August 2008

Software quality suffers during economic downturn

Businesses could face prohibitive costs arising from software failures as firms cut staff because of the economic slowdown. In a white...  Continue Reading

Tesco - every little bit of population control helps...

A woman discovered an unexpected order for a dozen condoms in her online shopping basket at Tesco. Knowing she hadn't ordered them, she suspected her partner of playing away and almost cancelled a ...  Continue Reading

Photo story: Beijing Olympics IT team applies final touches

The IT team at the Beijing Olympics are finishing last minute preparations  Continue Reading

Foreign office reports five significant data losses

The Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) lost the details of 188 people this year, in five separate incidents.  Continue Reading

Hacker McKinnon looks to Europe to avoid extradition

Self-confessed hacker Gary McKinnon ...  Continue Reading

British sports people lie back and smell the profits

With the Olympics, and the inevitable litany of British failures, approaching, Downtime felt it worth easing the pain with a pre-emptive celebration of our national character.The good news comes ...  Continue Reading

Rival to the Google throne proves to be the nuts

New search engine Cuil claims its name means "knowledge" in Irish, saying on its website, "Cuil is an old Irish word for knowledge. For knowledge, ask Cuil." But a search of the word in an online ...  Continue Reading

If you like sundials, perhaps we can interest you in...

Optional extras and gizmos are an important part of the sales pitch for any PC salesman, and that seems have been true from the very beginning. Even the world's first computer - a calculator made ...  Continue Reading

Council seeks to untangle IBM's tongue-twisters

You do not need to have mastered C++, or speak fluent HTML to know that most IT speak sounds like gibberish to the uninitiated.Somerset County Council has rather distastefully highlighted this fact ...  Continue Reading

Ofcom to investigate alleged BT price squeeze

Ofcom is to investigate complaints from network resellers Thus and Gamma Telecom that BT is trying to squeeze them out of the wholesale market in end-to-end voice calls.  Continue Reading

Alfresco creates open-source SharePoint

Alfresco has developed the first open-source enterprise content management (ECM) suite that is compatible with Microsoft SharePoint.  Continue Reading

Internet crime? Global justice?

This week we feature two stories that show how ICT intersects with national legal systems to produce very novel scenarios of crime and punishment.

A...

A good backup horror story can make you a better backup administrator

Broad IT skill sets are fine. But to truly be an exceptional backup administrator, one must have survived a nightmarish backup experience.  Continue Reading