eBay in Australia will be the guinea pig for their new policy to accept only PayPal and cash as payment options, removing direct debits, money orders and personal cheques as of June 17.

As of this new policy, people will now have to use Cash-on-Delivery or PayPal, which accepts credit cards and direct deposits - for a fee between 1.1 to 2.4 percent.

eBay has defended this move, but customers won’t be happy. eBay’s spokesperson acknowledged this fact, but also added that it would benefit users for security.

Using the Opera-powered Internet Channel on the Wii, the BBC has announced a version of its popular iPlayer website to the Wii.

It will offer the same content as what you will get on the site, with the 7 day content expiry on content. The BBC promises that additional features will also come in the next few months.

This also brings a new digital revolution around the BBC’s content, with the BBC relaunching their site and having it’s programming on the iTunes, and now this will see it entering the gaming console entertainment market.

It also has plans to create its own ‘channel’ soon.

The BBC iPlayer is only available only to the UK.

Only 2 in 5 households have now switched over to digital, that’s about 42 percent of the country, according to the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA); with one quarter that haven’t switch won’t switch in the long run.

If Digital Subscription Television numbers were added (Foxtel Digital and its resellers), then it improves to 54 percent of the country.

The highest take-up of Digital television was Mildura, Victoria, with 70.3 percent and Tasmania with 64 percent. This high take up is because there is a third commercial station that broadcasts only in digital, with both taking up Network Ten affiliation.

WIN Television has a 50% percent stake in the two networks; with Prime taking the other half in Mildura Digital Television (MDT), and Macquarie Media Group owning the other half of Tasmania Digital Television (TDT).

The lowest areas where digital has not fully developed were in South Australia (37.1%) and Queensland (37.2%).

Out of those who are not switching, said that they were not switching at all or were put off because of the price. The average price for a standard definition (SD) set-top box is around $70, while high-definition (HD) versions are around $200.

Digital Television will have its switchover date on 2013, but for now it will co-exist with its analogue counterparts. Only Pay-TV have made the switchover since 2005 and will now start broadcasting HD channels this year.

Last year, Seven and Ten launched their HD “multichannels”, thus allowing them to show additional programming during non-peak or their morning shows. Nine followed suit in March. ABC and SBS do not have plans to multichannel in HD, but already have done multichanneling in SD as current regulations allow such practice.

Foxtel, however, will be launching four new HD channels in line with its “Foxtel HD+” plan. Those will be a documentary channel being shared with Discovery and National Geographic; 2 sporting channels, Fox Sports HD and ESPN HD; and a new channel by BBC Worldwide called BBC HD.

Discovery and National Geographic will then be their own separate channels sometime next year.

You can find TEN HD on channel 1, Seven HD on channel 70 and Nine HD on channel 90.

Now we may never know if Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg ever stole the idea for Facebook for another social network at Harvard; as they are now looking into settling the deal.

As you may remembered, the creators of ConnectU have filed a lawsuit against Facebook stole their ideas while they were at Harvard; accusing him of copyright infringement, fraud and stealing trade secrets.

Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss and Divya Narendra, twins and also the founders of ConnectU, claim that they hired Zuckerberg for the back-end of their site.

Zuckerberg has denied the claims.

However, a source close to this case has said that Facebook is in the verge of settling the deal told the New York Times that it was finalizing a settlement with the founders and dismiss all claims, and counter-claims, in a couple of weeks.

This comes after a court has told Facebook it has to defend itself after asking the court to dismiss the case from Facebook.

In my view, this sounds like ConnectU is jealous of the popularity of Facebook; but we don’t have access to their proof, nor Facebook’s defense, so we don’t know. But, we will keep you posted on the trial.

The ABC launched its IPTV service in February, but it took us forever to get an invite to this beta; and our reviewer is not impressed at all. Is this what we are paying in taxes for this kind of crap???

Terence Huynh, the Editor in Chief of TECHGEEK, presents this review of the ABC Playback service to the masses, with images!

APC done a review about it first, but this time, we get our chance for fun. TECHGEEK has managed to get into the list of users who would be able to access the beta, and don’t get your hopes up just yet.

First, you will need to sign in or sign up to the ABC Message Boards and then wait awfully long to gain an invite link. We signed up in February, but it took us until a few days ago to have that prized e-mail telling us we have now got access

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HP has said that it had released some USB sticks for their Proliant server brand which may contain malware that could allow an attacker to take over an infected system.

The USBs affect a numerous amount of models of the Proliant line and are only contained in the 256MB and 1GB USB models. The malware has been identified as W32.Fakerecy and W32.SillyFDC. These two worms spread by copying themselves to removable or mapped drives and only affect Windows 95 - XP and Windows NT.

HP is recommending that to find out that if the drive is infected that you should insert it on a computer with an anti-virus system that is up-to-date.

It is also saying that this only affects a small number of customers. According to ZDNet Australia, there have been no reports. An advisory page can be found on the HP website.

After the collapse of margin lender Opes Prime, more than 25 percent, or 50 companies, of the 180-listed major technology firms have been revealed to be in the books since it went into administration last week.

Exposure, according to The Australian, does not appear to be large but it’s creditors, ANZ and Merrill Lynch, have seized the stocks attacked to those who are well known in the tech and communications sector.

The group includes Destra, internet media start-up; ERG, the supplier of the NSW canned Tcard project; internet service providers iiNet and Chariot and pay television operator Austar.

It is expected that the lower end of the sector will be the hardest hit with the collapse. iiNet and Austar have said that they did not expect Opes to have a material effect on their stocks.

Yesterday, ANZ released a number of companies names that it has now have stocks, or substantial ownership, over 5 percent; and many have struggled with the publicity.

Mooter Media has said that it was not able to trace an owner who holds of about 3.1 million shares that was included in the list.

Powerlan, an IT services and outsourcing company, is the most vulnerable with about 21 percent of its stock owned by ANZ. It has not made any statement yet.

However; one of Jumbuck, an instant messaging specialist, directors have launched a legal bid to stop the shares of the company from ANZ. Paul Choiselat’s private investment bank, Beconwood Securities, have on an injunction to stop the sell of what remains of the 3.5 million shares to Opes for a $1.3 million loan.

The matter will be heard in the Federal Court in Melbourne on Thursday.

Yahoo has announced that it has rejected the three-week ultimatum to accept the takeover offer from Microsoft.

In a letter sent by Roy Bostock, chairman of the board, and Jerry Yang, the CEO, said that they “continue to believe that [their] proposal is not in the best interests of Yahoo and [it's] stockholders”.

This continues to be a cat and mouse game, with Microsoft now will be taking the deal to the shareholders with a lesser bid than what was previously announced. It may also ask that the board be sacked.

A lesser bid could see a backlash against Microsoft or Yahoo.

Sandy Duncan, CEO of YoYo Games and the person responsible for setting up and running the European Xbox business for Microsoft, believes that console gaming will “die in the next 5 to 10 years.”

“The industry is fundamentally driven by technology. I think dedicated games devices i.e. consoles (and handhelds) will die [out] in the next 5 to 10 years. The business model is very risky and the costs associated with creating new hardware are incredibly high,” Duncan told That VideoGame Blog in an interview to be published tomorrow.

Beyond wishful thinking, I really don’t know what information Duncan is basing this prediction on. While I do agree that the gaming industry as a whole has become a risky business, that’s no different to, say, the movie business. Some games make a profit (and when they do, it’s usually quite staggering), others sink.

One reason offered by Duncan for the demise of the console is web distribution:

“In fact in 5 to 10 years I don’t think you’ll have any box at all under your TV, most of this stuff will be ‘virtualized’ as web services by your content provider.”

The web has been vital to some sectors of gaming - World of Warcraft, gaming on cellphones/iPhone, Steam downloads - the DVD is still king when it comes to delivering games. Maybe when fiber connections become commonplace there will be enough bandwidth for delivering an immersive gaming experience, but right now we’re far, far away from that. We have the disk storage capacities, but the bandwidth isn’t there.

But the main reason why I don’t see console and handheld gaming dying any time soon is out obsession with gadgets is still as strong as ever. While games consoles have enjoyed success, the reason that they’ve neither become dominant nor been killed off by the PC is the fact that how people game is become more diverse. People want to game while sitting in front of their TVs, while sitting in front of their PCs, and while on the move. I’m not seeing any signs of convergence. If anything, I’m seeing the exact opposite.

Microsoft’s chief executive has warned the Yahoo board on Saturday that if a merger was not completed in the next three weeks, it will offer the deal directly to its shareholders, at a lower price.

The warning, from an e-mail acquired by TechCrunch, also says that without an agreement that it would seek to oust the current directors.

“If we have not concluded an agreement within the next three weeks, we will be compelled to take our case directly to your shareholders, including the initiation of a proxy contest to elect an alternative slate of directors for the Yahoo! board,” Steve Ballmer wrote.

“If we are forced to take an offer directly to your shareholders, that action will have an undesirable impact on the value of your company from our perspective which will be reflected in the terms of our proposal.”

Yahoo declined to comment on the deadline.

The offer, which was announced on January 31, was a cash and stock offer worth $44.6 billion - or $31 a share. According to the NY Times, it is now worth about $42 billion. The company rejected the offer and said the offer “substantially undervalues” the company.

However, Microsoft described the offer as generous; as the deal on each share was a 62% premium over Yahoo’s closing price on Jan. 31. It has refused to raise it.

Yahoo is talking to AOL and News Corporation for a potential alternative to fend of the deal, though currently to no avail. Google is also backing Yahoo’s efforts to stop the deal getting the go ahead.