10th June 2009
Mobile phone directory to launch
A company will begin offering a directory service from next week that allows people to find the mobile phone numbers of people they don’t know. Run by 118800, it will cost £1 and use databases of numbers it said are freely available for purchase and in the public domain. Anyone searching for a number can type the name and location of the person into the 118800 website. It claims to have some 15m numbers in its database.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/working_lunch/8091621.stm
By 2013 Video Will Be 90 Percent Of All Consumer IP Traffic And 64 Percent of Mobile
By 2013, annual global IP traffic will reach two-thirds of a zettabyte, according to a new forecast of IP traffic issued by Cisco today. What is a zettabyte? It is a trillion gigabytes. And that number represents more than a fivefold increase in IP traffic from today. What is driving this growth is video. Cisco forecasts that 90 percent of consumer IP traffic (which makes up the majority of total IP traffic) will be video in 2013. Cisco also predicts that mobile data traffic will also be overtaken by video, reaching 64 percent of total mobile IP traffic by 2013.
http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/06/09/cisco-by-2013-video-will-be-90-percent-of-all-consumer-ip-traffic-and-64-percent-of-mobile/
O2: We can’t justify breaking iPhone contracts
TechRadar has spoken to O2 about the recent furore over the decision not to let consumers break current iPhone deals to move to the new iPhone 3GS, with the network pointing out users shouldn’t get special treatment just for having an iPhone. Speaking to Steve Alder, General Manager of Devices for O2 UK, he pointed out that it simply wasn’t viable to let O2’s iPhone customers upgrade early: “Having subsidised much (or all – depending on tariff) of the price of a customer’s iPhone 3G, we simply cannot justify invalidating that contract and subsidise a second device for the same customer.”
http://www.techradar.com/news/phone-and-communications/mobile-phones/o2-we-can-t-afford-to-break-iphone-contracts-607116
‘Failure to cut illegal downloads will cause widespread job losses’
A coalition of creative industries organisations, including the UK’s biggest trade union, Amicus/Unite, have increased the pressure on the government to act against illegal downloading in next week’s final Digital Britain report, saying that there will otherwise be large job losses in TV, film and music across the UK. The lobbying effort is backed by more than 15 organisations from the creative industries and, for the first time, Amicus/Unite and the Trade Union Congress. In a letter to today’s Daily Telegraph, the creative industries coalition urges the prime minister, Gordon Brown, to ensure a tough stance is taken in the final Digital Britain report, due to be published by the communications minister, Lord Carter, next Tuesday.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2009/jun/10/illegal-downloads-job-cuts
Sims 3 sets franchise sales record
Electronic Arts may get criticized in the press for its reliance on long-running franchises, but if the record first-week sales of The Sims 3 are any indication, gamers aren’t concerned with such matters. The game giant reported Tuesday that The Sims 3, the latest full iteration of the storied Sims franchise, sold 1.4 million copies in the first week following its June 2 release. That made it, according to EA, the best launch of a PC game in the company’s history. For any new Sims title to set such records is particularly noteworthy, given that the original version of The Sims, released in 2000, quickly became the best-selling PC game of all time. Further, the games and the many expansions released over the years have sold more than 100 million copies.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-10797_3-10261044-235.html
Speeding up brain networks might boost IQ
For decades scientists have tried, mostly in vain, to explain where intelligence resides in our brains. The answer, a new study suggests, is everywhere. After analysing the brain as an incredibly dense network of interconnected points, a team of Dutch scientists has found that the most efficiently wired brains tend to belong to the most intelligent people. And improving this efficiency with drugs offers a tantalising – though still unproven – means of boosting intelligence, say researchers.
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17280-speeding-up-brain-networks-might-boost-iq.html
