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March 23rd, 2010 by

Daily News 23/03

ITPRO – Browser ballot hits Internet Explorer’s market share

The browser ballot has hit the market share of Microsoft’s Internet Explorer in France, Britain and Italy.

The Daily Telegraph – China angry as Google stops censoring search results

Google has stopped censoring its search results in China in defiance of the country’s authorities, sparking a furious response from Beijing. The internet giant said yesterday it was closing its China-based search engine and redirecting visitors to an uncensored site based in Hong Kong.

The Daily Telegraph – Google offers racist search suggestion after hack

Google offered “Why are black people so ugly?” as a search suggestion after hackers avoided the firm’s filtering process. The question appeared when internet users typed in the word “why” and Google offered the question in full as one of its suggestions for what you may be about to write. The firm has extensive filters which are intended to remove offensive suggestions but hackers appear to have got around the controls and users picked up on it.

Computing.co.uk – Brown sees government savings of £11bn from new IT

In a major speech made today, Gordon Brown outlined plans for a new digital Britain that will save the government millions of pounds and be underpinned by UK-wide access to super-fast broadband and the ‘next generation web’.

BBC – Mixed reaction to fast net pledge

Labour plans to wire up UK homes with super-fast broadband have met with a mixed response. Experts want more details about what “super-fast broadband” means and how the plan would be implemented.

The Register – OFT to examine BBC’s Canvas

The Office Fair of Trading is to examine Project Canvas, the BBC’s strategic Sky-f*cker next generation set-top box. The BBC Trust looked at Canvas and decided that its strategic goals of screwing over Murdoch and Branson furthering BBC content were not incompatible with the Trust’s charter.

The Register – Home Office takes non-action against phone pinchers

The Home Office is demanding that mobile phone recyclers continue what they’re already doing, in the name of cracking down on mobile phone theft. The office is busy creating a new Code of Practice which will require the industry to check handsets sent for recycling against the register of stolen phones, preventing thieves cashing in on the £25 average value of a handset. Which would be most laudable, it if wasn’t happening already.

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March 19th, 2010 by

Daily News 19/03

The Daily Telegraph – BBC iPlayer has more than 1.4 million visitors per day

Latest figures show that around 3.5 million programmes were watched on the catch-up TV service last month. The February figures, made available today by the BBC, underline the enduring popularity of the iPlayer platform, which allows people to catch up with radio and TV programmes aired in the last seven days.

ZDNet – Microsoft shows off Internet Explorer 9 preview

Microsoft showed off Internet Explorer 9 Platform preview on Tuesday, with headline features including support for web standards and faster performance.

ZDNet – UK internet security rated among Europe’s best

Internet security around the UK’s critical national infrastructure is among the best in Europe, a House of Lords committee has found.

SC Magazine – Facebook, Twitter and Microsoft claim that weak passwords still cause security headaches

The biggest problem with web security is still weak passwords, according to spokespeople from three major IT networks.

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February 25th, 2010 by

Daily News 25/02

The Times – EU launches antitrust inquiry into Google ‘dominance’
The European Commission has launched a preliminary antitrust inquiry into Google after three companies complained that the US giant’s dominant search engine penalises potential competitors and keeps advertising prices artificially high.

IT PRO – Did Google hackers target Intel too?

Intel has confirmed that it was the target of a “sophisticated” hack attack at the beginning of the year around the same time as Google’s episode, but it suggests there is no clear link between the two.

The Register – Adobe Photoshop celebrates big 2-0

Exactly 20 years ago today – Wednesday, February 24 – the first stable version of Adobe Photoshop was released into the wild. At 728 kilobytes, it fit on a single floppy disk.

Computerworld UK – YouTube cuts off support for older Internet Explorer

Google’s YouTube will drop support for Microsoft’s nearly nine year old Internet Explorer 6 in just over two weeks, the popular video site has announced.

Computerworld UK – Twitter churns out millions of tweets

New numbers from the folks at Twitter show that people are tweeting furiously.

Computerworld UK – Apple Macs becoming popular business tool, says survey

Two out of three IT administrators at large organisations with Macs and PCs said they expect to see an increase in the number of Macs this year, according to a newly released survey by the Enterprise Desktop Alliance.

The Daily Telegraph – Human behaviour ’93 per cent predictable’

Location data from mobile phones has indicated that 93 per cent of human movement is predictable. A study published by peer-reviewed journal Science examined anonymised data culled from mobile phone service providers and found that it was possible to accurately predict movement and location up to 97 per cent of the time for the majority of people, and 93 per cent of the time for the entire set of data.

The Daily Telegraph – Apple close to selling 10 billion iTunes songs

Apple is expected to sell its 10 billionth track from the iTunes music store by the end of the week. The company is giving away a $10,000 iTunes gift voucher to whoever downloads the billionth song. A counter on the Apple website is tracking progress towards the landmark, with the magic number expected to be reached by Friday.

The Guardian – Scribd to launch mobile service

Document sharing website Scribd is making a more direct challenge to Amazon and Apple by launching a mobile service that it hopes will make it easier for millions of people to read on the go.

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February 3rd, 2010 by

Daily News 03/02

IT PRO – Cyber baddies using the web to hire
The bad guys responsible for creating software that steals financial and personal details are using the web to look for recruits to join them in their illegal activity.

The Register – iPhone vulnerable to remote attack on SSL

Apple’s iPhone is vulnerable to exploits that allow an attacker to spoof web pages even when they’re protected by the SSL, or secure sockets layer, protocol, a security researcher said.

Computerworld UK – China hacking laws to get tougher

Chinese police and judicial officials are formulating new measures that govern how hacking crimes are handled by courts, the country’s latest step to strengthen its cyber laws, state media reported.

Computerworld UK – NASA brings in commercial spaceflight companies

NASA moved quickly to advance its role as commercial space entrepreneur by awarding $50 million (£30m) to five companies who could help design and build future spacecraft that could take astronauts to and from the International Space Station.

Computerworld UK – Mozilla releases Firefox for Mobile

The first production version of Firefox for Mobile has been released, for Nokia’s Maemo operating system. But Mozilla already seems to be scaling back its deployment plans, and unexpectedly the mobile browser will not support Adobe Flash.

BBC – ‘Internet addiction’ linked to depression, says study

The study, reported in the journal Psychopathology, found 1.2 per cent of people surveyed were “internet addicts”, and many of these were depressed.

Computing – Social networking to replace email by 2014

The business benefits of social software platforms will lead to email being replaced as the primary means of communication by 2014, according to analyst Gartner. Increasing business use of tools such as Twitter and Facebook has resulted in more demand for such systems, says the firm, which predicts that 20 per cent of organisations will use them as their key communication medium by 2014.

The Daily Telegraph – Mobiles to replace wallets and tickets

The device is already tipped to start replacing credit cards, supermarket loyalty cards and bus passes by as early as 2011, when they will begin to be incorporated into mobiles.

The Daily Telegraph – Internet Explorer 8 becomes the most popular browser in the world

The latest version of Microsoft’s browser has finally overtaken Internet Explorer 6, now accounting for 22.3 per cent of the global browser market in January 2010, according to market share measurements carried out by NetApplications.

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February 1st, 2010 by

Daily News 01/02

The Times – Bill Gates pledges $10bn for a ‘decade of vaccine’

Bill Gates, the Microsoft founder and philanthropist, is to make the largest ever single charitable donation with a pledge of $10 billion (£6 billion) for vaccine work over the next decade.

IT PRO – UK’s big firms to use more free software in 2010
Big companies are increasingly looking at free alternatives to costly software suites in a bid to keep costs down, a new survey has shown.

The Register – Steve Jobs dubs Google’s ‘don’t be evil’ motto ‘bulls**t’

Steve Jobs has dubbed Google’s “don’t be evil” mantra “bullshit.” Or at least “a load of crap.”

Computerworld UK – Google winds down support for IE6

The warnings over Internet Explorer 6 are beginning to have some effect; Google has said it will end support for IE6.

The Guardian – After the iPad, what unicorns are there for Apple to unleash?

We’ve had the iPhone, and now we’ve got the iPad. But that won’t stop the fans inventing fresh products or services that theyr’e sure Apple has hidden in the cupboard

Computer Weekly – Fujitsu claims ownership of iPad brand

Fujitsu has laid claim to the iPad brand within hours of Apple unveiling its latest gadget under that name. The Japanese technology company’s iPad is a mobile device for verifying the price of retail goods, checking inventory data and confirming sales. The Fujitsu iPad has a colour touch-screen, an Intel processor, wi-fi and Bluetooth connectivity, and supports VoIP telephone calls. The company is consulting lawyers about what to do next.

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January 4th, 2010 by

Top 10 Google Chrome Extensions

Google Chrome ExtensionsIt is now nearly a month since Google launched ‘Extensions‘ for its free web browser, Chrome, so we’ve had a bit of time to play around and test out some of the 1,000 or so extensions available.

Extensions basically allow users to customise Chrome by adding features and functions that they require. A lot like add-ons for Internet Explorer or Firefox.

Here is a list of 10 extensions that we think are worth downloading:

  1. Goo.gl url shortener
    This extension allows you to shorten website addresses with Google’s URL shortening service Goo.gl. Once compressed the url is automatically copied to clipboard and you can share it with twitter, facebook, blogger, gmail or your default mail client.
  2. HTML2PDF
    This extensions lets you create a PDF from any webpage instantly with a single single click.
  3. Invisible Hand
    InvisibleHand discreetly notifies you if the product you’re browsing is available more cheaply from another retailer. The notification provides a convenient link straight to the relevant product page on the competing retailer’s website. (Disclosure: Invisible Hand is a Speed client)
  4. SendTo Extension
    This plugin lets you send the web page that you are viewing currently to various internet services directly from your Chrome browser. It support a whole host of sites including WordPress, Facebook, Delicious and Bit.ly.
  5. Zemanta
    Zemanta is great extension, designed to assist bloggers. It expands the user’s regular blogging dashboard, populating it with content suggestions relevant to the current text. Zemanta also presents images, links, articles, and tags that can be instantly added to the post at the touch of a button.
  6. Chromed Bird
    Chromed Bird lets you to follow your Twitter timelines and interact with your account.
  7. Google Mail Checker
    This extension displays the number of unread messages in your Google Mail inbox. You can also click a button to open your inbox instantly.
  8. Tech Crunch
    The TechCrunch extension for Google Chrome can help you to keep up-to-date with the latest technology news by providing a feed of the latest news stories posted on Tech Crunch.
  9. Google Translate
    This extension adds a button to your browser toolbar that enables you to translate entire webpages into a language of your choice with one click.
  10. Shiny MPs
    The Shiny MPs extensions gives you regular updates on your local MP’s parliamentary activity as well as quick links to important information.
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December 17th, 2009 by

Daily News: 17/12

BBC – UK consumers enjoy ‘advanced’ digital communications
The UK is one of the world’s most advanced countries in terms of digital communications, an Ofcom report says.

BBC – UK community groups win free wi-fi
Mother and toddler groups, youth clubs and unemployment centres are among the winners of a competition offering free wi-fi to remote areas.

The Guardian – EU ends case as Microsoft offers choice of browsers
European computer users who rely upon Microsoft Windows and its Internet Explorer application to get online are to be offered the chance to switch to a competing web browser. The deal today between the software company and European Union regulators ends more than a decade of legal wrangling.

The Guardian – YouTube considering subscription fees
YouTube may begin offering subscription services that allow users to watch major new TV shows and films online, according to a senior Google executive.

IT PRO – Facebook and Google are most wanted on our mobiles
The ability to access Google and Facebook rank highest on the public’s most wanted list when choosing a new mobile phone. A survey from market analyst Strategy Analytics asked respondents in the UK and US which applications and services were most important to them on a new phone’s list of features.

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November 10th, 2009 by

Fantastic Mr (Fire)Fox

FirefoxIt is five years since the launch of the open source Mozilla Firefox browser, so cue celebrations in cyberspace. Given we now live in a multi-browser world (albeit one still dominated by Internet Explorer) it is difficult to understand the internet landscape before Firefox.

First, a quick history lesson. After launching Internet Explorer, Microsoft poured millions into the product. This meant it successfully squashed the first independent mainstream browser, Netscape. Job done, it disbanded the development team, leaving users stuck with the same technology and little chance of upgrades.

Enter Firefox and the not-for-profit Mozilla Foundation which provided a clear, and function rich alternative. The result? 24 per cent of surfers now use Firefox. While it isn’t likely to topple the inertia that keeps IE at the top of the charts, it has stimulated diversity in the browser market – witness the introduction and growth of Apple’s Safari, Opera and Google Chrome in recent years.

In fact, it provides a template for what can be achieved with open source collaboration, listening to users and providing innovative solutions. Here’s to the next five years!

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September 28th, 2009 by

Daily News 28/09

The Guardian – Orange signs iPhone deal with Apple
O2′s exclusive deal to support Apple’s iPhone in the UK is set to come to an end, after Orange announced today that it would also be selling the handset later this year.

Silicon.com -IT chiefs ignoring data centre energy use
Data centre and IT chiefs aren’t paying enough attention to measuring, monitoring and modelling energy use in data centres – and unless they do, they will not be able to cut their energy costs and meet compliance requirements, according to analyst Gartner.

Computer Weekly – Google Chrome Frame doubles security risk, claims Microsoft
Microsoft has slammed Google’s Chrome Frame, which enables users of Internet Explorer to run the Google Chrome browser withing a frame in Internet Explorer. Microsoft claimed that the Chromium plug-in would open users to greater security risks.

CBR – Social networks key to good customer service: report
Consumers are increasingly turning to social network sites to solve their customer service issues rather than contacting a company directly, according to a new report. The survey of 2,050 UK consumers, conducted by YouGov for salesforce.com, found that two-thirds lack the confidence that a call centre would be able to satisfactorily handle their query.

Computing – New tool simplifies customer feedback management
Customer feedback management firm Managemycomplaints.com (MMC) has launched in the UK with a namesake online service designed to give SMEs the ability to forge closer relationships with their customers, but at low cost. Available for less than £2 per user per day, the new service enables organisations to log, manage and report on every comment a customer makes, giving them greater insight into what their customers think of them, and therefore helping to improve retention rates.

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July 29th, 2009 by

Hot off the press 29/7

FT.com – Microsoft and Yahoo close to partnership
Microsoft and Yahoo are on the brink of sealing an online alliance that could create a more formidable rival to Google in the search business.

Computing – Swine flu – prepare for home working, but don’t panic
Firms should start to prepare for a potential increase in home working caused by the spread of swine flu – but nobody needs to panic, according to business and medical experts.

Microsoft rushes two ‘out-of-band’ patches
Microsoft has today announced it will be releasing two out-of-band patches, its first of the year, with one for Internet Explorer deemed a critical fix and the other for Visual Studio rated moderate.

BBC News – Pirate Bay faces new legal threat
The world’s most high-profile file-sharing website the Pirate Bay faces a new volley of legal action.

Computer Weekly – MPs sceptical of £26.5bn of Gershon IT savings
MPs from the three main parties have cast doubt on government claims to have saved £26.5bn through IT and other efficiency savings.

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