Content

Content in its shift to become digital

Reuters launches 3G Video News Service On Vodafone
News agency Reuters has teamed up with Vodafone Live to offer a 3G streaming news video service for Vodafone customers in the UK.
The subscription service will be Reuters’ first direct-to-consumer mobile video news service and will be available to Joe Public for £3 ($5.45, €4.50) a month.
For their hard earned cash, mobile subscribers will be treated to regular updates from key financial markets around the world, as well as clips from the big news stories of the day.
The service, accessible by selecting “Business News” from the “News & Weather” menu on the handset, will become Vodafone’s first business and financial video to be made available over their network.
Suitably equipped 3G subscribers can choose from more than 20 different videos a day including market reports from London, New York, Singapore, Tokyo and Frankfurt.
Those lucky people can also watch riveting interviews with CEOs and industry leaders, and view stories on people and companies making headlines.
Vodafone subscribers will also get technology, world, sports and entertainment news and be able to set up SMS breaking news alerts.
Alisa Bowen, head of Reuters.co.uk, said: “The growth in downloads of video from our Websites, where over one million clips are viewed each month, made it clear just how popular video news has become.
It was an obvious next step to make this available on mobile devices, combining it with the existing financial data and text services to offer a truly multimedia experience.”
The 3G service is one a series of new mobile video services that Reuters will be rolling out as part of its meisterplan to make more of its news and information directly available to consumers.
Vodafone
Reuters
15 September, 2005
Truveo Claims Best Video Search
They may be a start up that no one’s heard of, but Truveo are making a big noise about their beta video search engine, claiming that it’s more up-to-date than either Yahoo or Google and produces higher quality results.
The company says that it has cooked up a unique technology which lets its crawlers reach video content that other search engines can’t reach.
Like most video search engines, Truveo locates and indexes video content by mining closed-caption transcripts and importing RSS feeds, but the vast majority of video clips on the web don’t provide any closed-caption or RSS metadata.
Their boffins have got around this restriction by employing visual crawlers which can “visually” examine the context of the surrounding web application, a process which apparently reveals “a bounty of rich and detailed metadata related to every video.”
Truveo claims that this technology lets them access material that cannot be found through other search engines.
“For search to reach the next level and become truly ubiquitous, a fundamentally new approach is required to rapidly find and organize the vast amounts of television, movie and video content created every minute.” said the fabulously named Tim Tuttle, co-founder and CEO of Truveo.
Despite the growth in video search engines and the recent involvement of big boys like Google and Yahoo, widespread consumer adoption of video search still seems a bit of a way off – we’ve certainly never found the need to regularly use one yet.
Bandwidth issues would have put off a lot of punters, although the growth of broadband connectivity should see more people downloading video off the web.
The real problem may be providing content that’s actually worth watching, with complicated legal tangles over copyright and digital rights management issues keeping a lot of the good stuff in the domain of the file-swappers.
And if any further proof of the problem were needed, Truveo’s entertainment homepage tells its own story, when we looked it was featuring a “Farting Preacher” clip in its top five links.
Quality!
Truveo
15 September, 2005
Cybershot M2: Sony Combines Stills And Video
Sony’s boffins have announced the addition of a new hybrid camcorder/digital still camera to their Cyber-shot range.
Sporting a 1/2.5-inch Super HAD CCD sensor with a resolution of 5.1 Megapixels for stills, the Cyber-shot M2 is designed to flip between camera and camcorder modes, letting users switch from Kertesz to Kubrick at the push of a button.
The camera/digicam wotsit comes with a Carl Zeiss Vario-Tessar folded-path 3x optical zoom lens, offering a focal range of 38-114mm and aperture range of F3.5-4.4, viewable through a large 123K pixel 2.5-inch LCD viewfinder.
Designed to be used with one hand, the M2 features a slightly tilted lens axis which allows a more natural wrist position according to Sony.
The camera can be switched between the modes with the press of a button, with the camera automatically switching to photo mode when you flip up the LCD screen.
The Cyber-shot M2 uses Sony’s proprietary Memory Stick Duo and Memory Stick PRO Duo memory card formats, with the battery life claimed at a not-entirely-impressive 50 minutes of MPEG4 video recording (no wonder Sony encourage people to choose the ‘5 Sec Rec’ mode for a “fresh style of snappy movie making.”)
A more intriguing feature is Sony’s Hybrid REC mode which is supposed to give you your pictures “in context”.
This automatically records five seconds of video before the still picture is taken, adding three more seconds of movie footage afterwards.
In this mode the movies are stored as 15 fps at QVGA size (320×240).
For carrying around and showing off your cinematic and photographic triumphs, Sony has added two functions called Pocket Album and Slide Show plus Movie.
The Pocket Album feature keeps low resolution (VGA) copies of all stills taken with the camera in a separate, internal memory, allowing users to bore their friends senseless with long tours (up to 1,100 pics) of in-camera holiday snaps.
Those really wishing to inflict pain on their friends could insist on using the Slide Slow plus Movie function.
This serves up a mixed slideshow of stills and five-second movies in a variety of themes (e.g ‘Active’, ‘Simple’, ‘Stylish’ and ‘Nostalgic’), accompanied by a choice of four pre-set background music melodies. Eeek!
Once the internal memory is full, the Pocket Album software will automatically delete the oldest images to make space for new ones (individual images can be protected from deletion, however.)
The camera also includes a Sony-first stereo microphone, support for PictBridge and USB 2.0 connectivity.
The Cyber-shot M2 will be available throughout Europe during November 2005. No price has been announced yet.
Sony
14 September, 2005
Google Blog Search Launches
Google’s virtual world domination plans continue afoot with the beta launch of their new blog search service, making the company the first major search engine to offer comprehensive blog and feed search capabilities.
After snapping up Pyra Labs – the folks behind the hugely popular Blogging publishing service – over two years ago, bloggers have been waiting patiently for Google to implement their promised blog search.
Although Google’s current Web search lets users rummage around blog formats such as RSS and XML, the new search facility aims to include all blogs that publish a site feed (either RSS or Atom).
According to Jason Goldman, Google product manager for blog search, their shiny new search engine scans content posted to blogs and feeds in virtually real-time.
“We look for sites that update pinging services, and then we crawl in real-time so that we can serve up search results that are as fresh as we can,” said Goldman.
Google’s new service (sporting its trademark, no-frills interface) can be found at google.com/blogsearch and at www.search.blogger.com with a Blogger branded design.
How the searching works
The Google Blog Search works exactly the same as the regular Google search with results being sorted by date and recent posts appearing at the top of the list.
Results can also be searched by relevance, using a technology based on Google’s Web search ranking algorithms.
An advanced search interface is available with options to specify titles, authors, languages and more.
The Blogger version comes with a branded interface with an extra “use search options” link giving access to most common search advanced options, like searching in specific posts, entire blogs or specifying a date range to search within.
Results can also be limited to a specific language, with the option to apply the Safe Search filter to results.
You can discover who’s linking to a post or blog using the link: command, and blog searches can be saved as an alert that gets updated any time new content is posted matching you query.
Getting your blog listed
You can’t manually submit your site at present, but Google say that they’ll be introducing the feature shortly.
Currently, Blogs that publish a site feed in any format which automatically pings an updating service (such as Weblogs.com), should be picked up.
Google Blog Search is available in English as well as Brazilian Portuguese, Dutch, French, German, Italian, Korean, Russian, and Spanish, with additional languages on the way.
google.com/blogsearch
www.search.blogger.com
Google Blog Search FAQ
14 September, 2005
Mobile TV Looks To Rake In The Revenue Stream
A report by Unstrung Insider claims that Mobile TV is set to become a breakthrough mass-market mobile data service, boosted by pioneering services offered by major global operators such as Orange, Vodafone, and SK Telecom.
The report, entitled Mobile TV: Switching on the Revenue Stream, highlights the growing success of mobile TV over 3G and satellite broadcast networks, with some operators already soaring past the million sessions per month mark.
With commercial services streamed over 3G networks showing signs of success in their own right, the report suggests that the real power of mobile TV will be to act as an “extension” to regular TV services, persuading even the most techno-phobic mobile phone users of the benefits of 3G subscriptions.
Report author and Unstrung Insider Chief Analyst Gabriel Brown was enthusiastic: “There’s a lot of mileage in unicast mobile TV as a lure to attract high- value 3G subscriptions”.
“The power is its simplicity: Everyone already knows how to watch TV,” he added.
Steven Day, corporate affairs director at Virgin Mobile in the U.K agrees, saying that people who wouldn’t consider using, a streaming media application, for example, will warm to the new technology.
Basing his opinion on feedback from the company’s current 1,000-user mobile TV broadcast trial in London, Day praised the ease of use of Mobile TV services, “It’s dead easy. Everyone knows what it is, and what it does”.
Although the simplicity and familiarity of the service will please punters, the report says that mobile TV will need a “sophisticated sales approach” from operators who face a market driven by very low-cost or “free” services, adding that the mass market will only likely pay up to US$10 (~£5,€8~)a month for mobile TV.
The technology
The report comments on the industry expectation that “one-to-many” mass-market mobile TV services may be more efficiently delivered over dedicated mobile broadcast networks using technologies such as DVB-H (Digital Video Broadcast-Handheld), DMB (Digital Multimedia Broadcast), and MediaFLO.
Despite DVB-H growing into the leading contender for dedicated mobile broadcast networks (especially in Europe) pesky issues surrounding spectrum allocation in urban areas looks set to slow down the commercialisation of services.
A potential joker in the pack could be Qualcomm’s MediaFLO technology, which has the potential to challenge DVB-H as the automatic mobile broadcast technology choice. Although the technology isn’t as mature as DVB-H, delays to mobile broadcast spectrum allocation can only work to Qualcomm’s advantage.
Unstrung
12 September, 2005
Firefox 1.5 Beta 1 Released
Mozilla have made their first preview of Firefox 1.5 Beta 1 – code named “Deer Park” – available to early adopters, Web developers and Extension writers.
The highly-rated open source browser already boasts over 80 million users, with its tabbed browsing, built in pop-up blocker and increased security making sizeable inroads into the market dominance of Microsoft’s Internet Explorer.
Firefox 1.5 was originally scheduled for release in March 2005, but a second beta is now expected in the next month, followed by one or two release candidates before a full release “sometime before the end of the year”.
Chris Beard, products and marketing manager for Mozilla Corp, explained that the delay was due to the unexpected number of new features added to the browser.
“This ended up being a much bigger release than we originally planned,” he added.
The beta serves up several new features and improvements of existing tools, but Firefox are describing the new automatic updating as the “premier addition to 1.5”.
Much like Microsoft’s Automatic Update, Firefox 1.5 will automatically fetch program and security updates in the background and install them without user intervention. Naturally, this feature can be disabled, or users can specify that they are notified before installing patches.
Mike Schroepfer, Mozilla’s director of engineering said that automatic updating will reduce the size of patches by 10 to 20 times, explaining that the feature will remove the current requirement for users to download the entire browser to obtain fixes.
Firefox also promises faster browser navigation with improvements to back and forward button performance, the ability to re-arrange browser icons by drag-and-drop and more pop-up blocking options.
There’s improved security too, with a Clear Private Data feature making it easier for surreptitious surfers to quickly remove personal data through a menu item or keyboard shortcut.
Engineers at Firefox have ensured that the latest version of the browser is open-standard friendly, offering support for SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics), CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) 2 and 3, DHTML (Dynamic HTML) and JavaScript 1.6.
We were impressed with the improvements in the latest version, but it’s worth bearing in mind that as an early beta release there’s bound to be a few rough edges on display.
Anyone with a lot of Extensions installed, for example, may want to hold back for a while as many are currently incompatible with 1.5.
Mozilla has said that it will be providing up-to-date listing of developer extensions as they become compatible with Firefox 1.5 beta 1 at addons.mozilla.org . Mozilla were also forced to release a critical Firefox patch after a security vulnerability affecting all versions of Mozilla Firefox and the Mozilla Suite were publicly disclosed.
Firefox beta
You can download the patch from here
12 September, 2005
Nikon Coolpix P1 and Coolpix P2 Cameras Offer Wi-Fi: IFA
Although on the surface Nikon’s brand new Coolpix P1 and the Coolpix P2 cameras look like standard fare from the photo giant, they’ve got a trick up their sleeve – they both offer Wireless LAN support (IEEE802.11b/g).
In a first for compact digital cameras, Nikon’s new cameras sport a built-in 802.11b/g WiFi module which enables images to be transmitted to a Wi-Fi enabled computer or printer without the need for pesky wires and cables.
This wireless connection lets users transfer images off the camera’s storage card or transmit them ‘live’ as they’re snapped directly to Nikon’s PictureProject software.
Unfortunately, the P1 and P2 will only transmit pictures to the PictureProject application and isn’t able to directly upload images to the Internet or to FTP servers which we would have found far more useful – and much more fun.
As for the Coolpix P1 and P2 cameras, there’s nothing much to get too excited about, with the two identical cameras offering 8.0 and 5.1 Megapixels respectively with a 3.5x optical zoom (36-126mm equivalent, f2.7 – 5.2).
There’s the usual shedload of scene modes on offer (16 in total) for snapping in a wide range of common situations, with some advanced scene modes for the adventurous, and an aperture-priority auto mode with 10-step manual control over aperture settings in 1/3EV increments.
Both cameras support video and sound recording up to 30fps, with seven movie modes to choose from – including a natty time-lapse mode. We like them.
Framing and viewing images is taken care of with a sizeable 110,000 pixels 2.5″ TFT LCD screen and there’s a SD slot and USB 2.0 connectivity onboard.
Both cameras will be available at the end of the month, with the P1 priced at £294 (~$532~€429) and the P2 being knocked out for £225 (~$408~ €329).
Nikon
9 September, 2005
iPod Nano; Rollable Screen; Koran Virus: Teenage Tech News
Cool, I want one!
Apple has unveiled a new iPod. Why is this news? Because the new device is miniscule and uses flash memory as opposed to a hard drive. This confirms the rumours that Apple were buying 40% of Samsung’s flash memory.
I think that Apple has unveiled a real killer here: It has a decent capacity, is small, cute and features a colour screen. And of course, Christmas is coming up (Shouts “Dad!”).
Ooh, Shiny, new and it rolls up!
Yes, Ladies and Gentlemen, we are still in 2005 and not 2020. Even so, Phillips has managed to come up with a prototype roll-up screen. What’s special about this screen is, surprise surprise, that it is possible to roll it up as you would a sheet of paper.
At the moment, the model they have is only a prototype, and can only display four shades of grey, but when it gets better to support more colours, I’m sure it will be an instant hit with makers of Mobile Phones and other applications where a large display and a small size is an advantage.
I personally thought the fact someone had finally developed something like this was pretty neat, very futuristic, and a useful invention. I, for instance, would love to have a small phone simply because it’s, well, small. I can’t currently get one however, because the ones that are the size I would like have tiny displays and no features. Hopefully this will now change.
Allah says no
Meanwhile, there’s a new virus out (Windows only, sorry Mac and Linux users) that attempts to block people from surfing pornography Websites. If the virus finds specific sexually-orientated words in a URL, it will minimize the browser window and display a passage from the Koran.
Don’t people realise that you can’t force religion on people? When will people realise that religion is something that comes naturally? People who don’t grasp this concept make me angry, although I can see there is a vaguely humorous element to this virus too.
At least the virus doesn’t damage any of your files!
“Drop the ink cartridge and put your hands on your head!”
We’re told that Lexmark are attempting to outlaw refilling their cartridges. Apparently, as the ink cartridges are patented as one use only, Lexmark think they can enforce this on anyone running a business refilling ink tanks. Luckily, patents don’t apply to non-for profit activities yet, so it’s still safe to refill a cartridge yourself.
I think there should be bans about companies applying terms of use on something that a consumer has actually bought. If it belongs to you, you should be able to do as you wish with it!
9 September, 2005
DSC-R1 10 Mpx CMOS Cyber-shot Announced by Sony
Sony has announced the ground-breaking Cyber-shot DSC-R1, a high-end enthusiast digital camera offering a 10.3 million pixel CMOS sensor with a fast 24mm -120mm zoom lens.
Uniquely, the camera’s “professional grade” CMOS image sensor is APS-class, which makes it similar to those found in professional digital still cameras (in fact, Sony have long been selling their CMOS sensors to dSLR manufacturers, but this is the first time they’ve put them in their own cameras.)
The benefits of these larger sensors is that they offer higher sensitivity to light and lower image noise than the little pups you find in fixed lens/compact cameras.
Despite CMOS sensors being notorious power hogs, Sony has engineered the camera to provide a live image preview through its swiveling LCD monitor and EVF viewfinder – a very useful feature not available on dSLRs.
Supporting the fancy pants sensor is a high quality Carl Zeiss Vario-Sonnar T 5X optical zoom lens covering 24mm to 120 mm (f/2.8 to f/4/.8.)
The 2-inch LCD is of an interesting construction, letting photographers swivel it through a range of positions or lay it flat across the top plate, in the style of a medium format camera viewfinder. Neat.
The camera offers Sony’s Advanced Gradation Control System (AGCS) which evaluates the distribution of brightness in a scene via the histogram and then applies the appropriate gamma curve to improve a scene’s contrast or to minimise saturation.
Despite the presence of the power-guzzling CMOS live preview, Sony are claiming a battery life of around 500 shots, with the camera storing files in JPEG or RAW image modes.
As has been the trend with their recent models, there’s both Memory Stick and Compact Flash memory cards onboard.
The camera’s $1000 price tag puts it in the heart of dSLR territory and we can’t help wondering how it’s going to compete.
Sure, the live preview is a very attractive and convenient option, but with its dSLR rivals offering far more flexibility through a huge array of available lens, we feel that Sony may struggle to gain a competitive edge – especially considering that the designers have bizarrely left off a movie mode.
I guess we’ll have to wait and see how it performs in the reviews before making a final judgment on this one.
The camera will be available in mid-November.
9 September, 2005
Nikon Coolpix S4 Swivels Out
We like swiveling cameras.
With their crafty pivoting design, they’re great for taking sneaky street candids, stealthy snaps and images taken from err, “imaginative” angles, so we were excited to hear about Nikon’s new Coolpix S4 camera.
Decked out in an attractive silver finish, Nikon’s new swiveler builds on the success of their Coolpix SQ and E9xx series cameras, boasting six million-pixels and a hefty 10x optical Zoom-Nikkor lens, covering 38-380mm.
The swivel capability lets users shoot from the eye, the waist, overhead or upside down if they so desire, with the 180 degree rotate making it easy to take self portraits.
The shirt pocket snapper comes with the usual slew of scene modes covering every climatic and lighting condition imaginable on earth, with the addition of an innovative “Face Priority AF Mode”, which claims to automatically find faces in photos and focus on their gurning mugs.
Handling’s been improved with the Coolpix S4 featuring a new grip design with a large 2.5-inch 110,000 pixel TFT monitor making it easier to compose scenes and admire captured photos.
Powered by a pair of AA-size batteries, the S4 is designed to be highly portable, boasting slimline 112 x 69 x 37 mm (4.4 x 2.7 x 1.4 in) dimensions and a light weight of 205g.
For fine tuning images, the camera offers In-Camera Red-Eye Fix, AE-BSS to select the best relative exposure from a series of shots and a “D-Lighting” function for brightening under-exposed pictures in-camera, conveniently saving a copy of the edited image rather than overwriting the original.
For punters with Spielberg aspirations, Nikon has included three Movie Modes (up to 15 frames per second) with sound and a time-lapse movie function.
The Coolpix S4 will be available at the end of this month priced €399 (£218, €320).
Nikon
Nikon Coolpix S4 specs
8 September, 2005