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Google Takes Heat for Illegal Rx Drug Sales Online June 19, 2013 
Mississippi AG Jim Hood has called on his counterparts in other states to join him in confronting Google for not doing enough to prevent illegal online activities including the sale of prescription drugs by rogue pharmacies. Hood invited Google CEO Larry Page to discuss his concerns but did not receive a response, he said. Consequently, the state had no choice but to issue subpoenas.
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Sprint Takes Clearwire Fight to Court June 19, 2013 
Sprint has taken legal action to prevent Dish from closing a deal with Clearwire. This is the latest development in the tug of war between the companies over the 50 percent of Clearwire's spectrum that Sprint does not already own. Sprint announced last December that it had worked out a deal to purchase the rest of Clearwire for about $2.97 per share, which would value the company at $2.2 billion.
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Apple's E-Book Trial Shrouded in Fog, Not Smoke June 19, 2013 
The e-book price-fixing trial took another turn this week, with Apple claiming that what the Department of Justice called a "smoking gun" was simply a misunderstood email draft. Apple veteran Eddy Cue worked with the late Steve Jobs to engineer a price-fixing plan that would undermine Amazon's dominant position in the e-book market, the DoJ has alleged.
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Adobe Sends Creative Suite to the Cloud for Good June 18, 2013 
After announcing last month that all of its Creative Suite apps would soon move to the cloud, Adobe on Tuesday made good on its promise and delivered the resulting subscription-based software. Now included under the umbrella name Creative Cloud, the latest versions of apps including Photoshop, Illustrator, Dreamweaver and Premiere Pro are now available exclusively to Creative Cloud subscribers for prices starting at $19.99 per month.
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The Ghost of SCO Dogs IBM Again June 17, 2013 
Like Carrie, whose hand emerged from the grave to grab Sue by the ankle in Sue's nightmare, SCO has reemerged from its grave to revive its lawsuit against IBM, 10 years after the case was first filed. A court has granted SCO's motion for reconsideration and reopening the case. SCO originally had sought $1 billion in damages from IBM, but it was soundly defeated in court.
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Tech Giants Dump Data in Trust-Rebuilding Bid June 17, 2013 
In the wake of recent revelations that the government has been tapping their networks to monitor users, Facebook, Apple and Microsoft in recent days have all published more information about those monitoring requests. Facebook, for example, reported that for the six months ending December 31, 2012, the number of user-data requests it received from U.S. government entities was between 9,000 and 10,000.
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Tech-Hungry 'Crazy Ants'? Not So Fast June 17, 2013 
To read some reports in the tech press lately, one might think there's an electronics-hungry menace from South America on a march of conquest through the Southeastern United States and Texas, leaving a trail of destroyed smartphones and other precious devices in its wake. It's known as the "crazy ant," and recent reports of its arrival derive from an article published in April.
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Google to Pit Technology Against Child Pornographers June 17, 2013 
Google is spearheading an initiative to build a picture-sharing database aimed at ridding the Web of child pornography. The company's new database will rely on "hashing" technology; once an image has been flagged as offensive, it uses an algorithm to identify that photo elsewhere on the Web. Despite widespread efforts to combat it, child pornography online is only growing.
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Hackers Find WordPress Easy Pickings June 17, 2013 
Adobe Reader and Oracle Java aren't alone in having a bull's eye painted on their code. WordPress also is becoming a popular target for Internet outlaws. It's quite a large target, too. About 18 percent of the sites on the Web -- about 60 million of them -- use WordPress. One reason WordPress is attracting hacker attention is that it's so easy to write plug-ins for it.
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Up, Up and Away: Google Balloons to Beam Internet Access June 17, 2013 
Regardless of how this turns out, at least they nailed the name. Google is launching about 30 superpressure balloons that will beam Internet access back to the ground. With equal parts brevity and self-deprecation, the effort has been dubbed "Project Loon." Taking flight from New Zealand, the balloons will sail around the world on a controlled path.
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Pondering Life in a PRISM World June 17, 2013
Not a single week goes by here in the Linux blogosphere without some assortment of news and events to keep life interesting. It's not often, however, that something comes along with the magnitude of PRISM. Linux Girl was comfortably ensconced on her favorite barstool when the news broke down at the Punchy Penguin Saloon, and it's been chaos ever since.
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Ending the US' Cyberwar Against Its Citizens June 17, 2013 
I'm into fixing problems -- in fact, for much of my life I've been employed as someone who is brought in to fix a difficult problem. I don't see much point in just complaining -- either try to fix it, ignore it, or move someplace where it doesn't affect you. The current problem is that the U.S. appears to be conducting a cyberwar against its citizens.
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Apple Exec Points Finger at Publishers in E-Book Trial June 15, 2013 
Apple SVP Eddy Cue gave testimony Thursday in the e-book price-fixing trial under way in the New York U.S. District Court. Cue, who was Apple's primary negotiator with most of the publishers during the run-up to the launch of iBookstore in 2010, told the court that it was not surprising that publishers began increasing pricing for e-books after Apple entered the market.
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Ouya, ESA Scrap Leaves Both Bruised June 14, 2013 
Indie startup Ouya had a showdown with ESA at E3 this week, momentarily overshadowing the rivalry between Microsoft and Sony. The brouhaha actually involved real police and took place on the streets of Los Angeles. It seems Ouya opted to introduce its open source gaming console not on the floor of the trade show, but in a parking lot across the street.
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From the Inevitable Files: Lawmakers Scrutinize Snowden-China Connections June 14, 2013 
Well, this was bound to happen. U.S. lawmakers said Thursday that the House Intelligence Committee -- the same House Intelligence Committee that trashed Chinese telecommunications companies last year -- will conduct a "thorough scrub" of connections between China and Eric Snowden. Snowden -- a "traitor," according to Committee chairman Mike Rogers, R.-Mich. -- is now believed to be in Hong Kong.
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Patenting Future Cures - or Not June 14, 2013 
The Supreme Court on Thursday unanimously decided that some of Myriad Genetics' patent claims were invalid for claiming products of nature. However, the Court also held that other Myriad patent claims were perfectly valid. In short, Myriad discovered the location and DNA sequence listing for two human genes that pertain to breast and ovarian cancer.
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Is Verizon's Uncomfortable Silence Savvy PR? June 14, 2013 
Verizon is on the hot seat. It is at the center of the story about releasing customer information to the NSA. While Verizon does make information about every call available to the agency, the actual conversation is still private -- for now, at least. To date, Verizon has been quiet as the argument rages. Is quiet what you expect from the PR department of any company caught in such a storm?
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Nuclear Power, Part 2: Nukenomics June 14, 2013 
There's no denying that safety and effectiveness are both critical concerns when it comes to nuclear power, and that's just as true for investors in the technology as it is for those who rely on the energy it generates. Still to be determined is whether small modular reactor designs are feasible as a free-market business proposition without current levels of government-backed investment.
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No Patents on Human Genes, Supreme Court Rules June 13, 2013 
In a decision that could make it more affordable for women to be screened for breast cancer, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled on Thursday that human genes cannot be patented. The court's rationale is that human genes occur in nature, making them unpatentable. Complementary DNA, on the other hand -- a synthetic DNA that's also used in genetic testing -- can be patented, the court ruled.
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New Drive Aims to Stamp Out Smartphone Crime June 13, 2013 
A coalition of United States officials, institutional investors and consumer advocates on Thursday launched the Save Our Smartphones Initiative nationwide. With smartphone-related crimes, some of which are shockingly brutal, on the rise in the U.S., law enforcement officials have cranked up the pressure on the cellphone industry to come up with technologies to deter theft.
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