UPDATES: News from our Digital Universe

DIGITAL PAPYRUS – The scroll is not dead as a reading medium.  Anne Eisenberg of the New York Times reviews the latest evolution of the electronic book, the roll-up Readius, made by a Dutch company, Polymer Vision … DUTCH TREAT – While the U.S. is going cold-turkey and switching by February of next year from analog to digital TV broadcasting on all full-power local stations, the Netherlands is moving more gradually – 73 percent of Dutch TVs are still analog, according to reporter Robert Briel, reporting for Broadcast Band TV News, published in Cambridge, UK – although a quarter of the population already watches TV on their desktop and laptop computers … VIRTUAL “LIFE” IN INDIA – Interest inside India in the on-line world Second Life (who dares call it a “game”) is surging, says V.K. Rishi in the Economic Times, India’s largest financial daily.  The world’s biggest steelmaker, ArcelorMittal, founded in India, recently held a shareholders’ meeting in Second Life (and now you can buy that company’s shares there in “Linden” dollars) … ON-LINE MUSIC? PRICELESS – The Radiohead experiment with pay-what-you-want software isn’t winning many followers among established artists in the music industry, according to Swati Padney, writing in the Los Angeles Times.  Mostly, the fans just rip off the tunes for free.  But newer bands, which have been giving away their music anyway in the local coffeeshop to get a proper buzz going, are happy that they occasionally get a dollar or two in revenue and worldwide “exposure” on the web.  Software developers at Topspin Media have even designed a new platform, now in beta test, that any artist can use to collect those pennies.

■ Tom Goff