Holiday
e-spending hits new high of $11.72B
The virtual cash registers have
clinked shut for 2003, and now some good news.
Holiday e-commerce
sales soared 29 percent from $9.08 billion to $11.72 billion from last
year to this year, according to a market research firm. ComScore, which
tracks the spending of 1.5 million internet users, said online holiday
retail purchases jumped
29.5
percent over
last year for the period from Nov. 1 to Dec. 31. Crowds and bad weather may have
contributed to the rise in online shoppers. This rise in consumers who
choose to log on and stay home to shop is affecting traditional retail
outlets. Some experts say people avoiding late shopping crowds increased
the online traffic this December. Internet retailer Amazon.com led the
year-end sales race with a one-day sales record of a sale every 24
seconds.
Rotten
Apples? Mac users threatening lawsuit
Some Mac users want to make
Apple-sauce. Two online petitions against Apple have attracted hundreds of
signatures from those seeking to file lawsuits over claims of defects in
the iBook laptop. Complaints have also been heard about the cult favorite
iPod line of digital music players. In California, a class-action lawsuit is expected to
be filed in January against the company claiming Apple’s warranty
isn’t long enough to cover problems with the player’s battery.
BlackCider.com and PetitionOnline.com both feature petitions complaining
about Apple defects. BlackCider.com site owner Michael Johnson even offers
T-shirts to support the cause.
Beware
holiday worm via MSN Messenger
Some people received an unwanted gift this holiday
season. Antivirus experts have warned against a nasty little
Christmas-themed e-mail worm and a virus that spreads through MSN
Messenger. Once the file Jitux.A is executed, it stays in memory and sends
messages to other MSN Messenger users every five minutes asking them to
download jituxramon.exe. Since Friday the virus has spread quickly,
affecting mainly Portugal, Spain and Mexico, according to Panda Software.
To remove the virus, the user can simply scan their PCs with antivirus
software. The more problematic PE_QUIS, also called W32.HLLP.Belzy@mm,
spreads itself through Outlook as an e-mail including a destructive
payload. The worm appears to be a Christmas screen saver and has an
attachment called xmas.scr. Once opened, the worm infects the computer and
says to disinfect it the user must take a quiz. Upon completion, the
infection code is executed once more.
Queen
knights net creator (it's Sir Berners-Lee)
Britain’s Queen Elizabeth is
knighting the king of links, technologist Tim Berners-Lee. The mastermind
behind the addition of hyperlinking to the internet to create the world
wide web in 1990 is a British citizen who lives in the United States. The
word from Buckingham Palace is the computer whiz received the honor
because of what he had done to propel global development of the internet.
The bright idea of launching the web came to Berners-Lee, 48, while
working at CERN, the European Particle Physics Laboratory in Geneva.
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