Items tagged with 'Format'
Blu-ray Adoption Still Sluggish, HDTV Sales Up
It's a tough time for Blu-ray to be really hitting its stride. Many consumers are still wary due to the battle with HD-DVD, and frankly, many are still content with DVD. In too many cases, upscaled DVD looks "good enough" for consumers, and only those with oodles of disposable income are willing to fork out for Blu-ray.... Read More
SanDisk Announces a New Physical Music Format
It's no secret that music sales comprised of physical media (i.e. CDs) are down in the face of huge competition from iTunes and other digital distribution channels. At the same time, no one ever said the record labels would give up on physical sales easily. Today SanDisk, along with the four major record labels... Read More
Banking Information Sold on eBay --- for £35
It's not the first time something like this has happened, and it won't be the last. What's worrisome is that it probably happens more often than we know, and we just don't hear about it. No, someone didn't explicitly sell personal info on eBay. What they did was sell a hard drive with the bank account numbers, phone numbers,... Read More
Forget The Information Economy. Make Stuff
It's common received knowledge that there was a tech bubble in the late nineties, and then it burst. But what if that wasn't the end of it? What if it was really more like a tech balloon, and it had a pinhole leak? Instead of the pop we thought we heard, perhaps it's was a long slow hissing until we wake up today and realize:... Read More
New MT9 Digital Audio Format Has Six Channels
Watch out MP3, AAC, WMA, FLAC, and Ogg Vorbis--there's a new digital audio format about to be introduced and it's creators are setting their sites on it becoming the new "de facto standard" for digital audio. The new format is called Music 2.0 and it will use MT9 as its file extension: "The distinctive feature of [the]... Read More
Sony Left Holding The Format War Winner Bag
Toshiba backed the HD DVD format against Sony's rival Blu-ray high-definition disc method, and Toshiba lost. One wonders whether Sony might ask themselves from time to time if it might have been better to have lost. More or less, no one wants a Blu-ray player. Sales of Blu-ray players, excluding PlayStation 3 game consoles,... Read More
Wal-Mart Switches to MP3-Format Only
When we last visited Wal-Mart's attempt at DRM-free music, they had only managed to get EMI and Universal Music Group signed up for the DRM-free portion of their store. They've now decided to go all-MP3, but they're still stuck without Warner Music Group and Sony BMG, which are unfortunately the top two record labels.As... Read More
OOXML Format Wins Approval
It's not even officially announced, but Microsoft has been trying so long to get OOXML approved, it can't wait. It's already issued a press release.While the final vote has not yet been announced formally, publicly available information appears to indicate the proposed Open XML standard received extremely broad support.... Read More
Too Much Information. Not Enough Storage
Most people deal with limited storage along with their almost unlimited desire to save pr0n things. In the digital world, the problem is compounded by the speed at which various storage formats become obsolete. Even if you can lay your hands on a 5.25" floppy disk you have valuable things stored on, do you even have... Read More
Next-Gen Disc Formats Are Both Losers
Any time that a console is responsible for the bulk of a next-gen disc format's sales, we're willing to consider the possibility that most consumers just don't give a damn. Yet, it seems that nearly ¾ of all North American Blu-ray Disc players are found in PS3s and more than a third of all HD DVD Drives are Xbox... Read More
Mudslinging In the Next Gen Format Wars
Politicians have often been asked what they intend to do when a race is too close to call, and voters are starting to wonder if casting their votes for a 3rd party might not be a good idea. The answer, based on their actions (not responses) is simple: Start the mudslinging campaigns!It seems that Blu-ray and HD DVD... Read More
HD VMD, New HD Format
It's bad enough there are two competing HD formats. Many consumers have not bought into either format, fearing they would be stuck with a Betamax redeaux. It's late to the game, but a new company has introduced a new, cheaper HD format, but will anyone care? Next month, New Media Enterprises' 1080p set-top players,... Read More
YouTube tests viewer-friendly ad format
Google says it has devised an ad format for YouTube that - and here's the unbelievable part - is not annoying. Now how could they possibly arrange that, since in this age of Tivo and other PVRs, as well as banner blocking software for your web browser, ads are almost by nature, annoying?TV viewers have grown accustomed... Read More
Next-Gen DVD Format Wars: Everyone Loses?
For anyone old enough to remember the VHS/Betamax wars, the new battle between Blu-ray and HD DVD might seem like history repeating itself. While VHS did eventually prevail, it certainly put a lot of consumers off. It also probably opened the door for wide adoption of the DVD as a single unified standard after both the... Read More
Vista Harvesting Your Information?
If you own a tinfoil hat, now might be a good time to go grab it. Apparently Windows Vista has no less than 20 features/services that harvest information:"Are you using Windows Vista? Then you might as well know that the licensed operating system installed on your machine is harvesting a healthy volume of information for... Read More
HD DVD Is Leading the Video Format Wars
The HD DVD Promotional Group made a proud announcement today that over half of all next-generation video players sold use HD DVD format, which means that they have a slight advantage over their BD contenders.“About 60 percent of all movie players use HD DVD, and are selling far more titles than before as well. Over 75,000... Read More
Time Warner to announce dual-format DVDs next week
While the format wars rage on, many different solutions are being proposed. The latest is a disk that Time Warner will announce next week at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Total HD movies will carry movies that can be played on high-definition DVD players that use technology backed by Sony Corp.'s Blu-ray format,... Read More
Cadence donates power format to Si2r
Attempting to bridge the divide between two competing standards efforts, Cadence Design Systems will announce Monday (Dec. 4) that it has contributed its Common Power Format (CPF) to the Silicon Integration Initiative's (Si2) Low Power Coalition ahead of the anticipated date of January 31, 2007. A statement from Cadence... Read More
Set Your Financial Information On Stun
The most mundane store has doors that open when you approach. We all have personal communicators now, but ours take pictures, play music, and have GPS. My PDA puts a tricorder to shame. Full body non-invasive scans? Check. All that was left really, from Star Trek's original kit of technology was teleportation.... Read More
Intel Requests Further Information From AMD-ATI
Intel is looking for details from AMD in the Antitrust case that was started last year. Now that the AMD-ATI merger is complete, Intel is requesting all sorts of info from both AMD and ATI, and is questioning whether AMD will make ATI chips. Intel is specifically looking for financial details from the merger, as well... Read More
Your Opinion Of Apple's Windows 7 FUD Ads?