[economy] Forum Topics

Anybody reading this blog knows that the media has been adamant about the U.S. economy tanking into recession, with reporters putting their notebooks and tape recorders down and waving pom-pom's in support of economic strife for millions of Americans. Why? Once again, who knows? Probably because it's a compelling story …

Even as U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson reassured us on Friday that the economy "would not go into recession" in 2008", some people, especially consumers, aren't buying it. This is exactly what I'm talking about when I vent over the power of perception and the media's glee in talking down …

It was supposed to be Christmas in May, with technology company executives harboring visions of wallet-waving consumers dancing in their heads. The reason? The proposed tax rebates coming from Washington that would put up to $1,500 in many Americans back pocket, and hopefully send them out to buy things like …

Lots to talk about today. You've probably already have read about Microsoft's $45 billion buyout of Yahoo. Obviously, Microsoft is giving up on its MSN web portal and throwing it's weight and capital behind Yahoo. For Yahoo, which has seen its stock slide precipitously in the last year, the deep …

Let's all take a breather at the end of another topsy-turvy week on Wall Street, where things have calmed down as of mid-morning on Friday (the Dow Jones Industrial Average is off a mere four points at 11:30 AM EST, and is actually up for the week . . . …

Today's batch of economic news is mixed, and seemingly conflicted as ever. Hey, don't shoot me - I'm only the messenger. But for techies wondering how secure their jobs really are these days the news from the most recent Federal Reserve Beige Book report signaled economic growth for November and …

Okay, I was downed by technology issues for a few days but I'm back up with a vengeance. And just in time, as the major technology companies begin to release their quarterly earnings statements. IBM was first up earlier this week, and easily surpassed analyst expectations. Wall Street attributed Big …

I'd like to dive into the technology stock sector for '08 this week, but let's first tee things up with the outlook from the folks who do most of the IT spending -- small business owners. According to the numbers from the Discover Small Business Watch, released this morning, small …

From what I'm seeing out here in the trenches, economists just can't seem to agree on the health of the U.S. economy, in general, and the technology economy, in particular in 2008. Last week's consumer numbers seem to suggest that people are still willing to break out the checkbooks and …

I had to shake my head when I read about the latest GDP numbers today. The news is good, maybe even great for the economy – a 3.8% upward spike in gross domestic product for the second quarter (the numbers were revised from the original GDP estimates, and were light …

For those who may not have heard, former network leader Novell (who owns SuSE Linux) made a deal with Microsoft exchanging some intellectual property rights. Those in the business-end of IT know that Microsoft is busy applying for thousands of patents concerning Intellectual Property -- have a look at Network …

What Caused Microsoft to Create DirectX10? It all started with the Windows Error Reporting Tool. Microsoft was collecting hundreds of Bugs per day only for its Operating System. Microsft Found out that 70% of all errors and bad user Experience in Windows XP comes from Graphic Display drivers. First, Microsft …

Well I suppose it will be Apple’s worst ever Christmas gift. For months people have been anticipating a music player from Microsoft commonly known as iPod Killer (for no apparent reason). Well the iPod killer has been finally confirmed and has been code-named as Zune (strange name?). It is expected …

Intel officially announced the introduction of 10 Core 2 Duo and Core Extreme microprocessors for desktops, workstations and notebooks. Intel said it has over 550 customer system designs underway, with the CPUs built on 65 nanometre technology. Machines using the desktop chips will be available in early August, while notebooks …

After months of possible merger information it finally happens and I am surprised at the amount of money that AMD had to spend on this. This is a huge step for both companies. Currently Intel is the lead manufacturer of microprocessors, semiconductors, and graphics chips with AMD being the second …

The world of malware could be turned upon its head if the Blue Pill virtualization based rootkit due to be demonstrated at the [URL="http://syscan.org"]SyScan 06[/URL] Conference, Singapore, in a couple of weeks proves as undetectable as the security researcher who has created it claims. [URL="http://invisiblethings.org/"]Joanna Rutkowska[/URL] is a stealth malware …

I was recently working on a personal project to setup a PVR system for my living room. The first part of this project was relatively easy; I just bought another dell computer. The next step was a little bit complicated, see, personally I would typically like to use an OS …

At [URL="http://www.supercomp.de/"]ISC2006[/URL], the 21st International Supercomputer Conference, in Dresden, Germany today an interesting announcement was made by [URL="http://www.tyan.com"]Tyan Computer[/URL]: the launch of the Personal Supercomputer. Not quite a desktop machine, it is being marketed as a deskside unit, the [URL="http://www.tyan.com/products/html/clusterservers.html"]Typhoon PSC[/URL] certainly promises to pack quite a punch. The 8 …

According to just released research from Michigan based [URL="http://www.onlymyemail.com"]OnlyMyEmail [/URL]Inc it would appear that Sender ID is ineffective as an anti-spam solution. Despite the high profile, and frankly somewhat aggressive PR campaign by [URL="http://www.microsoft.com/mscorp/safety/technologies/senderid/default.mspx"]Microsoft[/URL], the 60 day statistical analysis certainly suggests that it isn’t the Holy Grail of anti-spam that …

The reports that are popping up all over the web that [URL="http://www.ibm.com"]IBM[/URL], along with [URL="http://www.gatech.edu"]Georgia Tech[/URL], has [URL="http://www.gatech.edu/news-room/release.php?id=1019"]demonstrated [/URL]the world’s fastest ever chip are, sadly, not quite as exciting as you might at first think. Not least because this wasn’t a chip at all, but rather a transistor, and even …

The triple-gate transistor is not new, almost exactly three years ago on June 12th 2003 at the [URL="http://www.intel.com/pressroom/archive/releases/20030612tech.htm"]Symposia of VLSI Technology and Circuits in Kyoto[/URL], Japan, [URL="http://www.intel.com"]Intel [/URL]was heralding it as the future of chip design. However, the fact that at the same [URL="http://www.vlsisymposium.org/index.html"]Symposium this week in Hawaii[/URL], Intel reveals …

Multiple core processors are set to dominate the marketplace by the end of 2007, after [URL="http://www.amd.com"]AMD [/URL]follows [URL="http://www.intel.com"]Intel [/URL]down the ‘more performance for less power’ road. Having already beaten Intel to the dual-core processor punch, the announcement from AMD that it will ship four-core processors for high end desktops, servers …

In 2002, IBM scientists managed to produce a magnetic data tape capable of a storage density of 1 billion bits per square inch. This week the [URL="http://www.almaden.ibm.com"]IBM Almaden Research Center [/URL]boffins have done it again, in conjunction with Fuji, to the tune of 6.67 billion bits per square inch. That …

Remember this week, for it was the week that we lost the fight against spam. On May 5th I reported how militant spammer PharmaMaster had brought down the Blue Frog anti-spam vigilante service. I wondered then if it was the end of the toad for Blue Security, and sadly this …

Just when you thought the spam problem couldn’t get any worse, comes the news that spammers are fighting back against the pro-active anti-spam community approach using tit-for-tat Denial of Service attacks and intimidation. The [URL="http://www.bluesecurity.com"]Blue Frog[/URL] anti-spam approach is a relatively simple one of ‘hit them where it hurts’ and …

Part of my new job as a Linux Engineer is to evaluate different Operating Systems. I am most familiar with RedHat, having grown up with their OS since 5.2 back in the mid-90's. Wow, have things changed. So, I looked at a linux that a lot of people are talking …

Early in November, Microsoft began a free web-based Virus Scanner, allowing members of the general public to come to their website, download a tool, and then proceed to tie up your box and scan it for all of the creepies that have infested your computer while on the internet. What …

Microsoft this week updated Microsoft Works -- the consumer-level "home" edition of Microsoft Office. Microsoft Works Suite 2006 is now available for SRP $99.95 Microsoft Works is an integrated word processor, spreadsheet, database, calendar, and email client wrapped up into one large program. The programs are sufficient for most home …

Yes, it's finally out of Beta and into final release. New [url=http://www.openoffice.org/dev_docs/features/2.0/index.html]features[/url] are plentiful, and add both functionality and improved MS Office compatibility. Discussion of this upgrade to the excellent and well known freeware office software suite has been plentiful during the period of Beta release, so there's no need …

Microsoft's new Digital Locker system allows users of Windows computers to download computer software from a variety of vendors. A number of software vendors already provide this functionality -- Microsoft's system brings those vendors under "one roof", manages the financial transactions, and then stores the license information for later use …