Ad-ding It Up for VOD

It’s kind of like the war between spammers and anti-spammers. As soon as one side comes up with a new technological weapon, the other builds something for the arsenal to counter it. So it goes with television advertising. Charter is starting a trial in hometown St. Louis of dynamic, on-demand advertising. The reason this is … Read more

ZNF Does TechCrunch NYC, Part 2

Apparently Mike Arrington was at TechCrunch New York on Thursday night. Given that there were no introductions, no speeches or toasts, I had my doubts. I’m not one to stand on ceremony, but shouldn’t there at least have been a welcome to everyone? I did get some gratification, however. After announcing my status as official … Read more

CE Under the Tree (or Hanukkah Bush)

In the midst of today’s gadget-opia, you’d think it would be easy to pick out CE gifts for the holiday season. But the NPD Group suggests that consumers will be shunning electronics this year in favor of more �traditional� gifts like clothing and toys. And I’m not surprised. While there are plenty of new and … Read more

YouTube Goes for (More) Mass Distribution

Notice how indie and mass commercial distribution networks are merging? Well here’s one more example: Reuters and The Wall Street Journal report that YouTube (apparently we still call it that if even after Google’s buyout) and Verizon are in talks to distribute YouTube videos over cell phones and the FiOS TV network. I’m very curious … Read more

Is Our Online Digital Media Safe?

I hear ya… You want to know who Mari is. I’ll have a proper intro up in the next day or so. Stay tuned! -DZ

youtube.gifSeveral news organizations are reporting that YouTube has wiped nearly 30,000 videos from its site after a Japanese audit fingered the clips for copyright infringement. Aside from the rights management concerns, this brings up an interesting issue for those who upload and store content on remote servers: When content isn’t stored locally, it isn’t under your control…

In this case it may have been perfectly reasonable for YouTube to remove 30,000 files, but these situations won’t always be black and white. There’s a growing trend towards moving our content off local devices — online word processing applications, photo storage sites, even under-development Network DVRs. While remote storage has its benefits, there are also disadvantages that shouldn’t be ignored. The ability for providers to delete files at will is one of them.

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MySpace Hosts Fox Television Programming

Let me start by saying I don’t get MySpace. Maybe I’m too old or maybe I’m just antisocial, but I haven’t found a use for it (other than the requisite ‘keeping-tabs-on-exes’). In fact, seeing some of the stuff (risqué photos, confidential work details, etc) a few younger coworkers have publicly revealed alarms me. Despite me … Read more

iTunes 7 Web Roundup

The Good iTunes 7’s big new features. (TUAW) How to back up your music using iTunes 7. (TUAW) Use QTFairUse 2.3 to strip FairPlay DRM. (Engadget) The Bad iTunes doesn’t see all Nanos. (Apple) Streaming to SoundBridge is broken. (Roku) The Ugly iTunes 7 ate all my purchased music. (Wil Wheaton)

Dave Covers Zune

blah blah blah Toshiba Gigabeat S blah blah blah plus MusicGremlin blah blah blah battle iPod/iTunes blah blah blah If you’d like more verbose coverage, I suggest Engadget: Zune player, Zune marketplace