HTC's New Phone Provides Touching Experience

HTC is attempting to steal some of the iPhone's thunder with its pre-emptive launch of the Touch smartphone, which employs a touch screen interface that appears to be remarkably similar to the finger-control system in the upcoming Apple device. Taiwan-based HTC is the largest maker of mobile devices based on Microsoft's Windows Mobile operating system.

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HTC has launched a Windows Windows hosting solutions with 24x7x365 support – Visit HostMySite.com Mobile smartphone with a touch screen interface Manage remotely with one interface -- the HP ProLiant DL360 G5 server. strikingly similar in concept to Apple's (Nasdaq: AAPL) Latest News about Apple upcoming iPhone.

The new phone, dubbed the "HTC Touch," is a multimedia handheld Get the facts on wireless solutions suited to your industry. system with an animated 3-D user interface called "TouchFLO" that allows users to move through on-screen options by sweeping their fingers across the screen, or scrolling up and down using a fingertip.

The Touch, based on Windows Mobile 6, has a 4-ounce battery with life of up to five hours of talk time or 200 hours on standby, according to the company.

Taiwan-based HTC is the largest maker of mobile devices based on Microsoft's (Nasdaq: MSFT) Latest News about Microsoft Windows Mobile operating system.

Similar Screens

The 2.8-inch screen on HTC's Touch has features similar to the touch screen features on the iPhone, which is due to hit shelves on June 29.

"They do offer some similar technology, but it will be tough to compete with Apple in this space," Zippy Aima, an analyst with Frost & Sullivan Latest News about Frost & Sullivan, told TechNewsWorld. "Most consumers are going to wait and have a look at the iPhone before making any decisions."

Phone makers have done a good job of cramming more functions into handsets, said HTC Chief Executive Officer Peter Chou, but new user interface technologies have not kept pace with the hardware -- that is, until the development of the Touch.

"With the HTC Touch, access to your most commonly used content, contacts and features is only a simple finger flick away," he said.

Too Close for Comfort?

The new touch-based user interface immediately drew comparisons with Apple's iPhone, slated for launch at the end of June. As is the case with the iPhone, HTC's new handset lacks 3G Latest News about 3G capability, opting for GSM/GPRS (global system for mobile communications/general packet radio service) and WiFi Latest News about WiFi compatibility instead.

Although Apple also highlights touch screen functionality as a key reason to try out its iPhone -- including scrolling through songs and movies on its 3.5-inch wide display -- there are differences between the two offerings.
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The iPhone's focus is on entertainment, while the Touch is geared toward e-mail Email Marketing Software - Free Demo and other business-related uses.

The Touch's animated interface offers three views: contacts, media and applications. Each view supports finger control for scrolling through documents and browsing Web pages.

The device also comes with a digital camera and a 1 GB MicroSD Flash card standard.

Battling Apple

HTC executives have denied the gadget was designed with the iPhone in mind, but Aima says it is obvious the Touch is going to be pitted against the iPhone.

"Apple will always have the advantage," she maintained, "for the simple fact of what they have already achieved in terms of marketing. HTC may indeed be able to compete with technology, but it will be hard to fight the Apple brand."

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Intel Targets Gamers With High-Def Friendly Chipsets

Intel revealed at Computex Taipei the company's latest chipset featuring improved performance, clearer definition video and storage technologies. Chips from the 3 Series will benefit serious gamers and those playing HD DVD and Blu-ray discs. The company also announced it is developing a notebook PC priced under $200 for emerging markets.

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Intel (Nasdaq: INTC) Manage remotely with one interface -- the HP ProLiant DL360 G5 server. Latest News about Intel unveiled its 3 Series chipset family designed for playing high-definition media and for supporting the company's 45nm Penryn processors due later this year.

The highly anticipated chipsets, formerly codenamed "Bearlake," were presented at the Computex Taipei trade show in Taiwan.

The first chipsets from the series -- the P35 and G33 -- are available immediately with more due later this year, including the G35 and X38 that Intel plans to start shipping within 90 days.

The G33 and G35 Express chipsets provide integrated graphics, support high-definition multimedia interface (HDMI) and include Intel's Clear Video Technology.

In addition, system builders will be able to support HD DVD and Blu-ray disc playback with the chipsets.

Pushing the Platforms

The chips enable several innovative features for PCs, such as improved performance, clearer definition video and storage technologies that help better protect valuable data, according to Rob Enderle, principal analyst with the Enderle Group.

"They are pushing [a] platform strategy Barracuda Spam Firewall Free Eval Unit - Click Here that promises more power efficiency and performance," Enderle told TechNewsWorld.

The chipsets refine a number of platforms, he said, from small form factor applications through desktops.

Increasing Speed

The Intel 3 Series chipsets support DDR2 memory with data transfer speeds up to 800 MHz, or DDR3 up to 1333 MHz, enabling fast access to files and a more responsive PC.

The chipsets support PCI Express 2.0. The chips also support Intel's Turbo Memory, which enables faster application loading and boot times.

"In each case, it represents significant advancement over what came before," said Enderle.

Going Mobile

A mobile version of Intel's Core 2 Extreme chip is slated to hit store shelves in high-end gaming notebooks equipped with Nvidia's graphics system.

The notebooks with Nvidia's SLI (scalable link interface) technology, which use two graphics chips instead of one, are intended to replace high-end desktops used by gamers.

The idea is to extend the company's Extreme Edition brand first introduced for desktop PCs in 2003.

"The gaming segment has been incredibly lucrative, and Intel is now looking to want to play aggressive to position themselves," said Enderle. "There is a very high margin there."

Emerging Market Notebooks

The company also announced it is working with Taiwan hardware maker Asus Computer to produce a line of notebook PCs priced under $200.

The low-cost notebooks will run either Linux or Microsoft Windows Windows hosting solutions with 24x7x365 support – Visit HostMySite.com operating systems and will be produced for emerging markets.

Intel is looking to showcase its technology and demonstrate its ability to hit the low price range, Enderle said.

Big Pirate on Campus

Citing multiple instances of extensive illicit peer-to-peer file sharing by college students using their universities' computer networks, a Congressional committee has sent a survey to several college presidents surveying them on the veracity of their schools' stances against piracy. Is it a university's job to ensure its students stay within the bounds of copyright law?

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A Congressional committee last month gave universities with high volumes of student piracy violations 30 days to return a survey on Internet piracy and network practices. The committee is scheduled to resume its meetings Tuesday in Washington.

The letter hints that Congress is stepping up its crackdown on Internet piracy by college students in an effort to help the entertainment industry and higher education work together to prepare new legislation.

"The fact that copyright piracy is not unique to college and university campuses is not an excuse for higher education officials to fail to take reasonable steps neither to eliminate such activity nor to appropriately sanction such conduct when discovered," read a letter addressed to President Martin C. Jischke of Purdue University.

Opportunity to Resolve

"The real problem lies with leveraging the students through their schools. We are dealing with 17- and 18-year-olds. You go to the college and accuse them of a crime and say [they] owe us money. I have a problem with that," Donald David told TechNewsWorld.

David, a member of the New York law firm of Cozen O'Connor, represents artists and music companies.

The Recording Industry Association of America Latest News about Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) has initiated a new wave of pre-lawsuit letters to the targeted universities, according to David. The RIAA is requesting that college administrators forward letters to students who are being charged with illegally downloading music.

The letters offer the students an opportunity to resolve a claim of copyright infringement against them at a discounted rate prior to the filing of a formal lawsuit.

Congress, according to the letter, has long sought to address in a constructive and collaborative manner the issue of copyright piracy on university campuses. Since 2003, the House of Representatives conducted at least five hearings into this subject, involved multiple committees in the consideration of legislative alternatives and dealt directly with both the educational and creative communities.

Student Piracy Charges

The letter cites four examples of extensive college student piracy violations. One is a 2006 study by the L.E.K. Group that attributed 44 percent of the domestic piracy losses suffered by the U.S. motion picture industry to college students. That was more than half a billion dollars annually, according to the letter.

A second example the letter cited is a spring 2006 survey by Student Monitor that found more than half of all college students download music and movies illegally. A third example is a survey of college students conducted by the market research firm NPD revealing that students reported more than two-thirds of all music they acquired was illegally obtained.

NPD also concluded that college students were responsible for more than 1.3 billion illegal music downloads last year and disproportionately used P2P (peer-to-peer) networks to download unauthorized music files. College students accounted for 21 percent of all P2P users and 26 percent of all P2P downloaded music files, NPD said.

Survey Inquest

The survey that the House committee sent to the 19 university presidents seeks details of acceptable use and antipiracy policies at those campuses. The survey asks about the extent of student notifications from the colleges about copyright violations and the severity of punishments the schools imposed on the violators.

It also seeks details about the ability of the university to identify violators and the extent of records on network use.

The survey also asks the university presidents to make a full disclosure about their schools' network and data integrity policies as they existed on April 26, 2007. It directed the presidents to describe any policy changes after this date.

More Than Music

The Congressional survey additionally focused on strategies the universities have in place to block piracy and prevent misuse of other forms of intellectual property.

For example, the letter directed university presidents to specify which legitimate online services students are encouraged to use for accessing copyrighted material, such as Ruckus, iTunes, CinemaNow, Unbox, Rhapsody, or MovieLink.

Follow-up questions ask which Web sites the university uses to direct students to these services, if the campus offers free advertising Email Marketing Software - Free Demo to one or more services and if the school offers certificates for free downloads from or subscriptions to one or more services.

In addition, the survey inquires whether the school offers discounts on monthly use of one or more services, offers collective or site licensing of one or more services and whether the school offers free access to one or more services or parts of those services. Another question seeks information on whether schools promote services in student enrollment materials or during back-to-school events.

Lastly, the poll queries whether TV reception is available on campus. It asks what the policies are regarding the access and availability of cable or satellite television programming in university residences. Also asked is whether the school provides free or subsidized cable or satellite television programming to resident students and, if so, how much it costs students.

Backfire Possible

Attorney David sees There's a good chance that the Congressional inquiry could result in a legal backlash and misdirected new laws, said David.

"They are trying to make 17- and 18-year-olds afraid. That bothers me. This is the equivalent of going to your boss and saying you want the employer to send the employees a letter. We need some kind of change in the criminal law because nobody will ever be prosecuted," said David.

Ultimately, the inquisition could backfire on the RIAA with a class action suit alleging a violation of state laws, invasion of privacy and possibly the fair debt collection act, according to David.

While laws vary from state to state, he believes that there is no justification for using the universities as a conduit to reach the students. While it is permissible for an organization to inform the school that its network is being improperly used for the illegal downloading of music, it is problematic for RIAA to expect the university to forward a letter to the students prior to litigation to determine liability.

Most schools have mail delivery service. The RIAA could have also attempted to contact students by e-mail, he added.

Misguided Law?

Ultimately, new laws could be proposed as a result of the Congressional survey, David said. However, he faulted the approach taken by the music industry.

"These people have access to Congressmen. I think this matter will go to some kind of legislation with criminal acts. But the legislation won't address the issues. We need to recognize the changing paradigm in the music industry," he cautioned.

David is not sure that new laws will solve the problem. "New legislation will just bring another stupid law," he said.

Studying Results

As of Monday, federal legislators have not yet determined how many university presidents failed to reply by the May 31 deadline. While the letter encouraged the school officials to respond in their best interests, it did not threaten penalties to those who did not cooperate, said Jean Smith, spokesperson for Rep. Howard Berman, chairman of the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Courts, the Internet and Intellectual Property.

"We may require penalties, but we won't know how many replied until we study the results," she told TechNewsWorld. "We presume the universities respect the laws involving Internet piracy."

Lawmakers in Washington have not planned their next step and are waiting for the results of the survey before proposing action, said Smith.

New Solution Offered

Software may be one possible solution to the nagging problem of enforcing antipiracy laws on the Internet, according to Florida-based SafeMedia CEO and President Safwat Fahmy.

His company recently introduced a product that Fahmy claims will take universities off the hot seat regarding student piracy. Clouseau is a network appliance that prevents P2P downloading of copyrighted music and other materials.

"This is a country-wide issue beyond colleges. Colleges are having the hardest times with P2P because they don't want to stop it or don't have the technology to stop it," said Fahmy.

"Many universities are networks built upon subnets," he added. "So blocking schemes have to be applied at multiple locations to control P2P between subnets. You have to be very careful with P2P."

OSS Revenues to Ripen by 2011

The adoption of open source software has outpaced revenue growth due to uncertainty about which business models work best with the technology, according to a recent IDC study. Revenue, however, may soon catch up as businesses discover how open source software give them more choice and leverage when dealing with proprietary software vendors.

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Worldwide revenues from standalone open source Open Source Hosting Solutions with 24x7x365 Support – Visit HostMySite.com Latest News about open source software will reach US$5.8 billion by 2011, according to a report released last week by IDC.

Revenue from open source software will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 26 percent from 2006 to 2011, according to predictions from the Framingham, Mass.-based research firm.

"Open source has been growing quite substantially in terms of adoption, but revenue has substantially lagged that adoption," the author of the report, Director of IDC's Open Source Software Business Models Research Program Matt Lawton, told LinuxInsider.

Unproven Business Models

One reason that revenue growth has lagged behind the adoption of open source software, he said, is that people were uncertain about what business models worked best for the technology.

"That's been an historical significant barrier which is now starting to come down," he asserted.

In the enterprise arena, he added, a major barrier has been support.

"Enterprises don't mind paying for open source software," he observed, "but what they do need is professional support. So far, that's been lacking in the industry."

A recent storm cloud that's been hovering over the open source industry has been patent infringement, he added.

Leveraging Tool

The IDC study cited a number of drivers for commercial adoption of open source software. One of them is a realization by businesses that open source software not only gives them more choice but can also be used as leverage with proprietary software vendors.

Cost remains one of the primary reasons that organizations consider open source solutions, Lawton explained.

"If an IT organization has an open source product offering as an alternative, that's going to give it pressure that it can exert on their proprietary vendors to address its cost concerns," he said.

"I've heard some CIOs openly admit," he continued, "while they have not deployed or purchased open source software, they have certainly used it as a tool to leverage a better deal from their proprietary vendor."

Rearguard Action

Because single sales Free White Paper - What Retailers Should Know about M-Commerce are so important to proprietary software makers, playing the open source software card can win significant concessions from them, according to Bernard Golden, CEO of Navica, a management consulting firm in San Carlos, Calif.

"Every sale they don't make really hits their profitability dramatically," he told LinuxInsider.

The most dramatic revenue growth in the software industry in the coming years, he maintained, will go to the open source and software-as-a-service players.

"The established players are not going to go out of business tomorrow," he observed, "but they will be fighting a rearguard action. They'll be worrying about keeping their revenues streams where they're at, rather than growing their revenues another 30 percent."

Pay-As-You-Go Popularity

In the perpetual battle to keep costs down, businesses are increasingly attracted to pay-as-you-go software models, which are the kinds of models used by open source software vendors.

"Clearly people are more interested in pay-as-you-go," Chris Jones, executive vice president for solutions and services with the Decartes Systems Group, a logistics Software as a Service provider in Atlanta, told LinuxInsider.

"Depending on where you are in the world, there are plenty of people who would rather pay for product upfront and run it themselves," he noted.

His company, he added, has a rule of thumb when evaluating the potential for pay-as-you-go in a country. "Look at whether they lease cars in that country," he said. "If they don't lease cars, they'll want to buy and run software themselves."

Upending Traditional Model

Pay-as-you-go can be disruptive to an old-school software maker, Lawton maintained.

"It's a big change to their business," he said. "For vendors who are used to selling software with a huge upfront licensing fee, it changes the economics of their business."

No longer do they see a large revenue stream at the beginning of a contract with which they can reinvest in growing their business, he explained, but they see their revenue stream spread out over a number of years.

"For startups, that's all right because they can design their expenses around that, but for software vendors who have been in business for a while, they have an expense line that's tailored toward large upfront fees," he said.

Open source software, by removing the need to pay huge upfront licensing fees, has turned the model for selling software on its ear, contended Amanda McPherson, marketing director for The Linux Foundation, a nonprofit consortium for fostering the growth of Linux.

"I think that's to the benefit of software users everywhere," she opined.

Ask.com Dresses Up Search With 3-D Look

In its bid to stay in the search game with Google, Yahoo and Microsoft, Ask.com has undergone its own extreme makeover, which includes more content and a new interface. The upgrade, called "Ask3D," allows users to choose from various "skins" to spice up the search home page's background.

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Search engine Ask.com unveiled a major overhaul Tuesday that includes a new user interface Manage remotely with one interface -- the HP ProLiant DL360 G5 server. and a wider variety of content, including video, returned in regular search results.

The revamp is the latest in a series of moves undertaken by Ask as it bids to remain a player in the search space dominated by Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) Latest News about Google and Yahoo (Nasdaq: YHOO) Latest News about Yahoo, and is aimed largely at making search a more visual experience for users.

With Ask3D, as the upgrade is known, users can choose from a dozen different "skins" to liven up the background of the search home page, and the overall design of the results page favors graphics over text.

Fewer Lists

The end result will be a more pleasurable search experience, said Ask CEO Jim Lanzone, with users spending less time "hunting and pecking" for information. For instance, users can preview Web sites returned in results, listening to music clips, viewing video previews and learning more about a site in the results.

"On average, it takes people four queries to find what they are searching for online. This is because search engines have forced people to wade through endless lists of links, and refine query after query, to find the right information," Lanzone said. Ask3D seeks to cut down that process by "delivering the right information, from the deepest range of content, all on one clean and simple page."

Shares of Ask.com parent IAC/InterActiveCorp were down modestly in late morning trading Tuesday to $34.79.

Changing Ways

Since it bought the search engine in early 2005 for $1.85 billion, IAC has set out to revamp the site. It shortened the site's name from Ask Jeeves to Ask, and later jettisoned the butler icon that had become the site's mascot and marketing Email Marketing Software - Free Demo face.

Earlier this year, it made a bid to become a local search leader, tying Ask in with other IAC properties, such as its ticket-selling and city-specific information sites.

Still, Ask.com remains a second-tier search player by most standards. Ask accounts for just over 5 percent of all U.S. searches, compared to 10 percent for Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) Latest News about Microsoft, 27 percent for Yahoo and nearly 50 percent for Google, according to recent data from comScore.

Still, Ask remains a player for several reasons, including the deep pockets of its parent company -- and IAC Chairman Barry Diller -- and because of the way Ask can be leveraged in conjunction with other IAC properties, which range from local sites such as Citysearch to real estate sites including Domania.com, dating site Match.com and e-commerce Reliable hosting solutions with 24x7x365 support – Visit HostMySite.com properties.

Morphing Results

The revamp tries to infuse more fun into the search process, something that at least in theory could lead to users spending more time searching through the site. Results pages all look different, Ask said, thanks to a process it calls "morph" in which results are presented based on what the search engine thinks a user is seeking. Morph also uses Ask's ExpertRank algorithm to determine which results to present, the company said.

In most cases, textual results are listed first, but based on the query, video -- provided through a partnership with Blinkx -- music or image results may feature prominently on the front page of results.

An Ask search for "Pirates of the Caribbean," for instance, returns a dozen or so text links, followed by a group of image thumbnails, news and video results and showtimes at movie theaters in the user's home area.

The results also offer one-click options for refining a search, using Ask's Zoom Search tool -- which the company said is already the most popular feature on Ask.com. The tool allows a user to narrow or expand the original search or to search for related terms, such as actor Johnny Depp.

Ask's preview option is also beefed up, with users able to utilize the "binoculars" tool to get a larger preview of a Web page without clicking away from the search results. The previews also offer information such as how long a site will take to load and whether it will trigger pop-up windows.

Looks Matter

While there are innovations in the way results are compiled and presented, the visual difference is what users will most notice and that difference could be enough to lure more users to try the search site, Sterling Market Intelligence Principal Analyst Greg Sterling told the E-Commerce Times.

"Don't underestimate the power and lure of aesthetics," he said. "The fact that it's visually appealing makes it more fun to use."

Google has taken similar steps to combine search results, rather than relying on users to click on a vertical search tab, such as blogs or video, Sterling noted.

Ask's makeover highlights its advantage as a search alternative, search engine expert John Battelle told the E-Commerce Times.

"This is Ask doing what only a fourth place player can do: Throwing caution to the wind and betting on a new interface," Battelle said. "This new approach is a significant departure from ten plus years of search interface."

Leaders such as Google or Yahoo may be more reluctant to diverge from what Battelle called the "10 blue links" approach to search results because it is working for them. "Ask is trying a pretty evolved approach," he added.

Fedora 7 Tips Hat to Developers

"We hope developers will share what they create, but there is no obligation for them to do so," Jack Aboutboul, community engineer at Red Hat, told LinuxInsider. "We are discussing how we can create an online spot within our community where developers can offer the appliances they developed, but it won't be an official packet release within the Fedora 7 distribution."

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Red Hat's (NYSE: RHT) Latest News about Red Hat Fedora Project has released the Fedora 7 version of the Linux Linux hosting solutions with 24x7x365 support – Visit HostMySite.com operating system Manage remotely with one interface -- the HP ProLiant DL360 G5 server., which features a new build capacity allowing for the creation of custom appliances to meet individual needs.

Fedora 7 offers users an appliance development platform that it says is 100 percent open source Latest News about open source, with an entirely free distribution build tool chain. The Fedora 7 source code is hosted in a public version control system, the RPMs (Red Hat Package Manager) are built on an external build system and the distributions are built with an external, open source composing tool that allows access by the entire Fedora community.

"We hope developers will share what they create, but there is no obligation for them to do so," Jack Aboutboul, community engineer at Red Hat, told LinuxInsider. "We are discussing how we can create an online spot within our community where developers can offer the appliances they developed, but it won't be an official packet release within the Fedora 7 distribution."

Attract Outsiders

Fedora's major goal the last few years has been to allow proven non-Red Hat contributors to have greater influence and access to the Fedora Project, Max Spevack, Fedora project leader at Red Hat, wrote on the company's blog. This flexible, public build environment gives Fedora 7 users the ability to customize the operating system's live CD, DVD and USB Latest News about USB technologies.

After customization, developers can load Fedora onto various forms of bootable media, allowing users to run their operating systems without a hard disk installation.

From the technical side, the attraction of non-Red Hat contributors has been pushed forward by the Fedora Extras and the Fedora Infrastructure projects, according to Spevack.

Red Hat Differences

"Fedora 7 development has focused on improving the manner in which all Fedora releases will be made," said Spevack. "Beyond the usual set of upstream changes and improvements, our latest release is by far the most exciting and flexible to date. The ability to create appliances to suit every particular user need is incredibly powerful."

The Fedora 7 release is an upstream development for what will eventually get into the Red Hat Enterprise Linux versions, explained Aboutboul. It will be subjected to two years' worth of testing before Red Hat puts the components of Fedora 7 into its commercial Linux product.

While both the commercial version and the newer Fedora 7 come from the same core code, they are really two different Linux distributions. Only the commerical release comes with training and support that is built around Red Hat Enterprise Linux, Aboutboul explained.

Fedora 7 offers Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM) and Qemu virtualization technologies in addition to Xen. All implementations can be managed using the Fedora graphical virtualization manager.

KVM provides a full virtualization solution, letting users choose from KVM, Xen or Qemu.

Open Packages

The Fedora 7 release merges the separate repositories the community maintained for software packages for the Fedora OS and Fedora Extras project. Fedora Extras are sets of packages that supplement the Fedora Core but do not replace Fedora Core component packages. Now both Red Hat employees and community members can access the entire Fedora repository in one location.

The Fedora Project is a different Linux distribution than the Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL). Red Hat Enterprise Linux targets the commercial market, including mainframes. It is provided for free, but customers pay for support.

Red Hat's Fedora Project, which sponsored the release of Fedora 7, is a Linux-based operating system using the Fedora Core. Fedora is developed by volunteers comprising the Fedora community. Fedora distributions are free for anyone to use, modify and distribute.