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China reversed itself Tuesday, lifting the mandate to install Web-filtering software on all personal computers sold in the country. The Green Dam-Youth Escort software -- ostensibly a means to stem the flow of pornography -- was to be installed on all computers shipped into China beginning July 1. The government's announcement of the requirement,...

The free fall in the IT sector may be nearing an end, according to Forrester While the decline is not yet over, spending should begin to improve as the year wears on, culminating in the beginning of a recovery in the fourth quarter, according to a report by Forrester Vice President and Principal Analyst Andrew Bartels....

When the economic crisis hit last year, much of the government response was targeted at shoring up public faith in what once had been perceived as rock solid institutions. We all are now highly aware that these foundations were not as sturdy as once believed, and as a result, many are justifiably skeptical when being asked to trust the same organizations with their now-diminished portfolios. ...

Kudos to all those who participated in, organized or even attended the Enterprise 2.0 conference in drizzly Boston last week. There is a lot to write about The big ideas that I took away include disruption and evolution, ROI and a need to sharpen our focus. Here are a few thoughts on a very good show....

Here's one of the many questions facing device makers targeting the mini notebook and netbook markets: When business users or consumers want to access the Web on the go, will they be willing to set aside a smartphone or cellphone and instead log on using a next-generation PDA? Dell may be wagering the answer is yes. The Wall Street Journal reporte...

Though most major U.S. wireless carriers today tout the ubiquity of their third-generation, or 3G, wireless networks, they are simultaneously planning for the future, pushing the development of fourth-generation (4G) networks that they hope we'll all be using in a matter of years Two of the best-known 4G technologies now on the horizon are WiMax, o...

How do you conduct a great interview? For Katie Couric, it all starts with being a gracious host. "I think the more comfortable you make someone feel, the better interview you'll get," she says. "I know in terms of body language I always try to be very warm and welcoming. It's really critical to put someone at ease." How do you write a great piece...

Mozilla has released Firefox 3.5, the latest edition of its open source browser, one year after its release of Firefox 3. The update went through four betas, incorporating JavaScript fine-tuning and other improvements, resulting in the fastest version yet, according to Mozilla.

He may still have an eye patch, a peg leg and a funny hat, but is a pirate still a pirate if he writes you a check before plundering your ship? How long would Robin Hood keep his band of merry men intact if they took from the rich -- and charged the poor a redistribution fee for access to those riches? That same outlaw factor that propelled buccane...

The government of China says it will put off the July 1 deadline for mandatory installation of the controversial Green Dam Youth Escort Internet filtering software on new PCs, according to state-run news agency Xinhua. Originally, the country's government had said it would require vendors to include Green Dam, a program used to block Internet porn...

Palm's new smartphone, the Pre, is off to a rolling good start and has plenty of room to grow, but it isn't likely to emerge as a solo iPhone killer, ABI Research analyst Michael Morgan told the E-Commerce Times on Tuesday Morgan's assessment comes amid widely reported news accounts of a note from Charter Equity Research estimating sales of the Pre...

For seven months, New York Times reporter David Rohde was held by Taliban kidnappers. During his captivity, both his newspaper and Wikipedia kept quiet about his plight Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales reportedly agreed to a request from The New York Times to delete all references to the kidnapping on Rohde's Wikipedia entry....

Sales and revenues for the home systems channel will decline in 2009, just as they did in 2008. Many projects will be postponed or canceled this year. There will a decline in revenues of over 5 percent from 2008 to 2009. That's the bad news. However, integrators and manufacturers should not build their strategic plans based on "doom-and-gloom" hea...

In the past, companies with tight budgets frequently turned to outsourcing during tough financial times. The current global recession, however, has curtailed outsourcing as much as it has other parts of the economy "Oddly enough, the global recession has hurt outsourcing significantly," said Chad Hahn, principal owner of Hahn Consulting and CEO of ...

Part 1 of this two-part feature explores the lessons learned in the early days of launching business ventures in virtual worlds There's no doubt some companies have succeeded in using virtual worlds for branding and interaction with their customers, whether through in-world stores, billboards or other means....

Business Transaction Management (BTM) has been getting a lot of attention lately: IT organizations want it, and every major vendor in systems and performance management has rushed to claim they do it The promise of BTM is to finally be able to manage IT from a business perspective and make sense of the complexity of modern applications broken down ...

U.S. automakers have spent a lot of time lately wondering whether someone can think up a solution for their economic woes. Meanwhile, one of their Japanese counterparts is using brainpower in a different way: to control the movement and direction of a wheelchair. ...

Microsoft said last week that designated PCs with premium versions of Windows Vista preinstalled will qualify for upgrades to the equivalent Windows 7 product once the final version of Redmond's next-generation operating system becomes widely available in the fall However, reports that Microsoft is restricting the number of upgrades some companies ...

If you're working your thumbs into a carpal-tunnel frenzy on your Sony PlayStation Portable (PSP), navigating the blood and gore of the company's successful gaming franchise "God of War," do you really want to interrupt the mayhem to take a phone call from Mom? ...

European consumers will be able to cut a few cords from their lives as early as next year when smartphone manufacturers are expected to begin providing standardized chargers under an agreement announced Monday with the European Commission The agreement follows a February announcement by the GSM Association, a London-based industry trade group, deta...