novel

Pac-Man never dies

Yahoo and Nokia announced an extended partnership in New York today. The companies hosted a fancy press conference at the New York City NASDAQ for news that is relatively unfancy.

The news is that Yahoo will power mail, chat, and maps in Nokia devices. That's nice I suppose. It will have somewhat of an impact on developing countries and overseas where Nokia phones are popular.

The bigger news is what Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz said as a non sequitur during the event: that Yahoo products will get more social features integrated in the next few weeks.

Yahoo has experimented … Read more

Pandigital, B&N partner on $200 color e-reader

If you know of Pandigital, you probably know it for its photo frames. However, the company is moving into the hot e-book reader market with a device that a lot of people have been waiting for: an affordable color screen e-book reader with ties to a major bookseller.

Integrated with the Barnes & Noble's  e-book store, the Pandigital Novel is an Android-powered e-book reader that has a full color 7-inch touch-screen display, Wi-Fi connectivity, and multimedia capabilities. According to Pandigital, the reader will cost $199.99 when it ships in June.

While we're surprised to see Barnes & Noble partnering with Pandigital, but as anybody who has played around with the iPad knows, it's not a big leap from digital photo frame to e-book reader. Judging by the Novel's press shots, it looks a lot like the rumored smaller version of the iPad that some sites and analysts have been alluding to. That said, the Novel 800x600-pixel resolution display isn't as sharp as the iPad's is, and its resistive touch-screen interface--while responsive--isn't as responsive the iPad's capacitive touch-screen interface is.

An Arm 11 processor powers the Novel, which measures 7.5 inches tall by 5.5 inches wide by 0.5 inch thick and weighs 16 ounces. It has 1GB of built-in memory and has an expansion slot for SD/MMC memory cards--with support for cards up to 32GB in capacity. Pandigital rates its Novel's battery life at six hours in reading mode.  That's not a terrible battery life, but it's neither near the iPad's battery life nor the battery life of dedicated e-ink-based e-book readers, such as the Amazon Kindle, that don't have to be recharged for days or even weeks.

While the Novel has multimedia features as well as a built-in Web browser, e-mail client, calendar, and alarm, Pandigital is billing its new devices first and foremost as an e-book reader. According to the company, Novel owners will have "easy access to Barnes & Noble's expansive eBookstore catalog of more than one million eBooks, newspapers and magazines, a wide variety of free eBooks and more than half a million free classics." Novel users can also use Barnes & Noble LendMe feature that lets you share certain e-books with friends and family for 14 days; however, currently you can only lend a book out once. … Read more

Novell: 20 chances to reinvent itself

Most companies struggle to reinvent themselves, so shackled by their pasts that they can't reorient themselves toward the future.

Novell, once the king of the software world, is like that. Over the years it has built up a broad portfolio of software (with associated revenue streams) in repeated attempts to regain its glory days. That portfolio now stifles its ability to focus on other areas with the most promise.

But Novell's management may be about to get a lifeline. Twenty of them, actually.

According to Thursday's Wall Street Journal, up to 20 bidders, most of them private … Read more

Marvel comics in your pocket

Marvel Comics brings the largest U.S. comic book publisher to the iPhone and iPad with an interesting, but effective, way to read your favorite Marvel comic books. The interface of the app, before you start actually reading, includes buttons across the bottom to view My Comics (comics downloaded to your device), Featured titles, Free titles, a Top 25 list, and a Browse button, so you can sort by series, creator, genre, and other criteria. Clearly, the Marvel Comics app was made to sell and view comics, with several titles you can buy going all the way back to "… Read more

Novell wins in court; SCO eyes new fights

SCO's seemingly endless legal campaign over the copyrights to Unix may finally be over.

On Tuesday afternoon, a federal jury found that Novell owns the rights to the operating system, foiling SCO's plan to seek millions of dollars in licensing fees from companies it accused of illegally distributing its proprietary Unix code with the Linux OS.

Great news for the open-source community and for the long-suffering Novell, which has been battling SCO for quite some time now.

"Novell is very pleased with the jury's decision confirming Novell's ownership of the Unix copyrights, which SCO had … Read more

Novell rejects Elliot takeover bid as 'inadequate'

Novell has rejected an unsolicited $2 billion takeover bid from Elliot Associates, the business software provider announced in a statement Saturday.

"Our board of directors has concluded, after careful consideration, including a review of the proposal with its independent financial and legal advisers, that Elliott's proposal is inadequate and that it undervalues the company's franchise and growth prospects," Novell said.

In a March 2 letter to Novell's board of directors, Elliot--a New York-based hedge fund that already holds an 8.5 percent stake in Novell--offered to acquire the company for $5.75 per share in … Read more

If Novell gets bought, will Red Hat follow?

Elliott's proposed acquisition of Novell promises to shake up the software industry, which has grown a bit staid in the past year or two. But what will it mean for Red Hat, and for the broader open-source software industry?

In particular, Novell's acquisition might well spur a mergers and acquisitions revival, as Barron's notes. But will it create overwhelming pressure for Red Hat to sell, too?

Red Hat has been the subject of buyout rumors for well over a decade, but has never been particularly close to indulging the temptation, according to sources close to the company. … Read more

Novell's buyout and its effect on the industry

For years, Novell has served as an odd bargaining chip between Microsoft and enterprises looking to move to Linux.

Novell's Suse Linux distribution, while a distant No. 2 to Red Hat's leading Linux server business, has helped Microsoft keep some measure of control over its open-source competition--or, at least, to keep a close eye on it.

With Novell now up for grabs through a $1.8 billion buy-out offer from Elliott Associates, what is likely to happen to the Linux market, and to Microsoft, if it goes through?

The easy view is that Red Hat will benefit and … Read more

Hedge fund offers $1.8 billion for Novell

Elliott Associates has offered to acquire software maker Novell.

The acquisition offer, delivered in a letter to Novell's board of directors, is valued at $1.8 billion, or $5.75 per share. Elliott Associates already owns 8.5 percent of Novell's shares, which it began buying up in January.

According to The Wall Street Journal, Elliott Associates told Novell's board that the stock has "meaningfully underperformed" and called recent acquisitions and changes in strategies "unsuccessful." The hedge fund says its experience in restructuring and acquisitions will "deliver maximum value to shareholders." … Read more