IT News Review - Week Ending Monday 26/4/1999

US Internet stocks take a beating

The bubble may have burst. Internet stocks on US markets took a beating today, with the stock of many of the larger Internet companies falling by as much as 28 per cent. Among those, Excite, Cnet and America Online.

Click on the link below for the full storyhttp://www2.idg.com.au/pcwdb.NSF/mailout/NT00006B3ECOMDEX: Ignore the Linux hype, Torvalds urgesLinux is gaining in popularity not because of the hype surrounding it, but "because it does what people want it to do", the operating system's creator Linus Torvalds said to a standing-room-only crowd here yesterday. Torvalds urged the Spring Comdex trade show crowd of about 500 Linux enthusiasts to stay true to the roots of the open-source environment he champions.

Click on the link below for the full storyhttp://www2.idg.com.au/CWT1997.nsf/CWTCurrent/NT0000D796Employers neglect users' training demandsNew skills outweigh demand for higher salaries and a better working environment, results of a recent survey show. Network professionals surveyed in Com Tech's third annual training survey released last week also report employers fail to meet their training needs.

Click on the link below for the full storyhttp://www2.idg.com.au/nwwdb.NSF/mailout/NT00005F8EASIC appoints cybercopLooking to turn up the heat on Internet fraudsters, the Australian Securities and Investment Commission (ASIC) has established a dedicated electronic enforcement division. In creating the new unit, the organisation has appointed Tim Phillipps, previously NSW director of enforcement, to front its attack on electronic corporate crime.

Click on the link below for the full storyhttp://www2.idg.com.au/CWT1997.nsf/CWTCurrent/NT0000D7CECompaq to stick with Pfeiffer strategy -- BarthCompaq Computer will continue along the strategy path developed by company chief executive officer and president Eckhard Pfeiffer before he was ousted Sunday, according to Andreas Barth, Compaq's general manager for Europe, Middle East and Africa.

Compaq will carry on with its dual strategy of selling high-end systems and services to large corporate customers and at the same time continuing to sell PCs at all price levels. This strategy has been much maligned by analysts as being one of the main contributing factors to Pfeiffer's removal, because Compaq's attempts to be "all things to all people" have left the company too unfocused, they said.

Click on the link below for the full storyhttp://www2.idg.com.au/CWT1997.nsf/CWTCurrent/NT0000D7CABeware the statute of limitations of Y2K lawsuits: lawyerAustralian enterprises that wait until the new year to undertake millennium bug litigation against suppliers could find their claims invalid, according to a law firm. Roland Burt, consultant at Middletons, Moore and Bevins, said: "The prevalent attitude seems to be one of deferring legal action until after 2000 .

. . companies want to wait and see what happens first.

Click on the link below for the full storyhttp://www2.idg.com.au/CWT1997.nsf/CWTCurrent/NT0000D7C6USO claim closer to $600 million: ACA saysTelstra's claim of a $1.8 billion net universal service obligation (USO) cost for 1997-98 should be closer to $600 million, according to a preliminary analysis from the Australian Communications Authority (ACA). The ACA yesterday released two independent reports it had commissioned as part of its assessment of Telstra's 1997-98 figure.

Click on the link below for the full storyhttp://www2.idg.com.au/nwwdb.NSF/mailout/NT00005FC2Compaq results "disappointing, unacceptable"Compaq Computer's much awaited results for the first quarter ended March 31, 1999 were called "disappointing and unacceptable" by Compaq's chairman and acting chief executive officer, Ben Rosen. With poor performance in both its PC and high-end systems business, Compaq turned in $US9.4 billion in sales for the quarter and net income of $281 million, or 16 cents per share, the company said yesterday in a statement.

Click on the link below for the full storyhttp://www2.idg.com.au/CWT1997.nsf/CWTCurrent/NT0000D7F6Senators urge NATO to not lose sight of Y2KSenators Robert Bennett and Christopher Dodd have urged top NATO officials not to let operations in Kosovo distract them from the critical task of making sure key computer systems are year 2000-compliant, warning that inattention to the Y2K issue threatens to jeopardise ongoing and future NATO operations. In letters to NATO Secretary General Javier Solana, European Allied Commander General Wesley Clark and US NATO representative Alexander Vershbow, the senators said NATO command and control, communications and logistic systems "are not immune to the problem".

Click on the link below for the full storyhttp://www2.idg.com.au/CWT1997.nsf/CWTCurrent/NT0000D7EAGlobal call centre revenue to reach $4bn by 2005: OvumA new report predicts Asia Pacific network-based call centre services will generate revenues more than $US450 million by 2005, from a base of $US20 million today. According to the report from Ovum entitled "Network-based Call Centre Services: Market Strategies", telecomms service providers will reap global revenues totalling $US4 billion from network-based call centre services by2005.

Click on the link below for the full storyhttp://www2.idg.com.au/nwwdb.NSF/mailout/NT00005FD2Oz company selected for domain name trial runInternet Names Australia has been selected as one of five companies in the world to test a new system for the registration of domain names. The new system is hoped to bring competition to the market and a possible decline in pricing.

Click on the link below for the full storyhttp://www2.idg.com.au/pcwdb.NSF/mailout/NT00006BBAFahey sets the record straight on IT outsourcingFederal Minister for Finance and Administration John Fahey set out to set the record straight about government outsourcing of information technology at a business briefing in Sydney yesterday. "If our only objective were to achieve savings, I could achieve huge savings with one 25 cent phone call to a multinational. I could offer the whole project to one company, and save hundreds of millions," Fahey said at the NSW Australian Information Industry Association's business briefing.

Click on the link below for the full storyhttp://www2.idg.com.au/CWT1997.nsf/CWTCurrent/NT0000D7FAIT delivery: 'just not cricket'The Australian IT industry is at a "significant crisis point" but has continued to grow at an acceptable rate, says IDC's Peter Hind.

Speaking at yesterday's Directions 99 conference, Hind said the total IT spend in Australia had grown more than 150 per cent in the past 12 years which demonstrated the faith business had in IT.

Click on the link below for the full storyhttp://www2.idg.com.au/CWT1997.nsf/CWTCurrent/NT0000D80EOld switches, routers pose Y2K threatUsers of routers or switches dating back two years or more had better take note: Your network will likely not make the Y2K grade.

The leading internetwork vendors -- Cabletron Systems, Cisco Systems, Nortel Networks' Bay Networks unit and 3Com -- are not even considering testing some pre-1997 products for year 2000 compliance.

Click on the link below for the full storyhttp://www2.idg.com.au/nwwdb.NSF/mailout/NT00005FEEMicrosoft: Windows 98 has three more Y2K holesMicrosoft has identified three more "minor" year 2000 (Y2K) bugs in its Windows 98 operating system, and will release fixes soon, the company stated on Friday.

Click on the link below for the full storyhttp://www2.idg.com.au/arndb.NSF/Current/NT0000C022

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