Tech News Today 182

Tech News Today Episode 182

Tech News Today 182: Vendetta Stone

Google, Spotify and Sony beat iTunes to streaming punch, Canada under attack, FBI talks backdoors, and more.

Hosts

• Tom Merritt (@acedtect)
  • TomMerritt.com
• Sarah Lane (@sarahlane)
  • SarahLane.com
• Jason Howell
  • JasonHowell.net
• Harry McCracken
  • technologizer.com

Top Stories

• Google will launch iTunes music store competitor with upgrade to Android
• Motorola Mobility CEO Sanjay Jha seems to have spilled the beans. Speaking at MWC "If you look at Google Mobile services today, there's a video service, there's a music service," Jha was quoted saying in The Guardian. "That is, there will be a music service." ater on, Jha spoke about the Xoom—which will be the first to launch with the tablet-friendly Android 3.0 (Honeycomb)—and added that the OS "adds video services and music services." Insiders said in September that Google was hoping to offer the streaming service to user for $25 per year, which would give them online access to their music library via desktops and mobile devices. Users would also be able to create playlists to share with others—friends would be able to listen to each track all the way through one time, then would be limited to 30-second previews after that until they buy the song(s) themselves.
• Google music service expected to launch with Honeycomb and Xoom
• Spotify Signs On EMI For US Launch. At Least One More To Go…

AND Peter Kafka at ATD says sources tell him Spotify has reached an agreement with EMI, it's reported they agreed with Sony earlier last month.

• Sony’s Sony-Centric Music Service Goes Live in the US
• Sony Music Unlimited now streaming tracks to the US
• Music Unlimited Powered by Qriocity - six million tracks from all the major music companies, plus independent labels. -- PlayStation 3 and recent Internet-enabled Sony Bravia TVs and Blu-ray players, and there’s a Web-based version for PCs and Macs. A $3.99-a-month version lets you listen to music channels themed by genre, decade, and mood, and scan the playlists on your computer and reconstruct them within Sony’s service; a $9.99 version allows full on-demand listening to every song and album in the catalog.

• IDC: Big business giving Apple major sales boost
• Apple secures 60% of global touch panel capacity, causing tight supply
• IDC shows that Mac sales growth in the last fiscal quarter was nearly seven times that of the overall PC market with Apple outgrowing overall PCs for 19 consecutive quarters - NOT including iPads. Big gains come from come from large businesses and government sales.

Discussion Stories

• FBI: We're not demanding encryption back doors

FBI general counsel Valerie Caproni told a congressional committee that the bureau's push for expanded Internet wiretapping authority doesn't mean giving law enforcement a master key to encrypted communications, an apparent retreat from her position last fall.

• Congress Wants To Shut Down ‘Rogue’ Websites, But Verizon Wants Limits
• Combating Online Infringements and Counterfeits Act (COICA).
• BitTorrent is to movies what "bolt-cutters are to stealing bicycles"
• DHS erroneously seizes 84,000 domains, falsely accuses them of trafficking in child porn

• Report: Canadian cyberattack traced to China
• Attacks discovered in early January, reached Finance Department and Treasury Board, attempting to capture passwords for government databases. Net access was shut down for both departments entirely and is just now being restored. CBC reports the attacks have been traced to China. China denies involvement. Could be routed through China without originating there.

• Done With Silly Game Shows, IBM’s Watson Finds A Job
• The final score for tonight’s game was $44,131 for Watson, $19,200 for Ken Jennings and $11,200 for Brad Rutter. Total scores over two days of play was $77,147 for Watson, $21,600 for Rutter and $24,000 for Jennings. Nuance Communications, a software company best known for its Dragon Naturally Speaking line of speech-recognition software, today announced a research agreement with IBM to explore ways to use the Watson system and its deep analytics technology in the health care industry.
• IBM's Watson gets smashed on 'Conan'

News Fuse

• The blog Thinq from the Uk reports that Microsoft is keeping open source software out of the developing Windows marketplace. Jan Wildeboer, open source evangelist and Red Hat employee points to Article 5 of the Application Requirements which bans software with an excluded license. The requirements explicitly name the GNU General Public License version 3 as an example of an excluded license.

• Google wants to use your social network connections to improve search results. SearchEngineLand reports friends’ activity on Twitter, Flickr and elsewhere — but for now, not Facebook — will soon be visible in search results, if you're logged into Google and have connected those accounts to your Google account. The feature begins to roll out today.

• According to the blog Company Town, Redbox president Mitch Lowe told analysts yesterday that its upcoming online movie service would be subscription-based like Netflix and Hulu. The Seattle Times suggests Walmart / Vudu and Amazon as potential partners for the service. Engadget reports Disney will now charge redbox AND Netflix the full wholesale price for DVDs.

• You're going to get a lot of Dells this year. At least have the option to, Dude. WPCentral and Android Central both published alleged smartphone and tablet roadmaps for Dell, including Android Ice Cream Sandwich devices, Honeycomb tablets, Windows Phone 7 sliders and a slate running Windows 8 called Peju to be shown off at CES in 2012.

• Want to find out just how limited your broadband choices are? The Department of Commerce has published online the first public map providing information on the availability of broadband Internet service nationwide, maximum advertised speeds of the service, and the names of service providers in specific locations. Head to www.broadband.gov/maps/

• Sprint's getting more and more bullish on LTE. Senior Vice President of Networks, Bob Azzi told PC World, that "with the spectrum holdings we have, WiMAX is not an option." Azzi suggested that an LTE network which complements its current WiMAX network might be the answer, and he even suggested that we could see tri-band LTE phones with a WiMAX radio "velcroed on."

• Don't trust your data is gone from that flash drive you're tossing. Researchers at UCSD's Non-Volatile Systems Laboratory have examined solid state drives and found remnant data even after running several open source and commerical secure erase tools. They've also proposed some changes to SSDs that would make them more secure.

• It's not over for Meego... yet. Intel CEO Paul Otellini told analysts this morning that the company is seeking out new allies for the OS. “We will find another partner,” he said. “The carriers still want a third ecosystem and the carriers want an open ecosystem, and that’s the thing that drives our motivation.”

Kickers and Weird Science

• Scientists build the world's first anti-laser

Calendar

• It's official: Motorola pushes up Atrix 4G launch to Feb. 22
• Motorola pushes up Atrix 4G launch to Feb. 22, shoves Xoom pre-sales back to Feb. 20th?
• President Obama meets with tech elite Thursday evening 2/17
• SXSW coverage Saturday and Sunday 3/12 and 13
• Watch the TWiT studios get built

Voicemail

• Al? from Minnesota: DVD with a digital copy FAIL

Email

"As a long-time Tablet PC user, I feel a strong urge to chime in with regard your comments on the new HTC flyer tablet. As a group, you all poo-poo'ed the stylus as something that people would just loose and not get much use out of. However, I would argue that the reality is much like your comments on the facebook phone or tiwtter phone - there is a sizable market niche that will be very excited about good inking on some of these new tablets. (Call us the Courier dreamers).

A tablet with long-life battery, touch and digitizer input, digital ink and handwriting recognition is a product that will do well in the market, especially if they can get a good cloud system for the digital notes like evernote.

JOE"

"Count me in as one of the people who think my home town of Detroit has bigger problems than the lack of a Robocop statue. Others may agree, but comic book writer Ron Marz is putting his money where is twitter is - he, along with screenwriter/game designer Gary Whitta, have organized a twitter campaign under #ROBOCHARITY to give money to Forgotten Harvest, a local Detroit food bank. Let's see if we can get $50k where it's really needed.

Some links for more info:

http://www.geekweek.com/2011/02/after-the-robocop-statue-robocharity.html

http://www.forgottenharvest.org/

Thanks Bob in Philly, exported from Detroit"

Sponsors

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Production Information

• Edited by: Jason
• Notes:

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