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8th January 2004 Archive

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  • Intel coughs up for the Digital Home

    Capital idea

    Intel is to invest $200 million in companies creating technologies to digitise the home. The cash will come from the California-based company's venture capital arm, Intel Capital, one of the largest venture capital houses in the world. Money from the "Digital Home Fund" will be doled out to start-ups and young businesses over …

    Business 8 Jan 2004, 09:28

  • Gates wraps Brave New World with hefty fees

    CES Collecting the premiums

    There are many out there who would characterize Bill Gates as coming from the wimp mould made so popular by the first President Bush. Such a description, however, is far off the mark as the Microsoft Chief proved today at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Gates had the guts to face up to a gadget-hungry crowd and …

    Media 8 Jan 2004, 09:34

  • It’s Wi-Fi free week with BT

    Openzone madness at end of Jan

    For all those itching to put their Wi-Fi Xmas presents to good use, this month will give you the chance to browse the Web and send emails for free. BT is offering a week’s free wireless broadband over its Openzone network at the end of the month (usually it’s £6 an hour or £85 a month limitless). From 26 January to 1 February …

    Broadband 8 Jan 2004, 09:43

  • Business Objects maps out Crystal Decisions integration

    Three steps to merger heaven

    Business Objects today showed its customers the way it intends to merge its products with that of newly acquired Crystal Decisions. The two business intelligence software lines will be as one sometime in 2005. Business Objects will take three steps to get to technology merger heaven. Step One: a product integration pack …

    Data Center 8 Jan 2004, 10:33

  • Govt unveils Web kids safety campaign

    Education

    A hard-hitting ad campaign warning about the dangers of paedophiles 'grooming' young victims online has been launched by the Government. It's hoped the public awareness campaign will encourage youngsters to think twice about who they're chatting to online. This £700,000 campaign, featured on the radio, in cinemas and online, …

    Media 8 Jan 2004, 10:48

  • Stroppy emails make you sick: official

    Inbox open, blood pressure up

    Boffins at Buckinghamshire Chilterns University College have proven what Reg readers doubless already know - that aggresive emails are bad for your health. The eggheads monitored volunteers as they opened their inboxes, finding that threatening missives - or those from a work superior - raised the guinea pigs' blood pressure …

    Media 8 Jan 2004, 10:51

  • US tech industry stands up for overseas jobs

    'There is no job that is America's God-given right anymore'

    America's IT industry is looking at the foreign competition - and it's worried. A group of eight leading CEOs, all members of the Computer Systems Policy Project, is calling on the US government to help the country stay on top of the technology tree. The CSSP wants better R&D tax credits, more federal investment in science, and …

    Business 8 Jan 2004, 12:30

  • Evesham cuts jobs

    Restructuring

    Evesham Technology is to axe jobs in cost-cutting exercise. Workers at the Worcestershire-based computer maker learned that jobs were on the line at the beginning of the week. A spokeswoman for Evesham declined to say how many jobs were under threat, although it's understood that between 20 and 30 jobs could be at risk. …

    Channel 8 Jan 2004, 12:32

  • BT trials mobile SMS to voice landline

    Speech synthesis

    BT is to trial a service that enables customers to send SMS messages from mobiles to landline phones using text-to-speech conversion. The proposed service is designed for anybody who wants to text someone without a mobile, or to a leave a message for someone who doesn't have an answerphone. BT reckons the service will be …

    Mobile 8 Jan 2004, 12:44

  • 2004 – the year Microsoft's prices bend, buckle or break?

    Analysis Israelis demand Thai massage

    The Israeli government's decision to suspend Microsoft purchases will be old news to Register readers - we broke the story back in October. But it's the subsequent developments of sweet Thai deals, first reported by YNet, that have implications far beyond the Middle East. Procurement departments in EMEA and the Americas will be …

    Software 8 Jan 2004, 12:53

  • LG ‘will persist’ with Smart Display, even after Microsoft drops it

    Ugly duckling stays ugly

    The Smart Display, a year old, will not make it to 2.0 - Microsoft has told the unfortunate manufacturers who partnered with it in the doomed venture. The idea of a flat panel display which you could pick up and carry around the house sounded like a brilliant idea when it was first mooted, since all it needed was a (presumably …

    Mobile 8 Jan 2004, 12:54

  • AOL launches bargain basement Net access

    Dusts down Netscape name

    AOL is setting up a cheap-as-chips Internet access service in its American heartland. The dial-up service, branded under the Netscape moniker, offers unlimited access for $9.95 per month. Customers will get @netscape.com addresses, and built-in spam filters for their email. The home page incorporates a Google search box, and a …

    Media 8 Jan 2004, 13:52

  • Mississippi man denies Best Buy blackmail

    E-extortion

    A Mississippi man has denied trying to extort $2.5 million from US retailer Best Buy. Thomas E. Ray III, of Jackson, Mississippi, is accused of sending an email last October threatening to expose alleged security problems at Best Buy unless he was paid off. Ray, 25, was arraigned on two felony extortion charges in Minneapolis …

    Security 8 Jan 2004, 13:54

  • Reg kit slashed in our blockbusting January sale

    Cash'n'Carrion Shirts for a quid, plus other bargains

    We always vowed we'd never follow the retailing tradition of having a New Year sale to clear the warehouse shelves for new and exciting products. Not for us the buy-now-pay-2010 January orgy of discounting, with eager punters queuing for days in eager anticipation of that must-have Vulture Central accessory. Then we changed our …

    Site News 8 Jan 2004, 14:04

  • Multivision ceases trading

    Beyond our control, PC builder says

    Multivision, a PC builder based in the West Midlands, has ceased trading. Customers who called the firm this afternoon were greeted with a recorded message saying the company had "regrettably ceased to trade for reasons beyond the control of the proprietors". Customers with issues about outstanding orders, repairs or warranties …

    Channel 8 Jan 2004, 14:16

  • Scalextric races on to the Net

    Virtual makeover

    Slot car racing enthusiasts will soon be able to race against drivers anywhere in the world following a digital makeover for the popular Scalextric game. Hornby - makers of Scalextric and its popular range of model trains - is set to unveil a new system that should be in shops ready for Christmas this year. The "Scalextric …

    Media 8 Jan 2004, 14:33

  • HP wins $2.3m judgment against bust reseller

    Collection may be a bit of an issue, then

    HP has won court backing to recover $2.3m in damages for breach of contract from Future Network Services. As FNS went bust late last year owing "three or four million pounds" - much of which revolved around rebates that HP wanted paying back - it's difficult to see how HP will collect much or most of these damages. Police are …

    Channel 8 Jan 2004, 15:00

  • MS (nearly) ditches the PC religion with home net plans

    Maybe it's not the PC, stupid...

    Did Microsoft finally concede the death of the PC yesterday? Not quite, but the string of home electronics announcements, although pitched as the next logical steps onward from its existing product lines, put the company's vision of the PC as the center of home entertainment in some considerable peril, and kill off any last …

    Software 8 Jan 2004, 16:52

  • HP agrees to be Apple DRM dealer

    CES Inks OEM deal for iPod, iTunes

    Apple found a friend in the Wintel world on Thursday, as HP announced it will start selling a version of the iPod MP3 player. At this time, HP is only saying that its HP-branded player will arrive sometime in the U.S. summer and be priced inline with current music devices. HP also plans to to pre-install Apple's iTunes music …

    Mac Channel 8 Jan 2004, 20:18

  • Worldcom allowed once more to bid for Federal contracts

    Dedebarred

    Scandal-hit telecoms outfit Worldcom - aka MCI - is once again able to carry out US Government contracts after being excluded from bidding for work. Last summer, US procurement agency, the General Services Administration (GSA), barred MCI/Worldcom from bidding for new federal contracts, ruling that the telco giant "had not …

    Business 8 Jan 2004, 20:49

  • Nortel to resell Avici routers

    Second coming

    Nortel Networks today signed a three year deal to resell Avici's carrier grade routers. Under the agreement, Avici (number three in the market behind Cisco and Juniper) will become Nortel's worldwide preferred 'partner' for IP core routers. Nortel and Avici are former partners but this relationship was broken off five years …

    Data Networking 8 Jan 2004, 20:52

  • Flight Sim enquiry raises terror alert

    Troopers thwart ten-year-old

    A mother's enquiry about buying Microsoft Flight Simulator for her ten-year-old son prompted a night-time visit to her home from a state trooper. Julie Olearcek, a USAF Reserve pilot made the enquiry at a Staples store in Massachusetts, home to an earlier bout of hysteria, during the Salem witch trials. So alarmed was the …

    Bootnotes 8 Jan 2004, 22:43

  • Dell ‘suspects’ Yamhill is on the way

    CES Ticking Itanium bomb

    Michael Dell today has removed whatever layer of doubt may have surrounded Intel's introduction of an x86-64-bit chip, during a keynote at the CES shown in Las Vegas. Rumors have circulated for years now that Intel would follow rival AMD and add some 64-bit extensions to its 32-bit processor lines, and now one of Intel's …

    Bootnotes 8 Jan 2004, 23:17

  • Sun shares spike on Opteron optimism

    Eyeing the profit barrier

    Shares of Sun Microsystems surged on Thursday as an analyst firm upgraded the company's stock based on its relationship with AMD. Sun rose more than 10 percent to $5.51, nearing its 52-week high of $5.64. A note from Banc of America raising Sun to a buy from neutral appeared to be one driver of the uptick. "Our upgrade is …

    Servers 8 Jan 2004, 23:40