May 1 - 3:15am EDT  Days after celebrating iTunes' fifth anniversary, Apple on Thursday is expected to announce a breakthrough movie distribution deal that would allow it to sell new releases at the iTunes Store, offering a digital content delivery alternative to DVD sales. The new agreement will include major studios such as Fox, Walt Disney Studios, Warner Bros., Paramount, Universal, Sony Pictures, Lionsgate and New Line as well as smaller boutiques such as Magnolia and Image Entertainment, but will leave out new titles from MGM, the report said. The Hollywood Reporter notes that the move would allow a broad slate of top-shelf films to be offered day-and-date with home video releases, potentially cannibalizing ... [full story]

April 25 - 7:10pm EDT   The Tennessee State government is reviewing the possibility of implementing a tax on digital media downloads, which would include music videos, movies, news and entertainment programs, music, ringtones, and electronic books, among others. Law firm Waller Landsen notes that standard software downloads would not be taxable, and while the proposition has not been shown to lawmakers, it is predictably drawing negative criticism. [full story]

April 22 - 7:45pm EDT   Sony Corporation of America has signed a merger agreement with Gracenote, Inc, and will pay approximately $260 million plus other contingent consideration for the digital media information warehouse. Formerly known as CDDB, Gracenote delivers information -- including lyrics -- on music to various services including Apple iTunes and Yahoo! Music Jukebox. The companies say that Gracenote's existing business will continue to operate separately as a wholly owned Sony subsidiary, and that the senior management team will remain with the company. [full story]

April 16 - 8:15pm EDT   Rivet 1.0 has been released, enabling users to stream video, music, and photos from Mac OS X to an Xbox 360 over a home network. Rivet allows users to quickly browse and view their entire collection of digital media from from anywhere in the house on their Xbox 360. The Mac OS X folder structure and organization is completely reproduced to allow you to quickly find the appropriate media. Features include: Music streaming of your iTunes library; Photo streaming of your iPhoto library and user defined folders; Video streaming from user defines folders; Full organization support, your mac is recreated on the Xbox 360 and quick automatic updating on the Xbox 360 when files ... [full story]

December 5 - 12:50am EST   Olive Media and designer Karim Rashid recently unveiled a stylized version of the Olive's OPUS N°5 digital music player. Rashid – having designed things from Dirt Devil vacuum cleaners to the Smiramis Hotel in Athens, Greece – has created four designs, inspired by binary notation. The boxes can hold up to 2200 CDs in lossless quality, and is capable of outputting up to 352.8 kHz, or up to eight times what a CD is capable of. Olive is currently selling the OPUS N°5 Karim Edition for $3000, and is available from the company's web site. [full story]