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| Oct 2008 | Sep 2008 | Aug 2008 | Jul 2008 | Jun 2008 | May 2008 | Apr 2008 | Mar 2008 | Feb 2008 | Jan 2008 | Dec 2007 | Nov 2007 |Mon, 31 Dec 07
Vonage Settles Patent Suit with Nortel
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57473
In a move to begin the New Year with a clean slate, Vonage took a major step toward settling another patent suit against it. Vonage and Nortel Networks said they have agreed to end the litigation between them.
The settlement involves cross-licensing three Nortel and three Vonage patents, and does not include any monetary payments. The companies are dismissing claims relating to past damages and other patents not covered by the suit.
The settlement is subject to final documentation, but if it is finalized, it could mark the last of the string of patent suits against Vonage.
Just one week ago, the VoIP provider settled a patent dispute with telecom giant AT&T. AT&T had sued Vonage in October for using packet-based telephony products based on its intellectual property.
Since the company went public in May 2006, Vonage has been the subject of several patent suits from telecoms and other service providers. Both Sprint Nextel and Verizon targeted Vonage for patent infringement, and both companies won judgments against the young VoIP provider.
Before the AT&T settlement, Sprint Nextel took its turn collecting from Vonage for patent infringement. Specifically, a federal court ordered Vonage to pay Sprint Nextel $69.5 million in damages for six counts of patent infringement. The ruling cost Vonage a third of its market value, although the stock has since seen gains.
Sprint Nextel claimed Vonage infringed on seven of its patents for connecting Internet phone calls. Vonage argued that Sprint's patents should not have been approved in the first place. However, in September, jurors in a Kansas City court decided Vonage deliberately violated Sprint's intellectual property.
U.S. District Judge John Lungstrum had the option to triple the damages because of the finding of willful infringement. In the final ruling, a federal court ordered the company to pay $69.5 million in damages, plus...
Mon, 31 Dec 07
Gen Y Tops Internet Use at Libraries
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57472
New research is turning traditional thinking about libraries on its head. More than half of U.S. residents visited a library in the past 12 months to use computers instead of search for books, according to a survey from the Pew Internet & American Life Project.
Specifically, 58 percent of participants in a national phone survey said they used the Internet at home, work, a public library, or some other place to get help in solving problems during the past two years.
"These findings turn our thinking about libraries upside down," Leigh Estabrook, Dean and Professor Emerita at the University of Illinois, and coauthor of a report on the results of the survey, said in a statement.
Of the 53 percent of U.S. adults who said they visited a library in 2007, young adults age 18 to 30 -- commonly known as Generation Y -- were the biggest library computer users, according to the Pew study. Compared to their elders, Gen Y members were the most likely to use libraries for problem-solving information and general patronage.
Overall, more than two-thirds of library patrons of all age groups said they used computers during their library visits. What's more, Internet users were more than twice as likely to patronize libraries as non-Internet users.
Young adults said they are most likely to use libraries in the future when they encounter problems: 40 percent of Gen Y said they would do that, compared with 20 percent of those above age 30 who say they would go to a library.
"Librarians have been asked whether the Internet makes libraries less relevant. It has not. Internet use seems to create an information hunger and it is information-savvy young people who are the most likely to visit libraries," Estabrook noted.
According to Lee Rainie, director of the Pew Internet &...
Mon, 31 Dec 07
Internet Opens Elite Colleges to All
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57455
Gilbert Strang is a quiet man with a rare talent: helping others understand linear algebra. He's written a half-dozen popular college textbooks, and for years a few hundred students at the elite Massachusetts Institute of Technology have been privileged to take his course.
Recently, with the growth of computer science, demand to understand linear algebra has surged. But so has the number of students Strang can teach.
An MIT initiative called "OpenCourseWare" makes virtually all the school's courses available online for free -- lecture notes, readings, tests and often video lectures. Strang's Math 18.06 course is among the most popular, with visitors downloading his lectures more than 1.3 million times since June alone.
Strang's classroom is the world.
In his Istanbul dormitory, Kemal Burcak Kaplan, an undergraduate at Bogazici University, downloads Strang's lectures to try to boost his grade in a class there. Outside Calcutta, graduate student Sriram Chandrasekaran uses them to brush up on matrices for his engineering courses at the elite Indian Institute of Technology.
Many "students" are college teachers themselves, like Sheraz ali Khan at a small engineering institute in Peshawar, Pakistan, and Noorali Jiwaji, at the Open University of Tanzania. They use Strang and other MIT professors as guides in designing their own classes, and direct students to MIT's courses for help.
Others are closer to MIT's Cambridge, Mass., campus. Some are MIT students and alumni, while others have no connection at all -- like Gus Whelan, a retiree on nearby Cape Cod, and Dustin Darcy, a 27-year-old video game programmer in Los Angeles who uses linear algebra regularly in his work.
"Rather than going through my old, dusty books," Darcy said, "I thought I might as well go through it from the top and see if I learn something new."
There has never been a more exciting time for the intellectually curious.
The world's...
Mon, 31 Dec 07
Data Breaches Set Record in 2007
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57452
The loss or theft of personal data such as credit card
and Social Security numbers soared to unprecedented levels in 2007,
and the trend isn't expected to turn around anytime soon as hackers
stay a step ahead of security and laptops disappear with sensitive
information.
And while companies, government agencies, schools and other
institutions are spending more to protect ever-increasing volumes of
data with more sophisticated firewalls and encryption, the
investment often is too little too late.
"More of them are experiencing data breaches, and they're
responding to them in a reactive way, rather than proactively looking at the company's security and seeing where the holes might be," said Linda Foley, who founded the San Diego-based Identity Theft Resource Center after becoming an identity theft victim
herself.
Foley's group lists more than 79 million records reported
compromised in the United States through Dec. 18. That's a nearly
fourfold increase from the nearly 20 million records reported in all
of 2006.
Another group, Attrition.org, estimates more than 162 million
records compromised through Dec. 21 -- both in the U.S. and overseas, unlike the other group's U.S.-only list. Attrition
reported 49 million last year.
"It's just the nature of business, that moving forward, more
companies are going to have more records, so there will be more
records compromised each year," said Attrition's Brian Martin. "I
imagine the total records compromised will steadily climb."
But the biggest difference between the groups' record-loss counts
is Attrition.org's estimate that 94 million records were exposed in
a theft of credit card data at TJX Cos., the owner of discount stores including T.J. Maxx and Marshalls. The TJX breach accounts for more than half the total records reported lost this year on both
groups' lists.
The Identity Theft Resource Center counts about 46 million -- the
number of records TJX acknowledged in March were potentially compromised. Attrition's figure is based on estimates from Visa and
MasterCard officials who were deposed in a lawsuit banks filed
against TJX.
The...
Mon, 31 Dec 07
Internet Giant Looks to the Future
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57448
You know your company is having a good year when its first-quarter profits top $1 billion. And that's exactly how Google kicked off 2007, by pulling in revenues of $3.66 billion for the quarter ending in March.
While we may have joked back in April 2006 that Google could afford to pay $1 billion to advertise on the lunar surface, in 2007 that was definitely true.
And in a way the company is doing something similar by putting up a total of $30 million towards the Google Lunar X Prize to encourage international teams to land a privately funded spacecraft on the Moon. Well, the company has already mapped the stars.
While Google can obviously afford a few frivolous activities, it didn't take its business eye off the ball in 2007. Its most audacious move came at the expense of its biggest rival: Microsoft.
Microsoft was known to be in talks to buy ad tracking firm DoubleClick, valuing the company at $2 billion.
The buyout would have given Microsoft access to DoubleClick's Dart technology, which monitors how Internet adverts perform, boosting Redmond's ability to fight Google for online advertising market share.
A brilliant plan, except for the part where Google sneaked in and bought DoubleClick for itself.
The deal is naturally being investigated by the Federal Trade Commission over competition worries following complaints from Microsoft.
Germany is also questioning the buyout over user privacy fears, putting the $3.1 billion deal under threat.
Even if the DoubleClick deal does eventually come unstuck, Google has plenty of irons in plenty of other fires.
For starters there's the rumored Google phone, a device that became much more likely when the company applied for a patent.
What Google eventually released was a mobile software platform called 'Android' that should have applications running on it by the second half of 2008.
Google claims that Android, which is...
Mon, 31 Dec 07
Pitfalls on the Road to Digital TV
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57446
According to the Consumer Electronics Association, more than 50 percent of U.S. households now own a digital television -- a milestone that the industry trade group's president Gary Shapiro characterized as a "critical threshold" for the nation.
What's more, an additional 32 million DTVs are now forecast to ship nationally during 2008, "with high definition expected to account for 79 percent of total DTV shipments in the U.S.," Shapiro explained.
However, the U.S. government's General Accountability Office (GAO) recently warned that no comprehensive plan is in place for tracking or measuring transition milestones. Having no plan raises concerns about whether consumers will have the information necessary to respond to the transition and to maintain access to TV programming, the GAO said.
"Only the FCC appears to be in a state of denial over what the GAO is telling us," FCC Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein noted. "Rather than making excuses, we need to come up with solutions," including the establishment of an interagency task force, Adelstein said.
A comprehensive partnership between the public sector and the private sector should have accountability, clear lines of authority, and daily coordination at the highest levels, noted FCC Commissioner Michael Copps. "I agree with GAO that the FCC is in the best position to get the job done," Copps said. "But the hour is late -- very late."
Digital-to-analog conversion capabilities are included in all set-top boxes for cable and satellite TV reception -- the preferred reception mode used by 87 percent of U.S. households, which will be able to continue to view broadcast programming on analog TVs after the transition to digital. But the remaining 13 percent of U.S. households will not be so lucky.
These over-the-air reception households disproportionately represent low-income workers, the elderly, and minorities -- particularly those for whom English is a second...
Mon, 31 Dec 07
Mobile Advertising Still at Tryout Stage
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57443
In the weeks leading to Christmas, an online wine retailer gave 15 percent discounts to anyone who sent in a photo of its newspaper ad snapped with a camera phone.
SnapTell Inc., the company helping Wine Enthusiast and other merchants offer such services, uses image-recognition software to determine what offer, video clip or other content to return to the phone. In the coming months, the same technology could deliver movie reviews and discounts to anyone snapping a picture of a movie poster or billboard.
It's one of a number of emerging approaches to mobile advertising, an industry still in its infancy but showing promise. More than 80 percent of Americans now own cell phones -- a statistic Jupiter Research analyst Neil Strother equated with "carrying a potential advertising channel in their pocket."
Fast-food chains, carmakers and TV reality shows have run contests and other promotions in which consumers participate by sending text messages. Wireless carriers have begun letting companies run banner ads -- mini-versions of what you might see on a PC. Google Inc. and Yahoo Inc. have brought lucrative search ads to phones.
Advertisers have been spending a little money here, a little there trying to gauge what works on mobile phones. The efforts so far are best described as trials and pilots, lacking in comprehensive strategy.
"It's the Wild, Wild West right now," said Rick Sizemore, chief strategy officer for the tech consultancy Multimedia Intelligence. "This is an interesting and compelling vehicle, but they don't necessarily know who to work with. There are so many options out there -- a lot of hype with no substance, and then a couple of gems."
SnapTell is among Sizemore's favorites.
Gautam Bhargava, SnapTell's co-founder and chief executive, said the company considered the phone's unique qualities -- its lack of regular keyboards in most cases, and the ubiquity of...
Fri, 28 Dec 07
AOL Finally Kills Netscape Browser
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57445
On Friday, roughly a decade after Netscape's fortunes started to slide, AOL announced it is finally pulling the plug on the Netscape browser. "While internal groups within AOL have invested a great deal of time and energy in attempting to revive Netscape Navigator, these efforts have not been successful in gaining market share from Microsoft's Internet Explorer," Tom Drapeau, AOL's director of development, wrote on the Netscape Blog.
The start of the saga dates back to 1994, when a University of Illinois student named Marc Andreessen founded a company called Netscape Communications, after taking the world by storm with the NCSA Mosaic browser. For a time, it looked like Netscape would be the dominant player on the Web, as Microsoft seemed to regard the Internet as somewhat irrelevant.
In 1995, Netscape had a stellar IPO, with shares almost tripling in value on the first day of trading, and the dot-com boom was born. Soon enough though, Microsoft got in the game and released its Internet Explorer browser. By 1997, Microsoft was already up to Internet Explorer 4, with significant advances over its three earlier versions.
By 1998, not coincidentally, Netscape's financial results had turned south and the company started laying off employees. A year later, America Online bought the struggling company for $4.2 billion, in what now looks like an exorbitant waste of money, but it was 1999, after all.
At the time of the acquisition, Netscape had started building an open-source version of the browser called Mozilla, an effort that in 2003 produced the independent Mozilla Foundation. Before the Foundation's creation, Drapeau said, "AOL played a significant role in the launch of the Netscape 6 browser, the first Mozilla-based, Netscape-branded browser that was released in 2000 and continued to solely fund the development and marketing efforts of Netscape-branded...
Fri, 28 Dec 07
Wireless Hitches a Ride on the Subway
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57441
Some cell-phone users were bemused a few years back when an episode of the Fox TV series 24 aired in which Jack Bower and his intrepid antiterrorist team used GPS technology to track the movements of a biological weapon riding on an underground train in Los Angeles.
Given that terrestrial cellular calls are unable to penetrate the wide expanse of concrete and earth that lies between trains underground and the sky above, viewers reasoned, then how could any space-based satellite be expected to succeed at the task?
These days, however, metropolitan subway systems are joining forces with technology providers to come up with a reliable method for delivering wireless services to their customers. Boston commuters, for example, now have the ability to use cellular phones and other wireless devices as they travel through some of Boston's busiest subway stations.
"This is a major customer service enhancement for our ridership," said Daniel Grabauskas, the general manager of the Metropolitan Boston Transit Authority. "Not only can customers make calls, send text messages, and receive T-Alerts while using the subway, they can also access the Internet and check e-mails."
Boston's MBTA wireless system was constructed by InSite Wireless, which specializes in the deployment of distributed antenna system (DAS) technology in public facilities, such as San Francisco's Moscone Center.
DAS technology expands the wireless coverage of cellular networks in much the same way as access points extend the reach of today's Wi-Fi systems. The DAS signal, which is received by small antennas scattered throughout a facility, is balanced among the antennas and then forwarded over fiber optic cables to the carrier networks.
The DAS providers make money by charging access fees to cellular providers, such as AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon Wireless. And the subway system operators benefit by getting a slice of...
Fri, 28 Dec 07
Google Responds to Reader Brouhaha
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57440
With Google users growing more irate over a sharing feature on its Google Reader service, the search giant is making moves to appease the masses.
The drama began on December 14 when Google announced that Reader, its RSS feed service, would connect with Google Talk and Gmail contacts. In other words, when users tagged a feed to "Share" in Reader the users' Gmail and Google Talk contacts would see it.
The uproar arose almost immediately, as industry analysts and consumers alike expressed their displeasure. In fact, the Google Reader forum offers 277 comments on the Share feature since it launched. Not all of them were negative, but most of them ranged from mildly annoyed to extremely angered.
"Don't you think there might be a method of being selective with what you share that might be slightly more fine grained than, you know, deleting our shared items en masse? This is the worst 'feature' you have ever introduced," wrote a Google Reader Help poster named "Modulo Noh."
Many had the same question: How do I turn this off? "Do I need to unsubscribe from all my feeds? I do *NOT* want colleagues seeing my personal feeds. Unless I'm misunderstanding something here, I have to stop using Google Reader," wrote a user by the name of LeeWNYC.
Chrix Finne, the Google spokesperson who blogs about the Reader, fielded the questions in one overarching blog post. He first acknowledged the "helpful feedback" about the new sharing feature. Then he admitted that the company had hoped making it easier to share feeds with people they chat with frequently would be useful and interesting.
"We underestimated the number of users who were using the Share button to send stories to a limited number of people. We're looking at ways to make sharing more granular and flexible, but...
Fri, 28 Dec 07
Tech Startup Bridges Mideast Divide
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57427
Zvi Schreiber is a British-born serial entrepreneur who established the headquarters of his latest tech startup, a software company called Global Hosted Operating System (G.ho.st), in Israel last year.
G.ho.st has developed a "virtual PC" that saves all of a person's files online so data and programs can be gathered from any computer. As Schreiber sees it, the Microsoft Windows and Apple Macintosh operating systems that cram applications and documents all inside one physical computer will soon be obsolete.
"Our G.ho.st virtual computer will enable users to get their computing environment from any browser -- and we'll eventually compete head-on with Microsoft," Schreiber predicts.
Taking on Microsoft is tough enough. But Schreiber is embracing another challenge: He's helping create a high-tech economy in the Palestinian territories, one of the most poverty-stricken, crisis-riddled spots in the world. He has located the development center for G.ho.st in the West Bank.
It's a bold move at a time when the Palestinians are facing an unprecedented economic crisis due to years of Israeli restrictions and border shutdowns imposed for security reasons. Some $7.4 billion in aid was pledged by international donors at a Dec. 17 conference in Paris to shore up the government of President Mahmoud Abbas. But what is really needed, according to a recent World Bank report, is economic integration of Israel and the Palestine territories -- a task that's far easier said than done.
Consider the challenges Schreiber confronts. Though he has hired three dozen Palestinian engineers and programmers in Ramallah, Schreiber has yet to set foot in the development center, located a mere 12 kilometers (7.5 miles) north of his home in Jerusalem. As an Israeli citizen, he is barred for security reasons from entering Palestinian-controlled parts of the West Bank. And Israel's security fence prevents most Palestinians from entering Israel.
Still, the...
Fri, 28 Dec 07
Amazon Signs Warner in DRM-Free Music Deal
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57425
In yet another step away from the digital-rights-management ties that bind, Warner Music inked a deal with Amazon.com on Thursday to sell songs and albums without copyright protections.
DRM-free music downloads from Warner Music Group are now available on Amazon MP3, Amazon's digital music store.
Warner Music Group is home to a collection of some of the best-known record labels in the music industry, including Asylum, Atlantic, Bad Boy, Cordless, East West, Elektra, Lava, Nonesuch, Reprise, Rhino, Roadrunner, Rykodisc, Sire, and Warner Bros.
Amazon MP3's unique value proposition is that every song and album is playable on virtually any device capable of playing digital music.
Amazon targets Apple iTunes' sore spot. Most of the digital music on iTunes only works on iPods or in the iTunes software. However, a recent deal between EMI and Apple has opened up a portion of iTunes to DRM-free digital tracks.
Bill Carr, Amazon.com vice president of digital music, said consumers have responded well to Amazon's DRM-free MP3 service. Since the September launch, he reported, Amazon has received thousands of "thank you" e-mails from customers for offering MP3 downloads that play on any device.
Amazon officially offers the largest selection of a la carte DRM-free MP3 music downloads with more than 2.9 million songs.
Most songs available on Amazon MP3 are priced from 89 cents to 99 cents, with more than one million of the over 2.9 million songs priced at 89 cents.
The top 100 best-selling songs are usually 89 cents. Most albums are priced from $5.99 to $9.99, with the top 100 best-selling albums typically priced at $8.99 or less.
In addition to Warner Music Group's digital audio catalog, Amazon and Warner are working to make available additional digital music products, such as album bundles containing exclusive tracks. The companies did not announce a timeline...
Fri, 28 Dec 07
Motorola's Pain Is Samsung's Gain
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57406
Samsung Electronics is confronting bad news on many fronts. The South Korean company is facing probes into an alleged bribery scheme implicating powerful sectors of the country's society, and its money-spinning memory-chip business is in the worst slump in five years. That's why Samsung executives must be thrilled to have their mobile-phone business. There, executives can get a very upbeat view of Samsung's future.
The numbers tell the story. With Motorola struggling for more than a year, Samsung overtook its American rival in 2007 to become the world's second-largest handset maker after Nokia. Its global market share is up about three percentage points from last year, at 14.5% in the third quarter, compared with Motorola's 13.1%. And for every quarter this year, Samsung set a new sales record, with the 115 million phones sold in the January-September period exceeding the 114 million sold during all of last year.
Samsung believes its record-breaking run is just beginning. This year, its sales are expected to top 160 million phones, up 40% from last year, and executives are confident the pace of its growth will be about double that of the rest of the industry next year, when they expect sales of 200 million. "The growth momentum is accelerating, and there's no reversal in the trend," says Samsung's Executive Vice-President Chu Woo Sik.
The big question is whether Motorola can rebound and stop Samsung. New Motorola chief Greg Brown, who was chief operating officer before being named CEO last month, has spent the past few months tackling the company's problems to try and restore the glory it had just after the Razr's sensational debut in 2004. "Samsung will face challenges," says mobile communications analyst Tina Teng at market researcher iSuppli.
Samsung's top brass believe the company's recent run is sustainable. That's because Choi Gee...
Thu, 27 Dec 07
Warner Music Goes DRM-Free on Amazon.com
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57424
Warner Music Group, a major holdout on selling music online without copy protection, caved in to the growing trend Thursday and agreed to sell its tunes on Amazon.com Inc.'s digital music store.
Until now, Warner Music had resisted offering songs by its artists in the MP3 format, which can be copied to multiple computers and burned onto CDs without restriction and played on most PCs and digital media players, including Apple Inc.'s iPod and Microsoft Corp.'s Zune.
The deal raises the total number of MP3s for sale through Amazon's music download store to more than 2.9 million. Warner Music's entire catalog, including work by artists Led Zeppelin, Aretha Franklin and Sean Paul, will be added to the site throughout the week. The Amazon store launched with nearly 2.3 million songs in September.
Major music labels Universal Music Group and EMI Music Group PLC had already signed to sell large portions of their catalogs on Amazon, as had thousands of independent labels. Most songs cost 89 cents to 99 cents each and most albums sell for $5.99 to $9.99.
Warner Music Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Edgar Bronfman Jr. had been reluctant to follow in the steps of the rival recording companies.
In February, when Apple Inc. CEO Steve Jobs penned an essay calling on record labels to drop Digital Rights Management from tracks sold on the company's iTunes Store, Bronfman shot back during a conference call with Wall Street analysts: "We will not abandon DRM nor services that are successfully implementing DRM for both content and consumers."
The recording industry had argued that DRM itself is not what makes some songs incompatible with some digital players, but the fact that there are different versions of DRM in use. The companies suggested Apple, whose iPod outsells all other media players, should license its DRM technology to other...
Thu, 27 Dec 07
Report: Google, DoCoMo Working on Deal
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57423
NTT DoCoMo, Japan's largest mobile carrier, is partnering with Google to offer search and e-mail on its handsets, according to news reports.
DoCoMo subscribers could have access to Google's search tool, Gmail e-mail service, Picasa photo-sharing software, and Google Calendar application early next year via DoCoMo's i-Mode network, according to Reuters.
The report cited unnamed sources, and Google and DoCoMo could not immediately be reached for comment. However, according to Japan's main business daily, The Nikkei, DoCoMo is hoping to establish a closer relationship with Google than its growing competitors.
Last month, DoCoMo joined the Open Handset Alliance, a consortium of 34 companies that have pledged to work with Google and its Android platform.
Yahoo has inked several mobile services deals in Asia, but if Google and DoCoMo partner, it could be a major coup for both companies.
Michael Gartenberg, an analyst at Jupiter Research described the rumored deal as one more win for Google and another opportunity for the search titan to get its services and content into an important mobile market.
Google would gain access to DoCoMo's 49 million users of its i-Mode mobile phone Internet service in a market where Yahoo leads the pack.
"What we are seeing is that it's not an issue of dominance on the mobile platform," Gartenberg said, noting that Microsoft, Yahoo, and Google all are making significant inroads onto mobile handsets. "It's an issue about many strong players each trying to grow stronger."
He said the mobile world has not turned into a winner-take-all scenario like PC desktops. "In 2008," he concluded, "we'll see different players try to break away from the crowd."
The mobile services market is growing by leaps and bounds. According to a recent study from ABI Research, the market value for mobile video telephony services, including video mail, video calling,...
Thu, 27 Dec 07
EMC Buys Document Sciences for $85 Million
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57422
EMC announced its intentions to acquire publicly held Document Sciences for approximately $85 million in cash. Document Sciences provides enterprises with software for creating and delivering personalized, multichannel communications to customers, partners, and suppliers.
The proposed stock buyout, which has been approved by Document Sciences' board of directors, is expected to extend EMC's position in enterprise content management, company officials said.
The core software technology that EMC is acquiring under the deal "provides a tremendous advantage in addressing transaction-intensive applications, such as loan origination, new account enrollment, wealth management, brokerage, and claims processing," noted Mark Lewis, the president of EMC's Content Management and Archiving Division.
It will give "our customers a significant competitive edge to increase customer loyalty and maximize business performance," he said.
Over 100 major organizations around the globe currently use Document Sciences' third-generation software for their document-generation requirements, company executives said.
Applications in the xPression 3 software suite, which is designed to help automate the creation and delivery of interactive communications, range from contracts, policies, and high-volume relationship statements to customized marketing collateral and correspondence.
The product's xPressContracts extension, for example, is designed to give financial organizations a method for initiating, negotiating, and managing their contracts.
Document Sciences' software suite integrates with traditional CRM, ECM, and ERP systems, and provides components for document design, assembly, composition, output, and delivery -- including the plug-ins for working with documents in Adobe InDesign, Dreamweaver, and Microsoft Word file formats.
At the time of publication, xPression-produced communications can be customized, assembled in batch or real-time using multiple templates and data sources, and delivered over the Web, in an e-mail, or as a printed document.
Under EMC's acquisition proposal, Document Sciences stockholders would receive $14.75 in cash for each share of common stock. "We are pleased to enter...
Thu, 27 Dec 07
Apple Embraces Movie Rental Business
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57421
According to a report in the Financial Times, Apple has inked a deal with News Corp.'s 20th Century Fox that will bring a new video-on-demand service to iTunes. The companies are expected to announce the deal on January 14 at MacWorld.
The agreement reportedly will allow consumers to rent, for a limited time, just-released Fox movies via digital download from iTunes. Although Apple already peddles newly released movies through a deal with Disney, this is the first time iTunes will be renting rather than selling movies digitally.
MGM, Lionsgate, Viacom, and Paramount restrict their digital libraries to older titles. However, the Fox deal could open the floodgates for new release rentals. Apple is reportedly in talks with Paramount, Warner Bros., and Sony to make their new releases available on iTunes for rent or purchase.
The reports of a movie rental deal with 20th Century Fox, if they are accurate, represent an important shift in Apple's business process, according to Michael Gartenberg, an analyst at Jupiter Research.
The deal, Gartenberg said, is Apple's recognition that renting movies is an understood business model that could add profits to Apple's already swelling bottom line.
"The idea of people being able to rent movie content, put it on their iPod, watch it on the go, and then move on to the next thing is definitely a concept that will resonate with consumers," Gartenberg said.
Of course, iTunes won't be the first digital-download store to rent movies. Netflix and other companies offer digital rentals. But Apple's deal with Fox -- and the possible deals with the other studios -- could shake up the decades-old rental business.
"The Fox deal could become a tipping point for digital movie rentals because Apple has already built out this tremendous ecosystem between the computer, the iPhone, and the iPod," Gartenberg said....
Thu, 27 Dec 07
Reducing Storage's Thirst for Power
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57418
Anyone responsible for managing a data center understands the increasing importance of power efficiency. This is especially the case in data centers where consolidation and higher-density equipment have packed more and more devices into less floor space.
Although many companies have already consolidated their storage and server environments, they could benefit further by consolidating their storage-area-network (SAN) environments. In fact, some data centers have reached or are nearing the maximum power allotment for their facilities, meaning they have no choice but to consolidate and deploy more power-efficient devices.
I.T. managers already know that servers are putting a strain on the world's power grids, but what is often overlooked is the energy consumption of storage environments. The environments are expanding rapidly to accommodate the explosive growth of digital data. IDC calculates that 161 billion gigabytes of digital data were generated in 2006 alone.
According to Gartner, servers account for 40% of a data center's power consumption, but storage comes in a close second, with 37%. What's more, storage-related devices -- including SAN devices -- can consume 1,000 watts or more. The lesson? If you're attempting to contain your data center power use (and costs), you can't afford to neglect your storage or SAN environments.
What can you do to lower your data center's power consumption? To understand some of the issues better, it helps to consider the analogy of transportation and fuel efficiency. Vehicles such as electric, hybrid or compact cars obviously are more fuel-efficient than larger, petroleum-fueled vehicles.
But a larger vehicle, such as a bus, can provide a highly efficient mode of transportation because it can accommodate many passengers, making for a low fuel-per-passenger ratio.
This concept reflects what is occurring in today's data centers: consolidation of multiple devices into a larger, shared resource. If the shared resource happens to...
Thu, 27 Dec 07
Inside Clearwire's Pre-WiMax Service
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57415
My cell phone rang just as I pulled my car into a park along the Puget Sound. I needed to add something to a news story I had written a few hours earlier, but I really didn't want to give up my evening stroll.
Instead of driving back to the office or hunting for a Wi-Fi hotspot, I booted up my laptop, plugged in a PC card, connected to the Internet and updated my story -- all from a bench near the water, with a dreamy view of snowcapped mountains.
Such a feat is no surprise to anyone with a wireless card from a cellular carrier, but I wasn't connected to the networks of Verizon Wireless, Sprint or AT&T. Instead, I used an early version of the relatively new technology WiMax, which is being offered in Seattle by Clearwire Corp.
What's exciting here is the availability of yet another pipe for accessing the Internet at home, in the office and on the go. It raises the possibility that it not only will be faster but also -- in theory -- cheaper than the competition.
The Clearwire card saved me in a pinch when I needed to file a story from across town. But in the end, it didn't quite live up to my hopes for an "everywhere" broadband wireless connection. Coverage is far from complete, and it's still too expensive.
The company says its "pre-WiMax" network I tested is four to five times faster than cell phone providers' 3G, or third-generation, networks, and cheaper to deploy. It's also testing true WiMax, which can deliver connections that promise to be even faster over wider areas, and plans to launch its first network in the middle of 2008.
Kirkland, Wash.-based Clearwire sells high-speed Internet access and Internet-based calling for homes and businesses in 46 U.S. markets, including Seattle,...
Thu, 27 Dec 07
Sony Looks to Future with LCD, OLED
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57413
Sony is dropping its money-losing rear-projection TV business worldwide to focus on two flat panel technologies -- liquid crystal display and organic light-emitting diode, the company said Thursday.
Sales of rear-projection TVs had been declining recently as LCD TVs gain in popularity and get bigger, Sony Corp. spokesman Shinji Obana said.
In October, Sony lowered its global sales forecast for rear-projection TVs -- which uses a projector to create images on large screens -- to 400,000 from 700,000, which is down from 1.1 million the previous fiscal year.
By contrast, Sony expects to sell 10 million LCD TVs this fiscal year through March, up from 6.3 million the previous year.
Sony sells 85 percent of its rear-projection TVs in the U.S., and about 10 percent in Europe, according to Obana. Production at the three plants that make the rear-projection TVs in Japan, Mexico and Malaysia, will be halted, Obana said.
The decision to abandon rear-projection TVs underlines Sony's strategy of focusing on LCDs and OLEDs at a time when competition is heating up in flat TVs.
In the fiscal half-year through September, Sony lost 60 billion yen ($526.3 million) in its TV operations, partly because of losses tied to rear-projection TVs. Diving prices of LCD TVs also contributed to the red ink, Obana said.
The world's electronics makers are all working on LCD technology for TVs, as well as another technology called plasma display panels, or PDP.
Earlier this month, Sony began selling a small 11 inch TV that uses a relatively new but expensive flat-panel technology called OLED. Sony's XEL-1 measures just 3 millimeters, or 0.12 inches, thick and delivers clear, vivid images.
Earlier this week, Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., which makes Panasonic brand products, Hitachi and Canon forged a tie-up in their liquid crystal display businesses -- another sign of how Japanese electronics makers are being forced...
Thu, 27 Dec 07
Samsung Seeks Probe of Rival Sharp
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57412
Samsung Electronics Co. said Thursday it filed a complaint with American authorities over alleged unfair trade practices by Japanese rival Sharp Corp., fueling an intensifying legal battle over flat panel technology.
Samsung said in a statement that it filed the complaint with the United States International Trade Commission on Dec. 21, claiming that Sharp and two U.S. subsidiaries imported and sold liquid crystal display products that infringe on four of Samsung's U.S. patents.
The complaint came after Sharp earlier this month sued Samsung in a South Korean court, also alleging patent violations for LCDs. It demanded damages and a halt to manufacturing and sales of affected TVs and display panels.
In August, Sharp filed a similar lawsuit against Samsung in federal court in the U.S. state of Texas. Samsung said Thursday it was pursuing federal lawsuits in Texas and Delaware against Sharp.
The string of lawsuits between the two companies -- two of the world's biggest makers of LCD panels -- highlight the bruising competition to develop better technology for products like hot-selling flat screen TVs.
Samsung said its complaint calls on the Washington-based trade commission to launch an investigation and order that Sharp products that allegedly infringe on Samsung's patents -- including LCD TVs, monitors, notebook computers and mobile phones -- be kept out of the U.S. market.
"Samsung has and will continue to vigorously protect itself against the infringement and unauthorized use of its intellectual property," Samsung said.
Separately, Samsung also said it asked the Tokyo District Court on Wednesday to prohibit the manufacture and sale in Japan of Sharp LCD TVs it claims incorporate technology that allegedly violates two Japanese patents owned by Samsung.
"Sharp is prepared to take appropriate legal countermeasures once it studies the complaints," company official Akinori Shibuya said from Osaka, where Sharp is headquartered, referring to both the trade commission filing...
Thu, 27 Dec 07
Chipmaker Via Faces New Challenges
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57409
The sad fall of Taiwan's Via Technologies picked up speed Dec. 19 when Bear Stearns dropped analyst coverage of the company. Once the top chip-design company in Taiwan and one of the world's premier makers of chipsets for PCs, Via had ambitions of entering the major leagues by creating microprocessors that would compete directly with those of Intel and Advanced Micro Devices. Back in the late 1990s and early 2000s, Via was a headache for Intel, which charged the Taiwanese company with getting ahead by violating its intellectual property.
No doubt Intel execs are now smiling as things haven't worked out so well for Via and its plans to enter the microprocessor business. It turns out there's a very good reason Intel and AMD dominate the high end of the chip business: Making microprocessors (also known as central processing units, or CPUs) is no walk in the park, and convincing computers to switch to an unfamiliar alternative is even harder. Via's stock price, which traded at 50 Taiwan dollars in mid-2003, is now at 17. This year alone, it has dropped 56%. Sales for the first 11 months of 2007 were down 31%, to $430 million.
Bear Stearns decided that Via no longer warranted coverage even though just a day earlier Via struck a deal with China Unicom to provide the Chinese state-owned cellular operator with CDMA chips. "Given the company's uncertain growth prospects, investor interest in the stock has diminished substantially," the Bear analysts wrote.
The big problem: "It is increasingly difficult for Via to compete with Intel in the chipset market, given Intel's dominance in CPUs." Via spokesman Richard Brown declined to respond directly to a question concerning Bear Stearns' decision, but in an e-mail reply acknowledged that "we have undergone a challenging transition over the past few years from...
Thu, 27 Dec 07
AT&T and Cisco: A Bandwidth Bonanza
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57408
When AT&T went shopping for high-tech gear to soup up its communications network with advanced video, broadband, and voice services, it turned to long-time supplier Cisco Systems. On Dec. 10 the nation's largest telco announced a deal that could be worth up to $500 million to Cisco over the lifetime of the upgraded AT&T network, according to Jim Kelleher, an analyst at Argus Research.
What's noteworthy isn't simply the size of the deal but the vast amount of bandwidth it represents. When Cisco brought out its top-of-the-line router in 2004, many analysts felt it was so powerful that only a handful of companies would ever buy one. Now, AT&T plans to link 25 cities with these mighty machines to help it handle the rising tide of Net traffic -- particularly video. This bodes well for a Cisco unit that has traditionally brought in a steady 25% of networking giant's $34 billion sales.
Now other telcos and cable companies, located everywhere from Korea to Bulgaria, are flooding Cisco with orders -- and helping realize its dream of conquering the telecom market, long a domain of Alcatel-Lucent, Ericsson, and Nortel. Cisco's service provider business finally had a major growth spurt this year, shooting up to nearly 30% of overall sales. To put this in perspective: Cisco's carrier revenues are nearly as large as all of Nortel's. And service provider sales "could grow another percentage point or two [as part of total sales] next year," says Eve Griliches, an analyst with consultancy IDC.
Why is Cisco on such a tear? It enjoys a far broader product line than most rivals, both for the basic routers that carriers need to run their networks and for related products, such as Scientific Atlanta cable TV set-top boxes and pricey videoconferencing systems, that can be resold by carriers to consumers...
Thu, 27 Dec 07
Online Advertising vs. Personal Privacy
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57391
With more than $11 billion in acquisitions this year aimed at reshaping Internet advertising, Microsoft, Google, and Yahoo are ready for the competition to pick up steam.
But a funny thing happened on the way to the brave new world of online ads: Web users rediscovered a sense of privacy.
Members of the social network Facebook howled this month after it launched Beacon, an advertising feature that tells your network of friends about your shopping habits at dozens of Web sites. Facebook was forced to let users turn off the service.
"Beacon fell victim to a poorly thought out plan of execution," says Kevin Lee, founder of search consulting firm Didit.
Advertisers are hungry to reach consumers congregating at sites such as Facebook, MySpace and YouTube to socialize and access free content. Microsoft, Google and Yahoo all want to help advertisers track consumer behavior, then distribute product pitches dovetailing with an individual's interests. If they are successful, consumers will see more Web sites posting compelling free content.
But pitfalls await tech giants as they attempt to engineer the great leap forward into "targeted advertising" -- marketing pitches that key off what individuals say and do online.
Google cleared an important regulatory hurdle when the Federal Trade Commission last week approved its $3.1 billion merger with ad placement giant DoubleClick.
But congressional hearings on privacy are set for this spring, and consumer advocates are clamoring for limits on Google's use of behavioral data. As part of its merger ruling, the FTC proposed a set of principles for self-regulation in behavioral marketing.
Meanwhile, European antitrust regulators have begun what could be a protracted look at whether the merger could stifle competition. "Google is so big and is moving so fast that they've became a natural target," says tech consultant Rob Enderle of the Enderle Group.
Microsoft paid...
Wed, 26 Dec 07
Electronics Giants Form New LCD Alliance
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57402
Canon, Hitachi, and Matsushita have formed a new alliance under which the three companies intend to cooperate in the development and production of LCD panels and related technologies. The announcement follows hard on the heels of a rival LCD deal announced by Sharp and Toshiba.
Canon, Hitachi, and Matsushita said intensifying competition has made it imperative for them to join together to ensure a stable supply of high-quality LCD panels at low prices.
Under their new alliance, Canon and Matsushita initially will acquire 24.9 percent of the shares of Hitachi's wholly owned subsidiary Hitachi Displays, reducing Hitachi's stake to 50.2 percent. In the long run, however, the three companies are planning ownership changes under which Canon will take a majority holding in Hitachi Displays.
Hitachi said the alliance would help it accelerate the development of cutting-edge technologies as well as strengthen its efforts to develop ultrathin flat-panel TV sets. The agreement also gives Canon and Matsushita access to Hitachi's highly regarded in-plane switching (IPS) technology for TFT liquid crystal displays.
Canon said the deal will help it secure a steady supply of LCD panels for its medical and office equipment products as well as consumer electronics offerings such as Canon's digital single-lens reflex camera. And by teaming up with Hitachi, Canon expects to accelerate its ongoing development of organic light-emitting diode (OLED) displays.
Plasma display market leader Matsushita expects the cooperative effort with Canon and Hitachi will help it develop LCD offerings that can compensate for an anticipated slowdown in Plasma TV sales. Matsushita said it expects to take a majority stake in its separate LCD joint venture with Canon and Toshiba. That venture is known as IPS Alpha.
Matsushita is pushing ahead with construction of a next-generation plant for IPS Alpha that could serve as a possible future...
Wed, 26 Dec 07
E-Commerce Shines in Holiday Sales
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57401
Shoppers were spending money up until the last minute, but holiday sales were nevertheless a disappointment. So says MasterCard Advisors' SpendingPulse, a report that tracks retail sales nationally.
SpendingPulse analyzed the electronics, apparel, e-commerce, and luxury sectors. All categories experienced a surge in growth on Black Friday, a lag in the middle of the holiday season, and a rally to the finish line. MasterCard's report indicates that retail posted year-over-year growth of just 3.6 percent for the period between Black Friday and December 24.
"Overall, sales came in just above the lower end of the range we were expecting, maintaining the slower, modest growth we have been seeing throughout the year," Michael McNamara, vice president of research and analysis for MasterCard Advisors, said in a statement.
"Most industry observers had adjusted their sights down," he went on to say, "but anyone who was looking for this holiday season to kick-start a new wave of growth would find these numbers falling short of expectation."
Even so, electronics sales opened the season with a surge of 15 percent growth on Black Friday. By the middle of the season, however, consumer spending on electronics was showing only a 5.8 percent gain over the same period in 2006. By the end of the season, overall growth was a moderate 2.7 percent.
A noteworthy observation, however, is that SpendingPulse views the electronics sector as encompassing a product mix of large appliances as well as consumer electronics, such as cameras, televisions, and software and hardware for gaming.
"It's very likely that when you extract big appliances, that the consumer electronics sector provided a higher level of growth than we see in our view of this category," McNamara said.
E-commerce was the strongest category, easily outperforming all other categories covered by the SpendingPulse report. This channel enjoyed...
Wed, 26 Dec 07
Information Overload Costs Economy
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57400
Think twice before you copy someone on an e-mail or hit "reply all." Such practices have made today's workers less productive, a research firm concludes.
After years of naming a product or person of the year, Basex Inc. decided to name "information overload" as problem of the year for 2007.
"It's too much information. It's too many interruptions. It's too much lost time," Basex chief analyst Jonathan Spira declared. "It's always too much of a good thing."
Information overload isn't exactly new, but Spira said the problem has grown as technology increases societal expectations for instantaneous response.
And more information available, he said, also means more time wasted looking for the right information, whether in an old e-mail or through a search engine.
Workers get disoriented every time they stop what they are doing to reply to an e-mail or answer a follow-up phone call because they didn't reply within minutes.
Spira said workers can spend 10 to 20 times the length of the original interruption trying to get back on track.
He estimates that such disruptions cost the U.S. economy $650 billion in 2006.
Spira has a number of recommendations: Resist the urge to immediately follow up an e-mail with an instant message or phone call. Make sure the subject line clearly reflects the topic and urgency of an e-mail. And use "reply all" sparingly.
Wed, 26 Dec 07
India's Outsourcers Face New Problems
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57396
The job came with a good salary, and good perks. But, 26-year-old Vaibhav Vats will tell you, it was doing him no good. His weight had grown to 120 kilos (265 pounds) and he was missing out on social life as he worked long overnight hours at a call center. Eventually, he quit.
"You are making nice money. But the tradeoff is also big," said Vats, who spent nearly two years at IBM Corp.'s call center arm in India, answering customer calls from the United States.
Call centers and other outsourced businesses such as software writing, medical transcription and back-office work employ more than 1.6 million young men and women in India, mostly in their 20s and 30s, who make much more than their contemporaries in most other professions.
They are, however, facing sleep disorders, heart disease, depression and family discord, according to doctors and several industry surveys.
Experts warn the brewing crisis could undermine the success of India's hugely profitable outsourcing industry that earns billions in dollars annually and has shaped much of the country's transformation into an emerging economic power.
Heart diseases, strokes and diabetes cost India an estimated US$9 billion in lost productivity in 2005. But the losses could grow to a staggering US$200 billion (EU135 billion) over the next 10 years if corrective action is not taken quickly, said a study by New Delhi-based Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations.
The outsourcing industry would be hardest hit, it warned.
Reliable estimates on the number of people affected are hard to come by, but government officials and experts agree that it is a growing problem. Health Minister Anbumani Ramadoss wants to enforce a special health policy for employees in the information technology industry.
"After working, they party for the rest of the time ... (They) have bad diet, excessive smoking and drinking," he...
Wed, 26 Dec 07
OLPC Project Enlivens Peruvian Hamlet
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57394
Doubts about whether poor, rural children really can benefit from quirky little computers evaporate as quickly as the morning dew in this hilltop Andean village, where 50 primary school children got machines from the One Laptop Per Child project six months ago.
These offspring of peasant families whose monthly earnings rarely exceed the cost of one of the $188 laptops -- people who can ill afford pencil and paper much less books -- can't get enough of their "XO" laptops.
At breakfast, they're already powering up the combination library/videocam/audio recorder/music maker/drawing kits. At night, they're dozing off in front of them -- if they've managed to keep older siblings from waylaying the coveted machines.
"It's really the kind of conditions that we designed for," Walter Bender, president of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology spinoff, said of this agrarian backwater up a precarious dirt road.
Founded in 2005 by former MIT Media Lab director Nicholas Negroponte, the One Laptop program has retreated from early boasts that developing-world governments would snap up millions of the pint-sized laptops at $100 each.
In a backhanded tribute, One Laptop now faces homegrown competitors everywhere from Brazil to India -- and a full-court press from Intel Corp.'s more power-hungry Classmate.
But no competitor approaches the XO in innovation. It is hard drive-free, runs on the Linux operating system and stretches wireless networks with "mesh" technology that lets each computer in a village relay data to the others.
Mass production began last month and Negroponte, brother of U.S. Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte, says he expects at least 1.5 million machines to be sold by next November. Even that would be far less than Negroponte originally envisioned. The higher-than-initially-advertised price and a lack of the Windows operating system, still being tested for the XO, have dissuaded many potential government buyers.
Peru made the single...
Wed, 26 Dec 07
Report Predicts Drop in Next-Gen DVD Player Prices
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57388
According to a new market report from Understanding & Solutions, both Blu-ray and HD DVD player prices should decline significantly in early 2008.
Consumers can purchase HD DVD players for less than $200 and Blu-ray player prices have dropped to below $300 at some online venues. This is just the beginning, according to Bill Foster, Understanding & Solutions' senior technology consultant. "Drive, chipset, and other system components are now benefiting from economies of scale," Foster said in a statement.
"In early 2008, we're going to see the bill of materials for a basic high-definition player, in either format, weighing in at less than $150," Foster said, "and that's going to impact the high street very soon, providing the consumer with a choice of low price players that allow consumer electronics companies a margin for profit."
The research group predicted that if both formats continue to sell, HD DVD and Blu-ray players will retail below $100 by 2011.
"Crucially, Blu-ray benefits from stronger Hollywood Studio support and represents a greater proportion of high definition disc production volumes and disc sales," said Jeremy Wills, a consultant at Understanding & Solutions. "To date, Paramount's move to sole support of HD DVD has failed to turn the market, despite the HD DVD exclusivity of key titles Transformers and Shrek the Third."
Notably, Blu-ray still represented over 70 percent of HD movie sales in the
U.S. during the week Transformers was released on HD DVD. As demand grows and manufacturing volumes build, Wills predicted, the market will see the costs of releasing on two different formats start to add up. Wills suggested that there might be surprises just around the corner, and that we could see a lot more clarity on these issues in 2008.
Despite all this action in the HD...
Wed, 26 Dec 07
IBM Buys Solid Information Technology
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57387
IBM said it will acquire privately held Solid Information Technology for the purpose of adding real-time, data-access capabilities to its existing database and information-management offerings.
Currently available in more than three million deployments worldwide, Solid's software employs in-memory database technology to access and store data in RAM at speeds up to 10 times faster than what can be achieved through the use of traditional disk-based database systems, IBM said.
The company's major clients include Alcatel, Cisco, EMC2, Nokia, and Siemens.
"Together, IBM and Solid Information Technology will provide a comprehensive set of capabilities that enable companies to deliver trusted information in real time to every person and every business transaction," said Ambuj Goyal, general manager of IBM Information Management.
Solid's solidDB software is designed to support numerous consumer applications as well as services in telecom, retail, finance, and healthcare.
In particular, the product's real-time, data-access capabilities provide nearly instantaneous access to data for mobile phones, Internet-based calling, online shopping, investment transactions, and other applications, IBM said. What's more, Solid maintains that its technology offers the ability to recover from a system failure within milliseconds..
IBM, which already partners with Solid on information management for telecommunication service providers, said it sees the acquisition as complementary to its own disk-based DB2 and Informix Dynamic Server offerings.
For example, a proof-of-concept conducted last June at IBM's Innovation Center in San Mateo, California showed how Solid's technology can be used to accelerate access to data stored in DB2 by a factor of 40 over a configuration lacking Solid's enhancements.
In a separate undertaking, the two companies have demonstrated how Solid's technology can work with IBM Bladecenter. According to the companies, the combination delivered an industry-leading throughput in a benchmark that simulated a wireless scenario involving one million subscribers.
The throughput...
Wed, 26 Dec 07
IBM Sets Out To Prove Security Mettle
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57371
IBM is trying to succeed in the less familiar terrain of network and desktop security -- and finding that a few high-profile moves aren't enough to sway some skeptical analysts.
When IBM acquired Internet Security Systems (ISS) a year ago, the industry's mixed reaction included that of Gartner security analyst John Pescatore, who said it doesn't "make sense for IBM to own network-security products."
IBM pushed forward nevertheless, striking a deal to buy Web-application security vendor WatchFire in June. Then in November IBM said it will spend $1.5 billion on security in 2008, and announced several new products and services for data security and compliance with the Payment Card Industry Data security Standard. The $1.5 billion sum is thought to be twice as high as IBM's previous security spending.
Pescatore still thinks IBM should take it slow, saying that the fact IBM has expertise in providing I.T. infrastructure doesn't mean it should be selling products that react to security threats. Fraud detection and fraud management are areas that would make sense for IBM to enter, but "the area we don't think they should go [into] is more network security stuff, like buying a firewall company or getting into antiviral software," he says.
IBM does provide antivirus software in IBM ISS' desktop offering. Moreover, IBM intends to be "the dominant security player" in a market that's ripe for consolidation, says Peter Evans, vice president of marketing at IBM ISS. A big enterprise that buys security products from dozens of vendors might have an easier time managing those tools if they all came from one vendor, or from just a few, Evans notes. Much of the $1.5 billion IBM plans to spend on security will focus on creating integrations between various security products, he says.
Some analysts are wary of IBM's increased focus on security, but others...
Wed, 26 Dec 07
Inside the Data Encryption Revolution
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57370
Although data encryption adds cost and complexity, business and government sectors are becoming wedded to it -- even though at times it's like an arranged marriage driven by regulatory compliance and fear of data-breach fiascos.
"We now require encryption for 'data at rest' on laptops in the Air Force," says Greg Garcia, member of the senior executive service of the US. Air Force and director of the 754th Electronic Systems Group at Gunter Air Force Base in Montgomery Ala. The group sets security policy for the 500,000 laptops used by the Air Force.
"The contract we awarded for this grew out of what happened at Veterans Affairs," Garcia points out, alluding to the data breach fiascos of this year and last that led to millions of veterans' personal information being exposed on lost and stolen laptops.
The VA data-breach incidents spurred the White House Office of Management and Budget, the U.S. Department of Defense and the civilian-side General Services Administration to look at government-wide approaches for data-at-rest encryption.
The outcome was the U.S. government's first-ever blanket purchasing agreements (BPA) for data-at-rest encryption products to protect sensitive but unclassified data on government laptops and removable storage devices.
BPAs were awarded in June to eleven resellers, including Intelligent Decisions, MTM Technologies and GovBuys.
The encryption products on the list include Credant Technologies' CredantMobile Guardian, Encryption Solutions' Skylock AtRest, GuardianEdge Technologies' GuardianEdge, Information security's secret Agent, Mobile Armor's Data Armor, Pointsec Mobile Technologies' Pointsec, SafeBoot's (acquired by McAfee for $350 million in October) SafeBoot Device Encryption, SafeNet's SafeNet protectDrive, Spyrus' Talisman/DS Data security Suite, and WinMagic's secureDoc.
What's known as the data-at-rest encryption BPAs are also available for use by state and local governments.
The Tennessee Department of Revenue is going its own way in adding encryption to its mobile laptops by deploying Entrust encryption software this...
Wed, 26 Dec 07
Surveillance: A New Look at Big Brother
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57323
There are about 30 million surveillance cameras in the U.S. -- inside ATM machines, at traffic lights, in department store dressing rooms. And while such digital eyes are now deeply woven into society's fabric, experts say there's scant public debate over how they should be used.
"Unfortunately, most people just don't care," says David Holtzman, author of Privacy Lost: How Technology Is Endangering Your Privacy. "What this issue needs is a Michael Moore to go after the issue and raise public awareness."
Holtzman may have gotten his wish -- sort of -- in the indie film Look, which opened in New York and Los Angeles on Dec. 14. Look is shot entirely from the perspective of surveillance cameras. The footage is fictional, but the angles are common to daily life.
This is no Michael Moore-like advocacy piece. Look takes no sides. The movie tells the story of a group of characters whose lives are dramatically affected by surveillance cameras. At times, the camera plays the hero, assisting in the capture of murderers.
At other points, it's negligent -- failing to alert police to the car left for days in a mall parking lot, a woman locked in the trunk dying. Always, the camera's power is palpable, as when it catches a dutiful husband in a moment of weakness. "We're not trying to grind any ax," says co-producer Barry Schuler, formerly chief executive of AOL, owned by Time Warner. "It's designed to be an eye-opener."
The movie is likely to succeed in that mission, challenging the laissez-faire attitude toward surveillance that's emerged since September 11. In a recent ABC News/Washington Post survey, 71% of respondents said they support increased use of surveillance cameras. The results may well be different if taken after a Look screening.
Look's release comes amid rapid advances in technologies that...
Wed, 26 Dec 07
Intel, STMicro Flash Memory Deal Delayed
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57403
Tightening credit markets have forced Intel and STMicroelectronics, Europe's largest semiconductor maker, to delay a planned merger of the companies' memory divisions.
The new company, to be called Numonyx, will be formed by March 28 instead of the end of 2007, as originally planned when the deal was announced in May, the companies said.
Numonyx, which would be the largest manufacturer of flash memory in the world, is an attempt to wrest profits from a sector that has seen slumping prices amid increased competition.
The companies estimate Numonyx would represent $3.6 billion in sales, making the new company bigger than Spansion, currently the market leader.
A third party in the deal is Silicon Valley-based Francisco Partners, which will invest $150 million for a 6.4 percent stake in the new company.
As the credit situation continues to be tight, banks are looking to scale back their exposure to the deal. In May, Intel and STMicro announced they had commitments for a $1.3 billion loan and $250 million in revolving credit, but Wednesday the companies said financing would be reduced to a $650 million loan and $100 million in revolving credit.
Under the new deal, STMicroelectronics will get 48.6 percent of the new company plus cash and notes worth $364 million. In May, the transaction called for Intel to get a 45.1 percent share of the company plus $432 million. Now, Intel isn't saying how big a payment it will take.
"We'll wait and see when we get the terms all finalized," said Chuck Mulloy, an Intel spokesperson.
"Numonyx will be the industry's largest supplier of NOR flash memory and a leader in nonvolatile memory solutions with a substantial patent portfolio," the companies said in a statement. "Intel, Francisco Partners, and ST intend for Numonyx to hit the ground running,...
Mon, 24 Dec 07
Army Adds Macs To Improve Security
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57382
One of Apple's major marketing themes is that Macs are less susceptible to viruses, Trojans, and other hacker attacks than Windows PCs. While that argument has yet to hold much sway with enterprise I.T. departments, it is causing the U.S. Army to add some Macs to its networks.
Lt. Col. C.J. Wallington, a division chief in the Army's office of enterprise information systems, told Forbes that the Army is adding Macs to make its networks harder to hack. Wallington said that making networks more heterogeneous might make it more difficult for attackers to compromise an entire group of computers.
These things don't just happen overnight. The Army's CIO, Gen. Steve Boutelle, called for more diverse computer networks back in August 2005. He said the Army should deal with a broader range of vendors to increase competition and harden I.T. defenses. But thus far, the Army has allowed only a trickle of Macs to enter military facilities. The Army buys only about 1,000 Macs during its twice-a-year buying seasons.
One key barrier -- besides Apple's price premium and the general I.T. resistance to Apple -- has been incompatibility with Common Access Cards, a security key card program the military uses heavily. Early in 2008, the Army will adopt software that will allow Macs to use CACs.
The Army is impressed with Apple Xserve servers' ability to withstand attacks, Wallington said. "Those are some of the most-attacked computers there are. But the attacks used against them are designed for Windows-based machines, so they shrug them off," he said.
The Army's Apple program is being led by Jonathan Broskey, a former Apple employee. He says it's not just that Macs are a less inviting target than Windows; Apple's version of Unix is inherently more secure than Windows, he says.
But some observers point out...
Mon, 24 Dec 07
FBI Unveils $1B Biometrics Initiative
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57381
The FBI is launching a $1 billion initiative to develop the world's largest biometrics database. The computer platform would collect information on people's physical characteristics, according to a report in the Washington Post.
The technology, which has been named Next Generation Identification, will give the government new capabilities to identify people in the United States and abroad.
"Bigger. Faster. Better. That's the bottom line," Thomas E. Bush III, assistant director of the FBI's Criminal Justice Information Services Division, which operates the databases from its headquarters in the Appalachian foothills, told the Washington Post.
The FBI already is compiling digital images of fingerprints, palm prints, and faces into its systems in Clarksburg, West Virginia, but the organization plans to award a 10-year contract in January that would expand the amount and types of biometric data it receives and stores in its computer systems.
For example, plans call for storing iris patterns, face-shape data, scars, and possibly even the unique ways people speak and walk -- all in the name of tracking down criminals and solving crimes.
"It's going to be an essential component of tracking," Barry Steinhardt, director of the Technology and Liberty Project of the American Civil Liberties Union, told the Washington Post. "It's enabling the always-on-surveillance society."
According to a new technical market research report by BCC Research called The Global Biometrics Market, the global market for biometrics was worth nearly $2 billion in 2006 and is expected to increase to $2.7 billion in 2007 and $7.1 billion by 2012, a compound annual growth rate of 21.3 percent over the next five years.
The market is broken down into applications of fingerprint, face, hand, and other recognition technologies. Fingerprint biometrics, the oldest form of biometrics in use today, will continue to be the main revenue contributor from 2007 to 2012, according to the report.
According...
Mon, 24 Dec 07
OnStar Users Left in Lurch by Shutdown
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57379
When Adele Rothman bought her 16-year-old son a car in 2003, she made sure to pick one that had OnStar, the onboard communications and safety system.
What the Scarsdale, N.Y., resident didn't know was that the OnStar system in the car was already doomed to die. The federal government decided in 2002 to let cellular carriers shut down analog cell phone networks, used by Rothman's Saab and about 500,000 other OnStar-equipped cars, after Feb. 18, 2008.
It's the end of the nationwide network that launched the U.S. wireless industry 24 years ago, and it leaves a surprising number of users like Adele Rothman in the lurch.
OnStar told Rothman in March its service would stop at the end of this year, in anticipation of the network shutdown in February. "I was really upset," she said, "because that was my tieline" to her son.
Perhaps a million cell phones will lose service, but those are cheap and easy to replace. The effects will be felt the most by people who have things that aren't phones but have built-in wireless capabilities, like OnStar cars and home alarm systems.
The shutdown date has been known years in advance, but some industries appear to have a had a problem updating their technologies and informing their customers in advance, which raises the question of whether the effects will be even more widespread the next time a network is turned off, given the proliferation of wireless technology.
General Motors Corp., which owns OnStar, started modifying its cars after the 2002 decision by the Federal Communications Commission to let the network die, but some cars made as late as 2005 can't use digital networks for OnStar, nor can they be upgraded. For some cars made in the intervening years, GM provides digital upgrades for $15.
In 2006, OnStar said it had let customers know...
Mon, 24 Dec 07
Tech Innovation Comes to Retailing
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Red pumps. Silver slingbacks. Bronze flats. Black suede boots. Size 7 1/2, please.
Without leaving the customer's side, Macy's sales associate Felicia Dixon uses a small, handheld electronic device that essentially summons the shoes in the right style, color and size, from the stockroom. It is not quite magic: A clerk in the backroom receives the request electronically and brings out the merchandise.
The shopper does not have to hunt around for a clerk each time she wants to try on a different style or needs a different size. Better service means happier customers, and that could lead to more sales.
At least that is the hope, from the retailer's perspective.
Stores spend $34.5 billion a year on all kinds of technology, from the cables and routers behind-the-scene to in-store devices such as price checkers, self-service checkout stations and electronic kiosks for customers, says the National Retail Federation.
With older equipment needing to be replaced, spending for high-tech upgrades is expected to increase, the federation says.
Some workers might view technology such as self-checkouts threatening their job. Other devices -- electronic price checkers or Macy's shoe locator -- might make their jobs easier.
Still, the number of jobs in some segments of the retail industry is diminishing, and economists believe that technology has played a prominent role.
An Associated Press analysis of Bureau of Labor Statistics' employment data found that department stores have slashed 247,100 jobs since June 2001, when employment in that sector peaked. The number of jobs at food and beverage stores has fallen by 118,800 since April 2000.
Technology that allows companies to produce more goods or provide service to their customers with fewer workers or with their current staff is a factor in some job losses, economists say. A second is consolidation when a company buys out a rival or merges with a competitor.
"No local...
Mon, 24 Dec 07
Airborne Internet Might Bring Turbulence
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57375
Seat 17D is yapping endlessly on an Internet phone call. Seat 16F is flaming Seat 16D with expletive-laden chats. Seat 16E is too busy surfing porn sites to care. Seat 17C just wants to sleep.
Welcome to the promise of the Internet at 33,000 feet -- and the questions of etiquette, openness and free speech that airlines and service providers will have to grapple with as they bring Internet access to the skies in the coming months.
"This gets into a ticklish area," said Vint Cerf, one of the Internet's chief inventors and generally a critic of network restrictions. "Airlines have to be sensitive to the fact that customers are (seated) close together and may be able to see each other's PC screens. More to the point, young people are often aboard the plane."
Technology providers and airlines are already making decisions. Some will block services like Internet phone calls altogether while others will put limits and install filters on content. And traffic management tools that are frowned upon on terra firma could be commonplace in the air.
Panasonic Avionics Corp., a Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. unit testing airborne services on Australia's Qantas Airways Ltd., is designing its high-speed Internet services to block sites on "an objectionable list," including porn and violence, said David Bruner, executive director for corporate sales and marketing.
He said airlines based in more restrictive countries could choose to expand the list.
The company also is recommending that airlines permit Internet-based phone calls only on handsets with wireless Wi-Fi capabilities -- the technology delivering access within the passenger cabin. Bruner said the company believes Wi-Fi handsets use less bandwidth than telephone software that runs on laptops.
Airlines, he said, also could block incoming calls -- and the annoying ring tones they produce -- or designate periods of quiet time.
OnAir, which has European certification...
Mon, 24 Dec 07
China Cracks Down on Text Messages
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A Beijing city regulation clamping down on people who send text messages that "spread rumors" or "endanger public security" is a threat to freedom of expression, a watchdog group said Monday.
China Human Rights Defenders, an international network of activists and rights monitoring groups, said the recent regulation on text messages "raises serious concerns over the restriction of freedom of expression in China."
The group said in a statement that an average of 180 million text messages are sent every day and that text messaging has become one of the most important means of receiving information unavailable in the mainstream media.
The 2008 Olympics, which Beijing is hosting, offer a high-profile opportunity for protesters to air their grievances against China on issues like religious freedom, human rights and Tibetan independence.
Beijing police will work with government agencies and telecommunications companies to investigate and punish those using text messages to "spread rumors" or "endanger public security," the city government said in a notice posted on its Web site late last month.
Chinese authorities commonly use vague charges such as those to detain dissidents or others it views as a threat to the ruling Communist Party.
Although the notice did not detail specific punishments, a story in the city's Communist Party mouthpiece newspaper, the Beijing Daily, earlier this year said people who spread rumors or other false information are subject to detention for up to 10 days and a fine of up to $70.
China has more than 500 million cell phone users and text messaging has become an increasingly effective way to spread word of meetings or demonstrations.
This summer, plans to build a chemical plant in the southern coastal city of Xiamen were suspended after residents sent nearly 1 million text messages to friends and family, urging the government to abandon the project because of its alleged health...
Mon, 24 Dec 07
Toshiba, Sharp Team Up in LCD Race
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On Friday, electronics giants Sharp and Toshiba announced an agreement to collaborate on LCDs. The Japanese companies are market rivals, but both sides anticipate significant advantages from the alliance.
The move is expected to allow each company to leverage its respective strengths and resources, particularly Sharp's capabilities in LCDs and Toshiba's expertise in semiconductors. Sharp and Toshiba will launch the collaborative partnership in 2008.
The first initiative will be an expansion of an existing reciprocal procurement agreement. Sharp will purchase computer chips for use in LCDs from Toshiba, while Toshiba will purchase LCD panels for TVs that are 32 inches or larger from Sharp.
The companies made the announcement at a news conference at a hotel in Tokyo. Toshiba President Atsutoshi Nishida told reporters that the partnership combining the product strengths of both companies would create a win-win relationship.
"To survive the tough competition, we need to be strong in both the key devices of panels and the technology of system LSIs," Nishida told reporters, referring to the sophisticated chips increasingly used in digital consumer goods that are Toshiba's forte. "It is difficult for one company to handle both."
The global market for LCD TVs is growing at a brisk pace, a trend expected to continue in coming years. Indeed, factors such as rising demand, increasing prices, and a tightening supply have caused market research firm iSuppli to raise its forecast for shipments of large LCD panels for 2007 and beyond.
Global revenue for large LCD panels will rise to $66 billion in 2007, up 22.2 percent from $54 billion in 2006, according to iSuppli. This figure represents a 6 percent increase compared to iSuppli's previous forecast of $62 billion for 2007. In 2007, worldwide shipments are forecast to reach 353.8 million units, up 25.2 percent from 282.5 million units in 2006. Previously,...
Mon, 24 Dec 07
Vonage Settles Patent Suit with AT&T
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On Friday, VoIP pioneer Vonage said it has settled a patent dispute with telecom giant AT&T, which had sued Vonage in October for using packed-based telephony products based on its intellectual property.
Terms of the settlement were not disclosed. However, on November 7 the companies said they had tentatively agreed to a settlement in which Vonage would pay AT&T about $39 million.
Since the company went public in May 2006, Vonage has been the subject of several patent suits from telecoms and other service providers. Both Sprint Nextel and Verizon targeted Vonage for patent infringement, and both companies won judgments against the young VoIP provider.
Most recently, a federal court ordered Vonage to pay Sprint Nextel $69.5 million in damages for six counts of patent infringement. The ruling cost Vonage a third of its market value, although the stock has since seen gains.
Sprint Nextel claimed Vonage infringed on seven of its patents for connecting Internet phone calls. Vonage argued that Sprint's patents should not have been approved in the first place. However, in September, jurors in a Kansas City court decided Vonage deliberately violated Sprint's intellectual property.
U.S. District Judge John Lungstrum had the option to triple the damages because of the finding of willful infringement. In the final ruling, a federal court ordered the company to pay $69.5 million in damages, plus future royalties.
Under the terms of the agreement, Vonage is paying Sprint Nextel a total of $80 million. That includes $35 million for past use of its technology, $40 million for a license going forward, and $5 million in prepaid services.
The suit that opened up the floodgates against Vonage was Verizon's legal bid against it. In June 2006, Verizon sued Vonage in Richmond, Virginia's U.S. District Court, claiming that Vonage's methods for interfacing between packet-switched...
Fri, 21 Dec 07
Samba Gains Access to Microsoft Code
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57364
Microsoft has entered into a licensing agreement with the nonprofit Protocol Freedom Information Foundation (PFIF) under which the software giant will be providing developers working on the Samba file and printing system with the information they need to ensure interoperability between their open-source software and Windows.
Essentially, the agreement gives the Samba team access to Microsoft specifications for the protocols in the Work Group Server Protocol Program and allows the Samba team to create, use, and distribute implementations.
"What this process has shown me is that if we focus on technology, and patient, diligent execution, we can make real progress together," said Sam Ramji, the director of the Open Source Software Lab at Microsoft.
Microsoft's licensing of proprietary information represents the first fruit of the software giant's capitulation to the European Commission's landmark 2004 antitrust decision.
"The agreement allows us to keep Samba up to date with recent changes in Microsoft Windows, and also helps other free software projects that need to interoperate with Windows," said Samba cocreator Andrew Tridgell.
In exchange for a one-time fee of 10,000 euros (US$14,350), the PFIF will be able to provide Samba with the necessary documentation for implementing all of the Workgroup Server Protocols covered by the European Commission's antitrust decision.
"I expect that this will significantly improve the process of Samba development, and produce better quality interoperation between the Windows and Linux/Unix environments," Ramji said.
The agreement clarifies the exact patent numbers involved so there is no possibility of misunderstanding. Microsoft is prevented from asserting any patents against any implementation developed using the supplied documentation, noted Samba cocreator Jeremy Allison. In addition, Microsoft's warranty under the agreement extends to all third parties, he said.
Samba will be able to continue its existing practice of including comments in its source code, "so that there...
Fri, 21 Dec 07
Felon Became a Top Wikipedia Exec
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57363
The foundation that runs -- and accepts donations for -- the online encyclopedia Wikipedia neglected to do a basic background check before hiring a chief operating officer who had been convicted of theft, drunken driving and fleeing a car accident.
Before she left in July, Carolyn Bothwell Doran, 45, had moved up from a part-time bookkeeper for the Wikimedia Foundation and spent six months as chief operating officer, responsible for personnel and financial management. In March, she signed the small nonprofit's tax return, which listed more than $1.3 million (EU900,000) in donations.
At the time, she was on probation for a 2004 hit-and-run accident in Virginia that had landed her seven months in prison. Doran had multiple drunken-driving convictions, and records show earlier run-ins for theft, writing bad checks and wounding her boyfriend with a gunshot to the chest.
The revelation comes as the Wikimedia Foundation, which runs the volunteer-written Wikipedia and its sister Web encyclopedias in other languages, is staging a fundraising drive and trying to expand beyond a ragtag startup.
"This is indicative of poor management of the Wikimedia Foundation," said Charles Ainsworth, a frequent Wikipedia contributor. Ainsworth said he had been considering donating to support the encyclopedia, but won't "unless they clearly get things fixed."
The foundation said it had no indication Doran did anything improper with donors' money. However, the organization's most recent audit is incomplete, despite a goal of completing it months ago.
Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales, who is on Wikimedia's board, said he did not expect to find anything amiss but would personally cover any losses that turned up.
"We are very saddened and hurt by these shocking revelations," Wales wrote in a message to the Wikipedia community. "Of course we are doing soul searching about what we could have done different."
Doran's background was reported first in The Register, a London-based...
Fri, 21 Dec 07
New Satellite Joins GPS Constellation
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The U.S. Air Force has launched a new GPS satellite that is expected to provide civilian and military users with enhanced navigation capabilities. The latest GPS Block II series satellite to be modernized by aerospace manufacturer Lockheed Martin is expected to become operational next month.
"The successful deployment of this high-performance satellite represents another important milestone in the modernization of the GPS constellation and reflects our commitment to achieving mission success for our customer," said Lockheed Martin's VP of Navigation Systems Don DeGryse.
"Our team is now focused on performing a rapid and efficient on-orbit checkout to quickly place the satellite's advanced navigational capabilities into operational service," DeGryse added.
Operated by the GPS wing of the U.S. Air Force, the entire 30-satellite GPS constellation currently in orbit provides the data so GPS-enabled mobile phones, dashboard-mounted devices, and other electronic gear can determine their altitude, velocity, and geographic coordinates to within just a few meters -- on the ground, at sea, or in the air. The U.S. government provides users around the globe with access to the civilian side of this system free of charge.
Like its four predecessors already in commercial service, the newly launched satellite offers better performance than the previous-generation GPS platforms by incorporating a higher-powered antenna panel and an additional open-access signal for civilian use. And the new spacecraft features encryption and antijamming enhancements that will boost the security of the weapons control and navigation gear aboard U.S. military aircraft.
Moreover, the next GPS satellite in the series, which is slated for launch in 2008, will carry a demonstration payload that will transmit an additional civil "safety of life" signal that, among other things, will improve navigation accuracy.
"Early delivery of this payload reflects our team's commitment to successful and timely program execution," said DeGryse. "We look...
Fri, 21 Dec 07
Japan Gives Two Companies WiMax Frequencies
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The Japanese government gave licenses Friday for future high-speed wireless Internet services to KDDI Corp. and Willcom Inc., which is owned by U.S. investment fund Carlyle Group.
The decision for the 2.5 gigahertz broadband WiMax services is a victory for the telecommunications companies and a defeat for major mobile phone carriers NTT DoCoMo and Softbank Corp., which had also sought the license.
WiMax, a technology that allows speedy transmission of wireless data over long distances, is viewed as an attractive connection for future wireless devices, allowing users instantaneous access to the Internet while they're on the go, riding a commuter train, for example.
The Japanese government maintains tight controls over wireless services and earlier said it would allow only two companies to do WiMax.
Other companies won't be banned from offering WiMax services, but they will have to lease the frequencies from KDDI or Willcom.
KDDI is promising WiMax services for 2009, targeting 5.6 million users by 2013, with tests starting in February. By the end of 2012, WiMax will cover 90 percent of Japan's geographic area, according to a company release.
WiMax is already available in parts of the U.S., South Korea and other nations but has not yet started in Japan.
Similar to the Wi-Fi standard used at home and coffee shop hot spots, WiMax has much greater range and enables data transmission at higher speeds.
Softbank, which was planning to work with Internet services provider eAccess Ltd. has submitted a complaint to the telecommunications ministry about the decision, according to Japan's top business daily the Nikkei, opening a new chapter in Softbank's continued battle with the government over control of telecommunications.
Softbank President Masayoshi Son has repeatedly contested such government controls as holding back Japan's technological and economic growth.
The government has said it is weighing quality and the ability to cover areas with the services in...
Fri, 21 Dec 07
Apple Squashes Mac Rumor Site ThinkSecret.com
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57358
Apple and Think Secret, a Mac rumor Web site published by Nicholas M. Ciarelli, have come to an agreement in a nearly three-year-old lawsuit. The financial terms of the settlement were not disclosed, but Ciarelli has agreed to shut down ThinkSecret.com.
Ciarelli posted a press release on his Web site that said the agreement results in a "positive solution" for both sides. "I'm pleased to have reached this amicable settlement, and will now be able to move forward with my college studies and broader journalistic pursuits," Ciarelli said in a statement.
Apple was not immediately available for comment.
Apple targeted Ciarelli with a lawsuit after he posted details about the Mac Mini computer prior to an official announcement at January 2005's MacWorld. The suit also named Ciarelli's company, dePlume Organization LLC.
The suit claimed that Ciarelli induced company employees to break confidentiality agreements with Apple. Ciarelli, the complaint argued, obtained the information illegally by posting an online request for Apple insiders to disclose trade secrets.
Ciarelli, who was also an editor at the Harvard Crimson, launched Think Secret when he was 13 years old. After Apple filed suit against Ciarelli, he told the Harvard Crimson he had a right to the same protections as other investigative journalists.
"I talk to sources of information, investigate tips, follow up on leads, and corroborate details. I believe these practices are reflected in Think Secret's track record," he told the paper in 2005. Ciarelli's attorney based his arguments on the First Amendment right to free speech. Ciarelli had a right to publish the information, he said, because it was legally obtained.
It's a shame that Apple is using its heavyweight status and obvious financial strength to squash some of these small players, said Tim Deal, a senior analyst at Pike & Fischer. But, he added, he...
Fri, 21 Dec 07
IBM Intros Semantic Search for E-Mail
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With new search software for Lotus Notes announced Thursday by IBM, users will be able to find information in what the company described as "the vast personal database that e-mail has become."
The IBM OmniFind Personal Email Search (IOPES), from IBM's Research Labs, uses advanced algorithms that can figure out what is meant by incomplete queries and can find phone numbers, people, meetings, presentations, documents, images, and other data.
A search tool such as this is useful because e-mail is no longer a simple communication tool, Lotus Chief Technology Officer Douglas Wilson said in a statement, but has become a "personal database where we retain vast amounts of valuable information."
IOPES uses semantic searching so that users can, for example, find a phone number even if the words "phone" and "number" are not in the e-mail.
The concept of dates, times, phone numbers, and other terms are part of the tool's logic. And other concepts, such as meeting requests or locations, can be defined by users who are not programmers. In addition, users can share their customized concepts, and personalized searches can be saved.
The tool works by creating an index of keywords as well as another index of concepts and relationships. When a search is conducted, the tool finds the keywords in the first index and then relates them according to associations in the second one, assisted by rules provided by the searchers.
The IBM tool uses the Unstructured Information Management Architecture (UIMA), which is an open-source framework for creating analysis technologies to discover relationships, identify patterns, and predict outcomes in unstructured information.
UIMA was originally developed by IBM, and is also being used for concept search capabilities and text analysis in IBM's OmniFind product line, which includes OmniFind Enterprise Edition, Omnifind Analytics Edition, and OmniFind Yahoo Edition.
Matt...
Fri, 21 Dec 07
Red Hat Names James Whitehurst New CEO
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Red Hat Inc. tapped former Delta Air Lines Inc. executive James Whitehurst to lead the company into a new phase of growth, as the open source provider said Thursday its third-quarter earnings rose 12 percent.
Company officials said Whitehurst's experience at Delta, including his work leading the development of the online travel site Orbitz, will help him carry Red Hat to $1 billion in revenue and beyond. He was at Delta for five years, where he worked to bring the airline out of bankruptcy.
Long-standing Red Hat CEO Matthew Szulik, explaining in a conference call he needs more time to tend to "serious health issues" in his family, will continue to serve as chairman of the company's board of directors.
Red Hat said its net income in the quarter that ended Nov. 30 climbed to $20.3 million, or 10 cents per share, compared with $14.6 million, or 7 cents per share, in the year-ago period. A surge in subscriptions in the latest quarter helped offset increased spending on marketing and research.
Revenue rose 28 percent to $135.4 million.
Analysts expected the Raleigh-based company to post earnings of 10 cents per share on revenue of $132.4 million, according to a Thomson Financial survey.
The company also raised its fiscal 2008 revenue outlook to between $521 million to $523 million, up from $510 million to $520 million.
Red Hat shares rose $1.16, or 6.2 percent, to $19.95 in after-hours trading. Before the news was released, the shares gained 53 cents, or 2.9 percent, to close at $18.79.
Szulik said the board selected Whitehurst after considering candidates from an array of industries.
"We were interviewing people with a track record of successful leadership first and foremost," Szulik said in a conference call, noting that Whitehurst also demonstrated a strong command of the open source industry. "We're getting a technically savvy executive who...
Fri, 21 Dec 07
Yahoo China Loses Music Piracy Suit
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An industry group says it has won a new round in a court battle with Yahoo Inc.'s China arm, which is accused of helping online music pirates.
A Beijing appeals court on Thursday upheld a ruling against Yahoo China over its search engine's links to outside Web sites that carried illegally copied music, the International Federation of Phonographic Industries said.
Court officials would not confirm the report. A spokesman for Alibaba Group, the local partner that manages Yahoo's China arm, said he had not seen the ruling and could not comment on it. But the spokesman, Porter Erisman, said Yahoo China hoped to reach an agreement with music companies to create a licensed download service.
China is a leading source of pirated copies of music, movies and other goods. Operators of pirate Web sites offer music, games and other services to attract users and make money from advertising or online commerce.
Industry groups have won a series of lawsuits against companies accused of profiting from piracy but say violations are growing despite increased Chinese government enforcement.
In the latest case, the IFPI -- representing companies including Warner Music Group Corp., Sony BMG and Universal Vivendi -- accused Yahoo China of violating copyrights because of links between its search engine and Web sites with 229 illegally copied songs.
The Beijing No. 2 Intermediate People's Court ruled in April that Yahoo China facilitated the infringement of copyrights and awarded 210,000 yuan ($27,000) in damages.
Yahoo China appealed, arguing that search engines should not be liable for content on outside Web sites. The IFPI said that appeal was rejected by the Beijing Higher People's Court.
Music companies lost a similar lawsuit earlier against Chinese search engine Baidu.com Inc. But China changed its laws on enforcement of copyrights and other intellectual property after that, and Yahoo China was sued under the new...
Fri, 21 Dec 07
Cisco Changes Management Structure
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57346
A "development council" composed of several executives will replace Cisco Systems Inc. CEO heir-apparent Charles Giancarlo, who has resigned.
Cisco Chairman and Chief Executive John Chambers announced the appointment of the group of executives to oversee acquisitions and other business deals on Thursday after he confirmed Giancarlo, his chief development officer, was leaving.
Giancarlo, whose last day is Dec. 31, plans to join Silicon Valley investment firm Silver Lake as a managing director.
Chambers said in a conference call he and Giancarlo held with reporters that Cisco is shifting from a "command and control" organization to a network of task forces and other teams.
Such a structure is rare in the tech industry, where heroic and charismatic executives often cultivate loyal followings. But "management by committee" approaches have become more common in the legal and financial industries in the last decade.
Chambers said he had no intention of naming another individual to be chief development officer and he might appoint multi-person councils to lead other divisions of the company if it the development council works well.
"I believe this type of structure will be the future, given the complexities and ... market adjacencies we're going to move into," Chambers said. "The future of our company will be about how groups work together architecturally."
Giancarlo's resignation was a rare loss for Cisco, which makes the switches, routers and other gear that enable people to use the Internet. It is the second-most valuable Silicon Valley company after Google Inc.
Cisco is often ranked among the top companies to work for nationwide, and it's known for high morale and low turnover, at least by Silicon Valley standards. In February, it also lost Mike Volpi, senior vice president and general manager in charge of the routing and service provider technology group.
The entrepreneurial Volpi, 41, said his decision to leave was influenced by...
Fri, 21 Dec 07
Privacy Advocates Against GoogleClick
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57344
Google leaped over a major hurdle on Thursday when the U.S. Federal Trade Commission gave its blessing to its planned acquisition of DoubleClick. However, the European Commission has yet to give the nod to the megamerger.
Google announced in April 2007 its plans to acquire DoubleClick for $3.1 billion in cash from San Francisco-based private equity firm Hellman & Friedman, along with JMI Equity and management.
"The FTC's strong support sends a clear message: This acquisition poses no risk to competition and will benefit consumers," Google CEO Eric Schmidt said in a statement.
The acquisition was approved earlier this year by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission and was recommended for approval by one of three Brazilian regulatory agencies. But Google won't close the deal until the European Commission, which is still examining the transaction, grants it clearance.
In its opinion, the FTC explicitly rejected any concerns about competition. Google's current business involves the selling of text-based ads, while DoubleClick's core business is delivering and reporting on display ads.
DoubleClick does not buy ads, sell ads, or buy or sell advertising space. It provides technology to enable advertisers and publishers to deliver ads once they have agreed to terms, and to provide advertisers and publishers statistics relating to those ads.
The FTC's opinion noted the robust competition in online advertising, with Google's acquisition of DoubleClick being just one of several recent transactions that underscore this strong competition.
In recent months, several major transactions in the online advertising space were announced, including Yahoo's acquisition of Right Media, AOL's acquisition of ADTECH AG, WPP Group's acquisition of 24/7 Real Media, and Microsoft's $6 billion acquisition of aQuantive and acquisition of AdECN.
"For us, privacy does not begin or end with our purchase of DoubleClick," Schmidt said. "We have been protecting our users' privacy since our...
Fri, 21 Dec 07
Research In Motion Defies Conventional Wisdom
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57339
If there's supposed to be a big slowdown in corporate I.T. spending, then someone forgot to tell Research In Motion. The Canadian maker of the wildly popular BlackBerry wireless device reported sales that doubled over the year-ago quarter and profits that grew even better over the same period.
But then corporate spending was really only part of the story for RIM, which has over the year made a concerted push into consumer markets with new, sleeker devices, adding cameras and music-playing features it had long eschewed.
Clearly RIM's new image -- less suit, more T-shirt -- is paying off. Sales for the quarter were $1.67 billion, a 100% improvement over the $835 million reported a year ago, and a 22% boost from $1.37 billion in sales during the prior quarter. Profits came in at $370.5 million, or 65% per share, 111% better than in the year-ago quarter, and a 28% improvement sequentially.
RIM's powerful results delivered a strong counterpoint to the conventional wisdom that tech spending by large corporations, the company's bread-and-butter customer base, is heading into a slowing period. The ongoing credit crunch, which has pummeled the financial community and resulted in restructuring and layoffs at banks and other institutions, would appear to drive right to the heart of that base. Investment bankers and financial executives are big BlackBerry addicts, and in most cases their devices are paid for by employers.
Yet the company appears to have suffered no ill effects whatsoever. RIM added a net 1.65 million subscribers, and shipped 3.9 million units, finishing the quarter with 12 million Blackberry users. Nearly half of the new subscribers were either consumers or small business accounts, RIM co-Chief Executive Jim Balsillie told analysts.
The numbers beat analysts' expectations; many of them had predicted revenue of $1.65 billion, per-share earnings of 62%, and 1.7 million...
Thu, 20 Dec 07
Google Text Ad Trojan Wreaks Havoc
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57337
A new Trojan has been discovered in an unlikely place: Google ads. According to BitDefender, the Trojan is actively hijacking Google text ads and replacing them with ads from a different provider.
BitDefender, which named the threat Trojan.Qhost.WU, said the Trojan modifies the infected computer's hosts file, which controls domain mappings. The Trojan damages both users and webmasters because it takes away viewers and thus a possible money source from Web sites, BitDefender virus analyst Attila-Mihaly Balazs said in a statement.
These days, ads may not be such an unlikely place to find Trojans. In fact, according to the Q1 2007 Web Trends Security Report published by Finjan, a computer security company, some 80 percent of malicious code now comes from online ads.
The proof is in the incidents. Beyond the Google-targeted Trojan, Danish media company sites have reportedly been inadvertently serving ads with malicious content this week. And last month, DoubleClick was serving ads that installed Trojan software on victims' computers. Earlier, in October, malicious hackers targeted RealPlayer software, exploiting it through malware embedded in advertisements.
"Certainly using advertisements -- and banner ads in particular -- to distribute malicious code is not new. We've seen it become more and more common over the past year or so," said Oliver Friedrichs, director of Symantec's Security Response. Friedrichs recalled another recent attack in which ad syndicator 24/7 Real Media was compromised. Its ads were poisoned with a Trojan downloader.
"Simply by compromising one system on the ad syndicator's network, an attacker can distribute his malicious code to many thousands of Web sites and potentially the many millions of users who are visiting those Web sites," Friedrichs said.
Symantec said it expects these sorts of ad-based attacks to continue in 2008. The simplicity and ease by...
Thu, 20 Dec 07
Mozilla Releases New Firefox 3 Beta
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Mozilla rolled out its second beta release of Firefox 3 in less than a month with the goal of receiving feedback from developers on the browser's core functionality. The Beta 2 release now available for download features builds for Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux in over 25 different languages.
"The next Milestone is Beta 3 scheduled for February," explained Mozilla vice president of engineering Mike Schroepfer. "We'll either do more betas or move to final release based on feedback from users and Web developers."
Mozilla is making several changes to Firefox that it hopes will compel more Internet users to try the free browser. For example, Firefox 3 sports improvements to the browser's look and feel, including a full page zoom capability, one-click bookmarking, and a location bar that matches against the user's history and bookmarks for URLs and page titles. In addition, Firefox 3's menus display using Vista's native theme.
Web-based applications, such as the user's favorite e-mail provider, can now be used instead of desktop applications such as Outlook for handling "mailto:" links. And a new keyword tag function allows Firefox users to sort their bookmarks by topic.
Users can resume downloads after restarting the browser or resetting their network connections. Or type in all or part of the title, tag, or address of a Web page to scan a list of matches from the browser's personalized history and bookmarks.
Firefox 3's security enhancements include antivirus integration in the download manager, version checking for insecure plug-ins, malware alerts, and better presentation of Web site identity and security. The content of Web pages suspected to be forgeries is no longer shown. And bookmarks, history, cookies, and preferences are now protected from system crashes through storage in a new database format.
For its part, Microsoft says...
Thu, 20 Dec 07
Microsoft Offers IE6 Crash Solution, Preps IE8
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=57335
Microsoft's recent set of security patches is causing problems, namely for Internet Explorer 6 users, who are watching their browsers crash midstream when vi