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Issue no. 13, 2002 Published: Mar 29, 2002
Europe backs satellite positioning system
Dutch court clears web music swapping
Brussels to clamp down on cost of calling mobiles
ICANN: 'We have final say on .EU internet domain'
Hewlett heir files lawsuit to overturn merger vote
Startup claims video-compression breakthrough
IceCubes would mean cool computing
Sigma announces 'world's first print-quality video camera'
'Silence machine' zaps unwanted noise
Talk on cell phone without speaking
Scientists create cheap plastic solar energy cells
Thumbs: Key fingers for online youth

Europe backs satellite positioning system
Europe's alternative to the US global positioning satellite system (GPS) was approved on Tuesday by the EU transport ministers. Europe is keen to develop its own satellite positioning services to break what it calls a US monopoly. The Galileo project is scheduled to go live in 2008. Unlike the US system, each of the in total 30 Galileo satellites will broadcast signals on at least two frequencies. By receiving more signals, ground-based receivers can correct more accurately for atmospheric disturbances to the signals. This improves the accuracy from the 10 to 20 metres achieved by GPS to around a metre. Galileo will lead Europe into conflict with the US, which has security concerns about the Galileo system. GPS, like Russia's Glonass system, is a military-run network and can be downgraded or taken offline if an enemy attempts to use the data. Galileo has no such option, so the signal would be always on for everyone. The US are now pushing for Europe to introduce ways to block the free Galileo signal if necessary.
New Scientist / BBC News Mar 26, 2002	back to top

Dutch court clears web music swapping
In a setback for efforts to halt copyright abuse, a Dutch appeals court on Thursday told a technology firm it could distribute software that is designed to let users share music and films on the net. The ruling in the case between internet software company KaZaA and Dutch music rights organisation Buma Stemra overturned a decision in November in favour of the music industry. The court ruled that KaZaA was not liable for any individuals' abuse of its software, which is being used by millions of people around the world every day to swap copyright-protected games, music, pictures and films. The Dutch ruling is in stark contrast to last year's decision in which a US judge forced Napster to cease operation until it could guarantee that there was no copyright infringement on its network. But, unlike Napster, KaZaA and its peers do not operate a central server connecting different users and enabling them to transfer files.
CNN / Reuters Mar 28, 2002	back to top

Brussels to clamp down on cost of calling mobiles
The European Commission is planning a crackdown on mobile phone companies with tough new rules that could force them to cut prices and lose revenues. Brussels is concerned that mobile phone companies are making too much profit by charging fixed line operators high prices for connecting to the network. The fees - known as call termination charges - account for up to two-thirds of the retail price of a call to a mobile phone and for a substantial part of the revenues of mobile phone groups, according to some estimates. The Commission's proposals will be published in the next few weeks. If its recommendations are followed, they would make it easier for national telecommunications regulators to force mobile phone companies to reduce excessive call termination charges.
Financial Times Mar 27, 2002	back to top

ICANN: 'We have final say on .EU internet domain'
Although EU officials have approved legislation authorising the creation of a '.eu' internet domain, that law will not have any effect until the EU obtains clearance from international addressing authorities to operate the new addressing space. A European Commission proposal to create .eu cleared another legislative hurdle this month, when the EU's Council of Telecommunications Ministers adopted the measure, but neither the EU, nor any individual EU country has the authority to directly create a top-level internet domain. The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) - which manages the internet's worldwide addressing system - has set aside .eu for possible use by European officials as the sovereign domain of the EU. But before that domain becomes accessible, EU representatives will have to reach a registry agreement with ICANN, ICANN Vice President and General Counsel Louis Touton said on Tuesday.
Newsbytes Mar 26, 2002	back to top

Hewlett heir files lawsuit to overturn merger vote
Hewlett-Packard's management improperly enticed a large institutional investor to change sides and support HP's hotly contested $19 billion merger with Compaq, a lawsuit filed Thursday claims. The move 'tainted more than enough votes to swing the election in favour of the merger', said the lawsuit, filed by Walter Hewlett, the HP director who led the five-month campaign against the combination. After the vote last week, HP said it had won approval by a slim margin for biggest merger ever in the computer industry. Although final results will not be known for weeks, the margin of victory is thought to be less than 1 per cent, the lawsuit said. The suit asks the court to invalidate votes in favour of the merger and declare the combination defeated, or order a new vote. HP said it would vigorously defend the lawsuit, which it said was without merit.
Nando Times / AP Mar 28, 2002	back to top

Startup claims video-compression breakthrough
A Silicon Valley startup claims it has found a new approach to video compression that blows away the commonly used MPEG-2 standard and will allow transmission of broadcast-quality video over DSL connections. Pulsent says its technology provides a 400 per cent improvement in bandwidth and storage efficiency over MPEG-2. The technique would allow TV-quality video to be transmitted over 1.1M bps connections. Enhanced video compression could drive new services such as video on demand and allow DSL providers to compete with cable TV providers. However, the company faces tough competition even if it can deliver on its claims. Many companies have already invested in other MPEG-2 successors, such as MPEG-4 and H.26L, which is expected to become part of the MPEG-4 standard. Another disadvantage is that Pulsent's technology is proprietary, whereas MPEG-4 is an open standard.
CNN / IDG Mar 26, 2002	back to top

IceCubes would mean cool computing
'Intelligent computer bricks' that can be built up into stacks could provide a more efficient way to build future computer servers, according to researchers at IBM. The stack would be compact, cooled by water and autonomously re-route data if any one of the bricks failed. In coming years it will become important to reduce the number of people required to maintain computers as they become more complex and more common. The new IBM design - dubbed IceCube - should run for five years before any significant hardware repairs are needed, the IBM team says. Currently, large computer clusters are built by stacking computers on top of one another in rows. The bricks designed by IBM can be clicked into one another in three dimensions to form a compact cube, allowing for very rapid routing of information. If any component inside the cube fails, each brick would automatically attempt another route, meaning human maintenance is not needed. For cooling IBM will be using 'cold rails' containing running water between each layer of bricks.
New Scientist Mar 26, 2002	back to top

Sigma announces 'world's first print-quality video camera'
At the Photo Marketing Association's PMA 2002 annual convention and trade show, Sigma unveiled the SD9, which it says is the first digital video camera with high enough resolution to also provide print-quality still photos. The camera uses X3 technology to generate image quality that is better than film and has the potential to greatly assist photojournalists who report using both media. Ifra analysts note that since print-quality digital images require at least 2-megapixel resolution but most digital video cameras have CCDs of at most 1.1-megapixels, convergent news photographers today normally have to carry two cameras on assignments and shoot a news event twice for video and still purposes. There are some software solutions offered to artificially enhance a video image to make it print-acceptable.
IFRA Trend Report / Editor and Publisher Mar 28, 2002	back to top

'Silence machine' zaps unwanted noise
You will soon be able to silence the deafening racket of a road drill or the thumping beat from a nightclub without blocking the sounds you want to hear, according to Selwyn Wright, an engineer at the University of Huddersfield in Yorkshire, UK. Wright has developed the 'Silence Machine'. It works by analysing the stream of sound waves from a noise source, and generating sound that is exactly out of phase and neutralises the incoming sound waves. The concept is already in use in noise-cancelling headphones to wear in passenger aircraft which cancel out the jet engine noise. But Wright's system is the first that can block out a particular source of noise to produce a personal 'sound shadow' in which everything but the unwanted noise will still be audible. The Silence Machine comprises microphones for sound sampling, a powerful computer for generating anti-noise, and loudspeakers for blasting that anti-sound at the incoming noise.
New Scientist Mar 27, 2002	back to top

Talk on cell phone without speaking
NTT DoCoMo's research and development centre has taken the first step towards development of a technology that will allow people to talk on the phone without saying a word, the company said Tuesday. Engineers are developing a sensor, which detects signals coming from the muscle movements in the cheek and jaw made when people are speaking. Signals from the sensor are interpreted and the sound being made by the speaker can be determined, but because the system measures such impulses, the user needs to just mouth the words and no actual sound has to be made. The company hopes to complete the development in five years. During experiments, engineers have been able to get the system to discern vowel sounds with 100 per cent accuracy. As one of the possible applications, the sensor can be attached to a mobile handset and, with the help of a voice synthesizer, mobile-phone users can communicate in silence, the company says.
CNN / IDG Mar 27, 2002	back to top

Scientists create cheap plastic solar energy cells
Cheap, plastic solar cells that can be painted onto just about any surface could provide power for a range of portable and even wearable electronic devices, scientists said on Thursday. A team at the University of California Berkeley said they had come up with a first generation of plastic solar cells, which could someday replace the bulky and expensive silicon-based cells used widely now. The scientists created a hybrid solar cell, made of tiny nanorods dispersed in plastic. Sandwiched between electrodes, the hair-thin layer produces about 0.7 volts. They can be made 'quick and dirty' in a laboratory beaker without the need for clean rooms or vacuum chambers, the researchers said.
Yahoo / Reuters Mar 28, 2002	back to top

Thumbs: Key fingers for online youth
The use of mobile phones, wireless messaging units and game-playing devices has caused a physical mutation in young people's hands. New research carried out in nine cities around the world shows that the thumbs of people under the age of 25 have taken over as the hand's most dexterous digit. 'Discovering that the younger generation has taken to using thumbs in a completely different way and are instinctively using thumbs where the rest of us are using our index fingers is particularly interesting,' said Sadie Plant of Warwick University's Cybernetic Culture Research Unit in Coventry, England. In her research, Plant noticed that while those less used to mobile phones used one or several fingers to access the keypad, younger people used both thumbs ambidextrously, barely looking at the keys as they made rapid entries.
CNN / Reuters Mar 26, 2002	back to top