Feds Probing Tech Hiring Practices

The Justice Department has launched an antitrust probe to take a look at the methods used by some tech companies to hire employees. The Feds believe that methods used when negotiating the hiring of each others employees may be anti-competitive. According to the Washington Post, the investigation is industry-wide, however the DOJ is focusing primarily on the actions of several big-name tech companies.

Google, Yahoo, Apple, and Genetech are receiving the most attention in the early stages of the investigation. Investigators believe the deals to not hire away star talent may be anti-competitive and allows the companies maintain market dominance illegally.

This case is not the first time that the DOJ has taken on tech. In May, it said it would look into Google and Apple, who have strong ties in the leadership of each company. Specifically, the boards of either have strong representation of executives of the other, which could potentially be a conflict of interest.

Back on the subject of hiring, it will be interesting to see what the DOJ concludes. I never really noticed any issue until this story. Come to think of it, there is very low turnover between companies, especially in the upper echelons of managemen

Opera 10 Hits Beta, Adds Turbocharged Dial-Up Mode

Boy, is it ever a great time to be a browser fan. Not only are there multiple viable, worthwhile browsers to choose from, but every one of them is improving with time. The latest example: venerable contender Opera, which is out today in the first beta release of Opera 10, the next version. An alpha has been out for months, but this beta is smoother and slicker, and packs some new features. In my brief time with it so far it’s mostly run well, but it did crash once.

Opera 10 introduces a feature borrowed from Opera Mini, its pint-sized cousin for phones: an option called Turbo which speeds up page rendering by doing it on the server side, then sending the browser a compressed version of the page that can be downloaded more quickly. It’s aimed at dial-up users, but was noticeably zippier than standard mode even on my broadband connection. There are multiple telltale signs of the compression process–graphics look cruder, and Flash elements don’t play until you click them–but it looks to be a worthwhile alternative for folks who are short on bandwidth. I’ll try it again next time I’m out in the world on an EVDO connection which is unusually slow.

Continue reading this story…

EchoStar Ordered To Pay Up in TiVo Patent Case

EchoStar will be forced to pay a total of $190 million to TiVo as a result of a Texas District Judge’s ruling that the company was infringing on technologies patented by TiVo. Furthermore, it was found the company had violated an earlier injunction by attempting to develop a “workaround” which it said still violated TiVo’s patent rights.

TiVo’s case against EchoStar has been going on for quite awhile now: it lost the original case in 2006. This set off a seemingly endless stream of attempts by EchoStar to appeal, of which it lost all major rulings.

In an attempt to avoid further infringement, EchoStar developed what it called a “workaround,” which it said removed what TiVo claimed to be patented technologies. The DVR maker disagreed, and the courts have now found that the workaround did still infringe on patents held by TiVo.

The patent infrigement claims will be worth $73.9 million plus $15.7 million in interest, plus another $103.1 million has been tacked on as a result of infringement that occurred during the injunction period.

In addition, the company will now be required to shut off the infringing technology from practically all of its DVR recorders. In addition, it will not be allowed to attempt another “workaround” without telling the court first.

 EchoStar is remaining ever defiant, saying it will appeal the order with a federal appeals court, however its beginning to look like sooner or later the company’s going to have to pay up.

TiVo seems to enjoy the fact that EchoStar wants to continue pushing its luck: “EchoStar may attempt to further delay this case but we are very pleased the court has made it clear that there are major ramifications for continued infringement,” it said in a statement.

It may make better business sense for EchoStar to just pay up and license the technology. A single court has yet to side with them on any major decision regarding the actual infringement, thus chances of victory in the courts seem slim to none.

At E3, Sony’s Strictly For the Gamers

In my mind, I was readying a trend piece on how this year’s E3 was all about broad appeal from the big three console makers. That plan was scrapped after Sony’s press conference, which was tailor-made for the college male demographic.

This was no more evident than in Sony’s motion control demo. The unnamed project used a handheld device with buttons, like the Wii, but tracked it in 3D space with a camera, like Microsoft’s Project Natal.

But while Nintendo continues to push its family-friendly image, and Microsoft strives to prove that Natal will make the Xbox 360 accessible to all, Sony’s tech demo included first-person shooting and swordfighting. Movement on the screen synced perfectly with the demonstrator’s actions, even as he walked around with a virtual gun in hand. To be fair, Dr. Richard Marks, who presented the technology, said Sony’s tech will afford casual experiences as well, but he also dedicated a fair amount of time to what he called “gamers’ games.”

It was a rough demo — far less polished than what Microsoft showed yesterday — but Sony Computer Entertainment of America CEO Jack Tretton said it will launch in the Spring of 2010.

Sony also gave lots of screen time to shooters and action games, including Uncharted 2: Among Thieves, Assassin’s Creed 2, God of War III and MAG, which boasts 256-person online multiplayer.

The company also thrilled the crowd by announcing Final Fantasy XIV (the 13th game is still in production) and showing a trailer for The Last Guardian, by the makers of the critically-acclaimed Ico and Shadow of the Colossus. Both will be PS3 exclusives.

For balance’s sake, Sony tried to fit in a couple of plugs for a Hannah Montana bundle with a pink PSP. It drew guffaws from the audience at every reference.

PSP Go is Real, PS3 Price Cut is … No Go!

First, the bad news: Sony’s Playstation 3 will continue to sell for $399.

Next, the sort of bad news: the PSP Go, a smaller, lighter handheld dubbed “the worst-kept secret of E3″ by Sony’s Kaz Hirai, will cost $249 — far more than a Nintendo DS or an iPhone.

But hey, maybe the handheld will pay for itself if its 16 GB flash drive and downloadable games prove cheaper than the UMD purchases. Sony didn’t say, so we’ll have to wait until the October 1 release date gets closer for details.

The PSP Go announcement complimented a lengthy segment in Sony’s press event on the Playstation Portable. The company announced a handful of big-name games — already known about, thanks to that leak — and stressed that 2009 would be a big year for the console, which lags behind the Nintendo DS with roughly 50 percent less worldwide sales.

We saw videos of a PSP Gran Turismo and Metal Gear Solid Peace Walker, plus mentions of LittleBigPlanet, SOCOM and Jak & Daxter games for the handheld. Sony also said that its video service will be available directly from the PSP, meaning users won’t have to download the content onto a PC first.

Importantly, Hirai stressed that support for the current PSP model won’t go away. “Let me very clear, the PSP Go will not replace the PSP-3000 or the UMD,” he said. With the PSP-3000 selling for $150, Sony’s set up a tough decision for people looking to buy in.

Few Surprises From Nintendo at E3

Nintendo didn’t look like a trendsetter at its E3 press event today. Instead, we got an earful of cockiness.

The Wii and the Nintendo DS have the broad appeal that Sony and Microsoft can’t capture, and Nintendo knows it. Today, the theme was “everyone,” with the slogan “everyone’s game” repeated several times throughout the presentation.

But with all the innovation out of the way, appealing to everyone just isn’t that exciting. Most of the topics discussed were already known about, and even the breaking news wasn’t surprising.

There was a feeling before the show that Nintendo would unveil new Zelda and Mario games, but only the latter came to fruition. Mario will star in two Wii games this year and beyond: New Super Mario Bros., due this holiday, is a classic two-dimensional platformer with four players at a time (this is not revolutionary, despite Nintendo’s insistence) and Super Mario Galaxy 2 is a straightforward sequel to the 2007 hit.

Nintendo’s confidence continued with the announcement of Wii Fit Plus, a sequel to the Balance Board game that has dominated sales charts since its US release last spring. The expanded collection of exercise games is sure to keep those sales alive when it arrives this fall.

I hoped to see some clever use of the Wii MotionPlus — an accuracy-boosting Wii Remote extension due this month — but instead Nintendo merely demonstrated Wii Sports Resort, a collection of minigames that’s been known about since last year. Nintendo didn’t discuss any MotionPlus games from other publishers besides those we already know about, including Red Steel 2 and Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10.

And then there’s the Nintendo DS. I won’t dwell on the facile attempts to draw in female audiences with games like Women’s Murder Club: Games of Passion and Style Savvy, but the audience was chuckling.

It wasn’t all bad. The announcement of Metroid Other M — a return to third-person shooting for the classic franchise — tickled this long-time fan’s heart. And at the end of the show, I spent a few minutes fencing in Wii Sports resort, and I had fun as expected. But the lack of any bombshells at Nintendo’s press event was a letdown.

I imagine that all the talk of broad appeal is exciting to analysts and investors, but for a journalist that came to see some cool stuff, well, it was just dull.

A Tweetup in San Francisco

Sam Levin and Daniel Brusilovsky, both of whom are definitely Friends of Technologizer, are throwing a tweetup this Thursday in San Francisco from 5:30 to 9:30. Door prizes include Western Digital’s WD TV video box, a WD portable hard drive, Flip video camera, and Speck cases; if you’re in the Bay Area and can make it, you’re invited. (I plan to be there–c’mon over and say hi.)

Click here for more details and to register.

Nintendo Announces Wii Biofeedback Sensor

At the Nokia Theater in downtown LA this morning, Nintendo’s E3 press briefing for its new lineup included the expected cast of characters for its Wii and DS platforms. Among the announced products were more than one new Mario game, a new Metroid game, and a new feature for the DS which allows you to edit photos and upload them directly to Facebook. But the most interesting — and least discussed — new announcement was about a hardware accessory for the Wii which provides the platform with the ability to literally take the pulse of the player, while playing.

As shown in these incredibly blurry photos taken at the event, the device that Nintendo execs are calling the Wii Vitality Sensor, looks like a small plastic sleeve into which you slip an index finger. A cable connects the Vitality Sensor to the Wiimote controller.

The tease for the Vitality Sensor explained that it would give Wii developers the ability to design games that use this type of input—games which can read the player’s physical state in a way that no current-generation console can. In theory, said Nintendo president Satoru Iwata, such an accessory could be used in, for example, a game designed to help the player relax and control his or her heart rate.

While this kind of biofeedback in games isn’t exactly new–especially so for Nintendo, which released a short-lived biofeedback sensor with a game for its Nintendo 64 platform years ago — the timing of the announcement is interesting, when you consider that the other two members of the console maker’s club are expected to announce point-at-the-screen game controllers like the Wii currently uses.

I don’t think Nintendo intends to recreate The Journey to Wild Divine for the Wii, but it isn’t hard to see how, combined with the Wii Fit controller, a heart rate monitor would make a pretty useful fitness gaming accessory. A number of developers have been working on games that use biofeedback to train players to relax. A version of something similar for the Wii — which has already brought huge numbers of casual gamers into the console market — would open up the market for so-called relaxation games to a much broader audience.

Windows 7: Coming to a PC Near You on October 22nd

Back on May 11th, Microsoft confirmed what was already pretty obvious: Windows 7 would ship for the 2009 holiday season. Today, it got specific and said that the OS would show up on new PCs and in retail upgrade boxes on October 22nd. That’s a little later than some predictions–just yesterday I was telling someone that I thought it would arrive in time for the full back-to-school season–but it’s cheery news for a PC industry that’s presumably already worrying about the holiday sales period and looking for incentives it can give consumers to buy, buy, buy.

It’s also a positive development for consumers, since there’s plenty of evidence that a Windows 7 machine will be more pleasing than the same hardware loaded with Windows Vista (or for that matter, Windows XP).

Continue reading this story…

Study Finds Twitter Usage Might Be Overstated

Research by the Harvard Business School seems to indicate that we might need to temper our enthusiasm for Twitter a bit. Taking a random sample of 300,000 users in May, researchers found that the top 10 percent of Twitterers in the sample accounted for 90 percent of all tweets.

Furthermore — and this may be surprising — most rarely tweet. The study found that the median number of tweets was one, which it said translated into half the group only tweeting once every 74 days.

Success as a tweeter also has to do with sex. On average, a male will have 15 percent more followers than a female. Men will follow men: they’re twice as likely to do so as following a woman. 

Harvard researchers noted that this is reversed from what is typically seen on other social networks. “On a typical online social network, most of the activity is focused around women – men follow content produced by women they do and do not know, and women follow content produced by women they know,” they said.

While this is probably not the most representative sample here, I’m wondering if and how often our Technologizer readers tweet.

I for one tweet at least 2-3 times per day. You’re welcome to follow me, of course! :)

Palm Pre’s iTune Sync: Destined for Oblivion?

You don’t tug on Superman’s cape…
You don’t spit into the wind…
You don’t pull the mask off that old Lone Ranger…
And you don’t use clever workarounds or hacks to do things with Apple products which Apple doesn’t want you to do, because Apple will surely release an update which defeats your clever workaround or hack.

–Jim Croce’s “You Don’t Mess Around With Jim” (minor revision by Harry)  

Among the many interesting features of Palm’s almost-here Pre smartphone is Media Sync, which lets it sync with iTunes on a Windows PC or Mac as if it were an iPod or iPhone. Daring Fireball’s John Gruber and Jon Lech Johsnsen (the uberhacker who reverse-engineered DVD encryption and Apple FairPlay DRM) have been blogging about the new feature. I’m intrigued by their take, and puzzled (so far) by what Palm is up to here.

I think that both John and Jon’s analysis is based on this video from last week’s D conference, in which Palm’s Jon Rubenstein shows the  iTunes synching feature. e specifies that it involves no additional software, and the synching is clearly happening within iTunes, which refers to the Pre as an iPod. Jon (Lech Johansen, not Rubenstein) says that the Pre must be essentially pretending to be some specific iPod model and thereby tricking iTunes into doing the sync, and John agrees, saying it “can’t be legit.”

This analysis is all well-informed and sensible. It’s possible, of course, that it’s wrong–maybe Rubenstein mispoke when he said no additional softwaere was involved, for instance. But for the moment, the Gruber/Johansen take on this is at the very least the most likely scenario.

And if it’s indeed what’s going on, it’s tough to figure out what’s going on in Palm’s head. Reasonable people can debate about whether there’s anything underhanded about one company’s device masquerading as another company’s device to gain access to the second company’s software. Reasonable people can debate about whether Apple has any moral responsibility to permit third-party hardware manufacturers to sync their devices  with iTunes. But it’s all moot: If Apple doesn’t like the Pre’s approach to iTunes synching, and there’s a technical  way for it to stop it, it will, in an upcoming iTunes update. History pretty much proves that. And considering that, it seems pointlessly risky for Palm to do what John and Jon think it’s done: There’s a high chance that anyone who buys a Pre because of this feature will end up disappointed when Apple circumvents it.

(Wild card: Maybe Palm is positive there’s no technical way for Apple to respond to what it’s done. I’m not a USB engineer, but this scenario seems unlikely.)

The odd thing is, it’s possible to write software that peeks int iTunes’ music library and syncs songs back and forth in a way that works quite well: When I owned a Windows Mobile phone, I used The Missing Sync to sync it with iTunes. But such techniques involve the installation of software on a computer, and it’s not iTunes that’s doing the synching. You’re synching with iTunes, not via iTunes. If Palm did this, there’d be no controversy and little chance of Apple striking back, and the Pre would have a neat and useful feature.

Based on the D demo, though, whatever the Pre is doing, it’s something other than that. It’ll be fascinating to get more details once the phone comes out on Saturday, and to see how Apple responds.

5Words for Tuesday, June 2nd 2009

Calm before the E3 storm…

4GB iPhone? I remain dubious.

Acer to build Android notebook.

DoJ: remote DVRs are legal.

SanDisk’s SD card for netbooks.

World’s. Cutest. Digital. Audio. Player.

Foveon? They’re still in existence?

Coming soon: more Twitter spam.

Blu-Ray in a portable package.

Microsoft’s E3 Presser: The Games, With Beatles

If fancy gimmickry’s a ways off and social console networking doesn’t catch on, at least Microsoft’s E3 press event had some good old-fashioned games to fall back on.

And yes, Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr were there to lend a hand. More on that later.

Maybe it’s because I’m green on the E3 battlefield, but it seems that Microsoft is making a big push for exclusivity in its line-up. Of the dozen video games announced at the presser, more than half will only be released on the Xbox 360, and in some cases the PC. All of the games had some element of bragging rights for Microsoft.

That started with The Beatles: Rock Band, which will be released for all consoles. Xbox 360 owners, however, will get to download “All You Need is Love,” with the proceeds going to Doctors Without Borders. To mark the announcement, Sir Paul and Ringo indeed showed up, even if their one-liners and lack of musical performance was a letdown.

Additionally, the much-anticipated Modern Warfare 2 will release two map packs that will go to Xbox Live before reaching the Playstation Network.

In another slap in the face to Sony, Metal Gear Solid creator Hideo Kojima took the stage to announce Metal Gear Solid Rising for the Xbox 360. The series has long given preferential treatment to the Playstation brand, with Metal Gear Solid 4 considered a PS3 system seller.

The other exclusives weren’t surprising. Left 4 Dead 2, Crackdown 2, Forza Motorsport 3, Halo 3: ODST and yet another Halo game called Halo Reach all have Xbox 360 predecessors. And we already knew that Microsoft had locked up Splinter Cell: Conviction and Alan Wake.

But as a whole, the games segment of Microsoft’s press event is a testament to the console wars. Exclusivity has little benefit to gamers, but it’s not going away.

One last thing: Microsoft apparently didn’t have time to announce this during the press conference, but it will offer full-length games for digital download. You know it was a monstrous E3 briefing when news of that caliber didn’t make the first cut.

Google is Serious about e-Books

Google is gearing up to challenge Amazon’s dominance in the e-book market. The New York Times is reporting that the company signaled its intention to introduce a system for publishers to sell digital versions of their books at the BookExpo convention in New York this past weekend.

According to the report, customers will be able to purchase books directly from Google on any device that has Internet access–even smartphones. Publishers would set the retail pricing for new prints, which is expected to be equivalent to hardcover pricing. However, Google is reserving the right to adjust any pricing that it finds to be “exorbitant,” the Times noted.

Continue reading this story…

Will Xbox Live Be a Hangout?

Microsoft wasn’t shy about its intentions during today’s E3 press event: It’s trying to branch out beyond the typical gamer set. Project Natal is one piece of the puzzle, and so is Xbox Live, for which the company revealed five significant additions and improvements.

Let’s make this nice and easy with a list:

Social Networking: Come this fall, Facebook and Twitter will be accessible through Xbox Live. A demonstration showed the usual features, such as status updates and friend lists, presented in the New Xbox Experience’s distinct windows. One feature allows Facebook friends to find each others’ Xbox 360 Gamertags.

“Live Party”: Friends on Xbox Live can watch videos or listen to music together over the Internet. In a brief demonstration, avatars gathered in front of a television (within a television, of course), watching and reacting to the content.

Zune Marketplace: As we heard when Microsoft announced the Zune HD, Xbox Live’s video service will become Zune-branded, but it’ll get at least one substantive change in the form of 1080p streaming videos.

Last.fm: Xbox Live Gold members around the world will have access to millions of songs through Last.fm, simple as that.

Netflix Improvements: My biggest gripe with the Xbox’ 360s Netflix service was the inability to select movies or manage playlists directly on the console. Fortunately, that will change, so a PC is no longer required.

While the Zune and Netflix developments are just tweaks to existing services, the other three announcements go in a different direction. Microsoft wants the Xbox 360 to be a hangout. I can almost sense this ideal of families or friends crowded around the tube, getting a dose of interactive entertainment.

But will people get into it? Live Party didn’t get an enthusiastic response at the press event, and the social networking seems a little clunky for everyday use (especially without a keyboard). I’m reluctant to make a bold prediction either way, but I’m curious to see how this effort pans out.

“Project Natal” is the Xbox 360′s Motion Control

Kudo Tsunoda took a shot at the Wii when introducing Microsoft’s answer to motion control today.

“This isn’t a game where you end up on the sofa just kind of using some preset waggle commands,” the project’s creative director said, talking about a physically intense tech demo.

Indeed, the so-called “Project Natal” was impressive, at least from where I was sitting at Microsoft’s E3 press event. As rumored, the technology is a 3D motion-sensing camera that needs no other peripherals to operate.

Video demonstrations included a young man performing karate kicks against an on-screen opponent, his image duplicated onscreen with dead-on accuracy. In the next clip, a girl held her hands like a steering wheel and drove a race car. When she hit a pit stop, one of her family members ran up to the screen and made the motions of replacing a tire.

We also saw a couple of live demonstrations. In a full-bodied take on Breakout, a girl used her arms, legs and head to hit balls down a 3D corridor. Another demonstrator pretended to throw paint buckets at a screen and created live splatter art.

Finally, Fable 2 creator Peter Molyneux introduced “Milo,” a child that, in a video, interacted with a real woman. In the most impressive moment, she drew a picture, held it in front of the screen, and Milo took a virtual copy, recognizing the color and shape of the drawing. Milo will apparently be demonstrated to VIPs during E3.

Microsoft steered clear from any sort of release window for Project Natal. Everything shown was in prototype, and the initial video shown is “product vision” rather than real implementation. The closest we heard to a timetable is that development kits are going out now.

In my E3 wish list, I said I’d rather see  Microsoft wait until the next console cycle to bust out motion control, but a comment by Don Mattrick, the Xbox division’s senior vice president, suggests that this technology will simply extend the life of the Xbox 360. It seems Microsoft is in no rush to move on to something else.

“We can leap into a new era of interactive entertainment without having to launch a new console,” he said.

You can see the concept video on YouTube.