December 31, 2004

Colorado man fools news agencies for ads

by brian_turner

If you’re new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thank you for visiting!Colorado man, Alek Komarnitsky’s, managed to fool the world’s press agencies, by suggesting that surfers to his website could control the Christmas lights on his home.
The story was initially picked up by local press - including several Colarado […]



Site search without the web

by brian_turner

While the web continues to wonder if Google Suggest actually means anything of importance, Micah Dubinko in Web search, without the web points to an application of his on XForms site that allows similar action with a preloaded Javascript enabled dataset at: Xfi.
The page contains a search box, that will show as you type any […]



eBay drops Microsoft NET passport

by brian_turner

In a move that sees Microsoft’s proprietary Microsoft NET passport left for use only on its own sites, and those of close partners, online retail giant ebay has disallowed access via the service.
Announcing that it would no longer be allowing users to sign in with a Microsoft Passport, users of eBay will only be able […]



Wordpress enters forum software market

by brian_turner

Wordpress, an already established name in blogging software, is turning it’s sights on community forum software, with the development of bbpress.
According to their current frontpage introduction:

bbPress is focused on web standards, ease of use, ease of integration, and speed. Most software in this space is focused on features like avatars or file attachment and […]



Windows NT 4.0 Support ends today

by brian_turner

Today is the last day that Microsoft will officially offer support for the Windows NT 4.0 server platform.
A operating system 11 years in use, patches and updates for Windows NT will no longer be publicly released after midnight tonight, having already had a year-long reprieve after original plans sought to end support for NT 4.0 […]



US legislation fails to stop spam

by brian_turner

Anti-spam company MX Logic reports that the current US legislation against Unsolicited Commercial E-mail (UCE) - also known as the Can-spam act - has so far failed to halt the amount of spam actually sent out from within the US.
According to the report: Can-Spam didn’t, survey says

“The Can-Spam law has been in place for […]



Blu-ray joins with DVD vs HD DVD

by brian_turner

The battle to be the dominant format in the next generation of DVD technology gets fiercer.
In a format war reminiscent of the video battle between betamax and VHS, two opposed technologies: Blue-ray, and High Definition DVD (HD DVD) are both poised to continue the DVD market to the next level.
However, as with video, confusion over […]



Internet TV on TV

by brian_turner

The convergence of PC and TV technology means that it is inevitable that one day the distinction between the two will be non-existent, with a combined device ni the home eventually functioning as both a TV and PC.
However, as the world of internet TV gathers attention and so long as the distinction exists, consumers currently […]



December 30, 2004

Asia quake fails to impact shares

by brian_turner

Despite a multi-billion dollar repair bill for the Indian Ocean earthquake, whose Tsunamis destroyed resorts and coastal assets across at least ten countries and killed at least 100,000 people, Asian stock markets continued upward surges.
Stock exchanges in India and Indonesia - two countries particularly affected - broke records in what has been a rich year […]



Gigablast release site search

by brian_turner

Gigablast following closely on the release of their user-built search engine for users, Gigablast have now released Gigablast Sitesearch tool.
This allows webmasters to use Gigablast search technology to create a search facility for their websites. Although indexing is promised to occur at least weekly, Gigablast also suggest that for content that constantly changes, indexing could […]



December 29, 2004

Deutsche Bank angry at Yukos

by brian_turner

Deutsche Bank has made a legal complaint over Yukos’s filing for bankruptcy protection in Texas, complaining that Texas was “a jurisdiction in which Yukos owns no real or personal property and conducts no business operations.”
At the heart of Deutsche Bank’s complaints is the fact that it lost out on fat fees, after being geared up […]



Analysts hard for Durex

by brian_turner

SSL International - formed by a three-way merger between Seton Healthcare, Scholl and condom-maker London International Group, is being firmly tipped for a buy-out in 2005.
With markets hot with the rumour that business intelligence firm GPW was sizing up SSL International for a corporate client, analysts now expect SSL to go into take-over talks within […]



US Airways asks for free New Years shifts

by brian_turner

US Airways, a troubled airline in bankruptcy protection since 2003, has apparently e-mailed it’s ground staff, asking them to volunteer to work for free on New Years Day.
This is apparently in response to large numbers suddenly calling in sick over the Christmas period, resulting in the cancellation of hundreds of domestic US flights.
It’ll be […]



APACS: More spent with plastic than cash

by brian_turner

The Association of Payment Clearing Services (Apacs) has reported than as of 10:28am today, payments by debit and credit card overtook payments by cash in the UK.
According to Cash gives way to flexible friend:

Shoppers in the UK are expected to put ’269bn on plastic cards during the whole of 2004, compared with ’268bn paid […]



Footfall revise festive sales

by brian_turner

Footfall have released more encouraging reports on post-Christmas shopper activity, upturning poor figures oringally reported in Internet wins Christmas shoppers, but high street sales fail Boxing Day.
Reporting on activity from December 26th to December 28th, consumer spending was up an overall 2,1%. this was despite Boxing Day custom being initially down by 16.1%, which was […]



Jarvis hits low

by brian_turner

Jarvis, the troubled engineering and construction group linked to the fatal Potter’s Bar rail crashe, has reported first-half losses of ’283 million - down from a profit of ’33.7 million in the same preiod last year.
Losses had actually been reduced by the recent sell-off of assets, such as roads (’24.5m), property (’25m), and the […]



Web Directories

by Brian Turner

Best Internet Directories
Most directories offer minimal traffic. If you’re looking for lots of sales, don’t ever rely on a single directory. And even submission to a large number of directories isn’t going to bring in a great number of sales leads.
That’s because most surfers don’t usually turn to a directory to find a site - […]



December 28, 2004

Open Enterprise Server beta released

by brian_turner

Novell has released a public beta of its Open Enterprise Server, that mixes its own NetWare with SuSE, an open source Linux distro.
According to Novell beta mixes SuSE Linux, NetWare:

Novell Open Enterprise Server will allow current customers to run a mixed network of NetWare and SuSE Linux servers and use a common management tool. With […]



New search patents and IBM

by brian_turner

The online search market is currently booming and dominated by the big three companies of google, Yahoo, and MSN search. As they continue to vie to increase market share, their continuing development has seen a string a new patents awarded and filed, as Gary Price helpfully and clearly lists in New Patents for Google, IBM, […]



Internet wins Christmas shoppers, but high street sales fail Boxing Day

by brian_turner

The extensive promotional sales used in the run up towards the Christmas period appear to exhausted the consumer retail market, with very poor showings in the following Boxing Day sales.
There were fears that the Christmas market itself would be sluggish, but high street traders pulled out all stops to create a sales bonanza to entice […]