Archive for: June 2007

A group of space scientists who aren’t actually insane aim to give it a try by 2009, jumping from 120,000 feet in a specially designed space suit that looks like a buggy-rollin’ getup, but without those silly roller skates. The daredevils hope to develop the technique not only as a sport, but also as a possible escape route for astronauts in low Earth orbit.

After they’ve mastered the 120,000-foot jump, their ultimate goal is to engineer survivable jumps from 150 miles or even higher above the earth. In a controlled dive, the jumpers would reach blistering speeds of more than 2500 mph, and as they begin to enter the earth’s outer atmosphere, a special drogue shoot opens, stabilizing their descent and preventing uncontrolled tumbling which could be fatal.

Read More

If you depend on the sounds of Internet radio to get you through your workday, don’t be surprised if your headphones pipe out little more than dead air.

In protest of the elevated royalty fees Webcasters are poised to begin owing to the record industry next month, Internet radio operators are planning to stage a “day of silence.”

So far, Live365 and AccuRadio.com have agreed to cease their music programming on June 26, save for brief audio public service announcements sprinkled throughout the day, according to a Wednesday report by Kurt Hanson of the Radio and Internet Newsletter,. So has the online presence of KCRW, the Southern California-based public radio station.

On Friday: SaveNetRadio, an advocacy group opposed to the copyright judges’ action, has posted an updated list of protest participants (PDF), which now also include Yahoo, RealNetworks’ Rhapsody, MTV Online, and more than 30 other stations.

Smaller Webcasters staged a similar protest five years ago in response to a similar rules change by the U.S. Copyright Royalty Board.

At issue are fee hikes that the Internet radio community says could bankrupt its services, particularly those run by smaller operators. SoundExchange, the non-profit collection entity that lobbied for the changes, has repeatedly argued the changes are fair and necessary to ensure artists are compensated adequately.

Read More

Consumer electronics giant Mitsubishi now hopes to combine the inherently large size of a rear-projection unit into a sleeker, lighter-weight product and pack it with enough advanced technology to out-dazzle the rest of the HD pack, although consumers may have to wait a while to see this next-gen version of DLP for themselves.

Since last winter, Mitsubishi has been trickling out details of what it unofficially is calling “Laser TV,” citing it as a breakthrough in existing DLP (digital light processing) that it believes will eventually move HDTV one step further to perfection cosmetically and technologically, through the use of colored lasers.

DLP, a registered trademark of Texas Instruments, traditionally uses white-light mercury bulbs. Mitsubishi’s new system, instead, uses separate red, green and blue semiconductor lasers in combination with an HD chip, which those who have seen a real-world demo (mostly dealers and Mitsubishi employees) say provides richer and more complex colors and hues, and noticeably more distinct HD clarity and depth-of-field.

Mitsubishi contends that lasers also prompt a more realistic manifestation of “black” than current DLP, plasma, LCD or CRT screens. Lasers purportedly shut off totally when not needed, frame-to-frame, creating a more natural blackness. (In contrast, today’s DLP mercury bulbs do not completely blink off, according to Mit-subishi.) Today’s DLP units without colored lasers already produce at least 16 million color variations, including 124,000 shades of gray, according to TI.

Read More

Apple has strengthened two of the iPhone’s Achilles’ heels by boosting battery life and adding an optical-quality glass screen.

The first potential problem, mediocre battery life, has been remedied with significantly stronger power cell. Instead of just five hours of talk time, as reported by Apple when it first showed the iPhone in January, the new and improved iPhone will deliver eight hours, according the company. Internet use increased by one hour to up to six hours, video playback increased two hours, now up to seven hours, and audio playback jumped from 16 hours to 24 hours.

These new battery life statistics, Apple boasted, are better than competing phones like the Nokia N95 , Samsung Blackjack , RIM’s Blackberry Curve 8300 and Palm Treo 750 . The iPhone’s battery, like the iPod’s but unlike most competing smartphones, is built-in and difficult for the user to remove. This makes the device’s solid battery life critical to its day-to-day usability.

“With eight hours of talk time and 24 hours of audio playback, iPhone’s battery life is longer than any other smartphone and even longer than most MP3 players,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO.

The entire top surface is now glass, which provides for superior scratch resistance and clarity.

Read More

New CEO Mike Volpi said Joost is a piece of software that can reside on a variety of platforms, including a television with an internet connection, a set-top box, a mobile phone, or in some alternative device that might come out in the future.
Perhaps it’s coincidental that at a time Joost appears to be experiencing unexpected problems it also starts talking about embedding its player software in consumer hardware.

David Clark, executive vice president of global advertising for Joost, told TV Week that a year from now there will be a lot more convergence, enough that “you will see Joost in the living room.” He said that the vast majority of consumers will eventually use Joost as their primary entertainment platform. As long as you have an internet connected device you would have access to the Joost community, he said.
Joost founders Niklas Zennstrom and Janus Friis have to be taken seriously. They successfully developed their own technology to use the net to speed the copying of music tracks (Kazaa) and to carry voice-quality conversations (Skype). Both developments eroded long established and well-heeled industries: music and telecom.

Read More

The new technology from Kodak, to be unveiled Thursday and used in products in 2008, increases light sensitivity of existing image sensors by a factor of two to four. Translated into photography terms, that means a camera’s shutter speed could be cut in half or a quarter, helping cut camera shake or motion blur problems. Alternatively, it could let photographers shoot in low light with less image “noise”–the pesky multicolor speckles that degrade photographs. And unlike some efforts to improve digital cameras, the new Kodak technique can be applied to any existing image sensor, leading Kodak to hope it will be able to license the high-sensitivity technology far and wide.

Read More

Aquada, a revamped vehicle that runs up to 100 mph on highways and 30-plus mph on the water. The new Aquada will head to production late next year and finally go on sale in the U.S. in the first half of 2009 for under $100,000. And it’ll meet standard safety and emissions regulations in this country. But buyer beware: Even if Aquada is water skier-friendly, you’ll probably need a boat license.

Read More

The new Sony HDR-SR5C camcorder priced at $1,300 comes with 100GB hard drive, 10x optical zoom, a 2.7-inch widescreen LCD, picture stabilization system, memory Stick Duo slot, 5.1channel Dolby Digital audio recording, slow motion video recording and more. You can order it know, but it’s not shipping until July 9th.

Download the pro version of DivX for free, today only. DivX Pro for Mac and PC contains the free DivX player, DivX Converter and the DivX Pro Codec.