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Archive for the "Digital Audio" Category

Apr14

Podcasts Get Their Own Search Engine

Posted at 1:12 AM • No Comments

Fairfield, Connecticut based TV Eyes, the real-time broadcast search provider which has been indexing television and radio broadcasts since 1999, will debut a Podcast search engine called Podscope later this month. Every word within an Internet podcast will be made searchable which is equally applicable to video blogs and personal videos. Podscope will crawl the web to look for podcasts, when it finds one, it will create an index against every word within the content. Podcasters are also able to submit url(s) for crawling.

“With a looming explosion in such user generated rich content as Podcasts and video blogs, there is a growing need to empower consumers to find and subscribe to programs that meet their diverse interests, commented Allen Weiner, Vice President and Research Director at Gartner. “Searching and indexing these varied audio and video programs will not only benefit content-hungry consumers, it also adds legitimacy and velocity to this burgeoning space.

Podscope isn’t the first speech recognition search technology. HP’s Speechbot has been online for years in demo form using speech-recognition technology to create a searchable transcript. BlinkxTV which we featured here last December also uses speech-recognition technology to create searchable text transcripts.

Related Links

Podscope: New Search Engine Will Allow You to Keyword Search Every Word Spoken in a Podcast [SearchEngineWatch Blog]
Pod Catch [PodCatch.com]
BBC To Massively Expand Podcast Trials [iLoveRadio.org]
Podcast Lab [PodcastLab.com]
Podcast Alley [PodcastAlley.com]
Busy Podcasters Guide [iPodder Sourceforge]
Podcasting (aka How To Get Podcasts and Also Make Your Own) [Engadget.com]
Podcasting Power [MercuryNews.com]
A Look At Other Video Search Tools [SearchEngineWatch.com]

Jan23

Yet More Beatles Mash Up Mayhem

Posted at 12:27 PM • No Comments

We’ve already mentioned the Beastles and the ‘Revolved’ Beatles remix mash-ups on these pages in recent weeks and now there’s another one worthy (or not) of your attention. Beatallica.

Although they’re not in the truest sense of the meaning, mash-up or ‘bastard pop’ as celebrated vigorously on the bootleggers ‘bible’, ‘Get Your Bootleg On’ (or GYBO to those in the know), Beatallica have the spirit of the art down to a tee. A sense of humour and an unlikely clashing of musical genres. Online rockzine Blabbermouth probably summed them up the best by saying that musically they were, “arrangements of Fab Four standards with wonderfully unsubtle references
to Metallica’s songs and a spot-on imitation of James Hetfield’s distinctive vocals…”

So probably more in common with parody like the Rutles and Dread Zeppelin than the genius of Loo and Placido but worthy of a mention here also for their usage of BitTorrent to distribute both their albums, ‘A Garage Dayz Night’ and ‘Beatallica’, not only in the ubiquitous MP3 format but in the lossless audio format Flac. Props all round and great fun to boot (no pun etc….).

Related Reading

Another Beatles Mash Up [MusicbizNews24.com]
Meet the Beastles [MusicbizNews24.com]
Music For the Bootleg Generation [MusicbizNews24.com]
Culture Deluxe [CultureDeluxe.com]

Jan12

Its Here, the iPod Shuffle Emerges

Posted at 12:49 PM • No Comments

As predicted for a while now just about everywhere, Apple CEO Steve Jobs yesterday announced Apple Computer’s Flash memory based MP3 player, dubbed the iPod Shuffle.

Unveiled for the first time at the Mac World Expo in San Francisco CEO Jobs said, “It is smaller than most packs of gum,” and, “It weighs about four quarters.”
The iPod Shuffle will sell for $99 and $149. Unlike other iPods, the Shuffle uses flash memory, rather than a miniature hard drive, to store songs and it is priced lower than many competing flash players with less memory than the 512 megabytes and 1 gigabyte Apple will include.

As predicted at MacMind over a month ago the unit comes without an LCD screen.
“Get this: NO SCREEN. Got a cellphone with one of those flat joysticks? This is apparently how you’ll get around on the screenless iPod.”
Like its big brother the hard disc drive iPod, the iPod Shuffle includes a navigation wheel. There’s also a slider on the back of the player that determines how tunes will be played. The first switch position tells the iPod shuffle to play songs from the beginning of the playlist to the end in orderm, one more notch and it will shuffle the songs on the device. The third position turns the device off.

Jobs told Conference goers, “With most flash-memory music players users must use tiny displays and complicated controls to find their music; with iPod shuffle you just relax and it serves up new combinations of your music every time you listen.”

Users can charge and transfer music from their Mac or PC by plugging iPod shuffle directly into a USB port. The Shuffle also doubles as a portable USB flash drive and comes with its own lanyard so you can wear the tiny player. Apple already have a number of accessories for the new iPod including an arm band, dock connector and sports case.

The players go on sale from today on the Apple website.

Related Reading

iPod Shuffle:First Impressions [PlaylistMag.com]
iPod Shuffle Sparks Stampede [Wired.com]
Apple Introduces iPod Shuffle [Yahoo Finance]
Apple Makes Tiny Steps for the Masses [Washington Post]
Apple: Jobs Unleashes Mini Mini Pod [Silicon.com]
Apple iPod Shuffle (512MB) [CNet Reviews]
Turn Any iPod into an iPod Shuffle in 3 Easy Steps! [Flickr.com]

Jan10

Another Beatles Mash-Up

Posted at 1:07 PM • No Comments

Its not exactly a groundbreaking new idea, grab an old Beatles album, mash up with random choice of other tracks etc. Still, mash-up DJ/ ‘Frankenstein Pop’ artist CCC has undertaken the not undaunting task of putting his own spin on the Beatles classic 1966 ‘Revolver’ album.

The full track listing and ubiquitous MP3 downloads for ‘Revolved’ will be up next month on its completion, meanwhile there’s five variations already up for grabs, the most promising of which is ‘Eleanor Ciccone’ a rather wonderful pairing of Madonna’s ‘Ray Of Light’ and the Fab Fours ‘Eleanor Rigby’ . Theres an unadventurous mash-up of the Jams ‘Start’ and the Beatles track that was the inspiration for Paul Weller, ‘Start’ and overall its great fun but not nearly as clever as DJ Dangermouse’s groundbreaking (at least in terms of column inches)‘Grey Album’.

Related Reading

Meet the Beastles [MusicbizNews24.com]
MTV Premier’s New ‘Download’ Show [MusicbizNews24.com]
Music for the Bootleg Generation [MusicbizNews24.com]

Jan10

Philips Unveil MP3 Mini Boombox

Posted at 1:01 PM • No Comments

Philips were showing off one of the oddest entries amongst the army of new MP3 portables at CES last week with the dinky looking Personal Sound System (or the PSS 110 as its known officially).
The super compact digital stereo comes with built in speakers, doing away with the need for the after market accessories needed for iPods to escape the restrictive headphone only playback.

The unit comes with a relatively sparse 256MB (though this is still sufficient enough to cram over four hours of reasonably high bit rate MP3′s on there) with no expansion slot. In its favor there’s an FM radio tuner, WMA and MP3 playback and a built in clock/alarm. Its due in the US in April for around $159.99.

Jan10

More MP3 Gadgets From CES (2)

Posted at 12:56 PM • No Comments

Still a huge list of MP3 players, PMP’s, PVP’s and other similar acronymed portable music and video players that we havn’t had time to mention from the CES gadget fest last week. Koreans iAudio/Cowon ( JetAudio in the USA) had a bunch of funky looking new models–new to the USA that is, some of these have been floating around the Far East for a while– on show in Las Vegas. The iAudio5 (pictured below) has a choice of flash memory ranging from 256MB right up to 2GB. It has a color screen, USB 2.0, support for Ogg Vorbis, MP3, WMA and the newer secure Janus/WMA (see PlayForSure.com, better known as PayForMore amongst digital cynics). Other Flash memory players included the G3, and the U2. Cowon were also showing off the 20GB hard drive big brother M5 and the unexpected A2 portable media player.
Clockwise from L to R, Ezav Enom EMP-5000, the LG MF-HE 700, Enox-EMX-830 and the Cowon iAudio 5
Elsewhere there was the Korean Enox EMX 830 said to be the worlds smallest and lightest MP3 player and featuring capacity ranging from 256MB to 1GB.

LG had the 20GB MF-HE 700 with color screen and MP3, Ogg, WMA and video playback function, FM tuner/recorder and voice recording capabilities. And another name new to these shores was Koreans Ezav who were showing off the smooth looking EMP 500 flash player, with the usual 256MB-1GB range, color display and direct MP3 encoding feature.

Related Links

iAudio Cowon Forums [iAudiophile.net]
CES 2005 Portable Audio and Video [CNet]
DAP Review [DAPReview.net]

Jan9

Flash Memory Micro iPod Only A Day Away?

Posted at 1:11 PM • No Comments

Geeks and electronic gadget fans attention will be shifting from Las Vegas to San Francisco tomorrow as the much anticipated Mac World Expo opens just 48 hours after gadget-fest Las Vegas ends.

Much of the anticipation surrounds the expected official announcement of a smaller Flash based memory version of the iPod which has already been much whispered and speculated about web wide (including here). I cant think of a portable device that has sprung up so many speculative DiY designs and gossip ever.

The MacMind website was the first one to actually post leaked mock-ups early last month. A few days ago Think Secret had even more information (from reliable ‘sources’) with claims that the device will be in 1 and 2GB sizes with the Flash memory module sourced from Samsung. Prices are said to be $149 for the 1 Gig player and $199 for the 2 Gig (which is said to have two mini Flash modules) with manufacturing already underway in Taiwan courtesy of Asustek.

The other much talked about device expected to be elaborated on at the San Francisco Expo (there was a sneak preview at CES) is the Motorola iTunes capable phone which has been the source of frantic debate almost as much as the Flash iPod.

Related Reading

iPod Flash Will Have a Screen? [Engadget.com]
The Chinese MP3 Invasion [MusicbizNews24.com]
Applele [Applele.com]
iPod Flash Player Revealed? [MusicbizNews24.com]
the Cult of Mac Blog [Wired Blogs]

Jan7

More MP3 Gadgets From CES

Posted at 1:12 PM • No Comments

If you want to see just why there are so many manufacturers fighting for the digital portable audio market right now, aside from all the iPod hype, sales of MP3 players more than doubled in 2004, to 6.9 million units, with dollar sales nearly tripling to $1.2 billion, according to data released by the Consumer Electronics Association. The CEA (organisers of the CES) projects that MP3 player sales in 2005 will reach 10 million units and $1.7 billion in dollar sales.

Clockwise L to R. MP3 Players from the 2005 CES in Las Vegas. Panasonic SV-SD 100, the red SAFA SR, the 20GB Aireo2 WiFi MP3 unit in white, ASmart U-538 and the RCA Lyra mini photo 5GB

So another tidal wave of MP3 and multi media devices to mention from CES this week, some of them we’ve mentioned before but its the first US appearance for most of them here. Panasonic had four new flash players on show including the SV-SD100 (pictured above) with 256MB and an OLED screen MP3, WMA and AAC playback. Unremarkable judging by the spec but some unusual shapes in the 512MB units the SV-MP120V and the SV-SW120V.

The SAFA SR-M800 model we highlighted last month. There are four models, the 128mb M800F , 256mb M820F , 512mb M850F and the 1GB capacity M890F . The players are available in four colours, blue, red, black and silver. Besides having an integrated FM tuner, line-in recording, and built-in speakers, it also has a 1.5-inch 65,000 color LCD screen you can use to look at your digital photos.

Taiwanese ASmart Technology have some unusual flash models including the weird looking SU-745 and the U-538 (pictured above) both in 128 and 256 sizes and with SD/MMC slots for expansion. RCA/ Thomson introduced the 5 GB Lyra Mini Photo with a 1.5inch LCD screen (where everyone else is already moving to OLED) and a $270 price tag (more than the iPod Mini benchmark of $249).

Related CES News

DAP Review [DAPReview.com]
Report: 2004 U.S. MP3 Player Sales Double to 6.9 Million [CE.org]
I4U CES 2005 News Coverage [i4U.com]

Jan6

New Manufacturers Crowd MP3 Market at CES

Posted at 1:31 PM • No Comments

As well as all the usual leading audio manufacturers displaying new MP3 players at this years CES that market is set to get decidedly busier in 2005 with a whole raft of new names (at least to the US) showing off an interesting (though not exactly ground breaking) group of new models. The Mobiblu brand from Korean firm Hyun Won Inc. have some sharp looking players on show.

Three flash models are making their US debut, the DAH 1000 and 1200 both come in choices of 128/256 and 512MB while the 1400 has a 256/512 and 1GB memory option. The DHH-100-5 has a 5GB HDD and is compatible with MP3 and WMA and also the newer DRM’ed WMA format. The feature rich unit has built in voice recorder, USB 2.0, an SD/MMC memory card slot and built in stereo speakers and direct MP3 plug and play encoding (rip without a PC) and retails for $229.

Related Reading

MobiBlu DHH 100-5GB Review [Cnet Reviews]
I4U CES 2005 News Coverage
[i4U.com]
CES 2005 Daily Updates [CrutchfieldAdvisor.com]
Portable Audio and Video CES 2005 [CNet News]
Engadget at CES [Engadget.com]

Jan6

More Korean MP3 Players (CES Entry 2)

Posted at 1:28 PM • No Comments

Dont know a whole lot about Korean gadget manufacturer IOPS but they have a handful of nice but quite generic looking flash players. At CES they are showing off the F4 model which plays WMA, MP3 and Ogg, has USB 1.1, comes in four colors and four memory sizes, the pretty standard 128/256/512 and 1GB flavors. There’s FM receiver and recording, voice recorder, direct encoding feature and OLED display. No details on price or availability. The model is marketed in Europe via Czech Republic based brand Emgeton.