For the record 27 April

27-04-2007

by Maxim Kelly

USD100 laptop now costs USD175 | ComReg awards first joint spectrum licence with Ofcom

Personal Broadband UK has been offered a spectrum licence by ComReg as part of its joint licensing approach with Ofcom in Northern Ireland. The 15-year technology and service-neutral licence cost EUR205,000 for spectrum between 1785MHz and 1805MHz. Ofcom will shortly launch the second stage of the process by auctioning a similar licence in Northern Ireland. "This auction is the result of continuing close co-operation between the two telecom regulators on the island of Ireland," said ComReg chairman Mike Byrne. "This licence has the potential to introduce more competition in wireless markets in Ireland for the benefit of consumers. ComReg will continue to work closely with Ofcom with the objective of introducing services to benefit businesses and consumers throughout the island of Ireland."

Digiweb has won the 2007 Telecommunications Company of the Year award, as well as the ICT Company of the Year at the ICT Excellence Awards. Colm Piercy, managing director at Digiweb, said: "We are very pleased to have been recognised by the industry in this manner. Telecommunications is an extremely difficult market and is also notoriously competitive. We will continue to grow as a company through innovation and developing customer driven products."

IBM has disclosed plans to integrate the Cell Broadband Engine (Cell/BE) with the IBM mainframe for the purpose of creating a hybrid computer that is fast and powerful, and secure enough to handle a new generation of 'virtual world' applications, such as the 3D Internet. The supercharged hybrid computer is a cross-company project beyween IBM and Hoplon Infotainment, a Brazilian online game company whose software is used to test the capabilities of 3D environments. The project intends to create an environment that can seamlessly run demanding simulations, such as massive online virtual reality environments; 3D applications for mapping, enterprise resource planning and customer relationship management; 3D virtual stores and meeting rooms; collaboration environments; and new types of data repositories.

An online archive providing details of nearly 100,000 slaves owned by British colonists in Barbados during the early 19th Century has been launched, according to the BBC. Ancestry.co.uk features the first part of the Former Colonial Dependencies' Slave Register Collection and will eventually detail 3 million slaves. The initiative has been undertaken as part of the 200th anniversary of Britain's abolition of the slave trade.

Sony launched a YouTube competitor in Japan on Friday that allows users to share videos and blog about them. PC Advisor reports that the new eyeVio website allows users to upload video clips, watch those of other members and subscribe to channels featuring content from commercial providers as well as models, designers and writers. To avoid the copyright infringement problems that have dogged the YouTube service, Sony said it would carefully monitor the videos uploaded by users, although it did not say how it would do that. The company has not announced plans to launch the service overseas.

The founder of the ambitious USD100 laptop project, which plans to give inexpensive computers to schoolchildren in developing countries, has revealed the machine now costs USD175, according to The Sydney Morning Herald. The laptop will also be able to run Windows in addition to its homegrown, open-source interface. Nicholas Negroponte, the former director of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Media Lab who now heads the nonprofit One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) project, updated analysts and journalists on where the effort stands, saying "we are perhaps at the most critical stage of OLPC's life".