Net law professor Michael Geist takes a look at how open access is reshaping the way research becomes available.

Filed under: HDTV, Peripherals, Networking

Sony announced last month that they would be releasing products including their new Internet Video Link capabilities, which will allow users to stream free standard and high-definition content through their broadband connections directly to the television, bypassing any set-top boxes or computers. Providers will include AOL, Yahoo!, Sony Pictures, and Sony BMG music, along with user generated videos and RSS feeds. Now we've got more detail on the IVL box, along with a glimpse at the first sets to support it. Apparently the unit will display its wares in Sony's XMB Xross Media Bar format, as seen on the company's PSP and PS3 consoles. The IVL module will be sold separately for $300 starting in July, and it attaches to the back of a "majority" of Sony's 2007 BRAVIA sets -- currently including the new KDL-46S3000, KDL-40S3000, KDL-32S3000, KDL-26S3000, KDL-46V3000, KDL-40V3000 and KDL-32XBR4 LCDs, and the KDF-37E3000, KDF-50E3000 and KDF-46E3000 micro-displays. Looks like a regular ol' USB plug will do the honors, and the IVL saps power from the TV while sipping internet off of an Ethernet plug, so added cable clutter will be fairly minimal.

 

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BOLD MOVES: THE FUTURE OF FORD A new documentary series. Be part of the transformation as it happens in real-time

Office Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!

Online campaigns and e-petitions are only the beginning of what the net can do to politics, argues Bill Thompson.

Filed under: Handhelds, Tablet PCs, Wireless, Networking

Although UMPCs haven't exactly caught like wildfire for one reason or another, Berkeley Varitronics Systems is hoping to make a splash in the spectrum analyzer niche with its vividly colored BumbleBee. Touted as a tool for "investigating and troubleshooting corporate wireless networks," BVS' machine is capable of measuring VoIP, 802.11b/a/g, Bluetooth, WiMAX, cordless phones and video, RFID, and broadband public safety data networks. Aside from packing goods that a vast majority of average joes will have absolutely no use for, the three-pound handheld houses a 1GHz Intel Pentium M processor, Windows XP Tablet PC Edition, a seven-inch WVGA touchscreen display, 1GB of DDR RAM, 40GB hard drive, Ethernet, an SMA connection port, and gets powered by four AA cells. While it's doubtful you'll be using all this hardware to check your inbox, it does give you user-selectable power triggers, three pairs of markers, spectrogram, histogram, video smoothing, and waveform averaging, and a PIP mode that allows viewing of live and recorded data. For those still with us, the BumbleBee is purportedly available in two separate forms, one with omnidirectional antennas covering 902 to 928MHz, 2.4 to 2.5GHz, and 5.15 to 5.9GHz, while the other flavor just handles 2.4 to 2.5GHz and 4.9 to 5.9GHz. Of course, all this analyzing won't run you cheap, as each unit clocks in at a whopping $4,500, and if you're thinking about interfacing with Windows XP mapping software, you'll be looking at an extra $2,500 for that luxury.

[Via Slashgear]

 

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BOLD MOVES: THE FUTURE OF FORD A new documentary series. Be part of the transformation as it happens in real-time

Office Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!

BBC Click reporter Chris Long takes a swipe at some of the technologies that are floated as good ideas by government.

Filed under: Storage, Networking

Western Digital is at it again with its My Book lineup of HDDs, but rather than bumping the storage capacity from the already roomy (albeit bulky) 1TB Pro II Edition, WD is adding an Ethernet port for remote access ability. The My Book World Edition II sports a shiny white finish and touts 1TB of storage, RAID 1 capability, a USB 2.0 port for stringing on more external drives, and the obligatory gigabit Ethernet jack to boot. Additionally, this device pays a bit more attention to detail by offering up a "unique capacity gauge LED that allows users to discern at a glance remaining storage space," but the real story is its ability to be accessed from any internet connection as a standalone device. Essentially becoming a NAS drive at heart via the included Anywhere Access software, this Book also includes Data OnHand software which makes the drive active in Windows Explorer regardless of your location, and boasts the ability to let friends and family access / upload files without having to actually be near the drive. Notably, the My Book World Edition II is deemed "user-serviceable," and should be available by the week's end for $499, but if you're interested in the half-sized 500GB My Book World Edition, you can snag it for just $279.

[Via Yahoo, thanks Steve]

 

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BOLD MOVES: THE FUTURE OF FORD A new documentary series. Be part of the transformation as it happens in real-time

Office Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!

Filed under: Wireless, Networking

Oh tricky, sneaky Fon. Fresh off their 10,000 Fonero giveaway, they're stepping up the ante with how they give away their loss-leader routers. Their newest campaign is sure to strike a chord with armchair entrepreneurs and Adbusters fans alike: if you live within the immediate vicinity of a Starbucks (read: WiFi range), Fon would like to send you one of their Foneros. Why? Because, if you recall, when you allow users to connect with your internet connection over your Fonero, Fon splits the profit with you -- $1 for every user (who pays $2 to use your connection). So for every $10 T-Mobile / Starbucks WiFi user you swipe, Fon gives you a buck; now, granted this still isn't a scheme for those paranoid about home network security, bandwidth usage, or nefarious hax0rs type with a spoofed MAC and a keen eye for easy hotspot access, but who knows, for those near Starbucks (yes, they'll be checking against known locations) it might even be worth it to buy a budget DSL line just to profit with Fon.

 

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BOLD MOVES: THE FUTURE OF FORD A new documentary series. Be part of the transformation as it happens in real-time

Office Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!

Filed under: Home Entertainment, Networking

As if we needed any more verification of the existence of such a device, Sling's SlingLink Turbo just go peeped from all sorts of angles for some fancy press shots, and seems to be accompanied by another new SlingLink model that keeps the sexy design but loses the Ethernet hub. What a charming couple.

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BOLD MOVES: THE FUTURE OF FORD A new documentary series. Be part of the transformation as it happens in real-time

Office Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!

Filed under: Networking

For those who are lucky enough to have only known the internet care of broadband, you might be a bit unfamiliar with the pings and screeches of days past, but for those all too familiar with dialing up in an attempt to hop on the world wide web, you could probably hum it back on command. In yet another instance of DIY creativity being used in a completely unnecessary (albeit very retro) manner, Jonah Brucker-Cohen is developing the Forward Compatible, which is a "parasitic object" that utilizes a light sensor in order to sense when a modern day modem / router is transmitting data, and subsequently belts out tones from a 2,400 baud modem from yesteryear. The FC is also designed to simply strap onto any internet-connected device without internal modifications, making it completely portable and universal in nature. So if you're interested in adding a dash of vintage to your otherwise fresh device, grab yourself an audio recording circuit, a photo-transistor, and tag the read link for a bit of old fashioned fun.

[Via MAKE]

 

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BOLD MOVES: THE FUTURE OF FORD A new documentary series. Be part of the transformation as it happens in real-time

Office Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!

Filed under: Home Entertainment, Networking

When you're slinging media across the home, there's no such thing as "too much bandwidth," and it looks like Sling Media is beefing up its SlingLink line of home wiring network products with the SlingLink Turbo. The new device ups the bandwidth from 14Mbps to 85Mbps, and while the original SlingLinks were primarily designed for a single Slingbox connection, the Turbo vision should be able to handle more general purpose home media networking tasks. The SlingLink Turbo was spotted by a SlingCommunity member on Amazon.com, with an expected ship date of February 27th 2007 for $149. The device is interoperable with existing PowerLine adapters, and has four Ethernet ports beyond the PowerLine link. As far as rumors go, this one looks pretty legit, but with a February 27th date on the books, we should know exactly how legit before too terribly long.

[Thanks TieGuy]

 

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BOLD MOVES: THE FUTURE OF FORD A new documentary series. Be part of the transformation as it happens in real-time

Office Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!