Google's video faces patent challenge
A serious complication has emerged for Google's plan for high-quality, patent-free, open-source video on the Web, with the company revealing plans to try to counteract it, reports ZDNet.
Mpeg-LA, an organisation that licenses video-related patents related to a variety of standards, has formally requested for patent owners to inform them of patents they believe Google's VP8 technology uses.
In "offering to facilitate development of a joint licence to provide coverage under essential patents", Mpeg-LA is taking a major step towards actually offering such a licence.
Sony threatens to leave iTunes
Sony is signalling its intention to removing its music from iTunes after Apple started trouble by pulling the company's eBook reader from the app store, states MacWorld.
Instead, the company is concentrating on developing its own distribution strategy, unveiling a music streaming service called Music Unlimited to compete with iTunes, according to an interview in The Age.
”Publishers are being held to ransom by Apple and they are looking for other delivery systems, and we are waiting to see what the next three to five years will hold,” Sony Computer Entertainment CEO, Michael Ephraim told the paper.
Dolby brings smartphone HD audio
At the Mobile World Congress event this year, Dolby will be unveiling a host of new Audio technologies for smartphones, and will be demonstrating them via some of the latest smartphones on the market like the Nokia E7, LG Optimus Black and some offerings from HTC, Acer, Fujitsu and ZTE, says Gizmo Crunch.
Just like HD video being bumped up from 720p to 1080p in the latest smartphones, high-definition audio is coming in as well, the report states.
Some off the HD audio technologies Dolby will have on display at MWC 2011 are Dolby Digital Plus (5.1 surround sound over headphones), Dolby Pulse (quality audio over limited at low bit rates), Dolby Mobile (virtual surround sound without headphones), Dolby Media Generator (content optimisation for faster delivery and higher playback quality) and Dolby Voice (technology to provide clear, consistent voice communications regardless of environmental noise).
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