Acer to acquire Gateway for $710m

[ComputerWorld] This is the biggest acquisition in Acer's 30 year history," said J.T. Wang, Acer's chairman, speaking at a news conference in Taipei. "After this acquisition, we are solidly number three in the global PC market," Wang said. Acer's acquisition deal with Gateway also derails rival Lenovo Group Ltd.'s plans to acquire Packard Bell BV.

MSFT meltdown tars customers as pirates

[Computerworld] Microsoft Corp. has blamed an unspecified server problem for a 19-hour stretch during which paying users of Windows XP and Vista were accused by the company's Windows Genuine Advantage (WGA) validation system of running pirated software. Any Vista system fingered during the episode was stripped of some features, including the operating system's Aero graphical interface.

Source: gPhone aimed at $100 laptop

[Rizzn.com] I talked to one of my inside sources at Google today. He said that the Google (applications) Suite is going to play a huge role in the usability of the GPhone, and the thought process behind it's functionality is less about beating the iPhone and more about beating the $100 Laptop, which provides a huge clue behind what will be the pricing structure on this. When he was telling me about all the nuances of what he's seen the thing do, I couldn't help but audibly remark about the FCC bid for the 700mhz spectrum making a whole lot more sense. He didn't come out and say it, but I got the impression that they were gunning for the spectrum with a vengeance. (via Om)

How resizing should work

[Guardian] From SIGGRAPH, here's an amazing video on image resizing by Dr Shai Avidan and Dr Ariel Shamir, in support of their paper on Seam Carving for Content-Aware Image Resizing. It achieves the ultimate level for any graphics processing trick, which is that when it's implemented in software, people won't notice. They'll just think, well, that's how resizing should work.

Why Mahahlo and Techmeme are going to kick GOOG's butt

[Scobelizer] Scobe explains how SEO-resistant technologies like Mahalo, TechMeme, and Facebook are about to upend the search industry.

Samsung tapped to help Sprint with WiMax in NYC

[NYT] Sprint, which recently said it would spend up to $5 billion on a mobile high-speed wireless standard by 2010, said it had awarded the New York WiMax market to Samsung.

YHOO lets users text from webmail

[Reuters] Yahoo Inc said on Sunday it was giving its e-mail users more ways to reach friends and online contacts by allowing them to trade messages with mobile phone users.

MSFT will distribute free software to India

[AP] Microsoft sees BiG Tech as another opportunity to push its India strategy that has often tied business moves with philanthropy. "We think it is going to make a big impact in India," said Neelam Dhawan, managing director at Microsoft India.

Is hacking an iPhone illegal?

[TopTechNews] The DMCA might not protect groups such as iPhoneSimFree and iPhoneUnlocking, which are planning to sell their hack software for profit. Writing on the Engadget blog, copyright attorney Nilay Patel said that AT&T or Apple might opt to sue on other grounds. TracPhone has turned numerous suits into settlements precisely because reselling unlocked phones is not within the DMCA exemption.