Golf gets the WiFi treatment

Going online on the green - surf and swing You can see the logic. Just. The demographics of a golf course: high flying executives too old to do anything more energetic than swing at a ball and walk about a bit. ...more

Apple climbs the brand value ladder

Apple has moved up just two places in the annual list of the world's most valuable brand, despite a 16 per cent growth in its value. The company now lies in 41st place in the top 100, compiled by Interbrand, nine places higher than its 2003 position, such is the impact that the iPod has had in the past couple of years. Conversely, Sony - which is arguably the company that has lost most as a result - lost 16 per cent in the past year to drop eight places in the table to 28th. ...more

IBM supercomputer breaks own speed record

An IBM supercomputer already rated as the fastest in the world has overtaken its own speed record according to the US Energy Department. The record was achieved despite the fact that the computer in question is still only half built. An IBM Blue Gene/L currently under construction at the Department of Energy's Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) in California performed 135. ...more

HP gets a visit from the SEC

Post-voting squabbles between HP and board dissident Walter Hewlett have taken a grave turn as the company is requested by the SEC and a US Attorney's office to give information on the voting. Despite HP claiming to have won the vote - albeit unofficially as yet - by a narrow margin, Mr Hewlett launched a lawsuit against HP on 28 March alleging that the company misled shareholders and, in particular, threatened Deutsche Bank with withdrawal of business if it were to vote against the deal. HP has since said it has been subpoenaed by the US Attorney's office for the Southern District of New York for information regarding voting by financial institutions, including Deutsche Bank. ...more

IBM and Microsoft want to federate your identity

Microsoft and IBM have shown their plans for managing user identities online across Web services. The two companies, along with RSA Security, BEA Systems and VeriSign, have published a specification for WS-Federation, which deals with problems of how to establish and manage business relationships via trusted third parties. The plans envisage a 'federated identity' system that can support single sign-ins - eg a single login can be propagated across all trusted systems. ...more