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The San Jose, California, police department has been under fire recently for several incidents involving the use of excessive force by officers on unarmed individuals. Perhaps the best-known incident in recent months was the beating and tasering of an unarmed student caught on video in September.

An exhaustive report published by the San Jose Mercury News on Sunday examined resisting-arrest cases over a one year period ending in October 2008, and found some disturbing patterns. Resisting arrest charges are notoriously used by police to cover up excessive, unnecessary force. The Mercury News investigation found 321 resisting arrest cases during the one-year study period, and discovered ten officers who reported using force in four or more incidents. This report lends some validity to a “bad apples” theory, that a few officers are responsible for most instances of excessive force.

The San Jose Police Department has been reeling from these accusations in recent months, but officials are taking action. Following on the heels of in-car cameras, which have provided critical evidence in cases across the country, San Jose is now experimenting with cameras worn by officers on their heads. It’s the first major department in the country to try wearable cameras.

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Filed under: CES, Technology, Ford

Here’s another first for Ford after the revelation of its motion-capturing software: The Blue Oval will be the first to offer iTunes tagging through iPods on SYNC-equipped vehicles. Right behind the announcement of mobile Internet connectivity being added to SYNC, this will go along with the package of mobile apps the carmaker will reveal at CES next month.

The way it works: if you you have SYNC with HD radio, when you hear a song you like on an HD station you can press the ‘Tag’ button, and the system will note the track. When you plug your iPod in, it will suck up all of those tracks in a ‘Tagged’ playlist. You can have another listen through them and then buy the ones you want from iTunes.

There are other makes of vehicles that will let you record songs directly onto the car’s hard drive for a fixed amount of time, but you can’t really do anything with the recording after that. Ford’s setup won’t get you that immediate satisfaction, but it will save you a few steps. You can read the press release on the new – and free – feature (provided you’ve paid for SYNC and the HD-equipped head unit) after the jump.

[Source: Ford]

Continue reading SYNC to offer iTunes tagging through HD radio

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Which is the most popular web site in the US? Normally, if you’d answer Google, you’d be right. On Christmas day though, it looks like Facebook managed to pull off the seemingly impossible, dethroning Google as the most visited online destination. At least that’s what analytics firm Hitwise is saying, interestingly enough, on Twitter.

“Facebook was the most visited site in the US on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. 1st time the site has been the #1 visited US site ever,” Hitwise wrote in a tweet. Of course, this was just for two days and Google isn’t in any immediate danger of being overtaken by the social network.

The most recent numbers show that Facebook is the fourth largest site in the US having just passed AOL last month. Google, Yahoo and Microsoft sites still manage to get well over 100 million unique visitors every month in the US and Facebook still has some work cut out before challenging these top players.

If it manages to keep up the growth it has been seeing, especially in the past year, the time when Facebook is the number one site in the US may come soon enough, perhaps even next year. And with no sign of slowing down, it may very well reach this goal.

In fact, when it comes to individual sites, which is what Hitwise is measuring, Facebook is the third larg… (read more)

Latest data from Career Builder shows that the number of employers planning to reduce headcount has nearly halved to 9% from 16%.

Meanwhile, about 20% of employers now expect to add workers, as opposed to 14% previously.

Reuters: “There’s definitely an uptick. The number of employers who say they’re going to add full-time workers is up from last year, and that is very good news,” said Michael Erwin, senior career advisor at CareerBuilder.

Yet 61 percent of employers said they do not plan to change staffing levels, showing a degree of caution, he said.

Still, the outlook is a mixed bag for those lucky enough to still have jobs. Top-performers (or those in with the boss) should do well.

Reuters: Fifty-seven percent of employers expect to see higher salaries for existing employees in 2010, down from 65 percent in 2009. Also, 29 percent plan to increase salaries in offers to new employees, down from 33 percent in 2009.

Yet underperformers (or those who missed a few too many golf outings) could be replaced.

Reuters: As to bonuses, medical coverage and matching 401k contributions, the survey found 37 percent of employers plan to cut benefits in 2010, up from 32 percent who trimmed in 2009.

Many employers — 37 percent — said they plan to take advantage of the large labor pool and replace low-performing employees in 2010.

Thus there’s a rub: while some firms might keep headcounts stable, they might still fire and hire in order to tweak their work force. They certainly have the luxury to do so; supply vs. demand favors employers right now. At least they’re increasingly planning to hire.

Read the full article at Reuters here.

Join the conversation about this story »

See Also:

• Half Of State Unemployment Programs Are Broke
• Business Hiring Plans Are Still Very Weak
• Nobody Is Hiring Because Americans Are Too Productive

There have been many battle gameplay vids for Final Fantasy XIII, but there aren’t a lot that show you what it’d be like if you’ve actually got the game. Since those in Japan already do, we can

La integración entre televisión, cine e internet no sólo se va a saldar con nuevas formas de consumo (bajo demanda, ver la tele y navegar a la vez) y de distribución (por internet frente a la TDT) sino también está comenzando a trastocar el poder de los intermediarios actuales como ya sucedió con la música. Si empezamos a ver a los canales actuales como lo que son – agregadores de contenidos de otros, con un pequeño porcentaje de producción propio, a los que el estado concede un mercado acotado – podemos entender que en el entorno de la TDT se encuentren muy cómodos, pero que el escenario del vídeo por internet les aterre: tanto por la aparición de nuevos intermediarios mejores conocedores del medio como por la comercialización directa de los productores de contenidos que no los acaben necesitando para la distribución.

Su tabla de salvación estaría – cómo no – en cambios legislativos que extendieran el status quo al vídeo en la red, salvaguardando la escasez ficticia de las licencias de TDT. Si esto no sucede o la intervención del estado no es lo suficientemente protectora – crucemos los dedos por que así sea – el paulatino acercamiento a la “tele del salón” de nuevos actores hace que el aspecto del futuro del negocio de la televisión no se parezca demasiado a lo que hemos venido viviendo en nuestro país. Los nuevos intermediarios en la televisión y el cine por internet pivotan sobre los tres elementos clave para hacer negocio en este ámbito: experiencia de usuario, cambios en la distribución y control sobre el canal. Según conjuguen estas variables, serán capaces de hacerse con un espacio en el salón de casa y articular un negocio a partir de él. Veamos

Control sobre el canal

Cuando hablamos de nuevos intermediarios nos referimos tanto a los que ofrecen un dispositivo para conectar a la tele del salón, como a los que son un servicio de distribución de contenidos online. En el primer caso, tenemos quienes apuestan por un control más fuerte de qué puede hacer el usuario como las consolas de videojuegos, a partir del cual ofrecen el acceso a contenidos de pago y quienes sólo quieren favorecer a la tienda propia pero permiten que existan otras opciones. A más control, menos posibilidades de que el usuario te escoja como opción preferente, pero también más posibilidades de que ofrecer el dispositivo te permita hacer negocio; por contra, quienes dejan la puerta abierta a cualquier fuente de internet dan más valor al usuario de entrada, pero tienen complicado que no sea un servicio online quien haga las ventas / alquileres.

Experiencia del usuario en la televisión por internet

La tele tradicional ofrece una experiencia de usuario inigualable, es sentarse en el sofá, pulsar el botón y listo. Si se quiere competir en la distribución de contenidos, todo lo que sea alejarse del estándar pone más difícil el ocupar el papel de intermediario. Aquí también hay que tener en cuenta el valor del “enchufar y listo” frente a opciones en las que uno se monta un ordenador, lo configura y lo mantiene. Las soluciones actuales basadas en “descargo por P2P/descarga directa en el ordenador y luego lo paso al disco duro multimedia” o “enchufo un ordenador a la tele del salón para hacer lo mismo”, son escogidas por la libertad que ofrecen de utilizar el contenido bajado de la red, pero probablemente sean cada vez más farragosas de ejecutar.

También deberíamos esperar que crezca la demanda de contenidos de nuevos creadores del vídeo por internet, de los Nikodemo, Balzac.tv, Malviviendo y compañía. El poder ofrecer acceso a los mismos y un escenario donde estos hagan negocio debería ser también una variable a considerar.

Los nuevos distribuidores del cine y la tele por internet

Desde hace años asistimos a una dura pugna por liderar este terreno. Con Hulu la industria de los productores de televisión ya demostró que no quiere otro iTunes, pero es un modelo que tiene varias asignaturas pendientes como es decidir si cobrar y qué hacer con los intermediarios que quieren llevarlo al salón donde competiría con la televisión por cable americana.

En un escenario intermedio entre Hulu y los Megaupload / Megavideo tenemos a Youtube, que seguirá siendo un actor ineludible: todo el mundo quiere tener al servicio universal de vídeos en su solución, pero el negocio pasa por acuerdos con los productores que todavía no están resueltos, los grandes no quieren quedar en manos de Google y para los pequeños no escala el negociar uno a uno. Finalmente Megaupload / Megavideo y similares tienen un futuro a largo plazo poco claro, con tanta presión por parte de la industria y unos gobiernos animados a imponer mayor control en internet, tienen difícil hacer una transición hacia servicios con acuerdos con los creadores de los contenidos.

Candidatos

Candidatos a nuevo intermediario hay muchos, sólo glosar algunos destacados y sus posibilidades.

• Las consolas: parten de una posición privilegiada al estar ya conectadas al salón de casa y tener un índice de penetración muy importante. Sony y Microsoft llevan años teniendo esto más o menos claro y ofreciendo soluciones bajo demanda de contenidos audiovisuales, incluida la alta definición. Su punto débil frente a otras soluciones más abiertas es el control de lo que puede hacer el usuario a la hora de acceder a servicios online.
• Los fabricantes de set-top boxes: entre los que hay de todo, completamente abiertos a quienes son clientes de su propio servicio. Dentro de este grupo podemos destacar a Boxee, Telebision, BluBrain, Roku o AppleTV. Todos comparten su escasa penetración en el mercado de momento (algunos ni siquiera han salida) y la dificultad de encontrar la solución a la ecuación “apertura / negocio”.
• También tenemos a quienes optan por tener un HTPC completo, tanto hecho a medida (seremos la minoría) o soluciones de fabricantes como el Acer Aspire Revo.
• Los propios fabricantes de televisores, como Sony o Phillips.

Y dejamos algunas variables a evaluar. En la experiencia de usuario también pensará en cómo se plantea y qué valor aporta internet en el salón de casa, si pensamos en una televisión social a lo Boxee, si el usuario demandará experiencias interactivas o querra una web reducida a la recepción de datos a través de widgets.

En este 2010 apostaría a porque todo este ecosistema de nuevos intermediarios va a poner toda la carne en el asador para hacerse con hueco cerca de la televisión del salón. Si lo consiguen y la legislación lo permite, los actuales agregadores – también conocidos como canales de televisión – deberían empezar a pensar en que es una batalla en la que lo tienen complicado a largo plazo.

Forget about Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt driving up to a movie premier in a BMW Hydrogen 7. Forget about Cameron Diaz, Jay Leno, Will Ferrell, Arnold Schwarzenegger and even Prince Charles driving hydrogen cars.

Apparently New Mexico is the new Hollywood and a 35-foot film truck will be using hydrogen gas to cook food for the crew and have an oxygen bar to keep stars and staff alert. The hydrogen and oxygen will be created from wind turbines from Jetstream Wind that will electrolyze water to create hydrogen and oxygen for the film truck.

According to the Hydrogen Journal, “The truck will also supply oxygen (generated when water was electrolysed with electricity from the wind turbine) for ‘oxygen bar therapy’ to actors and film crew so they can breathe it directly. This is thought to increase energy, stamina, concentration and alertness, promote relaxation, ease headaches and hangovers and make skin look fresher.”

New Mexico is often used for the on-location shooting of major motion pictures. The name of the film has not be disclosed yet, nor the actors or director. Leave it to Hollywood to come up with a creative use for electrolysis of water. And, let’s hope that sniffing a little pure oxygen is all they do on set.

In the spirit of meta-blogging, we offer this morning a list of some of the lists on green energy Web sites that we read. Some of the lists are forward looking – i.e. here’s what’s going to happen in 2010 – and some look back at the biggest stories of 2009 or, in a silly but traffic-getting conceit, the whole decade.

The lists follow after the jump.

Climate Progres: The “Citizen Kane” award for non-excellence in climate journalism

Blogger Joseph Romm is always on the offensive, which makes his blog an interesting read. But he sometimes gets so wrapped up in his campaigns that they cease to make sense. You will see in this list, for example, that Rush Limbaugh ranks as a less non-excellent (don’t want to mess with the double negative lest we get accused of altering the meaning) climate journalist then the former New York Times climate reporter Andrew Revkin. Really, Joe?

Grist: The top green stories of the 00’s

Far and away the most readable of general-interest green Web sites, Grist provides an entertaining roundup of broad trends in the green movement. Like most best-of-the-decade lists, however, the Gristies cite mostly recent trends. The list can broadly be divided into a before-Obama period and after-Obama period. It also leans heavily on private activist movements, like sustainable food and the expansion of the environmentalist coalition, while dismissing political matters as a “yadda, yadda, yadda” gabfest that doesn’t go anywhere. Oddly undemocratic.

Cleantech Group: Top 10 cleantech promises to watch for in 2010

It’s wonk time. Cleantech Group likes to predict the future, hence its post on why Copenhagen doesn’t matter before the conference had even started. But the writers at the industry research company generally post well-informed, if esoteric, thoughts and predictions on the industry. This list runs down what greentech companies are promising for the year ahead – a valuable overview for investors.

Earth2Tech: Lotsa lists

List overload! We’ve got lists on the year in climate lobbying (which is actually pretty interesting) nine plug-in cars hitting the road in 2010, four green building trends to watch in 2010, five tips and tools to green your holiday travel and etc. There are limits to this list thing, people.

FT Energy Source: Top 10 questions for 2010 – Climate change and cleantech edition

Interesting questions – no elaboration = terrible list. Try harder.

Article Tags: Comment, Copenhagen Conference, You could not make it up

Although this article is a few weeks old, you should take note that just before the Copenhagen Conference a NEW study was issued to show an even worse effect of “global warming” and CO2……….these guy’s tried everything in the book to persuade delegates to come to an agreement…….this so called “scientific” study should be seen as a blatant use of scare tactics, and undermines the entire “Man Made CO2 industry”.

Carbon dioxide indirectly causes up to 50 percent more global warming than originally thought, a finding that raises questions over targets for stabilising carbon emissions over the long term, a study said on Sunday.

As a result, calculations for man-made global warming on the basis of carbon emissions may be underpitched by between 30 and 50 percent, they said.

Source: breitbart.com

Read in full with comments »   

AT&T is apparently not alone in struggling to cope with the demand that data hungry devices like the iPhone have placed on its network. Ronan Dunne, CEO of O2 UK, has publicly apologized to Londoners for the poor performance of its network over the past 6 months, blaming the explosion of demand for data by smartphones such an Apple’s iPhone for its woes. Londoners on O2 have struggled with intermittent data outages and occasional periods where they could not make or receive phone calls, a scenario all too familiar for AT&T customers in the US. To cope with this surge in usage, O2 UK has dumped 30 million pounds ($48 million USD) into its network and has added 200 mobile base stations. O2 is also working closely with Nokia Siemens to help better equip its network infrastructure and is in talks with both RIM and Apple to help identify data-intensive applications, a strategy which sounds a bit troubling. With a bit of good news, Mr. Dunne claims O2’s London network has shown improvement in the month of December and that any  “short-term blip” in their network reputation will be ameliorated by these efforts.Read

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My favorite thing about the Baking Bites Holiday Cupcake Contest is seeing how creative everyone is with their cupcakes and their photography. Every single entry is just mouthwatering – and all of the designs and decorations can easily be recreated in your own kitchen, so I’m sure I’m not alone when I say that they really inspire me to start preparing for next year’s contest! Getting down to business, I’d like to announce the two winners (as selected by an anonymous panel of judges).

The grand prize goes to Bittersweet’s cupcakes topped with Mini Gingerbread Houses. There is great attention to detail in these cupcakes, including a teeny tiny snowman made from dragees and some stepping stones made from chopped walnuts. The second prize goes to Tracyecakes Snowglobe Coca-cola Cupcakes. The cupcakes are actually turned upside down to serve as the base of the snowglobe. The fondant polar bears and gummy cola bottles are very cute (and will remind everyone who’s seen them of those cute polar bear holiday commercials that Coke used to put out annually. You can find a detailed how-to recreate the snowglobe effect here.

A big thanks to everyone who participated, and a big thanks to my judges (you know who you are!) for sorting through all those cupcakes. If you haven’t already, don’t forget take a peek at the rest of the entries and see what great work everyone who participated did, and get some ideas for next year’s contest!

Apple come next month is expected to announce—by far—the most successful quarter for iPhone sales in the handset’s history, according to one Wall Street analyst who raised his price target on the company to $260 per share.

Calling Apple stock a “must-own technology bellwether,” Broadpoint.AmTech analyst Brian Marshall issued a research note to clients on Monday defending his well-above-consensus iPhone quarterly shipment estimates of 11.3 million units for the three-month period ending December.

Read more from AppleInsider

The S&P/Case-Shiller 20-city home-price index, a closely watched gauge of U.S. home prices, rose a seasonally adjusted 0.4% in October from September. But it was flat on an unadjusted basis as the monthly gains seen earlier in the year faded.

The index declined 7.3% from a year earlier. For the 19th straight month, no area in the 20-city index posted a year-over-year price gain.

“Coming after a series of solid gains, these data are likely to spark worries that home prices are about to take a second dip,” said David M. Blitzer, chairman of the Index Committee at Standard & Poor’s. But he added that sales of existing homes have been strong in recent months.

Just seven of the 20 areas saw monthly price gains in October. Phoenix posted the largest gain at 1.3% followed by San Francisco at 1.2%. Tampa fared the worst with a 1.6% drop.

By October the 10-city index was down 29.8% from its mid-2006 peak, while the 20-city was down 29%. Home prices nationwide had returned to levels similar to the fall of 2003.

• See the full S&P/Case-Shiller report.
• Read the full story.

Below, see data from the 20 metro areas Case-Shiller tracks, sortable by name, level, monthly change and year-over-year change — just click the column headers to re-sort.

(About the numbers: The Case Shiller indices have a base value of 100 in January 2000. So a current index value of 150 translates to a 50% appreciation rate since January 2000 for a typical home located within the metro market.)

Home Prices, by Metro Area

Source: Standard & Poor’s and FiservData

Christmas is a holiday that brings people together, so perhaps it should be no surprise that Facebook has become a part of millions of peoples’ Christmas experiences. For the first time in its history, Facebook was the #1 most visited website in the United States on both Christmas Eve and Christmas Day this year, according to traffic analyst firm Hitwise today.

That’s worth noting. HitWise reported last year that Facebook was #2 behind Google on Christmas. People say that Facebook vs. Google will be the web’s biggest battle of coming years – but it looks like Facebook has already won the battle for Christmas.

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Throughout 2009, Google and Yahoo! Mail were both bigger than Facebook, Hitwise says. Facebook was the most popular search query of the last year across all search engine use by US users, however. It’s a social network’s world these days.

One Christmas gift Facebook users may not have expected: December’s major shift away from Facebook’s initial nature as a privacy-centric social network. Apparently that didn’t slow people down from visiting the site on the holidays.

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Just Say No: Lawyers Should NOT Take Fees on Voluntarily Paid No-Fault Benefits Like Wage Loss, Replacement Services and Medical Bills

Let me be clear: There is absolutely no reason whatsoever for a Michigan personal injury lawyer to try to take an attorney fee when an auto insurance company is voluntarily paying a crash victim wage loss and replacement services.

This practice by some lawyers who handle car accident cases in Michigan makes me cringe. It represents the worst excesses of my profession; and these personal injury lawyers have no excuse for doing this  They are literally taking thousands of dollars that rightfully belongs to their injured clients for no reason.

If you have been in a car accident, and this is happening to you, this is my advice: Run (don’t walk) away.  Find a respected lawyer who truly really cares about you and is trying to maximize the dollars in your pocket — not his or her own.

But… Attorney Fees on Attendant Care

Ok, I’m a lawyer, so sometimes I have to talk like one.  Here’s one important exception to this black and white issue. It lies with attendant care (AC), also called nursing care services.

Attendant care is so complicated in Michigan, and the insurance abuse and outright fraud by insurance companies is so great, that when it comes to attendant care, it does makes sense to hire a lawyer right away to help you collect these important benefits — even if the insurance company is willing to pay an amount voluntarily.

Here’s the rub: Even with an attorney fee being taken, an experienced attendant care lawyer in Michigan can normally double or triple the hourly rate that an insurance company would otherwise voluntarily pay for attendant care.  Also, an attendant care lawyer can also normally negotiate a higher number of hours per day that attendant care services should be paid.

Finally, after the string of cases allowing an insurance company to avoid paying attendant care, hiring an experienced no-fault insurance lawyer can stop insurance companies from later trying to evade paying the full value of attendant care services.

The legal pitfalls and obstacles are mind boggling in the area of attendant care law.  Cases in Michigan have literally allowed insurance claims adjusters to lie to their own insureds about their right to collect attendant care.  And there are many hyper-technical traps that allow an insurance company to get out of paying for attendant care, even when they have already made a promise to pay.

In the next in my series of blogs on insurance company abuse in Michigan (and the resulting excesses and abuses that has caused lawyers and doctors to “stare into the abyss”), I’d like to discuss the false Internet advertising and outright fraud committed by some personal injury lawyers both in Michigan and throughout the country.  It’s important for accident victims to know that lawyer advertising on the web today is truly the wild west, with very little oversight and regulation.

Now, it’s more important than ever to look for trusted, independent third-party reviews of lawyers.

– Steven M. Gursten is recognized as one of the nation’s top experts in serious car and truck accident injury cases and automobile insurance no-fault litigation. Steve has received the largest jury verdict for an automobile accident case in Michigan in four of the past seven years, including 2008, according to a published, year-end verdicts and settlements report.

Related information:

For Michigan Lawyers: Pursuing Auto Injury Claims in Michigan

Michigan No-Fault Benefits

Car Accident Victim Testimonial

Michigan Auto Law is the largest law firm exclusively handling car accident, truck accident and motorcycle accident cases throughout the entire state. We have offices in Southfield, Detroit, Ann Arbor, Grand Rapids and Sterling Heights to better serve you. Call (800) 777-0028 to speak with a lawyer. There is absolutely no fee or obligation.

Starting in 2010, Ford will become the first automaker to offer HD Radio with iTunes Tagging capability. The feature will allow Ford owners to tag a song they hear on their HD Radio receiver and download it later onto their iPhone or iPod.

iTunes Tagging  is currently available on a couple of aftermarket HD Radio receivers, but Ford will be the first automaker to offer it as a factory-installed option.

“Up to 100 tags can be stored on SYNC until the iPod is connected to receive the download of metadata,” Ford says. “When the iPod is then synced to iTunes, a playlist of “tagged” songs will appear. Customers then can preview and, if desired, purchase and download tagged songs from the iTunes Store.”

Click through for the press release.

Press Release:

FORD FIRST TO ENABLE iTUNES TAGGING WITH LAUNCH OF NEW HD RADIO CAPABILITY IN ITS LINEUP

* Ford is the first auto manufacturer to offer HD Radio™ technology with iTunes® Tagging capability; this new functionality will be available next year
* HD Radio technology captures free digital radio broadcasts, which eliminate static, fadeout and other problems associated with conventional analog radio signals; the result is FM audio that’s comparable to near-CD quality and AM audio that sounds like today’s FM broadcasts
* HD Radio digital technology provides a number of advanced services not available with an analog radio. Extra FM channels, called HD2/HD3 channels, are delivered, as well as useful on-screen Program Service Data such as artist name and song title

DEARBORN, Mich., Dec. 29, 2009 – iTunes Tagging and crystal-clear radio sound through HD Radio technology are the latest features on Ford’s growing list of factory-installed customer conveniences and technologies that will be newly available in 2010.

HD Radio receivers pull in digital radio signals and play them with dramatically improved sound. FM stations, for example, have near-CD quality, making it convenient for customers to select songs they want to download and purchase.

“iTunes Tagging and HD Radio technology are strong new additions to the growing collection of Ford convenience features and technology we’re offering customers to make driving even more enjoyable,” said Mark Fields, president of The Americas. “This is another example of Ford’s commitment to bring the widest variety of factory-installed customer-focused technology, features and conveniences to millions of people.”

In 2010, Ford vehicles will offer familiar terrestrial radio, HD Radio technology, SIRIUS® Satellite Radio as well as Internet radio through Ford SYNC® from a Bluetooth®-streaming audio-capable smartphone.

“Ford continues to lead the market in bringing advanced capabilities to popular vehicles. We are very pleased that HD Radio technology is an integral part of Ford’s broad offering of new features,” said Jeff Jury, COO of iBiquity Digital Corporation, the developer of HD Radio technology.

Like the song? You can tag it
The world’s first implementation of iTunes Tagging in a factory-installed HD Radioreceiver will launch in 2010 on select Ford vehicles. Through the SYNC system, iTunes Tagging will provide Ford customers with the ability to capture a song they hear on the HD Radio receiver for later purchase. With a simple push of the “TAG” button on the radio display, the song information will be stored in the radio’s memory.

All HD Radio-enabled receivers in Ford vehicles also will provide Program Service Data – information that appears on the radio screen and includes song title, artist name and more.

Familiar controls with better quality
HD Radio technology enables more listening options and increased sound quality by using the same radio interface customers are used to as well as the same antennas and analog tuners with an added digital decoder inside the radio. Additionally, HD Radio-enabled receivers provide listeners with unique advanced services.
To operate, there’s no difference from today’s radio operations – customers just tune in their favorite stations. If the station is broadcasting with HD Radio technology, the system automatically picks up the signal and will transition to digital audio once decoded.

Exclusive to HD Radio receivers are HD2/HD3 channels, which resemble mini-stations that could be spun off the “mother” station or completely new content for the local market. HD2/HD3 channels are found directly adjacent to the main (HD1) channel on the dial if available.

If additional HD2/HD3 channels are available, the radio will indicate how many on a multicast information bar. Users may tune up to the new available channels like they would tune to any other analog station. Users also may store HD2/HD3 presets, just as they do with today’s radio.

HD Radio technology enables better audio and exclusive unique content choices
One significant benefit of HD Radio technology is that the sound quality of the broadcast is dramatically better because of the digital transmission – FM sounds like a CD and AM sounds like terrestrial FM broadcasts. Also, the sound itself is much clearer and more consistent, without issues such as pops or hisses. Unlike analog broadcasts, digital broadcasts aren’t susceptible to interference, fadeout and other issues.

Most stations use the additional HD2/HD3 channels to provide more unique coverage of sports, music or other niche programs often tailored for their individual markets – all for free. For example, in Dallas there is now a dedicated 24/7 Cowboys channel on 105.3-HD3. In Pittsburgh, there is a dedicated 24/7 Penguins channel on 105.9-HD2.Broadcasters may choose any genre they wish for their additional channels.

Nearly 2,000 radio stations in the U.S. currently broadcast in digital HD Radio sound, with more than 1,100 stations also airing HD2/HD3 channels. Approximately 85 percent of the U.S. population is served by a station broadcasting with HD Radio technology.

– By: Kap Shah