Stop monkeying about

When I was a young lad, there was nothing better than to spend a Sunday morning watching the Planet of the Apes TV series on our small black-and-white TV set. I didn't even realise that there were a multitude of films already in the can! Well, as is the way of Hollywood these days, the powers that be have decided to remake this classic based on the Monkey Planet by Pierre Boulle. Gone is Charlton Heston (though he does make a cameo appearance) and Roddy McDowell, who has retired to the big monkey puzzle tree in the sky, to be replaced by Mark Wahlberg, Tim Roth and Helena Bonham Carter. ...more

Web services for all, promises IBM

A single development environment for delivering Web services is IBM's promise for WebSphere Studio Version 5. The idea is to make it easier to create Web services from existing software, covering multiple platforms as well as legacy applications involving older programming languages. That's Linux as well as Windows, and using Java too. ...more

China issue changes Microsoft's blogging stance

If you were ever unsure quite how important the 'China thing' is right now, look no further than Microsoft's latest announcement, stating it has changed its policy on blogging. In a speech to government officials and community leaders in Lisbon, Portugal, Microsoft Senior Vice President and General Counsel, Brad Smith, said that blogs on MSN Spaces would no longer be removed outright if they contravened local law, but rather access to them would be restricted from the territory in question. Either way, users in that country won't have access to the content in breach of that country's law, and maybe on another day this slight a change wouldn't make the news. ...more

BT slams slammers

BT is reporting that people have returned home from their summer holiday to find two letters on the mat. One from a company they haven't heard of saying thanks for choosing them for telephone service and one from them saying we're sorry to be losing you. This practice, known as 'slamming', where people are unknowingly switched to other suppliers, has generated over 44,000 complaints this summer. ...more

Apple confirms end of line for single processor Power Macs

Apple has confirmed that it has stopped manufacturing single processor Power Macs, although some remain in retail channels, including the online UK Apple Store. No reason for the decision has been given. Once the inventory has been sold, the cheapest Power Mac will be the dual 2GHz model for ?1,349, ?350 more expensive then the now defunct model. ...more