Stellar growth for online CRM spurs a Microsoft / Salesforce duel
Microsoft and Salesforce.com are at loggerheads over online CRM. Microsoft just rebranded its service and retooled its software, Salesforce is partnering with Google to parry Microsoft, and verbal attacks from both sides verge on vicious.
Why? As some analysts see it, software as a service (SaaS) opportunities have never been bigger anywhere than right now with CRM.
Netflix offers tempting details about future hardware
On Monday, Netflix discussed its favorable first quarter 2008 and tempted investors and subscribers alike with references to four mystery hardware manufacturers working on Netflix-enabled products.
Netflix executives made reference to a LG "product launch" scheduled for the second half of this year, which will bring to the market a Netflix-integrated set-top box.
Vista SP1 goes live on Automatic Updates, but gradually
It's apparently safe to try this now: Microsoft stated this afternoon it's going forward with plans to deploy Windows Vista Service Pack 1 via Automatic Updates.
But today's go-ahead won't mean that users will wake up one morning and suddenly find themselves upgraded (or not), or even that SP1 will find itself deployed all in the same morning.
Apple tops Wall Street's estimates in record quarter
Apple posted its best second quarter in company history, on strong sales of Macs and iPhones.
One chink in Apple's armor was its iPod sales, which only managed to increase 1% year-over-year to 10,644,000. However, sales of Macintosh computers were up 51% to 2,289,000, and the company sold 1.7 million iPhones.
Rambus victory upends an FTC unfair monopoly practices finding
A long-standing claim was that Rambus behaved unfairly by withholding secrets from competitors in standards committees. But an appeals court today erased an FTC decision, on the grounds that those committees may have been useless anyway.
An August 2006 US Federal Trade Commission decision finding Rambus illegally garnered monopoly power in the memory market by manipulating standards agencies, was voided yesterday by the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals, on the grounds that the standards agency in question -- JEDEC -- did not provide its members with enough guidelines for properly sharing information the FTC said Rambus withheld.
Outlook Express to finally end access to Hotmail
Yesterday an e-mail was sent out from the Windows Live Mail Team announcing that Outlook Express would be dropping the legacy DAV protocol on June 30 2008, severing access to the Hotmail Inbox from Outlook Express.
Users are encouraged by the team to download Windows Live Mail as Outlook Express' free replacement. Live Mail replaces Distributed Authoring and Versioning with Microsoft's proprietary DeltaSynch protocol, which detects changes in the e-mail server, allowing the client to only download the changes, instead of all the headers in every folder as DAV does.
Cross-site scripting vulnerability may affect Earthlink, other ISPs
Security research firm IOActive notes that several ISPs, including Earthlink, are using advertising servers to collect revenue on misspelled URLs, but alleges that in so doing, they may have mistakenly exposed users to cross-site scripting.
Dan Kaminsky, the group's director of penetration testing, reported that a bug on Earthlink servers may have allowed hackers to launch phishing attacks through the third-party Barefruit service used by several ISPs. Barefruit is a service whose stated purpose is to help ISPs catch DNS errors and redirect users appropriately. However, ISPs took advantage of that redirection by building error-catching pages that included paid advertisements. Earthlink was notoriously caught using Barefruit for this purpose in 2006.
Microsoft to end support for MSN Music DRM
As of August 31 of this year, Microsoft's "Plays for Sure" technology -- once codenamed Janus -- will no longer play for sure -- unless, that is, users play back the tunes on the same computers and OS forever.
In a move that's come under concerted attack by users ranging from anti-DRM music bloggers to Linux fans, Microsoft has disclosed plans to stop providing authorization keys for songs downloaded from the old MSN Music service.
Alltel Wireless gets the BlackBerry Curve 8330 smartphone
The latest Research in Motion (RIM) BlackBerry smartphone, the Curve 8330, is now on its way to three different US mobile phone networks on May 1, the latest addition being Alltel.
Operating on Alltel's EV-DO network, the BlackBerry Curve 8330 features a full QWERTY keyboard, trackball navigation system, instant messaging, GPS, 2 megapixel camera with video, Bluetooth 2.0, and an added MicroSD slot. It measures 4.2 x 2.4 x 0.6 and weighs just four ounces.
Analyst: Mobile DTV standards problem may never be solved
In-Stat has published a report that forecasts the future of the worldwide mobile TV market, anticipating a total of $12 billion dollars in revenue in 2012, but it appears the fragmented nature of standards is here to stay.
Much like PAL and NTSC on analog sets, different nations adhere to different mobile broadcast standards. DVB-H, ATSC-M/H, CMMB, ISDB-T, DVB-SH, T-DMB, and MediaFLO are just some of the most common standards currently in place or in development. And among these, there is even further disunion between free, pay-as-you-go, and subscription-based services.
Microsoft seems prepared to walk away from Yahoo deal
In the face of better-than-expected financial results last quarter for Yahoo, Microsoft now seems to be indicating that it is ready to move on.
Over the past two days, CEO Steve Ballmer has made comments that Microsoft's offer for Yahoo will not change, and that the company will soon move on if necessary.
Microsoft takes on Google with CRM Online
Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online left beta this week for general release, amid industry scrutiny as to how well Microsoft's software as a service (SaaS) will fare against that of rival Salesforce.com.
Known until last month as Microsoft Dynamics CRM Live, Microsoft's new hosted offering in priced less -- especially for those who take advantage of Microsoft promotional offers-- and also offers at least five times as much storage as Salesforce.com.
Apple buys embedded chipmaker for $278 million in cash
In response to media inquiries, Apple disclosed early Wednesday that it had purchased embedded chipmaker P.A. Semi, whose chips may end up in the Cupertino company's devices.
P.A. Semi was founded in 2003 by a lead designer for the Alpha and StrongARM processors. It currently employs about 150 and focuses on low-power chips that can be used in portable devices.
Appeals court lets 'Vista Capable' class action proceed
In a big blow to the case against Microsoft's allegedly confusing "Vista Capable" labeling program for PCs, the US Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals yesterday denied Microsoft's petition to overturn a decision granting the case class action status.
It may be exactly what Microsoft doesn't want right now, even if it ends up winning the case in the end: the symbolism of a mass of consumers taking up arms against the company, in dispute over the very heart of its value proposition for Windows Vista. Yesterday the Ninth Circuit ended the company's hopes of being able to face the plaintiff on the company's terms.
Linden Labs search for CEO ends with Organic exec
Organic CEO Mark Kingdon will take the reigns of Linden Labs on May 15, when chief Philip Rosedale steps down to become chairman of the board.
Rosedale had said that the company needed a chief executive with more operational experience when he first announced his intent to resign in mid-March. Although Kingdon may have not been the person many were expecting, he does seem to fit those qualities.
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