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It seems like the companies we all thought would survive the dot-com nonsense are dropping like flies. Buy.com, where I still shop regularly, is laying off 40% of its staff, etoys.com is toast, Lycos is suffering… The good news: dot-com layoffs declined 9% in Febrary. Perhaps the end of the carnage is near.

A hearing is scheduled on Friday in the Napster case, and it may be taken down the same day. Meanwhile, the RIAA is collecting republicans for their side, but my local Republican (and space alien) Senator, Orrin Hatch, likes Napster.

Claude Shannon, a pioneer in the field of information theory, died at 84 of Alzheimer’s disease on Saturday. As someone who not only made a long list of contributions to computer science, but could also juggle while riding a unicycle, he will be greatly missed. Here’s a biography written before his death.

Microsoft goes to court again today to continue their appeal, and there’s no clear winner yet. Wired news, The Standard, ZDNet, and Reuters have lengthy analyses. BBC News, always with a unique perspective, noticed that five of the seven judges were using Windows-based laptops. Hmmm.

Microsoft may own the OS market, but according to a CNET article, AOL/Time Warner owns the Web, with their sites accounting for 1/3 of US users’ online time. I expect Microsoft to point to this as evidence of competition, and they’ll probably be right.

Thomas Dolby, one of my favorite 80’s musicians, has been running Beatnik for a few years. Now the Beatnik music software is being integrated into wireless devices. I’m still not a big wireless Web fan, but I wish Dolby the best of luck.

Apparently Napster‘s billion-dollar offer to the record industry has started an auction. Self-proclaimed Napster competitor J. River, also known as Music Exchange, has made their own $3 Billion offer. Napster, meanwhile, is filing another appeal.

Matias Corporation has released the half keyboard for Palm OS, PC or Mac. Cute, but I’d rather have a whole keyboard, or even a BAT. (more…)

Microsoft heads back to court today for their appeal in the antitrust case. CNNfn has a good summary of what’s going on. Meanwhile, ZDNet’s David Coursey’s very silly article begs for forgiveness for poor Microsoft. (more…)

ZDNet’s David Coursey waxes enthusiastic about UltimateTV, Microsoft’s answer to TiVo. It looks like it might be a VCR killer, but I wish it didn’t require DIRECTV.

The Internet World Wireless show was held this week, and nobody noticed. Meanwhile, conference chairman Jack Powers called Web-enabled phones a rich man’s toy. If anyone cares, ZDNet reports on the cool gadgets shown for us toy enthusiasts.

Salon.com reports, in a well-informed article, , that PayPal may have bitten off more than they can chew in trying to be a bank. Citibank is standing by to take over with their c2it service, as soon as PayPal’s in trouble.

Wired news reports on a new vulnerability in MS Outlook, this time related to those annoying VCard attachments. Here’s The Register’s take on it, and ZDNet’s report. A patch is available from Microsoft. (more…)