Tuesday, March 21

3Com plans to get out of the analog modem business and sell off its U.S Robotics division. Analysts believe that the dialup modem division is dragging down 3Com's profits. 3Com will continue to produce wireless and high-speed Internet access devices. ZDNet and Wired have additional coverage.

Former InfoSeek executive Patrick Naughton pleaded guilty to a federal charge that he crossed state lines with the intent of having sex with a 13 year old girl he met on the Internet. He now faces a prison term of up to 15 years.

Wireless

Merit Studios is proposing a plan to save the Iridium satellite network by converting it to a data transmission network.

Palm and Yahoo have struck a deal that will allow Palm users to access their Yahoo email and instant messages.

PhoneOnline.com is a new venture that uses WAP-enabled cell phones for logistics, banking, and vertical markets.

Infrastructure

ZDNet's Leslie Cauley examines issues involved in keeping a cable modem network running at top speed.

RateXchange, a company that lets companies buy and sell bandwidth in a timely manner, has received US$32.7 million in additional startup funding.

A new standard is developing for 10 gigabit Ethernet, which could one day replace routers on some networks.

Bell Labs scientists have reached a new threshhold in data transmission, creating a 3.28 terabits/second fiber optic system.  

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Friday, March 24

With 3Com exiting the analog modem market, PC World asks, "Is dial-up Web access dead?"

Forbes Digital Tool performs a post-mortem on the sale of Cray Research to Tera Computer.

Microsoft is expected to proposal a settlement in the government's antitrust case.

Ted Landau over at MacFixIt discusses a problem with AppleTalk and cable modems: other AppleTalk networks on the cable modem network may interfere with yours. In some cases the ISP can fix the problem with filtering, or by shutting down servers that aren't supposed to operate on the network. The ultimate solution, though, is to partition your network from the cable network, either using a router or installing a second network interface card on your gateway computer.

After engineer Ken Segler learned that a $99 NetPliance i-opener could be converted to a Pentium PC, Netpliance is changing the i-opener design to prevent such modifications. Netpliance's business model is selling hardware near cost and charging monthly subscription fees.

Netscape is gearing up for the release of Netscape 6.0, having skipped 5.0.

ZDNet reviews the new Opera 4.0 web browser.

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