News and Events - November 2001
Fri 30th Nov, 2001
DMCA upheld
The FT reports that "A US federal appeals court has delivered a big victory to copyright holders who want to use technology to protect films, music, and other copyrighted material from digital piracy." By giving such strong legal protection, the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) reassures content owners who want to distribute their copyrighted material over the Internet.
Thu 29th Nov, 2001
GPRS mobile technology released
TTP Communications has announced that its licensee, Novatel Wireless, is about to start shipping PC modem cards to allow laptops and PDAs to connect directly to the GPRS network. This is good news for companies like Forbidden that can compress video to stream at below the 40kbps data rate that most GPRS will support.
Mon 26th Nov, 2001
Forbidden's first patent application
The official search report has now been issued on our PCT patent application by the International Searching Authority at the European Patent Office. All the cited publications are in the category of background, which is an indication that the 19 claims are all novel and inventive.
Wed 21st Nov, 2001
Always on more important than bandwidth
"ADSL deployment has been woefully slow. Only 100,000 customers have the technology today" says the FT, adding that Telewest has 70,000 broadband users and NTL "has signed up its 100,000th" although many of these only have access at 64kbps. Electronics Weekly says "one of the main advantages of broadband is that it is always on". It quotes Andy Green, Chief Executive of BTopenworld: "a major reason for the low demand [for broadband] comes down to the flat-rate unmetered Internet access packages available ... we have fantastic value narrowband ". Forbidden's technology is ideal both for that market, and for another narrowband always on market - GPRS.
Mon 19th Nov, 2001
Growth Company Investor report
AIM stocks have been slower to recover than those on the main market, but "leading the way was Forbidden Technologies", says Growth Company Investor. Forbidden also has a double page research report in the November edition of The AIM & OFEX Newsletter, which says "The market for Forbidden's technology is thus far greater than that for MPEG-based suppliers".
Thu 15th Nov, 2001
DoCoMo launches video on 3G
NTT DoCoMo has announced that it will begin delivery of short video clips over its 3G network from next week. DoCoMo's service will use its FOMA infrastructure at speeds of up to 384 kilobits per second. This high bandwidth doesn't come cheap, however. A 100 kilobyte video clip is expected to cost between ¥16 and ¥169 (£0.10 to £1) to view on a 2.2 inch screen. Better compression would reduce the cost, of course.
Wed 14th Nov, 2001
3G articles
"Are you a mobile internet believer?" asks the FT's Lex column, while Vodaphone predicts a shortage of 3G handsets will delay significant financial benefit for the group until 2004. On the other hand, Electronics Weekly reports that Hutchison wants more 3G licences and "believes the key 3G application is video" and its network will be able to carry JAVA-based multimedia applications.
Tue 13th Nov, 2001
Agreement with Travel Television
Forbidden Technologies announces an agreement with Travel Television. Citywire has issued a research report update.
Fri 9th Nov, 2001
World Travel Market
Greg Hirst, our Business Development Director, will be at the World Travel Market at Earls Court on Monday and Tuesday of next week. If you are at the travel market and are interested in talking to him, then please email him on sales@forbidden.co.uk.
Wed 7th Nov, 2001
Philips promotes 2.5G
Electronics Weekly quotes Philips' marketing strategy and innovation director, Ton van Campen: "The real revolution in mobile communications is happening right now in the move from GSM to ... 2.5G". The new 2.5G iPAQ wireless pack is expected to be available in December 2001, supporting datarates sufficient for the videos which we currently use to demonstrate our iPAQ player.
Mon 5th Nov, 2001
Christmas Special Offer - Be an Internet Video Star!
You can now put some of your own video on your website, to show to family, friends and, potentially millions of Internet viewers this Christmas!
Fri 2nd Nov, 2001
Christmas Special Offer
Forbidden Technologies will launch its Christmas special offer on Monday 5th November.
Thu 1st Nov, 2001
CPU speed increases continue
On Monday we released a big picture player. The efficiency of our codec made this possible, but we've also been helped by the continuing increases in processor speeds. For example, the latest Athlon prices show that the cheapest desktop CPU currently available is 950MHz at a cost of $69, with the fastest chips now running at 1.53GHz. On mobile devices, ARM's Jazelle will help our Java player. Our iPAQ codec runs on a 200MHz ARM, but faster chips will soon be common, such as the XScale from Intel running at 400, 600 and 733 MHz. Devices such as the Palm are expected to use these CPUs.
