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MP3 Player News & Headlines
Performers see tiny returns from streaming music
(Reuters)
Reuters - As the music business continues to watch traditional revenue streams slow or even evaporate, a good deal of faith often has been placed in what's hailed as a panacea for the industry's ills: online streaming.
Google Android Phones Can Now Search With Written Gestures
(PC World)
PC World - Google announced an experimental application for its Android mobile operating system, which allows you to search your phone using written gestures. Instead of bringing up the keyboard, users of the newer Android phones can just draw letters on the screen to search through contacts, music or apps.
iTunes Hits Two Billion Sold Milestone
Apple today announced that more than two billion songs, 50 million television episodes and over 1.3 million feature-length films have been purchased and downloaded from the iTunes Store.
EMI files "Down Under" royalties appeal
(Reuters)
Reuters - Record company EMI will appeal against a court ruling that Australian Grammy-award winning band Men at Work stole a section of the famous 1980s hit, "Down Under," from a popular folk song.
Griffin Intros PowerBlock Travel, International USB Power Adapter
Griffin Technology has introduced PowerBlock Travel, a package designed to simplify charging your USB devices (including iPods) while traveling.
Apple Intros iPod Phone
Apple today introduced iPhone, a new device that combines a state-of-the-art mobile phone, a widescreen iPod with touch controls, and an Internet communications device with desktop-class email, web browsing, searching and maps—into one small and lightweight handheld device.
The Eight Thousand Dollar Piano-Shaped ipod Table
The Concerto Table, a piano-shaped table designed by Nicholas Lovegrove & Demian Repucci, has to be one of the most expensive and exclusive iPod accessories yet.
MP3 Tech Commentary
A $150 eReader This Year? Plus AP, Conde Naste Eye eReaders and iPad Rejoice, literate cheapskates! Chip maker Freescale, which counts Amazon and Sony among its customers, recently announced that it has created a faster processor that will lower prices of eBook readers. The i.MX508 processor, which is twice as fast as the ones currently in use, should result in an eReader hitting the magical $150 price point as early as this year, according to Wired.com. (The company claims that it supplies 90 percent of the processors used by eReaders on the market.) A separate report by Reuters estimates the savings from the device to equal about $30, which doesn't sound like a lot. But every little bit certainly helps a sector that's seeing both phenomenal sales growth but is also under siege from new slate tablets such as Apple's iPad. Meanwhile, the Associated Press and magazine publisher Conde Naste are both planning to provide more content to electronic devices such as cell phones, eReaders and Apple's iPad. According to eWeek.com, the AP considers the move as a way to free itself from the constraints of the Web and deliver news to consumers directly. Conde Nast, meanwhile, hopes that putting more resources on digital content will help boost revenue streams. As a young dinosaur who's nowhere close to retirement and works in what's now considered the prehistoric field of print journalism, anything that can boost revenue streams is certainly worth a shot to me. A $150 eReader This Year? Plus AP, Conde Naste Eye eReaders and iPad originally appeared on About.com Portable Entertainment on Tuesday, March 2nd, 2010 at 00:01:07.
Sony Sets Sights on Apple's Turf Remember when Sony was the electronics company in terms of consumer mindshare? Fast forward to today and you have Amazon grabbing the reins of the eReader sector Sony pioneered while Apple's iPod has replaced the Sony Walkman as the music-playing phenomenon of this generation. (And we haven't even touched on the Playstation brand's fall from the No. 1 overall spot for video game consoles.) In fact, Fortune's annual World's Most Admired Companies list has Apple No. 1 while Sony is ranked 38th. Well, like Twisted Sister, Sony is apparently not taking it anymore, with the company setting its sights on countering Apple's rise as an electronics juggernaut. According to a report from the Wall Street Journal, Sony is planning to release two new portable devices — one aimed squarely at the iPhone and the other at the upcoming iPad. The first device is something Sony is working on with Ericsson, which is basically a phone that can download and play video games. The other is a hybrid device that incorporates features from netbooks, eReaders and handheld game machines (sounds like PSP content might feature prominently in both devices). Sony will also be launching sonyTunes, er, Sony Online Service — an "online media platform" that features music, video and, of course, games, later in March. Will Sony's latest moves be enough for it to regain its mojo? I guess we'll find out soon enough. Sony Sets Sights on Apple's Turf originally appeared on About.com Portable Entertainment on Friday, March 5th, 2010 at 00:01:48.
Universal Music Group Loses Legal Battle With Dancing Baby Even though Universal Music Group (UMG) has annouced an 8.4% increase in its digital music sales this week, this financial achievement has been somewhat eclipsed by news in the blogsphere that it has been defeated by a dancing baby. For those of you who aren't familiar with the case, Stephanie Lenz posted a video on YouTube in 2007 of her toddler which contained Prince's Lets Go Crazy song playing in the background. UMG promptly issued a takedown notice to YouTube who removed the 30-second video clip. The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) then argued that the video was in the realms of 'fair use'. Over two and a half years later, the legal battle has now been resolved with Judge Jeremy Fogel granting Lenz's partial summary judgment. This will now enable Stephanie Lenz (and her dancing tot) to recover the appropriate fees and costs from UMG. Related Articles:
Universal Music Group Loses Legal Battle With Dancing Baby originally appeared on About.com Digital Music on Wednesday, March 3rd, 2010 at 07:19:34.
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DR 950, er, DR-900 Officially Unveiled After blogging about Asus' new DR-950 eReader in January, it looks like Asus has finally officially unveiled the DR-900 to the expectant and not-so-expectant masses. Wait, DR-900? Hey, what happened to the DR-950? Oh my head... (keeping up with all these eBook readers is becoming a nightmare). Anywho, Engadget managed to catch a glimpse of the device at CeBIT in Germany and the info they mention basically sounds like a rehash of what we know about the DR-950, e.g. 9-inch display with 1024 x 768 resolution, They did mention that while PDF's look crisp, the touchscreen isn't quite as responsive as they would like. Then again, this is just basically a demo so there likely will be more tweaks before the DR-900, 950, or 9-whatever-it-is launches at retail. As commenter Bic pointed out, the DR-900 uses SiPix instead of E Ink. The difference? According to epapercentral.com, SiPix uses a single white particle in a dye while E Ink uses a double particle in clear fluid. Photo © Asus DR 950, er, DR-900 Officially Unveiled originally appeared on About.com Portable Entertainment on Thursday, March 4th, 2010 at 00:01:45.
E Ink SiPix, etc.
Web Radio: Tune into Thousands of Radio Stations From Your Desktop If you're old enough (like me) to remember when there wasn't an Internet, then you'll probably have memories of fiddling around with the tuner on your radio trying to find a decent music station to listen to. If you were really lucky, you may have also had a built-in analog tape deck that you could use to record radio onto compact cassette tape. These days, it's so much easier (and convenient) to listen to radio. With the invention of the Internet, we are now accustomed to listening to music on-demand via streaming audio, MP3 downloads, music services, and other Internet-based delivery methods. Web radio, or more commonly referred to as Internet radio, is very similar to traditional radio in that you can tune into radio stations that broadcast over the Internet; a lot of terrestrial-based stations also broadcast over the Web. However, one of the biggest advantages of using this technology, is that you can access thousands of stations from all over the world -- something that couldn't be done before the digital age. But how do we access this enormous resource of music? One of the most convenient ways is to use software that can play streaming music straight to your desktop. As well as popular software media players such as iTunes, Windows Media Player, and Winamp which can access Web radio, there's alternative light-weight applications that specialize in delivering Internet radio. The big advantage of using a dedicated Web radio software program is that many of them offer more functions such as being able to record what you're listening to -- similar to the old cassette tape. For more information on listening to and recording Internet radio stations, be sure to read our article on Free Web Radio Software. Related Articles:
Web Radio: Tune into Thousands of Radio Stations From Your Desktop originally appeared on About.com Digital Music on Wednesday, February 10th, 2010 at 09:00:36.
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Wal-Mart Moves Into Video With VUDU Deal Retail giant, Wal-Mart, has announced via its Website that it has inked a deal with the VUDU video service. Since its inception in 2004, the VUDU media technology company has specialized in developing devices like the VUDU Box to deliver on-demand video such as movies. With the likes of iTunes and Amazon already offering multimedia content, Wal-Mart who also provide digital music downloads are hoping to muscle into the increasingly popular on-demand video market too. Edward Lichty who is VUDU's executive vice president said, "We are excited about the opportunity to take our company's vision to the next level, VUDU's services and Apps platform will give Wal-Mart a powerful new vehicle to offer customers the content they want in a way that expands the frontier of quality, value and convenience." Even though the official announcement doesn't reveal the financial value of the deal, a report by The Wall Street Journal puts the sum at 'slightly more' than $100 million. Related Articles:
Wal-Mart Moves Into Video With VUDU Deal originally appeared on About.com Digital Music on Wednesday, February 24th, 2010 at 06:27:22.
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Omniphone to Use Dolby Laboratories' Cloud Music Format Omniphone, which provides cloud-based music services for major consumer electronics vendors, has annouced that it has struck a deal with Dolby Laboratories to use its new Dolby Pulse audio format. Boasting up to 4 times more bandwidth and data rate efficiency compared to other file formats, Dolby Pulse is a multi-platform file format especially suited for music delivery from the 'cloud'. If you're not familiar with this buzzword, then it's simply just another term to describe Internet-based solutions. In the case of Dolby Pulse, this file format is particularly suited for delivering streaming music to mobile devices, and other consumer electronics that use streaming audio -- home computers, in-home or in-car devices that use digital music services are examples.
Omniphone intend to use the software that Dolby Laboratories supply (Dolby Media Generator) to encode their entire music catalog that currently contains over 6.5 million tracks. Looking at the inner-workings of Dolby Pulse, the file format is basically the same as the HE-AAC (High Efficiency AAC) format, but differs by the integration of Dolby metadata -- this ensures the quality and consistency of the broadcast is maintained. Kevin Yeaman, who is the president and CEO of Dolby Laboratories said, "As digital content services and networked devices become part of our day-to-day lives, the ability to deliver digital content in the most efficient file format becomes increasingly important." So far this is the second article this year concerning new music formats --will this year see the largest change in how digital music services deliver audio? Related Articles:
Omniphone to Use Dolby Laboratories' Cloud Music Format originally appeared on About.com Digital Music on Wednesday, February 17th, 2010 at 07:36:14.
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Flash Absence Worries iPad Publishers; AT&T Exec Predicts iPad 3G Use What, me, worry? That, so far, has been the stance adopted by Steve Jobs when it comes to the absence of popular Web program Flash on his company's much anticipated iPad tablet. Content publishers, however, apparently are singing a different tune about the lack of Flash on the iPad, according to a story on MSNBC.com. While magazines such as Wired and GQ, for example, have embraced Flash on their Web sites, the absence of Flash support for the iPad means they can't simply port over their Flash content such as video to the iPad, the same way they can with, say, HP's Slate tablet. At the very least, offering such content for the iPad will come with some added cost as publishers re-package their content in a new format. Oh well, them's the breaks, eh? Meanwhile, AT&T's CEO took some time to put his Great Karnak turban on, predicting that there won't be that much demand for 3G service on the iPad, according to Reuters. That would be Randall Stephenson, the CEO of the same company that's actually, um, providing 3G service subscriptions for the iPad. "My expectation is that there's not going to be a lot of people out there looking for another subscription," Stephenson said. Oh no he "din't!" Anywho, whether you agree or not, you must give the guy credit for his refreshing honesty — at least until Apple or his own shareholders send in the stormtroopers to straighten him out. Photo © Apple Flash Absence Worries iPad Publishers; AT&T Exec Predicts iPad 3G Use originally appeared on About.com Portable Entertainment on Wednesday, March 3rd, 2010 at 00:01:49.
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