No copy-protection on Sony’s PS3 DVR, PlayTV

First, to everyone’s surprise, Sony introduces DivX support to the PlayStation 3, and now we learn that PlayTV, the company’s yet-to-be-released digital TV tuner and recorder, won’t be employing copy-protection. As a result, television programs can be transfered off of the PS3 onto any device that supports MPEG2, including a PC where they could be re-encoded and shared on the Internet.

In a recent blog post, the Electronic Frontier Foundation’s Seth Schoen lays out a number of criticisms of Adobe’s push to introduce Digital Rights Management (DRM) technology into its Flash Video and accompanying Flash Media Server products.

If DRM was to become commonplace for Flash Video (the dominant format for streaming video on the Web e.g. YouTube) then it would stifle competition and dramatically hinder the burgeoning “remix” culture that the Internet has spawned, argues Schoen.

A version of the BBC’s UK-only TV catch-up service, iPlayer, will be available to iPod Touch and iPhone users within “the next few weeks”, reports The Register.

Optimized for streaming over Wi-Fi rather than O2’s slower EDGE network, the new version of iPlayer will employ the iPod-friendly H.264 video codec, according to the report. While this would limit iPlayer use on the go, the BBC has a partnership with UK-wide hotspot provider The Cloud to deliver free Wi-Fi access to the BBC’s website.

It’s official: Toshiba, the leading partner in the HD DVD camp, has waved the white flag. The next generation DVD format war is over. Blu-ray wins.

The move to stop production of HD DVD players and recorders was an “agonising decision”, according to Toshiba president Atsutoshi Nishida, but one that the company had to take after “judging that there is no way of winning the competition.”