Hong Kong is planning to launch a 1Gbps broadband home service. Although the idea of using shared infrastructure is nothing new for TV/phone/data this appears to be the first to do this over IP at such high speed. The cost is high — US$215 a month. Per megabit, however, this is a very cheap service. This kind of solution only really works in town blocks where cat5 cabling is a realistic option

Looks like the Internet Explorer team is trying to catch up to some of the major OS browsers. They claim to have finally added proper PNG support and have fixed numerous CSS bugs

A recent study at King’s College indicates that the average IQ loss of e-mail users was ten points or six points more than cannabis users. And in another story, it seems that computers make kids dumb and an apparent problem-solving deficit disorder observed in children who use computers

The trend of using inbox as a personal database has become more pronounced as the services have dramatically increased their storage capacity in response to Gmail offering a free service with 1,000Mb of storage. For all but the very organised, old e-mails will contain phone numbers that haven’t been entered into a diary, names and addresses of contacts, meeting or customer information, useful statistics or competitor information and photos of products and people

Google has added a My Search History feature to its online search engine that allows users to view past searches. The technology also lets them search inside the results to quickly retrieve a page they visited in the past. The feature will provide visitors with a relevant history, such as the number of searches performed and the last time they visited a Web page, as well as an overview of similar searches

Sony and Toshiba, which support the Blu-ray Disc and HD-DVD formats respectively, are actively discussing the possibility of a single format. Should they manage to agree on a single format, and gain the acceptance of other companies backing the respective formats, it would benefit both consumers and the electronics and entertainment industries

Elwood (Woody) Norris has invented a working flying machine, AirScooter. He asked one of his test pilots to demonstrate it for 60 Minutes on a hilltop outside San Diego, California. It can fly for two hours at 90 km/h, and go up to 3,000 metres above sea level. This week, he will receive America’s top prize for invention. It’s called the Lemelson-MIT award — a half-million dollar cash prize to honor his life’s work, which includes a brand new personal flying machine. Woody Norris’ and others’ inventions are for NASA’s The Highway in the Sky. It is a computer system designed to let millions of people fly whenever they please, and take off and land from wherever they please, in their very own vehicles — via Slashdot

Many of the world’s largest organisations are turning their backs on outsourcing and one in four are actively bringing services back in-house. A survey from Deloitte Consulting reveals that 70% of respondents have had significant negative experiences with outsourced projects

Adobe is to buy Macromedia in a stock transaction valued at US$3.4 billion that will see the formation of a content-creation behemoth. The deal, announced early on Monday morning in the US, is expected to close in the fourth quarter of 2005, subject to shareholder approval. Bruce Chizen will continue as Adobe’s chief executive and Shantanu Narayen will remain president and chief operating officer. Macromedia chief executive Stephen Elop will join Adobe as president of worldwide field operations

I finally got my paws on an iPod, but not without running afoul of the idiocy of Apple’s sales and marketing people. I find it interesting that Apple paid to get most department store catalogues to pimp their products when they refused to deliver said products to the stores in time for the catalogue run.

The monkeys at Next Byte were their usual mindless selves and no help whatsoever. A run around town resulted in the same thing. Finally, a ring around of stores resulted in yet the same story. No iPods. No idea when they’ll arrive. Apple won’t part with information.

There was the distinct feeling that Apple are not making themselves any friends with their retailers, several were more than happy to give tell me their woes. After having to tell customers that they don’t have stock of the advertised product and have no idea when they will, I don’t blame them.
I ended up having to deal with the horror of the online Apple store. That was not a joyous experience. I wouldn’t have minded the inconvenience of their crap ID check if I was informed up front, I object when I get an e-mail on a Friday afternoon that can’t be replied to until after the Apple monkeys have left for the day. Wonderful timing to hold my order up for the weekend through their incompetence. I was no a happy camper. It certainly didn’t help their case that their idea of e-mail looks exactly like a phishing scam.

Now I’m left wondering if it was such a great choice. One of co-workers iPods has died the death and it’s less than a month old. Apple have been keeping iPod problems very quiet, happily claiming that each fault is unique and never admitting to the possibility of a wider reaching series of problems.

Journalist Peter Cotton is now on his fifth iPod and Apple’s no comment is wearing a bit thin.

I decided it was time to go to the top. I called the managing director’s office, where an assistant heard me out. Within hours I had a call from Apple Australia’s marketing director, Arno Lenior. He apologised for his staff’s failure to return calls but refused to say anything about the five failed iPods.

No comment was Lenior’s only comment. Not This is most unusual or Sorry about those iPods. No. It was No comment, and he said it about 20 times as I peppered him with questions about the efficacy of iPod technology, about other people’s experience of the iPod, and why Apple was prepared to trumpet the brilliance of this music machine but was unwilling to talk when there was a problem. No Comment. So I asked whether Apple ever commented for stories about hardware failure. We do sometimes, Lenior says, but in this case: no comment.

I got a similar idiotic, whining Nobody else complains, when I queried their business practices. Apple really need to lift their game before they shoot themselves in the foot
Update: My colleague had no problems getting his iPod replaced, aside from the delay of getting a new one shipped out to him. He expected to get stuck in a repair cycle, but they didn’t even suggest that.
His conversation with the store was interesting. The guy stated that this was the first iPod Photo that had stopped working, but he mentioned that the previous generation were buggy and died constantly. These comments are from the store point of view of what is coming back through them, they personally have seen many buggy units, and it would explain the no questions swap.
I had a new power supply for the PC blow a week after I installed it. My friend got the same model at the same time and his went too. Both were replaced with different models without a problem, but it does illustrate that occasionally you do get bad batch runs.
With any luck, my colleague’s problem was an anomoly and is not endemic to the series. Hopefully it shouldn’t affect my iPod Mini or his iPod Photo replacement.

LED lamps were unthinkable until the technology cleared a major hurdle just a dozen years ago. Since then, LEDs have evolved quickly and are being adapted for many uses, including pool illumination and reading lights, as evidenced at the Lightfair trade show here this week. More widespread use could lead to big energy savings and a minor revolution in the way we think about lighting