E-Readers 

The 'Amazon Kindle', the best selling e-reader today.

E-Reader manufacturers make their money from selling the actual e-reader devices and from selling the books, but recently there has been speculation around giving away the e-readers for free or at a very low price to encourage people to buy the books because they believe that the book market is bigger than the e-reader device market; for example China's biggest selling e-reader the Hanvon N510 has had to cut its price by 40% to compete with other, cheaper e-readers and of course the iPad. Since the E-reader market is relatively recent company's are working hard to try and dominate the market like apple did with the iPod and with iTunes. Maybe in a few years if an effective efficient and affordable e-reader comes and dominates the market than maybe the hard copy books will slowly disappear like the cassette did when the CD first came.   

Digital Rights Management

What is DRM?

Digital Rights Management (DRM) describes a range of technologies which allow control of distribution and access to information, typically - but not restricted to - mass-media content (e.g. books, music, movies), software or data files (e.g. documents, spreadsheets, databases).
Control may be applied for purposes including copyright or intellectual property protection, commercial, industrial or military confidentiality, regulatory privacy and regulatory compliance, amongst other functions. In the latter cases rights management solutions typically ensure that duplicate files cannot exits. This ensures that audited documents remain traceable, that the originators of any and all changes can be traced and recorded and that duplicates (or excerpts) do not exist when confidential files are deleted.
Rights Management solutions typically consist of technical protection measures and some type of rights database that determines correct policy or usage for each file and each user. The technical protection system typically comprises a cryptographic layer and a copy protection layer.

How does DRM work?

DRM is a two-part scheme. It relies on encryption to protect the content itself and authentication systems to ensure that only authorised users can unlock the files.
When applied, DRM scrambles the data in a file rendering it unreadable to anyone without the appropriate unlocking key.
Authentication systems stand between users and the decryption keys, ensuring that only people with the proper permissions can obtain a decryption key.
Without a username and password or if a file has been decrypted too many times, the system will not provide the key. This means music files with DRM, for example, can be swapped over the internet and remain unusable to those who have not paid for them.
It also means only authorised programs and portable players can use the tracks.
Music without DRM, like the popular MP3 music format, retain the ability to be played regardless of the number of times or to whom they have been copied.

Who is using DRM and why?

The most common commercial use of DRM is copy prevention. The technology gives rights holders some assurance that their intellectual property will not be pirated, and helped to create a legal digital download industry.
Film studios were some of the first large companies to adopt DRM.
When the DVD format was launched it included an encryption scheme called the Content Scrambling System, which prevented users from making digital copies of films off the disc.
Recording labels have also adopted DRM to prevent copying.
With the advent of peer-to-peer file sharing networks and the MP3 music compression format in addition to the proliferation of broadband internet access, they claimed music piracy drastically increased.
CD publishers reacted by making discs in a way that lets them play in a regular machine, but not in a computer. This prevents users from copying the music and distributing it over the internet.
Many record labels have also released DRM-protected music for sale and download in online stores like Apple's iTunes and Roxio's Napster. These tracks can play on a set number of computers and portable devices.
DRM video downloads are just beginning in the UK. Channel 4 and Sky have on-demand services that include films.

What are the problems with DRM?

Some consumer groups and internet commentators vociferously argue against the use of DRM.
One of the most often cited problems with the technology is that competing systems are not compatible. For example, users of the Napster service cannot play a track on the iPod.
Changing music download providers or portable players could mean already purchased tracks are unusable.
Because tracks have to be authenticated to play, they may also become unusable if a download company goes out-of-business.
Both cases force purchasers to either forfeit their music or re-purchase it, and for this reason has been characterised as anti-competitive.
Unlike brick-and-mortar shops selling records, cassettes, or CDs, digital download companies can lock consumers into their service.
Critics also argue that many DRM systems go far beyond the rights the law gives rights holders to protect what they create.
DRM is also an imperfect technology. Hackers and software companies engage in a constant back-and-forth battle where any given system is broken, patched, and broken again.
DVD copy prevention was cracked in part by the then 15-year-old Jon Lech Johansen.
Still others object to DRM on philosophical grounds. Art, they contend, is often a collaborative process that builds off the work of others.
For digital media, this is referred to as the "rip, mix, burn" culture.
As music, film, and literature is increasingly expressed in digital form, many worry that restrictions on the use
of this content will limit creativity.

sources: drm.uk.com
             bbc.co.uk

Mashups are basically two songs with a similar beats or tempos put togther: here is an example of one 'MASH UP'
Mashup- the musical genre encompassing songs which consist entirely of parts of other songs.

WikiLeaks superhero or villan?

Wiki leaks is a websight that tries to open up and publicise all the government's secretes. Wiki Leaks seems to be hugely contravertial and is  loved by most public people and hated by all politicians. Wiki leaks is most famous for publicising the civilian deaths of the iraqi war. The organisation has won a number of awards, including 'The Economist's' New Media Award in 2008 and Amnesty International's UK Media Award in 2009.At the same time, several U.S. government officials have criticised WikiLeaks for exposing classified information. Several human rights organisations requested with respect to earlier document releases that WikiLeaks adequately redact the names of civilians working with international forces. Wiki leaks has been critiscised not just for exposing classified information but what people are most intersested about and so are the authority's, is how do they get their information, could they be breaking the law. The U.S government is still trying to prosecute Julian Assange for exposing information about the war in iraq during the year of 2007.


In my opinion I believe that the public have the right to know what their government is doing and should have a voice in what decissions they make, therefore to me wiki leaks is a hero.

Like it or loathe it, Wikipedia is a force. When contributors penned its new entry on Norwegian actress Beate Eriksen on Aug. 17, the English-language version of the controversial user-generated encyclopedia reached 3 million entries. More impressive still: more than 10 million users contributed to that milestone. Not bad for a service originally conceived as an afterthought to Nupedia, a failed first attempt by Internet entrepreneur Jimmy Wales and philosopher Lawrence Sanger at creating a free online encyclopedia.

When Nupedia was created in 2000, the plan was for it to feature expert-written, peer-reviewed content. But it suffered from a major problem: a lack of speed. In its first six months, only two articles made it through the process. To spur better production, Sanger suggested creating a counterpart that anyone could contribute to without editorial review. Wikipedia.com went live on Jan. 15, 2001, and the new model quickly eclipsed its older sibling. By the end of the first year, Wikipedia contained more than 20,000 articles in 18 languages. Since then, the site has grown rapidly, swelling to 250,000 articles by 2004 and a million by 2006. (See the 50 best inventions of 2008.)

Even in its earliest days, Wikipedia had to reckon with a slew of problems. Among them were vandalism and the lack of a fixed formula for determining what should and shouldn't be included in an encyclopedia unconstrained by physical limitations. The emerging community included a volunteer army of editors, who helped to keep the content aligned with Wikipedia's rules, the first version of which Sanger created in 2002. As the project grew, vandalization and dilution of the encyclopedia's content became more difficult to address. The site's software keeps a log of every modification to every page, and this tracking system has been used to bust some high-profile offenders. In May, Wikipedia banned IP addresses owned by the Church of Scientology on the grounds that Scientologists were making edits that didn't suggest a "neutral point of view" — the encyclopedia's golden rule.

But since its inception, the biggest issue dogging Wikipedia has been concerns about its accuracy. Sanger himself left Wikipedia in 2002 over questions about the legitimacy of the project's entries; he later established a competing encyclopedia, Citizendium, with more rigorous contribution criteria. While a 2005 study by Nature found that Wikipedia's science entries came close to matching the Encyclopaedia Britannica's in terms of accuracy — with 2.92 mistakes per article for Britannica and 3.86 for Wikipedia — no one argues that Wikipedia's content is flawless. Critics say the writing is clunky or prone to bias and that the authors focus on pet projects. Indeed, the site's list of Star Wars creatures totals more than 15,000 words, while the entire entry on World War II has just 10,000.

Running an organization as influential as Wikipedia isn't inexpensive. The company's costs reach nearly $6 million per year, and though it recorded more than 100 billion page views last year, the site has no advertisements. With that level of traffic, even a single text advertisement per page would net Wikipedia millions of dollars, but Wales is insistent that the service, which is supported by private donations, remains ad-free.
As impressive a milestone as 3 million articles is, it simply makes the English Wikipedia the largest component of a massive international enterprise. Wikipedia now contains more than 13 million articles in 271 different languages. The German-language version is the next largest, with more than 900,000 entries, but there's something for readers of every language. Even Cheyenne, which is spoken by only 1,700 Native Americans, has its own version of Wikipedia, although it boasts just 62 articles. Wales, who remains the "spiritual head" of the movement, says he wants Wikipedia to one day contain the sum of human knowledge. It has a way to go, but in just a few years the site has come closer to reaching that lofty goal than anything else.*
Time.com*

Self-Powering Devices


Self powering devices is the new break through that not many people are aware of. It's not actually a new technology. During the 60's wind up torches were very popular because people were amazed by the ease of being able to make your own power. These days instead of having to constantly wind up a torch to make it light up, you can wind it up to charge a battery inside which is a much more efficient way of doing it. These days they want the winding up part to disappear and have you do it unconsciously. For example Microsoft have created a television remote which you twist to choose a button or setting, but at the same time the battery in the remote charges. Self powering devices in particular are becoming a lot more popular due to global warming becoming a big issue. I think if self powering devices can become more efficient and power larger devices I think it could become much more successful.    

skateboarding

My presentation is going to be about skateboarding, there will be pictures and videos about famous skaters such as rodney mullen, and steve caballero. But you'll have to wait till' next week to find out!