Disney, who along with Paramount remain the only studios who still offer new releases to Netflix and Redbox the same day they go on sale, has raised the price it charges the rental outfits for the privilege.

The company will now charge Netflix and Redbox up to $18 per DVD, their full wholesale rate.

'Secretariat' was the first DVD to be hit with the increased pricing. The rental companies got the DVD for Secretariat on January 25th.

Disney has not followed in the footsteps of Fox, Universal and Warner, which have blocked Netflix and Redbox from making new releases available to customers until 28 days after they are released, a delay window long enough to appease internal concerns that the rentals hurt DVD sales on new releases.

Executives at Disney have said that they do not share those fears, especially since animated films and other family friendly Disney movies are often purchased rather than rented.

The wholesale price will drop to $10.80 per movie after 28 days.

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The IBM supercomputer 'Watson' has finished handily defeating its human opponents on Jeopardy today, beating former champions Ken Jennings and Bruce Rutter.

At the end of the three-day special event, Watson finished with $77,147 to Jenning's $24,000 and Rutter's $21,600.

After the first day of the three-day event, Watson was tied with Rutter at $5000 each, with Jennings lagging behind at $2000. At the end of day 2, however, Watson had taken a commanding lead, with $35,734 to Rutter's $10,400 and Jennings' $4,800.

IBM will receive $1 million, which it is donating to World Vision. Second place gets $300,000 and third gets $200,000. Jennings and Rutter will donate half of their winnings.

Watson is able to calculate thousands of algorithms at the same time, while searching its massive database for the right answer. The behemoth computer runs on ninety 32-core IBM Power 750 Express servers and has 16TB of memory.

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According to the Official PlayStation Magazine, classic PS2 games will soon be available for download via the PlayStation Network.

Currently, Sony offers PSX titles for download on the PSP and PS3.

The company did say last month that some popular PSX games would never be available via PSN, simply because they are too complicated to port or are too buggy.

Sony removed all PS2 backwards compatibility from PlayStation 3 consoles early on, claiming it would lower costs which would then be passed on to the consumer.

Regardless, there will certainly be buyers for blockbuster games like God of War and Grand Theft Auto, especially if available on the upcoming Sony NGP (PSP 2).

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Leaked sales data from BGR claim that iPhone 4 sales on Verizon are actually slower than anticipated.

BGR posted sales totals from five Apple brick-and-mortar stores including two "very, very prominent" ones, following the first five days of the smartphone's launch on the carrier.

While there was huge hype for the launch, there were no lines (or small ones) outside of Apple stores on launch day, a stark difference from the phone's launch on AT&T, where eager buyers waited overnight on the street to get the device on the first day.

The full data (sales for Verizon, sales for AT&T, same store):

Thursday: Verizon = 909, AT&T = 539
Friday: Verizon = 916, AT&T = 680
Saturday: Verizon = 660, AT&T = 471
Sunday: Verizon = 796, AT&T = 701
Monday: Verizon = 711, AT&T = 618

Pre-orders of the smartphone were large, however, coming to 550,000 units.

Finally, the site says 30 percent of Verizon iPhone buyers came from Android, 25 percent from BlackBerry and 14 percent from the AT&T iPhone.

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Sony Ericsson has said today that future purchasers of the Xperia Play Android gaming phone will have to repurchase all of their classic PSX downloadable games, regardless of when you bought them.

Most of the games available for the Xperia Play will be developed exclusively for the platform, but there are a number of direct PSX ports that will be available, as well.

You will not be able to just re-download those already purchased games, you will have to re-buy them.

Says Sony Ericsson UK managing director Nathan Vautier (via TG):

You will have to re-purchase the games, so it's not totally integrated. I think the exciting thing is that there are games which people are very, very aware of.

The Xperia Play will launch next month with 50 downloadable games available and only a few being direct ports that were available on the PSP/PS3 before.

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British technology firm ARM Holdings, plc. is expecting a boost in revenues from new high-end smartphones unveiled this week in Barcelona.

New high-end devices utilize ARM's new multi-core processor technologies. ARM licenses its technology to chipmakers like Broadcom, Samsung and Renesas instead of making chips of its own. It earns revenue from royalties on the sale of microprocessor units, as well as charging a licensing fee for the use of its technology.

Smartphones such as the new LG Optimus 3D and Samsung Galaxy SII are powered by ARM's Cortex, dual-core designs, which are also used to power tablet computers and microcontrollers.

It receives up to two percent of the selling price of chips based on the Cortex designs, and about one percent for the older chip technology which is still widely in use. The switch then to Cortex architecture in smartphones and tablets will significantly increase the revenue from royalty payments.

ARM CEO Warren East told Reuters that the company is not surprised by the speed of the roll-out of its newer chip technologies. He said that the company is keeping an edge over Intel in the ever-growing space. "Intel is still a long way apart in processors on the market," he said. "Unless they can make their processors smaller they will struggle."

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Symantec has published a report on the Stuxnet malware that made headlines around the world last year.

The complex piece of malware was believed to be targeted at Iran's nuclear program, with fingers of blame pointing at the United States and/or Israel for mandating it (though the origin of the malware itself is still a mystery).

Now a detailed description of Stuxnet has been released by Symantec, and the well-known security firm says it was targeted at five industrial facilities in Iran over 10 months. Symantec did not mention the targets by name however, and would not confirm whether the targets had links to the country's nuclear program.

Iran has denied that Stuxnet caused any major damage to its nuclear facilities, but analysis has previously shown that Stuxnet had the capability to disrupt the centrifuges used to enrich uranium. Once Stuxnet compromised a computer network, it was designed to seek out a specific configuration of industrial control software made by Siemens.

It would then reprogram the PLC software to alter instructions given to attached industrial machinery.

Symantec suggests that the authors of the Stuxnet malware must have had extensive knowledge of the systems in use at the targeted organizations. It infected and spread by use of USB keys, bringing it to networks not usually connected to the Internet for security reasons. The virus could have been spread among the targeted organizations by contractors associated with them.

A Symantec PDF document on Stuxnet is available at: http://www.symantec.com/

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Motorola CEO Sanjay Jha has finally confirmed the price of the upcoming Motorola Xoom tablet, which will sell for $800 (3G version) or $600 (Wi-Fi-only version).

The tablet launches next Thursday.

Motorola's Xoom will be the first tablet to run Android 3.0 Honeycomb, which has been optimized for media tablets.

The powerful tablet will ship with a 10.1-inch display, 1280x800 resolution, a Nvidia Tegra 2 1GHz dual-core processor, 1GB DDR2 RAM, 32GB onboard memory (expendable via SD), a 5MP dual-LED flash standard camera and a 2MP front-side camera for video conferencing.

Furthermore, the tablet has a micro USB 2.0 port, an HDMI-port, 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR.

Battery life has been rated at 10 hours (peak) for video playback.

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Sony has posted their first official response to the recent release of custom firmwares for the PlayStation 3 that allow for signed homebrew and the inevitable piracy of games.

Says the corporation:

Notice: Unauthorized circumvention devices for the PlayStation 3 system have been recently released by hackers. These devices permit the use of unauthorized or pirated software. Use of such devices or software violates the terms of the "System Software License Agreement for the PlayStation 3 System" and the "Terms of Services and User Agreement" for the PlayStation Network/Qriocity and its Community Code of Conduct provisions. Violation of the System Software Licence Agreement for the PlayStation 3 System invalidates the consumer guarantee for that system. In addition, copying or playing pirated software is a violation of International Copyright Laws. Consumers using circumvention devices or running unauthorized or pirated software will have access to the PlayStation Network and access to Qriocity services through PlayStation 3 system terminated permanently.

To avoid this, consumers must immediately cease use and remove all circumvention devices and delete all unauthorized or pirated software from their PlayStation 3 systems.

And the U.S. PlayStation Blog's continuation:

What this means to you

Circumvention devices and game piracy damage our industry and can potentially injure the online experience for you, our loyal PlayStation customers, via hacks and cheats.

Many PlayStation.Blog readers have asked how we intend to deal with these incidents that they have been reading about in the gaming press, and this is our initial response.

By identifying PlayStation 3 systems that breach our guidelines and terminating their ability to connect to PlayStation Network, we are protecting our business and preserving the honest gameplay experiences that you expect and deserve.

Rest assured, this message does not apply to the overwhelming majority of our users who enjoy the world of entertainment PlayStation 3 has to offer without breaching the guidelines detailed above, and we urge you to continue doing so without fear.

Sony has been very aggressive in their actions since the first release of the master signing key by George "Geohot" Holtz last month, suing the hacker and subpoenaing info on others who share the code and tools to use it.

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According to Engadget, Sony is creating a PlayStation-certified Android gaming tablet, one that will be released in September.

The 9.4-inch tablet will run a customized Android 3.0, and is currently going by the internal codename "S1."

Sources speaking to the site say Sony has brought out an engineering team from their VAIO, Reader, PlayStation, and Sony Ericsson product groups for the product.

The tablet will focus on Qriocity, Sony's on-demand music, games, movie and ebook service. Additionally, the tablet will come preloaded with Sony PSX games, a Bravia Media Remote for HDTV integration and an IR port built-in.

Inside, the device is powered by a Tegra 2 dual-core processor and the tablet will feature 1280x800 resolution and dual cameras.

Finally, Engadget explains the "design" of the tablet which looks like the picture posted below:

The tablet's "wrap" design is meant to remind the owner of something personal in the way that it mimics an open paperback stuffed into the back pocket, or a magazine folded backward upon itself such that only a single page is visible to read. A design that also gives the tablet's display enough angle to comfortably touch-type when placed on a table. It also makes one-handed operation a bit less taxing on the wrist by shifting the center of gravity to the bulbous edge of the device.

Best of all, it won't be ridiculously expensive, as a Wi-Fi-only model will sell for $600.

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