digital

Spotify tries to go mainstream, launches splashy ad campaign

Spotify today is rolling out a major advertising blitz, including a series of TV spots as the company hopes to reach a mass audience in the U.S. The campaign, called "For Music" and created by Droga5, will debut tonight during NBC's "The Voice" and will have Web and social media components.

Spotify's push comes at an important juncture for the company, which now has 24 million active users and 6 million paid subscribers. Spotify, which offers both on-demand music and Internet radio, said in December that it had passed 1 million paid subscribers in the U.S. … Read more

Is Spotify gearing up to take on Netflix? Not soon

Spotify, the largest on-demand music service with 24 million active listeners, is in the early stages of exploring a possible video service, according a person close to the company. But CEO Daniel Ek says building a Netlix competitor is not something the company is gearing up to do anytime soon.

"I won't rule it out because we're a company that looks at what we're doing incredibly long term," Ek said in a recent interview with CNET. "But right now, we're all focused on music."

The idea of a Spotify video service came … Read more

A $299 high-end USB digital converter from England

Regular readers of this blog know we're living in the golden age of desktop audio. The speakers just keep getting better and better, and digital converters from the likes of Schiit Audio, AudioQuest, Hifiman, FiiO, and HRT have all made computers sound better than ever.

Now along comes the Meridian Explorer, a sleek, extruded aluminum converter with line- and headphone-level 3.5mm output jacks and a USB input. The line-level output internally bypasses the headphone amp and volume control. Meridian is best known for its ultra-high-end digital converters that sell for thousands of dollars -- the Explorer is their … Read more

Fujifilm XP200, S8400W adds more Wi-Fi to FinePix line

Continuing to focus on its pockets of growth for point-and-shoots, Fujifilm announced today two new FinePix models, the XP200 and S8400W.

An update to 2012's rugged XP170, the XP200 gets better waterproofing, now able to shoot down to 50 feet, and is still shockproof to about 6.6 feet, freezeproof to 14 degrees Fahrenheit, and dustproof. It has a redesigned battery door with a dial-locking mechanism to help keep the seal tighter than simple sliding locks.

Other improvements include a 16-megapixel CMOS sensor, a 3-inch, 920K-dot-resolution LCD, and a new burst-shooting button for capturing shots at up to 10 … Read more

Sorry, DNG iPhone app won't let you shoot true raw photos

Photo enthusiasts already pleased with the iPhone's generally superior camera can be forgiven for getting excited about the possibility of shooting photos in the higher-end raw file format.

Cypress Innovations on Wednesday released a new app called Digital Negative that might raise that very hope by offering a way to take photos that are stored in Adobe Systems' DNG format for raw photos. Alas, although the app does store uncompressed image data, it doesn't actually store the raw data taken straight from the sensor.

The Digital Negative app collects the uncompressed red, green, and blue color information for … Read more

Visa chief: Fee on digital wallets seems 'appropriate'

Digital wallet operators, like Google, PayPal, and others, should be charged a fee for offering such a service, according to Visa CEO Charlie Scharf.

Speaking at the Barclays Emerging Payments Forum yesterday, Scharf said "it is totally appropriate" for credit card companies to charge digital wallet operators a fee on all transactions, according to Reuters, which was in attendance.

Scharf's comments come after eBay revealed in a February regulatory filing that MasterCard was planning to charge it a fee for its digital wallet service starting in June. The actual amount PayPal pays isn't expected to be … Read more

Congressman endorses data retention law, then backs away

A historic lobbying effort today to update U.S. privacy laws for the 21st century seemed to be in danger of derailment by a law enforcement-backed proposal to require Internet companies and e-mail providers to keep records of what their users are doing online.

Rep. F. James Sensenbrenner, the chairman of a key House of Representatives subcommittee, said this morning that it was time to resuscitate the idea of the government mandating data retention. Sensenbrenner, a Wisconsin Republican, had drafted a mandatory logging proposal seven years ago that included prison terms for company executives who failed to comply. A law … Read more

Skyera gets $51M in funding from Western Digital

Western Digital Capital, the investment arm of the hard-drive giant, has revealed that it is pouring approximately $51 million into enterprise startup Skyera.

Having previously funded Skyera as the initial outside investor, Western Digital Capital co-invested in the series B round as the two storage solutions makers enter into a joint agreement.

While it wasn't revealed as to exactly what technology the two businesses are going to develop together, it will likely build upon Skyera's enterprise solid-state storage systems.

For example, Western Digital pointed towards Skyera's SkyHawk solid-state storage, which is priced at "an industry breakthrough … Read more

Comixology suspends Marvel giveaway

AUSTIN, Texas -- Following a catastrophic server crash that occurred hours after Marvel Comics and Comixology announced a massive giveaway, Comixology has suspended the promotion.

Comixology CEO David Steinberger acknowledged that his company had "let down" customers. Previous orders under the "Marvel Comics #1" promotional, time-limited giveaway would be honored, he said, and he asked fans to fill out a form so they could be alerted when the promotion returns.

Because of Comixology's unique place in the digital comic-book distribution business as an iTunes-style marketplace with few, if any, direct competitors, other publishers' sales were … Read more

MakerBot honcho kicks off SXSW 2013

AUSTIN, Texas--What's next for 3D printing? MakerBot founder and CEO Bre Pettis answered that question in all-capital letters during his opening keynote speech here at South by Southwest 2013.

"LASERS," read a slide with factoid about his company's latest 3D printer, the MakerBot Digitizer.

"It's kind of like Tron," Pettis explained, as a prototype of the new printer fired its laser scanners at a garden gnome.

Introduced by South by Southwest Interactive director Hugh Forrest as the "hero of South by," Pettis started this year's conference with a brief history … Read more