The Olympics on the Web: Squashed by tradition

The 2008 Summer Olympics is the most online ever, which is no surprise. More of the world has broadband access than four years ago. But in the US, at least, the old advertising-supported television model for distributing sports coverage is hanging on tight.

That isn't to say the Web is losing. On NBCOlympics.com, you can quickly jump to delayed coverage of the major events, as well as live coverage of less popular sports or qualifying rounds. What you cannot do is duplicate the live-television experience online for major events like swimming.
This is because NBC affiliate stations make advertising revenues when people tune in to those events on TV. NBC cannot just run all its Olympics video online in real time and compete with its own affiliates. We may not like it, but from a business perspective, this appears to make sense.

Or does it? Could NBC offer a Web experience that's competitive with the television offering and end up still ahead of the game? I believe that it could.
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From the Great Ideas Dept.: Biodegradeable USB keys

OK, seriously, why hasn't someone thought of this before?

A Hong Kong company says it's come up with a biodegradeable USB drive. It's made out of fermented corn material, something called polylactide, which will actually break down in a way that doesn't harm whatever landfill it ends up in.

Hoshino, the drive's creator, is being really literal about it, as you can see, actually making the drive look like an ear of corn. Cute.

I don't really care what it looks like, something like this is very welcome. As evidence I offer a picture of my desk, below.

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Why the Internet continues to be NBC's Olympic headache

Sometimes things don't work out as planned but still it's all to the good. That's the case with the early data for NBC's telecasts of the Beijing Olympics.

Heading into the games, a big question on the minds of NBC execs was whether Internet video and piracy would erode TV viewership.

If the first couple of days offered a harbinger, it was all much ado about nothing. As the world settles in to watch the first truly broadband Olympics, too many big media creators still judge the Web to be more of a foe than a friend. But the masses are voting with their eyeballs. Turns out these Summer Games are the most watched in the last decade--coinciding with similar record viewership over the Internet.

This comes as a counter-intuitive--albeit pleasant--surprise to the likes of General Electric and Disney and all the other content creating factories. Anxious to mollify the concerns of its affiliates, NBC, which owns exclusive broadcast rights to the games, decided to offer only 75 percent of its live coverage of the Olympics via its Web site.
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Report: Nehalem to be named Core i7

Intel has revealed some details about its next-generation processor platform, which it has developed under the code name Nehalem.

According to an article on Expreview.com, the processors based on Nehalem architecture will be called Core i7, and Intel will introduce the Core i7 name next Monday. The significance of the i7 moniker is lost on me. Care to posit any theories, Crave readers?

Let's quickly recap Intel's tick-tock cadence model of shrinking the size of its chips with one release followed by the introduction of new chip architecture with the next release.

Tick: The latest Core 2 Duo processors are based on the 45-nanomater Penryn core, which was a die shrink (but using the same architecture) of previous-generation 65-namometer Core 2 Duo chips. Tock: Core i7 processors will introduce new chip architecture based on the same 45nm die and are expected to be released in Q4 of this year. The next tick is expected in 2009, when Intel shrink 45nm Nehalem chips to 32nm, which is currently being developed under the code name Westmere.

Via CNET Crave

gOS's new Linux OS embraces Google applications

gOS--a company known for its debut in the US$199 Wal-Mart gPC and Netbooks--announced Wednesday the details of gOS 3 Gadgets, the newest version of its Linux operating system for consumers.

The San Francisco-based company made the announcement at LinuxWorld Expo.

The main feature of gOS 3 Gadgets is its ability to instantly launch Google Gadgets for Linux on start-up, allowing users access to more than 100,000 iGoogle and Google Gadgets applications. These applications, though graphically rich, are small enough to be added to the computer in seconds over an Internet broadband connection. The new operation system will also be loaded with WINE 1.0, Lightweight X Desktop Environment (LXDE), and other Google software for Linux to improve the user experience.

While WINE has been known to allows users to use thousands of Windows applications on Linux platform, LXDE is a renewed effort to develop more lightweight desktop applications for Linux environment. By supporting LXDE, gOS 3 Gadgets, apart from desktops, would also make a good choice for ultra small mobile laptops, which are generally suffer from having slow hard drives and processors.

In addition to Google Gadgets for Linux, gOS 3 Gadgets can also run other Google applications more well-known in Windows platform including Google Desktop, Google Picasa, Google Earth and Google Maps. In the new gOS 3 Gadgets, other Google's web-based applications such as Documents, Calendar, and Mail launch have a closer appearance and functionality to desktop applications than other platforms.

Via CNET Crave

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