Sony Computer Entertainment America and George Hotz settled the lawsuit that SCEA had filed against Hotz and more than 100 other alleged hackers Jan. 11 in U.S. District Court in San Francisco (CED Jan 14 p6), SCEA and Hotz said in a joint statement posted Monday on the PlayStation Blog. The parties reached agreement in principle March 31, under which Hotz agreed to a permanent injunction, the statement said. A court document filed Monday said SCEA also “voluntarily and without prejudice dismisses this action against” all the other alleged hackers who were named in the same suit. It didn’t say why and the company didn’t respond to a request for comment.

The FCC’s Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau Monday sought comment on the kinds of performance-related information that’s the most useful to consumers when they assess which broadband service to buy. Bureau Chief Joel Gurin told us the notice isn’t focused on the kinds of basic information carriers will eventually be required to offer potential subscribers under the transparency requirements in the net neutrality rules approved in December. Instead, it will offer the public a better perspective on what kind of service they need based on the way they use the Internet, he said.

LAS VEGAS -- Though there’s a “content gap” in the availability of 3D programming that has not kept pace with shipments of 3D TV sets, the problem will soon sort itself out if networks and producers are “enabled” to do what they do best, but to do it in 3D, film maker James Cameron told the NAB Show Monday in a keynote. Cameron is no fan of active-shutter 3D TVs, he said, and when passive sets become a dominant product over active 3D TVs, that will mark the next big “threshold” in home 3D adoption.

Dish Network plans to use DBSD’s technology and spectrum for mobile broadband services, offered “both on a stand-alone basis and in a consumer-friendly bundle with its multichannel video services,” Dish said in a license transfer application at the FCC International Bureau. FCC approval would allow DBSD’s parent company ICO Global to transfer its satellite, several S-band, Ku-band and Ka-band earth stations and S-band mobile satellite service/ancillary terrestrial component blanket license to Dish, the filing said. DBSD controls 20 MHz of S-band spectrum.

Much more research on 3D TV health issues is needed before widespread terrestrial 3D broadcasting can begin, said the interim report on visual sciences that recently was released by an Advanced Television Systems Committee planning team (CED March 24 p1). It exposes huge gaps in knowledge and understanding, along with the Catch-22 issue of what meaningful research can be safely done on viewers of all ages when little is known about possible side effects.

Sharp’s move to cut production at its 8th- and 10th-generation LCD panel plants stems from a tight supply of raw materials and a slowdown in Japanese market, analysts said. Sharp is believed to have reduced utilization at the 8G facility to 65 to 70 percent of capacity from around 80 percent, Avian Securities analyst Andrew Abrams said. The plants are expected to resume full production by early May and the short-term manufacturing reduction isn’t affecting product availability in the U.S., a Sharp spokesman said.

LAS VEGAS -- It’s the news media that’s to blame for escalating the debate between active-shutter and passive 3D TV technologies into a “format war,” a Samsung U.S. executive said Saturday during a panel at the Digital Cinema Summit on the eve of the NAB Show. “The media has played this out as a format war,” said Dan Schinasi, senior manager of HDTV product planning at Samsung. For consumers, the debate is nothing more than “a technology choice” between active and passive 3D TV, he said. He didn’t mention senior LG and Samsung executives from Korea having used unusually harsh words to denigrate each other’s 3D TV technologies.

SAN FRANCISCO -- THQ and Ubisoft executives attending the MI6 Game Marketing Conference told Consumer Electronics Daily they were encouraged by the initial sales performance of the 3DS despite the handheld remaining widely available at major U.S. retailers. THQ continued to ready its first 3DS games, said Danny Bilson, executive vice president of its Core Games group. Ubisoft already backed the 3DS launch with four games and will field more than 15 titles for the system by this holiday season, Tony Key, Ubisoft senior vice president of sales and marketing and MI6 co-chairman, told us.

Sony is adopting a hybrid sales system this year as it shrinks the number of retailers getting direct distribution, said merchants and industry officials. The company will continue to have sales staff working with retailers and move logistics, including ordering and shipping, to distributor Tech Data, retailers said. The change, which took effect April 1, will narrow Sony’s direct sales accounts to 45 dealers, industry officials said.

Controlling depth and limiting “gimmicks” were the goals of Prime Focus, the company chosen by Lucasfilm and its Industrial Light & Magic to convert Star Wars: Episode I The Phantom Menace to 3D, Prime Focus CEO Namit Malhotra told Consumer Electronics Daily. The film, about 90 percent complete, is due to hit theaters Feb. 10, 2012. The most challenging aspect of the conversion was maintaining the creative vision of filmmaker George Lucas, who urged Prime Focus to “downplay the in-your-face aspects” of 3D, Malhotra said. He said audiences will be most impressed by seeing characters they know well “in an entirely new way, like they're right in front of them."