The Register® — Biting the hand that feeds IT

Feeds

15th September 2003 Archive

Browse by publication date, or search the site.

  • Tool lets blind people ‘touch’ graphics

    Mechanical arms

    A new type of computer interface is to enable blind people to feel and hear 3D graphic environments. The technology is being developed as part of an EU funded research project called GRAB (Computer Graphics Access for Blind people), and its end goal is to create workspaces that will let blind and visually impaired people …

    Personal 15 Sep 2003, 08:38

  • Sophos sales soar

    Worm farming

    Sophos, the UK anti-virus firm, had a good year on the back of the virus plague, producing pre-tax profits up 24 per cent to £12.1m (2002: £9.8m) on sales up 30 per cent o £41m (2002:£31.6m) for the year to March 31 2003. According to IDC, the anti-virus market should grow at 15 per cent annually between 2002 and 2007, so …

    Malware 15 Sep 2003, 08:49

  • MSN email spoofer pleads guilty to wire fraud

    Jail beckons

    An email spoofer who set up a simple scam to defraud MSN customers pleaded guilty last week to wire fraud. Matthew Thomas Guevara, 21, of Chicago, Illinois faces a jail sentence of up to 5 years and a fine of $250,000 for conning MSN customers into revealing their credit card details. Guevara set up email accounts on Hotmail …

    Music and Media 15 Sep 2003, 09:36

  • High-Tech Heroin

    Opinion Used and Abused

    Dostoevsky once wrote that "in the end they will lay their freedom at our feet and say to us, 'Make us your slaves, but feed us.'" His prophecy is relevant when examining the modern Information Age -- a dark, corporate-controlled society predicted by such artistic legends as Bruce Sterling, George Lucas, Ridley Scott, and …

    Music and Media 15 Sep 2003, 10:03

  • Rural UK must do more to get broadband

    Get orf yer backside

    People in rural areas must take the initiative and do more to help themselves if they want high speed Internet access. With fewer than one in ten villages in the UK hooked up to broadband, it is up to local communities to drive forward campaigns to secure funding and suppliers of high-speed services. To help those keen to …

    Telecoms 15 Sep 2003, 11:29

  • Transmeta powers brace of HP thin clients

    Win Win

    Transmeta has picked up an OEM contract to power some more HP thin clients with Crusoe processors. HP is to fit low-power 533MHz and 733MHZ Crusoes into the Compaq t5300 and t5500 models. Low power means low heat. Which in turn means smaller designs - no space is needed for fans. This is kinda useful for a thin client PC, …

    Servers 15 Sep 2003, 11:49

  • EA throws weight behind PS2 Online

    Major push for Christmas

    Electronic Arts is to provide a major boost for Sony's PS2 online service, with four of its biggest EA Games label titles set to support online play over the network adapter kit. The publisher, which has notably refused to provide any serious degree of support for the Xbox Live service following disputes with Microsoft over the …

    Personal 15 Sep 2003, 12:02

  • You don't have to be paranoid to work here. But we do

    Letter Take me to the cleaners

    "Clients are becoming more litigious, with technology playing such a critical part in the day to day running of businesses they are no longer willing to let mistakes go and bear the cost themselves." Litigation frenzy driving IT contractors under Letter Name and address supplied No kidding, the last two corporations I’ve …

    Letters 15 Sep 2003, 12:30

  • BT payphones get Wi-Fi

    Not all of them, obviously

    BT has begun installing Wi-Fi gear in its network of 108,000 public phone boxes. Of course, they won't all get the makeover treatment. The monster telco reckons that 91 payphones will be kitted out by the end of the week. Fast-forward to Christmas and some 200 public payphones should have Wi-Fi hooked up. Ultimately, thousands …

    Wireless 15 Sep 2003, 12:45

  • Telewest gets debt holders onside

    Capital restructure beckons

    Telewest has secured the approval - in principle - of its main debtholders which will see the indebted cable company swap 98.5 per cent of its debt for new equity. That leaves existing shareholders with 1.5 per cent of the equity. There's still a long way to go before Telewest comes out of the other side of the capital …

    Business 15 Sep 2003, 12:57

  • Atheros triples Wi-Fi range to 1km

    Fourth-gen chipsets knock back power consumption

    WLAN chipset maker Atheros today promised to eliminate zero-connection zones from homes and offices - and to provide radically extended range on public Wi-Fi hotspots - courtesy of its fourth-generation dual-band 802.11a/g product. The AR5004 series of WLAN chipsets also deliver mobile-friendly much-reduced power consumption …

    Wireless 15 Sep 2003, 13:33

  • A brand at last! Motorola rolla Microsoft smartphone

    Orange and AT&T first to go with it

    Motorola is to become the first major handset manufacturer to ship a Microsoft smartphone, with the rollout of the clamshell MPx200 starting in Europe with Orange next month, and AT&T Wireless commencing sales in the US in the 'fourth quarter.' M finally doing something will come as a welcome relief to Microsoft, but nice as the …

    Mobile 15 Sep 2003, 14:58

  • Freeserve hails ADSL cuts

    No more 'nips and tucks'

    Freeserve has welcomed recent cuts in wholesale ADSL fees insisting that these should feed through to greater competition and more choice for the consumer. Earlier this month BT avoided a showdown with the telecoms regulator by agreeing to further cost cuts on a key wholesale ADSL product that enables rival telcos to compete …

    Telecoms 15 Sep 2003, 14:58

  • PGP makes email encryption easier

    PGP Universal

    PGP Corporation today introduced simpler email encryption in which the burden of securing email messages is shifted from the client to the network. PGP Universal software suite, launched today, represents a new architecture for the company. The complexity of email encryption systems has long been a factor holding back …

    Security 15 Sep 2003, 15:05

  • Sun baits Dell as OracleWorld focuses on grid

    Battle ready

    Sun chief Scott McNealy indulged in his favorite pastime of Dell-baiting during his keynote at last week’s Oracle World conference in San Francisco. He claimed Dell took a non-integrated “systems” approach that contrasted with Sun’s own promise of integrated R&D and engineering between its N1 on-demand platform and Oracle’s new …

    Hardware 15 Sep 2003, 15:36

  • UK.gov to impose data retention dragnet on ISPs

    Consultation? What consultation!

    The Government is to impose a controversial Net surveillance regime on service providers, despite widespread industry criticism that its dragnet data retention approach is costly and unworkable. On Friday (Sept. 12) the Home Office announced the results of a consultation on a code of practice for the voluntary retention of …

    Music and Media 15 Sep 2003, 15:44

  • IBM launches iSeries backup and high uptime options

    Usage fees

    IBM has launched two new types of iSeries, both cut down versions of their Enterprise counterparts, one for backup and another for high availability and both have the "capacity on demand" concept that drives so many IBM offerings these days. To avoid confusion they are called iSeries for Capacity BackUp and the iSeries for High …

    Storage 15 Sep 2003, 15:45

  • Borland goes multi-platform with revamped C++ toolkits

    Coping with pain points

    Borland, after two years of coding, has lifted the lid on its latest C++ development toolkits. It says the offerings represent the industry's first multi-platform and multi-compiler development environments to ship for the language. C++BuilderX integrated development environment (IDE) and Enterprise Studio for C++ aim to deal …

    Software 15 Sep 2003, 15:59

  • Letter Mike Chatha re: xbox.ws

    re: Microsoft in reasonable Net action shocker! From: Mike Chatha Thanks for covering this story, but I'm afraid I should point out some inaccuracies which you may wish to correct: 1) We don't even own XBOX.US.COM - see the registrar's website at http://www.centralnic.com/register.php?op=search&domain=xbox where the domain …

    Letters 15 Sep 2003, 16:39

  • Microsoft? Ha! Trademark law? Phooey!

    Brave domain owner comes out with fists flying

    He may be weighed against the might of Microsoft and trademark law but brave domain owner Mike Chatha has refused to back down and has instead come out fighting. Last week, we reported how Mike had received a legal letter the Beast of Redmond insisting he hand over his domain www.xbox.ws or pay the price. Microsoft claimed that …

    Music and Media 15 Sep 2003, 16:42

  • Motor giant Ford to move to Linux

    But is it Red Hat, or SuSE?

    Motor giant Ford is switching to Linux for its sales systems, human resources, customer relations and infrastructure, according to a report in yesterday's Scotland on Sunday. But although the company is undoubtedly a megawin for Linux, Register sources suggest that the real battle was between the Linux vendors, with maybe just a …

    Software 15 Sep 2003, 16:58

  • Google – the only archive we'll ever need?

    N5M Only if you're wearing Google-goggles

    Net Time list moderator Ted Byfield had an almost impossible task summing up a panel discussion on the politics of the archive here on Saturday. The panel, at the Next Five Minutes festival featured Danielle Riou, who curates the Milosevic on Trial video archive and artists Julia Meltzger and David Thome, who create haunting …

    Music and Media 15 Sep 2003, 19:30

  • 64-bit desktop computing unnecessary, says Intel CTO

    IDF Gelsinger happy with 4GB for now...

    AMD and Apple are touting 64-bit computing on the desktop far too quickly, Intel CTO Pat Gelsinger said today. Moving beyond 32-bit addressing is "really not needed for several more years", he told reporters attending the Intel Developer Forum in San Jose. AMD, of course, isn't going to wait that long. Next week, the company …

    Channel 15 Sep 2003, 20:42

  • Exec shuffle continues at HP as Elias departs

    New horizons

    The executive churn in HP's hardware ranks continues with former storage top dog Howard Elias confirming his departure from the company. Elias was serving as senior vice president of business operations and management in HP's Enterprise Systems Group but has left in search of a new employer. "I wanted to go off and do some …

    Servers 15 Sep 2003, 21:16

  • Gelsinger: 100W power dissipation ‘OK’ for desktops

    IDF Managing expectations for Prescott

    Intel CTO Pat Gelsinger came as close as he's likely to get before the chip's launch to admitting that 'Prescott', the next generation of the Pentium desktop processor, dissipates more than 100W of power. Speaking to reporters at Intel Developer Forum in San Jose today, Gelsinger didn't confirm Prescott's alleged 103W power …

    Channel 15 Sep 2003, 23:41