Mari Silbey 
Not much to report from New Orleans yet, but I’m on the ground. From the look of the sessions over the next few days, there will be a lot of tru2way talk, and no shortage of discussions on bandwidth, the DTV transition and cable advertising apps. Start looking for company news announcements today – a lot of folks won’t wait for the start of the work week. And if you’re a Twitter-er, the NCTA tweets under the name CableShow.
Like freebies? This one’s not bad at all. Laplink, which specializes in file syncing and migration software, is giving away copies of its PCmover product. According to the press release: PCmover automatically moves selected files, folders, settings, and even applications from an old PC to a new one. The software is normally $50, but to … Read more
I’ve been meaning to follow up on Dave’s Sezmi post. I’ll start by saying that I love the idea of Sezmi, the former Building-B, but I simply can’t imagine how the enterprise will succeed. As everyone has discovered, video services are entirely dependent on the quality of the transmission systems they use. Sezmi is relying … Read more
We finally hooked up the JVC KD-HDR1 in my husband’s car (okay, Tweeter hooked it up), and I filmed a quick Flip video showing the device’s add-on iPod module. Very few after-market car stereos include HD radio and an iPod connector that lets you not only listen to you iPod through through the car speakers, … Read more
I’ve been living with the Slacker Portable device for about six weeks now and have accumulated a slew of thoughts/insights/revelations on what I like and don’t like about the music player. In case you’re really ADD or just don’t have the time to read the details, here’s the bottom line: the functionality of the Slacker Portable is phenomenal, and far outweighs the hardware and software quirks that come along with it.
First, if you’ve never used the Slacker service online, go check it out. It’s like other customizable Internet radio applications (Last.fm, Pandora), but the personalization tools are particularly flexible and produce great results. So far, having a Slacker Portable is just like carrying the online application around in my pocket, and I don’t need a constant broadband connection.
Like Slacker’s online service, you can use the Slacker Portable to create custom Internet radio stations, or select from DJ-derived stations based on genre. It comes with built-in Wi-Fi, which you can use to transfer station content to the device any time you’re in range of an open wireless network. (No feature yet to enable connections to password-protected networks) In a brilliant move, the Slacker folks let you pre-load your device with stations from your online account when you order it. This is nice because otherwise the first-time download of music via Wi-Fi takes hours. Content refreshes are much faster.
If you follow the DVR market, you likely remember Digeo’s spectacular failure-to-launch earlier this year. After hyping a line of retail DVR products through the Consumer Electronics Show, the company suddenly pulled the launch and cut half its staff in mid-January. We got word that Digeo would continue to focus on one retail DVR product … Read more
HDTV just never gets old. According to a friend at the NAB show, companies are still shouting HD from the rooftops. Or in this case, from their booth displays. Weather and traffic are in on the game. AccuWeather was showing off HD content for all types of displays and platforms. Here are some photos of … Read more
After the explosive hype around Amazon’s launch of the Kindle, things have gone kinda quiet on the new e-book reader, with the exception of reports on shipping delays last month. So are people buying the Kindle? Are they using it? Are they liking it? I can’t answer any of those questions, but I can relate … Read more