The Facebook effect: MySpace to open up

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1. The Facebook effect: MySpace to open up - 2007-06-29 08:27:59-04
   The Financial Times is reporting that MySpace may soon open itself up to third-party developers -- in a similar strategy to Facebook -- which would see outside companies able to "plug" their web services into the number one social networking site. This is of course in direct response to the huge success of Facebook's recently revamped developer platform which has seen hundreds of companies set up shop on the site. What's most interesting about such a response is that we are now moving into an era where the top networks are using their perceived "openness" as a way of competing -- and in MySpace's case, staying on top. But rather than focusing on opening up as the end game, it's...
   
2. Dual-core desktops as cheap as iPhones - 2007-06-29 08:33:29-04
   Dual core desktops are getting cheaper and cheaper. Gateway, today, unveiled a new eMachines lineup that offers a dual-core eMachines T5230 Desktop PC for $449 after a mail-in rebate of $50. The machine comes with Advanced Micro Devices' Athlon 64 X2 4400+, a dual-core 2.3GHz processor. It's also got 1GB of RAM, a 250GB hard drive a multi-format DVD burner and a memory card reader. That's a lot of computer for relatively little money. It does not include a display, but it beats Dell's offering sold, via Wal-Mart, by $50. These days, however, many consumers are opting to spend $100 or $200 more to buy a notebook instead of an inexpensive desktop. That's just one more reason the desktop business...
   
3. Where for at thou, Barcelona? - 2007-06-29 08:58:32-04
   June is nearly over and it's appearing more and more like Advanced Micro Devices will not deliver its much anticipated (both in this blog and elsewhere) quad-core Barcelona chip this month. Several sites are now reporting a September launch date. TGDaily, for one, is reporting a September launch date. Here's the link. That, by all accounts, is a later launch than AMD would have liked. The chipmaker had been targeting a mid-year introduction, which most believed meant it would come in June. I think customers would rather have AMD deliver Barcelona in significant quantities and at sufficient clock speeds than to simply launch it, say it's on time, and make them wait for processors. Depending on when AMD actually begins...
   
4. Exchange Server Rollup 3: An IMAP fix for the iPhone? - 2007-06-29 09:00:14-04
   Microsoft rolled out on June 28 the third rollup of fixes for Exchange Server 2007, a product introduced in December 2006. According to a Microsoft Knowledge Base article on Rollup 3, Microsoft has fixed a number of Exchange issues, including: The addition of an integer to the end of the legacyExchangeDN attribute of a newly created mailbox in Exchange 2007 Failure to display an attachment when using Outlook 2003 to open an e-mail message that contains an attachment Display of an error message when a user tries to open a forwarded message to accept or to deny a resource request in Exchange Server 2007: "Cannot open the free/busy information" eWEEK is reporting that the new Exchange Server 2007 Rollup 3...
   
5. Eclipse delivers biggest update yet - 2007-06-29 09:29:49-04
   As important as operating systems and applications may be, the real key to software innovation lies in building better tools. Open source toolmaking is in the hands of the Eclipse Foundation, which has now delivered its biggest release yet, dubbed Europa. Some 21 projects were updated, with 17 million lines of code, and 25 organizations in 19 countries contributing. It's easy to minimize the importance of this. Eclipse has regular annual update cycles, which go off like clockwork each year, at the end of June. The updates are named for the moons of Jupiter, so planning is already underway for next year's Ganymede release. Some of the largest software organizations in the world, including IBM and BEA Systems, now depend on...
   
6. Microsoft readies a consumer healthcare platform - 2007-06-29 09:47:14-04
   Microsoft has made no secret about the fact it has designs on being a healthcare-IT contender. But what the company has kept under wraps, at least until now, was what it planned to do on the consumer side of the healthcare space. Sure, there've been hints here and there that Microsoft was readying some kind of "Windows Live Healthcare" offering. And it's not a huge surprise that Microsoft would be considering some kind of consumer-facing offering, given that Microsoft rival Google and AOL Founder Steve Case's Revolution Health are rushing headlong into the patient-information world. Microsoft is, indeed, readying a consumer healthcare platform, confirmed Steve Shihadeh, General Manager for Sales, Marketing and Solutions with Microsoft's Health Solutions Group. "We are...
   
7. Apple.com updated, new Finger Tip video added - 2007-06-29 10:00:53-04
   Apple this morning updated the front page of Apple.com with a giant iPhone group picture and removed the Hot News area and the small tiles from the bottom of the page. The image clicks through to, where else, the iPhone product page. On the iPhone page Apple has added a new video called Finger Tips. The new video features a number of practical iPhone usage tips: Silence the ring Delete a message Create your favorites list Assign a ringtone More song controls Browse in Cover Flow Magnify to edit Mail preferences Set a passcode Reset your iPhone
   
8. Time to get off Red Hat's case? - 2007-06-29 10:19:58-04
   Red Hat is a company that is easy to dislike. Maybe it's the relationship with IBM. Maybe it's the way they absorbed JBOSS. Maybe it's CEO Matthew Szulik, or the proprietary way in which the company operates. Maybe it's because they're based in Raleigh, North Carolina, and don't schmooze the Silicon Valley press corps, which has something in common with that of Washington, D.C. Whatever, I think it's time we got off Red Hat's case. The company delivered another solid quarter yesterday, helped out by channel partners and bigger JBOSS subscription sales.   The company probably goosed those JBOSS sales further with its acquisition of MetaMatrix, which specializes in metadata and data services. That sale closed this week. Red Hat is...
   
9. iTunes 7.3 released, required for iPhone activation - 2007-06-29 11:42:41-04
   Apple just released iTunes 7.3 (34MB) which is required to activate iPhone service: With iTunes 7.3, you can now activate iPhone service and sync it with your music, TV shows, movies and more. Also, you can now wirelessly share and enjoy your favorite digital photos from any computer in your home with Apple TV. Early-adopters should note that iPhone also requires Mac OS 10.4.10. Now might be a good time to back up your hard drive, repair disk permissions and install that bad boy.
   
10. TippingPoint heading for IPO door - 2007-06-29 12:00:51-04
    Less than three years after shelling out $430 million to acquire TippingPoint, 3Com plans to spin out the unit in a planned IPO later this year. The IPO plan, according to 3Com chief executive Edgar Masri, allows the networking vendor to "focus more closely on its core business." 3Com intends to remain a majority TippingPoint shareholder following the IPO and plans to reduce its ownership over time in subsequent transactions. 3Com will consolidate TippingPoint results in its quarterly and annual financial reports in accordance with GAAP for the foreseeable future. A successful TippingPoint IPO would confirm the end of a three-year drought among security start-ups looking to the public markets as an exit strategy. Earlier this year, Sourcefire raised $75...
    
11. Working Assets calls for iPhone boycott (updated) - 2007-06-29 12:06:55-04
    There was bound to be a backlash at some point. The AT&T bashing has begun: Working Assets is calling for a boycott of the iPhone. The locking of all iPhones to AT&T is unnecessary, and Working Assets has specific issues with AT&T -- including their stand on net neutrality, their warrantless wiretapping, and their handing over of customer records to the NSA. They say Apple is locking iPhone users into a service contract with 'a corporation whose practices seem to run counter to everything Apple stands for... From Boing Boing: Handset locking sucks, and AT&T sucks more: These people are criminal traitors who helped wiretap the nation, neutricidal maniacs bent on wrecking the Internet, and convicted monopolists besides. Blorge.com also...
    
12. People as an AI computing tool - 2007-06-29 12:21:18-04
    The tagging phenomenon started about 3 years ago, with people putting labels on their posts in their blogs or on their pictures or videos. Now, a researcher from the University of Southern California (USC) has discovered the newest AI computing tool: people. Computer scientist Kristina Lerman thinks that 'she has found a new source of artificial intelligence computing power to solve difficult IT problems of information classification, reliability, and meaning.' For example, 'by extracting the tags that Flickr users had described the images with, and applyng a mathematical technique called the "Expectation-maximization (EM) algorithm,' she found it's possible to quite accurately separate pictures of insects from pictures of cars returned by the "beetle" search. So can we expect better search...
    
13. iPhone invades the cell phone market - 2007-06-29 12:32:44-04
    I'm going nowhere near my closest Apple store today, which is only a few blocks away from where I live in Hollywood. All evidence would suggest that the store will be an absolute madhouse. This is a shame, as I've been dying to take one of the devices for a spin (though not buy...I would have trouble justifying the expense given the other technology toys I'd like to buy). I've been waiting for a full-screen phone ever since I worked at Orange Communications in Switzerland. Back then, SMS was the pinnacle of cell phone technology, though WAP was supposed to change all that and bring "the web" to cell phones. What a joke. WAP is to the web what the...
    
14. Blue Pill hacker challenge update: It's a no-go - 2007-06-29 12:58:44-04
    A quick update to the challenge handed down to hacker Joanna Rutkowska to prove that her Blue Pill technology creates "100% undetectable malware." Rutkowska says she is "ready to accept" the challenge but wants her two-person team to be paid $384,000 ($200 a day each for two people working full-time for six months), a demand that has dashed all hopes for a hacker face off at Black Hat this year. Rutkowska's response, detailed in a blog entry, sets the following ground rules: The challengers cannot intentionally crash or halt the machine during detection scanning. The detection software cannot consume more than 90% of the CPU for more than a second. Instead of two laptops, she wants to use five laptops...
    
15. Linus contradicts OpenBSD founder on Intel TLB issue - 2007-06-29 13:08:16-04
    OpenBSD founder Theo de Raadt has been making a lot of noise over a change in Intel's current generation Core 2 microprocessor goes as far to claim that this will lead to serious security flaws. Linus Torvalds by contrast has given a completely opposite view of the situation while other CPU analysts like David Kanter agrees that this is essentially "a mountain being made out of a mole hill". While Theo de Raadt characterizes as a serious flaw in the CPU that will "will *ASSUREDLY* be exploitable from userland code", David Kanter says that this technically isn't even a bug.This can't even be considered a bug because software developers were taking advantage of an undocumented behavior of the TLB in...
    
16. 'Worthy of the hype' was the wrong iQuestion to answer. iPhone 2.0 will likely be worth the wait - 2007-06-29 13:29:22-04
    Maybe I need to go back on the same iMeds that everyone else appears to be on. Without laying my hands on an iPhone, my sense is that the early reviews are for the most part iNuts. In fact, it's almost surreal how all of them seem to answer the very basic question of whether the handset actually lives up to the hype that preceded it: The NYT's David Pogue: The iPhone Matches Most of its Hype USA Today's Ed Baig: Apple's iPhone isn't perfect, but it's worthy of the Hype Steven Levy, Newsweek: …one of the most hyped consumer products ever comes pretty close to justifying the bombast. On balance, Pogue, Baig, Levy and Mossberg (the last of which...
    
17. The iPhone Missing Manual preview offers a few tips and tricks - 2007-06-29 13:44:42-04
    I made it through the night with about an hours sleep in the rain under an umbrella as I wait in position 1 at my local AT&T store. I have been assembling a list of things to check out, downloaded and installed iTunes 7.3, and have played games (primarily UNO) and chatted with my two daughters over the last 17 hours. We only have just over 7 more hours to buy the iPhone and I just received an email linking to some cool tips and tricks from David Pogue. The iPhone Missing Manual Sneak Preview gives you plenty to think about as you plan to use your new iPhone. If you are waiting in line and have an internet...
    
18. MonkCast #7: GPLv3 Day is here, Web APIs (good for business?) & nary an iPhone mention - 2007-06-29 13:55:12-04
    OK, so the iPhone was mentioned twice, but in very fleeting moments without any substance whatsoever (it could just have well not been mentioned at all and this week's MonkCast would have been no different).  It was refreshing to talk about industry events other than the iPhone and today's MonkCast was largely dominated by discussions of version 3 of the GNU General Public License. Today is apparently GPLv3 day: the day that the license is officially put into product. The new GPL was written to improve on it's predecessor but the process of drafting it has not been without controversy.  In today's MonkCast, Redmonk principal analyst and co-founder Stephen O'Grady talks about the new GPL, how Novell has managed to...
    
19. Shopping for iPhone today? Send me your stories - 2007-06-29 14:38:41-04
    You can send me your stories as Comments to this post. Really would like to know: If you happen to visit an AT&T Wireless or Apple retail store today, or even attempt to order an iPhone online, I'd like to hear how it went for you. Was the store jammed? What about the lines outside the store? Inside the store, was the atmosphere orderly, chaotic, or some of both? Were the salespeople helpful and knowledgeable? What questions did you ask, and how did they answer them? Did the salesperson try to push upgrades on you? Did they listen to you, rather than just recite from a script? If you've ordered online, did the order go smoothly or did the...
    
20. A free Cardo Scala 700LX Bluetooth headset goes to the ZDNet's 12 Deputy Tester - 2007-06-29 15:25:18-04
    It's Friday and you know what means; it's time to pick another ZDNet Deputy Tester of the Week. Our 12th one as a matter of fact. Earlier this week, I issued a clarion call for applications from people wanting to review Cardo's Scala 700LX Bluetooth headset (worth about $65) and ZDNet's readers responded in force. It's pictured to the left and, compared to other headsets on the market, the 700Lx has some unique features (or at least a package of unique features): It can keep track of multiple pairings so you can switch to other phones or bluetooth devices without having to re-pair the device (and delete the other pairings); a cool feature that I wish some of my other...