Europe – Page 6 – Digital-Lifestyles

24/24 Video By Orange France Gets Paramount Deal

Orange France have picked up a deal with the US studio Paramount Pictures, to distribute their content in France.

24/24 Video By Orange France Gets Paramount Deal It’s not just old content that will be available, but new productions from Paramount including DreamWorks titles, which will be among the latest films available.

Orange France customers with a broadband digital television package or a High-Speed Internet package will be able to enjoy a Video-On-Demand programming schedule including the studio’s latest releases, such as Mission Impossible III, Over the Hedge and World Trade Center, among others.

There’s over 2,500 films, in French or original language versions with subtitles, available on the 24/24 Video service currently, which costs from 3 Euros to rent for 24 hours. Usual features such as unlimited viewing, pause functions and fast forward and rewind are available.

Apple And Record Companies Charged In EU iTunes Row

The European Commission has dished out formal charges to Apple and ‘unnamed major record companies’, accusing them of restricting music sales in Europe.

Apple And Record Companies Charged In iTunes Row The EU alleges that agreements between Apple and the record companies are guilty of breaking European Union rules that prohibit restrictive business practices. It’s far from the first time that the EU and other Northern European Countries has got wound up about Apple and iTunes.

“Consumers can only buy music from the iTunes online stores in their country of residence and are therefore restricted in their choice of where to buy music, and consequently what music is available and at what price,” said Jonathan Todd, European Commission spokesman.

Apple And Record Companies Charged In iTunes Row “The statement of objections alleges that distribution agreements between Apple and major record companies contain territorial sales restrictions,” he added.

Promptly shifting the blame on to the record companies, Apple insisted that they’d tried to operate a single pan-European iTunes store accessible to peeps from any member state but were foiled by music labels and publishers imposing legal limits on the download rights.

The Commission first got involved back in 2005 after the UK consumer group Which? pointed out that iTunes purchasers in France and Germany were paying far less than us poor chumps in the UK (67 pence against 79 pence).

Apple And Record Companies Charged In iTunes Row Apple and the record companies now have two months to defend themselves in writing or take part in an oral hearing which usually happens around a month after a written reply has been received.

This latest development is unrelated to yesterday’s deal between Apple and EMI.

Source

EU Reding: Europe Should Standardise on DVB-H

Viviane Reding, European Commissioner for Information Society and Media has been re-encouraging the European telco industry to pull their collective socks up and agree a standard to mobile TV.

EU Reding: Europe Should Standardise on DVB-H Her guidance to them is to settle on DVB-H (Digital Video Broadcasting for Handhelds), a European led development of the DVB-T (Television) standard that is throughout large areas of Europe.

It makes total sense for the industry to select and stick to one technical solution, as it makes life easier for everyone, especially the consumer – avoiding the VHS/Betamax Blu-Ray/HD-DVD confusion.

While commenting on the estimated global value of mobile TV being 11.4Bn Euro, she followed it with “I am disappointed about the lack of progress made so far. To fully reap the benefits of this market and to export a European model for Mobile TV as we did with GSM for mobile phones, industry and Member States must work more closely together to devise a common approach, compare technologies, look at possible legal obstacles, make spectrum available throughout Europe and choose together the best way to ensure a quick and large take-up of Mobile TV by Europeans, preferably based on a single standard.”

It is understood that she is meeting today with Telecom ministers from the European Member-states to try and get some agreement.

Despite a number of trials stretching back years, including the UK, Spain and Finland, the jury is still out on whether the public will pay anything for the privilege of watching TV on their mobiles, while on the go.

Mobile TV: Commission urges industry and Member States to develop a proactive European strategy

Vodafone To Offer Europe-wide Daily Flat Data Rate

The practicality of using cellular data service while you’re abroad hasn’t been high, unless your company doesn’t mind paying the crazy rates that has been data-roaming.

Vodafone To Offer Europe-wide Daily Flat Data Rate Sanity appears to have been reached by Vodafone, as they announce a flat-rate of €12/day for data in Europe – but only if accessed from “mobile-enable laptops” from 1 July 2007. It will replace their current per Megabyte service, giving what they say is “practically unlimited data usage,” which is actually up to 50Mb/day.

We asked Vodafone for clarification as to what “mobile-enable laptops” were and they said the service would be open to any laptop user who has a datacard, or a mobile phone with modem – as long as they opted-in to the service. The opt-in is free of charge.

Back in June 2005, Vodafone offered a months worth of data roaming for €75, but only included 100Mb in the service – the equivalent of two days data limit for the new service.

Vodafone have been running a voice equivalent roaming service, Vodafone Passport, for two years now, which they claim has 12m users. They tell us that they’ve yet to come up with a swish name for the equivalent data service.

The EU has been on at mobile phone companies to make their European voice roaming charges more reasonable for a while – in fact Vodafone pre-empted any action by the EU, by announcing a dropping their prices a year before they were going to do it.

EU Comments Add Pressure To Apple iTunes

The heat on Apple to open up their iTunes/iPod combination went up another notch following an interview with Meglena Kuneva, the European Union’s Consumer Protection Commissioner.

EU Comments Add Pressure To Apple iTunes In the interview with German weekly magazine Focus, published today, she poses the following question, “”Do you think it’s fine that a CD plays in all CD players but that an iTunes song only plays in an iPod?” It’s followed by a couple of words that are going to make uncomfortable reading for Apple, “I don’t. Something has to change.”

Music bought on the Apple iTunes online shop cannot be played on any other music player, apart from Apple’s iPod.

Kuneva is carrying out a review of the eight basic laws which govern cross-border consumer rights.

Pressure has been building for quite a while against Apple, with the latest, most significant one being in January as the Norwegian Consumer Watchdog, declaring iTunes to be illegal.

Previous actions have been, the approval of France’s ‘iTunes Law,’ after Apple narrowly avoided the French courts over their FairPlay DRM back in 2004.

Apple leader, Steve Jobs, wrote an open letter at the start of last month, entitled “Thoughts on Music,” where he said he’d drop DRM “in a heartbeat,” but was hamstrung by the content owners not allowing him to do so.

Meglena Kuneva – EU site

European PS3: No Emotion Engine: PS2 Compatibility ‘Limited’

Sony has just let it be know that it will be redesigning the internals for the EuropeanPS3, removing the Emotion Engine, which gives compatibility with PS2 games.

European PS3: No Emotion Engine: PS2 Compatibility Limited The Emotion Engine will instead be handled in what they call, “a new combination of hardware and software emulation which will enable PS3 to be compatible with a broad range of original PlayStation (PS) titles and a limited range of PlayStation2 (PS2) titles.”

Much fuss was made by Sony of the Emotion Engine when they were building up to the initial release of the first PlayStation. CNN even went as far as asking if the PS2 will replace the PC, with claims like, it was “two times faster than a 733-MHz Pentium III and 15 times faster than a 400-MHz Celeron at handling tasks like full-motion video.”

Now we know that Sony are keen to ~~make the maximum amount of money~~ reduce the amount of money that they are losing from selling PS3s. According to iSupply’s estimate on the Bill Of Material of the PS3, they’ll save $27 on this.

Many UK gamers were angered when they felt that they were paying over the odds for the UK PS3 when the price of £425 was made official. This news will do nothing to make them feel better.

The real danger is that if people think they’re going to get less of a machine that their-cousins in the US and Japan have, that may well be the last straw in deciding which ‘Next-Gen’ console they’ll buy – even if they never end up playing any of their old PS2 games.

Sony is on a knife-edge with this one. We’ve already postulated that the PS3 might not be bought in the way that was once thought, before the Wii caught peoples imaginations.

What is strange is that in an interview at the start of February, SCE UK managing director, Ray Maguire, said that the machines were being built at that point, but omitted to mention that they would be fundamentally different.

Full release follows …

23/02/2007 10:00
Sony Computer Entertainment Europe Announces Hardware Specification of PLAYSTATION®3 for Europe

London, 23 February 2007 – Sony Computer Entertainment Europe (SCEE) today announced that PLAYSTATION®3 (PS3™) to be launched in Europe, Middle East, Africa and Australasia on 23rd March 2007 would utilise a new hardware specification.

The European PS3 will feature the Cell Broadband Engine™, 60 GB hard disc drive, Blu-ray Disc player, built-in Wi-Fi connectivity, SIXAXIS™ wireless controller. It also embodies a new combination of hardware and software emulation which will enable PS3 to be compatible with a broad range of original PlayStation® (PS) titles and a limited range of PlayStation®2 (PS2) titles.

“PS3 is first and foremost a system that excels in playing games specifically designed to exploit the power and potential of the PS3 system,” said David Reeves, President of SCEE. “Games designed for PS3 offer incredible graphics quality, stunning gameplay and massively improved audio and video fidelity that is simply not achievable with PS and PS2 games. Rather than concentrate on PS2 backwards compatibility, in the future, company resources will be increasingly focused on developing new games and entertainment features exclusively for PS3, truly taking advantage of this exciting technology.”

Some additional PS2 titles will become compatible on the PS3 system through regular downloadable firmware updates, which will be made available through the PLAYSTATION®Network, from http://www.playstation.com or via PS3 game discs, with the first update planned for the launch date of the 23rd March 2007.

Users will be able to check whether their titles are compatible with PS3 at http://faq.eu.playstation.com/bc. This site will be available on 23rd March to meet launch day.

1. A device compatible with Linear PCM 7.1 Ch is required to output 7.1 ch audio, supported by Dolby TrueHD or a similar format, from the HDMI OUT connector.

2. This system does not support output from the DTS-HD 7.1 Ch. DTS-HD 7.1 Ch audio is output from a 5.1 or lower channel.

3. Usability of all storage media types is not guaranteed.

4. Certain PlayStation 2 format software titles may not perform properly on this system. Visit faq.eu.playstation.com/bc for the latest information regarding compatible titles

Skype Pro: Europe Details Emerge

Sykpe Pro: Europe Details Emerge As you know, Skype Pro was announced in the middle of January. Today the pricing was confirmed.

For €2 + VAT per month, subscribers will be getting

Zero cents per minute calling to domestic landlines in the UK previously 1.7c per minute
Free Skype Voicemail (normally €15 per year)
€30 discount on SkypeIn numbers
€5 Skype Credit included as part of the introductory offer (see below)
A €30 discount on a Philips VoIP 841 cordless phone
A €10 discount on an SMC WiFi phone
Additional discounts on a series of Skype Extras are also available including desktop sharing, avatars, emoticons and ring tones

It’s not all free on the calls to landlines, as each call made will have a 3.9c connection charge made against it.

The lucky dwellers of Europe (specifically Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Sweden, Norway, Portugal, Spain and the UK) will benefit from this first.

Other countries worldwide will follow in 2007.

Skype Pro

Google Breaching Belgian Copyright: Judge

Belgian courts have ruled that Google is in breach of copyright.

Google Breaching Belgian Copyright: Judge The case was brought by Copiepresse, a copyright protection organisation that was representing 17 [UPDATE (thanks Michel) French-speaking] Belgian newspapers, complaining that both Google’s search and News service were in breach.

Their complaint is that their news pages are being cached by Google, thus, in their view, offering free access to their valuable content. Google’s argument is that they only display a headline and a short part of the content and also point out that they drive huge amount of readers to the newspapers Web sites.

This action was first launched last August in the Belgian courts. Google lost the case and was directed by the judge to remove the offending articles from the Google.be site and corresponding news service and post messages to their home pages. Google appealed the decision and lost yesterday.

Copiepresse is also pursuing similar action against Yahoo and MSN and it’s reported that they are in touch with copyright groups in Norway, Austria and Italy.

Google Breaching Belgian Copyright: Judge

It is understood that Copiepresse is pursuing Google for payment for access to their content. Google has stated that this will not happen – not surprisingly as _every_ other publication, worldwide, would be asking for the same.

Google respect both robots.txt and metatags that enable any Web pages publisher to exclude them from being included in the Google index. As Google’s Rachel Whetstone, European Director of Communications and Public Affairs, points out, if asked, Google will remove content if requested.

Confused
We’re very confused by the ruling. How do these publishers think people are going to find their content without a search engine pointing them? Sure, their regular readers will still visit their home pages, but their potential readership will not be aware of the quality of their writing.

Copiepresse

Motorola’s 3G MOTORIZR Z8 Announced

Motorola's 3G MOTORIZR Z8 Announced We reckon there could be moist spots breaking out in the gussets of mobile phone freaks everywhere with a veritable onslaught of new phones being announced today.

First to catch our eye was Motorola’s bendy-shaped 3G MOTORIZR Z8 phone sporting a novel ‘kick-slider’ (a what?!) and purring along on a Symbian OS handling up to 3.6Mbps HSDPA.

The curved profile is supposed to make the phone sit more snugly against your noggin, with the 15.3-mm thin form factor ensuring you can grab a place on the Cool Dudes Table.

Motorola's 3G MOTORIZR Z8 Announced Decked out in a natty black body with green trim, the MOTORIZR Z8 features a 1.4 x 2-inch, QVGA 16 million colour display and a twin camera set up, with a 2 megapixel camera on the back (with 8x zoom and lumi LED light) and a lower spec’d VGA jobbie up front for video calls.

The handset can record in either MPEG-4 or 3gp (for MMS) and includes 90MB of internal memory and a MicroSD expansion slot to keep you stocked up with up to 4GB’s worth of photos, video, and tunes on the move.

Motorola's 3G MOTORIZR Z8 Announced There’s also A2DP stereo Bluetooth audio onboard, support for SMS, EMS, MMS 1.22 messaging and SMTP, POP3, IMAP4, SSL/TLS2 email.

The Moto boys claim a battery life of up to 5-hours 3G talk time or up to 16 days standby, but the cheeky monkeys haven’t come clean about what network frequencies are supported yet.

Motorola

Omnifone Announces Rival To iPhone/ iTunes Service

You may not have heard of them yet, but feisty Brit mobile music company Omnifone have announced one of the first big challengers to Apple’s soon-come iPhone/iTunes Store service.

Called MusicStation, the new service will dish up an “all you can eat” menu for European users, with music downloads starting at £1.99 ($3.88) per week

Initially launching their service in Europe and Asia this year, the London based company says that it’s already secured partnerships with 23 mobile network operators giving them access to a customer base of 690 million subscribers in 40 countries.

“MusicStation will give users of any music-capable mobile phone the ability to legally access, download and enjoy an unlimited amount of music, from a global music catalogue supported by the music industry, all for a small weekly fee, wherever they are,” enthused Omnifone Chief Executive Rob Lewis.

“We will ensure the vast majority of Europeans have the freedom to choose MusicStation by the time iPhone arrives in Europe. We will give consumers the choice they deserve,” he added.

Users subscribed to the service can search, download and play tunes on their mobiles with the option to sync content with home PCs to create playlists sharable with other MusicStation users.

Unlike the iPhone service, MusicStation lets users download tracks over the air across a data network, giving music-hungry punters an instant fix, wherever they are.

“By leveraging the hundreds of millions of handsets sold every year by operators to deliver MusicStation into the global market, we believe we can give Apple a run for its money in digital music provision,” chest-thumped a tiggerish Lewis, adding, “except that with MusicStation users don’t need a credit card, computer or broadband connection.”

Predictably, music tracks will come with digital rights management and be delivered in the eAAC+ format (that’s enhanced advanced audio coding, in case you’re into knowing that kind of thing).

As well as music, the service will feed punters personalised news, new release details, ticket sales and concert listings, along with recommendations for new songs based on their listening habits.

With songs and playlists being held on a centralised server, content can also be recovered and downloaded in the event of some steenkin’ tea-leaf nicking their phone.

MusicStation say that music content will be supplied by both major and independent labels – including Universal Music Group – as well as local artists.

http://www.omnifone.com/