Book review: Microserfs by Douglas Coupland

The story of Microserfs traces the lives of six self-declared geeks - Dan (the narrator), Michael, Susan, Abe, Bug and Todd. It moves from their live-to-work existence at Microsoft's Redmond campus to a learning-to-live environment in northern California as part of a start-up company in Silicon Valley. On the surface the story is about life as a programmer, working in an intensive, cutting edge environment. ...more

Price Check: PDAs

The personal digital assistant is coming under fierce pricing pressure in the run up to Christmas. Time to check out what's worth buying to organise your festive tasks. For ?43. ...more

Apple in BMW iPod deal?

Apple may be about to announce a new tie-up with BMW that will see the car manufacturer's 3 Series, X3 and X4 models fitted with an iPod adapter. MacMinute has obtained a copy of a joint advertisement, saying, 'The first seamless integration of iPod and automobile.. ...more

Red Hat exec launches blog attack on Sun

A Red Hat executive has accused Sun of being 'pathetic' and 'doing things that benefit nobody but Microsoft' in his blog. Red Hat VP Michael Tiemann's attack comes in response to a post in the blog of Sun's COO Jonathan Schwartz, in turn responding to recent articles and comments suggesting that an agreement between Sun and Microsoft is 'probably as close as Microsoft can legally get to buying OpenOffice.org'. ...more

RealNetworks tunes up its radio services

RealNetworks has launched RealMusic: a music and video Internet broadcast service. RealMusic is an evolution of the company's RadioPass, and features other services such as music downloads, ringtones and a range of user-generated content, but the main thrust of the service is radio. More than 300 'channels' are available, with music 'mixed' by Real's global team of music editors - although in our experience of the service, 'chosen' would be the more appropriate verb. ...more