availability of WinDVD 2010 last week, the latest version of the world's most widely used DVD playback software. The software improves its Blu-ray and BD-Live features and uses new GPU-based upscaling to convert SD video to HD output. Increased format support lets you watch popular video formats, even direct from your camera or camcorder.
The software is also designed for the latest technologies in Windows 7, giving users hands-on control when used with Windows Touch enabled hardware. "With more than 200 million units sold around the world, WinDVD is widely recognized as the industry's best DVD and Blu-ray playback software and with the latest version we wanted to take our users' experiences with the software even further," said Nick Davies, Senior Vice President of Product Management and Product Marketing at Corel.
The founders of the P2P VoIP Internet communication service Skype - Janus Friis and Niklas Zennstrom - have filed a lawsuit against the former chairman of Joost, Michael Volpi, for allegedly stealing trade secrets relating to the P2P technology at the core of Skype and Joost.
Volpi was fired just last week, and at the time Joost announced that it was investigation his actions while he was chief executive and chairman of the Web TV firm. Friis and Zennstrom have already taken legal action against eBay recently through their company Joltid, which they claim owns the technology used by the Skype software.
The auction giant had warned the markets back in July that questions were being raised about the ownership of the technology central to Skype. Plans for an IPO were blocked by a disagreement over patents. eBay originally paid $2.6 billion for Skype.
Adobe Systems Incorporated has announced the new Adobe Flash Platform Services, which enabled content providers and advertisers to measure and monetize applications across social networks, desktops and mobile devices. Adobe Flash Platform Services are online, hosted services that allow developers to add innovative capabilities to Web applications.
With the growth of social media, advertisers and publishers are looking to more predictable and effective methods to reach audiences. There are many benefits to using sharable, social applications to connect with customers; however, it can be difficult to get users to install the applications.
The new Distribution service from Adobe helps solve these challenges. The solution includes a unified management tool to effectively promote, measure and monetize Web applications and games. "Our customers rely on the Adobe Flash Platform to make rich and compelling applications that work across operating systems and screens," said David Wadhwani, general manager and vice president at Adobe.
"The new services from Adobe allow Flash Platform developers, advertisers, game makers and other content publishers to connect with an even larger audience more effectively, and grow revenue opportunities."
Netflix has paid out a $1 million reward to a seven-member international research group after the group won a contest held by Netflix to improve its predictions of movies a customer might like to view. The contest was launched in 2006 and witnessed 51,000 contestants from 186 countries participate ever since.
"I was stunned at how the Netflix Prize created its own economy of researchers competing and collaborating," Netflix CEO Reed Hastingssaid. BellKor's Pragmatic Chaos, the winning team, had improved Netflix movie recommendations success by more than 10 percent to claim the prize.
Technically however, it had drawn with a rival group called the Ensemble at a 10.6 percent improvement, but it was declared the winner at an awards ceremony on Monday because it submitted its final entry just a few minutes before Ensemble managed to.
Netflix has more than 100,000 films and TV shows available, so making improvements to its recommendation system is far from easy, but will undoubtedly result in long-term revenue gains that easily surpass $1 million.
Apple Inc. is investigating battery issues arising from updating an iPhone to the v3.1 operation system, following a lot of messages about the issue being posted on the Apple support forums. Users are reporting that after the update, the battery drains very quickly after being charged, and that performing a restore on the device using iTunes as suggested by Apple, failed to fix the problem.
Some users are being contacted by AppleCare helpdesk reps with a list of 11 follow-up questions focused on the battery. Additionally, an unsigned battery life logger is being offered for download that will collect information about the phone's battery life while it is in use.
Using various App Store applications, Push or Exchange e-mail, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and other features can drain an iPhone battery a lot faster than regular use. However, the users complaining of the issue (mostly iPhone 3GS users) can't seem to get the problem solved by disabling features, system restores or other common suggestions from Apple support.
Vodafone, the world's largest mobile phone operator (in terms of revenue), has inked a new deal with Warner Music Group that completes its collection of deals with major music labels.
The Warner deal will see music from artists such as James Blunt being made available by Vodafone without any copy protection mechanism included that would not just make copying harder, but also lock music to certain devices.
The operator had previously signed deals with the EMI group, Universal Music Group and Sony Music. Vodafone is now the first global mobile phone operator that will offer over-the-air downloads of music from all four major record companies.
"The response to the DRM-free offering in all the markets where it has launched has been incredibly enthusiastic,"saidPieter Knook, Vodafone Internet Services Director. "Our customers love ... the flexibility that DRM-free on mobile gives them."
The record labels continue to seek out new deals where DRM is now negotiable, as it tries to fill revenue gaps created by falling CD sales, rising piracy and other economic factors since the start of the century.
Microsoft's Bing search engine took more market share from Google Inc. during August, according to new data. A research note from JPMorgancited data from industry tracker comScore to show that Microsoft's search share had grown from 8.9 percent in July, to 9.3 percent in August in the United States.
The Bing search engine was launched by the Redmond giant in June 2009.
Google's share of the search market in the United States in August only declined by 0.01 percent - standing at about 64.6 percent - whereas the overall U.S. search market volume increased 15.5% from July. The U.S. search market volume increased 19.2 percent compared to August 2008.
Yahoo Inc. took second place behind Google, with a market share of 19.3 percent, almost unchanged from July.
Seagate has shipped the new Barracuda XT hard drive with 2TB of storage capacity, 64MB cache, spindle speed of 7200RPM and its most notable feature of SATA 3.0 - or put another way - up to 6Gb/s transfer rate. Of course, in order to benefit from the SATA interface in the drive, you will need a compatible motherboard, such as an Intel P55-equipped motherboard.
The drive is, of course, backward compatible with older revisions of the SATA interface, meaning you can buy one and avoid paying for the latest motherboards, like those shown off recently at the Intel Developer Forum in San Francisco, until you are ready. The 2TB capacity is also an attractive feature, but Seagate was beaten to that goal by Western Digital.
Nevertheless, it is the second Seagate 2TB drive, with the Barracuda LP announced in April (with spindle speed of just 5900RPM for low power consumption). Seagate expects the new drives to be used in high performance servers or high end gaming rigs for the near future. However, it's $299 price tag might ruin its appeal for the moment.
At the Samsung Mobile Solutions Forum 2009 in Taipei, ArcSoft showed off its PowerMobia Mobile Broadcast TV application. It is designed for users to watch live TV broadcasts on their portable devices. It supports a variety of standards including T-DMB/DAB, DVB-H, DVB-T, One Segment, and CMMB. The Mobile Broadcast TV solution is offered either as a consumer-ready application, fully developed and ready to use, or as an Application Development Kit (ADK).
"ArcSoft works closely with Samsung LSI to bring TV entertainment onto mobile devices," said David Cao, ArcSoft's VP and General Manager of Mobile Group. "We are honored to be the only software vendor chosen to demonstrate broadcast TV solution in Samsung Mobile Solutions Forum 2009, an event to discuss present and future trend of mobile solutions. We look forward to further success in our collaboration with Samsung LSI."
This solution includes full software stack such as audio and video codecs, ESG/EPG, tuning and scanning, and integration with conditional access (CA) solutions. Advanced TV functions such as time-shift playback and PVR features are also provided.
A Cuban man has been freed after being sentenced to two years in prison for posting a YouTube video protesting a food shortage in the country. Juan Carlos Gonzalez Marcos was sentenced last month after the video had receiver 450,000 views since it was posted in April. Instead, he was sent to a psychiatric hospital for three weeks of treatment for alcoholism.
"It's a corrective decision very unusual for a government known for its rigidity," said Elizardo Sanchez, spokesman for the independent Cuban Commission on Human Rights. He said it was likely the result of "international public opinion." Gonzalez was originally seen drunk in a video where he pushed away a person being interviewed about reggaeton.
"What we need here is a little bit of jama," he shouted (jama being slang for food). "We need food, we're hungry here. Listen to what Panfilo tells you from Cuba: food." He then published a video on YouTube, sober, where he recanted the message. On August 4 he was detained by police and sentenced the following week for two years for "dangerousness."
Microsoft Corp. has filed a number of lawsuits against companies that use malicious advertisements in order to trick Windows users into installing useless "security" software. Scareware ads generally appear as system scan utilities, which report that they have found critical problems, and suggest the user simply "click to fix the problem". On click, the user is brought to a website selling fake anti-malware utilities.
In many cases, the software they receive is not only fake, but malicious in nature. The credit card numbers used to buy the software are then often used for fraudulent purposes later on or sold on to scammers, along with all the personal information offered up by the concerned victim. Recently, the New York Times website was tricked into running a scareware advertisement, which made headlines.
"These guys have decided to go full-court press on this, because it's obviously very profitable," said Paul Ferguson, a researcher with antivirus vendor Trend Micro. Microsoft's round of lawsuits target DirectAd Solutions, Soft Solutions, qiweroqw.com, ote2008.info and ITmeter, but they are "John Doe" lawsuits - that is Microsoft of the identities of the owners yet.
The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) has appealed to regulator Ofcom to be allowed to use encryption on Freeview HD data to prevent piracy. Of course, the request was immediately criticized as under licensing rules, the BBC is not allowed to encrypt video or audio streams. However, the BBC is requesting it be allowed to encrypt the data associated with TV listings, which in effect will stop set-top boxes from decoding TV content.
"We are committed to ensuring that public service content remains free to air i.e. unencrypted," the broadcaster said in a statement. "However, HD content holders have begun to expect a degree of content management on the Freeview HD platform and therefore broadcasters have recognised that a form of copy protection is needed."
A vocal critic of the plan is Labour MP Tom Watson, who says the plan results in limiting consumer choices. "In an attempt to satisfy the fears of powerful rights holders, the BBC will prohibit millions of people from programming their existing set top boxes," he in a blog entry. "If implemented this will make it difficult to view or record HDTV broadcasts with free software. Where's the consumer interest in that settlement?"
On the day of its release in the United States, Microsoft confirmed that the Zune HD media player will function as a games device, with 3D versions of Project Gotham Racing: Ferrari Edition, Vans Sk8: Pool Service and Audiosurf: Tilt expected to become available by the end of the year. The games will be available from the Zune Marketplace, along with applications for a variety of services including Twitter, MSN and Facebook.
"With today's announcement, the Zune business is growing into a comprehensive entertainment service that's no longer tied to any one screen or device," said Enrique Rodriguez, corporate vice president of the TV, video and music business at Microsoft. "Zune lets consumers connect to their music, TV shows and movie content and enjoy it on the three screens they use every day."
Users have access to a wide range of multimedia through the Zune software running on a PC, or over a WiFi connection if it is available. The Zune HD costs $219.99 for the 16GB version and $289.99 for the 32GB version. It is only currently available in the United States with no plans to release to any other territory being announced yet, but Microsoft will be bringing the brand to Europe when "Zune starts to deliver video content to users through the Xbox Live Video Marketplace".
Check our review of the device here: Unboxing the Zune HD
Iowa senator Tom Harkin recently became chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, following the death of Senator Ted Kennedy. On Monday, Harkin vowed to look into the possibilities of cancer risks from mobile phone use. He said he was concerned that nobody was able to definitively prove that mobile phones could not cause cancer.
"I'm reminded of this nation's experience with cigarettes. Decades passed between the first warnings about smoking tobacco and the final definitive conclusion that cigarettes cause lung cancer," Harkin said. It is estimated that 4 billion people worldwide use mobile phones regularly.
Harkin called a hearing of the Appropriations Committee's Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education, to examine the issue on Monday. "I will pursue this beyond this panel, with the National Institutes of Health," he said afterward.
However, Harkin should be aware that an enormous amount of research has been conducted already on this issue, and no link has ever been found to prove that mobile phones do cause cancer. Simply saying that nobody has been able to disprove it does not make it more plausible, and it is slightly concerning at least that an elected Senator would pursue something on the grounds that nobody could disprove its existence - but it isn't surprising.
A leaked Toys R Us catalog has sparked reports that Nintendo will drop the price of the Wii console in the United States to $199, a cut of $50 from the price tag. The new price is expected to take effect by September 27, according to Kotaku.
The leaked Toys R Us catalog reflects a previous alleged upcoming Wal-Mart advertisement that appeared to indicate the same price drop.
The Wii has remained at its $249.99 price tag, costing more than an Xbox 360 Arcade and now just $50 short of a PlayStation 3 (PS3) console. The Wal-Mart advertisement gave the impression that the price drop would come a bit later than the 27th, but if it is official then it won't be long before it is announced.
"Nintendo does not comment on rumors and speculation," the company said to Kotaku when asked to verify the price cut.
Swedish Internet Service Provider (ISP), Black Internet, was ordered by a Stockholm court to cut off the Pirate Bay from its service or face a fine of up to 500,000 kronor per day.
Black Internet complied with the order, which forced the Pirate Bay to relocate in order to get back online. At the time, Black Internet's CEO Victor Möller said that the company would not appeal the verdict.
However, the company has had a change of heart. "This is a very important question for all ISPs and we can't just lay down,"Möller said, confirming to IDG that the company would appeal the decision after all.
The reasons given for not appealing the verdict at first were the typical reasons; the possible costs, time and other resources it would take to fight it.
"The district court made a very controversial decision. The entire ISP business needs some clarity in this matter. A door has been opened and we don't know what's behind it," he said yesterday.
The news of the appeal comes just days after Global Gaming Factory was removed form the stock exchange after being found guilty of serious infringements. Despite that, GGF's boss Hans Pandeya said the company still plans to buy the Pirate Bay.
According to data released by iSuppli, Intel Corp. has built on its lead in the global microprocessor market. Intel received 81 percent of all revenue made from microprocessors in the second quarter of 2009; a 2 percent rise compared to the figures from last year.
It represented the highest level it has had in almost four years, after achieving an 82 percent share in the third quarter of 2005.
Both Intel and Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) reported lower revenues than a year earlier because of a decline in PC shipments. Intel benefited as the global PC market began to recover, according to iSuppli analyst Matthew Wilkins.
Because AMD's average pricing for a microprocessor was lower than that of 2008, it did not gain from the small sequential rise in sales of new PCs.
While Intel saw strong demand for products in all segments, only the netbook segment provided Intel with any growth over the previous year, at about 13 percent. Last month, the chip-maker upped its third-quarter sales forecast due to stronger than expected demand for its processors.
A federal judge has dismissed a 2007 lawsuit brought against online video site Veoh Networks Inc. by Universal Music Group. The lawsuit alleged that Veoh was aiding and abetting copyright infringement on its video service. However, U.S. District Judge Howard Matz on Friday disagreed with Universal Music Group and found that Veoh was taking reasonable steps to prevent and take down infringing videos uploaded by users.
Veoh CEO Dmitry Shapiro welcomes the judge's decision as a "great victory". The lawsuit costs the company millions of dollars in defense fees. "We've been dragging a giant boulder on a chain. This frees us,"Shapiro said. "This lawsuit was simply Universal's attempt to prevent innovation and shut down the company."
Universal said it will appeal the decision to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. "The balance between copyright holders and technology that Congress sought in enacting the DMCA has been upended by this decision," Universal said in a statement. Settlement talks between the two over the past couple of years have always amounted to nothing.
SanDisk Corporation unveiled its new Extreme Pro CompactFlash memory cards on Monday, designed for professional photographers and other pro-users. The new cards on offer from SanDisk range in capacity from 16GB to 64GB, with write speeds that reach as high as 90MB/s, due to the SanDisk Power Core Controller's dual-lane architecture and software algorithms.
"The new SanDisk Extreme Pro CompactFlash line is the direct result of SanDisk's passion, commitment, and break-through engineering innovation to provide best-in-class flash memory cards for professional photography," said Eric Bone, vice president, retail product marketing, SanDisk. "The SanDisk Power Core Controller delivers unmatched write speed and reliability, providing photographers with a spectacular combination of performance, capacity and peace of mind that images are safely stored."
SanDisk Extreme Pro CompactFlash cards are fully compatible with any camera, card reader or other device that supports CompactFlash cards. A SanDisk Extreme Pro ExpressCard Adapter is optimized to take advantage of the SanDisk Extreme Pro CompactFlash card's read speed. The reader carries an MSRP of $49.99 and will be available in late October on SanDisk.com and at select retailers.
If you think back a few short years, you might remember a very controversial copy protection technology (XCP) used on a number of Sony BMGCD titles. The DRM used a rootkit to bury itself deep into the operating system and it was very hard to remove. Sony BMG settled a case with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) in the United States over the incident, but it stands as the biggest example of DRM going too far.
The incident still is causing ripples however. A German court has ordered a retailer to pay compensation to a man who has claimed financial losses due to the DRM. He had put a CD with the anti-piracy software on it into a number of his computers over time and the end result eventually was many hours dealing with virus alerts, attempted removals and restoring lost data.
He claimed that the incident caused him to lose man hours dealing with the situation, and sued over lost income. He claimed $2,200 in damages should be paid to him as a result of the rootkit infection, which came from an Anastacia CD. The German court ordered the retailer to pay the plaintiff about $1,750 in damages, according to Heise.de (German source).
Academics at the University of Warwick have taken advantage of the Xbox 360 GPU chip's parallel processing abilities to crunch data as part of scientific study. The Warwick team harnessed a single Xbox 360 Graphical Processing Unit (GPU) to model how electrical signals in the heart moved around damaged cardiac cells. It is an example of how technology being used for gaming can also be used to perform functions vital to modern research at a fraction of the cost.
The PlayStation 3's technology has also been used by researchers to build powerful number-crunching clusters for relatively low costs. Dr Simon Scarle, a researcher on the team, a researcher on the Warwick team, previously worked as a software engineer a Microsoft's Rare studio, which enabled him to tap into the power of GPU technology.
"You don't quite get the full whammy of a cluster, but its close," he said. "Instead of pumping out stunning graphics, it's reworked; in the case of my research, rather than calculating the position of a structure and texture it's now working out the different chemical levels in a cell."
He believes it is the first time that such a project has been carried out with chips from the Xbox 360. He believes that it is entirely possible to link many Xbox's together, in a similar way that has been done with the PS3. "It could be done, but you would have to go over the internet - through something like Xbox live - rather than a standard method," he said.
The Recording Industry Association of Japan (RIAJ) is pushing for an agreement with music download sites and other entities in Japan that would see digital rights management (DRM) copy protection software being placed on mobile phones in the country. In Japan, handsets are branded, supplied and managed by the network operators themselves. Every year, about 330 million tracks are sold legally and delivered over-the-air in Japan.
It is estimated that as many as 400 million tracks are shared illegally each year. The Financial Times reported the story, citing anonymous participants in the talks. If the plan were to go ahead, when a user attempts to play a song on a mobile phone, the device would first consult online servers to check whether the file was legitimate.
If it wasn't legitimate, then the song simply wouldn't play. If the companies involved came to an agreement soon, then the technology could be rolled out in the country as early as 2011. Of course, there are some big questions that need to be asked about its practicality. What about legally "ripped" tracks from a purchased CD? How could they possibly be verified - or would they simply not be allowed to play on the phone either? What about free music?
Another Guide has been added to our collection in the latest round of additions and updates. This one shows how to use an application called Synergy to control multiple computer systems with the same keyboard and mouse. In the guide it is used to provide a dual-screen setup with an older computer/monitor and a spare laptop. Moving control from one system to the next is as simple as moving the pointer off of the side of the screen.
Synergy also allows you to share a clipboard across multiple systems too (text and bitmap data work fine). The only thing necessary is that both systems are connected to the same network and firewalls do not block their access to the network. It can be a useful program for a free dual-screen setup.
It is cross-platform (runs on Windows, Linux and Mac) but we have kept the Linux and Mac off of the guide for now because there are some limitations that the Synergy team is currently working out. The project does have good goals however, and for now, it works very well. Time and time again, adding a second screen to your workspace is suggested to significantly boost your productivity.
According to a report in the Sunday Telegraph, Germany group Deutsche Telekom is on the verge of submitting a bid for the third largest mobile phone operator in the United States, Sprint Nextel.
With Sprint Nextel's market valuation topping 10.6 billion, Deutsche Telekom would surely need to call on a cash injection from shareholders, among whom is the German government itself with a 32 percent stake.
The report cites sources familiar with the matter as saying the company will make a bid for Sprint within the coming weeks.
The news comes after Deutsche Telekom's T-Mobile business in the UK announced a merger with France Telecom's Orange UK arm, which would result in the largest provider in the mobile phone market in Britain.
The report states that neither Deutsche Telekom or Sprint Nextel would provide a comment on the story.
The NPD Group followed up its recent sales figures for the U.S. games industry in the month of August with a new study titled "Kids & Cross-Entertainment Behaviors." It suggests that a way for the games industry to recover from a recent slump in sales would be to increase targeting of the 12-and-under demographic. In the first half of 2009, kids of 12 and under accounted for 24 percent of games industry sales.
Households with kids in the age group account for 45 percent of total industry sales. The study notes that 57 percent of kids aged between 2 and 12 play games, while 62 percent use a computer.
"According to the US Census Bureau, there are 53.4 million [kids] ages 12 and under in the US, accounting for 17 percent of the population," NPD analyst Anita Fraziersaid as part of the study. "Yet for many industries, games included, they account for a much larger portion of total sales."
Frazier also noted that the "Tween" demographic is a good target, with 75 percent in the age group playing games regularly.
A European Union investigation into online retailers that sell electronic goods has found that over half of the 369 websites checked were breaking European laws and regulations that exist to protect consumers. The sites sell mobile phones, DVD players and games consoles in 28 European countries (all EU member states except Slovakia - and also included Norway and Iceland).
"We know from the level of complaints coming into European Consumer Centres that this is a real problem area for consumers," said EU consumer commissioner Meglena Kuneva. "We discovered that more than half of the retailers selling online electronic goods are letting consumers down."
200 of the sites were chosen because of their size (largest 200), and the extras were chosen because they were subjects of past complaints. 203 of the 369 are now facing further investigation. Two-thirds (66 percent) failed to explain that consumers had the right to return a product within 7 days of receiving it without having to provide a reason, or that a faulty product must be repaired or replaced for at least two years after purchase - regardless of manufacturer warranty.
Porn companies from the United States and Japan have been very disappointed with the outcome of a complaint made against 10,000 Internet users in South Korea they accused of pirating their content. Prosecutors only managed to charge 10 people with breach of copyright following the complaint. The porn companies have come back and let their grievances known, and now plan to re-file the complaint next week, against 65,000 alleged violators.
The companies allege that the pirates have exploited their content for profit. "Now, we've drawn up a new list of some 65,000 users who fit this guideline," lawyer Kim Han-Seo said. "We'll see whether the prosecutors will press charges against them all." He said that some users had managed to earn up to 30 million won ($24,170) from other users "clicking on the pirated content."
If that allegation is true, then it is certainly a different offense than sharing files for free. Kim went on to explain their displeasure at the fact that South Korean authorities had acted swiftly and decisively after a local mainstream Blockbuster, Haeundae, leaked onto the Internet and was downloaded 100,000 times after.
"We believe that the prosecution should not be discriminatory in applying copyright laws,"he said. "Illegal copying and distribution run rampant in Korea because it is one of the world's most wired countries. We decided to take legal action to minimize our past business losses and to protect anticipated future profits."
We've been working on updating some of our stone-age guides (yes, we get the complaints ;-) ) and adding a few new ones as well, for anyone who is interested. Decided just to mention a couple here that were written as a result of recommendation. The first one uses a freeware utility to download Windows Updates for any Windows OS after 2000 (not 7 just yet), make an ISO and burn to disc.
The disc (or alternatively USB) will provide an automated install then on a Windows machine. It's a very useful program if computer repairs are part of your business. It also can download all updates for Microsoft Office 2000, XP, 2003 or 2007 and automate the installation.
The second is just an update to a simple guide for saving YouTube videos to your hard drive. I had been asked about saving YouTube HD videos and remembered a simple JavaScript bookmark I had set just to do that, so I added it as a second page to the guide. I looked for the original source but found it has been scattered pretty far across the Internet, so I couldn't find it anymore (so kudos, whoever you are).
It was something of a mystery as to why Apple's latest changes to the popular iPod Touch did not include a video camera as expected, while the iPod nano did. Rumors and a mounting pile of evidence before the September 9 "Rock and Roll" event pointed toward the camera being a certain upgrade, but when the unveiling happened, it turned out that not a whole lot seemed to have changed for the iPod Touch.
However, inside the new iPod Touch, there is space that seems to have been deliberately left for a Nano-like camera that would have been positioned exactly where it was expected to be. A teardown by iFixit revealed the camera space. "It appears that Apple left in room for a camera in the top of the device," the solutions provider said. "There is a 6mm x 6mm x 3mm space between the Broadcom chip and the wireless antenna. There isn't enough depth for an iPhone-style autofocus still camera, but just enough room for the camera that Apple used in the 5th generation iPod nano."
A recent "tweet-tirade" from Courtney Love following the likeness of deceased Nirvana front-man, Kurt Cobain, appearing in the latest installment of the Guitar Hero gaming franchise, included a message of intent to sue Activision. Love claims she never agreed to Cobain's final appearance in the video-game, in particular the possibility to have his character lip-sync to Bon Jovi.
Most of Love's outburst about the issue were in response to a video posted (see below) by Everett True of Cobain in GH5 and a very critical personal thought on it aimed at Courtney Love and Dave Grohl (ex-Nirvana drummer and current Foo Fighters front-man) - essentially blaming them for the appearance of Cobain in the video game.
"[I] never signed off on the avatar, let alone this f***ing feature!" Courtney wrote. "There's been four breaches of a very strict contract." Her responses to Everett True were defensive and pointed the finger at Grohl. "He was always a bad seed and is still riding the s**t while I take bullets. If there's a hell, he's going. I'm not," she ranted.
The Guitar Hero developers appear to remember a positive experience of working with Courtney. "Courtney supplied us with photos and videos," said Activision vice president Tim Riley. "She picked the wardrobe and hairstyle, which turned out to be the 'Teen Spirit' look, then we went back and forth over changes – some subtle, some not so subtle ... She wanted a sort of athletic definition but not overly so."
Vivid Entertainment, the largest adult entertainment video production company in the world, is interested in distributing pornographic content through the PlayStation Network (PSN), and then possibly with Xbox Live or on the Wii console. Vivid owner, Steve Hirsch, hopes to convince Sony first, having had trouble initially offering Vivid titles on the Blu-ray Disc format.
"Our point is pretty simple," Hirsch told Kotaku. "As long as age verification is in place that (Sony) feels comfortable with we see no reason why adults shouldn't be allowed to access adult movies on the Playstation 3." The company is drafting a formal request that will be sent to Sony Computer Entertainment, but has not yet discussed the prospect with the console maker.
The decision to approach Sony about PSN porn comes after some pornographic content has become available from Japan's DDM.TV on the PS3 console. "They had made it clear in the past they were not interested," Hirsch said. "Now that they have agreed to in some way allow adult films on the Japanese platform we are going to move forward and make a formal request."
Microsoft has confirmed to Ars Technica what the blogosphere has reported as rumor for the past few weeks; Microsoft has no plans to sell the Zune HD portable media player outside of the United States. With the first Zune model, Microsoft only managed to get the Zune as far as Canada. "For the time being the Zune HD device will remain US-only," a Microsoft spokesperson told Ars.
"Right now we are focused on deploying an exciting service in the form of Zune Video to 18 markets. We are looking at potential future hardware experiences for these markets, but do not have anything to announce right now." Microsoft's other Zune models are to be discontinued in favor of the new Zune HD, which comes with 16GB or 32GB capacity.
When Ars asked about a rumored 64GB model, the spokesman said that the company has no plan to develop it right now. "We are constantly looking at other options and evaluating what consumers are looking for," said the Microsoft spokesperson. "That said, we have not announced any plans to offer a larger device."
In a blog post in the Skype Developer Zone, titled "The future of Skype Extras", the company announced that they will shut down the Skype Extras program. Skype will no longer certify any new Extras - though existing Extras will stay certified until their expiration dates. It will continue to distribute applications through the existing Extras Manager in Skype for Windows, but won't add any new Extras.
"Despite the incredible breadth of Extras developed for Skype, simply not enough people were using them to justify our continued support of the Extras programme," the blog post, written by Antoine Bertout, reads. "Unfortunately, effective today, we will shut down the Skype Extras programme."
We will no longer certify new Extras. However, all existing Extras will stay certified until their expiration dates and all unused test tickets will be reimbursed.
We will continue to distribute applications through the existing Extras Manager in Skype for Windows, but will no longer add new Extras.
All public API documents will continue to be maintained.
Skype will continue to support accessories via the Public API.
The Skype shop will continue to feature currently listed Extras.
"It was a tough decision, but we want to assure the community that we focus our time and resources on initiatives that delight our users and help our partners create innovative products for new markets," the blog reads. "While the Extras program didn't work as well as we'd hoped, we still believe there are opportunities for third-party developers to enhance the Skype experience."
The IEEE announced on Friday that its Standards Board has ratified the 802.11n-2009 amendment, designed to help the data communications industry address the escalating demands placed on enterprise, home and public WLANs with the rise of higher-bandwidth file transfers and next-generation multimedia applications. WLANs based on IEEE 802.11 are widely deployed, with more than 1 million units shipping per day.
The 560-page 802.11n amendment, "WLAN Enhancements for Higher Throughput", will enable rollout of significantly more scalable WLANs that deliver 10-fold-greater data rates than previously defined while ensuring co-existence with legacy systems and security implementations.
802.11n increases the data rate from the current 54 Mbit/s to a maximum of 600 Mbit/s. Devices on the market today can support up to 300 Mbit/s (802.11n draft 2.0) by using 2 Spatial Streams at 40 MHz, marketed as "Draft N" devices. The addition of multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) to improve system performance, channel bonding to the physical layer, frame aggregation to the MAC layer, antenna diversity and spatial multiplexing builds upon he older 802.11a, 802.11b and 802.11g standards.
On Friday, Motorola Inc. shares rose 9 percent on the hopes that the new Cliq"Google Phone" could reverse its string of loss making. The phone, which it developed with Google Inc., pleased analysts that believe it might be the key to boosting its failing handset business. The phone's social networking features in particular caught the attention of analysts.
"Our initial take is favorable, and it seems that Motorola is carving out a niche in the crowded smartphone market by focusing on socially minded demographics as opposed to enterprise users or pro-sumers,"RBC analyst Mark Sue said, raising his price target on Motorola shares from $8 to $10.
T-Mobile USA will offer the Cliq in the fourth quarter in the country. Orange planes to sell the phone in Britain and France, while Telefonica will sell it in Spain and America Movil in Latin America. It will be called Dext outside the United States.
Motorola will launch another phone later this year that uses Google's Android software. Some analysts believe that it is Motorola's next big hope to regain market share it lost to Apple, Nokia and Samsung.
An update for the Wii console has caused the BBC iPlayer to stop working on the platform, according to the BBC itself. After the update was released on September 1, forums began to fill with complaints about the iPlayer post-update, which ranged from programmes simply dropping in the middle of viewing, to not working at all.
The system update that has caused the hassle was designed to bring Flash 8 to the Wii's Internet Channel, according to Nintendo. The company was unaware of the BBC iPlayer problems, but the BBC confirmed to Reg Hardware that something definitely went wrong since the update.
"We are currently investigating and hope to resolve the issues with the iPlayer website," the BBC told Reg Hardware. The problem is definitely with the update, since users that haven't applied the update can still use the BBC iPlayer just as before.
Microsoft Corp. has dodged paying Alcatel-Lucent damages of $358 million for patent infringement for now. A federal appeals court rules that Microsoft does not have to pay the damages because of errors in how the damages had been calculated.
Alcatel-Lucent had originally said Microsoft's Outlook and other programs illegally infringed on its patent which covers a method of entering information into fields on a computer screen with no Keyboard.
The U.S. District Court jury had determined that damages Microsoft should pay would have to reflect what the company would have paid up front to license the technology. However, the appeals court said that Alcatel-Lucent had failed to prove that its technology was valuable enough to merit royalties of $358 million.
The court judges told a district court to reconsider the penalty, and in the same ruling, affirmed the underlying verdict against Microsoft, which it claimed was backed by substantial evidence. Alcatel-Lucent said it was disappointed with the court's decision.
A music pirate that was allegedly the head of a piracy syndicate operating across Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific was yesterday sentenced to 15 months jail and 300 hours community service in the Sydney District Court. "These are offences where the deterrence of others is paramount," Judge Colin Charteris said.
"No penalty other than a period of imprisonment is appropriate. What you have done is rob the artists of their work and now you will have to give something back." The man had been convicted on 32 separate charges arising from the illegal manufacturing of more than 50,000 remixed compilation albums.
Judge Charteris said the parliament had made it clear that copyright theft was a serious crime and it was important the courts "protect performers and artists so they can be adequately rewarded for their efforts." The Australian Federal Police and Music Industry Piracy Investigations (MIPI) had broken up the piracy operating, serving 11 warrants across Sydney.
The District Court ordered the jail sentence be conditionally suspended for a period of 3 years.
Starting on Wednesday, Apple pushed out 47 separate fixes for its Mac OS, iPhone and QuickTime products. Some of the fixed issues had the potential to allow attacks seize complete control over a system.
The iPhone updates addresses holes in CoreAudio, WebKit and MobileMail. QuickTime, which is no stranger to security updates, also had several security problems that could allow attackers to hijack a machine. They related to how QuickTime handled manipulated H.264 and MPEG-4 files.
One one of the 47 fixes was for the Snow Leopard operating system (though it was updated to fix other issues with the new OS), only recently released. The single fix only updated the Flash software to the latest and most secure version.
Mozilla Corp. pushed out updates for its Firefox web browsers yesterday to address four separate security bugs and several stability issues. Three of the four security bugs have been considered critical. They involve a memory corruption flaw, a bug with "BrowserFeedWriter" and a TreeColumns dangling pointer vulnerability.
It also addressed several stability bugs, such a tendency for the browser to crash when opening the Bookmarks menu on a Mac.
Changes from Firefox v3.5.2 -> v3.5.3
MFSA 2009-51 Chrome privilege escalation with FeedWriter
MFSA 2009-50 Location bar spoofing via tall line-height Unicode characters
MFSA 2009-47 Crashes with evidence of memory corruption (rv:1.9.1.3/1.9.0.14)
The updated versions are v3.5.3 and v3.0.14, and will automatically be updated by the Firefox software. Alternatively, you can download both versions from AfterDawn.
As predicted, Apple blocked the use of the Palm Pre with iTunes in the latest update for the multimedia application, iTunes 9. Previously, Apple had locked out the Pre handset from iTunes with the iTunes 8.2.1 update. Following the initial block, Palm restored the syncing abilities with the WebOS 1.1.0 update.
The cat and mouse game looks set to continue however, as the Pre is getting a WebOS 1.2 update in the near-future. Before the Pre launched, Palm announced that the new handset would be capable of syncing with the iTunes software. An Apple statement followed, promising that the syncing ability with the Pre won't last very long. It was two months after the launch when Apple blocked it.
Palm wasn't going to sit still over the issue however, and a wrote a letter of protest to the USB Implementers Forum (USB-IF), the non-profit organization that maintains the Universal Serial Bus (USB) specification and promotes the interface. Apple had blocked the Pre from syncing with iTunes by checking the idVendor descriptor when connected.
Speaking to the New York Times, Apple CEO Steve Jobs revealed that the iPod Touch did not get a camera upgrade in the new 2009 iPod line-up for marketing and cost reasons. Basically, Jobs said that Apple is marketing the iPod Touch primarily as a gaming device now, and that it was important to be able to offer a relatively inexpensive portable device to compete in the market - a camera would apparently have caused some problems here.
The cheapest iPod Touch now costs $199, and includes 8GB of storage capacity. However, it should be noted that the latest iPod Nano models got a camera upgrade without having a negative effect on the price. Even outside Apple there are contradictory examples, such as the dual-screen, dual-camera Nintendo DSi, which sells for $170.
More possible bad news for anybody looking to buy an iPod Touch is that it appears the 8GB model might not be getting an upgraded processor and graphics capabilities like the iPhone 3GS, and the new 32GB and 64GB iPod Touch models.
However, most eyes fixed on the Apple event were waiting to hear about what happens now for the iPod line-up. After weeks of rumors and speculation, here it is.
So far at Apple's media event, the company has touted its 30,000,000 iPhone sales figures, 1.8 billion apps downloads, 75,000 apps available, iTunes 9, 100 million accounts with credit cards, 8.5 billion songs sold, Home media sharing and more. One notable announcement is the current estimated share that Apple's iPod music players have of the MP3 player market.
As things stand, Apple says it has 73.8 percent of the market, followed by 18 percent held by "other", SanDiskat 7.2 percent and Microsoft at 1.1 percent share. Apple's own data shows that 50 percent of new iPod sales are to new customers (didn't previously own one) and the total number of iPod sales is closing in on 225 million units.
The fastest growing model is the iPod Touch, which has sold over 20 million units since it was unveiled two years ago by the company. This means that 40 percent of the "iPhone platform" is accounted for with the iPod Touch (20 million sales for Touch, 30 million sales for iPhone).
Apple CEO Steve Jobs arrived at the "Rock n' Roll" event today and was greeted with a long standing ovation from the audience. Speaking about his health experience in the past couple of years, Jobs credited his life to a man in his 20s who had died in a car crash, and was an organ donor. "I'm very happy to be here today with you all," he said, before thanking Tim Cook and his executive team for the support and how well they ran things in his absence.
Anyway, on to other things. The first revelations include that iPhone's new milestone; it has sold 30 million units in its two years of availability. It's dedicated App Store has 75,000 applications available for the device and has so far served a whopping 1.8 billion downloads. If updates were to be counted too, it would be "a few times higher," according to Phil Schiller.
The iPhone 3.1 OS is also ready, and includes among its features, a port of "Genius", which will now be used to recommend what application you might like. It will be available as a free download from today. The recent rumor about record labels offering pre-made ringtones is also true; over 30,000 pre-made ringtones will be available for $1.29 each.
Some pirates of the new Eidos title, Batman: Arkham Asylum (PC version) might be surprised when they realize a certain "problem" in the game prevents them from advancing through it properly. While some pirates might have thought the copy protection mechanisms were beaten when the game loaded properly, Eidos has (at least) one more trick up its sleeve that probably wasn't suspected.
On the Eidos Forums, a user Cheshirec_the_cat might have gotten a surprise with the response from an Administration over the problem he has had with the game.
"Hi!
I've got a problem when it's time to use Batman's glide in the game. When I hold , like it's said to jump from one platform to another, Batman tries to open his wings again and again instead of gliding. So he fels down in a poisoning gas. If somebody could tel me, what should I do there." Cheshirec_the_cat asked on a new thread.
After one user told him to "try buying the game" and commented that it has not even been released publicly for PC yet, an administrator, Keir, summed up the problem for him.
"The problem you have encountered is a hook in the copy protection, to catch out people who try and download cracked versions of the game for free.Read more...
Microsoft Corp. has been hit with another lawsuit over the Windows Genuine Advantage (WGA) software that is used as an anti-piracy tool for Windows XP. The latest lawsuit - filed in a Washington district court - also makes claims of false advertising and privacy law violations. The false advertising possibly refers to how the WGA tools are offered as security updates and not anti-piracy tools.
Mirroring past lawsuits, the complaint also addresses how WGA phones home to Microsoft on a daily basis with IP addresses and other private information of users. This combined with an alleged difficulty in removing WGA from a system leads the complaint to suggest that it acts no different than spyware.
Two lawsuits filed in 2006 over the same issues have not amounted to any decisions yet, and since then Microsoft has extended modified versions of WGA to Windows Vista, Windows 7 and Microsoft Office. Online validation is generally required to download updates for the products from Microsoft's servers.
It has also come under fire in the past for having allegedly high levels of false positives, where genuine copies of Windows XP were flagged as counterfeit. If that should happen to you, then maybe this tool will help.
Microsoft's monthly Patch Tuesday included five updates this time that address some critical bugs in the newer versions of the operating system. Microsoft did point out, however, that none of the issues apply to the final version of the soon-to-be-released Windows 7 operating system. However, for those running Windows Vista, Windows Server 2003 and Windows Server 2008, get your updates.
Two of the flaws involve serious vulnerabilities in networking components of Windows Vista, Server 2003 and 2008 which could let malicious software spread from computer to computer. In total, the five bulletins address eight different vulnerabilities. Those that are most likely to be exploited widely exploit the way in which Windows handles ASF and MP3 multimedia files.
The International Trade Commission (ITC) sided with Funai Electric Co back in April by ordering a list of companies that includes Vizio, AmTran, TPV Technology, Top Victory Electronics, Envision and Proview International to stop importing and manufacturing screens that violated patented technology. While the order was made in April, Funai complained last month that infringement was ongoing.
"The commission has determined to institute a formal enforcement proceeding to determine whether the respondents are in violation of the commission's limited exclusion order and cease and desist orders issued in the investigation, and what, if any, enforcement measures are appropriate," the panel said in a statement on Tuesday.
Funai has been involved in several legal disputes in the United States with companies that manufacture or import digital screens. It's own customer service has come under sizable criticism too, mostly to do with its warranty service not functioning as advertised.
Concept code has been published that takes advantage of an unpatched vulnerability in Microsoft's implementation of Server Message Block (SMB), which is a protocol used in File and Printer sharing over a network. Microsoft's Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008 and Windows 7 are all currently affected by the unpatched vulnerability, while Windows 2000 and Windows XP are not affected by it at all.
The concept exploit uses the flaw to force Windows machine into the infamous Blue Screen of Death (BSOD). According to security researchers at the Internet Storm Center (ISC), the problem is defeated by using basic firewall protection. "The exploit needs no authentication, only file sharing enabled with one packet to create a BSOD," ISC researchers warn. "We recommend filtering access to port TCP 445 with a firewall."
Microsoft issued a number of security updates during the day to address some serious vulnerabilities in the Windows operating systems. The SRV2.SYS (SMB) file vulnerability that can cause a BSOD was not included, likely due to the timing of the exploit code's release, but Microsoft did reveal that it is investigating the issue.
Netgear has launched the latest multimedia set-top box in its Digital Entertainer Live line-up. The EVA2000 is an easy-to-use and affordable Internet set-top box that enables viewers to play their digital media collections, YouTube videos and a wide range of other Internet content on big-screen TVs. Users can also view newly released pay-per-view movies from Roxio CinemaNow.
"People are amassing a huge amount of their own downloaded and personal digital music, photos, and videos, as well as consuming more and more Internet video," said Phillip Pyo, NETGEAR's director of product marketing for connected home entertainment products. "According to comScore's Video Metrix service, between January 2007 and July 2009, there was a 331 percent jump in the number of minutes of video watched per average viewer per month. It went from 2 hours, 31 minutes to 8 hours, 20 minutes.
The vast majority of people are still watching these videos on small computer screens, so it's logical to assume that the amount of time spent will continue to increase as devices such as the Digital Entertainer Live make it even easier to watch online video on HDTVs. NETGEAR is thrilled to offer an affordable, content-rich, and easy-to-set-up and -use solution that bridges this gap and enables people to fully enjoy their home media collections and online video from popular Internet sites on the best screen in their home -- their big-screen TVs."
At a news conference in Taipei, Intel showed off a range of new stuff, including several high-performance desktop and low-cost server processors, the new single chip P55chipset and a range of products from third party manufacturers that support the new Intel technology. On the processor side, the company showed off two new Core i7 processors, Core i7-860 and Core i7-870, and the first Core i5 processor, Core i5-750.
The new desktop chips were formerly codenamed "Lynnfield," and are based on Intel's Nehalem microarchitecture, providing very high performance for digital media, productivity, gaming and other resource hungry tasks. All three are Halogen-free, Lead-free and feature Intel Turbo Boost Technology. The Core i7 processors also support Intel Hyper-Threading Technology.
The new Core i7 and i5 processors are the first Intel processors to integrate both a 16-lane PCI Express 2 graphics port and two-channel memory controller, enabling all input/output and manageability functions to be handled by the single-chip Intel P55 Express Chipset. The P55 Express Chipset is the first from Intel to be composed of one chip, not two.
Japanese mobile operators may be forced into packet inspection on their mobile networks to identify and cut off pirates. A user who was found to be sharing infringing files over the mobile network would be warned about the activity and then disconnected if it persisted, or alternatively their phone could be rendered unable to play music.
In Japan, handsets are branded, supplied and managed by the network operators themselves. Every year, about 330 million tracks are sold legally and delivered over-the-air in Japan. It is estimated that as many as 400 million tracks are shared illegally each year.
The prospect of cutting off repeat offenders is expected to be discussed next week by the Recording Industry Association of Japan (RIAJ) and the Telecommunications Carriers Association.
Representatives of the Internal Affairs ministry will reportedly also be present. Japan just recently had a much-publicized change of government, and observers will be wondering if the new administration's need to make friends in the industry will influence a decision in favor of the motion.
Asus is planning to bring two ebook readers to the market to take Amazon and Sony head on, according to reports. Asus is one of the world's biggest consumer electronics companies, and in the last couple of years it played a large part in the rise of the netbook, a low-cost alternative to a laptop. Now Asus is planning to bring affordable ebook readers to the market to undercut the Kindle.
The Times Online quotes Jerry Shen, CEO, as source. The report says that the company is expecting to offer two different devices, a budget ebook reader and a more feature-rich premium ebook reader. The readers will have a hinged spine with two screens to emulate a book, with touchscreen controls to flick through pages.
While other ebook readers are offered with a monochrome screen, Asus' ebook readers could show full color images of the pages. Some other possible uses for the ebook reader that are mentioned are using Skype with an available mic and speaker, or viewing webpages.
AppleInsider cites a reliable source that has suggested that either camera-equipped iPods won't be shown at the media event on September 9 hosted by Apple, or that they will be unveiled but won't be available to buy for some time. According to the source, Apple has experience technical problems with the cameras hardware.
Pictures of iPod Touch and Nano cases surfaced online in recent months with holes for a camera lens present in them. No pictures showed up of cases designed for the iPod Classic, which is equipped with a traditional HDD instead of flash memory storage.
Reports have suggested that some iPods in the line-up were to be fitted with the same 3.2 megapixel CMOS image sensors that are used with the iPhone 3GS model. The report of technical problems from AppleInsider also mirrored another report published on Monday by Hardmac, the English-language version of French Apple news site Macbidouille.
Psystar, the infamous Apple clone maker and public enemy number one for Apple at this time, has revealed in a blog post that it is working on ensuring the recently released OS X Snow Leopard operating system will run on its products. However, it has urged users not to attempt to upgrade to the new operating system yet until Psystar can confirm a safe way to install the new operating system.
"Our development team had been eagerly awaiting the arrival of the official release the next iteration of OS X," the blog post reads. "We have developed new virtualization technologies to allow our Open Computers to interface with the all new Mac OS X like never before, ensuring a seamless computing experience. We support Snow Leopard on all new Psystar machines and we're already taking orders for computers with the latest OS from Apple which will begin to ship next week.
"We ask you not attempt to install the new OS X as it may cause harm to your computer, resulting in a possible re-installation of Leopard OS 10.5 and a loss of data. As with all previous software updates to the OS, Psystar meticulously tests and retests all software updates to confirm their compatibility with older Psystar machines."
Mozilla's recent product roadmap has dated the release of Firefox 4.0, the next major update of the popular web browser, for October - November 2010. The version will offer a new user interface and multi-touch gesture support. Of course before Firefox 4.0 is released, there will be many upgrades set to be released of the browser, such as Firefox 3.6 and Firefox 3.7.
The releases made before Firefox 4.0 will improve Javascript handling performance, improved "form completion tools", pageload enhancements and more. This report however is currently classed only as a draft, and therefore it could change between now and the time that Firefox 4.0, or any of the in-between versions are released.
One thing that is expected with Firefox 4.0 however, is for every individual tab open in the browser window to have its own separate process, like they do in Google Chrome. This reduces the risks of losing a browser session when you have multiple tabs open.
Spotify recently made its way onto mobile phones with the iPhone and Android applications for premium users. However, Spotify put up an article explaining that they didn't, "want to leave out all those people who have a phone that runs the S60 mobile platform." A video was posted on the site showing a demo of Spotify running on S60, which is currently in development.
"It's an early version and we still have a fair bit of work to do before we can release it but we wanted to give you a little idea of what to expect," a note on the page reads. "And like our other mobile apps, Spotify for S60 will be available for our premium subscribers."
On it's U.S. PlayStation Blog, Sony Computer Entertainment America (SCEA) has confirmed that it is aware and is actively investigation isolated reports of PS3s behaving badly after the latest firmware, v3.0, has been installed. PS3 3.0 included a lot of aesthetic changes to the XMB as well as the addition of "What's New, Status Indicator, Friends List, PlayStation Store Shortcuts, Personalization and improved Trophies."
However, since it was released, there has been numerous reports made on forums about the console acting badly after the latest firmware update has been installed. "SCEA is aware of reports that PS3 owners are experiencing isolated issues with their PS3 system since installing the most recent system software update (v3.00)," the blog reads.
It continues: "Rest assured that we are looking into the matter and will provide an update here as soon as possible. We apologize for any inconvenience, as it’s our mission to deliver the best consumer experience on all PlayStation platforms."
CyberLink Corp. has announced the availability of MediaShow 5, which helps users to easily organize, fix/restore and share photo and video content with each other. MediaShow 5 is created for consumers to handle the large amounts of digital content that we hoard nowadays, due to the increased usage of digital still cameras and camcorders, often built into mobile phones and other equipment.
"Proliferation of video and photo capture devices such as affordable cameras, camcorders and even cell phones, allows consumers to capture their life stories anytime, anywhere. In fact, we are taking more videos and photos than any generation," said Alice H. Chang, CEO of CyberLink. "MediaShow 5 incorporates the latest video and imaging technologies to help consumers organize, fix, and enhance their media, and then share their life stories."
MediaShow 5 adds many new enhancements for users, including Face Recognition that can make organize/indexing photos much easier, easy solutions for fixing photos and videos captured in poor conditions (low light for example), hardware acceleration (when available) for CPU and GPU to speed up not only the manipulation of content but also conversions of it into formats for specific players and more.
Nokia has revealed its first Internet modem supporting Long Term Evolution (LTE) technology. LTE is generally marketed as 4G, since it is the last step toward the 4th generation of radio technologies designed for mobile networks. It is a set of enhancements to the Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UTMS) to be introduced in 3GPP Release 8.
Nokia's Internet Modem RD-3 supports interoperability with GSM/EDGE and WCDMA/HSPA to make the most out of the global GSM and WCDMA reach right from the start. "Nokia is committed to supporting industry activities aimed at maturing LTE technology to enable the first commercial networks to launch in 2010," says Jani Mäenpää, Project Manager, LTE/SAE Interoperability and Trials, Nokia.
He continued: "Nokia is a founding member in the LTE/SAE Trial Initiative (LSTI) and carries out interoperability testing with a number of network vendors, collaborates with measurement equipment manufacturers and is ready to support operators with their LTE deployment activities. The Nokia Internet Modem RD-3 is used in all these activities."
Following a disastrous week for the PlayStation 3 (PS3) platform in Japan in the week ending August 30th, which witnessed just 1040 unit sales, the PS3 Slim has injected new life into the platform. In the week ending September 6th, sales of the PS3 Slim in Japan jumped to 150,252 units (150,832 units of all PS3 SKUs combined), according to Kotaku.
The sales increase marks the highest PS3 sales in the region to date. In its launch week, the PlayStation 3 (PS3) console sold 88,000 units in Japan. However, the first week sales would have performed much better if it wasn't for unit shortages at the time.
In the UK, the response to the PS3 Slim introduction has also seen a dramatic climb in unit sales for the platform. Chart-Track informed GamesIndustry.biz that sales of the PS3 had jumped 999 percent over the previous week. "The uplift on week 36 on week 35 is plus 999 per cent," revealed Dorian Bloch, director of Chart-Track. "We don't give out the hardware numbers, but never-the-less it's a very large increase."
In Canada (and many other countries), levies are places on the sale of blank media (CDs, DVDs etc.) that are collected and distributed to artists and record companies to make up for lost revenue due to copying. Similar mentions of "iPod tax" that would put levies on MP3 playing hardware depending on the potential storage capacity have also been proposed in several countries in the past few years.
The Canadian Private Copying Collective has paid over $160 million in such levies to 100,000 songwriters, recording artists and record companies since it was established. However, file sharing on the Internet is not covered by any surtax or levy, and it would like the government to change legislation in order to allow it to generate revenue for that too.
If it were to become reality, a government would have to increase the tax on charges for Internet service for "all" users, regardless of whether they download music at all - legally or illegally. Comparing Internet usage to what you can do with a blank CD, the amount of "other possibilities" for practical uses is overwhelmingly larger for the Internet - so this tax would be even more unfair than the blank media levy that punishes all buyers, not just pirates.
According to the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre (CEOP), the vast majority of pedophile activity on the Internet now takes place on public and private P2P networks. Additionally, offenders have become more aware of how law enforcement can track them down, and are exploiting technology made to protect privacy in order to avoid being identified.
"Our focus must now be on tackling this as a priority," CEOP said in its annual report. "The scale and nature of P2P file sharing involving child abuse images is currently impossible to establish. It is a mode of abuse and image distribution that remains largely unseen to the general public and indeed to the victims themselves."
The agency receives very few reports from the public about child abuse images and videos on P2P networks, and instead get the majority of their reports from Internet industry sources and other non-public sources. To avoid detection, offenders are now increasingly using file encryption software to mask the content being shared on P2P networks; even if investigators download the files, they cannot decrypt them to see their contents.
Ocean Blue Software, based in the UK and Hong Kong, has developed "talking" digital TV technology in conjunction with The Royal National Institute of Blind People (RNIB). The technology is developed for set top boxes and televisions, and the developers say millions of people worldwide could gain from an improved experience of TV.
On-screen text such as TV programme guides, digital displays and menus will be brought to life with the power of speech because of the new technology. It is hoped it will be adapted across the consumer technology market, offering real benefits to millions of people with sight problems and different forms of impairment around the world.
The technology is now an IABM Design Awards Candidate for 2009. "We are absolutely thrilled to have been shortlisted for the prestigious award," commented Ocean Blue Software CEO Ken Helps. "Ocean Blue constantly strives to develop innovative solutions for the digital TV industry, so we are very pleased with the nomination and look forward to the awards ceremony next month at IBC Amsterdam."
It is compatible with consumer products, such as televisions, that have screen-based menu systems and converts on-screen text into speech output. "We are really excited by this development as it has the potential to significantly improve the lives of nearly 8 million people in the UK alone. These include the blind, visually impaired, deaf, severely dyslexic and the elderly, who can all benefit from this advance in technology," said Steve Tyler, the RNIB's Head of Innovation and Disability Access Services.
In an Open Letter sent to The Times last week, the heads of the major Internet Service Providers (ISP) in the UK, as well as representatives of the Open Rights Group, Which? and Consumer Focus, all protested to the plans to disconnect "repeat offenders" of P2P piracy from the Internet.
"Consumers must be presumed to be innocent unless proven guilty," the letter read. "We must avoid an extrajudicial 'kangaroo court' process where evidence is not tested properly and accused broadband users are denied the right to defend themselves against false accusations."
The letter acknowledged the industry's legitimate concerns about illegal sharing of copyrighted material, but still said the government's proposals for dealing with the issue are "misconceived, and threaten broadband consumers' rights and the development of new, attractive services".
"Without protections, innocent customers will suffer. Any penalty must be proportionate. Disconnecting users from the internet would place serious limits on their freedom of expression." The proposal to disconnect file-sharers came from the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) in late August.
At IFA in Berlin, Samsung is currently showing off a 7-inch touchscreen remote control that can browse through other TV channels than the one showing on your TV screen. The concept remote needs a second tuner and WiFi link between the two devices for it to work correctly. A user can browser through TV listings on the remote control and watch alternative channels on the 7-inch screen itself.
"The advantage is that if you have a family, your wife [can be] watching one channel, and you can browse on your small device some other channel or zap there without annoying anybody else," said Michael Zöller, a marketing director at Samsung Electronics Europe.
In order to switch the channels being viewed on both, the user can hold down the channel icon on the remote control and then sweep the icon toward the top of the screen, which will send the channel showing on the 7-inch screen, to the big screen main TV set. Since it is just a concept remote control, it has no planned release at the moment.
Toshiba has introduced a new user interface software designed to share content across a home network from a single area. It can connect to a wide variety of multimedia devices and will make it possible to stream videos, music and pictures from devices to TV Sets, laptops, smartphones and media players, all using a simple drag and drop interface.
Toshiba Media Controller can be installed on servers or controllers in the home network to expand multimedia capabilities to all compatible connected devices, which are compliant with DLNA (Digital Living Network Alliance) guidelines.
"As the use of digital content grows in popularity, Toshiba is committed to enable its customers to easily exchange content between the screens and devices they are using in their everyday lives," says Thomas Teckentrup, General Manager, Toshiba Computer Systems Division "The new Toshiba Media Controller represents a major step in making multimedia files easily available on any compatible device on the home network."
The software is designed particularly for the Windows 7 operating system, and will be installed during the fourth quarter on selected Toshiba laptops to begin with.
Nokia's Ovi Store has reached just 10 million downloads in its first three months, according to Kai Oistamo, Nokia's EVP of Devices, with the average user reportedly downloading 6 applications. The tally is a disappointing figure, to say the least, especially when compared against Apple's App Store, which surpassed 100 million downloads in just two months and reached 1.5 billion after a year.
However, there are reasons why Nokia's service hasn't taken off yet. According to Kai, the Ovi Store was marred with performance and other issues right from the start. "We totally underestimated demand on the first day. We had an outage on the first day which was not our plan,"he said.
Users of compatible Nokia devices still also have to download the store to their handsets since it is not yet shipping pre-loaded onto devices. It also lacks the easy interface and usage of the iPhone App store. Niklas Savander, Nokia's EVP of services, said that the company needs to utilize its global footprint to make the store successful.
A report in the New York Times focused on the effects that bandwidth usage with Apple's iPhone have had on the AT&T network over the past couple of years. The report dug up details on the history of the AT&T-iPhone tie-up and has discovered that the wireless carrier has continuously struggled to keep up with demand as more and more iPhones are added to the network.
The AT&T network's problems had led to MMS and tethering features made possible in iPhone 3.0 being delayed. "The result is dropped calls, spotty service, delayed text and voice messages and glacial download speeds as AT&T’s cellular network strains to meet the demand," the report states, and goes on to compare the iPhone's usage of bandwidth on the network to a gas-guzzling Hummer.
To back up the comparison, it claims that the average iPhone user consumes ten times the bandwidth of an average Smarthphone user. This is a problem expected to grow to all networks as the other players keep bringing out new devices to take on Apple's iPhone - soon the problem won't be limited to AT&T.
At Apple's press event next week, the company is expected to add pre-made ringtones for iPhones, available from iTunes. The company is hoping to get a cut of the (strangely) large revenues generated each year through the sale of ringtones. Analysts expect that pre-made ringtones could be available directly from iTunes for about $1.29.
Currently, users can buy tracks from iTunes and pay an additional 99c to get a 30 second clip of the track to use as a ringtone. Apple's new ringtones service would be a higher price at $1.29, but lower when you add the original cost of the track.
Research firm SNL Kagan reported that in 2007, sales of ringtones amounted to $714 million, but fell to $541 million the next year. Perhaps more users are realizing that unless you are using a phone with heavy restrictions that you cannot lift, you can create ringtones rather easily out of your music collection.
AT&T has "soft launched" its own TV portal service, offering TV Shows and feature-length movies to users. The site also promises more content for U-Verse subscribers as it evolves. The site will host content from ABC, CBS, NBC Universal, Bravo, MTV, CNBC, VH1, Universal Studios, PBS, Current, Lionsgate and many more. At the current time, it is clearly still under development with many of its clips and TV episodes listed but still unavailable.
"We have started a soft launch of the AT&T Entertainment site. This site will feature free online content available to any consumer. We're finalizing a few final elements, and we'll share more details on our official launch soon. This site is another step forward for our three-screen strategy to provide more content to more customers across any device."AT&T said in an e-mail statement to customers.
Some feature-length movies available on the new AT&T Entertainment site include Along came Polly, Carlito's Way and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. Available TV shows include ABC's Lost and Ugly Betty, NBC's The Office and CBS' How I Met Your Mother.
Mozilla Corp. has confirmed that with upcoming versions of the Firefox browser, 3.5.3 and 3.0.14, users will be prompted via the "What's New" landing page if they have outdated and possibly insecure versions of Adobe Flash installed. Flash vulnerabilities are used to install malware on the computers of unsuspecting users running versions vulnerable to exploitation.
The "What's New" landing page is generally automatically loaded when new versions of Firefox are installed. Javascript on the page will detect the Flash version installed on the computer and will prompt the user of available updates. A user running an outdated version of Adobe flash would receive the following warning...
Whereas users running the latest/safe version of Adobe Flash software will receive the following message...
"Mozilla will work with other plugin vendors to provide similar checks for their products in the future. Keeping your software up to date remains one of the best things you can do to keep yourself safe online, and Mozilla will continue to look for ways to make that process as easy as possible for its users," a Mozilla blog announcement reads.
China has implemented more rules and restrictions for online music stores in the country. The changes apply to foreign-sourced tracks. The Chinese government will have to approve each song that originates from outside the country before any of the online music stores sell them. This affects all the big Internet companies with presence in China, including Google, Alibaba (Yahoo) and Baidu.
The Ministry of Culture said that the changes would help to weed out bad content and increase regulation on the market. Providers of music services in the country will have to provide the Ministry of Culture with lyrics of all foreign songs, translated to Chinese.
In addition, they will also have to provide evidence that they have the permission of the rights' holders to sell and distribute the songs in the country. This new change will upset the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) and other music trade bodies, particularly since the World Trade Organization recently sided with the United States in a complaint made in 2007 against China over the its system for the import of American media products including music, movies, magazines, books and other products.
Deluxe Digital Studios, an authoring firm which has developed more than 700 BD Live-enabled discs, has said it is very pleased with the pace at which BD Live usage is growing. Over 25 million people have used BD-Live enabled discs to connect to, and download content from the web in the 9 months since the feature became available for Blu-ray.
Consumers are connecting 4 million discs for online updates each month. "BD Live is a very viable technology," said Peter Staddon, executive VP at Deluxe. "And we're seeing an enormous interest in downloading content." Staddon suggests that a likely new feature for BD-Live will be exclusive versions of film trailers, only available to users of the service.
Downloading new trailers is the more popular activity of BD=Live users. "People will take this further in the coming year, where you might see a theatrical trailer first at Comic-Con, and then there'll be an exclusive trailer just for BD Live," said Staddon. "That is in the strong realm of possibility."
AT&T has utilized YouTube to post an instructional video that explains how the AT&T network works, what upgrades will be made within the coming years and to defend itself against the myriad or criticism it has received online over the iPhone MMS delay. "Hey, it's Seth the Blogger Guy with AT&T, I'm here to talk a little bit about our network; where it stands now, and a bit about where it's going," the video opens, with the host Seth(the Blogger Guy).
"We see the discussions on the web; on blogs, on Twitter, on Facebook, so we thought it would be a good idea to take what's being said head on," Seth remarked. "We've seen a dramatic increase in smartphone use over the past few years. We're proud of that fact, and we're proud that in many ways we've enabled the smartphone revolution."
"But all of that usage has created an astounding amount of data demand. In fact, wireless usage has been growing over 300 percent each year." It's at this point that Seth decides to address the issue of the iPhone MMS delay. The iPhone 3.0 software update brought about the MMS feature, but AT&T decided not to support it on its network until the end of summer - a target is hasn't managed to keep.
Amazon.com has once again apologized to Kindle owners by e-mail for the controversial removal of George Orwell's classics, Nineteen Eighty-Four and Animal Farm, after customers had paid for the content. Amazon removed the ebooks from customers' Kindles after realizing they were added to the Kindle library by an unauthorized publisher. Most customers already were refunded for the inconvenience.
The refund however, did not take away the irony that Amazon had displayed a strangely Orwellian central control over the content on customers' Kindles. It's probably safe to assume that most customers didn't realize Amazon had such control over their content, even after they have paid for it.
Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos apologized for the incident, describing it as, "stupid, thoughtless, and painfully out of line with our principles." On Thursday, the company contacted affected users and offered to recover the titles to their Kindles for free, or gave an alternative option of a gift certificate worth $30, or a check for the same amount. Those who had both books can claim $60.
When a recent report from the Strategic Advisory Board for Intellectual Property - a UK government advisory board - claimed seven million people in the UK use file sharing for illegal downloading, the news made headlines. Part of the attention given to the figure came from the 85 page report's estimated billions in economic losses and thousands of job losses each year due to illegal downloading.
However, the More or Less radio program that airs on BBC Radio 4 decided to find how the 7 million figure came about. The Advisory Board said the report was commissioned by a team at University College London, which pointed to Forrester Research for the 7 million figure. However, the cited paper did not include any reference to 7 million illegal downloaders in the UK.
More of Less then contacted one of the authors of the paper, Mark Mulligan, and figured out that the 7 million figure actually came from a report he had written for a subsidiary of Forrester called Jupiter Research. The peculiar thing about this particular paper is who it was commissioned by - the British Phonographic Industry (BPI), a trade group representing music firms in the UK.
Toronto-based i4i has responded to U.S. Court of Appeals ruling granting a stay of an injunction on sales of some Microsoft Office products. The company sued Microsoft for infringing a 1998 XML patent that it holds, in Word 2003 and Word 2007. Last month, a U.S. District court ordered Microsoft to pay $290 million to i4i and issued an injunction that would ban the sale of the Word versions involved.
Microsoft went on to request a stay of the injunction pending an appeal of the original judgment, which was granted. The case is set to be heard on September 23. "Microsoft's scare tactics about the consequences of the injunction cannot shield it from the imminent review of the case by the Federal Circuit Court of Appeal on the September 23 appeal," i4i chairman Loudon Owen said.
He added: "i4i is confident that the Final Judgment in favor of i4i, which included a finding of willful patent infringement by Microsoft and an injunction against Microsoft Word, was the correct decision and that i4i will prevail on the appeal." Microsoft claims Office accounts for over $3 billion in sales per year.
Dish Network and Echostar Corp. have been ordered by a federal Judge to pay about $200 million to TiVo Inc. for violating a permanent injunction that stemmed from a 2004 lawsuit. The lawsuit was brought by TiVo when Dish was distributing DVRs that contained an emulation of TiVo's "Time Warp" feature that enables the pausing of live TV or re-winding.
TiVo won its initial lawsuit against Dish, and Dish was ordered to pay $105 million to TiVo. While the case was on appeal, Dish decided to take a workaround solution and downloaded modified software to DVR's in use by its customers. TiVo protested saying the workaround software still infringes its patent and prevailed when it asked a District court for an injunction.
In June, the federal court found that Dish Network had violated the injunction. TiVo has asked that Dish be made pay $1 billion for using the technology between April 2008 and July 2009. Judge David Folsom of the U.S. District Court in the Eastern District of Texas awarded TiVo $110 million in damages and $90 million in sanctions.
Dish said on Friday that it did not believe the sanctions were warranted, but was happy that the court rejected TiVo's request for $1 billion. "The decision confirms our belief that we designed around TiVo's patent in good faith,"Dish said in a statement. "We believe that we ultimately will prevail on appeal."
Microsoft Corp. has successfully managed to get the U.S. Court of Appeals to grant a stay of an injunction imposed on the Redmond software giant that would have blocked the sale of some versions of its Microsoft Word product. The court ruled that Microsoft met the requirements necessary for the stay to be granted, after the corporation requested it two weeks prior.
A federal district court Judge ruled last month that Microsoft violated a patent pertaining to Extensible Markup Language (XML) held by Canadian firm, i4i, and told the company it must stop selling the infringing software; Word 2003 and 2007. Microsoft claims Office accounts for over $3 billion in sales per year.
Had the appeals court not granted the stay, Microsoft would have had to stop selling the products in mid-October. Now the appeals court will hear arguments in the case on September 23. In addition to the injunction, the Judge had ordered Microsoft to pay $290 million in damages.
"We are happy with the result and look forward to presenting our arguments on the main issues on September 23,"said Microsoft spokesman Kevin Kutz.
We added a couple of new entries to our Guide section lately. One of these new guides is a relatively simple guide on running potentially harmful executable files safely in Windows. It could be useful for running .EXE files found on file sharing sites or networks, or any program you are otherwise suspicious about.
It utilizes freeware software that some of you more safe users will already be using; Sandboxie. In a nutshell, Sandboxie allows you to run a program (like a potential virus), which "can" read data from the hard drive, but when it tries to write data back (new files, editing files, registry entries etc.) they are caught in the "Sandbox", so to speak.
Sandboxie sets up temporary storage on your hard drive, and will capture data that a program running will try to write to your hard drive. Moreover, you can view the contents of the Sandbox easily to see exactly what changes a program tried to make to your files.
While users of Research in Motion's Blackberry, or Windows Mobile handsets, and a large amount of other Smartphones available were able to send Multimedia Messages (MMS) for years now, AT&T is only going to make it possible for iPhone 3G/3GS users on its network to use the feature on September 25. The iPhone 3.0 software update brought about the capability, but AT&T didn't offer support for the feature.
The carrier said that it wanted to ensure its network could handle the traffic from iPhone owners sending MMS. "The unique capabilities and high usage of the iPhone's multimedia capabilities required us to work on our network MMS architecture to carry the expected record volumes of MMS traffic and ensure an excellent experience from day one,"AT&T said in a statement. "We appreciate your patience as we work toward that end."
The lack of MMS capabilities has made AT&T the target of a class-action lawsuit that alleges the carrier misrepresented the features of the iPhone. AT&T has been a constant target of criticism from iPhone owners, which doesn't bode well for the carrier at all now that the iPhone is expected to become available on other carriers in the U.S. soon.
Sony Pictures Home Entertainment is set to start including Descriptive Video Service features to upcoming Blu-ray Disc releases. DVS is an audio feature that can help those with vision problems with their viewing experiences by adding narration of important visual elements on screen, during times mainly where there is no dialog.
The DVS features that will be used are developed by WGBH Media Access Group, which focuses primarily on solutions to make mass media accessible for disabled people. The group estimates that around 12 million movie watchers have some form of vision problem.
The first Blu-ray title from Sony Pictures set to include this feature is The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3, which is due to be released on November 3.
Other Sony Pictures releases that will include this feature are District 9, Julie & Julia and The Ugly Truth, none of which have had their release date revealed by the studio just yet.
Toshiba Corp. has unveiled a bunch of new products at the IFA Consumer Electronics Tradeshow (2009) in Berlin, including it's first Blu-ray stand-alone player and Blu-ray equipped multimedia laptop. A new upscalingDVD player promising, "stunning, near-HD1080p picture quality from standard DVDs" is also included in the new products, as well as an LED-backlit LCD television, three new Camileo HD camcorders and a new touchscreen Mobile Internet Device.
Here is some information, pictures and videos of the new products shown off by Toshiba.
Retailer HMV has announced that it will buy a 50 percent stake in online music store 7Digital, making 7Digital the supplier of all HMV's digital operations, which will include a new e-books website. The retailer will pay £7.7 million to the venture capital firms that originally backed 7digital for its 50 percent stake in the site.
HMV's like-for-like sales in the five countries it has operations in fell 1.8% for the eight weeks leading up to August 29. "With consumer adoption of legal digital media now reaching the mass market, this joint venture partnership is great news for our customers and suppliers," said Ben Drury, founder and head of 7digital.
HMV also announced that 7digital is planning to launch a mobile application for Blackberry handsets. The company is expected to post a pre-tax loss amounting to about £1 million this year. The move by HMV comes as legal digital sales account for more and more revenues to major media companies.
Tokyo-based marketing research firm, BCN Inc., has said that SonyWalkman players managed to outsell Apple's iPod line-up in Japan last week - the first time it has happened in four years. Despite once being the kind of portable music, and revolutionizing how music fans listen to music with the original Walkman, Sony has had to stay in the shadow of Apple in the portable digital media player market.
In the week to August 30th, Sony's share of the market in Japan reached 43.0 percent, just ahead of Apple at 42.1 percent. However, the news is not entirely good for Sony for two reasons. Firstly, overall sales of portable music players are on decline in Japan, and secondly, the iPhone is not included in figures from the market, even though many consumers pick it over an iPod.
Nevertheless, BCN said that Sony has generally been benefiting from an expanded product line-up and more affordable prices. The Japanese electronics giant has hit tough times in recent years due to rival products in divisions it used to conquer in, such as Xbox 360 and Nintendo Wii in the console market, and the iPod in the portable music device markets.
After a dispute that arose over royalties early this year, YouTube began blocking music videos to users in the UK. Google, YouTube's parent company, had at that point failed to agree a fee with RPS for Music (formerly The Performing Rights Society) in the region, resulting in the action taken in March 2009 to block viewers access to some music tracks.
However, YouTube has agreed a deal reportedly in the "ten of millions" of pounds with PRS for Music that will last until 2012, meaning the music content will return to the site and be accessible in the UK. It will take a number of days before all of the deleted videos and audio tracks can be returned to normal.
"We are pleased to announce that an agreement for a license has been reached and both PRS for Music and YouTube are happy that the negotiations resulted in a mutually acceptable deal,"YouTube said in a statement. "As a result of the new agreement, premium music videos in the UK are coming back to YouTube - this is good for songwriters and composers, music fans and YouTube."
PRS for Music collects licensing fees in the country for over 60,000 members. "We have 60,000 song-writer and composer members and many of them don't earn very much money at all - 90 percent of them earn less then 5,000 pounds a year,"Adam Shaw from PRS for Music, said.
When a game modder found a piece of locked away code within the 2004 blockbuster Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas and produced patches to unlock it, who would have thought it would cost Take-Two and its insurers $20 million. Since the patch was released, Rockstar became the target of politicians such as Hillary Clinton, and the game was given an AO (Adult Only) rating instead of it's previous M rating due to the "strong sexual content" it then included.
Store shelves were re-stocked with copies of the game that did not include the unlockable code, which then carried the M rating. Now, five years after the this happened, Take-Two and its insurers have agreed to pay $20 million ($4,915,000 from Take-Two and $15,200,000 from its insurers) to settle a class action lawsuit that stemmed from the controversy.
"We are pleased to have reached this settlement, which represents another important step forward for the company," said Strauss Zelnick, chairman of Take-Two, in a brief statement.
The Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) has filed another request for the Federal Communication Commission (FCC) to give a waiver on the 2003 "plug and play" order which prohibits altering a video stream to disable the analog or digital signal to consumers home theater equipment. The MPAA first made the request in June 2008, but consumer groups such as Public Knowledge opposed the waiver and former FCC Chair Kevin Martin didn't like the idea either.
The MPAA claims that the waiver, which will allow the use of "selectable output control" (SOC) measures, will enable studios to link up with broadcasters to air pre-DVD releases that will benefit consumers. "Physically challenged or elderly consumers who have limited mobility would have greater choice in movie viewing options," a filing from the trade group reads.
Pro-consumer groups are not convinced however, largely because the use of SOC will inevitable disable some HDTV's in the United States when they try to view such broadcasts. Public Knowledge warned that SOC would, "break all eleven million HDTVs in the US that don't have digital input" and allow the MPAA to control when and how you view content with equipment you have already paid for.
The past two weeks in Australia has brought piracy of music and movies to the country's attention, starting with a case before the Superior Court in Australia - the first ever "physical piracy" case to be heard in the court. A man was jailed for six months by Judge Knox for importing counterfeit discs made in China and selling them to consumers. He was arrested in 2007 following investigations by MIPI and AFACT.
The raid turned up more than 16,000 discs of pirated movies and music, containing both discs that came from manufacturing plants in China and locally produced discs. "I do not think that a fine or a community service order is appropriate in terms of being a deterrent sentence, the proper penalty is one of a period of imprisonment," Judge Knox said before handing down the sentence.
Last week, another man was in court for selling pirate CD compilations which were packaged professionally and bought up by legitimate stores. The Judge in the case commented that, "Based on the bigger picture it's robbing the creators of the work of their livelihood, their efforts, their work is unrewarded," and that the message has to get out that you cannot rob artists of their work.
Sony Corp. will attempt to fight off the declining growth in demand for flat televisions by launching its first 3D-compatible BRAVIA TVs from next year.
At the IFA electronics trade show in Berlin, Sony revealed details about the high frame rate, 1920x1080 "pixels per eye" BRAVIA LCD TV to launch in 2010, and also that its Blu-ray players, PlayStation 3 (PS3) and VAIO brand of computers will support the technology
"As with high definition a few years back, there are a variety of issues yet to be addressed. But the 3D train is on the track, and we at Sony are ready to drive it home," Sony CEO Howard Stringertold the audience, according to the Financial Times.
Sony is the world's second largest manufacturer of LCD televisions, behind South Korea's Samsung Electronics Co Ltd.
Vevo, an announced music video website to be driven by YouTube's technology and supported by Universal Music Group, is reportedly in talks with broadcasters NBC and CBS. Citing information from sources familiar with the talks, Reuters reports the two sides are negotiating a deal that would see NBC and CBS produce music-related content to be licensed by Vevo and shown on the new site, and possibly also on television.
This would put Vevo into a more competitive position against Viacom Inc.'s MTV Networks. Vevo is being described as the music industry's answer to the popular Hulu site, which hosts TV content, backed by NBC Universal, News Corp and Disney. Vevo will offer higher quality music videos than YouTube, and will use advertising to generate revenues.
Since the announcement of Vevo back in April, Vevo has signed a content and equity partnership deal with Sony Music, and similar deals are reported to be lining up with Warner Music Group and the EMI Group. Former Universal Music head of digital Rio Caraeff was appointed as Vevo chief executive earlier this summer.
A Nokia World 09 on Wednesday, more details of Nokia's recently announced Booklet 3G 'mini laptop' were revealed. When it is released, it will be the first "computer" product offered by Nokia Corp. in going on twenty years. Some of its notable promises include support High-definition video content, 12 hour battery life and high-speed wireless Internet access.
Here are the specifications revealed at Nokia World for the Booklet 3G.....
1.3 MP front facing camera with integrated microphone
Keyboard
Frame keyboard
2 physical layouts: US (78 keys, 17 mm pitch, 1.8 mm stroke) and UK (79 keys, 16.7 mm pitch, 1.8 mm stroke)
Other
Accelerometer
Inbox contents
Nokia Booklet 3G
BC-1S battery
AC/DC power adapter
Quick setup guide and warranty instructions
Headset WH-205
USB charging multi-cable CA-126
Software
Operating System: Windows 7 Starter Edition, Home Premium or Professional
MS Office Small Business 60 day trial
MS Internet Explorer 8
HDD protection utility, Hotkey utility , Knock Control utility, Power Profile Switcher, Battery Life utility
Nokia Update Manager
Ovi Suite
Ovi Maps Gadget
Social Hub
F-Secure Internet Security 2010 trial
At Nokia World, Executive Vice President, Markets Unit at Nokia, Anssi Vanjoki, confirmed the price tag at a steep €575 (and Nokia generally announces prices without tax or subsidies taken into account).
While the PS3 Slim announcement was generally welcomed by most gamers last week, some weren't very happy about the lack of backwards compatibility, and the dropping of the "OtherOS" option which made it possible to install Linux on the PS3. On the first issue, Sony said that the console's ability to play PlayStation 2 (PS2) games was not a major driver of console sales and so was dropped for cost reasons, but it stayed silent for a while about the OtherOS decision.
This led to some theories of why Sony would want to kill the OtherOS option, which is cited often as a reason why many hackers haven't tried to break the system's security like they have with Xbox 360 and older consoles. One interesting theory said that Sony wasn't pleased by the use of multiple PS3s by research labs and companies to build "Cell clusters" that are relatively inexpensive.
Google Chrome has gotten itself a bit of a boost in the global Internet browser market. Sony announced on Tuesday that it plans to include Google's Chrome browser as the default Internet web browser in VAIO-branded computers sold in the United States, a decision it said was based on Chrome's quality and functions.
Even though this deal gives a bit more ammo to Google in the fight against Microsoft on the web, Google's Chrome browser hasn't enjoyed overwhelming success just yet, despite a wide advertising campaign and the status of its search engine service.
It took a 1.2% share in the market in February, according to research firm Net Applications after its initial launch to the public in September 2008. Internet Explorer was still, by far, on top of the market with a 67 percent share at the time, though market share numbers vary.
Nintendo has decided that the Internet Channel - the Wii's Opera Internet browser - should be free to all users. Up until now, Nintendo charged users (expect for lucky early downloaders) 500 Wii Points to download the browser.
The company has also decided to offer a free NES game to anybody who did spend a few dollars to buy the Internet web browser for the console. A version of the Opera-based browser is also available for the Nintendo DS console to provide Internet access on the handheld.
Nokia Corp., the world's largest handset maker, has revealed that it will delay the launch of its "Comes With Music," service in the United States despite previously having planned to launch it soon. The service will now be available in the U.S. sometime during 2010. The service first launched in the UK and then was followed by 9 other countries, showing up in emerging markets.
It's performance in the UK hasn't been notable however, but it does seem to do much better in emerging markets. It allows users to download and listen to an unlimited amount of music with their compatible Nokia handset for 12-18 months after buying the unit.
"Comes With Music has been below expectations in developed markets, though Nokia is having more success in emerging markets," said Mark Mulligan, an analyst with Forrester Research. "In Western Europe and specifically Great Britain, Nokia has been hindered by not having a strong operator route to market."
Nokia managed to link up with just one network operator in the UK, Orange. Network operators are very important in developed markets due to the subsidies that are offered to the customers to entice them into purchases. Other operators, including Vodafone, have already invested in their own branded music download stores.
Internet Auction giant eBay has announced it will sell a majority stake of Skype - amounting to 65 percent of the unit - in a deal with $1.9 billion. The majority stake is being bought up by a group of private investors. The deal values Skype at $2.75 billion, which is less than the $3.1 billion that eBay originally spent on Skype.
Shares of eBay fell more than 2 percent after the news as many analysts are worried that the deal, which was worth more than was generally expected, might curb the growth potential of eBay. The auction site said that selling a majority stake in Skype enables it to focus on its own service and PayPal, and to avoid potential risks of the initial public offering it previously had announced.
Kaufman analyst Aaron Kessler said in a research note that selling the company's fastest growing business was clearly going to impact its potential for growth, even if the price being paid for the service is great short term news for eBay. It brings back a recurring question however about eBay's future as it continues to face competition from its main rival Amazon Inc.
Opera Software, the Norwegian developer of the Opera web browser, has released a stable Opera 10 update. The new update promises to provide its users with faster downloads and browsing, along with new features. The company said that Opera 10 is significantly faster than the competition on resource-demanding pages such as Gmail and Facebook. One of its new features is new full thumbnails of open tabs.
For those with low speed connections, Opera 10 includes a "Turbo" feature that packages web pages, which it claims can make Opera up to eight times faster than rival browsers. It is battling for third place in the browser arena with Google Chrome and Safari, but is also far behind the Microsoft Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox products.
"We have worked a lot on Opera Turbo technology and have also made major improvements on the overall product stability. This is the most stable Opera browser yet," Opera Software said. Opera's desktop browser is more popular in countries like Ukraine and Russia, whereas the Opera Mobile browser is widely used with mobile handsets. Some of Opera's touted features include...
Computer security firm Symantec has issued a warning following the public release of concept code for a Trojan that can record Skype conversations and transfer them to an attacker. Trojan.Peskyspy records the conversations as MP3 and can then deliver the MP3 recordings to a specific server over the Internet.
Symantec is not looking to cause panic about the publicly released source code since security products could be now updated to detect it. Instead, Symantec deems it likely that malware authors will include it in their malware packages, many of which are built solely for stealing information on infected machines.
The release of the code was not for malicious reasons either, but rather to highlight a big problem with mass-communication using software like Skype, which now evidently can only be as secure as the computer it is installed on.
According to Forrester Research, more than a third of all consumers living in Western Europe will use mobile phones to access the Internet by the year 2014. The research, published by Forrester Research on Monday predicts mobile Internet adoption in the region to jump from 13 percent in 2008 to 39 percent by the end of 2014.
"The recession is forcing many consumers to reduce their spending, but they aren't cutting out their mobile subscriptions altogether,"said Forrester analystThomas Husson. The number of mobile users in Western Europe is expected to grow to 344 million by the end of 2014, rising from 334 million in 2009.
Husson commented that even in the global recession, Internet-centric phones and flat-rate data plans helped to stimulate mobile Internet adoption. "In the next decade, the mobile Internet will replicate the success story of the PC-based Internet as social networks, widgets, search engines or company websites adapt for mobile presentation," the report said.
It follows the story of lead character Huang Lee in a battle with Triad gangs in fictional Liberty City, following the murder of his father.
Beaterator is a title developed by Rockstar and producer Timbaland. Developed for the PlayStation Portable platform, the game is set to be released at the end of the month, with the iPhone port coming this fall. No details on pricing were revealed.
Electronic Arts CEO Rich Hilleman has revealed that he expects Sony and Microsoft to develop hardware updates for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 (PS3) before they move on to the develop the true next generation of home consoles. Hilleman explains incremental changes to the systems as 'Xbox 560' and 'PlayStation 3.5', to represent a gradual move toward the next generation.
He made his comments at the Hot Chips conference in Stanford, where he said that both of the console makers had dedicated an enormous amount of resources to establish their current generation of home consoles on the market, and are not likely to rush the development of brand new home consoles in a fast changing market.
"I expected we'll see a PlayStation 3.5 before we see a PlayStation 4 and an Xbox 560 before we see an Xbox 720," said Hilleman, reported Venturebeat. "The biggest shift is how fast packaged goods games are changing and going away." Both Microsoft and Sony have been left financially bruised from the costs of marketing the home consoles on the market.
Apple Inc. has revealed that it will play host at a media event on September 9, where the company is widely expected to show off a new updated line of iPod portable media players. Of course, Apple, as usual, has not revealed anything about what will be unveiled, but in recent years the company has constantly chosen September to reveal new iPod models in time for the holiday season.
An invitation sent out to media outlets features an iPod with a tagline: "It's only rock and roll, but we like it." Analysts are expecting that new iPod Nano and Touch models will feature a digital camera, with the Touch possibly stretching to a video camera. Sales of iPods in the quarter to June were down 7 percent to 10.2 million units, but it hasn't moved the company's dominance in the market.
Some more enthusiastic Apple fans are hoping to see Apple's rumored new tablet device, dubbed by Analysts as "iPad", unveiled at the event next week, but Analysts warned that it is unlikely to show up until either later on in the year or sometime during 2010. It has not even been confirmed to exist as of yet.
South Korean consumer electronics giant, Samsung Electronics Co Ltd announced on Monday that it would open an online store for smartphone applications, following the overwhelming success of the iPhone App Store. The online store will open on September 14th initially in the UK, France and Italy, with more than 30 countries to follow soon after.
Finnish handset maker, Nokia, launched the Ovi store in May followed by LG Electronics with a similar service in Asia in July. When the store opens it will offer an estimated 300 applications to users which will range from games to social networking applications. The aim is to grow the store's offerings to 2,000 applications by year's end.
Having a wide and growing variety of applications for use will mean a lot in the market for Smartphones. Analysts have said that companies such as LG and Samsung, while being successful in reasonably priced handsets, need to boost their efforts with mobile software in order to compete more with Smartphones.
According to sources close to the talks, Warner Music Group and Google Inc.'s YouTube video-sharing website are finalizing an agreement that will allow Warner music videos to be featured on the website. YouTube had to pull all video content owned by Warner from the website in December over a dispute over licensing rights.
The 
Nero has unveiled the Nero MobileSync software for smartphones. MobileSync is the first offering from Nero's new "hardware-agnostic" platform of products for mobile handsets, Netbooks, gaming consoles and Ultra-Mobile PCs. Nero MobileSync for smartphones is designed to allow the management, sharing and creation of content between the desktop, the mobile handset, and the Web regardless of the mobile device in use.
Several hundred comments have been posted on an official 
The Federal Communication Commission (FCC) in the United States is seeking input from industry players before October 23rd on an attempt to expand the wireless spectrum as part of the National Broadband Plan. The regulator is 
As if things weren't bad enough for the proposed acquisition of the Pirate Bay by Global Gaming Factory X, the company's chief executive officer Hans Pandeya has lost control of his assets. A Swedish court found that Pandeya owes about $400,000, including interest, to Johan Sellstrom, a former business partner in Global Gaming. The court ruled that the state will take control of his assets until enough can be sold to pay back Sellstrom.
The people at Xiph.org have released 
Microsoft Corp. has reportedly informed wireless carriers by letter that they can no longer use the Musiwave mobile tunes service once their contracts expire, a source told 
A meeting that was called for British musicians to discuss UK government proposals on how to tackle illegal file sharing has come to a consensus that file-sharers should have their 
Sales of 
In a letter to the Federal Communication Commission (FCC), AT&T accused Google of ignoring FCC regulations and called the company a hypocrite over its policies with the Google Voice application. Long-distance providers, such as AT&T, are required to pay fees to local phone companies for access to their landline networks, and FCC regulations ban long-distance providers from call blocking.
Earlier this week, 
Users of 
In yet another bizarre demand, the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP) is demanding that mobile operators pay licensing fees because their customers use ringtones. In a nutshell, according to ASCAP, when your mobile phone rings with a copyrighted ringtone, it counts as a public performance.
Valve is appealing a decision by Australia's Office of Film and Literature Classification that denied Left 4 Dead 2 a rating in the country, effectively banning the game in the territory. In all other territories, the game has received an 18+ or Mature rating, given by ESRB, USK, CERO, KGRB etc. but in Australia there is no 18+ certificate for videogames on the market.
The European Commission is preparing a mandate for the manufacturers of portable media players (PMP), to address concerns about consumer hearing loss due to noise levels of players. Meglena Kuneva, European Commissioner for Consumer Affairs, will present details of the mandate to develop standards for personal music player manufacturers, which will apply to 
Finnish mobile handset giant 
Microsoft has dismissed rumors that the company is planning to bid for game publisher Electronic Arts. "We have no plans to acquire EA," Phil Spencer, corporate vice president of Microsoft Game Studios, told 
Appeals court judges have called the $290 million damages awarded to i4i in a patent infringement lawsuit against Microsoft. i4i had originally won its case against Microsoft, which resulted in $290 million damages to be paid by Microsoft and an injunction against the sale of Microsoft's Word 2003 and Word 2007 applications.
John Donahoe, Chief Executive of auction-giant eBay Inc., said that despite recent lawsuits over the underlying technology used in 
There have been some calls lately for fees to be introduced for viewing TV shows episodes and other content on the BBC's popular iPlayer. Lorraine Heggessey, chief executive of TV production company Talkback Thames, said that users of the site should be charged "micro payments" to use the online catch up service.
UK retailers GAME has announced that in the six months to July 31, it earned GBP £177.3 million in sales of pre-owned game titles, accounting for a quarter of all revenue during the period. "We achieved year on year growth in pre-owned sales, which increased 12.3 percent and now account for 25.7 per cent of total sales," 
Microsoft has confirmed that it is working on a new wireless adapter for the Xbox 360 console that is compatible with the new 
Having already seen changes to the palette availability in the 
British artists have been commenting on some proposed measures to tackle illegal file sharing of music in the region, with the likes of Radiohead and Annie Lennox being opposed, and Lilly Allen and James Blunt supporting. The debate is about the plan to 
News Corp.'s MySpace is to launch a new video service within the next several months with the help of Hulu.com. Rupert Murdoch had commented earlier this year that he plans to reshape MySpace into an entertainment hub.
Corel Corporation announced the availability of WinDVD 2010 last week, the latest version of the world's most widely used 
Adobe Systems Incorporated has announced the new Adobe Flash Platform Services, which enabled content providers and advertisers to measure and monetize applications across social networks, desktops and mobile devices. Adobe Flash Platform Services are online, hosted services that allow developers to add innovative capabilities to Web applications.
Netflix has paid out a $1 million reward to a seven-member international research group after the group won a contest held by Netflix to improve its predictions of movies a customer might like to view. The contest was launched in 2006 and witnessed 51,000 contestants from 186 countries participate ever since.
Vodafone, the world's largest mobile phone operator (in terms of revenue), has inked a new deal with Warner Music Group that completes its collection of deals with major music labels.
At the 
The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) has appealed to regulator Ofcom to be allowed to use encryption on Freeview 
On the day of its release in the United States, Microsoft confirmed that the 
Iowa senator Tom Harkin recently became chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, following the death of Senator Ted Kennedy. On Monday, Harkin vowed to look into the possibilities of cancer risks from mobile phone use. He said he was concerned that nobody was able to definitively prove that mobile phones could not cause cancer.
A federal judge has dismissed a 2007 lawsuit brought against online video site Veoh Networks Inc. by Universal Music Group. The lawsuit alleged that Veoh was aiding and abetting copyright infringement on its video service. However, U.S. District Judge Howard Matz on Friday disagreed with Universal Music Group and found that Veoh was taking reasonable steps to prevent and take down infringing videos uploaded by users.
If you think back a few short years, you might remember a very controversial copy protection technology (
The Recording Industry Association of Japan (RIAJ) is pushing for an agreement with music download sites and other entities in Japan that would see 
Another Guide has been added to our collection in the latest round of additions and updates. This one shows how to use an application called 
According to a report in the Sunday Telegraph, Germany group Deutsche Telekom is on the verge of submitting a bid for the third largest mobile phone operator in the United States, Sprint Nextel.
A European Union investigation into online retailers that sell electronic goods has found that over half of the 369 websites checked were breaking European laws and regulations that exist to protect consumers. The sites sell mobile phones, 
We've been working on updating some of our stone-age guides (yes, we get the complaints ;-) ) and adding a few new ones as well, for anyone who is interested. Decided just to mention a couple here that were written as a result of recommendation. The first one uses a freeware utility to download Windows Updates for any Windows OS after 2000 (not 7 just yet), make an 
A recent "tweet-tirade" from Courtney Love following the likeness of deceased Nirvana front-man, Kurt Cobain, appearing in the latest installment of the Guitar Hero gaming franchise, included a message of intent to sue Activision. Love claims she never agreed to Cobain's final appearance in the video-game, in particular the possibility to have his character lip-sync to Bon Jovi.
Vivid Entertainment, the largest adult entertainment video production company in the world, is interested in distributing pornographic content through the PlayStation Network (PSN), and then possibly with Xbox Live or on the 
Microsoft has confirmed to 
The 
On Friday, 
So far at 
Some pirates of the new Eidos title, 
Microsoft Corp. has been hit with another lawsuit over the Windows Genuine Advantage (
Microsoft's monthly Patch Tuesday included five updates this time that address some critical bugs in the newer versions of the operating system. Microsoft did point out, however, that none of the issues apply to the final version of the soon-to-be-released Windows 7 operating system. However, for those running Windows Vista, Windows Server 2003 and Windows Server 2008, get your updates.
The International Trade Commission (ITC) sided with 
Netgear has launched the latest multimedia 
Psystar, the infamous 
Spotify recently made its way onto mobile phones with the iPhone and Android applications for premium users. However, Spotify put up an article explaining that they didn't, "want to leave out all those people who have a phone that runs the S60 mobile platform." A video was posted on the site showing a demo of Spotify running on S60, which is currently in development.
CyberLink Corp. has announced the availability of MediaShow 5, which helps users to easily organize, fix/restore and share photo and video content with each other. MediaShow 5 is created for consumers to handle the large amounts of digital content that we hoard nowadays, due to the increased usage of digital still cameras and camcorders, often built into mobile phones and other equipment.
According to the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre (CEOP), the vast majority of pedophile activity on the Internet now takes place on public and private 
Ocean Blue Software, based in the UK and Hong Kong, has developed "talking" digital TV technology in conjunction with The Royal National Institute of Blind People (RNIB). The technology is developed for set top boxes and televisions, and the developers say millions of people worldwide could gain from an improved experience of TV.
At 
China has implemented more rules and restrictions for online music stores in the country. The changes apply to foreign-sourced tracks. The Chinese government will have to approve each song that originates from outside the country before any of the online music stores sell them. This affects all the big Internet companies with presence in China, including Google, Alibaba (Yahoo) and Baidu.
Deluxe Digital Studios, an 
Amazon.com has once again apologized to Kindle owners by e-mail for the controversial removal of George Orwell's classics, Nineteen Eighty-Four and Animal Farm, after customers had paid for the content. Amazon removed the ebooks from customers' Kindles after realizing they were added to the Kindle library by an unauthorized publisher. Most customers already were refunded for the inconvenience.
Dish Network and Echostar Corp. have been ordered by a federal Judge to pay about $200 million to 
We added a couple of new entries to our 
Retailer HMV has announced that it will buy a 50 percent stake in online music store 7Digital, making 7Digital the supplier of all HMV's digital operations, which will include a new e-books website. The retailer will pay £7.7 million to the venture capital firms that originally backed 7digital for its 50 percent stake in the site.
Tokyo-based marketing research firm, BCN Inc., has said that 
When a game modder found a piece of locked away code within the 2004 blockbuster 
The 
The past two weeks in Australia has brought piracy of music and movies to the country's attention, starting with a case before the Superior Court in Australia - the first ever "physical piracy" case to be heard in the court. A man was jailed for six months by Judge Knox for importing counterfeit discs made in China and selling them to consumers. He was arrested in 2007 following investigations by 
Vevo, an announced music video website to be driven by YouTube's technology and supported by Universal Music Group, is reportedly in talks with broadcasters NBC and CBS. Citing information from sources familiar with the talks, 
A 
Opera Software, the Norwegian developer of the Opera web browser, has released a stable Opera 10 update. The new update promises to provide its users with faster downloads and browsing, along with new features. The company said that Opera 10 is significantly faster than the competition on resource-demanding pages such as Gmail and Facebook. One of its new features is new full thumbnails of open tabs.
Computer security firm Symantec has issued a warning following the public release of concept code for a Trojan that can record 
According to Forrester Research, more than a third of all consumers living in Western Europe will use mobile phones to access the Internet by the year 2014. The research, published by Forrester Research on Monday predicts mobile Internet adoption in the region to jump from 13 percent in 2008 to 39 percent by the end of 2014.
