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31st January 2002 Archive

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  • Beverly HP-billies go Pronghorn

    Spellchecker to blame for SECC recall

    We're not sure if anything we say can make the ludicrous HP-Compaq Sircam Merger any more ridiculous, but subversive Dadaist elements inside Hewlett Packard's Cupertino headquarters are hell bent on trumping us, and making satire truly redundant. Or so we surmise, after HP's latest Securities and Exchange Commission filing was …

    Bootnotes 31 Jan 2002, 05:30

  • Kodak surrenders!

    Honours £100 camera deal

    Kodak has decided to do the decent thing and honour its £100 digital camera deal. In the face of legal actions and media opprobrium, there was little else that it could do. Here is a link to the offer statement posted on Kodak's UK site And here is the email sent to customers who ordered the bargain camera (thanks to everyone …

    e-Business 31 Jan 2002, 08:58

  • Geoworks throws in towel and puts GEOS up for sale

    So farewell then...

    Wireless software pioneer Geoworks Corp has thrown in the towel, giving up hope of developing its AirBoss application platform technology and has put it up for sale along with the source code for its GEOS and GEOS-SC operating systems. The Alameda, California-based company said the wireless infrastructure market is "very …

    Software 31 Jan 2002, 10:34

  • Carly keeps cool on Linux

    'Yes and no,' apparently...

    Calm down, Hewlett Packard CEO Carly Fiorina told an audience at the LinuxWorld conference in New York yesterday. Despite her high-profile presence delivering the conference's opening keynote, Fiorina made it clear that HP sees Linux only as another revenue-earner, and is certainly not going to follow IBM into making any …

    Software 31 Jan 2002, 10:46

  • AOL blocks Trillian IM access

    Nasty cop, nasty cop routine

    Media conglomerate AOL-TW has blocked access to its instant messenging service from one of the most popular access clients, Trillian. Trillian offers Windows users an all-in-one client which provides access to the AOL, ICQ, Microsoft Messenger and Yahoo! Instant messanger networks, alongside IRC. Much like its excellent Mac OS …

    Software 31 Jan 2002, 11:19

  • Kodak U-turn victory for consumers

    Now Kodak must come clean on numbers

    Kodak's decision to back down and honour an agreement to sell a wrongly priced digital camera has been hailed as a major victory for consumers. As Kodak attempted to play down the U-turn those who have been battling against the company have been sharing their views at such an important victory. Alan Stevens of the Consumers' …

    e-Business 31 Jan 2002, 12:07

  • Tiny Computers = big losses

    The March of Time

    Tiny Computers, the UK's biggest PC builder, which collapsed on Tuesday and got bought on Wednesday, got itself into a right old mess. The company is understood to have lost £35m last year on sales of £200m, according to the FT which carries an interview with Bill Davis, chairman of new owner Time Group. The company increased …

    Channel 31 Jan 2002, 12:24

  • Alcatel posts record loss

    Looks to Q2 recovery

    Alcatel expects a recovery in its business after reporting a record loss today. The French telecommunications posted a Q4 net loss of euro 1,498 million compared with a net income of euro 426 million in the same quarter a year earlier. Group sales for Q4 were euro 6,766 million, down 20 percent over pro-forma sales of euro 8, …

    Business 31 Jan 2002, 12:57

  • PocketPC, Nokia threaten Palm lead in Europe

    Still ahead, but it's looking a tad ominous

    Palm took the top slot in European mobile device sales in Q4 2001, but the slot is less comfortable than it looks. Figures from research outfit Canalysis give Palm 34.1 per cent of the market, but the company benefited from "strong low-end sales during the Christmas period," and the Microsoft camp, in the shape of Compaq and HP …

    Data Networking 31 Jan 2002, 12:58

  • Out of the box, Linux is ‘dreadfully insecure’

    LinuxWorld Bastille Day

    Jay Beale, the lead developer of Bastille Linux and an independent security consultant, says it's not the Unix-based systems with interesting stuff on them that get hacked, it's the vulnerable ones. And if you're not prepared to tighten up what you get from the vendor, it's just a matter of time. Beale shared his philosophy …

    Security 31 Jan 2002, 13:58

  • Crackers exploit Cisco LAN switch flaw

    The CatOS is out of the bag

    Cisco has warned users of a potential denial of service risk involving its popular Catalyst LAN switches. A buffer overflow vulnerability in Telnet option handling can be used to crash the process and force a Catalyst switch to reload. This operation could be repeated by an attacker to produce a denial of service attack. Cisco …

    Security 31 Jan 2002, 14:01

  • Want broadband? then club together

    Interesting

    Fixed wireless broadband operator Tele2 will provide broadband in areas currently not served by high-speed Net access – but only as long as there is proven demand. The company says it is prepared to rollout its broadband services if at least 100 people from within a 10km radius area come forward. Elliott Mueller, CEO at Tele2 …

    Telecoms 31 Jan 2002, 14:03

  • Net faces being ‘most regulated medium in history’

    So says cyber rights group

    A UK-based online civil liberties group has called on governments to protect the freedom of people using the Internet. Publishing a statement marking the fifth anniversary of the creation of Cyber-Rights & Cyber-Liberties (UK) the group has called on governments to "respect fundamental human rights" and "encourage rather than …

    Music and Media 31 Jan 2002, 16:26

  • Tiscali deal with Tiny under threat

    Agreement under review

    Tiscali UK could lose a key distribution channel following yesterday's acquisition of Tiny Computers by Time Computers. The Italian-based ISP bought Tiny Online – the ISP of Tiny – for £8 million in August last year. As part of the deal Tiny agreed that Tiscali would become the PC maker's exclusive ISP. However, following the …

    Music and Media 31 Jan 2002, 16:44

  • BadTrans-B tops virus charts

    MS Outlook improvements unlikely to stem tide

    BadTrans-B remains, two months after it was first released, the most infectious virus on the Internet. The mass-mailing email worm heads the monthly chart of virus reports compiled by antivirus vendor Sophos and accounts for 61.1 per cent of calls to its support centre this month. It was followed by MyParty-A (4.3 per cent), …

    Malware 31 Jan 2002, 16:57

  • US mulls Linux for world's biggest computer

    Servers by the acre

    Linux is in the running to power the world's biggest computer, we learned this week at LinuxWorld Expo. A bid is being prepared to provide the computing power behind the US government sponsored Project Purple, which will pool a vast server farm to the three leading US research labs, which is scheduled to come on stream by the …

    Hardware 31 Jan 2002, 17:45

  • Judge drops Napster bombshell

    Queries labels' right to maintain pigopoly

    Marilyn Hall Patel, the district court judge in the Napster case, has been having some very subversive thoughts recently, we learn from case transcripts unsealed this week. On January 16, the New York Times reports, Patel questioned if the record companies copyright extended to digital distribution of music, and granted Napster …

    Music and Media 31 Jan 2002, 19:01

  • AMD talks Ab Fab with UMC

    Foundry deal

    Real men own fabs, AMD boss Jerry Sanders famously once said. Real men are also prepared to share them, for AMD has signed a JV with UMC, the Taiwanese contract semiconductor maker, to build a new chipmaking factory in Singapore. The AMD/UMC fab (or fabrication plant) will knock out 300-mm wafers for high volume production of …

    Channel 31 Jan 2002, 23:17