Support

Report: Movie Studio Support Waning for Sony PSP Universal Media Disc

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on March 30, 2006 - 9:26am.

Los Angeles - Sony's Universal Media Disc (UMD) format, on which movies are sold for playback on its PSP handheld video game, is losing support among top movie studios, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Facing very low sales, both Paramount and Universal will likely stop releasing movies on UMD, sources told THR. "It's awful. Sales are near zilch. It's another Sony bomb," a "high-ranking executive" at Universal Studios Home Entertainment told THR. "No one's even breaking even on them," added a high-ranking executive at Paramount Pictures Home Entertainment. Studios including 20th Century Fox and Disney's Buena Vista Home Entertainment have also dramatically reduced the number of UMD titles they plan to release. THR noted that big retailers including Wal-Mart appear to be reducing the shelf space allotted for UMD titles. Sony, meanwhile, has seen some success on several UMD titles, and currently continues to support UMD as a movie format. "We're hoping the format's going to be reinvigorated with next-generation capability that may include living-room or normal television playback," Benjamin Feingold, president of Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, told THR.

U.K. and Ofcom Support Proposal to Sell Unused Broadcast Spectrum

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on March 27, 2006 - 11:50am.

London - The U.K. government and Ofcom, the U.K. telecommunications watchdog, have both endorsed a plan to allow parts of unwanted or unused spectrum to be auctioned in order to raise funds for the government. "The government agrees with the audit that there is scope for more effective use of public sector spectrum through the introduction of spectrum trading and increased sharing with other users, and will work with Ofcom to enable this," the U.K. government said. The government insisted that it would ensure that enough spectrum is available for national security, defense and public services. The U.S. government hopes to raise billions of dollars when it auctions off spectrum freed by the transition to digital television broadcasting, now scheduled to take place on Feb. 17, 2009.

Motorola's Music Phones to Support Windows Media, Yahoo Music

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on February 13, 2006 - 11:30am.

Barcelona - Motorola announced on Monday that it plans to integrate Microsoft's Windows Media Audio (WMA) on a number of its music-playing cell phones. The collaboration will enable the phones to connect to Windows-based PCs to sync music from PC to phone, and also to play songs from Windows Media-based digital music subscription services and online music stores. Motorola said it will begin selling Windows Media-based music phones in the second half of 2006, and plans to enable over-the-air delivery in 2007. Separately, Motorola said that some of its phones will enable Yahoo Music users to drag-and-drop podcasts from their PCs directly onto their mobile phones through the Yahoo Music Engine. Over-the-air delivery of podcast downloads is also planned in the future.

Destiny Media Adds Mac Support to Promo Only MPE

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on February 2, 2006 - 7:03am.

Vancouver, B.C. - Destiny Media Technologies on Thursday announced the release of a Mac version of its software used to securely distribute new singles to radio stations. The Promo Only MPE system now also features support for iTunes and iPods, allowing users to export Promo Only MP3 files into iTunes. The system also now supports linear HD files, distributed to satellite and HD Radio broadcasters.

tags: MPE | Promo | Support | Destiny |

Yahoo Launches Online Library Project With Publisher Support

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on October 3, 2005 - 4:01am.

San Francisco - Yahoo has joined with partners including the Internet Archive, the European Archive, the U.K. National Archives, the University of California and HP to form the Open Content Alliance (OCA), which will attempt to digitize the world's public domain and copyrighted literature and make it available online for all search engines to index. Yahoo's project hopes to please publishers were rival Google's Library Project has attracted litigation; the Open Content Alliance will only include material submitted by publishers, whereas Google has been sued by the Authors Guild for not asking permission before including works in its index. "We welcome the launch of the OCA because its approach respects the rights of publishers and other copyright owners," said Sally Morris, CEO of the Association of Learned and Professional Society Publishers (ALPSP). The OCA archive's content will range from historical works of fiction to children's books to highly specialized engineering whitepapers. "We are honored to participate in a program that helps further our vision of expanding all human knowledge by working with content creators to make their content available to a growing online audience," said David Mandelbrot, Yahoo's vice president of search content.

tags: Deals | Yahoo | Support | Online Library Project |

Fox Comes Out in Support of Sony's Blu-Ray in DVD Format War

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on July 29, 2005 - 7:03am.

Beverly Hills, Calif. -- News Corp.'s Twentieth Century Fox film studio announced on Friday that it plans to release movies and other content on Sony's next-generation Blu-ray Disc DVD format. Fox said it decided to support Blu-ray as a result of the format's recent adoption of copyright protection measures, including renewable security. Sony's Blu-ray is one of two new, high-capacity DVD formats currently battling to become the standard -- reminiscent of the format war between VHS and Beta -- the other being Toshiba's HD DVD. The two companies have engaged in heated negotiations towards avoiding a format war, but so far have been unsuccessful. Studio support is considered vital for the success of both formats. Thus far, Disney and Fox are the only studios besides Sony's own to support Blu-ray; HD DVD has received commitments from Paramount, Universal and Warner Bros.

tags: Fox | Support | DVD Format War | Sony's Blu-Ray |

Electronic Arts Sets Launch Titles for Sony PSP, Support for Blu-ray DVD

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on January 7, 2005 - 11:14am.

Redwood City, Calif. -- Electronic Arts on Friday announced the slate of six titles it will offer for Sony's PSP handheld gaming system when it launches in the U.S. in March. The Redwood City, Calif.-based developer will offer "MVP Baseball," "FIFA Soccer," "Need for Speed Underground Rivals," "Tiger Woods PGA Tour," "NBA Street: Showdown" and "NFL Street 2: Unleashed." Separately, the company announced that "EA Sports Rugby 2005" is currently under development at Canada-based HB Studios for release in the spring for PlayStation 2, Xbox and the PC. The game will incorporate all major rugby teams and tournaments, including the Tri-Nations and Super 12. Finally, Electronic Arts announced that it has joined the Blu-ray Disc Association, and will release upcoming titles on Sony's high-capacity Blu-ray DVD format, on which Sony plans to build its next-generation PlayStation console. "The delivery of high-definition games is becoming increasingly important to us," said Electronic Arts worldwide studio CTO Scott Cronce. Fellow publisher Vivendi Universal Games also recently announced its support for Blu-ray.

RealNetworks Gets Support From Linux Developers for Media Software

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on June 28, 2004 - 7:16am.

Kristiansand, Norway -- RealNetworks, a provider of media delivery technology, announced on Monday an agreement with Linux software developer Red Hat, to ship its open source Helix Player with Red Hat's desktop PC software. The company signed a similar deal with Linux developer Novell, and also said that it will soon add the GNU General Public License to the Helix Player, allowing developers to freely build upon the software without paying royalties. Seattle-based RealNetworks also said that on Wednesday it will release its free RealPlayer 10 software for Mac OS X.

tags: RealNetworks | Support | Media Software | Linux Developers |