Computers News » The Future of Android, Part 1: The Legal Squeeze

Android is developing a huge and growing following among consumers. Android devices made by a wide variety of manufacturers are attracting millions of customers every week. But its popularity has also made it a lawsuit target. Players from all corners of the tech world have put Android in the legal cross hairs, claiming the open source mobile OS is crawling with patent violations. To say Android's popular among consumers is like saying Godzilla's...

Computers News » Apple Names Prices for Seats in Its iCloud

More information is trickling forth about iCloud, Apple's upcoming syncing and online storage service. The company's expanded on the prices it will charge for various levels of cloud data storage, and it's also shown a preview of the iCloud Web apps customers will be able to use alongside their iOS and Mac OS X devices. Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) has disclosed the pricing for iCloud storage and launched a limited beta version. Users of iCloud storage...

Computers Review » Taming the Lion: A Week With Apple's Latest Mac OS X

Mac OS X Lion catapults the user into Apple's touchy-feely future. New gestures and full-screen options bring the user to a new level of control, if you have the right peripherals. Safari has been improved, and what used to be called "Expose" has learned new skills and been renamed "Mission Control." But be advised: You will have to rejigger your brain. I'll admit, for a few hours, especially when TextEdit and Preview were crashing upon launch...

Computers News » The Slim Possibility That Microsoft's SUSE Deal Could Be Good for Linux

Microsoft "is trying to be like IBM in having a 'one stop shop' for a corporation's needs, and with deals like this it makes it that much easier for MSFT to sell WinServer," said Slashdot blogger hairyfeet. "SUSE is a really good solid business Linux, and with HyperV MSFT can host plenty of SUSE instances alongside Windows, making it a nice proposition for businesses." Well July has come and gone for another year here in the Linux blogosphere,...

Computers News » Commercial Gains Mean Growing Pains for Open Source Community

We are witnessing a new wave of open source use, driven primarily by innovation rather than cost, flexibility, or other advantages. With this new wave, there is a danger that the ease of commercialization ushered in by wider use, greater credibility and, again, innovation means the all-important community piece -- often the free and open source or community version as well -- becomes an afterthought. Recent conversations at OSCON, which I've attended...

Computers News » Google's Android Defense: Let's Give Them Something to Talk About

Executives at Google and Microsoft continued to bicker about patent issues Thursday via blog posts and Twitter feeds. Often lawyers prefer to save the arguments for the courtroom. However, the patent crises Google faces could seriously undermine developers', investors' and consumers' confidence in Android. A public show of force at least indicates Google intends to fight. A war of words continues between executives at tech giants Google (Nasdaq:...

MedTechNews » Invasion of the Body Hackers? Wireless Medical Devices Susceptible to Attacks

Concerned about the security guarding certain wireless-enabled medical devices, researcher Jerome Radcliffe attempted to hack into the insulin pump he wears on his body to keep his Type 1 diabetes in check. He succeeded. His presentation on the matter at the Black Hat Security Conference has called into question the safety of medical devices and implants that can be controlled via wireless networks. Security expert and diabetic Jerome Radcliffe...

News » Google and Microsoft Take It Outside

A top Google lawyer drew attention to Android's beleaguered patent position recently with a public blog post that took the platform's top attackers to task over what the attorney called "bogus" patents. Public rebukes like this may be relatively rare, but they have their place. Meanwhile, RIM seeded new BlackBerries, McAfee smelled a rat, and AT&T users got ready for a good throttling. By just about any measure, the Android mobile platform...