315weixiu.com

Arrington’s post, written at 3:24 a.m., goes on for an additional 2,132 words and outlines his plans for the new company, along with angry words on mainstream media and the tech industry’s failure to understand the importance of the pre-teen and teen market.

“As you can tell by the geographies we’re taking our road show to, we’re going after the kids with parents with piles of cash,” Arrington said. “Ultimately, the pre-teen market is all about innovation and targeting the right audience, and I challenge anyone–Sony, Warner Bros., even those dinosaurs at Disney–to understand this market as well as me and my new partners at Tiger Beat.”

“When I left Silicon Valley the first time around, I assumed someone would truly innovate around pre-teens and teens. Sure, there have been some efforts, Hello Kitty cell phones and other accessories immediately come to mind. But for the most part it’s been hugely disappointing,” Arrington wrote. “So screw it. I’m cashing in.”

Exact terms of the deal weren’t disclosed, but Arrington made it clear he intends to shut down the magazine and go online-only with Tiger Beat, which tech reporters covering the news Monday discovered is actually called Bop Tiger Beat. Within the next 30 days, the site will be renamed CrunchKids.

In a stunning move that caught the blogosphere off-guard, TechCrunch editor Michael Arrington announced Monday that his fast-growing blog empire is acquiring the venerable teen magazine and Web site Tiger Beat from the magazine’s parent company, Laufer Media.

Editor’s note: Remember, tomorrow is April 1, a day reserved in the U.S. for some levity. Happy April Fools’ Day.

Not surprisingly, TechCrunch’s move has roiled the blogging community. “What Tiger Beat does is not blogging; it’s gossip news targeting a teen and pre-teen audience,” wrote sometime Arrington friend (and sometime Arrington foil) Dave Winer. “It is endlessly frustrating to me that people should want to make money off what they write. And making money off what they write for pre-teen and teen girls is even more offensive.”

Arrington wrote that he believes there is terrific synergy between his knowledge of social networking sites such as Facebook and MyYearbook and the Tiger Beat editorial staff’s knowledge of important pre-teen and teen news such as the hilarious new video posted by the Jonas Brothers on YouTube.

The Silicon Valley gossip site Valleywag was even more scathing in its careful critique of the merged sites’ potential. “It sucks,” wrote one Valleywag commenter who was believed to be older than a pre-teen. “Arrington can’t go out in the sun without SPF 45. So how’s he going to look side-by-side on a Web site with the likes of dreamy Zac Efron and Chace Crawford? That’s right, he’ll look terrible. This is dumb. Arrington sucks.”

We’re going to win this fight,” he added. “It will be long and it will be tough. But is Disney willing to get out of bed at 4 a.m. to dig into the rumor that Miley Cyrus was grounded again? I am. I will make that commitment.”

Move over, Hannah Montana. There's a new kid in town.

“It’s the perfect fit for us,” Arrington said in a blog post announcing the deal. “I’ve always thought Big Tobacco had it right: Get ‘em while they’re young. But instead of polluting their lungs, we’re just going to pollute their minds. And really, at some point, like when they’re 14 or so, they’ll get tired of discussing teen news and focus on what I can bring to the table: deep discussions about late-round financing of important new Web 2.0 sites, new services, and TechCrunch’s dream of a $1 billion payday.”

But Arrington said in a brief interview with CNET News.com that he isn’t discouraged and will go after the pre-teen and teen market with the same gusto he has the technology industry. Already, he has planned meet-ups hosted by pre-teen bloggers scheduled to coincide with 11-year-old Mackenzie Dwyer’s slumber party in Chevy Chase, Md., this Saturday night and the junior high dance the following weekend in Oak Park, Ill.

Dueling Fools: Microsoft Bear

Microsoft’s biggest customers have been around long enough to know never to be early adopters. The strategy has pretty much always been: Wait for the biggest bugs to be fixed.
Wait for the hardware to catch up.
Try it out with a few key applications and power users.
Then upgrade the end-user base as the PCs come due for replacement.

For the record I do not own any Microsoft stock but it is easy to see why someone would invest in a monopoly–even if it’s making giant missteps. I suppose if you have enough money you can screw up for a long time with minimal impact.

Dueling Fools: Microsoft Bull

This was supposed to be Microsoft’s final feast, the major last hurrah for its
Windows Vista operating entry and its Office 2007 suite of applications before the inevitable embrace of cheaper open source operating systems and Web-based apps. Very true, Vista has failed to wow, but the impact of that hasn’t been felt yet. As the Bull retorts, early adoption doesn’t really matter as it’s the long tail (ugh) of Windows that keeps paying the bills.

This morning I received Jason Maynard’s (Credit Suisse) note on Microsoft’s outstanding financial performance. I never find it surprising when Microsoft makes its numbers. It’s a well-known fact that company is great at cash management, (though innovation is a whole other story.) Over on Motley Fool there is an interesting point/counterpoint on the demise or not of the MSFT stock.

I never thought I’d say this, but I’m starting to think the
iPod is a true high-end audio component. What’s changed? I heard it in my high-end system, docked into Wadia’s 170i Transport ($379). I can now testify to the iPod’s bona fides.

Thing is, an iPod, even one loaded with uncompressed AIFF or WAV files, isn’t all by itself a high-end component, but teamed with Wadia’s 170i Transport, aka, dock, an iPod is elevated to high-end status. The transformation takes place when the Wadia transmits the iPod’s zeros and ones to an outboard digital-to-analog (D/A) converter in your A/V receiver, or even better, a standalone high-end D/A. Wadia’s claims that the 170i is the first and only “dock” to extract a digital output from an unmodified iPod.

The digital and analog audio outputs, plus component and s-video outputs.

For these listening tests I hooked up the 170i Transport to my high-end system: Sunfire Theater Grand III surround processor, Parasound JC-1 power amplifiers, and Magnepan 3.6/R speakers.

Full 170i/iPod compatibility is limited to the latest generations of iPods; check Wadia’s site for more detailed info on that score.

A Nano docked into the Wadia 170i Transport.

According to Wadia’s national sales manager, Martin Cooper, iPods store MP3, Apple Lossless, and AAC files in Apple’s own digital language, and when an iPod is nestled into a 170i it converts those files to 16/44.1 PCM. That way, the signals can be processed by the D/A in your A/V receiver or high-end D/A. MP3, Apple Lossless, and AAC files will sound “good,” just not quite the same as the original CD. In other words, only AIFF and WAV files can be heard with bit-for-bit accuracy over the 170i.

The 170i’s digital out sends a 16 bit/44.1 kHz PCM digital signal to a D/A. The 170i does that for MP3, AAC, Apple Lossless, AIFF, and WAV files, but just be aware that it converts all but AIFF and WAV to 16/44.1. It can also pass 16/48 PCM, but in most cases 16/44.1 is what you’ll get.

The Wadia 170i Transport will delight audiophiles–you know, people who really care about sound quality. And yes, it’ll pass video over its S-Video and component connections.

The iPod Nano 4GB/170i’s sound was highly resolved, with great depth and high frequency air. As a “control” I hooked up the Nano via its 40-pin connector to the system. I can’t say the difference between the Wadia docked iPod and solo iPod was huge, but significant enough to sway audiophiles. The Wadia docked iPod was cleaner and more transparent.

Have you heard the 170i for yourself? Are you planning on buying one?

(Credit:
Steve Guttenberg)

(Credit:
Steve Guttenberg)

Awful sounding CDs, like Bruce Springsteen’s Born To Run, still sound awful–whether it’s a CD, AIFF, WAV, or 128 MP3. The old “garbage in, garbage out” truism hasn’t changed.

Other results
On the subject of other MP3 player companies, 36 percent claimed to have never owned anything but an iPod. Creative and Rio ranked first and second among the other manufacturers, although “Other” was tied with Creative, suggesting I forgot someone notable. I owned a Rio before buying my first iPod.

There were many interesting tidbits, some of which I discussed in the other story, and some of which didn’t quite fit in with that piece. Here’s a look, and I’ll also put down my answers:

Very few people have sat out the
iPod revolution.

Credit: Susan Dove/CNET News.com

Credit: Susan Dove/CNET News.com

This says to me that people are holding onto their iPods longer than I would have assumed. There have been lots of iPod revisions since 2003 and 2004, including the Nano and video iPods most notably. Perhaps the 2003-2004 respondents have had two iPods, and the 2005-2006 respondents have had one? My first iPod arrived for Christmas 2004.

Credit: Susan Dove/CNET News.com

At least, very few people who read CNET News.com and took the time to answer a poll about iPods, that is. Last week we asked readers to participate in an iPod survey to help inform a separate story on the future of the iPod, which ran over here.

The majority of people who responded to the poll were conservative iPod buyers. I myself have owned two, an iPod Mini and an iPod Nano. I was a little surprised by this, especially given the results of the next question. Just 341 people claim to have never owned an iPod, and that 8 percent figure was consistent throughout the survey.

A few disclaimers: this survey was not sanctioned by The Official Group That Makes Surveys Officious, and should not be viewed as a competitor to data complied by professional survey companies or market research firms. I think it is more representative of CNET News.com readers than the general public, meaning that I think we drew from a group more enthusiastic about technology than the average consumer. And 83 percent of the responses came from U.S. computers.

We had more
Mac users respond to the survey than Windows users, which surprised me a bit. Forty-nine percent of respondents used a Mac to manage their iPod, compared with 41 percent of respondents who used Windows. And of those who own both an iPod and a Mac, 36 percent said they bought the Mac first, throwing a bit of a wrench into the halo theory. I use my Mac, obtained after my iPod, to manage my player.

These two charts suggest that most people’s iPods have sent out to pasture, rather than dying on the battlefield. But it still seems high to me, although it didn’t have much of an impact on people’s perception of the iPod: 84 percent said they’d buy another one. For the record, I’ve never had any problems with either iPod I’ve owned.

Finally, 43 percent of respondents said they aren’t considering another MP3 player company. But of the 57 percent who said they would consider another company, Microsoft’s Zune topped the list, followed closely by Creative and Sony.

The Palm Pre next to the current iPhone 3G.

(Credit:
Corinne Schulze/CNET)

While many lined up this past weekend to buy the
Palm Pre, some decided to wait on making a purchase to hear what would come out of the WWDC 2009 keynote, and as we all found out on the Monday, the answer was the iPhone 3G S.

Since then, the cell phone editors have received numerous reader e-mails wondering whether we’d be doing a prizefight between the two smartphones and we just wanted to let you know that the answer is most definitely yes. As soon as the
iPhone 3G S is released on June 19 and we get a review unit, we’ll pit the two devices against each other in various categories, so stay tuned!

You might not be able to get Google-like profits, but at least you can treat your employees more like how Google treats its own employees. There’s a good lesson in there….
Most of the music on the iPods of UK youth has been pilfered. Surprising? No. There are two interesting factoids in the data, however:
“80% of those who admit to illegally file-sharing are prepared to engage with a legal file-sharing service, and place a considerable monetary value on it”; and
The older people get, the more they pay for music. 55 percent of youth aged 14 to 17 illegally download music, jumping to 60 percent when they’re aged 18 to 24, but dropping down to 39 percent when aged 25 and above.
Does this mean that “old fogey” music is more likely to be monetized than Britney Spears?
The next version of JBoss has been significantly delayed, but Red Hat insists the delay will be worth it as it invests heavily in updating and refactoring the code: “We are better off [than rivals] because we bit the bullet - everything will interoperate.”
Nokia suggests that the open-source community can learn from businesses, in particular how to take a conciliatory approach to resolving complex business problems (like DRM). Worth reading.
Michael Tiemann argues that user-generated innovation, a la open source, is a more sustainable model for software development than proprietary software. It’s a useful read if you’re prone to thinking that individuals qua individuals are weak.

So many good stories, so little time….Here are a few of the best posts today:

commentary

This option will be available on XPS 630, 720 H2C, and M1730 systems. After June 26th, Windows XP will no longer be offered on currently available Inspiron laptops and desktops.

Just when you thought it was the end of the line for Windows XP (well, except for netbooks, individual system builders, etc.), mega PC-maker Dell has granted the operating system a reprieve, moving back the deadline (”extended by popular demand”) for ordering one of a handful of XP systems until Thursday, June 26. Originally, Dell said the last day to order a system with an OEM copy of XP preinstalled was going to be June 18 but now says:

After that, you’ll have to go for the XP downgrade option, which involves paying for both XP and Vista, with Dell installing XP for you and tossing Vista in the box, so you can upgrade when you’re ready (i.e., never).

Per the Microsoft Windows Life-Cycle policy, Direct OEM and Retail License Availability for Windows XP will End-Of-Life (EOL) on June 30, 2008. To meet Microsoft’s June 30 last-day-to-ship OEM Windows XP deadline, we are able to offer the opportunity to purchase a Dell desktop with an OEM Windows XP license until June 26 at 5:59 AM CT.

After June 26 you have the option to purchase
Windows Vista Business or Windows Vista Ultimate with a downgrade service to Windows XP Professional.

Self-interested Google? Absolutely. But then, how many companies do you know that aren’t self-interested contributors to open source? Walker notes:

It helps when Google launches a new platform, such as Android, because its communities will be the source of a great number of hackers who will enjoy bending Android to their will.

John Mark Walker, Hyperic’s community lead, has an interesting take on whether Google deserves to be loved or loathed for its open-source community outreach.

I wonder, however, if Google gets a free pass on so many issues simply because developers are praying for an alternative to Microsoft’s dominance? Perhaps many, or most, embrace Google, thinking, “The enemy of my enemy is my friend.”

Back to John Mark’s point. Google has been exceptional in some areas of community development. The Summer of Code was a masterstroke of genius. Hiring key open-source developers such as Greg Stein hasn’t hurt, either. Together, its open-source community outreach has been executed well, though not flawlessly.

John Mark is in the former camp and, increasingly, so am I. Google is the Teflon open-source company, contributing selectively and strategically…and winning kudos across the board.

Perhaps Google has more to teach us than advertising.

Or perhaps Google has done an exceptional job of looking past the criticisms that I and others have thrown at its open-source efforts, and simply barrels forth. When you’re on the top of your game, you can afford to do this.

commentary

I’m always bemused to see companies stop to throw stones back at critics, as if it’s going to help their stock price. The only thing that silences critics is performance–something Google has had in spades.

I didn’t say they were altruistic, but rather that they knew what they were doing with respect to community development. They invest in communities, many of them related to open source, and this devotion to community helps them tremendously. It helps them when they launch a new set of services because the communities they target will no doubt be the early adopters.

Does the sales pitch change a lot because of what’s going on in the economy?
Benioff: I don’t think it does today, but maybe over time, it will. I don’t think we’re far enough in this. Technically, at least, we’re not yet in a recession.

Along with my colleague Dan Farber, I sat down with Salesforce.com’s Marc Benioff this week for a wide-ranging Q&A. You’ll be able to read the entire interview Monday morning, but what with Bear Stearns’ Friday meltdown and the ensuing panic in the stock market, it was apropos to get Benioff’s take on how Wall Street’s tribulations might impact the tech business and, more specifically, Salesforce.

If there’s a protracted slowdown or recession, what will it mean for the tech business?
Benioff: We haven’t really had any technology companies report numbers or make statements to the effect that this was affecting them yet. Maybe we will see it at some point, but you get where you read about it, and you see it on CNN, and, of course, the stock market has a 200 point bear sell-off. I think that’s why it’s on everybody’s mind. But so far, tech companies haven’t reported that it’s an issue.

Does this kind of economic climate, where there’s lots of uncertainty, make it tougher for someone selling software as a service?
Benioff: With software as a service, you pay as you go, so the risk is mitigated over time. If it’s not right for you, for whatever reason, you’re not as far into it as the old model. The old model was, you bought everything–the software, the hardware, the implementation–and then you had to make the determination: is this the right product for me?

It is interesting to note that the last time Wall Street and the economy headed south, market forces took the model for ASPs, or application service providers, with it–for a time, at least.

"Blue Horseshoe likes software as a service"

That’s what they keep saying–
Benioff: But, of course, it is a bear stock market.

Here are some excerpts:

In our interview, Benioff talks, among other things, about his ambitions to turn Salesforce into an application development platform. He also discusses the nascent competition from Microsoft.

Benioff plays down the potential impact on Salesforce of any prolonged macroeconomic slowdown. But he’s dealing from a position of relative strength. Salesforce recently announced a spectacular fourth quarter. What’s more, Benioff has built the company into more than a ASP.

ASP’s were all the rage in the late 1990s, and a clutch of start-ups took advantage of easy access to capital and an infrastructure buildup. But when the dot-com bubble burst, so did most of their hopes, and bankruptcy became the byword.

(Credit:
Dan Farber/CNET News.com)

Improve your photos?
MotionDSP’s technology works by comparing as many as 25 views of the same subject matter. The FixMyMovie site uses the consecutive frames of a video, but the technology also works on a collection of still images.

The technology also can get rid of chunky compression artifacts, smooth jagged lines, enrich colors, reveal details, and make text readable. It’s an example of computational photography–or videography in this case–in which sophisticated computer processing can improve a photo or video after it was taken.

The company also is seeking new investors. “We’re out raising a round now to take FixMyMovie and really expand on it,” Varah said.

Right now the software takes a little time to improve videos, but with multicore machines growing more common, on-the-fly processing will arrive soon. “I think real-time is less than a year away,” Varah said.

Better video from set-top boxes?
MotionDSP also is exploring licensing deals that could enable companies to embed the technology in devices such as set-top boxes. “Everyone wants to take Internet video to the television,” but today’s low-resolution YouTube videos aren’t inspiring on a large screen, he said.

(Credit:
MotionDSP)

For videos, FixMyMovie can make several improvements. A video shot with a cell phone at 7.5 frames per second, for example, can be increased to 15 frames per second.

Most recently, the company added the ability to create a single high-resolution 1280×1024 JPEG image from a 320×240 video. The company also is contemplating use of the technology to stitch together smaller frames into a wide panorama, to improve image tones to retrieve detail in bright highlights and murky shadows. And it’s possible, if there’s demand, that the company could pursue resolution-enhancing technology to let photography enthusiasts improve their images, Varah said.

MotionDSP got started about three years ago with technology from the University of California-Santa Cruz. The company now has 18 employees, with much engineering work done in Serbia.

I’m among the legions who fume when the investigator on the TV show zooms in endlessly on a photo to uncover some minute detail that in reality couldn’t have been photographed by any camera. Worst is when the investigator clicks some “increase resolution” button to smooth a bunch of blocky pixels into a richly detailed image.

One area of interest is building an online service that can be embedded elsewhere–Facebook, for example. Another is improvements to the FixMyMovie site that would let users automatically push videos to one’s YouTube account or a blog.

Right now, the Web site is free, but eventually MotionDSP will move it to a “freemium” model in which customers would pay for improvements to longer or higher-resolution videos, Varah said.

I suspect there’s a significant population that might be interested; some purchase tools like OnOne Software’s Genuine Fractals to increase the pixel count of their photos for large-printing purposes. The MotionDSP method might not be a simple process, though, for example in a case with moving subjects.

A burst of five or six images–”it’s better if your camera moves a bit”–can be combined into a single still image with four times the resolution, Varah said.

Although that Hollywood hokum is an information-theory impossibility with a single image, some limits are lifted when you have multiple shots of the same scene. And a start-up called MotionDSP is working on commercializing that technology to improve photo and video quality.

The company showed off its FixMyMovie.com technology for improving lower-grade video at the Demo conference last fall, but the company has other applications of the technology in mind, Varah said.

This low-resolution image shows the greater detail that can be shown in the license plate by combining data from several frames of a video. The lower view of the plate is enhanced.

MotionDSP has been funded by In-Q-Tel, the Central Intelligence Agency’s venture investment arm, which naturally is interested in software to extract information from grainy or low-resolution images. But the San Mateo, Calif.-based company is raising a new round of funding to underwrite a more consumer-oriented application of its software, said Chief Executive and founder Sean Varah.

“If you have good 10-megapixel image, do you need to make something bigger? It might make sense if you want to crop or make a billboard,” he said.

The image above demonstrates the technology in action. Clicking the arrow buttons will load different images; my favorite is the mariachi band in the gazebo, in which the process reveals arches and architectural details otherwise lost in noisy murk.