CBS acquires Last.fm in bid for youth market
CBS paid $280 million for the service, which allows music fans with similar tastes to connect.

Touch screen in a table is latest techno wrinkle
Microsoft Surface features a screen embedded in an acrylic tabletop; its electronic guts are hidden in the thick pedestal.

Doctors' online forum offers tips to Wall Street
The American Medical Association is working with a start-up company that encourages physicians to swap ideas online. It charges investment firms to view postings that could serve as tip-offs to market-moving medical trends.

Inventor puts hopes in computer pen
Jim Marggraff, an entrepreneur with a long string of successful innovations under his belt, said he believes he has figured out the secret of pen computing.

News Analysis: Deutsche Telekom and union face off
As a strike against the German phone giant stretches into its third week, Deutsche Telekom's plan to move 50,000 employees into a new subsidiary, while paying them less for longer workweeks, has so far created little more than entrenched positions on both sides.

Loss narrows at Vodafone Group
Shares of the company rose to a five-year high after it forecast strong growth in emerging markets.

Google deal for DoubleClick is reportedly under scrutiny
The Federal Trade Commission has opened a preliminary antitrust investigation into Google's planned $3.1 billion purchase of an online advertising company, an industry executive said.

In Estonia, what may be the first war in cyberspace
A three-week battle forced the Estonian authorities to defend their small country from a data flood they say was set off by orders from Russia or ethnic Russian sources in retaliation for the removal of a statue.

China investing heavily to train a more tech-savvy army
Beijing is upgrading its military education system to produce better officers and noncommissioned officers capable of waging war with modern equipment and techniques.

IBM laid off 1,570 people Wednesday as part of its overhaul of operations in its giant technology services unit.

The company has now laid off 3,023 employees this quarter and 3,720 this year, which amounts to about 1 percent of the International Business Machine work force, a spokesman, Edward Barbini, said. IBM did not disclose where the layoffs were being made. The company blamed a 19 percent decline in profit during the first quarter on problems in its U.S. outsourcing business.

IBM said that it did not expect more layoffs this quarter.

Sony/ATV Music Publishing, a joint venture between Sony and the pop singer Michael Jackson, agreed to buy Viacom's Famous Music for $400 million, acquiring rights to songs by Duke Ellington, Shakira and other artists.

The purchase is the first by Martin Bandier, Sony/ATV's new chief executive. He was hired away from EMI Group in February to revitalize the business.

Sony/ATV will acquire 1250,000 songs in all, including the standards "Silver Bells" and "Moon River," and the score to the film "The Godfather."

Apple began selling digital music from EMI Group without copyright protection software on its iTunes store.

Apple expects more than half of the five million songs on iTunes to be offered without the protection by the end of the year, Steve Jobs, the chief executive, said.

EMI announced in April that it would offer its catalog, excluding music by the Beatles, without digital rights management software. Apple is selling the DRM-free songs for $1.29 and continues to offer copy-protected versions for 99 cents.

CDW, one of the leading computer resellers, has agreed to be acquired by the private equity firm Madison Dearborn Partners for about $7.3 billion.

Under the agreement, announced Tuesday, CDW shareholders will receive $87.75 in cash a share, the company said, a 16.1 percent premium over the company's $75.56 closing price Friday.