December 15th -21st

Internet:
Old media becomes new media ... Monkey magazine launches online, free with registration. It's a 'men's magazine' so it's just soft porn, cars, sport and gadgets, just like Nuts and Zoo. What makes it interesting though is the interface - it's presented as a double page magazine page that you can click to focus in on or zoom out from, with pages that can be turned and containing features that are actually videos that can be played, plus sections that hyperlink to other web pages. For those of us who thought that electronic print/papers/books couldn't work, this may be one answer ... find a free issue sample at: http://www.monkeymag.co.uk/registration/

Music:
US Record companies begin legal action against Allofmp3.com (21st Dec): http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6199237.stm

Music:
An Australian court has upheld an earlier ruling against a website that merely provided links to illegal MP3s and thus 'effectively authorized copyright infringement', a decision that equates linking - providing information about - with the illegal activity itself (21st Dec): http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/6199933.stm

Music:
HMV warns of poor profits due to online and supermarket competition (21st Dec): http://business.guardian.co.uk/story/0,,1976469,00.html

Internet /Video games:
Are there really 2m people using Second Life, as was claimed last week? (21st Dec): http://technology.guardian.co.uk/weekly/story/0,,1975940,00.html

Internet:
Ofcom pushes ahead with its plan for a new PSP -Public Service Publisher, delivering content online (21st Dec): http://business.guardian.co.uk/story/0,,1976440,00.html

Future Tech:
A UK Government report warns that robots could demand legal rights in the future (21st Dec): http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6200005.stm

Television:
The take-up of digital television continues to rise, according to media watchdog Ofcom. Quarterly figures show that 73.3% of households watch digital services on their main TV set, a rise by around 800,000 over the last three months. Around 18.5 million have digital TV installed, with increasing numbers watching on second or third sets. The figures also show that 9.3 million households now have digital terrestrial television, such as Freeview. More households (7 million) watch digital terrestrial TV than traditional analogue TV (6.4 million) on their main set, according to Ofcom's report (20th Dec): http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/6197747.stm

Internet:
An article on the arrest of Tom Stephens in relation to the Ipswich/Suffolk killings, the media interest in his Myspace page and attacks on his 'friends' (20th Dec): http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,1975648,00.html His Myspace page is soon taken down ... before he is charged with anything ...

Music / Security:
Sony BMG finally settles on the compensation payable to computer users affected by its November 2005 placing of a DRM XP 'rootkit' on consumer's computers (20th Dec): http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6197107.stm

Cyborgs:
'The world's most advanced bionic hand' is fitted to a man in Scotland (20th Dec): http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/6193681.stm

Internet / Television:
The BBC announces it will make hundreds of BBC TV programmes available on a file-sharing network to make them available to audiences overseas, although they will be paid for and come with DRM (20th Dec): http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6194929.stm

Internet:
Hamleys toy store 'pillaged' after internet error lets customers get up to 60% discount. It says at first that it will honour the orders (19th Dec): http://business.guardian.co.uk/story/0,,1975206,00.html but the next day it backs down and refuses (20th Dec): http://business.guardian.co.uk/retail/story/0,,1975865,00.html This coming not long after the Threshers email voucher offer was spread virally around far more people than the company bargained for in early December ... see: http://www.guardian.co.uk/christmas2006/story/0,,1963310,00.html and http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/6198828.stm

Security:
A report on Google and Yahoo's operations in China (19th Dec): http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6191171.stm

Television:
£600m of the BBC licence fee will go towards helping the elderly get digital TV (19th Dec): http://business.guardian.co.uk/story/0,,1974973,00.html

Internet:
A conference on social networking has to be cancelled because of lack of interest ... presumably people weren't that interested in actually meeting each other! (18th Dec): http://business.guardian.co.uk/story/0,,1974179,00.html

Internet:
On the spread of viral videos and movie clips (18th Dec): http://media.guardian.co.uk/mediaguardian/story/0,,1973938,00.html

Mobile Phones:
Orange are in talks with Google for a 'Google phone', providing information wherever you are (17th Dec): http://www.guardian.co.uk/mobile/article/0,,1974094,00.html

Internet:
'You' are named as Time magazine's 'person of the year' - as in the producers of user generated content (17th Dec): http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6187113.stm On January 4th 1983 Time announced 'the man of the year' for 1982 was the computer. As it said: 'There are some occasions when the most significant force in a year's news is not a single individual but a process, and a widespread recognition that this process is changing the course of all other processes.' Now, given the realisation of the computer's potential through increased processing power, the power of computer networking, the economic and practical democratisation of the technologies of computing and digital production and the transformation of media content into a digital form so that it can be produced and dissemintated over these networks ... we have the user as the person of the year ...

Video Games:
Over enthusiastic users of the new Wii controllers lead Nintendo to recall and improve wrist straps (15th Dec): http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/12/14/wii.danger.ap/index.html Within a week they're hit by a lawsuit for damages ... (20th Dec): http://news.com.com/2061-10797_3-6145335.html The newly launched Wii is already outselling PS3 (for the moment) in the US (10th Dec): http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/fun.games/12/10/nintendo.sony.reut/index.html

Video Games / Internet:
Posted a few days ago but important enough to include - a story about Sony faking Youtube style video postings from PSP (Play Station Portable). Their hoped-for viral marketing failed when the fakery was discovered ... (11th/14th Dec): http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/games/archives/2006/12/11/new_sony_viral_marketing_ploy_angers_consumers.html

Security:
A hacker attack at UCLA affects 800 000 (12th Dec): http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/ptech/12/12/ucla.data.theft.ap/index.html