The European Union's consumer chief will propose new rules to make it easier and safer for the bloc's 490 million consumers to shop online in any corner of the 27-nation EU. Some 150 million EU citizens turn to websites such as Amazon.com and EBay for shopping but only 30 million buy goods and services from another EU state, spending on average 800 euros ($1,240) a head.
Google-Yahoo Deal Faces Scrutiny from Justice Dep't
Google Inc. and Yahoo Inc. face intense U.S. Justice Department scrutiny of their deal to share some advertising revenue, and the heat will likely increase under a new administration, antitrust experts said. Google, with more than 60 percent of the Web search market, and Yahoo, with 16.6 percent, announced a deal that would allow Yahoo to place Google ads on its site and collect the revenue.
cliffski writes "How much does your PC really draw in terms of power when idle, when in sleep, and when playing a demanding game? I don't trust everything the manufacturers of hardware say, so I thought I'd get myself a watt measuring device and run a few tests on some of the gear I leave on all the time, and the gear I go to the trouble of turning off. The Linksys router drew 8 watts, the monitor drew a fairly noticeable 30-31, but what surprised me was how little power the base unit drew, even when playing Company of Heroes. Also, the variance of power draw for Vista seemed minimal, regardless of what you got the machine to do."