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Report: Microsoft relaxes Windows downgrade rules
Submitted Thursday, April 09, 2009 @ 02:39 PM
Microsoft company information - ( Microsoft News )
computerworld.com -- Microsoft Corp. has relaxed its "downgrade" rules and will let computer makers continue to sell PCs preinstalled with the aged Windows XP for as long as six months after it launches Windows 7, according to a report published Wednesday. See the complete story here.
Microsoft Must Pay $388 Million To Settle Patent Claim
Submitted Thursday, April 09, 2009 @ 02:37 PM
Microsoft company information - ( Microsoft News )
informationweek.com -- Microsoft has been hit with one of the largest patent awards on record, as a jury on Thursday ordered the software maker to pay $388 million to a security vendor that claims Redmond misappropriated its technology. See the complete story here.
Facebook Now Has 200 Million Members
Submitted Thursday, April 09, 2009 @ 02:36 PM
informationweek.com -- Facebook reached a milestone this week as its 200 millionth user joined the social networking site.
CEO Mark Zuckerberg noted the achievement in a blog and launched an effort to put Facebook to use for greater good. A "heat map" on the site shows where the growth has occurred. See the complete story here.
French Parliament Tosses Out Net Piracy Bill
Submitted Thursday, April 09, 2009 @ 02:35 PM
crn.com -- France's National Assembly on Thursday tossed out the country's proposed HADOPI law -- a three-strikes rule that if it had passed would have required ISPs to cut off customers' Internet access for one year if they were suspected of illegally downloading copyrighted material. See the complete story here.
Spies 'infiltrate US power grid'
Submitted Thursday, April 09, 2009 @ 02:32 PM
news.bbc.co.uk -- The US government has admitted the nation's power grid is vulnerable to cyber attack, following reports it has been infiltrated by foreign spies. See the complete story here.
Conficker begins stealthy update
Submitted Thursday, April 09, 2009 @ 02:24 PM
news.bbc.co.uk -- The Conficker worm has started to update infected machines with a mystery package of data.
Computer security firms watching the malicious program noticed that it sprang into life late on 8 April. See the complete story here.
Microsoft killing free XP support next week
Submitted Thursday, April 09, 2009 @ 12:07 PM
Microsoft company information - ( Microsoft News )
theregister.co.uk -- Microsoft will drop free support for handful of aging products next week, including consumer versions of Windows XP and Office 2003.
On April 14, the Redmond giant ends "mainstream" support for Office 2003 in addition to Windows XP Home and Professional. This means the software will no longer include no-charge incident support, warranty claims, design changes, and bug fixes not related to security. See the complete story here.
YouTube to carry full-length Sony movies?
Submitted Wednesday, April 08, 2009 @ 12:19 PM
Sony company information - ( Sony News )
Google company information - ( Google News )
electronista.com -- Google's video site YouTube is in discussions with Sony Pictures to carry the latter's full movies, a leak hints. Without mentioning sources, CNET asserts that YouTube hopes for a license to play the movies on its site. Most of the terms of the deal aren't specified, though expectations would likely see YouTube pressing for free, ad-sponsored versions of the movies. Neither company has agreed to comment on the slip. See the complete story here.
Researchers spend $60M to build wicked fast circuits
Submitted Wednesday, April 08, 2009 @ 12:17 PM
networkworld.com -- The ability to develop high-powered network devices and systems that can see clearly through considerably dense materials or storms are the driving ideas behind nearly $60 million in contracts awarded this week to firms that are building terahertz-speed circuits.
The advanced research scientists at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) are behind the project whose goal is to develop what it calls revolutionary advances in electronic devices and integrated circuits that operate at THz frequencies (at least 1.0 x 10 [to the 12th power] cycles per second). See the complete story here.
AP takes aim at Web sites over unlicensed news content
Submitted Wednesday, April 08, 2009 @ 12:17 PM
computerworld.com -- The Associated Press, one of the world's largest news providers, plans to take legal action against Web portals and other sites that use its content without paying for a license, the organization said Monday. See the complete story here.
Google adding local results for all searches
Submitted Wednesday, April 08, 2009 @ 12:15 PM
Google company information - ( Google News )
computerworld.com -- Like the old adage that all politics are local, Google Inc. is telling users today that all Web searches are local, too.
Google announced yesterday that it had just finished a global rollout of an update to its Google search engine that can automatically guess user locations to provide local results for anything from restaurants to doctors and garden nurseries, along with maps of each location. See the complete story here.
Nanotouch technology shrinks touch-screen displays
Submitted Wednesday, April 08, 2009 @ 12:14 PM
Microsoft company information - ( Microsoft News )
computerworld.com -- Touch screens can only get so small before the user's fingers start to block most of the information on them, but a technology called nanotouch that's being developed by Microsoft Research and the Hasso Plattner Institut in Germany is designed to allow a touch-screen device to be controlled from its backside, preventing fingers from occluding the screen. See the complete story here.
Net firms start storing user data
Submitted Wednesday, April 08, 2009 @ 12:13 PM
news.bbc.co.uk -- Details of user e-mails and net phone calls will be stored by internet service providers (ISPs) from Monday under an EU directive. See the complete story here.
Spam overwhelms e-mail messages
Submitted Wednesday, April 08, 2009 @ 12:10 PM
Microsoft company information - ( Microsoft News )
news.bbc.co.uk -- More than 97% of all e-mails sent over the net are unwanted, according to a Microsoft security report.
The e-mails are dominated by spam adverts for drugs, and general product pitches and often have malicious attachments. See the complete story here.
Google addresses newspaper woes
Submitted Wednesday, April 08, 2009 @ 12:09 PM
Google company information - ( Google News )
news.bbc.co.uk -- The majority of newspapers should be online, says Google boss Eric Schmidt, amid criticism it should share some of the millions it makes from newslinks. See the complete story here.
New Web address endings could be start of turf wars
Submitted Tuesday, April 07, 2009 @ 11:24 AM
usatoday.com -- A sea change may be coming to cyberspace with Web addresses ending in anything from .a to .z. That has businesses increasingly worried they will have to spend millions to guard their brand names.
The familiar .com, .net, .org and 18 other suffixes — officially "generic top-level domains" — could be joined by a seemingly endless stream of new ones next year under a landmark change approved last summer by the Internet Corp. for Assigned Names and Numbers, the entity that oversees the Web's address system. See the complete story here.
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