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15th March 2000 Archive

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  • Spot-the-ball in the Net with Littlewoods gambling site

    £2 million weekly jackpot

    Spot-the-ball and the pools has come to cyberspace via Littlewoods's £10 million online betting site. Bet247.co.uk kicked off yesterday, offering an online lottery and a weekly pools jackpot of £2 million. Hi-tech gamblers will be able to access the service via WAP phones, their PC or digital TV. Littlewoods has launched the …

    Business 15 Mar 2000, 06:39

  • What do Rolex, Brad Pitt and Llanwrthwl have in common?

    A. Domain name angst

    A Glaswegian entrepreneur last week netted £25,000 for the sale of one gambling domain name. Mark Dale ditched his Mini Metro for a Porsche after the URL was snapped up by an Internet bookie. The 26-year-old had bought the domain www.bettingservice.com for £70 the previous year. Dale's story is one of many littering the press …

    Business 15 Mar 2000, 06:44

  • Novell unleashes NDS for Linux

    Directories, we got directories...

    Novell has released NDS eDirectory for Linux, and NDS Corporate Edition for Linux - the latter allows the management of Linux users and groups, as well as standard NDS eDirectory functionality. NDS eDirectory licences are $2 each, while Corporate Edition licences are $26 per user. It is possible to integrate Unix, NetWare, Linux …

    Business 15 Mar 2000, 08:02

  • Euro businesses slow to adopt Windows 2000

    Survey But overall growth of PC market to bounce back

    The latest survey from market research company IDC covering the European, Middle Eastern and African (Emea) markets has revealed that sales of PCs were slow in the first quarter. But IDC also forecasts that the market will bounce back, growing by over 16 per cent, later in the year, despite intense competition and cost cutting. …

    Business 15 Mar 2000, 08:48

  • Intel buys Giga AS for $1.25 billion

    It's more of a Legover than a takeover

    Further signs that Intel is deadly serious about being the future building block company for the Internet has emerged after the company said it has bought Danish company Giga AS for $1.25 billion in cash. Intel is putting together a massive Internet construct, using takeovers to help it create additional building blocks, which …

    Business 15 Mar 2000, 09:03

  • Intel broadsides Broadcom for poaching secrets

    Systematic attack causes legal affray

    Silicon giant Intel has confirmed it has taken legal action against Broadcom for allegedly acquiring its trade secrets by stealth. The firm yesterday filed a lawsuit against Broadcom, which makes silicon for digital cable set top boxes, alleging that the firm had wooed away three staff who possess inner secrets of Intel's …

    Business 15 Mar 2000, 09:19

  • NEC wins huge share prize from Rambus

    The price is right. Come on down, them thar RIMMs

    In mid-January we reported that Rambus (ticker: RMBS) had hit on a wizard wheeze to encourage memory manufacturers (the Seven Dramurai) to make more of its chips during this year. At the time that story was written, the Rambus share price stood at around $90 or so. These were the terms that Hyundai and a couple of other memory …

    Business 15 Mar 2000, 09:54

  • MS claims Win2k sells million in first month

    Good, bad? Depends on how you look at it...

    Microsoft says it has sold a million copies of Windows 2000 in the month after its launch, the total consisting of retail and OEM copies of all versions of the OS. Depending on how you look at it this could be anything from bad to good progress, but hey - it's a nice round figure for marketing purposes. As The Register tediously …

    Business 15 Mar 2000, 10:09

  • Microsoft licenses media player to RealNetworks

    Not a reformed Redmond, just using different tactics

    Spin was well to the fore when Microsoft announced it had licensed its Windows Media Player technology, free of charge, to its rival RealNetworks, but although Microsoft itself is trying to present the move positively, it's arguably more of a surrender than a victory. Despite what RealNetworks CEO Rob Glaser was claiming last …

    Business 15 Mar 2000, 10:48

  • Blair, Clinton gut the NASDAQ

    Biotech stumbles; can IT take up the slack?

    US President Clinton and British Prime Minister Tony Blair initiated a sell-off among biotech stocks by announcing Tuesday that the human genome "should be made freely available to scientists everywhere." The tech-heavy NASDAQ, which fuels IT and dot-com growth, relies heavily on the biotech sector for much of its dazzling …

    Business 15 Mar 2000, 11:57

  • Lastminute: What the Papers Say

    The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

    Ian King, Business Editor, The Sun The value the market has put on lastminute.com is absolutely ridiculous. It is now worth more than the combined values of retailers Somerfield, Courts, and House of Fraser and Aston Villa. For a firm which, by its own admission, is unlikely to make a profit for "the forseeable future" and whose …

    Business 15 Mar 2000, 12:15

  • Inside-IT Hogs limelight with auction launch

    Surplus inventory disposal heralds the return of George's Harley

    Funny thing deja vu - as we shall see. Making Markets, the channel sales initiative run by one time Datrontech sales supremo George Evans, has set up a trade-only auction Web site for the UK channel through its Inside-IT.com portal. The idea is a simple one - as are most of the best business ideas. Working on the principle that …

    Business 15 Mar 2000, 12:46

  • Telewest leaks broadband service – by mistake

    £50 per month

    Telewest has shot itself in the foot by publishing details of its broadband service on its Web site ahead of next week's official launch. Details of the hush-hush service were supposed to be kept under wraps until then although a source within Telewest had suggested earlier this month that an announcement was imminent. The only …

    Business 15 Mar 2000, 13:48

  • Share punters should hi-tail into hi-tech

    bubble.dots may burst but tech stocks will stay steady

    It seems there's almost a unanimous scream now from financial pundits on a pile of well known broadsheets about the dangers of investing in dot.com ventures, many of which appear to be wildly overvalued. But while many of these bubble.coms may float to the surface of public perception and then go pop, there's little likelihood …

    Business 15 Mar 2000, 13:51

  • Raise your glasses to Compaq on St Patrick's Day

    Lend me 10 pounds and I'll buy you a drink…

    With St Patrick's Day coming up at the end of the week, Guinness drinkers the world over will be able to breathe a collective sigh of relief knowing that Compaq has been charged with the job of keeping the black stuff flowing. The Big Q's customer services division has won a £1.6 million contract to take over the running of …

    Business 15 Mar 2000, 14:48

  • It's Big, it's Irish, it's online.ie

    Damn fine computer news service behind the green door

    online.ie, Ireland's "answer to to major international sites such as Yahoo! or AOL," has opened for business. The site aims to be the "largest gathering place for Irish people", and it is packed with news, information, classified ads and shopping facilities. online.ie is kicking off with a series of news feeds from AP, The …

    Business 15 Mar 2000, 14:50

  • GraphOn sues Citrix and Insignia

    Trade secret 'misappropriation and breach of contract'

    Thin clients are going generate fat legal fees, judging from this press release that landed in our in-box today "GraphOn Inc., a leading developer of thin, server-based softwares, today filed a lawsuit against Citrix Systems, Inc. and Insignia Solutions plc. for trade secret misappropriation and breach of contract. The lawsuit, …

    Business 15 Mar 2000, 15:26

  • Over and out for CUT unmetered lobby group?

    Good job, well done

    Unmetered Net access has finally arrived in Britain. Time will only tell if this "revolution" is sustainable and delivers the quality of service necessary to help increase usage levels among Net users in the country. In fact, what happened over the last ten days or so could be described as a coup d'etat -- a new order imposing …

    Business 15 Mar 2000, 15:51

  • German Net access price war heats up

    Choice cuts

    With as many variables in their price structures as a discount holiday package, Germany's flat rate Internet Service Providers (ISP) have begun to compete for Internet users. At the same time, the "free" ISP movement is rapidly gaining subscribers, putting a downward pressure on the cost of Internet access for everyone. But the …

    Business 15 Mar 2000, 16:01

  • Storm over MS bid to bounce MSCEs into Win2k

    Switch to Win2k now and it's a bargain, honest

    Microsoft's current treatment of its MCSEs (certified systems engineers) shows just how fundamental are the problems faced by the company with Windows 2000. Microsoft is trying to pressure MCSEs who have taken the NT4 exam to take a combined Windows 2000 exam, code-numbered 70-240, before they might otherwise choose to do so. …

    Business 15 Mar 2000, 16:04

  • AMD gets unjustified kicking in share goolies

    Yet many see bright times ahead...

    The failure of AMD, or perhaps the success of Intel, in winning the contract to power X-Box futurology dented the shares of the Athlon manufacturer yesterday, but many analysts are reporting that Jerry Sanders' firm will make a big profit next year. The next financial quarter AMD will report will be the second consecutive …

    Business 15 Mar 2000, 16:30

  • Nineteen charged in $8.4m AOL chatroom insider-trading scam

    Who says bulletin boards are bad for you?

    Nineteen people have been charged with using an AOL chatroom to make $8.4 million through an insider-trading scam. The scheme was masterminded by a part-time computer graphics employee, hired to work nights at Goldman Sachs and Credit Suisse in New York. After the rest of the office had gone home, John Freeman would rifle …

    Business 15 Mar 2000, 16:56

  • Will X-Box win (X) Windows Everywhere for MS?

    Analysis The latest thing may cut a path through the OS strategy mess

    US reports earlier this week claimed that Microsoft has been busily stripping LAN features from its forthcoming consumer operating system, Windows Millennium Edition (WME), thus forcing corporate users to migrate to Win2k instead. But we shouldn't be surprised - in reality, the move simply illustrates that Microsoft's OS …

    Business 15 Mar 2000, 17:01

  • Tubbie Terror game strikes The Web

    Games sick people play

    BBC bosses are said to be outraged at a Teletubby PC game where players gun down and murder the cuddly characters. Tubbie Terror shows Tinky Winky, Dipsy, Laa-Laa and Po as you've never seen them before. Players can download the game from the Web for free and spend time flouncing around Tellytubby land looking for Po and …

    Business 15 Mar 2000, 17:03

  • PlayStation 2 can play US DVDs – apparently

    Hurrah for Hackers

    Gaming boffins claim to have found a way to play American DVDs on PlayStation 2 consoles. Three codes have surfaced which make it possible to play Region 1 (North America) DVDs on the PlayStation 2 -- a Region 2 (Europe, Japan and Asia) DVD player. Like console video games, DVDs are usually fixed by vendors so they can only …

    Business 15 Mar 2000, 17:04

  • Clinton aids Intel in Bangladeshi oil push

    One day before the spring Equinox...

    Second sources revealed to the The Register today that Bill Clinton, current president of the United States, will seal oil deals with Bangladesh on the 20th of March next, as he helps Intel introduce technology into the country to aid local conditions. Clinton will visit one of the poorest countries in the Indian sub-continent …

    Business 15 Mar 2000, 21:20