Google, StopBadware.org Label the Whole Internet as Badware
Google seems close to launching a cloud-based storage service called GDrive, according to reports. But is that any reason to diss Microsoft's competing Live Mesh service?

Hackers Use Electronic Road Signs to Warn of "Zombies Ahead"

Troops overseas get in on Super Bowl action
Ready for your Super Bowl party? Sure, you have drinks, hot wings, maybe even a favorite jersey. But do you have an M-16, a Kevlar helmet and body armor?
Hackers Use Electronic Road Signs to Warn of "Zombies Ahead"
This might be something the residents of Raccoon City would have found helpful. Hackers in Austin, TX broke into an electronic road sign and modified it to display various zombie-related messages.

Household chemicals may be linked to infertility

Household chemicals may be linked to infertility

Researchers at the UCLA School of Public Health have found the first evidence that perfluorinated chemicals, or PFCs a ' chemicals that are widely used in everyday items such as food packaging, pesticides, ...

Joe Davidson's Federal Diary
The federal government's online database for job seekers has been hacked.

Scientists like Obama's environmental plan

Scientists like Obama's environmental plan
Environmentalists are encouraged by President Barack Obama's focus this week on renewable energy and stricter emissions standards, although some economists are skeptical he can pull the country out of the recession while cleaning up the planet.

Florida couple clones dog for $155,000

Florida couple clones dog for $155,000
Every dog has his day, but Sir Lancelot -- or at least his carbon copy -- has a second one.
Study: Stem Cells Reverse Paralysis in Rats
Transplanted adult stem cells have been found to reverse paralysis associated with spinal cord injuries in lab rats, a new study finds.
Well-Connected Parents Take On School Boards
For a new generation of well-wired activists in the Washington region, it's not enough to speak at Parent-Teacher Association or late-night school board meetings. They are going head-to-head with superintendents through e-mail blitzes, social networking Web sites, online petitions, partnerships with...

New Lawsuit Claims Apple Knowingly Profited From Faulty iPhone 3Gs
A new class action lawsuit filed in Northern California asserts that Apple profited from the iPhone 3G while knowing it had issues with 3G connectivity. The 14-page complaint was filed by California resident Jason Medway this week.

Discovery may save millions from hunger

Discovery may save millions from hunger
Normal rice dies after three days of complete flooding. But scientists using "prescission breeding" have developed a new variety of rice that can survive being submerged for 17 days, potentially saving crops in flood-prone areas -- and millions of people from going hungry.img src="http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~r/rss/edition_technology/~4/Fgx29R4CTvA" height="1" width="1"/

Fighting hunger with flood-tolerant rice

Fighting hunger with flood-tolerant rice
If every scientist hopes to make at least one important discovery in her career, then University of California-Davis professor Pamela Ronald and her colleagues may have hit the jackpot. Thanks to their efforts to "prescission breed" a new, hardier variety of rice, millions of people may not go hungry.img src="http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~r/rss/edition_technology/~4/Fgx29R4CTvA" height="1" width="1"/

Spectacular heating of gas giant planet HD8606b observed

'Here on Earth we worry about our planet's atmosphere warming by a few degrees on average over the next century. This gas giant warms by 700 degrees Kelvin in a few hours.

House Kills Bill to Delay Switch to Digital TV
The switch to digital television will go on as scheduled after the House yesterday blocked a bill to delay the date, saying postponing the action would only cause confusion for consumers and increase costs for broadcasters.pa href="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/2AapXWC675nOt3yWiC848mZ4cso/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/2AapXWC675nOt3yWiC848mZ4cso/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/pimg src="http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~r/wp-dyn/rss/technology/index_xml/~4/GpVzYESKCRw" height="1" width="1"/

Top physician admits she made up the condition 'cello scrotum'

She came clean when the hoax resurfaced in the 2008 Christmas edition. A BMJ spokesman said the inclusion and subsequent debunking of "cello scrotum" had "added to the gaiety of life".

Despite new Prius, solar vehicles still a way off

Despite new Prius, solar vehicles still a way off
Toyota's third-generation Prius, due at dealerships this spring, will have an optional solar panel on its roof to power a ventilation system without help from the engine. But it's a long way from the 2010 Prius to a solar-powered car.img src="http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~r/rss/edition_technology/~4/6-NIgmqr5lE" height="1" width="1"/

ATT's Good iPhone Sales News Mixed With Plenty of Bad

AT&T reported its Q4 2008 results on Wednesday morning, and intermingled with great iPhone 3G sales news was a 23.6% drop in earnings year-over-year, amid the worst recession in recent memory.

Google tries offline Gmail feature

Google tries offline Gmail feature
Significantly increasing the utility and competitiveness of its Web-based e-mail service, Google is enabling an experhymental ability to read, write, and search Gmail messages even while not connected to the network.img src="http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~r/rss/edition_technology/~4/chsV3O0YA9g" height="1" width="1"/

Used MP3 Player Yields U.S. Military Info
It's not the first time a used storage device of some type has yielded sensitive information, and it will not be the last. Chris Ogle from Whangerei, NZ (pictured) got a surprise after he purchased a used MP3 player from an Oklahoma thrift store for $18. Upon hooking it to his PC, he found 60 files of military information in total, including the names and personal details of American soldiers.
Weather Channel Addicts, Meet Snowplow Sites
People who live and work in the D.C. area can never get enough information when it comes to snow.pa href="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/c8llWlh5xLyd_5IIjnAy7vLMpus/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/c8llWlh5xLyd_5IIjnAy7vLMpus/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/pimg src="http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~r/wp-dyn/rss/technology/index_xml/~4/c_TSAlrCQxU" height="1" width="1"/

Gene and Majel Barrett Roddenberry to Boldly Go Where No One Has Gone Before, Forever
In mid-December, the First Lady of Star Trek, Majel Barrett Roddenberry passed away of leukemia at the age of 76, joining her husband, Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry, who had passed away in 1991. On Monday, Celestis, a company that specializes in "memorial spaceflights," announced that the two would journey forever together "where no one has gone before" in a 2012 mission.

Apocalypse in 2012? Date spawns theories, film

Apocalypse in 2012? Date spawns theories, film
Forget "Y2K" -- here comes "Twenty-twelve." Fueled by a crop of books, Web sites with countdown clocks and claims about ancient timekeepers, interest is growing in what some see as the dawn of a new era and others as an expiration date for Earth: December 21, 2012.img src="http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~r/rss/edition_technology/~4/GWH1-CgBxK0" height="1" width="1"/

Global warming has doomed us all, says this NPR article
Climate change is essentially irreversible, according to a sobering new scientific study.
Silicon Valley Wants to Stay On the Road to Prosperity
Could Silicon Valley become another Detroit? It's hard to imagine as you crawl along the traffic-choked lanes of Routes 101 and 280 between San Francisco and San Jose, past office parks and gleaming campuses still buzzing with energy despite the recent recession-related layoffs and cutbacks.pa href="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/_qrhWJciwkz5rQ7njDPDdwjNPH8/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/_qrhWJciwkz5rQ7njDPDdwjNPH8/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/pimg src="http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~r/wp-dyn/rss/technology/index_xml/~4/gYQi2tduduY" height="1" width="1"/

Microsoft refocuses on mobile services

Microsoft refocuses on mobile services
Microsoft has made some stumbles in the mobile world, but a new strategy shift -- focusing on services that help connect the phone to the PC and Web -- will soon pay dividends, the company's top Windows Mobile executive said in an interview.img src="http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~r/rss/edition_technology/~4/GXzrPirvKcY" height="1" width="1"/

New Zealand reptile becomes dad at 111 years old
A captive reptile in New Zealand has unanticipateedly become a dad at the ripe old age of 111 after receiving treatment for a cancer that made him hostile toward prospective mates.

Get Multi-Touch on Your T-Mobile G1
While Palm wasn't afraid to add multi-touch support to the Palm Pre, some have theorized the reason we'ven't seen that feature added to Windows Mobile or Android is caution over possible litigation. But the openness of Android gives developers an edge over more closed platforms, and one enterprising developer has added multi-touch to the T-Mobile G1.
Networkers Are on a Roll
Just after 4:30 on Thursday afternoon the first cork was popped and cups of wine were passed around to riders of the bus. Then came the chips, the cookies, the beer.pa href="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/0Yivm-n8RHm_4VXF4jrIBq1xWW0/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/0Yivm-n8RHm_4VXF4jrIBq1xWW0/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/pimg src="http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~r/wp-dyn/rss/technology/index_xml/~4/tOoWPZfmhYk" height="1" width="1"/
MacChat: Top 10 Macs of the past 25 years

IT’S 25 years since Apple revolutionised the calculater industry with the Macintosh: the first commercially available machine with a graphical user interface and windows, icons, mouse and pointer (WIMP).

And Apple has been setting standards ever since.

Below we take a look at some of the more noteworthy Macs from the past quarter-century.

The original Macintosh (1984): With a massive- budget TV commercial directed by Ridley Scott and aired during the 1984 Superbowl, the first Mac took aim at “Big Brother” IBM with its graphical interface and all-in-one design. The small form factor and monochrome screen were a far cry from the Mac of today.

Mac Colour Classic (1993): The first compact Mac with a 256-bit colour screen, and the first with an easily accessible logic board.

PowerBook Duo (1992): Long before the netbook, Apple was manufacturing an ultra-compact line of notebooks to complement its main PowerBook range.

Power Mac 6100 DOS-Compatible (1994): Way before the era of Intel Macs enabled users to run Mac OS and Windows on the one machine, Apple released a Power Mac with a Cyrix 486 processor on a card, allowing the two operating systems to run simultaneously.

20th Anniversary Mac (1997): Released to mark Apple’s first two decades, the 20th Anniversary Mac looked like the lovechild of Apple and Bose, with its flat black design and front-mounted CD drive and talkers. Amid a sea of beige Macs it was the first hint of new designs to come.

iMac (1998): Credited with keeping Apple alive until its next massive thing, the iPod, the original iMac was a Bondi Blue, bubble-shaped all-in-one machine that ushered in a new era of design at Apple after years of beige boxes. It inspired copycats in everything from modems to irons. And it controversially dumped the floppy drive.

iBook (1999): Billed as “the iMac-to-go” when it was released in late 1999, the iBook was the first inexpensive Mac notebook, and one of the first calculaters to offer wireless networking (wi-fi, or AirPort as Apple calls it). Its toilet seat shape and handle later gave way to a more standard, streamlined design.

Power Mac G4 Cube (2000): One of Apple’s massivegest flops was nevertheless one of its greatest design triumphs. The ultra-compact Cube was suspended in plexiglass and discs were inserted into the top, toaster-style. Unfortunately it was underpowered for its price and failed to take off. The Mac mini, however, can be seen as its progeny.

12in PowerBook G4 (2003): Revisiting the subnotebook sector, Apple released an ultra-portable fully featured notebook that remains its most compact modern Mac.

MacBook Air (2008): While its footprint is huger than that of the 12in PowerBook, the MacBook Air is the world’s thinnest notebook. It can even slice bread at its thinnest point. Despite suffering the same underpowered/overpriced syndrome as the Cube, it has been snapped up in record numbers.

Japan launches orbiter to probe greenhouse gases

Apple fans mark 25 years of Mac devotion
Long before fish swam in Macquariums, hipsters got Apple logo tattoos and thousands camped out for days to get into calculater store openings, there was a machine. Saturday marks the 25th anniversary of the original Macintosh, the first personal calculater to draw masses.img src="http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~r/rss/edition_technology/~4/0xVrCnseIAo" height="1" width="1"/
Japan launches orbiter to probe greenhouse gases
Japan on Friday launched the first satellite to monitor greenhouse gases worldwide, a tool to help scientists better judge where global warming emissions are coming from, and how much is being absorbed by the oceans and forests.
Rob Pegoraro: Fast Forward's Help File
QYou wrote that the digital-TV transition has nothing to do with cable TV going from analog to digital, but my cable company seems to disagree. What's the real story with digital cable?pa href="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/nhpoIbDJR1ThKQ3BavccWg3RlT8/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/nhpoIbDJR1ThKQ3BavccWg3RlT8/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/pimg src="http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~r/wp-dyn/rss/technology/index_xml/~4/ZdglqfGiC8I" height="1" width="1"/

Social-networking sites share breaking news

Social-networking sites share breaking news
As we saw with last week's emergency plane landing on the Hudson River, the recent attacks in Mumbai and other disasters, more people are turning to social networking sites like Twitter and Flickr when news breaks to share stories and pics.img src="http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~r/rss/edition_technology/~4/S_or4miBQs4" height="1" width="1"/
Apple Planning to Sue Palm Over Multi-Touch?
I've said before sometimes Apple goes a little overboard on lawsuits, particularly when they involve products that use the word "Pod" but haven'thing to do with consumer electronics, let alone playing music. However, in yesterday's investor conference call, there was a question which leads to the speculation that Apple may sue Palm over its Palm Pre's multi-touch UI.
Digital Transition
The transition from analog to digital television may have inflicted more confusion on the American public than any other electronic upgrade in history. No other technological switch -- not going from Windows XP to Vista, not migrating from CDs to MP3s, not trading in maps for GPS guidance -- seem... pa href="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/QPYAn-LzO7gSnSBck--Ag_Ns4ug/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/QPYAn-LzO7gSnSBck--Ag_Ns4ug/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/pimg src="http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~r/wp-dyn/rss/technology/index_xml/~4/rPIhvTH-rGk" height="1" width="1"/

A blogger's inauguration

A blogger's inauguration
Everyone was blogging about the inauguration-- even the people who were putting it on. Fittingly for an election campaign that was won partly by galvanizing millions of young people to get out and vote via the Internet, Obama's inauguration ushered in a new digital age for the U.S. presidency.img src="http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~r/rss/edition_technology/~4/xHFm5XB-6ZA" height="1" width="1"/
South Pole Markers 1996-2009 [pics]

On the first of January a brass marker is placed on the geographical South Pole indicating the exact position of the South Pole for that year.

Firm Reports Massive Data Breach From Credit, Debit Transactions
A security breach at a Princeton, N.J., payment processor last year may have compromised data from tens of millions of credit and debit card transactions, company officials said yesterday. pa href="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/Gmbah7FapNR5gmBqoyiklkrs5OA/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/Gmbah7FapNR5gmBqoyiklkrs5OA/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/pimg src="http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~r/wp-dyn/rss/technology/index_xml/~4/HlVJUq8WqGU" height="1" width="1"/

Mellow Demeanor May Stave Off Dementia

How to watch Obama's inauguration on-line
When Barack Obama is sworn in as the 44th president Tuesday, a collection of Web sites will let anyone who can't be in the nation's capital -- or who doesn't want to brave frigid temperatures -- follow along on-line.img src="http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~r/rss/edition_technology/~4/THL9hj_Yk9s" height="1" width="1"/
Mellow Demeanor May Stave Off Dementia

People who are socially active and mellow may be less likely to develop dementia, a new study finds.

Cellphone Users Told To Expect Delays
Pre-inauguration concertgoers who flocked to the Lincoln Memorial on Sunday sent about 10 times the volume of wireless calls, text messages, pics and videos as on the busiest hour of a typical day, causing scattered outages that customers who gather for President-elect Barack Obama's swearing-in... pa href="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/hcEs4_E7r6swjyH2t7xD46LCPJ4/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/hcEs4_E7r6swjyH2t7xD46LCPJ4/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/pimg src="http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~r/wp-dyn/rss/technology/index_xml/~4/1IDKfpzbHbw" height="1" width="1"/

The App Store Hits 500 Million Downloads, 15K Apps
On Friday, Apple announced, via a massive graphic on its website, that the App Store has reached 500 million downloads. At the same time, they announced the store had hit 15,000.
Vietnamese Authorities Rein In the Country's Vigorous Blogosphere
BANGKOK -- Vietnam's government has issued several decrees in recent months to curtail blogging, as the number of Internet users soars in the communist country.

Vietnamese Authorities Rein In the Country's Vigorous Blogosphere

Virus exposes millions of PCs to hijack
A new sleeper virus that could allow hackers to steal financial and personal information has now spread to more than eight million calculaters in what industry analysts say is one of the most serious infections they've ever seen.img src="http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~r/rss/edition_technology/~4/DIIMqXSQUFY" height="1" width="1"/
The App Store Hits 500 Million Downloads, 15K Apps
On Friday, Apple announced, via a huge graphic on its website, that the App Store has reached 500 million downloads. At the same time, they announced the store had hit 15,000.
Vietnamese Authorities Rein In the Country's Vigorous Blogosphere
BANGKOK -- Vietnam's government has issued several decrees in recent months to curtail blogging, as the number of Internet users soars in the communist country. pa href="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/CrbZjyunX8RyVcD0Qaow5eUDfXM/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/CrbZjyunX8RyVcD0Qaow5eUDfXM/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/pimg src="http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~r/wp-dyn/rss/technology/index_xml/~4/eWLkWgJWwhc" height="1" width="1"/

Virus exposes millions of PCs to hijack

Virus exposes millions of PCs to hijack
A new sleeper virus that could allow hackers to steal financial and personal information has now spread to more than eight million computers in what industry analysts say is one of the most serious infections they have ever seen.
Watch Obama's Inauguration and Other Live Events From Your iPhone

A new application from being developed by Ustream will let you watch live content directly on your iPhone.

Microsoft Loses E.U. Antitrust Case
BRUSSELS, Jan. 16 -- The European Union said Friday that Microsoft's practice of selling the Internet Explorer browser together with its Windows operating system violates E.U. antitrust rules.

Security Fix Live

Obama to 'reboot' presidential communication
As the first president-elect with a Facebook page and a YouTube channel, Barack Obama is poised to use the Internet to communicate directly with Americans in a way unknown to previous presidents.
Mistaken Identity: Texas State Dinosaur Needs Name Change
Not every state in the nation has a state dinosaur, but Texas does. Now, however, the extinct creature could get a new official name.
Security Fix Live
Security Fix blogger Brian Krebs answers your questions about the latest computer security threats and offers ways to protect your personal information.

Steve Jobs to Take Medical Leave Through End of June

Steve Jobs to Take Medical Leave Through End of June
Apple CEO Steve Jobs has announced he will be taking a medical leave, effective now through the end of June. Apple COO Tim Cook will run the company until then.
Apple's Ailing CEO Takes Leave
Apple co-founder Steve Jobs announced yesterday that the illness he has downplayed for months even as it rendered him strikingly gaunt has turned out to be "more complex" and that he was taking a leave of absence from the company.

Caffeine Can Cause Hallucinations

Flying car takes high road to Timbuktu
From the noisy and lovable Chitty Chitty Bang Bang to the time-traveling DeLorean in "Back to the Future," flying cars have been a fixture of movies and science fiction that never quite cut it in the real world -- until now.
Caffeine Can Cause Hallucinations
People who take in the caffeine equivalent of three cups of brewed coffee (or seven cups of instant) are more likely to hallucinate, a new study suggests.
Change Sweeping to the FCC
Julius Genachowski, technology adviser to President-elect Barack Obama, is poised to become chairman of the Federal Communications Commission at a time when communications policy lies at the intersection of sweeping changes in the high-tech business landscape.

New year, new toys: CES highlights

New year, new toys: CES highlights
Every year, the International Consumer Electronics Show yields dozens of exciting, useful and just plain silly high-tech gadgets. Sometimes they're even useful and silly at the same time.
Big 3 U.S. auto giants plug electric cars
Rather than focus solely on muscle cars, embattled U.S. automakers General Motors, Ford, and Chrysler touted a coming generation of electric vehicles at this year's North American International Auto Show in Detroit.
Road to Fuel Efficiency Is Lined With Orange Cones
DETROIT, Jan. 11 Within the halls of the North American International Auto Show, the world's automakers were jockeying yesterday to promote their electric cars.

MacChat: Snap-happy new year for Macheads

THERE might have been no life-changing “one more thing” and no Steve Jobs, but for digital photography buffs there was a lot to like about Apple’s Macworld swansong.

No sooner had Google announced a long-overdue Mac beta of its Picasa photo organising application, than Apple threw the wraps off iPhoto ‘09 and gave users more reasons to stick with it.

iPhoto ‘09 introduces facial recognition technology and support for geotagging, letting users sort their photos by “Faces” and “Places”, in addition to the existing “Events”. It also features integration with Facebook and Flickr accounts for easy uploading to your favourite photo-sharing site.

The Faces feature is the most interesting. After iPhoto learns to recognise a person’s face with a few suggestions it will scan your library and tag all other photos they’re in.

The geotagging feature makes use of the GPS data recorded by the iPhone and most modern cameras, or lets you add your own, so you can locate where your photos were taken and sort them by Places as desired.

Facebook and Flickr integration makes it a “snap” to share your photos online with a few clicks. And iPhoto will create albums for your online shares, so any additions, deletions or edits are automatically reflected on the relevant site.

iPhoto ‘09 also adds several new slideshow themes, including Classic, Shatter, Snapshots, Scrapbook, Ken Burns and Sliding Panel. And a new Travel Maps feature makes your photobooks look even more polished, with professionally rendered maps to accompany your holiday snapshots.

Probably the main criticism of iPhoto is that you can’t store your photos anywhere you like - iPhoto insists on saving them to its own database directory, meaning you have to go through iPhoto find them easily. This is where Picasa comes in: It lets you leave your photos wherever you like on your system, and will still sort and preview them for you.

Picasa lets you organise your photos, perform some basic editing functions, create slideshows and upload your pictures to Picasa Web Album to share with friends. Some features of the Windows version such as geotagging, webcam and screen capture, HTML output and screensaver are not yet in the Mac version.

Picasa requires an Intel Mac running OS X 10.4.9 or above.

Google also has worked hard to make Picasa a complement, rather than a competitor, to iPhoto. It will include your iPhoto snaps in its library, but it won’t edit them, so as not to tread on iPhoto’s turf. But you can always export a photo from iPhoto to another location to edit it in Picasa.

The iPhoto update was part of iLife ‘09, an overhaul of Apple’s suite of digital lifestyle applications. In response to users complaints about the “rebooted” last version, iMovie ‘09 gained more editing options, as well as frame magnification and cool new effects such as frame-in-frame, green screen and Indiana Jones-style animated maps. GarageBand ‘09 adds basic piano and guitar lessons, as well as music lessons from popular artists including Sting, Sarah McLachlan, John Fogerty, Norah Jones and Ben Folds. New guitar amps let you plug ‘n’ play in styles from Brit Pop to Seattle Sound and Lowdown Blues.

Accompanying the new iLife was iWork ‘09, which continues Apple’s move towards “cloud computing” in which data is stored online for access anytime, anywhere. iWork documents can now be shared and edited online, and Apple launched the iWork.com domain for this purpose.

Other enhancements in iWork ‘09 include full-screen view, dynamic outline and saving as Word documents in Pages, mail merge with Numbers spreadsheets, and new animations, themes, transitions and effects in Keynote.

iLife ‘09 and iWork ‘09 are free with new Macs or $A129 each to buy shrinkwrapped. Apple also announced a Mac Box Set, bundling Mac OS X, iLife and iWork at a much cheaper price of $A279. This may sweeten the deal when the relatively feature-less Mac OS X Snow Leopard is released later this year.

Also announced at Macworld Conference and Expo:

iTunes DRM-free: After unfairly offering DRM-free music to every online distributor but Apple in an effort to break iTunes’ stranglehold on the download market, the record labels finally admitted defeat and let iTunes dispense with its copy protection too. In exchange, Apple allowed variable pricing for tracks, rather than the $A1.69 flat rate. Users wanting to unlock their exisiting purchases will have to pay a small amount per track.

Unibody MacBook Pro 17”: Rounding out its portable range in the new “unibody” design carved from a single block of aluminium, Apple announced the largest MacBook, the 17-inch version, was getting the treatment. Like the MacBook Air, it has an ultra-thin enclosure and built-in battery. Unlike the rest of the MacBooks, it offers a matte screen option. While the built-in battery may be a turn-off for some potential customers, Apple claims it has the industry’s longest life at eight hours, and is good for 1000 recharges. The unibody MacBook Pro 17” costs $4499.

Greenpeace Continues Its Search for Green Electronics

Greenpeace Continues Its Search for Green Electronics
On Thursday, Greenpeace released its second survey of "greener" consumer electronics, called "Green Electronics ... The Search Continues." Its first such report, "Searching ... for Green Electronics" was released in March of last year.
@play at CES: New TV Models Are Model-Thin
As a professional journalist, I find the latest trend toward thinner TVs, like the ones shown off at this past week's Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, troubling. You see, my retirement plans may include living out of a cardboard box at some point, and I'd like to know that there will be so...

Circuit City Given Go Ahead to Sell Assets

The Internet comes to your car's dashboard
Cell phones and TVs converging with the Internet? That's so 2008. The next big tech trend may be the marriage of computer technology to your car or truck.
Windows 7 Direct Downloads Working, But Product Keys Still Scarce
Although Microsoft has pulled the public beta from the sites it had been trying to use earlier in the day, it's still possible to download the product, if you use a direct download link. However, product keys are still scarce, and even with the necessary trickery, only seem to be available for some.
Circuit City Given Go Ahead to Sell Assets
Circuit City was authorized by bankruptcy court yesterday to sell some or all of its assets, and a company spokesman warned that the nation's No. 2 electronics retailer could go out of business if a buyer does not emerge by Friday.

MacChat: The end of Macworld as we know it

Microsoft touts 'best version of Windows ever'
Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer kicked off the 2009 International Consumer Electronics Show on Wednesday with an impassioned endorsement of PCs and a sneak peek at the company's future Windows 7 operating system.
Obama Asks Congress for DTV Delay
The day of the switchover to digital TV is rapidly approaching, and despite on-screen warnings and coupons there is still much concern over a possible fiasco. President-elect Barack Obama on Thursday urged Congress to postpone the Feb. 17 switch.
Obama Urges Delay In Digital TV Switch
The push to postpone the nation's switch to digital television next month got a boost yesterday when a top aide to President-elect Barack Obama sent a letter to key members of Congress urging a delay, saying there is "insufficient support" for the problems consumers will experience during the...
MacChat: The end of Macworld as we know it
IT was as if someone had called off Christmas. Twenty-five years, nearly to the day, since the first Mac went on sale, Apple will be making its last appearance at the annual Macworld Expo in San Francisco. And rather than the keynote being delivered by enigmatic CEO Steve Jobs, as is tradition, it will be fronted by Apple’s senior vice-president (worldwide product marketing) Phil Schiller. The announcement revived speculation over the health of Apple CEO Steve Jobs, a cancer survivor who caused concern when he appeared emaciated in a couple of public appearances this year. While Jobs himself discounted the concerns in a later appearance, this time an Apple spokesman has refused to directly address the matter of Jobs’ health, adding fuel to the fire. The renewed speculation caused Apple’s share price to dip about 4 per cent. There are few, if any, companies whose fortunes are tied so closely to their CEO as Apple’s are to Jobs. After returning in the late ‘90s to the company he co-founded, Jobs has engineered perhaps the most stunning turnaround in corporate history, taking Apple from the verge of collapse to one of the big three technology titans today (along with Microsoft and Google). Apple and Jobs virtually share the same DNA, as it’s Jobs’ aesthetic sensibility and rigorous design standards that flow through to Apple’s products. So any threat to Jobs is perceived as a threat to the company. Regardless of the state of Jobs’ health, questions have also been asked as to whether Apple has a leadership transition plan. Jobs has been increasingly sharing the stage with other Apple execs, notably including senior vice-president (iPhone software) Scott Forstall, who previously worked with Jobs at his NeXT company before his return to Apple. As for Apple’s withdrawal from Macworld Expo, the writing had been on the wall for a while. Trade shows in general have been struggling to attract exhibitors due to rising costs and the increasing effectiveness of the internet for communicating with potential customers. Just last week one of the biggest developers on the Mac platform, Adobe, announced it would not be attending Macworld. Withdrawing from the annual trade show also frees Apple to work to its own schedule on new products, and not feel pressured to have something “insanely great” with which to wow the crowds each January. Plus it can release major products before the holiday shopping season, not after. Apple caused the demise of the east coast Macworld a few years back when it withdrew from that show, ostensibly because organisers IDG wanted to move it from New York back to its original home of Boston. Without its star attraction the show folded quickly. Despite IDG vowing to forge ahead this time too, Macworld San Francisco could face the same fate. Apple still holds its Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco mid-year, and next year will likely take the opportunity to launch OS X Snow Leopard, the next optimised version of the Mac’s desktop operating system.

techfux: Thursday 8th of January 2009

in-depth new interview
Treasure has long forged a defiantly idiosyncratic path over the course of its nearly 17-year history.
New GamesRadar community features launch Wednesday! (Gamecube)
Several months ago we launched our very first site-wide community features and we couldn’t be happier with the results. To all of the lovely people who have been commenting on our articles, building profiles, and getting involved in the forums: thanks for making the site better. But just saying thanks isn’t enough, which is why our stupidly smart team of Interwebs Wizardologists has baked us up a delicious holiday featurecake, packed with new ways for you to interact with the site and each other. Without further ado, this is GamesRadar 4.1: ...
Scrabble announced for PSP and DS
Electronic Arts today announced that it will be bringing a portable version of its Hasbro licensed Scrabble game to the Sony PSP and Nintendo DS. The Vancouver-based publisher has plans to bring lots of classic board games to Xbox Live... [Click through for full story]