Jim Jamieson
Province

Most mobile professionals have experienced the battery-pack blues.

You know the scenario. You’re on a cross-country flight and your laptop fades to black right in the middle of a crucial spreadsheet perusal. Or you’re in the field trying to close a key deal and your cellphone runs out of juice.

Burnaby-based Xantrex, known for its commercial and recreational power electronics systems, is launching its first consumer product to address just this need. The Pocket Powerpack 100 can charge a Blackberry 30 times, an iPod Mini 20 times, a cellphone eight times or provide 21/2 hours of additional run time for a laptop before it needs to be recharged. The unit features a three-prong AC outlet and USB power outlet. It is likely to sell for about $99.

© The Vancouver Province 2005

Repetitive motion injuries, which have long afflicted desktop and laptop users, are invading the mobile handheld world

Alicia Chang
Sun

LOS ANGELES — Chris Claypool was addicted to his BlackBerry wireless handheld. Like many users, he never thought twice about pecking away at lightning speed, replying to a wave of e-mails from clients around the globe.

Last year, the 37-year-old agricultural sales director from Post Falls, Idaho, noticed a throbbing sensation in this thumbs whenever he typed. He switched to tapping with his index finger, then his middle digit and finally his pinky. But his thumbs pained him to the point where he can’t even press the buttons on his TV remote control.

After months of aching, Claypool took a break. Now he only uses his BlackBerry to send short messages — typing with the tip of a pencil eraser whenever his thumbs get sore.

“It affects business because I can’t whack away on my BlackBerry like I used to,” he said. “It’s just too painful.”

Repetitive motion injuries, which have long afflicted desktop and laptop computer users, are invading the mobile handheld world.

There’s even an informal name for the malady — “BlackBerry Thumb” — a catch-all phrase that describes a repetitive stress injury of the thumb as a result of overusing small gadget keypads.

Business executives and tech-savvy consumers are increasingly using BlackBerries, Treos, Sidekicks and other devices with miniature keyboards designed for thumb-tapping to stay connected while on the go.

And that has some ergonomic and hand experts worried about injuries from overexertion.

“If you’re trying to type War and Peace with your thumbs, then you’re going to have a problem,” warned Alan Hedge, director of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Laboratory at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y.

No national statistics exist on how many people suffer from this type of thumb ailment, but some doctors say they are seeing an upswing in related cases, said Dr. Stuart Hirsch, an orthopedist at St. Joseph‘s Hospital and Medical Center in Paterson, N.J.

“It’s mostly the road warrior who prefers to answer e-mails on a thumb keyboard,” said Hirsch. “If all you did was just answer with a simple yes and no, it would not be a dilemma.”

For as long as video gamers have been blasting aliens, so-called “Gamer’s Thumb” has been a sore spot for them, as well. With tens of millions of portable video game machines on the market, lots of young hands risk digit abuse.

Games for such devices generally include some type of printed warning about injury risks from prolonged playing.

Earlier this year, the American Society of Hand Therapists issued a consumer alert, warning users of small electronic gadgets that heavy thumb use could lead to painful swelling of the sheath around the tendons in the thumb.

The group recommended taking frequent breaks during e-mailing and resting one’s arms on a pillow for support.

A booklet that ships with the Nintendo DS handheld system advises a 10 to 15 minute break for each hour of play, and a break of at least several hours if gamers experience wrist or hand soreness.

“People tend to use just one finger over and over again and it’s that repetitive use with one digit that could lead to problems,” said Stacey Doyon, vice-president of the American Society of Hand Therapists and a registered occupational therapist in Portland, Maine.

The BlackBerry, which debuted in 1999, employs a full QWERTY keypad for thumb typing to automatically send and receive e-mail. About 2.5 million people currently use Blackberries, more than double from a year ago.

An executive for Research In Motion Ltd., which makes the BlackBerry, said the company considers ergonomic factors when designing its keyboards.

“Of course, any product can be overused . . . so people should listen to their own bodies and adjust their routine if necessary. But I would caution against confusing rare examples of overuse with the typical experience,” Mark Guibert, vice-president of marketing, wrote in an e-mail.

Musculoskeletal disorders, which include repetitive strain injuries, accounted for a third of all workplace injuries and illnesses reported in 2003 — the latest data available, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

© The Vancouver Sun 2005

 

We spend a lot on our TV entertainment, but surveys show many of us don’t know what we’re buying

Peter Wilson
Sun

From Corner Gas to the CSI and Law & Order series to Desperate Housewives to Hockey Night in Canada to NFL Sunday Ticket, Canadians love their television.

On average, we eagerly lap up about 22 hours of it a week, with 7.6 million subscribers hooked up via cable and 2.3 million subscribers pulling it in via satellite dishes.

We like new video bells and whistles with about 50 per cent of viewers subscribing to the new digital services. And, as the word builds, we’re getting ready for high-definition television (HDTV), although right now only about four per cent of us watch it.

As well, we’re considering those new personal video recorders (PVRs) that allow us to pile up hours of digital programming (including HDTV) on massive hard drives.

However, despite the fact that Stats Canada reports that the Canadian households in 2003 spent an average of $460 a year on cable and satellite service, most of us really don’t have a handle on what we’re getting for our money.

Call it bundlemania, the result of which is consumer confusion.

For example, go on Shaw’s website — which, of course, you wouldn’t be able to do if you didn’t already have the Internet — and you’ll discover that you can get the Basic Cable & High Speed Internet Lite Bundle for $42.95 a month.

Or you could order the Premier Home Bundle (including digital cable and high speed light Internet) for $66.95 a month. Or you could go whole hog and get the Total Home Bundle (high speed Internet and digital TV) for $91.95 a month.

For the intrepid consumer to find out exactly what these bundles comprise requires persistence and the time to manoeuvre around the Shaw site to come across a chart of the TV offerings, where its all laid out.

Those who want these bundles then have to discover the difference between plain old high speed Internet and the lite version.

Then consumers have to price out a cable digital terminal and a Internet modem either to buy or rent.

As well, there’s the difference between a plain old digital terminal ($99), a digital terminal that allows you to get HDTV ($239 after programming credits) and a PVR ($589 after programming credits.)

Then of course, there are the TV packages like NFL Sunday Ticket (available at $37.49 a month four four months); 18 Canuck games for $139.95, current video-on-demand movie titles at $4.99; and even pay-per-view offerings like Carmen Elektra’s Naked Women Wrestling for, well, we couldn’t actually determine a price, but we’re sure it must be there somewhere.

Oh, and should you want just basic cable with nothing else or full cable with all the tiers (and, again, you’ll have search around a bit to get the tier details) you’ll have to phone to get the price, because that depends, it seems, on where you live.

From talking to Shaw president Peter Bissonnette, we found that those offerings cost $25 and $47.95 respectively.

To be honest, it’s just possible that these unbundled prices are there on the site too, but we couldn’t find them with a couple of hours of searching.

But then nobody in Canada expects this to be easy.

Just ask Mario Mota, a vice-president at Toronto‘s Decima Research, who believes that satellite and cable providers make their offerings too tough to understand — so much so, that many Canadians don’t even know what it is that they’ve actually ordered.

“There’s no doubt that consumers are confused about offerings in terms of what they are and who gets what,” said Mota in an interview. “Our survey has constantly shown major consumer confusion, even to the point where people don’t even know what they have and yet they’re paying for it.”

Mota believes that cable and satellite operators make the various tiers, bundles and deals far more complicated than they should and this actually makes it hard on themselves and restricts their ability to get more revenue from customers.

“They’ve really got to step back and make the offers as simple as possible for consumers because, first of all, people don’t have the time and energy to work their way through this stuff,” said Mota.

One of the reactions to the plethora of offers is that users just settle for the simplest to understand

That means, said Mota, that cable and satellite providers are missing an opportunity to upsell customers.

As well, he added, consumers are confused about the technology. One of the questions that Decima asks is if subscribers have a digital box that allows them to receive HDTV broadcasts.

“A large proportion of customers, in the 20 to 25 per cent range. are telling us they have an HD box, but they don’t,” said Mota, who checks the model numbers. “They just have a standard digital box.”

Strangest of all, a small group of people can’t even name their TV provider. A few in the Lower Mainland still believe they subscribe to Rogers, which sold out to Shaw a few years ago.

There’s somewhat less confusion over satellite offerings, because neither Bell Express-Vu nor StarChoice (owned by Shaw), can bundle TV with Internet services or, as is happening now at Shaw, with Internet phone offerings.

“A basic digital subscriber package is $27,” said Bell ExpressVu’s marketing vice-president Pat Button. “Then we have various theme packs — which are $8 a month — and we have the most popular package for us is what we call Pick 5 which has five theme packs for the price of four. The price then is $47 with the basic digital package.

“We find that customers go quickly to that $47 landing point and they sort of customize from there,” said Button

Should they want, Express-Vu users can take the Total TV package — including four movie channels with 12 theme packs, for $87 a month.

And for another $10 they can add as HDTV channels (Shaw doesn’t charge for its HDTV offerings, but is considering doing it soon. )And then there’s the NHL games and NFL Sunday ticket and the like.

Of course, with satellite TV you have to buy the dish and the digital box, which, depending on what you want, ranges from a basic $99 to almost $600 (with another $99 for installation, unless you take a 24-month contract..

At the upper end you get the HD PVR Plus System- Model 9220.

This model allows users to record up to 180 hours of programming (25 hours of HDTV) and, because it has two tuners can be connected to two TV sets and you can watch and record two live programs or record two programs while watching a third pre-recorded program.

Despite the criticisms of industry experts like Mota, Shaw’s Bissonnette doesn’t believe that his company’s bundles or offerings are confusing to customers.

And, said Bissonnette, consumers get real benefits from bundling because the more they add to their basic packages –including Internet and phone services — the more they save.

“About 51 per cent of our customers right now take some kind of bundle and there are very few of our customers that just take basic cable,” said Bissonnette.

On the Internet side, he added, just five per cent of their well over one million customers take the service alone, without bundling.

Express-Vu’s Button also believes that pricing for TV services is easy for its 1.6 million subscribers to understand and that they evaluate the service and, if they don’t like it, they can always switch.

“All of our research shows that customers are very price elastic, when they buy television or television services,” said Button. “Ultimately the value delivered by the product is reviewed and revalidated on an ongoing basis by the customer.

“So since they watch it and live it and breathe it, its a very personal part of their world every month when they bill comes in they validate whether its actually delivering the value that they thought it would.”

Mota, however, said that there is a reluctance by TV viewers to switch from a service they’re already using because they view it as a hassle and a step into the unknown.

Right now, said Mota, that is playing into the hands of the cable operators, because the early-adopter, must-have glow that first surrounded satellite television in its early years has faded.

In its most recent survey, Decima Research asked consumers who were considering going to digital TV in the next year, whether they were leaning towards satellite or cable.

Of course, this would be directed at cable subscribers only, because satellite TV is already an all digital service.

“And cable is really top of mind for them, rather than satellite,” said Mota. “Why is that? Well, these consumers are already cable customers as it is. So the decision to go with the cable company is easier.

“You’re staying with the same company, the same billing relationship. It’s not a whole new world of switching providers entirely.”

– – –

WHAT TV COSTS YOU. COMPARING SHAW WITH BELL EXPRESSVU:

Shaw Cable:

Basic Cable — Thirty-four channels including local stations, Seattle stations, The Weather Network, Sportsnet-Pacific, W, Vision CBC Newsworld and CTV Newsnet: $25 a month

Full Cable — Sixty-five channels, or three additional tiers of programming including Much Music, CNN, Spike, CNBC, History Television, Food Network Golf Channel, Life Network, Bravo! CMT and Showcase: $47.95

Digital Cable — Includes forty channels of music, plus eastern U.S. FOX, NBC, ABC and CBS stations (free) plus the chance to pay for, in bundles ( five for $6.95 or 30 for $22.95.) , such stations as Fashion Television, The Independent Film Channel, G4Tech, Travel TV and Animal Planet.

As well you can get movie channels (including six movie central channels for $20.95), pay-per-view, on-demand and specialty channels like Fairchild Television ($17.95) and Asian Television Network ($16.95) and adult channels like Playboy ($17.95) and Hustler ($20.95): $99 for basic digital box plus whatever you decide to order.

Shaw offers seven HDTV channels — including the major U.S networks and a movie channel — for which it charges nothing extra at the moment, but you need an HDTV box.

Bundles of other services: This is where cable differs from satellite, in that it can bundle such services as high speed Internet and Internet telephone service, which, in B.C., is available only in Victoria for $55 a month.

Shaw offers a Total Home Bundle (including high speed Internet, basic cable, full cable, pay-per-view, U.S. superstations, digital music and access to Shaw on Demand for $91.95.

Or you could go for the High-Speed Lite Internet plus full cable bundle (includes basic and full cable) for $69.95 and so on and on and on.

Bell Express-Vu:

Basic Digital Subscription: Includes all the Canadian networks, U.S. networks (either from the east or the west), music stations, Knowledge Network, etc.: $27 and for another $1 you can have both east and west feeds of U.S. networks.

Extra Value Combo: Offers the basic digital subscription with any five theme packs. Theme packs include the general headings of news and learning, sports, family, lifestyle, variety, movies and french, some with two offerings each. Among the stations available are CNN, TSN, Food, Much More Music and several channels, like Book and Lone Star, that on Shaw are included in the digital cable lineup: $47.

HDTV Value Combo: Same as the Extra Value combo, except that you get as many as 27 channels in HDTV, when they feature HDTV programming, including the likes of NBC, Fox, ABS and CBS: $57.

Ultra Value Combo: Same as the Extra Value Combo, but with premium movies and six theme packs: $68.

Max Value Combo: Basic digital subscription, premium movies, with all 12 theme packs: $88.

Pay-per-view: Movies, sports, special events and the like are all available here including the likes of NFL Sunday Ticket ($179), NHL Centre Ice ($179), Canucks Pay Per View ($139.95), WWE Wrestling (the recent No Mercy was $34.99) and Football Cheerleaders exposed for $4.99.)

© The Vancouver Sun 2005

 

EBay gave Dale Andrews easy access to a storefront that now nets $10,000 a year

Michael Kane
Sun

Who knew there was a market for NHL hockey pucks in England? Who knew that two competing bidders for an old children’s book would turn out to be long lost relatives of the author?

Victoria‘s Dale Andrews found out after he set up shop in cyberspace four years ago.

All he knew at the time was that an “eBay storefront” would give him a global market for his part-time business selling sports memorabilia and collector’s items such as T-shirts, books and toys. He’d previously relied on weekend shows which had decreased dramatically after the bottom fell out of the market for sports cards.

Andrews, a 33-year-old single, currently earns about $10,000 a year from Downstairs Collectibles and Gifts to supplement his income as a part-time courier and freelance writer.

After attending eBay’s 10th anniversary convention in June in San Jose, he is confident he can eventually make a full-time career on-line. “When you start talking to people from all walks of life and from all around the world, you realize many are making a full-time living and making a great deal of money selling just about anything you can think of,” he said in an interview.

Not surprisingly, the folks at eBay say “the world’s on-line marketplace” is one of the best places on the Internet to start and operate a small business. They note that Andrews is just one of 724,000 individuals in North America who are earning all or part of their income on the eBay site, an increase of 68 per cent from 2003.

The American monolith has levelled the playing field among entrepreneurs, small businesses and multinational companies, says Jordan Banks, eBay Canada‘s managing director.

“It offers a new global frontier, opening up borders traditionally closed off by geography and distance, giving the entrepreneur in downtown Vancouver and business owner in rural Saskatchewan the same access to the same buying community in the same real-time,” Banks said in a release.

Andrews started selling baseball and hockey cards in high school and now does most of his business across North America, but he has sold items as far afield as Australia, Malaysia, Japan and Germany.

He can’t explain the on-line demand for hockey pucks in England — “perhaps the buyers are transplanted Canadians” — but is happy to satisfy it.

His favourite selling moment began about two years ago when two buyers began a bidding competition over an old children’s book called Poco and the Parrot. Bidding started at 99 cents and closed seven days later at $28.

It turned out that both American bidders were relatives of the author and over the course of 20 years had lost touch with one another. Andrews says he is thrilled that the book played an instrumental role in reuniting two lost relatives. He is also pleased that he earned many times the $1 he paid for the book.

The “Downstairs” in his storefront name comes from the midden downstairs in an earlier rented home where he stored his merchandise.

For more information visit www.eBay.ca or http://stores.ebay.com/downstairscollectiblesandgifts.

© The Vancouver Sun 2005

 

TECHNOLOGY: Consumers face new choices

Jim Jamieson
Province

Just when you thought the tech world was becoming a safe place to play, here comes a traffic bulletin from the always pot-holed consumer-electronics highway: There’s another video-format war brewing.

Nobody knows yet whether it’ll be as nasty as the VHS/Betamax battle of the early 1980s, but the argument this time around is about which group of technology companies can best store and play high-definition content on home-video players. The stakeholders are the hardware manufacturers, Hollywood movie producers and, of course, consumers.

In one corner, we have Blu-ray Disc developed by Sony and Philips, one that can store up to 50 gigabytes on a double-sided disk.

In the other corner, there’s HD DVD, developed by Toshiba, which is an extension of the current DVD format and holds up to 30 GB.

The former brags it has more room to grow, while the latter claims an easier, more economical transition from current technology.

The driver for this battle is the dawning of the age of high-definition television. The TVs themselves are still in the minority amongst consumers — due to the lack of programming available in this richer, more compelling format. But industry watchers say demand will hit prime time in just a few short years.

Those few early adopters who’ve shelled out the $700-plus for hard-drive-based Personal Video Recorders — which work exclusively with the likes of cable company Shaw Communications and satellite provider Bell ExpressVu — already have the ability to record high-definition TV content and watch it later.

But soon the market will demand a means to watch HD video movies and the ability to record TV content to a disk, just as some of us do now with regular DVD recorders. And, just as DVD drives have migrated to personal computers, we’ll also see HD drives in PCs.

“I saw a demo at a trade show and it was spectacular,” said Doug Argue, general manager of Vancouver high-end electronics store Sound Plus. “Consumers are going to love this.”

The push for greater storage capacity is driven by the fact that a typical two-hour high-definition movie requires about 25 GB — far more than the 4.7 GB that current DVD technology accommodates.

Meanwhile, there has been all sorts of industry pie throwing between the contenders. The latest comes from software giant Microsoft and chipmaker Intel, who earlier this month announced that they were throwing their considerable weight behind the HD DVD camp.

This prompted a strong rebuttal from Blu-ray Disc supporters Dell and Hewlett-Packard, with the computer-makers pointing out what they believed were inaccuracies in some of the assertions made by the tech giants.

So, does all this mean you could end up tossing your recently bought DVD player and guessing which is the right path to high definition technology?

Relax, says Stephen Baker of U.S.-based technology consultancy NPD Techworld.

He says both systems will feature backward compatibility, so there will be no threat to consumers’ DVD movie collections.

“I suspect that 99 per cent of global consumers have no idea about this — nor should they care,” said Baker. “Most people aren’t going to run out and spend $1,000 bucks or more on a next generation DVD player. The early adopters obviously have plenty of money so if they make the wrong choice, who cares? They can always buy the other device.”

No one is yet producing Hollywood movies in HD format, but that industry has also begun to choose sides.

Twentieth Century Fox, Vivendi Universal, and Disney are in the Blu-ray camp, while HD DVD is counting on New Line Cinema, Paramount Home Entertainment, Universal Studios Home Entertainment, and Warner Home Video. This will create an obvious problem for video rental stores, not to mention consumers.

So when will we see the first of these new devices and what will they cost?

A couple of Blu-ray player/recorders were released earlier this year in Japan, selling for about $2,000 US. Canadian retailers expect to carry them in the first half of 2006.

Cedric Tetzel of London Drugs said the company will carry both formats and see how the dust settles. A Future Shop spokeswoman said it is still considering its strategy.

Prices aren’t fixed yet, but retailers expect the first player/recorders to come in at more than $1,000 US. The discs will also be expensive, as were blank DVDs initially, with one retailer expecting a $30 price point. However, one Japanese manufacturer predicted making an HD DVD disc would cost only about 10 per cent more that current DVDs.

SIZING UP THE COMPETITION — BLU-RAY VERSUS HD DVD

HOW THEY WORK — Both Blu-ray and HD DVD formats use blue lasers, instead of the red ones used in current DVD technology, with a shorter wavelength, allowing more storage.

CAPACITY (on a dual-layer disc)

– Blu-ray — 50 GB – HD DVD — 30 GB

HARDWARE SUPPORTERS

– Blu-ray — Sony, Dell, Hewlett-Packard, Hitachi, LG Electronics, Panasonic, Philips Electronics, Samsung Electronics. Sony will put Blu-ray in its PlayStation game platform.

– HD DVD — Toshiba, NEC, Sanyo, and Memory-Tech. Microsoft will support HD DVD in the next version of Windows.

PROS — Blu-ray has the greater storage capacity; HD DVD, being similar to current DVD technology, is easier and cheaper for manufacturers to get up and running.

CONS — Blu-ray involves more expensive hardware and media initially;

HD DVD has lower storage capacity, although Toshiba has announced plans for a triple-layer disc (45 GB).

© The Vancouver Province 2005

 

Sun

SAN JOSE, Calif. — Apple Computer Inc. unveiled yesterday an iPod capable of playing videos, evolving the portable music player of choice into a multimedia platform for everything from TV shows to music videos.

Videos will now be sold alongside songs on Apple’s iTunes Music Store.

Citing a groundbreaking deal with ABC Television Group, Apple CEO Steve Jobs said the online iTunes store will sell episodes of hit shows Desperate Housewives and Lost for $1.99 US each, making them available the day after they air.

“It’s never been done before, where you could buy hit TV shows and buy them online the day after they’re shown,” said Jobs whose other company, Pixar Animation Studios Inc., has a long relationship with ABC’s parent, the Walt Disney Co.

“This is the first giant step to making more content available to more people online,” said Robert Iger, Disney’s chief executive.

“It is the future as far as I’m concerned. It’s a great marriage between content and technology and I’m thrilled about it.”

The new video iPod, available in black or white, will be able to play video and podcasts.

A 30-gigabyte version will sell for $299 and a 60-gigabyte, $399.

Extra features on both versions include a clock, a calendar that Jobs said never looked better, a stop watch and a screen lock.

“It’s really very beautiful and very thin,” Jobs said at the much anticipated news conference.

© The Vancouver Province 2005

 

Joanne Lee-Young
Sun

Skype, the much-lauded pioneer of free voice-over-Internet-protocol phone calls, has partnered with Linksys to launch a new made-in-B.C. handset that frees deskbound VoIP users from having to talk into their computers.

The “CIT2000 Internet Telephony Kit” will allow users to make free Skype calls from wherever they are in the home or office.

Richmond-based Ascalade Communications is the handset’s maker. Ascalade is investing in R&D in VoIP as part of its growth strategy, according to manager of business development Raymond Chow.

Use of Skype’s free Internet phone calls has grown rapidly and the Luxembourg-based company says it now has more than 170,000 users signing up everyday.

In September, eBay acquired Skype in hopes of eventually driving its online sales by allowing buyers and sellers to talk to each other instead of just trying to build trust via e-mail.

“This [the kit] is a product that is the initial fruit of our partnership with Skype. It shows where the market is heading and is the first in a line of products to come,” Tarun Loomba, Irvine, Calif.-based Linksys’s director of product marketing, said in an interview Wednesday.

The kit will be available starting next week from more than 3,000 online and street retailers, including Staples, Radio Shack, Amazon and Egghead, in the U.S., Europe, Latin America, the Asia-Pacific, the Middle East and Africa.

Ironically, it won’t be on shelves in Canada even though the revolutionary technology for it was developed in Richmond.

Ascalade sells its products to brand giants, including NEC, Philips and Toshiba. Almost 85 per cent of its sales are currently to Europe, with revenues recently rising dramatically to $83.7 million US in 2004 from $12.7 million US in 2002.

The company focuses on products known as Digital Enhanced Cordless Telecommunication (DECT) devices, the main standard for cordless phones in Europe.

A recent Federal Communications Commission ruling in the U.S. opened the door for Ascalade’s DECT products, but the standard has yet to be approved in Canada.

“The irony isn’t lost on us,” Loomba said, adding that Linksys is hoping to start sales in Canada by the end of the year.

“We look to a number of partners to develop products,” Loomba said. “We linked with Ascalade after a rigorous process. They were very quick to market, cost efficient and the key thing was their technical expertise in DECT.”

Ascalade declined to confirm that it is the original equipment-maker in this deal, but, in addition to Loomba’s comments, there is a public filing with the Foreign Communications Commission naming the Richmond company as the manufacturer.

Ascalade’s Chow said in an e-mail reply to Vancouver Sun questions: “While VoIP brings about the convergence of data, voice and video, we are starting to see a blurring in the roles of the traditional telecom and networking players.

“We recognize this evolution and are likewise designing and manufacturing a new segment of communication products that we can move into our traditional telecom distribution channels as well as new networking distribution channels.”

In September, Ascalade closed a $40-million initial public offering on the Toronto Stock Exchange, led by GMP Securities.

© The Vancouver Sun 2005

 

All being well, Canadians will be able to switch to one of the two Canadian providers by the middle of December

Peter Wilson
Sun

The long wait for satellite radio in Canada is over. Well, okay, it’s almost over.

The best guess is that we’ll be able get our hands on legal satellite radios for our cars and homes by Christmas.

That’s if the two Canadian providers, Sirius Canada and Canadian Satellite Radio (CSR), can get their eight channels each (four English, four French) of home-grown programming in place quickly enough.

And that’s also if no major technical problems get in their way.

So, all being well, by the holiday season, average, everyday rule-observing Canucks will at last be able to join the estimated 100,000 grey market satellite radio subscribers in Canada already tuning into U.S.-based services.

Everything from the actual content of the Canadian channels to the cost of the service remains up in the air, but that doesn’t mean we don’t already know a lot about what’s coming.

Herewith, then, our frequently-asked questions about satellite radio:

Q: Why would I want it?

A: First, because the all-digital service even on the least expensive of the satellite radios sounds darn good in your car and even better pumped through your home entertainment system.

The wide variety of music is crisp, clear and gives as good as what you get from a CD. And that music is commercial-free.

Initially in Canada, you’ll get 80 channels of music, news, talk and sports (including the NHL, major league baseball, the NFL and the NBA) and at the same time be able to listen to, with a simple punch of a button, local AM and FM stations.

Driving.ca will provide vehicle shoppers with access to thousands of listings from dealers, classifieds

Patricia Cancilla
Sun

Consumers have a new online tool to help them buy or sell a new or used vehicle with driving.ca, a new automotive website from CanWest MediaWorks.

The site, which launches today, “provides vehicle shoppers with access to thousands of listings from dealers and from the classified ads in our newspapers across the country,” says Laura Pearce, general manager of driving.ca.

“Shoppers can search by make and model or by body type or even use Instant Search to get to common listing categories such as vehicles under $15,000, in just one click of the mouse. In addition, driving.ca features a new vehicle configuration tool that allows you to build your dream car and even see what colour you would look best in.”

The new driving.ca website complements CanWest’s newspaper driving sections.

“The local newspaper driving section allows consumers to browse for the vehicle they are looking for … then, consumers can go online for more details — full feature lists, multiple photos, digital and video advertising on specific vehicles or on dealer specials,” says Pearce. “Driving.ca is a great extension of the paper because it is available any time people are shopping for their next vehicle.”

And if someone is searching for a road test that appeared in their local driving section but can’t locate a copy of the newspaper, driving.ca can help them track it down.

“We have a comprehensive database of vehicle reviews and road tests from our newspapers across the country,” says Pearce. “We have an easy-to-use comparison tool that allows you to compare up to three vehicles side by side so you can make the right purchase decision.”

The site also allows users to search for road tests by their favourite writers. Automotive news and industry events can also be found online.

And what good is a website if one can’t comment on, well, just about anything automotive-related? Readers can make their feelings known by participating in driving.ca polls and soundoffs featured regularly on the new site.

© The Vancouver Sun 2005

 

Peter Wilson
Sun

The sounds of the likes of Sarah McLachlan and The Mediaeval Babes from Vancouver-based Nettwerk Records can now be heard on Palm Treo 650 smart phones from Bell Canada in the first music deal that Palm has made in Canada.

As well — Palm Canada and Nettwerk, an independent label, announced Tuesday — users of the LifeDrive Mobile Manager will not only be able to hear music from artists like Barenaked Ladies, Swollen Members and The Be Good Tanyas, they’ll also be able to download videos of Nettwerk groups.

Nettwerk general manager Brent Muhle said that the music deal was an opportunity to get the company’s artists heard by people who might not otherwise know about them.

“We tried to create a playlist that was representative of a bunch of different demographics,” said Muhle. “So there’s a little bit of something for everybody.”

Palm’s initial foray into music in Canada is also all for free — helping Palm to exhibit the versatility of its products as well as getting the Nettwerk Records acts exposures to a new audience, said Michael Moskowitz, general manager, Americas International, Palm Inc.

The users of the Treo 650 and the LifeDrive have been generally defined demographically as “over 25 years old, frequent Internet users and optimistic about new technology and entertainment vehicles.”

“We really want to show off our technology and how great it is, that it’s more than just a connected organizer and a smart phone,” said Moskowitz in an interview. “And the second part is that we really want to highlight great Canadian artists and both of those are very powerful.”

The tunes, which will come in MP3 and will not be copy protected, can be downloaded from the Nettwerk site (at www.nettwerk.com/palm) by those who got their Treo 650 through Bell or by all LifeDrive owners.

Videos will come in Windows Media and Real Player formats.

In order to get access to the music and videos, Palm users have to type in the serial numbers of their devices.

© The Vancouver Sun 2005