The Top Paying IT CEOs
Apple's Steve Jobs was the top-paid US chief executive last year, receiving some $US646 million, Forbes magazine said. Even though Jobs was paid a nominal one-dollar salary, the value of his stock options and other benefits made him the highest compensated CEO, the magazine said.The CEOs of America's 500 biggest companies got a collective 38% pay raise last year, to $US7.5 billion, or an average $US15.2 million. Exercised stock options accounted for the main component of pay, or about 48%, Forbes said. Number two on the list was Occidental Petroleum's Ray Irani with $US321.6 million, followed by Barry Diller at InterActive Corp ($US295 million), Fidelity National's William Foley ($US179 million) and Terry Semel of Yahoo ($US174 million). Michael Dell, who retook the reins at Dell Computer, was sixth with a compensation package worth $US153 million. With an outcry growing over extravagant pay packages for US corporate executives, Forbes said the highest-paid CEOs were not always those that delivered the most to shareholders. Forbes said by its analysis, Apple's Jobs was 36th. Topping the list was John Bucksbaum of General Growth Properties, a real-estate investment trust. Over the past six years, Bucksbaum was paid $US723,000 a year while delivering a 39% annual return to shareholders. At the bottom of the performance/pay rankings was Richard Manoogian, CEO of housing products maker Masco, with a six-year annual return of 5% and a paycheck averaging $US11 million a year.

Higher prices for music downloads?
The last time Apple Chief Executive Steve Jobs took on major recording companies, he refused to budge on his 99-cent price for a song on iTunes. As a new round of talks ramp up this month, however, Jobs has opened the door to higher prices — as long as music companies let Apple Inc. sell their songs without technology designed to stop unauthorized copying. Jobs contends that would "tear down the walls" by allowing consumers to play music they buy at Apple's iTunes store on any digital music player, not just the company's iPods. Although most of the major labels insist that safeguards are still needed to stave off online piracy and make other digital music business models work, one company has already struck a deal with Apple. Last month, Britain's EMI Music Group PLC, home to artists such as Coldplay, Norah Jones and Joss Stone, agreed to let iTunes sell tracks without the copy-protection technology known as digital-rights management. The DRM-free tracks cost 30 cents more than copy-restricted versions of EMI songs and feature enhanced sound quality. The other major labels — Warner Music Group Corp., Vivendi's Universal Music Group, and Sony BMG Music Entertainment, a joint venture of Sony Corp. and Bertelsmann AG — will be watching closely to see how the unrestricted EMI tracks sell. "At this point, no one can ignore Apple or what Apple wants, given its position in the marketplace," said Michael Gartenberg, an analyst with Jupiter Research. "The fact that they were able to do this deal with EMI puts more pressure on some of the other labels to follow suit." For their part, at least two of the recording companies will ask Jobs to sell a wider variety of content in digital bundles of songs, videos and other multimedia, according to two recording company executives familiar with their companies' plans.

Who Rules; Luddites or Geek?
Are you “Connected but Hassled?” How about “Light but Satisfied” An “Inexperienced Experimenter?” Or maybe you just can’t get enough, and you’re an “Omnivore.” Technology analysts often break consumers into simple categories like this: Early adopters (geeks); followers (most of us); and Luddites (still without cell phones). But to some researchers, those descriptions always seemed too general. The big surprise: Not all geeks love technology, not all neophytes hate it, and believe it or not, 15% of the population still lives without a computer and a cell phone. The survey unearthed some subtle distinctions: Not all geeks hang out online all the time. Some 10% of the population are “Mobile Centrics,” who use their cell phones constantly, but have very little use for computers or the Internet. The category includes a higher-than-average number of African-Americans. Many heavy tech users aren’t all that happy about being wired. Some are “Lackluster Veterans,” who have been using the Internet since its inception. For them, the thrill is gone. In fact, many seem to wish they could accidentally flush their Blackberries down the toilet. They represent about 8% of the population. Another 10% are “Connected But Hassled.” These users aren’t quite as experienced as the “Lackluster Veterans,” but they share the desire to disconnect from the grid once in a while. They really don’t see the benefit of being connected to co-workers constantly – only 9% in this group think technology makes them more productive. Many say they are facing “information overload.” “This group … has a lot of technology, they use it frequently, but they are dissatisfied with what technology offers them. That means 20% of the adult population is not altogether pleased with technology. That was surprising to me,” Horrigan said. On the other end of the spectrum are “Omnivores,” “Connectors,” and “Productivity Enhancers.” “Omnivores” buy all the latest gadgets and use them to the fullest. Most users surveyed by Pew had a generally positive attitude toward 21st Century gadgetry – but a sizable minority had more mixed feelings. About 30% of those surveyed indicated they were either “not thrilled,” “burdened,” or downright “annoyed” with technology. And another 15% have spurned it all together, remaining “off the network” by rejecting both cell phones and computers.

Other surprising facts from the study:
• Despite what you might see at the bus stop or on the train, only 20% of the population has iPods or MP3 players and only 11% own a Blackberry or other palm-sized computer.
• 27% of Americans still don’t have a cell phone.
• 45% don’t own a digital camera.
• Nearly 1 in 5 Internet users have posted a comment on a blog or newsgroup.
• Only 7% have ever listened to a podcast, and only 1% told surveyors they’d listened to a podcast “yesterday.”
• Across the spectrum, many tech users suspect their gadgets have more functionality than they are using – for example, 82% of elite “connectors” think their tech toys can do more.

Toward the bottom of the spectrum are “Light but Satisfied” users (15%) and “Indifferents” (11%). Both groups own the most basic cell phones and limit their Internet use. They have rather ho-hum notions about their gadgets. On the other hand, another 8% on the lower end of the tech spectrum are “Inexperienced Experimenters.” These users, often older women, don’t know a lot about their gadgets, but they are having fun tinkering with them. “These are people who in spite of coming to technology later are up for trying new things,” Horrigan said. The Pew typology does ultimately divide users into three familiar tiers – “elite” tech users, medium users, and those with few gadgets. But the study shows that within each group are both tech lovers and tech haters. Perhaps most surprising of all to those of us who live “On the Network” all the time: We’re still a minority. While 31% of the population is avid, or “elite” tech users, fully 49% rarely use high-tech gadgets. “I sense the Internet in general is making more inroads into everybody's lives,” Horrigan said. “But about half the population is less engaged with technology, and they think that’s fine.”

Spammers Use New Technique to Evade Filters
Spammers have stepped up efforts to use encrypted attachments to evade filtering systems, service provider Email Systems has reported. The technique relies on the fact that many spam systems can't scan inside emails containing encrypted or password-protected attachment, and work out that they are not legitimate. Without a rule to block such attachments, most systems will pass on the email to recipients, handing spammers an important victory in the battle to get spam through. In recent weeks, Email Systems detected a small but steady stream of such spam emanating from bot-compromised hosts, containing a zipped-up version of the pervasive 'Storm' bot-loading Trojan that plagued Internet users in January. Recipients would have been able to inadvertently unzip the Trojan using an embedded password, after being attracted by a number of eye-catching subject lines, including 'Worm Detected!', 'Virus Detected!', 'Spyware Alert!' and 'Warning!' Although the technique has been around for some months, spammers appear to be stepping up their attempts to use it, said Greg Miller of Email Systems. The company had quarantined hundreds of thousands of copies of attachment spam, up from levels a tenth this volume some months ago. "We have moved on from spam being just a guy sending out huge amounts of spam," said Miller. The vast bulk of spam was now automated via bots, and this made finding new infection methods even more critical to the spam economy. "Every six months or so we see a new attack that is very successful," he said. As anti-spam systems adapted to popular techniques such as image spam, criminals were having to look further to engineer spam stealthiness. The easiest means of detecting the current encrypted file attacks would be the attachment's filesize, 77KB, but this could be varied in future attacks quite easily. The best approach was simply to disallow encrypted emails to pass through the system at all.

Comcast goes with Zimbra
Comcast plans to launch SmartZone, a major replacement for its current and uninspired consumer email service. At the core of SmartZone is a new version of Zimbra's open source, brower-based collaborative suite that includes email, instant messaging and voice mail access. In addition, Comcast is working with HP on the infrastructure side and Plaxo for its contact management to create its communications dashboard. On the security front, SmartZone will use tools from Bizanga, Cloudmark and Trend Micro. SmartZone, due later this year according to the company, is the only way for Comcast to keep Comcast.net customers from migrating to Google, Yahoo, Microsoft and other players who have invested heavily in creating more state-of-the-art Web-based communications suites for consumers. Features include listening to voice mail online and video instant messaging. For example, you can go to the SmartZone to see your missed call log, forward voice mails via email and see who in among your contacts is online via a presence indicator. Zimbra provides the bulk of the user-facing capabilities for SmartZone. The company has targeted hosting providers and currently claims about 6 million users. Comcast brings more than 12 million customers, who are users of the company's high-speed Internet and digital voice services. "The Web 'office' is a complicated and crowded space, but there is a lot of demand from consumers and SMBs," said Satish Dharmaraj, co-founder and CEO of Zimbra. "Google has a suite and Microsoft may come out with a lightweight suite, and there are a lot of hosting providers with existing customers and billing relationships."

Motorola Showdown: Icahn vs. Zander
The biggest slugfest these days is Zander vs. Icahn. In one corner there's Ed Zander, CEO of Motorola, the once-soaring, now reeling cell-phone maker. In the other is Carl Icahn, the corporate raider turned shareholder activist, who has been agitating for change at Motorola and wants a seat on its board of directors. Like antsy pugilists trying to work the media for a pre-fight edge, the two have been waging a war of words leading up to their showdown May 7 under the lights at Motorola's annual shareholder meeting in Chicago. A couple of months ago, it looked as if Icahn didn't stand a chance. He came onto the scene in January amid the early fallout from Motorola's pursuit of market share at the expense of profitability. Icahn snapped up a barrelful of shares and called on the board to buy back up to $15 billion in stock. He had done much the same at several companies before, and Motorola shareholders dismissed him as an opportunist looking to pad his pockets rather than facilitate long-term change. "It's been said before that the only way to make Icahn go away is to make him money," says Shawn Campbell, principal at Campbell Asset Management, which owns Motorola shares. But like any determined fighter, Icahn made adjustments during the battle. He's no longer suggesting that Motorola devote all its cash to buybacks—a move that would hurt Zander's ability to invest in the kind of innovation the company so desperately requires. In recent days, Icahn has suggested that as a board member he can help Motorola address some of its operational deficiencies and sharpen execution. That posture, along with a greater understanding of the depth of Motorola's problems, has led to a new reality: It's not so farfetched to think that Icahn could indeed win a seat on Motorola's board.

Second Life: European fans lead the charge
The popularity of Second Life continues to rocket, with the virtual world currently proving even more popular in Europe than in the US. In March, 61% of active Second Life residents were from Europe, compared to 16% from the US and 13% from Asia Pacific, according to research by comScore. The study calculated around 1.3 million people ran the official software and logged-in to Second Life in March 2007. This represents an increase of 46% in the number of active residents from January 2007, comScore said. Second Life's own figures state it has more than six million residents and that 1.7 million have logged in during the last 60 days. The comStore research found 61% of residents are male and 39 per cent are female. While in the month of March around 16% of Second Life users came from Germany, 8% from France and 6% from the UK. The number of active residents of the virtual world coming from the UK grew 24% between January and March this year - compared to growth of 92% in the number of US users and a 70% increase in German fans. In addition to the resident activity cited above, comScore found that the SecondLife.com website was visited by 3.6 million visitors in March, up 17% on the previous month and an increase of 46% over January.

China launches high-speed rail
China has entered the high-speed-rail era. The signs are hard to miss. "Sixth national speed-up," proclaims a red banner the size of a Sunset Strip billboard in the middle of the Beijing train station. "Harmonious, made-in-China" bullet trains. In the station in Tianjin, posters of smiling families in first-class seats line the walls, under the heading "Pursuit of Harmony." In a country where vacation season means two or three passengers for every seat, improvements to the rail system are heralded with great fanfare. On April 18, two weeks before one of the nation's busiest weeklong holidays, 280 domestically made high-speed passenger trains were added to China's crowded and outdated tracks. Traveling 60 mph faster than most of their predecessors, the trains can cut travel time by a third and will add about 300,000 seats a day, state media reported. A record 150 million travelers were projected during the May Day holiday week. Upgrading to high speed isn't cheap. The tickets cost as much as 50% more than those for conventional trains. Already, the Internet is awash in criticism that the new service is out of the reach of migrant workers and others who need it most. Nothing comes easy for China's transportation system, which has been overwhelmed by the nation's staggering economic growth. Experts say China's 48,000 miles of railway meet just 60% of freight service demand. Passenger trains carry 3 million travelers daily, except during the three Golden Week holidays, when the system is even more crowded. Horror stories abound of price gouging and of passengers in adult diapers having to stand for 30-hour journeys — if they're lucky enough to get a ticket. The increasing industrial demands and mobility of China's 1.3 billion people have led the government to plan for 14 new national highways and the expansion of 12 major seaports and 10 airports, including those in Shanghai and Beijing, by 2010, the New China News Agency reported. An 82-foot rapid-transit vehicle — with room for 300 passengers, it's reportedly the world's largest bus — was exhibited in March at a Shanghai convention and will be used in Beijing and Hangzhou. But it's the aerodynamic bullet train that has gotten the most attention. China's leaders have long had a preoccupation with fast trains, rolling out the so-called speed-ups every few years.

Mig33 grows quickly
Unheard of mobile service company Mig33 is showing explosive growth — by offering a simple way to text, IM and make cheap voice calls. The company has gained four million subscribers in less than eighteen months, mostly in South East Asia, many of whom are using it as their only way to access the Web. Significantly, this is not a technology company. It is using standard technology, and following through with a clean execution. Monday it announced it has raised $10 million from Accel Partners and Redpoint Ventures, two well-known Silicon Valley venture capital firms. Technology Venture Partners also invested. Its traction is impressive considering the company has paid less than $20,000 in marketing costs — according to chief executive Steve Goh. Customers can use it on standard phones, to text and IM for free, and to share information in chat rooms. Mig33 gets paid when customers buy a pre-paid phone card, to use for voice services. While the voice calls themselves are made over the Internet (VoIP), and so very cheap, Mig33 takes a small cut for the service.

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