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Most people can visualize the classic customer service environment: hundreds of agents sitting side-by-side in a large contact center, all working off the same script, working the same shifts and being monitored in the same manner. The mass media has reinforced this vision of customer service facilities as work farms located in the middle of nowhere, staffed with unhappy employees...

The technology that college students are going back to this year is increasingly connected to the open source Linux operating system, says Red Hat, which is highlighting the growing adoption of its open source software and network solutions at institutions of higher learning Like large enterprises, many colleges and universities have converted muc...

What makes e-mail trustworthy? There are at least two factors at play here: e-mail authentication, as described in a recent article, ensures that outbound e-mail really comes from the purported sending domain. That doesn't tell you whether the sender is a highly-reputable institution or a spammer, though This is where e-mail reputation comes in. ...

Red Hat this week released its first JBoss product within a new open source stack that folds together Red Hat Linux, JBoss Application Server, JBoss Hibernate and either of two open source databases -- MySQL or PostgreSQL The Red Hat Application Stack, available via subscription, is offered as an alternative to proprietary application platforms and...

Researchers from Intel and the University of California, Santa Barbara, on Monday said they have built the world's first electrically powered hybrid silicon laser using standard silicon manufacturing processes This development addresses what Intel sees as one of the last major barriers to producing low-cost, high-bandwidth silicon photonics devices...

AOL and Intel on Monday launched a Web-based video service meant to combine AOL's extensive video library with Intel's hardware expertise in a bid to accelerate the adoption of Internet-based video-on-demand The joint venture combined the recently revamped AOL Video channel with the Intel Viiv line of PCs, which are designed to optimize the media-v...

Dell said it will invest more than US$250 million to build a new computer plant in Poland, a move meant to help the PC maker target a key emerging market in central and eastern Europe The company said it had signed an agreement with the Polish government on Monday to build the plant in the city of Lodz. The factory is expected to employ around 1,00...

Warner Music Group on Monday inked a deal with online viral video community YouTube to distribute its library of music videos, which includes content from such acts as Madonna and the Red Hot Chili Peppers YouTube will also distribute behind-the-scences footage, artist interviews, original programming and other special Warner content to its communi...

Want to be your own boss? Got an itch to try your hand at e-commerce but don't consider yourself a techie? Maybe you've got an eye for style, the next big fad, or just useful products. Or perhaps you have the pulse of a particular space, as well as the sales and marketing savvy to put an idea to lucrative use -- but technophobia has forestalled your plans...

Web hosting has always been a good place to find Linux servers -- often coupled with other popular open source software such as Apache Web servers -- butSpin Magazine's recent move toRackspace Managed Hosting illustrates the upsurge in choices for Linux hosting support, which is at the heart of the deal between the music magazine and hosting heavyweight...

Last week we saw the two big guys go at it: First Apple showed off product updates for the iPod and iTunes, and then Microsoft had the coming-out party for Zune -- its so-called iPod killer I'd like to talk about all this first and end up discussing products I think do the best job in the media space today to point out some non-Apple examples of e...

Five years after September 11, 2001, 85 percent of IT executives feel that U.S. government agencies are not prepared for cyberterrorism attacks. Yet, 86 percent believe their own organizations are prepared to defend against cyberterrorism, according to a survey from nCircle Analysts are skeptical about what they see as inflated affirmative response...

A collection of wireless carriers from around the world have joined together to form the Next Generation Mobile Networks (NGMN) initiative. The wireless industry group includes China Mobile, Sprint Nextel, Vodafone and others, and hopes to plot a course to the next generation of mobile network technology The companies, which formed the British com...

Samsung Electronics on Thursday took steps to address image quality concerns with its high-definition Blu-ray disc player. The electronics giant plans to make production changes and offer owners of existing players free upgrade discs to silence complaints from product reviewers The movies played on Samsung's BD-P1000 player had inconsistent image q...

Likely seeing better opportunities to leverage the News Corp. brand across multiple channels, Rupert Murdoch is reportedly in talks with partner Liberty Media on a deal that would give him full control of News Corp Murdoch and Liberty have traded proposals to have Liberty exchange its stake in News Corp. for a controlling share in satellite TV prov...

The Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago has produced a real-life bionic woman The RIC introduced Claudia Mitchell on Thursday, the first woman to be successfully fit with its original bionic arm technology. Three men were previously fitted with the bionic arm that weighs about six pounds and costs between US$60,000 and $75,000....

The chances that major social networking sites will face a potentially massive copyright infringement suit from at least one major record label grew this week, with talks among the various parties reportedly breaking down YouTube and MySpace have been on notice about copyright issues for some time, with Universal Music CEO Doug Morris recently ratc...

In today's ever more challenging business climate, CEOs are pressured to handle multiple tasks, each of which might be critical to the long-term success of the company. If the CEO takes his/her eye off the ball for even a short length of time, other competing tasks might go undone to the detriment of the corporation The list of duties for an activ...

The top 10 fastest growing Web sites in August with back-to-school online advertising campaigns were announced Tuesday by Internet media and marketing research firm Nielsen//NetRatings Topping the list was eBags.com, which showed month-to-month growth of 118 percent, from a unique audience of 582,000 in July to 1.3 million in August....

European Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes is touring the United States this week. Her visit comes during a nasty spat between the commission and Microsoft that could seriously hurt technology businesses and consumers Microsoft is planning to launch its new operating system, Windows Vista, in November for corporate clients and in January for c...