Madrid – Sony Music’s unit
in Spain
has licensed streaming video clips to local online social network Tuenti,
Billboard reports. Tuenti’s 8 million users will be able browse artist-specific
pages created on Tuenti and access streaming video clips.
Related Links:
http://snipurl.com/wfgns
(Billboard)
Redwood City,
Calif. – Video game publisher
Electronic Arts said that it has launched a contest for fans to submit
one-liners that will be used in its upcoming "NBA Jam" game. The
voice of the original NBA Jam, Tim Kitzrow, will reprise his role as the game’s
announcer. The original title was known for one-liners such as
"Boom-Shaka-Laka" and "He’s on Fire."
Related Links:
http://snipurl.com/wfa88
San Francisco – Mobile entertainment publisher Hands-On Mobile on Monday
named Judy Wade as its new president and CEO. Wade was previous an executive at
Linden Lab, creators of the "Second Life" virtual world, and before
that an entrepreneur-in-residence at Kapor Enterprises.
Related Links:
http://snipurl.com/wfita
Washington
– The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear an appeal on
"must-carry" cable TV system rules, letting stand a lower court’s
decision upholding the 1992 law requiring cable TV providers to carry local
broadcast stations, the Associated Press reported.
The Obama administration had
weighed in on the matter, urging the Supreme Court to keep the rule intact. Cablevision
sued the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) over the local carriage
requirement, with C-SPAN, Discovery and Time Warner Cable filing briefs in
support.
A federal appeals court eventually upheld the FCC carriage rules.
Related Links:
http://snipurl.com/wffiv
(AP)
Berlin
– A German court ruled last week that Internet users in the country must secure
their Wi-Fi networks with passwords, and will be liable for fines if others are
found to have used their connections for illegal activities, such as
unauthorized music and movie downloading, the Associated Press reported.
Users
could face fines of up to $126 for failing to protect their otherwise
publicly-accessible networks with a password.
The AP notes the ruling does not
hold users directly responsible for copyright infringement by third parties
committed on their unsecured networks.
The ruling also only requires that users
create password protection on their wireless networks upon first installation
of the network.
Related Links:
http://snipurl.com/wfbza
(AP)
San Francisco
– European cable TV provider Liberty Global plans to introduce a set-top box
that will deliver Web video alongside its stable of pay-TV channels, Wired.com
reported.
"It’s a set-top box on steroids," Liberty Global chief technology
officer Balan Nair told Wired.com.
"The interface will be very intuitive
and advanced and include features such as search and recommendation that will
tie in a seamless way the experience of a using a DVR and a web search engine."
Liberty will
partner with electronics makers Samsung and LG to manufacture the set-top,
which Nair told Wired will stream video, voice and data over Wi-Fi to a range
of connected devices in the home.
Wired noted that such set-tops could pose a
threat to start-ups like Boxee and Roku, which offer hardware and software intended
to bring Web video to the television.
Related Links:
http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2010/05/liberty-cable-internet-video
San Bruno,
Calif. – Google’s (NASD: GOOG) YouTube
announced on Monday that, after five years in operation, it is now serving over
2 billion video views daily, representing nearly double the prime-time audience
of the the three major U.S. broadcast networks combined. "What started as
a site for bedroom vloggers and viral videos has evolved into a global platform
that supports HD and 3D, broadcasts entire sports seasons live to 200+
countries," the company said in a blog post.
To celebrate its fifth
birthday, YouTube is also launching the YouTube Five Year channel, which
features videos of "people from all over describing how YouTube has
changed or shaped their lives."
Related Links:
http://snipurl.com/wf911
Los Angeles – Notorious
file-sharing hub The Pirate Bay has been knocked offline by its Internet
service provider, following a court ruling in Germany last week ordering the ISP
to disconnect the site on copyright violations, TorrentFreak reported. The
Motion Picture Association was successful last week in its litigation at the
Regional Court of Hamburg, where it secured a preliminary injunction against
ISP CyberBunker and its parent company CB3ROB.
A Pirate Bay
insider told TorrentFreak that the operators of the site are already working to
get the site back online with a different hosting provider.
The same circumstances have
befallen The Pirate Bay with two of its previous hosting providers, who where ordered
by courts to take the site offline at the behest of entertainment industry
interests.
Related Links:
http://snipurl.com/wf80j
(TorrentFreak)
Sao Paulo,
Brazil –
Thomson Reuters announced on Monday that it has acquired 98-year-old Brazilian
legal publisher Revista dos Tribunais.
Financial terms of the deal were not
disclosed.
The company said the acquisition "presents a strategic
opportunity for Thomson Reuters to lead the move to advanced information,
software and online services for the Brazilian legal information
industry," noting that the country "has among the highest number of
lawyers per capita after the U.S., with a growing base of medium and large law
firms."
The Revista dos Tribunais counts nearly 300 staff, and has more
than 2,000 published titles.
Related Links:
http://snipurl.com/wf6h2
