Archive for October 2004
Sony Ericsson Predicts Slow Growth for Mobile Devices
"Japanese-Swedish mobile phone maker Sony Ericsson said on Tuesday it expects slower growth in the global handset market next year.
"Replacement sales in rich markets, which has powered the market this year as consumers are trading in their old phones for new models with color screens and built-in cameras, may not be such a major force next year, said Miles Flint, president of the three-year-old joint venture between Sony and Ericsson.
"The phone market will be dominated by current models, although 2005 will be the first year of volume sales of handsets that can work on third generation (3G) networks, for fast multimedia services like video telephony and song downloads."
Santosh Menon. INTERVIEW: Sony Ericsson Chief Sees Slower Growth. Reuters. Oct. 5, 2004.
An Alternative to iPods
"As the trading of MP3 files ate into music sales, Damon Dash, the 33-year-old entrepreneur behind Roc-A-Fella Records, turned his hip-hop music company into a platform to sell other, more profitable products.
"Now Mr. Dash is taking his celebrity and music-infused marketing approach to a product line closer to the source of his troubles: MP3 files. In November, he will introduce a line of MP3 players under the name Rocbox, including one aimed squarely to compete with Apple Computer’s iPod.
"Mr. Dash hopes to distinguish the Rocbox players from other players on the market by weaving images of them into videos for artists of his label, and put tags promoting them on his clothing. While details haven’t been worked out yet, buyers of the player will have access to exclusive bits of Roc-A-Fella music."
Saul Hansell. Battle of Form (and Function) in MP3 Players. The New York Times. Oct. 4, 2004.
(Editor�s Note: The Times allows free access to their stories on the Web for seven days before sending the stories to the paper�s fee-based Archive.)
AT&T Offers Music Service
"In the first foray by a U.S. wireless carrier into the online music market, AT&T Wireless is launching a service that lets subscribers buy songs using their cell phones and later download them to a computer.
"Until now, mobile music sales have centered on ringtones, the song snippets used to customize ringer and other sounds on mobile phones.
"At Tuesday’s launch, mMode Music Store will offer roughly 750,000 tracks priced at 99 cents each. Full albums will start at $9.99."
Alex Veiga. AT&T Wireless Launching Music Service. MSNBC News. Oct. 5, 2004.
See also:
John Borland. AT&T Wireless Opens Mobile Music Store. News.com. Oct. 4, 2004.
AT&T Offers Music Service
"In the first foray by a U.S. wireless carrier into the online music market, AT&T Wireless is launching a service that lets subscribers buy songs using their cell phones and later download them to a computer.
"Until now, mobile music sales have centered on ringtones, the song snippets used to customize ringer and other sounds on mobile phones.
"At Tuesday’s launch, mMode Music Store will offer roughly 750,000 tracks priced at 99 cents each. Full albums will start at $9.99."
Alex Veiga. AT&T Wireless Launching Music Service. MSNBC News. Oct. 5, 2004.
See also:
John Borland. AT&T Wireless Opens Mobile Music Store. News.com. Oct. 4, 2004.
Balance Between Copy Protection and Technical Innovation
"A computer scientist at Princeton University, Edward Felten, took part in a contest sponsored by the Recording Industry Association of America to test technology for guarding music against piracy. He and his students quickly found flaws in the new antipiracy software and prepared to publish their results.
"But when the RIAA learned of the plan, it threatened to sue under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). Congress passed it back in 1998 to block hackers from breaking copy protection. And they wisely included a provision designed to let researchers such as Felten carry out their important work. Still, the RIAA deemed Felten’s line of study too sensitive.
"The lesson many scientists drew was that copyright protection takes priority over research."
Heather Green. Commentary: Are The Copyright Wars Chilling Innovation?. BusinessWeekOnline. Oct. 11, 2004.
Coral Seeks to Corral Copyright
"A consortium of technology companies hopes to create a common antipiracy language, ending the Babel of copy-proofing technologies that has rendered much digital content and hardware incompatible.
"The Coral Consortium, to be announced Monday, will initially draw on support from giants such as Hewlett-Packard, Matsushita Electric Industrial, Philips Electronics, Samsung Electronics, Sony and Twentieth Century Fox, along with digital rights management (DRM) company InterTrust Technologies."
John Borland. Tech Powers Seek Antipiracy Accord. News.com. Oct. 3, 2004.
See also:
Coral Consortium. Coral Call to Action. No date.
No Profit in Google News Beta
"When Google launched its news site three years ago, it led to a certain amount of hand-wringing at Yahoo News, MSNBC and CNN. Unlike its competitors, which were forced to budget millions of dollars a year to license up-to-the-minute content and pay reporters and editors, Google had figured out a way to do it on the cheap.
"By relying on algorithms, Google News completely automated the news-gathering process using high-speed computers to sift through information and determine the most relevant articles. They then grab the headline and first paragraph to post on Google’s news page, with the headlines acting as external links.
"As it turns out, however, Google has a problem that is nearly as complex as its algorithms. It can’t make money from Google News.
"The reason: The minute Google News runs paid advertising of any sort it could face a torrent of cease-and-desist letters from the legal departments of newspapers, which would argue that ‘fair use’ doesn’t cover lifting headlines and lead paragraphs verbatim from their articles."
Adam L. Penenberg. Google News: Beta Not Make Money. Wired News. Sept. 29, 2004.
COPYCENSE 