AOL
quietly cans broadband access plan
If America Online stopped
providing high-speed access, would anyone notice? Evidently not. Time
Warner’s internet arm evidently stopped selling its complete package in
January, but made no announcement about the change. Though it won’t stop
providing broadband for the customers who already bought it, future
subscribers can receive only AOL for Broadband, which offers access to
AOL’s “walled garden” portal when you bring your own access. The
company has 3 million total broadband subscribers, but has never admitted
how many of them subscribe to broadband access, at a hefty $54.95 per
month. AOL followers say this is one of the ripples from the strategic
realignment that began in December 2002 and last year resulted in Time
Warner dropping the AOL name from the company title, years after their
much-criticized merger.
Study: U.S.
internet users surpass 150M
In case you weren’t already aware, the popularity of
the internet has exploded over the past eight years. A study conducted by
comScore Networks’ Media Metrix found that the number of U.S. internet
users has now exceeded 150 million – more than seven times the amount of
users recorded by a similar comScore study in 1996. Another interesting
statistic from the study: Up from virtual obscurity in 1996, 35 percent of
U.S. internet users now access the internet in their homes via cable or
DSL. In addition, eight years ago comScore declared the most visited
internet sites to be ISP sites, search engines and university pages.
Today, our web-surfing tastes have shifted significantly, with popularity
rankings dominated by information and content delivery sites as well as
e-commerce sites. But perhaps one of the study’s most significant
findings is that overall online spending will top $100 billion for the
first time this year. In January 2004 more than half of the U.S. active
internet population of 83.5 million people visited eBay or Amazon.com. It
is the travel industry that has benefited the most from the switch to
internet shopping – it raked in $41 billion in consumer sales in 2003.
Worried
Microsoft wants caller ID for email
The government’s CAN-SPAM act
hasn’t had the desired effect against the heinous internet scourge, so
Microsoft is pumping a new approach. Not surprisingly, Microsoft is also
producing it. The company said last week that it is working on a caller ID
of sorts for email, which would publish big companies’ email server
technical information in an effort to block fraudulent spammers. Microsoft
has reason to lead the spam crusade. The company charges that spammers
trick recipients into downloading virulent software, which often preys on
Windows or Internet Explorer flaws. The company is worried that spam and
viruses are affecting trust in Windows and Microsoft in general,
especially with a wave of worms in the past two months that were
particularly fast-spreading. The Microsoft plan would check email
addresses of senders to verify that the person is who he says. The company
already has released information about its own Hotmail program that
functions like a caller ID.
Spanish
building $87M supercomputer
Apparently unwilling to compete
directly with the Japanese, Spain has reached an $87 million deal with IBM
to build the world’s second-most-powerful supercomputer. Japan houses
the world’s most powerful. The computer, to be built in the northeast
town of Catalonia, will be used for research on climate change, mechanical
engineering, aeronautics and medicine. The supercomputer seems like a sort
of consolation prize, since Spain had proposed the city for a $10 billion
nuclear fusion reactor. The new Spanish computer will match the
Japanese’s 40 teraflop capabilities.
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