If I remember correctly I once found a site that had a list of Software that called home from time to time but I do not remember a list ever being published of cracked software calling home. There is a assertion that this is happening and it is the companies that own the software that is releasing cracks that actually call home. Interesting to say the least. I am skeptical as most firewall software will ask you to authorize new outbound traffic. I have not heard much on companies reactions to cracks but a vendor has aired his thoughts on his software being cracked along with discussion on the software calling home. [Joel on Software Forum] [The Net Guy]

This is a cool device if your like me and travel overseas a lot and get stuck watching stupid TV networks like the STAR Network or the only news is the BBC (sorry don’t care for it). There is a company selling a TVBrick that is a home server that allows you to watch via the net what is playing at back home. Your going to need a broadband connection on both ends but it looks like pretty cool technology. Bit expensive but could be handy in a number of areas as it also will do voice over IP. [www.tvbrick.com]

I think I want to invest in this technology as it is going to sell like hotcakes. Imagine being able to feel what other people feel over the Internet, Wired uses the example of Tiger Woods hitting a golf ball. But thats not what is going to drive this market. There are applications for this technology that probably get people all giddy as the obvious other application will drive the technology. In what will become a exploding market if they have truly figured out how to feel what others are touching. [Wired]

The hotel I am staying at is a prime example of why companies should have broadband in the business’s I was staying at a Marriott Residence Inn the dial up sucked and I found a non long term stay hotel down the street cheaper and free Broadband. Fridge is smaller but hey I have broadband now. I can even do the WiFi thing while eating breakfast. Small business like restaurants and coffee shops are stupid if they have not deployed broadband. Customers will keep coming back. The proof is in the bean counters analysis [Seattle Times]

All’s this means is that prices will drop :D

“Advanced Micro Devices on Monday rallied a new phalanx of Opteron processors for servers, on the same day that rival Intel also unveiled a battery of server chips.

The chipmaker introduced the Opteron 800 and Opteron 100, the two latest versions of its 64-bit Opteron processor for servers. AMD created the 800 line for four-processor or eight-processor servers and the 100 line for single-processor servers.” [News.com]

“Squeezing out the last bit of oomph. LIKE ITS PENTIUM 44 3.2 GHz competitor, the 2.2 GHz AthlonXP 3200+ “Barton” is supposed to be the last in its line, to be followed by a brand new replacement (in this case, Athlon 64 of course). This CPU is the peak of the three-year old 32-bit Athlon platform, the first serious competition to threaten (and often take away) the Intel performance lead – at least until the maddening “Northwood” Pentium 4 ultraquick frequency ramp-up over the past year.

XP 3200+ has everything maxed out: the L2 on-chip cache is at 512 KB, the FSB reaches 400 MHz throughput (200 MHz DDR), and the matching Nvidia Nforce2 chipset provides a dual-channel DDR400 memory subsystem to provide full FSB bandwidth to the CPU even if AGP 8X, PCI and peripherals are all continuously accessing the memory as well.”

“Advanced Micro Devices will use cache memory in somewhat novel ways to broaden out its desktop chip line, including its upcoming Athlon64 processor, according to sources.

The Sunnyvale, Calif.-based chipmaker will launch the Athlon64 with performance ratings of 3400+ and 3100+ in September and then crank the top performance rating up to 3700+ in the fourth quarter, according to sources. By the end of next year, the performance rating is expected to rise to 4300+. Ratings roughly correspond to the clock speeds of Intel chips, so that a 3100+ chip is more or less equivalent to a 3.2GHz Pentium 4.” [News.com]