UK tax-payers subsidising AOL, claims Freeserve

Freeserve has laid into AOL over its exemption from VAT in the UK, which could represent a benefit worth tens of millions of pounds a year. In an official statement headlined "AOL cashes in on UK VAT System", Freeserve attacks the tax benefits enjoyed by what it describes as "the world's most sprawling media company". It draws attention to the 1997 Customs & Excise guideline that an ISP not belonging in the UK is not liable for UK VAT, providing its supplies are classed as mainly content, not telecommunications. ...more

Documents To Go adds Office 2007 support for Palm OS handhelds

DataViz has announced the release of a new version of Documents To Go for PDAs and smartphones that adds support for the most recent version of Microsoft's Office software suite. However, while Documents To Go enables users of Palm OS-based handhelds to open and view Office 2007 Word (.docx) and Excel (. ...more

Non-stop gaming kills obese Chinese youth

Obsessive online gaming has claimed another victim after a young man in China collapsed and dies following a marathon gaming session. The 26-year-old man, from the Liaoning Province in North East China, had been playing 'almost all' week during the Chinese Spring Festival, reports the China Daily. Obesity, as well as gaming, was blamed for his death - the man identified only as 'Zhang' weighed 150kg (23. ...more

Oracle goes halves for Red Hat Linux

Speaking at the company's annual user conference on Wednesday, Chairman and Chief Executive Larry Ellison said Oracle was seeking to solve key problems that have held back the development of Linux among big corporate customers. 'Oracle is announcing full support for Red Hat Linux,' Ellison told the OracleWorld conference in San Francisco. 'The goal is to enhance and speed the adoption of Linux. ...more

Universal to offer free music via ad-sponsored service

Music and video from the Universal Music Group (UMG) catalogue is scheduled to be available for free download in the US and Canada. The service will be powered by a New York-based company called SpiralFrog and will follow an advertising-sponsored model, as opposed to the paid-for per-track favoured by the market-leading Apple iTunes or the subscription model favoured by the likes of Napster. 'Offering young consumers an easy-to-use alternative to pirated music sites will be compelling,' said SpiralFrog's CEO, Robin Kent. ...more