ReplayTV caves to content industry: new model will drop two key features – it will no longer be able to skip entire commercials automatically, or send recorded programming over the Internet. Sonicblue Inc., the former owner of ReplayTV, was considered the company in the digital video recording industry that most …
Read More »Science and Technology
The Woz Returns As Big Brother
Apple’s Wozniak is doing it for the children and dogs: The co-founder of Apple Computer, Stephen Wozniak, recalls that it began with a series of lost dogs – a runaway husky, a roving Shar-Pei, a wayward bichon frisé. The problem led inexorably to a Wozniak solution: wireless location-monitoring technology that …
Read More »Busting Out of the Cage
Copyright has to be radically changed to reflect the realities of the brave new digital world. You may not like it, but the only way to compensate creators, to give the average creator the incentive to continue to create, is some form of copyright tax, as I have mentioned many …
Read More »Ablums
Jon Pareles looks at the status of albums in the download age: The pop album made its way through the 20th century by staying adaptable, transforming itself from analog grooves to digital bits. But can the notion of an album – a collection of songs sold as a single unit, …
Read More »Everything Old Is New Again
This item is rather astonishing – note the year: Telephony, December 18, 1909 Distributing Music Over Telephone Lines Wilmington, Delaware, is enjoying a novel service through the telephone exchange. Phonograph music is supplied over the wires to those subscribers who sign up for the service. Attached to the wall near …
Read More »It Was Just a Matter of Time
Bush, Niger, uranium, those all-caps emails from African widows and former government officials ……
Read More »Much, Much Worse
First it was reported six file sharers had been subpoenaed by the RIAA, then it was 150. Yesterday AP reported the number is closer to 900, with 75 coming each day: Subpoenas reviewed by The Associated Press show the industry compelling some of the largest Internet providers, such as Verizon …
Read More »Downloading With Whitney – Not Houston
The Christian Science Monitor examines the habits and attitudes of a downloading teen: The RIAA has set itself a herculean task: If Whitney and her friends are any guide, the industry has failed utterly to convince this generation of teens of the merits of its case. What has emerged through …
Read More »AOL-TW Getting Out of the Manufacturing Biz
Selling CD and DVD manufacturing business for $1.05 billion: Under pressure from Wall Street, AOL Time Warnerhas pledged to cut its debt to $20 billion by the end of 2004 and has been pursuing a number of deals, including the sale of its sports teams and a possible joint venture …
Read More »Much Worse
Here we were saying that six file sharers had been subpoenaed by the RIAA – try 150: The music industry has demanded that Verizon Communications cough up 150 names in its attempt to find those who are allegedly trading copyrighted songs. The phone company is in the process of complying …
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