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One of the things that has stuck with me after meeting with HP last month is that the movie industry is going through a lot of changes. It seems to me that few consumers have any concept of how much this industry is likely to change by the end of the decade. So this week, I thought it might be inter...
Software piracy is so widespread that it exists in homes, schools, businesses and government offices. According to the Business Software Alliance (BSA), an international association representing the leading software developers, software piracy is practiced by individual PC users as well as computer ...
Microsoft has hit the news once again by invoking its next major update to Windows XP -- called Service Pack 2 (SP2) -- in response to the significant security risks that have emerged over the past couple weeks. This time, the company has gone beyond its vague time frame for releasing SP2 "later thi...
The battle between Hollywood and Silicon Valley over copyright issues heated up recently as two bills in Congress generated attention. Each side has a point, but consumers would be better off if the battleground were the marketplace, not the political stage. How to protect intellectual property in a...
In the second ruling to limit the legal ammunition of Canadian copyright holders looking to sue file-sharers and hold ISPs accountable for peer-to-peer (P2P) piracy, the Canadian Supreme Court ruled that ISPs are not subject to royalty fees. Canada's high court ruled that the creation of a cache cop...
As part of its "Patent Busting Project," the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) yesterday released its "Ten Most Wanted" patents -- patents it claims pose the greatest threat to the public domain. At its web site, the EFF has posted a "wanted poster" that mimics those found on post office walls. "...
In one of the last settlements with states that sued it over antitrust allegations, Microsoft settled with Arizona, agreeing to US$104.6 million in vouchers for the state's consumers, who will each get up to $15 for purchasing Microsoft's operating system or applications. The settlement, which coinc...
Panasonic has released a DVD recorder based on Blu-Ray, a technology that can read and store data at much higher densities than previous DVD technologies. According to some analyst estimates, the move should give Panasonic an edge in the battle against a rival technology supported by fellow Japanese...
Security advisories and reports typically include preventive measures that computer users can take to avoid malicious Internet attacks, but one piece of advice is on the rise: Use a Web browser other than Microsoft's Internet Explorer. Security experts themselves have indicated that their own use of...
Known to some in the space community as "the last battlestar," the Cassini-Huygens spacecraft this week is on the verge of finishing its 2.2-billion-mile trip to Saturn as it prepares to get closer to the ringed planet than any other craft in history. Cassini-Huygens is set to slip between two of Sa...
Because they offer users network-access flexibility as they move from place to place, wireless LANs -- often called WLANs -- have gained significant acceptance. While the technology has proven to be a boon to maintenance technicians, salespersons and programmers, it has been a sometimes vexing secur...
Microsoft chief software architect Bill Gates claimed this week that his company has made great security strides, responding quickly enough and well enough to the increasing danger of attackers who are now using automation techniques to strike more quickly at exposed Windows systems. Gates pointed t...
Microsoft unveiled plans Tuesday to release stripped-down versions of its Visual Studio developer's tools and SQL Server database in an attempt to appeal to nonprofessional programmers. The inexpensive, lightweight "Express" versions are intended for people who write programs but do not work as soft...
Fujitsu and Microsoft have announced a collaborative agreement to develop Fujitsu's next-generation, Itanium-based server, which will be optimized for Microsoft's Windows Server 2003 and next-gen Longhorn server. The deal -- a new Memorandum of Understanding announced in Japan that builds on the two...
As a guest of AMD, I went to Indianapolis to watch the top Ferrari team once again whomp the other nine teams in what remains one of the most expensive sports in the world. This racing team has been winning for so long and is so dominant in this sport that I often wonder why anyone watches these rac...