eWEEK EDITORS

Microsoft announced last week MSN Premium, its latest online service. The service, designed for use with broadband Internet connections, will be available Jan. 8 and offer a range of features, including spam filters, anti-virus capabilities, a firewall, parental controls, photo management, exclusive multimedia content and multiple e-mail accounts. MSN Premium will compete with America Onlines […]

Despite the boom in wireless and broadband Internet access technologies, theres still money to be made in modems, at least of the legal variety. Last week, Townshend Intellectual Property announced it has resolved a patent infringement lawsuit brought by Brent Townshend against Analog Devices for use of 56K-bps modem technology, also known as V.90 or […]

Aside from the unprintable adjectives your help desk staff may use, there are a number of ways IT managers may classify a user: Power user or novice? Executive or worker bee? High maintenance or low? Local or remote? Revenue-producing or cost center? At my company, I recently took part in discussions about varying certain IT […]

Several companies driving next-generation “sneakernets” have banded together to support the key technology, USB flash drives. Little more than a USB controller, flash memory chip, and plastic shell, the USB drives are increasingly being used in place of floppy drives to transfer files between one PC and another. On Monday, the five companies formed the […]

The U.S. Department of Defense last week said it plans to stick to a January 2005 start date for suppliers to start using RFID. The department said it is running two pilots: one supporting field forces and the other supporting the department. Two other pilots are planned. Read the full story at Forbes.com

Ricochet Networks Inc. has been sold to EDL Holdings Inc. for an undisclosed amount. Ricochet expects to double its number of employees over the next year. The company plans to expand wireless coverage in Denver and San Diego by 50 percent in the next few months. Read the full story at DenverPost.com

The Federal Communications Commission last week began looking at AT&T Wireless Services Inc.s difficulties with porting numbers to other carriers. The companys porting error rate was about 60 percent, a company spokesman said. The California Public Utilities Commission also plans to monitor experience of California customers and wireless companies with LNP, said Susan Kennedy, a […]

The Wi-Fi Alliance will fast track the full 802.11e standard, skipping the “Wireless Multimedia Extensions” interim certification. The interim certification will be unnecessary if 802.11e can be released by the IEEE as early as June. The 802.11e standard will synchronize the client device and access points in terms of how they handle queuing, channel access […]

According to the Consumer Electronics Associations eBrain Market Research group, 48 percent of U.S. online consumers who have not installed a wireless network in their homes cited security as a concern. The group also said 48 percent of those consumers who have purchased wireless networking devices were least satisfied with security. Another 12.4 million consumers […]

Microsoft Corp.s MSN division has a lot on its plate. The MSN team, like all Microsoft product units, works simultaneously on different versions of its services. The developers working on the next release of MSN, due out in early 2004, are falling a bit behind schedule. Meanwhile, the ones working on a release of MSN […]

There is a strong case for free software (also known as open source or libre software) being deployed widely in developing countries. As argued in this note, the open source development community provides an environment of intensive interactive skills development at little explicit cost, which is particularly useful for local development of skills, especially in […]

Privacy President Bush on Thursday signed legislation giving consumers new protections against identity theft, including free credit reports and a national fraud-alert system to minimize damage once a theft has occurred. The measure also requires that receipts omit the last digits of credit cards. Opponents of the bill say it pre-empts tougher state privacy laws […]