Sky is giving millions of customers the chance to create their own personalised on-screen TV listings with the launch today of important improvements to its electronic programme guide, Sky Guide. The upgrade programme, the most significant since the launch of Sky digital in 1998, is intended to make it even easier for viewers to navigate the 500 plus channels now available on digital satellite.
Sky Guide provides TV listings information for all of the TV channels available on digital satellite for the full week ahead. Following the enhancements, Sky digital customers will be able to create their own personalised grid of their favourite 50 channels for the first time. When a viewer presses the blue key on the Sky remote from within the “TV Guide” section of Sky Guide they will be able to see full seven-day TV listings for all of their chosen channels at a glance.
The Sky Guide upgrade will be rolled out automatically to more than eight million Sky customers from today and will take up to the end of February to complete. Additional features include:
- MORE GENRES: The 500 plus channels available on digital satellite will be categorised into 15 programming genres, instead of the existing seven*, making it even easier for viewers to find their way around Sky Guide. For example, radio channels, documentary channels and shopping channels will each have their own dedicated categories for the first time.
- CHANNEL NUMBERS: Most channel numbers will change on February 28 to reflect the introduction of the new genre categories. All Radio channel numbers will also consist of a four-digit number beginning with ‘0’ to accommodate the increased demand for digital radio services on the satellite platform. So, for example, BBC Radio 1 will be found at 0101 and Virgin Radio at 0107 (full channel line up available upon request).
A marketing campaign will inform customers about the changes and help them to get the best out of the new features.
Brian Sullivan, Sky’s Director of Customer Products and Services, said:
“Sky has a huge choice of programmes that match the individual interests of millions of viewers. With this upgrade, we’re taking personalised choice even further by giving customers the chance to tailor the Sky Guide to suit their own preferences.”
We’ve been asked by Toshiba to hold this story for a couple of days. The site that originally published it, 
Way back in October last year we reported that Samsung was 
Still, it’s a very capable camera, offering a 6 megapixel sensor, 2.5-inch screen (210K pixels), expansive ISO range from 200 to 3200, a host of shooting modes and a Pentax AF lens mount.
Although some may not see the point in Samsung announcing what amounts to an already released product under a different name, there are clear benefits for both companies.
With more units shifted, Pentax benefit from lower production costs, increased sales and a greatly increased user base for their lenses and their system, thus ensuring the future of its system.
Then there’s the awesome might of Samsung’s marketing budget to consider, with some suspecting that the new camera will be sold as a “loss leader” to help establish the brand.
It might look like a run-of-the-mill Gameboy Advance SP, but the TAVI Portable Media Player packs a much mightier multimedia punch, with the wee fella letting you watch movies, playback music, look at your photos, listen to FM radio, read eBooks and record your own voice.
Audio support is pretty generous too, with the unit offering MP3, WMA, OGG, AC3 and AAC playback.
There’s also a built in FM radio and mic, line-in recording (audio only) and TXT reader support.
SPECIFICATIONS
PHOTOS & eBOOKS
POWER
Casio have announced the European release of their super-slim 6 megapixel camera featuring an ‘Anti Shake’ DSP and MPEG-4 movie recording.
As the name suggests, its not a proper mechanical anti-shake gizmo – instead, the camera employs high ISO1600 sensitivity plus a faster shutter speed to minimize image blur.
An improved battery allows up to 300 shots per battery charge, with the 2.2 inch LCD being “twice as bright” as previous models.
It’s taken some considerable time for the Casio S600 to reach Europe – it’s been available in Japan since October 2005 – but you should be able to pick it on the High Street for around £230 (~€335, ~$406).
In a feast of digital convergence, Pantech & Curitel have announced the launch of their new multimedia-tastic PT-S160 phone.
The PT-S160 doubles up as a PMP (Portable Multimedia Player) and a satellite DMB receiver, with a sliding design only showing keys for DMB functions when closed.
The screen can be switched between landscape and portrait formats.
The makers claim a talk time of 300 minutes and a hefty standby time of 300 hours (although we’ve no idea how long you’ll get when watching TV).
Nokia has shunted out a new addition to their mid-range mobile portfolio with the new Nokia 6125 clamshell phone, offering stereo audio streaming over Bluetooth and FM Radio.
The quadband Nokia 6125 operates in GSM 850/900/1800/1900 networks and provides a flight mode, which enables the user to work with calendar or listen to music while on the flight – although we’ve heard of airlines like Virgin insisting that you turn off all phones – including those with ‘flight modes.’
The buzz about the rebirth of the Internet has been getting louder for at least the last nine months as the label Web 2.0 was attached to the new generation of applications.
Om Malik has the scoop on Toni Schneider, senior exec at Yahoo’s Developer Network, leaving the Internet giant to move to start-up Automatitic (
WordPress, if you haven’t heard of it before (and you should have done), is a fully-featured blogging application that is being taken up in large numbers. It provides the same functionality of most pay-for blogging tools, but for zero cost. This has lead to it being used by both large-scale companies and community sites like the wonderful 
It’s based on the Open-source software principles that are integral to true Web 2.0 apps – by giving away the application and providing tools for interested developers, a large community has grown up providing plug-ins that extend WordPress in many different directions. This benefits the users as well as the people behind WordPress – see how giving things away is a good thing?
Some people get rather too carried away with online communities, and we’re safe in saying that Scott Leo of the City of Toledo in Ohio, USA.
This kind of behavior isn’t unique online. To get the lowdown, we spoke to Digital-Lifestyles’ Mike Slocombe, who has a parallel life as head honcho and founder of UK discussion board Urban75. It’s a seriously busy board with nearly 2.5 million postings and over 26,000 members.
Friday afternoon distractions.