Kara Swisher is inteviewing Tom Rogers, CEO of TiVo (and CEO with the ideal pirate name).

Kara: Why not TiVo tech in Televisions, powering everything?
Rogers: Biggest reason is that Televisions already have little margins. Building them into Televisions makes it hard to drive the same pricing. What we’re finding is that the Television world is extremely commoditized so they need to do things to differentiate with things like ease of use, and those things are bringing us back front and center.

Kara: How do you move away from the rep of a content thief?

Roger: We got around it by saying that no matter what TiVo does, fast forwarding through commercials is here to stay. They have to deal with it. No way to turn the clock back on this. They need to figure out an ad model that works. Passive watching isn’t going to work against the measurability of the web medium. So that’s what we’re working on. Ads in menus, ads at the end of the show or doing pause. Somehow you have to get them to click into and measure an ad.

Rogers: Do something to catch someone’s eye. Maybe at the end of the show, which is effective because there’s no interruption. Not everyone will watch your ad, but no one really did before. People changed their channels, went to the kitchen, and it was a lie. We track it by seconds, and it’s astonishing the difference between what people thought watchers were doing with ads.

The broadcast industry has to state that once everyone has a DVR, they’ve to figure out a way to advertise, otherwise they don’t have a business model.

Rogers: The cable companies are interested in getting our software. The box still has a role, though, because we can talk to a customer without an intermediary. It helps us gain leverage on cable companies, because we don’t have to pitch it to them. We’re here as a customer option they can see and compare the boxes to.

Kara: How about the internet content?
Rogers says they do this.

Kara: And people want one box to do this all. But who can do that? You’re not in a power position to do this.

Rogers: That’s why the box is important to us.

Rogers also says that cable will be the ones he thinks will do the box, because they’re already in the position of delivering so much. (Over both broadcast and IP, these days—B.L.)

Rogers also thinks that TV networks have to avoid the same pitfalls that the newspaper guys are dealing with now versus the internet. They need to rethink their models now to avoid dark times.

Rogers on CableCard: There’s no reason in the world why a cable company can’t just mail it to you. The cable industry sends a guy out and goes into your house, and has a opportunity to sell you his box, but this hasn’t been worked out in a regulatory rules yet.

Rogers on the TiVo/Comcast deal’s delay so far: The actual development time was 18 months, plus 10 months of prep before that. It’s not the box or software, it’s the infrastructure that cable has that has not proven it can support advanced operations. (What’s that mean? Cable has TV and IP, what else do you need?)

Rogers on more video sources: There isn’t a video producing company that isn’t talking to TiVo this day. Amazon Unbox isn’t exclusive.

Rogers on getting content around the house: Right now you need additional TiVo boxes, but we’re looking at addressing this need.

[All Things D]

Via [Gizmodo]

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Windows Live for Nokia is a service that brings Live Contacts, Messenger, Hotmail, and Spaces to the Nokia S60 platform. While it has been available in many parts of the world for quite a while, the US and a number of other countries have been missing out.

This day, Phil Holden announced on his blog that Windows Live for Nokia would be rolling out in 7 new markets, bringing the total up to 33. The markets joining the list this day are Hungary, Iceland, India, Israel, Poland, Romania and the US (Comprehensive list after the jump). Don’t get too attached if you’re not looking to spend a few bucks; while the service will be free at first, it’ll eventually switch over to for-pay at some undetermined date.

For more information and the list of supported S60 devices, check out the Windows Live for Nokia site.

Full list of supported markets:
Australia, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Iceland, India, Indonesia, Israel, Ireland, Malaysia, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, South Africa, Spain, Switzerland, Sweden, Thailand, UAE, USA, UK and Vietnam

Via Mobilecrunch

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Usenet appears to be the MPAA’s next target. Not good. The MPAA has told Newzbin, a popular Usenet indexing service and creator of the NZB file format, that it’s hosting copyright-infringing material, material that needs to be removed post-haste. Never mind that NZB files themselves aren’t copyright-infringing (though I doubt the courts would make that distinction), […]

Usenet appears to be the MPAA’s next target. Not good.

The MPAA has told Newzbin, a popular Usenet indexing service and creator of the NZB file format, that it’s hosting copyright-infringing material, material that needs to be removed post-haste. Never mind that NZB files themselves aren’t copyright-infringing (though I doubt the courts would make that distinction), but such is the world we live in.

By the looks of it, Newzbin seems to be complying with the MPAA’s demands. It made a statement saying it doesn’t “condone” the posting of copyright-infringing material, and has hinted that it will remove such material and ban offending accounts.

A few months ago, the RIAA targeted a prominent Usenet provider, so going after enablers like Newzbin was the next logical step.

My advice? Leech off Usenet while you stile can.

via TorrentFreak

Via [crunchgear]

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Samsung has announced the Soulb, which they state contains “all the merits of Soul DNA” in a candy bar form factor. The names an interesting one — though I’m unable to copy it here without using an image, the trailing b in Soulb is actually written as if it were a superscript, like so: . How would that be pronounced? Soul to the power of b? Soul-bee? Soul bar?

The handset squeezes a good amount into its 9.9mm thick body: HSDPA/Triband, 2.0″ QVGA screen, 3 megapixel camera with PowerLED flash, User created UI skins, Office document viewing, multimedia playback, FM radio, 1 gig of internal memory, and a microSD slot. Not a fan of the Soul Grey shown above? It also comes in Platinum Silver, Metallic Black, Soul Pink and Amethyst Violet.

It’ll launch in Germany in early June, and then trickle out to everywhere besides North America in the months thereafter. No word yet on pricing.

Via Mobilecrunch

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Our friend Robert Woodhead is at it again: He took his battlin’ bot Completely Offensive—and his trusty Casio Exilim EX-F1—to Carolina Combat Robots for some “test procedures” in preparation for the RoboGames in San Francisco June 13-15. End result: Mayhem ensuing at 300 frames per second, with some sparks flying, some parts flying and some fax machines and other stand-in electronics getting shizammed to oblivion. Grab a sandwich and press play, cuz you’ll probably watch this four-minute fest of cyberviolence a few times. And remember, this was only a test! Thanks again, Robert! [Robert Woodhead]

Via [Gizmodo]

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Short of the airlock opening in the space station and sucking you out to die in a vacuum, what’s the worst thing that could happen during your visit to the International Space Station? If you guessed “the toilet breaking,” you’re the massive winner! Because that’s exactly what happened this week.

While the solid waste functions of the toilet are still functioning all right, the liquid waste fan is working intermittently. So while the crew awaits a possible space plumber from the upcoming Discovery mission (that had planned on docking at the station anyway), they’ve made due with a backup “bag-like” system.

But what are the real implications of a broken toilet? Maybe NASA’s Allard Beutel summed it up best:

Like any home anywhere, the importance of having a working bathroom is obvious.

[CNN]

Via [Gizmodo]

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Op http://www.BE16.nl vindt je exclusieve deals, coole merken en gadgets, filmpjes, klik en win acties en meer … Ga snel naar BE16!

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Someone managed to get their hands on the ad spot for Sony Ericsson’s P5 Paris, and the folks over at JustAMP pushed it to YouTube. Details about this QWERTY/NumPad combo slider have been leaking out for the past month. Word is it’ll be made official at Sony Ericsson’s press conference on June 17th.

It’s a pretty lookin’ thing for sure, but if it doesn’t let me warp from business suit to hideous colored sweater vest at the press of a button like in the demo spot, I will be sorely disappointed.

Via Mobilecrunch

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Well, this one is just about as speculatory as it gets: Infineon, who might be supplying the chips for the 3G iPhone, announced this morning that they’re seeing less demand for HSDPA chips than they expected from an unnamed project. Analysts are guessing this means the next iPhone has either been delayed, or will launch with lower volumes.

Nothing to worry about, iPhone fans. If Steve planned to announce the 3G iPhone at WWDC, Steve will be announcing the 3G iPhone at WWDC. The launch date probably wouldn’t change either — if the initial shipments are lower than the demand, it’ll just lead to even more demand generated by all of the “OMG!!! 3G iPhone shortage!! Go fight a guy for yours!” stories that will go up.

[Via 9to5Mac]

Via Mobilecrunch

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A forum post on DP Review says that pricing info for Sony’s upcoming full-frame 25-megapixel flagship a900 DSLR went out to reps about a month ago, and that Sony’s aiming to to bring it to market for under two grand.

If true, that’d make it incredibly, stupidly cheap as far as major megapixel, full-frame cameras go, putting it more in prosumer than pure pro territory, somewhere between Canon’s 5D and Nikon’s D300, and way below either company’s pro cams. Let’s not hold our breaths yet, though. [DP Review via Photography]

Via [Gizmodo]

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