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27th May 2008 Archive

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  • Suits could soon lose grip on Java

    JCP chief cautious on roadmap

    A roadmap for reform, potentially exposing the Java Community Processes' inner workings to external scrutiny and ending a culture of closed-door meetings, could be made public in the next few months. That's according to recently elected chairman Patrick Curran, who told Reg Dev he believes a set of milestones to update the 10- …

    Software 27 May 2008, 05:02

  • Sarin quits Vodafone

    Surprise departure

    Arun Sarin is leaving Vodafone. The chief executive departs as the mobile group's profits pass £10bn for the year. Vodafone made revenues of £35.5bn, up 4.2 per cent, and adjusting operating profit of £10.1bn in the year ended 31 March 2008. Earnings per share were up 11 per cent to 12.5p. Sarin will be replaced by his deputy …

    Mobile 27 May 2008, 08:02

  • Indian gov denied BlackBerry snoop

    Subcontinental spooks blackballed by RIM

    Research In Motion (RIM), the Canadian company behind the BlackBerry handheld, has refused to give the Indian government special access to its encrypted email services. Indian authorities have previously evinced concern that terrorists or criminals might use BlackBerries to communicate free from government interception. …

    Mobile 27 May 2008, 08:14

  • Is Mac OS X ready for business?

    Reg Tech Panel Tell us what you think

    Welcome to the second of our polls on desktop operating systems. Initial results of the first, where we looked at Vista readiness for business use, can be found over here. In this week's poll we are turning our attention to one of the main contenders to Windows, Mac OS X. So, whether you love it, hate it or simply have some …

    Tech Panel 27 May 2008, 09:01

  • Infineon boss heads for door

    Scraps over strategy lead to ship-jump

    The chief executive of Infineon, Dr Wolfgang Ziebart, has resigned from the company because of an inability to agree strategy with the company's board of directors. Infineon's chairman Max Dietrich Kley thanked Ziebart for his work. Kley said: "We would like to thank Mr. Ziebart for his efforts and merits. He took over the …

    Channel Register 27 May 2008, 09:11

  • Internet censorship and mission creep

    CFP 2008 Saving adults and teens from themselves

    "The internet perceives censorship as damage," John Gilmore famously observed, "and routes around it." That might have been right in the early 1990s. In 2008, the state of internet freedom is looking a little rockier. Karen Karlekar, presenting Freedom House's survey of the state of internet freedom at the Computers, Freedom, …

    Law 27 May 2008, 09:11

  • Swede packs off GPS to make world's biggest sketch

    One line, 110,664 km long

    Swedish artist Erik Nordenankar claims to have created the world's biggest "drawing", having dispatched a GPS unit on a 110,664 km odyssey to create a global self portrait: Nordenankar explains: "On the 17th of March 2008, I sent away a briefcase containing a GPS device with the express transportation company DHL. I gave them …

    Bootnotes 27 May 2008, 09:13

  • Japanese customs dish out free dope

    Airport sniffer dog test goes 'awry'

    Japanese customs have very agreeably handed out 142g of cannabis to an unwitting passenger at Tokyo's Narita airport during a drugs-busting test operation "went awry". According to the BBC, an operative planted the pot in the side pocket of a randomly-selected suitcase belonging to an innocent incoming passenger. The airport's …

    Bootnotes 27 May 2008, 10:06

  • Virgin Atlantic site reveals sky-high employee disgruntlement

    'Quick! The boss is coming!!'

    Times are hard and friends are few for the civil aviation industry. Airlines are going titsup left and right, while fuel prices rocket and passengers tighten their belts, metaphorically speaking. Now comes shocking evidence from inside one of the world's leading carriers that the malaise is even more serious than we'd imagined …

    Bootnotes 27 May 2008, 10:33

  • Japanese children warned off mobiles

    It's good to talk, but nothing else

    Japanese children should be prevented from using their mobile phones for anything other than talking to protect them from harmful influences, according to an advisory panel to the government. The panel is already calling on schools and parents to take a much greater role in controlling the services children can access, reports …

    Mobile 27 May 2008, 10:35

  • TeliaSonera secures iPhone deal for Nordic and Baltics

    3G on its way

    TeliaSonera today announced it will bring Apple's iPhone to all Nordic and Baltic countries, including Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia. Until now, the iPhone wasn't available in those countries. TeliaSonera also offers services in Spain and the emerging markets of Eurasia, including Russia and …

    Mobile 27 May 2008, 10:47

  • Wireless links to be trialled in Gulfstream flight controls

    Fly-by-wireWiFi not just sky-pie?

    Future generations of jet aircraft might use short-range wireless technology to connect cockpit controls to ailerons, elevators or rudders. Flight International reports that the new fly-by-wireless concept will soon be trialled by biz-jet maker Gulfstream, using an unspecified radio technology to control a spoiler on a company …

    Science 27 May 2008, 10:51

  • Videogames feed your inner cavemen, says report

    Primal Instinct, the videogame?

    Men now have a proper excuse for spending hours glued to a games console, thanks to new research which has concluded that videogames force blokes to revert to their caveman roots. Allan Reiss, professor of Psychiatry and Behavioural Science at Stanford University, US recently hooked a group of men and women up to an MRI …

    Reg Hardware 27 May 2008, 10:56

  • Touchscreen sales set to soar

    Virtual keyboards in, physical keyboards out

    Gadgets controlled through touchscreen interfaces will soon become increasingly commonplace. Market analyst iSuppli has forecast that sales of touchscreen display modules will skyrocket between now and 2013. The analyst has predicted that the global market for touchscreen modules will grow from roughly 341m units this year, to …

    Reg Hardware 27 May 2008, 10:57

  • Bluetooth finally reaches ten (years, not users)

    Happy 'toothday - or is it?

    Last week the Bluetooth Special Interest Group celebrated ten years since its formation for the purpose of defining and promoting the radio-networking standard that was supposed to link everything together. But has Bluetooth actually done anything more than enable everyone to look like a twat with a glowing blue ear? When …

    Mobile 27 May 2008, 11:29

  • Deutsche Telecom caught doing an HP

    Board spying busted

    Deutsche Telecom has been caught snooping on its board directors and journalists in an apparent effort to stop directors talking to the press. The telco ran at least two snooping schemes, one targeting journalists and one aimed at the company's own directors and senior executives. They went so far as to have a mole working …

    Telecoms 27 May 2008, 11:37

  • Mozilla pilots second release candidate for Firefox 3.0

    Updated Beset by bugs

    Mozilla is considering whether or not to publish a further test version of Firefox 3 following the discovery of ten noteworthy bugs in Firefox 3.0 RC1. A decision on whether to create a second release candidate or to fix the flaws only after Firefox 3.0 ships is expected on Tuesday. Four of the ten bugs are marked as critical …

    Applications 27 May 2008, 11:41

  • Canon Digital Ixus 80 IS compact camera

    Review An evolutionary rather than revolutionary offering

    Not long ago we looked at the Digital Ixus 70 IS and now comes the follow up, the Digital Ixus 80 IS. So is it a case of the same chocolates in a different box or has Canon radically redefined this camera sector? First impressions are that the Digital 80 IS has that cool “Ixus look” – our model was sleek, silver, stylish and …

    Reg Hardware 27 May 2008, 11:52

  • Alton Towers trials ban on PDAs

    "PDA spotted at 200 yards, GO, GO, GO!"

    So-called quiet carriages on trains where the use of phones and laptops is frowned upon are to be avoided if you’re tech-obsessed. But now theme park Alton Towers wants to ban the use of PDAs from its grounds. Until 1 June, Alton Towers is piloting a “PDA Free Zone” in an effort to force parents to disconnect from the office …

    Reg Hardware 27 May 2008, 12:10

  • Adobe coughs up CS4 public betas

    Test drive Dreamweaver, Fireworks and Soundbooth

    Adobe Systems is today releasing public beta versions of its Dreamweaver, Fireworks and Soundbooth apps. The betas have been spat out by Adobe ahead of the company’s upcoming Creative Suite 4 release that will come bundled with the web design, web prototyping and audio editing tools. The firm said the betas are available to …

    Applications 27 May 2008, 12:21

  • Google gears Java 5 Web Toolkit

    CSS shrinkage on roadmap

    Google is this week expected to release the long-awaited update to its Web Toolkit (GWT) adding support for Java 5 Standard Edition language features to speed development and performance of JavaScript. The search giant has also outlined plans for successive versions of its web toolkit. Version 1.6 is scheduled for the third …

    Developer 27 May 2008, 12:24

  • Apple patent filing suggests solar powered iPhone

    Cells lurking beneath screen

    The battery life of portable gadgets has always been a source of frustration. But Apple may have found an eco-friendly way around the problem – by integrating a solar panel behind, say, the iPhone’s LCD display. Apple has filed a patent application for the integration of a layer of solar cells below a gadget’s LCD display. …

    Reg Hardware 27 May 2008, 12:52

  • Computacenter hires chairman

    Greg Lock takes Ron Sandler's old chair

    Computacenter has hired Greg Lock as its new chairman following Ron Sandler’s sudden departure from the IT services firm earlier this year. Lock will step into his new role at the start of July. In the meantime Computacenter said that Cliff Preddy will continue to serve as interim chairman at the company. Sandler quit his non …

    Channel Register 27 May 2008, 12:52

  • Scientologist ASBOed for being over 36

    Comments And Vista begs you to understand

    A man dubbed "Leeds’s dumbest criminal" has been served with an ASBO forbidding him from posting videos of criminal activity on the internet. Andrew Kellett, 23, had been in the habit of showing off his exploits on YouTube, which made some of you wonder why he hadn't been convicted of the acts he seemed so proud of, and why he'd …

    Letters 27 May 2008, 12:53

  • Voter-befuddling tricks moving online

    CFP 2008 The forecast for November is stormy

    The conundrum in anything to do with voting: the people who write the election laws are the ones who won the election. What motive do they have for changing the status quo? Nearly eight years after the voting fiasco of the 2000 Presidential election, two disturbing US trends were highlighted at last week's Computers, Freedom, …

    Government 27 May 2008, 13:02

  • Aussie droid planes in Barbados hurricane probe

    Sky-spy to eye eye of storm

    American weather boffins plan to send more unmanned aircraft plunging deep into the 2008 crop of Caribbean hurricanes, in a bid to find out more about the deadly rotating storm systems. When the going gets tough, the robots get going. ©Jon Becker, Aerosonde Pty Ltd. This year will see as many as five drone probes from the …

    Environment 27 May 2008, 13:17

  • International copyright talks seek BitTorrent-killer laws

    Plan to torpedo Pirate Bay-style freedom claims

    A new international trade agreement could seek to strengthen criminal sanctions against BitTorrent tracker sites that claim not to profit from internet users sharing music, movies and software. Many major tracker sites say advertising revenues and user donations are used to pay server and bandwidth costs. The operators of the …

    Law 27 May 2008, 13:57

  • Truphone becomes a true phone

    We don't need no stinking Wi-Fi

    Mobile-VoIP operator Truphone has expanded its offering with the launch of Truphone Anywhere, giving users access to their Truphone minutes from the cellular network. Truphone offers cheap calls for Wi-Fi handsets when they're on the data network, but from tomorrow the Anywhere version of the company's downloadable software …

    Mobile 27 May 2008, 14:36

  • Sony touts upscale DVD player

    Only the best DVD quality will do

    Sony has unveiled its latest upscaling DVD player, which the electronics giant’s also touting as the perfect way to display still photos on your HD telly. Sony's DVP-NS708H DVD player upscales DVD to 1080p The DVP-NS708H upscales to 1080p HD quality on any HD Ready TV, although Sony would obviously prefer it if you used a …

    Reg Hardware 27 May 2008, 15:02

  • Microsoft hands Google the future of digital books

    Here, have a monopoly

    While Bill Gates now holds a lucrative monopoly on digital images, his successors don't see the same prosperous future for the digital word. Microsoft is withdrawing from the Open Content Alliance digitisation project and will cease to scan books, the company said on Friday. It's abandoning its Live Book Search venture - a …

    Music and Media 27 May 2008, 15:38

  • EU sets ambitious IPv6 target

    The internet gets its own straight banana rule

    The European Commission is pushing for 25 per cent of the bloc's government bodies, industry and public to switch to IPv6 by 2010, amid warnings that the current IPv4 protocol is fast running out of net addresses. Doom-mongers have said for years that a shortage of the current generation of addresses will soon limit the growth …

    Data Networking 27 May 2008, 15:38

  • Brits pine for old and analogue tech

    Vinyl, CD and VHS all still popular

    Blu-ray and MP3 may be conquering the world, but vinyl, CD and VHS still hold a special place in the hearts of UK adults, according to survey into so-called graveyard-bound technology. A survey of just over 2000 people by Moneysupermarket.com discovered that the three aging media formats would each be a top ‘resurrection’ …

    Reg Hardware 27 May 2008, 15:43

  • South Africa launches formal objection at OOXML

    Ratification as international standard could be delayed

    The official blessing of Microsoft’s controversial Office Open XML (OOXML) document format as an international standard could be delayed after a formal objection was lodged against it. The South African Bureau of Standards (SABS) submitted an official complaint against the ratification of OOXML to the International …

    Applications 27 May 2008, 16:15

  • DARPA hands out cash for tiny bugbot-thopter

    Talk about your drone aircraft

    Famed solar-plane company Aerovironment announced today that it has won further US military funding to carry on its Nano Air Vehicle (NAV) programme, which will develop a tiny "three-inch flapping-wing air vehicle system". The money comes, of course, from DARPA - the Pentagon bureau which aims to get the bleeding edge to the …

    Science 27 May 2008, 16:19

  • Viacom suit is Net killer, Google claims

    Hey guys, this is what DMCA was made for

    Viacom's copyright infringement lawsuit against YouTube threatens the way that hundreds of millions of people use the internet, YouTube owner Google has said in its court defence. YouTube is accused by media conglomerate Viacom of copyright infringement in a $1bn court case that could prove a vital testing ground for the legal …

    Music and Media 27 May 2008, 17:59

  • Failing Web 2.0 stars pray for copyright abolition

    Wanted: starving artists to help out web tycoons

    Remember the date - the one about an inch above the words you're reading now. 27 May 2008. Two articles were published today of some note, and if you can put them in context, you can begin see the true, scary picture of internet economics today. The one that's usually too scary for the posh papers or broadcast media to describe …

    Music and Media 27 May 2008, 18:32

  • Philips' feedback telly watches your vital signs

    TV adapts lights, sound and vibration to suit

    Philips may have found the perfect use for its blood pressure monitoring pants – a TV range that provides physical and visual feedback according to your body’s changing vital signs. Philips' RelaxTV expands on Aurea's (above) features by adapting light, sound and vibration according to your body's vital signs According to …

    Reg Hardware 27 May 2008, 19:02

  • Verari crosses blades with virtual I/O house

    Xsigo to storage blades: lemme I/O you

    Verari Systems is now packing its network storage blades with a virtual I/O appliance, courtesy of a partnership with Xsigo Systems. The companies say the product union is ideal for the input/output strains of virtualization, and results in better CPU utilization, less cabling and easier management for IT admins. Their joint …

    Storage 27 May 2008, 19:36

  • FCC boss mulls free* wireless for all

    * - includes ads and content filters

    The US Federal Communications Commission is mulling a plan that would blanket America with free wireless broadband. Not to mention online ads and content filters. On Friday, as reported by RCR Wireless News, FCC boss Kevin Martin told some reporter types that the commission may auction off another 25-MHz of largely unused …

    Telecoms 27 May 2008, 19:43

  • Microsoft urges developers to tag sites for IE8

    Be prepared for Q3 launch

    Microsoft has firmed up the date a little for its Internet Explorer 8 second beta, saying the browser is coming in the third quarter. Nick MacKechnie, a techie at Microsoft New Zealand, blogged the date while telling website managers to get ready for IE 8's planned meta tag. The tag is designed to ensure millions of existing …

    Applications 27 May 2008, 20:28

  • Paypal glitch hits merchants with 12-day headache

    Software update gone bad

    PayPal customers are up in arms as a series of fresh glitches cost them time and money. Once again, eBay's inability to accurately say when the problem might be fixed is adding insult to injury. The most serious malfunction affects what's known as the "handling_cart," a feature within the PayPal shopping cart that tacks on …

    Channel Register 27 May 2008, 21:05

  • Attack code in the wild targets new (sort of) Adobe Flash vuln

    Updated At least 20,000 pawns recruited

    Security researchers from Symantec have clarified an earlier report of attack code in the wild that targets a previously unknown vulnerability in the latest version of Adobe Flash. They now say current versions of Adobe's stand-alone Flash application are vulnerable, but that updated browser plug-ins are not. At least 20,000 …

    Enterprise Security 27 May 2008, 22:31

  • Dell guilty of defrauding New York customers

    Likely to appeal false advertising ruling

    A New York state judge says Dell and its finance wing are guilty of making false promises to stir up more sales. State Supreme Court Justice Joseph Teresi ruled the #2 computer maker repeatedly engaged in fraud, deceptive advertising, and failure to honor its warranties, service contracts, and rebates. His judgment bars Dell …

    Small Biz 27 May 2008, 23:02

  • RIAA abandons iTuneski suit

    Mistakes failure for victory

    The Recording Industry Ass. of America has dropped its copyright infringement suit against the Russian online music seller AllofM3.com - aka iTuneski. Early last week, as reported by Bloomberg, the RIAA dismissed its 18-month-old suit without explanation, giving up on claims that AllofMP3 illegally sold millions of copyrighted …

    Music and Media 27 May 2008, 23:36