The Music Experience: MPD vs AppleTV

Multimedia, AV 29 Comments
For over 9 months now we use our Apple TV as our music entertainment system in our home. And when I mean "music entertainment system", I mean just that. We don't use our Apple TV for anything else, not even video (our much more video-capable Sony PS3 bears that task). We used to use CDs, in a 250 CD-changer device, but the experience was not nearly as good as when dealing with files that have metadata. So we got ourselves an Apple TV. On the other side of the country, a friend of ours uses the open source MPD solution. In this article I'll try to figure out which one of the two is the best solution for my household's usage pattern.
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It’s Official: Valve Releasing Steam, Source Engine for Linux

Games 64 Comments
"Valve Corporation has today rolled out their Steam Mac OS X client to the general public and confirmed something we have been reporting for two years: the Steam content delivery platform and Source Engine are coming to Linux. This news is coming days after we discovered proof in Steam's Mac OS X Client of Linux support and subsequently found more Linux references and even the unreleased Steam Linux client. The day has finally come and Linux gamers around the world have a reason to rejoice, as this is the biggest news for the Linux gaming community that sees very few tier-one titles." This means Linux users can finally enjoy two of the best games in recent years: Left 4 Dead and Left 4 Dead 2. BOOMER!
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Adobe’s New Flash DRM Comes with Selective Output Control

Multimedia, AV 7 Comments
"Adobe has rejiggered its DRM software for the Flash platform, combining a number of access control features under the rubric of Flash Access 2.0. The new platform can give content providers all sorts of ways to offer media content securely, including controlling what type of output devices can display the content - in effect, Adobe is enabling HDCP and broadcast control flags for Flash content."
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Verizon Wireless Is Working on Tablet with Google

Wireless 5 Comments
"Verizon Wireless is working with Google Inc. on a tablet computer, the carrier's chief executive, Lowell McAdam, said Tuesday, as the company endeavors to catch up with iPad host AT&T Inc. in devices that connect to wireless networks. The work is part of a deepening relationship between the largest U.S. wireless carrier by subscribers and Google, which has carved out a space in mobile devices with its Android operating system. Verizon Wireless last year heavily promoted the Motorola Droid, which runs Google's software."
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BSA: Global Software Piracy Down Year-over-Year

Legal 1 Comment
"The Business Software Alliance, an industry trade group that represents many software vendors, has made stamping out software piracy a major initiative. To that end, it commissions an annual survey of global piracy, performed by IDC. There's not a whole lot of information about the methods employed in producing those numbers, so it's difficult to know how reliable they are in absolute terms. But said figures may be valuable for detecting trends, in which case the news is good for the BSA: although piracy remains substantial, it isn't growing at the rates it once was, and many industrialized countries have seen rates of piracy drop below 25 percent."
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Jakob Nielsen’s iPad Usability Study

Graphics 34 Comments
Ah, Jakob Nielsen. Anyone who has ever been involved with serious document design or web usability will know his name. If you've never heard of him, the best way to describe him would probably be this: he's the Richard Stallman of usability. He has a set of very clear ideas about user interface and document design, which more often than not get in the way of beauty. He has performed a usability study, with real users, on the iPad.
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Mandriva S.A. For Sale

Mandriva, Mandrake, Lycoris 49 Comments
If there's one Linux company that has seen lots of ups and downs it's the Paris-based Mandriva S.A. They have a great distribution, but as a company, they've always been on shaky grounds. First a rumour, now confirmed: the company has put itself up for sale - which, as the community points out, isn't necessarily a bad thing.
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Adobe Shows Off Flash 10.1 on Android, Impresses

Wireless 55 Comments
While most of us here on the OSNews team are proponents of HTML5, we're all fully aware that Flash serves an important role on the web today, and will most likely continue to do so for the foreseeable future. Flash has a rather spotty record when it comes to performance, and so far, hasn't been able to run well on mobile devices. It seems this is about to change, as an Adobe evangelist has showed off Flash 10.1 on Android 2.2 (Froyo) running on the Nexus One. And eerlijk is eerlijk, it looks pretty darn impressive, especially considering how far they've come.
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The H.264 Debacle: We’re Complaining to the Wrong People

Internet 87 Comments
A lot of articles lately have been focused on why Apple and Microsoft are the bad guys by supporting H.264 and not Theora. Well, yes, they are bad guys, but there really is not much point whining to them. It will in all likelihood fall on deaf ears, simply because they are acting in their own best interests--as MPEG stakeholders and commercial, DRM-encouraging, royalty-loving, proprietary-operating-system-hawking corporations. But that could all change--if the HTML5 spec didn't allow H.264.
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Apple, AT&T Five Year Exclusivity Agreement Confirmed

Wireless 9 Comments
It has long been rumoured that Apple and AT&T signed an exclusivity deal for the iPhone covering five years since the launch of the original iPhone (2007). Apple has confirmed in a court case that this is indeed true; in other words, there is not going to be a Verizon iPhone before 2012. However, it is important to note that the original agreement may no longer be valid (for instance due to AT&T problematic service). This same court case also touched upon another important issue. "The plaintiffs argued that Apple exerts illegal monopoly power over the iPhone applications market by barring third-party apps from iPhone OS 1.0, and the court ruled the argument was valid enough to go forward." Should be of interest to Adobe and the FTC.
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Android Outsells iPhone in the US

Wireless 97 Comments
When Apple sued HTC, and targeted Android specifically (news which came out of the blue), many people, including myself, were convinced this was Apple letting the world know they were afraid of Android's rising popularity. This notion was laughed away by many an Apple fan, but it turns out that this is most likely far closer to reality than many dare to admit: in the first quarter of 2010, Android conquered the number two market share spot from the iPhone in the US - and by a wide margin too. Update: Added a graph which better shows the trend.
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