EA takes it to the streets with Take-Two's shareholders
EA has gone over the resistant heads of Grand Theft Auto franchise leader Take-Two, making an appeal directly to the shareholders and offering approximately $2 billion in cash to buy out its common shares.
The move is a smart one from EA, as Take-Two has been at the mercy of the shareholders in the past. Almost one year ago, the company's CEO and entire board of directors were ousted in a shareholder uprising from investors ZelnickMedia, allegedly spurred by the company's worsening financial situation.
'Windows 7' product deadline may or may not be 2010
Reports yesterday and today stating Microsoft confirmed its Windows 7 release date for 2010 appear to be very premature, as the statement those reports were based on is the same boilerplate language the company has produced for months.
An oft-repeated statement from Microsoft's spokespersons on the release timeframe for the next version of the Windows client, currently code-named "Windows 7," continues to make the case that the product remains slated for a development phase extending some three years after Windows Vista's general availability (GA) release, which was in January 2007.
Defendant in RIAA suit files amended complaint
Tanya Andersen refiled her lawsuit against the record industry body on Friday, which could open up RIAA's investigation techniques for all to see.
She filed the original lawsuit in August 2007, although a judge dismissed the case at a hearing on February 13 on a motion by the RIAA. Andersen was given 30 days to refile.
iPhone now available in Austria, Ireland
Apple is using its pre-existing partnerships to expand the reach of the phone to other markets.
T-Mobile will be the device's carrier in Austria, where the German telecommunications company also has a network and provides service. Phones will be sold for 399 euros for the 8 GB model, and 499 euros for the 16 GB.
House holds secret session to debate FISA telco immunity
The US House of Representatives passed its new version, largely sponsored by majority Democrats, of the FISA Amendments bill. For more on this afternoon's passage, click here.
11:42 am EDT March 14, 2008 - In an extremely rare closed-door session last night, the US House of Representatives debated whether to go ahead and approve a foreign intelligence bill that would grant prosecutorial immunity to telecom companies, or to advance another version without it.
Sun joins IBM, HP in standards advocacy group
The newest member of the Open Group today is Sun Microsystems today, in its latest effort to become recognized as the pinnacle of the open source community.
The Open Group is an organization aimed at the "creation of Boundaryless Information Flow," which is the stated ideal of being able to serve information throughout an enterprise in the context that each user specifically requires, without running into incompatibilities or interoperability problems.
Congress asks FCC for records on 'a la carte' debate
It was an ambitious idea: the possible invocation of a clause in the law that might have given the FCC the authority to make cable TV providers offer individual channels to their customers. Now, the US House is wondering whether it was too ambitious.
Last November, US Federal Communications Commission Chairman Kevin Martin surprised most everyone by making preparations to invoke a legal clause that would give the Commission authority it hadn't exercised before. Under a clause of telecom law, the FCC could direct cable TV operators to carry certain classes of programming, ostensibly as a way of ensuring diversity.
Asus' Eee Linux PC to become Windows machine
Asustek has said that nearly 66% of upcoming Eee PCs will be shipped with Windows XP, summarily putting the Linux-based Xandros operating system the sub-notebooks used to exclusively feature into the minority.
The company officially launched the Windows XP-based Eee at CeBIT in Hannover, Germany only a week ago. There, it also showed off the next generation Eee with a 9-inch screen and larger touchpad.
Harvard server hacked, database of student data on BitTorrent
Harvard, the Ivy-league bastion of higher learning released a statement on Monday that its database of applicants to the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences from last year was compromised.
As many as 10,000 applicants could have had their information exposed, with at least 6,600 comprehensive profiles that include names, Social Security numbers, dates of birth, mailing and e-mail addresses, phone numbers, test scores, and school records.
Four critical Office issues patched
'Sooners' in .ASIA land rush vie for 'girls,' 'fun,' and 'gold'
The DotAsia Organization has received more than a half million .asia domain applications during a three-week "landrush" period that started in late February.
Buy.asia was the domain that received the most applications in landrush with more than 400 applicants, while Sex.asia received the most applications in the "sunrise" period of filing. Hot.asia, Gold.asia, Fun.asia and Girl.asia round out the top five sought after domains during the Landrush period. DotAsia reported 45,697 domains had more than one landrush application and will end up in auction.
Apple sued over iTunes music distribution practices
Atlanta-based ZapMedia says Apple is infringing on technology to distribute music over the Internet covered in two of its patents.
Specifically, ZapMedia holds patents on sending music from a server to multiple players. The company applied for the patents in 2000, however the first one wasn't granted until March 2006, and the other on Tuesday.
Gibson to Activision: We made fake guitars first
Guitar company Gibson has filed suit against Activision with regard to its Guitar Hero music simulator game, claiming it patented the idea first.
Activision, which makes the popular Guitar Hero music simulator series, had been working in close conjunction with guitar maker Gibson, making graphic representations of the company's classic axes available to your game's characters, and even modeling controllers after the SG, Les Paul, Flying V, and Explorer models.
DirecTV to launch an on-demand service via IPTV
Traditionally a direct broadcast satellite (DBS) TV service, DirectTV's HD on Demand uses the Internet to deliver content. The service, which has been in beta since Summer, is expected to launch in the second quarter of this year.
DirectTV has confirmed to BetaNews that this morning's Wall Street Journal article stating its beta period is about to end, is correct, though the official announcement has not yet been made. One will come as the launch date approaches. The company already has over 1,000 downloadable files, including both episodic and stand-alone content.
iPhone hackers are a step ahead of Apple
Two groups of hackers trying to keep the iPhone unlocked say they have obtained the beta of the iPhone firmware version 2.0, and have already cracked it.
With this, the upgrade will be able to be "jailbroken" as soon as it's released. This will allow users to run unsigned applications from third-party developers as well as those officially approved by Apple.
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