Daily Marauder

TECHNOLOGY

It’s a blood bath out there this morning. The S&P 500 is at a four-year low as the credit crisis keeps getting worse, despite the passage of the government’s $700 billion bailout plan. The market is taking tech stocks down with it. Google is down 4 percent to $368, its lowest point since 2006. Apple is down 6 percent to $91. Microsoft is down nearly 5 percent to $25. Amazon, Yahoo, eBay—all down. (http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/10/06/tech-stocks-take-it-on-the-chin-as-market-continues-to-freefall 10/6)

Images published on the Boy Genius Report blog appear to show a redesigned and resized Amazon Kindle that trades its scroll wheel for a joystick. An Amazon representative said consumers should not expect a new version of the reader anytime this year. Pocket-lint.co.uk (10/6)

Increasing competition from other media has sent TV manufacturers rushing toward developing technology that might make 3-D pictures the next big step forward for broadcasters, some industry executives are saying. “If you go to any 3-D trade show, there are only two things on all of the displays-movies or live sports. Three to four years from now, there should be a lot of content in a lot of venues,” said Andrew Setos, engineering president at News Corp.’s Fox Group. TVWeek.com (10/5)

ABI Research predicts the market for home automation will experience rapid growth in the next five years, expanding to 4 million homes by 2013. The growth will be fueled by DIY packages plus wireless and broadband services that allow home monitoring. CEPro.com (10/3)

Yamaha has released four new products that feature audio docks for the iPod, all of them shipping in December at prices ranging from $300 to $1,233, the company said. The power on the devices range from 20 watts for a pair of the lower-end speakers to 25 watts for a midrange line to 60 watts for the MCS-1330. ElectronicHouse.com (10/3)