The following was posted on the Google Blog by Bindu Reddy, Google Video Product Manager:

When your friends and well-intentioned acquaintances tell you that you’ve made a mistake, it’s good to listen. So we’d like to say thank you to everyone who wrote to let us know that we had made a mistake in the case of Google Video’s Download to Own/Rent Refund Policy vs. Common Sense.

To recap: we decided to end the Google Video download to own/rent (DTO/DTR) program, and are now refocusing our Google Video engineering efforts. The week before last, we wrote to Google Video DTO/DTR program customers to let them know that videos they’d already bought would no longer be playable.

We planned to give these users a full refund or more. And because we weren’t sure if we had all the correct addresses, latest credit card information, and other billing challenges, we thought offering the refund in the form of Google Checkout credits would entail fewer steps and offer a better user experience. We should have anticipated that some users would see a Checkout credit as nothing more than an extra step of a different (and annoyingly self-serving) kind. Our bad. ##Here’s how we’re hoping to fix things.##http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2007/08/update-on-google-video-feedback.html

Wal-Mart said that it was now selling digital music downloads on its Web site without the customary copy-protection technology that limits where consumers can play the songs. Wal-Mart said its new MP3 music catalog included thousands of albums and songs from major record labels like Vivendi’s Universal Music Group and EMI Group without copy-protection software, known as digital rights management.

Wal-Mart said it would sell the “DRM-free” MP3 downloads of music by artists like the Rolling Stones, Amy Winehouse and Maroon 5 for 94 cents per track or $9.22 per album. It said the new format let customers play music on almost any device, including iPods, iPhones and Microsoft’s Zune portable media player.

Spb Software House has taken steps to woo the business users of handheld devices. Its new Spb Business Pack is aimed at making the life and work of a businessperson more organized, manageable, and stress-free. The bundle intertwines four time-proven applications for keeping track of financials, appointments, access codes, local currency exchange rates, weather, and more.

iSkoot announced that the iSkoot mobile software is now available on the Sony Ericsson P1i, which launched recently. The iSkoot mobile software is available to Sony Ericsson P1i users via a direct download service through the “More Applications” icon in the Phone User Interface. The iSkoot mobile software is now also available from the Sony Ericsson Web site. Sony Ericsson is supporting iSkoot to deliver mobile Skype features to its customers around the world.

GoogHelper from Iambic is very convenient and time-saving for those of you who love to search the web on your Treo smartphone. It has an intuitive, space efficient and elegantly designed interface, packed with enough power to search 15 different categories.

Version 1.01 brings in quite a few usability improvements, including dual browser mode choice, quick return to GoogHelper via home/launcher button, and most notably instant results via Google SMS service.

SBSH Mobile Software announced a new update for its Facade for Smartphone to version 1.3. SBSH Facade 1.3 brings new exciting features and improvements, including: changing orientation support to fully support all new device models, Automatic-implementation utility to implement installed plugins within Facade layout, new signal and battery temperature meters, fresh new layout and graphics including three different layout for your choice and much more.

Augmentix launched what it calls the first fully rugged, widescreen laptop based on Dell’s Latitude product line. The new XTG630 offers a 14.1-inch wide aspect screen with DirectVue LCD technology, the company said in a statement. The Austin-based company builds computers for military use and other rugged-computing settings.

Its Armored Protection System includes a dense magnesium exoskeleton and a patent-pending thermal management system for handling desert heat. It is based on Dell’s Latitude D630 and ATG630 software for operating systems, drivers, BIOS and utilities.

In an announcement at San Francisco’s recent Linuxworld conference, longtime Palm OS developers Normsoft has revealed they are bringing their popular Pocket Tunes music player to the Palm Foleo. Mark Belliveau, Normsoft’s VP of Marketing and Business Development, has provided Palminfocenter with a few details as well as a promotional flyer.

Complimenting Foleo’s oft-touted instant-on feature, the flyer states, “Pocket Tunes on the Palm Foleo combines instant on with instant music.” The screenshot on the Foleo shows playback controls clearly derived from the gorgeous Sleek interface of Pocket Tunes 4, and a large three-pane view area for album art, library navigation and the current playlist.

Palm has released a new update for the SMS software of the unlocked Treo 680s in the Asia-Pacific region. This update is intended for users of Treo 680s running the Treo680-1.04-ROW or Treo680-1.05-APR software, which can be checked in the Phone application via the ‘Phone Info’ menu. The update can be installed via a Windows/Mac download, an automatic SD installer or over-the-air directly to your Treo.

The Apple TV is Apple’s first set-top box, designed to play your iTunes movies and music through your TV and home entertainment system. Like most Apple products, it’s both impressive and disappointing, inspired and crippled. We love it, but we’re not sure we like it.

Read this Computing Unplugged article.