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Senate Bill Would Give Prison Time to Online Movie Pirates

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on November 13, 2003 - 7:45am.
Washington -- A Senate bill expected to be introduced on Thursday would provide a prison term of up to three years for any user of a file-sharing system found to possess any movie before it has been released in theaters, CNET News.com reported. Sponsored by Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) and Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), the Artists' Rights and Theft Prevention Act would also implement a $250,000 fine for anyone who placed such a film on a public computer network, regardless of whether or not any actual copyright infringement had taken place. The legislation would also create another new felony, for bringing a camcorder into a movie theater and recording a movie, with a penalty of up to five years in prison. "This legislation will go a long way toward targeting one of the most serious contributors to piracy right now, which is the practice of camcording motion pictures [in theaters]," MPAA spokesman Rich Taylor told News.com. A similar bill outlawing pirate theater recordings has also been introduced in the House.
tags: Internet | Senate | Prison | Movie Pirates |

Sprint PCS Launches MobiTV Wireless Live TV Streaming Service

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on November 13, 2003 - 7:44am.
Berkeley, Calif. -- Idetic, a developer of wireless media delivery technology, announced on Thursday that its MobiTV wireless live TV streaming service has launched for wireless carrier Sprint's PCS Vision customers. The $9.99 monthly subscription service is now available as a download to select PCS Vision phones. Initially, MobiTV will include content from providers including MSNBC, CNBC, Discovery Channel, The Learning Channel, CNET, College Sports Television, California Music Channel and Independent Music Network. "MobiTV really is live TV content streamed real-time to select PCS Vision phones, not pre-canned clips or slide shows. The real breakthrough here is that for the first time, people can watch real-time television content on their mobile phone anywhere on the Sprint Nationwide Network," said Idetic CEO Dr. Phillip Alvelda. Sprint PCS recently reported 2.7 million subscribers for its PCS Vision service.
tags: Wireless | MobiTV | Sprint PCS |

Report: U.S. Broadband Firms Added 2 Million Subscribers in Third Quarter

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on November 13, 2003 - 7:44am.
Durham, N.H. -- Major U.S. cable and DSL broadband Internet providers added a combined 2 million new subscribers in the third quarter of 2003 -- the largest single-quarter rise recorded -- and now count nearly 22.7 million high speed Internet subscribers, according to data from New Hampshire-based Leichtman Research Group. The firm credits new discounts on high-speed Internet as impetus for the increase. "The market was stimulated by nearly every major broadband provider offering aggressive discounts for new subscribers. Without these promotions, this level of growth may prove to be difficult to maintain," said company president Bruce Leichtman. Broadband cable providers maintain a 64% share of the overall U.S. market versus DSL. The report also noted that the top ten U.S. cable providers now have broadband available to 88% of their total network footprint, while the top four DSL providers are cumulatively approaching 70% availability.
tags: Broadband | Reports | Subscribers | U.S | Third Quarter |

Amazon.com Extends E-Commerce Fulfillment Pact with Borders Group

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on November 13, 2003 - 7:43am.
Seattle -- Online retailer Amazon.com on Thursday announced a multi-year extension of its agreement to provide e-commerce fulfillment services to fellow retailer Borders. Amazon.com will continue to provide technology services, site content, product selection and customer service for the co-branded Borders.com and Waldenbooks.com sites. Sales through the sites are recorded by Amazon.com, with Borders Group receiving a percentage of sales.
tags: E-Commerce | Amazon.com | Fulfillment | Borders Group |

Nielsen to Provide Data on P2P File-Sharing Traffic

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on November 13, 2003 - 7:42am.
New York -- Ratings firm Nielsen announced on Thursday that it will begin offering statistical data of music files traded among peer-to-peer networks for its music industry clients. The company licensed New York-based Uncommon Media's WebSpins data, which has provided P2P music file-sharing and real-time downloading tracking and analysis since 2001.
tags: P2P | Nielsen | Traffic | File-Sharing | Data |

Shares of Interactive TV Firm OpenTV Fall with Loss of DirecTV Partnership

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on November 13, 2003 - 7:40am.
San Francisco -- OpenTV, a provider of interactive TV services, announced on Thursday that satellite TV operator DirecTV has opted not to renew its agreement to carry OpenTV's Wink interactive ad service. The news saw shares in Mountain View, Calif.-based OpenTV, which is controlled by Liberty Media, fall nearly 11%. OpenTV said revenue from Wink-enabled set top boxes deployed in DirecTV's network accounted for 2% of its overall revenue for the last nine months. "We were not prepared to renew our DirecTV agreement on terms that were neither economically viable nor in the long-term best interests of our company," said OpenTV CEO James Ackerman. The company will deactivate approximately 10.4 million of its Wink-enabled set top boxes on Dec. 22, when the current agreement with DirecTV expires.
tags: DirecTV | OpenTV | partnership | Interactive TV | Shares |

New Paper-Thin, 1GB Storage Media Could Replace CDs in 5 Years

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on November 13, 2003 - 7:39am.
Leeds, England -- Researchers at Princeton University and Hewlett-Packard believe they have created new recordable media technology that is paper-thin, can hold up to 1GB of data and has the potential to make the compact disc obsolete within five years, Ananova.com reported. The research centers on "the discovery of a previously unknown property of a commonly used conductive plastic coating," called PEDOT. The device would be similar to a recordable CD crossed with a memory card, which can "plug directly into an electronic circuit and have no moving parts."
tags: CDs | 1GB | New Paper | Thin | Storage Media |