Amazon launches DRM-free “Amazon MP3” music downloads

Paul

If you’re into DRM-free music, you have a reason to get pretty excited today. As speculated, Amazon has launched the public beta of its new digital music portal called Amazon MP3, which will feature two million songs from 180,000 artists and 20,000 labels, all without the painful and annoying restrictions of DRM. The press release claims that the site, which will include EMI and Universal tracks (take that, Jobs), will make separate songs available for $.89 or $.99, and boasts that all of the “top 100” tracks will be priced at the former, lower amount. Albums will range in cost from $5.99 to $9.99, with the best selling albums coming in at $8.99. Of course, since there’s no DRM, users are free to throw the 256Kbps MP3s on any player they like, as well as burn CDs, copy to MiniDisc, and dump to 8-track.

http://www.engadget.com/2007/09/25/amazon-launches-drm-free-amazon-mp3-music-downloads/

Hmm, this could be a contender for ITUNES

MPAA Takes Down IsoHunt’s BitTorrent Trackers in the US

Paul

Starting today, the Isohunt team will deny access to all US visitors on their TorrentBox and Podtropolis tracker. They are forced to take this action because of their involvement in a lawsuit initiated by the MPAA.

http://www.digg.com/tech_news/MPAA_Takes_Down_IsoHunt_s_BitTorrent_Trackers_in_the_US

What the heck is this the day they try to shut down all these torrents? Stupid rabbit, torrents are for kids!!

NY’s ‘Halo 3’ launch was no riot, but it was close

Paul

reporter’s notebook NEW YORK–At about 9:30 p.m. Monday, George Clooney waltzed into a midtown Manhattan hotel, the camera flashes of the paparazzi following him right into the lobby. But a block away at the Best Buy store on 5th Avenue and 44th Street, the fans waiting for the launch of Microsoft’s Halo 3 video game couldn’t have cared less.

They had their own epilepsy-inducing lights, after all. New York’s Halo 3 debut stopped short of pyrotechnics, but it was over the top in just about every other way.

“George Clooney who?” one person near the head of the line joked when he heard the gossip. Like most of the queuers who’d shown up at the Best Buy store for the official launch celebration for the final installment of the Xbox 360 game trilogy, he was young, male and sporting a Halo 3 T-shirt that had been given away as part of the festivities.

http://www.news.com/NYs-Halo-3-launch-was-no-riot%2C-but-it-was-close/2100-1043_3-6209832.html?tag=nefd.top

Oh Come off it. These people love Halo 3 and I knew today was going to have to be a day of all Halo. I wish there was more House M.D. than Halo. I do not have an XBOX 360 and wished I did. I sit here wondering when I will get one and hope it is soon! Donate help me get an XBOX! 😉

Fifteen Back up programs to save your data!

Paul

There’s no way around it: Malware happens, drive failure happens, natural disaster happens. If your data isn’t backed up, it’s gone–or it will require an extremely expensive, not-certain-to-succeed recovery operation.

If all you have on your system are scribblings and unimportant downloads, you might not care. But you probably have something of value: scanned pictures of ancestors, wedding videos, a presentation you worked all week on, the song that’s going to make you famous.

It pays to back up, and it has never been easier to do so. No matter what method you’re most comfortable with, be it traditional file-based backup, image backup, or continuous data protection, one of the following fifteen tools will do the trick.


http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,137434/article.html

Even though they aren’t free I’ll still take a look at them to see if I can afford one or two of them.