Judge nixes Microsoft delay tactic
A federal judge Monday rejected Microsoft's request to delay hearings on what sanctions should be applied against the software giant for violating U.S. antitrust law. U.S. District Court Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly stuck to her timetable for remedy hearings beginning March 11 even though Microsoft complained that the nine states still pursuing the case had dramatically expanded the scope of possible sanctions.
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...kpt=zdnnp1tp02
New multimedia system blows you away
After two years of secrecy, start-up Rearden Steel will jump into the home entertainment market Monday by announcing its first products and a name change at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. The Palo Alto, Calif.-based company will announce that its new name is Moxi Digital and its first products will be the Moxi Media Center (MC) and Moxi Media Extension (MCx). As previously reported, the company designs software and hardware for cable and satellite set-top boxes that lets them effectively function as digital entertainment centers.
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...kpt=zdnnp1tp02
Linux world dismisses new Trojan risk
A Remote Shell Trojan (RST) is making its way around the Linux community, but security experts say it should not pose a risk if users are vigilant with the programs they run. The Trojan is a more complex variant of an earlier RST that hit Linux systems last October. In order to propagate, RST.b requires a user to run an infected binary, which then opens up a remote shell and allows an attacker to access the machine
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...kpt=zdnnp1tp02
VeriSign buys Tuvalu's .tv
VeriSign will take over control of the .tv Web domain by buying .tv Corp. International for $45 million cash, the company announced Monday. VeriSign operates the registry for Internet addresses that end with the suffixes .com, .net and .org, handling the database where the names and subscriptions are stored. The .com, .net and .org suffixes of Web addresses are known as "top-level domains." The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers recently added seven new suffixes--.museum, .biz, .info, .aero, .name, .coop and .pro.
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...kpt=zdnnp1tp02
W3C seeks clout for Web rules
A key Web standards group is moving quickly to seize the initiative in a seesaw battle over methods for creating and viewing Web pages, following a short but deeply felt crisis late last year. The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) closed the calendar year with what it called a record number of drafts and a recommendation targeting technologies from interactive TV to Web authoring tools.
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...kpt=zdnnp1tp02
More turbulence ahead for digital music
Despite a year of headline-generating turmoil, musicians, techies, media executives and lawmakers gathering for the second Future of Music conference on Monday will find that much remains unresolved on the digital-music landscape. Over the past year, recording companies managed to force the shutdown of the free online song-swapping service Napster and roll out services of their own, but then saw new threats sprout up hydra-like in the form of second-generation free services like Kazaa and Morpheus.
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...kpt=zdnnp1tp02
Gates to show XP entertainment interface
Microsoft will take yet another step down the consumer electronics path on Monday with the demonstration of a customized version of Windows XP tuned to digital entertainment. At the Consumer Electronics Show, which began Monday in Las Vegas, Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates will show off a prototype consumer interface for Windows XP, code-named Freestyle, according to the company. The new interface is intended to turn PCs into home electronics or entertainment systems by offering direct access to the digital entertainment features of Windows XP.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1003-200...html?tag=mn_hd
Big Blue unveils new services-related tools
IBM unveiled new software tools Monday to strengthen its Web services business plan. The company released management tools that will allow companies to offer secure Web services and develop ways to bill customers. The company also updated its Web Services Toolkit, a starter kit that provides developers the rudimentary technology needed to begin building and running Web services. The tools are part of IBM's plan to deliver software as a service over the Web to PCs, cell phones and other handheld devices.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1003-200...html?tag=mn_hd
Handsets stuck on RadioShack shelves
Dust may be settling on some mobile phones sold at RadioShack. The consumer electronics retailer reported on Monday that handset sales at its stores were down in December compared with December 2000. The company declined to provide a specific number. RadioShack earlier reported that handset sales in November were down by "midsingle digits" when compared with November 2000. The company did not offer a clear-cut number.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1004-200...html?tag=mn_hd
U.S. Rep. positions against copy controls
A U.S. congressman said Monday that he intended to change a controversial copyright law to allow consumers to override technologies that prevent them from making digital copies of music, movies and software. Rep. Rick Boucher, D-Va., said he plans to introduce a bill that would eliminate the "anti-circumvention" clause of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), a 1998 law that updated copyright laws for the digital era.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1005-200...html?tag=mn_hd
Snap a photo with your phone
Multimedia phones are proving popular in Japan and will be coming to Britain soon. J-Phone, operated by Japan Telecom and Britain's Vodafone Group, said on Monday that sales of its camera-attached mobile phone handsets have reached 3 million in the 14 months to December. The phone, which enables users to take pictures with a tiny built-in camera and send them via e-mail, was introduced in November 2000, and its popularity grew in the second half of last year.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1004-200...html?tag=mn_hd
DVD players to use Microsoft media formats
Microsoft said Monday that four consumer electronics companies will integrate Windows Media technologies into DVD players, a deal that could boost the use of the software titan's multimedia products in consumer devices. The companies will unveil their partnerships Monday during a keynote speech by Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Gates is expected to show off Matsushita's Panasonic DVD player embedded with Windows Media Audio software.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1005-200...html?tag=mn_hd
The geeks who saved Usenet
The message is the oldest Usenet posting in the 20-year archive, now searchable on Google. It's the first of some 700 million posts that provide a record spanning the early history to the present of Usenet -- the sprawling public bulletin board, composed of a vast hierarchy of newsgroups, that grew up alongside the Internet itself. Granted, this message doesn't exactly have the ever-quotable and historic ring of Alexander Graham Bell braying on the first telephone call, "Mr. Watson. Come here. I need you." But it's not the first Usenet message ever -- it's just the first one captured in this vast, yet still incomplete, archive of Usenet's 35,000 topic categories.
http://salon.com/tech/feature/2002/0...net/index.html
Why High-Tech Firms Can’t Afford to Ignore Patents
The laptop computer you may be reading this on most likely contains between 500 and 5,000 patentable inventions from different firms. If you also happen to be taking a certain prescription drug, that drug is more than likely covered by a single patent. The point, says Manny Schechter, an intellectual property lawyer for IBM Research, is that when it comes to patents, high technology firms are, out of necessity, interdependent. "Whereas pharmaceutical companies can get a monopoly - a single patent that controls a product set - software firms have to license each other," Schechter said. "If we didn’t, the industry would grind to a halt."
http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/a...9&homepage=yes
IBM forms life-sciences partnership
IBM will work with software maker Accelrys to develop technology intended to help chemists and biologists create new drugs faster and more efficiently. Under the terms of the four-year alliance, announced by Big Blue on Monday, the partners will combine Accelrys' drug-discovery software with IBM's middleware and server products. The resulting system will be designed to help automate and improve research and development activities at medical research centers and pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1003-200...html?tag=cd_mh
Adobe to unveil new GoLive, LiveMotion
Adobe will unveil new versions of its GoLive Web authoring and LiveMotion animation software during the Macworld Expo in San Francisco on Monday. The products are the company's largest assault yet against rivals Microsoft and Macromedia and Adobe's first volley into authoring content for wireless handhelds and handsets. GoLive 6 comes just as momentum builds for creating Web content that can be viewed on cell phones from Nokia and other handset manufacturers. Adobe is positioning GoLive as the product of choice for Web designers looking to create dynamic Web pages viewed using both computers and much smaller devices.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1006-200...html?tag=cd_mh
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