News written by Andre Yoskowitz (February, 2009)

Princeton defines the mythical city of Atlantis as "according to legend, an island in the Atlantic Ocean that Plato said was swallowed by an earthquake."

The Internet flared with rumors this weekend however that the fabled city had been found using the updated version of the satellite mapping software Google Earth.

A British aeronautical engineer fiddling with the updated 5.0 software noticed a strange 'street grid' pattern underwater about 600 miles off the west coast of Africa, and the size of Wales. For those interested, the exact coordinates are 31 15'15.53N, 24 15'30.53W.

Google has since denied the rumors though: "It's true that many amazing discoveries have been made in Google Earth, including a pristine forest in Mozambique that is home to previously unknown species and the remains of an ancient Roman villa...In this case, however, what users are seeing is an artifact of the data collection process. Bathymetric (or sea floor terrain) data is often collected from boats using sonar to take measurements of the sea floor. The lines reflect the path of the boat as it gathers the data."

Despite all of its accomplishments, there has been one glaring defect with the Xbox 360, the infamous Red Ring of Death (RROD) brought on by overheating of the system.

At first the software giant denied the RROD problem but eventually owned up to the console's failures and set aside $1.1 billion USD to cover extending the warranty of the system to three years for any system hit with RROD.

The company was even hit with a class-action lawsuit last October over the RROD problem which is still in court.

However, according to Microsoft's Aaron Greenberg, RROD may be a thing of the past. "We've improved that [repair] process. It's very quick, and they may upgrade your system with the latest technology. So that works really well. Read more...

Vizio has announced that they have surpassed Sony as the second-biggest seller of HDTVs in the United States, as of the 4Q 2008.

According to figures from iSuppli, Vizio accounted for over 14 percent of LCD and Plasma shipments, up 3.11 percent from the Q3. Sony fell 0.42 percent to 13.5 and Samsung remained the leader at 20.2 percent despite a small drop of 0.62 percent from the Q3.

Panasonic rose 3.12 percent for the quarter to settle in fourth place.

"Vizio's success in the fourth quarter was partly due to increasing brand recognition, courtesy of the company's strong marketing efforts and retail strategy," iSuppli analyst Riddhi Patel added.

"This is an indication that in the present tough economic climate, consumers are becoming less brand conscious and prefer televisions that they perceive to have good picture quality and that are less expensive compared to the competition, rather than seeking models with a lot of extra features," Patel concluded.

In a press release issued today, Sony has announced that a few key games will be hitting the PlayStation 3 "throughout the year," most notably God of War III and the massive multiplayer shooter MAG.

Although there were no specific release dates given, it is the first confirmation that GOW III will actually make it to gamers' hands in 2009, quelling any rumors that production delays would push the game back to 2010.

Among other anticipated games coming this year are Uncharted 2, Infamous and Heavy Rain.

In the same press release, the company announced a new TV ad for Killzone 2, which it promises was "rendered entirely in-game." The statement added: "We're very proud that our game engine technology has reached the point where we don't have to resort to software pre-rendering."

The company was criticized over the last few years for a Killzone 2 teaser trailer that used pre-rendered action instead of in-game action.

According to a WSJ report, Comcast and Time Warner are considering giving paying cable subscribers access to cable programming online, at no added cost.

Negotiations with content holders have been ongoing for months, and the report specifically notes Viacom and NBC Universal as being interested parties. Those companies own many of the most popular cable networks including TNT, USA and the MTV family.

The new Web services, which could launch as soon as the Q3 2009, should help attract new subscribers, says the cable companies although it will have to compete with free ad-supported sites such as Hulu and TV.com.

Sources familiar to the situation added that the "proposed Web services would likely be in a streaming format with ads, accessible in and out of the home, and without any additional charge to cable-TV subscribers."

Brian Roberts, the chief executive of Comcast added, "online video is our friend, not our enemy."

Warner Bros. is reporting that the blockbuster smash hit The Dark Knight has surpassed the $1 billion USD milestone for worldwide box office sales, becoming only the fourth movie to ever do so.

The highly rated sequel has now made $1.001 billion USD since its release last July and sits behind Titanic ($1.84 billion), The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King ($1.12 billion) and Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest ($1.07 billion) for highest all-time grossing movies.

Sitting in fifth place is Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone which almost hit the milestone but fell short at $974.7 million.

According to Box Office Mojo, $533.1 million was grossed in United States theaters with the remaining coming from nations around the world.

Warner also added that The Dark Knight is the highest-grossing 2-D IMAX movie of all time, with a gross of $65 million worldwide. The movie is also the record holder for most Blu-ray sales on launch day, launch week, and all-time.

Microsoft has confirmed that a new updates for users of the Windows 7 beta is coming next week while also adding that a Release Candidate (RC) for the upcoming Service Pack 2 of Windows Vista is being sent out to a few testers.

Windows 7 manager Brandon LeBlanc noted that on February 24th, five test updates would be released which “will allow us to test and verify our ability to deliver and mange the updating of Windows 7”.

LeBlanc did add however that the new updates would not fix any bugs but instead would simply “replace system files with the same version of the file currently on the system”.

The updates will need to be added manually through Windows Updates.

Vista SP2 RC, build 6002.16670.090130, was recently released to Microsoft Connect testers and should soon find its way to a larger range of beta testers.

When the SP2 eventually hits, it will encompass all previous updates and patches for the OS and will include 691 hotfixes, adds the source.

So far the largest complaint about the Android Market has been its lack of so-called "professional apps"; premium apps from big name publishers.

In fact, all of the applications in the store are free of charge, and although its hard to complain with free, many of the games have been lacking, even compared to free games available in the Apple App Store.

Beginning soon however, the Android Market will see premium content, most notably a mobile version of the blockbuster hit Guitar Hero: World Tour.

The official announcement adds: "Gamers will use the G1's sensitive touch-screen to play along with 15 rock classics including Deep Purple's 'Smoke on the Water', Guns'n'Roses' 'Welcome to the Jungle' and Black Sabbath's 'Paranoid'. There's also a bonus song available every month, and users can log on to guitarheromobile.com to create their own rock star persona."

The G1 referenced is of course the popular T-Mobile Android G1, available in the US. It is also safe to assume the bonus songs will cost extra money as is the standard with the Guitar Hero and Rock Band console games.

Thanks to the MPA's 10-week Operation ZoomOut, the average number of illegally recorded camcorded movies coming from Asia dropped significantly, leading the trade group to call the operation a raging success.

During the Operation, the MPA performed over 450 raids in 12 different nations, dropping the average amount of illegally camcorded movies from 2.4 to 1.4 during the time period.

370 alleged pirates were arrested and 4 million optical discs were seized along with 767 DVD and Blu-ray burners.

In China alone, over 74 retail outlets were shut down, and in Hong Kong and the Philippines combined, 3.3 million discs were seized. Most of the arrests came from raids in Thailand and Taiwan.

"All these measures have served to deter criminals from engaging in illegal camcording," added Mike Ellis, MPA prexy and managing director, Asia-Pacific.

According to Netflix CEO Reed Hastings, the company may start offering a streaming-only monthly subscription beginning in 2010, eliminating the need for physical media delivery.

Netflix has over 10 million subscribers and notes that "millions" of those users currently use the company's streaming library. The library consists of over 12,000 titles compared to over 100,000 physical DVDs.

Customers currently pay for a monthly subscription that includes mail delivery and access to streaming movies, but Hastings noted that the company's future success "hinges on its ability to transition to online video from DVDs."

“Most companies that are in our shoes fail,” Hastings added. “Most companies that have a sort of generational evolution forward, like AOL from dial-up to broadband, fail. And it’s catastrophic for investors.”

The company has been broadening access to its online streaming library in the past six months, adding the service to the Xbox 360 as well as to TiVo and a number of Blu-ray players.

“Right now, the power of the service is that hybrid message, the best of both,” Hastings noted, in reference to users ability to stream and get physical delivery. “So we’re putting most of our wood behind that. But we recognize at some point in the long term, the streaming will be good enough that an appreciable number of people will find streaming is all they need.”

Sony America has announced that they have officially expanded their PlayStation line of products to Latin America.

The company says the move will expand their install base, which is currently at over 140 million for the aging PS2 and 21 million for the PS3.

The new move will expand PlayStation sales to 13 new regions.

"Our commitment to expand PlayStation business into Latin America supports our vision to provide access to social entertainment experiences that can be shared among friends and family from around the world," added Mark Stanley, director and general manager, Latin America, Sony America.

"This expansion is the direct result of us listening closely to our community, and we're proud to deliver premium hardware and software services that will allow them to easily connect, play and communicate with one another."

Soyo, under its Honeywell brand, has announced the 82-inch Altura LE LCD HDTV with an expected launch date in April for the US market.

The TV has full HD 1080p resolution as well as a brightness rating of 600cd/m2 and a large 120,000:1 contrast ratio. The Altura LE will weigh 300 pounds and has a 120Hz refresh rate and 178-degree viewing angles.

As for inputs, the LCD will have three HDMI, two component video inputs, and one VGA, one composite and one S-video connection. Picture-In-Picture comes standard and the TV includes two 10W speakers.

There was no word on pricing yet.

Singapore Telecommunications (SingTel) has announced that it will sell the HTC Dream Android phone beginning on February 21st.

The HTC Dream, known as the T-Mobile G1 in North America, and dubbed the "Google Phone" in other regions, comes pre-loaded with Google Web Search, Gmail and Google Calendar among other software. SingTel will also offer video-on-demand subscriptions to new buyers.

The phone will sell very cheaply for the equivalent of $25 USD as long as the buyer purchases the most expensive monthly subscription package, costing around $62 USD.

SingTel recently launched the phone in Australia as well.

Two days after announcing the North American release date , Nintendo has announced the release date of the DSi for Europe, April 3rd, two days before the American release.

The handheld will cost $169.99 USD in North America and will cost "around GBP 149" in Europe.

Another notable difference from the US launch is the color schemes. North Americans will get to pick between black and blue (as pictured to the right) but European gamers will get to choose from black and white, the two choices the Japanese currently have.

Microsoft has accidentally let an internal memo slip which shows off that the software giant is preparing to release a red-colored Xbox 360 console.

The memo was sent to retailers and New Zealand gaming press, and specifically noted that a new promotion in the region would give buyers a free copy of Halo Wars with the purchase of any Xbox 360 console. However, the deal "does not apply to the Red Xbox 360 Elite console which is exclusive to EB games."

Currently, the Elite model only sells in black, but it appears that a second colorway is in the works.

There is no other word on whether the console will hit any other region besides New Zealand or any other store besides GameStop/EB Games.

AT&T has decided to continue its previous discount on the iPhone 3G, selling refurbished models of the popular smartphone with a $100 USD price cut.

The 8GB iPhone 3G costs $99 with a two-year contract and the 16GB version sells for $199. AT&T does note however that some of the handsets may have minor cosmetic "scratches."

"iPhones were either unused or lightly used and were returned during their 30-day trial period. The phones may have minor scratches but otherwise are in great condition," added the carrier.

There was no word on why the sale was back but most analysts have predicted that AT&T simply wants a boost in sales for the next quarter in light of the current economic recession.

Microsoft is currently negotiating to acquire the Israeli 3D technology company 3DV Systems for $35 million USD.

According to the company's website, "3DV Systems develops "virtual reality" imaging technology for digital cameras that it sells, called ZCams (formerly Z-Sense). Its main targets are the gaming market that enjoy a genuinely immersive experience."

The ZCam allows users to control the game through body gestures, just as the Nintendo Wii or PlayStation's EyeToy does. 3DV says their system is better however, as you are not required to wear anything.

The software giant will use the 3D technology in its Xbox 360 console.

Today at the Mobile World Congress, Skype, Ericsson and Nokia have announced that they will enter into a partnership that will place the Skype software on a few Nokia and Ericsson smartphones.

The first Nokia handsets to to have Skype integrated will be N-Series smartphones, and the upcoming N97 will be the first handset to have it when it launches in June.

According to Electronista, "the software for Nokia handsets will allow N97 owners to make and receive free Skype-to-Skype voice calls over Internet hotspots or their 3G data connections. They will havethe ability to make low-cost Skype calls to landlines and mobile devices. Users will also be able to see which of their Skype contacts are online and instantly message them."

Ever since the Nintendo DSi was announced in late October 2008, many interested gamers have wondered when the handheld would head stateside.

The answer came this morning when Nintendo announced the DSi will hit the US on April 5th priced at $169.99 USD. The console will initially be sold in black and blue.

When asked for comment, Nintendo Europe said they still did not have a set date for a European DSi release.

Nintendo also "announced that the DSiWare application will also be making its way to the US. The application allows owners of the portable to download new software from the internet a la the iPhone's App Store, with prices starting at 200 Nintendo points ($2)."

A 14-year-old girl from Wisconsin has been arrested and charged with disorderly conduct. Her crime? Repeatedly text-messaging during class time at school.

The police report also notes that the girl continually denied that she even had a phone on her person when asked to stop texting in class.

The school then called the police authorities and the officer who responded questioned the girl and interviewed her friends. When the officer tried to contact the girl's parents, "She gave me several numbers all being false by one or two digits wrong. [Redacted] stated I was dialing the wrong numbers so On [sic] speaker phone I dialed the number she gave me and spoke with a subject who stated I had the wrong number."

The girl continued to deny she had a phone until a female officer was called in to search the teen. A Samsung Cricket was found stuffed down the back of the girl's pants.

A court hearing is set for April 20th.

The ESA has released a new report on piracy, this time specifically pointing out the "rife" piracy of products in Western European nations.

The Special 301 Report reviews piracy issues in 48 countries and suggests that 40 of those should be placed on a "USTR Watch List."

During December 2008, reveals the report, thirteen selected movies were downloaded illegally 6.4 million times, with the two most popular titles accounting for over 75 percent of the traffic.

Italy had the "heaviest illegal download activity" at 17 percent, followed closely by Spain at 15.1 percent. Spain, Germany and Poland accounted for another 21 percent combined.

Telecom Italia was used the most for piracy by its users, followed by Spain's Telefonica de Espana and France Telecom, added the report.

"Piracy is the single greatest threat to the innovation, artistic commitment and technological advancements enjoyed by millions of consumers worldwide," added Michael D. Gallagher, CEO of the ESA, in a statement that sounds like every other ESA statement of the last 5 years.

"Piracy is a job killer that the world economy cannot afford in these difficult economic times. Countries that skirt obligations to combat piracy need to understand the unacceptable damage they are facilitating —and those countries that invest in protecting intellectual property rights and ensure that piracy is not tolerated at any level should be lauded."

Liberty Media, the parent company of DirecTV, has saved Sirius XM Radio from a likely bankruptcy by announcing it will lend the struggling satellite radio company $530 million USD.

Sirius had warned that bankruptcy could come as early as today if they could not negotiate with their debt holders. The company has been in talks with Liberty for a few days now.

The company's current situation brought Sirius into a standoff with Dish Network CEO Charlie Ergen, which purchased most of the debt that was coming due today and offered to restructure the loans in exchange for a controlling stake of the company.

Liberty did note however that they will be spinning off a portion of their company into a separate, publicly traded company, and that will include the Sirius division.

The source explains that "Liberty will provide a $280 million senior secured loan to Sirius, $250 million of which will be funded on Tuesday. Sirius will use the proceeds of the loan to repay $172 million of its maturing 2.5 percent convertible notes that had been due. The rest will be used for general corporate purposes."

Fujitsu has announced that they have inked a deal to transfer their HDD business to Toshiba, helping to soften the blow of a potential $112 million USD loss in the division for the fiscal year.

Fujitsu will spin off the division into a separate company which will then be purchased in full by Toshiba.

Although the agreement is already set, the actual deal will not occur until April at the earliest as Toshiba wants to have the deal happen in their Q1 fiscal 2009.

The deal should give Toshiba a stronger push into the smaller HDD market, including those for HDD-based media players and those found in laptops. The company also noted it will use the opportunity to "branch out" into solid-state drives and "other business-class storage."

In January we reported that Dell was preparing to enter the smartphone business, and today it appears that rumor has been confirmed.

This morning at the Mobile World Congress event in Barcelona, AT&T Mobility CEO Ralph De La Vega noted that "Dell announced they're entering the smart phone market." Although Dell has not confirmed anything yet, the word of the CEO of one of the largest carriers in America seems to be pretty solid at this point.

Previous reports have said that a group of engineers at Dell have been working on a phone based on the Android operating system for over a year now, and on a phone based on Windows Mobile for over six months.

Dell will be focusing on the increasingly crowded smartphone market, currently led by Apple, RIM and Palm and their two devices will likely be a touchscreen phone and one with a slide out QWERTY keyboard.

A dictionary will define "card counting" as a "card game strategy used to determine when a player has a probability advantage."

Bearing that in mind, Nevada gambling regulators have begun warning Las Vegas casinos that there is an effective card-counting program available in the Apple App Store for iPhone and iPod Touch users.

Although card counting as a practice is not illegal in Nevada, using a device to help you count cards is considered a felony.

The Nevada Gaming Control Board was tipped off by regulators in California "where officials at an Indian casino found customers using it and tipped state authorities."

Mitsubishi has announced that it has developed the world's first in-car Blu-ray player.

At 50 x 178 x 180mm, the company says the player is only 1/3 the volume of its home standalone BD player.

The player will support BD-ROM, BD-R and BD-RE and the company plans to commercialize it at some point in 2009.

Tech-On adds that "there are two main factors that contributed to the small size. First, Mitsubishi Electric increased the board density by 1.5 times. Second, the company reduced the thickness of mechanical parts while improving the anti-vibration performance of the equipment.

Specifically, the level of disc runout was reduced to 1/5 that of the company's existing products. By reviewing the mechanical design with the use of a vibration analysis technology, the company made the improvements without adding a damper."

This week at the Mobile World Congress, Samsung has been busy. First, the company batted off rumors that its upcoming Android phone was delayed and then released the world's first ever commercial solar-powered touchscreen phone.

Stealing the show however was the Omnia HD, which has the ability to record video in HD resolutions and can play back the video on any HDTV.

The phone has a large 3.7 inch touchscreen and is based on the Symbian S60 5.0 software. The screen resolution is an impressive 640x360, but that also obviously means the HD video playback on the device will be scaled down.

The phone achieves the HD video recording with the use of a 8-megapixel camera and also adds support for GPS, Wi-Fi and HSPA (High-Speed Packet Access). Supported download speeds are 7.2Mbps and 5.76Mbps depending on your access.

Huwaei Technologies of China has announced that they will be releasing 2 or 3 handsets based on Google's Android operating system in 2009 with more slated for 2010.

Edward Chen, head of Huawei's devices unit, added that the company was interesting in releasing phones using Symbian software as well as from Linux foundation LiMo.

The Symbian operating system, created by lead handset manufacturer Nokia, is the top platform used in current mobile devices but it continues to lose ground to software platforms used by Apple and RIM, the maker of the Blackberry smartphone.

Huawei, unknown in the United States due to the fact that it sells phone to telecoms who then re-brand them, said it hopes to sell 40 million phones in 2009, compared to 33 million in 2008.

Last week, we reported that Nokia was on the verge of opening their own "App Store" to rival Apple's, but that no date was set.

Today, the Ovi Store has been officially launched by the handset maker, with a launch date set for early May.

The store will merge Nokia's current Download!, MOSH and WidSets services into one platform that will allow users to buy applications, utilities and games to their S40- and S60-based phones. The platform will also include video and podcast downloads, as well as wallpapers and widgets.

Something to note about the service is its strong emphasis on "location-based content." Media will be highlighted and featured based on the person's current location and if given permission, the store "will also be able to flag items downloaded by peers in a person's social network."

The first handset to have support for the store preloaded is the upcoming N97 coming in June, but the company adds those with existing devices will be given access as well through updates.

Picture from the source:

The global phone maker Samsung is set to introduce its brand new Blue Earth solar-powered mobile phone today at the Mobile World Congress event in Spain.

The phone is made out of recycled water bottles, prominently features a pedometer and includes software that reminds you how "green" the phone is.

The solar panels are on the back on the handset and the front is a full touchscreen interface. There is no word on pricing or availability as of yet, but we will update the article when more details become available.

This is a nice step in the right direction for handset makers.

The Internet piracy trial brought forward by Sweden against the admins of the infamous torrent tracker The Pirate Bay is set to begin today and with it comes the fate of the world's largest public tracker.

Fredrik Neij, Gottfrid Svartholm, Peter Sunde and Carl Lundstroem are each accused of "promoting violations by other people of laws protecting royalties," and are being sued for $17.6 million USD in damages by representatives of the music, movie and video game industries.

"It's not a political trial, it's not the trial that has as its purpose to shut down some kind of people's library or to prohibit any file-sharing technique," added Monique Wadsted, a lawyer for the Hollywood studios.

"It's a trial that regards four persons that have conducted the commercial activity, earning a lot of money in providing the possibility for others to make pirate copies of big commercial productions, movies, music and popular computer games."

Apple has been sued again over their hugely popular iPhone, this time over the screen rendering technology used in both the iPhone and the iPod Touch.

The suit, brought forward by Picsel Technologies, alleges that the rendering process is in clear violation of Piscel's patents. Picsel added the "technology accelerates the process of updating the display on a device."

Lawyers for the company said iPhone users "would experience long screen update delays if it weren’t for the use of the patented technology. Zooming and panning documents, Web sites, and images would not work on the iPhone as fluidly."

Picsel adds that its technology is featured in hundreds of different gadgets and counts KDDI, Motorola, Nokia, NTT DoCoMo, Palm, Samsung, Sony Ericsson, and Sharp as past and current customers.

Earlier this week, rumors flared that Samsung's upcoming Android-based phone was delayed, but the company has fired back today saying that they never planned to release the phone at the upcoming Mobile World Congress, and that the phone is on track for the company's internal release date.

"Somebody decided that we had said we were going to show Android here and then said we weren't. We never said we were going to show Android, and we were never planning to. There's no delay, and we're on track to launch later this year as expected," added Samsung's Kim Titus.

There is not much known about the actual device but rumor has it the Android-based phone will be sold in the US through T-Mobile and Sprint Nextel, and would be similar to their popular Instinct handset.

Microsoft has announced that they will be opening brick and mortar retail stores around the United States and confirmed the appointment of David Porter as vice president of Retail Stores.

Porter, a former VP at Wal-Mart, will need to determine "the timing, locations and specific details of the stores."

The new move will help the software giant to compete with Apple, which has 251 retail stores that brought in $1.74 billion USD revenue for 2008.

Porter added the stores would give consumers better direct access to products such as the upcoming Windows 7, as well as the Zune media players and the Xbox 360 gaming console.

“This is an exciting time with our strong lineup of upcoming product releases including Windows 7 and new releases of Windows Live and Windows Mobile," Porter added.

“I am excited about helping consumers make more informed decisions about their PC and software purchases, and we’ll share learnings from our stores with our existing retail and OEM partners that are critical to our success,” he concluded.

Charter Communications, the fourth largest cable company in the US, has announced its intention to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, on or before April 1st.

The company has restructured its debt obligations and could see a reduction of almost $8 billion in debt. The ISP noted it has about $800 million in liquid cash to help with restructuring and daily operations during its bankruptcy.

Current common stock holders will have their shares canceled, but debt holders and bond holders can recieve "new notes, equity or cash, depending on the seniority and terms of the agreement."

Paul Allen, co-founder of software giant Microsoft, controls Charter and will remain on the board with the largest voting interest.

Sony has announced today that they have reached a new milestone for their handheld, the PlayStation Portable (PSP), reaching 50 million units sold.

The original PSP was launched in December 2004 and has seen two revisions done to the hardware adding a built-in microphone and slimming down the actual unit.

Sony has also slowly begun phasing out its dying UMD physical media format, pushing instead for digital downloads of games and movies that can be placed on Memory Sticks.

Despite the milestone, recent figures from NPD show that PSP sales have lagged, falling 25 percent year-on-year for the month of January.

The electronics giant Samsung has delayed its Android-based mobile phone until later this year, choosing to debut the gadget's specs at the Mobile World Congress 2009.

Younghee Lee, head of marketing at Samsung's mobile device business, told The Guardian that the actual phone won't be shown off at the show and instead will be launched in the Q3 2009. The company is still negotiating which carriers will release the phone.

Last month, rumors flared that the Android-based phone was going to be sold in the US through T-Mobile and Sprint Nextel, and would be similar to their popular Instinct handset.

"We are accelerating the development process for Google phone in order to meet the specific need of local carriers," Samsung added. "We will be able to release Google phone in the second quarter of the next year in the U.S. market."

According to the latest data figures from NPD, United States video game industry sales rose 13 percent year-on-year to $1.33 billion USD. That number includes gaming systems, software and accessories.

For the same period, hardware sales totaled $445.4 million, a 17 percent year-on-year increase.

Nintendo topped the charts as usual, selling 679,000 Wii units and 510,800 DS handhelds. Reggie Fils-Aime, president of Nintendo America, added that this was the 16th consecutive month that the Wii remained the top seller.

Microsoft sold 309,000 Xbox 360 units, and Sony lagged behind selling 203,200 PlayStation 3 units.

Software sales amounted to $676.6 million USD, a 10 percent increase year-on-year.

In March, Pioneer announced it was halting Plasma display production and today Vizio has made a similar announcement, putting another nail in the technology's coffin.

The inexpensive HDTV maker has decided to move its focus to LCD sets, and will completely halt its plasma production by the end of the year.

With Vizio and Pioneer bowing out, three major manufacturers remain in the plasma business: LG, Panasonic, and Samsung.

Plasma TV shipments rose 28 percent for the Q4 2008 and were up over 10 percent for the entire year. Despite those statistics, LCD TVs control the market, selling about seven times the amount of plasma sets over a full year.

Microsoft has announced that they will be offering Xbox Live for free to anyone who downloads the GTA IV expansion The Lost and Damned, for the week of February 17th-22nd.

Xbox Live multiplayer is normally reserved to those who pay for a Gold account, but the software giant is adding extra cross promotion for the downloadable content.

Additionally, Rockstar Games and XBL are promoting the expansion with a week of events that include the "chance to take on hip-hop DJ Statik Selektah in a special Game with Fame event and to play against "the people behind the Grand Theft Auto franchise" in a Game with Rockstar."

The downloadable content, which reportedly cost Microsoft $50 million USD to secure exclusively, will sell for 1600 Microsoft Points beginning on the 17th.

Pioneer has confirmed rumors that have flared this week and will be dropping out of the TV business altogether.

The move follows the $1.44 billion USD loss the company has taken in the past year on its LCD and Plasma operations. Two factories will be shut down immediately and the company will completely phase out TVs by the Q1 2010.

Additionally, the company said it will cut costs by cutting 10,000 jobs, mainly in Japan.

In the TV business, Pioneer is best known for its high quality Kuro plasma TVs which enjoy high contrast ratios and color replication. Back in March however, the company said it would halt Plasma production to focus on LCD production.

Police authorities in Poland have announced the crackdown of the EU's "largest ever" gang selling counterfeit CDs and DVDs.

"This is the largest gang pirating CDs and DVDs ever cracked in the EU," Warsaw city police spokesperson Anna Kedzierzawska added. "We are in contact with police forces from other countries."

Over 55,000 DVDs and CDs were seized and four pirates were arrested including the alleged "mastermind" of the ring, "Krzysztof M.," 38 years of age.

Krzysztof M. used two legal audio-visual copying centers in Warsaw and Rybnik as host to his piracy operation. The merchandise was then distributed all around the EU.

Authorities say the gang was in operation since at least October of last year.

The infamous public torrent tracker The Pirate Bay has released some statistics this week that gives more insight into the location of its users.

One of the most surprising stats (full chart available after the story) is that over one-third of the Pirate Bay's traffic comes from China, where the government has banned the site. Japan and Spain generated the next highest traffic followed by the US.

Making China's numbers even more shocking is that China only accounts for one-sixth of the world's internet users. Japan, on the other hand, makes up 6.7 percent of Pirate Bay traffic while accounting for 6.2 percent of total Internet users.

In November, the site announced that they had smashed a new milestone, 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.

Full chart here:

The popular rapper Snoop Dogg has announced a deal with MTV that will bring the artist's music to Rock Band.

Although no songs were specifically mentioned, Harmonix and MTV did note that there would be a "selection" of hits from Snoop's back catalog.

The new deal marks the third time Snoop Dogg will appear in a video game following his appearance as a fighter in Def Jam Fight for NY and a cameo as himself in True Crime: Streets of LA.

Additionally, MTV will distribute Snoop's next album, "Malice in Wonderland" and will be host to his new variety show entitled "Dogg After Dark."

Disney has announced that they will begin releasing all new DreamWorks full features on DVD beginning in 2010, taking over the job from the current distributor, Paramount.

The deal is effective for all regions except for India, added a Disney spokesperson.

It is not entirely clear yet, but Paramount should retain all home entertainment rights to DVD titles that released prior to 2010 including blockbusters such as "Tropic Thunder", "Blades of Glory" and "Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street".

Notably, DreamWorks Animation is not included in the new deal, as Paramount will continue to release all Animation projects through 2012. A few of the blockbusters from that unit include the "Shrek" franchise and "Madagascar."

In December, rumors began flaring that Apple was planning an entry-level $99 USD iPhone for Wal-Mart, one that would look the same as the current models but have fewer features and a cheaper data plan.

Thanks to RBC Capital Markets analyst Mike Abramsky, those rumors are back in the news today as Abramsky says the phone is definitely coming, and should be introduced in June or July.

"Checks reveal further entry-level iPhone details, including entry-level pricing," Abramsky said in his report. "Also expected is a 3G iPhone performance upgrade."

The cheaper model will have 3G capabilities stripped but will still include Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, just like its more expensive brothers.

How can Apple afford to drop the price so much? "We estimate the entry level iPhone would cost $195 to $225 to manufacture, vs. the iPhone 3G at $300," noted Abramsky.

The current iPhone data plan, which gives users unlimited Internet access, costs $30 a month but the $99 iPhone would include a "light data plan" at $15 a month, with restricted access.

According to a report from Appscout, Apple may be on the verge of making Quicktime Pro free with the latest update of Mac OS X.

Although the Quicktime media player is free for everyone, the Pro version costs $29.99 USD and gives users the ability to edit and save Quicktime movies as well as export additional codecs other than .mov.

Checking the new developer build of Snow Leopard shows however that all those abilities are available for free and any links to register for the Pro version are also removed.

This should mean that Apple is making the player free with OS X 10.5 but that has not been confirmed yet. We will keep you updated.

Following its previous holiday deal, VUDU has permanently dropped the price of its VOD media hub to $149 from $300 USD.

The new deal will make the VUDU player $80 cheaper than the rival Apple TV which does not offer as much storage and will almost certainly help boost sales, at least for the quarter. The hub initially launched in September 2007 for $400 USD.

"This is exciting news for the Internet to TV content delivery market. In just a year, we've been able to drive down the price of the product by 50 % while increasing image and sound quality, growing our content library to more than 13,000 movies and TV shows, building the world's largest HD library of more than 1,300 titles, and providing access to free Internet content," added the company in a statement.

Perhaps of more interest, the company dropped the price of its Vudu XL device from $999 USD to $499 including "a home theater connectivity software package." The company warns that supply is not constant with demand however and finding an XL may be hard.

The large optical drive maker Lite-On has announced the launch of the industry's fastest internal DVD writers, each capable of writing to DVD-R at 24x speeds.

Each of the three drives will also include Lite-On's SmartErase technology which will allow users to erase sensitive data on both CDs and DVDs.

The company has added their LabelTag technology will be included in the high end iHAS624 burner. Lite-On adds that "the feature allows users to create label tags on the data side of any blank disc, allowing them to burn data after making the label in separate recording sessions."

Price and exact release dates were not released but the cheaper iHAS324 burner will have a SATA interface and should be available next month.

The mid range iHAP424 has a PATA interface and will include standard LightScribe labeling capabilities.

Archos has announced that it will be joining the mobile phone market with a touchscreen smartphone based on the new Android operating system.

The handset will be based on the Archos 5 media tablet and will have a large 5-inch touchscreen and an ARM Cortex processor from Texas Instruments.

Even more notable, the company says the phone will deliver "PC-like" performance and will allow playback of HD video while offline. The mobile will also include Flash-video browser support right out of the box.

The source also adds that the phone will include up to "500GB of video storage, 7 hours of battery life for video, and a continued ability to record video from any source. Internet access should be fast with HSPA providing 7.2Mbps downstream speeds."

There was no word on a release date or price but it certainly looks promising.

Last January, the ISP Time Warner announced it would be starting bandwidth caps aimed at "collecting revenue from those who utilize over half of the total network bandwidth."

In June, they began their "metered Internet trials" in Beaumont, Texas and just last week the ISP announced they would be expanding the program to four other cities.

The original caps however, were 40 GB and users would be charged $1 for every GB over the cap they went. Critics found the caps to be far too limited and pointed to Comcast, who introduced 250 GB monthly caps last year, as a good starting point if bandwidth caps must be used.

It appears today that after receiving many complaints from unhappy customers, Time Warner is backtracking a bit and will increase the 40GB limit on a certain "range of packages, with higher priced plans that have a larger data "bucket" along with lower priced options for casual users."

BREIN, the Dutch anti-piracy outfit, has announced the complete shutdown of a torrent site "franchise hierarchy" that were all run by an individual who went under the name "Topspinner."

Last month the outfit took action against 75 torrent sites, each of which used similar templates and charged a fee on sign up. That fee allowed users to download all they want for a certain period of time.

During the initial raids however, the individual in charge managed to slip away but BREIN has now identified and summoned "Topspinner."

"The owner of the sites which almost all were registered under the alias Topspinner stayed in hiding after the Dutch take down and moved a number of his sites to a German hosting provider. After summons to the German provider, the sites ran to France and Belgium, and finally, after further summons, to Denmark. In meantime BREIN identified the 45 year old man from the Dutch town of Oudenbosch and summoned him yesterday," said BREIN in a statement.

According to the daily Japanese Nikkei paper, it appears Pioneer is on the verge of completely exiting the TV market.

Back in March the company said it would halt Plasma production to focus on LCD production. "We have judged that maintaining the cost competitiveness of plasma display panels, or PDPs, at projected sales volumes will be difficult going forward," Pioneer said at the time.

Despite the great commercial success of its Kuro plasma line, the company has been losing money for a few quarters now on TV sales. If the report holds true, then Pioneer will cut their losses and move completely out of the market, instead joining forces with Sharp to make a stronger move into the DVD and Blu-ray standalone business.

Venture capitalists invested in the popular video sharing website Veoh can rest easy following yesterday's decision that investors in the site can not be held liable in Universal Music Group's current lawsuit against the company.

Veoh allows for user-submitted content, just like its bigger competitor YouTube, but also shows premium content from Hulu.

Universal, in its lawsuit, claims that Veoh has "built its business on the back of others' intellectual property," and that massive copyright infringement occurs daily on the site. Veoh, just as most video-sharing site do, does not restrict what is uploaded but does take down videos at the request of others, including the record labels and film studios.

The decision, by Judge A. Howard Metz noted that the investors can not be liable, as they simply provided money and did not encourage copyright infringement.

According to a Washington Post report, Nokia is preparing to launch an "App Store" at the upcoming Mobile World Congress

Eldar Murtazin, editor of Mobile-review.com, broke the story but the blog is in Russian so here is the translation of what was said:

"At first glance, for now, the app portal looks so so, there is some confusion. But they are trying, polishing it and a lot has changed for the better in a matter of days. A right step in a right direction? And the distribution and revenue sharing model between app makers and Nokia looks very attractive."

Muzartin is known for having insider connections in the mobile industry but for now the rumor remains a rumor but we will keep you updated.

Following Nintendo's and Microsoft's disclosure of their Australian hardware sales for 2008, Sony has joined them releasing their numbers today.

Sony Computer Entertainment Australia says they sold 213,000 units for the year, making total install base 460,000 for the country.

The company did confess however that 70,000 of those units were not sold, and instead were given away during a Bravia LCD promotion.

In comparison, Nintendo has sold over 1 million Wii units and Microsoft has sold 537,000 Xbox 360 units.

According to a new analyst report, Nvidia's Tegra chipset will be used in a new Microsoft smartphone

Doug Freedman, of Broadpoint AmTech said: "We believe the HTC ramp in '09 is the more material of the two as we have some concerns on the channel for Microsoft's handset distribution given the lack of prior carrier relationships/handset qualification history."

However, "it could turn out to be...a reference design Microsoft has used. That could be possible. But we've also picked up that Microsoft is working on a phone themselves," he added.

Microsoft, as is standard, has denied the report: "Microsoft has no plans to make a phone," noted Microsoft's director of Windows Mobile, Scott Rockfeld. "Our core focus has been and will continue to be providing software plus services and working with our partners to deliver great phones. Our partners have been integral in our success to date, and we are excited about the innovation we are bringing to the market together."

"We continue to collaborate with Nvidia on the delivery of innovative solutions that move the smartphone industry and the consumer experience forward," he concluded.

Following yesterday's news that Time Warner was expanding their metered Internet trials to a few new cities, Charter Communications has also announced that they will be introducing bandwidth caps on their cable Internet service.

Charter, the fourth largest cable company in the US, will set tiered caps, meaning "customers who purchase speeds of up to 15 Mbps to 100 gigabytes a month, while those who purchase up to 25 Mbps will be capped at 250 gigabytes. People who pay for speeds up of to 60 Mbps will not face any limits."

Added a Charter spokesperson: "More than 99% of current Charter Internet customers use less bandwidth than the threshold allows and therefore will not need to change their surfing habits in any manner."

Critics, such as Derek Turner, the research director of Free Press, does not believe that only 1 percent of all users pass the threshold and that bandwidth consumption will continue to grow thanks to digital downloads from iTunes and Netflix and the ever popular YouTube, which now offers videos in 720p resolution.

For over two years, Norway Consumer Ombudsman Bjorn Erik Thon has been at odds with Apple over the company's use of FairPlay DRM which restricts iTunes-purchased music to iPods only.

Following last month's decision by Apple however, to move all its music to DRM-free (albeit some at a higher price), Thon has said he will drop his complaint against the iTunes store and Apple.

"We have no reason to pursue them anymore," he added.

The iTunes store is set to go DRM-free by the end of April, and the tracks will be in AAC form, opening up the music to most media players on the market, not only iPods.

According to new data from comScore, December was a record breaking month for online video views, with U.S. Internet users viewing over 14.3 billion videos for the month.

The number is a 13 percent growth from the month before it and YouTube led the way, accounting for about 41 percent of all the videos viewed for the month, about 5.9 billion.

Sites owned by Fox came in second with 445 million videos viewed and sites owned by Yahoo followed behind with 330 million videos viewed. Viacom lagged behind with 291 million videos viewed.

Seeing large growth for the month was Hulu, the video site brought together by NBC Universal and News Corp., which rose over 6 percent from November to 241 million videos viewed.

The data adds that about 150 million US Internet users watched on average 96 videos each.

According to Citigroup analyst Mark Mahaney, Amazon sold 500,000 Kindle e-reader devices during the 2008 year, far ahead of the estimated 378,000 units anticipated by most analysts.

Amazon has not yet released any sales numbers on the device but Mahaney says the "integrated EVDO antenna in each Kindle has provided an alternative gauge." Sprint's recent financial earnings report added that 210,000 "certain wholesale devices" were activated in the third quarter.

As an early marketing gimmick, Amazon originally nicknamed the device the "iPod of reading" and if Mahaney is right, then sales are rivaling that of the original launch line of the iPod. In its first year of availability, Apple sold 400,000 of the media devices.

Amazon currently offers 230,000 titles for the Kindle and has seen huge demand that has way outpaced supply since its release.

Once one of the most popular public torrent trackers in the United States, TorrentSpy now sits, defunct, after being ordered to pay a $110 million USD fine to the MPAA after losing a lawsuit to the trade group.

At first the site, and its parent company Valance Media LLC, said they could and would not pay the fine but it appears today that the have gone the legal route, and will be appealing the decision.

Adds Ira Rothken, head attorney for the site: "The court was wrong in procedures and wrong in judgment," for its decision that alleges the tracker was set up solely to connect users with unauthorized downloads.

Although TorrentSpy was never actually proven guilty of copyright infringement, the court did find that the site and its administrators had tampered with evidence by destroying servers and hiding other evidence.

Last January, the ISP Time Warner announced it would be starting bandwidth caps aimed at "collecting revenue from those who utilize over half of the total network bandwidth."

In June, they began their "metered Internet trials" in Beaumont, Texas.

"We think it's the fairest way to finance the needed investment in the infrastructure," said Kevin Leddy, Time Warner Cable's executive vice president of advanced technology, at the time.

Today the company announced it would be expanding the metered service to new areas this year, with a "few more cities" being subject to the program.

Many critics have called Time Warner's cap, which charges users $1 USD for every GB they go over the 40GB cap, very impractical and that it may even "hurt the future" of the Internet, pushing users away from Internet video, especially legal HD downloads from places such as Amazon and iTunes.

According to a new DigiTimes report , the prices of white box (off-brand), entry-level Blu-ray players will drop to $150 USD during 2009, setting the stage for name brands such as Sony, Samsung and Panasonic to drop their prices, at least for entry-level players.

The report also adds that Lite-On IT, one of the world's largest optical drive makers, will enter into the Blu-ray standalone market and that its lowest price players will start at about $150 USD as well.

The Chinese-language newspaper Economic Daily News (EDN) noted that over 5 million standalone BD players were sold globally in 2008 and that 11 million are expected to be sold during 2009.

Palm Pre, the latest in a long line of "iPhone Killers", is set to be one of the most anticipated smartphones of the year.

Although the company has not yet confirmed its release date, Wired is reporting that it could be available as soon as March, and on the Sprint network.

Citing an internal document from Sprint however, Boy Genius Report is saying that a May release is more likely as that will give Sprint time to stock up and clear out older Palm inventory.

The smartphone was initially showed off at this year's Consumer Electronics Show and the company's stock has exploded on anticipation that the phone will be a blockbuster seller.

The phone has a rounded shape, a 3.1-inch touchscreen, a slide-out QWERTY keyboard and uses a powerful interface to "pull together information, photos and current online status data from sites such as Facebook, Gmail and Exchange to seamlessly integrate them into the address book and contacts list."

The giant e-tailer Amazon has announced the launch of a new PC game download store that should move the company into a battle for market share against RealNetworks, Big Fish Games, and PopCap.

The store, available here, currently has over 600 downloadable games, with all priced at $6.99 to $9.99 USD.

As a promotion of the store, the company is offering three free full version games, “Jewel Quest 2,” “The Scruffs” and “Build A Lot.” Every other game comes with a free, 30-minute trial.

When asked whether Amazon had a chance to succeed in the now crowded online games market, Greg Hart, Amazon's vice president of video games and software, added:

"Sure, sure. A great example is when Amazon.com entered the traditional retail video game space two and a half years ago... obviously that was a very competitive and crowded space, but we've been very happy with our growth in that space."

"Certainly there is a lot of competition, and a lot of sites out there that do a very good job, but we think we bring a lot of things... certainly trust, and the convenience aspects... are all elements of the shopping experience that will carry over to casual game downloads very well."

Although they have been criticized for offering Windows Vista in far too many versions, Microsoft has confirmed that the upcoming Windows 7 will come in five different versions, with the company "focusing" on two.

The different versions of Windows 7 will be, Starter, Home Basic, Home Premium, Professional, and Ultimate. The company did note that "Home Basic" would only be sold in emerging markets however.

"We're going to focus on two versions," noted Microsoft Senior Vice President Bill Veghte. Veghte added he expected the Home Premium and Professional versions to account for 80 percent of Windows 7 sales.

The Starter version will be "severely limited" and will most likely only be sold in emerging markets as well or to those who simply want a cheap OS. The crippled version will have screen resolution limitations, processor limitations, and will only be able to have three applications running at the same time.

Cnet also adds that upgrading will be much easier this time around and "Windows 7, despite its many versions, will actually come as a single piece of code, or image. That means all the features will come loaded onto a Windows 7 PC, ready to be unlocked with an upgrade product key."

LaCie has announced the release of their latest Blu-ray burner, the updated d2 which can write to Blu-ray Disc at 8x.

The drive can also write "fully copy-protected, studio-grade movies" at 2x and single layer DVDs at 16x. Dual-layer discs can be burnt at 8x.

Electronista says, "The drive carries both FireWire 400 and USB interfaces and has a second FireWire port to daisy-chain the d2 with other peripherals and save expansion ports. Both Mac and Windows users get Roxio's Toast Titanium 9 and Easy Media Creator 10 to author Blu-ray discs, though only Windows users get playback software to watch Blu-ray movies."

The drive is already available and has a suggested price of $450 USD, a bit more expensive than other 8x Blu-ray burners available now.

Just as it has been in the UK and around Europe, the proposed 'three strikes' law for Internet pirates has been shut down in Germany.

The three strikes law would force ISPs to give two warnings to suspected unauthorized file sharers and then shut down their Internet connection on the 'third strike.'

The German Department of Justice has met with German ISPs and one clear conclusion was made: Three Strikes laws are "incompatible with German pirvacy and telecommunications laws."

In response, the IFPI said Germany would possibly face a competitive disadvantage against other countries that are still debating enacting the laws.

Germany's Secretary of Justice Brigitte Zypries added:

"I don't think that (Three Strikes) is a fitting model for Germany or even Europe. Preventing someone from accessing the Internet seems like a completely unreasonable punishment to me. It would be highly problematic due to both constitutional and political aspects. I'm sure that once the first disconnects are going to happen in France, we will be hearing the outcry all the way to Berlin."

Marking the seventh consecutive month it has done so, the Internet Explorer browser has lost even more market share to its competitors Firefox, Safari and Chrome.

Internet Explorer dropped to 67.55 percent of global browser market share, down from 68.15 percent at the end of December and down from 77 percent at the beginning of 2008.

Firefox moved up subtly to 21.53 percent, Safari jumped higher to 8.29 percent, and the four month old Google Chrome browser jumped to 1.12 percent

The browser has lost a massive amount of market share over the past few years, falling from its peak of 94.43 percent in 2003.

Crackulous, the software application that strips copy protection from App Store applications has now been released to the general public and is easily accessible via a jailbroken iPhone.

For anyone with a jailbroken iPhone (or iPod Touch with firmware v2 or higher), simply head to Cydia and find it in the directory. When you install and launch the app, Crackulous will list all the applications you currently have on the device. Whichever one you want stripped of its protection, just click on it and wait a couple of minutes.

Now that the program is available to everyone however, Apple is sure to notice. There is no fair way to use this, as it promotes complete theft. That's not to say that most of the apps from the app store haven't already been available via P2P and warez for months now but I think its fair to say that the guys over at Hackulous may be seeing a cease and desist letter soon.

After months of working on the technology, it appears Adobe is still having technical issues with creating a workable version of Flash for the Apple iPhone.

Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen elaborated during an interview with Bloomberg:

"It's a hard technical challenge, and that's part of the reason Apple and Adobe are collaborating," Narayen said. "The ball is in our court. The onus is on us to deliver."

In November, when Apple confirmed that they were working with Adobe to bring the Flash plug-in, Narayen said:

"To bring the full capabilities of Flash to the iPhone Web-browsing experience we do need to work with Apple beyond and above what is available through the SDK (the iPhone software development kit) and the current license around it." It appears not too much has changed since then.

At the same time, Adobe released a version of Flash that works with Android and Windows Mobile phones.

According to a new email sent out yesterday, the bankrupt retailer Circuit City has dropped the price on many of their items, finally giving some good sales on items they must liquidate before March 31st.

The retailer is dropping the price of all plasma TVs by 25 percent, all LCD TVs by 20 percent, 20 percent off most digital cameras and 40 percent off "car audio" systems.

That of course does not mean that there are many good prices, with some still selling for higher prices than Amazon even with the discounts.

Some smaller sized TVs are selling for a good 20-30 percent discount compared to any online retailer, so it may finally be time to head over to your local Circuit City in search of a deal.

Part of the email sent out:

In 2002, the retail giant Wal-Mart decided to launch an online DVD rental business, in an effort to rival Netflix. However, Netflix did what it has to all its other competition and practically drove the startup out of business.

By 2005 Wal-Mart decided it was a waste of money and let Netflix take over its DVD rental operation while Netflix would promote Wal-Mart's in-store DVD movie sales.

This decision led to a class action lawsuit early last month as the companies were accused of "conspiring to create a monopoly for online video rentals." The "collusion" between the companies led to higher prices for Netflix customers, alleged the suit.

This week, the companies find themselves facing a new class-action lawsuit of the same type, this time from a plaintiff in Chicago.

As proof that the deal in 2005 promoted "unfair trade", the plaintiff notes that Netflix raised its average subscription price from $14.99 to $17.99 USD almost immediately after the agreement with Wal-Mart. At the time, Wal-Mart's comparable monthly plan was $12.97 USD. Read more...