As of Dec 8th, Griffin’s iTrip FM and similar portable FM transmitters became legal in the United Kingdom.¬†

Alex Birch, iTrip product manager at Griffin Technology, said, “The approval of iTrip use gives UK drivers some new options for playing music in the car. There’s zero installation and they’re easy to use.”

Time shifting is, more and more, a popular way for people to view television and it’s cutting into network television’s bottom line. If the networks continue to be paid only on the basis of live viewing, lost revenue could be as much as $600 million next year compared with an estimated $300 million this year.

Nielsen media research has found that in homes with digital video recorders, 40% of broadcast viewing occurs using those time-shifting devices. Broadcast networks figure that roughly half of those watching shows in playback are seeing commercials, and the networks are not compensated for those viewers.

“Forty percent of viewers are time shifting and viewing out of the live bucket. That is so critical,” said Alan Wurtzel, NBC Universal’s president-research and media development. “What percent watched it within an hour? We’ve got to get some legitimate credit for that.”

Networks are eager to shift away from program ratings to a new currency, one based on advertising ratings.

via Advertising Age

Geeks over a certain age will remember Microsoft Bob, Microsoft’s attempt to create a personal, easy-to-use computer interface. Microsoft Bob was universally panned, because it was designed for the lowest common denominator, and just set the lowest common denominator a little bit too low.

Ten years later, Microsoft has quietly introduced Ms. Dewey, a sassy Flash-based search engine interface. Ms. Dewey is everything that Microsoft Bob wasn’t – intelligent, fun, and full of personality.

Ms. Dewey (performed by actress Janina Gavankar) is a fully animated search assistant who comments and responds to your searches. Ask “her” about yo mama, and she’s likely to go off on you. Ask her how to meet babes, and she may respond “Save yourself – it’s not too late to meet a real woman!” or “Somebody needs to get a hobby….like something interesting!”

Ask her about Janina Gavankar, she’ll review her resume. Ignore her, and she’ll knock on the glass of your monitor and ask “Anyone there?”

And you never know when she’ll whip out the condoms and the riding helmet….

The technology for getting TiVo content onto Macs and iPods is evolving quickly.TiVoDecode Manager (TDM) is a free Applescript Studio front-end (i.e. “wrapper”) that automates the process of downloading of TiVo Series 2 files to your computer and decoding them into MPEG-2 files.

Features include:

• Bonjour discovery of local TiVos (or enter an IP manually)
• Listing of show, episode, date recorded, and other information
• One-click download and decoding of TiVo shows

Here’s an screenshot of TiVoDecode Manager in action…..

Unilever has signed on to sponsor a new venture at Marie Claire, a women’s style magazine. Unilever will sponsor the magazine’s first video podcast series, The Masthead with Marie Claire, which will launch Jan. 2.

Hosted by editor-in-chief Joanna Coles and featuring the magazine’s editorial staff, the five-minute bi-monthly video podcasts will offer an inside look at the making of the magazine, with scenes from a real day in the life of magazine editors, beauty and fashion shoots, celebrity interviews, beauty talk and more.

Pluggd, a startup that focuses on using speech-recognition to enhance audio and video search, today disclosed the investors who have backed the company since its inception, and the addition of Intel Capital as an investor.

The company is reported to have raised $1.65 million to build out its technology. A demo of the company’s HearHere search technology is available at the Pluggd site.
“The current Internet media market, rich in potential growth, is clearly lacking a viable search tool,” said Angela Biever, vice president, Intel Capital, and managing director for the Consumer Internet Sector. “Pluggd addresses that need directly with their easy-to-use solution for audio and video search.‚Äù

Earlier in the year, Pluggd introduced a podcast directory and its plans to use speech-recognition to allow searching for words contained within the audio of podcasts and other media files. The company’s technology combines voice recognition, natural language processing, and video analysis techniques to enhance search results and allow for contextually targeted advertising.

‚ÄúWe’re pleased by the support of this eminent group of technologists and business leaders,” said Alex Castro, CEO of Pluggd. “We believe audio and video search will be key to revolutionizing the $95 billion dollar TV and radio advertising market. The advice and strategic counsel from these investors will be very helpful as we embrace this challenge.

InfoWorld podcaster and writer Jon Udell announced via his podcast (MP3) today that he is moving to a new job at Microsoft, where he will be a Microsoft Evangelist.

Udell’s move highlights the increasing importance of corporate podcasting and the growing demand for people that are as comfortable with new media as they are with technology. Blogger Robert Scoble recently switched from being a Microsoft geek blogger to hosting a technology show for PodTech, ScobleShow. Udell plans to become a sort of uber-Scoble at Microsoft.

“Robert played a key role in a grand experiment to make Microsoft’s development processes more transparent,” said Udell. “I’ve proposed a different experiment. I’ll continue to be a channel for alpha geeks. But I also want to become a channel for a whole lot of civilians in the mainstream. And above all, I want to build bridges between these two groups.”

Mac Geekery has a detailed how to on how to save TiVo recordings so that they can be viewed on a Mac or an iPod.

Unfortunately, you need to:

• Install and set-up Galleon
• Build an application called TiVo decode
• Set up a conversion script
• Set up launchd
• Transcode the video to a compatible format
• Sync it to your iPod

It’s not for the faint-hearted and probably violates the Digital Millenium Copyright Act half a dozen ways, but the fact that someone will jump through these hoops shows that there is an audience that wants to time- and space-shift video really bad.

mStation is shipping its 2.1 Stereo Orb ‘Colors’, 2.1 speakers systems designed to compliment the new Apple iPod nano line of MP3 players. The Orbs are available in Pink, Green, Blue, and Silver, as well as original Black and White.

The iPod Docking Station/Speaker Systems offer a 3″ Subwoofer, 10 Key Remote, and can play audio from iPods and other line level sources.

The mStation line is available now for $129.95.

Stephen Euin Cobb, host of the 2006 Parsec award winning podcast The Future And You has announced a partnership with Jim Baen’s Universe, the largest SF&F online magazine in the world.

In every issue of the magazine, Cobb will write a regular column, What’s new in The Future And You, as well as a nonfiction article (usually about the future). In return, he will provide the magazine ten minutes within every episode of his monthly, two-hour long show in which they will have one of their many famous authors read a sample of their work.

“While each of these are very different, and innovative, forms of media, this is a particularly natural alliance because the creative people behind both share passions and optimism for many of the same things, such as science fiction & fantasy and the real future in which we all hope to live.” notes Cobb.

The alliance launched on December 1, 2006 with the current episode (MP3) of the show and current issue of the magazine.