RELEASE: WINTER
DataPlay
Industry's would-be CD killer
The CD has survived previous attempts to dislodge its supremacy - witness Sony's MiniDisc. But DataPlay hopes to fare better with a coin-sized optical disc that's about to descend upon record and computer stores. Backed by major music labels, software companies, and over 60 hardware manufacturers, DataPlay media store up to 500 Mbytes of audio, photos, games, and video. You'll be able to choose between prerecorded discs and write-once blanks; the double-sided blanks will cost $5 to $12, making them pricier than writable CDs but far cheaper than similarly small, rewritable flash memory.
Three of the Big Five record labels - Universal Music Group, BMG, and EMI - plan to issue new releases in CD and DataPlay formats in early 2002. Samsung and others are manufacturing portable players, which will be followed by digital cameras, PDAs, and PC peripherals.
Record companies favor DataPlay because it supports digital rights management, which determines how many copies you can make of a file, if any, and what you're permitted to do with those copies. Buy corporate rock on DataPlay, and it'll take some hacking before you can share it peer-to-peer with Gnucleus. (Hint: You can recapture anything directly off the headphone jack.)
The consumer sell: The format's encoding standards, Dolby's AAC and QDesign's QDX, use a fraction of the space that CD's Red Book Audio does. The extra room will let prerecorded DataPlay discs, which are expected to cost about as much as their CD counterparts, hold bonuses like videos, lyrics text, and extra albums you can "unlock" by buying codes online.
In the abstract, DataPlay looks good. But as with other standards, people want to go with the winner - which is often determined by marketing and momentum rather than technical superlatives. If by next year we get a dazzling array of clever and reasonably priced DataPlay gadgets, plus lots of big-name music, then we'll embrace the format. If not, it will still be a nice and small removable storage medium, for what that's worth.
DataPlay: +1 (720) 562 2000, www.dataplay.com.
RELEASE: DECEMBER
Digital Angel
Wireless guardian tracks vitals
Combining biosensors and GPS with Web-enabled wireless communication, Digital Angel lets caregivers and parents monitor their charges' vital signs and locations over the Internet. The wrist unit sends pulse, body temperature, and other readings to a waistband pager, which transmits the information to a secure site. A 911 button allows wearers to call EMTs themselves. Options include a blood-oxygen level sensor and an alert if the wearer falls.
Digital Angel: +1 (651) 455 1621, www.digitalangel.net.
RELEASE: DECEMBER
ViA Mobile Language Translation System
Speak Spanish in five seconds
When a stroll down the peaceful Baja beach leads you to an armed federale, it's time to fire up ViA's MLTS, which translates simple conversations between English and Spanish speakers with a five-second delay. You can customize the Free Speech software, which runs on ViA II belt-pack wearable computers (or any powerful PC with a microphone input), with stackable dictionaries and synth voice traits like gender and age, for more natural exchanges.
ViA: (800) 353 9472, www.via-pc.com.
RELEASE: DECEMBER
Vitsab
Color-coded freshness guarantee
Wonder if that store-made sushi is still edible? Indicator tags that gauge foods' overall freshness are now appearing in the display cases of major East Coast grocers. Affixed to the packaging of meat, fish, and dairy products, the labels, made by Vitsab, contain an enzyme-and-triglyceride mixture which reacts at the same rate that the perishables spoil, changing the color of a pH indicator from green to yellow. If a slab of beef goes a long time without proper refrigeration, the label turns yellow faster. The tags come in a range of sensitivities to match different foods. Don't buy mackerel without them.
Vitsab: (800) 848 9865, www.vitsab.com.
RELEASE: DECEMBER
ARX Fatalis
Underground role-playing, Ultima-style
This unofficial sequel to Ultima Underworld breaks out of typical dungeon adventure formalities with a world of gemlike beauty and free opportunity. An unending winter has driven civilization underground, and you're commissioned to stop the God of Chaos from taking over the subterranean world. Open-ended gameplay lets you fight, sneak, and cast spells at will, no matter what your character type is. Objects in the PC game are just as improvisational. You can fashion tools, customize weapons, and even bake your own bread.
Arkane Studios: +33 (4) 72 19 68 53, www.arkane-studios.com.
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