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New Sony Management Says To Narrow Focus


Weaves

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Hello,

Here is another article about more forthcoming changes from Sony. I think I will hold off on buying my imported MZ-RH10.

Weaves

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Source: CNNMoney.

Sony eyes a new approach

Inventor of the Walkman may trim its product lineup or downsize businesses to remain competitive.

June 22, 2005: 7:17 AM EDT

TOKYO (Reuters) - Sony Corp. will unveil a new strategy in late September to reallocate resources, the company's new CEO said Wednesday, suggesting it would look to trim its product lineup or downsize struggling businesses.

Howard Stringer, whom shareholders approved as Sony's new chief executive earlier Wednesday, said management would conduct a survey of its sprawling operations during the next few months and come up with a plan that maximizes profitability.

Welsh-born Stringer and Ryoji Chubachi, the company's new president, are faced with the formidable challenge of reviving Sony's core electronics division, which has been in the red for the past two business years amid intense price competition.

"We cannot fight battles on every front," Stringer said after Sony's annual shareholders' meeting. "We have to make choices, and that is why this summer we will get together and decide what the company's priorities ought to be."

The electronics and entertainment conglomerate is in the last year of a three-year restructuring plan that aims to slash ¥330 billion ($3 billion) in fixed costs, mainly by cutting thousands of jobs in its electronics division.

But many industry analysts have said Sony will need to take more drastic measures to remain competitive with strong domestic rivals such as Sharp Corp. and a growing number of low-cost Asian manufacturers producing cheap electronics.

Lehman Brothers analyst Yuki Sugi said Sony's stock, which has lost about 5 percent and underperformed the broader market since March 7 when it named Stringer as CEO, will likely remain weak as investors wait for the new plan.

"While maintaining our longer-term positive view of the company, we think there will be a dearth of stock price catalysts at least until the end of September," Sugi wrote in a note.

The potential for weak earnings in the current quarter to end-June could also weigh on the stock, Sugi said. Sony will announce its quarterly results late next month.

One area in need of repair is Sony's television unit, which lost ¥25.7 billion on an operating basis in the past business year on weak sales of traditional cathode ray tube sets and sinking prices of liquid crystal display models.

The inventor of the Walkman is also trying to regain its footing in the portable music player market, where it has been outmaneuvered by Apple Computer Inc. (Research) and its popular iPod device and iTunes online music store.

Stringer acknowledged that it would be more difficult to implement bold restructuring in Japan compared with the United States, where he oversaw a streamlining plan called "Project USA" that produced significant cost savings by cutting thousands of jobs.

"I know I cannot use an axe in Japan, but we need to change. The world has changed and we have more competitors than ever," he said.

Sony shareholders overwhelmingly approved Stringer, Chubachi and other board members by a vote of 5,653,690 to 114,527.

Stringer and Chubachi will replace Nobuyuki Idei and Kunitake Ando.

Sony (Research) shares closed up 0.52 percent at ¥3,890, in line with a 0.51 percent gain in the Nikkei average.

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As a follow up to Sony's new strategy due this September, please read the following:

Source: Reuters

New Sony Management Says to Narrow Focus of R&D

Fri Jun 24, 2005 01:04 AM ET

By Nathan Layne

TOKYO (Reuters) - Sony Corp. (6758.T: Quote, Profile, Research) will narrow the focus of its research and development to only promising areas such as next-generation video equipment, mobile phones and flat panel TVs, the company's new president said on Thursday.

Offering a glimpse of where new management is looking to lead the struggling electronics maker, Ryoji Chubachi also said Sony would continue restructuring its sprawling operations while cultivating new businesses to drive earnings growth.

"While we have not made this public, internally we have been looking at several areas within our R&D from which we could potentially withdraw," Chubachi told a news conference, flanked on his right by Howard Stringer, the newly appointed CEO.

"I can't give details right now on what those areas will be, but I will (in the future) make it clear exactly what we will and will not do," he added, referring to its R&D spending, which is expected to total 520 billion yen ($4.8 billion) this business year.

Chubachi and Stringer were overwhelmingly approved by shareholders on Wednesday, replacing Nobuyuki Idei and Kunitake Ando, who resigned from top management to take responsibility for the company's slumping earnings.

The new management team had told shareholders on Wednesday they would unveil a new strategy in late September to reallocate resources, suggesting they would look to narrow its product line-up or withdraw from struggling businesses.

They did not unveil specifics of that strategy, which has been internally dubbed "Project Nippon."

Welsh-born Stringer said he would use his skills as a communicator to help break down the "silo walls" that have been erected between different divisions of Sony, hampering collaboration and leading to missed opportunities in the market.

"We have to become one highly focused organization," Stringer said. "We have to talk to each other and we will re-evaluate R&D, rationalise product development, ensuring that the line-up is coherent and focused strategically."

Smiling often, Stringer tried to impress to the media that his first priority would not be to cut more jobs. He acknowledged on Wednesday that it would be difficult to "use an axe" in Japan.

"Cost cutting and axes are not solutions to all problems," Stringer said.

Some newspapers have been referring to him as a "cost-cutter" while comparing him to Carlos Ghosn, another rare foreigner at the top of a Japanese company who saved Nissan Motor Co. (7201.T: Quote, Profile, Research) from near bankruptcy by squeezing suppliers and cutting staff.

In his former post as head of Sony's U.S. operations, Stringer oversaw "Project USA," which eliminated 9,000 jobs and achieved annual cost savings of $700 million.

Under the current restructuring plan called "Transformation 60," Sony has already slashed about 20,000 jobs, most of those in its loss-making electronics division. TR 60 is a three-year plan that runs through March 2006.

"We are extending Transformation 60. It was incomplete. It was a very good start but we are examining different priorities for improving the performance of Sony," Stringer said.

Shares of Sony closed down 0.26 percent at 3,880 yen, underperforming the Nikkei average , which gained 0.26 percent on the day.

($1=108.78 yen)

Edited by Ishiyoshi
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At least we'll know where we stand at the end of this year.

Mobile Phones are NOT the future - the market has matured so there's not really much more NEW growth in that arena. Boring, predicatable and not a huge amount to be made here anymore. Who wants to watch video on those tiny screens anyway and not all portable music needs to be managed through computers (With a Mobile phone sim card you'd need a card reader or whatever to get the music off / on to the Sim card --and what happens when it's full -- do you have to buy a New sim card ?? --Not the future of portable music.

VAIO's have excellent screens so there's life in that end of the market -- The Sony VAIO laptop is about the only serious player for Laptops that compete against the Apple "Powerbook" in the Imaging / Photography business (where Macs are still predominately the rule).

I've got enough equipment and blanks to keep using MD's for MANY MANY years even if Sony (which actually is quite unlikely to do) abandons MD's. Nothing else even comes close for portable recording and large capacity disc devices --if you get mugged or it gets broken imagine ripping a 60GB Music library again. --In fact getting a New device is a pain with these HD units -- You have to transfer all the stuff to a new unit.

With MD you just pop your disks into the new unit.

I can't really see Studios going back to using cumbersome DAT again for recordings.

What they really need to do is sort out the DRM crud and open up the MD hardware to it's FULL potential -- that will make them SERIOUS big bucks.

Cheers

-K

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If they were going to finish with Hi-MD they would have killed it off before 2nd generation.

I'm going to remain optomistic, it says a possible cut in portables, not Hi-Fi or decks. tongue.gif

They could scrap their line of cassette tape walkman without anoying too many people. biggrin.giflaugh.gif

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I can't really see Studios going back to using cumbersome DAT again for recordings.

What they really need to do is sort out the DRM crud and open up the MD hardware to it's FULL potential -- that will make them SERIOUS big  bucks.

perhaps it sounds silly and very naive, but couldn't we - MDCF members and mods (yeah, and also the administrator tongue.gif ) - send a joint and signed statement to sony (by email) which exactly states:

- our hopes for the survival of the Hi-MD format

- a couple of realistic remarks about (rich niche) markets for the format (and perhaps some marketing strategies)

- a couple of (realistic!?) requests/suggestions for the future and then I don't mean "bring back full backwards compatibility"-stuff (think realisticly, it's not going to happen and we undermine our statement by demanding such a thing)

but rather: "line out", "better software" (even though it's already improving slowly), "flac support if possible" (although that isn't really realistic perhaps), "different, easier going or even no DRM for ppl's own analogue recordings" (well realism didn't last long tongue.gif ) or even "a Sony Hi-MD deck (one good model would suffice) and a car deck (again one type would be enough)"-stuff

I don't really have the time right now (masters thesis) and besides I don't really pretend to be a good choice to write such a thing (I think there are a number of guys'n'galls here that would do a better job than me) but I would immediately support such an effort if someone feels up to it...

Volta

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They could scrap their line of cassette tape walkman without anoying too many people.  biggrin.gif

Cassette tape is still the leading media in developing nations, from what I understand. It is cheap, durable, and arguably outlasts formats like CD-R [and any other dye-based optical WORM format].

Tape will never die. 1/4" open-reel is still the prevalent standard for archival usage. The reason? It's simple, it's mechanica, and it's analogue. You know that any company with tech knowhow will be able to design a machine that plays standard tapes any time in the future; the mechanics, playback mechanism and electronics required can be made using relatively simple techniques and the simplest solid state or even vacuum-tube technology. There are no competing data formats to worry about [only equalisation standards which are well established and documented], no competing encoding formats are a requirement [though noise reduction and/or compansion are options which are also doable with simple analogue circuits], &c.

Even LPs if taken care of have the potential to outlive almost all currently-existing storage media. Their simple mechanical nature ensures thus.

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Let's look at this as good news. MD is good, Sony will realise and concentrate more on it.

I can wait til the end of the year to find out. I'm doing something very important at the moment (let's say, of national security) and won't have much time to care about it until then. Although I'm sure that I'll still find time to log on here regularly, wherever I am!

ph34r.gif

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I can't really see Studios going back to using cumbersome DAT again for recordings.

What they really need to do is sort out the DRM crud and open up the MD hardware to it's FULL potential -- that will make them SERIOUS big  bucks.

Cheers

You don't need to convince me, but some Sony execs... They're most likely dumping MD in september.

"We cannot fight battles on every front,"

and

The inventor of the Walkman is also trying to regain its footing in the portable music player market, where it has been outmaneuvered by Apple Computer Inc. (Research) and its popular iPod device and iTunes online music store.
Edited by Breepee2
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Cassette tape is still the leading media in developing nations, from what I understand.  It is cheap, durable, and arguably outlasts formats like CD-R [and any other dye-based optical WORM format].

Tape will never die.  1/4" open-reel is still the prevalent standard for archival usage.

That's what people are saying about FILM --but apart from Niche markets such as B&W, or Medium Format (4 X 5 Hasselblad etc.) digital rules the roost (even in Hollywood).

As a Pro photographer I can genuinely say that around 99% of my colleagues never even THINK of using film anymore.

For long term professional archiving these days Optical media (large Jukebox type systems) are being used -- particularly DVD-RAM in casettes --has very long term longevity and doesn't suffer problems tape has.

DVD-RAM is still available for consumer use (particularly in Cam corders and DVD recorders although being a bit more expensive doesn't have quite such a following as the DVD+ and DVD- formats --but it does have a great advantage in that you can watch any part of the disk while SIMULTANEOUSLY recording on another part.

Wind up radios are used a lot in developing nations --but this is not where the main markets are.

Tape currently is the only feasable medium for backing up large volumes of data --but for permanent archive these are dumped as soon as possible to DVD-RAM or other optical media.

As for Online music stores most people I know who've tried these and got over the novelty only need one piece of DRM hassle and they all say NEVER AGAIN.

A lot of people also find "Crap-Pods" don't yield the quality or flexibility ond once the "kewl" factor has gone they will look for something a bit better.

I think MD will actually survive -- just think what would Sony sell for it's portable players if it did pull out.

There's a market out there willing to spend serious money om decent products -- the old way of 100,000 consumers for 6 markets is being overtaken by 100,000 markets for 6 consumers now --and that's what the Internet etc does.

I recommend people to have a read of this

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/4118770.stm

particuarly the section Millions of Markets

Sony is not going to survive as a company just by making CCD and CMOS chips for digital cameras.

Cheers

-K

Edited by 1kyle
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your glass is always half empty breepee.

I'd call it realism, but like I said, we'll know for sure (for the time being) later this year.

Or just "wider support for audio codecs used by computer users".

That would be a cool feature, but (surprise surprise tongue.gif) I'll be _very_ happy with FLAC-support smile.gif

Edited by Breepee2
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That's what people are saying about FILM --but apart from Niche markets such as B&W, or Medium Format (4 X 5 Hasselblad etc.)  digital rules the roost (even in Hollywood).

While the majority of photogs I know now use digicams, I would dispute that the film industry is lead by digital at this point.

There are many practical disadvantages to shooting in most of the available HD formats; the top one I've heard from people in the film industry being the fact that there's zero overscan while shooting. This was pointed out to me last autumn while I was on the set as a sound observer with Leon Johnson and during the filming of Tamara [a horror movie] - they were shooting in flat 35mm [i.e. non-anamorphic] and the Leon pointed out to me on our monitor that they still shot the full 35mm motion frame despite the actual framed shot being only a portion of it.

Even though the aspect of the preview was "safetied" at 16:9, the full frame was viewable on everyone's monitor - meaning for instance that if the mic was about to sink into the shot, the recordist could alert the boom op to the fact over their com system and avoid wasting the entire shot [and the actors' performance, and everyone's time and money]; with HD it would simply waste the shot, as you wouldn't see the mic until it was already in frame. The same would happen for people wandering into the sides, objects rolling or blowing in, &c. Most of the people I've spoken to dislike shooting video of any form for these among other reasons.

The camera op and cinematographer emphasised to me that film is still used because of its contrast ratio ["gentler" than video in any form with less exposure latitude], the fact that the chemical process has been refined so far that limited lighting can still give good footage, the fact that the resolution of the film still exceeds almost all HD formats, and the fact that it's [currently] far cheaper in most places to shoot 35mm and digitise it for post than shooting in HD in the first place. This is not to mention the fact that the equipment itself for film costs only a fraction what HD equipment does. That will change as HD formats become more widespread, though.

As a Pro photographer I can genuinely say that around 99% of my colleagues never even THINK of using film anymore.

For most still photography [i have been a photographer for about 13 years] I would agree, but I'll repeat what I said in another thread here yesterday - let's see you do 10 minute exposures with CMOS or CCD cameras. I've found that, by and large, attempting to do night photography [what was my passion for a long time] with digicams, even $10k ones, gives pretty shoddy results compared to film. Admittedly, this is a very specialised use, relegating colour transparency or neg to the same class as b/w has been in for years already.

For long term professional archiving these days Optical media (large Jukebox type systems) are being used -- particularly DVD-RAM in casettes --has very long term longevity and doesn't suffer problems tape has.

I use cartridge DVD-RAM for my backups. Note that what I said in the previous post was re: dye-based WORM formats, which DVD-RAM is not one of [it's a phase-change medium, like CD-RW].

DVD-RAM is still available for consumer use (particularly in Cam corders and DVD recorders although being a bit more expensive doesn't have quite such a following as the DVD+ and DVD- formats --but it does have a great advantage in that you can watch any part of the disk while SIMULTANEOUSLY recording on another part.

Interesting that you point this out - as no computer DVD-RAM drives that I'm aware of or have used were capable of it [including mine]. [DVD-RAM video recorders are known for their timeshifting capabilities, however.]

DVD-RAM [backing you, here], incidentally, has notably more longevity than CD-R and RW or DVD-/+R and RW.

Wind up radios are used a lot in developing nations --but this is not where the main markets are.

Certainly not, but that's not to say there's no demand for wind-up radios. This is kind of a specious comparison to what I ended up saying about tape, anyway. Tape is simple and the playback method is direct, well-standardised and documented, and relatively easily reproduced with manufacturing techniques that are 60 years old. Let's see someone dig up a DVD-RAM drive in 100 years. It's not likely to happen, is it.

A more direct analogy would have been digital broadcast vs. analogue FM or AM radio. Analogue radio uses relatively simple circuits for modulation and demodulation of simple signals; digital requires knowledge of the data format and the presence of its codecs as well as high-precision analogue circuitry. DAB as it stands now is only beginning to penetrate markets outside of Europe, and is largely doing so using encoding formats that are already over 10 years old.

Tape currently is the only feasable medium for backing up large volumes of data --but for permanent archive these are dumped as soon as possible to DVD-RAM or other optical media.

You appear to have missed my point entirely. It's not that it's the only feasible medium, it's that the cost-effectiveness taking into account signal degredation over time, the ability to play back the medium, and the medium's longevity itself is very high.

It's true that DVD-RAM [to continue with that example] has a minimum expected lifetime of 30 years, whereas polymer-backed magnetic particle tape will suffer print-through and likely start shedding particles in the same period of time - but in 30 years, you will still be able to copy the tape again, even with its degredation.

Optical media will be completely different in 30 years, whereas you will still be able to take a 1/4" analogue tape and play it back; archival is about more than just the content, it's also about maintaining the equipment to retrieve it. Again, let's see you pull out a working DVD-RAM drive in 100 [or even 20, for that matter] years that will interface with any of the equipment existing at that time. It likely won't happen - the cost of manufacturing the drives to retrieve ancient information will be exorbitant at best.

My point was: an analogue tape machine is cheap, simple, and effective.

I think MD will actually survive -- just think what would Sony sell for it's portable players if it did pull out.

I believe that the future of portables lies in solid-state media and eventually nonmechanical optical [holographic] and beyond that organic/molecular storage. But then, that's what I think.

I think MD will stick around for a while in certain uses [it's heavily embedded in the broadcast industry, for instance, which is pretty much the only reason it survived in North America] but consumer use will give way primarily to solid state in the not so distant future.

HiMD itself takes 30 year-old recording technology [the 16-bit LPCM front and back ends] and applies it to an already compromised medium [HiMD could have been higher-density from the start if they'd invested more time and money in refining the manufacturing process needed for DWDD discs] whose capacity is, really, not all that much to shout about these days. It is, however, a great step up from MD [which really was state of the art in 1992] and in terms of portable recording gear that uses a physical medium [that isn't solid-state] has literally no competition from any other part of the industry.

MD itself is already dead in my eyes. Sony appear to have deprecated it, and the other leading manufacturers are offering next to nothing new in terms of equipment. Sharp for instance have stopped introducing new models [according to Sharp, at least], which is as much an omen for the format as Sony's lack of any new consumer models [they are still making gear intended for use by broadcasters and legal transcribers, from what I can tell]. Onkyo appears to be one of the only manufacturers still introducing new products for the format.

I don't see the media disappearing soon, but the equipment is basically at the end of its manufacturing lifetime, and makers are moving on [including pro makers, like HHB and Tascam]. The flirtation the home/portable multitrack makers [like Yamaha] had with MD died off long ago, as well, in favour of hard disc recorders [and even 8mm tape].

Sony is not going to survive as a company just by making CCD and CMOS chips for digital cameras.

No. There's a reason why Samsung is being touted as "the new Sony."

Sorry for the confrontational tone. I'm enjoying the debate, really, not just arguing to be an arse.

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You don't need to convince me, but some Sony execs... They're most likely dumping MD in september.

so anyone up 'to convince some Sony execs' (or at least let them know how we think)? or are we just going to see what happens and whine about the demise later?

Volta

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MD itself is already dead in my eyes.  Sony appear to have deprecated it, and the other leading manufacturers are offering next to nothing new in terms of equipment.  Sharp for instance have stopped introducing new models [according to Sharp, at least], which is as much an omen for the format as Sony's lack of any new consumer models [they are still making gear intended for use by broadcasters and legal transcribers, from what I can tell].  Onkyo appears to be one of the only manufacturers still introducing new products for the format. 

I don't see the media disappearing soon, but the equipment is basically at the end of its manufacturing lifetime, and makers are moving on [including pro makers, like HHB and Tascam].  The flirtation the home/portable multitrack makers [like Yamaha] had with MD died off long ago, as well, in favour of hard disc recorders [and even 8mm tape].

No.  There's a reason why Samsung is being touted as "the new Sony."

Sorry for the confrontational tone.  I'm enjoying the debate, really, not just arguing to be an arse.

Solid state may well be the future (certainly not fixed non removable mechanical HD players).

The media will have to be removable as per cameras and card readers --but currently 6GB seems to be the maximum size of a solid state card for current uses and at over 260 USD a pop will have to become a lot cheaper.

Non removable storage is not likely to displace removable media whether MD's CF cards or whatever as

1) it won't have enough capacity,

2) what do you do when you get a new device

3) if the device gets broken / stolen etc.

To those who argue that 6gb is enough -- I disagree --especially if the media is NON removable -- when it's full you have to keep deleting and copying music. I just want to be able to pop in a disk and away I go.

A removable solid state player will definitely be the way once the media becomes relatively cheap --but it's got a long way to go yet.

But :

From a purely physical thing also --tiny solid state media will be hard to label and identify which card you need. To put ALL the music on one card has the same disadvantages as with a HD device.

Sometimes miniturisation isn't the best solution -- not necessarily from a technical point but just from praticability / useability.

BTW as far as film is concerned the latest crop of high end Pro DSLR's (Canon 1D2, 1Ds2 etc) give a FAR better dynamic range than film can give you and less noise (aka grain) as well.

You with decent Noise reduction software can get some stunning astronomy shots with CMOS.

You might enjoy this website

http://www.schursastrophotography.com/auroramain.html

Cheers

-K

Edited by 1kyle
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so anyone up 'to convince some Sony execs' (or at least let them know how we think)? or are we just going to see what happens and whine about the demise later?

Volta

We could start a petition (altough nothing is sure yet), but I think it's next to impossible to change the new path the new direction wants to go (with the shareholders and all). Seems just a dead end, and I don't like it, and will probably cry and whine for some time. There's no alternative out there. DataPlay was the only remote possibility of competition and they're long gone.

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We could start a petition (altough nothing is sure yet), but I think it's next to impossible to change the new path the new direction wants to go (with the shareholders and all). Seems just a dead end, and I don't like it, and will probably cry and whine for some time. There's no alternative out there. DataPlay was the only remote possibility of competition and they're long gone.

Well here's ONE firm who haven't given up (Don't look at the price --this is PRO gear designed for Studio use) --OK Not Hi-MD but in a Studio not so necessary

http://www.tascam.de/en/index.html

Cheers

-K

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To those who argue that 6gb is enough -- I disagree --especially if the media is NON removable -- when it's full you have to keep deleting and copying music. I just want to be able to pop in a disk and away I go.

And I want to pop in one disc and make uncompressed or lossless 24/96 recordings that are a minimum of 5 hours long, or even quad or hex recordings.

From a purely physical thing also --tiny solid state media will be hard to label and identify which card you need. To put ALL the music on one card has the same disadvantages as with a HD device.

Heartily agreed. I have enough problems with MD labels, though I tend to think of the media itself as being the perfect size for handling.

BTW as far as film is concerned the latest crop of high end Pro DSLR's (Canon 1D2, 1Ds2 etc) give a FAR better dynamic range than film can give you and less noise (aka grain) as well.

You with decent Noise reduction software can get some stunning astronomy shots with CMOS.

I'm aware of this.

My point about contrast ratio/exposure latitude was regarding motion film specifically. Still digis have surpassed film already in the vast majority of applications, there's no question in my mind about that. In any case, even 35 year-old TV cameras have more dynamic range [contrast ratio and s/n] than film.

Long-exposure photography used to be my passion. Digital didn't kill that [living on less than $10k/year did], but it annoys me that basically no commonly available cameras have the signal processing to handle long exposures, even through image stacking. Doing so would also suck power at an unbelievable rate. My choice my long-exp photography is still a completely mechanical camera where you don't have to worry about the curtain's being open killing your battery. Unfortunately, when most of my equipment got stolen several years ago, I lost that option.

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From a purely physical thing also --tiny solid state media will be hard to label and identify which card you need. To put ALL the music on one card has the same disadvantages as with a HD device.

Sometimes miniturisation isn't the best solution -- not necessarily from a technical point but just from praticability / useability.

Agreed. I think CF is probably the smallest reasonable size for media. I really dislike SD cards -- fine for a phone, but not as removable storage.

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Mobile Phones are NOT the future - the market has matured so there's not really much more NEW growth in that arena. Boring, predicatable and not a huge amount to be made here anymore.

The above comment is very wrong.

Simple "silly" cell phone features like DOWNLOADABLE RING TONES

are a huge, huge, huge profit maker for cell phone vendors.

Simple "silly" cell phone features like Text Messaging

are also huge profit generators.

Simple "pay for picture download" camera phone features are also

huge profit generators.

And they are easy to add to the phone with little engineering effort.

I dont know what it will be called, but "personal communication device"

is the future, it may not be a cell phone, however it will have a similar form factor,

and combine many features, in convergence, just like the new HiMD-PHOTO

or cell phones with built-in MP3 players.

FYI new cell phones will have built-in WIFI, and that will allow for many new

internet apps (like voice over IP, conferencing, file transfer, client apps, etc).

Personally I wish there were a HiMD-PHOTO with cell phone, then I could wear the

same headphones and use them for multiple purposes. Oh it should also have PDA email/calendar features. And it should also have...

. himd_user

Edited by himd_user
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The above comment is very wrong.

Simple "silly" cell phone features like DOWNLOADABLE RING TONES

are a huge, huge, huge profit maker for cell phone vendors.

Simple "silly" cell phone features like Text Messaging

are also huge profit generators.

Simple "pay for picture download" camera phone features are also

huge profit generators.

And they are easy to add to the phone with little engineering effort.

I dont know what it will be called, but "personal communication device"

is the future, it may not be a cell phone, however it will have a similar form factor,

and combine many features, in convergence, just like the new HiMD-PHOTO

or cell phones with built-in MP3 players.

FYI new cell phones will have built-in WIFI, and that will allow for many new

internet apps (like voice over IP, conferencing, file transfer, client apps, etc).

Personally I wish there were a HiMD-PHOTO with cell phone, then I could wear the

same headphones and use them for multiple purposes.   Oh it should also have PDA email/calendar features.  And it should also have...

. himd_user

My remark was meant for the HARDWARE (Manufacturing).

There's all sorts of content that can be delivered --but it's usually a One-off --once the initial take up has been done (initial huge growth) it then flattens off to next to nothing.

As far as Camera phones are concerned -- the 3G operators aren't getting anything lke the volume they budgeted for and with more and more places banning these the public's infatuation with camera phones is likely to wane quite fast. And with the recent "Slapping" cases in the UK the public will become very wary of these --especially for younger children.

Who also needs email and Internet on a tiny hand held mobile --might sound OK but it's not a biggie and like all these devices --if you lose it the more complex it is and the more functions it has then replacing it becomes impossible

This also inhibits further growth once the market is saturated as the problems of upgrading become really severe --

By Upgrading I mean getting all your data and applications off the old device and into the new one -- and once you have Internet and other apps this is much more complex than just copying data -and if it's DRM'ed like a lot of music downloads will be then that's another whole hassle of moving stuff to another device.

In fact there's a (hopeful) sign at last that people don't want 24 Hour MOBILE offices --why should they be "tethered to a boss" 24 hours a day --almost a 21st century version of Slavery. I'm glad people are now realizing it that mobile phones actually have an OFF switch and THEY are in charge not the phone.

Actually a small phone that's JUST a phone suits a lot of people just fine.

And why For G--'S sake would I want or need things like File Transfer when I'm on the tube etc.

If I need a computer I'll use a Laptop with a DECENT size screen and a proper keyboard.

And after 17.00 on a Friday until 09.15 on a Monday I DON'T NEED A MOBILE OFFICE -- that's what Weekends are for. (Or if you work at other times you still need a "Notional Weekend").

I really have to pity people when I'm travelling from Brussels to London on the Eurostar late on a Friday Afternoon and see all these "Suited bozos" rabitting away on mobile phones about pointless business meetings and what they are going to to next Monday, while I'm listening to nice music on a HI-MD player through some great Sennheiser phones with a glass of champagne in my hand and contemplating a great weekend.

As for ring tones -- these are nothing to do with the operators -- just enterprising people who managed to use the existing capability within the current hardware. This again is CONTENT not the actual phones themselves.

Cheers

-K

Edited by 1kyle
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Sometimes miniturisation isn't the best solution -- not necessarily from a technical point but just from praticability / useability.

Oh honey, that was Sony's argument for the size of the original MemoryStick. Witness how many people bought that argument? rolleyes.gif

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if sony would take the time to look around and see that they can once again reign and push the ideas of portable audio that would be great, however they have been held back their segragation of divisions.

if only ...

InPhase 1.6TB Holographic Disk: I would pay upwards of $50 for a disc (only need one).

3rd Party SonicStage

BlueTooth: For Transfer and Earbuds and Streaming Audio (like one of those in home media centers NOT always on)

AM/FM Tuner

HDRadio (for european users)

Line In.Out (digital upload no DRM for musicians who need their music can at least get it to CD)

Optical In

Mic In

2gb Flash Internal Memory Buffering 0 possiblity of skiping (continuous play if changing a disc + have a "shuffle" like playlist possibly made on the fly(option))

Sonys Monstrous Menu of BitRates for Different Recordings

HiMD Size (the InPhase discs are not bigger than MDs now)

Scroll Panel: On side no wheel, keeps aesthetic clean. (Play.Menu/>>/<</[])

OLED Screen (no color necessary its music not TV)

10mW +- 10mW internal amp

30+ hr Battery Life

they would leave solid state media/HDD media players in the dust, and marketing if they focused their marketing and pushed what they researched they would recoup their money better than they are.

its just a list of what i want to see happen will it no, but if i got Howard Stringers email i wold be the first to let him know what the deal was.

magnetic HDDs are slow and small.

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