San Francisco-based kids’ app platform Fingerprint is teaming up with UK educational app maker Mindshapes. The two companies are collaborating on a series of new digital learning activities called “appisodes,” which combine both storytelling and games. It’s the first in what promises to be a busy year of Fingerprint announcements, partnerships, and app launches → Read More
Today, Nick Bilton of the New York Times published a pretty extensive piece on Twitter, specifically its CEO, Dick Costolo. As I read it, one paragraph concerning the potential IPO of the company struck me. → Read More
For over a decade, if you were to say “home shopping,” you were likely referring to the experience of viewing products on your TV set, and ordering over the phone. After launching in the ’80s, it wasn’t long before television networks like QVC and The Home Shopping Network (HSN) had become synonymous with “home shopping.” The Web and eCommerce changed that. Today, QVC and HSN both have active… → Read More
One of the best manga ever created, Akira, is going to the big screen. And this time, it won’t be an anime (like the one from 1988) but a live-action film. We first reported about plans to shoot the live-action remake, whose rights were bought by Leonardo DiCaprio’s production company, Appian Way, back in February 2008. The idea was scrapped a few months later, until New York Magazine wrote in … → Read More
No doubt, Gundam is Japan’s favorite anime. They opened a Gundam Cafe in Akihabara, they erected a 1:1 scale Gundam statue in Tokyo bay, and they keep offering tons of Gundam-powered stuff on a monthly basis. The 1/60 Gundam statue replica (30cm) we showed you last November, for example, wasn’t bad, but today Bandai unveiled something even cooler: a Gundam model that stands an impressive 1.5… → Read More
NTT DoComo, Japan’s largest cell phone carrier (55 million customers), is currently running a pretty bizarre viral promotion campaign in this country (both on- and offline). The company has set up a weird website [JP] that, for some strange reason, shows Darth Vader running around Tokyo and asking who’s his boss (“Who is my boss” is the official tag line of the campaign). → Read More
Remember Gigantor? Remember last October, when the Japanese city of Kobe erected a 18m high statue of the giant anime robot? Granted, the robo statue is nowhere near as big as its Gundam counterpart, but it’s still pretty cool. → Read More
We’ve given you the first plot details and pictures on Friday, but now the first trailer for Resident Evil: Afterlife (aka Resident Evil 4) is online. It’s pretty cool (well, it shows more of the same), mentioning the movie was filmed with the “James Cameron / Vincent Pace Fusion Camera System”, the “World’s Most Advanced 3D Technology”. → Read More
We spent two posts covering the announcement of the fourth installment of the Resident Evil movie series last summer, and today we can give you the first five pictures and some plot details. Titled “Resident Evil 4: Afterlife”, the movie is scheduled for release in American theaters (both conventional and 3D) on September 10. → Read More
I assumed that VHS tapes had gone the route of Polaroid film and were continuing to be phased out of existence. I must have been too hasty, because according to the Entertainment Retailer’s Association, videocassette sales in Britain have more than doubled in the past year. → Read More
Augmented Reality is a pretty hot topic currently, but it seems to me that the Japanese in particular have really embraced the concept of mixing the real world with computer-generated imagery and data. One case in point is the Crimsonfox project [JP], an “Alternative Reality” scavenger hunt game event that took place over the weekend in Tokyo, Japan. → Read More
We MUST stop this. Somehow Smallville must be canceled before it surpasses Stargate SG-1 and becomes the longest running Sci-fi show in North America’s history. → Read More
We’ve shown you the new Tron trailer 48 hours ago in bootleg quality, but you can forget that one now and rather watch this high-quality version. Judging from these 2.30 minutes, we’re in for something cool. → Read More
We’ve given you a first look at Iron Man 2 way back in June last year, and two months ago, we reported it will be Marvel’s first IMAX movie when it hits screens on May 7, 2010. It’s 2.32 minutes long and very, very cool. → Read More
I have a list of things that I plan to do once I become absolutely ridiculously rich. Being a blogger armed with a liberal-arts degree puts me on the perfect path, I know. The item right after building a house with secret passageways everywhere is calling up the guys from Goldmund and having them come by and install their top-of-the-line sound system. They invited me up to their brand new showroom… → Read More
In November last year, we’ve shown you not one but two trailers for the Prince of Persia movie, and both turned out to be quite decent. And this third full-length trailer (courtesy of IGN) for one of this summer’s blockbusters doesn’t look too shabby either. → Read More
You’ve seen that commercial for Hulu, right? The one with Alec Baldwin sashaying around a futuristic office promising TV everywhere, TV that turns your brain into mush? Take that idea—TV everywhere—and apply it to your biology. That is, how does TV implanted into your contact lenses sound? Really great, or just great? Absolutely horrendous, or just horrendous? → Read More
You may have woken up to news that we’ll all be standing in bread lines in just a few short weeks—I’ll be back in the US of A in just about a month to witness the country’s unraveling in person—so credit to Sirius XM’s Mel Karmazin for trying to keep the company afloat. Sirius XM is, after all, a luxury expense; when there’s proper bills to pay, listening… → Read More
Here’s an interesting Q and A session with a panel of experts in the rich media industry — mostly online video – that took place last Tuesday at the Pacific Crest Technology Leadership Forum in Vail, Colorado. The members of the panel: Ron Bloom, CEO, MEVIO Mike Hudack, CEO, Blip.tv Steve Liddell, CEO, Panther Express Joy Marcus, General Manager, DailyMotion U.S. Perry Wu, CEO… → Read More
Now you’ve gone and done it. “It” being, maybe, freaking out the entertainment industry by not buying as many DVDs as you used to. (That, incidentally, sorta gibes with a study that come out today.) One of them there Lehman Brothers analysts downgraded numerous industry stocks yesterday because he doesn’t like how people are now downloading movies more and more often. Studios… → Read More
FlyTunes continues to expand its entertainment offerings, having announced a deal today with terrestrial radio corp Entercom, one of the biggest “regular” (as opposed to satellite) radio corp in the U.S. Users of the free service will be able to listen to content from all Entercom-owned radio stations, though initially limited to Seattle and San Francisco stations. FlyTunes lets iPhone users… → Read More
Meet the new Nokia, completely different from the old Nokia. Well, that’s what its executive vice president for entertainment and communities wants you to think. See, while Nokia is content creating genuinely good cellphones, some inside the company think it’s time to move in a different direction, namely entertainment. Hence, services like Ovi and deals with records labels. No one… → Read More
No need to overanalyze, but Sony has teamed up with Sky in the UK to create an on-demand video store for the PSP. Go!View, as the marketing folks have named it, will lets users download and watch all sorts of entertainment, from hilariously dry comedy to infamously drab sporting contests—yesterday’s dire Manchester United-Barça game comes to mind. The service doesn’t appear to… → Read More
Microsoft has reportedly inked a deal with Hollywood producer Peter Safran to produce entertainment content for Xbox Live. Safran’s been tapped to produce genre-specific short episodes (less than 10 minutes) that appeal to 14- to 34-year old males. His client list includes Sean Combs, Nia Vardalos, and filmmakers Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer. I know — I’m excited too! Look… → Read More
Hulu, which has been throwing me the above 500 error all morning as I try to log in with my beta credentials, will be open to the public tomorrow. It’s tallied up about five million viewers in the past month, which is impressive for a site that hasn’t been open to just anyone yet. It’s got a pretty broad swatch of content partners, too, including Fox, NBC Universal, MGM, Sony… → Read More
Wow. Apparently Seth MacFarlane and company are working on a spin-off from Family Guy tentatively titled Cleveland, starring the slow-talking walking stereotype Cleveland Brown. It’s unclear whether the series would be set in Quahog and/or if Loretta, Cleveland, and Cleveland Jr. would continue to show up on Family Guy as part of the storyline. I’d hope they’d still be part of… → Read More
[photopress:idolitunes.jpg,full,center] Aren’t American Idol ratings way down this year? That’s what the Drudge headlines read, I think. That might explain why you’ll soon be able to download Idol performances on iTunes. The show’s creators/rpducers/hangers-on have cut a deal with Apple that will put on iTunes audio of the 24 semifinalists on iTunes and video+audio of the… → Read More
If you hadn’t heard by now, there’s a strike brewing in Hollywood. The Writers Guild of America wants higher home video residual payments and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers isn’t giving in. The guild is meeting at 7:00 tonight in Los Angeles to further discuss how the strike’s going to go but its website already has the 2007 Strike Rules in place. → Read More
If this recent patent filing is to be believed, then Apple is working on an actual media center solution, not some half-hearted Front Row attempt. The patent, which was originally filed back in late 2005 but was unearthed today, depicts a central “module-controller” that appears to lie at the heart of the media center. Apparently it’s a piece of software that sits between other… → Read More
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