Author: Gary Cutlack
Judge orders YouTube pranksters to apologise – in YouTube video
You have to love the occasionally maverick decisions handed out by US judges.
Some crazed lawmaker out in Florida has ordered a gang of unruly youths to apologise to their victim via a YouTube video, after they chucked “soda pop” at a drive-through junk food joint waitress.
Unsuspecting Taco Bell employee Jessica Ceponis…
Weak bloggers cave in to Metallica's new album non-review demands
This story’s a bit of a mess. We know some UK bloggers were invited to listen to an “unmixed” demo of the new Metallica album and weren’t required to sign any non-disclosure agreements or stick to an embargo regarding what they heard.
Which meant they could all, quite legally, tell the world all about it on their blogs.
So sites like The Quietus ran with reviews (cached version here) – only to get told to take them down shortly afterwards. This has, predictably enough, turned into a mammoth Metallica HATE-FEST with everyone blaming the put-upon band for trying to break the internet again…
Who's joining the digital movie rental scene today? Motorola and Paramount!
If you have a Motorola telephone (commiserations, by the way) you’ll soon be able to watch a few crusty old Star Trek movies on it.
Excuse me while I go and change my trousers, I have just soiled myself with excitement.
Yes, while the world waits for Apple to pretend it’s invented 3G and video calling later today, Motorola has teamed up with Paramount to allow its users to stick movies on their handsets via their PC and a Motorola server. 40 films are…
Microsoft wants more "music" on Windows Mobile
Microsoft is clearly a bit jealous of how well the iPhone/iTunes/iPod trinity is raking in cash for the Apple machine, so is keen to try and boost the amount of music services available “on the go” to users of Windows Mobile phones.
“One thing that Apple has leveraged on is the music scenario, and I think that that is something the operators and ourselves are partnering on, just to make sure that consumers can use live music in the best way,” Andy Lees, senior vice president…
Blu-ray Xbox 360 rumour rises again – internet says "yes," Microsoft says "no"
The old, very old, boring and no doubt entirely untrue “Blu-ray Xbox 360” rumour surfaced over the weekend – and has already been SHOT DOWN by Microsoft. Again. We are stuck in a time loop where every week we write this very same news.
Gadgety blog TechCrunch started it all by running a news piece – or some might say HIGHLY IRRESPONSIBLE LIE – stating that Microsoft is planning to announce a Blu-ray Xbox 360 tonight. As in, today. This evening. June 9, 2008…
Wholly unimportant world first – band streams live show through Facebook
Brilliant news. We doubt anyone noticed, but brilliant news all the same.
The no-doubt popular-on-the-internet band RedBoxBlue has made the claim, reckoning that its series of streaming video performances currently being shown on Facebook are indeed a world first.
It’s not 100% live, though – they’re only beaming taped…
Asus innovation of the day – a laptop with a mini projector built in
Imagine the joy. Imagine the power. Imagine the sheer amount of BUSINESS that could be done, any time, any place, anywhere that has a white-ish wall suitable for projecting slides and PDFs onto.
That’s the future-world dream of Asus, which has revealed this little monster – a laptop with one of the new-wave of miniaturised projectors stuck inside. It sits flush against the lid, then swivels out when the need to bore someone with your…
PC DJ game AudioOdyssey uses the Wiimote to get the "party" "started"
AudioOdyssey has been designed by boffins at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Gambit Game Lab with the Wii controller in mind.
Players take control of – and I can only apologise on their behalf for this – a DJ called “Vinyl Scorcher” who attempts to keep the crowd “jumping”. Mr Scorcher keeps the crowd jumping thanks to you waving the Wiimote…
Don't go to (click on) Hong Kong – one-in-five .hk domain names are scams
Fear-spreader and paranoia-monger McAfee has raised panic levels of internet browsers to DEFCON 2 today, with its latest guidance on web sites that will do bad things to your computer when/if you visit them.
And it’s the Hong Kong domains – web sites ending in .hk – that are the biggest causers of trouble. Trouble like having pornography set as your home page, trouble like…
WiiPlayer – a hacked and streamlined unofficial iPlayer app for Wii
Some extremely clever man has been working away on improving the Wii’s iPlayer, creating his own solution to the rather clunky and slow official Wii implementation of the Beeb’s streaming telly service.
Moaning that the Wii’s slightly duff Opera browser simply hasn’t got the right screen resolution to handle the BBC’s default text and layout, the creator has simplified the design, bumped up the font size and generally “Apple-ised” the look and feel of iPlayer so it’s quicker to operate and easier to find your way around…
