Business

It's no accident that the new Palm Pre smartphone is compatible with Apple's iTunes. The man who helped Steve Jobs turn the iPod and its online music store into a digital revolution is the same man who has helped design the Pre and its well-reviewed webOS operating system. Now that man, Jon Rubinste...

It looks as though the Southern District of New York has opened a new front in the war on Internet gambling. Federal prosecutors have asked Citibank, Wells Fargo and two smaller banks to freeze funds in accounts belonging to two companies that process payouts on behalf of four offshore poker sites, ...

The Federal Communications Commission has closed the first round of comment on its national broadband plan initiative, a requirement of the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act of 2009. The FCC must deliver a completed plan to Congress by February 2010 showing the way to more widespread broadband ...

When Palm's and Sprint Nextel's latest bundle of smartphone joy, the Pre, arrives Saturday, it will be entering an increasingly crowded market backed by parents that have a lot riding on its success. The Pre -- which costs $200 with a two-year service plan and rebate -- might be most important to Su...

The FTC has shut down an ISP that it painted as the worst of the worst in cyberspace. Pricewert, which has done business under a variety of names including "3FN" and "APS Telecom," sought out criminals seeking to distribute illegal electronic content including child porn, violent porn and bestiality...

On the front line of the e-commerce tax are online travel companies such as Expedia, Hotels.com, Priceline, Travelocity and Orbitz. The issue is whether the OTCs should be collecting hotel room occupancy taxes on the difference in the price between what the OTC pays the hotel operator and the amount...

U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker on Wednesday dismissed dozens of lawsuits against telecommunication companies that cooperated with the Bush administration's so-called warrantless wiretapping activities several years ago. The once-secret program allowed government agents to listen in on U.S. citize...

The U.S. Department of Justice has launched an investigation into the hiring practices of high-tech firms to determine whether they are colluding with one another, according to a press report. Essentially, it is investigating possible agreements among high-tech companies not to poach talent from eac...

EMC's all-cash bid to buy Data Domain is going to be hard to beat, according to Stifel Nicolaus analyst Aaron Rakers. EMC's $1.8 billion bid, announced Monday, is worth $30 per share in cash, a 20 percent premium over a previously accepted bid by NetApp of $25 per share. NetApp may increase its bid,...

Google said Monday that it plans to build an e-book service to make electronic editions of mainstream titles available to consumers -- whether they own a specialized e-book reader or not. The service should roll out by the end of the year, Google spokesperson Gabriel Stricker told the E-Commerce Tim...

With an increasing number of individuals engaging in social networking, it is not surprising that Web sites such as Facebook, Twitter and MySpace have started to play a prominent role in litigation in the United States and Canada, at times affecting outcomes. Increasingly, information contained in F...

Time Warner is officially releasing AOL from its parentage. A year after announcing its intention to separate from the struggling unit, Time Warner said Thursday the time had come. The company, which owns 95 percent of AOL, will buy out the 5 percent stake that Google owns -- and has already said it...

Think of the ideal software asset management system as a monitor that displays what exactly drives your business operations. It provides a readout of all the software installed throughout the company's computer systems, and much more. SAM programs also help IT departments rein in duplicate or redund...

One figure that's drawn much attention in Facebook's $200 million investment deal with Moscow-based Digital Sky Technologies announced Tuesday is the implied valuation of the privately held social networking company: $10 billion. While impressive, the number is off a third from the $15 billion figur...

As the business use of mobile devices such as laptops and smartphones proliferates, IT departments are scrambling to implement adequate security safeguards both inside and outside company walls. The cost of implementing security measures is problematic for many small-to-medium-sized enterprises, but...