TechNewsWorld: All Tech

IBM Suits Up Watson to Tackle Thorny Customer Service Problems

Tuesday - May 21, 2013

IBM on Tuesday announced that it will offer Watson -- its artificial intelligence software package that won the Jeopardy game show -- as a customer service solution called Watson Engagement Advisor, a cognitive computing assistant that rapidly learns, adapts and understands a company's data. Watson's data-crunching capabilities will be offered as part of IBM's Smarter Commerce initiative for automating a business's marketing, sales, procurement, supply chain, and service functions. [More...]

Microsoft Packs Xbox One With Home Entertainment Power

Tuesday - May 21, 2013

Microsoft has officially unveiled the Xbox One, promising it will usher in a new generation of games, TV and entertainment. The One comes a dozen years after the original Xbox video game console debuted, and eight years after its best-selling Xbox 360 proved that Microsoft was a serious contender in the gaming arena. The reveal took place at an event at its Redmond, Wash., campus on Tuesday. [More...]

Teenager's Power Storage Project Lights Up Science World

Tuesday - May 21, 2013

Interest in nanochemistry research and energy storage led 18-year-old Eesha Khare, a senior at Lynbrook High School in San Jose, Calif., to develop a supercapacitor that could potentially be used in flexible displays and fabrics. Her effort won her first prize at the Intel Science Fair and the Project of the Year award in the California State Science Fair's senior division for 2013. [More...]

TECH TREK
Congressional Investigation Scopes Apple's Web of Tax Havens

Tuesday - May 21, 2013

A series of subsidiaries spanning numerous countries have helped Apple avoid billions in United States taxes, congressional investigators reported Monday. Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., head of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, which is looking into Apple's suspected transgressions, said that Apple "sought the holy grail of tax avoidance." [More...]

Food Testing for Safe Tasting

Tuesday - May 21, 2013

As parents of children with peanut sensitivities well know, awareness of what's in their kids' food is of paramount importance. In order to detect this allergen -- and many others -- engineers at UCLA have created a system called iTube. It involves placing a small amount of food in a test tube, shining a light on it, and then using a smartphone's camera and a specially-designed app. [More...]

Stay and StatsBar Worthy Additions to a Mac's Utility Belt

Tuesday - May 21, 2013

Designers of operating systems can't think of everything that should be in their programs. Utilities are a testament to that. Utilities are software programs that do things that should have been included in an operating system, but weren't. They can help you keep your system performing at top speed or solve irritating problems. [More...]

EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW
Neo Technology's Emil Eifrem: 'Cloud Is the New Open Source'

Tuesday - May 21, 2013

Graphs are everywhere. You find them on websites adding social capabilities. Telecommunications companies use graphs to personalize customer services. Innovative bioinformatics researchers, and other organizations are adopting graph databases to model and query connected data. Neo Technology has pioneered graph databases since 2000. [More...]

Yahoo's Too Uncool for Some Tumblr Bloggers

Monday - May 20, 2013

Yahoo confirmed on Monday that it was acquiring Tumblr for US$1.1 billion -- perhaps further propelling the flight of Tumblr bloggers that began when rumors of the sale intensified last week. While the deal has implications on many levels and for many players, at least one group appears to have weighed the transaction and come to a conclusion about its merits. [More...]

Jolla Floats 1st Sailfish Smartphone

Monday - May 20, 2013

Jolla on Monday launched the first smartphone to run its Sailfish operating system. The handset, which is now available for preorder, will come with a removable back plate designed to let the phone user customize its interface. Jolla was founded by former Nokia employees who wanted to continue the development work the company had started with the MeeGo OS. [More...]

SPOTLIGHT ON SECURITY
Island Nation's Web Domain Now Paradise for Spammers

Monday - May 20, 2013

Chances are you've never heard of the tiny Pacific island nation of Palau, but you may be familiar with its former Internet domain: PW. That's because the domain, now owned by Directi, has become a favorite of spammers. According to Fort Systems, Directi -- which christened PW "Professional Web" -- began offering the top-level domain to all comers at rock-bottom prices. [More...]

TECH TREK
Chinese Army Ends 3-Month Hacking Hiatus

Monday - May 20, 2013

After a three-month lull, China's People's Liberation Army has resumed hack attacks against United States companies and government agencies. Despite a ballyhooed February report from private security firm Mandiant, and despite public complaints from the Pentagon, Unit 61398, the PLA group made famous by the report, is again back to its hacking ways. [More...]

OPINION
Will BlackBerry, Nokia or Amazon Replace Apple or Google?

Monday - May 20, 2013

Apple and Google are currently at the top of the mobile device heap, but both companies are vulnerable at the moment. Apple has lost its iconic CEO and appears to be chasing Samsung, and you can't lead by following. Samsung is the dominant player on Android, but Google and Samsung are having relationship problems at the moment. Both have been quietly expressing dissatisfaction with the other. [More...]

The Windows Kernel's Achilles' Heel

Monday - May 20, 2013

Life is like a roller coaster, as the popular saying goes, filled with both ups and downs. Here in the Linux blogosphere we've certainly experienced our share of downs in recent months -- thanks in large part to a frustrating spate of FUD -- but lately the clouds have parted and the sun is shining on Linux with full force once again. [More...]

IPHONE APP REVIEW
The Clock Is Ticking on 30/30's Simple, Powerful Task Manager

Monday - May 20, 2013

I'm a sucker for productivity management -- too much to do, never enough time, and there is always, it seems, some sort of flashing distraction. There are plenty of people out there with similar problems: Even if they survived a round of layoffs, there's usually a business need to get more done with fewer resources and people. [More...]

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