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“A federal jury handed Apple a win in a long-running antitrust case on Tuesday, rejecting plaintiffs’ claims that the company had sidelined competitors and hiked up prices during the iPod’s heyday,” Julia Love reports for The Mercury News. “After just a few hours of deliberations, the eight-member jury sided with Apple that iTunes 7.0 was a meaningful improvement over previous versions of the software, rather than a plot to hobble rivals,” Love reports. “The verdict defuses a case that could have cost Apple as much as $1 billion.” “The trial was full of legal drama, including an eleventh-hour search for...

(Reuters) Oakland, CA — A software update for Apple Inc's iPod music player was not a product improvement, but was intended to improperly raise costs for consumers who wanted to switch to newer devices, an attorney for Apple customers said in court. Closing arguments were delivered on Monday in an Oakland, California, federal courtroom in an antitrust trial that has cast fresh scrutiny on Apple's onetime virtual domination of the digital music market. The plaintiffs, a group of individuals and businesses who purchased iPods from 2006 to 2009, are seeking about $350 million in damages from Apple for unfairly blocking...

“Apple Inc said it discovered that the lead consumer in a $1 billion group antitrust lawsuit over the iPod didn’t buy a device in the time period covered by the case, which could derail a trial now under way,” Karen Gullo reports for Bloomberg. “Bill Isaacson, Apple’s attorney, told U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers that plaintiff Marianna Rosen’s iPod was purchased in July 2009, three months after a deadline for iPod owners to be included in the case. The case, filed in 2005, is over claims that Apple sought to thwart rival music stores to maintain a monopoly over...

<p>Mayor Bloomberg - who has already cracked down on smoking, trans fats, salt and super-sized drinks - is embarking on a new crusade: preventing New Yorkers from going deaf.</p> <p>Hizzoner's health officials are planning a social-media campaign to warn young people about the risk of losing their hearing from listening to music at high volume on personal MP3 players, The Post has learned.</p>

The Analogue Counter-Revolution, Part 6 Part 1: Step Away from the Computer Part 2: iPad, Therefore I Am Part 3: Life between the Cracks Part 4: The Tyranny of Google Part 5: Digital Dark Age Ahead? Bach is singing. Well, from his grave at least. A local Bach Society presented its annual concert recently, a fine affair featuring selections from several composers, including Bach and Beethoven. The setting at the small chapel was perfect, and the musicians were first rate. Yet, the concert was only an hour long. Since half a dozen selections were featured, most ran only a few...

The Polk County school district is giving away iPods to some parents. The school district is using the device to reward parents of children with disabilities who fill out a 10-minute online survey. The district wants to know how well it's connecting with the parents and how to get parents involved in their children's education. The district is spending about $350,000 in federal stimulus money for the iPods. The district has more than 10,000 students with disabilities.

Really? THE FACTS A much-noted study last year raised more than a few eyebrows when it suggested that digital music players could set hearts aflutter — by interfering with pacemakers. The study, published in the journal Heart Rhythm, found that all it took to cause electrical interference in an implanted pacemaker was holding an iPod two inches from a patient’s chest. In some cases, the study found, an iPod caused interference when it was held within 18 inches of a patient. But many scientists were skeptical, and apparently for good reason. More recent studies that looked at music players have...

A report by the Financial Times (registration required) cites unnamed executives who say that Apple is in talks with record labels to offer access to the entire iTunes music library for a lump sum price. The fee would be added as a premium option on an iPod or iPhone, or it could come as a monthly charge. It would allow downloading of any song at any time so long as the purchaser still owns the device, and the songs would be yours to keep.This latest concept is similar to Nokia's "Comes With Music" program set to launch later this year....

Two Texas Target stores have served as scenes of embarrassment for the brick-and-mortar retail chain after an angry mother discovered rocks inside the box that was supposed to contain a shiny new $350 iPod. The box, which weighed as much as the iPod it was supposed to contain, was destined as a birthday gift to her teenage daughter. Upon returning to the store, Target employees believed the story but said they were sold out of that particular iPod model and that the woman was not allowed a refund in cash because she had purchased the device on her Target card....

Anger over NHS plan to give addicts iPods   Sarah-Kate Templeton, Health Editor   DRUG addicts are to be offered gift vouchers and prizes on the National Health Service under plans by the government’s medicine watchdog to encourage them to stay clean. The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (Nice) will recommend the system of inducements, which could enable clinics to offer televisions and iPods as prizes, to tackle the burgeoning drugs problem. But patients denied drugs for blindness, Alzheimer’s and lung cancer under Nice rationing are likely to accuse it of wasting public money. Katherine Murphy, of...

How listening to an iPod could stop your pacemaker workingBy DANIEL MARTIN - More by this author » Last updated at 23:27pm on 11th May 2007  Ipods can cause pacemakers to malfunction by making them go too fast, too slow or even stop altogether, according to a study. Researchers found that iPods could make pacemakers malfunction by interfering with the electromagnetic equipment monitoring the heart rate. As a result, the pacemaker was unable to effectively monitor how fast the heart was beating, making it unable to regulate its speed. The study may concern the increasing number of older people...

IPODS can kill people who use cardiac implantable pacemakers by interfering with the electromagnetic equipment monitoring the heart, according to a report on Reuters.

Although I have never been compelled by "slippery slope" arguments, something has to account for the recent popularity in the government banning commonplace practices such as talking on the phone, eating fatty foods, and listening to music. It started with the cell phone ban. Many of us did not protest the ban... after all, no one likes to deal with idiots swerving on the road with their cell phones. So when the government stepped in no one complained. Like the cell phone ban, which seemed to catch on like wildfire, banning smoking in bars also became popular. For many, it...

Singer Steve Nicks is doing her part to support U.S. troops by donating hundreds of iPods to soldiers wounded in Iraq. The former Fleetwood Mac star regularly visits soldiers at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland. She explains, "I refuse to be pulled into the politics of war. But once these soldiers sign up, go to war and come back to a hospital, I will do whatever it takes to make them better." Nicks has provided iPods loaded with her music, along with fellow artists Aerosmith and Elvis Presley. She has also sent baby clothes to war widows,...

Losing their jobs and even their iPodsBy Barry Shlachter, Jim Fuquay, Maria M. Perotin Star-Telegram Staff Writers National Semiconductor giveth, and it taketh away. The Santa Clara, Calif.-based company gained loads of publicity last month for announcing plans to give every employee a 30-gigabyte video iPod. Last week, the company laid off 35 employees at its Arlington plant. To the surprise of some at the plant, the laid-off workers were asked to give back their high-tech toys. A person who called the Star-Telegram claiming to have been one of the 35 laid-off workers said many employees at the Arlington plant...

Does your kid have an iPod? Does he or she want one? Don't even answer that question. Every kid in America either has one or wants one. The demand for these little devices is amazing – and so is the price, between $200-$300. "What's wrong with that?" you ask. "Commerce is good for America. It creates jobs and stimulates the economy." Jobs? Stimulated economy? Do you know where your iPod was made? Do you know by whom? The London Sunday Mail wanted to find out. It sent reporters to "iPod City," where most of the Apple music players are...

SAN DIEGO (UPI) -- A California psychologist says young people have become increasingly indifferent to the impression they make on others. Jean Twenge, the author of "Generation Me," teaches at San Diego State University. She gathered data from surveys taken between 1958 and 2001 by more than 40,000 youngsters. They featured questions aimed at whether the respondents always said "please" and "thank you" or were careful to dress appropriately. Twenge says that 76 percent of children aged 8 to 12 in 1999 were indifferent to social approval, up from 57 percent in 1970. Among those who were already in college...

College life is not just about drinking beer. In a rare instance, Apple Computer Inc.'s iconic iPod music player surpassed beer drinking as the most "in" thing among undergraduate college students, according to the latest biannual market research study by Ridgewood, New Jersey-based Student Monitor. Nearly three quarters, or 73 percent, of 1,200 students surveyed said iPods were "in" -- more than any other item in a list that also included text messaging, bar hopping and downloading music. In the year-ago study, only 59 percent of students named the iPod as "in," putting the gadget well below alcohol-related activities. This...

SAN JOSE, Calif. - Move over Bud. College life isn't just about drinking beer. In a rare instance, Apple Computer Inc.'s iconic iPod music player surpassed beer drinking as the most "in" thing among undergraduate college students, according to the latest biannual market research study by Ridgewood, N.J.-based Student Monitor. Nearly three quarters, or 73 percent, of 1,200 students surveyed said iPods were "in" — more than any other item in a list that also included text messaging, bar hopping and downloading music. In the year-ago study, only 59 percent of students named the iPod as "in," putting the gadget...

Hear that silence? It’s the sound of America going deaf from an earful of technology. What’s that, you say? Popular technology — not just the iPod — threatens everyone’s hearing, especially children and teenagers, according to a new report by the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA). While much attention has focused on the iPod and other personal music players, the association randomly chose and tested nine devices that can be turned up to potentially damaging decibel levels. Among those tested were Bluetooth headsets that allow wireless communication and laptop components that let travelers listen to private concerts while blocking out the...