LA Times pulls wikitorial experiment

It sounded like a great idea. Why not let the readers write the newspaper? However, when the Los Angeles Times punted out the idea of 'wikitorial', the results were not quite what it hoped for. After just a week, the newspaper has withdrawn the wikitorial section from its website after being bombarded with what it terms 'inappropriate content'. ...more

Belgian teen murdered over iPod

A Belgian teenager has been murdered after he refused to hand over his iPod to two youths attempting to rob him. Joe Van Holsbeeck, 17, was stabbed several times in the ticket hall of Brussels' central station in the middle of the afternoon and died several hours later. The Belgian prime minister, Guy Verhofstadt, said that catching the two perpetrators is 'an absolute priority' for the police. ...more

Microsoft to ship new Korean Windows

Microsoft has announced will ship new versions of its Windows operating systems in Korea. The decision follows the failure of an appeal against an anti-trust ruling. Last December the Korean Fair Trade Commission found that the integration of Media Player and Instant Messaging capabilities into Windows contravened South Korea's Fair Trade Law. ...more

April showers backdoor viruses

Trend Micro has issued its virus roundup for April, indicating that virus numbers continue to escalate and increasingly use backdoor components to allow attackers access to personal information. The antivirus company said that it had detected 1700 new viruses in the month - 500 more than in March and 1300 more than in December. Perhaps more cncerning however is the increased proportion that install backdoors on infected systems to give attackers remote access - some 60 per cent. ...more

BT speeds up ADSL services

BT has announced a package to triple the speed of its rollout of broadband services yesterday, after weeks of complaints about delays and missed appointments. The company admitted that the rollout has not been smooth and has hired US specialist staff and consultants with experience of delivering broadband services in order to increase the installation rate by a factor of three - to 15,000 a month by March. To date it has connected just 14,000 users through ISPs such as BT Openworld and Freeserve since the service was made available in August. ...more