Get Your iPhone OS 3.0 on BitTorrent Now

 

Gizmodo - iPhone OS 3.0 Now Available in Torrent - iPhone OS 3.0

Well, to say the least, it looks like someone beat Apple to the jump. This is supposed to be the same build demonstrated at WWDC 2009…now we just wait for the jailbreak!

iTunes ditches DRM (finally!)

iTunes going primarily DRM free? (Update: yes, it is! 3G downloads, too) - Engadget

It's about time that the record labels and the music stores realize that DRM doesn't protect sales - it HURTS them. DRM is nothing more than a draconian method to insult customers. Amazon has already caught on with its DRM-free MP3 store, and now Apple has announced it'll ditch DRM too, during the ongoing Macworld expo. The entire iTunes catalog should be liberated by the end of the quarter. Finally, we actually get what we pay for (imagine that!) Unfortunately, though, Apple is making sure to remilk its current customers with existing DRM'ed songs by offering them a chance to "upgrade" their collection to the new "iTunes Plus" DRM-free .m4a format.

I think I'll continue sticking with free-free-free BitTorrent, thank you very much.

NVIDIA Ion = Atom + GF9400

AnandTech: NVIDIA's Ion Platform: Bringing High Def to Netbooks

AnandTech did an informative article on NVIDIA's new "Ion" chipset/platform,
which is an ambitious foray into the netbook market. Out with the old, crappy,
desktop-inspired 945G chipsets used in today's Atom netbooks. Instead, Ion
is a two-chip solution that combines an Atom processor with a smoking GeForce
9400M GPU (the same graphics chip found in current MacBooks). The Ion
treatment makes any Atom netbook capable of playing H. 264 HD video,
something previously unfeasible with an archaic, piece-of-junk GMA 950.
And remember that the GF9400 is currently the only GPU capable of
such exotic HTPC ticks as 8-channel LPCM output.

Most interesting, though, is the size and scalability of Ion. Check out
NVIDIA's cute little reference box:

Amazing, huh? It is (literally) small enough to put in your pocket. Not to mention that this imparts a whole new meaning on "Home-Theater-in-a-Box"!

iPhone Now Runs Linux

TG Daily - iPhone now boots Linux, soon to boot Android?

Stop the presses! It's the apocalypse!!! The iPhone Dev Team has created a basic port of the Linux 2.6 kernel to the iPhone. Right now, it seems to be just a measly command line, but needless to say, this paves the way for something much more significant. Google's Linux-based, open-source Android cell phone OS may soon be running on an iPhone near you. If this ever happened, things would get real interesting for sure - Apple's rep of creating a secure, locked-down platform would be completely destroyed.

More info can be found here: http://blog.iphone-dev.org/post/62041396/linux-here-we-come

The Definitive Guide to Free Music + the Internet

The vastness of the Internet is home to a myriad of entertainment sources, particularly music. Traditionally, getting your tunes meant walking into your local music store and purchasing CDs (or heaven forbid, vinyl!) Naturally this implies cost and money. As you'll see, though, the Internet is an excellent channel for satisfying your musical fix quickly without costing you a penny.

In order of increasing tech-savviness:

1. Streaming Audio/Video - YouTube is the most prominent player in this category, but innumerable other sites exist. Unofficial user creations as well as official releases can be found - just be wary of the often disorganized nature and varying quality.
2. Online Radio - With the likes of Shoutcast, Pandora, and last.fm, online radio services provide a user-friendly solution. In exchange for ads or partial tracks, people can listen to both mainstream and indie artists.
3. Music Portals/Sites - iTunes and the Zune Store might be great for those willing to fork over some dough, but people often don't realize that free music download joints exist as well. The service that comes to mind first is SpiralFrog. In exchange for an ad-laden site and heavily DRM'ed Windows Media Audio files, you get the latest tunes for free. For college students who have a .edu email address, a somewhat more polished service exists - Ruckus. Like SpiralFrog, they force you to live with an onslaught of website ads and WMA DRM. It's a difficult choice - pay for "free" non-DRM music, or pay nothing for "locked" DRM tracks?
4. Other P2P - Besides BitTorrent, a number of other P2P networks exist. Think Frostwire/Limewire, Ares, etc. In my humble opinion, centralized, node-based P2P networks are on their way out. Nevertheless, you will likely find a decent array of music out there. Beware, though - files are often improperly/incompletely tagged and quality varies from amazing to abysmal. Additionally, the risk of coming across a malicious/fake file is significant.
5. BitTorrent - I would have lumped this with P2P in general, but the extraordinarily high prevalence of music on BT deserves a special mention. Public trackers like Mininova and The Pirate Bay provide a respectable mix of more mainstream/well-known artists. For the tech-savvy, elite private trackers such as Waffles and what.cd serve up a delectable variety of lesser-known works; high quality releases are the norm with lossless FLAC rips of entire albums. In general, one can expect high quality when using BitTorrent - usually, tracks are properly named and labeled, and of consistent bitrate.

Whatever route you decide to go with, realize that getting good music doesn't mean forking over an arm or leg for a new album. Countless other listeners out there enjoy good music as much as you, and, especially in the case of P2P, have been kind enough to share their musical treasures with you.

Microsoft May Use Apple's WebKit engine for IE

TG Daily - Microsoft considers WebKit transplant for Internet Explorer

Microsoft has long used its own proprietary rendering engine for its venerable Windows Internet Explorer browser, but this strategy is becoming quite long in the tooth compared to the much faster, more modern, and open-source Gecko engine used in Mozilla Firefox. Now comes a stunning piece of news from Steve Ballmer : "the company may consider moving IE to the open-source WebKit browser engine." WebKit is a rendering platform originally developed by Apple, and is used in the Apple Safari browser. So if this switch did indeed happen, we'd not only have a IE+Safari hybrid (OMG!), but also a major change in Microsoft's closed-source-centric ideology.

Most importantly, though, users would likely see a vast improvement in the functionality and quality of IE - something much needed these days, especially when one compares the anemic IE7 (and even IE8) to its current competitors, like Firefox 3 and Opera 9.

The Top Ten Reasons iTunes Sucks

The Top Ten Reasons iTunes Sucks - Webmonkey

GREAT article that details the flaws in Apple's iTunes software, as well as suggest a few alternatives for users on Windows and Linux alike.
May I once again iterate my unbounded love for MediaMonkey!