Science and Technology

New devices to record any radio program, convert it into a digital format for listening or upload onto a PC: Like TiVo, the audio recorders will let customers fast-forward over commercials — although this isn’t a feature the industry is actively promoting. “What you do with it is your own …

One of the single most important individuals in the establishment of Blogcritics.org, John Scalzi, has some very exciting news: Today is the official release date for The Rough Guide to the Universe. That’s in the US, mind you; in the UK, it’s already been out for a month, and I’m …

The RIAA mistakenly harassed Penn State’s department of astronomy and astrophysics about a nonexistent MP3 file on their computer – then – apologized for it: Last Thursday, the RIAA sent a stiff copyright warning to Penn State’s department of astronomy and astrophysics. Department officials at first were puzzled, because the …

I still don’t see Apple’s Music Store as anything revolutionary, it’s just a refinement of what has been going on for some time. But if a lot of other people see it as a revolution, that’s okay with me – the perception is as important as the reality and a …

Jamees Russell linked here yesterday to a story about Google seeking to adjust or even filter out blogs from its search results. This is certainly a concern, although I am not sure we will be classified as a blog under their valuation system – we are more of an online …

English band Hell Is For Heroes having success with interactive music video: [EMI] home to the likes of Robbie Williams, Coldplay, Blur and Radiohead, has already produced the world’s first fully interactive video and is so pleased with the results that it plans to repeat the trick with several of …

Gunnar Van Vliet compares the sound quality of the new Apple Music Store AAC codec vs. MP3: Being a Mac user and a music lover, when Apple announced the Apple Music Store for digital song downloads I was very excited. The store uses a new codec called AAC to deliver …

Chalabi says Saddam and his vile progeny remain alive and in Iraq: “Our sources confirm that he (Saddam) has actually not left Iraq,” Chalabi told the Arabic-language Asharq al-Awsat daily in an interview in Baghdad. “He is here with his sons but they don’t always travel together. “I can’t tell …

Rather scathing analysis of Microsoft’s PR for DRM (digital rights management) in the Register: Microsoft is putting a lot of money into Digital Rights Management, and expects to get a lot more money back out so long as it can persuade consumers that DRM is their fluffy friend, and most …

Using free to sell not-free via Altnet – the “first peer-to-peer network created to give consumers easy access to secure content that originates from content owners” – which piggybacks off of Kazaa: Altnet today announced that it has secured the exclusive distribution rights to artist and author Lee Jaffe’s never-been-seen-before …