Yahoo and MySpace join with Google
Yahoo, Google and MySpace said Tuesday that they would create the OpenSocial Foundation to maintain a neutral, community-governed forum for developing applications.

Taiwan PC maker says battery shortage may stall shipments
Asustek Computer, the No.2 PC maker in Taiwan, said Tuesday that a global shortage of batteries for computers could affect up to 40 percent of its second-quarter shipments.

Altimo of Russia steps up campaign against Telenor of Norway
Altimo said its subsidiary had filed a $1 billion lawsuit against Telenor for delaying Vimpelcom's entry to the Ukrainian market.

Shares of Semiconductor Manufacturing rise on talks of sale
Negotiations to sell a significant stake to an undisclosed strategic investor are at an advanced stage, the chip maker said.

Justice dept. approves XM merger with Sirius
The Justice Department said the buyout of XM Satellite Radio by Sirius would not hurt competition or consumers.
- U.S. Justice Department approves Sirius's purchase of XM Satellite Radio

Social Web sites struggle to find the path to profit
The sites and companies that make applications for them push to harvest more personal information posted online, then sell it to advertisers. But the search for the best way to do so is still on.

Facebook closes security hole on photos
Strangers could briefly look at personal pictures before Facebook tightened security.

STMicroelectronics introduces flu detection laboratory on a chip
The top European semiconductor maker, STMicroelectronics, presented a portable chip Monday to detect influenza viruses, including bird flu, in humans.

With TV strike over, U.S. networks accentuate the positive
Advertising based on the long-awaited return of scripted programs to television omits any mention of the three-month writers' strike.

Icahn steps up pressure on Motorola
Carl Icahn, who is engaged in a proxy battle with Motorola, is suing the company to force it to hand over documents related to its money-losing mobile devices business.

Wall Street Journal's Marketplace getting a makeover
The Wall Street Journal's transition to more breaking news and shorter articles will include reshaping the paper's second section.

U.S. coverage of in Iraq plummets
Iraq coverage by major U.S. news sources has dropped to about one-fifth of what it was last summer, according to a survey.

As Google refines searches, some site owners object
Google is taking a greater role in helping users search within particular sites, and some retailers and publishers are not happy about it.

Google proposes using unused U.S. airwaves for wireless Internet services
Google gave the FCC a proposal Monday seeking permission to use the airwaves between television broadcast channels for mobile broadband services.

After years of splitting chips, Sun tries to connect them better
Sun will explore the high-risk idea of replacing the wires between computer chips with laser beams.

Online site lets Scion owners design custom logos for their rides
With an eye to the social networking ethos that has made Facebook and MySpace wildly popular, Toyota will let Scion owners design their own personal "coats of arms" online.

Taking on the Godzilla of video-sharing sites
Dailymotion, a French Internet video company, is mounting a grand mission to take on a global behemoth: Google's YouTube.

Quaero gets off the ground to challenge Google
The 23 companies and organizations involved will collaborate on researching and creating prototypes for multimedia and multilingual search tools.

Food industry advertising draws fire from children's health advocates
As a crucial meeting of members of the WHO draws near, anti-obesity groups and the food industry accuse each other of dealing in misinformation.

Bain backs out of 3Com deal
Bain Capital Partners and its Chinese partner abandoned a $2.2 billion bid for 3Com on Thursday after failing to agree to new terms that would satisfy U.S. government concerns over national security.

Intel to bring low-cost PC to U.S. and Europe
The Classmate PC, designed for poor children in developing countries, will soon be available to U.S. and European customers.

Advertising boycott of Olympics unlikely
Companies already committed to spending millions to advertise at the Beijing Olympic Games would find it hard to pull their ads if they felt the situation in Tibet was hurting their images.

They're not dead yet: IBM keeps its mainframe computer business going
Mainframe technology - hardware, software and services - remains a large and lucrative business for IBM, and mainframes are still the back-office engines behind the world's financial markets and much of global commerce.

Recording the inevitable of programming: The system crash
What if you could record a computer crash and play it back, like a video recorder for software?

Taiwan seeks to grow beyond high-tech contractor status
Many of Taiwan's high-tech workers and analysts say the greatest economic challenge for Taiwan and its 23 million people is overcoming its reliance on manufacturing for other brands and instead focusing on innovation and building its own brands.

Hollywood goes prospecting in the booming Gulf
Last autumn, just as the U.S. movie capital was starting to panic over slowing injections of cash from hedge funds, Warner Brothers struck a deal in Abu Dhabi, but other deals are proving more elusive.

Elite U.S. schools turn the fight for supremacy into online game
The historic rivalries of Ivy League universities in the United States have reached the Internet through an online war game.

TietoEnator gets takeover offer from Nordic Capital
TietoEnator, the largest computer services provider in the Nordic region, received an unsolicited takeover bid of €1.1 billion, or $1.7 billion, from Nordic Capital of Sweden and dismissed it as too low.

British media apologize to parents of missing McCann girl
Newspapers admitted Wednesday that much coverage of the case of Madeleine McCann, who disappeared shortly before her fourth birthday during a family vacation in Portugal last May, was completely wrong, including accusations that her parents had killed her.