Coming Soon via Your TiVo: Internet Video on Television - New York Times

More details on new TiVo tricks 

A handful of producers have agreed to convert some of their programming to MPEG2 and make it available to download directly to TiVo recorders. TiVo has already offered some programs in conjunction with programmers including iVillage, Heavy.com and The New York Times. It will soon add more programming, from CBS and Forbes, and make the content more prominent on its menu screens.

The company will also introduce software that will allow users to watch a much wider range of videos that are available on the Web. This method, however, requires users to first download the videos onto their computers. If they purchase software from TiVo for $24.95, they will be able to connect their TiVo recorders to their computers over a wired or wireless home network and watch the videos on television.

Source: Coming Soon via Your TiVo: Internet Video on Television - New York Times

New TiVo Feature Lets Families Share Videos On TV Via the Web - WSJ.com

Now you can torment people over the Internet with slide shows and videos of your vacations...

The latest push is by TiVo Inc., the company that pioneered the digital video recorder, or DVR, a device that made it easy to record "The Sopranos" and other programs from cable and other traditional sources of television. The Alviso, Calif., company today plans to unveil several new features designed to enhance the array of content available to TiVo users to download from the Internet for playback on television sets. The new options include a home movie service, through which users can create an Internet "channel" that automatically broadcasts clips of kids' birthday parties and other movies over the Internet to family and friends with TiVo recorder boxes.

Source: New TiVo Feature Lets Families Share Videos On TV Via the Web - WSJ.com

Sony Finds Some Older Videogames Don't Work on PlayStation 3 - WSJ.com

So much for one of the features touted as key to differentiation relative to the Xbox 360. 

Sony Computer Entertainment spokesman Satoshi Fukuoka said some of the 8,000 older games weren't working properly on PS3, making the wrong sounds or images, and some couldn't be played at all. He declined to give a number for the games that weren't functioning, but he said the same problem is expected when the game console goes on sale in the U.S. on Nov. 17. About 16,000 different games have been sold for the PlayStation and PlayStation 3 in North America.

I'm sure this is comforting to people who waited a year in part because of game compatibility:

""We are sorry for the game fans that they cannot play all the games," Mr. Fukuoka said. "But unfortunately some of these problems could not be avoided.""

Source: Sony Finds Some Older Videogames Don't Work on PlayStation 3 - WSJ.com

Microsoft | You've heard this song before | Economist.com

The Economist on Zune dynamics -- read the full article (no subscription required) 

As Microsoft borrows from Apple, the opposite is also true. After failing to defeat Microsoft in operating systems, Apple learned a valuable lesson and has opened up its music technology just enough to make it a standard. It licensed the iPod's connector-plug so that other firms could make accessories for it, and it made the iPod and iTunes available on Windows, something that would once have been unthinkable. The great irony of the epic rivalry between Apple and Microsoft, says Mr Bajarin, is that the longer they fight, the more they resemble each other.

Source: Microsoft | You've heard this song before | Economist.com

Donald J. Rosenberg Joins Apple as General Counsel

Interesting times... 

Apple® today announced that Donald J. Rosenberg, senior vice president and general counsel of IBM, will join the company as its senior vice president and general counsel, reporting to Apple CEO Steve Jobs.

Source: Donald J. Rosenberg Joins Apple as General Counsel

Nick Bradbury: Web 3.0 Does Not Validate

Timely reality check from Nick Bradbury (FeedDemon creator) 

Apparently, Web 3.0 is the latest re-branding of the Semantic Web, a noble attempt to turn the Web of documents into a Web of data.  Don't get me wrong - the goals of the Semantic Web are good ones, and I believe many of those goals will be met in my lifetime.  But too much of the Semantic Web relies on data being valid - that is, valid XML, XHTML, RDF, etc. - and too many of us will never publish valid data.

Source: Nick Bradbury: Web 3.0 Does Not Validate

The Seattle Times: Business & Technology: PS3 is nifty, but it's a bit too pricey

PS3 reality check 

After spending time with Sony's new PlayStation 3 game console last week, I understand why Microsoft's Xbox team has been strutting lately.

Don't get me wrong. The PS3 is an amazing machine. I'd love to have one sitting beneath my TV. But not for $500 or $600. That's just too expensive for a game console, even one that incorporates a bleeding-edge Blu-ray disc player.

Source: The Seattle Times: Business & Technology: PS3 is nifty, but it's a bit too pricey

Microsoft Counting on a Twist to Make Zune Shine in Shadow of iPod - New York Times

I'm guessing one day sooner rather than later...  Read the full article for a Zune reality check on the eve of its launch. 

Would the Zune ever be able to connect to the Internet? Could someone walk into a Starbucks and use the connection there to download a song?

Mr. Lee answered without hesitation: “Probably, one day.”

Source: Microsoft Counting on a Twist to Make Zune Shine in Shadow of iPod - New York Times

Identity Thief Is Often Found in Family Photo - New York Times

Yikes 

Though most victims never learn who stole their identities, half of those who do say the thief was a family member, a friend, a neighbor or an in-home employee, according to surveys by the Federal Trade Commission and Javelin Strategy and Research, a private research firm. The surveys estimate that 9 million to 10 million Americans have their identities stolen each year.

Source: Identity Thief Is Often Found in Family Photo - New York Times

Sun Makes Java a Free, Open-Source Platform - WSJ.com

Unclear if the open-source move has any licensing impact on other vendors that rely on Java. 

Sun still intends to sell commercial versions of the Java products included in its open-source scheme, which include its Java Platform Standard Edition and a version for cellphones and similar products called the Java Platform Micro Edition.

Christina Martino, vice president of the open-source and Linux organization at rival Hewlett-Packard Co., said Sun appeared to have finally listened to its developers and Linux partners. "I think if Sun is doing this, the H-P message is 'It's about time,'" she said.

Source: Sun Makes Java a Free, Open-Source Platform - WSJ.com

Sun makes Java code open source - The Boston Globe

Better late than never?... 

Computer server and software maker Sun Microsystems Inc. said today that it had begun to make its Java technology an open-source software project available for free on the Internet.

[...]

Rich Green, Sun's executive vice president of software, said the company hopes to turn more developers into Java programmers, who may then create additional software to support Sun products.

Source: Sun makes Java code open source - The Boston Globe

Rob Pegoraro - Videophoning From an Unexpected Source - washingtonpost.com

Indeed, we have something of an embarrassment of riches in consumer-oriented video, with Skype, Windows Live, Yahoo! IM, and others... but I still don't know many people who routinely use video. 

We don't have jet packs, flying cars or food pills, but the videophone has finally come home -- no thanks to the phone company.

Instead, it comes from a little eBay subsidiary called Skype, an online service that provides Internet video communication, as well as Internet phone service and instant messenger style-chat.

Source: Rob Pegoraro - Videophoning From an Unexpected Source - washingtonpost.com

Entrepreneurs See a Web Guided by Common Sense - New York Times

No doubt "Enterprise 3.0" and many other 3.0 candidate memes will soon follow.

Their goal is to add a layer of meaning on top of the existing Web that would make it less of a catalog and more of a guide — and even provide the foundation for systems that can reason in a human fashion. That level of artificial intelligence, with machines doing the thinking instead of simply following commands, has eluded researchers for more than half a century.

Referred to as Web 3.0, the effort is in its infancy, and the very idea has given rise to skeptics who have called it an unobtainable vision. But the underlying technologies are rapidly gaining adherents, at big companies like I.B.M. and Google as well as small ones. Their projects often center on simple, practical uses, from producing vacation recommendations to predicting the next hit song.

Source: Entrepreneurs See a Web Guided by Common Sense - New York Times

Microsoft Exec Says Vista Is So Safe He Doesn't Need Anti-Virus Software - News by InformationWeek

See the article for more context... 

Windows co-president Jim Allchin has said that Windows Vista, which met its release to manufacturing milestone earlier this week, is so superior to Window XP on security that he feels safe letting his own son run a PC without anti-virus software.

A prominent security analyst countered that that attitude would be fine as long as everyone using Vista was a seven-year-old.

Source: Microsoft Exec Says Vista Is So Safe He Doesn't Need Anti-Virus Software - News by InformationWeek

PlayStation 3 on Rescue Mission - New York Times

Meanwhile, my Xbox 360 updated itself when I last turned it on, and now it can download videos etc.

Indeed, analysts say, Sony cannot afford for PlayStation 3 to be anything less than a smashing success. Sony’s chief executive, Howard Stringer, has proclaimed that Sony’s future depends on creating “champion products,” the pathbreaking hits that earn high profits and keep the company ahead of cheaper Chinese and South Korean rivals. Even in consoles, a category it has long dominated, Sony is already a year behind the Xbox 360 from Microsoft. It will compete head-to-head with Nintendo’s Wii, which will be introduced this month.

But analysts say PlayStation 3 is the only product currently visible in Sony’s development pipeline with real “champion” potential.

Source: PlayStation 3 on Rescue Mission - New York Times

MySQL wants to build 'database in the sky' | InfoWorld

 Hmm...  I'd like to see the logical data model for this...

MySQL AB wants to launch a global project to build a massive, distributed repository containing all of the world's data now stored in structured databases, the company's chief executive officer said Thursday.

[...]

The project seeks to apply the open-source model to data, so that developers worldwide could share and aggregate data, Mickos said. "Then the data would be the platform," Mickos said. He envisions, for example, being able to tap into all of the world's structured databases that have weather information.

Source: MySQL wants to build 'database in the sky' | InfoWorld

Office Live a smart move | InfoWorld

 Interesting perspective -- read the article for more Office Live details.  I haven't seen a single net-negative review of Office Live.

Office Live is the first real step I've seen Microsoft take on its own here. Redmond's not thinking about matching Google's Writely/Spreadsheet almost-useful bundle; it's doing what Microsoft does best: hunting for profit. First thing Microsoft does when it's looking for yet another percentage of the world economy is ask customers what they're willing to pay for.

Source: Office Live a smart move | InfoWorld

Backfence.com - Google to Make Data Semi-Portable

 I'm surprised there hasn't been more press/blogosphere activity on this topic.

Big problem, though: Google will continue to reserve the right to keep the data you've stored in its servers forever, and use that data as it sees fit.

When Google lets customers actually move their data to a new place -- that is, move it, not copy it -- that will be truly worth celebrating.

Source: Backfence.com - Google to Make Data Semi-Portable 

GigaOM » Google… the OS for Advertising

Timely reality check; read the full post 

Now, taking it from the top… if you were an executive at a traditional media company, would you consider Google a friend or a foe? As one media executive said to me the other day… “as long as they don’t develop their own content, we think we’re safe”. Hmmm, interesting. But it would behoove him and his colleagues to remember that Google’s core competency is to use technology in a manner that devalues and deflates⁴ traditional industries by extracting inefficiencies in existing processes.

Source: GigaOM » Google… the OS for Advertising

Good Morning Silicon Valley: "Hello, I'm a PC." "And I'm pursuing other interests."

Glad to see this; I am very tired of the ads... 

Looks like the PC outlasted the Mac in the end, after all. Justin Long, the actor who plays the part of the Mac in Apple's "Get a Mac" television campaign, won't be reprising his role in a forthcoming run of commercials. "Every ad you see Justin in is for that previous time period only," Long's representative told Radar. "There's no long-term deal with him."

Source: Good Morning Silicon Valley: "Hello, I'm a PC." "And I'm pursuing other interests."