NEWS IN BRIEF
Daily Digest 6 March
06-03-2009
by Deirdre McArdle
Green Party strengthens Web 2.0 campaign | Windows 7 to allow IE8 switch-off
As it strives to replicate in some way the success of Barack Obama's Presidential campaign, where technology and the internet were used to such great effect, the Green Party has linked up with MiCandidate. Irish-based MiCandidate will provide the party with online campaign tools and resources to help it maximise its chances at the upcoming local and European elections. "When MiCandidate.eu launches across Europe in April, it will become the world's largest database of political candidates, covering over 10,000 candidates and hundreds of parties from some 27 countries," said Paddy Cosgrove, founder of MiCandidate. "This is a revolutionary grassroots platform and we are currently working with citizen sector organisations, student unions, senior citizen groups and public service broadcasters to engage as many people, young and old, across as many countries as possible."
Online classifieds website Craigslist has been accused of being "the single largest source of prostitution" in the US by police officials in Chicago who are seeking to ban "erotic services" advertising on the site. Thomas Dart, the sheriff of Cook County in Illinois, announced on Thursday that he was asking judges to shut down the "erotic services" category on Craigslist. "Erotic services" ads posted on Craigslist have in the past resulted in several prostitution arrests in the US. Susan Best, a spokeswoman for San Francisco-based Craigslist, told the Associated Press that the company cooperates with law enforcement and works diligently to prevent illegal use of the site. She said the company has taken such measures as placing prominent notices banning illegal activity and removing inappropriate ads.
The Beatles' fans all over the world will welcome the news that a new game, "The Beatles: Rockband," is to be launched in North America, Europe, Australia, New Zealand on 9 September 2009. The game will be compatible with Microsoft's Xbox 360, Sony's Playstation 3, and Nintendo's Wii console. Existing "Rock Band" instrument controllers can be used to play the game. The game marks The Beatles' first step into the world of digital music. A large number of major rock bands, such as Aerosmith and The Rolling Stones, have made their music available for sale online and have licensed music to "Rock Band" or Activision Blizzard's rival game, "Guitar Hero".
Microsoft has publicly acknowledged the findings of a couple of bloggers who discovered that with the next major test release of Windows 7, Internet Explorer 8 will be able to be turned off. The acknowledgment was made on the Engineering Windows 7 blog. In the posting Jack Mayo, the Group Program Manager for the Documents and Printing team, listed a set of Windows 7 features that will be able to be turned on and off by users after the initial Windows set-up. These include: Windows Media Player, Windows Media Centre, Windows DVD Maker and Internet Explorer 8.
Global PC shipments decreased by 1.9 percent in the fourth quarter of 2008, following five years of almost uninterrupted double digit growth. That's according to an IDC report, which said it expects shipments to fall by 8 percent in the first half of 2009. The research firm said that PC shipments will gradually improve over the year and by the fourth quarter of 2009 will record a small positive growth.
In another report from IDC, the research house said it expects worldwide IT spending on cloud services to grow almost threefold, reaching USD42 billion, by 2012. IDC expects more and more businesses to adopt the cloud computing model as they try to cut costs in the current economic environment.
Caped Koala Studios has built a virtual world for kids, combining education and social networking 