Hasta La Gadget!

Intel Media’s Vice President of Engineering, Jim Baldwin, recently left his position at Intel Media, just months before the company is set to debut its Web TV service. An Intel Media spokesperson told GigaOM that “Baldwin left Intel Media to pursue opportunities outside the company.”, however GigaOM discovered through Baldwin’s Linkedin page that he has retired. Losing a key player shortly before its product is set to launch is sure to be unsettling for Intel Media.

Intel Media said to GigaOM that Baldwin will be missed, “but we have a very strong engineering organization in place with a deep leadership bench,” that will make up for Baldwin’s absence. Baldwin played a crucial work for Intel Media’s TV project. He was previously a key player in the Microsoft Mediaroom project, where he stayed for 8 years. He worked on several other TV projects including WebTV Plus, Echostar Dishplayer, DirecTV, and Ultimate TV.

Baldwin was instrumental to making Intel’s dream of launching its new Web TV service a reality. Intel Media’s Web TV service will be a subscription service that will allow viewers to watch live TV, video on-demand, and also watch TV shows/movies that the viewer may have missed. Intel Media plans on launching the Web TV service in the U.S. by the end of the year.

Intel Media says that its Web TV service will be a game changer, but it has received some criticism from all around, mainly due to the camera installed on Intel Media’s set-top box. The camera will be used to monitor whether a user is in the room, if the user is paying attention to the TV content, and the age and gender of the user. It will use the data it gathered to play targeted advertisements for the users, as well as offering suggestions on TV shows/movies the viewer(s) may enjoy. Consumers and critics feel that the camera is an invasion of privacy, however, Erik Huggers, Intel Media’s CEO, defends the camera by comparing it to the Kinect devices millions of homes have, which people have no problem using.

[via GigaOM]

Intel Media VP of Engineering retires shortly before product launch is written by Brian Sin & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

We heard back in December that Amazon would be releasing a slew of pilot episodes for the company’s original series initiative in order to compete with Netflix. It turns out that there are 14 pilot episodes in total, and all of them are available now for streaming for free. Amazon will be accepting viewer feedback to narrow the pack down to just a handful of shows.

We’ve already heard about a couple of them in the past, one being a Zombieland original series, as well as a geek-oriented comedy called Betas. Both pilots of these shows are available now, as well as 12 other shows split between the comedy genre and children’s variety. The six children’s shows include Annebots, Creative Galaxy, Positively Ozitively, Sara Solves It, Teeny Tiny Dogs, and Tumbleaf.

As for the remaining comedies not already mentioned, there’s Alpha House, Browsers, Dark Minions, Onion News Empire, Supanatural, and Those Who Can’t. You can watch all 14 episodes right now, but you’ll need an Amazon Prime account if you don’t have one already. You’ll get free two-day shipping, as well as access to Amazon Instant Video.

As for how many shows Amazon wants to begin producing, it seems that the company’s goal is to get half of the 14 shows currently available ordered up for a full season of about 13 episodes each. However, there’s no set number that Amazon has decided on, and it could turn out that even less than seven shows end up getting picked, so be sure to submit your feedback if you want to see the episodes you like continue on.

Amazon releases all 14 original series pilots for free is written by Craig Lloyd & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Forget music halls — Twitter thinks morning TV talk shows are where it’s at for product announcements. It used The Today Show last year to unveil a profile page redesign, and we now know it will rely on Good Morning America this Thursday to unveil something… “big.” But what does that cryptic clue mean? While logic would suggest Twitter Music given its semi-official status, we could also see TV in expanded tweets or something entirely unexpected. We’ll keep our eyes (and possibly ears) open.

Filed under: Internet

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Source: Good Morning America (Twitter)

When Seiki’s 4K TV set popped up on retail listings with a price that’s just a fraction of what we’ve seen from its more expensive rivals, we were almost convinced it was a site glitch — that couldn’t be real, could it? The company would like to reassure us that it’s quite serious. The 50-inch Ultra HD set is officially shipping to the US later in April, and it will still carry that regular $1,500 price tag when sales expand from TigerDirect (which claims to have stock today) to include Amazon and QVC, among others. We’d remain cautious about leaping in when Seiki is trying to skip a year or three of the usual commoditization process, but those who insist on their 4K bragging rights won’t have long to wait before they can start boasting.

Filed under: Home Entertainment, HD, Amazon

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Source: Seiki, TigerDirect

A certain demographic of home theater connoisseurs has fretted for a few weeks over talk that Panasonic might end plasma TV production and research — would viewers have to resort to anything so vulgar as… an LCD? No, Panasonic says. Despite earlier claims of frozen development, the company’s merchandising VP Henry Hauser is emphatic that there remains “room for further improvement” in the plasma realm, and that Panasonic fully intends to develop upgrades. The Viera ZT series we saw at CES will be a launchpad for future work, according to the executive. Hauser’s full statement awaits after the break if there are any lingering doubts; for now, it appears that Panasonic values plasma’s distinct qualities as much as the next basement movie maven.

Filed under: Home Entertainment, HD

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Source: Panasonic