6th December 2000 Archive

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Mafiaboy goes back in the slam

Updated Impolite, apparently....tsk, tsk

Notorious Canadian cracker kiddie 'Mafiaboy', the sole unfortunate scapegoat in the much-hyped distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks which shut down Yahoo!, eBay, CNN and Amazon back in February, has been placed in custody once again after being suspended from high school for cutting classes and being otherwise beligerent …

Music and Media 6 Dec 2000, 01:57
Freeserve and Wanadoo to tie knot?

They've booked the church and the reception, now get ready with the confetti

There's intense speculation this morning that Freeserve has struck a deal with French ISP Wanadoo. Both Freeserve and Wanadoo have suspended share dealing this morning - a sure sign that something's afoot. Elswhere, the BBC reported that both companies have booked a room in the Baltic Exchange in the City of London. Why? Are …

Music and Media 6 Dec 2000, 08:16
Sony PS One sales rocket as PS Two famine continues

Even Dreamcast sales are up

Sony's remodelled PlayStation console, the PS One, is saving the company's bacon this Christmas, as gaming punters snap it up because they can't get PlayStation 2s. According to US market researcher PC Data, which monitors the retail sales channel, the PS One topped the console sales chart for the week ending 25 November. It …

Business 6 Dec 2000, 09:38
Palomino ‘is really cool’

Says our man with the asbestos fingers

One of our regular AMD informants emails to confirm that the forthcoming Athlon Palomino is indeed exceptionally cool. "You can put a finger on it while its running," he states. Regrettably we are not told if this is one of our mole's fingers, or one belonging to someone he doesn't like very much. As someone whose promising …

Channel 6 Dec 2000, 10:13
Apple to fall into the red with $225m loss

Shrinking PC market hits Mac maker hard

Apple admitted last night that it too is being hammered by the industry-wide decline in PC sales - to the extent that it will make a massive $225-250 million loss for its current quarter. Apple now expects top post revenues of $1 billion for the three months to 30 December, the first quarter of the company's 2001 fiscal year, …

Mac Channel 6 Dec 2000, 10:22
The VAX of Life: Sun's cluster guru talks Full Moon

Net Effect™ meets Reg Effect™

Yousef Khalidi, Sun Microsystems Distinguished Engineer, Full Moon chief architect, and Register reader took us on a ride through the history of Sun Clusters 3.0 yesterday. First as might be seen by visiting aliens, and then from a programmer's perspective. Which was nice: plenty of detail gets left out even from the "technical …

Business 6 Dec 2000, 10:32
AltaVista cans free Net access in US

Probably for the best, eh?

AltaVista's dismal dalliance with providing Internet access is finally about to come to an end. The company's subscription free service in the US funded by ads is to be pulled on 10 December. The company said it was forced to take the action because "the company who provided the service and telecommunications infrastructure, …

Music and Media 6 Dec 2000, 11:08
Bore and Gush camps take the fight online

Will this never end?

Just when you thought it was coming to an end, another chapter has opened in the US election Saga. While all the national papers report that Gore will be conceding any day now, the online debate rages on. Both camps have now started petition sites where disgruntled voters can register their support for either candidate. This …

Music and Media 6 Dec 2000, 11:19
Freeserve and Wanadoo get hitched

Da dum de da, da dum de da...

French ISP Wanadoo has agreed an all-share offer for Freeserve valuing the British ISP at £1.65 billion. The offer values each Freeserve share at 157p - a modest premium of approximately 11.2 per cent based on last nights closing price of 141.25 pence per Freeserve Share. As a result of the all-share deal, Freeserve's parent, …

Music and Media 6 Dec 2000, 11:20
Rambus derides Intel chipset

'Inherent bandwidth limitations'

It looks as if California's leading law firm, Rambus, Rambus and Rambus, is spoiling for a fight with Intel. The company is still smarting from Craig Barrett's remarks about the Rambus/Intel relationship being a mistake and his criticism of Rambus' litigious nature. Rambus CEO Geoff Tate spent some time listing his Intel …

Channel 6 Dec 2000, 11:56
Iris recognition puts evil eye on retinal scans

Blinkin' ell

Retinal scans, long the mainstay of biometrics identification technology, could have a little competition in the form of iris recognition, a new technology developed by Alpha Engineering. The system was developed in conjunction with researchers at Yonsei University's computers and biometrics labs. The group claim it is so …

Business 6 Dec 2000, 12:07
Intel US finally catches up with Europe

Intel Inside scheme extended to the small guys

Intel US has followed Europe, Japan and Asia Pacific in extending its Intel Inside programme to small system builders selling white box desktop and mobile systems. The chip behemoth has set aside $10 million to contribute up to the cost of print and website advertising. Since its inception some ten years ago, the programme had …

Channel 6 Dec 2000, 12:45
Wanadoo in French phone farce

And we think Rip-Off Britain is bad

Freeserve's soon-to-be French owner, Wanadoo, is already up to no good by exploiting British journalists Those hacks who couldn't attend today's hastily convened press conference in London were given the choice of taking part in a telephone conference call supplemented by a slide show on the Web. Except they were asked to dial …

Bootnotes 6 Dec 2000, 12:46
The Secret Diary of David Edmonds, aged 46 and nine months

With apologies to Sue Townsend

Wednesday Arrived at Oftel bang on time. But what a day! Had another meeting with BT over this and that - and felt intimidated. Again. Just can't seem to assert myself in front of an audience. I'm fine in front of a mirror. In fact, intimidated myself the other week with a really hard stare. Gosh, I was powerful. Menacing, …

Bootnotes 6 Dec 2000, 12:48
Micro$oft acquires another Xbox games developer

Buys Digital Anvil

Microsoft has opened its cheque-book to secure the rights to what it reckons will be showcase games for its upcoming Xbox console. Yesterday, the software giant said its had bought Digital Anvil, though it wouldn't reveal how much it had spent on the deal. DA will join Bungie, FASA Interactive and Access Software, all now part …

Business 6 Dec 2000, 12:49
Mafia trial to test FBI spying tactics

Keystroke logging used to spy on mob suspect using PGP

A trial of an alleged mafia boss will test whether the FBI surveillance teams are entitled to plant keystroke-logging devices on the computers of suspects. Nicodemo S. Scarfo Jr., 35, the son of the jailed former boss of the Philadelphia mob, faces charges of masterminding a mob-linked bookmaking and loansharking operation. A …

Software 6 Dec 2000, 13:01
Opera browser goes free with version 5.0 launch

Company pitching standards, independence against IE and Navigator

Opera, the 'third force' in the browser wars, is available for free download from today, with the launch of Opera 5.0. Small but perfectly-formed Opera Software claims 1.5 million registered users, which is low even compared to Navigator's much-diminished market share, but Opera intends to leverage its advantages into increased …

Software 6 Dec 2000, 13:35
Mobile Duron due this month?

Many a slip twixt launch and availability

Reports from Taiwan suggest that 600 and 700MHz mobile Durons could launch before the end of the year. And about time too - Intel's had things pretty much its own way recently with the mobile Celeron out-punching the venerable K6-2. Chimpzilla is also due to launch a mobile Athlon at 1GHz sometime in Q2 2001. AMD seems to have …

Channel 6 Dec 2000, 14:33
Intel's Barrett: P4 the ‘king of processors’

Oh lawks, he's at it again

It's one thing having faith in one's products, but that faith should not be of the blind persuasion. In an interview in Hong Kong yesterday, Intel boss Craig 'Five Speeches' Barrett told Bloomberg that the Pentium 4 is the "undisputed king of microprocessors". Asked to comment on analysts claiming that poor execution had given …

Channel 6 Dec 2000, 15:08
The real story behind the Freeserve Wanadoo deal

A tale of ineptitude, racism and forbidden love

Nicolas Dufourcq and John Pluthero - CEOs of Wanadoo and Freeserve respectively - are in love with each other. At the press conference announcing the two companies' joining of hands (well, outright buy of poorly performing Freeserve), journalists exchanged quizzical looks as John looked Nicolas deep in the eyes and said "we'll …

Bootnotes 6 Dec 2000, 15:19
Star Trek gamers get tips on the phone

Beam me the cheats, Scotty

Game players can now sign up to receive clues to playing a Star Trek game in text messages via their cell phone. The availability of the service for the recently released game, Star Trek Deep Space Nine: the Fallen, is an industry first according to Simon & Schuster Interactive (S&S), the game's publishers. This service will …

Data Networking 6 Dec 2000, 16:03
Dell announces next year's server offerings

Also planning to cash in on services

Dell is to refresh its server and service offerings to business customers. The direct selling giant also announced a new version of its OpenManage Software. Dell will expand its range of products for Web servers, application servers and database servers over the next quarter. The Web server tier will get a couple of rack- …

Business 6 Dec 2000, 16:05
How important is the British Monarchy? asks the Guardian

As important as shaving rash, say Net users

One of Britain's leading newspapers challenged the role of the monarchy today promising to back a legal challenge to the 300-year-old law banning Roman Catholics and other non-Protestants from succeeding to the British throne. The Guardian claims that the Act of Settlement, adopted in 1701, breaches the Human Rights Act and …

Bootnotes 6 Dec 2000, 16:15
Bluetooth comp results in full

Our winner comprehensively listed

At last the truth can be revealed - the terrible and dark truth about what exactly is going on in our GN Netcom Bluetooth competition photo. We also have a winner. More of that in due course. First, let's peruse some of the more noteworthy captions submitted by Reg aficionados. Dismissed outright was this effort from Dmitry …

Bootnotes 6 Dec 2000, 16:43
IBM preps Itanium workstation

Codename 'Rattler' - maybe they should tighten some screws

IBM is already prepping its first Itanium workstation, and claims to have 209 applications certified to run on the system. The system is code-named Rattler, according to a report by Infoworld, and is tipped to take pride of place at the top of Big Blue's Z-Pro workstation line. IBM execs expect it to ship the first day the …

Business 6 Dec 2000, 16:46
WIPO domain dispute coup continues

Bigger share, biased results

WIPO has continued its march toward control of the domain dispute market, taking 68.5 per cent of all cases in November - up from 66 per cent in October, 63 per cent in September and just 48 per cent back in January. How it is doing this is no secret - it consistently favours big business and celebrities over anyone else ( …

Music and Media 6 Dec 2000, 17:51
Gates sues Caribbean hotel promoter

Surely there are better way to spend time in Martinique?

Bill Gates has got the full weight of the law onto a Caribbean businessman who registered the software chief's name as a trademark. Eric Vigneron, a hotel promoter on the French island of Martinique, trademarked "Bill Gates" with France's Intellectual Property Institute back in January 1998. His reasoning was that the trademark …

Business 6 Dec 2000, 17:59
AOL, Time Warner deal in ‘home stretch’

Or so says Steve Case

AOL top man Steve Case has said that his $110 billion purchase of Time Warner is in the "home stretch" with the announcement it will make some more concessions to the FTC. The FTC is expected to submit its latest report next week and Case's comments are clearly an attempt to pressure the FTC to bring the situation to a close at …

Music and Media 6 Dec 2000, 18:08
Asus P4 mobo squares up to Intel board

HWRoundup It's got people drooling

Game PC reckons its found the P4 board all other boards will aspire to be, and a worthy alternative to Intel's D850GB i850. The Asus P4T i850 board was the P4's get out of jail free card according to this lot. They use the phrase "nothing short of astounding", so check it out. TweakTown has posted a missive on overclocking …

Hardware Roundup 6 Dec 2000, 18:12