network.com

Sun looks for new direction for Network.com

Sun Microsystems appears to have put its utility computing effort, Network.com, on hold until it gets an idea of how to resurrect it.

The pioneering computing effort, which launched two years ago, offered pay-per-use computing infrastructure for high-performance computing applications without forcing customers to buy expensive IT equipment. However, Network.com has only 13 customers and has stopped accepting new customers, according to a report on the Register.com.

Dave Douglas, senior vice president of cloud computing and developer platforms group, told reporters Tuesday that the service is in transition but was reluctant to offer specifics on the direction … Read more

Sun heading into the cloud

SAN FRANCISCO--While an interview with Neil Young has been my big highlight of JavaOne, I also managed to hook up with Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz for a video interview. We talked about Project Hydrazine, a new cloud computing initiative with services similar to what Google and Amazon.com offer. We also discussed JavaFX, Sun's competitor to Adobe AIR and Microsoft Silverlight, and Project Insight, which is designed to gather instrumented user action data via JavaFX and provide it to developers.

JavaFX, which includes a runtime, scripting, and a media framework, could have a hard time competing with Adobe and … Read more

ComScore: Facebook traffic surged after 'open' registration

According to Internet statistics firm ComScore, unique visits to Facebook rocketed 89 percent between May 2006 and May 2007, from about 14 million unique visitors to 26.6 million.

Average minutes spent on the site per users also rose from 138 to 186--a 35 percent increase--and the number of pages viewed rose 143 percent, from 6,530 to 15,841. This coincides with Facebook's decision to "open its doors" last fall, no longer requiring a corporate or university e-mail address in order to gain access to the site.

Consequently, most of the growth charted by ComScore is … Read more