may the force be with you

"For a long time people have talked about getting browser support for multilink feature. A multilink is a link that points to more than one targets. It's useful because many times a single target is not sufficient to describe a link. Wikipedia has numerous examples of acronyms and abbreviations that expand to more than one term. Well, I got sick of waiting, and so I wrote a plugin for the excellent Wiki application PmWiki that adds the multilink feature. This is fully supported under Mozilla Firefox, but only partially under Internet Explorer."

source:http://slashdot.org/articles/05/07/18/190249.shtml?tid=95&tid=154&tid=185

Sen. Hillary Clinton has called for an investigation of the video game Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas after hackers discovered a secret section of the game that depicts graphic sex acts. The game has a rating of "M," for mature audiences. Clinton says the game probably deserves the more restrictive "AO," for adults only. Where do video game ratings come from?

An industry-funded group called the Entertainment Software Rating Board. The ESRB was founded in 1994 amid chatter that the government would start to regulate game makers. Software developers aren't required by law to submit their games to the ESRB, but many retailers only sell titles that receive a rating from the board. If a company does ask for a rating, it must comply with the rules of the ESRB or face penalties, which can include cash fines and product recalls.

When submitting a game for the board's scrutiny, the developer fills out a questionnaire that describes potentially offensive material, especially sequences involving drugs, sex, or violence. The company must also supply the rating board with the scripts for any scenes with dialogue and material like song lyrics. The package sent to the ESRB will also include a videotape showing the game's basic plot and each questionable scene. Such videos can be several hours long.

At least three raters watch the videotape and answer a series of questions about its content. They are more likely to be homemakers than hard-core gamers. They must be at least 21 years old and have no connection to the video game industry.

Most new games require 50 hours or more to complete, so the ESRB doesn't play titles all the way through. For certain games, members of the board will perform a spot-check using manufacturer-provided cheat codes that allow access to higher or hidden levels. The board combines all of this information to issue a final rating and a set of official content descriptors—like "Use of Alcohol," "Fantasy Violence," "Partial Nudity," and "Comic Mischief."

The ESRB issues seven designations. They range from "EC" (Early Childhood) to "AO," adults only. Most titles receive either an E (for children over the age of 6), or a "T" (for teens over 13). Out of thousands of games that have been reviewed, only 18 have received the AO rating—including such titles as Water Closet: The Forbidden Chamber and Leisure Suit Larry: Magna Cum Laude Uncut and Uncensored.

The new Grand Theft Auto game's M rating includes content descriptors for blood and gore, intense violence, strong language, strong sexual content, and drug use. The ESRB suggests that retail stores limit sales of M-rated games to those 17 and older. AO-rated games, almost all of which have the "strong sexual content" tag, are limited to those 18 and older. So, what's the big deal if a game gets bumped up to the higher rating? Big retailers like Wal-Mart won't stock AO-rated games; that means potentially huge revenue losses if you can't eke out an M from the board.

Some game companies submit their product to the board repeatedly to ensure they get a desirable rating. Others send developers to New York City to meet with members of the board. The ESRB generally doesn't say which specific scenes or dialogue should be trimmed to get a more child-friendly rating. But by speaking with the raters in person, a company's representatives might learn, for example, that a particular character is probably a bit too busty for an "E." [Clarification, July 18: Game developers meet with members of the rating board, not the independent "raters" who review and write reports on each game.]

Explainer thanks James Coliz of Microsoft Game Studios, Dennis McCauley of GamePolitics.com, and Eliot Mizrachi of the Entertainment Software Rating Board.

Daniel Engber is a writer in New York City and a featured member of www.cryingwhileeating.com.
Still from Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas by KRT.

source:http://slate.msn.com/id/2122746/fr/rss/

"MSNBC is reporting that Apple is in talks with major record labels to license and sell video content on the iTunes music store. The videos would sell for $1.99 and be playable on a video iPod, which Apple has reported may come out sometime in September." Update: 07/18 18:54 GMT by T : Carl Bialik from the WSJ writes "Just to add to the previous Apple post, here's a free link to today's Wall Street Journal article upon which the MSNBC article was based."

source:http://apple.slashdot.org/apple/05/07/18/1721231.shtml?tid=176&tid=3

Google rainmakers and venture capitalists John Doerr and Ram Shriram are pinning their hopes--and millions--on yet another Stanford University spin-off with a nonsensical name.

Doerr and Shriram, whose early investment in search giant Google paid off in spades, have invested $16 million in Menlo Park, Calif.-based Zazzle, a 2-year-old online marketplace where people can buy and sell artwork in the form of customized gifts, T-shirts, stamps, posters and prints.

On Monday, Doerr's Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Shriram's Sherpalo Ventures will announce they've led Zazzle's series A funding, and the two men have joined the company's board of directors.

"Zazzle represents a significant breakthrough in e-commerce and is the ideal advocate for every individual who wants to create products that are as unique as they are," Doerr said in a statement.

Zazzle's online store taps into the notion of mass customization, in which people can be the creative force in tailoring goods to buy. Billed as a cross between auctioneer eBay and PC manufacturer Dell, the service combines a buyers' and sellers' marketplace with customized manufacturing of prints, apparel and gifts.

Zazzle draws on the creative works of community members and more than 10,000 contributing artists, along with images from partners like Walt Disney, the Library of Congress and others. People can search for and choose an image and then augment it with online design tools before ordering it as a T-shirt, framed canvas, or other item. In turn, Zazzle pays a royalty fee to the artist or content partner.

On Monday, the company will announce a partnership with Pitney Bowes that allows members to buy customized stamps.

Like Google's humble beginnings in a Palo Alto garage, Zazzle started in a pool house of the company's founders, Robert Beaver and his two sons, Bobby and Jeff. The two sons were still attending Stanford University as economics majors when they began fleshing out the idea for Zazzle.

The name Zazzle means "to embellish something" from the root word "zazz."

source:http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9588_22-5792396.html

"Is there another format war on the horizon? This wiki compares the two, and finds that even though RSS has far greater deployment (and mindshare), Atom 1.0 solves a lot of the problems associated with it."

source:http://developers.slashdot.org/developers/05/07/18/117226.shtml?tid=95&tid=156

Humbled by Apple's success in music, the tech giant mends fences with the film world as it tries to conquer the home entertainment market.

By Joseph Menn
Times Staff Writer

July 17, 2005

REDMOND, Wash. — When Apple Computer Inc. transformed the digital music scene in April 2003 by selling songs over the Internet, the richest man in the world was not amused.

Microsoft Corp. Chairman Bill Gates had struggled for a decade to get his software into consumers' home entertainment systems. Now the digital media party was finally starting, and he wasn't invited.

But the blow gave Gates new insight, motivation and some needed humility — and it intensified work on what might prove the turning point in his quest to extend Microsoft's supremacy from the office into the living room.

Just weeks after Apple's seismic announcement, Gates and new AOL Time Warner Inc. Chairman Richard Parsons settled America Online's claim that Microsoft had crushed its Netscape software subsidiary with illegal monopolistic behavior.

More important, Gates and others said in recent interviews, the settlement led to a new relationship that has changed the course of Microsoft's fractious dealings with Hollywood. Since then, the Warner Bros. studio has guided its movie industry peers in quietly meeting Microsoft halfway on a range of contentious issues, setting the stage for the software giant to play gatekeeper for the home video business of the future.

The alliance with what is now Time Warner Inc. "is quite an amazing thing, given that they had a lawsuit against us and we were really mostly in conflict," Gates said in a recent interview. "We have a great, ongoing dialogue with them, including them guiding us on the concerns of other content companies."

Gates' battle to succeed in video where he failed in music is far from over. For one thing, the movie studios and television broadcasters are more prone to internal disagreement than were the record companies when Apple signed them up. That makes it trickier for Microsoft to forge content deals.

What's more, movie producers are under less financial pressure to rush to a download world: Unlike music sales, which have been declining, DVD revenue is still growing, although more slowly than it once did.

Even if they stick together, the content creators may stand pat, place their bets with multiple technology partners or choose someone other than Gates. In particular, few in Hollywood would be shocked to see Apple founder Steve Jobs pull another rabbit out of his hat, unveiling a perfectly thought-out system for moving paid video to computers and portable devices.

Meanwhile, Google Inc. and Yahoo Inc. already are getting users to contribute video to their sites for others to watch. And Time Warner's AOL is finally taking advantage of its parent's premium content, this month promising online video from Warner Bros., HBO and broadcast television.

Yet after investing billions of dollars and working doggedly behind the scenes, Microsoft executives are predicting visible results within a year.

"We'll see a broader range of movies available for both rental and ownership" via the Internet, Gates said from his corner office. And he said those movies would become available much sooner in their life cycle, "closer to the pay-per-view-type release date."

The pact with Time Warner called for Microsoft to pay $750 million in compensation for its misdeeds and for the two companies — until then mainly rivals in selling Internet access — to collaborate on ways to keep video from being copied indiscriminately. Parsons later directed Time Warner to join with Microsoft in buying a combined majority stake in ContentGuard, which holds patents on anti-copying techniques.

Walt Disney Co. was so concerned about missing out that it called Microsoft and asked for a similar alliance in writing, minus the cash. And the other studios are coming along, spurred by Gates' chats with News Corp. Chairman Rupert Murdoch and other industry captains, many of them at the annual media conference held by investment bank Allen & Co.

Hollywood negotiators say the key has been Microsoft's realization that it can't dictate terms the way it has with computer makers. After it was left in the dust by Apple's iTunes, they say, Microsoft's arrogance evaporated.

"They get it better than they used to," said one studio's new-media executive, who like others declined to be identified because of the sensitivity of negotiations. "They're trying to learn lessons from their failure on the music side, where Apple blew them out of the water."

Perhaps the most significant fruit emerged a year ago with the formation of a group that is close to finishing a rights-management system for high-definition video. Backers of the Advanced Access Content System, known as AACS, include tech firms Microsoft, Intel Corp. and IBM Corp.; media companies Warner Bros. and Disney; and consumer electronics companies Panasonic, Toshiba and Sony, which also makes movies.

Microsoft digital media chief Amir Majidimehr said AACS, which uses pieces of technology from Microsoft and other companies, would allow some content to be moved around within a home network, such as from a computer to a television.

The system would also allow the AACS group to reach into the house and change software if the system got hacked to produce unauthorized copies. That's a level of control rarely seen before the latest video game consoles.

But such control may alienate customers, analysts warn. Indeed, some consumer advocates complain that Microsoft is giving veto power over new technology to the risk-averse entertainment industry. Especially disturbing, they say, is the idea of buying a device that does something, only to have a piece of restricted content disable that feature later with a forced software "upgrade."

"The warning I'd like to see is: 'Here are all the things that can be removed from this device if someone somewhere does something naughty, and the studios decide to punish the innocent,' " said Cory Doctorow of the Electronic Frontier Foundation. "Microsoft and other technology companies are saying that the person who makes the record should be able to design the record players, and we have never given that power to copyright holders."

Gates said that such compromises were essential for drawing more content into the digital realm and that standard practices would emerge.

"Can I use it, can I lend it to my friend, can I use it in my summer home, what can I do with it? That's got to be clear," he said.

Controversy or no, AACS will be included in HD DVD, one of the two high-definition successor formats to DVDs. The competing format, Blu-ray, may follow suit.

For the negotiations with Hollywood, Microsoft last summer hired Blair Westlake, a longtime home video and television executive at Universal. Westlake advocated for some of the studios' concerns within Microsoft, said Disney Executive Vice President Salil Mehta, which made the people in Redmond "more cooperative."

Microsoft has even agreed to make architecture changes in its next-generation Windows operating system and is modifying its policy positions in Washington. Although the company previously opposed laws that would require anti-copying technology, for example, Westlake now says some might be appropriate.

Microsoft has reason to play nice. Its future depends on developing new uses for computers. As more PC users see their current machines as good enough for everyday computing needs, they delay buying new ones, which depresses Microsoft's sales. But if PCs could become true family entertainment centers, that would kick-start sales.

"It's important to us to get the content available," Gates said. Without the studios' work, "our platforms aren't very interesting."

Taking studios' copyright concerns seriously by working on AACS was one step to reassure Hollywood skeptics. Another came after Microsoft developed a technique for compressing large video files for easy transmission.

Facing suspicion that its VC-1 technology might give it too much control, Microsoft turned over the authority to license VC-1 to the same group that administers licenses for the industry-standard MPEG digital video format. That move won it enough backing from consumer electronics companies that makers of both HD DVD and Blu-ray players will support Microsoft's technology.

Another sign that Microsoft is loosening its tight control over technology has been its willingness to negotiate where consumers can move their content within the home and even how they move it within their computers.

Fashioned with considerable input from Hollywood, the forthcoming Longhorn version of Windows will allow rights-management tools made by Microsoft and others to keep video encrypted as it moves around inside the PC and stop it from leaving the home network.

"They can feel a sense of ownership of how it got pulled together," Gates said of the studios and broadcasters. "When we say to them, 'Hey, please make more content available,' obviously we need to be able to listen to what their concerns are."

Among the trickier remaining goals for Microsoft is making it easy for people to watch cable television on Media Center PCs, or computers based on a special edition of Windows that are designed to be used in living rooms as home entertainment centers. Some cable companies see Microsoft as an emerging competitor and aren't cooperating, instead offering their subscribers advanced recording functions in an effort to make cable-equipped TVs a more compelling choice than Media Center PCs.

Gates' longer-term plan involves a technology known as IPTV, or Internet protocol television. With that, Microsoft can circumvent the cable firms and deal with their rivals, the phone companies.

Some studios say they will be reluctant to give the phone companies much IPTV content if it will be locked into Microsoft's format and can't be transferred to devices relying on other protection schemes.

"I don't want my customers to have to pick a technology before they can pick content," said Mitch Singer, a Sony Pictures executive vice president and key negotiator.

Although Microsoft is seen as having a more complete technology for IPTV than rivals, the first large phone company trials of its system have been delayed because of quality issues.

But the content owners are watching IPTV's progress closely, Gates said. "They'll often say to us, 'Well, how many households, and in what year?,' and at this point nobody knows the exact number. But over the next five years, it will be definitely many tens of millions."

In the best case for Microsoft, Gates said, the phone companies will invest so much that the cable companies get nervous and invest in IPTV as well.

Whichever way it shakes out, Gates vows not to play the victim in "Son of iPod."

After learning a hard lesson in the digital music business, "we're really having to work more closely with partners in the hardware industry and content industry, to really think through the whole end-to-end experience and make it better," Gates said. "That's where we've done our mea culpa. We are fixing that."

source:http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-micro17jul17,0,3776901.story?coll=la-home-business

"Almost all of us get those junk emails from someone in Africa usually promising millions of dollars if you give them your bank details. Finally good to know that they are being caught by the authorities and punished. These are also known as 419 emails named after the Nigerian penal code for fraud. As an interesting aside, fooling these scammers by responding to their emails is a fun passtime for quite a few who call themselves baiters. Check out the trophy pictures of these spammers.. pretty funny."

source:http://yro.slashdot.org/yro/05/07/18/0612235.shtml?tid=123&tid=111

Top 3

Let's face it, we all love technology. We surround ourselves with the latest and greatest and consume nothing but the best of the best when it comes to gadgetry and technological extravagances, yet in the past few years the only thing to advance in an incredible degree would be video cards and CPUs. Why has there been such a sudden lack in innovation as of late? Are we in a technological drought? I like to stick to my own diagnosis of the industry as being too concerned with keeping a steady cash flow over social experimentation with new products but then again that's just an opinion from a little guy.

Well, I know what I want to see happen in the next years and I'm there are at least 1 million blogs about this very subject but I have a very convincing statement which should make you read and backup my list and It's quite simple really: I'm right and all 1 million blogs are wrong. There. I said it. I'm sure that after reading the list that you'll also come to this conclusion, at least that's what I'm banking on.

1) Better Designed fans -- RAWR! That's the sound of my system all 24 hours of the day. Although I have fairly new Thermaltake fans for both my CPU and system, the thing sounds as if it had wings and wheels that it would take off into the sky. Now, I'm sure many of you will say "Oh stop whining, there's liquid cooling and fan-less solutions, yackity smackity" but I say nay onto those because 1.) Liquid cooling is more expensive than a fan based setup and 2.) Have you seen an AMD 64 being ran with a fan-less solution? They melt like marshmallows on a campfire.

Seeing how there are is a nearly frictionless lubricant in Japan, I'm sure that some engineers from these fan manufacturers can conjure up the nerve to walk into the sex shops selling the stuff and just buy a few bottles (in the name of advancement and science of course). I mean, haven't they heard of Teflon!? Why not even use a little Wesson on the things, I'm sure they'd sound a lot quieter then apposed to the sand and glass I suspect they use currently for lubrication.

2) Cases with more functionality -- Haven't you even dreamt of having your case double as a food/drink dispenser as well? Of course you have! Wouldn't it just be oh-so cool to have a bottle opener or a soda dispenser built into the case without having to do tedious and sometimes ridiculous amounts of modifications? I mean, the possibilities are quite endless really when it comes to being a dispenser and it wouldn't necessarily be all that hard.

It doesn't have to stop at food either, I mean how many of you have or use the phone near your computer? Well, why not combine the two!? Wouldn't it just be so cool to have a fully functional phone right there on your case? There would be no need to get up ever again except for bathroom breaks but they have bags and jugs for that anyways, right?

3) Wireless everything -- That's right baby, no more wire hang- err, wires. I want to be able to buy something, set it on my desk and it automatically work. This rule applies for everything from mice and keyboards to monitors and various displays. We are in a world where being connected is required but I don't necessarily see why we need to be connected with a huge cable or dare I say dozens of cables! It isn't as if it would be hard, it would just take a standardization of a short range communications standard and some willingness from a few manufacturers.

If it's once thing that amazes people still in this day and age, its things that can send and receive data wirelessly. Even people with a complete understanding of the technology stare in bewilderment at their cutesy, wireless mouse. Come on industry, cut the cords and go truly wireless already!

4 & 5

4) More use of the USB storage keys -- If you're like me, then you game on your PC. And also like me, you must absolutely despise having to keep the damn game disk within the drive all day long. Well, grief no more because I have a handy dandy solution that would not only please you and me but also the game corporations and that idea is: Keep all necessary verification data on a single USB storage key! Simple, right!? Of course it is! Game publishers can each make available a custom "Game Key" that would hold the same information that a CD/DVD of the game would hold for simple "ownership verification." It would kill the need for no-CD patches and be an absolute hit for any avid gamer. Think of it, you could have a custom "EA" USB key that holds verification data on every single current EA game out there and you could "unlock" a game on the key by simply running a registration program or during the initial installation.

Genius, isn't it? I know. It simply baffles me as to why game developers and publishers would skip an idea such as this. I'm sure some people would say that this would simply be unsafe and lead to easier access for pirates to do their "thang" but in all actuality, it's just as safe, if not safer than using disk verification. Also, if you don't want to buy or have a separate USB key for each game publisher, then I propose one company which would collectively hold an agreement with game makers, to sell and manage this entire system. Gamespy is one company that certainly comes to mind. As for production fees, it really isn't too expensive to make an 8MB-32MB USB memory key anymore, in fact, I see them being given away by software companies looking to spread their product. It's no excuse.

5) A Complete Storage re-haul -- Why is my hard drive the same size as the one I owned in 1995? I mean, I know that the engineers went for speed and storage increment over size reduction for desktop solutions but what exactly is their excuse now? small hard drives serve more purpose outside of portable music devices and cell phones, think of how small PCs really could get if hard drives for the desktop were made the same size as those found within the iPods' of today? One could only guess: Freaking small. I want to own a PC that is as thin as a light-weight laptop and with the length and width of a Mac Mini. How cool would that be? It would be beyond amazing in all aspects.

Why doesn't Microsoft use some of their hardware manufacturing knowledge to create a "Windows OS Flashcard?" Think of a world where you could buy Windows as a PCI-E card that is plugged in and automatically run? Operational speed would increase 10 fold easily if the OS was stored on some sort of solid state memory card directly interfaced with the PC and you would never have to worry about keeping track of all those damn installation disks. Life would be sweet and simple and overall system speed and operation would be like lighting! This is one innovation I can only hope comes our way soon.

Well, that's my list. I know it's short but I'm sure it can give you some insight into the maniacal brain of mine and hopefully sparks some discussion or interest into the possibility of any of these things actually being introduced to the public. Innovation should never yield to greed!

This commentary was submitted by the author to take part in our contest.

About the author
Clarence Ladson is currently a college student in Tocoma, Washinton and works in robotical and anatomical engineering. His hobbies include contributing programming skills to various console homebrew developements and orchestrating local LAN gaming events.

source:http://www.flexbeta.net/main/articles.php?action=show&id=99

Lafayette voters turned out in surprising numbers Saturday for an election with a single issue. With a 27 percent turnout, they voted 12,290 to 7,507, or 62 percent to 38 percent, to proceed with the controversial fiber-to-the-home project.

"I am so proud of this community," said City-Parish President Joey Durel. "It humbles me a bit that Lafayette's citizens put so much trust in their leadership. Now, we need to prove them right and show that other 38 percent that they can trust us and look to us to move this community forward."

Saturday's vote authorizes Lafayette Utilities System to sell up to $125 million in bonds for a fiber to the home and business project. It will involve extending fiber optics cable down every city street, then offering residents and businesses the option of receiving high-speed Internet, telephone and/or cable TV service through LUS. City officials said they believe it can offer those services at lower prices than incumbents such as BellSouth and Cox Communications.

Fiber 411, the citizens group that opposed the LUS plan, took the loss as a victory.

"I think we won," said Tim Supple of Fiber 411. "We started off wanting to get people the right to vote. We accomplished that. We tried to get people to understand the issue. We accomplished that, I hope. We won."

Both Supple and Neal Breakfield of Fiber 411 have said they do not plan on pursuing or participating in any lawsuit to challenge the fiber project.

The next step for LUS is to work with the Louisiana Public Service Commission on its rule making, a move that can affect how much LUS can charge and could prevent LUS from guaranteeing the fiber bonds with revenue from its electric, sewer and water divisions. The matter may be taken up at a PSC meeting this week, said Terry Huval, LUS director.

Once LUS clears the PSC rulemaking, it will begin the process to issue bonds. Without delays, Huval said, LUS could have the bond money in hand in four to five months. Then the utility would hire an engineering firm to prepare engineering on every pole and lot in the city.

"Two years from today we ought to begin serving our first customers," Huval said.

It will take about another 1 1/2 years to bring fiber to everyone in the city who wants it. The voter turnout - bigger than the 15 percent expected, with at least two precincts at Thomas Park and Girard Park recording 45 percent turnout - is a good indication that residents want the services and the business plan can work, Huval said.

"I hope all the lawsuits and artificial hurdles are behind us," Huval said. "The people have voted. They ought to honor that."

Fiber supporters were pleased with the results and what fiber may bring Lafayette.

"This opens the door for every municipality in the nation to look at how they can do what we did," said Don Bertrand of Fibre911. "We deserve connectivity and as we did in 1896 with the electricity, if you won't bring it to us, we'll do it ourselves."

Benjamin Dorsey, 19, who attended several fiber town hall meetings, said fiber will be great for his generation.

"Lafayette's going to be on the world's map and the face of this city will change over time thanks to this project," Dorsey said. "We'll be able to stay here, and have high-paying jobs in science, software engineering and the medical field."

Jeffery Landry, government watchdog, said he had doubts about the project but voted in favor of it.

"I hope it will benefit everybody in Lafayette," he said. "The bottom line is I want everybody to benefit from it."

"Victory - that's what can happen when you get people together," said Gobb Williams of Citizens for Common Sense. "We will become Lafayette, Louisiana - not north and south Lafayette."

source:http://www.theadvertiser.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050717/NEWS01/507170362/1002

"After seeing some of the ideas management comes up with as a result of reading the Harvard Business Review, you may be tempted to hide their copies. But make sure they see this month's Managing for Creativity by Dr. Jim Goodnight, the still code-cranking CEO of SAS, the world's largest privately held software company." From the article: "Many academics and businesses have made inroads into this field. Management guru Peter Drucker identified the role of knowledge workers and, long before the dot-com era, warned of the perils of trying to "bribe" them with stock options and other crude financial incentives. This view is supported by the research of Harvard Business School's Teresa Amabile and Yale University's Robert Sternberg, which shows that creative people are motivated from within and respond much better to intrinsic rewards than to extrinsic ones."

source:http://developers.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/07/17/2126211&tid=185&tid=187&tid=8&tid=218

Hewlett-Packard officials worked over the weekend to finalize the size of the layoffs, which will come within 5 percent of the previously targeted 15,000 positions, according to a source close to the company.

IT, sales and services will be among the areas particularly hit, although the sweeping cuts will be felt throughout the company, according to the source. The move to cut more than $1 billion a year in costs during the next two years marks one of the most significant initiatives Mark Hurd, HP's chief executive, has launched since his arrival less than four months ago from NCR.

"Almost every area will be affected across-the-board, but it won't be 10 percent cuts in every department. It'll be in areas where (HP) need to improve their benchmark against competitors," the source said. "Mark likes to benchmark against the competitors and IT, sales and service are areas where (HP) needs to improve efficiencies."

A representative with HP was not immediately available to comment on the layoffs or which departments would be impacted most.

HP is expected to announce the layoffs as early as Monday, but employees are not expected to be immediately notified of their status, the source said, noting such a practice is common in corporate America.

More high-level discussions on the layoffs will occur late next week and employees may get a greater sense of their specific status sometime thereafter.

HP's management team and business units will remain in their current form, with the restructuring mainly focusing on the workforce, said the source, who declined to further delve into the effect of the layoffs in each division.

The source noted none of the existing executives on the management team will be re-assigned to new posts, but members may be added to the team.

Analysts, however, have been expecting HP's Technology and Solutions Group to be the likely recipient of most of the pink slips, as well as services and HP's research and development spending.

Within HP's total workforce of 150,000 employees worldwide, about 70 percent of the company's workers reside in the Technology Solutions Group, which is headed by Ann Livermore, said Toni Sacconaghi Jr., an analyst with Sanford C. Bernstein & Co.

That group includes enterprise storage and systems, software and services.

HP Services has roughly 65,000 employees, but analysts are predicting HP will lop off only about 8 percent here because the company is working on edging out IBM Global Services, EDS and Accenture for corporate contracts.

"We estimate that HP has roughly 20,000 salespeople, with the majority in (enterprise server group) and Services, and that CEO Hurd is likely to look to streamline the organization, moving away from HP's current 'matrixed' selling organization to focus on more direct accountability," Sacconaghi said.

The company's Enterprise Server Group (ESG) has roughly 40,000 employees on the payroll, Sacconaghi said. If HP cuts back about 10 percent, or approximately 4,000 jobs, HP could hypothetically boost operating margins by 2.3 percent, Sacconaghi said.

Noncritical research and development (R&D) could also be impacted, analysts suggest.

HP's R&D spending is nearly $1 billion higher than all of its relevant competitors combined, according to an independent benchmarking analysis done by Sacconaghi's firm. The comparison was designed to mirror the one that Hurd has professed as his method for bringing costs back into line.

"We suspect that Hurd might be able to lower HP's annual $3.5 billion in R&D by $250 (million)-$500 million through the elimination of non-core projects, Sacconaghi said.

Meanwhile, analysts suggest long-term employees could see their pensions and options programs slashed if Hurd follows his past course.

While at NCR, Hurd replaced pension benefits with 401K plans for employees older than 40 and reduced option grants to 1 percent, said Cindy Shaw, an analyst with Moore & Cabot.

Future severance packages may also be less generous than the current range of two to 12 months of pay, depending on years of service, according to Shaw. Severance expenses averaged $78,000 per person in the first half of this year, Shaw said.

Massive job cuts have been more the rule than the exception in recent years at the Palo Alto, Calif.-based company. HP laid off thousands of employees under the plan by previous CEO Carly Fiorina to merge with Compaq Computer.

HP has laid off about 4,500 employees so far this year with, "no ostensible disruption to business," Sacconaghi said. But further layoffs could run the risk of undermining employee morale.

Not all cuts have been in the form of pink slips, though: 1,900 employees took advantage of a voluntary severance plan in the imaging and printing division.

In the last quarter, which ended April 30, HP took a charge of $71 million for the imaging and printing cuts. It also took a $74 million charge for cuts in services and $24 million for cuts in the servers and storage group.

In the current quarter, HP said it has budgeting $100 million for job cuts that already were planned.

source:http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9584_22-5791732.html