The AP uses the phrase “subtle but noticeable” to describe how the new $150 XD-E500 looks in comparison to another, unnamed upconverting player. “Subtle but noticeable” isn’t exactly a ringing endorsement, it must be said. Great words - but is this new DVD player worth it?

And who exactly is Toshiba going after here? They’re charging a premium—the XD-E500 is about twice as expensive as other upconverting DVD players—for an old technology. People who’d want to spend extra money on their home entertainment might as well go for Blu-ray.

ShareThis

Tom Coates, head of product at Yahoo! Brickhouse, said Fire Eagle is dedicated making everything on the Internet more useful, fun or interesting by adding the element of location. “We’re here to help people take their location to the Web by giving them the ability to control how much detail about their location they want to share and which applications they want to share it with,” Coates said.

For users, Fire Eagle acts as an interface for managing location information and deciding how, and with whom, to share it. Automatically, users can authorize Web, mobile or desktop applications to update their location. Also, this open platform enables users to decide how much of that information to share with their favorite services, company officials say. Officials said at any time they can hide themselves, change their sharing preferences or delete any of their stored information.

Fire Eagle allows developers to focus on how they can use location in their services without having to build the infrastructure to know where their users are. Fire Eagle was built at Yahoo! Brickhouse, a home for start-up like projects inside Yahoo!. Since its private beta launch earlier this year, Fire Eagle has been integrated into over fifty live applications, including Dopplr, Pownce, Movable Type, and Outside.in.

“The combination of Outside.in’s new Radar feature and Fire Eagle’s amazingly simple and powerful API means that our users can now see all the news and buzz within 1,000 feet of their current location, updated from any number of applications and devices,” said Steven Johnson (News - Alert), co-founder of Outside.in.
“Fire Eagle allowed us to easily add location data to Pownce using their simple API,” said Leah Culver, co-founder of Pownce.

ShareThis

AT&T posted on its site Friday that it would indeed be offering free Wi-Fi, only to renege and say it was a mistake that was posted. As of Friday afternoon, the Web page that announced the arrival of free Wi-Fi had been removed. AT&T told customers in April that it would be brining iPhone users free Wi-Fi access, but has yet to make the service available.

“We have not made any announcement regarding free Wi-Fi and iPhone,” Seth Bloom - AT&T technology - told Ars Technica. “Wi-Fi is a real differentiator for AT&T and it is our intention to make it available to as many customers as possible.” AT&T is the exclusive wireless carrier for the iPhone in the U.S., having inked a five-year deal with Apple following the product’s launch last summer.

ShareThis

Sprint launched online sales of the Treo 800w, the Windows Mobile-based Treo model, hoping to capitalize on the fading Apple iPhone 3G fever, which hit its peak when Apple launched the device Friday morning. The latest Treo runs Windows Mobile 6.1 Professional as its operating system, a Treo choice for Microsoft purists not wanting to run Palm’s own OS. The Treo 800w also features GPS, Wi-Fi and EVDO Rev. A.

It offers a 320 x 320 resolution touch screen along with a full QWERTY keypad. In addition, the Treo 800w has a 2.0-megapixel camera with camcorder, built-in media player and stereo Bluetooth. It also features a MicroSD card slot for up to 8 GB of memory. The 800w lists for $599 but is available through Sprint for $249.99 with a two-year contract after $250 instant savings and a $100 mail-in rebate.

The 800w’s introduction follows a busy several months for Palm, which unveiled the Palm Centro, a touch-screen device targeted at first-time smartphone users, in September. Since its release, the Centro has sold more than 1 million units, mainly due to its sub-$100 price tag with new contracts from major carriers like Verizon Wireless and T-Mobile. AT&T also offered the $99 Centro deal, but recently reduced that price to a cool $69.99.

Along with Centros for major carriers, the smartphone maker offers an unlocked version for $299, which can be used with any wireless carrier that uses GSM.

ShareThis

It could be worth the cost if you really dislike AT&T’s service and wanted to use the phone on another carrier. Unfortunately this option is not allowed. Both the iPhone 3G “contract” phones, which go on sale July 11 for $199 and $299, and the contract-free phones will work only on AT&T’s network.

AT&T’s early-termination fee is a maximum of $175 and, as of May 25, that fee is reduced by $5 for each month you own the phone. That’s a lot less than $400. Why would you do this? When I asked an AT&T spokesperson, she said it is an option for people who don’t want to sign a contract.

ShareThis

The new browser also adds a note-taking ability. By logging in, you can jot down shopping lists or copy directions for access on another computer or handset.

ShareThis

If successful, the digital makeover could signal the next stage of growth at what is already one of the world’s most popular websites. MySpace anticipates an influx of social-networking neophytes and businesses to its new-and-improved site.

MySpace has revamped the appearance and enhanced functions of its home page; site navigation; search; MySpaceTV Player, a video player; and Profile Editor, which lets users customize their profile. There’s a spanking-new interface, heightened security, availability on mobile and instant-messaging services — and the ability to create categories of friends at work, school and family, among dozens of other new features.
“It cleans up the user experience,” says Dave McClure, a start-up adviser and angel investor in Silicon Valley. “It is a streamlined, easier-to-use version of MySpace.”

The overhaul comes as dozens of social-network sites scramble for a bigger slice of the nearly $50 billion online-ad market. Facebook has ramped up revenue with the sale of banner ads through an agreement with Microsoft, targeted-ad programs for local businesses and the sale of virtual gifts. Those gifts, such as a birthday cake or a popping champagne cork, are affixed to a user’s profile in the manner that someone would sign a high school yearbook.

MySpace is banking on the notion that social-networking holdouts are the same folks who resisted e-mail and text messaging. The idea is to simplify things so they’re comfortable with MySpace, a company co-founder says.

“The renaissance of our site touches on making things easier for someone who has never been on the Internet, or rarely uses it,” says MySpace President and co-founder Tom Anderson. “We want anyone online to consider MySpace. We want it to be as ubiquitous as e-mail.”

ShareThis

The new version lets Web surfers add keywords, or tags, to sort bookmarks by topic. A new “Places” feature lets users quickly access sites they recently bookmarked or tagged and pages they visit frequently but haven’t bookmarked. There’s also a new star button for easily adding sites to your bookmark list — similar to what’s already available on Microsoft Corp.’s Internet Explorer 7 browser.

Other new features include the ability to resume downloads midway if the connection is interrupted and an updated password manager that doesn’t disrupt the log-in process. In a nod to the growing use of Web-based e-mail, the browser can be set to launch Yahoo Inc.’s service when clicking a “mailto” link in a Web page, the ones you might come across clicking on a name or a “contact us” link. Previously such links could only open a standalone, desktop e-mail program.

Yahoo is the only Web service initially supported. To use rivals like Google Inc.’s Gmail and Microsoft Corp.’s Hotmail, developers of those services will have to enable that capability first. Firefox also will start blocking rather than simply warning about sites known to engage in “phishing” scams that try to trick users into revealing passwords and other sensitive information. The new version adds protection from sites known to distribute viruses and other malicious software.

The list of suspicious sites come from Google Inc. and StopBadware.org, a project headed by legal scholars at Harvard and Oxford universities. Security researchers who need access to problem sites can manually turn the feature off.

ShareThis

Bernadette McGuire-Rivera, associate director of the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, said at a hearing that it was possible the agency “would have to get more money, basically to buy more stamps to send out coupons.” “This sounds like it could be a big problem here,” Rep. Edward Markey, chairman of the House Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet, said at the hearing before the panel.

The NTIA is an arm of the Commerce Department that is overseeing the converter box program. Congress ordered the February 17, 2009 switch to digital television to free public airwaves for other uses, such as for police and fire departments. The switch also is to lead to improved picture and sound for TV viewers.

The transition is being closely watched because owners of analog televisions will be unable to watch television unless they subscribe to satellite or digital cable, replace their TV with a digital television by that date, or get a converter box. The federal government is subsidizing the cost of buying a digital-analog converter box by offering the $40 discount coupons to anyone who owns an analog television. The $1.5 billion program has enough funding to subsidize as many as 33.5 million converter boxes.

The converter box coupons expire if they are not redeemed within 90 days. More than 100 retailers have been certified to participate in the converter box program, including Best Buy Co Inc (BBY.N), Circuit City Stores Inc (CC.N), RadioShack Corp (RSH.N), Sears Holdings Corp (SHLD.O), Target Corp (TGT.N) and Wal-Mart Stores Inc (WMT.N). The government began mailing coupons on February 21. As of June 3, it had received requests for more than 16 million coupons, McGuire-Rivera said in a prepared statement.

But extra coupon mailings could be needed because many people who applied for them did not use them before they expired. Only 42 percent of the coupons sought by consumers were being redeemed before they expired, according to NTIA figures. Funds for expired, unredeemed coupons are being returned to the subsidy program and will be available so more coupons can be mailed.

But McGuire-Rivera said, “The program currently has limited administrative funds to distribute additional numbers of coupons that might be issued from the returned funds.” The NTIA issued a statement after the hearing saying it “has no plans to ask Congress for any additional funds.” A more accurate forecast of the costs would be possible sometime after July 1, when NTIA gets further redemption information.

ShareThis

Among the successful applicants duties will be: “creating and executing a test plan for Wii’s USB devices.” Our first thoughts were a USB hard drive, but Nintendo has repeatedly denied claims it was even considering one. Earlier today, we reported that Nintendo of Europe’s managing director had dismissed the hard drive space as an issue only “geeks” were interested in.

ShareThis