Tuesday, August 10

Sega is delaying online gaming plans for the Dreamcast game console, scheduled for release September 9. Online play won't be available until the first of next year when the first interactive title is released. Meanwhile, Sega announced that AT&T will be the Dreamcast's preferred Internet provider and will collaborate on an online gaming portal. The Dreamcast has presold 200,000 units, and will come equipped with a 56K modem for online play, email, and web access.

Surfree is a new take on the free ISP model. Customers pay $14.95 a month for Internet access from Surfree. Customers can reduce their bill by running Surfbar software that displays advertising while they're online. The more they surf, the less they pay each month. The advertising can be turned on or off at any time, though the customer receives no discounts while it is turned off.

MultiTech claims their MultiMobile USB is the world's smallest V.90 modem. Julio Ojeda-Zapata of the St. Paul (Minnesota) Pioneer Press has a brief review.

Speaking of USB, PC Magazine's Bill Machrone has good things to say about APC's new uninterruptible power supply (UPS), which connects to your computer via USB to shut down the computer in case of a blackout. Conventional UPSes performed the same function using serial ports, which were almost always occupied by a more important device, such as a mouse or modem.

Rumor has it that Lucent in in negotiations to buy International Network Services for US$3.7 billion. 

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Friday the 13th

(as Count Floyd would say, "Friday the 13th. Ewwwwww, skerry")

Sprint PCS is ready to offer wireless Internet on its PCS mobile phones by the end of September. Access speeds will be at 14.4 kilobits per second. Yahoo! will provide content, such as stock quotes, news, and horoscopes. [Specialized, low-volume content is likely to be more practical for connected mobile phones than surfin' the net on a 100 x 100 pixel screen. - Leslie]

L0pht Heavy Industries, a hacking group, has released an advisory concerning network vulnerabilities in Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows 2000, SunOS, and Solaris 2.6. The vulnerability uses ICMP Router Discovery Protocol (IRDP) to spoof routes when DHCP is in use, and can reroute packets of information for snooping.

Michael Pastore of InternetNews.com looks at ISP equipment spending, a market expected to reach US$154 billion by 2003.

IBM will offer the option of built-in ADSL modems in the Aptiva line. Texas Instruments is building the modems, which will add $100 to the price of the computer.

Unverified information department: check this list of the top ISPs in the U.S. Anyone who subscribes to the ISP Report can confirm or deny.

Friday's hot download

Do you love text? Talking directly to your modem with AT commands? Telnetting in to check your email with UNIX Pine? We sure do. That's why we say to check out HyperTerminal 5.0 Private Edition, the latest version of the terminal program included in Windows. It's free for personal use, or $29.95 for business use.

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