Datamation Staff

Bloomberg BusinessWeek: An International Trade Commission (ITC) judge has rejected Barnes & Noble’s claim that Microsoft was misusing the patent system in order to stifle competition from Android-based devices. Barnes & Noble had presented the argument as a defense in a patent infringement case brought by Microsoft. Microsoft claims the company’s Nook e-reader infringes on […]

Cnet: Unnamed sources say that Microsoft now has a version of Windows 8 that is stable when running on ARM-based devices and that a developer preview of the technology should become available very soon. “We haven’t heard this directly from Microsoft, but we’ve heard this from the hardware partners that [Microsoft] is working with. We’ve […]

ZDNet: Amazon Web Services (AWS) has revealed that its S3 cloud-based storage service now hosts approximately 762 billion objects. That’s nearly triple the 262 billion objects S3 stored in 2010, and it means that S3 grew much faster in 2011 than in any other year. AWS also said that at its peak, the cloud storage […]

ZDNet: The European Commission has announced a formal investigation into Samsung’s patent enforcement efforts. Specifically, the Commission will consider whether enforcing standards-essential patents “distorts competition” in the smartphone and mobile device markets. Samsung had previously promised the group that it would license the patents in question on fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory (FRAND) terms, but it […]

All Things D: Massachusetts Democrat Ed Markey has drafted new legislation that would require cell phone carriers to notify customers before placing any tracking software on their mobile devices. Observers say the bill is a response to last year’s revelations that many carriers had installed CarrierIQ tracking software on customers’ smartphones without the customers’ knowledge. […]

eWeek: A new survey from CDW finds that IT decision makers are more optimistic about spending plans than they’ve been in five years. CDW’s six-month growth outlook composite score climbed to 71, the highest its been since October of 2007. Overall, 42 percent of IT decision makers said that they expect their IT budgets to […]

The Register: The judge overseeing HP’s Itanium-related lawsuit against Oracle has dismissed one of Oracle’s counter-claims. Oracle had accused HP of fraud for withholding information about its plans to hire Leo Apotheker and Ray Lane when the two companies reached a settlement related to Mark Hurd’s departure from HP and subsequent hiring at Oracle. The […]

The Guardian: Have millions of Android smartphones been infected by newly identified piece of maware? Maybe–depending on which security firm you believe. Symantec has sounded the alarm about 13 applications in the Android Market “are being used to push out Android.Counterclank,” which the firm calls “a bot-like threat” that could put user data at risk. […]

Wall Street Journal: Unnamed sources tell the Wall Street Journal that Facebook could file the paperwork for its initial public offering (IPO) as early as this week. Insiders say the IPO could raise $10 billion for the social networking firm and would likely value the company between $75 billion and $100 billion. The sources say […]

Wired: Google, Facebook and Microsoft usually view each other as rivals, but the three have teamed up, along with eleven other organizations, in a new effort to stop phishing. The Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting and Conformance (DMARC) group hopes to establish new email standards that would make it more difficult for bad actors to send […]

Bloomberg: Hiring in the tech industry is way up, leading some to caution that the sector may be in the midst of another bubble. Fifty tech firms valued at $100 million or more, including Apple and Amazon, have increased their headcount by 50 percent or more in the last two years. And 70 of those […]

PCWorld: Semiconductor firm Tilera has unveiled a new 36-core processor for servers. According to the company, the Tile-GX36 offers better performance per watt of energy than Intel’s x86 chips. It runs at clock speeds of 1.2GHz and draws up to 24 watts of power. Experts say the new Tilera chip could be a good choice […]