Category: Columns & Opinion
nuTsie: do you really want ads on your own shuffled iTunes library?
Andy Merrett writes…
Melodeo has introduced a new beta service that lets users play a random selection from their iTunes music library on their mobile phone or Internet-connected PC.
Called nuTsie (and yes, that is an anagram of iTunes), users upload their iTunes library to Melodeo’s servers, and then have the ability to play back a randomised selection of their tunes in hi-fi quality.
The nuTsie service doesn’t download any of the music from its servers to the mobile device – it streams it. It also features a ‘radio rules’ shuffle algorithm to ensure artists, record labels and music publishers are paid for every use of a song. It can even play iTunes’ “Fair Play” tracks.
Ask gets a shiny new look, is Google bothered?
Will Head writes… Reliable number four search engine Ask has unveiled its shiny new interface – which is all web 2.0-y, with shiny graduations and the like. To see the new look, you'll have to make sure you're looking at…
Amazon starts touting its wares on Twitter
Will Head writes… Amazon is the latest company to jump on the micro-blogging bandwagon and start pushing its products on Twitter. The online retailer is putting its latest special offers on its Twitter page so you can easily keep up…
To add or not to add, that is the question – the politics of friendships on Facebook
Katherine Hannaford writes…
Love it or loathe it, Facebook is the new MySpace…oh, and the new Twitter, the new Flickr and pretty much every other work-shirker time-waster known to man, thanks to opening themselves up to third-party developers.
But how much is too much? Is there such a thing as being too involved in the social-networking service? And just how many friends is acceptable – is there a stigma attached to Facebook in the same manner as with MySpace, where those with fewer than 10 friends are deemed social pariahs?
Just how much is too much?
Has Google gone too far with its Street View photos?
Will Head writes… Earlier in the week, Google added the new Street View feature to its Maps site, allowing people to see photos of selected areas in certain cities. The pictures were taken using from a van driving along the…
High definition is great, but do you really want Sony in your "Whole House"?
Andy Merrett writes…
Sony has been showing off its latest integrated solutions at PCBC (Pacific Coast Builders Conference) 2007.
It has three updated solutions for ensuring that new houses are totally kitted out with Sony equipment.
Their reasoning is that it’s easier and more cost-effective to plan and install a complete audio-visual system when a house is being built, rather than after all the walls are nicely plastered and you’re left scratching your head wondering how to keep that pristine look, while trying to separate and hide all that cabling.
Their top-of-the-range NHS-3040 rack system allows for 13 zones of HD video distribution, incorporating a 7.1 surround sound home theatre with LCD touch-panel remote control, a 400-disc DVD/CD changer with management system, an 80GB music server, radio tuner, HD cable/satellite support, three auxiliary inputs, and a Blu-ray player. Each separate zone has in-wall keypads for controlling it all.
Is Sony facing an uphill struggle with Blu-ray?
Andy Merrett writes…
Yes, it’s another instalment of the HD DVD versus Blu-ray debate / war, but this time things are a little different.
Instead of a war of words between various equipment manufacturers and official associations on both sides, this is to do with lawsuits.
We’ve spent a lot of time reporting on lawsuits – a lot of them come from Apple – but Sony has been hit with two in a single week. They both affect Blu-ray.
Google Gears untethers online applications
Will Head writes… When is an online app not an online app? When it’s running offline. With the help of some clever jiggery pokery from those crafty Google engineers it could soon become a reality. Gears is Google’s new browser…
Me TV: How Ustream.tv and BlogTV will turn us all into broadcasters
In the week that Big Brother’s latest series kicks off here in the UK, there are probably 873 media commentators already wheeling out Andy Warhol’s ‘Famous for 15 minutes’ maxim, so I won’t labour the point. However, people always assume that there has to be Someone Else making us famous for that quarter of an hour – usually a broadcaster.
Microsoft gets all touchy feely with Surface
Will Head writes… It would be great to sneak into the deepest, darkest, most top secret research labs at Microsoft for a day and just see what bizarre ideas its engineers have got stacked away, waiting for the right time…
