Singapore clamps down on unauthorised file sharing

Police in Singapore have arrested three people charged with sharing more than 20,000 files. It is the country's first clampdown on unauthorised sharing. An amendment to the country's Copyright Act has made large scale file sharing a criminal offence; this contrast with the US and Europe where the record industry has only has recourse through civil courts. ...more

AOL above-expectation results and under investigation

AOL Time Warner yesterday announced its second-quarter results, marginally beating analysts' expectations, along with a sting in the tail in the form of a 'fact-finding' investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). In the quarterly results, net income of $394m (compared with a loss of $734m for the corresponding quarter of the previous year) was driven by the traditional media of Time Warner: strong box office returns for feature films added to good figures from television, music, publishing and cable divisions. AOL on the other hand fared less well, with ad revenues down some 40 per cent and, more worrying, adding just 492,000 subscribers for the quarter. ...more

Windows ME incompatibility revealed

Microsoft has confirmed that its update for Windows 98 is incompatible with several third-party applications. The new operating system had been redesigned to be more stable, but new updates in the areas of digital media, Internet support and home networking have caused the clash with other applications. A new System File Protection feature that prevents core files being overwritten causes the main problem. ...more

IBM spreads grid computing to WebSphere

The latest version of WebSphere Application Server is to include grid computing facilities, IBM has announced. WebSphere Application Server V5.0. ...more

MSN Search debuts

Microsoft has officially launched its own home grown search engine. The new MSN Search is now the default on Microsoft's consumer portal in ten languages and 24 markets. The service now claims to have indexed around five billion pages which is somewhat less than Google's six billion, all of which are via its own technology. ...more