Month: July 2004

Teenager Arrested for Filming Spider-Man 2 on Camcorder

An American teenager has been arrested in a California cinema as he tried to take a video Spiderman 2 on his handheld camcorder.

The Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) has taken a number of actions to focus the public attention on not copying films in cinema. There is now a message displayed at the start of each film stating that it is a criminal offence to video it and they recently offered a $500 (€406) inducement to cinema staff who reported camcorder usage.

The message in UK cinemas reads “You are not permitted to use any camera or recording equipment in this cinema. This will be treated as an attempt to breach copyright. Any person doing so can be ejected and such articles may be confiscated by the police. We ask the audience to be vigilant against any such activity and report any matters arousing suspicion to cinema staff. Thank you.”

It is understood that in this case the projectionist who was apparently using night vision goggles to scan the audience will be claiming their bounty.

If found guilty, the unnamed 16 year old film goer could face up to a year in prison and a maximum fine of $2,500 (€2028).

The MPAA claim that camcorder piracy accounts for 92% of all illegal copies of films sold on the Internet and street corners worldwide and say that it is now illegal, in the US, to even take recording equipment into a cinema.

Crown Castle Sell UK Broadcasting Business to National Grid

National Grid Transco have had their eyes on Crown Castle’s UK broadcasting and mast operation for some time – and they are about to hand over $2.035 billion (€1.67 billion) for it. The deal is still subject to approvals, but is expected to be finalised on or before September 30th.

Crown Castle’s reason for the sale is that the need US$1.3 billion (€1.06 billion) of the money to pay off a credit facility from CC Operating Company.

“The sale of our UK subsidiary is expected to provide us with significant financial and operational flexibility to pursue opportunities in the larger and faster growing US market,” stated John P. Kelly, CEO of Crown Castle. “While our UK operations have been a solid contributor to our business, we believe there is substantially greater growth potential for our US business given the lower penetration of wireless services and the earlier stage of 3G deployments in the US market. This transaction also substantially improves our balance sheet, which we believe will provide flexibility to capitalize on this growth.”

“As a result of this transaction, we will significantly reduce our net debt, exposure to currency fluctuations and floating interest rate exposure,” said W. Benjamin Moreland, the company’s CFO, in a statement.

The other US$740 million (€608 million) will be invested in new business opportunities in the US and to pay off some other debts.

Crown Castle

National Grid Transco

Portable Music Watch: Dell’s Cheeky iPod Deal; New Sony Players

The Sony Vaio Pocket - yes, yes, we know you want one...Dell have come up with a slightly controversial deal to attract customers who are disgruntled with the iPod’s less than impressive battery life: tempt them to buy a Dell DJ as a replacement by offering them US$100 (€82) for their dud iPod. With the rebate, this makes the 15gb music player half-price.

Dell are clearly capitalising on the iPod’s “dirty secret” – that promised eight-hour battery life doesn’t stay eight hours for very long. Battery inefficiency and memory effects mean that after a year or so, some users are lucky to get two or three hours of tunes out of their player, with some reporting batteries that have completely given up.

Apple have recently introduced a US$99 replacement service for players that are more than a year old, but Dell’s promotion is aimed at enticing iPod owners to jump ship by offering a shiny new (though less capacity) player, with 25 free downloads, for the same price.

“Is your iPod battery starting to fade? Before you pay for a replacement battery for your same old device, consider upgrading to a brand new Dell 15GB1 DJ with more than double the battery life”, yells the website.

In other portable music player news, Sony have unveiled two new portable players – the Network Walkman Player NW-HD1 and the Vaio Pocket VGF-AP1L. Sony don’t make cars because you wouldn’t know if you were looking at the model name or the registration number.

The NW-HD1 is a 20gb player for US$400, and is claimed by Sony to be the smallest in its class. It also incorporates 256mb of Flash memory too.

The VGF-AP1L is a 40gb player with a 2.2 inch colour screen for displaying photos and album artwork and is US$500. The player also can store photos from Cybershot cameras, rather like the iPod’s picture storage function, with the upside that the Vaio player can actually display them.

To put further pressure on Apple, both devices will work seamlessly with Sony’s new music download service, Connect. Supported formats are MP3, WAV and WMA, but no AAC – so Sony Walkman owners won’t be doing much business with iTunes. Given that they invented the entire portable music player market with the Walkman, if anyone can compete with the iPod, it’s Sony.

Dell’s Deal

Sony

Home Technology Monitor: 4% US Homes Have a PVR

The 2004 Ownership and Trend Report from the Home Technology Monitor shows that advanced video devices are becoming more and more popular in home entertainment.

According to the study of US homes:

  • 4% own a PVR – double the number six months ago
  • 6% own a HDTV – against 4% six months ago
  • 18% now own a dual DVD/VCR deck
  • 5% have a PC TV tuner
  • “The proliferation of video technology in the past 10 years is transforming the media use habits of mainstream consumers,” said David Tice, Vice President, Knowledge Networks/SRI. “Though the options for reaching consumers with marketing messages are multiplying, viewers are also exerting greater control over their entertainment options. To maintain an informed marketplace, measurement systems must keep pace with these changes; but current approaches can exclude the very households that advertisers need to understand most. This is troubling news, because these consumers are disproportionately affluent and heavy media users.”

    • Knowledge Networks

    Google, Orkut and Affinity Engines’ Social Networking Suit

    Google is facing legal action after Affinity Engines (AE) accused them of using their code in their Orkut social networking site.  This is all splendid timing for a company that is planning a major IPO.

    They claim that the code was taken to Google by Orkut Buyukkokten, who had also promised Affinity Engines that he wouldn’t develop a competing social network product.

    It’s not looking good for Google – nine bugs present is Orkut are also present in Affinity Engines’ inCircle product. In addition to the bugs, AE claim that there are textual similarities between the two sets of source code.

    Google refuted the claims in a statement to Wired News: “Affinity Engines has not provided any evidence to Google that their source code was used in the development of orkut.com. We have repeatedly offered to allow a neutral expert to compare the codes in the two programs and evaluate Affinity’s claims, but Affinity has rejected that offer.”

    Orkut is a Turkish citizen and was working on inCircle when he ran into some visa problems. Taking a job at Google was a way to get round this, but he kept working on inCircle – though signed agreements not to develop any further social-networking technology and confirming that any code he developed belonged to AE.

    The name of Google’s new social networking site couldn’t be a more obvious indicator of who has been working on it.

    Orkut

    About inCircle

    RTS London Centre: Digital TV – Global Review

    Royal Television Society, London site

    To date, Digital Television has had varying degrees of success. Governments around the world want it to happen and some are setting ambitious dates for its introduction. dTV will mark a major change in television, not least because of the potential explosion of new channels that will be enabled. Our panel of experts will present on the current progress of DTV around the globe; looking specifically where the UK is currently & its first Analog switch-off trial in Wales; and how it will affect the BBC.

    Intended for the broadest possible audience, this panel will bring you up to speed – vital if you work in television in the UK.  The discussion will also conver the possible impact of both BBC and SKY having announced their intentions for free digital satellite services. Come along, get informed and get your questions answered.

    Speakers:
    DAVID HARBY, Consultant to Cabinet Office eGovernment Unit (formerly Office of the eEnvoy) to develop policy on DTV, Indigo Associates UK
    ANDY TOWNEND, Controller of BBC Distribution
    PETER MARSHALL, Technical Director, Digital Television Group
    Chairman, SIMON PERRY, Digital-Lifestyles.info

    This event has been organised by the London Centre of the Royal Television Society. Limited free tickets are available by providing a name and company/association to [email protected].
    LWT, South Bank, London [email protected]

    MSN Search’s Revamp

    Moogle? Goomsn? The news MSN Search service is out of the stables today, and despite what might be under the hood, Microsoft have obviously been inspired by Google’s clean, easy to use interface. Basically, they’ve taken most of the ads off.

    After a year in development and US$100 million (€82 million), Microsoft’s MSN Search tool is still just a front end for Yahoo’s technology. For the time being.

    To catch up with Google and Yahoo, Microsoft are gearing up to launch their very own, in-house developed, search tool this year. Webmasters will get a chance to vet its performance and accuracy before it goes live, baring in mind that MSN Search has had a odd and unfortunate habit in the past of dropping results from some sites competing with MS. Hope they manage to track that bug down and fix it.

    In an interview on this week Yusuf Mehdi, head of MSN Search said, bafflingly “If this is a next-generation airplane, this is only the inside of the engine.” The first person to tell me what that means gets the usual prize – a bad CD from my collection. Come on people, I’ve still got a few left.

    Microsoft’s MSN Search engine is currently third place in the US – Google deals with 35% of all internet searches, Yahoo takes a healthy 30% and MSN has 15%. They have a lot of catching up to do, but a strong band, new search engine and integration with MS’s operating systems (if they’re allowed to!) might just put them at the front of the field.

    MSN Search