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Bookworms bootleg, too
Music enthusiasts are not the only ones swapping bootlegged copies of their favorite artists work on the Net. A study by Envisional released last week found that book lovers have made 7,267 pirated e-books available for free download on the Web.
The most-pirated author in the report by the U.K.-based software company is horror writer Stephen King. Among the King titles available on newsgroups and file sharing services such as Gnutella is his latest novel, “Dreamcatcher.”
Also available are all four Harry Potter books from J.K. Rowling, as well as works by Tom Clancy, John Grisham and Douglas Coupland.
On a related note, federal prosecutors last week asked a judge to postpone a hearing in their case against Russian computer programmer Dmitry Sklyarov, who is charged with violating copyright law by writing code that circumvents Adobes e-book security.
Both sides in the case are reportedly discussing a plea bargain.
FireWire Links to An Emmy
Apple Computer last week received the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences Emmy Engineering Award for creating the FireWire high-speed networking connection.
The technology, known by its cross-platform moniker IEEE 1394, is widely used in the TV industry to transport digital images.
Amazon OKs Purchase Order
E-tail poster child Amazon.com has waded deeper into the business-to-business waters. Last week, the company began accepting purchase orders from registered businesses, schools and government agencies.
The move makes it easier for high-volume corporate sales and purchasing agents to conduct business on the site without having to distribute numerous corporate credit cards.
To make the service more appealing to corporate types, Amazon is including features aimed at businesses, including named authorization and consolidated, line-item billing and account history. The site already offers zShops online storefronts and online business essentials such as inventory loading and management tools.