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RIAA Lobbies for Copy-Protection for Digital Radio

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on June 10, 2004 - 10:38am.
Washington -- The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is actively lobbying for copyright protection to be added to the medium of digital radio, according to The Hollywood Reporter. The RIAA has argued for anti-piracy measures "in documents and meetings at the FCC and in communications with other industry trade groups," and planned to make the issue a focus of a Congressional hearing on digital copyrights that was postponed this week due to the Reagan funeral. So far, only about 100 U.S. radio stations have adopted iBiquity Digital's HD Radio technology, which allows traditional stations to transmit a digital signal alongside their traditional analog signals. "We're in favor of HD radio," RIAA CEO Mitch Bainwol told THR. "It offers great benefits for consumers and everyone involved, but we're not blind to several concerns. Someone could cherry-pick songs off a broadcast and fill up a personal library and then post it on Kazaa." Consumer electronics firms and broadcasters say the RIAA is exaggerating the potential for digital radio piracy. "They've sold a half-million digital radios in Great Britain over the past five years, and this problem hasn't come up," Consumer Electronics Association vice president Michael Petricone told THR. "It's premature to ask the FCC for restrictions on devices for a problem that might not exist."
tags: Digital Radio | RIAA | Copy-Protection |

Report: "The Passion" Still Most-Pirated 'Net Film; Studio Spoofing Increases

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on June 10, 2004 - 10:34am.
Los Gatos, Calif. -- "The Passion of the Christ" was the most-downloaded movie on peer-to-peer file-sharing systems for the second month in a row, according to data from Los Gatos, Calif.-based BayTSP, a marketer of anti-piracy solutions that also monitors traffic on file-sharing networks. BayTSP found a total of 37,609 copies of "The Passion" available for download in May, followed by "Hellboy" (33,650), "Van Helsing" (30,666) and "The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King" (28,593). The firm said Kazaa averaged 2.7 million daily users in May, down from 2.9 million in April, followed by P2P network eDonkey, which averaged 2.2 million daily users. BayTSP also noted that movie studios flooded Kazaa's Fast Track network with "spoofed" or corrupted movie files in May -- in an attempt to thwart piracy -- as evidenced by the average number of files available in each user's shared folder increasing from 203 on May 10 to 371 on May 31.
tags: Reports | The Passion | Most-Pirated Net Film |

Search Engine Firm Ask Jeeves Acquires Desktop Search Provider Tukaroo

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on June 10, 2004 - 10:33am.
Emeryville, Calif. -- In a move into the desktop search market, where larger rivals Google and Microsoft are making headway, search engine provider Ask Jeeves announced that it has acquired Tukaroo, a San Jose, Calif.-based developer of desktop search technology. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. Founded in 2003, Tukaroo makes desktop search and file management software designed to enable users to access, view and manage data on their computers in real-time. Steve Berkowitz, the CEO of Ask Jeeves, said that the acquisition fits in with the company's growth strategy, which it began in 2002 with the acquisition of the Teoma search engine.
tags: Search Engine | Acquires | Ask Jeeves | Desktop Search Provider | Tukaroo |

U.K. Online DVD Rental Service Video Island Raises $11 Million

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on June 10, 2004 - 10:32am.
London -- Video Island, a U.K.-based online DVD rental service, announced on Thursday that it has raised $11 million in its second round of venture capital financing. Cazenove Private Equity led the investment round; Benchmark Capital and Index Ventures also participated. Founded in 2002, Video Island offers a catalog of 15,000 titles under three flat-rate monthly subscription packages that allow a differing number of DVDs to be checked out at a time. Like Netflix, Video Island delivers movies to subscribers via the postal service and does not charge late fees, although Netflix's library is somewhat larger with 20,000 available titles.
tags: VC | Video Island | U.K. Online DVD Rental |

Mobile Multiplayer Game Networking Firm Terraplay Raises $7.9 Million

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on June 10, 2004 - 10:31am.
Stockholm, Sweden -- Terraplay Systems, a provider of multiplayer gaming network systems for consoles and mobile phones, announced on Thursday that it has raised $7.9 million in a recent round of financing, provided by Nordic Venture Partners and existing shareholders. Sweden-based Terraplay said it launched its first real-time mobile and console-based commercial multiplayer gaming systems during the first quarter of 2004, allowing subscribers to play against each other in real-time across a wide range of mobile devices and platforms. The company is partnered with M7 Networks in the U.S. to provide its technology to video game publishers and wireless carriers.
tags: VC | Terraplay | Mobile Multiplayer Game Networking |

Report: Global Demand for Mobile Phones Set to Soar

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on June 10, 2004 - 10:25am.
London -- Demand for mobile phones is surging the world over, according a new report conducted by market research Gartner. The report found that total global sales of mobile handsets soared by 34% to more than 153 million units in the first quarter compared to the same quarter last year. Gartner said that such a good start to the year could mean that as many as 600 million handsets would be sold by year's end. In Western Europe, where demand was much stronger than expected, the recent launch of 3G services by Vodafone (U.K.), T-Mobile (Germany) and TIM (Italy) should lead to a considerable rise in 3G phone sales in the second quarter, Gartner said. Although its market share in Western Europe shrank from 34% to 29%, Finnish giant Nokia still leads the pack after selling more than 44.2 million handsets, a 5-million-unit year-on-year increase. Nokia's loss was mostly Motorola's gain, and the company pointed to particularly robust sales in Europe as the reason behind its increase in sales from 16.7 million units in the first quarter last year to more than 25 million units this year.
tags: Report | Mobile Phones | Soar | Global Demand |