media

Slide show roundup: Custom earphones, tech for summer road trips, and CUVs

Summer has officially arrived, and our Car Tech editors have put together some photos of cool tech to take on the road. We also have some pictures of crossover SUVs, or CUVs, which you also can take on the road. Well, you could take the pictures on the road, but I really meant the cars.

Something you may not want to take on the road (or at least not while you're in the driver's seat) is the futuristic-looking MyVu Personal Media Viewer. Finally, Donald Bell shows us what it's like to get custom-molded earphones. It involves pink … Read more

News Roundup: AOL, CircleUp, MediaMaster

AOL relaunches its news service. AOL relaunched its news service with an all-new design earlier this morning. In addition to adding an extra column, it now features some Web 2.0 goodies such as a tag cloud of popular story headlines, and the most-read stories and comment threads. The service will also aggregate news from other sites. Read more about it here.

CircleUp launches embeddable widget. CircleUp [ review], the social-planning service has a new widget called MyQuestions that lets people add their questions and subsequent list or responses to blogs, Web sites, or social-networking profiles. Users can interact with these … Read more

The New York Observer on the New York Times on News Corp.

There's something kind of funny about a blog entry around a recent article in one outlet indicating that another newspaper is working on an expose about yet another media outlet, but that really is what this post is about. According to Michael Calderone at the New York Observer, "The New York Times is currently undertaking a major news investigation, led by managing editor Jill Abramson, into News Corp.'s business dealings throughout the world, according to a source with knowledge of the project."

Amidst the heavily hyped negotiations between Murdoch's minions and the Bancroft family who currently own the Wall Street Journal, The New York Times has apparently decided to mount their own investigation in an effort to examine what should be expected from the possible merger. While there is no clear indication what spin the Times will put on the story, it seems unlikely that the paper will conclude that Rupert Murdoch is the patron saint of news media. The New York times is one of the last major independent media outlets (along with the Wall Street Journal - for now), and it's altogether possible that News Corp. may eventually set it's sites on the Times, so I think it is safe to anticipate that this article won't be a puff piece.

Getty Images buys music licensing start-up Pump Audio

Getty Images, which made a name for itself as a stock photography clearinghouse, announced Wednesday it has purchased Pump Audio, which licenses independent music to advertising and media clients. The price of the acquisition, according to a release from Getty, was $42 million.

This is the most recent in a series of moves on Getty's part to expand beyond photography and into the digital media sector. Last month, it launched a new division in the company to license video footage and other multimedia content, and over the past few months has chalked up a string of acquisitions, from amateur photography site Scoopt … Read more

Rumor: Annalee Newitz to helm new Gawker sci-fi blog?

Trekkies rejoice (or beware): The rumors are getting stronger that New York-based blog network Gawker Media will be launching a science fiction themed title in the near future, and we're hearing that Wired blogger and freelance writer Annalee Newitz has been chosen for the top post at the new blog. The original rumor, as reported last week by the Huffington Post hinted that Gawker Media had nabbed a writer for its new, yet-to-be-named blog from Wired; a source confirmed to CNET News.com that the title will indeed be launching soon and that an editor has been hired.

A … Read more

Sling Media Unleashes the SlingLink TURBO

In an effort to expand its footprint in your home, Sling Media has unveiled the SlingLink TURBO.

Do you have areas in your home that make it impractical to run an Ethernet cord and wireless connectivity is impossible? If so, the SlingLink TURBO may be perfect for you. The premise is simple: connect one SlingLink TURBO to the wall outlet by your router. Once connected, plug an Ethernet cord from your router into your SlingLink. Once this is connected, bring another SlingLink TURBO to the desired area next to your devices and plug that into the wall outlet. Next, plug … Read more

GOM Media Player, jockeying for your musical attention

GOM Media Player Pros: Wide media support, built-in screen capture tools Cons: No help manual, saving settings are a little weak Extras: Audio output options, subtitle support, skins

Numerous media players are jockeying to become the default setting for your music and video streams. Among the top audio contenders clamoring for your ear--among them RealPlayer, Windows Media Player, DivX Player, QuickTime, and WinAmp--GOM Media Player has stood out as a firm favorite.

GOM Media Player's support for a wide range of media certainly helps. DAT, MPEG, DivX, XviD, WMV, ASF, AVI, and MOV formats are all compatible, as … Read more

Pirates nab Michael Moore's yet-to-be released doc

From all that we've heard about Michael Moore's soon-to-be released documentary indictment of the U.S. health care system, he clearly supports universal health care.

But does he support universal Web access to his film two weeks before its official release? Probably not, or at least his studio doesn't.

Advertising Age reported Friday that Moore's new film, Sicko, has been pirated and is widely available for free download on the Web at BitTorrent and peer-to-peer sites. Advertising Age reporter Claude Brodesser-Akner wrote that he easily downloaded a copy and watched it late Thursday night.

The breach … Read more

Lies we tell ourselves about IP infringement

Glyn Moody has a disturbing post on the latest attempt to stave off the IP hemorrhaging the industry apparently suffers. Quoting from Glyn's post:

"Our law enforcement resources are seriously misaligned," NBC/Universal general counsel Rick Cotton said. "If you add up all the various kinds of property crimes in this country, everything from theft, to fraud, to burglary, bank-robbing, all of it, it costs the country $16 billion a year. But intellectual property crime runs to hundreds of billions [of dollars] a year."...

This is clearly total poppycock: the figures for the supposed losses … Read more

New Archos media players: Look out, iPhone?

Archos announced its 2007 lineup of media player/recorders today at press events in both Europe and New York, introducing four new portable models as well as the company's first set-top DVR.

The big news--as reported earlier--is that the new Wi-Fi-enabled portables include direct access to an online "Content Portal" and offer a Flash-supported Web browser option. The portal offers pay-per-download CinemaNow movies--just use the touchscreen to pick the movie you want to buy and download it to the internal hard drive, no PC required. The Opera browser--a $30 option on Wi-Fi models--includes a Flash plug-in. … Read more