paygham.net

All we need now is another Digg acquisition rumor, and then I’m about ready to call it a week.

Nobody’s commenting, obviously.

“Who’s going to buy Yahoo?” isn’t the only big question in mergers and acquisitions this week. Over the past few days, rumors have circulated that social-networking site Bebo and contacts management site Plaxo are either in negotiations or already sold.

But Arrington also noted that the Bebo buyer, if there in fact is one, could be just about any big name in media or technology, from CBS to Viacom.

First, TechCrunch’s Michael Arrington wrote on Tuesday that a source told him that a Bebo acquisition was “definitely happening.” The company was in the process of negotiating a $1 billion sale, he said, but didn’t know who the buyer was. Arrington speculated it could be Google, considering that Bebo’s user base has “very little overlap” with that of Google’s in-house social network, Orkut–the former has a youth-skewing base and is extremely popular in the U.K., whereas the latter is geared more toward adults and is big in Brazil and India. But with its OpenSocial developer initiative, Google seems like it would rather have influence across the entire social-networking landscape rather than choose one to operate. (Orkut was created by Google engineers, not acquired.)

The second rumor is a bit more detailed: tech gossip blog Valleywag reported on Wednesday that Plaxo has been sold to cable conglomerate Comcast for $175 million. Last week, the rumor was that Google had bought Plaxo. But Comcast, Valleywag’s Owen Thomas pointed out, already has a deal with Plaxo to handle address book applications for its Internet customers.

Let’s get real. You know you’ve got some music and movies on your computer you can’t exactly vouch for. Maybe you feel guilty about it, maybe you don’t, but clearly there are plenty of folks out there who play a little fast and loose when it comes to ripping and sharing music and videos. For example, recent estimates show that 48 percent of the average teenager’s
iPod is made up of illegally obtained music.

There’s at least a hundred different ways to find yourself on the wrong side of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. And while we don’t condone piracy in any form (well… maybe toasters), we thought it would be fun to round up some portable music and video players that (in the wrong hands) could make it easy to be an outlaw.

(Credit:
CNET Networks)

The Cowon A3's video recording capabilities make it easy to rip video right from anything with an analog signal. Also, the A3’s DIVX video playback support will let you play all those mysterious movie files you don't remember downloading. We won’t tell.

See our Top 5 MP3 players for media pirates and DMCA outlaws.

Update. January 24, 2008: The next day, the Google Alert email linked to another malicious web page peggynoonztj46.blogspot.com. Just like the clarkjohnlzl22 phony blog, this site too had a video that required the installation of software from gift-vip.net

The video doesn’t play, but instead generates the error window shown below.

There are two lessons here. First, any one anti-malware product can only provide so much protection. Second, any software that is pushy about getting itself installed, you don’t want.

In the interest of research, I downloaded the file. Don’t try this at home. Needless to say, I didn’t install the software. Instead I had it analyzed at VirusTotal.com a great web site that analyzes a single file with many different antivirus products. (for more see Can you trust that file?).

As is usual at VirusTotal, some antivirus programs found the file to be malicious, others gave it clean bill of health. Among those that felt the software was safe were NOD32, BitDefender, Ewido and eTrust-Vet. Most products however, considered the file malicious. Among them were:

Initially, Google sent me to
clarkjohnlzl22.blogspot.com
which purported to mention my client by name. It doesn’t. But it does have a big video box with the usual Play button on it. Clicking the Play button, at least as of this writing, takes you to
gift-vip.net/videos/?name=crystal+children
Recently it took me to
gift-vip.net/videos/?name=steve+harvey+bald
On another computer, it took me to
websoft-a.com/download/504/411/0/

I got a taste today of the ever present danger that is the Internet. A client of mine is often in the news, so I watch for articles using Google Alerts. Once a day, I’m sent an email listing the new web pages Google found that contain my client’s name. After doing this for well over a year without incident, Google today included a malicious web page in the list of those referencing my client. The page tried to install malicious software on my computer. Hopefully the details of the scam, described below, will educate anyone not yet sufficiently skeptical about life on the Internet.

Update. January 25, 2008. As a couple people commented below, another point here is that you are safer by not running Windows. The comments were about Macs but the same can be said about Linux.

AntiVir 7.6.0.48 2008.01.23 HEUR/Malware
Avast 4.7.1098.0 2008.01.23 Win32:DNSChanger-SF
AVG 7.5.0.516 2008.01.23 Generic_c.FTY
ClamAV 0.91.2 2008.01.23 Trojan.DNSChanger-2168
F-Secure 6.70.13260.0 2008.01.23 Trojan.Win32.DNSChanger.aqd
Kaspersky 7.0.0.125 2008.01.23 Trojan.Win32.DNSChanger.aqd
McAfee 5214 2008.01.23 Puper.gen.d

See a summary of all my Defensive Computing postings.

To kill your browser in Windows XP, use Task Manager (see my prior posting Task Manager - useful enough to run all the time). Right click on the task bar and select Task Manager from the pop-up menu, then navigate to the Applications tab.
Click on your web browser in the list of active applications, then click on the End Task button at the bottom of the window.

Here again, clicking Cancel or the official “X” does nothing useful. These prompts also prevent access to other open Firefox tabs. The only way to get out of this is to kill your web browser. But, clicking the “X” in the top right corner of the browser window does nothing (technically, the install prompts are modal). Normally you can right click on the task bar entry for a program and close the program from there. That too, doesn’t work in this case.

Clicking anywhere in this error window leads you down a dangerous path. There is almost no getting away from the nagging to install the software. For example, clicking Cancel, just results in nags similar to those below (one is from
Firefox, one from IE6).

Inside the AT&T Experience store. Click on the photo for a full slide show.

(Credit:
Kent German)

Going to a cell phone store can be like going to the DMV. Typically you have to wait a long time to be helped, and there’s seldom a place to sit while you kill time. The lack of chairs in carrier stores has always baffled me, but then a sales rep at the AT&T in Pasadena, Calif., told my mom that they removed the chairs because some klutz fell off one of them and sued. Who says baseball is the American pastime?

But seriously, buying a cell phone can be a trying experience, particularly if you’re not a cell phone geek. While many store representatives mean well, I’ve found that getting basic information often comes with a sales pitch for services you don’t need. That’s a disservice to customers who just want to grab their new phone and go.

The AT&T Surface.

(Credit:
Kent German/CNET Networks)

But I have to give credit to AT&T, as the carrier is making a push to redefine the cell phone shopping experience. The carrier recently opened five AT&T Experience stores across the country. Two are in New York City, one is San Antonio, one is in Atlanta, and one is in San Bruno, Calif., which is just outside San Francisco. The Experience stores are meant to be a destination of sorts. AT&T said it plans to open more in major markets.

I recently visited the San Bruno store to experience (sorry) what the new AT&T stores has to offer. While my expectations were low, I came away quite satisfied (check out the slide show for a full gallery of photos). Not only is the store bright, clean, and spacious, but also it’s very welcoming to harried shoppers. The staff was polite, the displays are plentiful and shiny (including a dedicated iPhone section) and there’s a comfortable lounge where you can view AT&T programming. But the best thing about the store is the new AT&T Surface displays. They really do make shopping fun again.

The surface provides a variety of useful information.

(Credit:
Kent German/CNET Networks)

Developed by Microsoft, the AT&T surface is an interactive display that resembles one of those old tabletop videos games. Using the surface you can access a variety of information to help you make your purchasing decision. You can research available service plans, scan coverage maps, and check out a selection of phones. The coverage maps are especially cool; you can start with nationwide maps before zooming into your region or neighborhood. In a city like San Francisco, where geography plays such a big role in cell phone reception, it was helpful to see how coverage changed block by block. If you’re looking for 3G service, you can research that coverage as well.

Just below the surface are a few AT&T phones on display. Each handset has a sensor sticker on its back for interacting with the surface. When you place a phone on the surface, it recognizes the handset and offers you a variety of options. You can see the features, the specifications, the applicable plans, and the available colors. The surface also lets you compare two handsets by showing their feature lists side by side. At present, only eights models can interact with the surface. While that selection includes AT&T’s most popular models, such as the RIM BlackBerry Curve and the Samsung SGH-A737, according to AT&T, it will add more models soon.

AT&T's phone selection.

(Credit:
Kent German/CNET Networks)

The surface is entirely touch sensitive so its quite easy to use. What’s more, it even has some elements of the
iPhone. By pinching your fingers together you can zoom in on the coverage maps while the opposite motion will zoom you out. Also, you can move multiple windows around the screen by dragging them.

What makes the AT&T surface so cool is that you can get en enormous amount of information on your own. Everything is right there in front of you in an unedited, unabridged format free of any sales pitches. But even better, the surfaces have an exceedingly easy-to-use design and interface. As a result, you can arm yourself with everything you need to know before you to talk to a sales representative. I can imagine everyone one from cell phone old-timers to cell phone newbies having a pleasant shopping experience. The San Bruno store has six surfaces in the store, so if you live nearby and you’re AT&T customer, be sure to check it out.

Add IBM to the hordes of companies trying to build a better solar cell.

The computing giant on Monday is expected to announce a deal with a Japanese semiconductor equipment manufacturer to make thin-film solar cells from CIGS, a combination of copper, indium, gallium, and selenide.

Neither IBM nor its partner, Tokyo Ohka Kogyo (TOK), plan to manufacture cells themselves. Rather, they will develop technology that can be licensed to solar companies in two or three years, said Supratik Guha, lead scientist for photovoltaics at IBM Research.

IBM has already built a prototype device. Once made at large volumes on a glass substrate, the cells are expected to deliver electricity at less than one dollar per watt at peak times–a long-held target of many solar outfits.

“We have the skills that we have developed in other areas–standard silicon semiconductors, materials chemistry–and we’re looking to utilize those skills in the photovoltaic space and develop IP (intellectual property) and know-how that other people don’t have,” Guha said.

Traditional solar cells are made from silicon, but alternative thin-film materials are becoming a larger share of the market. Thin-film cells are less efficient at converting sunlight to electricity than silicon, but they require much less material to produce a cell, making them cost-competitive. Solar high-flier First Solar sells thin-film cells from cadmium telluride.

CIGS is a material that a number of companies are betting on, including Nanosolar, Global Solar Energy, Miasole, and Heliovolt.

These companies are not producing cells at large volumes yet, but use of CIGS is expected to catch on quickly next year as their factories come online.

“CIGS will be the big story of 2009 because we know how many companies are putting in multimegawatts of CIGS (production capacity) in 2009,” predicted solar expert Travis Bradford, president of the Prometheus Institute, who spoke at a recent Greentech Media solar briefing.

15 percent efficiency goal
IBM’s CIGS manufacturing technique came out of research IBM had done about 10 years ago in flexible electronics.

It’s a break with the most common CIGS manufacturing process, called co-evaporation, in which active chemicals are immersed in a solution that gets removed in a vacuum.

IBM’s “solution-based processing” calls for the chemicals to be dissolved in a liquid and then dried. It does not require a vacuum, doesn’t require as much energy to run, and can be done faster than co-evaporation, Guha said.

IBM is also looking to leap-frog existing CIGS manufacturers on efficiency with a target of about 15 percent.

The efficiency of the CIGS cells on the market now is at about 9 percent or 10 percent. HelioVolt recently announced that it hit 12.2 percent efficiency with a process that is faster than co-evaporation. Global Solar said it expects to get to 14 percent, eventually.

The record for efficiency was done by the U.S. National Renewable Energy Research Laboratory (NREL) earlier this year, which reached 19.9 percent efficiency through a co-evaporation process.

In about a month, IBM intends to provide more technical detail of its solutions-based process in an advanced-material paper, Guha said.

CIGS is not the only area of the solar industry where IBM is investing.

Again by modifying chip-manufacturing technology, IBM created a cooling method for a solar concentrator that it hopes to license to others.

It is also doing work on techniques to manufacture silicon solar cells on glass using very little silicon, Guha said.

Rival Hewlett Packard, meanwhile, earlier this month licensed transparent electronics technology to Xtreme Energetics to make a solar concentrator.

When questionable economics makes for good business.

Years ago, for my wife’s birthday, I bought her a terrarium for her orchids. You know where I got it? Terrariumsale.com. Because that’s what showed up in Google. Now, Terrariumsale.com is not a business unto itself. It’s one of several front-ends to a catalog of goods sold by FineWebStores. I was reminded of this today when I got a pitch for FreeShippingOn.com, a site that helps you find items available for sale online that you can get without paying shipping fees. I wrote back to the person who sent me the pitch: “You’re kidding. That’s a whole business?” It’s not, of course. But it’s a great strategy.

The idea of shopping by shipping cost is dumb. (Better bet: use a shopping service like NexTag that computes total price for you including tax and shipping.) But that’s not for me to judge. If people want to buy items based on shipping cost, and FreeShippingOn can get those eyeballs and those affiliate dollars, more power to the person who launched the service.

And that person is Jonathan Lieberman, president of Deallocker, and a man who runs focused sites for consumers, like TypoBuddy (for finding deals based on misspellings in eBay and Craigslist postings), the new Buy-discount-gift-cards.com (a front end to Lieberman’s eBay sales of gift cards), and the “Secret Amazon Discount Finder” section of DealLocker. None of his sites is technically ground-breaking. And, like FreeShippingOn, some are based on the erroneous economic proposition that getting dollars off a retail price is more important than the actual out-of-pocket dollars the product costs you. But as I said, that’s not the point. The point is that people look for very specific things online, and the businesses who know the mind of the consumer–and not necessarily what’s right or sensible–are the ones that make the bucks.

(Credit:
IBM)

Microsoft Office is not just overpriced–for most users, it’s overkill. That’s why I’ve been increasingly recommending IBM Lotus Symphony, a well-rounded office suite that just so happens to be free. It’s built on open-source favorite OpenOffice, but sports a sleeker, friendlier interface.

Symphony (available for Windows and Linux) offers word processing, spreadsheets, and presentations. It supports Office 2003 file formats as well as OpenDocument and others. And it relies on an ingenious tabbed interface that keeps all your documents under the same roof–no switching between apps like with most other suites. I particularly like the sidebars, which keep frequently used settings close at hand while reducing toolbar clutter.

What’s the bad news? Symphony is still in beta, and it has the bugs to prove it. It’s kind of slow, too. But you can’t argue with the price. Why spend upwards of $400 on Office when you can get most of the same features (and a less intimidating interface) for nothing?

Find more deals, coupon codes, and bargains on CNET’s Shopper.com.

Apple said Monday that its shareholders have approved a so-called “say on pay” proposal, contrary to the results it had reported earlier.

The company informed the Securities and Exchange Commission that a filing last week “incorrectly reported the voting percentages for shareholder-submitted proposals because abstentions were counted as ‘No’ votes.” At Apple’s February 25 shareholders meeting, shareholders had seemingly rejected a “say on pay” resolution that would have let them weigh in on policies regarding executive pay and compensation.

After a recount, Apple told the SEC on Monday, it turned out that a majority of votes had been cast in favor of the resolution, officially known as Shareholder Proposal No. 5 Regarding Advisory Vote on Compensation. The mistake in the earlier count was the result of human error, according to the company.

Shareholders should be able in 2010 to start telling Apple’s board for the record what they think of executive compensation policies. “Apple is committed to implementing an advisory Say on Pay vote next year,” the company said.

On Monday, I had a chance to talk with Windows VP Mike Nash about Microsoft’s approach with
Windows 7. In addition to his comments for this article, I also did a brief video interview with him that is posted below.

Nash’s overall summary of Windows 7 was this:

“The focus is on making sure the things you do (today) are easier and that the things you always wanted to do are possible,” he said. “There’s a lot of work we’ve done to just make things easier and faster.”

Of course, users will be the ultimate judge of whether Microsoft meets this goal. It set out many of the same objectives with Vista.

Click here for more news on Windows 7.

commentary

Nominations won’t open until April, but Sourceforge.net has already made the news by opening up its 2008 Community Choice Awards to any open-source project, no matter where it is hosted. In the past open-source projects had to be registered on Sourceforge.net to be considered. Not this year.

I really like the categories, too, some of which are new to the competition:

Best Project
Best Project for the Enterprise
Most Likely to Be the Next $1B Acquisition [New] - Am I allowed to vote for my own company/project? Best Project for Multimedia Best Project for Gamers
Most Likely to Change the World
Best New Project
Most Likely to Be Ambiguously Accused of Patent Violation [New]
Most Likely to Get Users Sued [New] (And no, “Anyone using Busybox” doesn’t count Best Tool or Utility for SysAdmins
Best Tool or Utility for Developers
Best Project for Educators [New]

It should be a great competition this year. Get ready to start nominating in April!