Text goes to the wall

A UK company has developed a digital post-it note that can display text messages sent to it via SMS. The txTboard is designed to be hung from a wall, or in the tradition of note sharing stuck on a fridge, and features a colour touch screen to display text messages sent from mobile phones. Although the technology was developed with the aim of making it easier for households to leave messages for each other, it is not difficult to see how the ability to send a message to a particular place rather than a person could prove useful in an office environment. ...more

Fujitsu to shed thousands of jobs

The hi-tech downsizing continues with news that Fujitsu is to cut 10 per cent of its workforce. Sixteen thousand jobs are to be shed by the Japanese technology giant as part of a restructuring process, with two thirds of these expected to be outside Japan. The Japanese economy is struggling with a long-standing recession, of course, and the global PC and chip markets are still not providing any relief. ...more

Swatch turns to Microsoft Smart Watch technology

Swatch has announced its Paparazzi watch featuring Microsoft's Smart Watch technology that wirelessly feeds in data via a US network of FM radio signals. The Paparazzi will go on sale for $150 and give wearers access to entertainment news and national news headlines; local weather high and low temperatures; major stock indexes and horoscopes delivered through Microsoft's MSN Direct service. Paparazzi is the result of three years collaboration between the companies. ...more

EU to sign up to first Cybercrime Treaty

A treaty that criminalises child pornography and fraud on the Internet could be adopted within weeks, reports Reuters. Member states will have the opportunity to sign up to the cybercrime convention at the conference in Budapest on the 23 November. The treaty advocates global policing policies, email interception, the extradition of suspects and computer searches. ...more

Steve Jobs unlikely to face charges over stock option backdating

The likelihood of Steve Jobs finding himself in the dock over stock options backdating looks slim, after an investigation by the San Jose Mercury News. 'Despite Apple's disclosure that Jobs approved widespread backdating at Apple, there is no evidence he directed the backdating of his own grant or covered it up afterward,' said the paper. The paper says that such close examination reveals not malice, but 'a good-faith, although clumsy, attempt by Apple's board of directors to reward its star chief executive for resurrecting a moribund company. ...more