Technology latest news

DENVER (Billboard) - Search for an artist on any of the popular search engines, and the top three results are practically guaranteed: the artist's official Web site, Wikipedia entry and MySpace page — often in that order.

But while artists and their handlers devote massive attention to the Web site and MySpace, the Wikipedia page is often overlooked. Recent data suggests they may want to reconsider their priorities.

According to data provided to Billboard from Yahoo — the second-most popular search engine on the Web after Google — those searching for artist information are selecting the Wikipedia entry link over artists' MySpace pages by a factor of more than 2-to-1. The Wikipedia entries are also more popular than artists' Web sites.

“The interest that people had to go to MySpace to find out more about their favorite band is waning in favor of going to Wikipedia,” Yahoo head of programming and label relations John Lenac says. “In the last six months, it's surpassed it.”

Yet when compared with the number of artist profiles on MySpace, Wikipedia entries are noticeably fewer. MySpace claims 3 million artist profiles. Wikipedia does not have an exact count of artist entries, but estimates that it's in the “tens of thousands,” according to Wikipedia Foundation head of communications Jay Walsh.

MISSED OPPORTUNITY

What's more, because of Wikipedia's low profile relative to the MySpace hype machine, many artists and their managers remain ignorant of the resources available to them.

“There's been many people I've talked to that didn't even know they could upload a Wikipedia page,” Lenac says. “There's been some managers that didn't even know what it was.”

For those in the latter category, Wikipedia is a free online encyclopedia that relies on everyday users to submit the information listed about a given topic, using a collaborative software system known as “wiki.” It contains more than 7 million articles in 200 languages and receives some 300 million page views per day. Anyone can contribute to a given article, BUT they must first past muster from a team of volunteer editors with a particular passion about the subject before the text appears live.

The result is a rather tight, focused and vetted overview of the subject, which some online marketing experts feel is why fans are selecting Wikipedia over other options.

“Wikipedia is a fantastic landing page,” says Jason Feinberg, owner/president of On Target Media Group, a Web promotions consultancy. “It's so clear, so concise, and it's standardized. That's something I think is a draw over MySpace, where you never quite know the experience you're going to get. Is it going to be a horrible jumble of images and video and text that's difficult to read? Also, (Wikipedia is) rooted in fact. It's not promotional. Especially these days when the Internet is full of artists trying to essentially ram their message down your throat, I think a fan is a lot more receptive to a simple, no-hype approach.”

But don't expect to see Wikipedia offering full-song streams or links to buy digital songs anytime soon.

“That's not what we're about,” Walsh says. “We're about knowledge. We're about bringing the reader to other free content … content they can use and enjoy without worrying about violating any copyrights.”

Reuters/Billboard

NASHVILLE, Tenn. - Gibson Guitar Corp. has widened its attack on the video game industry with a second patent infringement lawsuit.

It claims, in a case filed Thursday in federal district court in Nashville, that by developing, distributing and promoting the video game “Rock Band,” Harmonix, MTV Networks and Electronic Arts are violating a virtual-reality patent the guitar maker holds.

The same 1999 patent is at issue in a separate lawsuit Gibson filed earlier in the week against Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and five other retailers. The real-guitar maker claims the stores are violating the patent by selling the Activision Inc. game “Guitar Hero.”

Before Gibson filed either lawsuit, Activision sued Gibson in Los Angeles this month asking for a federal court declaration that it is not violating Gibson’s patent.

The game publisher says it doesn’t want or need a license under the patent as Gibson claims.

“We disagree with the applicability of their patent and would like a legal determination on this,” George Rose, Activision’s general counsel, said in explaining Activision’s lawsuit.

Gibson officials haven’t said why the company is not suing Activision directly.

Representatives for Harmonix, MTV Networks and Electronic Arts — the companies Gibson sued Thursday over “Rock Band” — did not immediately return phone calls seeking comment.

Harmonix also created and developed some of the “Guitar Hero” games.

Gibson said in a statement released Friday that it had made “good faith efforts to enter into a patent license agreement with the defendants in this case.

“The defendants have not responded in a timely manner with an intent to enter into negotiations for a patent license agreement,” according to the statement. “Gibson Guitar had no alternative but to bring the suit, and it will continue to protect its intellectual property rights against any and all infringing persons.”

Gibson wants the companies to pay damages for infringing on its patent and to stop selling “Guitar Hero” and “Rock Band,” according to the lawsuit.

A copy of the patent included in Gibson’s lawsuit is dated Nov. 23, 1999, and describes a device that lets a user “simulate participation in a concert by playing a musical instrument and wearing a head-mounted 3-D display that includes stereo speakers.”

“Guitar Hero” users perform songs using a stringless, plastic guitar that plugs into a game console. A TV connected to the gaming console displays animated musicians playing along and graphics that guide users’ play.

“Rock Band,” which hasn’t garnered the sales and popularity captured by “Guitar Hero,” lets players hook up to peripherals modeled after a guitar, drums and a microphone and form a virtual band.

Founded in 1894 in Kalamazoo, Mich., and headquartered in Nashville since 1984, Gibson Guitar Corp. has brands including Dobro, Maestro, Kramer, Steinberger, Tobias, Echoplex and Wurlitzer.

SlySoft is at it again. The Caribbean firm says it has broken the copy-protection technology used on some Blu-ray discs to prevent consumers and bootleggers from copying movie content. SlySoft is offering a 20 percent discount on its latest version.

Last year SlySoft launched HD-DVD-cracking software designed to let consumers decrypt HD-DVD movie discs and copy them. AnyDVD HD software cracked the Advanced Access System, a specification for managing content stored on HD DVDs.

SlySoft also produces several other copy-protection software tools, including CloneDVD to burn copies of DVDS, Game Jackal Pro, which burns CD games to the hard drive, and Virtual CloneDrive, which is virtual drive software. SlySoft could not immediately be reached for comment.

Focusing on Blu-ray

Now that Blu-ray is the clear winner in the high-definition format battle, SlySoft has turned its attention to the Sony format. The latest version, AnyDVD HD 6.4.0.0, promises to crack Blu-ray copy protection. SlySoft is peddling the program on its Web site for $47.

SlySoft's claims about its software appear to be accurate. The company has a track record for its ability to hack CD and DVD copy protection and let consumers clone the files. But Richard Doherty, an analyst at Envisioneering Group, said the program may not work with all Blu-ray discs.

“We don't have the package to know whether this works with a handful of discs or would work with the latest Blu-ray discs with Sony and Fox, but we are doing tests,” he said. “We should have more information to report next week.”

A Slew of Crackers

“AnyDVD HD comes with the same functionality as AnyDVD, but with additional features for full Blu-ray Disc and HD-DVD support, including decryption of Blu-ray and HD-DVD movies,” the SlySoft Web site says.

Specifically, SlySoft is cracking BD+, a technology Macrovision developed. According to Macrovision, more than 20 companies, including major consumer electronics manufacturers, motion-picture studios, and The Blu-ray Disc Association, use BD+ technology.

Although some industry analysts believe the film and music industry will eventually scrap complex copy-protection schemes, concerns over piracy could instead lead the movie industry to develop a distribution model in which consumers download content and pay for a predetermined viewing time before access expires.

Will Police Bust Offenders?

While that debate goes on, the bottom line is that it is illegal for consumers to use SlySoft's software to crack Blu-ray discs and copy them, even to their hard drive, according to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. However, Doherty said, he hasn't seen many consumers arrested for that.

“Truth be told, I have jaywalked in my life but there are no cops waiting to arrest me,” Doherty said. “If somebody were cranking out 100,000 discs in Brooklyn based on this, we would see swift action. But we haven't seen anybody prosecuted on what this company seems to be violating with its capabilities. There seem to be no studio panics or nosedives out of the 10th-floor window yet, so it doesn't seem that the execs are too concerned about it at this point.”

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A puppet show version of “Harry Potter” featuring a naked Dumbledore and an enigmatic song called “Chocolate Rain” by a Minnesota graduate student were among the winners of YouTube's second annual video awards, the Web site said on Friday.

Tay Zonday, a 25-year-old baritone PhD student in American Studies, won best music with his original song “Chocolate Rain,” a rhythmic electric keyboard-backed number whose curious lyrics could be a political statement — or humorous nonsense.

The song, one of about 30 videos Zonday has posted, has been covered by singer John Mayer and rockers Green Day, and he has performed it live on Jimmy Kimmel's late night talk show.

“I would say basically (I started) just like millions of other people making videos in their living rooms,” Zonday told Reuters. “That's become so much a part of our lives.”

A homemade version of the special effects-laden Harry Potter movies, called “The Potter Puppet Pals in 'The Mysterious Ticking Noise”' captured the comedy award.

The puppet show features an a capella song with an appearance by a naked, but not anatomically correct, Professor Dumbledore and an explosive ending.

Despite a huge number of views and worldwide media attention, “I Got a Crush on Obama” lost the politics award to “Stop the Clash of Civilizations,” about prejudices in the Islamic and Western worlds, by the “global web movement” Avaaz.org.

The short film winner, “My Name is Lisa” by Shelton Films, focuses on a teenager coping with a mentally ill mother, while commentary winner “LonelyGirl15 is Dead!” by “What the Buck Show” gave a gossipy, arch review of the demise of the popular Web character.

Winners were chosen from among six nominees in 12 categories, including “Adorable,” commentary, eyewitness, instructional, politics, short film, comedy, creative, inspirational, music, series and sports.

Nominees and winners were selected by a combination of means including the number of people who viewed and selected the short, user-generated videos and “general buzz,” YouTube spokesman Aaron Ferstman said.

The videos in this year's contest received a quarter-billion views, Ferstman said.

(Reporting by Gina Keating, editing by Todd Eastham)

Novell has announced plans for SUSE Linux Enterprise 11. While the actual launch won't happen for another year or so, Novell is highlighting the key themes of the new release to let developers in the open-source community know the feedback the company has gotten from customers and what the new release needs from developers.

Justin Steinman, director of product marketing for Novell's Linux & Open Platform Solutions, told us the “core tenets,” such as focusing on mission-critical data-center technologies and “green IT,” won't change between releases. There are three areas of critical importance to small and midsize businesses (SMB) on which Enterprise 11 will focus, he told us: interoperability, Unix migration, and virtualization.

Interoperability

Novell has made efforts to build a successful partnership with Microsoft, and Steinman said Enterprise 11 will expand this relationship. “I would suspect that the majority of SMBs have Windows in some shape or form inside their organization,” Steinman said, “so one of the things we want to continue to deliver in Enterprise 11 is extending our interoperability leadership in working with Windows. We like to say that SUSE Linux Enterprise is Linux that's been optimized to work with Windows. We think that's a core differentiator and also a core benefit for customers who are trying to make a Linux decision.”

One example of Windows support is Novell's plan to include the Mono 2.0 development framework, which allows .NET applications to run on Linux, in Enterprise 11. A Mono migration analysis tool will also be included in the new release; Novell said this tool “helps customers determine the readiness of their .NET applications for migration to Linux.”

Unix Migration

Another key theme of Enterprise 11 is Unix migration. “For SMB customers, Unix is an expensive platform that's not very flexible, and you're really tied in to an expensive [Sun] SPARC server,” Steinman said. “By moving off of Unix and onto Linux you get the same performance, reliability and scalability at 25 percent of the cost.” That's a strong value proposition for companies with a tight IT budget, he said.

Novell says Enterprise 11 “will focus on meeting or exceeding performance benchmarks of [Sun] Solaris and providing best-in-market tool sets and features from the kernel on up.” In addition to upgrading to the latest Linux kernel, the release will feature storage-management technologies such as OpenAIS cluster communication infrastructure as well as enhanced crash dumping and hardware monitoring.

Virtualization

Businesses of all sizes are seeing cost savings from virtualization, such as lower electric bills, smaller data centers, and freeing up IT departments to focus on long-range business goals. “Our goal with Enterprise 11 is make virtualization easy,” Steinman said. Enterprise 11 will make further steps toward facilitating virtualization, such as including “a stand-alone virtualization platform that can be embedded in new hardware or can be deployed on existing hardware.” Enterprise 11 will use the latest version of the Xen hypervisor to allow virtualization in multiple formats.

“Most importantly, we offer cross-platform drivers,” Steinman said. “If you have Windows servers and Linux servers as virtual guests on the same box, we offer a driver path that comes as part of SUSE Enterprise 11 that enables you to run both Linux and Windows guests at near-native performance levels. We think there's a lot of value in that as well.”

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Gibson Guitar said on Friday that it filed a patent infringement lawsuit against Viacom Inc's MTV networks and Harmonix as well as Electronic Arts relating to the wildly popular “Guitar Hero” video games.

The lawsuit, filed in Federal District Court in Tennessee, relates to the same patent involved in another suit Gibson filed earlier against various retailers, the Tennessee-based guitar maker said in a statement.

The “Guitar Hero” series has sold more than 14 million units in North America and raked in more than $1 billion since its 2005 debut.

Gibson said the games, in which players use a guitar-shaped controller in time with notes on a television screen, violate a 1999 patent for technology to simulate a musical performance.

Harmonix developed the first “Guitar Hero” game and was later bought by MTV. Electronic Arts and another company, Activision Inc, as well as several retailers, either develop, distribute or sell one or several of the games in the “Guitar Hero” series.

A spokesperson for MTV and Electronic Arts could not be immediately reached for comment.

Earlier this month, Activision filed a preemptive suit against Gibson, which had complained that the games infringe upon one of its patents.

Activision filed a lawsuit asking the U.S. District Court for Central California to declare Gibson's patent invalid and to bar it from seeking damages.

Gibson, whose electric guitars are used by legendary blues and rock artists such as Eric Clapton, B.B. King and Slash, has been a high-profile partner in the “Guitar Hero” games.

Activision licensed the rights to model its video controllers on Gibson guitar models and to use their likenesses in the game.

Activision has said that by waiting three years to raise its claim, Gibson had granted an implied license for any technology.

(Reporting by Ilaina Jonas in New York and Scott Hillis and Gina Keating in Los Angeles; Editing by Christian Wiessner)

If you're security minded, you might keep your important paper documents in a safe-deposit box at your local bank. If those documents are digital, you can keep them in a virtual safe-deposit box so that they're not only secure, but also available from anywhere.

Wells Fargo Bank will soon offer its retail banking customers a personal online safe-deposit box that it calls “a natural extension” of the company's 156-year security legacy.

The Wells Fargo vSafe service is the first online storage solution offered by a financial services company, according to Katherine McGee, senior vice president of Wells Fargo's Internet Services Group.

Like other online storage solutions, vSafe offers accessibility from any computer with an Internet connection. Documents, PDFs, spreadsheets, and even media files can be stored. McGee told us that the bank did extensive research with its consumer and small-business customers and honed the product to match their needs. The offering is integrated with the Wells Fargo Online Banking service so that customers can have account statements automatically added each month

“It's secure online storage with an easy-to-use interface built for customers based on their needs,” she said. The company offers a set of boilerplate folders to help customers get started quickly; there's also an option to create unique folders and subfolders. McGee said that online forms simplify the procedure of consolidating data from a plethora of sticky notes into one safe place (such as a PDF document). Users can add folders and upload files from any computer.

Security a Priority

With sensitive documents being uploaded and stored, security is naturally a priority to customers. According to McGee, vSafe “offers secure storage, and it's available through the Wells Fargo online banking session, so we leverage all the security we use for online banking,” as well as additional measures that encrypt information as it crosses the Internet and while it's stored. An RSA SecurID token that adds a layer of authentication is an available option for a one-time fee of $25.

Help will be available via a toll-free customer service number as well as through online help systems. Customer service representatives will not be able to see any stored customer information even as they assist customers, McGee said.

The Price of Convenience

McGee says there will be different plans available, depending on the amount of storage required. For $4.95 per month, you can buy 1 gigabyte of storage — the equivalent of about 10,000 documents, she said. For 3 gigabytes customers will pay $9.95 a month, and $14.95 will buy you 6 gigabytes.

The vSafe service will be rolled out this summer and should be available to all customers by the end of this year.

While the offering may fare well with existing Wells Fargo customers, it will compete with some well-established — and cheaper — services such as Mozy, which offers 2 gigabytes for free and charges $4.95 a month for unlimited storage, as well as Microsoft's SkyDrive, which offers 5 gigabytes for free.

NEW YORK - Just three months after taking Tribune Co. private, CEO Sam Zell already is considering selling off one of its biggest properties, the Long Island-based newspaper Newsday, according to news reports.

Zell said during the buyout process that he wanted to hold on to all of Tribune’s major newspapers, which also include the Los Angeles Times and the Baltimore Sun. But several news reports Friday indicated he was considering a sale or other options for Newsday.

There’s already interest. Mortimer B. Zuckerman, a real estate developer who also owns the New York Daily News and U.S. News & World Report, will bid on the paper, according to a person familiar with the situation who asked not to be named because the talks are confidential.

Separately, Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. is considering a joint venture that would combine some business operations of its New York Post and of Newsday, such as printing, the New York Times and Wall Street Journal reported Friday. The Journal is owned by News Corp.

Another New York media company, Cablevision Systems Corp., is also considering a bid for Newsday, the Times and Journal reported. A Cablevision spokeswoman declined to comment, as did a spokesman for News Corp.

Tribune didn’t return calls for comment Friday. On Thursday, company representatives declined to comment on an initial report about Murdoch’s interest.

A combination of Newsday with Cablevision could make sense since both companies operate primarily in Long Island, a major suburban area outside New York. Cablevision, a major cable TV provider there, also operates a local cable news channel in the area.

As part of an earnings announcement Thursday, Tribune confirmed it had begun reviewing its assets “to determine whether capital can be more effectively redeployed into our core operations” or to reduce debt. Tribune took on $8.2 billion in debt when it went private.

Zell indicated to employees of The Sun last week the company might have to rethink its plans because of tough economic conditions and steeper-than-expected declines in revenues.

Already faltering business conditions for newspapers have worsened more quickly in recent months, with many reporting advertising declines — particularly in areas hard-hit by slumping real estate prices, such as Florida and California.

Tribune reported a $78 million fourth-quarter loss from continuing operations on Thursday, compared with profits of $233 million in the same period a year earlier. Excluding the effect of an extra week in the year-ago period, newspaper advertising revenues fell 9 percent in the period.

Tribune has already indicated it plans to sell the Chicago Cubs baseball team, but no deal has emerged.

Sony is offering to remove some of the trial software it crams onto the hard disks of new laptops — for a fee.

Buyers of the configure-to-order versions of its Vaio TZ2000 and Vaio TZ2500 laptops can opt to have Sony remove the some of its own applications, in addition to trial software and games.

The “Fresh Start” option, billed as a software optimization, costs US$49.99, and is only available to customers choosing to pay an additional $100 to upgrade the operating system to Windows Vista Business from the Windows Vista Home Premium edition offered as standard.

PC manufacturers are often paid by software publishers to include such trial versions on the computers they ship. Bloatware, as it is often called, poses problems for businesses because it reduces system performance and available hard disk space, makes it harder to maintain a consistent software image across PCs from different sources and may introduce additional security vulnerabilities or — in the case of games — unwanted distractions for workers.

Dell was one of the first PC manufacturers to offer to remove bloatware. Last July it introduced Vostro, a range of PCs for small businesses designed to be simpler to manage. Everex followed suit a week later, saying it would eliminate bloatware from a $300 desktop machine for consumers.

Customers opting for Sony's Fresh Start will miss out on software including Microsoft Works SE 9.0 bundled with a 60-day trial version of Microsoft Office, Sony's Vaio Creation Suite Photo Software bundled with a 30-day trial version of Corel Paint Shop Pro; the Click to Disc video editor; WinDVD, and a free edition of QuickBooks Simple Start that can only track 20 customers.

Sony justifies the $49.99 fee by saying it covers removal of the unwanted software before shipment — although selecting the option appears to have no consequences on the estimated shipping date.

Although Sony has other laptops with configure-to-order options, including the FZ, SZ, AR and CR ranges, none of those are available with Fresh Start.

The Federal Communications Commission auction for the 700-MHz wireless spectrum is over, and the winners are known. One obvious winner is the FCC itself, which exceeded its initial estimate of $10 billion with a $19.59 billion total.

Among the bidders, Verizon Wireless and AT&T won big portions of the available spectrum, which is being vacated as U.S. television stations move to digital transmission.

Google a Big Winner, Too

Verizon took 108 licenses for $9.6 billion, and AT&T bagged 227 for $6.6 billion. Observers say Verizon's purchases will help it narrow a gap in coverage as it competes with AT&T.

One potentially big winner is Google, even though it didn't win any bids. It bid $4.7 billion for the C-block frequencies, which triggered an auction requirement that any third-party compatible device or software must be able to operate on the bandwidth. That was one of the open-network provisions that Google, as head of an alliance of consumer organizations and businesses, was able to have adopted by the FCC.

Verizon, which backed an open-network position shortly before the auction, bought the C-block license.

Dish Network took 168 wireless licenses for $711 million, although it was not immediately apparent what it intends to do with them. Some observers are speculating it might be for a video service of some kind, but the company is prohibited from discussing its plans until it makes the down payment on April 3.

One setback for the FCC was the auction of the upper 700-MHz D block. Earlier this week, the agency separated that block from the rest of the auction and said it will “consider its options for how to license this spectrum,” since bids did not meet the $1.3 billion minimum. The D block was established to create a public-private partnership that would guarantee public-safety agencies bandwidth access in emergencies.

Impact on Consumers

The impact on consumers is not yet clear. The open-network provisions, plus the new open-access stances of the major companies, may lead to a more robust third-party ecosystem of devices and software. The new environment also means that the Google-backed, open-source Android platform for mobile devices may now have access to bandwidth, even if the Android device makers or software providers are not carriers.

Some observers said that, because the two biggest carriers increased their position, the prospects of dramatically lower prices for consumers or businesses are not huge.

But the FCC said the auction increased the potential for market competition. It said “a bidder other than a nationwide incumbent won a license in every market,” and there is now “the potential for an additional wireless 'third-pipe' in every market in the nation.” It also noted that 99 bidders who are not nationwide wireless incumbents won 754 licenses, or about 69 percent of the 1,090 licenses offered.

Bill Ho, an analyst with industry research firm Current Analysis, said he “kind of expected Verizon and AT&T to win.” They're the biggest, he noted, and, for an event that had become known as “the chance of a lifetime,” the biggest players had to step up.

Ho said “Google had an agenda,” to get bandwidth access for itself and others, and it accomplished that. Ho pointed out that Google's core competencies have not involved running a network, and now it can concentrate on a strategy of delivering services, including Android, to mobile devices.