9th August 2000 Archive

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Yes, we'll IPO – Symbian

Don't know where, don't know when

Symbian officially declared that it intends to IPO next year. This has been something of an open secret even before Psion's David Levin - Psion is the biggest shareholder in the private company - broached the subject in February. Earlier this year Symbian sources indicated that the preferred exchange would be New York's NASDAQ …

Business 9 Aug 2000, 06:09
Amazon goes URL crazy

To hell with books, what about cars?

"It was the biggest aspidistra in the world" - Gracie Fields Mega booksite Amazon has registered a stack of non book related URLs which show it's getting into the Arthur Daley*, and possibly the Gerald Ratner* business. It has recently registered the following URLS: NEWCARSAMAZON.COM, USEDCARSAMAZON.COM, SELLCARSAMAZON.COM, …

Music and Media 9 Aug 2000, 07:54
AMD still fab despite analyst downgrade

Big Blue, Motorola unlikely to be bedmates

Financial analyst Ashok Kumar, of USB Piper Jaffray, downgraded AMD shares from buy status to neutral yesterday, while the firm's share price sank a few dollars more on Wall Street. But the decline in the firm's stock price has forced the firm to clarify its position on its fab capacity and the partnerships it has with IBM and …

Channel 9 Aug 2000, 08:17
ShopSmart swaps shares for AOL, Wal-Mart thump

Wal-Mart hands over Valuemad

ShopSmart, a British-based comparison shopping engine is poised (the FT says) to sell 20 per cent of the company's equity to AOL and Wal-Mart for - nothing! However, it will gain distribution on AOL and Wal-mart Web sites in Europe, and it will see Wal-Mart's own price comparison site, Valuemad, injected into its business. …

Business 9 Aug 2000, 08:31
Users come last in ICANN elections scramble

Stop voting: it's all a terrible misunderstanding

Defending the English monarchy in the 19th Century, the social historian Walter Bagehot argued that for the general good, its mechanics should be kept incomprehensible and largely invisible. "I can conceive of nothing more corrupting or worse for a set of poor ignorant people than that two combinations of well-taught and rich …

Music and Media 9 Aug 2000, 08:34
Intel confirms server support prog

And so it came to pass

Chip giant Intel has now formally introduced its server support strategy, as predicted here at the end of March. The service, which Intel calls the e-business server programme, provides training, sales and marketing support and integration tips to its system integrators, Web partners, dealers and "value added resellers". …

Music and Media 9 Aug 2000, 08:43
Click here to save Reg hack's job

Buy a BOFH T-shirt... or else

In a moment of madness, the powers that be here at Vulture Central approved a vast branding exercise. Along with heavy demand for Reg shirts, T-shirts and caps came reader suggestions for other goods sporting the vulture logo. So we ordered a catalogue from one of these companies that specialise in merchandise - everything from …

Bootnotes 9 Aug 2000, 09:59
SiS airs Athlon integrated chip in public

Pre-production next month

SiS has supplied the world with a fresh viewing of the SiS730s, an integrated single chip for the AMD Athlon and Duron platforms, in the run-up to launch day. The SiS730S begins pre-production in September in its own 0.18 micron wafer fab. It is assembled in what SiS claims is the highest pin count (672) plastic BGA package in …

Channel 9 Aug 2000, 10:09
CMGI to buy ISP for AltaVista

We thought it already had one

CMGI - the company that owns AltaVista - says that it is looking to buy an ISP or telco to help generate more traffic for its portal. Marcus Bicknell, CMGI European president, said he is looking for acquisitions in Britain, France and Germany. "It will be many weeks before we make a move, but I wouldn't be surprised if we go a …

Music and Media 9 Aug 2000, 10:22
EXCLUSIVE AltaVista user sighted

Well, kind of...

In a shock overnight development a reader has contacted The Register to say she has received a password and user ID from British-based unmetered ISP, AltaVista. Although she hasn't used these to sign up to the service, she believes she was sent them. "I'm not actually 'using' it, but they did send me an invite," said the …

Music and Media 9 Aug 2000, 10:34
Swedish King loses out on dotcom white-knuckle ride

Dressmart's assets to be sold off

Dressmart.com has gone into administration with debts of £2m. The upmarket European clothes etailer is reported to be facing bankruptcy and its 60 staff the sack. A plan has been approved to sell much of Dressmart's business to fellow Swedish business New Wave. According to today's Times newspaper, New Wave could snap up the …

Business 9 Aug 2000, 11:53
BBC drugs site stoned by reactionists

It's witch-hunt week here in the UK

Tired of trying to get innocent people lynched by crazed paedophile-hunting gangs, The Daily Mail has turned on the BBC with a front-page rant at its Radio 1 Web site. In its Essentials section on the site, Radio 1 has made the mistake of providing balanced information on illegal drugs. The justifying opening paragraph on the …

Bootnotes 9 Aug 2000, 11:53
FRIACO hit by telco stalemate

Diluted offer on the table

Plans for a wholesale unmetered Net access package that would let providers compete directly with BT's SurfTime product have been watered down - for the time being at least. The original FRIACO (Flat Rate Internet Access Call Origination) deal is still on the table, and the subject of ongoing and detailed negotiations between …

Music and Media 9 Aug 2000, 11:55
How to overclock the Asus A7V for $3

Dr Tom and Frank Volkel show the way

It is a bit thin on the ground in hardware land today. We think everyone has gone on holiday. Frank Volkel gets his soldering iron out and shows how to modify an Asus A7V if you don't have the dipswitches on it over at Tom's Hardware. He says the CPU can be overclocked for around $3. Go here if you want to know how. Since it …

Hardware Roundup 9 Aug 2000, 12:12
Women on top in Web usage

Anti-wrinkle.com does the business

Women have topped men on the Web for the first time. In May, 50.4 per cent of all unique users in the US were female, according to a survey by MMXI. They found the most popular sites for women in the US were shopping and beauty sites, such as chadwicks.com and anti-wrinkle.com. In Europe the proportion of women users is also …

Music and Media 9 Aug 2000, 12:14
Pentagon pleas for cyber peace fall on deaf ears

Hackers keep doing it for themselves

Hackers probing the Pentagon's cyber defences have taken no heed of the ministry's pleas for them to stop their incursions. A spokesman for the government body appeared at the hackers' convention Defcon 8 to appeal to hackers to work with the government instead of constantly attacking it. It tried tempting them with promises of …

Music and Media 9 Aug 2000, 13:48
‘Hacktivist’ bail reduced, finally

Nattering Nabobs of Negativism return

A so-called hacker arrested during the Republican National Convention in Philadelphia last week and slapped with a whopping $500,000 bail requirement is about to be released after a local judge reduced his burden to a more manageable $100,000 during a hearing Tuesday afternoon. The accused, one Terrence McGuckin, who works as a …

Music and Media 9 Aug 2000, 14:23
Korea to crack down on obscene Webcasting

The nations youth are being polluted

Officials in Seoul are to crack down on obscene Webcasting services after fears they are polluting the minds of Korean teens. The Ministry of Information and Communication revealed to the Korean Herald that plans are afoot to draw up a bundle of fresh regulations for Webcasting stations. If they get the go-ahead, these …

Music and Media 9 Aug 2000, 15:05
Inter-mediates' sites hacked and down

2nd Update Done and dusted

We received word that Inter-mediates' vast network of sites had been hacked and were down. The company, most commonly known for its Special Reserve discount store network confirmed there had been "external interference" but declined to comment on whether it was a denial of service attack or a hack. It looks pretty much like a …

Music and Media 9 Aug 2000, 15:21
DoCoMo crash knocks media back towards WAP

Isn't all this getting a bit tiring?

Is it just us or have the media become more and more unstable in the last year? WAP and DoCoMo's i-Mode are a prime case in point. WAP of course was initially greeted with the kind of frenzied excitement normally reserved for royal marriages or plane crashes. Then, when it failed to live up to the hype, it was denounced as …

Data Networking 9 Aug 2000, 16:44
English country furniture fanatic starts PC seller ‘hit parade’

Resellerratings.com for Brits

An English country furniture fanatic has taken it upon himself to start a "hit parade" of the best and worst computer sellers in the land. David Knell has made a list of 44 PC sellers, from the likes of Carrera and Panrix to the big boys Compaq and Toshiba, at his Web site for computer enthusiasts. Voting started today, and …

Business 9 Aug 2000, 18:22
China and the running dog lackeys of Net democracy

New battle front for enemy forces

We ran a story yesterday on the government's closure of the only pro-democracy Web site based in China. The closure was roundly condemned by many human rights organisations but they all of knew their complaints would have no effect on the policy, either now or in the future. Following the story and seeing the opportunity, …

Music and Media 9 Aug 2000, 18:22
The trouble with LearnHowTospeak Korean

WSJ questions L&H sales

Lernout & Hauspie (L&H) stock fell 19 per cent on Tuesday (Aug 8, 2000) following a Wall Street Journal article which questioned the veracity of sales figures claimed by the company's operation in Korea. With Q2 sales of $68 million for Q2, Korea contributes a very high proportion of revenues (44 per cent this quarter)booked by …

Business 9 Aug 2000, 21:40