Microsoft Launches Policy Offensive Against Google
Continuing an extraordinary public relations campaign whose aim appears to be to position it as the champion of individuals' and publishers' rights in the information age, Microsoft today plans to blast Google in a public forum for having built its business model around what it calls a "systematic infringement of copyrights."
This morning, Microsoft released the prepared text of comments its associate general counsel, Thomas Rubin, plans to make later today in New York before a meeting of the Association of American Publishers. Along with it, the company released one of those prepared Q&As with Rubin, which the company puts forth in the opening stages of a major software strategy shift or policy initiative.
AMD Accuses Intel of Destroying Evidence in Antitrust Trial
In a troubling development late Monday, AMD filed a brief with US District Court Judge Joseph J. Farnan, Jr. accusing Intel of having destroyed e-mails and other documentation that may have been important to its antitrust case. The brief comes in response to a letter submitted by Intel's attorneys to Judge Farnan acknowledging the loss of documents that AMD has sought, and blaming Intel's document preservation process for their loss rather than intentional destruction.
“Through what appears to be a combination of gross communication failures, an ill-conceived plan of document retention and lackluster oversight by outside counsel,” reads AMD’s brief, “Intel has apparently allowed evidence to be destroyed. Though all the facts are not in, potentially massive amounts of e-mail correspondence generated and received by Intel executives and employees since the filing of the lawsuit may be irretrievably lost, as may other relevant electronic documents.”
Another AACS Device Key Found; How Will Studios Respond?
Another user of the Doom9 Forum, whose members have been actively working to develop a system to subvert AACS copy protection, has apparently discovered in a memory dump a legitimate device key - the cryptographic element licensed to components in order to obtain the volume key automatically from high-definition HD DVD discs, according to a post yesterday. The source of the key appears to be CyberLink PowerDVD; and another forum user was able to use a published AACS formula to validate its authenticity.
At this rate, it may only be an academic matter before programmers there refine a method by which an independent program uses this or some other device key to decrypt and even play high-def content on computers, without the intervention of a licensed program.
AMD's Ruiz: First Quarter a 'Blip,' But Growth Estimates Foggy
2:30 pm March 5, 2007 – During comments to analysts during a Morgan Stanley analysts’ meeting in San Francisco this morning, Pacific Time, AMD CEO Hector Ruiz was uncharacteristically, selectively vague about the status of his company. While he maintained his now-trademark optimism, calling the current fiscal quarter a “blip” with regard to performing less than expected, his fogginess in reference to the second quarter and beyond was so unlike Ruiz that it could potentially draw negative attention to itself for that reason alone.
More about Ruiz’ comments follow our original story from this morning:
Stock Options Scandal Claims RIM Chairman, Company to Restate Earnings
Just over one year after Research in Motion put a patent infringement lawsuit behind it, in the interest of setting forth confidently into the future, the future came back to bite the company where it hurts.
Finding itself amid a wave of technology companies under investigation in both the US and Canada for granting backdated options without reporting their values as charges, RIM announced this morning it may have to restate prior years' earnings up to 2003 to the tune of USD$220 million, with additional restatement of perhaps $5 million per year thereafter.
AMD Claims of Intel Benchmarks 'Not Ethical' Scrutinized
8:45 pm March 2, 2007 - After BetaNews' publication late this afternoon of our original story on ZDNet blogger George Ou calling into question the validity of recent AMD benchmark claims -- after AMD had called Intel's claims into question -- AMD changed its mind and decided to comment in full. Spokesperson John Taylor's response appears in full after our original story:
5:33 pm March 2, 2007 - After a press conference on Wednesday in which AMD Executive Vice President Henri Richard told reporters he's tired of being pushed around by Intel with regard to the accuracy of its recent performance superiority claims, ZDNet blogger George Ou turned the interrogation light back onto AMD. As Ou confirmed, data AMD used to debunk some of Intel's performance claims had since been superseded by new data that substantiates Intel.
Judge Dismisses One Alcatel-Lucent Claim Against Microsoft
After two weeks of almost incessant bad news for Microsoft comes a ray of hope, courtesy of US District Court in San Diego: Judge Rudi Brewster has dismissed a series of patent infringement claims against Microsoft regarding technology Bell Laboratories developed for converting text into speech, in a summary judgment this afternoon.
It is an extremely important decision, especially given the subject matter of the patent: AT&T (Lucent's former parent company) is currently embroiled with Microsoft in US Supreme Court over whether Microsoft had the right to distribute software that uses AT&T's speech synthesis software in foreign copies of Windows Vista.
Dell Cautiously Enters New Era with Weak Q4 Earnings
With the prospect of substantial financial corrections still looming over the company, Dell Computer hasn't been able to present its usual, detailed comparisons of present performance compared to past. So analysts late yesterday were given a preliminary fourth-quarter fiscal year 2007 earnings report, on top of a recently issued third-quarter report that still remains preliminary. Those who were able to do the math for themselves came to a daunting conclusion: Dell's not growing.
Financially speaking, the task ahead of new Dell CEO Michael Dell - who re-assumed his old post last month - is not impossible. His company isn't exactly hemorrhaging or even bleeding cash. It's just in a low-margin business where, even in segments where sales aren't declining, profits aren't accumulating. The big task ahead of Mr. Dell is restoring public trust in his company.
Sanyo to Help Lenovo Shoulder Battery Burden
In statements made to the AP, Reuters, and other services this morning, spokespersons for Sanyo said they would help bear the cost of Lenovo's recall of an estimated 205,000 lithium-ion notebook computer batteries sold worldwide, whose risk of overheating and explosion was determined yesterday to be too tenable.
Sanyo has not said exactly how much of the cost it would bear, so it's not clear whether that question was left unanswered or simply unasked.
YouTube to Add Three BBC-Branded Channels
The BBC has beaten ITV to the goal line in signing a content deal - the terms and length of which have not been disclosed - with YouTube, the streaming video division of Google. Starting today, YouTube has begun offering three new BBC-branded channels containing sharable clips from BBC programmes (spelled here using the Queen's English), though it appears this morning that these clips will be mostly promotional.
The main BBC channel will be classified as a "public service" - which is an important distinction, because the BBC is not a private corporation. It receives its funding from license fees collected by the British government from citizens, so any BBC enterprise that would overtly feature commercial advertising might come under scrutiny by subscribers, and under fire in Parliament.
AMD Responds to Intel with its Own Teraflop Concept
Last month at the International Solid-State Circuits Conference, Intel showed off a kind of "concept CPU," the way automobile manufacturers at the Auto Show in Detroit parade their concept vehicles. Intel's model was observed to have performed at a throughput rate of one teraflop - one trillion calculations per second.
Never to be left outdone for long, AMD answered back yesterday at a press event in San Francisco, with a system design that, while not a single CPU, makes the case for "teraflop on a budget."
Calif. Document Format Bill Could Test Microsoft's Openness Claim
A bill introduced last week in the California state legislature would make it state law next year for all state agencies to create, preserve, and archive their digital documents using an XML-based file format, and to be able to receive new documents in XML-based formats as well. The bill does not mention any format specifically, though observers believe it refers indirectly to OpenDocument Format (ODF).
However, with Corel having promised last November to implement Microsoft's Office Open XML (OOXML) in its next edition of WordPerfect Office, and with an announcement on that edition believed to be imminent, there may be no barriers left that would specifically exclude OOXML from being adopted by the State of California, should bill AB 1668 pass.
EU Threatens to Fine Microsoft for Lack of Innovation
In what could be an historic first, the European Commission's new statement of objections to Microsoft for alleged non-compliance with its March 2004 antitrust ruling forwards a novel theory: not that the interoperability information the EC demanded is incomplete, but instead that the communications protocols it describes are not innovative enough for Microsoft to deserve charging royalties for its use.
In Microsoft's draft copy of the royalties it proposes to charge for licensing its interoperability protocols, as the EC has directed, it divides its intellectual property in categories based on the degree of confidentiality of IP information licensees would be receiving. Certain protocols which may fall outside the realm of patentability are given a separate classification, and for those, Microsoft wants to charge a flat fee; but for technologies for which it claims patent rights, the company proposes either US dollar rates per server or percentages of revenue.
Boucher DMCA Exemption Bill Would Legalize Commercial-Skipping
A copy of the early draft language of the revised H.R. 1201, sponsored by Rep. Rick Boucher (D - VA) and introduced on the floor of the US House of Representatives yesterday, shows the revised legislation would add six new exemptions to US Code section 1201, which had been amended by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.
But the language in the new draft is shorter and simpler, and perhaps more prone to broader interpretations.
Symantec Vista White Paper Links to PatchGuard Crack
In a curious decision on the part of a security software company, a white paper released today on the Web site of Symantec - whose opinions of Microsoft's implementation of PatchGuard protection on 64-bit Windows Vista are well known - contains the address of an independent research paper which includes a demonstration of defeating PatchGuard, complete with source code, in an early Vista beta.
The address of the PDF white paper entitled "Bypassing PatchGuard on Windows x64" -- which was released in December 2005 and has since acquired a modicum of fame and respect -- is located in Symantec's 16-page analysis of Microsoft's security technologies, in a footnote to this sentence: "As demonstrated during the development process of Windows Vista and during its release, hackers can and will subvert PatchGuard."
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