From Geeks are Sexy Technology News: Woz: Apple didn’t deserve to win Samsung case

Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak says he doesn’t agree with a California court’s decision to rule in favor of the company in its patent battle with Samsung. He also attacked the entire idea of the rival lawsuits.

Speaking to Bloomberg, Wozniak said:

I don’t think the decision of California will hold. And I don’t agree with it — very small things I don’t really call that innovative. I wish everybody would just agree to exchange all the patents and everybody can build the best forms they want to use everybody’s technology.

This isn’t the first time Wozniak has made comments that show a lack of blind loyalty to his former company. In January he praised the iPhone’s beauty but argued that leading Android handsets had superior navigation, voice recognition and battery life. A few months later he spoke of looks and beauty again, but this time was complimenting Windows Phone, joking that Steve Jobs may have been reincarnated at Microsoft.

As part of the Bloomberg interview, Wozniak said his main hope for the iPhone 5 was an improved camera. He noted that the iPhone 4′s shots are inferior to those taken on his Galaxy S III.

It looks as if the Woz might be in luck. Even though it will be several weeks before any consumer get their hands on the phone, a piece of luck allows a direct comparison. Apple has released several images taken on the iPhone 5, including one of a piece of California coastline. Scott Everett of the Digital Photography Review site happened to have recently taken his own photo of the same scene with the iPhone 4.

The technical analysis shows that although the pixel count is the same, the iPhone 5 has a slightly larger sensor despite the lens being a fraction smaller. There’s also a wider range of camera speed settings: the sample iPhone 5 shot was taken at a slower speed than the iPhone 4 can use.

Whether that translates into visibly better pictures — and superior shots than the Samsung handset — is a little more subjective.

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from Geeks are Sexy Technology News

From Technology Review RSS Feeds: A Startup Asks: Why Can’t You Resell Old Digital Songs?

ReDigi has technology that helps transfer ownership of digital media—but it’s already being sued by the record industry.

In the iTunes store, the hit song “Someone Like You” by Adele sells for $1.29. Head over to ReDigi, an online marketplace where people can resell the music files they’ve purchased, and there’s the track for only 59 cents.




from Technology Review RSS Feeds

From Droid Life: Amazon Cloud Player and MP3 App Receive Updates, Audiophiles in For a Treat

Today, Amazon has pushed an update to both their online Cloud Player and MP3 mobile applications. To say the updates are major is almost an understatement. For starters, you can now use Amazon’s scan and match feature that will make uploading your library to the cloud much faster, as well as the ability to add past MP3 purchases to the Cloud for free. The new feature that most music lovers will be happy about is that Amazon now offers to turn your library of music (as long as they have it) into high quality 256 Kbps audio files. Yes please.

New features include:

  • Import your music to Cloud Player faster with scan and match technology
  • Upgrade your music to high-quality 256 Kbps audio
  • Add your past Amazon MP3 purchases to Cloud Player automatically…for free
  • Edit song and album information
  • Import more types of music files

The updates are live now, so for anyone that has their music stored on the Cloud Player, go get your free high quality files!

Via: Amazon

from Droid Life

From Engadget: The Humble Bundle tries something different, lets you name your price for albums from They Might Be Giants, Jonathan Coulton, and more

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The Humble Bundle may have gone mobile on Android earlier this year, but that’s proven to be a relatively small jump compared to the organization’s latest expansion. It’s now rolled out its first Humble Music Bundle, a collection of six albums that, as always, you can name your price for. Those include an album of rarities from They Might Be Giants, Jonathan Coulton’s Greatest Hit (Plus 13 Other Songs), an exclusive MC Frontalot collection, Christopher Tin’s Calling All Dawns, and game composer Hitoshi Sakimoto’s Best of the Valkyria Chronicles — plus OK Go’s Twelve Remixes of Four Songs if you pay above the current average price. Naturally, all of the albums are DRM-free and available in both MP3 and FLAC formats, and you’re able to choose what percentage of your payment goes to the artists, charities (Child’s Play and the Electronic Frontier Foundation) and the Humble Bundle organization itself. You can get a taste of what’s in store in the video after the break, or get full previews of each album before you buy at the link below.

 

from Engadget

From Engadget: E-Onkyo music service becomes first to offer Dolby TrueHD 5.1 audio

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Looking for something a little more than your average online music store has to offer? Then you may soon want to give Onkyo’s somewhat niche e-onkyo service some consideration. It’s set to be the first store to offer music in Dolby TrueHD 5.1 — something that will initially be limited to just 100 albums (heavy on the classical, from the looks of things) and require a compatible Onkyo receiver. Those downloads will also only be available in Japan initially (where they’re rolling out on May 30th), but Dolby says they’ll be available “elsewhere in the world” sometime this fall. Not surprisingly, that new option will demand a bit of a premium as well, with albums starting at Â¥3,000 (or about $35) and singles setting you back Â¥400 (or $5).

from Engadget