Unlocked iPhones may total 1 million.

Between 800,000 and 1 million iPhones have been unlocked without permission.

25 percent of all iPhones reportedly in the hands of customers that have modified their phones rather than activate them with O2, Orange, or T-Mobile .

The large numbers are due to the relatively quick creation of a hardware based unlock by the Czech firm Bladox. In August of last year, the company developed a variant of its Turbo SIM card that turned from handling mobile payments to fooling the iPhone into believing it was running an activated, officially sanctioned SIM card from AT&T.

In the US, iPhone sent to phone recycling are often shipped to wholesale outlets that fix and promptly sell unlocked versions of the once-discarded devices.

Apple and its official partners have done little to slow the tide Nonetheless, lost carrier income is described a non issue; many unlocked iPhones are sold in countries where no official providers exist.

Branson Unveils New Tourist Spacecraft

“2008 will really be the year of the spaceship,” said Sir Richard Branson...Sir Richard, who founded a company, Virgin Galactic, that promises to take tourists on brief trips to the edge of space, was there to show off the sleek pod of a spacecraft and its spidery carrier plane.

In 2004, SpaceShipOne earned Mr. Rutan and his backer, Paul Allen, the $10 million Ansari X Prize when it carried a pilot to the edge of space twice in five days. Since then, Mr. Rutan has been working on the follow-up vehicle for Sir Richard, under his customary heavy secrecy.
Test flights of the planes could occur this year. Passenger flights are not expected to begin before late 2009 or 2010.

The vehicle is meant to open space to a new generation of spacefarers who are more creative than the classically trained astronauts, Mr. Rutan said. And that will bring with it a new way of looking at space travel, just as personal computing opened up the use of computers from a military and academic tool to something that transformed the world.

Virgin Galactic had received 200 firm reservations and $30 million in deposits.

Virgin has tested most of those customers for the ability to withstand the high G forces of space flight by taking them for a centrifuge ride. Of the 80 including the scientist James Lovelock, who is 88, as well as people who have had heart bypass surgery and limb replacement — only two were unable to take the forces.

“We’ve proved that ordinary people can go to space,” he said, “and almost all of us have the right stuff.”

Amazon MP3, Pepsi team up for promotion

January 14, 2008 Amazon.com and Pepsi on Monday announced a new promotion called Pepsi Stuff, through which consumers buying Pepsi products will be able to download DRM-free digital music from Amazon MP3.

Consumers will be able to "bank" and redeem points on PepsiStuff.com beginning Feb. 1, by collecting them through purchases of specially marked Pepsi products. Pepsi says that 4 billion marked packages will be in circulation. The promotion will extend across the entire Pepsi product line.

Amazon MP3 is Amazon's digital music purchase and download service. The service features artists represented by major labels and by tens of thousands of independent labels; it includes more than 3.25 million songs from over 270,00 artists in its inventory. The music downloaded via Amazon MP3 isn't protected by a digital rights management system and can be played on virtually any MP3-compatible device, including Apple iPods, iPhones and Macs.

FCC Issues Rule Changes For Switch to Digital Television

The Federal Communications Commission has announced rule changes to give broadcasters more flexibility in switching from analog to digital television.

The FCC announced changes on New Year's Eve. Under the new rules, broadcasters would be allowed to phase out or end their analog signals before the Feb. 17, 2009, deadline. The FCC also announced, in its third periodic review of the transition plans, that it will begin issuing coupons to help consumers pay for converter boxes.

"The commission has made technical adjustments to its rules and policies to enable broadcasters to take the actions necessary to complete the conversion from analog to digital," FCC Commissioner Kevin Martin said in a statement. "As all major changes tend to be, the coming transition to digital television transmission is an exciting -- but complicated -- revolution. The rules we adopt in this item attempt to provide broadcasters the flexibility they need while at the same time ensuring that any disruption to over-the-air viewers is minimized to the fullest extent possible."

The commission will require broadcasters to provide progress updates in February and October.

"The commission will review this information, assess the progress toward meeting the transition, and take whatever actions are necessary to ensure that the digital transition remains on track," Martin said. "It is by taking concrete steps to advance this transition that we can ensure that the broadcast spectrum is made available as soon as possible for critically important public safety needs and broadband wireless uses."

Commissioner Michael Copps criticized the timing of the move.

"One year earlier would have been the charm," he said. "Sometimes timing is everything, and here a year's earlier start might have been the difference between a seamless and a chaotic Digital TV Transition. Had we acted then, we could have established a far more measured and orderly switch-over process, and the difficult trade-offs and compressed schedules contained in this order could have been largely avoided. If a dissent could legitimately be based on frustration at being stuck in this situation, I would dissent today -- I am that frustrated by our inaction."

Copps said that since the FCC was "stuck" the order "does an acceptable job of balancing the various technical and policy factors in play.

"Unfortunately, at this point, the transition will not be as smooth as it might have been," he said in a statement. "Not every consumer will have access to all of their analog broadcast channels on February 17, 2009 and then wake up happily the next morning to those same stations in digital. There will be some period of time -- perhaps before the transition date and almost certainly after -- in which some stations may not be able to provide service to all of their viewers."

Copps said that it is "unfathomable" that the government will block every analog signal in the United States at once without testing the plans. He said other countries, like the United Kingdom and Germany, are making the switch in a more cautious way, going region-by-region over a period of several years.

"The lessons learned from those initial test markets doubtless will prove invaluable to those countries' broader transition efforts," he said. "We need some of that real-world experience here. Why in the world aren't we doing that? I am encouraged that the chairman and my colleagues are willing to sit down now and begin exploring the idea of one or more DTV demonstration projects around the country. I recognize there may be legal, technical, and practical challenges with planning and conducting such a test this close to the national transition date. But I believe it can be done. At least -- for the sake of a successful DTV transition -- let's hope it can."