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>> Google gives away free music, how to Twitter about your road rage without getting into an accident, and some sad news about computer love. It's Monday, March 30th, I'm Natalie Del Conte, and it's time to get Loaded.
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Google is giving away free tunes in China. The company launched a free music engine today that lets users search and download music from Sony, Warner, EMI, and Universal for free. Google has been saying that they would do this for a while, they kind of had to because they were losing market share to Bidu [assumed spelling] which helped users download free music, although it wasn't so legal. Google service is legal, and unfair to Google users outside of China. Why do they get free music when the rest of us don't? The CTIA wireless conference starts in Las Vegas on Tuesday. Some news we're expecting is Skype on iPhone and Blackberry. This means that you could make Voice Over IP calls from your mobile device when you're connected to a Wi-Fi network. Unfortunately, you can't make them from a 3G connection, because obviously the carriers wouldn't have any of that. The good news is that the app makes good use of your address book, with the ability to sort contacts alphabetically and by who's online. Research in Motion is also said to be launching a new video download service for Blackberry. The service would be part of an unlimited monthly subscription. Already several broadcast and cable partners have offered up content. It will only work over Wi-Fi, not 3G. These are the major announcements we're expecting, but we will bring you the wireless news as it comes in. So stay tuned this week for more from CTIA. A company called Diotech [assumed spelling] may launch handwriting recognition for the Google Android operating system. There are no details about the software and how much it will cost, but the company already does produce something similar for Windows Mobile. The app will recognize English and Korean. Kind of odd, considering the T-Mobile G1 has a built in keyboard. You may soon be able to Twitter while you're driving if you have On-Star. This is the subscription based communication system in your car that provides security and GPS directions. Gear Live is reporting that they will use speech to text to communicate with Twitter, and post your spoken Tweets in your feed. I would love to read those, especially the road rage ones. You Tube also wants you Twittering. The site added a Twitter button below its video, so it lets you share the link to whatever your watching with your followers. And if you're in the UK, you can now send Twitters from your mobile device again if you're with Vodaphone [assumed spelling]. This was turned off last year because Twitter couldn't afford it. Vodaphone may also offer free Twittering from their phones. Soon we'll be able to Twitter from our sleep. On Thursday we mentioned that the Apple developer conference would be some time in June. We now have confirmation that the event will be in San Francisco June 8th through 12th. We're still betting on a Snow Leopard release, and possibly a new iPhone. Speaking of iPhone, AT and T is now selling the iPhone without a contract, and so is Apple. Originally the plan was that you could get an iPhone without a contract in AT and T stores, now you can get them in Apple stores too. They're costly though, between five ninety nine and six ninety nine, and they're not unlocked, so you can't use them on another carrier. You just won't be married to AT and T. And in other Apple news, the tiered pricing on iTunes is set to launch on April 7th. This is the model where different songs cost varying amounts, based on their popularity. Songs could cost anywhere between sixty nine cents and a dollar twenty nine. The Set Dev group has released findings to a ten month long investigation over cyber espionage. The report found that one thousand two hundred and ninety five computers, in one hundred and three countries, belonging to several international institutions had been spied on. China was singled out as a haven of cyber hackers, government sponsored or otherwise. While it's not a surprise that governments spy on one another, the authors of the report have termed the ghost net as the source of many of these acts of espionage. Supposedly the network can take control of a computer, steal sensitive documents, and control webcams. The computer lab is quickly becoming a thing of the past. The University of Virginia is closing down computer labs on its campus because nearly all of their students own their own computers. According to the school's IT department, three thousand one hundred and thirteen of their three thousand one hundred and seventeen freshmen had their own computer in 2007. So why pay the operating cost to run entire computer labs for only four students. Would be cheaper to buy those four students computers, but of course the university isn't doing that. The question is how many other schools will follow this lead, and when, and how will nerds meet and fall in love if there are no more computer labs? Those are your headlines for today, but I will see you tomorrow with more. Thank you for watching. I'm Natalie Del Conte with CNET TV, and you've just been Loaded.
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