22nd May 2008 Archive

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Chicago demands ticket taxes from eBay, StubHub

'You must pay for your amusements'

The City of Chicago is suing eBay and its secondhand ticket outfit StubHub, claiming they've failed to collect millions of dollars a year in city taxes. On Monday, as reported by The Associated Press, the city filed separate suits against eBay and its subsidiary, demanding records of their Chicago-area ticket sales. A Chicago …

Financial News 22 May 2008, 00:07
NetApp shares fall on downbeat forecast

Q4 revs up, earnings flat

Despite reinventing itself with a "bold blue" new brand identity this quarter, NetApp's net income was practically flat in Q4 2008. Investors say: awww. But the storage vendor's revenue rose a healthy 17 per cent year-over-year, beating some market estimates. Investors say: eh? Not so fast — NetApp's forecast for next …

Storage 22 May 2008, 00:17
Apple sued over Mighty Mouse

Trademark tango

A US hardware manufacturer is taking Apple and broadcasting corporation CBS to court over the Mighty Mouse name. Mighty Mouse as seen in Apple's eye... Man & Machine has, since 2004, sold its Mighty Mouse - a waterproof and chemical resistant optical mouse for medical, industrial and marine applications. The firm has filed …

Reg Hardware 22 May 2008, 01:02
EU sets out mobile satellite services

Transmissions from space must reach all of Europe

The European Parliament has approved a proposal that demands mobile satellite services reach at least 60 per cent of every country in Europe, and 50 per cent of their populations, in order to get operating spectrum. The ruling relates to a couple of chunks of spectrum which have been handed to the EU by member countries, for …

Telecoms 22 May 2008, 07:02
Missing MacBook Air cables

Q&A

Having less than two months ago become the proud owner of a 1.8GHz Mac Air. Then I managed to have the power leads and assorted cables pinched from my car. I'm having a nightmare trying to purchase replacement cables. I have been to Apple web-site and searched a few other places and have been unsuccesful in finding any …

Reg Hardware 22 May 2008, 07:29
Deutsche Post issues Rudolf Hess stamp

Neo-Nazis make merry with design-your-own service

Neo-Nazis have left Germany's Deutsche Post rather red-faced after using its "design-your-own" stamp service - Plusbrief Individuell - to issue a limited edition Rudolf Hess stamp. While Deutsche Post apparently monitors Plusbrief Individuell - which launched in February and promises to deliver pre-franked, personalised …

Bootnotes 22 May 2008, 08:32
Tories show they're ready for government...

By carelessly losing thousands of voter records

The Tory Party is fighting a by-election in Crewe and Nantwich and showed yesterday that it is ready for power by engaging in computer incompetence that is normally seen as the preserve of our Labour overlords. A local Tory official accidentally sent several Excel spreadsheets containing details on thousands of voters to radio …

Government 22 May 2008, 08:46
MS bashes Gay(wood) Xbox Live gamer

Brit's surname ruled offside

A Brit gamer has fallen foul of an Xbox live policy that disallows any apparent references to the Friends of Dorothy in gamertags. Microsoft recently ruled "theGAYERgamer" well offside, and quickly moved to deal with Reg reader Richard Gaywood's online moniker, as you can see. Richard told El Reg that MS could have verified …

Bootnotes 22 May 2008, 08:52
Dutch boffin, astronaut in space-sickness breakthrough

Space-flying Dutchman and PhD student team vs astronausea

A Dutch PhD student believes she may have developed a ground-based method useful for identifying people who are subject to space sickness, following lengthy research during which she whirled astronauts around in a centrifuge. Suzanne Nooij defended her thesis yesterday at the Delft University of Technology. While Nooij herself …

Space 22 May 2008, 08:55
Asus speaks out on UK Eee PC 900 battery issue

Caveat emptor

Asus today offered little solace for British Eee PC 900 buyers who've found that the machine packs a lower-capacity battery here than it does in some other countries. When Register Hardware reviewed the 900 last month - you can read our evaluation of the elfin PC here - we noted the 900 comes with a 4400mAh battery. We asked …

Reg Hardware 22 May 2008, 09:42
Pants purveyor punts handset-holding undies

NSFW Brief encounter

What can we say? US company Vavoom has taken the old gag about girls and vibrating phones to its logical conclusion and come up with a pair of pants with a handset holding pouch on the front. Dubbed the Call Me Panty the naughty knickers - tagline: "Special panties for that special someone. Simply turn your phone to vibrate …

Reg Hardware 22 May 2008, 10:08
China airlifts bamboo to quake-hit pandas

Emergency rations

China has sent emergency relief to its Wolong Conservation and Research Centre for the Giant Panda in the Sichuan earthquake zone - home to 53 of the endangered creatures. The centre lies north of the provincial capital Chengdu, and just 30km from the epicentre of the devastating 12 May quake which claimed an estimated 50,000 …

Biology 22 May 2008, 10:11
Samsung's F480 hitting Europe next month

Yet another iPhone 'killer'?

Seoul-based electronics giant Samsung has finally confirmed that the credit-card sized F480 handset will land in Europe this coming June. Samsung's F480 has a 2.8in touchscreen and enables 7.2Mb/s HSDPA downloads The manufacturer unveiled the 2.8in touchscreen phone with leather backing and a chrome trim at Mobile World …

Reg Hardware 22 May 2008, 10:40
Time to overcome Java misconceptions

Myths and legends Program, profile, repeat

It doesn't really matter which version of the Java platform you use, does it? Well I know for sure that thread context switching is expensive. Isn't it? OK, but there's no doubt that 32-bit Java Virtual Machines (JVMs) are faster than 64-bit JVMs. Right? The truth is, most of the things we think we know about Java performance …

Developer 22 May 2008, 10:47
Hackers exploit China earthquake to punt Trojan

Sadly predictable

Unscrupulous virus writers have inevitably latched onto the Chinese earthquake disaster, which killed more than 50,000, to punt malware. The Trojan-laced email attacks follow earlier phishing scams themed around the Sichuan province disaster. Emails with infected Word attachments contaminated by MalDoc-Fam Trojan are being …

Crime 22 May 2008, 10:52
Petrol stations deploy anti-theft stingers

Metal spikes 1, 'Drive-aways' 0

A number of UK petrol station owners have installed a £10,000 anti "drive-away" stinger system designed to discourage ne'er-do-wells from making off with fuel without paying, the Telegraph reports. The Drivestop was designed by Jaginda Singh, whose family-owned fuel outlet was almost brought to financial ruin by such incidents …

Policing 22 May 2008, 10:55
Nokia shows an Orange face to the world

Operator and manufacturer in perfect harmony

Orange and Nokia have signed a strategic deal involving ten new handsets across the Orange businesses. Most importantly, it means Nokia's Ovi media service is becoming part of the Orange customer's experience. The ten new handsets will come out over the next three years and will be part of Orange's Signature range, which has …

Mobile 22 May 2008, 11:15
Moody's drafts in lawyers to probe ratings code 'screw-up'

Rate my regulator

Ratings agency Moody's has confirmed it has started an external review of how it screwed up ratings for mortgage debt packages. It has appointed law firm Sullivan and Cromwell to look at its European CPDO ratings, after the FT claimed that a bug in its computer model meant packages of debt were erroneously given AAA ratings. …

Financial News 22 May 2008, 11:22
Palm Treo 850 snap reveals Wi-Fi connection

A Treo with WLAN support? About time too...

Palm's as-yet-unlaunched Treo 850 has appeared on the web, and it would indeed appear to be the company's first handset with Wi-Fi on board. A slightly blurry picture of the phone has turned up on website BGR showing the Windows Mobile handset running Internet Explorer which, in turn, lists the device as the "Palm 850". The …

Reg Hardware 22 May 2008, 11:23
Fujifilm to tempt lovers with smooch-sensing snapper

A vision of love?

Just when you thought compact camera features couldn’t get much dafter – smile detection, anyone? - along comes Fujifilm with a camera sporting a feature dubbed… ahem… "Timer in Love". The feature won’t find you a date, though, because it’s actually a form of face detection that the manufacturer claims enables the Z200fd …

Reg Hardware 22 May 2008, 11:27
Broadband bumpkins overtake city surfers

~~Hay-chewing yokels~~ stockbrokers lead the UK's charge online, Ofcom crows

Ofcom is prematurely claiming victory in closing the digital divide today, as its annual review of communications markets reveals that for the first time broadband uptake by country folk has overtaken that of urbanites. Taking the UK as a whole, 59 per cent of rural households are now hooked up, compared to 57 per cent in the …

Telecoms 22 May 2008, 11:29
The economy: A big Arab did it and ran away, claims PM

'Scandalous' OPEC to blame for slump, by-election results, weather etc...

It's all OPEC's fault, according to Gordon Brown. Speaking at Google's recent Zeitgeist conference, the UK prime minister told the audience that the world's current economic woes can largely be blamed on the scandalous behaviour of the oil producer's cartel. They're just not pumping enough oil, he claims: Gordon Brown …

Government 22 May 2008, 11:41
EC takes own sweet time backing Microsoft ODF move

Interoperable? We'll be the judge of that

The European Commission is investigating Microsoft’s interoperability pledge that it will support OpenDocument Format (ODF) in Office 2007 service pack two (SP2). Regulators at the anti-trust arm of the EC said in a statement today that it welcomed “any step that Microsoft took towards genuine interoperability, more consumer …

Applications 22 May 2008, 11:51
Tesco VoIP goes mobile

Just not for Tesco Mobile customers

Tesco has started extending its VoIP service, Tesco Internet Phone, onto mobiles, offering Wi-Fi capable handsets the chance to make free calls to other Tesco customers. Tesco's existing service is a pretty-standard VoIP operation, and is handled by Freshtel, the Australian VoIP specialist with a PC client. Freshtel are also …

VoIP 22 May 2008, 11:53
MEP tries to ban lightbulbs with mercury amendment

Mad as a hatter

As Bismark pointed out, laws and sausages have things in common - both are highly useful, but you don't want to see either of them made. An example of the turning of lips, ears and arses into comestibles came this week in the European Parliament. One idea quite seriously put forward was to close down the entire European …

Government 22 May 2008, 11:53
Logitech Z Cinema advanced surround sound system

Review Put your PC’s audio on a course of steroids

Is Logitech’s answer to the demands of a media-centric PC world the next logical step in home entertainment - or just more boxes to knock over or spill stuff on while working at the computer? The basic premise is simple. We are all storing and viewing loads more stuff on the PC: music, film, TV and, of course, games. The …

Reg Hardware 22 May 2008, 12:03
Epson rolls off A4-size e-paper panel

William Caxton turns in his grave

Epson may be inking plans to replace tabloid newspapers, because the firm has developed a prototype A4 size e-paper display. Epson's A4 e-paper: the largest display of its kind Image courtesy of Tech On At 13.4in, the display is considerably larger than Epson’s previous attempt a building a big e-paper screen – a 7.1in …

Reg Hardware 22 May 2008, 12:08
Boffins sound exam cheat warning on brain enhancing pills

P*ss tests for SATs?

A group of leading medical scientists has called on the government to investigate what effects the use of brain performance-enhancing drugs by healthy people could have on society, education and the workplace. The call comes today as part of a new report on drugs in society by the Academy of Medical Sciences (AMS). …

Biology 22 May 2008, 12:20
CPS apologises for DNA disc blunder

Civil Service pass-the-parcel

The Crown Prosecution Service has apologised unreservedly for misplacing a disc of DNA profiles sent by Dutch authorities in January 2007. The 2,159 DNA profiles from crime scenes were not checked against the UK database until February 2008. This resulted in 15 matches. Because of the delay in dealing with the disc, 11 of the …

Policing 22 May 2008, 12:22
'Loitering Munition' prowler-bomb in Welsh test

Lurking sky-shell gives new meaning to fire-and-forget

A consortium of missile companies has announced a successful test firing of a sophisticated new "loitering munition" intended for service with the British Army. According to Steve Wadey, UK boss of pan-European missile group MBDA: "The successful Fire Shadow firing provides tangible evidence that the UK Complex Weapons …

Government 22 May 2008, 12:27
WD pitches Firewire pocket HDD

Western Digital has released a Mac-friendly version of its My Passport Studio portable external hard drive, fitting the unit with a Firewire 400 port and pre-formatting it with Mac OS X's HFS+ file system. Sure to please Mac fans? Well, possibly not. While WD was quick to tout the external drive's ability to be powered by the …

Reg Hardware 22 May 2008, 12:30
Wii still king in US

Yet to leave the building, despite April sales slippage

US sales of the Wii, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 all declined last month, but the Nintendo console remained head and shoulders above its rivals, according to the latest market analysis. Console movement watcher NPD found that, during March, US consumers bought 262,000 Xbox 360s and 257,000 PS3s. But the following month, sales …

Reg Hardware 22 May 2008, 12:42
Undercover teachers to track gang members online

Beware - dangerous minds at work

Teachers will be forced to become undercover homies as part of a government strategy to combat the rise of teenage gangs, the children’s minister will say today. However, this won’t mean swapping their cords for do rags and baggy jeans, rather that they will have to scour social networking sites for evidence that their charges …

Policing 22 May 2008, 12:55
Too dim to set up your phone? Pay someone else to do it

Get your phone settings here, only a quid

A new service from WDSGlobal will send your mobile all the configuration settings it needs, and the company reckons you'll pay a quid for it too, despite network operators offering the same thing for free. Configuremyphone is a website where UK punters can select their mobile phone and network to receive settings for browsing …

Mobile 22 May 2008, 13:55
Cisco breaks cycle with IOS patch

Preemptive defence against rootkit exploits?

Cisco released a trio of updates on Wednesday. The advisories cover denial of service vulnerabilities in IOS Secure Shell and its Secure Control Engine software. The escalation update involves Cisco's voice engine portal software. The network giant states that it discovered all three vulnerabilities itself but the timing of …

Data Networking 22 May 2008, 14:05
Lenovo undershoots Wall St as US disappoints

PC maker cracks a tooth on credit crunch

Lenovo today posted fourth quarter results that fell short of analyst forecasts, despite doubling its earnings and seeing strong sales in China and Europe. The Beijing-based firm, which is the world’s fourth biggest PC maker, was hampered by disappointing notebook sales in the economically gloomy US. Total revenues at the …

Channel Register 22 May 2008, 15:24
Social networking site bans oldies over sex offender fears

Over 36? You can't play

A social networking site has deleted most of its users over the age of 36 because it claims older users pose a danger of sex offending. It claims to be forced into the action by the Government, but the part of a law it cites is not yet in force. Faceparty has deleted what it describes as "a huge number of accounts" from its …

Law 22 May 2008, 15:47
Iomega launches leather-bound pocket drive

Old codgers' favourite?

Iomega has redesigned its portable hard drive, the eGo, for storage connoisseurs, by wrapping the drive in gentlemanly brown leather. Iomega's eGo: leather bound The eGo range first hit the high-street back in June 2007. The new leather variant is described as a “must have” gadget for everyone from fashionistas and tech …

Reg Hardware 22 May 2008, 15:51
Boeing robot whisper-copter team claims record

Whirlydroid outlasts all comers

Mammoth US arms'n'aerospace firm Boeing has announced test successes for its prototype robot whisper-copter, the A160T "Hummingbird". The company believes it has broken the world endurance record for unmanned aircraft in the A160T's weight class with a flight lasting longer than 18 hours. The possibly record-breaking test took …

Science 22 May 2008, 15:58
Samsung tightens grip on world LCD TV sales

Outsells Dell in the monitor market, too

If you’ve got a Samsung LCD TV at home, then the South Korean giant owes you some thanks, because the company’s now led the global LCD TV market for the ninth consecutive quarter. According to market watch DisplaySearch, Samsung controlled 20.8 per cent of the market between January and March this year - with sales of around …

Reg Hardware 22 May 2008, 16:02
IBM and Dell lick their lips as Microsoft and Google buy billions in gear

Radio Reg The death of the white box makers

Voracious buyers such as Yahoo!, Microsoft and Amazon represent a niche in the server market - a very lucrative niche. So, we've seen companies such as IBM and Dell come out recently with gear aimed right at the service provider set. Episode 17 of Semi-Coherent Computing takes a look at the "white box killer" hardware …

Semi-Coherent 22 May 2008, 16:54
Researchers out Apple over unpatched iCal bugs

Too slow for Core's liking

Researchers at Core Security have released details of three vulnerabilities in Apple iCal scheduling application, after four months of talks with the company. The security tools vendor said it is important for users to know about the flaws and make security precautions, even without a patch from Apple. The iCal bugs comprise …

Security 22 May 2008, 17:05
Tech Data sales, profits up in Q1

Acquisition to pump up Europe revenues

Tech Data net income more than doubled to $23m in Q1 FY09 (Q1 2008: $9m) on sales up 12.3 per cent to $6.1bn (Q1'08: $5.4bn). The skinny profits show how little room there is for error in the computer distribution business. Gross margins improved year-on-year from 4.72 per cent to 4.86 per cent, on the back of better pricing …

Channel Register 22 May 2008, 18:32
Lifelock's fraud-prevention service takes more legal flak

'Ineffectual'

LifeLock's dubious fraud-prevention service is attracting more flak, this time from disgruntled customers in three US states who say it fails to provide the comprehensive protection its CEO and high-profile pitchman claims. The lawsuits, filed by individuals from Maryland, New Jersey and West Virginia, take issue with LifeLock …

Security 22 May 2008, 18:54
Print-on-demand crusader tags Amazon with anti-trust suit

'Unlock my BookLocker'

After threatening to limit print-on-demand sales to books printed by its very own print-on-demand printer, Amazon is facing an anti-trust lawsuit. Earlier this year, as we reported here at The Reg, the world's largest e-tailer told many print-on-demand publishers it would destroy their Amazon "Buy" buttons if they didn't start …

Music and Media 22 May 2008, 20:13
IBMers answer call for IBM-free Eclipse

Build it and they might come

If Eclipse was hoping to escape its current over reliance on IBM then it's off to a slow start judging by early work on its next platform - E4, due in 2010. Project members are meeting during the next two days at an E4 summit in Ottawa, Canada, to push on with the practical work of building E4, announced at EclipseCon in March …

Software 22 May 2008, 20:32
Electrical grid overlords take drubbing over cyber attack vulnerability

'Disorganized, ineffective'

US lawmakers ripped into the organization that oversees North America's electrical grid, saying it isn't doing enough to prevent cyber attacks that could cripple the economy. US Representative James Langevin, chair of the House Subcommittee on Emerging Threats, Cybersecurity and Science and Technology, said he had "little …

Security 22 May 2008, 23:00