DigitalOutbox Episode 42
In this episode the team discuss iPad, politics, paywalls and the 3DS.
Playback
Listen via iTunes
Listen via M4A
Listen via MP3
Shownotes
1:50 – Google Shuts Down Chinese Search
– Chinese search shutdown, redirected to Google Hong Kong
– Users are being redirected for Google web, news and image search to the Hong Kong site, which sits outside of the Chinese firewall.
– Users are also being presented with simplified Chinese in addition to traditional Chinese and English results.
– Dashboard showing status – http://www.google.com/prc/report.html#hl=en
– China then blocks certain searches/results, so back to square one – Google is still censored as it was before, no?
– Gmail has that email attachment thingy! I.e. write “attached” in a document and don’t attach a file and it will warn you!
– It will also now warn you if it thinks you’ve been hacked. Bases this on if your account has been accessed in two different countries over a short time-period.
8:39 – Times and Sunday Times to charge from June online
– The Times and Sunday Times newspapers will start charging to access their websites in June,
– Users will pay £1 for a day’s access and £2 for a week’s subscription.
– Both titles will launch new websites in early May, separating their digital presence for the first time and replacing the existing, combined site, Times Online.
– The two new sites will be available for a free trial period to registered customers. And payment will give customers access to both sites.
– James Harding, editor of The Times, agreed that NI’s paywall strategy was a risk. “But it’s less of a risk than just throwing away our journalism and giving it away from free,” he told the BBC.
– Rebekah Brooks said the decision to charge came “at a defining moment for journalism… We are proud of our journalism and unashamed to say that we believe it has value”.
– Sun and News of the World next
– Privately they acknowledge they will lose 1000’s of regular readers and millions of casual readers but hope the cost is small enough to entice many
15:22 – Best Buy coming to UK
– Best Buy opens its first UK outlet, a superstore with with a 50,000 sqft shop floor, in Lakeside in May
– June for Southamption and Merry Hill, West Midlands, and later this year for Aintree, near Liverpool, and Croydon.
– 80 stores in UK over next 5 years
17:53 – iPad
– WSJ – $17.99 a month
– WSJ print is $29 a month
– But what about flash
– http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/10/03/29/brightcove_converts_time_nyt_flash_video_to_html5_for_ipad.html
– Brightcove’s partnerships with The New York Times and Time magazine will allow HTML5 to seamlessly replace Adobe Flash video content on the publications’ Web sites for compatibility with Apple’s iPad
– Brightcove Experience for HTML5, a framework for publishing and delivering interactive and advertising-supported Web video. The platform is available free to the more than 1,000 Brightcove customers in 42 countries.
– Monday’s announcement means it’s possible that video in the Adobe Flash format could be converted to HTML5 automatically for high-profile Web sites, perhaps as soon as the device’s April 3 U.S. launch. The company said its clients can now use the tool to build iPad-ready Web sites, and in the next year the platform will be expanded to support customization and branding of the player environment, advertising, analytics, social sharing and other capabilities.
– Magazines – same price as print version or cheaper – non add version of esquire for $2.99, $2 less than paper version
– http://www.macrumors.com/2010/03/26/ipad-app-store-reveals-launch-apps-top-seller-lists-app-details/
– iPad App Store shows many titles with ‘HD’ added or ‘for iPad’
– Also shows increased price point for many app’s – will that be an issue? $50 for omnigraffle for example
– http://www.tuaw.com/2010/03/29/first-look-kobo-for-ipad/ – nice book app for iPad
– http://www.apple.com/ipad/guided-tours/
– iTunes 9.1 this week?
– Just got 10.6.3 on Mac’s – support for iPads?
37:44 – BBC iPhone Apps Delayed
-BBC Trust asks for delay on BBC iPhone app after industry representation
– industry think it abuses BBC’s dominant position in news.
39:33 – Gifting iPhone Apps
– You can now gift app’s in iTunes
– Can only gift to people in same country but apart from that, same as gifting music
40:49 – A night at the Opera
– A lot of talk this week about whether Opera will get their browser approved into the App Store
– I would call the majority saying “No way”.
– Opera seem weirdly optimistic though.
– My call? Rejected – duplication of core functionality.
– We may well know by he time of the next cast!
43:47 – Nintendo 3DS
– New handheld system from Nintendo
– we know the system will use two screens, will have some sort of 3D, won’t require any sort of special glasses, and will be backwards compatible with current DS and DSi games.
– rumours are that the 3d will use camera’s to tracks your eyes position in relation to screen angle – very clever
– Maybe 720p screens, accelerometer for tile controls, possible 3g chip
– Released between now and March 2011
47:24 – Microsoft Game Room
– Now launched on Live for Xbox and PC
– Free download
– Design arcade rooms
– 30 games available now that cost – 260 points for game on one platform, 500 for game on pc and xbox
– Friends can visit your arcade
– Time warp facility to rewind back a game
– No better than mame really
48:48 – PS3 No More Linux
– April 1st update will remove ‘Install Other OS’ option form older PS3’s
– Newer slims can’t do this anyway, but will disappoint Linux fans surely…
– Security concerns is the reason, but it is optional…
– The consumer electronics giant said that the update will be optionally, but it cautioned that failure to upgrade will lock users out of the PlayStation Network. They will also be prevented from playing DRM-encumbered videos stored on a media server, and from viewing any Blu-ray Discs or PS3 games that require firmware 3.21.
Picks
Henry
Scrivener
– The best app for writing books or long form material
– Great research options
– Track content via outliner, index cards
– Mac only
Ian
Auto Smiley
– A computer vision application that runs in the background while you work.
– The software analyzes your face while you are working and if it detects a smile it sends the the ascii smiley face letters “: )” as keyboard presses to the front most application.
– Auto Smiley has many uses from just straight up convenience to enforcing honesty in your online communication 🙂