Hasta La Gadget!

This article was written on February 07, 2007 by CyberNet.

The RIAA is in the news again, but this time instead of a victim paying out money to the recording labels, the RIAA was forced to pay out 50,000 in legal fees. The victim, Debbie Foster was sued for copyright infringement, however the case was dismissed last Summer.As the Inquirer points out, this is a pretty significant case because previously, the RIAA has not been ordered to compensate people when they have been wrongfully sued.

Wired spoke with Foster’s attorney who is obviously happy with the outcome.  Her attorney also mentioned that she’ll likely get more than the $50,000 originally ordered.You can bet Capital Records isn’t too happy about the hefty amount they’ll be responsible for sending out shortly. Not a good day for the recording industry!

In other RIAA news…

I came across this article from WHAS11.com in which they point out a Key Stats/Facts page on the RIAA website which says that CDs really should cost more. The RIAA’s website says,

By all measures, when you consider how long people have the music and how often they can go back and get “re-entertained” CDs truly are an incredible value for the money.

Their claim is that between 1983 (when CDs were first introduced), and 1996, the price of a CD fell by more than 40%. During the same time, consumer prices went up around 60%. According to their calculations, in 1996, consumers should have been paying $33.86 instead of $12.75 for CDs.

I don’t know ANYBODY that would have been willing to pay over $30.00 for a CD. The RIAA goes on to talk about how the quality and the number of songs has increased, and so has the range of choices, and ease of use, yet the price hasn’t, so really people are getting a great value.

In the world of Technology, the price tends to go down, not up which makes this even more ridiculous. If the price of a computer went up since it was first introduced, there’d be very few people in this world that owned one. The same goes for the price of CDs.  And their argument over the ”re-entertainment” value? It’s pitiful.

You can read the entire “Cost of a CD” article from the RIAA here.

Source: Thanks Curtiss!

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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This article was written on May 31, 2006 by CyberNet.

Dell Home is currently offering the Dell 24″ LCD monitor for just $710 after discounts. Just go to the 2405FPW product page and add the item to your cart. You will notice that the monitor has automatically been discounted the 20% by Dell. Now go to eBay and purchase a $35 off coupon, it will cost you about $0.99 so it is a good deal. Finally, you can use your Dell Preferred Account (DPA) to get another 2% off. Here is what you need to do to get the DPA discount:

1. Select “Pay with one credit/debit card online” at checkout
2. Locate “Save 2% using Dell Preferred Account” offer, and click the link
3. If you have an account already, find “Already have a Dell Preferred Account?” box, and click the link if you don’t have one – sign up for it.
4. Checkout

If the 2% DPA discount isn’t important then you can pay however you would like. After you add on the $9.50 shipping cost the total should come to $710 (if you decide to use the 2% off from the DPA).

Deal Source: SlickDeals

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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This article was written on August 07, 2006 by CyberNet.

Let the contest begin! Here at CyberNet we’re pretty focused on writing about all of the latest tech news. We decided it was time to take a step away from the news for a minute and have a little fun. GotVoice and CyberNet News want to give you a free iPod nano! We’re waiting to hear about the craziest/weirdest voicemail that you’ve ever received. The entry that is deemed the craziest/weirdest will win a 2GB iPod Nano. One runner up will receive three free months of GotVoice Premium.

The contest starts NOW and will end Sunday August 20th at 11:59 pm central time. Winner will be announced no later than Sunday August 27th. By submitting an entry, you agree to the following rules:

1. Only ONE entry per person. (You will be disqualified if more than one is entered)
2. Open to residents of the United States who are 18 years of age or older.
3. All submissions become the property of CyberNet News and can be published.
4. All federal, state, and local laws and regulations apply. Void where prohibited or restricted by law.
5. One iPod nano will be given away as the Grand Prize. Three months of Got Voice Premium service will be given to the runner up.

A few additional details:

• Use the ‘Leave A Comment‘ feature to submit your entry.
• While we’re not setting a specific word limit, we don’t want to read a novel. Make it short, sweet, and to the point. If you don’t have a good story, be creative, we won’t know the difference
• Be sure to leave your email address in the email field when entering your comment. If you are a registered user, your email address should be in your profile, if not edit your profile to include it. This is how we will contact you if you are the winner.
• This contest is sponsored by GotVoice

We look forward to reading your entries and giving away an iPod nano!

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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This article was written on May 22, 2008 by CyberNet.

One of the big complaints many people have always had with cell-phone providers over the years is that they like to charge on both ends, meaning they charge you for outgoing and incoming calls. Now we know not all providers do this because some do offer free incoming calls, but a majority of the providers out there, at least the ones we know of, still do this. The practice of charging on both ends also transfered to SMS messages once that became an option which leaves people forced to pay for incoming SMS messages that they have absolutely no control over. For someone who doesn’t have an SMS plan and gets charged for each message received, this can get pretty frustrating. Is it fair for cell phone companies to be able to charge consumers for something that they have no control over?

People in Mississippi don’t think its fair and they’re doing something about it. In a class-action lawsuit naming AT&T, Sprint, Verizon, Alltel, US Cellular, Cellular South, and Virgin Mobile, they say that carriers are unfairly charging customers for received text messages when they don’t provide the option to turn text messaging off. As part of the lawsuit, they say that people should be ‘entitled to relief from the unauthorized charges, wrongful collection, and unjust enrichment.”

So do these people have a chance at winning this lawsuit? We think they just might. Carriers should either offer the option to turn off text messages (without disabling other data features) or charge customers only for the messages they send out. With incoming phone calls, at least the subscriber has the choice of whether or not to answer the phone call. With text messaging, there is no option…

Source: Engadget

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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This article was written on October 15, 2007 by CyberNet.

If you live in the United States, you’ve probably seen the “Energy Star” image on different appliances, electronics, office equipment, and more, but never really thought about what it was or why it’s important. We thought today would be a perfect time to talk about the Energy Star, and in particular, how it relates to your electronics.

So what is the Energy Star program? Well, it’s a program that was started by the U.S. government, more specifically, the United States Environmental Protection Agency, to promote energy efficient consumer products. Products like washers, dishwashers, refrigerators, computers, fax machines, printers, light bulbs and fixtures are all part of the program. It was originally started back in 1992 as a way to help reduce the amount of energy consumed as well as reduce greenhouse gas emissions. As of July 2007, new requirements were put in place just for computers.  According to Wikipedia, the requirements are more strict than before, and computers that were previously given the energy star approval had to re-qualify if they wanted to keep the star. The Energy Star is just as important at home as it is in businesses.

The results of this program are promising.  According to the official Energy Star website, “Americans, with the help of Energy Star, saved enough energy in 2006 alone to avoid greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to those from 25 million cars — all while saving $14 billion on their utility bills.” The $14 billion saved in 2006 is a $2 billion increase in savings from 2005 which shows that each year as more products become more energy efficient, consumers save more money.

The Energy Star and your Computer

So how does the Energy Star come into play with your computer? The new qualifications that were put in place in July of 2007 specifically for computers will now save consumers and businesses over $1.8 billion in energy over the next five years. Remember, that’s $1.8 billion saved with computers alone. That’s the good news. The bad news though is that for a computer to qualify for the star, they must meet certain energy requirements while they’re turned on, when they’re in standby, and when they’re in sleep mode. There are far fewer computer models that qualify for the Energy Star with the recent change in requirements which means finding a computer with the Energy Star will be tough until more manufacturers are able to improve their product lines.

An example of a qualifying computer is the Acer  4710 Notebook with a 2000 MHz Intel Processor, 2048 MB Memory, and a 160 GB Hard Drive, or the Dell Latitude D531 with a 2.3 GHz AMD Processor and 4GB of Memory. If you’d like to see which computers qualify, the Energy Star website has a great tool that allows you to look up computers by brand which you can find here.

By choosing electronics with the Energy Star rating, not only will you save yourself some money on your electric bill, but you’ll also help the environment and prevent global warming. It’s a win-win situation all around!

This article was written in part for Blog Action Day.

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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