MTV Games and Harmonix announced the launch of an independent track store for the Rock Band game. The store, called Rock Band Network, will launch in August. Rock Band Network will allow independent musicians to sell tracks they create for the game through Microsoft’s XNA Creator’s Club.
First a track will be submitted for approval. Once approved, the track gets put on the Rock Band Network store. Players on the 360 can then download the track if they like it. Track artists will receive royalties.
A selection of approved tracks will later be added to the PS3 and Wii.
All Things Digital reports that a search deal between Microsoft and Yahoo may be nearing completion. Icahn, one of the earlier proponents of the deal, said he would favor the deal. Icahn owns 5 percent of Yahoo. He is also a director on the board.
“I’ve been a strong advocate of getting a search deal done with Microsoft,” Icahn told Reuters.
Microsoft tried to buy Yahoo for $47.5 billion in the spring of 2008. The offer was taken off the table when Yahoo’s board said the price was not high enough. Icahn later came in and tried to broker a deal between the two companies. He also tried to oust Jerry Yang and take over the company. He launched a proxy battle to take over Yahoo’s board.
If and when the deal takes place, Microsoft will likely take over Yahoo’s search advertising business.
Toshiba’s HD DVD is a failed format. HD DVD lost and Blu-ray won the high definition disc wars. HD DVD never caught on with movie studios, retailers, or consumers. Toshiba withdrew the format in February of 2008.
Toshiba has now swallowed its pride and announced that it will start manufacturing Blu-ray players.
Historically, Toshiba has done very well in the DVD player business. Toshiba was considered one of the top brands when it came to DVD players. So there is no way the company would stop producing DVD players. The Blu-ray market is steadily growing and doing very well. It would make little business sense for Toshiba to ignore the numbers and market.
According to Blu-ray Disc Association chairman Andy Parsons, Blu-ray is now main stream. Players can be found for a few hundred dollars at most consumer electronic stores. The format has already achieved a 50 percent market share in Japan.
ALL of the iPhone’s current GPS offerings suck. AT&T Navigator is absolutely not worth $10 a month. Gokivo’s real time navigation app suffers from the same issues as AT&T Navigator. It also costs $10 a month and does not come close to competing with a dedicated GPS unit. Both of them do not store maps locally. They download maps as you drive.
Navigon has released a pretty nice GPS app for the European market. Its maps are downloaded to your phone and no monthly plan or data network connection is required. The company says that a US version will come out soon but don’t hold your breath. There is also G-Map by XRoad. G-Map is currently under $40.00 and does not require a monthly plan. It also downloads all maps to your phone when installed. The G-Map app suffers from incomplete map data and bad routing directions.
TomTom on the other hand has not said anything about the release of their GPS iPhone application. They made a lot of noise about the product at WWDC last June. They generated high anticipation. But left everyone hanging. From time to time, a news report or blog post comes out saying the app is on the way. But we hear nothing official from TomTom.
All of the current GPS solutions on the iPhone suck. So TomTom still has a chance to win the category over. That is if they ever release their application.
You can now place Pizza Hut orders from your iPhone. Pizza Hut released a native application last Friday. Pizza can be ordered using all of the iPhone’s technologies. You can resize the pizza using multi-touch, add extra toppings to the pizza by shaking the phone, and much more.
The app even includes a Pizza Hut racing game.
One downside to the application is that it does not currently support Pizza Hut coupons.
The Energetically Autonomous Tactical Robot (EATR) robot is being developed to be autonomous and self-fueled. The robot harvests organic matter to create energy. The robot can find and extract biomass in the environment to fuel itself. It can also be powered by regular fuels such as gas. The EATR is being introduced by Robotic Technology Inc.
It was originally thought that EATR would eat any kind of organic matter. This includes zombies, roadkill, living humans, etc. However, EATR’s designers now claim that the robot will only eat plants to power itself.
This probably does not do much to make us feel any better. We all know what pissed off robots can do to us.
Gregory McKenna says that Apple conspired to track and bug him with the help of the Italian Mafia. According to him, Apple transmitted threatening messages to his iPod and placed bugs throughout his house. McKenna says that the Mafia and Apple started tracking him through an iPod Shuffle he bought on eBay and an iPod Nano he bought at the Apple Store.
The lawsuit was filed in a St. Louis district court. The suit names the following defendants:
THE ST. LOUIS COUNTY POLICE DEPARTMENT
OFFICERS CHARLES BOSCHERT, KENNETH
WILLIAMS, UNKNOWN AGENTS OF THE FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION,
MARK KAPPELHOFF, APPLE INC.
A-1 PRIVATE INVESTIGATIONS,
TIMOTHY BONINE
D’ANGELO AUTOMOTIVE
Gregory McKenna says that the conspiracy started on Aug 15, 2000. According to him, the defendants above “conspire to aid, abet, and neglect the stalking, extortion, and torture” of him by the help of the Italian Mafia. McKenna alleges that the threats started because the mafia wanted to extort him as a fashion model working for a modeling agency in New York City.
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