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16th December 2003 Archive

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  • ‘Gouging’ memo leaves Diebold red-faced

    Paper trail? Sure, that'll be $1200 for a printer

    The archive of internal correspondence from the politically-connected ATM giant Diebold - which is bidding for many electronic voting contracts across the US - is a gift that keeps on giving. Diebold has its own answer to critics who want a verifiable paper trail. Incredibly, the e-voting terminals don't leave behind such …

    Security 16 Dec 2003, 01:33

  • Letters The Internet's ‘background radiation’ – who pays?

    We published some interesting statistics recently in our story Watching the Net's background radiation. OK, this is more curio than crisis, but we asked "Who pays?" And you had plenty of suggestions. Who pays? Well, the best way to motivate people to clean up their traffic is to bill them for it… There's a problem though. My …

    Letters 16 Dec 2003, 01:33

  • Oracle coasts in Q2

    We're better than PeopleSoft

    Oracle posted a modest revenue increase in its second quarter with license updates and product support driving the gains. Oracle churned out $2.5 billion in revenue for the period - an eight percent rise over the same quarter last year. The company showed a more dramatic increase in net income, which rose 15 percent year-on- …

    Software 16 Dec 2003, 02:45

  • PortalPlayer Photo Edition paves way for Picture iPod

    All your digital photos. In your pocket

    PortalPlayer, the company behind the hardware, software and processor technology that powers Apple's iPod, will soon launch a upgraded version of its chip/firmware combo that paves the way for a Photo iPod. PortalPlayer Photo Edition will support synchronising digital photos between portable devices and host PCs, along with on- …

    Mobile 16 Dec 2003, 09:25

  • Business Objects completes Crystal Decisions purchase

    Careful integration needed

    Business Objects' acquisition of Crystal Decisions, for a total of $1.2 billion, has created one of the largest business intelligence companies around. While the merger does look like a sound pairing on paper, as always, careful integration will be required on product, sales and indeed cultural levels. Few could have predicted …

    Hardware 16 Dec 2003, 09:41

  • US student seeks J-Loesque posterior

    Givebooty.com begs for bigger butt

    Jennifer Lopez certainly is an inspiration to millions of Latin and black American women. After all, who wouldn't want a successful entertainment career, Ben Affleck as a beau and an arse the size of a Zeppelin? Casting as it does a shadow over lesser behinds, Lopez's prodigious posterior has become the yardstick by which …

    Bootnotes 16 Dec 2003, 10:23

  • AMD ships Athlon 64 3000+ – officially

    But where's the missing 512KB of cache?

    It's official. AMD yesterday added the desktop-oriented Athlon 64 3000+ to its price list, just days after the part began to appear in a variety of Far Eastern processor emporia. The desktop Athlon 64 3000+ comes in at $218 in batches of 1000 processors, the same price as the notebook-oriented Athlon 64 3000+. As we've noted …

    Channel 16 Dec 2003, 10:25

  • Dutch web host aided porno typosquatter

    Grilled by US federal agents

    Dutch web hosting company PGW Internet Solutions aided cyber scammer John Zuccarini in directing children looking for Disneyland, Harry Potter or Bob the Builder to explicit porn sites instead. The Register discovered that thousands of Zuccarini’s websites - including adaptac.com, gorgewbush.com and Bobthebiulder.com - were …

    Music and Media 16 Dec 2003, 10:31

  • UK needs greater wholesale broadband competition

    BT too dominant, says regulator

    BT faces a new challenge in the New Year after the UK's new communications watchdog - Ofcom - said it wants to see more competition in the wholesale broadband access market after deciding that the UK's monster telco is too dominant. In a consultation document published today, Ofcom found that the UK's broadband market has …

    Telecoms 16 Dec 2003, 10:36

  • Motorola widens Microsoft smartphone line

    Contracts awarded

    Motorola will next year add three more handsets based on Microsoft's Smartphone OS. So claims Taiwan's Chinese-language newspaper, the Commercial Times. And it says local manufacturers Compal and Chi Mei have been awarded the production contracts. Chi Mei currently produces Motorola's MPx200 Microsoft-based smartphone, …

    Mobile 16 Dec 2003, 10:39

  • BT tests wireless broadband

    Countryside Campaign

    BT today named four rural areas in England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland as guinea pigs for a three month trial of wireless broadband. If successful, the telco will roll out a radio broadband service to rural areas currently deemed commercially or technically unviable for ADSL installation. These include households …

    Small Biz 16 Dec 2003, 11:18

  • Toshiba preps sub-1in HDD

    Update 2-3GB drives for mobile phones

    Toshiba has developed a 0.85in hard disk platter and will begin sampling drives based on the tiny unit to mobile phone and PDA manufacturers next summer. The 2-3GB drives will go into mass production early 2005, company insiders claim in a Nihon Keizai Shimbun report yesterday. Image courtesy of MobileMag.com Pricing has …

    Personal 16 Dec 2003, 11:20

  • Europe's big biz starts buying telco kit again

    Hybrid IP systems are must have

    EMEA enterprise telephony market bucks downturn After a spell in the market doldrums the EMEA enterprise telephony sector has returned to positive sales growth, with year-on-year increases in the third quarter of 2003 reaching almost 5 per cent. According to Canalys, EMEA beat the global average which saw slightly more modest …

    Data Networking 16 Dec 2003, 11:52

  • Intertrust ‘universal’ DRM scheme coming in six months

    Big-name support claimed

    DRM specialist Intertrust will release its would-be standard generic digital media copy-protection system within six months, a senior Philips executive says. Intertrust was acquired by Philips and Sony jfor $453 million just over a year ago. The two joint developers of the original CD audio specification bought the company to …

    Music and Media 16 Dec 2003, 12:00

  • iPass aggregates T-Mobile US hotspots

    WLAN site tally to top 6900

    T-Mobile's US Wi-Fi operation has opened its network it iPass, allowing the remote access specialist's corporate and individual customers to connect to the Internet via T-Mobile hotspots. The financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. The deal follows an earlier agreement between iPass and Swisscom to add the latter's …

    Wireless 16 Dec 2003, 13:07

  • PSX rolls out in Japan, but analysts disappointed

    Specification 'blunder' bad for device's public image, apparently

    PSX, Sony's integrated games console, DVD recorder and digital video recorder, has arrived in Japan, but analysts now seem unconvinced by the machine following the company's decision to scale back its specifications. Speaking to the Associated Press, analyst Kazumasa Kubota of Okasan Securities described the system as a " …

    Personal 16 Dec 2003, 13:14

  • Check Point buys Zone Labs

    Onto the desktop

    Check Point is boosting its consumer portfolio with through the takeover of Zone Labs, the vendor best known for the Zone Alarm firewall software. Check Point is shelling out $205m upfront - approx $113m in cash and approx $92 mmillion in shares. It is also assuming Zone Lab employee stock options, which could convert to 2.9 …

    Security 16 Dec 2003, 13:20

  • Some points missed in Return of the ‘free’ PC

    Letter The CDs! The hackers!

    The Return of the free PC From Richard Lloyd, Liverpool Did you calculate how many CDs Metronomy would have to send out to users if all 200,000 PCs were snapped up and kept for the full three years? Yep, 7.2 MILLION CDs - one wonders why at least broadband users couldn't download the ads off the Net rather than from CD. …

    Letters 16 Dec 2003, 14:01

  • UK movie biz strikes again at DVD copying software maker

    Now DMCA-like EUCD is part of UK law

    Warner Home Video UK's legal battle with DVD copying software developer 321 Studios escalated last week when the UK content distributor filed a new High Court lawsuit with the aim of banning the sale of 321's products, DVD X Copy and DVD X Copy Xpress. WHV took on 321's UK division last summer with a Motion Picture Ass. of …

    Personal 16 Dec 2003, 14:28

  • On the Inland Revenue EDS sacking

    Letters Finger pointing

    Inland Revenue sacks EDS First the EDS pros (some literally): Having worked for EDS on the account for four years in role that involved dealing with the customer on project- related issues on a daily basis, you have given a true indication of the EDS side of events but have failed to divulge exactly how the relationship …

    Letters 16 Dec 2003, 14:45

  • European RIAA-style anti-file swap lawsuits ‘inevitable’

    Industry bigwig talks tactics

    The European music industry plans to take the fight against Internet piracy right to the doors of file sharers with individually targeted lawsuits, the head of the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) sayes. And the subpoenas could start flying next year. Writing in the IFPI in-house magazine, …

    Music and Media 16 Dec 2003, 15:29

  • Motorola taps former Sun prez Zander as new chief

    CEO at long last

    Motorola has tapped Ed Zander, the fast-talking former President of Sun Microsystems, as its new Chairman and CEO. As of Jan 5., Zander will realize his dream of heading a major company with Motorola's Mike Zafirovski remaining President and Chief Operating Officer. Zafirovski has been seen as a potential candidate for the CEO …

    Mobile 16 Dec 2003, 15:56

  • Roxio first target as CD-R patent owner threatens industry

    Optima claims ownership of key burning technique

    CD burning software developer Optima Technology has sued rival Roxio and threatened any other company that allows users to record information onto a CD-R. Optima's claim centres on a patent the company filed by the company in 1995 and granted two years later. The patent, number 5,666,531, details a "recordable CD-ROM accessing …

    Storage 16 Dec 2003, 16:13

  • Beat the Winter blues with hot shirts from NTK

    Cash'n'Carrion Two new offerings. In black, naturally

    Taking a well-earned break from their polyamorous exploits, the boys at NTK have applied their not inconsiderable talents to a couple of new t-shirts. Naturally, you can have either shirt in any colour you like as long as it's black, and NTK's own blurb outlines the bangs you get for your bucks: NTK Japanese It's like …

    Site News 16 Dec 2003, 16:13

  • Warning: lack of technology may harm your prospects

    Digital divide leaves underprivileged stranded

    A London conference today organised by the Institute for Public Policy Research (ippr) addresses the issue of the increasing marginalisation of those without access to technology. The first e-Quality festival featured Ivan Lewis, minister for young people and adult skills, who was keen to blow the government's trumpet on this …

    Music and Media 16 Dec 2003, 16:18

  • MS moves into ‘get Longhorn on the road’ mode

    That time of the dev cycle again, people

    If Windows didn't exist, Microsoft would be a far poorer and more obscure company - if, that is, it still existed at all, because most of its contemporaries from the 70s don't. So, what is wrong with this sentence: '[Microsoft has formed a new division, the Windows Core Operating System division, to focus closely on Windows OS …

    Software 16 Dec 2003, 16:45

  • Gov.uk touts Net access for all by 2008

    Say hello to the Digital Inclusion Panel

    Trade and Industry Secretary, E-Minister and all-round cyberbabe Patricia Hewitt is pleased to report today that the UK is one of the "best connected economies" in the world. This will come as a great surprise as those living out in the elephant grass and still surviving on Third-World dial-up connections and the promise of …

    Music and Media 16 Dec 2003, 16:56

  • Friends of Aimster back Supreme Court bid

    Set P-to-P free

    Aimster has formed a new buddy list ahead of a potential showdown with the U.S. Supreme Court with three advocates of the peer-to-peer service handing in "friends of the court" briefs. The American Association of Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS), Privacy Innovations Inc., and online author and librarian Eric Flint have all voiced …

    Music and Media 16 Dec 2003, 17:23

  • Windows-style security hell stalks Mac OS X? Yeah, you wish…

    Infowarrior's Richard Forno spells out the differences for the hard of thinking

    Since Apple released Mac OS X, even the PC industry trade publications have raved about its quality, design, and features.  PC Magazine even gave Mac OS X "Panther" a 5-star rating in October 2003. Perhaps it was because Macs could now seamlessly fit into the Windows- dominated marketplace and satisfy Mac users refusing to …

    Software 16 Dec 2003, 17:29

  • Intel's release of Itanium replacement is imminent – analyst

    2004: "The Year of x86-64-bit"

    A few gallons of rancid egg nog were poured this week all over the "Year of Itanium" celebration underway at Intel, as an analyst firm predicted Intel will not only give in and ship a x86-64bit chip but also that the product will be woefully behind in the market. Rick Whittington at American Technology Research must have been …

    Servers 16 Dec 2003, 20:10