Latest Technology News

In a statement released to wire services early this morning, BlackBerry manufacturer Research in Motion said it has settled its lawsuit with Samsung over its use of the "BlackJack" trademark for handsets sold in the US by Cingular Wireless (now AT&T).

But the exact terms of the settlement are being left private, and those parts of the settlement that were revealed this morning are about as vague as the news of the original lawsuit. Judging from RIM's own words and not Reuters' interpretation of them, it appears AT&T will be permitted to continue to use the trademark on a limited basis.

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Microsoft plans to release Windows Mobile 6 on Monday at the 3GSM Conference in Barcelona. The upgrade features integration with Windows Live services, better search, and tighter security.

Code-named "Crossbow," the new version is said to be more of an incremental upgrade to Microsoft's mobile operating system. Since the last release of Windows Mobile 5 in May 2005, the company has embarked on a massive net services initative, called "Live," and security threats to mobile devices have increased markedly.

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With pressure increasing on the country to remedy its rampant piracy problems, China said Thursday it had shuttered 205 Web sites in an effort to begin to take control of the problem.

Between the months of September and January, China had opened 436 investigations, with at least 130 of them requested by trade associations outside the country. 361 of them had been ordered to stop, it said.

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As promised, ESPN will re-launch its mobile brand through a major carrier, signing a multi-year exclusive agreement with Verizon Wireless. The feature will be available to subscribers of the company's V CAST service.

ESPN shuttered its mobile operation in September of last year after less than nine months in operation. It leased cellular spectrum off of Sprint Nextel and operated as a Mobile Virtual Network Operator (MVNO). However, the service never got off the ground, and reportedly only had 30,000 subscribers.

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Sun Microsystems announced Wednesday that it is preparing to release a plug-in for its StarOffice 8 productivity suite that will provide two-way conversion between the OpenDocument format and Microsoft Office 2003.

The idea of the plug-in is to enable organizations to transition to ODF while continuing to support Microsoft Office users. Although a number of governments including the state of Massachusetts have pushed for ODF adoption due to it being a completely open standard, there has been some resistance due to certain assistive devices being only supported by Office.

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In the fourth calendar quarter of last year, Intel made the most headway against arch-rival AMD in the server CPU market in several years, surging ahead in shipments and reportedly taking back a few points of market share. Now, AMD is working to take those points back and then some, and to do so, it's working hurriedly to seize the low-power, high-performance advantage that the company is perceived to have lost in the wake of Intel's Woodcrest introduction.

Two of AMD's introductions today include "high-efficiency" versions of its high-performance line. Whereas the Opteron 8220 and 2220 models for dual-processor systems, introduced today, are both rated for a thermal design point (TDP) of 95 watts, their 8218 HE and 2218 HE counterparts are rated for 68 W TDP, and five other single-processor HE models introduced today are rated for 65 W TDP.

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Casual game developers will soon be able to share in some of the revenue from MSN Games thanks to a new system developed by Microsoft. The new option is available immediately, and could mean as much as $250,000 in shared revenue for the five most popular titles.

Two levels of participation would be provided. The first level would require little or no change in the development process and would share ten percent of generated ad revenues. The second option would share 20 percent, but would require the developer to add more functionality to their games.

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A decision Monday by the German Federal High Court (BGH) in Karlsruhe renders it illegal in that country –- for now -– for police and intelligence services to use clandestine tools such as Trojan horse routines, or what would normally be categorized as malware, for use in surveillance on federal suspects.

But the high court ruling did not set a legal precedent, which means that it didn’t actually find a new way for existing law to be interpreted to permanently prohibit the use of remote computer exploits for surveillance purposes.

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If you're going to be in New York soon, you may want to think twice about crossing the street wearing an iPod. That's because legislation is being introduced that would make being distracted by an electronic device while crossing the street illegal. Violators would be subject to a $100 fine.

New York State Senator Carl Kruger is spearheading the effort after at least three pedestrians were struck and killed in his Brooklyn distict because they weren't paying attention while crossing the street. In all cases, some type of electronic device was to blame. He claims that the government is tasked with protecting its citizens, and the distractions are increasingly becoming a matter of public safety.

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Social networking site Facebook is partnering with Comcast's user generated video site Ziddio to produce a program that would give Facebook users the opportunity to have their user-generated videos appear on television.

Called "Facebook Diaries," the program would air both online, and on television through Comcast's On Demand service. R.J. Cutler, who is best known for his work on "American High" and "30 Days", would produce ten half-hour episodes.

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After opening its formerly invitation-only Gmail webmail service to anyone with a mobile phone in August 2005, Google removed that requirement Wednesday. Now, anyone can signup for a Gmail account by creating a Google Account.

The mobile phone requirement was designed to prevent Gmail accounts from being created by robots and stop spammers from signing up multiple times. As of Wednesday afternoon, the Gmail signup URL still redirected users to the SMS-based method, but a

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T-Mobile is seeking beta testers in the San Diego, Calif. area to trial a new software application for their mobile phones that tracks user activity without the use of GPS. Applicants would need to reside in the 619, 760 or 858 area codes, and have more than one phone on their account.

Wireless carrier Sprint launched a child tracking service last April, which relies on GPS technology built into handsets. Parents would be able to see the location of their kids on a map using their computer or cell phone. The T-Mobile beta test begins later this month; interested individuals can apply via Centercode.

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TiVo and Amazon have entered into an agreement that would bring the online retailer's "Unbox" movie download service to the set-top boxes of TiVo customers in the near future.

Both the rental and purchase functions will be available to broadband-enabled TiVo boxes. Amazon is no doubt banking on Unbox on TiVo as a way to jumpstart its download business, which has seen a rocky start.

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Samsung and a US subsidiary have agreed to pay $90 million to settle charges that it colluded to keep the price of DRAM memory artificially high.

Money will be used to reimburse consumers as well as the legal costs of state and local governments nationwide. The action settles cases brought by 41 states, and several private class-action suits.

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The day of his coronation as the new CEO of NBC Universal, replacing long-time executive and GE appointee Robert Wright, Jeff Zucker wasted no time taking a stand against YouTube, taking the video sharing site and NBCU partner to task for failing to implement copyright protections.

The public statement, along with the new division of labor in his organization in addition to comments made for The New York Times this morning, are fueling speculation that Zucker's company may be planning to expand its own experiment in video sharing, perhaps becoming a competitor to YouTube.

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