NEWS IN BRIEF
Daily Digest 20 February
20-02-2009
by Deirdre McArdle
eGov awards names winners | Vista lawsuit denied class action status
South Dublin County Council's Digital Book Service has won the overall price at the eGovernment Awards, which took place on 19 February. The online service allows users to sign up to South Dublin County Council library service and download audio books, as well as reserve books online. Taking home the People's Choice Award was the online TV licence service tvlicence.ie, which Maeve Kneafsey, MD of marketing company Elucidate, which co-hosted the awards, said "illustrates the public's appreciation of the self-service model when it interacts with government". The Department of Social and Family Affairs' website welfare.ie won the Accessibility category, while the Higher Education Authority's website studentfinance.ie won out in the Education category. For a full list of the winners click here.
In more news of awards, Belfast-based business process management software firm Singularity won the Business Excellence Award at the Invest Northern Ireland Innovation & Export Awards 2009 on Thursday. Singularity was given the award in recognition of its achievements in export growth, financial management, innovation and market leadership. The award committee evaluated factors including corporate vision, competitive strategy, export market success and corporate responsibility.
The Green Party has named eight finalists in its viral video competition aimed at promoting the party and its messages. The eight short film clips have been uploaded to YouTube for voting and the two most popular videos will go forward to the party's National Convention in March, where the overall winner will be decided. The entries received cover topics such as recycling, water conservation, energy use and climate change. The eight finalists' entries can be found here.
In a first for Ireland, a site (Dad.ie) has been launched that caters for dads-to-be, offering them a variety of tips on topics such as fatherhood, money and legal issues, health and lifestyle. The site was founded by father of two David Caren, who launched the site in a bid to fill the gap in information that's provided for prospective dads. "Information offered is predominantly targeted at mums and mums-to-be, but we are now living in a modern world where men want to be more involved from the very beginning," he said in a statement.
Though Microsoft will be happy that a US Federal Court has denied class action status to a lawsuit accusing the software firm of misleading buyers about which PCs would be able to run its Vista operating system, it will be disappointed that the court has allowed the suit to go forward on behalf of individual plaintiffs. According to Reuters, the court ruled that the plaintiffs could not demonstrate that their claims were common to the entire class of consumers who bought computers marked with the "Windows Vista Capable" but without the "Premium Ready" label. For its part Microsoft has maintained that the distinctions between the various versions of Vista were clear in its marketing campaign.
On Wednesday at the Mobile World Congress Google demonstrated a version of Gmail for the iPhone that could be used even when the device was offline. The move is similar to that which the internet giant announced in January for an offline version of Gmail for desktops and laptops. Vic Gundotra, Google's vice president of engineering, also showed the same Gmail software running on the HTC Magic, a new phone using Google's Android operating system.
The Walt Disney Company has acquired Kerpoof Studios, a creator of online tools that kids can use to make artwork, write stories and create short movies, for an undisclosed sum. Kerpoof's technology has been integrated into Disney.com, which means users will be able to create artwork around characters such as Mickey Mouse and those from the films "Cars" and "The Little Mermaid."
Caped Koala Studios has built a virtual world for kids, combining education and social networking 