IT Projects: Expert Witness, CIO, In-House Counsel & Litigation Forum

Court limits 'business method' patents

Let's hear from all of you IP people out there on this issue.  What do you all think are the pros and cons at stake here?                         Marlene

(AP)Previously appeared on Oct 30, 2008 Posted by Yahoo

http://tech.yahoo.com/news/ap/20081030/ap_on_hi_te/business_patents_court_case

WASHINGTON - A federal appeals court on Thursday ruled against a man trying to patent a business idea, a decision with far-ranging implications for the financial services and high-tech industries, which have major players on both sides of the issue.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit ruled against Bernard Bilski, who wanted to patent a method for hedging against weather-related effects on businesses. Because his process did not involve a particular machine and did not physically transform anything, the court said, the process was not eligible for a patent.

Relying heavily on 1970s-era U.S. Supreme Court decisions that established the "machine-or-transformation test," Chief Judge Paul Michel wrote for a nine-judge majority that Bilski's patent application did not meet this definition of "process" under patent law. The court affirmed the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office's denial of Bilski's patent, saying the agency's interpretation of the "process" was correct.

Spam Volume Drops When ISPs Terminate McColo

What a great job of research and follow through by Brian Krebs in getting this accomplished.  And congrats to Hurricane Electric for doing the right thing.                       Marlene

Previously appeared on Nov 12, 2008

Posted By Thomas Claburn, InformationWeek

http://www.informationweek.com/story/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=212002194

Security experts suggest there's a connection to the average of 11.9 spam messages per second in the last 24 hours compared to the 30.1 messages per second last month. If you notice a bit less spam in your inbox this week, thank Brian Krebs, who covers security for The Washington Post.

After four months of gathering information from various security companies about the malicious traffic coming out of McColo Corp., a San Jose, Calif.-based Web hosting company, Krebs took his findings up the data chain and presented them to the company's ISPs, Global Crossing and Hurricane Electric. Global Crossing declined to comment on Kreb's findings; Hurricane Electric cut off McColo's Internet service. "We looked into it a bit, saw the size and scope of the problem you were reporting and said 'Holy cow! Within the hour we had terminated all of our connections to them," Benny Ng, director of marketing for Hurricane Electric, told Krebs.

Money talks: Microsoft edges closer to Verizon search deal

Let the bidding wars begin!  First it was Yahoo spurning Microsoft's offer - only to end up with nothing to replace it because The Department of Justice stepped in and put the hammer to a Google/Yahoo deal on ads.  So then Yahoo's Wang makes comments as if the Microsoft offer was still on the table.  Ballmer quashed that pipe dream pretty quickly.  Now Google seems to have lost the Verizon deal to Microsoft, although the ink is not dry on any deal yet, and Zdnet's Larry Dignan is not ruling Google out yet.                Marlene

Previously appeared on November 12th, 2008
Posted by Larry Dignan

http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/?p=10797

Microsoft is reportedly close to landing Verizon Wireless in a search deal at the expense of Google. Why?   Money.

The Wall Street Journal reports Verizon Wireless is now favoring Microsoft over Google. The money paragraph (literally): Under the terms now being considered, Microsoft would share revenue with Verizon from ads shown in response to cellphone Web searches, with guaranteed payments to the carrier of approximately $550 million to $650 million over five years, or roughly twice what Google offered, these people said.

Will Tim Cook be the next Steve Jobs?

It would appear that Steve Jobs is very comfortable with bringing Tim Cook even further into the fray by having him appear along side him at important meetings and conferences. Interestingly enough, the negative response in the Fortune article about Tim Cook is from someone who was only identified as "...a Silicon Valley investor who travels in the Apple orbit..." .  Well, that could be one of any number of sycophants, wannabes and hangers-on, couldn't it?  Anonymous remarks carry as much weight as a wet Kleenex.  So - anyone  have any suggestions about any other candidates that would be a good choices to "shadow" Jobs?  Do I hear any votes for Jerry Yang?            Marlene

Previously appeared on November 10, 2008
Posted by Sam Diaz,a senior editor at ZDNet

http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/?p=10762&tag=nl.e019

Last month, after a press event at Apple’s Cupertino headquarters, I made an off-the-cuff observation about the future leadership of the company. In short, I commented on how Chief Operating Officer Tim Cook, who took a portion of stage time from Jobs to talk about new notebooks, was wearing blue jeans and a black shirt - Jobs’ signature outfit. Granted, a wardrobe does not make anyone worthy of a CEO title. But, given concerns this year about Jobs’ health, it suddenly felt like Cook - who filled in as CEO for two months in 2004 while Jobs recovered from pancreatic cancer surgery - could be the successor when and if Jobs no longer carries the big title.

 Now , Fortune magazine has published a pretty lengthy piece, called “The genius behind Steve,” which looks at Cook - as well as a couple of other execs - who could be positioned to take the reins. (Techmeme) It’s a good read that offers a deeper look into Cook as an executive and a human being. Consider these excerpts from Fortune:

Jobs has seen to it that Cook is getting public exposure, especially on Wall Street. He is a fixture on Apple’s quarterly earnings calls, and he speaks at select investment conferences. “Operationally, when you think about what they’ve done - a massive retail-stores ramp, an expanded sales-channel presence, delivering new products without glitches, and managing huge seasonality - all speak to a company that is exceedingly well run,” says (Toni) Sacconaghi, the Sanford Bernstein analyst, referring almost wholly to aspects of the company that Cook oversees.

With Jerry Yang Gone, What Yahoo Should Do Next

It seems like only yesterday when the Yahoo "step down" CEO was Terry Semel (it was June 2007, actually) to be succeeded by founder Jerry Yang, and Sue Decker as his second in command.  Predictions for new direction at the time included those of Jerry Caplan, in an Internet article for TIME/Business and Tech, speculating that after Yahoo's failure to acquire Facebook, the company might look to a deal with Microsoft.

The Tuesday, November 17th announcement of Jerry Yang's "step down" as CEO has followed the failure of Yahoo, and Yang, to secure a deal with Microsoft.   The following piece has some interesting do's and don'ts to offer towards the search for a new CEO.                                                  Marlene

Previously appeared on Monday, November 17, 2008

Posted by Om Malik - GigaOm

hthttp://money.cnn.com/news/newsfeeds/gigaom/search2008_11_17_after_yang_what_should_yahoo_do.html?eref=time_tech

Jerry Yang, after a tumultuous reign as the chief executive officer of Yahoo, the company he co-founded with David Filo, announced today that he is stepping down from the top slot. The news was first reported by Kara Swisher and later confirmed by Yahoo in a press release. He is going to make way for someone else, but will stay on the board of Yahoo and will be known as Chief Yahoo. More important, however, is the question of what Yahoo needs to do in order for Jerry to hang on to the title of Chief Yahoo!

Yang’s decision to move on isn’t a surprise – it was clear from his talk at a recent industry conference that he was tired and perhaps a little out of his depth. His choice to head the company that was looking down a deep abyss a while back was an ineffectual one, and a total and absolute failure on the part of Yahoo’s board of directors. In June 2008, I wrote about the systematic rot inside the company.  

What hasn’t been discussed is that the company isn’t really facing up to the fact that its layers of management have resulted in a state of masterful inactivity, masked perhaps as a culture of consensus. This starts at the top - from the company’s board and senior management down to VP level where people are prone to organizing and attending twenty meetings before deciding the fate of a project. Some senior managers including the ones who are deserting the company are skillful players in this game of hiding ennui behind grandiose plans and a great future that never happens.

SAP Makes A Dramatic Move:

We need a score card nowadays to keep track of the re-organizing of Tech biz companies - and the moves being made by top executives - its like a very intense game of  musical chairs, and the prizes for the winners are stupendous.  Right now the tech world's big businesses could be the new template for the classic Abbot and Costello routine - but what could we call it... "Who's On Google, What's On Apple, and Nobody's on Yahoo?             Marlene

Ex-Oracle Exec John Wookey To Head Up SAP’s New On-Demand Market Effort

http://blogs.zdnet.com/Greenbaum/?p=189

Previously appeared on November 11, 2008 posted by Joshua Greenbaum

It’s hard to know which was more significant, the announcement that SAP is going to tackle on demand at the top of its market, or the name of the person – former Oracle apps exec John Wookey – who was picked to lead the effort. Off the top of my head, I’d say it’s a draw: an almost amazing segue into a new, and very challenging market, and an amazing pick to head up the effort.

John won’t lack for challenges in his new job, the title of which is executive vice president for large enterprise on-demand. Having lead Oracle’s efforts to rationalize its ever-growing, and increasingly heterogeneous acquisitions until he abruptly left last year, John has some experience in accomplishing what looks almost impossible to do.

10 tech leaders who could become Obama’s CTO

Previously appeared on November 10th, 2008 posted by Jason Hiner http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/hiner/?p=850&tag=nl.e019

As a presidential candidate, part of Barack Obama’s technology policy platform included hiring the U.S. government’s first chief technology officer (CTO). If Obama follows through on this, who is likely to get the job? Here are 10 top candidates.

During his presidential campaign, Barack Obama used technology to organize, communicate, and raise funds in innovative ways that gave him an advantage over opponents in both the primaries and the general election. It’s clear that Obama views tech as a powerful catalyst, and with the U.S. facing an unprecedented array of economic challenges, Obama will need to use technology to drive efficiency and institutional transformation.

A part of his policy platform, Obama has stated that he plans to hire the nation’s first chief technology officer (CTO) to play quarterback in driving these changes. A CTO is typically an organization’s top engineer and focuses on outward-facing technologies (see What’s the difference between CIO and CTO) but based on Obama’s policy statements he wants to use the national CTO position to:

• Build a 21st centrury technology infrastructure

• Unite and lead the CIOs and CTOs of various federal agencies

• Architect innovative tech solutions to help solve big problems.  

As a result, Obama is going to need a visionary tech leader who can rally both technologists and standard Washngton bureacrats around a common purpose. It also wouldn’t hurt to bring in a big name — someone who already has a strong reputation that will translate into political capital.

Here are top 10 candidates.

10. Shai Agassi

This former technology head of SAP has the business experience and the interest in larger societal issues to do well as America ’s CTO. However, he’s recently founded his own company,Better Place, to create an entirely new business model and power system to run the electric cars of the future. Because of his passion for that project, it’s doubtful he would want the U.S. CTO gig.

Former IBM exec blocked from running iPod, iPhone engineering teams

Previously appeared on Nov 9, 2008
Posted by Gregg Keizer

http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9119643&intsrc=hm_list

November 9, 2008 (Computerworld) A federal judge on Friday ordered a former IBM executive who was recently hired by Apple, Inc. to stop working for the company, court documents showed. U.S. District Court Judge Kenneth Karas ruled that Mark Papermaster, who was announced as Apple's new vice president of devices hardware engineering only last Tuesday, must "immediately cease his employment with Apple Inc. until further order of this court."

Karas did not explain his reasons for the order, saying only that he would issue an opinion at a later date. Friday's move was the result of an IBM motion for a preliminary injunction designed to block Papermaster's move to Apple. On Oct. 22, IBM sued Papermaster, claiming that a noncompetition agreement he signed in 2006 bars him from working for competitors for a year after leaving the company.

According to IBM, Papermaster had information of "highly confidential IBM trade secrets" that would "irreparably harm" the company if he's allowed to work for Apple. Apple hired Papermaster to run its iPod and iPhone engineering group. The same day that Apple announced Papermaster's hire, it also said that Tony Fadell, who has been credited with jump-starting the company's iPod business, was leaving his position as senior vice president in charge of the player, but would remain as an adviser to Jobs.

Outsourcing vendor ACS to move 'higher-level' IT jobs offshore

How are U.S. companies reaching the determination that the resources in the offshore areas have acquired the necessary level of expertise to fill management and application development roles?  Isn’t there a great risk here, to be compared to the fairy tale where the two “ugly stepsisters” are attempting to jam their size 10’s into Cinderella’s size 5 glass slipper, in order to win the grand prize, the hand of Prince Charming in marriage?  If they actually do it by force, they will probably be too crippled to walk down the aisle with the Prince!  Have American companies done in-depth studies on the level of offshore skills available, to be certain that they will not cripple their businesses in the long run with staffing that is unable to “fit” the job?  This development has all the makings of a "fractured fairy tale".  We would like to have your insights and comments on this issue.                            Marlene

Originally appeared on 2008-11-03 posted by Patrick Thibodeau Obama touts desire to keep tech jobs in the U.S.

• Offshore Coders: Cheaper and Better
• People: The New IT Priority
• Bailout won't keep Wall Street from sending jobs offshore
• Salary comparison

http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&taxonomyName=Outsourcing&articleId=9118938&taxonomyId=72&pageNumber=1

Execs say firm plans to start offshoring development, project management work

November 3, 2008 (Computerworld) IT workers and managers who believe their jobs are at too high a level to be sent overseas may want to look at Affiliated Computer Services Inc.'s plan to boost its offshore outsourcing operations by moving "more complex, higher paying" jobs to countries outside the U.S.

Dallas-based ACS, which provides IT and business process outsourcing services to a wide range of corporate and government clients, currently employs about 63,000 people, 20,000 of them in low-cost offshore locations. But in a conference call last Thursday on its financial results for the quarter that ended Sept. 30, ACS detailed plans to increase the number of employees working offshore by 4,200 during its current fiscal year, which began July. (A transcript of the call can be read on Seeking Alpha Ltd.'s Web site.)

"To have a greater financial impact, we will be moving a higher percentage of more complex, higher paying jobs offshore, including management and application development roles," ACS President and CEO Lynn Blodgett said during the call.

ACS has been gradually shifting jobs to offshore and near-shore centers in the Philippines, Jamaica, Guatemala and India. In its 2006 fiscal year, just under 25% of the company's workforce was based outside of the U.S. Now, nearly 35% of its workers are overseas, according to a presentation used by ACS officials during the conference call.

Tom Burlin, chief operating officer at ACS, filled in some of the details about the jobs that will be affected by the additional offshore moves. "We've done a great job in moving base production-level jobs offshore but have decided," he said, "to aggressively move more of our higher level jobs, like production managers, higher-level back-office functions and higher-level development roles, to lower-cost locations."

The company said the expected savings from offshoring will give ACS more money to invest in areas such as sales, innovation and development of new products. "This is the right thing to do and the right time to do it," Blodgett said. "This investment will make us stronger, not only during this economic storm, but for years to come."

State Department, VA disclose two new data breaches

Database security is non-existent, stolen computers, breach of information files of high-profile citizens, personal details of veterans inadvertently included with public information on federal Web site that allows the public to search for details of government contracts and spending... and on and on it goes.  Who is watching the supposed "Watchdogs”?     Anybody have any good suggestions to pass on to help close up all the gaps and leaks?                     Marlene

Originally appeared in Computerworld on 2008-11-03 posted by Jaikumar Vijayan

http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&taxonomyName=IT+in+Government&articleId=9118959&taxonomyId=69&pageNumber=1

One affects passport applicants, the other, VA patients

November 3, 2008 (Computerworld) Two federal agencies that have already drawn attention this year for data security breaches are back in the spotlight again -- for the same reason.

One of them is the U.S. Dept. of State,  which last week disclosed that it had notified close to 400 individuals that the data they had submitted with their passport applications had been stolen in a database intrusion.

And last Saturday, the U.S. Department of Veteran's Affairs (VA) said that one of its medical centers in Oregon had accidentally posted personal data on about 1,600 patients on its public Web site.

The breach at the State Department occurred in March at around the same time the agency disclosed that some of its contractors had illegally snooped on passport records  belonging to Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.), Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and other high-profile citizens, according to a spokeswoman.

That disclosure triggered a review of the security controls protecting the State Department's Passport Information Electronic Records System (PIERS), which contains records on 192 million passports for 127 million people. An Inspector General's report was released in July and identified "many control weaknesses" -- including a general lack of policies, procedures and training for protecting passport data at the State Department. The report noted that there were about 20,500 users with active PIERS accounts as of May, with about 12,200 of them being employees or contractors at the department.

According to a State Department spokeswoman, 383 records were illegally accessed by a State Department employee. That worker has since been terminated, the spokeswoman said. All of those who were affected by the incident have been notified by the department and have been offered one year's worth of free credit monitoring. The notifications were sent out in two batches, with the first set going out on July 10 and the second on Oct. 6.

Yahoo, Google Revise Deal in Hopes of Approval

Back in September, we posted several articles that followed the Google/Yahooo advertising deal in the making.  Looks like the dust kicked up by the Advertising Groups and the involvement of the Dept of Justice with their hiring of super lawyer Sandy Litvack have changed the game for the two Internet companies.           Marlene

This originally appeared in a posting By Reuters  
2008-11-04

http://www.baselinemag.com/c/a/Search/Yahoo-Google-Revise-Deal-in-Hopes-of-Approval/1/

The two Internet companies have submitted a reworked proposal to the U.S. Department of Justice that shortens their partnership to just two years from 10 years, the source said. The revised deal also caps the percentage of search revenue that Yahoo can collect from Google at no more than 25 percent, and lets Google advertisers opt out of being placed on Yahoo, the source said.

WASHINGTON/SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Yahoo Inc and Google Inc have drastically scaled back the scope of their search advertising deal, a person close to the discussions said on Monday, in a last-ditch effort to win U.S. antitrust approval.

The move comes after Google appeared to be on the verge of walking away from the partnership, which was announced in June to foil Microsoft Corp's takeover attempt of Yahoo. The deal has since drawn scrutiny from U.S. regulators amid a growing chorus of criticism from advertisers.

The two Internet companies have submitted a reworked proposal to the U.S. Department of Justice that shortens their partnership to just two years from 10 years, the source said.

The revised deal also caps the percentage of search revenue that Yahoo can collect from Google at no more than 25 percent, and lets Google advertisers opt out of being placed on Yahoo, the source said.

Yahoo spokeswoman Tracy Schmaler said in an emailed statement the company continues to work with the Justice Department and discussions are ongoing.

Google spokesman Adam Kovacevich declined to discuss the details of the process.

Analysts said the new terms could help the deal get past regulators, but questioned whether such a limited partnership would be financially lucrative to Yahoo, which is a distant No. 2 to Google in the web search market.

Mukul Krishna, digital media global director at consulting firm Frost and Sullivan, described the revised terms as "more of a Band-Aid than the extensive surgery that is needed" for Yahoo.

"This sweetens the deal to go through antitrust red flags and gives (Yahoo CEO) Jerry (Yang) some breathing space, but how much money it would add to Yahoo's top line would be very crucial," Krishna said. "And it doesn't answer the question, what after two years?"

Mark May, an analyst with Needham & Co, said Yahoo's willingness to limit the scope of the deal "tells us that other alternatives are either not available or not attractive at all."

The Next Huge Security Threat: Web Applications

After reading this posting by Ms. Millard in Baseline, I realize it would have been a good pick for last Friday's post - on Halloween, since it sounds a lot scarier than ghost and goblins. 

What - "...no adherence to security software development practices".  Egads, "unpatched Browsers" ...!  Oh no, not "The Rise of the Botnets"...!  Suzy - don't go in there - don't open that----there is malicious code behind that Web page!  

So - how about sharing some of your scary Web Application stories with us?          Marlene

Originally appeared on 2008-10-29 by Elizabeth Millard

http://www.baselinemag.com/c/a/Security/The-Next-Huge-Security-Threat-Web-Applications/ 

 

The Next Huge Security Threat: Web Applications

Software as a service may be on the rise, but so are security threats targeted at loopholes in application code. Here are some application security strategies from industry experts, with a closer look at one area not generally associated with security and information technology management--insurance.

As companies flock to software-as-a-service (SaaS) and design their own Web-based applications to take advantage of an always-on and always-accessible enterprise, they're also opening themselves to a formidable security threat, many experts believe.

Web app security is already a major concern, notes Ivan Arce, CTO of Core Security Technologies. Most enterprises have already adopted the Web paradigm for many of their internal applications as well as almost all of their external Internet presence, he states, creating an environment where Web applications are a major technological component in enterprise business processes.

"Unfortunately, most of the Web applications already in deployment were developed with no consideration or adherence to security software development practices," he says. "The result is that for many years, Web applications have been plagued by design and implementation bugs and became the low-hanging fruit for attackers."

Adding to the problem is the large amount of unpatched browsers, which create an additional layer of insecurity that can be exploited.