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Authored by Scott Goldberg on October 11, 2006 - 3:55pm.
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From The Motley Fool: Generation Y Discusses the Baby Boom

Authored by Scott Goldberg on October 11, 2006 - 3:51pm.
Motley Fool LogoWith nearly 78.2 million baby boomers driving our economy and 330 of them turning 60 each hour, there's clearly a transition on the horizon with fiscal implications all around. Soon, a generation of parents will become a generation of geriatrics, and this means different things for different companies. These demographic trends will be providing a lot of great investment opportunities for younger generations -- the Xs, the Ys, and any other nicknames they're giving generations nowadays. So we've sought out the insights of two twentysomething analysts (Nick, 22, and Katrina, 23) here at the Fool. Their conversation follows:

The Fine Taste of Flavorpill

Authored by Scott Goldberg on October 11, 2006 - 3:23pm.

There’s no shortage of information today, and for anything you’re after there’s likely to be an abundance of options.  That’s great if you want a car deal, a news story, or an airline ticket, but when it comes to entertainment, especially in large cities like New York and Los Angeles, it’s hard to sift through the B.S. and find something interesting.  For one, the listings are too often the same.  I’ve heard or read at least a hundred times in the last month that The Killers have a new album and will be playing at the Wiltern in LA on October 6 and 7.  You begin to think LA doesn’t have much happening and that its entertainment sources are becoming stale, unless of course you want to see Ashton Kutcher’s latest attempt at serious acting in The Guardian.

CNET CEO Bonnie Quits After Probe Reveals Options Backdating

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on October 11, 2006 - 2:23pm.
San Francisco - CNET Networks, a publisher of technology news and product reviews, announced on Wednesday that Shelby Bonnie has resigned as CEO and chairman, after an internal probe revealed his partial responsibility in irregular stock options grants made to CNET employees. Also implicated in the options "backdating" -- wherein the date on which options were granted are changed to increase their value for employees -- were a former CFO, and current general counsel and head of human resources, who also resigned. "I apologize for the option-related problems that happened under my leadership," Bonnie said in a statement. "I believe that the company has come a long way since 2003 in addressing these deficiencies, but am deeply disappointed it happened nonetheless." San Francisco-based CNET named Neil Ashe, formerly senior vice president of strategy and development, as its new chief executive, and former Liberty Digital president and CEO Jarl Nohn as non-executive chairman. The company will restate financial statements related to the period when affected options were granted, while executives whose options were backdated have agreed to have them re-priced at fair market value.

GameStop Sells Out PlayStation 3 Pre-Orders, Launches Digital Distribution

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on October 11, 2006 - 2:21pm.
Los Angeles - Video game retailer GameStop has sold out of its allotment of pre-order units of Sony's PlayStation 3 console at its 3,600 GameStop and EB Games stores, Reuters reported. "In some stores they sold out in 10 minutes, in some stores hours, for others it was the afternoon," GameStop spokesman Chris Olivera told Reuters. Sony initially plans to ship 400,000 of the $500-plus PlayStation 3 consoles to the U.S. market, where it goes on sale Nov. 17. GameStop's pre-orders account for approximately 28,000 to 47,000 units, based on the company's statement to Reuters that it provided between eight and thirteen units to each of its stores. Separately, GameDaily reported that GameStop has quietly launched a digital download service for games. The service already offers over 1,000 PC titles that can be purchased and immediately downloaded for play, including many casual games, as well as titles like "Tomb Raider Legend" and "Civilization IV."

Digital TV Chipmaker Tvia Says Shareholder Lawsuit Without Merit

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on October 11, 2006 - 2:19pm.
Santa Clara, Calif. - Tvia, a chipmaker for next-generation digital televisions, said on Wednesday that a shareholder class action lawsuit filed against the company, alleging violations of federal securities laws, is without merit. Filed in U.S. District Court in Northern California, the shareholder suit seeks unspecified damages for those who purchased Tvia stock between Aug. 8, 2006 and Sept. 27, 2006, and alleges the company artificially inflated the market price of its shares. Santa Clara, Calif.-based Tvia said it will seek a dismissal of all charges. The company's shares plunged 57% in late September, after it cut its second quarter outlook to revenue of $300,000 to $400,000, down from first quarter revenue of $5.1 million. Tvia attributed the lowered projections to a shortage of LCD panels and other digital TV products.

Major League Gaming Acquires Tournament Site GameBattles.com

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on October 11, 2006 - 2:17pm.
New York - Major League Gaming, a professional video game league, announced that it has acquired GameBattles.com, an online community for console-based video game tournaments. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. Cincinnati, Ohio-based GameBattles.com claims over 460,000 registered users and 700,000 different teams on its service, who compete in tournaments across 40 game titles for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 2, Nintendo GameCube and other platforms. Major League Gaming operates a pro tour that will make stops in seven U.S. cities in 2006. "Major League Gaming is already the largest community of competitive console gamers and fans in the world. GameBattles.com is a natural addition to the company, and allows us to accelerate our plans to provide a home for online competition to every player on every platform," said Major League Gaming president and COO Matthew Bromberg.

SXSW, Blaze TV to Debut South By TV Network at 2007 Music Festival

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on October 11, 2006 - 2:15pm.
Los Angeles - The South by Southwest Music and Media Conference (SXSW), which annually showcases hundreds of bands from around the world in Austin, Texas, announced on Wednesday that it has formed a joint venture with music event producer Blaze TV to distribute performances from the festival via TV, DVD, Internet and mobile phones. The South By TV (SXTV) venture will shoot bands in a custom-equipped venue in Austin with multi-camera HD and 5.1 surround sound. SXTV performances will air on CD USA, a weekly show produced by Blaze TV for DirecTV; Miami-based Zeal TV was named to distribute SXTV outside the U.S. Along with Internet and mobile distribution, SXTV will also issue a "Best of SXSW 2007" DVD through Blaze TV's parent company, Shout Factory.

World Poker Tour Launches Online Poker Academy

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on October 11, 2006 - 2:14pm.
Los Angeles - WPT Enterprises, operators of the World Poker Tour, on Wednesday announced the launch of a Web-based poker education center and online community. The WPT Academy includes video tutorials hosted by poker pros, and a hand search engine and simulator called Handsim that lets users search the database for players, hole card values, card combinations, odds percentages and other data. The database contains over 1,700 final table hands from 13 World Poker Tour tournaments, and allows users to follow play-by-play recaps of top players like Scotty Nguyen, Doyle Brunson and Phil Hellmuth. Los Angeles-based WPT said that its WPT Academy will initially be offered for free to subscribers, and did not provide details on future subscription fees.

Ad-Supported Mobile Game Distributor Greystripe Raises $1.2 Million

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on October 11, 2006 - 2:12pm.
San Francisco - Greystripe, the developer of a service that distributes free, ad-supported mobile games, has raised $1.2 million in its first round of venture capital financing, VentureWire reported. Investors participating in the round included Incubic Venture Fund, Monitor Ventures and WS Investment Company. San Francisco-based Greystripe's AdWRAP network sources ads from advertisers and delivers them through its network of mobile games, which includes titles from publishers like 3D Arts, Big Blue Bubble, Blastone, Cellufun, Chakra Interactive and HandyGames.

U.K. Wireless Carriers, MobiTV to Trial TDtv Mobile TV Service

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on October 11, 2006 - 2:10pm.
London - A number of U.K. wireless carriers on Wednesday launched a technical trial of a mobile TV delivery technology called TDtv, the UMTS TD-CDMA-3GPP Multimedia Broadcast and Multicast Services (MBMS) standard. The TDtv service allows carriers like trial participants 3UK, Orange, Telefonica and Vodafone to deliver multiple TV channels to an unlimited number of customers, as well as digital audio and multicasting services. The trial will deliver mobile TV programming from California-based MobiTV to 12 cell sites provided by IPWireless that cover part of Bristol, England.

Former Microsoft Managers Launch Twango Media-Sharing Service

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on October 11, 2006 - 1:23pm.
Redmond, Wash. - A group of former Microsoft senior managers has launched Twango, a free media-sharing service that offers unlimited storage of over 110 file types, including pictures, video, audio and Microsoft Office documents. Twango allows users to upload from a PC, Mac or mobile phone, and does not require visitors to a user's shared media page to register in order to view its contents. Users can also publish files stored on Twango to blogs, discussion groups, MySpace profiles and eBay auctions. The founders of Redmond, Wash.-based Twango said the service is for users looking for "a more versatile and sophisticated service than Flickr, YouTube or Photobucket."

Qloud Launches Beta Test of Tagging-Based Music Search Service

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on October 11, 2006 - 1:20pm.
Washington - Washington-based start-up Qloud (pronounced "cloud") on Wednesday announced the launch of a public beta test of its "people-powered music search service" and plug-in for Apple's iTunes music player. The search service is powered by tags generated by users on individual songs in their iTunes music libraries. Tags can be provided by music preference, demographics, and category -- such as "workout," allowing users to search, for example, for the songs most tagged "workout" and "hip-hop" by women in New York aged 20-30. "Qloud will do for music discovery what Google(TM) has done for web discovery," said Qloud co-founder Toby Murdock.

XM, Acura to Offer 3 Mos. Free Satellite Radio to Used Acura Buyers

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on October 11, 2006 - 1:17pm.
Washington - XM Satellite Radio, a provider of digital radio programming with over 7 million subscribers, on Wednesday announced a partnership with automaker Acura, to offer three months of free service to purchasers of used Acura vehicles with factory-installed XM radios. Acura said it remarkets more than 35,000 certified pre-owned vehicles each year, with about one-third featuring XM radios. "XM's reach will now extend to Acura's pre- owned customers who seek the same high performance standards and quality as they have come to expect with a brand new Acura," said Steve Cook, executive vice president of automotive at XM.

Sirius to Broadcast Final Show from New York's CBGB Club

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on October 11, 2006 - 1:13pm.
New York - Sirius Satellite Radio, a digital radio service with over 5 million subscribers, announced that it will provide an exclusive live broadcast of the final show at New York's legendary venue CBGB, featuring artist Patti Smith. The club is closing following unsuccessful rent negotiations with its landlord. The final show at CBGB will be available live on Sirius on Oct. 15.

Nokia, Orb Networks Team to Offer PC-to-Phone Media Streaming

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on October 11, 2006 - 1:11pm.
New York - Nokia said on Wednesday that it plans to integrate technology from Orb Networks into its forthcoming Nokia N80 Internet Edition handset that will allow users to remotely access all the digital media stored on their home computers. Emeryville, Calif.-based Orb's technology lets users stream home PC content, as well as program and play recorded TV shows, using the Web browser and player on the handset. Nokia plans to ship the N80 Internet Edition in the U.S. next month.

Digimarc Awarded U.S. Patent for Social Network, P2P Watermarks

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on October 11, 2006 - 1:09pm.
Beaverton, Ore. - Digimarc, a developer of digital watermarking technology, announced on Thursday that it has been awarded a U.S. patent for its technology that can identify copyrighted content in social network and peer-to-peer environments. The technology was developed due to media files' ability to easily lose their identifying information during the distribution process, digital-to-analog conversion, or routine file format changes. Oregon-based Digimarc said the technology behind its new patent "teaches ways of identifying entertainment content with digital watermarks and links it to multiple sources of information or services."

Joe Theisman Sports Illustrated Cover

Authored by Scott Goldberg on October 11, 2006 - 1:05pm.
Joe Theisman Sports Illustrated Cover

First uWink Digital Entertainment Restaurant to Open in California

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on October 11, 2006 - 1:03pm.
Los Angeles - uWink, a company launched by Atari and Chuck E. Cheese founder Nolan Bushnell, on Wednesday announced that its first digital entertainment restaurant will open on Monday in Woodland Hills, Calif. The restaurant will feature tables with touch-screen kiosks that allow patrons to both place orders and access games, movie trailers, horoscopes and other media. Games offered will allow patrons to play with others at their own table, engage other tables, and eventually challenge guests at other uWink restaurants.

Digital Download Store Blish.com to Sell MediaBay Audiobooks

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on October 11, 2006 - 12:59pm.
Arlington Heights, Ill. - Digital download marketplace Blish.com announced on Wednesday that it has signed an agreement to distribute a library of over 5,000 audiobooks from MediaBay on its service. Founded in February, Illinois-based Blish.com also offers stock photography, royalty free music, legal documents, software, online courses, stock video and motion graphics from providers including Random House, RiverDeep Software and Princeton University Press.