For Thomson, a combination with Reuters is the next step in expanding its lucrative service business.
Thomson and its competitors, particularly Bloomberg, have shown that services are the key to profitability in a age when easy Internet distribution has made raw information a commodity.

Family meets on Dow bid by Murdoch
But people close to the family said they saw little new in a pledge by Rupert Murdoch and nothing that would soften family members' initial opposition to his offer to buy Dow Jones.

China-based writers for Wall Street Journal oppose Murdoch bid
In a letter, seven journalists said they feared that News Corp's acquisition of Dow Jones would threaten the paper's integrity, credibility and standards.

EU panel to vote on roaming charge proposal
Negotiators for EU telecommunications ministers will meet in Brussels on Wednesday to consider what one lawmaker described as a last-ditch attempt to cap retail and wholesale cellphone roaming prices for 400 million European consumers by this summer.

8 U.S. states fault MySpace on sex offenders
Law enforcement officials have asked MySpace to provide them with the number and names of sex offenders, their addresses and a list of steps that the company has taken to alert law enforcement officials and other MySpace users.

Motorola announces sequel to Razr
The U.S. company is hoping to revive its deteriorating business prospects with some slick new phones. On Tuesday, it announced a sequel to the company's hit Razr in the form of an update to the Motorola Q, its rival to the BlackBerry; and a new line of phones designed to play music, video and games.

Microsoft says open-source software violates 235 patents
The developer of the Windows operating system is making its most detailed challenge to such software, including the rival Linux operating system, but says it would rather make deals with vendors than fight disputes in court.

World mayors get software to track carbon imprint
A new Internet tool to help individuals and communities curb their roles in adding global-warming carbon emissions was to be announced Tuesday.

U.S. Web site postpones plan to cover local news from India
The editor of a Web site in the Los Angeles suburb of Pasadena postponed publication of stories by two reporters he hired in India to cover local politics.

Making its most detailed intellectual-property challenge to open-source software to date, Microsoft said Tuesday that such software, including the Linux operating system, violated 235 of its patents.

Microsoft, the maker of the Windows operating system, said it wanted to work out licensing deals with open-source companies instead of fighting over patents in court.

Microsoft contends that open-source software violates patents related to its graphical user interface, e-mail programs and other technology.

Linux is distributed by Novell and dozens of competitors. Users can get it and other open-source software for free and can download and modify it as long as they share changes with the public.

Microsoft hailed a partnership with Novell as an example of the type of licensing agreement it wanted to replicate with other vendors. The partnership also made the technology interoperable.

The rate of global software piracy has remained static in 2006 for the third consecutive year, but the cost to companies that make the programs is rising, the Business Software Alliance said Tuesday.

The survey, conducted by the market research company IDC, concluded that for every $2 spent on legitimate software, $1 went to pirates.

"The bad news is that overall global piracy rates have remained stagnant," said Robert Holleyman, the BSA chief. "Overall dollar losses have gone up because the overall market is growing."

The report claimed 35 percent of all software installed on personal computers in 2006 had been obtained illegally. It estimated that software vendors could lose about $180 billion to pirates over the next four years.

EBay, the world's largest online auctioneer, said its PayPal electronic payments unit had obtained a banking license from regulators in continental Europe that would make it easier to sell to merchants.

The charter, granted by the Commission de Surveillance du Secteur Financier for the European Union, is effective July 2, EBay said in a statement.

PayPal added Spanish, French and Chinese Web sites last week and almost doubled the number of countries it serves to 190, extending its lead over Google's rival Checkout service.

The editor of a Web site in Pasadena, California, who hired two reporters in India to cover suburban Pasadena politics said he had been so overwhelmed by reaction to his plan that he had postponed publication of their first stories.

The editor, James Macpherson, said he had not found the time he had hoped to train new staff members to cover Monday night City Council meetings in Pasadena, a Los Angeles suburb, which are broadcast live on the Web.

"We've been prevented from doing that, due to the attention that we've received," Macpherson said Monday.

He hired the reporters last week and had hoped to post their stories on pasadenanow.com by now.

AOL, seeking to accelerate online advertising growth, bought Third Screen Media to add technology that places ads on mobile devices.

Third Screen Media, a privately held company based in Boston, makes software that links advertisers, publishers and telephone carriers and allows ads to be delivered on mobile handsets, AOL said in a statement.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

AOL, Time Warner's Internet unit, is making its fourth purchase in a year to drive growth of online sales and help compensate for declining revenue from its Web access service.

Farecast.com, a new travel Web site that claims it can forecast the rise or fall of air ticket prices, went live after about a year in beta testing. It says it can predict with 75 percent accuracy the direction of air fares over seven days.

INDIA announced the appointment of Andimuthu Raja as its minister for computers and telecommunications. He succeeded Dayanidhi Maran, who resigned Monday after the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam Party sought his removal.

McAfee, the maker of antivirus software, said the number of mobile viruses was set to double by the end of the year as virus writers created new ways to attack the fragmented cellphone software market, the company said.