China Daily: ID required to purchase cell phone

By Chen Limin and Tuo Yannan (China Daily) Updated: 2010-09-01 06:58

BEIJING - Mobile phone customers will have to present an ID when purchasing a phone number in the latest campaign by the government to curb the global scourge of spam, pornographic messages and fraud on cellular phones.

Foreigners will also need to register with their passports or other ID in order to subscribe to mobile phone carriers.

ID required for new cell phones
Also from Wednesday, street newspaper stands will be banned from selling SIM cards, the Beijing Evening News reported.

The report said this was a temporary measure and after the owners were instructed on how to register customers, they would be allowed to sell SIM cards again.

Subscribers who did not show ID when they registered before the new regulations came into effect are encouraged to do so, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) said.

By the end of June, there were about 800 million mobile phone users in China and as many as 320 million did not provide ID information, said Chen Jinqiao, deputy chief engineer from the China Academy of Telecommunication Research.

The new rules, of which fuller details will be disclosed soon, are part of the government's efforts to prevent spam, pornographic messages and rampant fraud through the network, said MIIT spokesman Wang Lijian.

A government-backed spam mobile message complaint center said on Aug 23 that mobile users in China on average received 43.3 messages weekly in the first half of this year and, on average, 12 of them were Spam.

The center also said 74.5 percent of users surveyed received messages involving fraud. Many users were so annoyed that they said they would gladly spend 2.17 yuan (32 US cents) per month to block spam, the center added.

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Speed up Ubuntu Linux Ethernet connections

Rightardia uses BrightHouse Lightening at home but noticed that the Internet speeds seemed to be about half of what it should be.

We also noticed that the Ethernet connections dropped several times a day which was annoying. Our technical editor, Wirehead, decided to set up a static connection rather than use the Automatic Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP).

If your Ubuntu System has set to use DHCP, you will want to change it to a static IP address.

There is a way to use Ubuntu's GUI to make the change to a static IP address. Start by adding a new Wired connection.You may have to check the connection information in the Network applet if you have more than one Ethernet card to see which one is active.

Here we can se that the active DHCP connection is eth1.

Next disable the DHCP connection by unchecking 'connect automatically. Cut the MAC address form the active connection and paste it into the new static connection.

WSJ: Cheap Internet Calling with Magic Jack

2/17/2010 9:00:00 PM

Magic Jack is a new device and service that allows you to make cheap phone calls through your computer.

Overall, the product works as advertised, Walt Mossberg found.

Rightardia has been aware of Magic Jack for a long time and it is a $19 a year alternative to VOIP services provided by Verizon, Bright House and third party providers such as Vonage.

Most of these providers charge more for one month of service than Magic Jack charges for the entire year.

A leading consumer magazine was also impressed with Magic Jack. At this time you can install Magic Jack on Windows and MAC PCs, but not on Linux based systems.

Magic Jack is also working on a Skype type of system that does not require a USB dongle and only uses software to communicate.

source: http://www.chikkador.com/images/magic-jack-phone.jpg

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Food stamp use surges

By Sarah O’Connor in Washington 
Published: September 4 2009 20:10 | Last updated: September 4 2009 20:47

The number of working Americans turning to free government food stamps has surged as their hours and wages erode, in a stark sign that the recession is inflicting pain on the employed as well as the newly jobless.

While the increase in take-up is often attributed to the sharp rise in unemployment – which on Friday hit 9.7 per cent – the Financial Times has learnt that some 40 per cent of the families now on food stamps have “earned income”, up from 25 per cent two years ago.

The agriculture department, which runs the program, attributes this rise to workers having their hours cut back.

“I’m sort of stunned, it seems like a dire warning . . . that even the jobs people are retaining in this recession aren’t at the wage level and hours level that they need to provide for their families,” said Heidi Shierholz, economist at the Economic Policy Institute.

See the rest of the article at: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/c1e698a2-9984-11de-ab8c-00144feabdc0.html

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Cisco lays off 700 employees

Editor's Note: Cisco is a an unusual company that has remained proprietary in a world of open source.  It has dodged the anti-trust bullet by creating firmware and software for it routers and switches that are manufactured by third parties. Some techs consider its products overly complex since it has relied on the command line for a long time. Perhaps someone has built a better mouse trap with an open architecture that has taken market share away from Cisco.

WASHINGTON: US computer networking giant Cisco Systems has laid off between 600 and 700 employees at its headquarters in San Jose, California, to reduce costs amid slow sales, The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday.

The company has also cut jobs at other branches in the United States, although the total number was not immediately clear, the business daily said, citing a person familiar with the matter.

"We are doing everything possible to minimize the impact on employees affected by the limited restructuring," a Cisco spokesman told the Journal. In February, the group had said it would likely eliminate between 1,500 to 2,000 employees, or three per cent of its workforce.

In late April, the company had some 66,550 employees. After Cisco reported a 24 per cent drop in its net profit, or US$1.3 billion dollars, in the third quarter, chief executive John Chambers nonetheless said in May that he saw signs of stabilization in the group's sales.  

http://infotech.indiatimes.com/News/Cisco-lays-off-hundreds-of-employees/articleshow/4789686.cms

 
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