MP3.com and Warner Music Shake Hands
MP3.com, in an effort to turn its business into a legal moneymaker, has inked another deal with a label, this time Warner Music. The deal includes audio and video licensing, which will allow MP3.com to feature audio and video from artists with the label in exchange for artist Web sites and technical support from MP3.com. MP3.com earlier this year licensed Warner Music to stream from its My.MP3.com service, but with this deal expanded it to the whole site. For more information read the press release over at MP3.com.
Yahoo! Stands Up to France
Yahoo! Inc. this morning will file a declaratory judgement in U.S. Federal Court today telling France that they have no control over the United States-based company. Recently Yahoo! was found liable for auctions selling Nazi materials by a French court, when it was ordered to block all such materials from being viewed by French surfers. For more information visit News.com.
Windows Media 7 Skinning Contest
Microsoft and Adobe are partnering up for the "Gimme Some Skin" Windows Media 7 player skinning contest in the next few weeks. The contest, which runs through February 16, 2001, will be judged by a celebrity panel consisting of technology journalist Elliot Van Buskirk; Steve Harwell, lead singer of Smash Mouth; and Russell Brown, design guru and senior creative director at Adobe. Prizes include Harman Kardon home entertainment system, CD-burning equipment from Roxio, and SONICblue Rio 600 portable music devices. For more information read the official contest rules over at Microsoft.
AOL Expects FCC Decision Soon
In what seems to be conflicting reports between Newsbytes and Internet News, Internet News is reporting that AOL and Time Warner executives expect a decision in the merger case sometime in early January. Much of the wait revolves around George W. Bush's nomination for FCC chairman, which could play a role in the process. Current favorite is son of soon-to-be Secretary of State Colin Powell, Michael Powell, who has publicly stated his views on government intervention in markets. Many believe Powell could spur growth and deregulation in the marketplace. For more information read the Internet News article.
PHP 4.0.4 Released Today
The PHP Group has announced the immediate availability of PHP version 4.0.4 for netizens everywhere. In the announcement the group informed users "This release has undergone strict testing by our new QA team to ensure that this is
the most stable release ever on all supported platforms. It includes improvements for a large number of defects and numerous enhancements in the PHP core, the language implementation and
extensions." For a complete list of changes click here or download the source now. (Win32 binaries will come at a later date).
Happy Holidays - Watch Out for Kriz
W32.Kriz, just one year old, is expected to crop up again this Christmas, as the worm is set to dump its payload on December 25th. The worm is based on the CIH virus, which has caused damage to computers world wide. Symantec warns computer users everywhere to scan their PCs before the holiday, and released a free tool to scan for, and if necessary remove the virus.
Kriz has managed to infect Happy99.worm and W32.hllw.bymer.worm, which means it could piggy-back onto your system via the other two worms.
Cellphones and Cancer - No Link Found Yet
Reuters reports that the results from a recent industry-funded study show no correlation between cellular phone use and cancer. Medical experts are warning that more studies need to be conducted before a final conclusion can be drawn in the case. The American Health Foundation, which received some $28 million from industry leaders, conducted the study after concerns have been raised in the last ten years or so over the use of cellular phones. The New England Journal of Medicine also found similar results, saying that no link between the two could be found.
Oracle Challenge Number Two
Oracle will once again offer customers the chance to receive $1 million from the database software powerhouse provided the customer can prove Oracle does not run its Web site three times faster than that of BEA Systems. The first challenge came in early October when Oracle challenged Microsoft and IBM technologies. No company as yet has claimed that Oracle did not give the triple performance mark.
BEA's cheif executive officer Bill Coleman told reporters he believed none of their customers would spend the time and effort, saying "If you have an application working, why spend money to bring it up to another application server?"
Napster File Swapping On the Rise
According to recent research conducted by Webnoize, Napster usage and file-swapping is on the rise. Last month alone members traded 1.76 billion songs, up 40 million from Octobers 1.72 billion. The largest increase came between September and October, when trading rose a stunning 330 million songs. The researchers predicted Napster could have seen as many as 2 billion transfers had it added servers, which it was avoiding due to current deals with Bertelsmann to provide a subscription service. The service is expected to cost $5 a month, which could help retain a large portion of its user-base. For other information about the research, visit Webnoize.com.
FCC Delays AOL-Time Warner Decision
Today the Federal Communications Commission gave itself a 180-day stay on the AOL-Time Warner decision pending further review on the case. Last week the Federal Trade Commission conditionally approved the deal, after a lengthy debate on the company's cable line access rules. Several congressman have been notably upset on the decision to extend the time, as this marks the second time the FCC has "stopped the clock" on the deal. You can read the Newsbytes article if you are interested.
Microsoft Cutting Costs and Raising Salaries
In order for Microsoft to keep its top executives and employees from jumping ship, as several have done this year, CEO Steve Ballmer told the company today to begin cutting costs in certain areas of the budget in order to raise the salaries of those employees who could possibly leave. The Wall Street Journal reported that the seven-page memo issued by the CEO also outlined the top seven priorities on the Redmond Campus, which included the Windows operating system and the Windows .Net technologies.
Pitfall - The Perfect Game...Finally
In side news, TwinGalaxies.com is reporting that 35 year old Alan Hewston has finally done what no other man has ever done, score the perfect game in the classic Atari 2600 version of Pitfall. To do so, Hewston had to on his first man collect all 32 treasures and rack up the maximum 114,000 points. TwinGalaxies.com Atari Editor Ron Corcoran told reporters "it is believed that even game designer David Crane himself, had
never accomplished this feat." For an interview with the champion visit www.twingalaxies.com.
New Disk Drive Specifications Unveiled
Sometime near the end of 2001 and early 2002 computer users can expect to purchase end products with a new drive specification unveiled this week. Dubbed Serial ATA 1.0, the group currently developing it says the new specs will allow disk drives to keep up with faster processors and hard drives. Keep checking back as the story develops.
Gates Phones FCC About AIM
Bill Gates himself is said to have telephoned several members of the Federal Communications Commission, raising concerns about the current state of rival America Online's Instant Messenger. Gates called on the FCC to investigate the dominance in the market that AOL currently holds, with an overwhelming market share and a staggering 20 million plus users. The calls included one to the chairman, and two commissioners on the board. The calls from Gates came after the FCC's approval of the FTC's plan to allow the AOL-Time Warner merger to go through. Read the rest of the lengthy piece over at ZDNet if you are interested.
New Power in Aimster Next Week
Aimster next week will unveil a version that works with MSN Messenger and Yahoo Messenger. The company began testing versions supporting MSN Messenger in October, and will soon launch the product full scale along with Yahoo support. Also in this release is messaging services for Napster, Gnutella, and others. Capitol Records has promoed bands via the file-swapping service, and rumors were circulating of some talking with Intel a while back. The new version is expected to hit the net this coming Tuesday. For more information read the latest over on ZDNet.
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