Datamation Staff

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Internet start-up Twitter is taking a much-anticipated first-step in its quest to parlay its popularity into revenue by offering certain customers an expanded range of services. The company is preparing to offer commercial accounts in which corporations and other types of businesses pay a fee to receive an enhanced version of […]

SAN FRANCISCO — Competitors Microsoft, IBM and Sun Microsystems took to the same stage here at the Open Source Business Conference, giving separate keynotes Tuesday focused on the advantages of open source for business. Robert Youngjohns, President of Microsoft North America, might at first glance seem an odd choice of speakers for an open source […]

FRANKFURT (Reuters) – Online social network Xing plans to more than double its number of members in German-speaking markets in the coming years as it expands in Europe and creates new jobs. Xing, based in the German city of Hamburg, said on Thursday it saw “sufficient market potential in Germany, Austria and Switzerland” to increase […]

BEIJING (Reuters) – Dell Inc’s China sales grew 28 percent in unit terms in the year to January, accounting for about 5 percent of the company’s global business, Chief Executive Michael Dell said on Thursday. The world’s second-largest personal computer maker also purchased about $23 billion of products last year from China, Dell’s largest overseas […]

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Chances are you’ve never had a conversation with your house plants but if they could talk, what would they say? “Water me.” Researchers at New York University’s interactive telecommunications program have come up with a device that allows plants to tell owners when they need water or if they’ve had too much […]

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – A new videogame company is aiming to challenge the big three console makers by providing a “cloud-based” gaming system promising on-demand access to games and no lag time. The fledging company, called OnLive, said its service will allow users to play games on any TV and nearly any personal computer — […]

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Dell Inc is introducing new server and storage products aimed at cost-conscious companies, betting that its emphasis on value can help win market share as competition intensifies. The announcement on Tuesday comes as the corporate server market heated up considerably over the past week, with the much-anticipated entry of network equipment […]

TOKYO (Reuters) – The chief executive of Dell Inc said on Tuesday that talk of IBM possibly buying Sun Microsystems was providing an “enormous opportunity” to the world’s No. 2 PC maker in the corporate server market. Michael Dell said such talk created uncertainty over the future of Sun’s Solaris-based servers and accelerated a customer […]

(Reuters) – EBay unit Skype on Monday plans to announce a version of its Internet calling software that connects to corporate phone systems, the Wall Street Journal said. The new software, called Skype for SIP, is expected to allow employees to make domestic and international calls with regular office telephones, instead of a headset plugged […]

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. software industry is pushing for a greater role as government officials develop a policy to ward off attacks on the nation’s communications infrastructure, a trade group said on Friday. The Business Software Alliance, which represents companies including Microsoft Corp and Dell Inc., told White House officials this week the government […]

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Dutch navigation device maker TomTom has filed a countersuit against Microsoft Corp, accusing the U.S. company of violating three of its patents. The suit, filed on Monday in the U.S. District Court for the eastern district of Virginia, comes a few weeks after Microsoft filed a complaint against TomTom for violating […]

NEW YORK (Reuters) – An IBM takeover of Sun Microsystems Inc would raise the prospect of creating a clear leader in computer servers, but gaining market share might not be what’s behind IBM’s expensive overtures in hard economic times. Sun’s software portfolio, including Java, MySQL and Solaris, offers IBM a chance to get an edge […]