Nokia appears to have shot itself in the proverbial foot recently after announcing that some of its new handsets will come bundled with free music, dubbed ‘Comes with Music’, which would offer unlimited song downloads on Nokia phones.
With support from Universal Music, the world’s biggest label, and Sony BMG the Finnish mobile giant is expected to have to pay a wholesale rate per unit once downloads hit a certain level as well as a flat fee for each handset sold.
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Up until recently the relationship between the poker chip and the microchip was synonymous only in name, but if you’re a fan of the world’s greatest card game you might want to take a look at a new gizmo from Dane-Elec.
Fashioning a USB-drive from a poker chip might seem like a bit of a gamble, but one of the leading brands in Flash memory is betting it’ll be a success.
The ‘Poker Mate’ is almost exactly the same size as a casino-brand chip, with the flash memory part cleverly embedded inside.
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If you’ve already jumped aboard the media streaming / video on demand bandwagon you might well have asked yourself how long it’ll be before downloadable content replaces the DVD.
‘Not long’, would be a pretty accurate assumption, following news that Apple has struck a deal with a range of studios to sell new releases at its iTunes store.
The key driver here is that the films will be available online on the same day they’re officially announced on DVD, so if you’re too lazy to drag yourself down to HMV there’s a perfectly viable alternative right there.
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3D, the entertainment almost-ran, is hardly a mass-market consumer technology for movies and games but nVidia thinks it has a solution.
The company is working on a software driver for its graphics cards that will allow any PC game to be played in 3D without games developers having to do a thing. Can it really be that simple?
The software will let gamers choose between ‘normal’ or ‘3D mode’. Simply put, it works by creating a left-eye/right-eye view of the game and will require some special 3D glasses to combine both into the 3D experience. nVidia claimed it’s working on the glasses – a real departure for the card company.
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Sharp is hot on the heels of Sony this week, launching its own 2.1 home cinema package, the HT-DV50H.
It’s not as stylish or small as Sony’s DAV-F200 2.1 sound system, with the little speakers being replaced by two, leggy supermodels, but it’s still a viable alternative for those that want to crank up their movie and TV sound without cable clutter.
It boasts an RMS rating (of 250W), 75W each for the speakers and 100W for the subwoofer. Like the Sony unit it comes with a HDMI output for simple connection to a HDTV, USB port, and DivX playback support, There's also an FM stereo digital tuner.
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The problem with Internet access on mobile phones is that it costs extra to start with and when you exceed your limit, you’re charged a King's ransom. But now, Vodafone wants to give Net access to everybody.
The company is revamping its monthly payment plans to include ‘unlimited’ Internet access for everyone without the usual £7.50 add-on fee. Now, when they say ‘unlimited’ they really mean ‘a 500MB fair usage policy’ but it’s still enough for casual surfing every day.
The price plans start at £25 per month and run to £40 per month, the latter coming with unlimited texts, unlimited landline calls or unlimited calls to other Vodafone users.
Ian Shepherd, director of consumer for Vodafone UK, commented:
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How long do you have to wait before you start spoiling your kids. With this one-off gold pram, not very long indeed.
This blinged up Silver Cross Silver Shadow with in-built sound system was just snapped up at Harrods for a cool £6,000, thanks in large part to the £4,000-worth of 24k gold plating on every panel and the wheels.
The leather hood is trimmed with ermine fur and the inside is satin. And as for that ‘sound system’, forget your modern MP3 player tat here, as this one sports a clockwork music box filled with soothing nursery rhymes. A Harrods spokesperson commented to the Daily Mail:
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Telly addicts will be delighted to hear that Samsung is launching it’s first TV-capable mobile phone for Europe.
The P960 is described as the ‘world's first slider type Digital Video Broadcast - Handheld (DVB-H) mobile TV phone’. The P960 supports both of European mobile TV standards, Digital Video Broadcast - Convergence of Broadcast and Mobile Service (DVB-CBMS) and Open Mobile Alliance Mobile Broadcast Service Enabler Suite (OMA-BCAST). Of course, the UK - excluding some small trials - will not be getting DVB-H services anytime soon.
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Editor and Contributor | Martin Lynch
Contributor | Tamlin Magee
