Ed Oswald

LG said Wednesday that it had selected Broadcom's integrated dual HD disc format system-on-a-chip had been selected to power the company's next dual-format player.

Broadcom says that its solution continues to be the only one in the industry that can fully support the interactive features of either format -- HD DVD's HDi and Blu-ray's BD-Java -- and other mandatory requirements.

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Microsoft is trying to fight piracy in China by ensuring that more new computers in the region come with genuine copies of Windows pre-installed at the factory.

The Redmond company said Wednesday that it had come to an agreement with the nation's second largest computer manufacturer, Founder, which includes a deal to resell Microsoft hardware as well.

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ANALYSIS: Sources close to retailers indicate that Toshiba sold over 90,000 $99 HD DVD players over the weekend, and that figure only represents a portion of the retailers that participated in the frenzy.

According to Video Business, the 90,000 count includes Toshiba HD-A2 players sold at Wal-Mart, Best Buy, and Circuit City along with a few other brick and mortar outlets. But it apparently doesn't include online retailers who also participated in the price drop, such as Amazon.com.

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The Pirate Bay is pushing forward with the development of a new software standard that makes it easier for downloaders to pirate media files, as BitTorrent works to become more legit.

The site has long used BitTorrent to trade files between its users. However, the creators of that technology have taken great strides to market legal uses of its product and have begun to crack down on illicit file sharing where it can.

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Europe is looking to gain access to passenger data on American travelers much like the US already does with foreign nationals coming in to the country.

The European Commission is set to announce the proposal this week and is said to be part of the EU's efforts against terrorism. As well as American passengers, it also covera data on any airline passenger flying into the region.

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Sony is about to release a new version of its aging PlayStation 2 console in Japan ahead of the upcoming holiday season.

The new version is lighter than the previous model, and includes a built-in AC adaptor. An older version with an external AC adaptor weighed some 30 ounces: the new model only weighs 25.

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Sony believes that it may be about to have its best holiday season ever in the United States as it is seeing strong demand for TVs, cameras, and computers.

Fears of an uncertain market seem to be unfounded at least for now as American consumers continue to scoop up consumer electronics at a steady clip. In the wake of the sub-prime lending fallout, many manufacturers of consumer goods have feared that consumers would begin to stop spending.

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Hollywood writers went on strike at midnight Monday, at odds with the producers over several issues which included several disagreements on compensation for so-called "new media" royalties.

The disagreement and strike essentially brings to a halt production on nearly every current television show on the air. Depending on the length of the walkout, it could put network's fall schedules in jeopardy, especially for those which the full season has not yet been written.

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Although it is out of the jurisdiction of the United States Government, a Canadian ISP's admission that it is using similar tactics as Comcast is likely to keep the debate on net neutrality going.

The admission by Bell Sympatico came through its online forums after a user complained that he was noticing problems with his connection when using peer-to-peer downloading programs.

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Microsoft seems set to debut its newest addition to the Windows Live family, a calendaring application, and is also preparing to bring several Live services out of beta, sources report.

LiveSide.net is reporting that Windows Live Calendar briefly made an appearance on Microsoft's servers, apparently for testing. It's appearance led the site to believe that a release is imminent.

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Microsoft said Monday that the first product under the Windows Home Server line, HP's MediaSmart Server, is now available for pre-order and will be released later this month.

Pre-orders will be taken on the Web sites: Amazon, Best Buy, Buy.com. Circuit City and CompUSA. Shipping and availability through other retailers occurs later this month.

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Mozilla and Microsoft are in the midst of a squabble over the future of JavaScript, with each side accusing the other of actions which could end up "breaking the Web."

The two companies each have their own respective versions of the common programming language that is used across the web: Mozilla backs ECMAScript, while Microsoft pushes its own JScript.

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Seagate will settle a lawsuit over its definition of a gigabyte by giving customers the choice of either a cash refund or free backup and recovery software.

The hard drive maker was sued in 2005 by Michael Lazar and Sarah Cho, who accused the company of misleading consumers as to how much storage space Seagate hard drives contained.

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Comcast may soon find itself in hot water with the FCC after several public interest groups and legal professors from Yale, Harvard, and Stanford filed a network neutrality complaint against the company.

Listed as complainants are: Free Press, Public Knowledge, Media Access Project, Consumer Federation of America, Consumers Union, the Information Society Project at Yale Law School, Charles Nesson of Harvard Law School and the Berkman Center for Internet & Society, and Barbara van Schewick of Stanford Law School and the Stanford Center for Internet & Society.

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UPDATE - Friday, 4pm EST - ESRB President Patricia Vance has issued a statement saying Take-Two is not responsible for the latest hack.

"Once numerous changes to the game's code have been made and other unauthorized software programs have been downloaded to the hardware device which circumvent security controls that prevent unauthorized games from being played on that hardware, a player can view unobscured versions of certain violent acts in the game," Vance said. "Contrary to some reports, however, we do not believe these modifications fully restore the product to the version that originally received an AO rating, nor is this a matter of unlocking content."

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