The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) has voted against a proposal to create a special .xxx domain for adult entertainment, the Associated Press reported. The proposal faced opposition from conservative groups, who said it lacked teeth because pornography sites would still be able to maintain their .com addresses, instead of being relegated […]

Mastering has been the most important step of the replication process of CD and DVD media. But the increased requirements of mastering HD DVD or Blu-ray media is even more complicated, and changes the involved workflow. In order to create a DVD from a popular movie there are several steps that must be followed. The […]

A senior Microsoft executive has told a BBC World documentary that people should use commercial software if they’re looking for stability. “I don’t think [open source] is anti-Microsoft in the sense that it’s giving people choices in the technologies that they use,” Jonathan Murray, the vice-president and chief technology officer of Microsoft Europe, told BBC […]

Software piracy resulted in a loss of US$34 billion worldwide in 2005, a US$1.6 billion increase over 2004, according to a study commissioned by the Business Software Alliance. The study, conducted by research firm IDC, found that roughly one out of every three copies of personal computing software installed in 2005 was pirated. While the […]

In response to Apple’s dominance of the digital music market, Sony this week made its own data compression technology that shrinks music and video files compatible with Apple’s AAC format, CNET News.com reported. The change will enable the exchange of songs between iPod and Sony Walkman players via a PC, but will still not allow […]

Agere Systems, Coding Technologies, Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Ciruits IIS and Philips, the inventors behind the MPEG Surround technique, jointly demonstrate the full potential of the new Surround Sound system at AES (Audio Engineering Society) Pro Audio Expo in Paris. Combined with audio codecs such as MPEG-1 Layer-2, MPEG-4 AAC or MPEG-4 HE-AAC (aka aacPlus), […]

A U.S. District Court judge in New York gave final approval Monday to a settlement for music fans who purchased Sony BMG music CDs containing flawed copy protection programs. A federal judge yesterday gave final approval to a class action lawsuit that was brought against the entertainment company after Sony included a pair of invasive […]

Warner Bros. Home Entertainment Group announced an agreement with peer-to-peer file-sharing software distributor BitTorrent, that will see film and TV content distributed in the U.S. over the network once targeted with copyright infringement lawsuits by the movie studios. The announcement comes after the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) struck a deal with BitTorrent to […]

Real D, a developer of digital 3D cinema projection technology, announced on Monday that it has signed an agreement to install 20 if its systems in theaters owned by Dallas-based Rave Motion Pictures Theaters. With the addition, a total of 29 Rave screens will feature Real D Cinema systems that will screen digital 3D format […]

Sun Microsystems will open-source Java, it just has to figure out how to do it, company executives said on Tuesday. Open-source advocates have urged Sun for years to open-source the Java programming language, but the company has resisted, citing compatibility concerns and fear of losing control. Now the company has promised that Java will become […]

IBM has announced an upgrade to Lotus Notes that will include access to office productivity applications and support for the OpenDocument format. The new version of Lotus Notes, codenamed “Hannover,” will feature IBM Workplace applications for word processing, spreadsheets, presentations and numeric data analysis. These “office productivity editors,” as IBM refers to them, all support […]

Britain’s High Court has ruled that Apple Computer may use its trademark bitten-apple logo in conjunction with its iTunes Music Store in the U.K., taking the computer firm’s side in a trademark dispute with the Beatles’ record label, Apple Corps. Judge Edward Mann said in his ruling that Apple Computer used the fruit logo in […]

Microsoft’s love-hate relationship with open-source software can be epitomised by recent efforts to enhance interoperability and lure developers to Windows. In December, the software giant introduced a pilot program called NXT to make it easier for independent software vendors (ISVs) with non-Microsoft technologies, including Linux and Unix developers, to tailor their products to the Microsoft […]

Adobe Systems is overhauling its publishing applications to more closely resemble its popular Photoshop program in a bid to sway designers who are already using the image-editing software. A new software suite, Creative Suite 3, will include so-called metadata tags that users can stick to images and designer creations. In addition, the new version of […]

Hoping to build on the popularity of its instant messaging service, AOL is planning to add a bold new feature later this month that will allow its 41 million IM users to receive free incoming calls through their computers, The New York Times reported on Friday. Under the plan, users of the company’s AIM instant […]