Record companies to search for ringtone revenues

A recent report from Strategy Analytics identifies the introduction of real music ringtones as the catalyst for music companies such as BMG, Sony Music, EMI, Warner Chappell and Universal to become more actively involved in the ringtone value chain. 'Over the next five years, as demand evolves from monophonic reproductions of musical tunes to sample music based on copyrighted master recordings, the ringtone market is set for consolidation,' said Strategy Analytics senior analyst Nitesh Patel. 'Major record companies will move to strengthen their position by acquiring ringtone production companies, or setting up their own, in-house production studios, while continuing to act as licensors. ...more

UPDATED: iPod mini release put back to July

Apple has announced that the iPod mini will not be available outside the US until July, following higher-than-expected demand. Demand in the US for the portable music player exceeds the total planned supply from now through to the end of June. 'The iPod mini is a huge hit with customers in the US and we're sure it will be the same worldwide once we can ramp up our supply in the July quarter,' explained Tim Cook, Apple's executive vice president of Worldwide Sales and Operations. ...more

ARM embeds new instruction set for 2.6 Linux kernel

UK chip designer ARM has announced open source support for the 2.6 Linux production kernel. The ARMv6 Instruction Set Architecture uses new enhancements to the kernel that add features such as physical cache, application space identifiers (ASIDS) and the use of atomic operations. ...more

Be on track for nationwide ADSL2+

High-speed broadband provide Be has secured a ?24.5mn investment that will enable it to begin a nationwide installation of ADSL2+ services of up to 22Mbps. So far, the ISP has enabled or begun enabling 52 exchanges in London and will soon begin moving its kit into Birmingham and Manchester. ...more

AOL to dump a quarter of staff

AOL may shed 5,000 staff as it explores cost efficiencies while trying to keep up with the ever-increasing number of free consimer Internet services. The figure represents around a quarter of the company's 19,000 staff. Across Europe, as many as 3,000 of the 3,500 positions will be transferred with its ISP division as the company moves out the ISP market. ...more