August 23 – 29, 1999
from the Up-To-Date dept
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********************************************************************* UP-TO-DATE ********************************************************************* The not always serious, not always weekly update on the High-Tech Industry August 23rd - August 29th, 1999 ********************************************************************* Officially not as successful as Slashdot --------------------- Techdirt on the Web --------------------- As some of you might know, Techdirt was mentioned in Wired this week, causing a ton of traffic to the site, and a good number of new Up-To-Date subscribers. To see the Wired article: http://www.wired.com/news/print_version/culture/story/21448.html?wnpg=all To see my response to the Wired article and some of the mail I received in return: https://www.techdirt.com/articles/990826/1627256_F.shtml This week's poll is, what do you think of the term "open source journalism": https://www.techdirt.com/pollBooth.pl?qid=osj Also, it's time for a new contest. We're looking for a good tagline to explain Techdirt. For the full instructions, head on over to: https://www.techdirt.com/articles/990830/0247212_F.shtml Or just email your submissions to tagline@techdirt.com And, as always, there's plenty more stuff at https://www.techdirt.com/ -------------------- Say that again... -------------------- "Their product has been delayed until sometime in the summer of 2000. If and when Oracle delivers a viable product in this space we'd expect to see them become a competitor. Today, they're not a meaningful competitor." - Thomas Siebel, CEO of Siebel Systems, adding fuel to the fire in the fun little discussion he and Larry Ellison have been having. "If we were to go out there and scream: 'We are Nordstrom's Online,' we'd be just like everyone online. We want to go out there and scream: 'Nordstrom.com: Building the world's biggest shoe store.'" - Bob Scwartz, VP and general manager of Nordstrom.com "We have not seen any other viruses originating out of New Jersey." - Paul Loriquet, spokesman for the New Jersey Attorney General's office, concerning the creator of the Melissa virus being from that state. ------------------------------------------ Earnings Reports, IPOs and the like ------------------------------------------ Seagate laying off plenty of folks... Compaq laying off plenty of folks... Net2Phone's stock shot up to ridiculous levels due to a few well timed deals... Cisco buys again: this time for a mere $7 billion, they pick up Cerent, a networking startup... E-Loan buys up carfinance.com... ------------------------------------------------ Rumors, Conspiracies etc. of the week... ------------------------------------------------ Amazon.com's ad agency has ditched them after a bit of nasty fighting... Deutsche Telekom looking at buying Sprint... ---------------------------------------- News you should have read elsewhere ---------------------------------------- Clinton appoints an e-commerce advisor... Court says that Microsoft doesn't really have to make its Java compatible with Sun Java (as if Microsoft ever actually planned to)... Not all company names protected from cybersquatting (as in, when is this Avery Dennison case ever going to end?)... White House panel suggests that the US stop being so stupid about encryption policies... Bill Gates is "pretty sure" that Windows 2000 will ship in '99... -------------------------- News you could do without -------------------------- ABC medical correspondent and director at drkoop.com apparently doesn't understand the basics behind insider trading, as she discovers she needs to return $50,000 worth of profits made by selling early... Western Governors University, the extraordinarily overhyped "virtual" university, which was expecting thousands upon thousands of students has signed up a grand total of 120 (time to emphasize the value of a small community when learning)... Compaq is giving up on making the Alpha compatible with Windows 2000 (and, really, let's face it, no one cares)... Sun buying Forte Software... Network Solutions is reorganizing... Apple suing yet another iMac lookalike (why are these folks so unoriginal that they can't come up with at least a different color?)... SAP partners with eOnline as they try to figure out what an ASP is other than a anagram of their name... Amazon using domain data to compile "customer circles" info about what folks at a particular company are ordering. Privacy folks freak out, and Amazon backs down... Disney buys toysmart.com... The guy arrested for creating the Melissa virus 'fesses up... The end of Mir as we know it?... Yahoo encourages Yahoo store owners to spam... Microworkz CEO resigns (it's about time)... Dictionary publishers criticizing Microsoft's Encarta World English Dictionary as "inaccurate and hastily compiled" (from Microsoft? Do you really believe Microsoft would do something inaccurately and hastily compiled?)... Sony is going to spend $150 million in advertising on its Playstation to compete with the new Dreamcast from Sega... Handspring to unveil their product offering at Internet World (anyone making odds on how big of a disappointment it will be?)... Intergraph still pissed off at Intel... Stupid kid threatens to blow up IBM and Microsoft if they don't give him $5 million (there must be better ways to raise that sort of money these days)... ------------ Surprises: ------------ Rick Belluzzo leaving the CEO post at SGI (after just a year and a half) to head up Microsoft's interactive group (no, really, this makes no sense whatsoever)... PSINet went out and bought Transaction Network, which is a bit of a stretch for an ISP, but as the name of the game these days is e-commerce, it seems to make sense... "Ha ha! Just kidding," claims the Navy, backing off their really really scary Y2K report of last week... Sony buys up Emazing, as they attempt to add content to their new email distribution service... Benchmark ditches Toys 'R' Us to give a ton of money to Nordstrom so they can sell *socks* over the internet? (since when are socks a billion dollar business?)... Xanadu released? (nah, must be a dream)... Dunkin' Donuts buys up anti-Dunkin' Donuts website (but before you think that's the way to get rich, note that Ford is now trying to shut down an anti-Ford site)... ------------------------------- (Mis)Uses of Technology: ------------------------------- AOL-TV... Using AOL chat rooms can get you syphilis... Internet access available from Royal Caribbean cruises... Spending $3 million on a movie which will only be released on the web... New Liquid Audio supports MP3s and Real Networks' format... New Samsung phone allows you to download and play music... Liquidating a company's product lines by auctioning off everything online... RC5 clients left running used to track down stolen laptops (I'm still amazed by this - who thought to check to see if the little cow was still grabbing keys?)... Lobster cam... Giving away free internet access to folks who buy ice cream in Sweden... Linux credit card... Dell to create big internet enabled pagers... Discover and Dreyfus both offer after-hours trading online, and discover that no one wants to use it... ---------- Studies: ---------- So, it seems that only 6% of the folks on the web are addicted (though their definition of "addicted" is certainly a bit suspect)... According to JD Power and Associates, more than 5 million folks will use the internet in researching automobile purchases this year... More and more folks go to a smaller and smaller number of websites daily, leaving the rest out in the cold, according to Media Metrix... VaultReports.com has found that more than one-third of employees admit that they are constantly surfing the internet during the workday (something I, personally, would never do)... Schwab has the highest customer satisfaction rating of online trading sites according to JD Power and Associates... A new study from PC Data shows that brand name recognition is critical for e-commerce success... Forrester predicts "logistics chaos" for e-commerce companies planning to deliver goods to customers... ----------- Overhype ----------- Yahoo! Digital... AOL's latest internet messaging product (can you say "catch up"?)... AOL finally getting around to launching free internet service in the UK... US ACLU President calls Australians village idiots for their net censorship laws. Australians say the US has no right to talk about values. Hmm, they might both be right... Linux's success causing its downfall... -------------- Predictions: -------------- Postage4Free.com, the company that will give you free pre-stamped envelopes if you give them personal info, isn't going to go very far, but that won't stop them from raising ridiculous amounts of money... ------------------------ Too much free time: ------------------------ One of the more major problems of this decade. Shopping cart abuse: http://www.shoppingcartabuse.com/ ********************************************************************* Up To Date is written by Mike Masnick from whatever news he hears from whatever sources they happen to come from. It is not intended for any uses other than as one of many possible ways to follow what's going on in the hi-tech industry. I certainly wouldn't rely on it as your only source of info. And, of course, my comments may not accurately reflect reality. Finally, an explicit warning about investing: I do not, under any circumstance, consider any piece of information in this newsletter "investment advice" and neither should you. If you would like to subscribe to the email version please send an email to utd-sub@techdirt.com with "Subscribe Up-To-Date" in the subject heading. Up To Date is also available on the web at https://www.techdirt.com/uptodate/ If you want more in depth, daily up dates, along with your own commentary head over to https://www.techdirt.com/ Comments are always welcome! Email: feedback@techdirt.com *********************************************************************
