December 29, 2005 | It's The End of The Year, Wired News-style

It's the time of year for wrap-ups and lists galore, and this year Wired News did it up right.

Sexiest geeks, best foot-in-mouth moments, best and worst tech moments.

My contributions included this round-up of the most predictable tech stories of the year:

The video iPod: Of course Apple would unveil a portable video player. All the signs were present. As with the music-only iPod, other companies had long been selling similar wares. In fact, Archos introduced a mobile video TV recorder 18 months ago.

Apple garnered mammoth media attention in October when Steve Jobs unveiled the company's gorgeous device, which can't record but will happily play back episodes of The Tonight Show that users buy through iTunes for $2 a pop.

Google Maps: In retrospect, how did anyone bear using MapQuest's clunky interface, and why didn't we all realize that dragging a map would feel so good?

Of course, the geniuses at Google recognized that every American's birthright includes not only a search engine that works, but also online maps complete with Ajax goodness, satellite views and adorable pushpins.

I also filed this dispatch about stocking up on gadgets, before they all start shipping crippled:

Post-Christmas sales are a must for bargain hunters, but this year brings a new incentive to stock up on electronics: 2005 might be the last good year to get gizmos that aren't locked down.

As the music, television and movie industries move to make more media available online, they are also attempting to keep that content from showing up on peer-to-peer networks or being copied for friends.

They are looking to Congress for help.

Meanwhile, many consumer electronics firms are hobbling their own devices to protect themselves from potential lawsuits or, in the case of Apple, to make money from selling media to those who bought the company's hardware, according to Electronic Frontier Foundation staff attorney Fred von Lohmann.

"We've already seen early examples: ReplayTV was taken off the market after being sued by the television industry," von Lohmann said. "We have never seen a PVR that has offered the same features, like the ability to send shows from one machine to another, automatically delete commercials and a very large hard drive capacity."

Posted by Ryan Singel at December 29, 2005 08:16 AM

Trackback Pings

TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.secondaryscreening.net/cgi-bin/mt-tb.cgi/265