Articles by Keith Regan

Google said it would release another 5.3 million shares of its stock for public sale, claiming it wanted to be ready to meet higher demand for its shares as it enters the Standard & Poor's 500 index and in the process raise additional cash for "general corporate purposes." The move, which will reap Google about US$2 billion at current prices, immed...

A case that could dramatically alter the way keyword search advertising is sold has closely moved toward a court date, with Google's practice of letting anyone bid on certain keywords -- and whether the practice may constitute trademark infringement -- at issue The case of Edina Realty, Inc. vs. TheMLSonline.com is different than the large number o...

European Union regulators said they have warned Microsoft that Vista, the first new version of Windows in six years due out later this year, could face scrutiny on anti-trust grounds if third-party products cannot be made to work with the new platform There is no formal investigation yet under way into Vista. A spokesperson for the European Commis...

The lengthy patent battle between e-commerce giant eBay and a small firm that says it came up with the popular "Buy it Now" technology first will get a hearing before the U.S. Supreme Court Wednesday The focus of the hearing will be whether MercExchange should be granted an injunction barring eBay from using its "Buy it Now" feature, which lets buy...

The European Commission said it will present regulations aimed at cutting down on the often exorbitant fees mobile carriers charge when their customers roam internationally The Commission said the premiums charged by some mobile companies when users cross country borders are "unjustified."

The lengthy battle between The Beatles and Apple over whether the computer maker infringed on the legendary band's trademark by pushing into the music business will reach the highest court in the United Kingdom this week Justice Edward Mann will hear arguments on whether Apple's iTunes online music service violates a 1991 agreement between the PC m...

Sling Media, the maker of the Slingbox technology that enables remote access to TV programs stored on a digital video recorder, has made a beta version available of a service that can deliver video from various sources to mobile devices SlingPlayer Mobile lets Slingbox owners gain access to their stored video through mobile phones running on the Mi...

Alcatel (NYSE: ALA) andLucent (NYSE: LU) are discussing a possible merger, which would create the largest telecommunications equipment maker in the world and could trigger additional M&A activity in the telecom gear space The deal would likely be valued at around US$13 billion, according to published reports. Combined, the firms had 2005 sales of m...

Microsoft has again postponed the highly anticipated release of the consumer version of Windows Vista, dealing a blow to PC makers who had hoped to ride a wave of upgrades to stronger sales and causing a sell-off of Microsoft stock The software giant now says Windows Vista should be widely available in January of 2007 rather than during the fourth ...

Microsoft has scored a contract to provide Internet Protocol television services (IPTV) to one of the largest phone companies in Europe, possibly providing it a key proving ground for its technology as Web TV grows in popularity Redmond, Wash.-based Microsoft and Deutsche Telekom announced they had reached a deal to have Microsoft's IPTV software p...

Google has launched a beta version of a financial news and information site, creating a destination for investors and others that will target Webportal rivalYahoo, whose own finance site is one of the most heavily used on the Internet Google Finance is an improvement over existing options, Google said, because lets users find financial data on a co...

Seeking to help protect children from the seedier side of the Web, some U.S. lawmakers are hoping to reignite interest in creating a ".xxx" domain where pornographic and adult content would be concentrated Introduced late last week, the "Cyber Safety for Kids Act of 2006" would force the Department of Commerce to work with the Internet Corporation ...

Seeking to keep its low-cost advantage, boost new product development and supply fast-growing markets,Dell plans to double the number of people it employs in India Over the next three years, the company expects to grow its workforce there to 20,000. For Dell, the move could be an effective way to fend off competition from other low-cost PC makers, ...

Microsoft inked a deal with Epic Records that will give Xbox Live users a year's worth of free access to downloadable music and high-definition on-demand video from Epic artists Xbox Live is the online, interactive portion of the Xbox 360 gaming platform that debuted last year as the first of what is expected to be a wave of next-generation console...

Microsoft has launched a US$500 million marketing campaign aimed at using its new products, including Windows Vista and Office 2007, to wrest enterprise customers away from rival IBM Microsoft said Vista and the new version of Office will enable desktop computers to become control stations for hard-working enterprise applications that manage everyt...

Continuing its aggressive campaign to cut down on piracy of its products,Microsoft has filed eight lawsuits againsteBay sellers, accusing them of distributing counterfeit versions of the software giant's programs The suits were filed against individuals in Arizona, Connecticut, Florida, Hawaii, Massachusetts, Nebraska, New York and Washington. They...

In one of the first major efforts to bring an ad-supported broadband television experience to Internet users, America Online formally launched its In2TV service, with four major advertisers already signed up to have their commercials interspersed with the full-length programs and short video clips AOL said Intel, Kia Motors, Kraft Foods and Hershey...

Shining new light on the issue of wireless privacy, the state of California has filed a US$10 million lawsuit against a firm that sells cell phone numbers State officials filed suit Tuesday in San Diego Superior Court against Florida-based Data Trace USA, claiming the company misrepresented how it would use the data it purchased from telecom compan...

For years, the vast majority of purchases made from e-commerce sites have relied on the same technology to keep them safe and protect consumers from identity theft Secure socket layer, or SSL, has helped complete millions of Web transactions, often working without consumers knowing it. When an SSL connection is made, most browsers show a closed loc...

With the timeframe for its PlayStation 3 release already being questioned by some, Sony was dealt another setback this week when it lost a bid to appeal a ruling that it violated a smaller firm's gaming patent Sony had hoped to be able to appeal the ruling that found it had infringed on the patent held by Immersion for technology included in the Du...