Now you can watch the latest movies on YouTube. I was wondering why it's taken so long for Google to do this ... maybe they were too tight with their money.
"Google has struck a deal with Hollywood film studios, but no other details are being released at this time. YouTube has announced that it will be launching a movie-on-demand service as soon as this week, marking Google's first solid venture into mainstream movie sales online.
The video-sharing giant is following in the footsteps of Apples' iTunes, which is one of the most popular digital media player applications. In January 2008, Apple struck a deal with film studios such as Universal, Paramount, MGM, Sony, Lionsgate, Warner Bros., Fox, Disney and New Line for its video-on-demand (VOD) initiative. Apple charged rental fees of $2.99 and up."
The recent 3d craze has seemed pretty silly to me, but now the folks over at TechRepublic have laid things out in detail, and 3D is looking pretty bad (literally).
"The 3D gimmick has sadly infiltrated movies and television and is now threatening to infect video games and smartphones as well. There’s only one reason why the entertainment industry keeps relentlessly pushing this at consumers — it’s a transparent attempt to bleed more money out of people. And, while a lot of consumers have caught on to the scam, not everyone is doing enough to stop it.
3D is definitely NOT about innovation, as the industry would like you to believe. In fact, adding the current 3D effects to a movie or video of any kind subtracts from the picture. It muddies the colors and unsharpens the images, and it has to slow down the action shots because it makes people sick if things go too fast in 3D. In fact, optometrists estimate that up to 25% of people get headaches or nausea from simply watching 3D at all."
It's nothing new, but I just couldn't help filming this ... it's a massive touchscreen enclosure that hooks on to any LED/LCD TV, and with the help of some special programmable software, you're able to create some interesting graphics with your hands. Not much use in real life ... but it's nice to show it off to passers-by.
AIPTEK has demoed their latest full featured 3D Camcorder, with full 1080p HD recording at a resolution of 1920x1080. It also offers advanced H.264 high-end compression technology and you can use it to playback on your HD-TV, Standard TV, and your PC or Mac! Notice the dual camera lenses for 3D recording. We weren't able to publish the specifications in detail, as it's still under wraps, but we heard it's going to be one of the most affordable 3D camcorder on the market ... I'm guessing between USD $399-499. However, we expect Aiptek to make an announcement of its official launch some time in the next couple of months.
Japanese consumer electronics manufacturer, Sharp has teamed up with Mindscape to demo their latest "Immersion Reality" in HD using a some clever techniques. It involves a room installed completely full of LED screens, on all 6 sides of the room ... front, top, bottom, left and right. Each side has a minimum of 16 LED screens. And to enhance your HD immersive experience, the demo room is fully fitted with Dolby Digital surround sound ... Check out the video below and be amazed.
But what ... isn't YouTube owned by Google?.. doh! What they should have said ... is that they're launching a online channel with "original content". Now you get premium and original content from YouTube. So does that mean they'll start charging people a subscription?
"The popular video-sharing site will compete with network and cable. YouTube is one step closer to competing against broadcast and cable with their its original content. The world's largest internet search engine launched it's own television service, Google TV, late last year and now the parent company of YouTube is taking the same chance on the video-sharing website.
Google hopes to generate more revenue from the popular site with plans to invest $100 million dollars on programming into YouTube, instead of spending money strictly to license content, which is its standard practice."
Press Release: "Music Unlimited powered by Qriocity™" Arrives on the PSP™ (PlayStation®Portable)
FOSTER CITY, Calif., April 7, 2011 – SonyNetwork Entertainment today announced that beginning April 14, PlayStation®Portable (PSP™) owners with PlayStation®Network (PSN) IDs will be able to access "Music Unlimited powered by Qriocity™," a new, cloud-based, digital music service which lets music lovers listen to millions of songs and easily discover new music from major and independent labels from around the world*. PSP owners can also enjoy a common and synchronized music experience on their PlayStation® 3 computer entertainment systems as well as PCs and other network-enabled Sony devices without the need to manage or transfer music files.
This camera looks so sweet ... makes me want to upgrade my old compact, but at USD $900, I'm going to have to speak to my wife :P ... I could say it's for work.
"... Digital Home Thoughts has now let slip some official details and pictures of Nikon's new prosumer D5100 model. This one steps things up to a D7000-matching 16.2 megapixels from the 12 megapixel D5000, and boasts a 3-inch articulated display (side-mounted this time), 1080p video recording at both 30 and 24 fps (with autofocus!), ISO settings from 100 to 6,400, and an 18-105mm lens included in the kit (no body-only option available just yet, it seems). What's more, Nikon's also releasing a new ME-1 microphone alongside the camera to let you take full advantage of those video recording capabilities."
Now this is a real "FUNKY" demo ... it feels and looks totally "3D". The flex interface allows the content on the touchscreen to become almost elastic and distorted. Not sure why anyone would want that, but its supposed to help with Google Maps.
"In the demonstration, the flex interface was used with Google Maps. This method treats content on the screen as an elastic, flexible material. Parts of the content that are normally pushed outside the screen by scrolling are distorted to keep them within the screen. This enables users to navigate around the map while keeping an eye on the parts of the map that were originally on the screen."
