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05/22/2013 09:09:41 Daily, March 16What's Wrong With This Picture
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In This Issue:
1. Editor's Note: What's Wrong With This Picture
2. Today's Top Story: Microsoft
- Microsoft's $500 Million Message: People Are The Business
Related Story:
- Bill Gates Mocks MIT's $100 Laptop Project
3. Breaking News
- New Trojan Ransoms Files, Demands $300
- Mac Runs Both Windows XP, Mac OS X
- Review: Accoona, Google Alternative
- Prosecutors: Child Porn Ring Featured Live, Streaming Video
- Visa Debuts RFID-Enabled Payment Card
- Brief: Alltel Acquires Wireless Assets For $455 Million
- Skype Client Moves To J2MEE
- Brief: Microsoft Working On Developer Platform For Windows Live Mail
- Gartner Calls Microsoft's Ultra-Mobile PC A 'Tweener' Gadget
- 'Largest Wireless Network' Planned For Arizona
- Glide Looks To Improve Safety For Social Networking
- Congress Expected To Show Its Hand On Online Gaming
4. Grab Bag: PlayStations And Xboxes
- PlayStation 3 Delay A Blow To Sony's DVD Plans (The Age)
- Animals To Populate New Game For Xbox (Washington Post)
5. In Depth: Security
- Adobe Warns Of Critical Flash Flaw, Drive-By Downloads
- Microsoft Office Bug Could Result In Drive-By Downloads
- Apple Misses Bugs, Offers Fix
- McAfee Update Breaks Hundreds Of Apps
6. Voice Of Authority: Social Networking
- There's More To Social Networking Than Hype
7. White Papers: Performance Management
- Enterprise Performance Management: A Framework For Optimizing Network And Application Performance
8. Get More Out Of InformationWeek
9. Manage Your Newsletter Subscription
Quote of the day:
"An optimist is the human personification of spring." -- Susan J. Bissonette
Bill Gates this week mocked--yes, mocked--the $100 laptop computer, or One Laptop per
Child initiative, intended to benefit people in developing
countries. "Hardware is a small part of the cost" of computing,
he asserted, among other criticisms of the concept. He's right at
one level: One of the really big costs is overengineered,
memory-hogging, security-challenged software. Since such a
lightweight, $100 system won't likely have the horsepower to run,
say, Windows Vista, Gates obviously has an axe to grind. The
comments are especially ironic coming from a philanthropist with a focus on "bringing innovations in health and learning
to the global community."
That wasn't the week's only example of dubious statements and
achievements:
* A truly odd entity, referring to itself as a "blank check"
company, raised $150 million in an initial public offering, with
a promise to make technology acquisitions with the funds. Maybe
those who invested know something I don't, but this is a colossal
leap of faith in a firm with little more than marquee leadership.
Couldn't that same leadership have come up with the kinds of
fresh, original product ideas that otherwise have been lacking in
recent years?
* A bogus press release slipped by Google News' automated story- and
source-selection system. The release said its 16-year-old author
had been hired by Google to work on security flaws in Google's
Gmail service. Anyone who spends time on Google News--especially
those of us in the online information business--can't be
surprised by this development. There are any number of bizarre,
misplaced "selections" right alongside the legitimate ones on any
given day.
As a counterpoint to these developments, here's one example of
good news: U.S. and Canadian law enforcement cracked an international child porn ring that
streamed video of children being molested over the Internet. The
Internet, unfortunately, has made this material all too easy to
distribute and access. Let's hope this is a tangible step toward
elimination of this filth.
Tom Smith
Microsoft's $500 Million Message: People Are The Business
Related Story:
Bill Gates Mocks MIT's $100 Laptop Project
New Trojan Ransoms Files, Demands $300
Mac Runs Both Windows XP, Mac OS X
Review: Accoona, Google Alternative
Prosecutors: Child Porn Ring Featured Live, Streaming Video
Visa Debuts RFID-Enabled Payment Card
Brief: Alltel Acquires Wireless Assets For $455 Million
Skype Client Moves To J2MEE
Brief: Microsoft Working On Developer Platform For Windows Live Mail
Gartner Calls Microsoft's Ultra-Mobile PC A 'Tweener' Gadget
'Largest Wireless Network' Planned For Arizona
Glide Looks To Improve Safety For Social Networking
Congress Expected To Show Its Hand On Online Gaming
In the current episode:
Elena McMalykhina With 'Parading Around New York'
Mitch Wagner With 'The Leprechaun In The Lightbox'
PlayStation 3 Delay A Blow To Sony's DVD Plans (The Age)
Animals To Populate New Game For Xbox (Washington Post)
New From InformationWeek: Get Your News In A Flash--Literally
InformationWeek 500 Entry Call
Do You Access Our Content From A BlackBerry Or Treo?
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Adobe Warns Of Critical Flash Flaw, Drive-By Downloads
Microsoft Office Bug Could Result In Drive-By Downloads
Apple Misses Bugs, Offers Fix
McAfee Update Breaks Hundreds Of Apps
There's More To Social Networking Than Hype
Enterprise Performance Management: A Framework For Optimizing
Network And Application Performance
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InformationWeek Daily Newsletter
1. Editor's Note: What's Wrong With This Picture
tsmith@cmp.com
www.informationweek.com
2. Today's Top Story: Microsoft
CEO Ballmer says security and usability of its upcoming products
are the focus of the company's R&D efforts.
After demonstrating Microsoft's newest mobile computer, Bill
Gates suggested the Google-backed MIT project should instead
create "a decent computer where you can actually read the text,
and you're not sitting there cranking the thing while you're
trying to type."
The Trojan archives 44 file types with a ZIP library, then
password-protects the files and deletes the originals. But some
have discovered the password needed to free the files.
A pair of Californians figured out a way to dual-boot an Intel
Mac with both Mac OS X and Windows XP, winning a $14,000 prize.
But the technique isn't for beginners.
The latest search engine to hit the Web, Accoona offers
additional business info and a nice filtering ability. But is
that enough?
The international ring offered child molestation on demand, live
on Internet video, prosecutors say.
Use of "contactless" devices for retail has been slower to catch
on in the United States than elsewhere around the world.
The assets, which include 2 million new subscribers in the
Carolinas, were purchased from Palmetto MobileNet LP.
EQO Communications' move will allow users of some 150 million
mobile phones to see the presence status of their buddies, send and
receive text messages with other Skype users, and do other things.
The toolset will let other vendors make their software compatible
with the new mail edition.
In a recent analysis, Gartner Inc. said the device was too big to
be a personal digital assistant and too small to be a useful notebook.
Three neighboring cities of Gilbert, Tempe, and Chandler will
create a single network that all residents, visitors, and
businesses can use, as opposed to deploying three separate,
incompatible mesh networks.
TransMedia is adding parental controls, digital rights
management, and user preferences in an effort to improve the
safety of its social networking and file sharing service.
Some lawmakers want to ban online gaming outright; others want to
regulate it along the lines of casinos and other comparable
offline activities.
4. Grab Bag: News You Need From The Web
Sony has stunned the consumer electronics and video game
industries by pushing back the worldwide launch of its
anticipated PlayStation 3 to November.
Microsoft aims at younger customers with title and marketing
tie-ins.
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Users are urged to update immediately to the patched 8.0.24.0
edition of the Flash player.
Microsoft patched flaws in Office that could allow attackers to
strike users who simply visit malicious Web sites.
Apple is sending out its second security update for Mac OS X in
as many weeks, including follow-up fixes to bugs thought to have
been patched on March 1st.
For over five hours Friday, McAfee's anti-virus software
erroneously flagged hundreds of legitimate executables as a
malicious virus, leading some customers to quarantine or delete
the offending files and render applications such as Microsoft
Excel inoperative.
6. Voice Of Authority: Social Networking
I must confess to some skepticism about social networking. Like
many caught up in the hype, I joined a social networking service
last year. I then proceeded to not use it.
7. White Papers: Performance Management
The Enterprise Performance Management framework takes a
systematic approach to managing the combined performance of
enterprise applications and network resources.
8. Get More Out Of InformationWeek
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