News written by Andre Yoskowitz (November, 2008)

According to a flooding of posts over at xbox-scene, it appears that the cooler-running Jasper-based Xbox 360 consoles have begun arriving in stores featuring the highly anticipated 65nm GPU which should significantly reduce RROD failures.

A quick way to note if your new console is indeed a Jasper-based model is to check the power supply. A Jasper will use 12.1A power supplies, while all current models draw 14.2A.

Looking at the serial number can also give you an indication as it is assumed that any model made on October 23rd 2008 or later is a Jasper model.

Nokia, the world's largest handset maker, had decided to withdraw from the huge Japanese cellular market, following five years of attempted gains at market share.

The company will stop developing handsets for NTT DoCoMo and Softbank Mobile, and effectively remove itself from the entire market.

Thomas Jonsson, a company spokesman, said the current global economic downturn led to the withdrawal. Jonsson said lower demand led to the company rethinking its priorities, and noting that Japan was no longer a top priority.

"We've not reached our own internal targets over a sustained period," added Jonsson.

Nokia did say they would keep an R&D center open in Japan and "continue its procurement activities" in the region.

Random House, the large book publisher, has announced that they will be digitizing an additional 8000 books, in an effort to take advantage of explosive e-book growth.

CEO Markus Dohle added, "more people everyday are enjoying reading in the electronic format and Random House wants to extend our reach to them with more of our books."

The publisher currently has a library of about 7000 and says the new round of digital books will be completed before February. A few of the books included will be novels by John Updike and Harlan Coben, and many volumes of the "Magic Treehouse" children's series.

RH vice president for digital operations, Matt Shatz, noted that e-book sales have increased over 100 percent in 2008, thanks to the Amazon Kindle, but declined to offer a specific number.

Joost has announced the release of an iPhone application which the company hopes will bring more attention to its 46,000 title-strong video library.

Making the application a "game changer" is the fact that users will be able to watch full Hollywood movies or TV shows on their iPhones, in good quality, and for free.

One catch of the service is the fact that you cannot stream the movies over EDGE or 3G and instead it requires Wi-Fi.

Along with the lack of mobility, many review sites have noted "choppy playback" as well as "a lack of content." Its a good first step, but hopefully Joost will fix what it is so far lacking.

Fans patiently waiting the launch of the PC version of the blockbuster smash hit GTA IV may be disappointed today to learn that the game will launch with SecuROM 7 DRM, the brutal DRM that tarnished the release of Bioshock and Spore in the last year.

During an interview with IGN, game publisher Rockstar explained its rationale for adding the DRM saying "we invest a considerable amount of time and effort to release each title, and employ a large number of people in the process. Having copy protection allows us to protect the integrity or our titles and future investments… SecuROM is the most effective form of disc based copy protection and allows us to manage authenticity on a global level for Grand Theft Auto IV."

Making it different than past releases however, is the fact that you can install the game as many times as you want, on any amount of PCs. You will need to activate the game online, however, as well as keep Disc 1 in your drive at all times to play the game. If you happen to upgrade your motherboard or even videocard, the game will need to be reactivated.

The extremely popular Amazon Kindle e-book reader won't be arriving in time for Christmas, says the e-tailer, and those ordering today will receive it in 12 weeks at the earliest.

This marks the second holiday season in a row that there has been a lack of supply of the popular device, but last year Amazon had the excuse that the item was new and production was not yet in full swing.

The Kindle, which is priced at $359 USD and exploded in popularity after Oprah recommended it, "uses an e-paper display to show pages from books and newspapers, which can be purchased and downloaded over its built-in and free data network connection, with the service provided by Sprint."

In other related news, the Kindle 2, which should improve on many of the features the first generation device lacks, has been delayed until spring 2009.

According to media research firm Screen Digest, Blu-ray players will remain expensive in Europe this holiday season despite American consumers being able to purchase them for as low as $129 USD.

"A shortage of cheaper Blu-ray players means that the sub-$300 machines that are already appearing on U.S. shelves are unlikely to materialize in Europe this Christmas," said Richard Cooper, Screen Digest analyst. "Combined with the recession, this means the feormat is unlikely to move much beyond the early adopter market this year."

Citing the global economic downturn, Sony noted last week that Blu-ray player sales would not hit expectations, and likely sell 10 percent less than expected.

Screen Digest does believe however, that the Blu-ray market will be worth 5.4 billion euros by 2012, with players priced under 100 euros.

Nokia has announced that the hotly anticipated 5800 XpressMusic phone will soon be available in Russia, Spain, India, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Finland and other counrties globally. Separating the phone from previous XpressMusic models is a touch screen interface.

The 5800 launches alongside the release of Nokia's "Comes with Music" unlimited music download service and uses a Symbian S60 interface that Nokia has been demoing since last year.

The device is touchscreen and can be considered more of music player than a phone. Its dual stereo surround speakers face outwards and there is a 3.5mm headphone jack, two features not found on many phones. Also included are 81 MB of on-board memory and a large 8GB microSD card as well as a guitar pick stylus. Nokia says the speakers are the most powerful yet on a phone.

Music playback includes protected WMA, MP3, AAC and there is word that the phone can use Windows Media Player 11 as its on-board player.

"When it comes to music phones, people all over the world want a device that is a great music experience and still works really well as a mobile phone, without sacrificing features," said Jo Harlow, Vice President, Nokia. "The Nokia 5800 XpressMusic delivers on this and allows consumers to quickly and easily access and share the content that is most important to them with the people that are most important to them."

According to a recent survey by Leichtman Research Group (LRG), about one in five HDTV owners believe they are watching HD (high definition) programming simply because they own an HDTV, but instead are really watching SD (standard definition) content.

The data compiled by LRG is based on a telephone survey of 1302 U.S. households and marks the 6th consecutive year the survey has been run.

The findings are not all that surprising given the general consumer confusion surrounding terms such as 720p, 1080p, HDMI and Blu-ray. Cable providers are still only on their baby steps in regards to releasing HD services, and most companies only offer under 100 highly compressed HD channels that never live up to HD's full potential.

Last week we reported that Netflix had failed to get a licensing deal completed in time with Sony Pictures and therefore a number of Sony films were showing up as "not available on Xbox" when users tried to access them through their Xbox 360 Netflix streaming service.

It appears the licensing issues have been solved for the most part however, as most of the films are back and available for streaming.

Steve Swasey, a Netflix spokesman has declined any other comment about specific licensing deals but did say "We said earlier that titles come and go, that is part of the natural ebb and flow (of these licensing deals). Some titles are back while some are not."

The real issue at hand should be why Netflix had such an admittedly large snafu. The company has been planning to bring their "Watch Instantly" streaming service to Xbox 360 owners for months, and it seems odd that they would leave out a licensing deal with such a large studio.

Atlantic Records, a unit of the much bigger Warner Music Group, has announced that they are the first major label to have over 50 percent of its music sales in the US come from digital downloads.

“We’re like a college basketball team on an 18-2 run,” said Craig Kallman, Atlantic’s chairman and chief executive.

Overall for Warner, digital represented 27 percent of revenue, while Atlantic said digital sales now accounted for 51 percent of their revenue.

With the milestone however comes the clear realization that digital sales will never compensate for the lost revenue of declining CD sales. At its peak, in 1999, music sale revenue was $14.6 billion. Analysts at Forrester Research say that number will fall to $9.2 billion this year, despite the exponential rise in digital sales.

According to Sir Paul McCartney, any plans to have digital Beatles' tracks placed on iTunes have stalled, although he hopes the labels Apple Corps and EMI can "work out the differences."

Apple Corps, whose members include McCartney, Ringo Starr, Yoko Ono, and the estate of George Harrison, own the rights to most of the Beatles catalog. In the past year, EMI has released solo catalogs for each of the members on iTunes but has yet to get the rights to release the bands albums.

Music fans have been hoping for a legal digital release of the Beatles' catalog for years now but have been sorely disappointed.

Rumors arose last year after Apple Corps settled its lawsuit against Apple over the use of the name and logo, but so far nothing has come of it but negotiations.

In just a few days after Apple has released its iPhone 2.2 firmware update, the iPhone Dev Team team has already jailbroken it.

QuickPWN 2.2, available for free for both Mac and Windows users, will allow iPod Touch and iPhone users to jailbreak their device to the latest firmware, version 2.2.

With each update, Apple fights against jailbreakers, as a way to protect their exclusive contract with AT&T. An unlocked phone can work with any GSM carrier.

Whenever Apple updates the firmware, previous jailbreaks are broken in terms of the App Store, because most applications require the latest firmware to even run.

You can visit the site here: QuickPWN.com

According to a D+Pad report citing "insider sources", Sony has plans to cut the price of the PlayStation 3 console this upcoming March, in an effort to be "more competitive."

Sony Europe has so far dismissed the rumor as "rumor and speculation," but Europe president David Reeves is quoted as saying there will be "technical innovations" coming to both the PS3 and the handheld PSP.

The same source claims to have seen game footage of both Uncharted 2 and God of War 3 on the PlayStation 3 as well as gameplay for LittleBigPlanet, on the PSP. The insider added that studio Media Molecule has been working on the handheld port for four months.

Although dismissed as rumor for now, a price reduction in time for the Easter holiday is not all that far-fetched and has happened many times in the past with consoles.

YouTube has begun testing out HD-quality videos on their site, finally giving users the ability to watch 720p resolution videos and not the degraded quality of current YouTube uploads.

The new videos are over 80MB large and are assumed to be H.264 encoded mp4 files, the same format as those available from the iTunes HD store.

According to Wired, all that it takes to have standard videos upgraded to the 720p resolution (if they were taped at a high enough quality) is a small "hack."

To do so, take the URL of the video and add &fmt=22 to the end.

A good example to try this on is this video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zlfKdbWwruY&fmt=22

Fanedit.org, the most popular "FanEdit" site on the Web, has recently announced that after two years of being online, they have received a DMCA warning from the MPAA and taken down all their download links at the request of their US-based web host.

For those unfamiliar, a FanEdit of a film is "a new take on existing movie material. Anything can be changed, improved, restructured for a different watching experience and only the sky is the limit." Basically, fans edit existing films and add scenes, remove scenes, add music, add CGI, whatever they want, and recompile it as a FanEdit. The site, since the beginning has said you should not download the edits unless you own the original on VHS, DVD or Blu-ray, and even went as far as to place links to Amazon pages so you can purchase the original. Apparently this was not enough.

Boon23, founder of the site, says: "We all knew this day would come, but on the other side we all hoped, it would never. 3 days ago the MPAA has filed a DMCA warning against our download links. The result: 2 days of downtime, in which we removed all download links and all reference to them, making Fanedit.org just a showcase for fanedits without any possibility for the visitor to download. Read more...

According to a Japanese daily Yomiuri Shimbun report, Nokia, the world's largest mobile phone maker, is planning to launch its own mobile phone service in Japan next spring.

The move, if true, will intensify the already tight competition of cell phone carriers in Japan.

Nokia is "expected to use lines owned by Japan's biggest mobile phone carrier, NTT Docomo Inc, under an arrangement called mobile virtual network operator," added the paper.

The service will first be offered with high-end models in order to "establish a strong brand."

Despite being the biggest handset maker in the world, Nokia has only a 1 percent market share in Japan.

The Korean-based company MyRacer has announced the launch of its first portable Flash gaming console, the MF101.

The small handheld has a 2.4-inch, 290K color LCD screen with 320x240 resolution and uses a 192MHz ARM processor. The console has 1GB of internal memory which the company says can hold about 1000 Flash-based games. The media device can also play back text, music, photos and even movies as well as additional support for subway map views.

It is unclear whether the console can play full Flash-based games or only those available with Flash Lite, but even if it is the latter, there are many Flash Lite games as well. The handheld has two directional pads as well as shoulder keys. An SD slot allows for expandable memory.

The MF101 is available in Korea for the equivalent of $66 USD but some retailers are exporting it to North America for the equivalent of $104 USD.

Denon Electronics, makers of high end home theater equipment, have announced they will be giving away free copies of both Batman Begins and The Dark Knight in Blu-ray with the purchase of any one of their three standalone Blu-ray players.

The three players are the $749 USD DVD-1800BD, $999 DVD-2500BTCI or $1,999 DVD-3800BDCI, and the timeframe to purchase them is between Nov. 23 and Jan. 10. After the purchase, simply fill out a claim form and send in the proof of purchase from the player and the company will send the two Blu-ray films back to you.

“The Dark Knight truly epitomizes what this high-resolution format has to offer for home entertainment, both in terms of high-quality content, image and sound,” added Joe Stinziano, senior VP of sales and marketing at Denon. “Most importantly, our Blu-ray promotion with Warner is designed to benefit both our valued retail partners as well as consumers by generating excitement for Blu-ray products. Consumers will be looking for a strong value this holiday, season and an attractive offer tied to the year’s highest grossing film will help drive store traffic and sales.”

In an effort to stop the growing piracy of Blu-ray discs in the region, Sony Pictures has become the first Hollywood studio to distribute Blu-ray titles in China.

The studio will distribute 20 current and catalog titles in the format for 205 yuan ($30 USD) a price that it almost certainly way to high for the low-wage country.

A few of the movies available are "Hancock," "Kung Fu Hustle," the "Spider-Man" trilogy, "Hitch," "The Pursuit of Happyness" and "Close Encounters of the Third Kind."

None of the other major studios have announced plans to release Blu-rays in China but it appears that Disney and Warner Bros. are close.

"We will launch once (local) Blu-ray replication capability is ready -- hopefully in the first or second quarter," a Disney spokesman said.

According to VideoGamer, beginning in January 2009 all new Sony PlayStation 3 game releases will be required to support the popular Trophy system.

Despite being a rumor for a week or so, a Sony official has confirmed the information is correct, noting "Yes from Jan 09 all games must have trophies."

The Trophy system was added in July with the 2.40 firmware update and was seen as the PS3's answer to the popular achievement system on the Xbox 360.

Despite word this week from Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime that there will be ample Wii supply for the holiday season, giant video game retailer Gamestop believes differently.

David Carlson, Gamestop CFO, said he expects the retailer to be out of Wiis before Christmas and also expects to have little to no supply of Wii Fit or the full band versions of Guitar Hero World Tour.

"Wii Fit is in very, very short supply. It sells through as quickly as it hits the stores," added Carlson. "And although the Wii hardware is in very good supply right now we believe it may as well be out of stock by the holiday season."

Despite ramp ups in production, the Wii remains in short supply thanks to high demand that does not reflect the overall economic downturn.

A jury has found Sony guilty of copyright infringement and ordered the electronics giant to pay $18.5 million USD in monetary compensation to Agere Systems.

Sony was found guilty of "wilfully violating copyrighted technology on a number of devices" including the mylo personal communicator, the PlayStation Portable and the Network Walkman audio players. The patent in question relates to a "wireless local area network apparatus."

Although Agere won the case, it is not clear whether the ordered compensation is what the company had hoped for. The original claim stated Agere wanted compensation for lost profits as well as monetary damages equal to 300 percent of the lost profits.

Blizzard Entertainment has announced that the much anticipated World of Warcraft expansion pack, Wrath of the Lich King, has sold over 2.8 million copies on its launch date, making it the fastest selling PC game in history.

The previous record holder was WoW expansion pack The Burning Crusade, which sold 2.4 million copies on its first day.

"We're grateful for the incredible support that players around the world have continued to show for World of Warcraft," said Mike Morhaime, CEO and cofounder of Blizzard Entertainment.

"Wrath of the Lich King contains some of the best content we've created for the game so far, and we look forward to seeing even more players log in to experience it in the days ahead."

Stan Glasgow, president and chief operating officer of Sony Electronics America has said that the company believes sales of standalone Blu-ray (excluding the PS3) players will fall just short of expectations and the company will not meet its worldwide sales goal, due mainly to the global economic downturn.

Glasgow also pointed out the obvious when he said that Blu-ray movies were expensive and when they become more affordable, the standard should see a significant boost in interest.

The BDA and Sony had set a sales target of five million standalone players worldwide by the end of 2008 but Glasgow believes the year will end with only 4.5 million devices sold.

“It’s not that far off of it. Maybe 10% off of what we had thought. It’s truly one of the items that has performed well during this economic mess,” added Glasgow.

When talking about the prices of the discs, he added, “They (movie studios) need to make money, and the packaged media (discs) is a critical way for them to make money so I understand their problems also. But I’d love to see those prices come down, as well as the price of Blu-ray players, to drive adoption.”

eMusic, one of the older online music subscription stores, has finally hit its 250 millionth download, 5 years after the store opened for business.

The company offers DRM-free MP3 downloads compatible with all players and for a steep discount compared to titan iTunes. A monthly plan costs about $12 USD and gives users 30 downloads per month, averaging out to 40 cents per song.

The number may seem low, especially in comparison to Apple which has sold 5 billion tracks since opening their store in 2003, but it is important to note that the store has a heavy focus on independents and only 4.5 million tracks.

Despite a small subscriber base of only 400,000, the company has remained profitable for years now.

Sonic Solutions announced yesterday that they had purchased the assets of streaming movie provider CinemaNow. None of the financial details were disclosed.

The new agreement will combine CinemaNow's online movie business with Sonic's Qflix team, the new technology that allows users to download movies legally through CinemaNow then burn them to DVD using special drives and discs.

The combined division will be known as Sonic's Premium Content Group for now on.

Qflix was first announced in 2007 after Sonic signed a deal with Pioneer but the first drives were not released until recently.

Sonic's shares have plummeted in recent months, from a high of $11 USD in as late as May to $0.74 cents today.

Microsoft has announced that users with subscriptions to the Zune music store will receive ten free songs to keep every month, included in the $15 USD per month fee.

The monthly fee allows user to download unlimited amounts of music as long as they keep paying for the subscription, but because they are rentals, they become unplayable if the user ever stops paying.

The ten free tracks will come DRM-free in MP3 format and can be played back on any computer or device of your choosing.

"I think the 10 free tracks is going to be a huge accelerant to subscriber numbers", said Adam Sohn, Zune's marketing director. "People will enjoy owning that music, and I think they'll be more apt to transact more in the store."

According to Dean Hachamovitch, Internet Explorer general manager at Microsoft, the company will not be able to reach its goal of releasing version 8 of its browser by the end of this year and instead will begin shipping the product in 2009.

The general public beta will hit during the Q1 2009, with the final release following soon behind it.

An initial beta was released in March, and a second beta was released in August. Microsoft had hoped to have a final release by the end of 2008, but there appears to be delays.

Hachamovitch added that "Microsoft is being extra judicious in giving beta testers time to try out the software and incorporating their feedback into the product." Hachamovitch noted that the company "received a lot of feedback about how we transitioned from the IE7 beta releases to the IE7 final release, and as a result we want to be clear about the plan for IE8."

Internet Explorer 8 will add better security features, expanded privacy capabilities and new "Web slices" which will let "users subscribe to content on different parts of Web pages and have it sent directly to their browser."

After being announced earlier this year with no release date, the Xbox 360 exclusive Grand Theft Auto IV downloadable content (DLC) will finally become available on February 17th, 2009, says Rockstar.

The content, entitled "The Lost and the Damned," will follow the story of Johnny Klebitz, a prominent member of the "The Lost" gang in Liberty City.

"Johnny is a very different character than Niko, with a very different background," said Dan Houser, vice president of creative development for Rockstar Games. "I can't go into too much detail on the story, because we try not to give away too much plot before the game is released. But I can say that the story will show you a different side of Liberty City."

There was no price announced but acclaimed video game analyst Michael Pachter predicts $20 USD.

Nintendo president Reggie Fils-Aime has admitted that there will not be enough supply of the popular Wii Fit peripheral to satisfy demand this holiday season.

"With Wii hardware, I think we've got a good shot at meeting demand during the holidays," Fils-Aime noted. "With Wii Fit, I know we'll fall short."

Fils-Aime also added that he thinks 3rd party Wii developers are not reaching the full potential of the console and are therefore not finding the success they hope for.

"I will be able to say our licensees 'get it' when their very best content is on our platform," he says. "And with very few exceptions today, that's not the case."

Any price cut on the Wii coming?

"At some point, it will be time to adjust the [price]," he replied, "but we're nowhere near that point now."

Sony has announced today that they have added support for Slacker radio to BRAVIA HDTVs with Internet Video Link.

Users can now use their existing Slacker account to stream customized radio channels through their HDTVs. Sony did note that stations will have to be configured on a PC first.

The electronics giant also said Howcast support was being launched today giving "access to just short of 100 how-to videos through the TV separated into different categories."

Both accounts are free through Internet Video Link, which costs $300 USD and needs to be connected to a broadband connection. Slacker premium accounts start at $30 USD.

Just over a year after Apple began offering DRM-free music from EMI on iTunes, sources are indicating that Apple is in talks with the remaining Big 4 labels in an effort to offer their music in a DRM-free manner as well.

The music industry source says the talks are still preliminary and there are no completed deals but did add that one of the labels was very close to a final agreement. The rumor on that front is that the label closest to completion on a deal is Sony.

If these deals get completed, the iTunes' store would finally offer music that is not locked only to Apple media devices such as the iPod and will be free of FairPlay DRM.

Talks have been on and off for months now, add the sources, but if they are completed iTunes should manage to steal more market share in the now crowded MP3 download store market. Competitors such as Amazon MP3 and Rhapsody have been able to gain market share and differentiate themselves by offering DRM-free MP3s.

With the now available New Xbox Experience update, Xbox 360 owners have access to Netflix's large "Watch Instantly" streaming service. However, some users will be disappointed when they see that there are a few films listed as "not available on Xbox."

The movies not available are from Sony Columbia Pictures, and despite rumors, it is not because Sony happens to have a rival gaming console. It turns out that Netlix did not get a licensing deal completed in time, and the Netflix team admits to the snafu.

Steve Swasey, a Netflix spokesman, added that movie titles "come in and out of licensing all the time." He said he hopes the missing movies will only be temporary.

"Today, titles regularly come in and out of license and there is a natural ebb and flow to what we have on license at any given point in time," he explained. "In the case of Xbox 360, a few hundred titles are temporarily unavailable to be streamed via the Xbox game console. Those titles are still available to be watched on subscribers' computers and on TVs via other partner devices, and we hope they'll be licensed for Xbox 360 shortly."

A new Juniper research report has stated that despite increased interest in mobile gaming, sales of games have "flatlined across North America and Western Europe".

The total retail value of the mobile gaming market is expected to almost double in the next 5 years from $5.4 billion USD to $10 billion USD however "limited on-portal revenue share for publishers is driving some away from the sector and poor games marketing fails to capture customer attention."

"The revenue share offered by Apple to games publishers is incredibly attractive," said Dr Windsor Holden, author of the report, speaking about how iPhone gaming has helped bring increased interest to the market.

"The danger is that if operators do not respond with a similar business model, publishers faced with low margins may simply exit Java completely, thereby reducing consumer choice in the longer term."

At the Adobe MAX developer’s conference yesterday, Adobe showed off their latest Flash player, one that works on both Windows Mobile phones as well as the new Android-based phone, the T-Mobile G1.

“We are excited to be working alongside Adobe to bring Flash technology to Android,” said Andy Rubin, director of mobile platforms at Google. “Adobe Flash is crucial to a rich Internet and content experience on mobile devices and we are thrilled that Google will be one of the first companies along with the Open Handset Alliance to bring Flash technology to the smartphone market.”

Notably absent from the presentation was the popular Apple smartphone, the iPhone. Although Adobe has said they have a Flash player that will work on the iPhone OS, Apple's strict TOS will not allow it into the App Store. I mean, why would Apple let consumers play free Flash based games or watch movies from sites like Hulu when they can instead be locked into iTunes, the App Store and other Apple run platforms?

Adobe notes that 98 percent of computers have Flash installed, and it is becoming crucial to have it to enjoy the Internet. That is of course, unless you own an iPhone.

According to a new Wall Street Journal article, Hong Kong based movie pirates have begun selling bootleg Blu-ray films on standard DVDs, using the AVCHD format to fit a 720p film onto a cheap DVD-5.

Although the AVCHD discs only offers 720p and not the full HD 1080p, most consumers cannot tell the difference, and just see it as an upgrade from standard DVD anyways when playing back on their Blu-ray players.

The MPA warns that because blank DVDs can be had for, on average, 30 cents a unit, the pirates are making a huge profit on every bootleg sold.

"We are concerned and are assigning priority to this issue," said Mike Ellis, the Asia-Pacific managing director for the MPA.

According to Crunchgear, Apple has begun building HDCP (High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection) into their new MacBooks in order to protect iTunes Store purchased media.

Although most content are not protected, there are some newer videos that are and will not play at all unless you have connected an HDCP compliant TV or monitor.

Users trying to connect to a TV via HDMI or DVI should be fine, but users with VGA or component/composite ports only may have issues.

To understand more about what exactly HDCP is, please read our glossary entry here: High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection.

Pic via source:

Sony Computer Entertainment America has proudly announced that there are now 14 million active PSN accounts worldwide, matching the 14 million active users Xbox Live currently has. It is important to note however that XBL originally launched in 2002 but also costs money for a subscription. PSN is free.

As of July, Sony only had 10 million registered users who had downloaded 170 million pieces of content. That has now grown to 14 million and 273 million pieces of content.

"With 14 million active accounts and 273 million pieces of content downloaded, we know that you're thirsting for this digital entertainment," said John Koller, director of hardware marketing for SCEA.

"PlayStation Network has truly hit its stride with unique downloadable games and a video delivery service featuring movies, TV shows, and original programming that you can watch in HD with your PS3, or bring with you on your PSP."

The popular DVR company TiVo has announced that it has teamed up with Domino's Pizza to allow subscribers to order pizza right from their TV sets, free of charge. (You will still have to pay for the food obviously).

"This is the first time in history that the 'on-demand' generation will be able to fully experience couch commerce by ordering pizza directly through their television set," said Rob Weisberg, vice president of precision and print marketing at Domino's.

Weisberg added that TiVo users will see a Domino's ad and be able to click on "I want it" from their TV remote.

Consumers can enter their delivery address as well as crust type and sauce through the TV and expect their food within 30 minutes.

Domino's added that subscribers can set up a user-name and password for Dominos.com and use it place orders faster.

The infamous torrent tracker The Pirate Bay has smashed through another new milestone, reaching 25 million unique peers. It has been estimated that the site tracks over 50 percent of all BitTorrent users that are on at any point.

In 2006 the site tracked 3 million peers which moved up to 6 million peers by November 2007. In April of this year, TPB admin and founder Brokep noted that they had hit 12 million peers. The growth has been exponential and does not seem to be slowing down anytime soon.

Admin Peter Sunde added that there was previously limits on how many peers the site could track but those have been lifted thanks to new changes. “I wish we had lots and lots of money so we could just buy like 10 servers and another gigabit,” he jokingly added.

A new survey published by the The National Research Institute of Legal Policy shows that about 70 percent of teenage Finns have used or currently use file-sharing applications to download copyrighted material.

Online piracy was far and away the largest form of ‘criminal behavior’ among the Finnish youth. 6 percent smoke marijuana or has, 11 percent have participated in a fight, and 15 percent have stolen something from their school or someone else.

29 percent of those who reported downloading unauthorized content also admitted they download movies or music every single day from file sharing services.

Finnish pro-piracy group Piraattiliitto said, “There is an almost unanimous call from the readers to legalize private filesharing. The overwhelming change in the national opinion from anti-piracy to pro-piracy is somewhat surprising, even for us at Piraattiliitto.”

The Finnish copyright lobby however said the results of the survey were "alarming" and they are looking to pass new laws that will "allow copyright holders to force ISPs to pass their threatening emails to the alleged filesharing customers."

Richard Craig Lissaman of Calgary has become the first Canadian convicted under new movie pirating legislation for his decision to film the movie "Sweeney Todd" at a local movie theater last year.

Lissaman pleaded guilty on Friday and was sentenced to 12 months probation and a large fine of $1500 CAD.

The guilty party is now also banned from going to any movie theater as well as from owning video recording equipment (including a cell phone with the capability) while he is on probation.

Judge Skene said that Lissman's crime was comparable to someone shoplifitng a cart of meat knowing that they will resell it for a profit.

"You can say he and his pals will watch the movie, but he has an item that is more supportive of taking something to be used to make a profit," said the judge.

"It's not a simple theft of an item for personal consumption."

The motion picture industry was delighted by the ruling and admitted they spent six months investigating before having the authorities arrest Lissaman.

"Canada is a hotbed of movie pirating, which is a billion-dollar loss to the movie industry," Mark Christiansen, executive vice-president of operations for Paramount Picture's motion picture distribution. Read more...

According to a new Leichtman Research study, one-third of all Americans now own an HDTV, putting market penetration at an all-time high. The number has doubled from 2006's figures.

Just over 22 percent of all US homes purchased a new HDTV in the last 12 months, and about 48 percent spent over $1000 USD for their new TV.

"About 40 million U.S. households now have at least one HDTV set, and LRG forecasts that this number will double over the next four years," noted Bruce Leichtman, President and principal analyst of Leichtman Research. "While more people than ever before have HDTV sets, educating consumers on HD programming remains an issue.

HDTV prices, whether they be for DLP, LCD or plasma screens, have been dropping exponentially over the past two years and 42 inch screens with full 1080p HD resolution can be found for under $1000 depending on the brand.

The popular Canadian retailer Future Shop has announced they have dropped the price of the Zune 8GB to $100 CAD, down from $150.

The deal will last for the next week on all colors and will prove to be a large undercut on American retailers and other Canadian retailers' current prices. As of September, Microsoft's official MSRP for the product is $150 CAD.

It is unclear whether Microsoft or Future Shop prompted the deal but it is odd to see a product at such a high discount while it is still relatively new and not a clearance item.

Future Shop is also selling the 120GB model Zune for $234 CAD, $16 CAD lower than the MSRP.

Microsoft has announced that it expects the Xbox 360 to outsell the total sales of the original Xbox by November, surpassing 25 million units worldwide.

Mindy Mount, corporate VP and CFO of the company's Entertainment and Devices division, says "so far we've done a great job appealing to the core gamers. And by the end of this month we expect our global installed base to reach 25 million units, surpassing that of the first Xbox.

"It's a great milestone for us, but still only a start when you consider that history shows three-quarters of a console's sales come at a price of USD 199 or lower. We hit that sweet spot in September, making our Arcade model USD 50 cheaper than the Wii and half the price of a PlayStation 3."

Mount also correctly noted that the recent across the board price cut has had a huge impact on sales around the world. "In the US in September our console sales rose 42 per cent month over month, and in Europe they rose 62 per cent," she added. "In Japan we've had over a 500 per cent increase in sales."

The new Nintendo DSi continues to sell well in Japan, far outpacing its rival the Sony PlayStation Portable, says figures compiled by Media Create.

For the week ended November 9th, the updated handheld sold 104,897 units, just beating out its predecessor, the DS Lite by 8381 units.

Lagging in third was the PSP at 43,726 units, followed by another Nintendo console, the Wii at 24,726 units sold.

The PS3 moved back ahead of the Xbox 360 and sold 18,354 units compared to 12,759 units for the Microsoft console.

Netflix has posted on their site that beginning on December 15th they will no longer ship HD DVD titles, leaving Blu-ray as the consumer's only HD format of choice.

In February the company stopped purchasing HD DVD movies when Blu-ray won the HD format war but have kept renting out their current stock to those who wanted it.

On December 15th, if you have any HD DVD titles in your queue, they will be replaced with their standard definition counterpart.

There was no word on what Netflix will do with all the HD DVDs after the fact. Hopefully they will go on firesale.

Pic via Crunchgear

According to a new ABI Research report, the amount of Web-enabled electronics will at least triple in the next five years, allowing more and more consumers to connect to the Internet via their video game consoles, TVs and Blu-ray players.

There are currently 60 million electronics components worldwide that are Web-enabled and ABI says there will be over 200 million by 2013. Internet-protocol-enabled TVs, which are the standard in Japan, will become commonplace in the USA, adds the report.

"One of the main facets of multi-screen offerings will be Web-based user interfaces and rich Web content across all three screens," ABI research director Michael Wolf said in a statement. "Beyond the PC and mobile environment is the Internet-connected TV screen."

More and more TV makers are integrating Ethernet ports into their TVs and Profile 2.0 Blu-ray players are doing the same.

Companies such as Netflix have encouraged the pushing of Internet capability by signing deals to have digital copies of movies streamed directly through Blu-ray players or TVs.

Nintendo sold 803,210 Wii consoles in the United States for the month of October, marking a large jump from last month.

According to figures from market research firm NPD, the Nintendo had better supply for its hit console and increased sales from 687,000 units last month.

Sales of the Sony PlayStation 3 fell again from 232,400 units in September to 190,000 for October. Because of a recent across the board price cut, the Microsoft Xbox 360 saw a decent sized sales jump from 347,200 units in September to 371,000 for October

“The price reduction on the Xbox 360 is paying dividends at retail as the platform realized a 7% unit sales increase over September,” said analyst Anita Frazier. “Keeping in mind that September was a five-week month while October had four [weeks], the sales pace increased 33%.”

Electronic Arts, seeing the huge popularity of Nintendo's Wii Fit , has announced they will be releasing their own fitness game, EA Sports Active next March for the Wii console.

The game will have tennis, boxing, soccer and other sports which gamers can play using wireless controllers attached to their arms and legs.

The game will retail for $60 USD and will include a book on healthy eating.

Electronista says Sports Active "centers around a pair of leg straps that hold both the Wii remote and nunchuk in place as well as a single resistance band for the upper body. The set lets Nintendo's own controllers properly track exercise across the whole body and also introduce enough physical stress to provide strength-based exercise."

Microsoft has proudly announced that the blockbuster Gears of War 2 has sold over 2 million units worldwide in its first weekend despite being available on torrents and other P2P for well over a week.

The Major Nelson site has also revealed that 1.5 million Xbox Live account owners played the game during that first weekend, playing a record 15 million gameplay hours total and unlocking 19 million achievements as well.

"We were so excited to launch Gears of War 2 on the same day all around the world, something virtually unheard of in the games business," said Cliff Bleszinski, design director at Epic Games.

"We wanted our fans, no matter where they live, to have a shared experience on day one, and that’s exactly what’s happened."

Netflix has announced the hiring of former Macrovision Solutions executive Greg Peters in an effort to secure more video-streaming deals.

Peters will become VP of partner product development and report to current Netflix chief product officer Neil Hunt.

"Greg's expertise in all aspects of the product development lifecycle—from vision to design to implementation—will be a significant asset to Netflix and our partners as we push toward our goal of eventually enabling all U.S. households to stream Netflix to their TVs," Hunt said.

Netflix has gone on a tear recently securing deals with Samsung, TiVo, Microsoft, Disney and Starz, all in an effort to boost their "Watch Instantly" streaming service. The library currently has over 12,000 titles available with another 3000 titles expected by the end of the year.

Facebook has noted that use of its Facebook Mobile products have tripled since the end of 2007 and that the popularity has caught the company off guard.

Wayne Chang, an engineer on Facebook's mobile team, wrote today that use increased from 5 million active users to a current 15 million.

BlackBerry, iPhone, Palm and Windows Mobile users can access Facebook through dedicated third party apps and normal mobile phone users can access the site via any mobile browser.

Because of the increased growth in mobile usage, Facebook has now expanded its mobile team and will continue to improve the features of the offering.

Microsoft has confirmed that they are once again banning users of modified consoles from Xbox Live.

Quoting the Xbox team, I’ve gotten a few messages and seen some forum threads pop up on console bannings so I thought I’d post and let folks know what’s up. In our our continued effort to keep gameplay safe and secure for our community of more than 14 million members, Microsoft has taken action against a small percentage of Xbox 360 consoles that have been illegally modified in order to play pirated games. You should know that modifying your Xbox 360 console is also a violation of the Xbox LIVE terms of use, will void your warranty and result in a ban from Xbox LIVE. The health of the video game business depends on customers paying for the genuine products and services they receive, both from manufacturers and the local companies that support them. We will continue to employ and bolster anti-piracy security measures to counter piracy in the gaming industry and improve security in the Xbox LIVE community.

Live Nation, which has spent hundreds of millions of dollars attracting acts such as U2, Jay-Z, Nickelback and Madonna has announced it will soon begin selling DRM-free MP3s from artist's individual pages. So far, three of the Big 4 labels have signed on with Live Nation.

Live Nation has also confirmed it will be setting up its own ticketing service to compete with Ticketmaster and the company can now claim that it handles everything from merchandise to distribution and every step in between.

Sony Music, Universal Music Group and EMI have all signed on and negotiations with the last major label are still in progress. Artist have complained that iTunes, the current market share leader, does not have strong "artist pages" and lose sales because of it.

"Looking ahead, our primary goal remains centered on maximizing our global concert pipe for our client – the artist," explained president and CEO Michael Rapino, "and expanding into direct ticketing/online distribution, completing the world's only concert-to-fan direct platform for artists."

In an effort to spur added holiday sales, Orange France has cut the price of the 8GB model iPhone 3G from 149 euros to 99 euros when bought new with contract and data plan.

The price cut on the 16GB model wasn't confirmed but reports have said it will drop from 199 euros to 129.

The promotion, called internally the "Christmas Origami star," will last from November 13th until January 14th.

European prices for the iPhone 3G have never been this low but does bring back memories of last June when carriers slashed the price of the first generation iPhone to 99 euros or cheaper in an effort to clear out stock.

Pics from Apple Insider

Aiming to convert physical DVD bargain hunters to digital copy owners, Apple has set up a special "This Week's Great Movies Under $5" page on iTunes that will offer a few movies every week for $4.99 USD, a steep discount from their normal price point.

For the inaugural week, there are mainly older action movies such as Terminator 2: Judgement Day, The Last Action Hero, Air Force One and The Karate Kid.

Although Apple has not made clear how long each discounted movie will last on the page, we can assume that it will be only for the one week period of Tuesday to Tuesday.

Marking the first time they have ever done so, Sony Pictures Home Entertainment has announced that the two-disc DVD and Blu-ray offerings of the comedy Pineapple Express will include a free digital copy of the film downloadable from iTunes in addition to the digital copy that can playback on PCs and the Sony handheld PSP.

Previous Sony digital copies had not been compatible with Apple devices such as the iPod or iPhone nor on Mac computers.

Sony says it will offer iTunes downloads on a "select basis" for now on.

“SPHE is thrilled to expand the value and convenience of our digital copy program to the iTunes community,” said Lexine Wong, senior VP of worldwide marketing at Sony. “Consumers can enjoy Pineapple Express where and how they like—whether with the full home entertainment experience of Blu-ray high def or DVD or on the go with their laptop, PSP or iPod.”

On August 26th, 27-year-old Kevin Cogill was arrested on suspicion of violating federal copyright laws. FBI agents say Coghill had nine unreleased Guns N' Roses songs on his site in June.

The blogger allegedly had been streaming songs from the still unreleased new Guns N' Roses album "Chinese Democracy" on his site for some time.

Despite saying he would plead not guilty last month, it appears Cogill has changed his mind and will now plead guilty to one federal count of copyright infringement. Because the case was being treated as a misdemeanor and not a felony, Cogill faced up to one year in prison as well as a fine.

Due to his clean criminal record and the plea bargain, Cogill will likely face only 1 month of jail time. More importantly will be whether Cogill will be forced to reveal the source of the nine tracks he uploaded.

According to Video Business, the box office smash hit The Dark Knight can add another milestone to its list, highest selling HD title of all time.

Although the movie isn't set for release until December 9th, Warner is believed to be shipping 1.1 million units of the film for its launch date, the first time a Blu-ray film has ever hit the 1 million milestone.

Although accurate figures for Blu-ray sales are hard to come by, 'The Dark Knight' is expected to be the highest seller in the format's short history, surpassing previous trend setters Casino Royale, Transformers and Iron Man.

Casino Royale was the first HD title to sell 100,000 units (back in March 2007), and Transformers was supposedly the first HD title to ever hit 500,000, also in 2007. More recently, Iron Man smashed any previous Blu-ray record by selling an estimated 782,000 units in its first week.

VUDU has announced today via a press release that they now offer the largest HD library on the planet, 1150 titles.

The company noted they reached the milestone by adding 600 new titles in October, both in regular HD and the company's high-end HDX format.

Overall, VUDU offers over 10,000 titles, with 1150 of those being available in HD or HDX.

"This is only the beginning of our effort," said Edward Lichty, Executive Vice President of Content at VUDU. "We plan to maintain a leadership position in offering the best picture quality experience and the deepest library anywhere when it comes to HD."

VUDU is in direct competition with the crowded HD streaming marketplace which includes major players Apple, Netflix and more.

2Wire has introduced its new MediaPoint set-top box that will deliver high definition content via a broadband connection.

The media hub can connect to home networks through wired or wireless connections and can also be remotely accessed via the Internet.

The box's built-in USB ports allow users to stream all types of video and audio content from flash drives or external hard drives and the device is compatible with UPnP- and DLNA-enabled devices.

Electronista says the box will offer Internet browsing capability through your TV set but the interface method is unknown at this point. Internet radio is another interesting feature you will be able to access from the device.

The device will not be available to consumers directly and instead will come through ISPs such as Comcast and AT&T who purchase them, and "then offer specific content and options for the MediaPoint under their own respective brands."

Finally putting an end to weeks of rumors, Blockbuster has announced they will be building a set-top box that can stream digital movies to user's TVs.

The move can be seen as a way for the struggling company to compete with rival Netflix which has been making deal after deal to add to their streaming library.

Blockbuster CEO, Jim Keyes, added that the device will be brand associated with its Movielink rental and purchase service but did not disclose any other details. For the time being, cost, hardware and software specs and release date are unknown but Keyes did note the box would be available for the holiday season.

The new device may be too little too late for Blockbuster however as Netflix has had their own set top box (the Netflix player by Roku) available for almost a year. Netflix has also recently signed a deal with Microsoft to have its subscribers stream movies free of charge on Xbox 360 consoles.

Koch Entertainment Distribution, one of the fastest-growing independent music companies in the U.S, has announced that it will make over 2,600 hours of video available through Apple's iTunes platform.

The content will include fitness, foreign, horror, documentary, TV, special interest, classics, children’s, anime and independent film genres.

There will be programming available from Koch, Koch Vision, Koch Lorber Films labels, Passport Entertainment, Cinema Epoch, Lifesize Entertainment and more.

VB says the titles now available for download are the music video Hatebreed: Live Dominance, Chop Shop, High Times Presents: The Cannabis Cup, Les Paul: Chasing Sound, Monster Camp, Secrets of Mary Magdalene, the Sundance Channel’s Terminal City and Adventures of the Galaxy Rangers: The Collection Vol. 1.

“Making key titles from our home video library available on iTunes helps position Koch as the premier independent aggregator in the digital distribution space with the broadest distribution network of any independent,” noted Michael Rosenberg, president of Koch Entertainment Distribution.

According to Nielsen SoundScan, the Journey track "Don't Stop Believin'", originally released in 1981, has become the first catalog digital download in history to reach the 2 million sold milestone.

"Believin'" is at 2.03 million downloads since it reached legal download services in April 2003 and has seen increased popularity through famous placements such as during the final scene of "The Sopranos" and in episodes of "Family Guy" and "Laguna Beach." The recent addition of a new lead singer and a tour has also helped bring the song back into the spotlight.

"They are one of the most important artists we have," Sony Music Entertainment Commercial Music Group president John Ingrassia says. "We're constantly working with the band and our team to create new products or highlight the catalog."

Ingrassia added, "We always do search engine marketing and promotion through the Web sites of TV shows or other partners, but now we can go to DSPs (digital service providers) and say, 'We can do a lot more with this if you'll work with us.'"

Well done Journey.

Wal-Mart has begun a new promotional campaign dubbed Operation Main Street in which many products will see huge price cuts for a limited time.

From the full promotion however, Blu-ray products seem to be leading the pack. The Magnavox NB500MG9 Blu-ray player is selling for $198 USD, down from $229. The player is Profile 1.1 compatible and will upconvert standard definition DVDs to 1080p.

Potential buyers of the most popular Blu-ray player, the Sony PlayStation 3, should be delighted by the promotion as well. The $399 USD 80GB PS3 will come with a $100 USD Wal-Mart gift card that can be used on any items available at Walmart.com. PlayStation 2 buyers will receive a $30 USD gift card if purchasing the aging $129 USD

According to ABI Research, prices for older model Blu-ray players should drop to $150 USD for the holiday season, a steep price drop over their current average $200-250 USD price tags.

The analyst group says the price drops will be necessary to fight off pressures from emerging HD movie download services. The group also believes the studios will need strong Blu-ray sales for the holiday following the current economic downturn.

The sales prices will most likely be on older Profile 1.0 and 1.1 players that lack BD-Live Internet capabilities.

“Blu-ray vendors and dealers are starting to realize that for Blu-ray to become the next DVD, they need to lower player prices in order to generate interest and build volumes,” notes ABI Research's principal analyst Steve Wilson.

According to Nintendo's 2008 financial results briefing, the Wii gaming console was top seller in Europe, by far, for the year, shifting over 10.4 million units.

In second place was the Sony PlayStation 3 followed closely by the Microsoft Xbox 360.

The Wii had its best month in April when 180,000 units were sold. Its rivals each sold in the vicinity of 90,000 each for the same period.

The data did show what has been clear in North America and Japan though, that the recent price cuts on the Xbox 360 have helped it to surpass the PS3 for September and October. The sales still pale in comparison to Wii sales however, which remain strong.

For the handheld race, the DS took a big lead over its rival, the Sony PSP. At its peak, in July, the DS sold 225,000 units while the PSP sold only 50,000 for the same period.

According to co-founder Chris DeWolfe, MySpace is considering producing its own portable media player, one that will match its extremely popular MySpace Music streaming service.

Although he would not commit to whether a device is in development, he did say it was very "possible." For now however, the company wants to focus on its Music service which streams millions of songs, ad-subsidized of course, for free.

"If anything, we'll be accretive to iPod sales," DeWolfe said, speaking of the service's linking to pay-for track. "Unless we develop a device," he added however.

Apple's focus however, has always been on sales of hardware and not so much on the sale of tracks or videos as the margins are very small. MySpace is interested in bringing more traffic to its pages for ad revenue.

According to unnamed entertainment executives talking to CNET, YouTube may be on the verge of streaming full-length major motion films on a new service.

The service would be very similar to the popular Hulu site and would let users watch ad-supported movies in a widescreen format. CNET is under the impression that YouTube is so far into negotiations that a formal launch could happen as soon as January.

The deal would mark a major turnaround for YouTube which has so far mostly refused to host video longer than a few minutes.

The service will most likely only be available via a PC web browser as most web video services insert ads using Flash which most video-enabled devices cannot load.

The research firm Canalys has reported that Nokia continues to lose smartphone market share to Apple and RIM.

Nokia's share has fallen from 51.4 percent for the Q3 2007 to 38.9 percent for the Q3 this year. Apple has grown from under 10 percent last year to 17.3 percent while RIM has grown to 15.2 percent for the quarter.

The firm says the strong growth for Apple can be attributed to the global launch of the iPhone 3G. The firm believes the Q4 can be very strong for RIM and push it past Apple if sales of the Bold, Storm, and Pearl 8220 devices all exceed conservative expectations.

Nokia has seen its Symbian software lose market share as well, from 68.1 percent to 46.6 percent from last year.

HMV, Woolworths, 7digital, Digitalstores, Tescodigital, Tunetribe, and Play.com have all agreed to promote a new "MP3 compatible" logo that they hope will raise the profile of the open MP3 music format and inform users on what they can do with their DRM-free downloads.

The logo should also help consumers identify legal music stores from P2P.

The Entertainment Retailers Association created the logo and says it will emphasize that MP3s can be played in all media players.

7digital's Ben Drury added that digital sales "have been booming because users love the freedom of MP3".

"The beauty of an MP3 file is that once you have bought it, you don't need to be a computer genius or a lawyer to make it work and you are not locked in to a relationship with a single retailer or hardware manufacturer," he said.

The BPI is also standing behind the new proposal.

"This logo will not only help give consumers confidence that the music files they are buying will play on a wide range of devices, but will also help them know that they are legal and that artists are getting paid," noted Geoff Taylor, BPI chief executive.

Just one month after Comcast began imposing a bandwidth cap of 250 GB on all of its subscribers, AT&T has begun testing a cap of their own, however with a much smaller limit, 150 GB.

The cap will have tiers as well depending on how fast your connection is, slower users will only get 20 GB limit while the fastest users will get the 150 GB cap.

The test, beginning in Reno, Nevada today, will "evaluate a usage-based model that could potentially help address today's trend of explosive bandwidth usage, [and] may be extended to one other market by the end of the year," said AT&T.

Anyone in Reno who uses over 150 GB per month will automatically be enrolled in the full bandwidth trial at the end of the year.

Any trial participant that exceeds the limit will be given a one-month grace period but if they do it again they will be fined $1 for every GB over they go.

Unlike Comcast however, AT&T will provide all customers with a "bandwidth measuring tool" and will also notify customers when they have hit 80 percent of their limit.

Sony Music Entertainment Japan has announced the launch of a new disc standard today, Blu-spec, in which it hopes to use blue lasers to "cut CDs more accurately than would be possible with red lasers."

The company will also use polymer plastic for the actual discs and the combination will improve the quality of audio CDs while keeping compatibility with current CD players. Incompatibility has been the main weakness for Super Audio CDs and other audio standards.

The first Blu-spec discs will hit Japan on Christmas and will be mainly classical music discs as well as Jazz. Among the 60 titles available at launch will be Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 and Miles Davis' Kind of Blue.

The discs will all be Sony but they are hoping to "foster cross-label support" from the other Big 4 labels.

According to a new report published by Net Applications, Mozilla's Firefox web browser can now boast 20 percent of the global market share for browsers, slowly chipping away at Internet Explorer's once-thought of insurmountable lead.

The report says the browser has seen a huge surge in popularity thanks to the recent release of Firefox 3 as well as from converts fearing the infamously insecure Internet Explorer.

The milestone is even more impressive considering the growing popularity of Apple's Safari browser and the introduction of Google's Chrome browser.

Mozilla also added that they plan to replace their current JavaScript engine with TraceMonkey which will "improve operations within the application by 20 to 40 percent."

EZQuest has launched its latest Mac-based product, the internal Phoenix Blu-ray Super Drive 6X Rewriter.

The drive can play and record to CD, DVD, HD DVD and Blu-ray. The "device features a 4MB buffer for writing, and uses integrated buffer under-run protection. Files, folders, movies, or other content can be dragged and dropped directly from the Mac desktop to be written on the 50GB capacity discs," says the product page.

To be able to watch commercial Blu-ray or HD DVD discs on Macs however, the company says you will have to use Windows through Boot Camp on your computer.

The high-end home theater producer NAD has announced their first Blu-ray player, dubbed the T587, which includes Profile 2.0 support.

The T587 is expected to have the fastest load up time for Blu-ray movies (under a minute), a feature that should be welcome to many enthusiasts.

Electronista adds the player has "Dolby TrueHD and DTS Master Audio surround sound, HDMI 1.3 output with support for Deep Color on the right HDTVs; it also supports Dolby Digital Plus for 10.2-channel sound over the newest audio systems. A front USB port handles MP3/WMA music and JPEG/PNG photos, while the disc drive itself can play back DivX clips."

The French Senate has voted in favor of a law that will have pirates kicked off the Internet for multiple offenses and the bill now goes to the French National Assembly for final approval.

Pirates caught illegally sharing protected content will get two warning emails before having their Internet connection cut off.

The idea of the "three strikes law" has been around since late 2007 when French President Nicolas Sarkozy introduced it and called the proposal "a decisive moment for the future of a civilised internet".

Under the law, ISPs will become Internet watchdogs keeping a closer look on the piracy tendencies of its users.

The Senate almost unanimously voted to back the law (297 to 15) and will also create a new government division to strictly oversee anti-piracy.

Netflix has announced plans to discontinue sales of used DVDs in an effort to shift focus back to its core businesses of streaming movies and TV and DVD rentals.

Posted in the official Netflix blog, the company said they will stop sales of used DVDs on November 30th.

The blog states: "As you know, our core business is delivering great movie rentals to you on DVD by mail and instantly to the computer and TV, so we've decided it makes sense for us to focus exclusively on that. This means we will stop selling previously viewed DVDs through the Web site. We're sorry for any inconvenience for those of you who regularly purchase DVDs at Netflix, but we're excited about being able to spend the extra time focusing on continually improving our core rental business for you."

The announcement comes on the heels of Netflix's announcement that their new Silverlight-based movie streaming player had gone to public beta and would be accessible to Mac users.

Many subscribers who posted on the blog however seemed to be against the move.

"Being able to purchase previously viewed movies from Netflix was a huge bonus of my membership. I am truly sorry to lose that benefit. I hate to lose features to my membership, and I hope this is not a trend," wrote one subscriber.

Western Digital has announced the release of the HD TV Media Player, a networked media hub that will allow users to attach up to two USB hard drives, media devices or other gadgets and browse the contents via your TV.

Electronista says "the Media Player merges the content of two USB drives into a single pool of media and uses both file names and metadata for menus and the search process, so those with incomplete music or video tags can still find content."

Video playback is supported for up to 1080p through HDMI although what formats are playable was not disclosed. RCA outputs also allow for SD compatibility for older TVs.

The hub is available today and is priced at $130 USD without any HDDs.

Roku representatives have posted on the official Roku message boards that they will be partnering with Netflix again to deliver HD content to subscribers of the rental company before the end of the year.

Differentiating from the recent Microsoft-Netflix deal, Roku will "use different Advanced Profile encoding to deliver the HD content at significantly lower bit-rates."

The official post on the forum says the following:

Roku will be delivering Netflix in HD by the end of the year
- Roku will be using Advanced Profile encodes which will deliver HD at substantially lower bit-rates than what Xbox is offering
- The number of titles is up to Netflix but the library will be the same as or larger than the Xbox library
- The UI will be updated to run in 720p and more covers will be visible on the screen at a time
- And the release will include another major new feature that you’ll have to wait a bit longer to learn about.

Nintendo has noted that they had shipped about 200,000 DSi units in anticipation of the Japanese launch of the console on Saturday.

The updated handheld is selling for JPY 18,900, the equivalent of $179 USD in the country.

The DSi features two cameras, improved audio functionality, a built-in web browser and an SD memory card slot along side a slightly larger screen.

Nintendo also added that they would be shipping another 100,000 units during the course of the week.

The company recently added that the handheld would hit North American and European markets in August 2009.

Netflix has announced the public beta of its streaming movie player for Mac computers, marking the first time Mac users can use the company's extensive "Watch Instantly" library.

Users can now opt-in to try out the player as long they have Microsoft's Silverlight animation plug-in.

Mac users will have access to over 12,000 titles and the company says they will continue to add more content on a daily basis. The program will become available outside of the beta stage by Christmas.

There is some DRM in the beta however which will limit the number of authorized devices to six, and each device must have Silverlight installed.

DVD producer Giant Interactive has announced it has moved into Blu-ray production, noting its first two releases will be A&E Video’s Universe: The Complete Season 1 and Paul McCartney: The Space Within Us, both set for release on November 18th.

The studio noted the recent hiring of executive producer Jeffrey Eagle and director of digital operations Jay Chumley who will now be in charge of Blu-ray.

Eagle is best known for his work as creative director for Herzog-Cowen Entertainment where he worked on Pirates of the Caribbean, and other media.

Chumley used to work for LaserPacific and 1K Studios, and worked on hit DVDs such as Lord of the Rings and Sex and the City box sets.

The studio will work with Walt Disney Studios, Lionsgate, ABC Family, Starz Entertainment, HBO and CBS.

Mformation Technologies has announced they are suing BlackBerry maker Research In Motion over patent infringement. Mformation is a handset management software firm.

The firm says RIM has infringed two patents with its BlackBerry smartphone and its management software. There was no other details on what was being infringed or what Mformation was hoping to get out of the suit.

"After refusing to license Mformation's disclosed systems and software, RIM modified its BlackBerry software to include Mformation's patented systems and methods of remote management," Mformation said.

"Mformation provides mobile device management solutions to mobile operators and enterprises around the globe. We firmly believe in the importance and value of innovation, and have invested significantly for many years in developing our industry leading device management technology. We are also committed to protecting our intellectual property as it is a core asset of our business when absolutely necessary," said Mark Edwards, Mformation's Chief Executive Officer.

Last month we reported that the New Xbox Experience dashboard update was headed to Xbox 360 gamers on November 19th.

However, like most media content, the NXE has been leaked online and has seen thousands of downloads already. If you download it though hoping to be the first person on your block to do so, you are in for an unwanted surprise though. Any user trying to log into Xbox Live while running the leaked NXE will be blocked from XBL until November 19th.

Although unconfirmed, you also run the risk of being blocked from XBL permanently, in the same boat as users using flashed firmwares and copied games.

If you are really that excited for NXE, I think it pays to wait the almost three weeks for it.

The infamous torrent tracker The Pirate Bay has hit a new milestone, reaching 20 million unique peers. It has been estimated that the site tracks over 50 percent of all BitTorrent users that are on at any point.

In 2006 the site tracked 3 million peers which moved up to 6 million peers by November 2007. In April of this year, TPB admin and founder Brokep noted that they had hit 12 million peers. The growth has been exponential and does not seem to be slowing down anytime soon.

Admin Peter Sunde added that there was previously limits on how many peers the site could track but those have been lifted thanks to new changes. “I wish we had lots and lots of money so we could just buy like 10 servers and another gigabit,” he jokingly added.

According to new weekly data from Media Create, the PlayStation 3 had its worst sales week of 2008 in Japan, being outsold almost 2-to-1 by its rival, the Xbox 360.

The launch of the new updated PSP-3000 model helped boost sales of the handheld and it topped the sales chart by a hefty number.

The Xbox 360 continues to sell well, as does the ever-popular Wii yet the PS3 keeps seeing its sales fall.

The data for the week:

PSP - 60,467
Wii - 24,292
Nintendo DS - 22,965
Xbox 360 - 7,844
PlayStation 2 - 6,962
PlayStation 3 - 3,931

According to a new patent filing, Sony is developing a wireless motion sensitive controller for the PlayStation 3 that will use a new type of "ultrasonic tracking system."

The controller itself will break apart and combine to perform different actions.

"Game interface tracks the position of one or more game controllers in 3-dimensional space using hybrid video capture and ultrasonic tracking system," reads the summary at the US Patent & Trademark office.

"The captured video information is used to identify a horizontal and vertical position for each controller within a capture area. The ultrasonic tracking system analyses sound communications to determine the distances between the game system and each controller and to determine the distances among the controllers," reads the document.

You can find the full filing with pictures here: US Patent & Trademark office

According to Nintendo president Satoru Iwata, the new DSi handheld will launch in North America and Europe in August 2009 after launching in Japan this month.

In an effort to combat slowing sales in Japan, the DSi went on sale today for JPY 18,900 (about 192 USD). Iwata did not give any other details for the NA or EU release but did give the expected date.

"Specific plans will be unveiled by our local subsidiaries, but an autumn or year-end launch would probably be too late," said Iwata.

When asked whether the current economic downturn was affecting DS handheld sales, Iwata said it was not.

"With the business environment having changed this much, we of course need to stay alert. But so far I haven't seen even the slightest sign that overseas DS and Wii demand is being affected by the economy," Iwata added.

Apple has come under criticism this week for their apparent blocking of the popular mobile browser Opera Mini from the iPhone App Store.

Opera chief Jon Stephenson von Tetzchner has said they have the alternative to Apple's Safari browser already developed but Apple's App Store guidelines will not let it through as it will compete directly with Safari.

When the iPhone SDK was released in March, it became clear that Apple would "specifically bars third-party interpreters that call on non-Apple frameworks and languages, which by definition would include Opera's web rendering engine. This would have left Opera Software converting software unlikely to be released in the near term."