Sony

Last week, the Consumer Electronics Association announced its plan to label the next generation of high definiton televisions as Ultra HD, along with some baseline specifications to qualify for the label. Sony, for one, isn't planning on toeing the line. Sony has announced that they plan to continue using the 4K moniker by labeling their future products as 4K UHD. To be fair, consumer electronics manufacturers are in not beholden to the labeling strictures of the CEA, so there is nothing wrong with Sony choosing to forge its own path, though one must wonder if this move is so much about providing clarity for consumers as it is about capitalizing on the 4K label that is starting to show up more often at theater box offices so as to create the impression that Sony's TVs offer something closer to the 4096 x 2160 resolution of digital cinemas than the 3840 x 2160 resolution of UHDTV.

"To ensure clarity for consumers and delineate between today's and tomorrow's technology, Sony will continue to use the 4K moniker for its products and will market its future products as 4K ultra-high-definition (4K UHD)," she said.

cNet

The big iOS news of the week may have been Apple's iPhone 5 announcement and the opening of the preorder floodgates, but some big names in the streaming media business have been sneaking around releasing updates to their apps. The Hulu Plus, MAX GO, and HBO GO iOS apps have all received updates to offer support for closed captions. That this feature is only just coming to these mobile apps surprises me, even leaving aside the obvious issue of accessibility for the hearing-impaired. For one thing, these companies already deal heavily in closed captioned content, Hulu on their website, and Cinemax and HBO through their cable channels, so the need for support in their apps should not have been a surprise. On top of that, watching streaming media on a mobile device seems far more likely to put one in a noisy situation where one would desire captions to supplement the audio. Hopefully the other mobile platforms will be seeing similar updates soon.

In a move that should please the hard of hearing and anyone trying to watch a video quietly sans-headphones, the Hulu Plus, HBO Go and Max Go apps for iOS devices have all recently been updated with support for closed captions. 

Engadget

Hulu wasn't devoting all of their attention to their iOS app this week. The Hulu Plus iOS update comes with more than just closed captioning support, but it is not nearly as radical an update as the Playstation 3 got his week. The Hulu Plus app for the Playstation 3 received a significant overhaul that fundamentally changes the browsing interface, slims down and simplifies the playback controls, and offers improvements to search to make accessing results easier. The greater emphasis on artwork certainly helps to make the new interface pretty, as well.

We’ve implemented a tray-style format that allows you to scroll through recommendations based on your viewing history, or check out popular shows and movies, the top 100 clips on Hulu Plus, movie trailers and more. We’ve also included a “Shows You Watch” feature that highlights the content you regularly enjoy, and lets you jump straight to the latest episode.

Playstation Blog

At 84", the Sony XBR-84X900 is large enough to be impressive in its own right, but making the set even more intiguing is the fact it is a 4K television. With a native resolution of 3840X2160, the XBR-84X900 offers double the number of pixels along both the horizontal and vertical axes as compared to a standard 1080p HDTV. The TV also incorporates a 50 watt virtual surround sound speaker system, WiFi networking connectivity for the Smart TV functionality, passive 3D, and Simulview gaming support for single screen 2-player gaming with the PS3. Sony is planning on releasing the monster television later this year. Pricing details are not available yet, but expect the price tag to be as daunting as the number of pixels on the screen. On a side note, the announcement of the XBR-84X900 is the first time I have noticed a reference to QFHD or "quad full high definition" for describing a 4K TV. I had expected UHDTV, or "ultra high definition television" to take hold.

In addition to the usual networked "smart TV" features, the massive XBR-84X900 set incorporates "proprietary upscaling technology," which Sony claimed will "ensure that every frame looks clear and crisp, with a 4K resolution regardless of the content source." We're highly suspicious of those claims, but native 1080p content should scale well since QFHD is essentially "pixel doubling" of 1920x1080. 

Ars Technica

The idea that a game console manufacturer would present a keynote at E3 that is almost entirely devoted to video games should not surprise anyone, and that is exactly what Sony did this year. Sure, there was some weird ebook/augmented reality app/PlayStation Move thingy that some Harry Potter fan somewhere will enjoy, but otherwise the keynote was pretty much all games. Sony did briefly speak to the variety of media apps available on the PlayStation Network, but the only announcement was the addition of Hulu Plus and Crackle apps for the PlayStation Vita. 

The Vita will get new multimedia services in the coming months. It already has Netflix and YouTube is coming to the device later this month, and Sony announced at the presentation that Hulu Plus and free video service Crackle will also come to the PlayStation Vita in the future.

PCMag.com