Mossberg: New Sony player is no iPod
killer

Microsoft's iPod-Killer: Portable Media
Center?

Sony's "iPod killer" Fails to Draw Blood

Microsoft Searches for a Google Killer

Microsoft Puts Out Trojan-Horse Killer

Giant step for Microsoft spyware killer

Killer Kangaroos! No comment from the
Killer Rabbit

cnn.com/2004/WORLD/asiapcf/07/07/australia.kangaroo.reut/ index.html
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Killer Mobiles for Killer Apps

Continuing my series on mobile platforms, I now think killer mobile apps need mobile devices designed like game consoles, meaning that it has one or two slots for application cartridges.  Each cartridge contains one or more applications.  Cellphones would come with a built-in cartridge containing the phone app as well as others.

Adding a cartridge adds new apps.  Applications have two modes: running and stopped.  The Next-App button (aka Appy button) activates (brings to front) each running apps in turn.  Some apps can activate itself when an event fires (phone call received).  To see the list of available apps, keep the Next-App button pressed for a second.

Eventually, app cartridges will be advance to become platform cartridges, taking over the full functionality of the mobile device to offer better application platform services than the one that came with the device (i.e. easy to use app download service that auto-configures apps for your device).  If you don't like the built-in calender, just stop it and run a third-party calendar instead.

A $50 iPod from Microsoft?

Microsoft Exec On iPod

Microsoft And The iPod... It's Not As
Simple As You Think

Unless Microsoft get into the player business on the hardware side (which will not happen) Microsoft will continue to be at the mercy of the hardware OEMs and there's no way that they can play favorites and leverage off their business model. By Michael Gartenberg, Jupiter Research

No $50 iPod Clone From Microsoft

Microsoft to go after iPod market?

Microsoft CTO lauds iPod

"how-to record on your ipod (for free) -
ipod hacks - ipod.hackaday.com"

On the iPod and shortsightedness on the
Microsoft estate...

I have enormous performance anxiety at the moment. The world's turned to look this way for a few scant moments and everyone else is rising to the challenge and I'm just hiding. And it looks like I'm not the only one. Apparently, loads of Microsoft employees are using iPods instead of Microsoft-related products. You may not see the direct connection here, but everyone's looking at the digital music arena at the moment, Apple are doing tremendously well in it and there's absolutely no reason why Microsoft couldn't just look at their competitors, pull themselves together and go out there and try and create something even greater. It's not like they're short of cash or bright people. But instead they're burying their heads and pretending it isn't happening:

An internal e-mail circular sent to several senior managers in mid-December talked about iPod shipments to Apple's nearby store in Bellevue1. The e-mail said: "FWIW, the gal at the Bellevue Square Apple Store said that they are getting in two shipments of 200 iPods every day to keep up with this week's demand, and are nearly constantly selling out."

The note prompted a curt reply from Dave Fester, general manager of the Windows Digital Media division, who wrote the group: "I sure hope Microsoft employees are not buying iPods. We have great alternatives..." Fifteen minutes later, the manager responded: "I don't know what I was thinking. I'm sure that Microsoft employees are not buying iPods, or Macs or PlayStations."

I find this totally stunning and completely wrong-headed. Microsoft are trying to play the loyalty card to get their own staff to use their products even when they don't want to? They're making it a matter of fealty? This is no way to be creative - it's no way to operate in a commercial marketplace today. People don't make better products by not using the best ones that currently exist. And companies don't spot trends and opportunities by forcing their employees to lose faith in their own preferences and choices and become forced proselytisers of another's beliefs.

iPods everywhere is an opportunity for Microsoft. It sounds ridiculous but it's true. That there's a market that they haven't conquered - a space they haven't won it - should be the greatest reason to aspire to greatness. That there is something beautiful and functional in their midst that is worth admiring shouldn't be ignored just because they didn't make it. It should inhabited and ripped apart - explored and enjoyed, all with aspiration to see the cutting edge - the popular choice - and look to see how it could be surpassed.

It comes down to having respect for your craft and for the world in which you live. If you want to make great things then first you have to know what makes something great. And if you want people to make things that trigger enthusiasm in others then a good start would be to encourage that same enthusiasm in your staff. Making something that's true to itself is much easier when you're honest about its failings. Wise up guys, let them have their iPods. Let them learn from them, let them revel in them and then get them in a room and think of something that'll blow it away...

Read the comments

Microsoft Prepping iPod Challengers?

Microsoft works to block iPod

Microsoft CTO touts BlackBerry, iPod

Microsoft plans iPod competitor for as
little as $50

Microsoft Not Immune to iPod Frenzy

Microsoft talks $50 iPod Competitor

Microsoft V. iPod: Is It The Software,
Stupid?

Microsoft: "iPod Has Captured The
Imagination"

Sony NW-HD5 Network Walkman

Sony has just taken the wraps off their new NW-HD5 hard disk-based music player, a tiny little thing with 20GB of storage. It weighes just 125 grams, which I'm told is less than the weight of a heavily-iced cupcake (I'm not very good with weights, you might have noticed). Sony is also promising an ample 40 hours of bettery life and an easily removable battery. The NW-HD5 will be available in silver, red, and black and will go on sale in the UK next month for £200 (no word of a US release yet, but I'd say we'll get it soon enough).

The coolest trick is probably its new 'Follow Turn Display,' which orients the interface screen depending on which way the NW-HD5 is held. If I know Sony, I'll bet the controls rotate, too, like the Sony Vaio U-Series.

Sony announce the NW-HD5 [Pocket-LintUK]

Sony Network Walkman NW-HD3 Reviewed

Gizmo Girl has a healthy review of Sony's relatively new NW-HD3 MP3 Player. (And it plays real MP3, instead of "converts to our proprietary format while you wai MP3", which had been the case with all of Sony's previous "MP3" players.) Sony kindly calls it a "Network Walkman", but don't let those words invoke in you dreams of sugarplum IP fairies, streaming audio from one device to another, with rainbow wireless interfaces and candy packets of audio sharing. No, the NW wraps your MP3s so that effectively once they check in to your device, they don't check out. Still, sans file-conversion, the transfer process isn't quite as awful as their earlier players. And it comes in pretty (and familiar) colors. Battery life is apparently quite stellar, and its small stature but high capacity has them swooning.

Gizmo Girl Review [Pocket-Lint]

" Walt Mossberg: Get a Mac"

Has Sony finally gotten a Clue with the
Network Walkman

I'll be honest I don't think so. I love Sony products I am typing this article on a Sony Vaio and I have a lot of Sony products in my home. I always like Sony products and being my wife is from Japan she is a fan of Sony too. I draw the line though when it comes to buying vehicles as I am a die hard Chevrolet man. Anyway this Network Walkman that may or may not play the MP3 format and supposedly has a 30 hour battery life but only 20 gigs of storage priced at about the same as a Apple 40 gig iPod.

Give me a break Sony if you would have not been so scared that those ripping music was going to hurt your music division. I think they better wake up and smell the roses ripping of music is not going to stop and I bet their entire library is available on the P2P networks. [Engad get]

Sony Refreshes Its Network Walkman (PC
World)

Sony Building Smothered In Network
Walkman

It was only yesterday that Sony's NW-HD5 was officially announced in Japan, and it seems the company has already managed to convert the Sony Building into a giant promotion for the Network Walkman line, called "Walkman Records." This marks a first for Sony, as their domestic (Japanese) Walkman campaigns typically revolved around MiniDisc (and for good reason). The first floor is divided into three sections: "TOUCH," "LISTEN," and "BUY," where I presume you can do each activity. Don't expect to see this at your local Sony store any time soon — as of this writing, Sony hasn't even announced the NW-HD5 for stateside release.

Netwo rk Walkman in Sony Building [AV Watch]

Walt Mossberg is down on the new
Smartphones

Walt Mossberg like the iPod Mini

In fact, the latest version of iTunes even senses if you have a Mini, and if your song collection exceeds its capacity, the software can optionally auto-choose a selection of songs that will fit. It builds this selection, in part, based on which songs you've played most often or most recently, and which you've rated highest in iTunes.

Walt Mossberg: Gadget kingmaker

...when it debuted on October 17, 1991, "Personal Technology" was an immediate hit. Mossberg's voice, amplified by the power of the Journal, resonated like no other. In 1992, he recommended America Online, an also-ran with only 200,000 subscribers, over Prodigy, the leader with 1.8 million subscribers and powerful backers, including Sears and IBM. "Prodigy tried to get me fired," he recalls. Mossberg's endorsement "really helped put AOL on the map," admits founder Steve Case. "It turbocharged our growth."

Mossberg's proudest moment came in 2001, when he objected to Smart Tags, a feature he tested in a beta version of Windows XP. Smart Tags could turn any word on a Web page into a link to a Microsoft property or sponsor's site without consent from the site's author.

HOWTO de-obfuscate proprietary Sony
Network Walkman files

* The file starts with a 4-byte signature, "WMMP"

* Next is a 4-byte longword giving the total file-size in bytes. This includes the file header, i.e. it's exactly what you'd see displayed in a directory listing of the file.

* Next is the duration of the track in milliseconds, again in a 4-byte longword.

* The third 4-byte longword gives the number of frames in the file. If you're trying to write a file to the device using your own code, I recommend ripping bits out of XMMS or mp3info to get this number, as I had difficulty locating a library that would calculate it without actually decoding the entire file.

* There are 16 bytes of magic: there's the 0x08 0x9f 0x9e 0xff sequence that occurs in the PBLIST file, followed by 0x01, and padded out to 16 bytes with 0x00. I've no idea what any of this is but it seems unchanging.

* The rest of the file is the obfuscated MP3 data, with no ID3 frames - strip those out before you encode or your file will not play in the device.

Sony’s Network Walkman NW-HD1 - the
world’s smallest 20GB ATRAC3 player.

Walt Mossberg Reviews Mozilla Firefox

WSJ's Walt Mossberg raves about the new
iMac G5

Walt Mossberg interview with Steve Jobs
in the WSJ

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New Sony Walkman to Rival Apple Player

New Sony Walkman to Rival Apple Player
(AP)

Japanese Swap The Sony Walkman For The
Apple iPod

Tokyo's so-called 'gadget city' of Akihabara, where Sony's walkmans once reigned supreme, the most prized gadget is now Apple's iPod. It was perhaps some indication of how Japan's self confidence has faltered along with its economy. By Peter Cave, ABC News

Apple Hits Back At Sony 'Misleading'
Walkman Marketing

German Walkman Inventor Wins Battle
Against Sony, Fixes Gaze on Apple

German inventor Andreas Pavel has just settled a 20 year court battle with Sony over the origins of the Walkman, a device Pavel claimed to have patented in 1977. While Sony has spent the better part of two decades trying to ignore his claims of invention (despite the fact they paid him royalty fees for the first few years of the device's life), Pavel's near bankruptcy after a 3.7 million dollar court battle was finally rewarded by a confidential agreement in which Pavel was reportedly paid off to the tune of several million euros. Pavel, cock of the walk, is now planning to take a swipe at Apple, whose iPod has become the Walkman of this generation. Even better, Pavel has another patent in the wings: a 1989 US filing for a technology that combines the features of a portable audio player and a mobile phone. That patent will be decided on 'soon.'
Read [Management.Silicon via Blues]

Related
Sony VAIO Pocket Review [Gizmodo]
Old School Sony Walkmans (Walkmen?) [Gizmodo]

New Sony Minidisc Players

In a Nod to Niche Users, Sony Rethinks
the MiniDisc

Sony betting on minidisc; Jobs: Devices
won't catch on

Sony XDR-M1 DAB FM WALKMAN

People are saying that terrestrial radio is dead, but don't believe them. They're crazy and they smell. DAB&md ash;a digital radio standard popular with people "in other countries," if we're to believe the media—is very cool and could possibly improve our general listening experience. However, it is not readily available here yet. That said, Sony has introduced a line of portable DAB players including the XDR-M1.

This digital radio has 40 preset stations and an FM tuner in areas that don't have DAB reception. Now, if they could give us DAB over here instead of non-stop commercials for Trimspa, perhaps I'd turn on my radio every once in a while.

Sony launches range of DAB players [Pocket-Lint]

Sony unveils its new WALKMAN

Sony unveils HDD Walkman

Sony Launches MP3 Walkman

Real "Walkman" settles with Sony

Sony hopes to set history with Walkman,
again

$50 Microsoft iPod Killer? Feh!!