Posts Tagged ‘mobiles’

BlackBerry: on sale in China

// February 8th, 2010 // No Comments » // p2p

p2pnet view Mobiles :- BlackBerry phones will soon be on sale in China. Canada’s RIM, the handsets’ maker, has signed a cooperation agreement with Digital China, says China Tech News . “Commenting on the cooperation with RIM, Digital China’s president of consumer strategy, Wang Huamao, said after becoming the Chinese reseller of BlackBerry handsets, it will sell these mobile phones via its nationwide channels; and even telecom operators need to get BlackBerry handsets from Digital China,” says the story, adding: “In addition, Chinese telecom operator China Telecom will apparently officially start to provide BlackBerry 9530 mobile phones as well as BES and BIS services from March 1, 2010, at the package prices of CNY189, CNY289, CNY389, and CNY589. In May 2008, a new type of mobile phone, BlackBerry 9630, will also be available from this operator.” - … .. … and identi.ca More First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win ~ Mahatma Gandhi China Tech News – RIM, Digital China Sign Agreement For BlackBerry Promotion, February 8, 2010 Use free p2pnet newsfeeds for your site. Subscribe to - | | rss feed: http://-/feed -? -

‘No Texting!’ US tells truckers

// January 27th, 2010 // No Comments » // p2p

p2pnet view | Mobiles:- Multitasking increases the risk of vehicle crashes, says the US department of transportation. So yesterday, legislation stopping interstate commercial truckers and bus drivers from sending text messages while they’re operating moving vehicles went into effect, says the New York Times . “Truckers and bus drivers who violate the rule, which is effective immediately, face civil or criminal fines of up to $2,750,” it says. “Today we’re sending a strong message,” the Dallas News has transportation secretary Ray LaHood saying . “We don’t merely expect you to share the road responsibly with other travelers – we require you to do so.” It’s the “latest in a Washington campaign to make drivers keep their eyes on the road in an age of wireless devices increasingly prone to distract them,” says the story, adding: “Last month, Obama ordered about 3 million federal workers to stay off their cellphones while driving. He strongly encouraged states and companies alike to follow suit. “The news was greeted by lukewarm support from the trucking industry, which sees such bans as appropriate, but faulted the haste with which the move was made.” - … .. … and identi.ca More New York Times – Rule Bans Texting for Truckers and Bus Drivers, January 26, 2010 Dallas News – Ban slams the brakes on texting by truckers , January 27, 2010 Use free p2pnet newsfeeds for your site. Subscribe to - | | rss feed: http://-/feed -? -

‘iTunes is killing the music business’

// January 27th, 2010 // No Comments » // p2p

p2pnet view Music:- The recorded music business must switch to subscription, it’s its only hope of economic survival. The iTunes Store is killing the music business. Sure, it provides a legal alternative to theft/copyright infringement, but the economics make no sense.  Because instead of spending $10-$20 for an album, people are now purchasing $1.29 tracks.  And it takes many $1.29 tracks to reach the equivalent of an album. Essentially ten. So, you’re asking the public to make ten purchases instead of one.  Get it?  Can you imagine someone saying yes ten times in a row?  Imagine buying the White Album a la carte.  How many people do you think would have purchased “Revolution 9″?  But we did, as part of an album, there were no singles from the White Album, and therefore we know “Revolution 9″, because oftentimes we were just too lazy to jump up and lift the needle past it, and we ended up hearing it, it’s in our DNA, like the rest of those album tracks. But it makes no sense to complain that people should buy albums instead of singles, you’re pissing in the wind, the Internet has unbundled the album.  That doesn’t mean you can’t try to get people to buy as many of your tracks as possible, it just means that the concept of paying once for ten tracks is something that no one has to do, and almost no one wants to do. So, inherently, we’re selling less music, and making less money. Who do we want to blame?  Apple, the customer?  That makes no sense, as stated previously Apple is providing an alternative, and without customers you’ve got no business.  The key is to get more cash from each individual consumer, so in the aggregate, we end up with a lot of money. The classic example is cable bundling.  You cannot buy your cable channels a la carte.  You must buy them in tiers.  Which drives you nuts.  Why am I paying for something I’m never going to watch?  But economically, it makes sense.  For if the channels were unbundled, the cable system wouldn’t be able to make enough money, so it would have to raise the price of each individual channel substantially, to the point where you’d be paying just as much.  According to this article in the “New Yorker”, at most you’d be saving thirty five cents.  And you’d give up the ability to surf all those extra channels, and possibly find something interesting. That’s what we want people to do.  Surf the music and find something interesting.  That was the old album paradigm.  Since you paid four or six or ten bucks for the LP (the price went up with inflation), you listened to it, and found out you liked cuts other than the hits, to the point you wanted to see the act live, to hear it perform all these songs, and bought the next album not worrying about a hit, because you were a fan of the band. I hope these days can return.  But we’ve got to switch the game in the interim. We’ve got to make people fans of music! Yes, instead of paying ten bucks for an album, you pay ten bucks for music.  And technology allows everybody access, so instead of charging our good customers more, we charge everybody one low flat fee, kind of like cable television, the provider doesn’t care if you watch all day long or not at all, it’s the same price. And speaking of price, we can argue whether ten bucks is appropriate, we can argue price all day long, but we can’t argue paradigm.  The key to survival is charging everybody something.  Not breaking it down by track, but providing the whole smorgasbord for a single price. Now the Spotify trick is to get you hooked for free, then upsell you.  That’s a good concept, works in sampling across all wares.  Don’t think it’s about giving music away for free, it’s ultimately about getting a chance to convert many people.  It’s just like a retail store.  The first key is getting traffic, then, once people are in the store, you do your best to close them.  Hell, sometimes you do giveaways just to get them in! Not that Spotify is the only solution.  But the labels must see they need to drive subscriptions, or lose the bundling war.  That site allowing you to get tracks for experiencing ads?  That’s economic death.  As is Apple’s concept of letting you stream the tracks you own via the cloud.  If either of these take hold, the odds of subscription winning go down, and you want them to go up, because the pool is so much larger. Don’t see this as a music problem.  Don’t see this as a value problem.  See this as an economic problem.  How do we get the most money?  Certainly not by selling tracks.  Definitely by selling low-priced subscriptions. Furthermore, if the music is streamed (with thousands of tracks on your hand-held in case you’re out of range, Spotify provides this today), there’s no issue of someone stealing everything and then disconnecting.  What’s there to steal?  People believe YouTube clips will live in the cloud forever, very few people save them to disk.  We have to migrate music to this same sphere. Please read this article about bundling.  It will make the concept clear to you.  The cable companies and content providers are tempting unbundling by fighting their silly wars in public.  We have the reverse problem in music.  Our content has been unbundled.  Only by bundling it again can the industry regain health. http://www.newyorker.com/talk/financial/2010/01/25/100125ta_talk_surowiecki Bob Lefsetz – The Lefsetz Letter - … .. … and identi.ca More First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win ~ Mahatma Gandhi January, 2010 Use free p2pnet newsfeeds for your site. Subscribe to - | | rss feed: http://-/feed -? -

Spanish hairdressers say No! to SGAE

// January 27th, 2010 // No Comments » // p2p

p2pnet view Music | P2P:- Hundreds of hairdressers and beauty centres in Barcelona, Sabadell and Lleida, Spain, are displaying a poster featuring a girl with a vinyl record and the words ‘Catalan hairdressers are ordered to pay royalties for playing the radio in their shops”. So says the Barcelona Reporter . Clearly, the hairdressers are suffering from the SOCAN Syndrome . SOCAN is short for Composers, Authors and Music Publishers of Canada and they figure virtually anyone playing anything SOCAN anywhere owes them. Including hairdressers. When p2pnet did a post on this we had a pic of the SOCAN logo wearing a wig. SOCAN got all pouty, threatening p2pnet with a Cease & Desist missive. Spanish hairdressers, faced by demands from the local version of SOCAN, the General Society of Authors of Spain (SGAE), have adopted an intriguing tactic to protest the extortion. According to SGAE, when the hairdressers play SGAE music  for their customers, they’re breaking copyright laws. So the clever  hairdressers have chosen an unusual way to both publicise the farce  and  get the public on their side. They’ve launched a campaign “asking customers to come with their own music for avoid paying the tax,” says the Barcelona Reporter. “From now on when you come to the hairdressers … do not forget to bring house music and all original Ah ¡¡¡” – they say. “The vice president of the Catalan Federation of Beauty and Hairdressing (Fedcat), José María Figueres, explained that the posters began to be distributed among the 2,500 institutions that belong to this organization shortly before last Christmas and already hundreds have joined the campaign,” says the story, continuing: “The campaign has been well received. Customers sympathize, and relish the idea of bringing in their own mp3 music,” said Figueras, who emphasizes that in addition to protesting about the fees, this measure avoids establishments paying the tax, since they do not play music on the radio.” “Figueras said that the situation is amazing,” the story, quoting his as stating, “Hairdressers do not put on live music, they are just trying to ensure their salons are homely, as if our customers were guests in our own homes.” - … .. … and identi.ca More First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win ~ Mahatma Gandhi Barcelona Reporter – Catalan hairdressers are ordered to pay royalties for playing the radio in their shops, January 20, 2010 SOCAN Syndrome – SOCAN threatens p2pnet. Again, August 2, 2007 Use free p2pnet newsfeeds for your site. Subscribe to - | | rss feed: http://-/feed -? -

Newsday: entombed behind its pay wall

// January 27th, 2010 // No Comments » // p2p

- Freedom | P2P:- Ruposaur Murdochus Corporatus stands out in the dark, dank swamps it inhabits, said p2pnet just before Christmas last year. “It exists  by swallowing weaker species, believing it will absorb their attributes, thus perpetuating its own  existence,” we said, going on: “However, it’s moving in ever decreasing circles, with all that implies,  and in one of its last desperate attempts to  stave off its inevitable extinction, is attempting to market its droppings.” Other ancient beasts such as the New York Times harkened. Oh. And Newsday. ‘ … the web site sucks’ In October, 2009, the Dolans (that’s James on the right) bought Newsday, the Long Island daily, for $650 million — and promptly put its web site, newsday.com, behind a pay wall, says The Observer . The plan, or hope, was people would cough up $5 a week, or $260 a year, for “unfettered access to newsday.com”. Now, at the end of February, how may punters have signed up? Thirty-five. Count them. 35. “The web site redesign and relaunch cost the Dolans $4 million,” according to publisher Terry Jimenez and, “With those 35 people, they’ve grossed about $9,000.” wow And, “In that time, without question, web traffic has begun to plummet, and, certainly, advertising will follow as well,” says the story, going on, “Anyone who has a newspaper subscription is allowed free access; anyone who has Optimum Cable, which is owned by the Dolans and Cablevision, also gets it free. Newsday representatives claim that 75 percent of Long Island either has a subscription or Optimum Cable.” Not only but also, “In the short time that the Dolans have owned Newsday, it’s been a circus,” says The Observer, continuing > > > When they were closing the deal to buy the paper in May 2008, they had their personal spokesman scream at an editor who assigned a reporter to visit the Dolans, seeking comment; there was a moment back in January of last year, when Newsday editor John Mancini walked out of the newsroom because of a dispute over how the paper was handling the Knicks; in the summer, the paper refused to run ads by Verizon, a rival; Tim Knight, the paper’s publisher, and John Mancini, the editor, eventually both left. The paper, which traditionally has been a powerful money maker, lost $7 million in the first three quarters of last year, according to Mr. Jimenez at last week’s meeting. Now, “The view of the newsroom is the web site sucks,” says one staffer in the story. “It’s an abomination,” says another. Nielsen Online says traffic has fallen “since the paywall went up”. However, “A Newsday spokeswoman sends in the following statement,” adds The Obsever, quoting her as stating: “Our strategy is proceeding according to plan. By focusing on providing Newsday and Optimum Online customers free access to a site with hyper-local news and utilities, we have a more engaged, increasingly local audience.” - … .. … and identi.ca More First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win ~ Mahatma Gandhi p2pnet – Why would anyone pay for MySpace music?, November 17, 2009 New York Times – New York Times to build Pay Wall?, January 18, 2010 The Observer - After Three Months, Only 35 Subscriptions for Newsday ’s Web Site, January 26, 2010 Use free p2pnet newsfeeds for your site. Subscribe to - | | rss feed: http://-/feed -? -

‘Sexting’ course in Canadian classrooms

// January 22nd, 2010 // No Comments » // p2p

p2pnet view Mobiles :- Concerns centering on teenagers sexting messages, nude pix and videos are behind a Canadian Centre for Child Protection (CCCP) and Canadian Wireless Telecommunications Association (CWTA) project involving 100 Grade 7 classrooms. Launched yesterday, textED.ca is an interactive website “designed to teach teens to be safe, responsible and respectful users of texting, say the two organisations. Teens’ behavior “is less inhibited with the use of technology, so they tend to say and do things that they might not otherwise do in person,” according to the CCCP’s  Lianna McDonald. “The textED.ca site has been created to help educate youth about how to use technology respectfully and safely, and to know what to do when someone crosses the line.” “Teachers will use a series of safety lessons and the website to help guide their students through respectful conduct when texting, and to teach them life skills that will allow them to fully benefit from what is now a very public, technological world,” they say. ___________________________________ Click here for p2pnet music downloads ___________________________________ - … .. … and identi.ca More January, 2010 Use free p2pnet newsfeeds for your site. Subscribe to - | | rss feed: http://-/feed -? -

US should ‘respect the facts’: China

// January 22nd, 2010 // No Comments » // p2p

p2pnet view Advertising |  Politics:- US secretary of state Hilary Clinton’s ‘innovation advisor’ says although she’s “taking cyber attacks on Google and other US firms very seriously and is seeking an explanation from Beijing,” her department isn’t the “foreign policy arm of Google”. Google has raised a storm on- offline with claims that China is behind  cyber attacks against it. In response, Google says it may be forced it to abandon censorship practices it’d reluctantly imposed in 2006. Now, “The Chinese laws forbid hacker attack and activities to infringe upon citizen’s privacy in any form,” China’s state news agency Xinhua quotes foreign ministry spokesman Ma Zhaoxu as stating. “China is one of the major victims of hacker attacks in the world.” According to the Internet Society of China, “the number of cyber attacks from abroad saw a year-on-year increase of 148 percent in 2008,” says the story. In an earlier post, “ It is ordinary for a commercial company to enter and exit the Chinese market, but this is not the case for Google,” said Xinhua , continuing: “Firstly, it gave the Chinese government an ultimatum, requiring the latter to make a concession, which is obviously political in nature. In addition, Google’s move won the collective support from the U.S. government, congress and western media agencies, so this event has completely been politicized. “Such politicization was not provoked by China, but imposed by the U.S. and the west onto China.” ___________________________________ Click here for p2pnet music downloads ___________________________________ It adds: “ Several days before the Google declared that it planned to withdraw from China, the U.S. Secretary of State Hilary Clinton held a small evening dinner party. The guests she invited were just the leaders of the powerful information enterprises such as the Microsoft, Twitter and Google. The two affairs were so close that people would unavoidably think they were connected. “After this political affliction, the Google has already made itself in an awkward situation. If it withdraws from China, it will lose a market consisting of 360 million netizens; if it does not, it will be hijacked by the U.S. government.” Says the BBC , “ US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called on Thursday for China to lift restrictions on the internet. Mrs Clinton also urged Beijing to investigate Google’s complaints that cyber attacks had originated in China. “Foreign Ministry spokesman Ma Zhaoxu said the US should “respect the facts” and stop making “groundless accusations against China”. Stay tuned. - … .. … and identi.ca More First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win ~ Mahatma Gandhi raised a storm – Were ‘insiders’ part of China Google attack?, January 20, 2010 abandon censorship – Google to halt China censorship, January 12, 2010 Xinhua – China urges U.S. to stop accusations on so-called Internet freedom, January 22, 2010 Xinhua – Google, do not take Chinese netizens hostage, January 20, 2010 BBC – China condemns ‘groundless’ US criticism of web control, January 22, 2010 Use free p2pnet newsfeeds for your site. Subscribe to - | | rss feed: http://-/feed -? -

Hermione loves Alex

// January 22nd, 2010 // No Comments » // p2p

p2pnet view P2P | Advertising:- “He doesn’t care what I look like. “That’s the great thing. I can just be myself.” That’s Hermione Way, 24. And she’s talking about Alex. Her laptop. They’ve been unofficially engaged for almost a year and now they’re  having an  unofficial exchanging of vows on January 31. “Hermione Way started her first venture Newspepper.com in the second year of her degree, using money from her student load to buy the first piece of equipment,” says CrunchBase . “Newspepper is a essentially a video production company but with a difference; Newspepper employs student and graduate filmmakers and journalists enabling them to get paid, on the job experience and Newspepper’s clients receive high quality, low cost media services.” “Her latest venture Techfluff.tv reports of Europeean Internet culture.” Hopefully, Alex has a spellchecker on board. Good one, Hermione. ___________________________________ Click here for p2pnet music downloads ___________________________________ (Cheers, Em) - … .. … and identi.ca More First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win ~ Mahatma Gandhi January, 2010 Use free p2pnet newsfeeds for your site. Subscribe to - | | rss feed: http://-/feed -? -

Click here for p2pnet music downloads

// January 22nd, 2010 // No Comments » // p2p

My view Freedom | P2P:- “Lets see,” says a p2pnet Reader’s Write . TechDirt Great articles, but certainly not a one-man show BoingBoing: Good Torrent freak: its ok, they have good ones. TechCrunch is kind of boring these days. Sylck, eh, Jon’s daily round-ups are similar to this entire site. Zero paid, Slow but hits a good one once in a blue moon. Geist, Power house of current affairs going on “So I would rate p2pnet up there with BoingBoing and techDirt, but again, each are unique in their own way and compliment each other.” Earlier, “With all due respect Jon P2Pnet is past its prime,” said a critic in another Reader’s Write , going on: “You may have been a forerunner of a sort but there are now many other web pages carrying the kinds of reports you have specialized in, and doing a better job. They are more efficient, have better resources and are more credible P2PNet has had its day and since you obviously are no longer able to maintain it financially or in terms of content, stop these on-and-off posts and let it die quietly.” “So how is your appeal going?” – asks Jesse in an email. “Well, I hope.” The two comments and the email come in response to a p2pnet post pointing out the site is currently in survival mode . I feel like Public Radio — but without the masses of fervent volunteers trying non-stop to raise money to keep it going. On the other hand, p2pnet is very much a personal site so perhaps it isn’t surprising people aren’t exactly falling over themselves to donate. So with a lot of help from p2pnet friends who are also musicians, p2pnet now has a pay-what-you-want (or pay nothing at all) music download site which also includes a short story I wrote for my daughter when she was young. Over the last four days, four people have donated a total of $357.50 Canadian. In the same post, Rabbit80 suggests people ignore ads (like the one on the right linked to the download page) and just don’t notice the text banner in bold red that’s been at the bottom of stories for the past few days. So I’m going to try something else for a while – this text add in the middle of stories. Hopefully, people won’t miss it there. ___________________________________ Click here for p2pnet music downloads ___________________________________ p2pnet isn’t, and has never been, an entrepreneurial business venture. It’s an advocacy site which places special emphasis on freedom of speech, P2P and sharing. It carries daily, frequently updated news, stories, features and commentaries on digital media, distributed computing and associated technologies and events which haven’t been spun, filtered and pre-digested by vested corporate interests. I’ve followed my convictions for almost 10 years and I’m still 100% sure sites such as p2pnet are absolutely vital to the health and well being of the net. Without them, freedom of speech is in desperate peril. And that’s no exaggeration. If anything, it understates the situation. Unlike the commercial entities, however, one-person sites such as p2pnet have little or no financial or legal resources and unfortunately, no way of winning hefty grants from self-serving philanthropic institutions. But without some kind of financial input, it’s impossible to continue publishing. I’m determined to keep p2pnet going and I have an idea directly related to sharing information which I hope to put into effect. But it’ll take a while to assess and implement. If I pull if off, though, I’ll be able to stay online and pay the bills without carrying any form of advertising, which at the moment is bringing in $900 a month. That’s my sole income. Not a princely sum, I think you’ll agree. So Yes — this is another effort to grab your attention. Cheers! And thanks … Jon Newton – p2pnet - … .. … and identi.ca More First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win ~ Mahatma Gandhi January, 2010 Use free p2pnet newsfeeds for your site. Subscribe to - | | rss feed: http://-/feed -? -

Rogers HTC Dream 911 emergency

// January 17th, 2010 // No Comments » // p2p

- | Mobiles:- The Rogers HTC Dream has turned into a nightmare for the company. It’s been “pulled off the shelf from all locations and online”, says e-Canada. Why the scramble? Because an “urgent software fix is needed for 911 calls to be completed”, says Mobile Syrup . “Kinda important. All Dream owners were contacted by text message about the issue.” Rogers says it’s “expediting a software fix” which’ also “provide several other improvements”, says e-Canada, noting the company has asked “all customers turn off the GPS receiver until further notice so that all 911 emergency calls complete” until it’s in hand. It gives four steps to the GPS receiver on the HTC Dream: 1. Press the Menu button. 2. Select Settings 3. Select Location 4. Uncheck Enable GPS Satellite - … .. … and identi.ca More First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win ~ Mahatma Gandhi e-Canada – Rogers HTC Dream Turned Nightmare, January 17, 2010 Mobile Syrup - Rogers pulls Dream off shelf due to urgent 911 software fix, January 16, 2010 Use free p2pnet newsfeeds for your site. Subscribe to - | | rss feed: http://-/feed -? - January 17, 2010

« Older Entries


eXTReMe Tracker