Nikkei: Toshiba next in line as suitor for Fujitsu HDDs
The Nikkei business news service in Japan is reporting this afternoon that Toshiba is wrapping up talks to acquire the hard drive manufacturing division of Fujitsu, for what so far is an undisclosed sum.
It's no secret to anyone that Fujitsu wants to sell its hard drive operations; it made that much clear last October in its overtures to Western Digital, also carried out with the aid of Nikkei as its bullhorn. The crown jewel of Fujitsu's business there could be its 2.5-inch form factors for media players and small devices like netbooks. But a year ago, Fujitsu decided not to go forward with plans to manufacture even smaller form factors, which would help it break through to the MP3 player market.
Upper-case and straight lace: What Carol Bartz might bring to Yahoo
There is nothing the least bit low-key about Carol Bartz, the longtime Autodesk executive and former Sun Microsystems key executive who is widely considered to replace Yahoo co-founder Jerry Yang as CEO.
Carol Bartz presided over Autodesk as its president/CEO/chairwoman for 14 years since 1994, before stepping down in 2006. Prior to that time, Bartz served in the executive ranks of Sun Microsystems, DEC, and 3M. Not only might she be a dramatic change from the character of the laid back, often timid Yang, Bartz could be the polar opposite of Yang's predecessor, former Warner Bros. executive Terry Semel.
Early reaction to Genachowski for FCC Chairman
The man who was hired to help President-Elect Obama choose the next chairman of the Federal Communications Commission apparently saw this as an introspective affair. The former counsel to FCC Chairman Reed Hundt, former right-hand man to IAC chief Barry Diller, and present managing director of venture capital firm Rock Creek Ventures, will evidently be the new FCC chairman, pending his appointment by the new President.
The early reaction from both the cable and broadcasting lobbies is quite positive. American Cable Association chief Matthew Polka released this statement this morning: "The role of the FCC has never been more significant to more Americans, and we wish Mr. Genachowski well in taking on today's historic challenges. The next several years will present opportunities and obstacles in the technology and communications industries, including the coming DTV transition and the Government's effort to deploy broadband in underserved areas. ACA and its members are eager to work with the new Chairman and all the Commissioners of the FCC to ensure the unique challenges of smaller cable operators and their subscribers are understood and accounted for. Mr. Genachowski's record of accomplishments and reputation within the industry make him a good choice as Chairman, and we congratulate him."
Requiem for an 'N'
Many of you longtime BetaNews...oops...Betanews readers will have noticed starting last week with our CES 2009 coverage that we not only got fatter over the new year (contrary to everyone else with designs on losing weight) but we got a trim up top. Yes, just like myself, there's a little less bushiness on our head this year, and we went lower-case with the "n" in our name.
Now, does this mean anything? In this era of great and stirring symbolism, is there some dramatic statement that goes with the lowering of our "n?"
Behavioral trackers join in promising to behave themselves
We received word this morning of the formation of a coalition of associations, if you will, whose joint purpose will be the establishment of a set of principles for companies in the online advertising business. The promise of this new group of groups, as yet unnamed, will be to develop a set of guidelines for the use of behavioral monitoring tools.
And it's obvious from the get-go that a message is being set to the incoming administration, which could only possibly be more pro-active about consumer protection policies than the current one. It's a very polite message, but what it boils down to is, please, incoming FTC chairperson, leave us alone and let us take care of our own affairs.
Hawaii throws the DTV switch on Thursday
While the incoming Obama administration is considering suspending the countdown for the nationwide switch to digital television, the 50th State is preparing to actually throw the switch on Thursday.
Hawaii's standard-strength broadcasters will power down their analog signals on January 15, in the first statewide test of the DTV transition. However, recently fine-tuned regulations stipulate that low-power (LP) analog broadcasters do not have to power down even after the nationwide February 17 deadline. That affects Hawaii more than most states, since several of the smaller islands are served by LP stations. One such station on Kau'ai, KESU Channel 6, is actually a radio station since the audio portion of Channel 6 has always been available on 87.7 MHz (that's true everywhere in the country). But KESU sometimes supplements its audio signal with a picture, making it one of the nation's only "semi-TV" stations, and it'll be allowed to keep its unusual format.
From the ME: Betanews releases Alpha
"This is an old team," began Edward R. Murrow in his very first See It Now broadcast for CBS Television, "trying to learn a new trade."
Now, over the past few years, I've been guilty of telling folks that Betanews is not a blog, in the same spirit as telling your neighbor trying to borrow your sports car to haul furniture that it's not a truck. A few reasons for that: I don't want Betanews to become one of these peanut-galleries for the practice of would-be journalism -- of essentially replicating stories seen or printed elsewhere and calling it "coverage." We won't be doing that here, and thus ends my list of the things that Betanews Alpha is not.
The Betanews ground crew sum up CES 2009
It was a week with more than the usual chaos, but it left us all with a different perspective on the CE industry than we had going in. Angela, Jackie, and Tim share their thoughts on "green," on Pre, widgets, and 3-D football.
"Tomorrowland," that wonderfully boastful exhibit that was the hallmark of Disneyland since it first opened, let folks ride on a treadmill as animatronic scenes of our electronic, robotic, servo-motorized future dazzled them like Christmas displays in downtown retail store windows.
CES 2009: What have we learned this week?
Last year's Consumer Electronics Show was marked by decisive, pronounced changes in direction for the electronics industry. This year, the battle lines are being completely redrawn.
The single most pronounced aspect of CES 2009 was that, in nearly every industry category, the momentum had shifted in a completely different direction. The leaders and the followers, in many respects, had shifted direction -- in some cases, very surprisingly and almost impossibly. Here's some key examples:
Analysis: Is IPTV finally the key to convergence?
A world of choice and opportunity in televised media was offered up last week at CES, with the Internet enabling new channels and greater viewer choices. Of course, that world won't get here on its own.
If you ask ordinary Americans what bothers them most about the ongoing DTV transition, it's the notion that there doesn't seem to be a clear resolution to the problem of attaching another old-style dongle-like device to their televisions. It's not so much that older analog TVs have to be retrofitted; that much they can handle. It's that the cable, satellite, and now the phone/fiberoptic companies as well are all compelling or forcing customers to attach an even bigger set-top box (STB) to their existing displays, even if those displays are brand-new 1080p HDTV receivers.
Microsoft on Win7 Beta: 'The download experience was not ideal'
Download Windows 7 Beta from Fileforum now (or at least try).
After adding some server horsepower to the Windows 7 beta download over the weekend, some testers did manage to receive working copies. That's not to say everything's working perfectly just yet.
Analysis: The netbook's time has finally come
Eee, Adamo, Vaio P...None of them, it seems, have names that sound unlike yodels. But they're all catching on, as at long last, manufacturers may finally have found a low-cost functionality niche they can capitalize upon.
Three years ago at this time, Microsoft was urging more manufacturers to jump on-board a bandwagon named after paper folding, to sign on to a communal platform for small form-factor computing called UMPC. "What am I?" Microsoft literally asked, assuming the voice of "Origami," though to this day it never responded to its own question.
Has Windows Mobile become a CES wallflower?
If you go down the list of what you've been dazzled by so far from CES this week, just how many of those items have any association with the Windows Mobile operating system? Don't think we haven't noticed, either.
Let's be honest: What attendees expect to see from the Consumer Electronics Show every year is what's new -- what they hadn't seen before. If they wanted to know a status report of what's existing, or what's 30% further down the road than it was last month, they'd stay home and read Betanews.
HP / Voodoo Firebird sells out at $2,100
This morning, Hewlett-Packard's elite division began direct sales of its two newest Firebird enthusiast desktop models, though the top-of-the-line edition sold out right away.
HP's Web site revealed complete specifications and, for the first time, prices for the two slim form-factor enthusiast desktop systems introduced at CES on Tuesday. The lower-end model 802, which features Intel's 2.66 GHz Core 2 Quad 9400 with dual Nvidia 9800S GPUs, is still selling for $1,800 as of Friday evening. However, HP has sold out of the model 803, with the 2.83 GHz Core 2 Quad 9550 and the same dual Nvidias, priced at $2,100.
Analysis: The possible Palm Pre comeback
It is probably the story of this year's CES: A team that's down by several points, with time ticking away, coming back to within striking distance of winning the whole ball game.
That's Palm's circumstances this year at CES, as its Pre smartphone has clearly stolen the buzz in every topic of conversation. It's an important score, especially since Apple was perceived as not having a strong follow-up at Macworld this week, and since the other smartphone-related news from this year's show has not been major.
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