Dr Issam Awad
Just saw a really cool website with video of brain surgery.
The doctors name is
Dr. Issam Awad and you can see his site
at
http://www.issamawad.com.
Be carefull, the video may be a little graphic for some viewers.
Since
Dr. Awad is a brain surgeon, I was surprised at how cool his website is.
Digital music player sales seen up sharply by 2009
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Global sales of digital music players are expected to jump to nearly l billion units a year in 2009, driven by consumers' desire for the pocket-sized devices and falling costs for flash memory components, research firm IDC said on Thursday.
IDC predicted that annual sales of compressed audio players will reach 945.5 million units worth $145.4 billion in 2009, up from 224.9 units worth $46.7 billion in 2004. IDC defines these devices as everything from portable MP3 players to DVD devices and phones that can play music compressed by software.
The portable flash player category, which includes products such as Apple Computer Inc.'s (Nasdaq:
AAPL -
news) iPod Nano and Dell Inc.'s(Nasdaq:
DELL -
news) DJ Ditty, is expected to grow to some 124 million units in 2009 from 26.4 million in 2004.
"The portable MP3 player category has seen the most growth in popularity and Apple has been a very important driver of that," said IDC analyst Susan Kevorkian.
Stronger demand for players that use flash memory chips is expected to be fueled by cheaper flash prices, the expansion of services that sell songs and other media and growing consumer awareness of portable MP3 players.
IDC anticipates that the maximum capacity of flash players will grow to 16 gigabytes in 2007 from 1 gigabyte in 2004. By current compression standards, that's about 4,000 songs packed onto a player in 2007, up from about 250 songs last year.
What's more, music video playback on these devices is expected to drive demand for portable flash players and hard drive-based portable jukeboxes, IDC said, a feature that will be complemented by music video downloads from paid online media services.
"We see Apple positioning the iPod with video as primarily being a music device, and video enhances that by offering the possibility of downloading music videos and other video," Kevorkian said. "It is quite possible that a next generation video-enabled iPod may have not only a larger display, but Apple may also have more content available by that point."
.........
http://www.bridgeratings.com/
IDC Forecast and Analysis Finds MP3 All Over The Place
FRAMINGHAM, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 13, 2005--According to IDC, the portable compressed audio (MP3) player market continues to surge, led by the portable flash player category which is expected to grow from 26.4 million units shipped worldwide in 2004 to nearly 124 million units in 2009. Growth in the portable flash player category is expected to be fueled by falling flash memory costs, vendor adoption of flash for multiple device storage capacities at competitive retail price points, availability of paid online media services, and growing consumer awareness of and demand for portable MP3 players. However, music-enabled mobile phones are expected to inhibit the portable MP3 player market somewhat during the forecast period and the extent of this trend will vary by world region.
IDC segments the compressed audio player market into four major categories: portable, home and automotive audio-focused devices, and a fourth "other" category of devices that support compressed audio as a secondary feature (such as DVD players, mobile phones, and gaming devices). These categories are developing at different rates with distinct market forces influencing each one. The 'other' category, which includes devices that are competitive substitutes for audio-only portable, home and automotive players, will lead the compressed audio player market throughout and beyond the forecast period, and worldwide is expected to exceed 700 million units shipped and $114 billion in revenue in 2009.
"Demand for portable MP3 players is booming, as more and more consumers get acquainted with their stylish form factors and digital audio functionality," said Susan Kevorkian, program manager, Consumer Markets: Audio at IDC. "In addition, DVD players, mobile phones and gaming devices that play back compressed audio will be key drivers of the compressed audio player market during the forecast period."
Key forecast findings include:
- The maximum portable flash player capacity is expected to increase from 1GB in 2004 to reach 8GB in 2006 and 16GB by late 2007.
- Video support for music video playback is expected to drive demand for portable flash players and hard drive-based portable jukeboxes. This feature is expected to be complemented by music video downloads from paid online media services.
- The market for hard drive-based portable jukeboxes is expected to grow at a worldwide compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 21.5% during the forecast period. IDC expects this market to be inhibited by the availability of high-capacity portable flash players and average selling prices (ASPs) in excess of $200 throughout the forecast period.
- Worldwide total units and revenue for all four segments of the compressed audio player market are expected to reach 945.5 million and $145.4 billion respectively by 2009.
The IDC study, Worldwide and U.S. Compressed Audio Player 2005-2009 Forecast and Analysis: MP3 All Over The Place (IDC #33932) analyzes, forecasts, draws conclusions, and makes recommendations for the four major categories of the compressed audio player market. Each category is further segmented based on storage media. The study considers recent IDC audio survey research, as well as the expertise of IDC analysts from a number of programs related to the compressed audio player market.
Motorola iTunes Phone - Motorola ROKR
With iTunes and your Motorola ROKR, you can listen to music and podcasts on your mobile phone, wherever, whenever you want.
Motorola ROKRA recent estimate says that 774 million wireless handsets are expected to be sold globally by the end of 2005, compared to the estimated sale of 57 million mp3 players.
Combine these totals, and its easy to see that Podcasting still has a lot of potential.
Macromedia Studio 8 Dreamweaver and Flash 8 Website Templates
Tech Podcasts Still Most Popular
Technology-oriented podcasts are proving to be among the most successful. Los Angeles radio station KFI podcasts Leo Laporte's This Week In Tech, and it now has 41,000 subscribers, up from 360 in May, according to Rick Klau, VP of business development at FeedBurner, which manages RSS feeds for the radio station and thousands of other podcasters. Tech-oriented podcasts consistently rank among FeedBurner's top feeds, Klau says.
Flash 8 Templates
15,000 Podcasts? For Real?
FeedBurner offers more than 15,000 podcast RSS feeds, up from less than 1,000 in January. It now has 450,000 podcast RSS feed subscribers, up from 150,000 in June.
The Yankee Group estimates that by the end of the year, 41.6 million consumers will own a digital audio player, and there will be more than 10,000 businesses and individuals publishing podcasts. Currently, however, less than 1% of digital audio player owners actively download and listen to podcasts, the Yankee Group says.
Would You Pay for a Podcast?
A recent study conducted among young European consumers by Forrester Research found that 46% of 16- and 17-year-olds would consider paying for podcast content. However, only 33% of the teens surveyed said they would accept advertising as a necessary evil to subsidize content
The biggest threat to terrestrial radio
First off, for those who do not know, terrestrial Radio is your common radio stations found throughout the globe, and not some E.T. device made out of tinfoil.
A Poll is being taken at a very popular radio industry website; http://allaccess.com
The biggest threat to terrestrial is:
Satellite Radio 5.8%
Broadband Streaming Internet Audio 3.8%
iPods and Downloads 17.3%
Itself and the lack of creative programming 69.2%
what threat? 3.8%
Of course, many broadcasters believe that if they had more creative programming at radio stations than everything would be fine, however I disagree. I believe that iPods are the biggest threat to any terrestrial Radio station that relies on the "More Music" concept that is so popular throughout the USA.
Talk radio, live talk, or any other radio show featuring live interaction still stands on its own, as iPods will never be able to allow for live interaction with the media.
Notice, that even broadcasters have no faith in Satellite radio as a threat, with only 5.8%. I stand firm on my belief that Satellite will become obsolete before it becomes profitable.
Comedy mp3Parody SongMacromedia Studio 8 TemplatesInternet Consulting, Marketing and SEO
iPODs integrate into HONDA and VW car stereos
In the midst of the excitement over the introduction of the ROKR iPOD phone and the new iPOD NANO, APPLE also announced that it had added HONDA-ACURA, and VOLKSWAGEN-AUDI to its program to integrate iPODs into car stereos for the 2006 model year.
With over 5 million portable MP3 players due for delivery this year, the market for Podcasting continues to grow. It's important to note that 650 million cell phones will be delivered this year. Imagine when all the phones have the ability to store MP3's, perfect for listening to your favorite Podcast.
The MP3 players impact on traditional radio listening
During the twelve months ending December 15, 2004, Bridge Ratings conducted an eye-opening series of studies related to iPod/MP3 player libraries.
During 2005 an on-going follow-up study has been undertaken.
Study goal: To learn about radio listener music preferences and the MP3 player's impact on traditional radio listening
Methodology:Two groups of music consumers were tracked.
A) Listeners whose listening to traditional radio has decreased at least fifteen percent over the previous 9 months.
B) Listeners whose listening to traditional radio has maintained, increased or decreased less than ten percent in the previous 9 months.
Each group was divided into music constituencies, i.e., participants were placed into groups representing their primary radio listening. For example, individuals whose favorite station was Country, were placed into a Country constituency. These groupings allowed us to study music purity when studying the music file selections on their digital players. (see charts below)
1200 persons 12+ in each of the above categories were tracked weekly over a period of three months in 2004. The 2005 studies have used the same structure. During this time, each participant was willing to share the contents of his/her digital music player.
Findings of Interest:
During 2004 on average 60% of participants made some change in the files on their digital music players each week (adding, deleting or both). In 2005 that number has increased to 68%.
14% changed files more frequently than once a week in 2004 increasing to 20% in 2005. 5% changed files dailyIn 2004 17% made some changes every two weeks decreasing to 13% in 2005. 4% made no change to their files 88% in 2004, 90% in 2005 of the participants included more than one music "category" on their digital music players, i.e. almost all participants in the study have a variety of musical tastes.This last point raises a very interesting and important point: today's radio listeners prefer diversity in their music entertainment. Both groups' radio listening experience suggests that if there is lower time-spent-listening it is a function of a desire to hear more musical diversity and thus cume more different stations per week.
This higher desire for more variety of music radio station choice each week is the motivator for listeners to seek additional music diversity by managing their personal music choices through MP3 players.
The study found that a significant portion of traditional radio's listener base is driven to alternative digital entertainment choices by lack of musical or programming diversity on traditional radio.The diversity of the music on the digital players of each format constituency group was then plotted to give us a sense of commonality - if there was any - among the types of variety sought by each musical constituency. What we found was that, yes, most constituencies tend to prefer at least one music type in addition to the one which defines their favorite station music preference.
What is clear is that radio listeners who report preferences for radio stations with specific/narrow music formats have broader musical tastes than previously quantified. Over 85% of those interviewed for this project told us that the digital player offered them custom entertainment diversity in one compact solution and this was the
number one reason they were spending more time with their digital players and less with traditional radio.
