Stefania Spagnuolo

Last month, there was a lot of talk about a comment made by Dell CEO Michael Dell. He had said in a memo, "the direct model has been a revolution, but is not a religion." This comment certainly caused some buzz. After all, Dell's direct model had ... been the root of the company's outstanding sales record. Was the company going to head in a new direction? If so, what kind of direction? In a recent interview, Michael Dell sat down to explain why the company is beginning to divert from its traditional model -- and why that's a good thing. (Source: retuers.com ) Specifically, Dell indicated his ... (view more)

IAC has recently announced the release of Ask Mobile GPS. The company says that the service is the first to merge local content, social networking, and GPS navigation. (Source: tomshardware.com ) Users can use Ask Mobile GPS in a variety of ways. ... For example: users can broadcast their current GPS location (along with directions) to anyone in their contact list, get real-time directions, search for businesses through Citysearch, and view event invitations through Evite. (Source: arstechnica.com ) It almost sounds too Orwellian -- and certainly raises questions with respect to a new era in ... (view more)

If you're looking to purchase a new computer that comes with Vista and are planning on downgrading back to Windows XP, heed these words of caution: it ain't easy. Many system integrators have been frustrated over the time-consuming process of ... downgrading from Vista to XP. In order to do so, users need to phone a special telephone number and obtain a unique key. (Source: theinquirer.net ) As one system builder noted, this can be a huge problem for large organizations. "... the activation has to be done manually. What if you are a customer with a 100 desktops? You'll have to manually key ... (view more)

Google has vehemently denied allegations that the company has entered into secret deals with UK news companies for the rights to use the companies' material on Google News. The allegations were sparked from an article published in Scotland's Sunday ... Herald newspaper. The article claimed that Google had made arrangements with several large news groups in the UK over how Google would carry their content on Google News. The article further asserted that "the deals are reputedly being kept strictly secret for fear that Google will end up having to pay for similar licenses with all of the 4500 news ... (view more)

Dell has come under fire once again -- this time, it's for misleading customers. New York Attorney General Anthony Cuomo has filed a lawsuit against the company claiming that it misled customers on the financing arrangements of their purchases. ... (Source: arstechnica.com ) Specifically, the lawsuit accuses Dell and its Financial Services unit of deceiving customers with enticing financial offers which carried an abundance of restrictions and limitations. Cuomo said that consumers "who purchase Dell's products often find that many of the benefits and inducements featured in Dell's advertisements ... (view more)

Microsoft Research India in Bangalore has developed new screen-splitting software. The software splits the screen into two halves, with each half having its own keyboard, mouse, desktop and applications. (Source: theinquirer.net ) "At the most basic ... level, we are allowing two users to work completely independently on the same machine, sharing both the processor and monitor," explained Assistant Researcher and Project Leader Udai Singh Pawar. (Source: discovery.com ) The working prototype operates on a standard 19-inch screen, but the software also works on 15 and 17-inch screens. Since the ... (view more)

Up until now, few have questioned the success of the iPod and iTunes. However, the future of Video iTunes has now come under criticism, as more channels have begun streaming their own free content. Is there a future for iTunes? (Source: slashdot.org ... ) While sales of movies and television shows are expected to almost triple this year, a new study by Forrester Research found that unless the average consumer begins paying for online content en masse (which -- let's be serious -- is not likely to happen), growth in sales will likely begin to diminish next year. This could spell out bad news for ... (view more)

A couple of months ago, Google explained its plan to anonymize its logs after retaining them for a period of 18 to 24 months. While some praised this announcement, others questioned why Google has to store this information at all, particularly since ... the logs include data which can potentially be used to identify individuals. Last Friday, Google's global privacy counsel Peter Fleischer posted an explanation on why the company does -- and should -- keep the data for a while. (Source: arstechnica.com ) Fleischer says that the policy evolves around three factors: improving service, preventing ... (view more)

Media Rights Technology (MRT) has sent cease-and-desist letters to Apple, Microsoft, Adobe and Real, claiming that they have been infringing products under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. "Together these four companies are responsible for 98 ... percent of the media players in the marketplace; CNN, NPR, Clear Channel, MySpace, Yahoo, and YouTube all use these infringing devices to distribute copyrighted works," said MRT CEO Hank Risan. "We will hold the responsible parties accountable. The time of suing John Doe is over." (Source: arstechnica.com ) But MRT is not a content owner, so why is ... (view more)

A new study has found that iPods and pacemakers can be a harmful mixture. The idea for such a connection did not initially come from a Cardiovascualar doctor, but from a Michigan teenager. 17-year-old Jay Thaker, whose father wears a pacemaker, ... approached Dr. Krit Jongnarangsin from the University of Michigan to run some tests on the possibility of pacemaker interference from iPods. (Source: dailytech.com ) "We took patients from a pacemaker clinic, got consent, and we put the pacemaker programmer on them to view what was going on inside the pacemaker on a screen," Thaker explained. "And then ... (view more)