Articles by

This last week, I was introduced to a Linux-based PC that has the potential to out Apple by using a combination of open source software, Linux and Web 2.0 concepts I revisited another product that I think could free us from image management and enable us to use whatever PC we want at work or home -- safely -- with most of the benefits of virtualiza...

Wal-Mart is among the retailers now carrying a new US$298 PC from Everex featuring OpenOffice productivity software, Everex announced Friday Billed as a "back-to-school" offering aimed at students, the Everex Impact GC3502 is powered by the energy-efficient 1.5 GHz VIA C7-D processor and comes preloaded with the Microsoft Windows Vista Home Basic o...

The growth rate for illegal downloading of copyrighted material via peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing services slowed during 2006, while use of their legal counterparts picked up, according to recent research Nonetheless, open and walled-off P2P services -- so-called darknets -- remain the primary means of sharing and downloading music, videos, image...

Mobile communications service provider Verizon and semiconductor maker Broadcom have announced a licensing agreement allowing Verizon to sell a group of mobile devices currently in legal dispute Under the licensing terms, Verizon will pay Broadcom US$200 million -- at increments of $6 per device -- for rights to continue to sell mobile handsets, PD...

Back in 1994, a computer called "Chinook" became the World Checkers Champion. By 1996, the checkers world came to accept that the computer was better than any other player. However, it wasn't until more than decade later that the Chinook achieved perfection Chinook is now certifiably infallible and can never lose a game, according to researchers wh...

First Jeeves got the old heave-ho; now Ask.com is ready to give user data the boot as well In an apparent effort to one-up its much larger competitors in the field of user privacy, Ask.com unveiled its new AskEraser, a utility that the company said "will offer its searchers unmatched control over their privacy when searching for information on the ...

Music file sharers and ISPs in Europe were triumphant after an advisor to the European Union's Court of Justice (ECJ) said Wednesday that, in civil cases, telecommunication companies in Europe are not required to provide data on clients thought to be illegally sharing music files A Spanish court sought the advice of the EU's top court in a case lau...

Microsoft managed to post a 7.3 percent increase in earnings for its fourth quarter, despite a mammoth US$750 million charge relating to fixes to its Xbox 360 product, as strong enterprise sales helped the company surpass the $50 billion revenue mark for the fiscal year The Redmond, Wash.-based company's fourth-quarter revenue was $13.37 billion, a...

You can't label it a Web operating system. Don't refer to it as a simple platform or a bunch of applications. Yes, you can accurately call Parakey "acquired." The hard-to-describe startup, created by Mozilla Firefox cofounders Blake Ross and Joe Hewitt, is now owned by Facebook. The deal is the first acquisition for the social networking utility ba...

Google will bid US$4.6 billion or more in the Federal Communications Commission's auction for the 700 MHz (megahertz) band of wireless spectrum, the company announced Friday -- but only if certain conditions are met Specifically, Google wants the FCC to adopt rules for the auction that it outlined in a July 9 filing with the commission, requiring f...

For just the second time in its history as a public company, Google disappointed investors with its earnings report, saying Thursday that sales and earnings were up but posting profits that were below Wall Street expectations The Web search and advertising giant's gross revenue, which does not account for the money spent to acquire Web traffic, ros...

Since Europe enacted the euro as its common currency, there has been increased discussion about whether or not the world would benefit from a single global currency. At this point, the proponents seem to have a substantial edge; but like anything else, there are proponents and there are detractors The Book: The Single Global Currency...

A ruling by a federal court in a case involving an online roommate matching service will hamstring Web innovators, a civil liberties group argued this week in papers filed with the judicial panel In a "friend of the court" brief submitted Monday to the U.S. Court of Appeals in California, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) argued that "the ru...

SAP's profit rose 8.2 percent thanks to a surprising increase in license sales. In response, the company's stock surged to record highs not seen in the last 18 months For the quarter, SAP posted net income of 51 US cents a share, or $620 million, from .47 cents a share, or $573 million, a year ago....

Other than perhaps the medical and legal industries, no field relies on jargon more than computer technology. Take, for instance, the use of words borrowed from other lexicons -- terms such as "virus, "Trojan," "intrusion prevention system," "spyware" and "attack vector." You might hear these terms spoken by physicians, Greek history professors, go...

Sales of personal computers around the world rose faster than forecast in the second quarter thanks to strong business sales, with HP retaining the title of global sales leader PC shipments in the second quarter totaled 61.1 million, an increase of 11.7 percent over the same time last year, according to Gartner, which had been forecasting growth of...

MTV Networks' Nickelodeon Kids and Family Group will drop a cool US$100 million into its online casual games venture, the Viacom business unit announced Wednesday at the Casual Connect gaming conference in Seattle "Across all of MTVN's online sites, gaming is an important original genre and we are committed to delivering fresh content to our audien...

A new company called "Ooma" is introducing a peer-to-peer (P2P) Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) network that will result in free domestic calling for its customers, a concept it says will revolutionize home telephony The Silicon Valley company, which includes industry veterans such as TiVo cofounder Mike Ramsay and Napster cofounder Sean Parker...

After months of controversy and global outcry, Google's proposed US$3.1 billion acquisition of DoubleClick will undergo congressional scrutiny later this year in a planned closed hearing before the House of Representatives' Commerce, Trade and Consumer Protection Subcommittee Rep. Bobby Rush (D-Ill.), chairman of the subcommittee, on Tuesday announ...

IBM continued its recent run of strong growth in the second quarter, posting a double-digit profit increase on strong sales fueled by service and software Big Blue's net income rose 12 percent to US$2.26 billion, or $1.55 a share, from $2.02 billion, or $1.30, a year earlier, the Armonk, N.Y.-based company said Thursday....