According to figures from Cowen & Company, Activision's blockbuster series Guitar Hero continues to see sales declines, despite new additions to the franchise.

The latest game, "Warriors of Rock," saw only 86,000 sales in its first week, well below the average for the franchise.

In 2007, Guitar Hero 3: Legends of Rock sold 1.5 million copies in five days, in 2008 GH: World Tour sold 500,000 copies in its first week and last year's Guitar Hero 5 sold 499,000 copies in the same time frame.

Says analyst Doug Creutz: "Guitar Hero III likely attracted a lot of one-time buyers (that have not returned for subsequent franchise instalments) due to its 'it-game' status at the time."

Rival Harmonix, the company behind Rock Band said this of the genre as a whole: "I absolutely do not believe that rhythm-action gaming has reached its peak."

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Apple's recently released quarterly earnings revealed that the company sold 250,000 Apple TV set-top devices as of the end of September, three weeks after its launch.

Says CEO Steve Jobs: "We're happy with how it's turned out."

Jobs says he expects sales to pick up with the release of iOS 4.2, which will allow owners to stream their own content in addition to the content they downloaded from iTunes.

Available for $99, the updated Apple TV drops the hard drive of its predecessor and is now small enough to fit in your hand.

The device streams movies from the Web or from smartphones/tablets directly to your HDTV.

Additionally, the second-generation device streams movies from Netflix's ever expanding "Watch Instantly" catalog and HD movies purchased through iTunes.

The Apple TV has built-in Wi-Fi and an HDMI output.

Pic via Wired

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Hector Martin aka marcan42 has just posted to his blog the launch of AsbestOS, a way to run Linux on your jailbroken PS3 without OtherOS. Martin has been working on AsbestOS for over a month.

"Other OS" was disabled by firmware version 3.21, and the latest Sony firmware update is version 3.50. Therefore, only owners of "fat" PS3 consoles running firmwares 3.15 or under can still use the OtherOS feature of their console.

Users running firmware 3.41 or under can "jailbreak" their console using a USB Development Board or a number of items like the DualShock 3 controller, TI-84 calculators, an iPod or other media players.

Says Martin:

"AsbestOS (a mineral, and meaning "inextinguishable" in Greek) is a bootloader to run PS3 Linux without OtherOS. It runs using the USB GameOS exploit (on PS3 version 3.41) from any compatible device, and any reprogrammable devices currently running the PS3 exploit can be used as long as they have enough free internal or external storage (40kB or so) to hold the loader. It is general enough that it should be useful to boot Linux given any other GameOS exploit in the future.

Currently, it only supports netbooting a kernel and no initrd (mostly due to bootmem limitations). This is enough to run a Linux system booting from an NFS share or from USB storage media. Almost everything that works under OtherOS is working. As additional perks of running as GameOS, you also get access to a seventh SPE (needs a kernel patch to enable) and there is clearly full access to the RSX including 3D support, although we still need to learn a few details about how that works to be able to use it.

AsbestOS is a fully independent open source payload and does not contain any code from the original PSJailbreak payload or derivatives. It is licensed under the GPLv2. Compiling it does not require any SDK tools, and it includes a script to build a fully vanilla GNU toolchain for the PS3."

For more info, check here: AsbestOS

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Microsoft has unveiled their Kinect motion control system's launch titles this week, with the highest touted game being "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows—Part 1 The Videogame."

Kinect is set to launch early next month.

Says Microsoft directly of the Harry Potter title: "Playing as Harry, you are on the run from the opening sequence, fighting for survival on a desperate and dangerous quest to locate and destroy Voldemort's Horcruxes."

There are 22 moves within the game that require the Kinect system, allowing users to control the action with hands-free motion controllers.

The other games to be released at launch are Kinectimals, Your Shape: Fitness Evolved, Kinect Sports, Kinect Joy Ride and Dance Central.

Kinectimals allows users to interact with zoo animals, Fitness Evolved is a fitness game, Sports is (you guessed it) a sports game, Joyride is a racing game, and Dance Central is a game that lets you "hone your dance skills" to pop hits.

Microsoft will begin offering a $299 Kinect bundle (4GB console, Kinect, Kinect Adventures game) on November 4th or you can purchase the system as a standalone (with the game) for $150.

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AT&T has said today that it will be giving away a free "Entertainment Pack" to buyers of Windows Phone 7 devices.

Included in the pack is a free month to U-Verse Mobile, the Xbox Live game ilomilo and a free one-month subscription for Zune Pass, the unlimited music streaming service.

Reads the press release:

The Entertainment Pack includes: 1) Xbox LIVE® game ilomilo, 2) 30 days free unlimited music service + 10 free songs to keep through one-month Zune® Pass trial, and 3) 30 days free to download and watch hit TV shows with U-verse® Mobile.

The Entertainment Pack is available (while supplies last) at no charge to consumers who purchase a Windows Phone device from AT&T between October 25, 2010, and December 31, 2010.

Redemption must be completed by December 31, 2010, by 11:59 p.m. PT. Consumers can redeem this offer by going to att.com/windowsphone and clicking on the Entertainment Pack offer, providing information to confirm their device purchase, and following the redemption instructions.

Redemption requires: a valid U.S. credit card, PC Internet access, Wi-Fi availability, ability to send and receive SMS messages.

Additionally, Microsoft is handing out three-month Zune Passes to anyone who pre-orders a device directly from the store.

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We already knew AT&T was giving away ilomilo and a free month of U-verse Mobile to folks who buy one of its glorious Windows Phone 7 phones. What else? Well, AT&T is tossing in a free month of Zune Pass for good measure. Now, Microsoft already offers 14 day free trials to the Zune-curious, and there's nothing stopping other carriers or Microsoft itself extending this deal to the rest of the world -- we think the "first one's free" method of addiction generation is particularly great for subscription music. Still, it's nice to know AT&T has such an offer sewn up. Now that the Xbox is getting a native Zune UI at long last, how about a free month of Zune for Xbox Live subscribers as well? Microsoft can afford it.


The Entertainment Pack includes: 1) Xbox LIVE® game ilomilo, 2) 30 days free unlimited music service + 10 free songs to keep through one-month Zune® Pass trial, and 3) 30 days free to download and watch hit TV shows with U-verse® Mobile.

The Entertainment Pack is available (while supplies last) at no charge to consumers who purchase a Windows Phone device from AT&T between October 25, 2010, and December 31, 2010.

Redemption must be completed by December 31, 2010, by 11:59 p.m. PT. Consumers can redeem this offer by going to att.com/windowsphone and clicking on the Entertainment Pack offer, providing information to confirm their device purchase, and following the redemption instructions.

Redemption requires: a valid U.S. credit card, PC Internet access, Wi-Fi availability, ability to send and receive SMS messages.

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We already knew AT&T was giving away ilomilo and a free month of U-verse Mobile to folks who buy one of its glorious Windows Phone 7 phones. What else? Well, AT&T is tossing in a free month of Zune Pass for good measure. Now, Microsoft already offers 14 day free trials to the Zune-curious, and there's nothing stopping other carriers or Microsoft itself extending this deal to the rest of the world -- we think the "first one's free" method of addiction generation is particularly great for subscription music. Still, it's nice to know AT&T has such an offer sewn up. Now that the Xbox is getting a native Zune UI at long last, how about a free month of Zune for Xbox Live subscribers as well? Microsoft can afford it.


The Entertainment Pack includes: 1) Xbox LIVE® game ilomilo, 2) 30 days free unlimited music service + 10 free songs to keep through one-month Zune® Pass trial, and 3) 30 days free to download and watch hit TV shows with U-verse® Mobile.

The Entertainment Pack is available (while supplies last) at no charge to consumers who purchase a Windows Phone device from AT&T between October 25, 2010, and December 31, 2010.

Redemption must be completed by December 31, 2010, by 11:59 p.m. PT. Consumers can redeem this offer by going to att.com/windowsphone and clicking on the Entertainment Pack offer, providing information to confirm their device purchase, and following the redemption instructions.

Redemption requires: a valid U.S. credit card, PC Internet access, Wi-Fi availability, ability to send and receive SMS messages.

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Verizon Wireless will start their tiered data plans for smartphones next week, says the WSJ, following AT&T's decision in June to remove unlimited plans in favor of more restrictive, but cheaper subscriptions.

Subscribers will now have the chance to purchase 150MB a month for $15, or keep their unlimited plan for $30.

Both Verizon and AT&T have said in the past that 95 percent of users don't need unlimited plans as a good portion use under 100MB per monthly cycle.

Five percent of smartphone users use about 50 percent of all data bandwidth, added Verizon.

"It's designed to make data more affordable for entry-level users," added Roger Entner, an analyst for Nielsen. "There's a large number of people who simply can't afford $30 for data."

For now, the $15 plan is a "holiday promotion" but Verizon hopes to make it permanent if it's successful.

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HP, who acquired Palm earlier this year for $1.6 billion has finally announced WebOS 2.0, the second-coming of Palm's popular mobile operating system.

Furthermore, the company announced the launch of the Palm Pre 2, which will first hit France this week and then Verizon in the United States in "a few months."

HP says WebOS 2.0 is "the most significant update" to the mobile OS since its inception in June of last year.

One of few of the new features is improved multitasking thanks to "Stacks." Stacks keep all related items together.

"Exhibitions" lets you see a slideshow of Facebook photos or view your calender when docked on the optional Palm Touchstone Charging Dock.

Notably, WebOS 2.0 will support a beta of Adobe Flash 10.1.

The Palm Pre 2 looks very much like its predecessor except HP has turned the display to glass, added an improved 5MP camera and a 1GHz processor.

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Phandroid has posted a blurry pic this week of the Nexus One smartphone running Google's upcoming Android 3.0 Gingerbread, giving everyone an early look of the new features coming with the firmware update.

There are a number of cosmetic changes including the notification bar becoming a darker gray and the dialer and browser buttons becoming light green, the same color as the Android mascot.

Additionally, native voice and video calling will be made available through Google Talk, over both 3G and Wi-Fi.

The YouTube app will be completely re-done, as well, integrating it more into the OS.

Google Voice will be updated to allow users to receive calls to your Google Voice number over Wi-Fi and cellular data.

For now those are the only confirmed aspects of the upcoming Android update, which many believe Google will use to unify the platform, moving away from the fragmentation issues that have so far plagued Android. Expect Gingerbread by the end of the year.

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Earlier this week, auction giant eBay expanded to three new countries including Finland, AfterDawn's home nation.

A few months ago, eBay opened sites in Russia, the Czech Republic, Greece, Denmark, Sweden and Norway as part of their broader eBay International Market program.

Adding Finland, Hungary and Portugal to the program will give 25 million people the chance to use a local eBay site (in their own native language) to make international purchases.

However, the company notes that auctions themselves, including titles and descriptions will not be translated into local languages.

Shoppers will be able to search for fixed-price items that are delivered to those nations and the prices are converted to local currency.

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