Internet & Media

CARLSBAD, Calif.--After a shaky start, tech veteran Philippe Kahn impressed the crowd at D by showing how his company's motion-sensing technology could be used to stabilize a blurry cell phone photo.

Kahn's Fullpower Technologies was the first of several companies invited to do a no-slides tech demo at the conference. Kahn drew the ire of Kara Swisher and Walt Mossberg when he tried to sneak in some PowerPoint.

The last moments were interesting, though, as Kahn and a co-worker took an iPhone photo and showed it as initially captured and then stabilized using their technology. The best … Read more

We've all heard the rant. With e-books, there's no paper, printing, transportation, and so forth. So why should an e-book still cost $9.99 (typical for Kindle) or even more?

The idea of e-books being cheaper makes a lot of intuitive sense. If everything you physically hold in your hand and everything it took to deliver that physical good to your hand can be converted to a few megabytes worth of electrons, surely the cost of the book must be dramatically lower than a typical hardcover--and the price should reflect that fact.

The problem is that the costs … Read more

Microsoft is using server virtualization technology to make its Mediaroom IPTV software more palatable to smaller phone companies.

The company announced the new virtualization features in the Mediaroom software on Wednesday. The company said the added technology will reduce the amount of hardware needed to create a full IPTV offering by more than 80 percent.

This is a big deal for smaller service providers, which often can't afford the cost of running the necessary servers for the traditional Mediaroom platform. Microsoft claims that the virtualized offer can provide hundreds of TV channels and tens of thousands of videos on … Read more

CARLSBAD, Calif.--I left the Twitter keynote still wondering what the company's business model will be, but also with a new question.

Why are the co-founders so seemingly uninterested in making money? Haven't they heard about striking while the iron is hot? (Clearly they have. After all, Evan Williams sold Blogger to Google.)

Anyway, after the speech I got a chance to ask them that and more firsthand.

"I wouldn't say we're not focused on the dollars," Williams told CNET News. "We are trying to take a really long-term perspective about how we … Read more

CARLSBAD, Calif.--The D7: All Things Digital opening night keynote, often reserved for tech legends like Bill Gates and Steve Jobs, was handed over this year to the team behind Twitter. CNET News is offering live coverage, so check back for frequent updates.

6:37 p.m. PT: Rupert Murdoch takes the stage to kick things off.

6:40 p.m. PT: Singer Jill Sobule takes the stage with a song written for Rupert. Kara Swisher comes out to hold the lyrics.

"Rupert I met you last year at this conference," she sang. "Do you remember me. … Read more

We've all had those ideas that seemed like good one at the time and then perhaps didn't seem so good the following morning. Or when the police got involved.

But a marketing agency in Australia reportedly decided to skip straight to the part involving the police.

Mentally Friendly (because mental friends really are the best) decided to set up a Twitter account in the name of the New South Wales police. Which was an interesting thing to do, save for the fact that an increasingly large number of people thought it really was written by the New South … Read more

Facebook announced on Tuesday a $200 million investment from Digital Sky Technologies (DST), whose social networks are market leaders in Europe.

Presuming Facebook is valued at $10 billion, DST's $200 million comes out to about a 1.96 percent stake, the companies said in a statement. DST would not have a seat on the board or hold special observer rights, the companies said.

DST also plans to offer to purchase at least $100 million of Facebook common stock from existing stockholders whose shares have vested. The details of the plan will be announced during the summer.

"This investment … Read more

Australian film and music studios have claimed a victory in their war against copyright offenses, with a Sydney man convicted for selling pirated content last week.

Yong Hong Lin, owner of a music and movie store in Eastwood, Sydney, was found guilty of 15 copyright offenses in Sydney's District Court last week, the Australian Federation Against Copyright Theft (AFACT) and Music Industry Piracy Investigations (MIPI) announced in a statement distributed Monday. Lin is scheduled to be sentenced on August 21.

The jury acquitted Lin of 16 of the 31 offenses he was initially charged with.

Police had raided Lin'… Read more

Facebook and Think Computer have settled a dispute over whether the former actually owns the term "facebook."

Under the settlement announced late Friday, Think has agreed to abandon its efforts to get the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to cancel the trademark issued to Facebook in 2006.

The story behind the dispute between Think and Facebook is a long, convoluted one. But according to the joint statement, Think founder Aaron Greenspan attended Harvard with Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg earlier this decade. In 2003, Think released HouseSystem, a Web-based student portal that included a section called "The … Read more