Medical records: Embed a Memory Spot chip into a hospital patient's wrist band and full medical and drug records can be kept securely available.

Audio photo: Attach a chip to the prints of photographs and add music, commentary or ambient sound to enhance the enjoyment of viewing photos.

Digital postcards: Send a traditional holiday postcard to family and friends with a chip containing digital pictures of a vacation, plus sounds and even video clips.

Document notes: A Memory Spot chip attached to a paper document can include a history of all the corrections and additions made to the text, as well as voice notes and graphical images.

Perfect photocopies: A Memory Spot chip attached to a cover sheet eliminates the need to copy the original document. Just read the perfect digital version into the photocopier and the result will be sharp output every time, no matter how many copies are needed, and avoiding any possibility of the originals jamming in the feeder.

Security passes: Add a chip to an identity card or security pass for the best of both worlds -- a handy card with secure, relevant digital information included.

Anti-counterfeit tags: Counterfeit drugs are a significant problem globally. Memory Spot chips can contain secure information about the manufacture and quality of pharmaceuticals. When added to a drug container, this can prove their authenticity. A similar process could be used to verify high-value engineering and aviation components.

It is very small compared to the Ram and flash chips on the market, but it is a start.

In fact many companies, including IBM, have been working on the nanotechnology behind Mram for around a decade.

Put simply, Mram stores data magnetically, in the same way a hard drive does. This makes it non-volatile.

It is also very quick, and does not wear out over time. So it seems to have the advantages of both RAM and flash, with none of the disadvantages.

Only don't expect these new chips to hit your price sensitive consumer electonics just yet. The first markets for MRAM will most likely be automotive or industrial settings where durability is critical. So hold tight and let the invisible hand work some magic, mkay?

My Web interface will identify specific malware without the Google API. It directly searches Google using fingerprints from executables that we already have," he said.

Moore's project uses code strings, or fingerprints in malware samples, then runs a search on Google for those characteristics.

The search engine has been programmed with about 300 malware signatures and Moore said he plans to add another 6,000 signatures in a future bug fix update.

WARNING! The following links lead to executable programs that can harm your computer. Please be careful when accessing these files and make sure that you only run them in a restricted environment. The signature technique used by this search engine may result in non-malicious files being detected as malware, so be sure to use an updated virus scanner prior to filing a complaint with any web site.

The design is the result of a personal annoyance for years and years. Almost everybody with a computer has the same problem. An ugly looking skincoloured box under the desk, all kind of ugly wires, all the peripherals like soundsystems, transmitters and so on are annoying too. No matter how nice the desk looks when you buy it, by the time you have everything installed there is not much left of it. A lot of people decide for that reason not to put the PC in the living room.

In the i-Con I everything is integrated. The PC is in the desk. The only thing you see yet is the front of the DVDburner, the adjustable screen and the powercable, coming out of one leg, that's it. All the other things, the motherboard, the harddisk, the wires to and from the screen, the bluetoothhub and other transmitters, all that is in the desk.

S3 is proving to be particularly attractive to community-based media companies - homegrown photos, video, even music. Altexa, Elephant Drive, Jungle Disk, MediaSilo, Ookles, Plum and SmugMug are some of the start-ups that are currently using Amazon's S3. Online photo sharing company SmugMug CEO Don MacAskill seems to be one happy customer, with a good reason!

He was facing a hefty tab for storage - Smug Mug is adding about ten terabytes worth of photos every month and claims he saved almost $500,000 in storage expenses. His monthly tab just in storage is around the $1500. An Apple 7TB XServe RAID costs about $13,000. Of course there are cheaper options, but still it is a lot of savings.

S3's early success makes you think that if the on-demand infrastructure can be delivered at an affordable price, the cost of setting up an online business is going to decline even further, perhaps prompting a whole cycle of new entrepreneurial activity. Amazon's Alexa platform plays into this trend quite well since it allows developers to process and analyze data on Amazon, store it (on S3), and serve it back out to the world. (Amazon, after all is the harbinger of Web 2.0 trends.)

Funny to think now how it all started so innocently. Then suddenly, phones became mobile, CD players gave way to MP3s, computers found new life on the internet and DVDs made tapes obsolete.

Your relationship with gadgets quickly gained pace, gathering into obsession. But sooner or later there comes a time when you must ask yourself: has our relationship moved to a new level? Am I and technology more than just friends?

The operating system has been going for 8 years now, and Microsoft is encouraging anyone still running it to switch to Windows XP! Of course, if your machine isn't quite fast enough for XP, you're a bit stuck.

The switch-off means no more telephone support, and no security fixes - meaning that the internet is about to become a very dangerous place for Windows 98 users. With no updates for the numerous security issues and viruses that arrive each week, a box is sure to be hosed before long.

The switch-off was originally due to happen in 2003, but Microsoft delayed it because a number of developing countries are still using Windows 98.

In two weeks, the board of Time Warner Inc., which owns AOL, will hear a proposal from Jonathan Miller, AOL's chief executive, calling for a near halt in marketing for AOL's 17-year-old Internet access service, price cuts for existing customers and thousands of layoffs. His goal is to devote all of AOL's energy into building its free Web-based services.

Traditionally, when companies have profitable but shrinking businesses, like AOL's access service, they try to milk as much money as they can from them without investing new cash. Indeed, that is what Mr. Miller has tried to do for the last several years.

Mr. Miller will defend his unusually draconian plan by arguing that trying to wring every last dime from its dial-up subscribers is preventing AOL from being as aggressive as it can in competing with Yahoo, Microsoft and Google on the Web, according to AOL executives involved in developing the proposal. With such powerful and fast-moving rivals, he wants to hasten the pain to speed the recovery.

This plan will require the board to accept lower profits at first until the advertising revenue grows further, the AOL executives said, although they declined to say how much profits would fall and at what rate. (The AOL executives spoke on the condition of anonymity because the plan is not scheduled for public announcement until Aug. 2.)