AUDIO VIDEO NEWS

Consider the humble headphone jack. Whether it welcomes a big quarter-inch plug or a mini-plug, it is the nearly universal analog interface for headphones great and small. Apple is trying to change that with an addition to its Made for iPhone spec. Apple-friendly headphones will use the company’s new Lightning connector to receive 48-kilohertz digital stereo input, or 48-kHz mono for headphones with integrated mikes. Lightning headphones dubbed Standard will include a DAC, while those dubbed Advanced will add DSP and features such as active noise cancellation.

TV station owners are worried that a lack of convertors may let analog sets fade to black after the transition to digital television.

Comcast and NBC are in merger talks, according to The Wall Street Journal.

A new bill introduced by Senators John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Joe Lieberman (D-Conn.) entitled the "Spectrum Availability for Emergency-response and Law-enforcement to Improve Vital Emergency Services Act" - otherwise known as "The SAVE LIVES Act" - will, if passed, directly affect the on-going Digital TV transition and the impending analog broadcast cut-off date. The proposed legislation assigns a hard cut-off date of January 1, 2009 - the point in time when the nation's television over-the-air broadcasters will be required to begin using the digital TV spectrum which has been assigned to them and return the spectrum they've been using for analog broadcasts.

EchoStar, the owner of the Dish Network, is accumulating debt from the recently merged Sirius XM Satellite Radio Inc., according to The Wall Street Journal. The newspaper speculates that this "could be the first salvo in an attempt to take control of the battered company," either inside or outside of bankruptcy.

A clash is shaping up between DTV broadcasters and other potential users of their spectrum. Broadcasters are getting ready to defend the spectrum they received in the DTV transition which concluded in 2009. But some in the federal government say much of that spectrum that would be better used for expanded cellphone networks and a new generation of wireless internet service.

What The New York Times describes as "an old media vs. new media lobbying battle" is now underway.