Festive Internet traffic doubles from 2003

British Internet and email use on Christmas Day and Boxing Day was double that of 2003 according to the London Internet Exchange (Linx). Internet traffic through Linx hit a peak of around 45 Gb/sec on Christmas Day and 50 Gb/sec on Boxing Day. Although Linx says the numbers are not directly comparable, the figures are double those for 2003, when the peaks were 25 Gb/sec on Boxing Day and around 22 Gb/sec on Christmas day. ...more

Range of FireWire products expanding

The range of FireWire products continues to expand, following the announcement that Orange Micro will ship the iBOT desktop video camera at the end of October. The company claims the camera is "quite simply 16 times better than current standard USB video cameras," as it takes full advantage of FireWire's 400Mb/second bandwidth. The camera captures video at 30 frames per second at standard 640x480 resolution, performance unheard of in USB cameras. ...more

Mobile phone fire puts US man in hospital

A California man was badly burned at the weekend after his mobile phone spontaneously combusted. Luis Picaso of Vallejo suffered second and third-degree burns on half his body, after his polyester-blend trousers and nylon shirt caught fire. The fire also melted the plastic chair that he had been napping in. ...more

Nintendo recalls DS adapters, exchanges Wii straps

Following reports of broken controller straps, Nintendo has said it will voluntarily exchange, globally, some 3.2 million straps for its Wii game console with stronger versions. Nintendo also said it would recall about 200,000 AC adapters for its hot-selling DS and DS Lite handheld game machines in Japan, because they may overheat and cause burns on rare occasions. ...more

Microsoft acquires content management technology for .NET

Microsoft has acquired NCompass Labs, the company behind the content management system aimed at e-business, NCompass Resolution. The management of content is obviously a fundamental issue for serious online business and Microsoft is keen to be seen to be covering this area. The technology will be adopted under its wide-embracing . ...more