GA News Bulletin: Google's plan to save the world, Unlimited Music?, and iTunes stays alive

Google to save the world

Clean Energy 2030. Doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue, but it gets the point across for it’s the name of Google’s globe saving plan that would see the climate crisis averted with dedicated reformation and preemptive solutions culminating in the year 2030. The targets are based on reductions from the Energy Information Administration’s current baseline and would see everything from vehicle emissions to CO2 emissions in the electricity sector. The plan calls for, among other things, a marked rise in the use of plug-in and hybrid cars (with the goal of 90% of all new cars being sold in the year 2030 being of those varieties), as well as the replacement of all coal and oil power plants and a fifty percent decrease in the reliance upon natural gas for energy.

And all this at the bargain price of $4.4 trillion dollars. But seriously, what the hell is green paper worth when your entire country is under miles of fresh glacial waters?

Source

• Unlimited Music for only 130…pounds that is

Ah, not a day goes by that we don’t hear something from the music biz. Today we’re fortunate enough to have two nice tidbits. The first is that for a mere £129.99 (approx. $220 USD) you can download an unlimited amount of tunes from Universal Music, Sony BMG, EMI and Warner Music—for a year. The ‘deal’ comes in the form of a pay-as-you-go phone. It’s all part of Nokia’s Comes With Music campaign that in this case sees the phone manufacturer signing over cheques to the record companies for each handset it sells. Tracks can be downloaded to the device itself and one other computer.

So how about it; $220 a year for unlimited music? Probably the same amount it costs per hour to retain a lawyer that’s capable of defending you against music piracy charges.

Intel, Yahoo to bring Widgets to your TV

Right now, as we speak, there is an ongoing struggle in the universe. Not one between good and evil, but one of even greater philosophical importance; do you want to turn your PC into a TV or your TV into a PC? This debate has become somewhat longstanding over the past decade or so. There was a time when graphics cards manufacturers were pushing TV-Out and then they started pushing TV-In. Then set-top boxes emerged, firmly stating that your PC and TV should be separate, but we capable of accessing the same features through the internet. Then videogame consoles hopped on the bandwagon, turning your television into a streaming machine, bringing YouTube and other wackiness under the power of the joystick. And while the debate still rages on, two major companies are embarking on an endeavour to tip the scales. Yesterday, Intel and Yahoo announced that they have joined forces in a bid to meld PC like features with the accessibility of your television. The news was unveiled at Intel’s conference for developers in San Francisco, where it was stated that they will be manufacturing a “system on a chip” for use in a set-top box. Yahoo will be providing a platform that will run widgets, those small little applications that relay the weather, news, stocks, even eBay auctions. As for how long before we’ll see this joint effort in stores, the timetable is set for a 2009 launch. In the meantime, here's some footage of the system in action: And apparently the fun doesn’t stop with just two, as it was revealed that a whole host of companies, running the gambit of Blockbuster, CBS, eBay, Joost, Twitter, Samsung Electronics and Toshiba, are all joining forces in order to bring a more interactive television experience. So, will this mark a major victory for the TV into a PC campaign? Not likely, as the Intel/Yahoo initiative offers next to nothing new to an already crowded market. It’s odd seeing such a niche market swell with so many offerings. However, in some sense, it may resemble the digital music player market, pre-iPod. In those dark days everybody and their brother was making an mp3 player, all copying one another, mediocrity copy mediocrity. Perhaps, one day, we’ll see a truly innovative meld between televisions and PCs but for now, I’m sticking with my TV-In/TV-Out card. Source

GA News Bulletin: Streaming iTunes, the world's most efficient supercomputer, and Bigfoot!

iPhone: Simplify Media

Streaming. No, not what you do in your canoe on the weekends, I’m talking data, music data to be precise. Lately, there has been buzz around the notion of streaming your music library (as that would apparently be Dell’s ace in the hole as they contemplate returning to the mp3 player market, as reported earlier here on GA). The pull here is that you could simply keep your iTunes library up to date with your latest downloads and purchases and then simply stream the media to any other computer you had access to or even a handheld device. Say, isn’t the iPhone a handheld device? Wouldn’t it be something if you could stream your iTunes to your iPhone? Well, you can! Thanks to Simplify Media, a new app available in the App Store, that allows you to access your iTunes library and 30 of your friends via EDGE, 3G and Wi-Fi!