Technology

Chinese Minister Insists Google Abide By the Law

China's top Internet regulator insisted Friday that Google must obey its laws or "pay the consequences," giving no sign of a possible compromise in their dispute over censorship and hacking.

"If you want to do something that disobeys Chinese law and regulations, you are unfriendly, you are irresponsible and you will have to pay the consequences," Li Yizhong, the minister of Industry and Information Technology, said on the sidelines of China's annual legislature.

Li gave no details of Beijing's talks with Google Inc. over the search engine's January announcement that it planned to stop complying with Chinese Internet censorship rules and might close its China-based site.

"Whether they leave or not is up to them," Li said. "But if they leave, China's Internet market is still going to develop."

China has the world's most populous Internet market, with 384 million people online. Google has about 35 percent of the Chinese search market, compared with about 60 percent for local rival Baidu Inc. Chinese users of Google and even some of China's state-controlled media have warned that the loss of a major competitor could slow the industry's development.

Beijing encourages Internet use for education and business but tries to block access to material deemed subversive or pornographic, including Web sites abroad run by human rights and pro-democracy activists.

Li insisted the government needs to censor Internet content to protect the rights of the country and its people.

"If there is information that harms stability or the people, of course we will have to block it," he said.

Responding to Google's complaints of China-based hacking against its e-mail service and several dozen major companies, Li said the government opposes hacking.

Google CEO Eric Schmidt said Wednesday that the company is in active negotiations with Beijing and expects some resolution in the dispute soon.

Speaking at a conference in the United Arab Emirates,...
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VeriSign Plans $300 Million Tech Overhaul

VeriSign Inc., whose technology is key to allowing Internet users to access Web sites with names ending in ".com" and ".net," plans to spend more than $300 million over the next decade to upgrade its systems.

The upgrades will allow VeriSign's machines to handle up to 4 quadrillion requests per day from computers trying to reach those sites. That's a thousand times more lookups than the 4 trillion per day that the company can currently handle.

Ken Silva, the company's chief technology officer, said Thursday that the latest changes are needed to keep up with ballooning Internet traffic and with spikes in usage caused by major news events and computer attacks.

Traffic volume is expected to soar along with the expansion of technologies such as Internet-connected televisions, navigation systems and video streaming.

VeriSign is in two big businesses that are critical to the functioning of the Internet but both remain largely out of the public's view.

The most recognizable business involves selling "certificates" that Web sites can use to tell Web browsers that they are using encryption to protect data passing between a user's computer and the Web site's servers. That's important for banking and e-commerce sites in protecting customers' data. VeriSign is one of several large vendors of such Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) certificates.

VeriSign also operates the registry of all ".com" and ".net" domain names. That means it's responsible for ensuring that Internet users can reach sites registered with those names.

When someone enters a Web address into a browser, the traffic doesn't go directly to servers operated by that Web site. It often has to go through servers operated by VeriSign and other companies to translate the written name, such as verisign.com, into a numeric Internet Protocol, or IP, address that computers can understand.

The last major infrastructure upgrade VeriSign announced was in 2007, when...
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Online Censorship Is Getting Craftier

Repressive regimes have stepped up efforts to censor the Internet and jail dissidents, Reporters Without Borders said in a study out Thursday.

China, Iran and Tunisia, which are on the group's "Enemies of the Internet" list, got more sophisticated at censorship and overcoming dissidents' attempts to communicate online, said Reporters Without Borders' Washington director, Clothilde Le Coz.

Meanwhile, Turkey and Russia found themselves on the group's "Under Surveillance" list of nations in danger of making the main enemies list.

Although Zimbabwe and Yemen dropped from the surveillance list, that was primarily because the Internet isn't used much in either country, rather than because of changes by the governments, Le Coz said.

Reporters Without Borders issued the third annual report ahead of Friday's World Day Against Cyber Censorship, an awareness campaign organized by the Paris-based group.

Le Coz said repressive regimes seemed to be winning a technological tussle with dissidents who try to circumvent online restrictions. She said some U.S. technology companies have been aiding the regimes by selling equipment and filtering software that could be used for such censorship.

One sign of hope: Google Inc.'s public threats to leave China if the Silicon Valley powerhouse cannot reach a deal that lets the company offer search results there free of censorship.

"A year from now, I would be happy to tell you that Google opened the path," Le Coz said. "That's a bit idealistic."

In fact, she worries that more democratic nations would be joining the list.

Australia is among the countries under the group's surveillance for its efforts to require Internet service providers to block sites that the government deems inappropriate, including child pornography and instructions in crime or drug use. Critics are worried that the list of sites to be blocked and the reasons for doing so would be kept secret, opening the possibility that legitimate sites might...
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Intel Core i7 Extreme Boosts Portable Workstations

Intel this week offered a preview of platforms using its Core i7 Extreme Edition processor. Although the company is aiming the processor heavily at the gaming market, analysts said there are also clear business applications for the processor.

Code-named Gulftown, the i7-980X Extreme Edition processor is the industry's first 32nm, six-core processor with 12 computing threads. Intel introduced the i7 family last September with its exclusive Turbo Boost technology and Hyper-Threading Technology.

Turbo Boost is built into the latest-generation Nehalem micro-architecture and automatically allows processor cores to run faster than the base operating frequency if the chip is operating below power, current and temperature specification limits. Hyper-Threading Technology, along with Turbo Boost, works to increase performance of both multi-threaded and single-threaded workloads.

Portable Workstation Benefits

"The Core i7 chip has a special sensor built into it. If it detects that an application that would benefit from high throughput is launched, it can actually boost the clock speed and throughput of the chip by about 10 to 15 percent," said Charles King, principal analyst at Pund-IT. "So if you've got a graphics application where you need an extra oomph, the Turbo Boost can give you that extra kick-start to get a little bit better performance."

This is a clear win on the gaming front, but King said it also shines in the portable workstation market. With a Core i7 chip featuring Turbo Boost, engineers can take their workstation on the road without losing speed or productivity. A second business application for the Core i7 is support for HDMI high-definition video output in notebooks. King pointed to Dell's Vostro 3000 laptops, announced last week, as a prime example.

"If you are an executive or high-end salesperson who's going out on calls, this gives you the ability to run sophisticated graphics applications, high-def video, and other kinds of...
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Microsoft Xbox 360 Leads Gaming Sales in February

Microsoft's Xbox 360 video-game console moved to the top of the U.S. market in February. The software giant's console had been number two behind the Nintendo Wii for nearly three years.

The popularity of the new BioShock 2 game may have been behind Microsoft's sales of 422,000 Xbox 360s in February, an eight percent increase from a year earlier, according to NPD Group. Nintendo sold 397,900 Wiis and Sony sold 360,100 PlayStation 3 consoles in February.

The BioShock 2 game for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 was released on Feb. 10 and sold 750,000 units. Of those, 75 percent, or 562,900, were for the Xbox 360.

"We're excited about the biggest February in Xbox 360 history," said Dennis Durkin, COO of Microsoft's interactive entertainment business, in an e-mail. "We know consumers are hungry for our 2010 portfolio of exclusive blockbuster games, industry-leading online experiences over Xbox LIVE, and for the holiday release of Project Natal for Xbox 360."

A Sense of Excitement

While BioShock 2 has created a buzz among gamers, so have sensing controllers. Microsoft's Project Natal system will let Xbox players use body motions to control the game instead of pressing buttons or waving a controller.

Microsoft wasted no time in getting celebrities to praise Project Natal's potential. Boxer Sugar Ray Leonard called the technology "amazing"; former NFL quarterback Willie Gault said it was one of the "most realistic game experiences" he has had; and pro beach volleyball player Misty-May Treanor said it's great for someone who, like her, is in physical therapy.

This week, Sony revealed additional information about its own new motion-control sensor. Dubbed the PlayStation Move, Sony first provided details last June. The controller allows PS3 gamers to use an Eye web camera and a wand to detect motion.

The controller will be packaged as a starter kit...
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iPad Will Read Books Aloud, Support Open EPUB Format

Eager to be the first on your block with an iPad? Apple started taking orders for the tablets on Friday. Wi-Fi models running from $499 to $699 will be available on April 3; 3G models, costing $629 to $829, won't be available until late April.

Along with the advance orders, Apple released some details on what's expected to be a key app for the new device -- e-books. Promoting the iBooks feature of the iPad, Apple's web site explains, "iBooks works with VoiceOver, the screen reader in iPad, so it can read you the contents of any page. Even with all these extras, reading is so natural on iPad, the technology seems to disappear."

The site also promotes iBooks as a totally new reading experience. "Turn iPad to portrait to view a single page. Or view two pages at once by rotating to landscape. Change the text size. Even change the font. Touch and hold any word to look it up in the built-in dictionary or Wikipedia, or to search for it throughout the book and on the web," the site says.

Support for EPUB Format

And in a positive sign for open-source books, Apple announced the iPad will support the EPUB format for digital books -- even those that are not offered through Apple's e-commerce sites.

"The iBooks app uses the EPUB format -- the most popular open book format in the world," Apple's site says. "That makes it easy for publishers to create iBook versions of your favorite reads. And you can add free EPUB titles to iTunes and sync them to the iBooks app on your iPad."

EPUB features advanced presentation for digital books, including in-line raster and vector images, embedded metadata, digital-rights management support, and Cascading Style Sheets styling.

Authors Demand a Voice

That support could go a long way to making the...
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Geolocation Stars at South by Southwest

What's likely to be the hottest tech trend at this weekend's trendy South by Southwest Interactive in Austin, the powwow that has become a launch pad for the coolest, hippest new technology? Location, location, location.

The conference is shaping up to be a coming-out party for Foursquare, an application that lets people flag where they are -- and for the entire category of fledgling geo-location services. A bumper crop of services, notably Gowalla, Brightkite, Loopt and Where.com, are being embraced by smartphone owners to socialize and play games.

Venture capitalists are pouring in money. Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers has invested $9.5 million in Booyah, maker of a location-based social-gaming iPhone app.

"This is the year of location (at the show)," says Booyah CEO Keith Lee. Last week, Twitter said it would supply developers with richer geo-location data. In January, review site Yelp added a check-in option to its iPhone app. About 5 percent of iPhone apps have location services. Facebook officials won't comment, but independent tech analyst Greg Sterling and others expect it to soon add location-sharing features.

The service with the most buzz is the year-old Foursquare, with just 500,000 users.

Foursquare players earn points by visiting restaurants, bars or museums in major cities. The payoffs range from special deals to Boy Scout-like badges and "mayorships," essentially bragging rights for hanging out at certain locations. "This isn't mainstream, but it's the talk of tech insiders," says Sterling.

To build buzz as Twitter did a few years ago, the services are using the show to reach the general public. Last year, Foursquare benefited from a marketing blitz in which it doled out special badges, digital mayorships and other goodies. This year, rival Gowalla is throwing a big party with Lance Armstrong's LiveStrong foundation, and it has a partnership with Chevrolet.

"All the early...
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Palm Teeters in Crowded Smartphone Market

Last year, Palm thought it had all the pieces for a turnaround in the market it pioneered: A new CEO known for making the iPod a household name, a sleek new smart phone called the Pre and fresh, intuitive operating software.

Instead, the company is in danger of going the way of its 1990s Palm Pilot, making it the latest innovator to learn that great technology and an accomplished leader don't guarantee success.

Several analysts say Palm Inc. might not remain an independent phone maker for more than a year or two. It just could be too late to stop the momentum enjoyed by Apple Inc.'s iPhone and Research In Motion Ltd.'s BlackBerrys -- not to mention a growing crop of phones running Google Inc.'s Android software.

Palm spokesman Derick Mains said the company had no comment.

Consumers have gravitated toward smart phones for their versatile features, such as Internet access and applications that can be downloaded. One out of six U.S. adults had a smart phone last year, according to Forrester Research.

But Palm -- a leader in the early days of handheld computing -- was slow to adapt. It began fighting back in earnest in January 2009 at the International Consumer Electronics Show. It unveiled the stylish touch-screen Pre and webOS, software that allows Palm phones to do something the iPhone can't -- run multiple apps simultaneously.

Ed Colligan, who was then Palm's CEO, said at the time that the new products somewhat marked a relaunching of Palm itself. But it hasn't gone as smoothly as Palm hoped.

Palm released the Pre last June, for use on Sprint Nextel Corp.'s wireless network, and followed it in November with a cheaper model, the Pixi. Verizon Wireless started selling upgraded models of these phones in January, and AT&T Inc. plans to offer webOS phones later this year.

Despite...
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New iPhone OS Rumored To Finally Allow Multitasking

Version 4.0 of the operating system for Apple's iPhone, iPod touch, and the forthcoming iPad will represent a major overhaul of the software and will feature a "full-on solution" to one long-standing gripe about Apple's devices -- their inability to multitask.

At least that is the latest rumor making the rounds, as reported by the AppleInsider blog. The site attributes the report to "people with a proven track record" in predicting Apple's next moves.

AppleInsider's sources offered no details, however, on how the company will deliver multitasking without compromising battery life, efficient memory usage, and security.

Multitasking Manager

Users will see a multitasking manager that "leverages interface technology" already bundled with the Mac OS X, according to AppleInsider. The site added that the operating system is still early in development and has a "way to go" before its ready for release.

The lack of full multitasking on the iPhone is not strictly a technology problem. The current iPhone 3.x software is a multitasking operating system, but Apple artificially restricts third-party applications from running in the background.

This is an intentional choice Apple made in version 2.x of the software as part of the security model. By cutting off apps when the user hits the hardware button or answers an incoming call, third-party apps cannot run in the background, which effectively eliminates much of the risk of viruses and spyware.

No Background Music

The downside is that users are irritated by the phone's behavior. For instance, users playing music via the Pandora music-streaming app, or listening to audio feeds of baseball games via the MLB.com app -- just the type of content that works best in the background -- cannot switch to games or productivity apps while listening to audio streams.

Other apps that users want to be able to run in the background are instant messaging programs (other...
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FTC Probing Google's Planned AdMob Acquisition

U.S. regulators are reportedly digging deeper into Google's planned AdMob acquisition. The Federal Trade Commission is asking for sworn statements from the search giant's competitors and advertisers in what could signal plans to hold up the merger. The news comes as part of a wave of government scrutiny against the maturing company.

According to Bloomberg News, the FTC is seeking to learn whether Google's proposed purchase of the mobile-ad technology provider would lessen competition in the market for Internet advertising on mobile phones. The FTC couldn't immediately be reached for comment.

Bloomberg didn't identify the names of two companies that said they were asked to sign statements for the probe. However, it's likely that the FTC spoke with companies like Microsoft, Yahoo, Jumptap and Millenial Media, all of which have stakes in this growing space.

Will Google Dominate Mobile?

"We're continuing to talk with the FTC and provide the information that they've asked for, but we're not going to discuss the details of that process," a Google spokesperson said. "We're confident that they'll conclude that the rapidly growing mobile-advertising space will remain highly competitive after this deal closes."

Google announced plans to acquire AdMob for $750 million in stock in November. Although the FTC is concerned that the acquisition would reduce competition, Google painted a win-win picture, predicting the acquisition would enhance the company's expertise and technology in mobile advertising and give advertisers and publishers more choice in the emerging mobile market.

Google is jockeying for position in a mobile market that is projected to be worth billions in just a few years. Jupiter Research issued a recent report, Mobile Advertising: Delivery Channels, Business Models & Forecasts, that predicts the mobile-advertising market will grow to $5.7 billion by 2014.

According to IDC, if the Google-AdMob merger is approved, it would create the mobile-advertising industry's largest company....
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Verizon Expects a 4G Smartphone Earlier Than Planned

Verizon Wireless hopes to debut its first 4G smartphone in the middle of next year, months earlier than planned, a company executive revealed Wednesday. The new handset will debut about three to six months after its Long-Term Evolution network launches, Verizon Wireless CTO Anthony Melone told The Wall Street Journal.

That timetable suggests Verizon sees 4G as a significant way to outpace its leading rival, AT&T.

"With AT&T's timetable for 2012 or 2013 and Verizon still on track for next year, that shows a pretty big head start for Big Red," said Ramon Llamas, mobile-devices senior analyst for IDC Research.

Data Cards First

Verizon's LTE will be available to some 4G users via laptop cards before the phones debut, Melone told the Journal. Verizon has reportedly been testing 4G coverage in Boston and Seattle, and LTE is planed for 10 to 30 U.S. markets by the end of next year, an area that includes 100 million people.

In December, Verizon promised that LTE's capabilities "will be unmatched in the marketplace, allowing customers to do things never before possible in a wireless environment" with average data rates per user of five to 12 Mbps for download and two to five Mbps for upload.

That would top the existing 4G network operated by Sprint Nextel, which boasts of 2.4-Mbps downloads and 153-Kbps uploads.

"If you look at Verizon's position on LTE, they are not just planning for smartphones but for other consumer electronics devices," Llamas said. "The usual evolution of things is that when you come out with a faster network, you go to data cards first and then to mobile phones."

AT&T is moving more deliberately to the next generation. The company's CEO, Randall Stephenson, recently told a technology investors' conference, "We're not in a tremendous hurry on LTE," but will instead rely on current technology for...
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'Nobel of Computing' Goes To Early PC Designer

A Microsoft Corp. researcher won the $250,000 Turing Award, one of technology's most coveted prizes, on Tuesday for his work helping design and build what is widely considered the first modern personal computer.

While at Xerox Corp.'s famed Palo Alto Research Center, or PARC, in the 1970s, Charles Thacker led the hardware development for the Alto, which featured innovative display and other technologies that helped inspire future generations of computers.

Thacker, 67, was also co-inventor of the Ethernet networking technology for connecting computers, which is still widely used.

Thacker said he would probably donate the money to his alma mater, the University of California, Berkeley.

"I was flabbergasted," he said in an interview Tuesday. "I frankly never expected to get the award, because it wasn't given to people like me. Most of the people who have gotten the Turing award in the past few years are software people or theoreticians. There are scant few people who have actually built some hardware."

Other recent winners include Internet pioneers Vint Cerf and Robert Kahn, and Doug Engelbart, the inventor of the computer mouse.

The Turing Award is funded by Google Inc. and Intel Corp. It is named for the mathematician Alan Turing and is administered by Association for Computing Machinery.

The association's president, Wendy Hall, said that Thacker is "one of the most distinguished computer systems engineers in the history of the field" and that his innovations have "profoundly affected the course of modern computing."
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CA Expands Cloud Services with $350M Nimsoft Purchase

IT software behemoth CA has acquired yet another company as it moves to provide its emerging enterprise customers and managed-service providers with cloud-computing support. CA acquired Redwood City, Calif.-based Nimsoft, its fourth acquisition in the cloud-computing space, in a cash purchase valued at $350 million, CA announced Wednesday.

Nimsoft, a provider of monitoring systems used in data centers, is the fourth company that CA, formerly Computer Associates, has acquired in the past nine months. CA plans to integrate Nimsoft's assets into its cloud products and solutions business.

The acquisition, expected to close by March 31, will enable CA to tap into Nimsoft's more than 300 managed-service customers such as Hitachi, Barclays Capital, and Amway and its emerging enterprise customers (with revenues between $300 million and $2 billion).

Perfect Marriage or Bad Move

Nimsoft's reporting and monitoring technology has been used in public cloud services such as Google Apps for Business, Amazon Web Services, and Salesforce.com. Its technology has also been used in internal applications and in both physical and virtual server environments.

CA's new acquisition is only one piece to its larger cloud-computing puzzle. CA acquired Cassatt, NetQoS and Oblicore, and last month announced plans to acquire 3Tera.

While Nimsoft attracted a solid customer base, it was having difficulties keeping up with the fast-moving market. Nimsoft hired both engineers and salespeople, but not fast enough, according to CEO Gary Read.

"We were already hiring additional salespeople and engineers as fast as we could, but there is a natural limit to how rapidly you can scale a business without breaking those things that are important to us, customer satisfaction being the top of the list," Read said.

When he was approached by CA, Read said, he was hesitant to begin any talks. That changed once CA told Nimsoft executives that the company was committed...
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Google CEO: Resolution in China Dispute 'Soon'

Google Inc.'s CEO said Wednesday the Internet search company is in active negotiations with the Chinese government and expects some resolution in its dispute with Beijing soon.

Speaking at a media conference in the Middle East, Eric Schmidt declined to provide specifics or predict how long the discussions would last, saying that the company has decided not to publicize details of the talks.

"I can't really say anything other than that we're in active negotiations with the Chinese government, and there is no specific timetable," Schmidt told reporters in the United Arab Emirates capital of Abu Dhabi. "Something will happen soon."

Google's comments come just days after China dismissed reports that talks were underway over the company's threat to shut down its China-based search service unless the government relented on censorship.

On Saturday, Chinese vice minister of industry and information technology Miao Wei was quoted as saying that there had been no negotiations with Google.

The Mountain View, Calif.-based Internet company said in January it was alarmed by hacking attacks on it and other companies that appeared to originate from China. Google also complained about attempts that apparently were made to access the Gmail accounts of human rights dissidents.

The dispute has prompted a broader debate about China's controls over the Internet.

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton has criticized China's censorship, leading China's Foreign Ministry to say her remarks damaged bilateral relations. The U.S. Congress has been holding hearings about Google, China and Web freedom.

In his comments Wednesday, Schmidt denied that Google's dispute was prompted by Washington.

"The Google action was not in any way advanced or coordinated with the U.S. government except post-facto," he said in response to questions. "Google's discussions are with the Chinese government, and they do not involve the U.S. government. The U.S. government's doing its thing unrelated to Google."

Schmidt was speaking at...
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Microsoft Highlights Assistive Technology for Seniors

Not even the vibrancy of the city that never sleeps could get lifelong New Yorker Milton Greidinger to leave his home. Chronic illness kept Greidinger, 86, from participating in outside activities. Loneliness set in. "I was just waiting for my time to finish," Greidinger says.

Now Greidinger, a former department store salesman, has revived some social interests with the help of a private-public partnership between Microsoft and the City of New York that introduces seniors to computer, video, and Internet technology in their homes. The program, known as the Virtual Senior Center, uses technology to fight social isolation and give older, homebound New Yorkers better access to community services.

Working with the Benjamin Rosenthal Senior Center in Flushing, Queens, Microsoft equipped a group of seniors, aged 67 to 103, with a range of technology gadgets and assistive technology to help them function.

For New York, as with cities facing budget shortfalls across the country, a private-public partnership may be a cost-effective way to deliver higher-quality services to a rapidly aging population. "We want to make New York City the most age-friendly city in the nation," says Marah Rhoades, Assistant Commissioner of New York's Department for the Aging.

Microsoft's Model for Urban Seniors

New York City is home to 1.3 million seniors. About 20,000 need a range of services, from home-delivered meals to medicine dispensing. The city's 60-and-over population is set to jump 50 percent in the next 25 years, according to the Department for the Aging. In fact, the expected rise in the number of people 65 and older will outpace the total population increase in every state, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

Redmond [Wash.)-based Microsoft can use such partnerships to bring its software and services to a wider range of customers. "Even in a large city like New York, people can...
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Target Launches Mobile-Coupon Program

Using your cell phone during checkout at Target could soon earn you discounts.

Starting Wednesday, the giant retailer will allow customers to take advantage of special mobile-coupon offers on their handsets.

The coupon is redeemed when the bar code on the phone is scanned at checkout. Offers are good only once and expire on the dates listed. "We believe it's a competitive advantage for us," says Target.com President Steve Eastman.

Target says it will be the first major nationwide retailer to exploit the bar-code technology in all its stores. It almost certainly won't be the last.

For example, J.C. Penney is testing similar scanner-based technology at 16 point-of-sale registers in Houston. But at the rest of its stores, checkout clerks still must manually enter alphanumeric codes tied to discount coupons, rather than using scanners.

Scanning bar codes makes the process faster and easier, says Dan Kihanya, vice president of consumer marketing at Cellfire, the mobile-coupon company working with J.C. Penney on its Houston tests. "Any time you have data entry, you have to worry about errors."

Mobile coupons, while not new, are still in their relative infancy. "It's an area ripe for growth," says ABI Research analyst Neil Strother. Not everyone clips coupons, virtually or otherwise. But most people crave a bargain when the economy is tough. And coupon technology works with more and more cell phones.

U.K.-based Juniper Research recently forecast that more than 1-in-10 mobile subscribers in developed regions around the world will use mobile coupons by 2014, generating nearly $6 billion in redemption value.

Kihanya of Cellfire says mobile coupons are redeemed at a 5% to 20% rate, compared with about 1% for print coupons. Cellfire does much of its business with grocery chains, such as Kroger and Safeway.

Shoppers interested in Target's program must "opt in" by registering at the company's online or mobile Web...
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IBM Develops Earth-Friendly Plastic

When you recycle a plastic bottle, it doesn't necessarily become another plastic bottle.

Because of limitations in recycling technology, a common type of plastic used in water bottles and food containers weakens so much when it's recycled that it can't be used again for the same purpose. Some small amount of the plastic might make it into another bottle, but more often than not, it instead becomes synthetic carpet or clothing and can't easily be recycled a second time. So when those products are used up, they end up in landfills.

Researchers from IBM Corp. and Stanford University believe they have developed a way to significantly improve the quality of recycled plastic and strip away those limitations.

A new recycling method the researchers are announcing Tuesday involves a way to break the plastic down so that it can be reused again and again in the same form. It is an advancement that could intrigue beverage companies and help cut the environmental damage from making plastic from scratch.

The innovation is a new family of catalysts that can reduce polyethylene terephthalate (PET) plastic to its basic building blocks, while retaining its original properties and making it "ridiculously economical" to build it back up again, said Bob Allen, senior manager of chemistry and functional materials for IBM's Almaden research center in Silicon Valley.

The project is in the laboratory on a small scale. Researchers are planning a bigger pilot at the King Abdul Aziz City for Science and Technology, home to Saudi Arabia's national laboratories. Allen said the technology could be commercially available within five years if the pilot goes well.

A critical question will be the price of the technology.

Andrew Williamson, a director with the venture capital firm Physic Ventures who has seen IBM's research, said it could help solve one of the biggest challenges facing food...
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As Ballmer Praises Apple, EFF Cites Stiff App Store Rules

With the stakes high in Microsoft's bid to add its search engine to the iPhone, a few words of praise by the software giant's CEO have drawn a considerable amount of attention.

"Apple's done a very nice job that allows people to monetize and commercialize their intellectual property" in the App Store, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer told a University of Washington audience last week.

Playing Bing-o

Although Ballmer was stating the obvious, observers and analysts quickly surmised that he was trying to sweeten the waters in advance of Apple's decision on whether to replace Google with Microsoft's Bing as the default search engine on the iPhone operating system.

Business Week reported in January that the two giants were in negotiations for that deal. Asked by Reuters about the prospects after unveiling the Windows 7 Phone Series last month, Ballmer said, "I hear the same rumors you do."

The App Store has more than 130,000 products for sale or free, fueling the sale of iPods and iPhones and creating a user experience that other smartphone manufacturers have tried to emulate. Microsoft's Windows Marketplace for Mobile has less than 1,000 apps.

No Denying It

"It would appear that Microsoft is no longer in denial about what Apple has accomplished," said Michael Gartenberg of the Altimeter Group, a technology consulting firm. "The question is, will Microsoft be able to drive a wedge between Apple and Google and find a new and unlikely ally in the mobile space?"

As Ballmer praised the App Store, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), a San Francisco-based nonprofit, launched a broadside against Apple by publishing the company's 28-page developer licensing agreement on its web site.

Since NASA now has an iPhone app, the group cleverly filed a Freedom of Information Act request for the agreement that the government agency signed with Apple.

'Major Shift'

"The entire family of devices built...
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In College, Is Better Education Just a Click Away?

The students in Michael Dubson's physics class at the University of Colorado fell silent as a multiple choice question flashed on a screen, sending them scrambling for small white devices on their desks.

Within seconds, a monitor on Dubson's desk told him that 92 percent of the class had correctly answered the question on kinetic energy, a sign that they grasped the concept.

Clickers -- not unlike gadgets used on television game shows -- first appeared in college classrooms over a decade ago and have since spread to just about every college and university in the country thanks to cheaper and better technology.

But as clickers have become commonplace, a divide has emerged over just how sophisticated they should be.

Some professors like Dubson endorse simple, straightforward devices that stick to multiple choice questions. Others embrace fancier models or newer applications for smart phones and laptops that allow students to query the professor by text or e-mail during the lecture or conduct discussion with classmates -- without the cost of purchasing a clicker.

Those preferring simplicity say pared-down remotes reduce distractions in a multitasking world, while others say fighting the march to smart phones and digital tablets is a losing battle.

Clickers first gained popularity in large science lecture halls as a way of gauging whether students understood the material. They have since migrated into smaller classrooms and can be found in nursing and other professional schools. Even middle schools and high schools are using them.

Research at the college level has found that students like using the devices and attendance often goes up. But results are mixed when it comes to learning. Some evidence suggests clicker use has led to only modest gains in retention and test scores, while other studies have detected little or no improvement, according to a November article in the North American...
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Sony, Samsung Join Campaign To Push 3-D TV Sets

On the heels of the big 3-D television presence at the Consumer Electronics Show in January, Sony and Samsung are joining Panasonic, LG Electronics, and others in promoting the new technology. On Tuesday, Sony said it is aiming for 10 percent of its TV sales within the next year to be 3-D models, and Samsung announced a range of HDTV sets and Blu-ray players will ship later this month.

At a press conference Tuesday in New York City, Samsung announced what it described as the "world's first available full HD 3D LED TV," as well as a variety of related 3-D home entertainment products.

'World's First HDTV App Store'

Under a new promotion, buyers of a Samsung 3-D TV and 3-D Blu-ray player or home theater system will get a "3-D starter kit" with two pairs of 3-D glasses and a 3-D version of DreamWorks Animation's Monsters vs Aliens. The manufacturer also said it plans to make available a 3-D version of the studio's popular Shrek film series.

Samsung's 3-D offerings include 46- and 55-inch LED TVs being released this month, and others to be rolled out over the next several months. It also touted the 240-Hz refresh rate and Internet connectivity in the new models, as well as access to the "world's first HDTV app store," Samsung Apps.

On Wednesday, Panasonic will start selling its first 3-D TV in the U.S. in a partnership with Best Buy, while Samsung is also launching a 3-D TV and Blu-ray player offer with that retailer. LG said Tuesday it will begin offering its new 3-D sets in India.

Sony's first sales will be in June in Japan, and the company hasn't announced launch plans for the new products in the U.S. It has also said it will be releasing a software update for the PlayStation 3,...
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HP Swipes at iPad as 'Watered Down' as Rivals Line Up

Competitors in the fast-moving tablet-computer category are lining up to take on Apple's iPad. Hewlett-Packard is the latest to preview its upcoming slate product, and other companies like Lenovo, Sony, Dell and Acer are similarly positioning their products.

The HP tablet runs Windows 7, and was first previewed by Microsoft at the Consumer Electronics Show in January. HP published some details on its company blog last month and updated the information with a posting Monday that includes two promotional videos. The videos show a tablet device running Flash and responding to hand gestures.

'Not a Watered-Down Internet'

The positioning by tablet makers comes a few weeks before the iPad goes on sale in early April. On Sunday night, Apple showed its first iPad TV ad during the Academy Awards. It showcased the device's ease of use for e-mails, movies, music, photos, news reading, and web searching.

But the iPad is being criticized for several shortcomings, and the posting on the HP blog by Personal Systems Group Chief Technology Officer Phil McKinney emphasized some of those differences.

The HP slate product, McKinney wrote, gives "a full web browsing experience in the palm of your hand," not a "watered-down Internet." In particular, he noted, it has full support for Adobe's ubiquitous Flash technology.

Not coincidentally, Apple's mobile devices do not support Flash, which is used for most of the animation and much of the video shown on the web. In addition to being Flash-less, the iPad also doesn't have a webcam, HDMI high-definition output, GPS or multitasking.

Tablets from Smartphone Makers?

Ross Rubin, director of industry analysis for consumer technology at the NPD Group, noted that the apparent rush of competition following the iPad announcement in January is really the latest in a "long history of tablet-based computing devices." To date, no tablet product has been particularly successful, so...
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Building Your Own Computer: Not Just for Nerds

Buy a standard off-the-shelf computer and you're probably making compromises. It's rare to find a pre-configured system that meets your needs to a tee.

The simplest way to make sure that every piece of technology in a new desktop PC fits your requirements is to build it yourself. You don't have to be a nerd to manage the task anymore, either. The key thing is to enter into the planning stage by ensuring that the individual pieces -- the components -- are compatible with one another.

The key components of any PC are the case, power supply, motherboard and processor (including fans and heat conductive paste), memory, graphics cards, optical drive, and hard drive.

"Once you have these components, you can create a PC system that would suffice for most users," says Christian Kissinger from German electronics specialists Conrad Elektronik.

Each one of the components listed above is available in hundreds of variants. Deciding which one should grace the inside of your new creation is largely a matter of determining what kind of tasks the computer will be performing. A computer being used just for email messages and surfing the net doesn't require the horsepower under the hood that a gaming PC needs, for example.

Evaluating the individual components is thus a relatively important part of the process, says Josef Reitberger from the computer magazine Chip, but it can also be fun. He suggests checking the top products lists in well-known magazines.

Reitberger feels the challenge of physically constructing the PC itself is often overblown. "Good cases are constructed so that amateur tinkerers just have to tighten a few screws," he notes. And those even usually come included with delivery.

The process is a key part of the PC.

If you've already decided on a specific model, then the next step is finding a suitable motherboard. Once that...
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IT Workers on Leave Amid School Webcam Probe

Two information-technology workers at a suburban Philadelphia school district that secretly activated webcams on students' school-issued laptops are on paid leave amid an FBI wiretap investigation.

Lower Merion School District officials have said the webcams were only activated to locate missing laptops, and not for any rogue purpose.

"Placing them on administrative leave with pay is not a reflection of any wrongdoing on their part. It is a standard, prudent step in an investigation such as this one," the district said in a statement Friday, confirming a Philadelphia Inquirer report.

Technician Michael Perbix and systems coordinator Carol Cafiero went on leave two weeks ago, after a student's lawsuit revealed the district practice of taking webcam photos and screen shots when laptops were reported lost or stolen.

The district remotely activated 42 webcams in the last 14 months, successfully locating 18 of the computers. School officials have declined to describe the resulting photographs, or say if any were taken inside student homes. The district has halted the practice amid the lawsuit and resulting state and federal criminal probes.

In the civil suit, Harriton High School student Blake Robbins accuses school officials of invading his privacy by photographing him in his bedroom without permission. A vice principal later approached him, he said, and warned that school officials -- based on webcam photos -- suspected him of selling drugs.

Robbins, 15, denies the drug allegation. He claims Vice Principal Lindy Matsko mistook Mike & Ike candies for illicit pills.

Lower Merion, a wealthy district on Philadelphia's Main Line, spent $21,600 per student in 2008-2009, the most in the Philadelphia region and nearly twice the $11,426 spent on Philadelphia children. The district issues the $1,000 Macintosh laptops to each of the 2,300 students at two high schools.

Robbins' lawyer hopes to win class-action certification, but nearly 500 district parents have signed on...
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Panasonic and Best Buy Plan To Push 3-D TV Sets

In one of the funnier moments of Sunday's Academy Awards, Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin thought they spotted Avatar director James Cameron in the audience. The hosts whipped out 3-D glasses to scan the audience for the man whose top-grossing film has fueled more interest in 3-D viewing.

Common Sight

While the gag got some laughs, it may not be unusual for more people to carry around 3-D glasses this year. All the top manufacturers are planning 3-D television models.

And on Wednesday, Panasonic and Best Buy will kick off a partnership to put more of the struggling Japanese electronics manufacturer's TV sets in U.S. living rooms.

While neither company had posted a news release about the venture as of Monday afternoon, The Wall Street Journal said Monday that Panasonic hopes to revive flagging sales of its plasma sets with the 3-D push, and will offer a large discount for its 50-inch model at $2,500. The same set sells for about $4,800 in Japan. Best Buy will add more than 1,000 display centers in its stores to highlight the experience, the report said.

Panasonic, which trails Samsung, LG Electronics, and Sony in worldwide TV sales, unveiled its VT25 3-D set at January's Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. That set comes with a battery-operated pair of glasses with shutters that create the 3-D effect, unlike previous 3-D technology that relied on color filters and glasses with red and blue lenses.

A Tough Sell?

But with the economy still teetering precipitously, is this a good time for new luxury goods?

"Absolutely," said Avi Greengart, a consumer devices specialist at Current Analysis. "Vendors are always searching for premium features that keep them from competing solely on cost. While it is true that unemployment is high and there is still a stigma attached to extravagant luxuries, a $2,500 price tag hardly...
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Verizon Reports Faster Speeds in 4G LTE Network Tests

Six months after launching trials of its new 4G Long Term Evolution network, Verizon Wireless has reported wireless data speeds faster than its own and competitors' existing networks. The recorded speeds are also faster than any competitors' promised 3G network speeds.

Trials in Boston and Seattle show the LTE network is able to hold peak download speeds of 40 to 50 megabits per second and peak upload speeds of 20 to 25 megabits per second, the New Jersey-based wireless carrier announced Monday.

Verizon's development of LTE began in August in response to consumer demands for more bandwidth and richer applications. Since then, engineers have been testing the LTE network in both cities with voice calls, web browsing, file uploads and downloads, and voice calls using Voice over Internet Protocol.

A Faster, Richer, Experience

The next-generation 4G cellular technology is more than 10 times faster than 3G and has enhanced security.

Verizon said it will be the first to roll out LTE this year, and boasted that the new network will have superior coverage and performance, thanks to its 700-MHz national deployment in 49 states, including Hawaii.

The company has an aggressive rollout plan for its LTE network, according to CTO Tony Melone, who said Verizon plans to deploy the network to approximately 100 million people in 25 to 30 markets by the end of the year.

The company already is in the process of installing LTE equipment at switching centers and cell sites throughout the nation as part of its investment in its voice and data infrastructure.

Analysts expect LTE to grow faster than past mobile standards. LTE is expected to take four years to reach 100 million subscriptions, which is two years less than it took for High Speed Packet Access to reach the same number of subscriptions.

LTE subscriptions worldwide will grow at...
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