Hell, Who Wants To Face Anyone Sober? Edition

Today’s links of interest:

• Scientists unlock mystery of 2,000-year-old computer
  Turns out it was running an early version of DOS, which was why noone could get it to work.
• Drunk Danny DeVito Appears on "The View" Show
  Of course, if you think about it, it’s really the sanest approach to going on that show. Who wants to face Rosie O’Donnell and Elisabeth Hasslebeck sober?
• Google Says Goodbye to Google Answers
  Our guess is that this answers the question: "Did anybody ever use Google Answers?"
• While not a splash, Zune makes positive debut
  Ladies and Gentlemen, would you please welcome the backlash to the backlash!

Read the entire entry …

We have noticed a lot of recent stories out there about how much people hate to deal with their cable companies. This is, of course, nothing new. But still, after 30 plus years, you’d think that the cable companies would have figured it out. Nope.

A decade ago, Congress even got involved, making it part of the promise of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 that the increased competition would mean lower cable prices.

How did that work out for you?

So, as a public service, we offer a new column: I Hate The Cable Company. It will be a monthly round-up of just some of stories discussing the crappy service and high prices that people enjoy from their local cable providers. Just to be fair, we will add satellite to the mix, as well.

Read the entire entry …

Brawlers, Bawlers and Bastards Oh My! Edition

Today’s links of interest:

• U.S. to North Korea: No iPods for you
  Looks like James Bond and Kim Jong Il have something in common.
• BitTorrent set to unveil deals with studios
  Legit downloads from Fox, Paramount, MTV and others. Not Universal, however. Which means that the lawsuit will be coming any day now.
• Zune means zilch for artists
  Think artists might actually see some of that royalty Microsoft is paying to Universal? Guess again.

Read the entire entry …

There was a time when the release of a new James Bond movie meant that audiences would be treated to a fantastic collection of gadgets and inventions, each of which was devised with the sole purpose of rescuing Bond from some unlikely scenario. The recently released Casino Royale is not that kind of movie.

The new Bond is much closer to the literary character created by Ian Fleming than he is to the Hollywood Bond we’ve come to know over the last four decades. As a result, Casino Royale presents audiences with the most low-tech Bond yet.

While it’s true that Sean Connery didn’t have a laptop in Dr. No, the technology he did have was at least recognizably different from what the average viewer could buy at the local mall.

Read the entire entry …

Today’s links of interest:

• Allofmp3 to be closed
  The RIAA gets their wish. The music industry learns nothing in the process.
• Writers spurn studios on talks
  Studios ask for early talks, guilds reject. And you thought strikes were thing of the past.
• MTV cues up plan for niche Web sites
  Imagine the internal memo: niches are big, get us twenty of them. Now.

Read the entire entry …

So, we received a question this morning, and it’s one that every member of the ‘loper team will probably want to address in different ways: who does piracy really hurt? You know the arguments, how some people believe that stealing music doesn’t hurt anything because, well, those corporations are so big, nobody will notice a few bucks here, a few bucks there.

Let’s be honest here. Piracy hurts every single person and business in the chain. It hurts the artist, it hurts the labels, it hurts the retailers. If you’re talking in terms of physical media, it hurts the people who drive trucks and work in warehouses. It hurts artists who haven’t yet been signed to labels. You might not think there’s an impact, but you’re wrong.
Read the entire entry …

Today’s links of interest:

• Warner Brothers Makes A Super Screwup
  Some problems with that Superman DVD Box that WB is putting out. But it’s a mistake with Superman III, which isn’t one of the movies that you’re buying this box for, is it?
• Xbox Live Video Marketplace debuts to *crunch*
  The last couple of weeks haven’t been very kind to either Microsoft or gamers, have they?
• As cable, broadcast snit boils, FCC calls a meeting
  It’s a season of battles between cable companies and content providers.

Read the entire entry …

From London comes news that seems alarming, if only we all didn’t realize it pretty much instinctively: 90% of all email traffic is spam. While the natural response is to say “tell me something I don’t know” and move on, if you think about that statistic — 9 out of every 10 emails you get is spam, it really can give you pause.

It’s been increasing a such a rate that some experts are forecasting that within a couple of years, 127% of all email traffic will be spam.

OK, not really, but still, how did we get here? And what’s next?

Read the entire entry …

While you were busy overeating and cursing your cable company because you couldn’t see the third football game on Thanksgiving, this is what we were doing:

• Universal Music’s New Biz Model: Lawsuits and Extortion! - An interesting new concept in marketing - attack your customer base and generally make it more difficult for them to discover your product.
• Target Blinked - That’s what happens when you go up against Captain Jack.
• Reasons To Be Thankful 2006 - I can agree with most of these, but what about Veronica Mars, TiVo Series 3 or even his patient and loving wife?
• That’s What I Like: Fridays Off - A concept all the ‘Loper households can get behind.

Today’s links of interest:

• How To Bypass The Zune’s WiFi Sharing DRM
  It actually took a few days longer than we expected for this hack to show up.
• Wal-Mart’s site stalls on Black Friday
  Seriously, this is a wake-up call. People, get your servers upgraded. It’s only going to get busier!