InternetConnectivity
Latest
U2 360° Tour Blu-ray actually makes compelling use of BD-Live
Normally, if asked to choose between living with or without gimmicky BD-Live enabled bonus features, we'd pick the latter. Musical preferences aside though, U2's use of the technology on their 360 Tour Blu-ray to share select performances from their 2011 tour is just the kind of cool use case we've been looking for. According to the disc's production company, it was also cheap to implement -- think less than a pair of Bono's sunglasses. That happens to fly directly in the face of arguments made by other studios who cite BD-Live's costs as the main reason for its limited integrations to date. So while we never thought the day would come, it looks like the same minds behind the special edition iPod have set a new precedent -- mainly that studios shouldn't get away with all that they leave behind. That's right you heard us movie companies, we want more free future content on discs -- and while you're up get us some Goobers too.
Google's Internet-equipped magic bus lights across India
When you spend all of your workday bloggin' it's easy to lose sight of the fact that some folks don't have access to basic utilities, or HDTV, or -- the horror! -- the Internet itself. In the time-honored tradition of Hippies and earnest seekers alike, Google has headed to rural India, where it will be focusing its philanthropic endeavors (or perhaps its shrewd marketing endeavors) for the next month and a half. The company's Internet bus will roll through towns in the state of Tamil Nadu, providing connectivity via satellite, and content and instruction in both English and Tamil to people whose only previous exposure to the online world (if any) has been via cell phone or cyber cafe. This is all part of a broader scheme to expand into the Indian countryside, and if the trip is a success more are sure to follow. The company's services already include transliteration, news, bidirectional machine translation, and soft keyboards for a number of Indian languages, and a host of kick-ass Ravi Shankar tunes now available on Google Video.
