I’d looked at FeedBurner a few weeks ago when I was setting up WordPress, but I put it under ‘Things To Look At In More Depth Later’ at the time. Google’s acquisition of FeedBurner the other day, bumped it to the top of the stack. I generally favor Google’s services, and if it was good enough for them to acquire, it was worth looking at.

Alex of TiVoBlog also recommended it, and the FeedSmith WordPress plug-in. Tonight I installed FeedSmith and setup both the main blog feed and the blog comments feed via FeedBurner. I’m also trying out some of their additional services - you’ll notice a new ‘Email Subscription’ form in the left column of the blog, and some new links along the bottom of each entry, both on the site and in the feed.

So far things look OK. If you have any feedback, leave a comment. Thanks.

TiVo sent out an email promoting their Father’s Day specials, including the $200 rebate on the Series3. As I posted previously, there are deals on both the S2DT and the S3. However, you’ll save more buying the S3 elsewhere than you will buying from TiVo.com. Amazon is selling the S3 for $606.95, just $406.95 after rebate. DVRupgrade also has deals on pre-expanded units.

To connect the unit wirelessly, use the TiVo Wireless G USB Network Adapter. You can also pick up TiVo Service Gift Cards if you’re giving it as a gift.

As always, if you pick up a box, the TiVo Referral Points are appreciated.

TiVo’s email below:
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TiVo Inc. (Nasdaq: TIVO), the creator and a leader in advertising solutions and television services for digital video recorders (DVRs), today announced that Media IQ, a firm specializing in highly quantitative media measurement to maximize client marketing Return-On-Investment (ROI), has subscribed to the Stop||Watch(TM) ratings service. New York-based Media IQ has purchased the Stop||Watch ratings service to complement the traditional ROI research it provides its roster of leading national advertisers.

Good to see TiVo’s data services continuing to gain traction in the market.

Sony’s new Blu-ray player, the BDP-S300, had been previously announced at $599. However, Sony is now saying that the player, which ships this week, will street with an MSRP of $499 instead. Blu-ray player prices have been dropping rapidly since the format launched late last year with players $999 and above. The new player has basically the same capabilities as the older BDP-S1, but in a smaller package.

Sony attributes the falling prices to rising demand for Blu-ray products, and falling component prices and production costs. This puts the standalone player on par, price-wise, with the Sony PS3 - the least expensive version of which also sells for $499.

This is interesting, it seems Sony Ericsson has patented the ‘PSP Phone’. The name pretty much says it all - a combination cell phone and PlayStation Portable.

As the image shows, the screen rotates through 180-degrees for a more gaming-friendly orientation, putting the controls into a PSP-like configuration. Sony Ericsson has already drawn on Sony brands in the past, producing Walkman-branded music-phones and Cybershot-branded camera-phones. It looks like an interesting concept to me.

Oh, speaking of the iPhone - Apple has announced June 29th as the release date. Frankly, I couldn’t care less. I’m not impressed by the iPhone. Some of the technology, like the multi-touch screen, is nice. But overall, from what I’ve seen it wouldn’t replace my Treo very well. Once they’re in stores I’ll try to play with one to see if it makes a better hands-on impression.

Last week’s Foleo annoucement was a bit underwhelming. I wouldn’t go as far as to call it the “Folly-o”, as I’ve seen some sites dub it, but it still doesn’t seem like Jeff Hawkins ‘best idea ever’, which is apparently how he views it. I see potential there, but the product as revealed is underwhelming. Even Hawkins said that if he could do it again he’d put in a better CPU to handle video. Jeff, the product hasn’t launched yet, YOU CAN DO IT AGAIN! Don’t launch it if it has known flaws, do it right the first time. First impressions count.

Well, Palm got some better news today - private-equity firm Elevation Partners is acquiring a 25% stake for $325 million. Possibly even better news, the deal also brings Jon Rubinstein, who formerly ran the iPod divsion at Apple, in as executive chairman of Palm’s board. Fred Anderson and Roger McNamee, both managing directors and founders of Elevation, will also be joining the board. Current board members Eric Benhamou and D. Scott Mercer will depart.

Hopefully Rubinstein and bring some focus to Palm and put them back on track as a real innovator in the mobile device space. He had this to say, in a release:

“Approximately 1 billion cell phones are sold each year, and mobile computing is a category with enormous potential. This is a company with an impressive history of introducing game-changing products–it pioneered the smart phone–and I intend to help extend that legacy.”

I’ve been a Palm supported for quite a while, getting my first unit in 1998. I’d love to see more innovation out of Palm - maybe something to explain Hawkins’s view of the Foleo.