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DIGITAL MEDIA WIRE -- December 4, 2002
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o Random House, RosettaBooks Settle E-Book Legal Dispute
o Russia's Elcomsoft Goes On Trial In Test of U.S. Copyright Law
o Judge Orders Madster File-Sharing Service Completely Shut Down
o Amazon.com to Take Over Distribution for Bertelsmann-Owned CDNow
o Holographic Storage Media Firm InPhase Technologies Raises $6.3 Million
o RealNetworks, Starz to Offer Internet Video-on-Demand Service
o AOL Expecting Major Advertising, Commerce Revenue Decline in 2003
> DMW Publications: Special Rates for DMW Subscribers
> Featured Section
o Briefly Noted: Hitachi - smaller flash memory, National Cable
Communications - Visible World - SeaChange, Cornelius, Infogrames -
"Dragon Ball Z," Advent Networks - BroadQ - PlayStation 2, Activision -
Stainless Steel Studios, Ubi Soft - CBS' "CSI," Digital vs. film
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> Jobs:
> Events: Eventeurs
> Marketplace: Homeland Security Directory, Interest-Based Navigation
Full Classifieds located beneath "Briefly Noted" section below.
To post a Classified Ad:
http://www.digitalmediawire.com/mainpostingpage.html
or contact Tinzar Than at tinzar@digitalmediawire.com
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o Random House, RosettaBooks Settle E-Book Legal Dispute
New York -- E-book publisher and retailer RosettaBooks announced on
Wednesday that it has settled pending litigation with major publisher
Random House, over who owned the rights to distribute e-book versions of
texts penned by Random House authors. The settlement's terms do not call
for monetary damages to be paid to either side and in effect license
Random House titles to RosettaBooks for publication as e-books, avoiding
any legal test of the question of whether authors signed away their rights
to publish their works as e-books in older contracts, such as Random
House's contract with author Kurt Vonnegut. Under the settlement,
RosettaBooks will exclusively publish several dozen Random House titles as
e-books, paying an advance and a royalty to the authors and the publisher,
as in other typical agreements. "We are very glad to be able to put our
differences behind us and to now work co1laboratively rather than
combatively to enhance RosettaBooks´ and our commitment to electronic
publishing," said Katherine J. Trager, senior vice president and general
counsel for Random House.
http://www.rosettabooks.com/pages/RB_RH_Release.html
http://www.latimes.com/technology/ats-ap_technology11dec04,0,564733.
story?coll=sns%2Dap%2Dtoptechnology
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o Russia's Elcomsoft Goes On Trial In Test of U.S. Copyright Law
San Jose, California -- In the first major criminal trial involving the
controversial Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998, U.S. prosecutors
on Wednesday accused the Russian software firm Elcomsoft of "selling a
burglary tool for software to make a profit." The case centers on
Elcomsoft's sale of a program that removes copy-protection safeguards on
Adobe Systems' e-book reader software. An attorney for Elcomsoft argued
that the company's intention with the software was not to facilitate
copyright infringement, and that it profited only $2,000 from 10 days of
sales before removing the ability to buy the software from its website.
Elcomsoft employee Dmitry Sklyarov, who sparked the current controversy
when he was arrested in the U.S. for his role in creating the software, is
scheduled to testify at some point in the proceedings.
http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,56703,00.html
http://news.com.com/2100-1023-975916.html?tag=cd_mh
http://www.elcomsoft.com
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o Judge Orders Madster File-Sharing Service Completely Shut Down
Chicago -- A U.S. District Court judge has issued a temporary restraining
order against file-sharing service Madster (formerly known as Aimster),
compelling the company to terminate all Internet access to its servers and
shut down the service. The Recording Industry Association of America
(RIAA) had asked Judge Judge Marvin Aspen of the Northern District of
Illinois to find Madster in contempt for continuing to allow its service
to operate in light of an injunction to prevent the company from allowing
unauthorized copyrighted music files to be traded. "Aimster and John Deep
have no excuse for not complying with the court's November 4th preliminary
injunction," said RIAA president Cary Sherman. "This temporary restraining
order will certainly make clear that the infringement must stop
immediately, whether that is through Aimster's actions or actions by its
Internet Service Provider." A hearing has been scheduled for Dec. 19 to
decide whether Madster CEO Johnny Deep's inaction on the preliminary
injunction to stop unauthorized trading placed him in contempt of court.
http://www.riaa.org/PR_story.cfm?id=588
http://www.riaa.com/PDF/Aimster1202.pdf
http://www.madster.com
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o Amazon.com to Take Over Distribution for Bertelsmann-Owned CDNow
Seattle -- Bertelsmann-owned online CD retailer CDNow announced on
Wednesday that it will now operate its e-commerce business through online
retail giant Amazon.com. Terms of the multi-year agreement call for
Amazon.com to handle CDNow's inventory, fulfillment, site content and
customer service. The two companies had reportedly been in talks for some
time regarding today's announcement. Seattle-based Amazon.com also
provides fulfillment for online orders placed by shoppers at retail sites
including Toysrus.com, Borders.com and Virginmega.com.
http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/021204/nyw043_1.html
http://www.cdnow.com
http://www.amazon.com
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o Holographic Storage Media Firm InPhase Technologies Raises $6.3 Million
Longmont, Colo. -- InPhase Technologies, a developer of holographic data
storage technology, announced on Wednesday that it has raised $6.3 million
in the first closing of its second round of financing. The new funds are
part of a projected $15 million round of financing, expected to close by
September 2003. New Venture Partners led the investment round; Hitachi
Maxell Ltd. and Newton Technology Partners also participated. Longmont,
Colo.-based InPhase holds over 40 patents in the area of holographic
storage, which layers data atop itself so that a CD-sized disc utilizing
the technology could potentially initially store 400 gigabytes, enough
room for 100 full-length feature films. The format's capacity could also
potentially be increased to trillions of bytes (or terabytes) over time.
InPhase also recently received a $2 million grant from the U.S.
government's National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) to
develop rewritable holographic data storage media.
http://www.inphase-technologies.com/news/roundbfinal.html
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o RealNetworks, Starz to Offer Internet Video-on-Demand Service
Seattle -- Media delivery technology provider RealNetworks announced on
Wednesday that it has partnered with cable TV operator Starz Encore Group
to offer a broadband-based online subscription video on-demand movie
service. Slated to launch in the spring of 2003 for U.S. users, the
service will offer "more than 100 unique movie titles a month," similar to
the selection aired on Starz' digital cable channels. Current titles will
include "The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring," "Black Hawk
Down" and "Pearl Harbor." Pricing has not yet been announced for the
service, which will be delivered via RealNetworks' RealOne platform and
subscription service; the video-on-demand service will also be bundled for
subscribers to Starz' Super Pak on digital and satellite TV.
http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/021204/law062_1.html
http://www.realnetworks.com
http://www.starz.com
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o AOL Expecting Major Advertising, Commerce Revenue Decline in 2003
Dulles, Va. -- As executives from America Online laid out the company's
future plans to investors and analysts on Tuesday, the company also gave a
revealing glimpse of what could be a difficult year ahead. AOL's stock
dropped 14 percent on Tuesday; so far this year, it has lost 50 percent.
While reaffirming its guidance for this year, the company said that an
expected 40-50 percent decline in advertising and commerce revenue in 2003
will keep revenues flat. "It is clear that 2003 will be a transition year,
but with this plan we expect America Online once again to deliver solid
EBITDA growth beginning in 2004," said Wayne Pace, CFO of AOL Time Warner.
http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/021203/32202_1.html
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DMW Publications: Special Rates for DMW Subscribers
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For those who believe in ITV - "INTERACTIVE TELEVISION: The Definitive
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FEATURED SECTION
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Featured Section posting at:
http://www.digitalmediawire.com/featuredpostingpage.htm
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Briefly Noted:
(San Jose, Calif.) Consumer electronics firm Hitachi announced on
Wednesday its Reduced Size MultiMediaCard, a flash memory card for MP3
players and other devices that holds the same amount of data on cards half
the size of existing cards. The new cards, available in 16, 32 and 64MB
densities, weigh 0.8 g with dimensions of 18 mm x 24 mm x 1.4 mm. Hitachi
plans to release 128 and 256MB models in the latter half of 2003.
http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/021204/40052_1.html
http://www.hitachi.com
(New York) National Cable Communications (NCC), a distributor of cable TV
ads, announced that it has partnered with Visible World and SeaChange
International to test a system with the capability to automatically
assemble multiple variations of a commercial and simultaneously deliver
them to diverse geographic zones across television markets. New York-based
Visible World and Massachusetts-based SeaChange developed the
"IntelliSpot" technology, which will begin testing this month in Albany,
with more nearby markets gradually added so that by the end of January the
network will reach 4 million homes.
http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/021204/nyw094_1.html
http://www.spotcable.com
http://www.visibleworld.com
http://www.seachangeinternational.com
(Nakameguro, Japan) Electronic music artist/producer Cornelius has
announced a contest whereby fans may download and remix songs from his
2002 Point album, with winners judged and chosen by the artist to be
included in the upcoming release of his Summer 2003 Point Mix album.
Submissions are due by Dec. 31, 2002. The remix album from Cornelius, who
himself has done remix work with artists including Moby and Beck, will be
released on Matador Records in the U.S. and on Polystar in Japan.
http://www.cornelius-sound.com/news/news_contestE.htm
(Beverly, Mass.) Game developer Infogrames announced on Wednesday that it
has shipped its "Dragon Ball Z: Budokai" title for PlayStation 2, based on
the popular animated children's TV series, to retailers.
http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/021204/new006_1.html
http://www.dbzgamer.com
(Anaheim, Calif.) Advent Networks, a provider of broadband networking
equipment for cable TV operators, announced on Wednesday that it has
partnered with BroadQ, a provider of digital TV tuner software, to develop
a system for delivering MPEG-4 video-on-demand content to Sony's
PlayStation 2 video game console. "Our QCast Tuner software together with
[Advent's] Ultraband service will allow the cable operator to provide a
high-quality entertainment-on-demand solution that plays MPEG2, MPEG4 and
MP3 audio formats," said BroadQ president and CEO Stacy Cook.
http://www.businesswire.com/cgi-bin/f_headline.cgi?day0/223380004&ticker=
http://www.broadq.com
http://www.adventnetworks.com
(Santa Monica, Calif.) Game developer and publisher Activision said on
Wednesday that it has signed a multi-year, multi-title agreement to
publish real-time PC strategy games developed by Stainless Steel Studios,
developer of "Empire Earth." Cambridge, Mass.-based Stainless Steel
Studios founder Rick Goodman was also lead designer on Ensemble
Studios/Microsoft's popular "Age of Empires" title.
http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/021204/law043_1.html
http://www.stainlesssteelstudios.com
http://www.activision.com
(San Francisco) Video game publisher Ubi Soft Entertainment announced on
Wednesday that it is currently developing "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation"
for PC, based on the CBS drama series, for release in March 2003. San
Francisco-based Ubi Soft licensed the exclusive rights to a PC version of
the game from CBS Consumer Products.
http://www.businesswire.com/cgi-bin/f_headline.cgi?day0/223380133&ticker=
http://www.ubi.com
http://www.cbs.com/primetime/csi
(Los Angeles) The Los Angeles Times recently reported on the ongoing
debate on the merits of digital filmmaking, and whether or not
digitally-made films should be held in the same regard as traditional
celluloid films. The issue prompted the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and
Sciences' board of governors to vote on whether a totally
digitally-produced movie should be disqualified from winning an Academy
Award. Academy president Frank Pierson reportedly ended the issue for the
moment by asking the board, "Who's going to call George Lucas and tell him
his movie can't be nominated for an Oscar?" The article also discusses
other problems emerging due to the differences between film and digital,
including the differing pay rates for "digital video" and "film"
production crews, and the difficulty in distributing a "digital" movie in
foreign markets.
http://www.latimes.com/technology/la-fi-language3dec03,0,7405594.
story?coll=la%2Dheadlines%2Dtechnology
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CLASSIFIEDS - HOLIDAY GIFT IDEAS & RED HOT DEALS
================================================
To Post Holiday Specials:
http://www.digitalmediawire.com/marketplacepostingpage.htm
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-Jos. A Bank - Quality Men's Apparel.
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HOLIDAY PERSONAL SHOPPER
I can help anyone in any department with any gift buying needs... or offer
suggestions... be it jewelry, home, accessories, mens or ladies clothing,
etc..and can be reached at 310-550-5900 ext 2007. GEMMI
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Rock & Roll One Of A Kinds!
Hipsters Franky & Minx (www.frankyandminx.com) are getting attention with
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CLASSIFIEDS - JOBS
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To Post Jobs: http://www.digitalmediawire.com/jobpostingpage.htm
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CLASSIFIEDS - EVENTS
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To Post Events: http://www.digitalmediawire.com/eventpostingpage.htm
HOLIDAY CATERING...The best staff and food in town!
Eventeurs uses the top chefs and most attractive staff in the business. We
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CLASSIFIEDS - MARKETPLACE
==========================
To Post Marketplace:
http://www.digitalmediawire.com/marketplacepostingpage.htm
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Digital Media Wire, Inc. leverages its integrated media network to provide
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Copyright 2002 Digital Media Wire, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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