As any real gadget fanatic knows - you’ve got to do your research. To many features, too many brands. How the hell do you know what to buy? Personally I research the hell of everything. Here’s a new site worth hitting the next time you go to buy. TestFreaks.com. They’ve got a ton product categories with scored product reviews, plus user feedback and forums. Pretty awesome for finding out if that new Wii game sucks before you own it.

Design student Joonas Saaranen has created a backpack that is actually a speaker system. The hardshell pack contains both speakers and an amplifier for on the road use. (And I’m assuming a metric ton of batteries as well?). Pretty cool concept though I’m not sure I’d walk my streets rocking one. But bonus points for designing it to look like it came right off the back of a Stormtrooper. Just wonder, is there storage built in for an iPod? Or a six pack?

DirecTV’s satellites will automatically transmit a limited number of popular movie titles to customers’ digital video recorders, where they will be stored for viewers to order whenever they want. Viewers will be able to order other titles, including TV programs, by streaming them from the Web through a high-speed Internet connection on the DirecTV set-top box. DirecTV says that about half of its customers currently have high-speed Internet connections.

DirecTV has been late to the VOD game, as cable and rival satellite provider Dish already have a video on-demand service up and running since last fall. One aspect to the story that is intriguing is the mention of how DirecTV plans to use the data it gets from subscribers to sell ads.

More than just offering video on demand, this arrangement will let DirecTV tap what some analysts think could be a big growth area for TV providers — selling highly targeted ads.

With a set-top box connected to the Web, DirecTV will be able to track what programs people order through real-time data about a user’s television viewing behavior and allow the company to target ads. Cable operators already have similar plans, using the interactive capability of their set-top boxes.

With the launch of Hulu, and the recent update to Apple TV, 2008 is shaping up to be all about getting content to viewers in as many ways as possible.

[via WSJ]

For a company that continually loses money and is hated by advertisers, why are they the best game in town? For one, they were first to create the “time shifting” concept for digital recorders. Yes, there were others to do this (Replay TV) but TiVo, made it easy to use and locked up their software with a bunch of patents.

That’s not, of course, an earth-shattering idea; VCRs have been doing this for decades. Tivo’s edge is simple but critical: it’s easy to use. As a result, the company is now on the very short list of corporate brand names - like Google, Xerox, FedEx, and Photoshop - that are widely used as verbs.

If you don’t believe patents are worth much, ask Dish Networks. They tried to circumvent TiVo’s patents and lost and will now have to pay to TiVo to keep there DVRs working. DirecTV has paid TiVo for years, first to license the software and then of late to “maintain” those boxes while they put out their own branded DVR.

Rather than risk infringing on Tivo’s strong patents, cable companies will have little choice but to forge agreements with Tivo in order to provide their customers with DVR capabilities.

Says Westerfield: “Pay-TV operators who have not yet properly licensed the right to provide DRV services in the vein set forth by Tivo’s patents might well be at risk of patent infringement claims. Therefore, in due time, we think that nearly all pay-TV operators will review their risks and opt to legitimize their DVR offerings.”

Comcast and Cox have already said they will provide customers with set top boxes using TiVo’s technology, and others seem likely to follow.

TiVo has made up with advertisers and won the battles in court. Maybe now, they will finally get to reap the reward others have made at their expense.

[via Fortune]