New HD-DVD to Blu-ray ‘upgrade’ scheme not as generous as it appears

Warner Bros is offering HD-DVD buyers the chance to replace their movies with Blu-ray copies for $4.95. But the deal is plagued by restrictions which will likely mean it does little more than irritate buyers who backed the wrong horse.

The basics of the deal sound fine: you simply mail in the cover art from the disc packaging along with your payment, and Warner sends you a Blu-ray replacement. Each customers can replace up to 25 discs.

However, the deal is not only limited to Warner-produced discs, but to just 128 specific titles. And the conditions note that not only is there no guarantee you’ll get the same DVD extras (so watch out for special editions being replaced by bare-bones versions), but the disc you get might be in fullscreen rather than widescreen editions. That might not be a problem for some buyers, but the chances are that most people who’ve splashed out on both an HD television and a next-generation DVD player won’t be too happy with a 4:3 picture.

With these restrictions, the deal looks less like a generous gesture to help the casualties of a format war, and more like a chance for Warner to shift unwanted stock which had been produced on the mistaken assumption that Blu-ray buyers would pay extra for picture quality but try to save a few bucks on features.

It also doesn’t really help that Warner is marketing the scheme with the tagline “Upgrade your Warner Bros. HD-DVD titles for new industry-leading Blu-ray discs”. Leaving aside the argument about whether Blu-ray is an upgrade to HD-DVD, using that wording is likely to make HD-DVD buyers once again feel they’ve been tricked into wasting their money and that the $4.95 per disc charge is their penalty.

There is at least some good news for the next-generation DVD industry, however. Blu-ray sales for the first three months of 2009 were around 9 million units, close to double that for the same period last year. That’s likely down to a drop in Blu-ray player prices (and the resulting increase in sales as Christmas gifts), plus the confidence of buyers that the format will stick around.


Does MySpace see the writing on the wall?

Oh, wait – writing on the Wall is a Facebook thing.  But increasingly, so is MySpace’s business.  The erstwhile king of social media sites has been deposed by Facebook, which now has over 200 million profiles.  Everybody has a Facebook page – but who do you know who is still on MySpace but who isn’t a member of a struggling band with shockingly bad taste in web design?

MySpace’s loss of popularity has not been lost on its owner, News Corp.  With Google’s advertising deal expiring next year and unlikely to be renewed under the same terms, they’ve realized that they need to make some changes.  So they’ve unceremoniously given the boot to the backside of (now former) CEO Chris DeWolfe, who will “serve as a strategic advisor” (translation: “when we want any more of your bright ideas, we’ll toss you a nickel, Chris”).  Tom Anderson, the founder and president will be euphemistically “assuming a new role in the organization.”

MySpace’s new CEO will be Owen Van Natta, the former COO of Facebook – who will now get to take on his old boss Mark Zuckerberg mano a mano.

What do you think?  Can MySpace make a comeback?  Do we really want it to?

Eating the World’s Largest Cheeto Over the World’s Most Expensive Keyboard

Eating anything that crumbles over a keyboard is gross. Anyone who has managed a small or large fleet of office computers will agree with me. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, here’s a short experience that will enlighten you. Take your keyboard, put one of its extremities on your desk, and tap it gently a few times. I can GUARANTEE that about 90% of you guys will have crap coming out of it: chips, crackers, paper clips, and other various dried up food items. But this is nothing compared to what Gizmodo’s Adam Frucci has done. He has committed the unthinkable: Eat the world’s largest Cheeto Over the world’s most expensive keyboard.

Adam, you officially just became one of the world’s grossest geeks… ok, maybe not, but at least, you made us laugh.

[Source: Gizmodo]

Apple approves, then pulls, baby shaking iPhone game

Apple has pulled an iPhone application which simulated shaking a baby until it fell asleep. But the firm hasn’t given a clear explanation as to how it was approved in the first place.

The application was produced by third-party firm Sikalosoft and approved for sale through the App store section of the iTunes store. Costing 99c to download, the app was promoted with the line “See how long you can endure his or her adorable cries before you just have to find a way to quiet the baby down!”

Players were presented with a drawing of a child and could then shake the phone until the child’s eyes were covered with red crosses.

As you’d imagine, news of the app caused outrage. Jennipher Dickens, a spokeswoman for the Sarah Jane Brain Project and a mother of child left brain damaged after being shaken, said “Words do not even adequately describe how much [the app] disheartens me.”

Sikalosoft isn’t commenting on the app. Apple has confirmed it went on sale on Monday and was withdrawn yesterday, but hasn’t answered any other questions, including how it got approval or how many copies were sold.

It’s the latest in a long string of confusing decisions by Apple over its vetting process, which can take several weeks. The firm has rejected apps including an official South Park clips app (despite the same content being available on iTunes), an internet radio station app which had been approved three times in previous editions, an app allowing users to download podcasts wirelessly to the iPhone, and a movie listing service.

However, it has approved a Google voice search app (which contravenes a ban on using the phone’s sensor which smaller firms have had to follow), an app turning the iPhone into a wireless modem (which breaches the service agreement US users have with AT&T), and a screensaver retailing at $999.

Speed the key to next-gen Bluetooth

The next version of Bluetooth technology should mean lower power consumption, higher transfer speeds and wireless syncing of music and video libraries between computers and portable devices.

The changes are part of Bluetooth 3.0, which effectively became official today when the industry’s Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG) agreed to adopt the standard. It’s the last bureaucratic measure before manufacturers can release compatible devices, expected to be on sale within a year.

The big difference is that Bluetooth 3.0 uses the 802.11 radio protocol: put simply, it can piggyback onto Wi-fi signals and offer speeds of up to 24Mbps, around eight times that available on existing Bluetooth devices.

Bluetooth SIG chief Michael Foley noted “Like Ricky Bobby in ‘Talladega Nights,’ the latest version was ‘Born to go fast,’” an odd comparison presumably designed to allow websites to illustrate stories with something other than a picture of a cellphone headset.

The group also notes the new standards include wireless syncing, claiming “Transferring an entire music library, a complete DVD, a vacation’s worth of photos, all within seconds at the touch of a button and wirelessly will now be possible.”

The higher speeds should also mean a longer battery life in portable devices. Though sending data over the Wi-fi link uses more power than Bluetooth during transfer, this will usually be outweighed by transfers taking less time.

The system won’t work on most existing Bluetooth devices, though it’s possible some laptops which currently have both Bluetooth and Wi-fi will be able to take advantage of the new technology.

Game Over. Geek Wins.

Michael Jordan having “retired,” with $40 million in endorsements, makes $178,100 a day, working or not.

  • If he sleeps 7 hours a night, he makes $52,000 every night while visions of sugarplums dance in his head.
  • If he goes to see a movie, it’ll cost him $7.00, but he’ll make $18,550 while he’s there.
  • If he decides to have a 5-minute egg, he’ll make $618 while boiling it.
  • He makes $7,415/hour more than minimum wage.
  • If he wanted to save up for a new Acura NSX ($90,000) it would take him a whole 12 hours.
  • If someone were to hand him his salary and endorsement money, they would have to do it at the rate of $200 every second.
  • He’ll probably pay around $200 for a nice round of golf, but will be reimbursed $33,390 for that round.
  • He’ll make about $19.60 while watching the 100-meter dash in the Olympics, and about $15,600 during the Boston Marathon.
  • This year, he’ll make more than twice as much as all U.S. past presidents for all of their terms combined.

Amazing isn’t it?

However…

If Jordan saves 100% of his income for the next 500 years, he’ll still have less than Bill Gates has at this very moment.

Game over. Geek wins.