Take-Two sued by its Shareholder over EA bid

Following the revelation of Take-Two rejecting the Electronic Arts (EA) $2-billion bid on February 24, one of Take Two's shareholders has sued the company for rejecting the offer, as reported by the Wall Street Journal. The suit reportedly filed in Delaware Chancery Court on Friday, March 29, 2008, alleges that Take-Two top executives wanted to make a buck for themselves at the shareholders' expense by way of a 'compensation agreement'. The opportunity for the Take-Two bigwigs, apparently, came into being after EA made an alternate private offer to them for taking over the company. The two law firms who've filed the suit are Prickett, Jones and Elliott, Schiffrin, Barroway, Topaz & Kessler. They have named Take-Two Chairman Strauss Zelnick and CEO Benjamin Feder as defendants. For the uninformed, Take-Two is the maker of the wildly popular "Grand Theft Auto" or GTA series of video games.Source

Indian Mobile TV Market sailing high

"India's mobile television market will be worth $360 million by the end of this year," says a report by Springboard Research, a Singapore-based IT market research firm. Courtesy mobile TV, users can view regular television programs on mobile phones and other mobile devices. It marries two dominant consumption trends of entertainment and mobile telephony in the country. According to the Springboard report, as many as 84 percent of users are waiting for an affordable mobile TV service in the country. News, sports, music videos, and game shows have emerged as preferred choices for this service. According to Ravi Shekhar Pandey, manager (Syndicated Research) of Springboard Research, "The market is ripe for the launch of mobile TV services, and we believe that India will have around 12 million mobile TV subscribers within the first year of launch of service." Pandey added that a majority of mobile users in the country are interested in trying out mobile TV, and would invest in new handsets for using the service. That this willingness is definitely a positive sign for those considering offering mobile TV in one of the world's largest and fastest-growing mobile services market. Going a step further, the report recommends that those companies planning to roll out the service should consider offering on-demand, pay-per-view option that will not be attached to a monthly subscription offer. Presently, Doordarshan is the only player in this field. However, the report states that in recent months, the market has witnessed increased activities from various stakeholders, including technology providers, network equipment vendors, and mobile service providers like Nokia, Samsung, Spice Telecom, and Qualcomm.Source

MP3 Players complete 10 Years this Month

It's a major milestone for MP3 players this month. They complete ten years since introduction of the first MP3 player to be commercially sold -- the MPMan F10. Manufactured by Korean Saehan Information Systems and launched at CeBit ten years ago, the MPMan F10 was imported into North America by Eiger Labs. With 32mb flash storage, the player was capable of storing around 8 songs of 128 kbps quality. Around 91mm tall, 70mm long, and 16.5mm wide (roughly the size of the iPod classic), the F10 was but all of 65 grams approximately. Featuring a tiny LCD display and MegaBass, the player came in five colors. It could be connected to a PC using the bundled parallel port cable. It was powered by two 1.5V AA rechargeable batteries, and came with a docking station for recharging. Showcased first at CeBit 1998, the player aroused immense interest among visitors to the show, and Saehan put it into mass production in May the same year. Initially sold for around $250, prices were slashed to $200 soon after when a new competitor arrived -- the Diamond Multimedia Rio PMP300 (priced at $200 and with similar features). Eiger Labs promptly revisited the device, and introduced the F20 that had a 64 mb capacity, calling it "EigerMan". Till such time as Apple Computer introduced its iconic iPod in 2001, MPMan continued making MP3 players. Two years down the launch of the iPod, Apple started allowing Windows users to connect to their device with the obvious outcome -- iPod sales hit the roof, rivals couldn't keep up, and iPod rule began. Despite their much popular "Walkman" brand, Sony was too busy promoting ATRAC and MiniDiscs to look into its line of MP3 players. While Sony overlooked the iPod's phenomenal success, Saehan could hardly keep up pace, and the rest -- as they say -- is history!Source

For Firefox 3 Mozilla Releases Beta 4

It was only in February that beta 3 for Firefox 3 was released, and now Mozilla is out with a new and improved beta 4 for the browser. The beta 4 version, like last time, is aimed at Web developers and testers to generate feedback and betterments in order to take a step further towards the final version of Firefox 3. Firefox 3 beta 4 claims to have nearly 900 enhancements over the last beta -- in terms of performance, stability, user interface, etc. For instance, the download manager in beta 4 promises to make it easier to locate downloaded files; also where the download originated and other information around it. Another new feature promises to allow users to zoom in and out on pages through keyboard shortcuts. Performance-wise, beta 4 is claimed to be able to make Web applications like Google Mail and Zoho Office run twice as fast as in Firefox 2.0. Besides, it's claimed to hog less memory.

And while it was earlier thought that this would be the final beta release before final release of Firefox 3, there's a reported beta 5 in the works. And that's not all, code freeze for beta 5 will likely be on Tuesday, March 18th, 2008.Source

Acer 5315 launched

One of the most essential things for most management students today is a laptop. Looking to tap this growing market Acer today has introduced its new 15.4" Acer Aspire 5315. This machine has a new chassis design and sleek looks and is based on the Linux OS.

In terms of specifications, it utilizes an Intel Celeron M550 processing, supporting Intel Wireless Wi-Fi Link network solution for excellent speed and performance, storage capacity with a 120 GB HDD and system memory of 1 GB of RAM. It further comes equipped with a DVD super multi 8x Double layer and inbuilt camera. Its screen is a 15.4” WXGA Acer CrystalBrite TFT LCD display and is capable of reaching battery life up to 2 hours. The Acer ePowerManagement allows you to choose the power management setting to extend the battery time. Additionally, the Acer SignalUp and Acer GridVista technologies have been incorporated into this notebook for more reliable wireless connectivity as well as optimized feature driven display management.

S. Rajendran, Chief Marketing Officer, Acer India said, "The Acer Aspire 5315 is part of Acer’s initiative of making mobile computing available to all audience segments. We have been following the market closely and have evaluated the requirements of the Indian Consumer before tailoring such a product. This notebook offers clean design, affordable performance, enjoyable entertainment and far-reaching communication - all on one platform. With the Aspire 5315, we have once again pushed the boundaries of digital lifestyle with advanced product features at a great price point."

Acer Aspire 5315 notebook will be available in the major cities across India and will offer the latest technology like 10/100 LAN, easy-to-use system utilities, like the Acer Empowering Technology features and Easy-launch buttons for WLAN, email, Internet and user-programming. It has been priced at Rs. 22,219.Source

Speakers for Gamers by Logitech

Logitech today expanded the G-series of PC gaming peripherals, with the Logitech G51, a 5.1 speaker system featuring 360-degree surround sound with dual Matrix modes for a more immersive gaming experience.

Using Logitech's proprietary Matrix surround sound technology, the G51 speakers split the audio signal into six channels of sound, without degrading the audio quality. That means, even if their game doesn't provide six-channel audio, people can enjoy it anyway. As a result, gamers can gain the competitive advantages of surround sound - first-person-shooter gamers; for example, can now hear enemies creep up behind them. If they're being shot at, they'll know what direction the bullets are coming from.

With 155 watts of total RMS (root mean square) power, the G51 speakers feature Frequency Directed Dual Driver (FDD2) technology, which produces a uniform sound field by housing two drivers in each satellite. FDD2 overcomes high-frequency overlap that leads to uneven sound - a major barrier to dual driver speakers in the past. The result is uniform, intense sound from any place in the room. And with laser-tuned audio drivers, the speakers provide clear audio with less distortion.

G51 Surround Sound Speaker System is available at a suggested retail price of Rs. 12,995 with a warranty of 2 years.Source

Game Developers Conference(GDC) Revisited

While the Electronic Entertainment Expo – or E3, as it was fondly known among gamers – was stripped down to a shell of its former self in 2007, tons of other lesser-known trade shows were suddenly thrust into the limelight, the most prominent being the Game Developers Conference (GDC). While last year’s GDC was hailed by some as a spiritual successor of sorts to E3, this year’s gig wasn’t all that hot. Still, some interesting announcements made during the event managed to pique our interest. Here’s a look at some of them...

Gears of War 2 Announced
Most of us who played through Gears of War aren’t too surprised, considering the cliffhanger note the first one ended on. While not much is known about the story, the teaser trailer accompanying this announcement shed light on a couple of new gameplay mechanics, such as lancer dueling and lancer impaling. Expect more to be revealed soon, since Epic’s targeting a November release.
Oh and I forgot to mention that game will be using an updated version of the Unreal 3 engine, so you can expect stuff like Ambient Occlusion Technology (better lighting effects), Dynamic Water Effect Technology, improved 'Matinee' system (better-looking cutscenes), Soft Body Physics Technology and High Density Crowds (which, as the name suggests, renders tons of characters on screen).Source

Facebook App Lets Users Send Movie Clips

Paramount Pictures will become the first major studio to make clips from thousands of its movies available for use on the Internet.The unit of Viacom Inc. is teaming with Los Angeles-based developer FanRocket to launch the VooZoo application Monday on Facebook.The service gives Facebook users access to footage from thousands of movies, ranging from "The Ten Commandments" to "Forrest Gump," to send to others on the popular social networking site."The short clips for a movie that you've already seen before helps you relive the moment," Paramount senior vice president of entertainment Derek Broes said.The clips last from a few seconds to several minutes and cover the gamut from Eddie Murphy's guffaw in "Beverly Hills Cop" to Audrey Hepburn's pleas over her "no-name slob" cat in "Breakfast at Tiffany's."The studio will market DVDs of the movies through a button that appears after each clip is played. It eventually wants to use the application to virally market upcoming releases.For example, VooZoo is withholding clips from the "Indiana Jones" series until it works out a way to market the May 22 release of the latest installment, "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull."FanRocket founder Danny Kastner said he is aiming to get a few hundred thousand users within two months and added that the company is in talks with other Hollywood studios to package their titles on VooZoo.That could take time, however, since Paramount staffers needed more than a year to select clips from the archive and tag them with search terms.Paramount said it has not set revenue goals for the new venture."My benchmark for success is that people are joining and sending," Broes said.Source