EU mandates Web sites delete personal data after six months
Can a fair compromise be obtained on the matter of how long search engines should be allowed to retain personally identifiable data? Last week, a key European advisory group moved the goalposts on that issue yet again.
The European Union's key advisory panel on governing policy for Internet services issued an opinion last Friday stating that search engines and Web sites that retain personally identifiable data delete that data from their servers after six months. Member states would then be free to specify an even tighter timeframe.
Sprint affiliate offers VoIP phones with visual voicemail
Embarq, formerly the local division of Sprint Nextel, has introduced its eGo home phone, a DECT 6.0 IP handset manufactured by Vtech that looks to challenge VoIP leaders Comcast and Vonage.
The company was formed under the leadership of Dan Hesse, who saw the future in converged communications, and was escalated to Sprint Nextel's CEO position late last year. The company offers triple (and quadruple) play service bundles in 19 US states, maintaining its alliance with Sprint and partnering with DirecTV.
MySpace targets Latin American userbase
MySpace says its Spanish-language site will feature "culturally relevant content" aimed at this quick-growing segment of the internet population.
MySpace has signed on partners that produce content for the market to support its effort, including the Spanish Broadcasting System, Billboard en Espanol, and Remezcla.com.
Wal-Mart focuses on MP3, but without Sony BMG and Warner
Sony BMG and Warner's music is missing from Wal-Mart's online store, which has been recently redesigned to feature its catalog of DRM-free music.
With the apparent full switch to MP3, it marks yet another former customer of Microsoft's PlaysForSure who let the DRM technology fall by the wayside. However, it appears that with the embrace of DRM-free music, some artists are not available, at least temporarily.
Google opens its Web application engine to 10,000 developers
The engine that powers the company's online applications suite will soon be accessible by a select number of developers, for testing their own Web services at their own pace...on Google's servers.
In a highly anticipated move given the fact that it had publicized that something would emerge today for a company retreat billed as "Campfire One," Google this morning announced it is granting developmental access to its application servers, to the first 10,000 developers who apply.
Newest Blu-ray recorders include transfer to PSP
Sony will release Blu-ray recorders April 30 in Japan that allow for one-touch transfer to the PSP, Walkman, and select mobile phones.
The BDZ-A70 will carry a hefty price tag, coming in at ¥170,000 ($1,658). At the same time, it shows a willingness by Sony to embrace the growing consumer desire for media portability.
People-search startup Spock.com seeks partners, maybe with Google
New search engine venture Spock.com is using a Linux-based software architecture to save money on development. But it's also showing some ingenuity with its business model, focusing on partnership rather than competition.
NEW YORK CITY (BetaNews) - Now in beta since August of last year, Spock.com specializes in "people searches" across the names of both "ordinary people" and celebrities, said Jay Bhatti, the company's VP for marketing, services, and user experience, during a press briefing last week.
Ringing cell phones coming to a EU flight near you
Following six months of studies, the EU is finally ready to move forward with allowing in-flight cellular calls within the next month or so.
Once the plane has reached an altitude of 3,000 meters (9,850 feet), calls will be permitted. An on-board cellular tower of sorts will handle the calls, and then transfer them to the network on the ground.
AMD confirms 10% workforce cut, declining outlook
The worst is not over by a long shot for AMD. This afternoon, the company confirmed it would have to make very painful cuts, the repercussions of which are already being felt in terms of declining revenues.
Up until today, AMD had been saying it expected its revenue from the first calendar quarter of this year to decline "in line with seasonality" -- meaning, it would be lower than over the Christmas holiday because January always drops from December. And analysts had been responding to that claim, for the most part, with disbelief. As it turned out, the analysts were right.
Joost denies it's shrinking its sights to just the US
Is Web video distributor Joost, facing new competition from Hulu, shrinking its geographic coverage as a result? According to at least one recently published report, Joost has now decided to focus on the US only.
But last month, Nimbus Sport International unveiled deals with Joost spanning multiple continents, and a Joost spokesperson told BetaNews today that new but still unannounced agreements are also in the works for Europe and Asia.
Social media firm Imeem buys DRM firm Snocap
Today, imeem confirmed earlier reports that it had acquired content licensing and DRM company Snocap. No financial terms were disclosed.
After Snocap saw a major downsizing, laying off 60% of its workforce, the company made it known it was pursuing a sale. Four months later, reports started to circulate that social network for artists and musicians imeem had entered into an acquisition of the suffering company.
Vista SP1 'prerequisites' to gear up systems for auto updates
In a world, to sound like Don LaFontaine for a moment, where nothing could possibly go wrong, when something small does go wrong, it's huge. Today, Microsoft is hoping a small patch will make a huge difference to Vista's image.
The problems Microsoft had in simply rolling out early versions of Windows Vista Service Pack 1 to its initial testers served to vindicate its worst critics' complaints: It didn't seem the company could even correct Vista correctly. The rollout problems were even the topic of at least one of Apple's recent anti-Vista Mac ads. But many of those problems were apparently caused by a minor issue with automatic updates; and now, Microsoft says it's publishing a patch for pre-SP1 Vista that will enable customers with Automatic Updates to apply the SP1 series of patches without fear of entering an endless reboot cycle.
Adobe to correct its controversial Photoshop Express terms Thursday
"You grant Adobe a worldwide, royalty-free, nonexclusive, perpetual, irrevocable, and fully sublicensable license to use, distribute, derive revenue...from [Your] Content" read its original Terms of Service, which apparently didn't go over well.
Maybe the company didn't expect anyone to actually read the Terms of Service word-for-word, or maybe it didn't actually read the text itself after "boilerplating" it from some other product. But last Friday, Adobe said it has altered the Terms with regard to its online Photoshop Express product, so that it doesn't appear the company will claim the right to open a service on the side that resells users' own photos.
HP floats a file backup service in the cloud
One thing you start to notice about companies doing business "in the cloud" is that it's becoming harder to tell whether they were software or hardware companies to begin with. This morning, Hewlett-Packard publicly launched a subscription-based backup service where the "cloud" houses duplicate data.
HP's Upline allows users to share their stored data with other Internet users via uniquely created URLs. Though HP offered similar services in the past, Upline was created using technology from Opelin, a startup company it recently acquired. Opelin created the Titanize software solution, though anyone searching for Opelin Titanize will now be redirected to HP Upline.
Online fraud up over 20% per year, says FBI operation
The Internet Crime Complaint Center (I3C) has released its annual report of online misconduct, with 2007 showing a huge increase in the amount of money lost to theft.
Though the number of complaints has been steadily decreasing since its peak in 2005, the total losses were the highest yet at $239.09 million. This is an increase of $40.65 million over 2006, or about 20.5% year over year.
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