4th November 2004 Archive

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Java server startup nabs former Sun HPC boss

24 cores and a new CMO

Azul Systems - the Java server company - has plucked former Sun Microsystems high performance computing chief Shahin Khan off the free agent market. Khan joined Azul this week as vice president and chief marketing officer. He's already made it on the company's web site and is expected to be highly touted in a statement issued …

Servers 4 Nov 2004, 04:02
Bush wins as Reps add seats in Congress

Kerry concedes - Florida re-play averted

US President George W Bush has been re-elected by a substantial margin in the popular vote, that is, 58,941,293 (51 per cent) to Kerry's 55,353,453 (48 per cent). "America has spoken, and I'm humbled by the trust and the confidence of my fellow citizens," the President said in a victory speech Wednesday. The President outlined …

Public Sector 4 Nov 2004, 09:07
US Navy contract knocks back EDS Q3 (again)

Let the new probe begin

EDS has once again delayed the release of its third quarter results due to an ongoing account investigation and topped off word of the delay by announcing a new internal investigation into another matter. EDS once planned to reveal third quarter numbers on Oct. 25 and then moved that announcement to Wednesday. Now it has …

Financial News 4 Nov 2004, 09:09
BT crows about broadband numbers

But why?

BT is boasting that it has recorded its best three months ever for wholesale broadband connections, racking up 50,000 new xDSL lines a week. Today's announcement follows a series of downbeat reports about the UK's dominant fixed line telco ahead of the publication of the telecoms review by regulator Ofcom. It is no doubt …

Telecoms 4 Nov 2004, 10:26
Napster beams songs to Windows smart phones

All thanks to Windows Media 10

Napster has extended its US music download store and subscription service to Windows Mobile 2003 Second Edition-based Smartphones. Right now, that means the AT&T Wireless' Audiovox SMT5600 handset, though there's no reason why its Windows Media Player 10 plug-in shouldn't run on Motorola's MPx220 provided that ships with WMP10 …

Music and Media 4 Nov 2004, 10:51
Sharp drops plan to drop Linux PDA from US

Zaurus SL-6000 will still be offered to corporates

Sharp is not pulling out of the US PDA market after all, the company has revealed, at least not to the extent that it had previously indicated. The about-turn follows last month's announcement that it was dropping its Linux-based Zaurus SL-6000 handheld in the US in order to focus on the more friendly Japanese market. Sharp …

Mobile 4 Nov 2004, 11:17
California backs stem cell research

Props to Prop 71

Californian voters on Tuesday approved a measure providing funding for stem cell research, thus circumventing President Bush's cuts to funding in the field. Known as Proposition 71, the measure will provide a $3bn state bond over 10 years to set up an Institute for Regenerative Medicine and fund research. It will also outlaw …

Science 4 Nov 2004, 11:26
Chip trade body revises 2004 sales downward

Anticipated market decline happened sooner than expected

The Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) yesterday scaled back its forecast for this year's semiconductor sales, after demand slowed though July, August and September. In June, the organisation forecast $214bn worth of chips would be sold during 2004, up 28.6 per cent on 2003's total, $166.4bn. Now, it believes this year's …

Channel Register 4 Nov 2004, 11:47
Tiscali targets SMEs with 'affordable' broadband

Bit of a trend going on

Tiscali UK has unveiled a range of "affordable" business broadband packages specifically tailored for small businesses. Starting £15.99 a month (ex VAT) for a 256k service, its Tiscali Business Broadband range includes anti-virus protection, spam filtering, a domain name plus oodles of space to set up a website. Although the …

Small Biz 4 Nov 2004, 11:47
Indymedia server grab - Home Office knew, but isn't telling

Search for culprits moves on by millimetres

Almost a month after Indymedia servers in London were seized by agencies unknown working for states unknown, a parliamentary answer suggests that the Home Office does know who seized them, and under what authority. But it's not telling. The Home Office has been subjected to a steady drizzle of questions on the subject of …

Music and Media 4 Nov 2004, 11:59
Take us to Mars, Beagle team says

Next-generation craft unveiled

The team behind the lost Beagle 2 lander has outlined plans for a third generation craft, Beagle 2: Evolution, that could yet go to Mars. Although the European Space Agency did not ask the team for new ideas, Professor Pillinger is keen to present the idea to the space agency as soon as possible. The team hopes the lander could …

Science 4 Nov 2004, 12:16
Nokia accuses rivals of ripping off designs, patents

Lawsuits target Sagem, Vitelcom

Nokia today initiated legal action against French handset maker Sagem and Spanish phone manufacturer Vitelcom, alleging both have infringed its intellectual property and trade-dress rights. Nokia's action against Sagem centres on allegations that the French company has essentially ripped off its styling with the Sagem X5-2 …

Financial News 4 Nov 2004, 12:22
Nokia to bring digital TV to mobile phones

Mobile with digital TV receiver in 2006

By 2006 you will be able to watch television on your Nokia phone. Within two years as many as 20 different TV channels will be made available, Anssi Vanjoki, Nokia's general manager of Multimedia, told the ninth Nokia Mobility Conference, which opened this week in Monaco. Nokia will introduce a mobile phone with a built-in …

Mobile 4 Nov 2004, 12:32
iPod-crazed youths invade London station

Welcome to the world of 'Mobile Clubbing'

It's 6:45 pm on a drizzly Wednesday evening at Waterloo Station. The main concourse is crowded more than usual due to train delays. Anxious faces stare at blue screens hoping for their cue to sprint to a platform in the hope of a seat. The middle aged lady with handbag in one hand and mobile phone in the other looks down for a …

Mobile 4 Nov 2004, 12:34
Sibling spammers convicted

Bogus products flogged from bogus email addies

A brother and sister have become among the first Americans to be convicted for sending spam email. Jeremy Jaynes, 30, and Jessica DeGroot, 28, were found guilty of bombarding AOL subscribers with hundreds of thousands of junk emails. The duo were convicted under Virginia law which bans sending emails using false email addresses …

Spam 4 Nov 2004, 12:49
PalmOne Tungsten T5

Reg review The best Palm yet?

Back in 2002, the Tungsten T's unique slider mechanism, which tucked the PDA's text-entry area behind a slide-up five-way navigation control, seemed a radical step forward from the tablet form-factor of old. PalmOne was pitching the device at executives and, it reckoned, executives spend more time looking at their information …

Reviews 4 Nov 2004, 13:36
Kent gets UK's first WiMAX network

Town and country

A next-generation wireless broadband network is being created in Kent which will provide high-speed wireless services to residential and business punters in the South East of England. Trials are due to start in January ahead of a full commercial launch by the middle of next year. Telabria - a privately-held company based in …

Business 4 Nov 2004, 13:42
Panto bin Laden in New York, New York outrage

Musical kerfuffle

A caricature of Osama bin Laden appearing in panto in New Zealand has caused a bit of a kerfuffle by bursting into a rendition of Frank Sinatra's New York, New York, the New Zealand Herald reports. The musical Ozzie appeared at the end of the Southern Stars Charitable Trust's version of Aladdin, provoking one parent to complain …

Bootnotes 4 Nov 2004, 13:44
Boffins issue stealth comet apocalypse alert

We're all going to die, part 347

Not content with scaring us half to death with dire predictions about killer comets, asteroids, tsunamis, plagues, global warming, floods, locusts and general pestilence, scientists have now discovered a new threat to humanity - the invisible killer comet. According to the Independent, a team led by Chandra Wickramasinghe at …

Science 4 Nov 2004, 14:03
ATI to launch AMD PCI-E chipset 'next week'

Radeon Xpress steams in on Monday

ATI will formally launch its Radeon Xpress 200 chipset family on 8 November, sources familiar with the company's plans have told The Register. The chipsets, which target both Intel's Pentium 4 and AMD's Athlon 64 processors, and support PCI Express, have been shipping in small quantities to motherboard makers for since early …

System Builder 4 Nov 2004, 14:05
MP takes aim at eBay over gun sales

Blunkett alerted

A Labour MP is to present Home Secretary David Blunkett with a list of handguns that have been made available for sale on internet auction site, eBay, over the last four days. Steve McCabe, member for Birmingham Hall Green, has called on eBay to pay closer attention to goods for sale on its pages after he was able to buy an air …

Financial News 4 Nov 2004, 14:07
Phishers develop sophisticated lure

Covert scripting exploit

Fraudsters have developed phishing emails capable of automatically stealing bank log-in details without requiring users to click on a website link, email filtering firm MessageLabs warns. Over the last two weeks, MessageLabs has monitored a small number of these dangerous new emails, which are capable of sidestepping the need …

ID 4 Nov 2004, 14:22
Movie biz to sue P2P film-sharers

MPAA follows RIAA

The Motion Picture Ass. of America (MPAA) is set to follow its music-industry counterpart, the Recording Industry Ass. of America (RIAA) and begin suing file-sharers. So claims an Associated Press source said to be familiar with movie studios' plans, though the MPAA itself would not comment on the move. Searches of most P2P …

Music and Media 4 Nov 2004, 15:01
500 call centre jobs bound for UK

Europe gets a look-in too

Some 500 jobs are to be created in the UK by the end of the year as ClientLogic Corporation expands its call centre operation as part of a Europe-wide expansion plan to meet increased demand. The jobs are to be created in its contact centres in Newcastle, Watford and Derby taking ClientLogic's total UK workforce to 3,600. As …

IT Director 4 Nov 2004, 15:32
Wanadoo UK poised for 500,000th broadband customer

Bubbly on ice

Wanadoo UK reckons it's about to pass an important milestone tomorrow when it hooks up its 500,000th broadband punter. Last month the ISP reported that in the year to September the number of broadband punters had mushroomed from 68,000 to 442,000. With new sign-ups swelling this number each day Wanadoo is predicting it will hit …

Telecoms 4 Nov 2004, 16:32
Corporate governance goals impossible - RSA

IT managers tied up in red tape

Companies are struggling to cope with tighter corporate governance regimes, which might even work against the goal of achieving improved IT security they are partly designed to promote. The need to comply with requirements such as data protection, Sarbanes-Oxley, Basel II and other corporate governance reforms is tying up IT …

IT Director 4 Nov 2004, 16:43
3D patent suit extended to Dell, HP, IBM, Sony, others

PC makers targeted as list of allegedly infringed patents grows

Texas law firm McKool Smith has extended its 3D graphics patent violation litigation to target not just games publishers but hardware manufacturers. According to a GameDailyBiz report, HP, Dell, IBM, Toshiba, Sony, Acer, MPC, Systemax, Fujitsu, Matsushita, Averatec, Polywell, Sharp, Twinhead, Uniwill and JVC are all named as …

PCs 4 Nov 2004, 16:57
Music biz in unauthorised downloads shock

Should EMI sue itself?

A posting in Robert Fripp's online diary provides some fascinating inside information on the poor and starving but caring, sharing music industry. Fripp and obscure but legendary band King Crimson have parted company with EMI/Virgin over digital download rights; not, apparently, because Fripp is agin downloading as such, but …

Music and Media 4 Nov 2004, 18:45
Watch out there's an IE bug about

You've been iFramed

Microsoft's ubiquitous IE web browser software became the subject of yet another security flap this week. The latest buffer overflow vulnerability could be used to inject hostile code into vulnerable systems, security clearing house US CERT warned yesterday. The flaw stems from a bug in the way particular versions of IE …

Enterprise Security 4 Nov 2004, 21:36
Netscape/CNN site calls Bush an a--hole!

Angry techie gets revenge

The very citizen journalists who very nearly pushed John Kerry into the White House have continued with their stellar work, uncovering a shocking photo naming policy on a shared Netscape/CNN site. Citizen journalists traveling to this page discovered a dubious name for the file of the photo showing a lovable Laura Bush holding …

Bootnotes 4 Nov 2004, 22:27
VoIP heads for the big time

European land grab

VoIP applications and services, which allow residential customers to avoid call charges, could grab up to 13 per cent of the European phone market by 2008. This is one of the key findings of a new Analysys report Voice Communications: From Public Service to Private Application. It estimates that more than 50 million broadband …

Data Networking 4 Nov 2004, 22:27