I have written loads about how music label consolidation has changed the face of the industry over the last decade. We have dropped from having a half-dozen large labels with many second-tier players and indies and other smaller labels, to having four majors … and that is about it. There have been reports about financial problems at two companies – EMI and Warner – potentially causing issues and shifting the power balance to an even smaller set of players. Last week we found out that Warner Music Group was being sold – but also that the outcome wouldn’t shift the balance of power as some had feared. Here are some details from… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Next in my “Kids, don’t try this at home” series of tests I examine the power strip sent us by WetCircuits.com – the Wet Circuits Waterproof Power Strip to be precise. Initially I thought this was a joke, especially with the image they provide of a person holding a pair of metal tweezers inserted into an outlet while the power strip is energized. CRAZY. Like a fox, actually. This thing works. While I did not drop it into the bathtub with me and the rubber ducky, I did take it out to the greenhouse, a normally moist-to-wet environment that should provide a suitable test scenario. When it comes my turn to water… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Plenty of bloggers have ranted about the death of publishing and the end of newspapers…but did you ever consider what the newspaper might look like for that final run of the presses? It probably will look an awful lot like the brilliant website “The Final Edition“. The Final Edition is a satire, clearly, but it takes mocking to a whole new level. For example, check out their prose in the headline article “The New York Times, World’s Newspaper of Record, Closes Its Doors Forever“: The New York Times, since 1851 a chronicler of world history spanning three centuries has turned its final page. The global definer of news, the cultural arbiter Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Looking for a good book to read? Of course you are. How are you going to find one? Well, you could hit a site like Goodreads, or you could bounce around to Amazon, B&N, Kobo, your local library…or if you could hit up Lovereading.co.uk for edited, curated recommendations AND books in every ebook format for purchase! Lovereading.co.uk was offering books in Kindle and ePUB formats for some time, and they’ve now added integration with the iBookstore! This is a UK-only deal, but it’s (as far as I know) the first time anyplace has been able to offer iBooks titles outside of iTunes. It’s a big move for Apple, and a way to… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Love gaming on your computer? If so you are going to love today’s Gear Deal because Dell has just released the 18″ Alienware M18x Gaming Laptop. Yes, you read that right, this is an 18″ gaming laptop. And the huge screen is just the beginning. The Alienware M18x features a space black anodized aluminum body and starts with Intel Core i7 2630QM 2.0GHz. It has 4GB DDR3 RAM, a 320GB 7200RPM Hard Drive, a 1.5GB GDDR5 NVIDIA GeForce GTX 460M video card, a slot-loading DVD-RW, Internal High-Definition 5.1 Surround Sound Audio and Windows 7 Home Premium. If you need more you can get upgrades like Dual 2GB GDDR5 AMD Radeon HD 6970M with CrossFireX graphics… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Electronic devices always seem run out of power at the most inopportune times, don’t they? Figuring out ways to keep those devices powered for as long as they are needed is key. Whether you are a regular road warrior or simply away from the office for the day, if you aren’t going to be near an outlet or power port, and if you carry multiple devices which will require energy doses at random times, carrying a portable power supply is the best option. Many times, these power supplies can best be described as bricks. How big or how small of a “brick” to choose depends upon your specific needs and ability to carry it; when traveling… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

I reviewed Magicka for Gear Diary, saying: I haven’t encountered a show-stopper bug since day 2 -January 26th. All I have had since then is FUN. The game is great as a solo experience, great with friends, and is fun enough that replaying it on FOUR different systems over the last month was never an issue! For $10 this game is a no-brainer: it isn’t perfect but these are the types of customer-first developers we want to encourage. Creativity and risk-taking are dead at the big studios, and it has fallen on folks like Arrowhead to generate great new ideas and worlds to explore! Now Amazon.com has the digital download game at 50% off! This… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Dell Professional P2411H 24″ Monitor with LED for $70 Less! Enough with that small computer monitor you have been using. It is time to move up to something big and bold. Something where the colors pop and the images come to life. Something that is fun to use but doesn’t break the bank. Something like this New Gear Daily Deal on a Dell 24″ monitor!   Fulfilling your demands for high productivity, great user comfort, and minimized environmental impact with EPEAT Gold rating, the DellTM Professional P2411H 24″ Monitor with LED is the ideal display for the professional office space. Environmentally sensitive: Use of recycled materials and halogen-free laminates in its Continue reading on Gear Diary …

I have always loved Goozex – it offers a great way to maximize the value of your gaming dollar: after you are done with a game you can trade it out, and then request other games using the points you earn! In fact, we got my older son an XBOX360 for Christmas, and after a couple of new game buys I grabbed a bunch of games on Goozex and he now has a 30 game library without ever having spent $1 of his own! Now Goozex has stepped forward to do a great thing for PS3 users put out by the PSN outage. According to this thread: Hey everyone Continue reading on Gear Diary …

When mophie first released their juice pack air for the iPhone it was a revelation. At least it was a revelation for me! For the first time I could wrap my iPhone in a case that brought with it both protection and far far better battery life. A short time later the company updated the juice pack to use a soft-touch material that even made holding the iPhone a pleasure. And that was a few iPhone’s ago! Since the first juice pack came out I have had one for every iPhone I have had. In fact, my juice pack air for iPhone 4 is often on my phone and, when it isn’t, it… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

In case you didn’t notice, Sony still hasn’t brought their PSN & Qriocity services back online. In fact, we now know that the myriad of article yesterday were inaccurate in reporting that the service would be fully operational by May 31st. It all stems from a Bloomberg article that stated: Sony Corp. (6758)’s PlayStation Network and Qriocity online services remain shut as of today, Shigenori Yoshida, a Tokyo-based spokesman said. Sony is uncertain when it can resume the services, Yoshida said by phone today. The company is in the process of adopting an improved security system and its plan to restart the services fully by May 31 is unchanged, he Continue reading on Gear Diary …

I recently did a retrospective on The Witcher, and here is some of what I said: There is an old saying that basically goes “I have seen the future and it is ‘x’”. There have been some very popular RPGs released over the past few years that some point to as the future of the genre. I hope they are wrong and I hope this because I want more depth in my role-playing games and less glorified action games. So when I think of that saying, I hope that The Witcher represents the future; it has plenty of combat, a deep skill system, nicely integrated alchemy and most importantly one of the Continue reading on Gear Diary …

As a rule my “Pop Goes the Music Diary” posts are meant to point out trends in the music business as exemplified by a song – and in general that means skewering the absurdities of the music industry. And that is likely to continue unabated. However, not all trends in popular music are negative! Way back in the 1940′s we started seeing popular comedy song recordings by Spike Jones, followed by Alan Sherman (of “Hello Muddah, Hello Fadduh” fame), and Ray Stevens. But as a creative genre things really took off in the 1980′s with Weird Al Yankovic, who would take popular songs and rework them – examples include Eat It (Michael Jackson’s… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Dear Apple, There is big news in the tech sector these days and, one way or another, you are part of all of it. Not a surprise considering the amazing growth you have maintained and the way in which you are shaping the next era of computing. It looks pretty likely that the Nuance deal that has you in a strategic partnership with the voice recognition company is a done deal. Good move! As we wrote last June, Google was eating your bacon in the voice recognition arena and you needed to do something… And fast. Okay, so it took you a year and a full point jump in your version of iOS but… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

9:55AM PST: That’s it! We are done for today’s keynote! Stay tuned for tomorrow’s keynote though. 9:52AM PST: Google’s showing the Galaxy Tab 10.1 Limited Edition. 1GHz dual-core CPU, 32GB onboard, 1GB of RAM, and Android 3.0. It’s launching in a month, and everyone here at Google I/O 2011 is getting one! 9:47AM PST: Project Tungsten is being introduced by Google. Music Beta by Google is used to demo with this project. 9:43AM PST: Android at Home is the new vision, making your Android device the “center” of your life. Discover, connect and communication with devices in the home. 9:41AM PST: Whoa, some seriously crazy stuff… Continue reading on Gear Diary …