IBM to pilot broadband over power lines in US

An American power company CenterPoint Energy, is teaming up with IBM to provide broadband over power lines to subscribers in Houston, Texas. Customers using a BPL (broadband over power line) modem can connect to high-speed broadband services over existing electric power lines from a computer that is plugged into any electric outlet in their home. Of course, broadband over power lines isn't new. ...more

The Low-down On... MP3

Everywhere you look there's someone talking about MP3 these days. New and cool players are coming to market, and sites such as Napster are in the dock for enabling the exchange of copyrighted material. This international swap-shop is what the Internet was made for, but it's the record companies' worst nightmare and it's not going to go away. ...more

Free Software Foundation to update GPL

The international network of Free Software Foundations is currently reviewing the GNU General Public License as part of the preparations to release a version 3 of the licence that underpins the open source movement around the world. Originally written by software legend, Richard M. Stallman, the GPL sets out to provide a legal basis for establishing developers' rights to examine, copy, modify, reuse, share and redistribute software distributed under the licence. ...more

New York Senator urges boycott of video game

A US senator has proposed a boycott of a new video game ahead of its launch this summer. The move is guaranteed to make the game, '25 to Life', a best seller and likely to revive the fortunes of its publisher Eidos, which has struggled to find another hit franchise after the Tomb Raider series. In the game, reports Reuters, the player can choose either to play the role of the gangster or the police and it is the former which has raised the hackles of Democrat Senator, Charles Schumer from New York. ...more

Web entrepreneur commits perfect cybercrime

A Seattle-based web entrepreneur has achieved the perfect political cybercrime, without breaking any laws. Newsvine.com chief executive and co-founder Mike Davidson's perfect hack was the result of what you might call a social engineering tactic in that it involved the use of one of his free templates. ...more