iPod joins fashion

Apple's iPod may already be the smartest portable music player around, but its place amongst the elite of the fashion world has been cemented by Christian Dior and its designer Hedi Slimane. Style.com reports that Slimane was driven to design the case as he had nowhere suitable to keep his own iPod - which, to his credit, is packed with tunes from The Smiths, Blondie and The Clash. ...more

China accuses West over WAPI wireless encryption technology

China has accused the International Standards Organization of insulting the country and waging a conspiracy against its WAPI wireless encryption technology. In March the ISO rejected China's attempt to have WAPI recognised as a standard, preferring the 802.11i protocol developed by the US engineers' group, the IEEE. ...more

LaCie displays the 100 series

LaCie has unveiled a new range of flat panel displays designed for what it calls 'digital professionals', particularly those working in editing, design and layout. The 100 series comprises the 119 (19in) and 120 (20in) models with Premium MVA (Multi-domain Vertical Alignment) LCD technology that provides high contrast up to 1000:1 in the 120 and 777:1 in the 119. The 120 has a resolution of 1,600x1,200 and the 119 provides 1,280x1,024 pixels. ...more

UPDATED: Playfair cracks iTunes DRM protection

The digital rights management technology that Apple uses to restrict the copying of songs bought from its iTunes Music Store has been cracked. An anonymous programmer has released software called Playfair that takes one of the iTMS AAC files, decodes it using a key obtained from an iPod or Microsoft Windows system and then writes the new, decoded version to disk as a regular AAC Audio File. It can also, if required, copy the metadata tags that describe the song, including the cover art, to the new file. ...more

More sacked for e-mail abuse

Following on from the recent story concerning two men who lost their appeal of unfair dismissal over e-mail abuse, it has come to light that six more people from a different company have been dismissed. The former employees at the Birmingham sales office of Cable & Wireless were dismissed and six other staff were disciplined for sending offensive e-mail. It is believed that a number of those concerned will be appealing against the dismissal and claim that they have been victimised and that abuse of the computer system is rife in the company. ...more