Aah, it’s like the glory days of that famous picture moment when Lars Ulrich of Metallica brought reams of paper to Napster’s HQ in Redwood City all over again. Let’s make a big splash on the front page and sue someone today. Well, that’s what Viacom is doing with Google, owner of YouTube, as it has filed a $1 Billion lawsuit against the Mountain View parent company in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York today.

Viacom’s claim is that YouTube has almost 160,000 of unauthorized video clips available for viewing on the popular video site. Even after YouTube removed anything it was asked, like my Grand Prix super charger gauge video that was completely unrelated to Viacom, the media giant still feels offended and desires to get cash from the number one search engine. Viacom states that, “YouTube is a significant, for-profit organization that has built a lucrative business out of exploiting the devotion of fans to others’ creative works in order to enrich itself and its corporate parent, Google.” Google, not having seen the 27-page lawsuit filing yet, stated that it is, “confident that YouTube has respected the legal rights of copyright holders and believe the courts will agree.”

Sadly, Viacom, like the RIAA and music sharing, doesn’t get it. Removing free advertising for its content that drives perspective viewers to purchasing something they may have not otherwise is just plain silly. The SNL skit from last summer that lit up the YouTube site made it a number one download on iTunes when NBC officially placed it up for sale. As in people paid for it. Even while Viacom in the end did get monetary payment for this, it still sees blindly and demands payment for 1.4 billion downloads (views) made from YouTube of Viacom content.

I guess old money doesn’t get new money and how things work on the Internet. With such a wonderful vehicle for advertisement of a product that costs the parent nothing, Viacom is plan stupid. Like Metallica, whom no one cares about anymore, Viacom will hurt itself in the end than improve its image. Where teens are behind most fads and trends, don’t be surprised Viacom when your content isn’t catching on ’cause, well, you’re just not cool anymore, Viacom.

Verizon Wireless today announced that it has obtained a permanent injunction and default judgment in one of its lawsuits against wireless spam, bringing the case to its conclusion. The default judgment prohibits Specialized Programming and Marketing LLC and its owner, Charles Henderson, from sending further spam to Verizon Wireless customers and requires them to pay damages in excess of $200,000. Specialized and Henderson sent nearly 100,000 unsolicited text messages to Verizon Wireless customers offering them a prize vacation.

“Text messaging is a great and increasingly popular way to communicate, but unwanted or unsolicited text message spam to our customers’ handsets is unacceptable,” said Steve Zipperstein, Verizon Wireless, vice president of legal and external affairs. “We have a long track record of protecting our customers’ privacy, including through lawsuits, and will continue to do so.”

Verizon Wireless initially filed the suit against Passport Holidays in October 2005 in U.S. District Court in Trenton, N.J., alleging that the Florida-based company arranged and coordinated the sending of the text messages to Verizon Wireless customers, urging them to take action to claim a Bahamas cruise prize. In February 2006, Verizon Wireless filed an amended complaint, after officials from Passport Holidays named Specialized Programming and Marketing LLC and Henderson as the company and individual that sent out the spam messages that formed the basis for the suit.

A permanent injunction against further spamming by Passport Holidays was entered in February 2006 as the result of a settlement between Verizon Wireless and Passport Holidays. The settlement also required Passport to pay $10,000, which Verizon Wireless then donated to the Florida Coalition Against Domestic Violence.

Companies and individuals who send unsolicited text message spam to wireless phones violate the Federal Telephone Consumer Protection Act by using “auto-dialing” equipment to send large bursts of text messages to sequential phone numbers within very short periods of time. Additionally, these spammers often use deceptive means to hide the identity of the party sending the spam messages and to avoid filters that Verizon Wireless employs to prevent spam from reaching its customers.

The CDMA Development Group (CDG) today announced that there were 100 million new CDMA2000® subscriber adds in 2006. Currently, there are more than 325 million CDMA2000 subscribers, including 55 million CDMA2000 1xEV-DO broadband subscribers, representing a 125% increase in EV-DO subscribers from the previous year. Including cdmaOne, there are now more than 370 million CDMA subscribers worldwide. Most of the growth came from the Asia Pacific region, followed by North America, Latin America and the Caribbean, and then Europe, Africa and the Middle East.

“The CDG is pleased to report such strong growth in global CDMA subscribers,” said Perry LaForge, executive director of the CDG. “The farther CDMA2000 progresses on its evolution path, the more compelling it is for carriers. Now, more than ever, operators are heeding the market call for the outstanding performance and economic characteristics of CDMA2000.”

More than 100 operators deployed CDMA2000 in the past three years, including 47 CDMA2000 1xEV-DO networks. Up to 40 of these operators had been operating GSM networks. The CDG also reported the launch of 3 EV-DO Revision A (Rev. A) networks at the end of 2006. Rev. A’s all-IP platform and enhanced radio interface enables advanced wireless broadband and multimedia services to be transferred at high speeds equally as well across the downlink and uplink, essentially catapulting its performance above and beyond competing air interface technologies. Because of its evolutionary and enhanced value proposition, more then a dozen more Rev. A networks are scheduled to be launched within the first half of 2007.

In addition, the CDG announced the introduction of more than 600 new CDMA2000 devices to the market—including 25 WorldMode devices and 19 EV-DO Rev. A devices.

XM and Sirius satellite radio have both just announced their pending merger. Both companies, “Have entered into a definitive agreement, under which the companies will be combined in a tax-free, all-stock merger of equals with a combined enterprise value of approximately $13 billion, which includes net debt of approximately $1.6 billion.” Mel Karmazin, Sirius’ current CEO, will continue with his title of the newly merged company. Gary Parsons, XM’s Chairman, will also continue with is title and be chairman of the combined company. Both companies will continue to operate as separate entities until the merger completes at which time a new central location and combined programing will be determined.

SvenOnTech was told that, ” The combined company is committed to consumer choice, including offering consumers the ability to pick and choose the channels and content they want on a more a la carte basis. The combined company will also provide consumers with a broader selection of content, including a wide range of commercial-free music channels, exclusive and non-exclusive sports coverage, news, talk, and entertainment programming.”

Interesting development for sure. It has been well known that Sirius was hurting financially while XM has yet to even make a profit. Combining the two companies will help; however, will it pass FCC scrutiny? Most likely since it allowed all the Baby Bells to become basically what it broke up in 1981. The pick-and-chose channel aspect is very appealing to me. The one question I’ve got to ask though, is what will my wife and I do? She has XM and I have Sirius. Will we both need new receivers? Doubt it, but it’ll be interesting to see how the two resolve this technical aspect of the merger.

A-DATA Technology and SiPix Imaging, Inc. have made a real breakthrough by creating the first ever e-paper display into a SecureDigitalTM flash card. SiPix developed the display modules and then A-Data took them and integrated that into the memory card. Talk about teamwork! The result is the first in the world in SD media.

The new display has been given the name infoSD. A-DATA developed this technology using software that allows the SD media to update to the integrated display using real time. This process uses minumum space and energy and the remaining storage space can even be seen without a power source. This is due to the bi-stable nature of the SiPix e-paper. The SiPix Microcup is designed particularly for high visibility and ultra low power. This patented technology means that SiPix is very capable of meeting any and all requirements to be competitive in this market.

The use of this e-paper technology has been a growing trend in the past and by taking advantage of the SiPix e-paper technology, A-Data has made sure to stay ahead of the game by being an innovator in a very competitive market. This new technology is so good, the Consumers Electronics Association (CEA)has honored A-DATA’s infoSD by giving them the prestigious Best of Innovations Award for 2007.

The Beatles will be releasing their original 13 albums that found their way to CD in 1987 on the Internet very soon according to Neil Aspinall, the head of Apple Corps Ltd. Aspinall is the man responsible for protecting the assets of the Beatles and the man behind the Apple Corps vs Apple Computer (now Apple Inc) law suits. While much speculation has been running a buzz in the media of a Valentine surprise on iTunes, Aspinall told Roger Friedman of Fox News that everyone would be sharing in the love of Beatlemania when online downloads happen. “It will be on all the services, not just one,” Aspinall told Friedman. This means iTunes, Rhapsody, and Napster will all have it.

Aspinall offered little more details about the release of the most popular catalog in the music world other than to say it will definitely happen. No dates or specifics were given. All you need is love…and patience.

Much has changed for Kodak since it’s founders George Eastman and Henry Strong started film-based camera company back in 1881. Now, film isn’t the big thing but rather digital photography. Being keen to future trends, Kodak announced in 2004 that it would restructure itself by, “elimination of 25,000 to 27,000 positions,” saving the company over $3 billion. Well, smile, yesterday it said the final 3,000 would be getting their pink slips and investors could start banking on that $3 billion.

It’s not all bad news. Antonio M. Perez, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Eastman Kodak Company, can be found saying on the Kodak site, “Kodak is now a company comprised of numerous leading digital businesses with diverse sources of sales and earnings, coupled with strong intellectual property positions.” Perez further stated, “Our dramatic operational improvements during the past three years have created a solid foundation from which Kodak will become a growing digital company with innovative new products and services, attractive margins and strong cash generation.”

Me? I understand the hardship and I’d rather make cuts to an American icon than see it completely be lost…or bought by a foreign company like Zenith in the ’80s.

Spymac announced yesterday that it has sent out it’s first wave of checks to users who have posted on their site, Leapfrog 2.0, the most popular content. Users receive a cash award for having the most popular music, videos, and pictures uploaded onto the website. Winners are chosen using two criterion: 1) most revenue collected from that users uploaded content and 2) the popularity of that content. Spymac is sharing the money it earns from the website with the people who helped earn that money, not a bad deal!

“Our unique revenue sharing model has proven to be a hit with uploaders, we’ve already sent out thousands and we’re now getting ready to pay out the large monthly jackpot to January’s top contributors” said Spymac’s CEO Holger Ehlis.

With Spymac, users have unlimited storage space for whatever they wish to post, and several useful tools they can use to promote their uploaded items. Users also have the ability to chat with other people and network to share their content around the globe. There are versions of Spymac available to 95% of the online population in 18 different languages. This gives pretty much anyone and everyone the chance to win large daily and monthly Jackpots.

“Last week, we were getting more than 500 uploads a day, and that number has quickly climbed to more than 1,000 uploads from around the world every 24 hours — about a new upload every minute of the day…Already in the first month, we have individuals making enough money that they can literally quit their day-job and spend all day creating videos and uploading to Spymac,” joked Ehlis. “We are paying out between $3,000 to $5,000 a day.”

Looks like Verizon Wireless did pretty good during the holiday season as it’s user base jump by 2.3 million, a 12.7 percent increase, since the same time in 2005. Further fueling Verizon Wireless’ good numbers was its low churn rate (customer turnover) of 1.14 percent which is an industry low. Wonder how that’ll change in Q3 this year when the iPhone finds its way into AT&T stores. With its total revenues up 16.3 percent from fourth quarter 2005, this makes Verizon the largest wireless company (sorry Steve Jobs, it’s not Cingular like you said at Keynote) in the nation.

Like we said, things should get interesting in June when the most highly anticipated phone finally makes it to market at one of the highest prices to ever reach the market. Will Verizon give away Motorola Q’s in hopes of wooing would be iPhone users or give current subscribers reason to stay with special incentives? As a Verizon Wireless user myself, I’m hoping for something tasty.

If CES, Macworld, WWDC, WinHEC, and the Beauty Revolution shows aren’t enough to fill your calendar, well then you’re headed to Boston this fall! A 3-day conference to be held November 13-15, 2007, at the Hynes Convention Center in Boston, Mass. will highlight, well, mobile stuff. The Mobile Internet World Conference & Exposition will highlight the, “Evolving wireless and mobile broadband technologies are now enabling the next major wave—the Mobile Internet.”

“We are extremely pleased to announce today the launch of Mobile Internet World Conference & Expo,” said Eliot Weinman, President of Trendsmedia and conference co-chair. “During the next decade, the expansion of the Mobile Internet will likely represent the single largest definable growth marketplace in the telecommunications industry. Trendsmedia and Yankee Group have developed this event to assemble the entire ecosystem of emerging Mobile Internet companies. They will come together to examine the dynamics, trends, and ultimately, how to accelerate the development of profitable business models.”

Get your tickets now!