Digital-Lifestyles

Digital-Lifestyles pre-empted and reported thousands of articles on the then-coming impact that technology was to have on all forms of Media. Launched in 2001 as a research blog to aid its founder, Simon Perry, present at IBC 2002, it grew into a wide ranging, multi-author publication that was quoted in many publications globally including the BBC, was described by the Guardian as 'Informative' and also cited in a myriad of tech publications before closing in 2009

  • Apple’s Q3 – and the new G5 iMac

    Apple’s Q3 results are out and they’re good – the quarter saw them shipping 876,000 Macs, the highest unit shipment for three years, increasing their Macintosh revenue by 19%.

    US$60 million (€48.5 million) of Apple’s income came from music accessories and other related items – showing that iPod demand is far from slowing.

    Steve Jobs said: “It was an outstanding quarter-our highest third quarter revenue in eight years. Our Mac-based revenue grew a healthy 19 percent, and our music-based revenue grew an incredible 162 percent. We’ve got a strong product portfolio, with some amazing new additions coming later this year.”

    Those of you who have been holding off buying a new Mac in the hope that the new iMac models will feature G5 processors can finally dust off the piggy banks. Although IBM has had manufacturing problems, resulting in a shortage of G5 processors and G5-based Macs, the new model is expected to ship in September.

    Apple normally doesn’t pre-announce new products as it tends to hurts sales of the previous model – though in this case, the previous iMac has ceased production.

    Apple’s results

  • Digital Entertainment In The Networked Home

    Awaiting details Seattle, WA, USA

  • eBay Trialling Digital Downloads

    eBay are testing digital downloads in a trial with software company Digital River. The 90 day pilot allows purchasers to download software as soon as they’ve paid for it.

    Whilst this is a common business model for more traditional companies, it’s the first time that eBay have tried it. Pirated and counterfeit goods are still seen as a problem with online auctions, and eBay will have to police vendors and auctions carefully to stay on the right side of the law.

    As eBay will only allow pre-approved sellers to offer downloads so we can forget sales of unloved, second-hand iTunes songs for the time being.

    As the rapid success of online music stores is demonstrating, internet users are getting more used to the idea of buying goods on a download only basis – including software, music, fonts and reports. If eBay can keep control of their vendors, then this could be the next big phase for them.

    Digital River Inc.

  • iTunes in Indie Deal

    After the protests of indie music fans clogged up Apple’s music store with bogus iMixes, the company is close to completing a deal to get more indie music on the service.

    Hundreds of artists have not been able to get their music on iTunes because lengthy, piecemeal negotiations with individual indie labels. Sony and Napster managed to get round this by doing a single deal with the Association of Independent Music, the UK trade body that represents many of the labels in question.

    This means that popular acts such as the White Stripes will finally be available for download, and music fans will be able to download Franz Ferdinand rather than Franz Liszt. Not that there’s anything wrong with Franz Liszt – other than he didn’t come from Glasgow.

    iTunes

  • Japanese School Authorities to Tag Children

    School authorities in the Japanese city of Osaka are to begin tagging the pupils of one of their primary schools with RFIDs. Radio Frequency Identification tags are tiny transceivers capable to broadcasting their location and other data to nearby receivers. The tags have generated controversy in recent years as supermarkets and clothes retailers have begun embedding them in their products.

    Once just a jacket accessory for retrieving the posh out of snow drifts after skiing accidents, RFID technology can now track goods around a store – and in the case of clothing, can inform Gap’s data mining operation that you’re wearing previous purchases the second you walk in the store.

    Keeping privacy considerations in mind, the Japanese have evidently decided that the negative side of tagging is now outweighed by the increased security of their children.

    The Wakayama primary school will install RFID readers on gates and around the school, and will be able to track the movements of children around the building. It is expected that the scheme will be employed in other schools later, and you can bet that the eyes of the world’s school boards will be watching this very closely.

    We reported a similar child-tracking story a few weeks ago with Lego’s introduction of RFID child tracking at their Billund theme park.

    Wikipedia on RFID

    Spy Chips – RFID security concerns

  • Sony Connect: Video Content Within 12 Months

    Sony is to extend its Connect music download service to cover video downloads within the next twelve months. The chairman and and chief executive of Sony Pictures Entertainment, Michael Lynton, said: “Sony Connect will not be just a music service but also a video business within the next year.”

    Of course, no-one dropped their latte at that announcement, but this is the first time that the move has been confirmed.

    Sony’s consumer electronics business is developing devices that will be able to download and play videos from the Connect store, in exactly the same way that their new range of audio devices do now. The new service will be called Movielink, and given Sony’s enthusiasm for DRM, will probably only be compatible with Sony devices and PCs.

    Movielink is a joint distribution venture with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Paramount, Sony Pictures, Universal Studios and Warner Brothers, and will feature content from all five studios and others.

    Sony Connect

  • CacheLogic Survey: P2P Accounts for 10 Petabytes of Data

    CacheLogic, the P2P technology company has conducted a survey of global internet traffic using network monitoring tools to find out more about the size of the file sharing community.

    In June, an average of 8 million P2P users were online at any one moment, with 1 petabyte of data available to share.

    The growth of broadband means that users are now downloading larger files than before, so movie downloads are becoming a more attractive proposition to those of that inclination. Separately, the OECD has announced that video has just passed music as the most popular download, echoing this. Indeed, BayTSP report that “The Day After Tomorrow” was the top downloaded film of June, and Digital Lifestyles predicts that “Spiderman 2” will be July’s most popular pirate victim.

    For some bizarre reason “The Passion of the Christ” was the second most ripped-off film in June – which doesn’t strike me as very Christian.

    CacheLogic

  • Windows XP Service Pack Hits Delay

    Windows XP Service Pack 2 will now not be appearing until August. Citing a need for more stability checks, Microsoft have delayed the patch for the third time – it was originally scheduled to appear in June, then July.

    The new service pack has been described as more than just a few bug fixes – some sources say it’s more like a new version of XP.

    XP users can look forward to a number of enhancements when the service pack does appear, including a new firewall, spyware blocking and security revisions to Outlook Express and Internet Explorer.

    The download will be about 70mb, if beta test versions are anything to go by – you’d better make sure that broadband link is in by then.

    Microsoft Windows

  • London Gets a TV Channel

    Claiming to be the first channel of its type in the world, London TV is a new channel designed to help Londoners get the most out of their city.

    NOP have carried out a survey citing 33% of Londoners “worry constantly that they are not making the most of their free time”. I must be in that other 77% slice, presumably.

    The channel revolves around “bite-sized” (i.e. short and cheap to produce) snippets of entertainment designed to inspire Londoners to get over their fear of mugging and burglary and to leave their ludicrously priced homes and venture out for some fun.

    David Campbell, chief executive of Visit London, said: “If you live in the capital, you often feel guilty that you’re not making the most of everything the city has to offer. Now you don’t even have to get off the sofa to get some inspirational ideas delivered straight to your living room. London TV provides one of the best ways to deliver up to the minute information in a fast moving city like ours. Television brings the capital to life in a way that a guide book could never do and with digital uptake increasing all the time, there has never been a better time to launch a channel dedicated to the greatest city in the world.”

    The channel has cost some UK£2 million (€3 million) to set up, financed through Visit London’s marketing budget.

    Visit London

  • PlayStation3: 2006, Playable Demo at E3

    Ken Kutaragi has said that Sony plans to have a working PlayStation3 console at next May’s E3 show – so if you’re not doing anything between 18th and 20th of May next year, you might as well get yourself to Los Angeles.

    Kutaragi told a meeting of PlayStation developers, suppliers and journalists: “There has been some talk that development is not going well, but we expect to have a playable version at E3. We are pushing ahead with that schedule in mind.”

    Sony have been receiving a lot of criticism lately for their PlayStation brand – the PSX has been discontinued in Japan after selling only 100,000 units, and the PSP is under scrutiny with developers citing concerns battery life and screen quality. Sony have yet to confirm what the battery life of its new handheld console will be, and it has emerged that the screen in the demonstration model costs 70,0000 Yen (€520) alone. Clearly Sony will not be able to produce a console with the same screen and will have to source another, cheaper component.

    Last week Sony Computer Entertainment announced that they had changed the memory chips in in the PS3 to 256 megabit chips, down from 512. This does not necessarily mean that the console has had its memory capacity halved, doomsayers – it could mean that, with the same memory and twice the number of chips that the bandwidth has been doubled: from 25.6 gigabits to 51.2 gigabits per second.

    Sony are expected to follow their usual release pattern with PlayStation hardware – the console may well become available one year after its demonstration at E3, making that May 2006. US release will follow a couple of months later, with a European launch three months or so after that. Expect worried parents queuing up trying to get one of the few models released in the UK for Christmas 2006.

    SCEE