News written by James Delahunty (October, 2009)

Microsoft Corp. has released the final Windows 7 XP Mode software to manufacturing, and will offer it for download later this month from its website. The Windows 7 virtualization tool is offered to provide incentive for businesses to upgrade to Microsoft's new operating system when it is released later in October.

"We expect many Windows XP applications to be compatible [with] Windows 7," reads a blog post from Microsoft, "however Windows XP Mode is meant to serve as an added safety net so small and mid-sized businesses can migrate and run Windows 7 without any road blocks."

Windows XP Mode software will be available for users of Windows 7 Professional, Windows 7 Enterprise, or Windows 7 Ultimate from Microsoft's website on October 22, when WIndows 7 is scheduled to launch. It requires an extra gigabyte of RAM, 15GB disk space and virtualization features must be present in hardware and activation in BIOS.

European Union antitrust regulators have given conditional approval to Panasonic's planned acquisition of Sanyo Electric Co Ltd. The body approves of the deal as long as the company sheds certain units to uphold competition. The European Commission released a statement saying that Panasonic would need to sell battery production facilities in some markets where competition concerns were identified.

"In view of the remedies offered, I am satisfied that competition will remain vigorous after the merger and that purchasers of batteries will continue to benefit from choice and competitive prices," EU Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes said.

"Without some unit sales, the merged entity would have a significant market share in batteries used in alarms and utility meters, portable rechargeable nickel-metal hydride batteries and rechargeable coin shape batteries based on lithium," the Commission statement reads.

Chip maker Telegent Systems has commented that fast uptake of free-to-air mobile TV services in Asia, Latin America, the Middle East, Africa and Eastern Europe is bringing life to the ailing mobile TV broadcasting market. Built up as a major new feature just a few short years ago, the feature has secured favor by consumers in Japan and South Korea in particular, accounting for 90 percent of mobile TV viewers.

Telegent Systems announced on Wednesday that it has hit a milestone of 50,000,000 mobile TV chips shipped, which gives it more than half of the market estimated by analysts to be about 80 million-strong. "The availability of handsets that support analog broadcast TV ... has ignited the growth of free-to-air mobile TV globally," Samuel Sheng, new CEO of Telegent, told Reuters.

"We expect to see this (to) continue right across the world, including in developed economies, as free-to-air handsets become available that support the new digital TV standards emerging in those regions." Strategy Analytics expects the mobile TV broadcasting market to total $280 million next year after incorrectly forecasting it to reach $5.4 billion in 2010 just three years ago.

Sirius XM is passing on $2 fees to its customers in order to raise money to pay performance royalty fees intended for singers, musicians and of course, record companies. In the Sirius / XM deal, the Federal Communication Commission (FCC) barred Sirius XM from raising prices on customers for three years. However, the FCC did permit the collection of fees through a separate surcharge after a year.

The company began charging customers the additional fee in August, and claims to have notified all customers by e-mail and postal mail of the new charges. Lauren Weinstein, a tech blogger and commentator, noticed the $2 fee added to his bill but claims he did not get any notification beforehand of the new fee.

Amazon.com has agreed to settle a lawsuit brought against it by a 17 year old student after the online retailer deleted George Orwell e-books from his (and other users') Kindle. The company has agreed that it won't remove e-books from U.S. users' Kindle readers without their permission. Justin D. Gawronski, the student who filed the lawsuit, sued Amazon after his copies of 1984 and Animal Farm were removed.

The lawsuit had sought class-action status and called for unspecified damages and a ban on future deletions. Amazon had removed the books after it came to light that an outside party added the e-books for sale without having the rights to do so. Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos apologized to customers and offered to re-deliver the titles for free to users in September (or a gift certificate).

In the proposed settlement, which is awaiting approval from the judge, the company vowed not to remotely delete e-books from users' Kindles again except for cases where a user fails to pay for an e-book or asks for a refund. The company may also delete content remotely if it can protect a consumer or the Kindle's operation.

Amazon also agreed to pay $150,000 in legal fees, which will be donated to charity. "We think in the end Amazon did the right thing," said Jay Edelson, a Chicago-based lawyer who filed the suit on behalf of Gawronski.

Disbarred Florida lawyer, Jack Thompson - the man who said "Grand Theft Auto" is a "murder simulator" and blamed it for the murder of three people - has filed a lawsuit against Facebook over comments on the website. Thompson claims that certain Facebook groups and user comments are a threat to his personal safety.

He said that groups on the website that call for users to "smack him in the face for $50" or "hit him with an Atari game system" have caused him harm and distress. Thompson is seeking $40 million in damages from the social networking giant - Facebook will contest the suit in court.

According to the legal documents, Thompson became aware of the groups on Facebook, such as "Jack Thompson should be removed from the populace" and "Jack Thompson should be smacked across the face with an Atari 2600," in August, and Facebook failed to close the groups on request. Thompson attempted to contact Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg twice in August - by Fax - not exactly how the site expects you to make these kind of complaints.

According to a study by Ernst & Young, released on Thursday, Internet-enabled television sets could see wider adoption in the coming years as more consumers are warming to the idea of running widgets and other features on their TVs. Widgets are mini-applications that are widely used with computers and mobile phones, and the study suggests that such mini-applications could be successfully blended with TV content.

The widgets would be designed to access the Internet and locate content that is complementary to the programming, whether it is a discussion on the content or advertisements for products that are featured in the show, which can then be ordered by the viewing using the television. This year, web-connected TV shipments will total less than half a million.

According to Net Applications, Microsoft's Internet Explorer web-browser lost more market-share during September while rivals Firefox and Chrome gained. During the month of September, Internet Explorer usage dropped by 1.3 percent, sitting at a still-dominant 65.7 percent. However, the browser has dropped 8.5 percent in 12 months, with 2.6 percent being in the last three months alone.

If Microsoft does not figure out how to curb the trend, then Internet Explorer's share will drop below the 50 percent mark in 2011. Mozilla's Firefox web browser gained 0.8 percent, its biggest gain for a single month since November, to claim 23.8 percent share of the market. Even with the September gain, Firefox has not yet recovered from a share drop in May and June - its record standing at 23.84 percent.

A federal judge has overturned a court judgment against Microsoft in a patent dispute that would have cost the company $388 million. The federal judge ruled on Tuesday that Microsoft did not infringe on a patent held by anti-piracy software maker Uniloc Inc. U.S. District Judge William Smith's decision nullifies the $388 million Microsoft would have had to pay in damages.

It would have been one of the largest damages awarded in a civil patent case in history. "We are pleased that the court has vacated the jury verdict and entered judgment in favor of Microsoft," said Kevin Kutz, a Microsoft spokesman.

The case stretches back to 2003, when the Singapore-based Uniloc USA parent filed a lawsuit against the Redmond giant over security software it was using to prevent unlicensed use of Windows XP and Office software. In April of this year, a jury found in favor of Uniloc, and Microsoft appealed the verdict.

Vodafone has inked a deal to offer Apple Inc.'s iPhone in the United Kingdom and Ireland early next year, the company has announced. The deal comes after a previous announcement by Orange in the UK, following the loss of iPhone exclusivity by mobile carrier o2. "Vodafone and Apple today confirmed that they have reached agreement to bring iPhone 3G and iPhone 3GS to the UK and Ireland in early 2010," a Vodafone statement reads.

"Beginning today, Vodafone UK and Vodafone Ireland customers can register their interest in iPhone 3G and iPhone 3GS at www.vodafone.co.uk/iphone and www.vodafone.ie/iphone respectively." Vodafone will offer the iPhone in the region as a defensive move against subscriber defections, as providers such as O2 and Meteor entice users with bundle deals.

Bringing the phone to the market in early 2010 will miss the all-important holiday season. Orange expects to start offering the handset in the UK to customers before Christmas time.

The Guinness Book of Records files some of the most interesting and utterly useless records for our entertainment, constantly looking for more weird entries to fill the books each year. A new entry into the Guinness book of records is the awesome High-definition (HD) video screen(s) present above the Dallas Cowboys' football stadium in the United states.

Manufactured by Mitsubishi Electric, the giant four-sided screen has a surface area of about 1058 sq m (11,400 sq ft). "This is probably the most exciting project we've ever been involved with," said Mark Foster of Mitsubishi Electric.

Mitsubishi said the video board is the equivalent size of 3,268 52-inch television sets, packs more than 10 million light-emitting diodes (LEDs) and with all four panels account for, weighs around 600 tonnes.

(Pic source: BBC)

Nokia Corp., Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd., Sony Corporation and Toshiba Corporation have announced the formation of the new Mobile High-Definition Interface Working Group. The group intends to create an industry standard for an audio/video interface to connect mobile phones or portable consumer electronics devices directly to high-definition televisions (HDTVs) and displays.

This new mobile connectivity standard, based on Silicon Image's Mobile High-Definition Link technology, will be defined, promoted and marketed by the Working Group as an industry standard open to anyone desiring to be an adopter and enable the development of mobile products that adhere to this new standard across a broad connectivity ecosystem.

The Working Group is expected to organize a Consortium of founding members who will develop a mobile connectivity technology standard specification that governs transmission and reception of high-definition content between portable devices and display devices, to support connectivity in accordance with the new specification.

A report issued on Monday by industry tracker comScore showed that Google Inc.'s mega-popular YouTube video sharing service played the largest roll as U.S. online video viewing hit all new heights in the month of August. Over 161 million people in the United States viewed some video online during the month, adding up to more than 25 billion Internet videos watched for the first time ever.

Google websites pushed about 10 billion of those videos in the United States, with YouTube accounting for 99 percent of that share. Google sites pulled 121.4 million viewers, watching a remarkable average of 82 videos in the month, according to comScore.

Microsoft came second - but a distant second - with websites it operates serving up 547 million videos viewed by around 55 million U.S. Internet users in August. Viacom Digital served 539 million video streams, edging ahead of Hulu at 488 million views. Around 82 percent of all Internet users in the United States watched videos online in August, for an average viewing time of 9.7 hours.

Earlier this week, Microsoft officially made its free anti-virus software available for download after being beta tested for some time. Microsoft Security Essentials provides real-time protection for your home PC that guards against viruses, spyware, and other malicious software. It updates daily to ensure that it keeps its database up-to-date with the latest virus and other malware threats.

"Microsoft Security Essentials is a free download from Microsoft that is simple to install, easy to use, and always kept up to date so you can be assured your PC is protected by the latest technology. It’s easy to tell if your PC is secure — when you’re green, you’re good. It’s that simple," Microsoft's website reads.

"Microsoft Security Essentials runs quietly and efficiently in the background so that you are free to use your Windows-based PC the way you want—without interruptions or long computer wait times." The Redmond giant said that it is not out to steal business from anti-virus companies such as McAfee or Symantec Corporation.

Instead, Microsoft is hoping that people who do not already run anti-virus software, and will not consider buying anti-virus software, will be the ones who choose to run Microsoft Security Essentials.

China Unicom will sell Apple Inc.'s iPhone in the country to promote the launch of its new 3G service. The phone will sell for a hefty fee of 5,000 yuan (about $732.50), which will undoubtedly force even high-end buyers in the country to seek subsidized packages that will reduce the handset price but lock the owner into a longer-term contract commitment with China Unicom.

The company will sell the phone in an attempt to attract buyers at the highest end of the market, an area that is currently dominated by China Mobile. "They look at this as a high end product, not mass market. All these plans offer subsidized phones," CLSA analyst Francis Cheung said.

"Most people will not buy a phone separate from a plan. It's very expensive. I do get the sense there are going to be affordability issues." The phones will be available for service October 1. The move comes at a time when competition between Unicom and China Mobile is heating up following the recent reform in China's telecoms sector.

Freecom has announced its new "Hard Drive XS 3.0", he first external hard drive in the world to offer "SuperSpeed USB" technology - or not in marketing lingo, USB 3.0. The driver offers speeds around 130MB/s via USB 3.0, enabling the transfer of very large files in significantly less time than external hard drives available on the market at the moment.

Offering storage capacities of up to 2TB, the ultra-compact Hard Drive XS 3.0 can hold up to 400,000 MP3's, more than 1.3 million digital photos, 400 full DVDs or 2,000 movies (though we aren't sure what exactly they mean by "movies").