A4AAPL

Imagine this. You are on a business trip to Paris. You are new to the city and are taking Metro to your client's office. Thanks to the Jet lag, you are running late and just missed the train. You seem to be in the vicinity of Metro station but do not know the schedule of the next train. You take your iPhone and start punching to get Google Maps show schedule information while navigating the human maze on sidewalk.

Now Imagine this. You take your iPhone, point your iPhone camera at Metro station and give a voice command "Metro Schedule... English". A french sounding female voice gives you the Metro schedule. Knowing that your next train is after 15 minutes, you see a Starbucks logo on the building adjacent to Metro station on your iPhone screen. You head towards Starbucks while the female voice gives walking directions to Metro station from your current location.

Welcome to Augmented Reality. Services like this are becoming popular in smartphones like iPhone and Android. Even though the applications are in early stages, this is going to be a sought-after feature in smartphones. These applications make use of built-in GPS receiver, built-in compass and camera in smartphones to locate your position and orientation to overlay the available information on top of smartphone's camera view. Additionally these applications can provide access to user generated data in real time. Below is a list of iPhone Augmented Reality applications:

Pranav Mistry's SixthSense technology, which is a wearable gestural interface that augments the physical world around us with digital information promises to take augmented reality to next level.

The hype surrounding Vevo is increasing day-by-day as it's launch date is approaching. The music video website is going to be launched on Dec 08. Dubbed as "Hulu for Music Videos",  the joint venture by Universal Music Group and Sony Music Entertainment will be powered by Google's YouTube technology on a revenue sharing basis. The site will feature music videos, concert footage, backstage footage and interviews. 

Considering the list of investment/partnership deals UMG believed to have inked for Vevo - Abu Dhabi Media Company, EMI Group, Warner Music Group, AT&T, A2IM (an international consortium of 225 independent record labels), this website is going to be a top destination for music videos bypassing TV and radio. As YouTube's top money makers are record labels Universal Music Group and Sony Music Entertainment whose music videos generate more advertising revenues than any other channel in YouTube, this new website possibly could be a substitute for their YouTube channel.

While details about the site are kept under the wraps, it appears from their Facebook, Twitter updates that Vevo is going to use Microsoft's Sliverlight technology for video playback. Vevo's popularity is going to depend on it's ability to let users comment on videos and vote for videos. It remains to be seen whether Vevo is going to complement Google's YouTube services or compete with it for viewership (and revenues).

Update ( Dec 7, 2009) : Vevo announces an agreement with EMI Music.

Looking for deals on Blu-ray discs this holiday season? This might interest you. Warner Home Video, a division of Warner Bros. Studios is offering a trade-in program called DVD2BLU wherein you can send in your DVD titles (from the list of 55 or so available titles) and get Blu-ray version of the same titles for around $8 - $10 each. They are offering free shipping on orders over $25. But, after throwing in factors like parting with your beloved DVDs, paying shipping cost of $4.95 and waiting 4 -5 weeks to get your Blu-ray discs, the effective price you pay here may not be as competitive as buying Blu-ray discs from Amazon or Bestbuy. List of Blu-ray titles available from Warner Bros.'s website DVD2BLU:

Movie	Price	Movie	Price
10,000 BC	$9.95	Journey to the Center of Earth	$7.95
2001: A Space Odyssey	$7.95	Last Samurai	$7.95
Alexander Revisited: (Unrated)	$7.95	Lost Boys, The	$7.95
American History	$7.95	Michael Clayton	$7.95
An American in Paris	$7.95	National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation	$7.95
Any Given Sunday	$7.95	Ocean's Thirteen	$9.95
Aviator	$7.95	Orphanage, The	$9.95
Beetlejuice	$7.95	Pan's Labyrinth	$9.95
Blazing Saddles	$7.95	Perfect Storm, The	$7.95
Body of Lies	$9.95	Pride and Glory	$7.95
Bucket List, The	$7.95	Rio Bravo	$7.95
Christmas Story, A	$9.95	Risky Business	$7.95
Clockwork Orange, A	$7.95	Rumor Has It	$7.95
Collateral Damage	$7.95	Rush Hour 3	$9.95
Constantine	$7.95	Scanner Darkly, A	$7.95
Dark City: Director's Cut	$7.95	Searchers, The	$7.95
Deliverance	$7.95	Shining, The	$7.95
Dirty Dozen, The	$7.95	Speed Racer	$9.95
Dumb and Dumber	$7.95	Superman II: Richard Donner Cut	$7.95
Elf	$9.95	Superman Returns	$9.95
Eraser	$7.95	Swordfish	$7.95
Final Destination	$7.95	Taking Lives	$7.95
Fugitive, The	$7.95	Training Day	$7.95
Full Metal Jacket	$9.95	We Are Marshall	$9.95
Gods and Generals	$7.95	Wedding Crashers	$7.95
Golden Compass, The	$9.95	Wedding Singer, The	$7.95
Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle	$7.95	Wyatt Earp	$7.95
History of Violence, A	$7.95

Of late, retailers have been offering discounts on Blu-ray players by bundling them with High Definition TVs and Home Theater Systems. This holiday season, you are going to find entry level Blu-ray players for as low as $100. This break in entry level price barrier is partly due to higher Blu-ray adoption rate and partly due to the imminent competition the Chinese Blu-ray disc manufacturers are bringing in.


Unlike high-end models, entry level Blu-ray players lack support for BD-Live (profile 2.0) and high definition audio standards like Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio. But, most of them will do the job of playing Blu-ray discs and upconverting DVDs without any issues. If you are planning to get onto Blu-ray bandwagon without burning a hole in your wallet, look out for these players:

• Magnavox NB530MGX (Profile 1.1. No BD-Live support. Has SD slot instead of USB drive)
• Bestbuy Insignia NS-BRDVD3 (Ethernet enabled, supports Profile 2.0
• Curtis Mathes CMMBX130
• Sylvania NB530SLX

A leaked Walmart Black friday Ad lists Magnavox NB500MG1F for $78.

If you are a Netflix customer, this one may make your life little bit easier. Next time you want to manage your Netflix queue or search for titles while watching TV, you don't have to reach for your laptop or desktop to do so. You can just do that from your mobile. There are few applications available for iPhone, Blackberry and Nokia phones. Using these apps, you can manage your DVD rental queue, search for movies, get recommendations. The Netflix app on Nokia phones can even stream movie trailers via 3G or Wi-Fi. Even though the application is available only on select Nokia models, this is definitely a right move from Netflix to reach out for more customers. This means we can expect Netflix streaming to mobile phones in the future!

Three Hollywood studios - Paramount, Lionsgate and MGM - have joined hands to offer their movie and programming content through cable TV channel, Video On Demand (VOD) and online. The platform is called EPIX. Launched with Verizon FiOS as the only distribution provider in October 2009, this service is going to compete with premium channels like HBO, Starz as well as online services like Netflix, Amazon.

The next question is system requirements for watching the content online. According to their website, video is streamed at 500Kbps to 3Mbps and can be  played on Windows and Mac. Video resolution for online streaming is going to be 720p which is not high-definition but is comparable to similar service offered by Netflix etc. Also, you need to be a Verizon FiOS subscriber to access their online content. By limiting online content access to existing Verizon subscribers, they are losing a chance to attract potential new cable customers. So far, no other cable provider has announced any deal to carry the channel which means, all those regions without Verizon service don't have a chance to get the channel anytime soon.

One cool thing about EPIX channel is that you can watch new movies which are not yet available on DVD and Blu-ray. But, all those movies are in 720p, while many other channels offer their HD content in 1080i resolution. So, you are not going to get the best movie watching experience here.

In an attempt to increase profits from the already declining DVD sales, Hollywood studios are planning to keep new DVD releases away from movie rental services like Netflix, Redbox and Blockbuster as many as 30 days. By doing so, studios are expecting that people would buy more DVDs instead of renting them (at least in that 30 day period). While Blockbuster and Netflix seem to be agreeing to this new mandate from Hollywood studios, Redbox is fighting the proposal as it would negatively impact their business model. Redbox has a reason to oppose this proposal more than Netflix or Blockbuster as majority of it's revenues come from new DVD releases. Netflix and Blockbuster seem to agree to this proposal as most of their revenues come from old DVD rentals and Hollywood studios are willing to offer them huge discounts on new DVD releases.

While this apparent decision by Netflix and Blockbuster may boost their profits in short-term it would affect their business model in long-term as people would try to avoid this moratorium by waiting 30 more days for the DVDs to be available for rental or Looking for ways to download/watch illegal copies of movies.With an average period of 3-5 months between theatrical release and DVD release, people may decide to wait 30 more days to rent the DVDs instead of shelling out $20 or so to buy them when they are available. Also, penalizing movie rental customers to wait while making DVDs available for sale will make more people to look for options like illegal downloading.

As digital download/online rental  is becoming more popular, studios and movie rental services should find ways to make them more mainstream and affordable instead of forcing customers to pay more for their movie watching experience at home.

After missing the opportunity to team up with Apple on iPhone more than 2 years ago, Verizon is betting big this time with the introduction of a slew of phones running on Google's Android platform.

Motorola's Droid (available on Nov 06) is the first touch-screen smartphone to use Google's Android version 2.0. Droid's features include sync to Exchange right out of the box so that you can check your work emails and download contacts and calendar. It also syncs your contacts with Facebook. Droid has a 5-megapixel camera with built in flash. Like other Android based phones, it can run multiple programs at once. The Google maps application in Droid can turn the smartphone into a GPS device providing turn-by-turn directions.

However, compared to iPhone, Droid's OS and look-and-feel is not refined. It does not support true multi-touch and it's application foot print is not as big as that of iPhone. Android's inability to use more than 256MB of apps is another drawback. But, better wireless coverage from Verizon and positive reviews by technology critics would make this smartphone a top shopping item for people looking for a mobile this holiday season.

According to Google, 18 mobile phones will be using Android platform by the end of 2009. Below is a partial list of phones available in North America:

Phone	Android Version
HTC Dream (T-Mobile G1)	1.0
HTC Magic (T-Mobile myTouch 3G)	1.5
HTC Hero (T-Mobile G2 Touch)	1.5
HTC Click	1.6
Samsung Galaxy	1.5
Samsung Moment	1.5
Motorola CLIQ	1.6
Motorola Heron	2.0
Motorola Droid	2.0
Sony Ericsson Xperia	1.6

Owning movies on a USB or SD drive falls somewhere between owning a physical disc and owning/renting/streaming digital content in terms of consumer's perception about owning something that they buy. Nowadays almost every computer comes with a DVD drive and not all portable devices support SD cards. This is going to narrow down the prospective audience for this new offering. Also, as people are moving towards Blu-ray high definition content, it would be difficult to get people buy this DVD quality movie offering in USB/SD cards.

As more and more content is made available in digital format, it remains to be seen whether this kind of offering is going to help Hollywood studios make money that are already affected by dwindling DVD/CD sales.