Tip: We only provide abstract for users. If you want to read the full article, please click the Full Article Link.
You may be interested in these articles:
Elinor Mills Year:March 27, 2008 1:32 PM PDT Source Site:newsblog
The latest paid-click data for search engines shows that Americans are clicking on paid search ads less than we did last year--not an encouraging trend for the state of online advertising.
For Google alone, which represents about 60 percent of the U.S. search market and is a bellwether for Internet companies, this deceleration in paid-click growth has been going on since at least October. Year-over-year monthly growth rates in paid clicks have fallen from 37 percent in October to 27 percent in November, 12 percent in December, 0 percent in January, and now 3 percent in February, according to ComScore figures published by Silicon Alley Insider. (ComScore does not disclose the paid-click data to the public, only to Wall Street analysts.)
Google representatives declined to comment on th...
...
Greg Sandoval Year:March 27, 2008 12:46 PM PDT Source Site:newsblog
The movie industry has seen mixed results from suing individuals for file sharing but continues to clobber BitTorrent search engines.
TorrentSpy, once one of the most popular indexes of BitTorrent files, shut down on Monday following a two-year copyright battle with the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA). TorrentSpy, accused in a lawsuit of encouraging copyright infringement, finally crumpled under the legal costs.
This cant come as good news to Gary Fung, chief executive of IsoHunt. His company was among a group of torrent-file search engines, which also included TorrentSpy, accused of copyright infringement in a 2006 lawsuit filed by the MPAA. With TorrentSpy gone, the MPAA can now set its sights on IsoHunt.
But Fung points out that TorrentSpy was never able to argue the...
...
Jim Kerstetter Year:March 27, 2008 10:56 AM PDT Source Site:newsblog
Want a tax break?
Then be like Larry Ellison. All you have to do is spend around $200 million on a replica of a 16th-century Japanese summer palace. Add extreme landscaping, such as a few hundred mature maple and cherry trees and a man-made waterfall carved into rock to look as though it had been put there "by the hand of God." Make sure this thing is so insanely over the top that no one besides you could possibly imagine living in it. And put this 23-acre estate in tony Woodside, in the hills above Silicon Valley.
Larry Ellison beat the tax man
Do all this and you too could be eligible for a $3 million tax break from the San Mateo (Calif.) County assessment appeals board. The lead story in Thursdays San Francisco Chronicle is what can be charitably described as a galling piece th...
...
Declan McCullagh Year:March 27, 2008 10:32 AM PDT Source Site:newsblog
Joe Waz, Comcasts senior vice president for external affairs and the companys public policy counsel, speaks about the BitTorrent detente.
(Credit: Declan McCullagh/CNET News.com)
HOLLYWOOD, Calif.--BitTorrent and Comcast have declared a detente in a Net neutrality cold war that has drawn a slew of angry protests and already ended up before the Federal Communications Commission.
But details are still unclear. Comcast will adopt a "capacity management technique that is protocol agnostic," and BitTorrent plans to work with Internet service providers, other technology companies, and the Internet Engineering Task Force to develop ways to optimize file swapping on networks like Comcasts.
To try to figure out what exactly Comcast is planning to do later this year as its part of this deten...
...
Chris Soghoian Year:March 27, 2008 9:38 AM PDT Source Site:newsblog
Googles terms of service, while ignored by the vast majority of users, contain a pretty shocking clause: Under 18s are not permitted to use any of Googles Web properties. Thats right, kids--no search, YouTube, Gmail, news, or images.
Under 18s wishing to watch YouTube videos of skateboarding dogs, or perform research for a school project will have to go elsewhere--Ask.com or Microsofts Live.com search, perhaps. The message from Mountain View seems clear: We dont want your (underage) business.
Googles terms of service, thick with legalese, state that:
"You may not use ... Googles products, software, services and web sites ... and may not accept the Terms if ... you are not of legal age to form a binding contract with Google.
The problem with this, of course, is that all 50 stat...
...
Anne Broache Year:March 27, 2008 8:57 AM PDT Source Site:newsblog
Update 10:15 a.m. PDT: Comments from Rep. Edward Markey and FCC Chairman Kevin Martin added.
Its official: Comcast and BitTorrent are calling a truce.
Ever since the cable giant admitted to disrupting file-sharing traffic based on the BitTorrent protocol, a very public debate has erupted over what constitutes appropriate "network management" by Internet service providers, and with it, a resurgence of calls for Net neutrality rules that would prohibit such practices.
But as companies are wont to do when regulators are breathing down their necks (read: the Federal Communications Commission), the companies announced that theyre going to become collaborators. Whether the deal is enough to satisfy policymakers scrutinizing Comcasts behavior, however, remains to be seen, as its already draw...
...
Matthew Elliott Year:March 27, 2008 8:53 AM PDT Source Site:newsblog
(Credit: Engadget)
If youre not making a cheap and tiny laptop to compete with the Asus Eee PC, what are you doing? Hewlett Packards forthcoming mininotebook will use Via processors (not Isiah, however) and start at $549, according to a spec sheet that Engadget got its hands on. The entry-level HP 2133 Mini-Note PC will use Linux (SuSE Enterprise) and have a 1.2GHz Via C7-M processor, 1GB of RAM, a 120GB hard drive, a 3-cell battery, and a 8.9-inch screen with a 1280x768 resolution. Another $50 nets you the same configuration with Windows Vista Home Basic. A $749 model serves up a faster 1.6GHz CPU, 2GB of RAM, a 7200rpm drive, a 6-cell battery, Bluetooth, and Vista Business. Were not sure what to make of the
"Regional" model listed, which costs $849 for a weaker configuration than t...
...
Greg Sandoval Year:March 27, 2008 8:49 AM PDT Source Site:newsblog
A prolonged legal fight with the movie industry has forced TorrentSpy, BitTorrents popular search engine, to shut down.
"The legal climate in the USA for copyright, privacy of search requests, and links to torrent files in search results is simply too hostile," said a note on TorrentSpys front door. "We spent the last two years, and hundreds of thousands of dollars, defending the rights of our users and ourselves... we now feel compelled to provide the ultimate method of privacy protection for our users - permanent shutdown."
In 2006, the largest Hollywood film studios accused TorrentSpy in a lawsuit of encouraging movie piracy. A federal judge ordered the company last June to provide the studios with user information found in its computer RAM.
TorrentSpy, often used by file sha...
...
Brooke Crothers Year:March 27, 2008 8:30 AM PDT Source Site:newsblog
Intel has posted the quad-core QX9775 on its price list, indicating the top-of-the-line chip used in the Skulltrail motherboard is available in volume.
Intel QX9775 Extreme processor
(Credit: Intel Corp.)
The Skulltrail motherboard was announced in mid-February but the QX9775 processor was initially very scarce. Intel has now listed (PDF) the processor at $1,499. The 45-nanometer part runs at 3.2GHz, packs 12MB of cache, and uses a 1600MHz bus.
Skulltrail is a very high-end enthusiast gaming platform based on the companys 5400 "Seaburg" workstation chipset. Skulltrail distinguishes itself with a dual CPU socket design that uses eight processing cores (two QX9775 chips) and support for the Scalable Link Interface (SLI). The system can be maxed out with two dual-GPU graphics cards fr...
...
Jonathan Skillings Year:March 27, 2008 7:17 AM PDT Source Site:newsblog
Update 7:57 AM PDT: Comcast and BitTorrent have made it official, announcing that they are working together "and with the broader Internet and ISP community" to address issues of rich media and network management. One specific result of the talks: Comcast says that, by the end of 2008, it will have adopted a "capacity management technique that is protocol agnostic."
Are Comcast and BitTorrent secretly an old married couple, prone to bickering over their peccadilloes and never quite comfortable together in public, but still joined tightly by an abiding sense of union and shared purpose?
So it would seem. The Wall Street Journal on Thursday reports a deal in the works between the cable provider and the file-sharing company that would have the pair collaborating on ways to make their te...
...
Martin LaMonica Year:March 27, 2008 6:11 AM PDT Source Site:newsblog
Apple, it seems, hasnt totally gotten used to making browsers for this Windows thing.
The license terms for the companys Safari Web browser on Windows include a curious restriction: "The software allows you to install and use one copy of the Apple Software on a single Apple-labeled computer at a time."
(Credit: The Register)
The Register, which was tipped off by legal eagles at the Italian site settleB.IT, calls the terms a "mockery of end user agreements."
Apple last week caught a lot of flak from users and from Mozilla, which makes the rival Firefox browser, for its practice of offering Safari for Windows as part of its auto-update service for iTunes.
Lets see how many millions of Safari for Windows downloads there are before Apples legal corps tweak their language to cover ex...
...