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And is IBM using it's portfolio to do negatively? Nope.

Patents are a necessary evil. Any large company has to file patents to protect itself.

They are playing the game by the rules that have been written

I envy koreas achievements as well, my local monopolists just keep prices up despite amazing international examples, even by at&t and mci; I live in Mexico :)

http://www.silicon.com/networks/broadband/0,390246 61,11035920,00.htm

But I guess we are on our way, 5 or 10 years? who knows, at least companies are making it easyer, here's an offer with a linux box for an extra 10 USD a month from a cable company

http://www.megared.net.mx/maspc.htm

But Id still preffer a nice lap top to go

http://www.walmart.com/catalog/product.gsp?product _id=3504708&cat=179113&type=19&dept=3944

I notice it's out of stock, as in sold out? good for them! :)

This is an article that slashdot rejected from me, but still fairly pertinent.

Silicon.com reports that there's a new Trojan named Phel that takes advantage of the Help (get it?) controls in internet explorer. Though the expoit's been known about since October, Microsoft is still "testing" the patch, and isn't expected to release it anytime soon.

He wasn't exaggerating. IBM is done with PCs because they weren't making money selling them.

I thought that he was trying too strongly to make the case that those that want to use Linux for real-time applications will not buy tools and those that want better performance for hard-real-time will not choose Linux.

It is also obvious that a general-purpose operating system is not going to work as well in a real-time environment as one specially designed for that purpose. It's the reason why, for example, if you are an organization that wants a system to break encryption keys fast, you build a special-purpose machine that includes hardware designed to do quick computations of prime numbers, not commodity hardware with lots of extra features you don't need and won't use, that slow down the primary purpose of breaking codes.

He seemed to be arguing the point far too strongly, as if he had a hidden agenda. Okay, presuming his argument is valid, so what if Linux as a general-purpose O/S is not as good at handling hard-real-time as a specially designed one? He could have argued that in about 1/5th of the space his article uses. What is also interesting is, despite all his talk about how bad Linux is, he seemed to ignore examples where Linux is considered good enough for real-time use in many cases, and was unable to mention any alternative which might be better, such as some open-source alternatives that have been mentioned here on Slashdot.

I had a suspicion but I wasn't sure. And now it's clear: his company sells real-time operating systems in competition with Linux. So he claims Linux is not good enough. Where have we heard this before? :)

Ooops wrong link that was a guy arrested in the US for posting information. try this for a guy arrested in london.

...Or better, since Java runs in a (relatively) secure sandbox. It's worth noting, from the article, that there hasn't to date been a single Java virus. This is bad, but it has to get a lot worse before comparison with ActiveX is warranted.

According to this report, the always so useful MS Word change tracking reveals that this report was originally even more enthusiastic about Linux. Obviously this was not in keeping with the officially sponsored Government policy because the claims were toned down before release.

It started off with the "iPod users are thieves!!11!!11!!" outburst; now he delivers this ripper. What next, Slashdotters are closet Windows(TM) lovers?

The meds seem to have no effect, Ballmer. Check the dates ...

An article By UK Columnist Peter Cochrane last year give a nice list of why this technology won't work, even though it has been claimed as "Proven" many times:

- Power cables employ low-grade plastic that is unfriendly to high-frequency signals as the absorption per unit length is very high. This alone precludes transmission of high-speed data over significant distances.

- Power cables are not physically symmetrical and are therefore very effective antennas. They radiate energy from high-speed data signals which becomes a source of interference for wireless services including broadcast radio as well as emergency, maritime, aeronautical, military and navigation services. By reciprocity they also suck in energy from every local radio source which further degrades data signals.

- As signals propagate along cables they become weaker but the switching transients from washings machines, refrigerators, vacuum cleaners, electric drills, light switches and other appliances are huge, do not decay at the same rate and swamp data signals.

- Switching transients on power grids with generators going on and off line, dynamic load sharing, fault and maintenance work, all induces massive transients that also swamp data signals.

- Cable joints, transformers, power meters, the on/off nature of electrical appliances and the topology of power grids create large load changes and multiple signal reflection points. This creates a dynamic echo environment where the transmitted signal is further corrupted.

- Real time communications of any kind - whether by telephone, radio or TV - are taken out by the huge voltage transients inherent to power lines and ultimately the data rates achievable for non-real time are also very low.

- Transformers and power meters require a workaround as they present an absolute block to any high frequency signals.

Gates said Microsoft will offer software to detect malicious applications and that the company will keep it up-to-date on an ongoing basis.

Now the only question is what Microsoft feels to be a good update schedule for their anti-malware software. Are we going to see once a month release cycles that detect spyware that has been out for six months the way they wait six months to release patches for known vulnerabilites on Windows Update?

Sony supports MP3 on its CD products, but not in its best digital products which is what most people think of when it comes to MP3/music players.

The real story here is shift in business strategy. Sony was the king of portable music after the introduction of the Walkman, but has seen its share slip. It seems that someone at Sony has realized that using a closed, proprietary standard and forcing customers to listen to their music collections how Sony wants them to quickly turns them into ex-customers.

That is big news for Sony. The Sony PSP is coming and Sony has decided to introduce yet another proprietary standard: the Universal Media Disc, which will be hardly universal if Sony is the only one that uses it.

Original post follows:

2004-09-22 16:20:39 Sony to Support MP3 (Index,Music) (rejected)

CNet/ZDNet reports that Sony has confirmed 'it is working to add native MP3 support to its portable music players,' reversing its previous strategy of native support for its proprietary ATRAC music file format only. Currently, MP3 files must be converted into ATRAC format to listen to them on Sony music players. MP3 support will be included on upcoming flash memory-based players, with a decision on hard drive based music players to come later, but there's no word if the Sony Connect music store will offer anything but ATRAC-encoded music. The strategy reversal is seen as a way to compete with Apple's dominant iPod, which supports both MP3 and its own proprietary Advanced Audio Coding (AAC) format. The story was originally reported by ZDNet France (French) reporters Christophe Guillemin and Pierre Labousset. The move comes on the heels of an IDC study that projects a $58 billion MP3 player market by 2008, with the greatest growth coming from flash memory players (press release).

Windows crashing is a lot less fatal than a car crashing

Well, check out the Linux Oracle commercial and be amazed.

So whats up with Oracle and Linux?

Oracle will finish switching its 9,000-person in-house programming staff to Linux by the end of 2004, the database powerhouse said Wednesday.
In October, the company finished the Linux transition for the 5,000 programmers of its Oracle Applications software. Now the transformation has begun for those who work on the database product, said Wim Coekaerts, director of Linux engineering, in an interview at the CeBit trade show in New York.
"By the end of the year, (Linux) is our core platform," Coekaerts said. Oracle is switching because Linux systems are less expensive and faster, he added.

From This article (and others), will Google retain the gmail.com domain? Is it even in jeopardy?

Ah that's neat. I didn't even know about that. Anyone interested in reading more...

http://networks.silicon.com/lans/0,39024663,391215 01,00.htm

This appeared months ago!

Slow news day?

There is a lot of good research out there on how to use the data gathered form eye tracking. You can test web site designs and expose weaknesses in design, for example. You can also use eye tracking as an input device (PDF). I like that it can tell you what people read on the internet.

Just remember, what matters is how the technology is applied, not the technology itself. Without users, you just have slabs of technology sitting there. People make this stuff interesting.

http://networks.silicon.com/lans/0,39024663,391215 01,00.htm

Easy solution. Change the wallpaper.

The interest in open source is improving and some money is flowing in. See Malaysian Venture Capital (Mavcap) http://www.silicon.com/software/os/0,39024651,3911 6677,00.htm
puting in RM 18-36 million.If you take a look at on Malaysian open source center (http://www.asiaosc.org/enwiki/page/Malaysia.html)
you can see the ecosystem growing.

rotecting children from porn (if you can even call it protecting) is soly the responsibility of the parents.
What about something like this?
The guy registered a whole bunch of mis-spelled disney-related domains. And IIRC, kids are not the greatest spellers. I think that while the parents should take responsibility, porn vendors should also go out of there way to ensure that minors do not accidentally stumble across the site, and if they do, we should edcuate children on what it is, and that they should tell an adult immediately.

A short, but informative article here:
http://hardware.silicon.com/desktops/0,39024645,11 008313,00.htm

The WinXP article is dated June 7. The link points to a Silicon.com article about a security flaw in OS X, and that article is dated May 26.

It was on June 7, the same day, that Apple released a second Security Update that fixed the remaining vulnerabilities.

~Philly

Thanks for the correction. The main point stands however; the M$ tax is still included in the price of the laptop, whether they're using M$Windows or not, thus making true price competition on the OS impossible.

Microsoft has very strong contracts

True. They have been the subject of anti-trust court cases.

Almost none of them care, because they understand the situation

Yes, customers are resigned to it. That doesn't mean it's right.

---

It's wrong that an intellectual property creator should not be rewarded for their work.
It's equally wrong that an IP creator should be rewarded too many times for the one piece of work, for exactly the same reasons.
Reform IP law and stop the M$/RIAA abuse.

Just for the record this did happen . The satellites are still up there, but the initial investors lost their money. The new Iridium is alive and well.

There is a similar trial with Biometrical data by lufthansa in Frankfurt. I dunno the detail... But you can read them here :
LH and biometric
German Airport and Biometric

Face it, whether you like it or not (I personally dislike it being traced and identified by my "biological property" for various reason, one being you cannot escape being recognized once they are in governement database...), biometric will come...

Maybe so, but as the poster above pointed out, they may have to behave like a public company, and so, may go IPO if they lose the benefits of being private.

Didn't know that AOL's IP stack was drastically different to those of the rest of the world.
Presumably they've overcome this if they're opening up their core content to users of other ISPs via their Bring-Your-Own-Access scheme.

Yahoo used to use Google, but they bought Inktomi and have switched to their search engine. MSN also uses the Inktomi search engine, but tweak the results.

Right before google became a big name, yahoo used inktomi (inktomi used to be a really big name in the search engine industry). Yahoo used to use google more recently, but now they don't.

It looks like yahoo bought inktomi about a year ago, so I guess that's what they are using again.

Now that Lindows changed its name, does that mean that the ruling forbidding them to sell their product to Benelux or Sweden still applies?

Furthermore, could the agreement french company Hermitage had with Microsoft possibly allows them reselling Linspire again now they renamed their flagship product? (Not that they would be especially be inclined to do so, given that they gave up when Microsoft was starting to threaten them.)

Securities law requires private companies that exceed a certain level of stock distribution to file quarterly financial data with federal regulators. If the law is applied to Google, company executives would have to disclose the company's closely guarded financial information. If your already doing that then you might as well go IPO. Microsoft had a similar experience.

More information here

My own workplace is considering this.

In addition, I just read that IBM is planning to double their Indian staff.

These are phones that are kinda like a blackberry, it can retrive it's own e-mails, and you can reply to a e-mail via the voice record button. They can run both Palm OS and Windows CE. Which ofcourse has a web browser. SO!

- Surf
- Shop
- E-mail
- Talk
- No PC, No hardline, No worries.

cheap laugh but totally wrong :

Beckham takes juicy Vodafone contract to Madrid
June 18 2003
by Tony Hallett

Vodafone has confirmed it doesn't expect to feel any direct fall out from David Beckham's 25m move from Manchester United to Spanish football giants Real Madrid.

A Vodafone statement said: "Vodafone has a two-year contract with David Beckham and it is independent of the [Manchester United] team. David Beckham's move to Real Madrid will not compromise Vodafone's position with the England captain or Manchester United."

The notorious female hacker Gigabyte (19 years old) was arrested in Belgium under a computer data sabotage law introduced in 2000. If convicted, she faces up to three years in prison and fines of up to 100,000 euros (US$127,000). Gigabyte was quoted in a recent New York Times Magazine article discussed on Slashdot. She has been very outspoken about hacker stereotypes countering the claim that hackers are, "pizza-addicted, sex-starved, ugly teens who never get outside." She is widely credited with writing the first Microsoft .Net virus. Authorities seized her computers and shut down her website. It's interesting to note that under Belgian law she could be sued for damages by any corporation damaged by her work (e.g., Microsoft).

apt-get isn't a good package management system?

I was thinking more along the lines of portage, but let's explore apt for Fedora...

Wowee. Four mirrors on this continent. Looks like this whole Fedora apt thing is really taking off.

Nah more like $49.94

Wow. They're giving the zero service box-pusher channel 50 points. The best deal Red Hat would give me direct was $89. Add trolling the CDWs of the world for price quotes to the annual Red Hat ownership ritual.

They said the "desktop was unatainable" wow I never got that memo, do you have a link?

yes.

So Manchester uses SCO and Yorkshire uses linux? But they normally get on so well ;).

This has been coming for over 5 years. It is just the beginning.

I won't bother getting into a political shootout over this so here's my two ^*. The last place I would want to look towards when thinking of the pResidency, votes, voters* (and any variation of this) would be online. How many articles have you seen on Diebold, and all of the quirks associated with things political.

Wait before you shoot some quick response, I know this has little to do with voting so let me shift. Using the net in the fashion Dean has, is nothing new, he's probably the only one smart enough to publicize it though. Remember, many Americans aren't that literate when it comes to computing as it is, so think about this... Who are his real followers, and one has to know these numbers the Dean camp or whomever can be tweaked.

E.g.: Dean2004.com or whatever sites associated with them show 1,000,000 visitors for February. Oh really? How many unique visitors, etc. Don't throw out numbers without backing it. Secondly, when it comes to computing, for all you know, there could be some 13-17 (under the voting age) kids playing around with Dean & Co. No you say? Prove it. Who in Dean or any camp can say with a straight face "We've attracted 1,000,000 legal aged voters that live in America" that would be a flat out lie. Even if say "cache.bigcompany.com" (where Big Company was a Fortune 500 co.) connected to someone's party, how do you know it's not a misconfigured proxy allowing anyone to connect.

Dumb users spread viruses. Irrelevant? I definitely think not. I would not look to the net for the next best thing "politically" for a long ass time. Now when someone decided to post "this is the first *real* use of the Internet in a meaningful way" ... They should have thought up something more meaningful like medical studies or something similar. My personal "REAL USE" of the internet would be the sharing of information on the educational level a-la MIT's Open Course Ware, and other projects similar to that. However I think medically it's underdeveloped and could rock. Think distributed dna sequencing type stuff.

Oh well my ramblings for the day

Actually you can. Quick google will bring up US makes digital signatures legally binding from Silicon.com in November 1999. Even assuming that the judge is an utter bonehead over four years behind the law, this would be brought up in court.

This story was covered in the Australian press a few days ago. Other sources report that the GMA has apologised, describing the acction as a "youthful indescretion".

Microsoft will retalliate by re-inserting swastikas back into their Bookshelf Symbol 7 font

In other words, since the SEC is forcing them to behave like a publicly held company and publish quarterly reports, they might as well take the money and run -- much as we'd like them to remain privately held.

Besides, as far as I know it's my only option if I want a made-in-Canada distro.

Linus is Canadian now? I thought he hated hockey

News in the mother tongue appears to be spreading!

He was _supposed_ to make it into the Top 50 most powerful IT men list, but slightly before publication the editor came to his fscking senses:

News article about the 50 Most Powerful IT men check the Free Thinkers link

Someone who could well have fallen into this category this year but didn't make the list at all is SCO CEO Darl McBride. He has led his company's charge to get credit for what it claims is some of its code turning up in Linux. So far the row has taken the form of a lawsuit brought against IBM, headlines in the media and SCO invoicing some users for Linux roll outs.

However, when asked what happened when his company was served with a request to pay a SCO licence for Linux, panellist Ric Francis, Safeway's CIO, said: "I told them to stick it. At the end of the day it is never going to fly. It's the last dying breath of a company that is never going to make money."

This is a result of previous government directives to start looking at Linux solutions in the government. This is something that has not trickled down all the officials to get as far as being a policy announcement in the left wing press here (of which the Observer is just one example.

Obviously this is a better situation than before, when government directives insisted that Microsoft solutions be looked at first, so far as anyone can tell simply because Tony Blair did not understand computers but did enjoy Bill Gates' company when they met - they are a similar age, and see themselves as similar global figures, and I personally think they have a similar contemptable attitude to people who are ultimately their paymasters. Now Tony Blair is politically weaker, following the recent Gulf war not being popular within the Labour Party, but really it would be better if this was happening according to other reasons.

I know this for fact since I am working on a system I put together for partners here and in India for selling prescriptions online. Our site is 100% legal, yet we don't have a huge budget, so Google and other search engines were our main hope. However, this looks to have now changed.

For proof of fact that it is big money lobbying congress and the search engines, take a gander at this article (one of many on the subject). Drugstore.com and others are part of VIPPS, which is a 'licensed' group of online pharmacy companies. Getting VIPPS certification is not cheap and has particular requirements.

While I believe in making sure pharmacies are legit and safe, I think this approach is not the best and only benefits the ones who are raking in cash hand over fist.