Monday 16 April 2007

Can you break the google habit??

In the uk Google dominates 75% of the search engine market! But what about the other engines?

There is nothing really to prove that google has any better results than search engines like Ask but it seems using the convenient google toolbar has become a very habitual thing. This may be due to its easy uncluttered homepage and its downloadable toolbars and services such as Gmail and GoogleEarth.

Many people seem to think they have typed something wrong into google if they cant get the results they want, it doesnt occur to them that maybe this major search engine doesnt have the information they need. A resolution to this problem is the idea of 'meta-search'. this is a search engine that compiles its results from several different search engines.

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Quality or conveinence

High Definition DVD players are here but have they arrived to late??

HD TV's and DVD's give you great picture quality but many people seem more interested in being able to access media from their iPods and computers, these have much poorer quality.

Many people would much rather download clips off the internet than pay for a cinema ticket and see a decent quality film at the cinems. They would also rather have the clips on their iPod's which they can carry around rather than having them on a high quality tv.

There is evidence, that given the choice between picture quality and convenience an increasing number of consumers will choose convenience.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6558807.stm

is the virtual world going too far?

Big Brother maker Endemol is set to make a virtual world where people are able to take part in familiar tv shows like Deal or no Deal, Fame Academy and Big Brother.

"Bosses at the two firms said it was a concept that bridged the divide between traditional TV and video games."

The new virtual game is said to be called Virtual Me and should be available in the coming months.

VirtualMe

Will Britain be ready for the next wave of net use??

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6552823.stm

Time is running out to get the UK in shape to cope with the next wave of net use, says a report.

Big decisions need to be made to encourage telecom firms to build faster networks must be made within the next two years for the uk to have a chance of keeping up.

Monday 26 March 2007

YouTube's soon to be rival???

Just weeks after YouTube had a $1bn lawsuit battle on their hands, they now have another challenge from yet another media industry, last time it was Viacom, this time it is NBC Universal and News Corp. The two are joining forces in order to distribute full length tv programmes with the help of advertising. Over time these two instituitions hope to allow viewers to save the progrmames onto their computers so they may watch them when they want, but for now they are just showing streams of hit shows plus ads.

After the trouble with unauthorized content being available on YouTube, NBC Universal and News Corp. hope that their new idea will prove more popular and successful than YouTube.

Click here

Wednesday 21 March 2007

Virtual Worlds

Virtual Worlds are becoming more and more popular and millions of people are flocking to join them.

Massively Multiplayer Online Games, or MMOG's, are rapidly developing and making a significant appearance in the converged media world.

The market for MMOG's is now worth more than $1bn (£511m). Revenues from subscriptions for these games are said to hit $1.5bn by 2011.

However the increase of MMOG's is small compared to the growth of video on demand, which is said to be worth $11.4bn in four years time!

One of the most succesful MMOG's is World of Warcraft, this game has over 8million subscribers worldwide including 3million in the West, where it has over 50% share of the market.

Top 5 MMOG's
  • World of Warcraft
  • RuneScape
  • Final Fantasy Online
  • Everquest
  • City of Heroes/Villains

There are a number of new MMOG's genres emerging, including:

  • Virtual world building games e.g. second life
  • Virtual pet rearing games e.g. Neo pets
  • More casual MMO puzzle games
  • Sports games where you have to buy items and build up your character

Article on virtual worlds

Wednesday 14 March 2007

Viacom are throwing their toys out the pram!

Viacom want to sue Google and YouTube for $1bn (£517m) because Viacom is saying that YouTube is using their shows illegally.

Viacom has made allegations that around 160,000 of its programmes have been loaded on to YouTube and been viewed over 1.5bn times.

As these two large institutions battle it out, meanwhile Google's shares have fallen by 2.6%.

Click here for more information