Internet Software News

The British boss of Sony's PlayStation division unexpectedly steps down after 15 years. Read more…

PC World - Microsoft and SAP said they will target the health care industry with Duet, software that integrates their desktop and back-end business applications. Read more…

Reuters - Online auction company eBay Inc on Monday named Josh Silverman chief executive of Skype, its Internet telephony unit. Read more…

PC World - Japan has launched a satellite that is able to provide high-speed Internet connections to homes and offices at speeds rivaling those of today's fiber optic connections. Read more…

InfoWorld - Blu-ray Disc may have beaten out HD DVD as the high-definition optical disc format to replace DVDs, but it now faces a new test against Internet downloads, market researchers Gartner and iSuppli said. Read more…

NewsFactor - On Monday, the Cult of the Dead Cow hacker group released an open-source Web auditing tool that aims to let owners check their Web sites for security vulnerabilities. Dubbed the Goolag Scanner, the technology is based on "Google hacking," a form of vulnerability research developed by Johnny I Hack Stuff. Goolag Scanner is a standalone Windows GUI-based application. Read more…

PC World - SAP is expected on Monday to ship a third "enhancement package" to its ERP (enterprise resource planning) application, with new features focusing both on core functionality, such as financials and procurement, and functionality aimed at verticals like the retail and manufacturing industries. Read more…

AP - Industrial conglomerate Siemens AG will cut 7,000 jobs at its corporate telecommunications unit Siemens Enterprise Networks, officials with knowledge of the plans told The Associated Press on Monday. Read more…

NewsFactor - Call it a flashback to the Microsoft-Yahoo takeover battle. On Sunday Electronic Arts announced a proposal to acquire Take-Two Interactive Software in an all-cash merger valued at approximately $2 billion. In true Yahoo style, Take-Two said the proposal is inadequate and not in the best interests of its stockholders. Read more…

FT.com - Sachio Semmoto, who founded KDDI, Japan's first alternative mobile provider and who has repeatedly challenged the country's telecoms market, has unveiled a new mobile service. Read more…

Reuters - Qwest Communications International Inc said on Monday that it planned to deepen partnerships to offer consumers better video, Internet and wireless services. Read more…

AP - Online advertising revenues exceeded $21 billion for the first time in 2007, although preliminary data compiled by an industry trade group also suggest growth is slowing. Read more…

Reuters - The head of the U.S. Federal Communications Commission said on Monday he is "ready, willing and able" to stop broadband providers that unreasonably interfere with subscribers' access to Internet content. Read more…

InfoWorld - The launch of a new family of Windows server products this week will kick-start a broad shift among customers to 64-bit versions of Microsoft's server software, analysts and customers said. Read more…

Macworld.com - Take-Two Interactive Software, publishers of the popular Grand Theft Auto series of games, has received and rejected a $2 billion acquisition bid from Electronic Arts but left the door open to a possible acquisition later. Read more…

Macworld.com - AOL on Monday introduced Xdrive Desktop Lite, a new version of the online data storage service. For the first time, Xdrive works on the Mac, thanks to AOL's switch to Adobe AIR technology. Xdrive Desktop Lite is being offered as a public beta. Read more…

NewsFactor - European regulators are considering whether to categorize IP addresses as personal property. Their decision could throw a monkey wrench into the methods that search-engine operators like Google, Yahoo and MSN use to track the online habits of Web surfers. Read more…

Reuters - Qwest Communications International Inc said on Monday it is working on a new kind of wireless partnership as its current arrangement to resell Sprint Nextel Corp services is inadequate. Read more…

InfoWorld - Adobe Systems plans to extend its AIR (Adobe Integrated Runtime) software to Linux later this year, Adobe CTO Kevin Lynch said during the company's Engage event in San Francisco on Monday morning. Read more…

AP - Most of the world's Internet users lost access to YouTube for several hours Sunday after an attempt by Pakistan's government to block access domestically affected other countries. Read more…

AP - A federal jury in Texas has sided with e-learning company Blackboard Inc. in a patent case against rival Desire2Learn that pitted two leading education software developers in a dispute closely watched by campus IT officers. Read more…

InfoWorld - Phishers, cyber-squatters, and other online fraudsters continued their assault on well-known corporate brands over the last 12 months, increasing the burden on the companies being targeted and further frustrating consumers. Read more…

NewsFactor - The Federal Communications Commission convened at Harvard Law School in Cambridge, Mass., Monday for a public hearing on allegations that Comcast improperly throttled the peer-to-peer application BitTorrent. Read more…

InfoWorld - RightNow Technologies a SaaS (Software as a Service)-based CRM vendor launched its February '08 release this week offering an approach to SaaS customization that is 180-degrees different from that of archrival Salesforce.com. Read more…

InfoWorld - Advocates on both sides of the net neutrality debate descended on Harvard Law School Monday for a U.S. FCC hearing that multiple speakers suggested was crucial to the Internet's future. Read more…