Microsoft goes Google, Google goes shopping, and Apple loves its Macs

Hardware worth waiting for?

Microsoft has confirmed it will detail its second generation Zune media players in time for the Christmas sales season, and the One Laptop per Child has started production, with the first children in the developing world expected to receive their computers in October this year.

Who is buying whom?

Facebook bought Parakey for an undisclosed sum, while TomTom made an offer for TeleAtlas, so it can do social networking on the move.

Google also gets in on the action and snaps up an aerial camera company.

More conventional firms also like to buy companies, as evidenced by HP's double moves on Opsware and Neoware.

Nokia also dipped a toe into purchasing waters with its acquisition of photo sharing firm Twango, again for an undisclosed sum.

It's a bust

The FBI teamed up with Chinese authorities and seized $2bn of counterfeit Microsoft software.

UK companies in mass float?

Floods in the UK even threaten broadband connectivity. But all seems well, and many jokes about staying afloat in rising waters are being thrown around.

Groovers and movers

BT has hired Sally Davis as chief executive of its network services and solutions division, BT Wholesale. She'll start in September, reporting directly to BT group CEO Ben Verwaayen.

Meanwhile, Sage has hired David Clayton as its new group strategy and mergers and acquisitions director, starting in October.

iPhone, you BlackBerry

AT&T does rather well, thanks in part to the iPhone, but CIOs are not keen to part with their BlackBerrys.

Going mobile

Yahoo! is following in Vodafone's footsteps and has announced plans to use Novarra's mobile-optimising technology on its m-commerce sites.

Motorola has teamed up with Microvision to put laser-projector technology into mobile phone handsets, and a survey reveals that mobile application developers like Nokia best of all.

Bookkeepers at Carphone Warehouse report that the firm is doing well out of all of it.

Critically vulnerable

Security researchers have disclosed a zero-day vulnerability in the latest version of Firefox that gives miscreants complete control of Windows-based computers when the Mozilla browser visits a booby-trapped website. Don't you just love the word "miscreants"?

Love the iPhone, make money on the Mac

Apple's third quarter results served as a handy reminder it's the record-breaking Mac and unstoppable iPod that are driving business at the fruity firm.

Going for Google

Company-loving Steve Ballmer has committed his firm to becoming an advertising and consumer device powerhouse, intent on sustaining growth via software sales and diversification into online services. And just to prove it, the firm has already inked a deal with Digg to manage advertising on Digg.com. The text-based Google advertising that currently appears on Digg is due to be replaced in the coming weeks.

A load of Bull?

If you're inclined to believe published reports, then HP's set to buy French computer maker Bull for $1bn

Trust me, I'm a chipmaker

After years of investigation, the European Commission has issued formal charges against Intel this week for alleged anti-competitive business practices against rival AMD.

And, relax

Need something lighter to wind down after all that? Try aliens, Moon exploration, and growing your own.. Spaceships, of course. ®