InsideTech

When times were better, Robert Taylor had one hell of a job. As a team member for Yahoo's search operations center, he helped oversee the company's search engine systems worldwide. "If you went to Yahoo and something was not working, I was one of the people in the background," the 46-year-old Covina resident said. "I monitored their servers and network devices ...

While the independent music industry and small labels are largely thriving, the major label music industry is down on its luck.  Big artists like Jay-Z, Britney Spears, and Metallica just aren't selling as many albums as they used to.  The major labels blame this on pirates.  They have banded behind a thuggish organization by the name of the Recording Industry Association ...

New engine ideas are gaining traction thanks to a combination of technical breakthroughs and demand for more fuel efficient vehicles.  Such diverse technologies as cam-less (solenoid driven) engine valves, gasoline direct injection, and advanced turbocharging are being explored. However, one fundamental problem is that when you reduce the engine to the smallest possible size with these technologies, it's still a block ...

Microsoft dropped a blockbuster product announcement yesterday via Gizmodo.  After months of Apple-tablet rumors, including word that Steve Jobs himself is masterminding the device, it is Apple's competitor Microsoft that has stolen the spotlight with the announcement of an upcoming touchscreen ultra-mobile device. The new device was developed with positively Apple-like secrecy.  Only a handful of engineers worked on or were ...

We already know a lot about the collaboration service coming from Google called Wave. The new Wave platform has so far been seen only by developers and press at events designed to showcase the platform's capability. Since Wave was first introduced, Google has been signing people up as beta testers for Wave in exchange for the users reporting bugs in the ...

If there's one thing clear from the Google Voice iPhone debacle, it's that there's no love lost between AT&T and Google.  AT&T, to date, is accusing Google of everything from political and news manipulation, to violating net neutrality. The drama surrounding the rejection began shortly after when the Federal Communications Commission opened an inquiry into who was responsible for the rejection ...

Sep. 29 - Here's a hot list (not a holiday list!) of new or upcoming home-entertainment products, technologies, novelties and maybe more than a couple of wannabes. Merry browsing. 1. Vizio VF47XVT LED HDTV ($1,700, available in November): The two hottest HDTV technologies are LED backlighting with local dimming - where reduced brightness in specific areas produces deeper blacks - ...

Oct. 26 - PORTLAND, Ore. - Maybe I'm on to something. For a good part of last week, my musings about Ubuntu Linux was among the top five most-read stories on our site. Since the other top stories concerned health-insurance reform or the H1N1 vaccine and similar weighty topics, the presence of a geek-oriented column came as a pleasant surprise. I ...

BEIJING - Apple's iPhone is making its long-awaited formal debut in the world's most populous mobile phone market, without a key feature and at higher prices than widely available black market models. Apple's local service provider, China Unicom Ltd., hopes the iPhone will give it an edge against giant rival China Mobile Ltd., the world's biggest phone company by subscribers. ...

BOSTON - The hotel review may sound too good - citing obscure details like the type of faucets - or perhaps one stands out as the only negative rating of an otherwise popular location. The influential travel Web site TripAdvisor has been quietly posting disclaimers to warn customers of hotels writing fake reviews to improve their popularity rankings or hurt competitors. ...

Sep. 14 - For nearly two years, one of the biggest names in consumer financial software has listened to a steady drumbeat of rave reviews for a new personal finance tracking service offered by online startup Mint.com. Mountain View-based Intuit responded Monday by announcing it will spend $170 million to buy the upstart company and add its fast-growing service to ...

NEW YORK - New York's attorney general hit Intel Corp. with an antitrust lawsuit Wednesday, claiming the company used "illegal threats and collusion" to dominate the market for computer microprocessors. Following a similar case in Europe, Attorney General Andrew Cuomo claimed that the world's biggest computer chip maker paid billions of dollars in kickbacks to computer manufacturers and retaliated against those ...

Nov. 3- PASADENA - Microsoft's customer base could get even bigger - but so will a local company's footprint in the $50-billion world of online advertising. Pasadena-based ad technology firm OpenX just inked a deal with the software giant. Under the partnership, through OpenX, Microsoft will get access to a huge new distribution channel - a community of 150,000 Web ...

Nov. 3 - Despite upbeat pronouncements by Intel about its resurgent sales and evidence the economy finally is growing, the prospects for other chip companies and their thousands of Silicon Valley employees remain unsettlingly murky. Those optimistic about the industry's immediate future cite a big jump in chip shipments in recent months and the potential for a bump in holiday ...

Apple is in a constant battle with unlockers in the form of both independent enthusiasts and rival companies.  It recently succeeded in killing iPhone jailbreaking for the time being and cutting off the Palm Pre from iTunes.  However, to its dismay, Psystar is selling a software hack to trick Apple's Snow Leopard OS into being easily installed on PCs. Now, Apple ...

One of the greatest fears of eBay sellers is that their customers won't send payment for items they win.  In such cases new sellers fear losing not only the posting fee, but also the Final Value Fee, if the conflict goes unresolved.  Fortunately, over the years, eBay has tweaked its rules governing buying and selling many times to try to fix ...

With Windows 7 launching this week, there are many businesses and consumers looking to upgrade from Windows XP and Vista to the new OS. For the individual upgrading a single computer may not be that big of an issue, but for enterprise users with hundreds of thousand of machines needing updated, the migration to a new OS can be arduous. Dell ...

Oct. 16--Almost anyone who talks about Net neutrality is all for treating all types of data equally. Skeptics and opponents give it a more accurate name: Internet regulation. Whatever you call it, it's coming. A rulemaking process is expected to start next week, led by Julius Genachowski, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission. He and a majority of the members ...

Among the most effective tools in the arsenal of medicine for detecting and diagnostic disease and injury inside the body without cutting the patient open is Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI). The technology allows medical personnel to get a look inside the body of a patient to form better treatment plans and to diagnose serious diseases like cancer. The problem with detecting ...

Apple has always tried to promote an image of high quality products and boasts a slogan "It just works" - in reality, the company has its fair share of quality control issues.  The release of the Snow Leopard (Mac OS X 10.6) operating system was supposed to be a momentous occasion for Apple, but was marred when it shipped with an ...