Get the look you want

We like the Acer Aspire One netbook's out-of-the-box UI. It's like Mac OS X's Dock writ large: a way of giving you easy access to key apps, but right in front of you, not tucked down at the bottom of the screen. However, you really should be presented with the apps you want, not what Acer believes you should have.…

Flickr updates its mobile Web site and introduces support for video playback, a huge feature that's still not quite open to all.

It's not just the fact that everyone has a Facebook ID. It's the marketing that site owners get in return.

Player shortages, consumer fears exaggerated, it's claimed

The Blu-ray Disc Alliance (BDA) has pooh-pooh'd claims that demand for the format is slowing under the recessionary pressures. It even forecast "Blu-ray will enter the mainstream" in Q1 2009.…

The online media company, which owns music service Rhapsody, went through a round of layoffs on Thursday, according to multiple sources.

Blogging platform WordPress is getting a big upgrade tonight, with a whole new dashboard and the option to write quick posts right from the admin page.

Yes, third

A third former worker at the NASA Ames Research Center in California was sentenced Wednesday to federal prison for using a government computer to download child pornography.…

Stuck between business challenges on the one hand, and information management systems on the other hand which simply limit your ability to respond. IBM's Tom Inman wants an easy way to spread your information across the board. Commentary--As the CIO of a flourishing business, you are happy to report...

It's small and it's real

Though some claimed it didn't exist, the CherryPal cloud PC chimera has been spotted in the wild.…

New chips from Advanced Micro Devices, Freescale Semiconductor, and Qualcomm may redefine the market for so-called Netbooks and ultraportables.

Give your UI the finger

Ever since Jeff Han's deservedly famous demo of a multi-touch interface at the TED conference in February of 2006, gestural-display developments have continued to appear, from Apple's mega-successful iPhone to Microsoft's micro-market Surface computer.…

Python 3.0 is a major change from the Python 2 series, and the first release that is intentionally backwards-incompatible.

In a campaign for the Burger King Whopper, Crispin Porter and Bogusky is doing a taste test with some of the remotest peoples of the world.

Biofuel deadlock put to rest, but other issues prevent the EU from sealing the green energy deal.

With the Internet Governance Forum jockeying with ICANN and the ITU for decision-making authority over the Internet, setting up a listserv incorrectly and enraging journalists isn't helpful to the cause.

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Featured links from the CNET Blog Network

Intel, Nvidia bookend top-20 chip ranking--iSuppli's preliminary 2008 top-20 chip rankings are out as memory chipmakers fall upon hard times.

Harvard team to copyright office: Let consumers hack DRM abandonware --What if a failing DRM store didn't mean that consumers would be left high and dry? What if instead, consumers had a legal right to hack the software to gain access to content that they paid for?

Seven awesome new iPhone freebies--Talk about a lucky seven: These great apps won't cost you a dime.

CBS adds Launchcast to its online radio arsenal--Launchcast, Yahoo's streaming music site, joins Last.fm and AOL Radio in CBS's online radio arsenal.

Rights management deal

Microsoft is adopting technology from EMC's RSA security division for Windows to police data and prevent loss and theft of information.…

As details emerge, it appears that small profits, corporate neglect, and executive egos all played a role in causing a major Internet outage for customers of Sprint and Cogent when the two engaged in a trial separation at the end of October.

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Bernie Ebbers, the former CEO of WorldCom who is serving a 25-year prison term for masterminding an $11 billion accounting scandal, wants President Bush to lighten his sentence.

Sun has released the second major version of OpenSolaris, a community-driven desktop-oriented distribution built on open source Solaris technology. The new release isn't capable of replacing Linux yet, but it has a lot of potential.

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