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11th January 2002 Archive

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  • Googol AIMSearch blossoms

    Add your own chat logs...

    There's a limit on how much you can explain a gag without ruining it, and our skimpy details on the wonderful AIM Search prank yesterday were intentionally open-ended. Yes, it's a prank. No, the logs aren't real. And no, it doesn't randomize the "messages". And you need to read from the bottom up. Many users have discovered a …

    Bootnotes 11 Jan 2002, 09:38

  • Jabber Inc frees IM add-ons

    US telco brews open source messaging

    Jabber Inc, the commercial software house that employs many of the software libre Jabber IM developers, has released new proprietary server extensions in open source form. One of the libraries, Server Connection Manager (SCM) allow servers to peer with each other, and the other offers an API for collaborative extensions such as …

    Data Networking 11 Jan 2002, 09:39

  • Server sales down 20% in 2001, may be up in 2002 – IDC

    Perfect storm?

    The server analysts at International Data Corp held a conference call with its key customers yesterday to discuss the bloodbath that was the 2001 server market and to forecast what the future server market might look like over the next year -Timothy Prickett-Morgan writes. While the people who attended the call were told …

    Hardware 11 Jan 2002, 09:57

  • Vodafone enters m-payment arena

    Germany, Italy, UK

    Vodafone Group Plc yesterday announced trials of a mobile payment system which will allow customers in Germany, Italy and the UK to pay for goods and services using their mobile handset as ID. The Newbury, UK-based mobile operator is not the first telco to experiment with turning a handset into an electronic purse or …

    e-Business 11 Jan 2002, 10:41

  • AOL shadows Microsoft on instant alerts

    Web services tango

    The web services skirmish between America Online Inc (AOL) and Microsoft Corp continued yesterday, as the service provider launched a set of real-time alerts that extend to mobile devices and mirror Redmond's own .NET Alerts system. Dulles, Virginia-based AOL yesterday took the wraps off AOL Alerts - a set of real-time …

    e-Business 11 Jan 2002, 10:43

  • Europeans e-shop till they drop

    Especially Brits and Germans

    The UK and Germany accounted for almost two thirds of all visits to retail Web sites in Europe last month, according to Jupiter MMXI. Nine million Net users in the UK visited a retail Web site in December, while in Germany, ten million Net people visited etailers in the run-up to Christmas. Across Europe as a whole, the …

    Music and Media 11 Jan 2002, 10:48

  • Naked at the Moscone: the MacWorld Expo Round-Up

    Gadgets, gossip, and show-floor cruft

    MacWorld Expo is like a naturist's semi-annual holiday trip to the nudist camp. All year you're poked and teased for your weird habit. You suffer: the shelves of CompUSA are filled with nothing but Windows stuff, except for that bit under the stairs marked "Freaks". But for two weeks a year, you're surrounded by people just …

    Mac Channel 11 Jan 2002, 11:27

  • Anti-anthrax kit fries flash cards, chips

    So email your precious snaps...

    Anthrax scares may have stimulated the use of email, but snail mail is inadvertently hitting back at IT by frying chips. According to John Schwartz in today's New York Times (registration required), the irradiation machinery being used by the US mail to zap anthrax spores can destroy chips, and in one case has allegedly set the …

    Channel 11 Jan 2002, 12:18

  • Students hit by new reunion site

    Lest we forget

    A copycat reunion Web site has been launched in the UK to take advantage of the apparent obsession with nostalgia and the craze of people getting in touch with long lost friends. Gradumates targets former students who went on to higher education or university, unlike the phenomenally popular Friends Reunited site, which is …

    Music and Media 11 Jan 2002, 12:58

  • Software firewall vendors under sales pressure

    Forecasting appliance of firewall science

    The European firewall market is expanding strongly but in transition as sales of appliances eclipse those of software for the first time. That's the finding of market analyst firm Frost & Sullivan which estimates that software will, by 2005, account for 38.3 per cent of the total European firewall market of $1.25 billion. Sales …

    Security 11 Jan 2002, 13:08

  • Seagate sells an awful lot of HDDs

    Company record

    Seagate flogged 14.6 million hard disk drives (HDDs) in the December quarter (its Q2), a record for the company. Sales were $1.741bn and net income was $122m. On a GAAP comparison (a conservative US accounting standard) Seagate and Seagate Technology, the previous owner of the hard drive business, reported a combined net loss …

    Business 11 Jan 2002, 14:14

  • Genealogy more popular than sex, anthrax beats WinXP

    Search top tens completely meaningless - official

    Genealogy has become more popular than sex, according to Altavista's top ten search terms list for this week. The UK Public Records Office, which was forced to shut down its 1901 census site earlier this week after being deluged by vast waves of ancestor-seekers, will not be at all surprised by this news, and Altavista's PR …

    Music and Media 11 Jan 2002, 14:23

  • Is your son a computer hacker?

    Enough, we give in

    OK, we give in: if we tell you how you can find out whether your son is a computer hacker, promise us in turn that you'll stop submitting us the original article. Let's begin. In December, a site called Adequacy.org posted the piece by author T.Reginald Gibbons "How to tell if your son is a computer hacker." Mr. Gibbons, model …

    Bootnotes 11 Jan 2002, 14:44

  • VoIP enters the mainstream

    Plateau of productivity

    IP telephony is becoming a viable proposition for mainstream enterprise users, according to Cisco Systems, which says recent customer wins and market research demonstrate its leadership in the market. According to Synergy Research, in the third quarter Cisco shipped more than 50 per cent of the total VoIP ports (equivalent …

    Hardware 11 Jan 2002, 14:49

  • YouthNet buys Web agony aunt with lottery cash

    Tea and e-mpathy

    Web-based youth charity YouthNet UK is to use a £850,000 grant from the National Lottery to set up an interactive advice service. The service launches in the autumn and is hosted on TheSite.org, a Youthnet site. Professional youth counsellors will man the mouses, providing a confidential advice service for people aged 16 to 25 …

    Music and Media 11 Jan 2002, 15:42

  • Gigger worm can format Windows PCs

    JavaScript nasty

    Gigger, a new JavaScript-based virus, has escaped into the wild. It attempts to delete files from a computer and format user's disk drive on restart and antivirus vendors are characterising it as high-risk. Gigger, which uses a combination of Microsoft Outlook and mIRC to spread, is not spreading widely, but its destructive …

    Malware 11 Jan 2002, 15:47

  • UK fails to make the most of open source

    Fragmented picture

    UK firms are failing to exploit open source software as much as they might because of uncertainty about its business benefits. That's the key finding of a report prepared for the UK Department of Trade and Industry by the National Computing Centre (NCC), which offers a series of recommendations to encourage use of the …

    Software 11 Jan 2002, 17:31

  • Seattlement terms nixed by Judge

    Windows schools giveaway "predatory"

    A district court judge has rejected Microsoft's proposed settlement in the private law suits brought against the company. Microsoft's $1.1 billion giveaway of computers software to US schools would constitute "court-approved predatory pricing," if approved, said Judge Motz. He didn't, and it's back to the drawing board for The …

    Software 11 Jan 2002, 20:57