Connect 2400

Sony PSP Firmware Update Adds RSS and WMA

As reported in an uncharacteristically short entry on Robin Good's MasterNewMedia.org site, Sony has released a new firmware update to the PSP that allows RSS reading and WMA audio on the handheld device. Alongside TiVo2Go adding PSP support for television, we're seeing this gaming handheld become quite a useful and interesting machine. Perhaps I will get my hands on one to see where the limits lie.

Mac Mini to become a TiVo Killer?

ThinkSecret has posted about a rumor that Apple is working on "Kaleidoscope", a new Mac Mini containing an Intel processor, very likely a larger hard drive, and TiVo-like PVR capability. Also rumored to run the new FrontRow software, which is currently shipping on the iMac G5, this would make the Mac Mini into the living room multimedia component that it was originally rumored to be when it was first released.

Thinksecret also speculates that this Mac Mini may have the built-in iPod dock which was rumored to be part of the original Mini.

This ties in with my ongoing observations that Apple is moving piece-by-piece toward a full home media strategy to win the hearts and minds of a market that has been conditioned to Windows software. Moving the computing experience away from "computing" and more toward the experience of using a media appliance. One physical device for all media, affordable enough and simple enough to use that most homes can have one or even more, just like home stereo equipment or VCRs are today.

The new Mac Mini, if it exists, may be released at the MacWorld Expo in January. We're moving into the time period that many Mac fans like to delay purchases, as new announcements at MacWorld tend to make purchases within a month prior to the conference obsolete. I don't plan on purchasing any new hardware for quite some time due to the G4's engineering and durability, but something like Kaleidoscope might find its way into my home if it siginificantly improves my media experience.

Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving to anyone in the U.S., and best wishes to anyone in the world at large. Thanks for visiting!

TiVo to integrate TiVo2Go with iPod and PSP?

According to an AP article that appeared on Forbes Online, TiVo is beta testing a feature that will allow iPod or PSP owners to download TiVo content to their portable device for viewing on the go.

TiVo2Go has not previously supported Mac OSX due to the unavailability of the Windows DRM fair use restrictions mechanism on the Mac platform, so this new service is said to use digital watermarking  that will discourage piracy on all platforms. With every new hard disk iPod sold now supporting video display, this appears to be a smart move by tiVo because it's offering iPod users a new source of video content, no longer constrained by the television companies' willingness to sell through iTunes.

I've previously mentioned the rumor that the EyeTV PVR software will soon have an Export to iPod feature for its video recordings. As new iPods are sold, portable video devices will approach ubiquity and the content providers will need to get on board. Steve Jobs was often quoted in the past as saying that the market doesn't want portable video playback on such small screens, but the introduction of video as a standard feature to the market dominant player device may have changed the market itself. Witness the power of the Reality Distortion Field.

Apple to Include Screen Protectors with iPod Nano

According to AppleInsider, Apple is to begin shipping iPod Nanos with a protective sleeve similar to the one included with the new 5th generation iPod (featuring video capability). I've previously covered the subject here about the scratching problems faced by the casual user of the iPod Nano. While I doubt the wisdom of putting such a device in your pocket with keys and such, the public outcry was great enough that Apple decided to do something about it. Yet another example of how speaking up can get results.

This would seem to be done just in time for the holiday season, where it might be reasonable to expect a high volume of iPod Nano sales this year.

Source: http://www.appleinsider.com/article.php?id=1367

IBM jumps into Web 2.0 with Public Image Monitoring Solution

Internetnews.com reports on IBM creating (drum roll) RSS aggregation and web reputation monitoring:

IBM (Quote, Chart) today introduced new software that monitors and analyzes blogs, wikis, news feeds, consumer review sites, newsgroups and other community-generated content to keep tabs on their image.

The Public Image Monitoring Solution is a response to two developments, Irving Wladawsky-Berger, IBM's vice president of technology strategy and innovation, said at a news conference at the company's research offices here.

I would love to get my hands on this software, just to see what kind of value it adds. RSS is simple enough to work with that simple scripting can go very far, and there are free scripts out there for scraping all kinds of content into RSS. Perhaps the allure is that it's a commercial offering with support and all, but I suspect there's more to it- perhaps some kind of killer organization of all the information.

Pirates? Sonic Weapons?

This story is too interesting to pass up mentioning. Apparently pirates, which are more common than one might think nowadays, attempted to board the wrong cruise ship recently. The result was that they got blasted by a high power LRAD weapon which may have repelled their attack .

From the AP article:

The Seabourn Spirit had a Long Range Acoustic Device, or LRAD, installed as a part of its defense systems, said Bruce Good, a spokesman for Miami-based Seabourn Cruise Line. The Spirit was about 100 miles off Somalia when pirates fired rocket-propelled grenades and machine guns as they tried to get onboard.

The subsidiary of Carnival Corp. was investigating whether the weapon was successful in warding off the pirates, he said. The ship's captain also changed its course, shifted into high speed and headed out into the open sea to elude the pirates, who were in two small boats, he said. He had no further details.

Source: http://www.bradenton.com/mld/bradenton/news/breaking_news/13106303.htm

Motorola's new RAZR V3i with iTunes

Now this is more in line with what people may have been expecting out of the Motorola/Apple collaboration.

After the ROKR phone's lukewarm reception, Motorola has unveiled the latest phone offering with iTunes support: the RAZR V3i. Some will say this is what the ROKR should have been. While the ROKR is essentially an older Motorola brick-style phone with new software, the V3i sports the buzzworthy RAZR form factor along with iTunes, expandable memory via MicroSD and TransFlash, POP3/IMAP email client, and a 1.23 megapixel digital camera. The RAZR V3i is slated to ship, along with 3 other new RAZR phones - two that are pink and blue, and one that supports CDMA/EV-DO - in Q4 of 2005.

The Bluetooth connectivity is present in the V3i, although the current RAZR models are compatible with Apple iSync for USB only. However, the ability to use Bluetooth as a mobile internet connection for your laptop via the phone, and of course Bluetooth headset capability are present in the RAZR V3 so this will likely be the same in the RAZR V3i. Here's to hoping that the Bluetooth abilities will be expanded upon, though I wouldn't hold my breath. Until this hits the shelves we won't get much more information than this, but the important point is that the ROKR's unfortunate debut may not have put a damper on the future of mobile iTunes. Time will tell- the ROKR television ads are still airing frequently, so perhaps the jury is still out on the ROKR as well. Rejection by the early-adopter tech crowd does not mean commercial failure overall... many a Slashdot reader can recall the infamous line "No wireless, smaller than a Nomad. Lame." that was their verdict on the original iPod.

Motorola announces new RAZR with iTunes

Now this is more in line with what people may have been expecting out of the Motorola/Apple collaboration.

After the ROKR phone's lukewarm reception, Motorola has unveiled the latest phone offering with iTunes support: the RAZR V3i.

Some will say this is what the ROKR should have been. While the ROKR is essentially an older Motorola brick-style phone

with new software, the V3i sports the buzzworthy RAZR form factor along with iTunes, expandable memory via MicroSD and TransFlash, POP3/IMAP email

client, and a 1.23 megapixel digital camera. The RAZR V3i is slated to ship, along with 3 other new RAZR phones - two that are pink and blue, and one

that supports CDMA/EV-DO - in Q4 of 2005.

The Bluetooth connectivity is present in the V3i, although the current RAZR models are compatible with Apple iSync for USB only. However,

the ability to use Bluetooth as a mobile internet connection for your laptop via the phone, and of course Bluetooth headset capability are

present in the RAZR V3 so this will likely be the same in the RAZR V3i. Here's to hoping that the Bluetooth abilities will be expanded upon,

though I wouldn't hold my breath.

Until this hits the shelves we won't get much more information than this, but the important point is that the ROKR's unfortunate debut

may not have put a damper on the future of mobile iTunes. Time will tell- the ROKR television ads are still airing frequently, so perhaps

the jury is still out on the ROKR as well. Rejection by the early-adopter tech crowd does not mean commercial failure overall... many a Slashdot

reader can recall the infamous line "No wireless, smaller than a Nomad. Lame." that was their verdict on the original iPod.

Schedule TiVo Recording from Yahoo!

Users of Tivo who either have or are willing to sign up for a Yahoo! account can now schedule recording remotely from any web browser. While there is some lag time due to the way that the Tivo device polls the Tivo service for information, I can see how this would be extremely useful.

An article on ZDNet implies that further content sharing might be in the works, such as weather, finance, news, etc. But what I find interesting is that now a certain populations TV viewing habits are potentially linked to their online habits. TiVo always had the capability to observe their users' viewing habits, and Yahoo of course has the ability to track web surfers' habits throughout the Yahoo properties (and eventually through sites in the Yahoo Publisher ad network?). It seems like a reasonable idea to begin building marketing profiles based on this linkage. Have the online ads served to a user be congruent with the messaging delivered via television advertising and vice versa.

The one-to-many communication model of broadcasting does not lend itself to that kind of tracking and customization, but we're entering the age of one-to-one communication models. Online sites are getting intelligent enough to target individuals as well as populations. Now, with PVR/DVR and VOD applications coming into an increasing number of homes, watching television becomes a two-way communication process.

As I've pointed out before, you can't not communicate. Companies such as TiVo and perhaps Comcast have a huge opportunity to begin listening to the communications implicit in channel surfing behavior... done right, this could greatly enhance the television viewer's experience in ways similar to how Google is credited with helping web advertising along with contextual ads.

I'm not just talking about logging what programs are watched at what times. The conversation could include how quickly someone skips past a channel when surfing the dial, what specifically is showing when the channel is changed, whether a program is viewed in its entirety and if not, precisely when its turned off and from there, the users' destination channel, volume settings getting changed, etc.  These behaviors might not make any kind of easily discernable pattern when observed at an individual level, but taken in aggregate there might be patterns emerging, just as we've found with online habits. Even Google has discussed the possible implications of microbehaviors (even typing behavior!) to web marketing.

The continuing trend to make television two-way, combined with online profiling, could target advertising well enough that in the same way Google has increased ad effectiveness through less annoying, context-sensitive ads, so could Yahoo!/TiVo do something similar with more relevant television advertising.  We're a long way off from that (as TiVo merely records what ads are broadcast already by television networks) but it seems to be technologically feasible and if the money's there, perhaps inevitable.

New Sidekick / Hiptop OS Update Released

I've received my new Hiptop OS update for the T-Mobile Sidekick II. Having played with it for about a week, I can say that this is absolutely a great update so far. Good job, Danger Inc! Here's a quick listing of what I have noticed so far. Refer to my previous write-up of the release notes for a complete feature list.

• Faster web browser performance. Much faster.
• Javascript in web browser. Seems to work okay. Posting to Typepad caused my device to reset but I've only tried that once so don't draw any conclusions.
• Better visual rendering of HTML and CSS. This is a pretty big deal because sites are more readable and less stressful to look at.
• Copy text out of a web page. There's only a select all option for now, probably because there is no cursor with which to highlight sections of text.
• Slideshow capability in photo gallery
• The Terminal app that stopped working with a previous update now works again. I can use SSH/Telnet from virtually anywhere now.