Free Republic

Speaking at a gathering of digital advertisers in New York City last night, Mr Schmidt refused to forecast when internet video would displace television, instead declaring: "That's already happened." "It's not a replacement for something that we know," he added. "It's a new thing that we have to think about, to program, to curate and build new platforms." YouTube recently surpassed the milestone of a billion unique users a month. Only the Google search engine and social network Facebook are frequented more often by those browsing the internet worldwide. However, the video site lags behind traditional television in the UK,...

LONDON (AFP) - A faulty digital television receiver has sparked a helicopter rescue mission after sending out a rogue distress signal, Britain's Royal Air Force has said. The "freeview" box -- which normally allows television viewers access to dozens of digital TV and radio channels via a standard, rooftop aerial -- sent out a signal identical to that for emergency beacons at sea. The SOS, beamed from Portsmouth, on England's south coast, was picked up by a satellite and sent to the RAF's Aeronautical Rescue Co-ordination Centre in Kinloss, northeast Scotland, in the early hours of January 5. Personnel then...

Couple's TV licence trick foiled CRAIG WALKER A COUPLE IN Aberdeen wrapped their television in a parcel of tin foil to try to avoid paying their licence. They believed the silver foil would make their set invisible to hi-tech detector vans. But the couple got a shock when a TV licensing squad came knocking on their door after their state-of-the art equipment picked up the set. The lengths householders will go to dodge paying a licence fee were revealed yesterday by TV Licensing, the firm which detects rogue viewers. A wide range of weird and wonderful excuses were recorded across...