Clock Ticking Down On Circuit City

If you’ve been waiting until Circuit City’s final days to make one last trip to the former electronics giant, and possibly scoop up a good deal, you’d be best to wait no longer. That’s because it was announced today by the Associated Press that Circuit City will be closing the doors on all 567 of its American based stores early, now on March 8th. While it was expected that the chain would close around the end of the month, they are running out of inventory and now plan to close by this coming Sunday!

Of course, Circuit City has been one of many businesses harmed by the current economic downturn, and was entered into bankruptcy last November.

YouTube Hits 100 Million Visitors

According to information provided from web tracking company ComScore, it appears that the YouTube video sharing website, for the first time ever, has  exceeded 100 million viewers. The new YouTube record comes from January data. Amazingly, for every 3 web surfers who enjoyed online videos in January, 2 of them used YouTube. That’s a huge market share for the Google owned company. Also interestingly, and a stat that me be due to such high North America unemployment, is that the average online video user watched approximately 6 hours of video content. Certainly a lot more than I have found time to, as of late.

One more video related stat to through at you, the overall number of folks who viewed online videos, from YouTube and other services, rose four percent from the previous month, so YouTube may be celebrating 200 million visitors in a month before we know it.

New Kindle App For iPhone Released

For those of you who would like to read your favorite books or magazines in an electronic gadget medium, but prefer not to spend over $300 dollars on an Amazon Kindle, a new iPhone app may be just what you’ve been looking for.

The new App, from Amazon, allows for Kindle like services on both the Apple iPhone, and the iPod touch. The app is a free download from the Apple App store, and will allow users of those devices to buy digital books wirelessly.

Users of the application will have access to thousands of offerings from the Kindle Library, most of which will cost them $9.99 USD. Conveniently, the app also lets users sample the first chapter of any book free of charge before purchasing. Oh, and if you happen to own both an iPhone and a Kindle? No problem, the app includes Amazon’s “whispersync” technology, which allows a user to continue reading wherever they left off with either device.

Microsoft Tests New Search Service

Microsoft  is testing a revised online search service internally that has the code name of Kumo.com. The service is only available within the company, but may eventually be offered outside. The new service was disclosed in an internal memo sent by the head of research at the company’s online services division. No details were added regarding the new features. The memo was first made public on The Wall Street Journal’s All Things Digital blog. The Redmond, Washington-based company is scrambling to make up for lost ground to Internet search leader Google, which for its part is beginning to impinge on Microsoft’s core software business. Last year, Microsoft made an unsuccessful endeavor to purchase Yahoo for $47.5 billion. Executives at both companies have left open the potential of an agreement entailing only Yahoo’s search business.

Gloomy Days On The PC Horizon

According to major research and stats company, Gartner, there are some terribly depressing times ahead for the PC sales and manufacturing industry. The firm predicts that PC sales will dip lower at a pace unheard of for the industry: more than eleven percent.

Based on the firm’s data, they predict that only 257 million personal computers will be sold this year, which is a huge and shocking 11.9 percent decline from 2008. The decline is largely due to a slowing in PC renewals, which have been around eighty percent of PC sales in recent years.

PSP Revamped

Sony’s PSP offering has been revamped, given a make over, and is looking pretty. Check it out in the photo above, and you’ll see the changes give it a few major design changes. Most notably, the device now has a sliding screen, which moves to give way to some of the control buttons when in use. Also, due to the PSP’s new sliding capabilities the device is somewhat smaller, making it even more travel friendly than before.

The gadget will likely need to be in its expanded mode in order to play feature rich games, however, more simply games may be able to be played in its more compact position. Personally, I think the new PSP design looks sleek and trendy, which should help Sony to move more units. Now, I just need to get my hands on one…

Famous Music Piracy Lawsuit Settled

Lawyers have arrived at a conditional settlement in a music piracy lawsuit issued by the music recording industry. Once the settlement is nailed down, it would stop a long conflict between the industry and the family of Patti Santangelo, who was sued in 2005 for music piracy using file sharing networks. Santangelo, denied the accusation, saying she couldn’t have downloaded or shared music because she didn’t possess the know-how. A federal judge represented her as an “Internet-illiterate parent, who does not know Kazaa from kazoo.” Santangelo refused to abide with a settlement and spoke for her case on national TV and  in newspapers. Supporters of online liberties used the Internet to raise money in favour of her defense.

In 2007, the industry ended the lawsuit against Santangelo but sued 2 of her children, Michelle, then 20, and Robert, 16, stating they had downloaded and shared more than 1,000 tracks. The industry had been trying to get an injunction, unspecified damages for each download as well as court costs. It said Michelle had confessed to piracy in a deposition and Robert had been implicated by a family friend. The Santangelos have denied any wrongdoing. The Santangelos’ lawyer, Jordan Glass, said Friday that a theoretical settlement had been arrived at and details should be finalized by March 18.

Is This For Real? Multi Million Dollar iPhone

The picture above sure is pretty, and is ought to be, as it is of an iPhone costing over two million dollars! 2.5 million to be precise, at least that’s its worth according to its creator, jeweler Peter Aloisson. The multi million dollar iPhone, called the “King’s Button” features an eighteen carat yellow gold lining, a 6.6 carat diamond start button, as well as 138 high end diamonds as a trim.

Unfortunately, even with the hefty price tag the improvements to this iPhone model are only superficial, as its features are exactly the same as the regular iPhones you’ll find in the three digit range.

While its certainly extravagant, and dazzling to say the least, I’m not sure I can see too many people rushing out to spend millions on such a device. Maybe I’m wrong though?

ExpressMusic 5800 Pulled From Store Shelves

After spending just a single weekend on the consumer market, Nokia’s new and highly touted ExpressMusic 5800 cellphone has had its plug pulled and been removed from store shelves. The reasoning for its hasty disappearance appears to be because of its failure to connect to the 3G network of wireless carrier AT&T. Many of the gadget’s very first customers reported that they were unable to use the phone’s 3G capabilities in central locations that clearly should have connectivity.

While the phone’s overseas release in Europe stumbled do to a widespread problem with the ExpressMusic 5800′s speaker, that same issue was not reported after the North American release, having seemingly been fixed.

What did Nokia have to say about this? Well, they haven’t made an official comment yet, however they are offering a European model of the phone is some stores as an alternative.

Chinese Lunar Probe Makes a Landing

China’s first lunar probe has landed on the the surface of the moon in a controlled a hard impact on Sunday, signifying the initial phase of the nation’s 3-stage moon program, according to the state-run Xinhua news agency reported. The 2nd stage entails launching another probe to practice soft landings, the Xinhua news agency said. The mission will reach its pinnacle with the sending and landing of a rover on the moon to accumulate mineral samples during the year 2012. The probe is is named Chang’e-1 after a fabled moon goddess. It was launched into space sixteen months ago on October 24, 2007. China became only the 3rd country, following the United States and Russia, to send a manned spacecraft into orbit. It has achieved this milestone in October 2003.