Apple coughs up cash to settle Nokia patent spat
Apple has agreed to license wireless phone patents owned by Nokia that sparked a long-running legal dispute between the two companies.
The deal will settle all patent litigation between Nokia and Apple, and the two will withdraw their respective complaints with the US International Trade Commission. In addition, Apple will pay Nokia an undisclosed one-time fee and ongoing royalties, Nokia said today. Read more...
Open University revamps degrees with employers in mind – and its own box of tricks
The Open University has revamped its computing and ICT degree curriculum, in a move it hopes will make its computing graduates better suited to the needs of UK employers and inspire more students to study IT.
The OU, whose students study remotely rather than by attending a teaching campus, will offer two new undergraduate IT degrees starting in October: a BSc in computing and IT, and a BSc in computing and IT and a second subject, such as maths, stats, design, business or psychology.
The new computing degrees have an emphasis on vocational and work-based learning - allowing students to gain credits towards their degree for previous industry work experience or accreditation and internationally recognised vendor certification. Read more...
Google pulls more malware from Android Market
Google removed more malware-infected applications from its Android Market last week, according to a security researcher who reported the rogue software to the company.
On June 5, Google yanked 10 apps from the market after Xuxian Jiang, an assistant professor in computer science at North Carolina State University, reported his findings to the company.
Jiang published an analysis of the malicious code, dubbed "Plankton," in a blog post last Thursday.
Andrew Brandt, lead threat research analyst at Webroot, has also dug into Plankton. Read more...
Is Facebook’s IPO worth $100B?
Facebook may not be having its initial public offering until sometime in 2012 but its potential valuation is already generating a lot of buzz.
For months now, would-be investors and industry analysts have been expecting the world's largest social networking site to conduct an IPO next year.
And there's been a lot of talk that this could be the biggest and most exciting IPO since Google went public.
Some even say Facebook's IPO could be bigger than Google's. Read more...
AMD pledges sharper graphics with new Fusion chips
Advanced Micro Devices has promised a boost in video and graphics performance from its first Fusion processor aimed at the mainstream PC segment, which will go on sale in laptops later this month and desktops soon after, AMD announced Tuesday.
The new A-Series Fusion chip combines a quad-core CPU on the same silicon die as a DirectX 11-capable GPU and a dedicated chip for video encoding and decoding. That makes it well suited to tasks like video playback, gaming, and video and photo editing, AMD said. Read more...
Lulzsec sets sights on U.S. Senate and game-maker Bethesda
The Lulzsec hacking group continues to cause headaches for IT staffers. On Monday it published data it obtained from servers belonging to the U.S. Senate and Bethesda Softworks, a Rockville, Maryland, game maker.
The U.S. Senate hack appears to be the less serious of the two. According to Martina Bradford, a spokeswoman for the Senate's sergeant at arms, the hacking group managed to break into the account of an unnamed senator's office and then execute commands on the Senate's Web server. But because the server was locked down by Senate staff, it doesn't look like Lulzsec was able to do much on the server. Read more...
Apple likely to settle iCloud trademark lawsuit, says legal expert
An Arizona company sued Apple in federal court last week over the "iCloud" trademark, court documents show.
One legal expert said Apple would likely settle the case for cash.
iCloud Communications, a Phoenix-based provider of VoIP (voice over Internet) and other online services, claimed in a complaint filed Friday that Apple is treading on the trademark it's been using for several years. Read more...
HP reshuffles executives, prompts departures
Hewlett-Packard today made some seismic changes to its top management that included the exit of its CIO, Randy Mott, who is leaving "effective immediately."
Another major change was the exit of Ann Livermore, an HP employee since 1982, as head of HP's Enterprise Business unit. But Livermore, who has been on the shortlist of potential CEOs of the company, will continue to work for HP as a member of its board, the company said. Read more...
Google buys Admeld
Hoping to further boost its position in display advertising, Google scooped up Admeld, a company that aims to simplify the display ad buying process, the companies said Monday.
They did not disclose the value of the deal.
Admeld lets publishers connect from one place to a variety of ad networks, demand-side platforms and agency trading desks. Ad buyers from those sources compete for impressions through Admeld's unified auction. Admeld also offers real-time analytics. " Read more...
Java standards process to get an upgrade
The much-criticized JCP (Java Community Process), which maps out procedures for amending officially sanctioned Java technologies, is set for a face-lift that includes greater transparency and the possible loss of voting privileges for JCP members who disregard their responsibilities.
New procedures are part of the recently introduced Java Specification Request 348. "This JCR -- nicknamed JCP.next -- proposes a variety of changes to do with transparency, participation, agility, and governance," JCP said in a document posted on its website on June 8. The document states that JCP chairman Patrick Curran views full transparency of a JCP expert group operations as the most important change introduced by JSR 348. "Many expert groups carry out their business openly over public mailing lists and publicly viewable issue-trackers, and they make public responses to all comments. JCP.next will elevate those recommended practices to mandatory status. The process of recruiting Expert Group members will also be documented for the public eye, ensuring that all applications are considered in a fair way," JCP said. Read more...