Internet Service with No Fees, No Contracts and No Strings MetroFi, a leading provider of free municipal wireless (Wi-Fi) Internet service, today announced the next phase of its free wireless coverage plan for the city of Portland. The second phase will be completed over the next four months, and will include the districts of Pearl, Old Town, Portland State University's surrounding areas, Hosford-Abernethy, Richmond and Sunnyside, respectively. The Portland network already covers the districts ... [full story]

At last year's World Cup soccer matches in Germany, spectators entered by waving an electronic card near a reader. Once inside, they could get directions to their seats by holding the card near another reader. While the high-tech tickets were part of a demonstration of a technology called Near Field Communications, or NFC, the little wireless chips that made it all work were familiar to many of the fans. WIRELESS WALLET - NFC, also known ... [full story]

To complement the opening of action thriller "Smokin' Aces" on January 26, 2007, Universal Pictures created "Smokin' Aces: Second Life Assassin," which has now become one of the largest in-world events in Second Life history. The online phenomenon Second Life (www.secondlife.com) is a 3D world with "residents" from 100 countries around the globe. "This game is a solid way for fans to become a part of the action of 'Smokin' Aces,'" said Doug Neil, senior ... [full story]

If you had to venture a guess, how much time would you say the average American wastes dealing with paperwork each week? Before you answer, keep in mind all those incoming and outgoing contracts and purchase orders you handle on a daily basis at work, permission slips for the kids’ field trips and extracurricular activities, progress reports you have to sign for school, etc. “Lost count yet?” asks Jeff Zwelling, a businessman from California. He ... [full story]

After several delays, Microsoft has released the latest version of its Windows operating system, Vista. While not revolutionary, the upgrade offers many new features. Windows upgrades are known more for integrating existing, popular functions into the operating system than for major innovations. In the past, those copycat upgrades included such features as desktop icons, a media player and a Web browser. In the Vista upgrade, it means improved data backup, speech recognition and photo editing ... [full story]

(NewsUSA) - From ads that dance or sing to MTV-like commercials, online advertisers are now using a new type of technology called "rich media" to attract consumers. U.S. Internet advertising revenue will have reached about $12 billion last year, up $3 billion from 2004. Of this, advertisers spent about $1 billion on rich media, up from $800 million in 2003, according to the Interactive Advertising Bureau. So what exactly is rich media? By definition, it is an ... [full story]

Plenty of technology companies that were once household names have become industry footnotes - thanks to management missteps or new technology leapfrogging over their products. But few companies have had a more tumultuous, lingering fall than Iomega. Iomega's Zip drives for backing up computer data were so popular that the company became a top name in the technology industry.   COMEBACK AHEAD? - Iomega’s Zip drives for backing up computer data were so popular that the ... [full story]

WASHINGTON - A federal agency is expected to deliver a ruling Friday that some say could strike a serious economic blow to the wireless industry by banning the import of certain advanced cell phones into the United States. The U.S. International Trade Commission has a deadline of Friday to announce its remedy or penalty in a patent infringement dispute between Southern California chip makers Qualcomm Inc. of San Diego and Broadcom Corp. of Irvine, Calif. ... [full story]

FORT WORTH, Texas - New computer programs adopted by U.S. airlines to track planes will get a severe test as winter weather sets in and the holiday travel season arrives.The goal is to reduce delays and cut the number of stranded passengers when bad weather closes airports, The New York Times reported. Recent incidents when loaded planes sat on runways for hours waiting for takeoff have made the issue a pressing one.Monte Ford, the chief ... [full story]

With use of Web sites and other digital media continuing to rise, it's not surprising that U.S. Internet advertising revenues grew more than 30 percent last year, topping $16 billion according to eMarketer estimates. Yet, many corporate advertisers and advertising agencies are concerned that their online ad impressions may not be properly counted. In a recent survey sponsored by the Audit Bureau of Circulations (ABC), less than half of ad-agency respondents and only one-third of ... [full story]

CHI, Ill. - AT&T Mobility restored most of the service that was disrupted in the U.S. Midwest and Southeast on Thursday, the company announced Friday.Technicians said they hadn't figured out what caused the outages, which were discovered about 5:30 a.m. Thursday, the Chicago Tribune reported.During the outage, cell customers could make calls and send text messages, but iPhone and Blackberry models were unable to access the Internet, the company said.Service was expected to be fully ... [full story]

At the Kensington Vine wine bar in San Diego, an iPod sits on the corner of the counter, pumping sound to the stereo that runs speakers throughout the business.   SOUND GOOD? - Portable digital audio can be equal in quality to CD audio if you adjust the compression rate when you record it. CNS Graphic by Cristina Martinez Byvik.     A BIT BETTER - Scott Owen, co-owner of Kensington Vine wine bar in San Diego, holds his ... [full story]

Raveta, a leader in innovative collaboration solutions, announced the release of Audio Fabric, the world's first service that enables musicians to play together live over the Internet using any type of instrument-acoustic, electric, MIDI, or voice. Musicians in different locations can play together as if they are in the same room using their ordinary broadband Internet connections. Audio Fabric also enables musicians to find each other, record their sessions, store sessions in a band archive, ... [full story]