Technology - Hardware

Projecting 28 percent annual growth in cloud computing, IBM this week opened its 10th laboratory focused on developing products and services for global Web 2.0, collaboration and mail services. The facility will support IBM's LotusLive division, which it says has gained 18 million users in its first year and will be geared toward clouds for government and companies. The monthly cost for companies is $3 per user. Full Story »

San Francisco - Sun Microsystems officials introduced on Thursday Sun's upgrades to three Java-based technologies, including the company's latest implementation of enterprise Java. But they were silent on the elephant in the room: How the company's efforts might be impacted by the planned acquisition of Sun by Oracle. Full Story »

LINTHICUM, Md. - Shares of Ciena Corp. tumbled 11 percent Thursday after the computer networking equipment maker posted a wider-than-expected loss for its fiscal 2009 fourth quarter and full year as costs offset strong revenue results. Full Story »

Oracle is expected to portray its planned acquisition of Sun Microsystems, and more specifically of Sun's MySQL unit, as a procompetitive move necessary to balance the might of Microsoft in the low end database market during a two-day hearing in Brussels that opened Thursday. Full Story »

Hit your system update option, PS3 owners, and you'll discover firmware revision 3.15 snuck onto Sony's distribution servers overnight. According to PlayStation Lifestyle, it includes a fix for a few issues introduced in the 3.10 update, and introduces PSP Minis to the PS3 itself. Full Story »

KUALA LUMPUR (AFP) - Online social networking pioneer Friendster has accepted a buyout from Malaysia-based MOL Global, the companies announced Thursday, saying the site would shift into e-commerce. Full Story »

Social networking site Friendster accepted a buyout offer from Malaysia's MOL Global, which hopes to generate revenue from the site using micropayments. Full Story »

IBM opened a new data center in South Korea on Thursday and said it is building another one in Auckland, New Zealand, to address a surge in demand for cloud computing and IT services in the Asia-Pacific region. Full Story »

SAN FRANCISCO (AFP) - Facebook began calling on users to get a better grip on their online privacy by dictating who sees what in profiles at the world's leading social networking service. Full Story »

NEW YORK (Reuters) - A former senior IBM Corp executive denied being involved in a sprawling hedge fund insider trading case and asked a court on Wednesday to dismiss civil charges by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Full Story »

Dell has updated its enterprise class and SMB-oriented OptiPlex business desktop PC lines. Full Story »

Milestones in social networking over the past decade: Full Story »

BRUSSELS - The European Union's top antitrust official said Wednesday she was "still optimistic" that regulators could resolve a bitter dispute over an EU investigation into Oracle Corp.'s planned takeover of Sun Microsystems Inc. Full Story »

NEW YORK - Deutsche Bank analyst Brian Modoff said Cisco Systems Inc.'s meeting with analysts Tuesday reinforced his upbeat outlook on the networking gear maker and its shares. Full Story »

San Francisco - Oh, what a difference a year makes! In October of last year, I reviewed a pair of virtualization servers from Dell. Full Story »

Cisco Systems tried to partner with major server vendors several years ago before coming out with its own blade servers earlier this year, and it's still open to a partnership with IBM, Chairman and CEO John Chambers said Tuesday. Full Story »

A group of companies is starting up an Enterprise Cloud Buyers Council in hopes of removing barriers to enterprise use of hosted cloud computing. Full Story »

SAN FRANCISCO (AFP) - MySpace on Tuesday announced that it has bought online music service imeem and is weaving it into the social networking community. Full Story »