Los Angeles – MovieTickets.com said on Tuesday that it has
partnered with Microsoft (NASD: MSFT) to allow gamers to purchase advance movie tickets from
their Xbox 360 game consoles through the Xbox Live online service. Xbox Live
members in the U.S. can now purchase tickets through a text-in, or via a
Microsoft Tag viewed in movie studio ads on the service.
Related Links:
http://tinyurl.com/2f7xobn
Los Angeles – Sweden’s file-sharing-friendly Pirate Party is
partnering on the launch of a new ISP in the country, which promises to offer
anonymity to file-swappers while financially supporting the Party, TorrentFreak
reported.
The Pirate Party recently announced plans to begin hosting notorious
file-sharing hub The Pirate Bay from within the halls of Sweden’s Parliament,
claiming Parliamentary immunity.
The Pirate ISP will be operated by ViaEuropa,
which also developed a Web anonymity service called iPredator.
The service is
already beta testing in the Swedish city of Lund.
Pirate ISP chief executive
Gustav Nipe told TorrentFreak the company aims to take 5% of the market in
Lund, and then expand to other locations in Sweden.
Related Links:
http://tinyurl.com/3y63wen
(TorrentFreak)
Los Angeles – The Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem
(DECE), a consortium of technology and entertainment firms jointly developing a
new open market for digital content distribution, on Tuesday introduced its
"UltraViolet" consumer brand. The group hopes the UltraViolet brand
and logo will catch on with consumers, and inform them of content that can be
played across multiple platforms — including connected TVs, PCs, game
consoles, smartphones and tablet PCs.
Consumers will be able to create free,
cloud-based UltraViolet accounts, which will include a digital rights locker
and allow them to manage all of their UltraViolet-branded content, regardless
of where it was purchased.
The first UltraViolet content, services and devices
are expected to launch later this year.
The DECE also announced the addition of
three new members, brining its roster to 60: LG Electronics, Marvell
Semiconductor and LOVEFiLM.
Related Links:
http://tinyurl.com/2drwk4g
Seattle – Amazon.com (NASD: AMZN) has announced that, as its Kindle
e-book reader has been the top-selling item on the entire site for the past two
years, the company now sells more books in the Kindle format than it does print
editions. "Even while our hardcover sales continue to grow, the Kindle
format has now overtaken the hardcover format. Amazon.com customers now
purchase more Kindle books than hardcover books — astonishing when you
consider that we’ve been selling hardcover books for 15 years, and Kindle books
for 33 months," said Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos.
"We’ve
reached a tipping point with the new price of Kindle — the growth rate of
Kindle device unit sales has tripled since we lowered the price from $259 to
$189," added Bezos.
The Kindle bookstore now offers over 630,000 e-book
titles for sale, in addition to some 1.8 million free, public domain titles.
Amazon
said that over the past three months, the company has sold 143 Kindle books for
every 100 hardcover books sold, while that figure jumped to 180: 100 in the
past month.
Related Links:
http://tinyurl.com/23bmaxz
Redmond, Wash. – Microsoft (NASD: MSFT) announced on Tuesday that it will
release its forthcoming Kinect motion-based controller for the Xbox 360 on
November 4 with a price tag of $150. Kinect — formerly known as Project Natal
— uses cameras and voice recognition technology to control gameplay.
Microsoft
will also release a new entry-level Xbox 360 model, featuring a 4GB hard drive
— instead of the now-standard 250GB drive — for $200 on Aug. 3.
A bundle with
the 4GB Xbox 360, the Kinect system, and the "Kinect Adventures" game
will sell for $300.
Microsoft said the Kinect system will launch with more than
15 available games.
Some retailers will begin taking pre-orders for the Kinect
and $300 console bundle today.
Related Links:
http://tinyurl.com/29gb93x
San Francisco – Venture capital firm Founders Fund, which
has backed companies including Facebook, Spotify and Quantcast, announced on
Tuesday that it has closed its third venture fund at $250 million, its largest
yet.
San Francisco-based Founders Fund is managed by Peter Thiel, Ken Howery,
Luke Nosek and Sean Parker.
"Our goal is to provide as much support for a
company as it requires, without interfering with an entrepreneur’s vision for
that company," said Thiel. "In our experience that leads to the best
returns for our investors."
"We’re delighted that our limited
partners have backed us for a third fund," added Howery, "and we’ll
use that fund to continue supporting transformational companies."
Related Links:
http://tinyurl.com/2dzcglx
Mountain View, Calif. – Pixazza, a developer of
commerce-enabled Web images, has raised $12 million in its second round of
financing, led by Shasta Ventures.
Previous backers August Capital, CMEA
Capital and Google Ventures also participated in the round, which will be used
to fuel product growth, and facilitate category and geographic expansion.
Mountain View, Calif.-based Pixazza’s service lets consumers mouse over Web
images to learn more, see related products or make purchases.
The company said
its publisher network now reaches more than 25 million unique monthly visitors,
and today launched a new self-service publishing tool.
Related Links:
http://tinyurl.com/2e6rxje
Los Angeles – Gaikai, the operator of a cloud-based video
game streaming service, announced on Tuesday that it has received new
investments from Intel Capital and Limelight Networks.
Financial details were
not disclosed.
Los Angeles-based Gaikai plans to launch its service this
summer, which will utilize Intel equipment and Limelight’s content delivery
network services.
The company recently signed Electronic Arts as a partner, and
will stream titles such as "Mass Effect" and "Medal of
Honor" on its service.
Other investors in Gaikai include Benchmark
Capital, TriplePoint Capital and Rustic Canyon Partners.
Related Links:
http://tinyurl.com/25wt9v6
Los Angeles – FanFeedr, a service that provides sports news
aggregation and a social game that includes virtual betting, has raised
$450,000 in seed funding from friends and family, PEHub.com reported.
Founded
in 2008, the free service offers sports fans a range of real-time news feeds,
and allows virtual wagering via credits that may be purchased, or else earned by
agreeing to participate in marketing offers from TrialPay.
The company will use
the funds for infrastructure and operations.
Related Links:
http://tinyurl.com/2ek3nkw
(PEHub.com)
