eWEEK EDITORS

In what many say is a sign of a maturing industry, several new products designed to debug, stress-test and monitor Web-based applications will be in the spotlight this week. Among the expected announcements at the Software Test Automation Conference in San Jose, Calif., is the release of Functional Testing Tool, a code name for a […]

London bookmakers traditionally make money even when others, notably their customers, dont. Now, according to The Sunday Telegraph, thanks to heavy investments in online gaming—which hasnt taken off as expected—and offshore operations, these shops are feeling pinched. A slowdown in telephone betting also is hurting these firms. Two of them have even decided to postpone […]

Sentiment about the economy has turned decidedly negative, causing investors to shun many stocks in our index. The index fell 7.6 percent for the week ended Feb. 28—its fourth consecutive decline, down 28 percent year to date. Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan Greenspan reinforced the bleak outlook when he told Congress last week that current […]

Superheroes needing a place to change may have to turn to cyberspace for privacy. Not only are telephone booths disappearing, the pay phone itself is fast becoming the dinosaur of telecommunications. Corporate executives in the pay-phone industry said they hope offering Internet access and seeking regulatory protection will let them escape the stranglehold with which […]

When Phil Zimmermann published Pretty Good Privacy, one of the first encrypted e-mail programs, in 1991, he had no idea it would become the most popular product of its kind. Nor did he know that it would spark a three-year investigation by the U.S. government into whether he had broken federal laws against exporting strong […]

Claude Shannon was a curious man, a juggler who rode his unicycle in the hallways of AT&T Bell Laboratories and the mathematician who laid the foundation for all digital communications back when the biggest pipes could carry only 1,800 voice conversations at a time. He died Feb. 24 at the age of 84. Shannons seminal […]

If you want to tell the difference between a principle and a platitude, invert a statement and see if the result sounds absurd. If no one could possibly support the opposing sentiment, the original statement is merely a platitude that adds no value to a discussion. Thats our take on Microsofts statements on open-source software […]

Now we did it. We talked to people involved in Linux and probably landed ourselves on an FBI list suspected of anti-American activities. After all, in the eyes of Microsofts Jim Allchin, Linux and other forms of open-source technology are almost threats to the nation. “Im an American,” Allchin was recently quoted as saying. “I […]

Technically theyre still phone companies, but traditional providers of voice services are making more and more of their money these days by selling data services. And theyre partnering to a greater extent than ever before with data integrators who can provide necessary back-end connections, as well as voice integrators making the switch to data services. […]

We live in a nation where the winner of the most powerful office in the land may have been decided by a lousy user interface. So, if typical Americans have trouble choosing the right options on a butterfly ballot — a sheet of paper with four arrows on the left, four arrows on the right […]

Thats Rich Heres a little factoid that wasnt included in all those press releases earlier this month about Microsoft Chief Operating Officer Bob Herbold resigning —former Silicon Graphics Chief Executive Rick Belluzzo, whos been at Microsoft for about 18 months, takes his place as COO and also picks up the title of president. Herbold, whos […]

After 20 years in the MCI-WorldCom nest, Omar Leeman decided to fly. He left his safe, lofty job as president of the special markets group at WorldCom to head up a new kind of telecommunications carrier — Talk2 Technology — which is building out a next-gen applications infrastructure that will service telephone and wireless providers […]