Summary: This is our 14th episode. In this episode we discuss: Google acquires Postini, Update: FTC Clears Microsoft's $6 Billion AQuantive Buyout, AMD sinks $7.5 million into Transmeta, Nigerian school gets 300 OLPCs, Bloodstream Mini-robot, DARPA laser-guided bullets, Pioneer Computers' quad core laptop, Boeing Dreamliner, Spectec's miniSD GPS with microSD slot, Skinkers LiveStation: P2P live TV broadcasting.

The Word for the day: Psalm 126:1 - When the LORD turned again the captivity of Zion, we were like them that dream.

Google acquires Postini

Postini supplies on-demand communications security and compliance solutions to more than 35,000 businesses and 10 million users worldwide. Google said the deal could enable it provide organizations with more hosted services similar to its Google Apps package, which includes its e-mail service Gmail, Calendar, and Talk, its messaging service. Google said Postini will become a wholly-owned subsidiary. The deal is subject to customary closing conditions. The deal is expected to close by the end of the third quarter.

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Update: FTC Clears Microsoft's $6 Billion AQuantive Buyout

SEATTLE (AP)--Microsoft Corp.'s (MSFT) $6 billion acquisition of online advertising group aQuantive Inc. (AQNT) has cleared an antitrust regulatory hurdle, the companies said Friday. The Federal Trade Commission mandates a waiting period to review anticompetitive fallout from large mergers. In a Securities and Exchange Commission filing Friday, aQuantive said the waiting period passed without requests for further information from the FTC.

"We're obviously pleased," said Tom Phillips, a spokesman for Seattle-based aQuantive. A shareholder meeting to vote on the sale of the company is scheduled for Aug. 9. Phillips said aQuantive is still working out how the organization, which employs 2,560 people worldwide, with 662 in Seattle, will look after the buyout. Microsoft's Live search engine lags far behind sites operated by Google Inc. (GOOG) and Yahoo Inc. (YHOO) in the number of searches performed each month. As a result, Microsoft racks up far fewer dollars from the small text ads placed next to search results. Microsoft's acquisition of aQuantive, announced in May, followed Google's announcement that it would pay $3.1 billion for online ad technology company DoubleClick Inc. Microsoft was reportedly interested in DoubleClick as well; aQuantive's ad-serving technology could help the Redmond-based software maker close the gap with Google..

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AMD sinks $7.5 million into Transmeta

Shortly after months of bickering with Intel, Transmeta finally took its ungraceful bow out of the CPU business, but apparently AMD sees something within the company worth investing in. Yesterday, AMD announced that it would be investing $7.5 million in Transmeta in exchange for Transmeta preferred stock, a move that was eloquently dubbed "a strategic investment in the future of Transmeta." Les Crudele, president and CEO of Transmeta, was quoted as saying that his firm looked forward to "continuing its collaboration with AMD on technology initiatives in the future," and AMD returned the lip service favor by boasting about how vital Transmeta was in bringing its AMD64 technology to market. Aw, how touching.

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Nigerian school gets 300 OLPCs

It's been a long time coming, but the much-vaunted OLPC XO is now slowly making its way to the people it was meant for, recently landing in the hands of 160 school children in Uruguay, and now finding its way to the Galadima Primary School in Abuja, Nigeria. According the News Agency of Nigeria, the school got some 300 OLPCs but is having a slight problem keeping them powered, as the school has no electricity and power at the students' homes is irregular (still no pull-string, it seems). Despite that setback, the students are apparently "very happy" with the laptop, although we're sure they'll be even more pleased when they discover some of the OLPC's non-educational potential.

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Bloodstream Mini-robot

Two Israeli scientists may have created the catalyst for a medical revolution with their new project: a tiny, 1-millimeter-diameter robot which is capable of crawling through human veins and arteries. The bot can cling to vessel walls using small, powerful arms which protrude from a hub in its center. Manned control is accomplished by using a magnetic field outside of the body, and the robot is able to swim against the flow of blood, as well as squeeze through a variety of arterial openings. Right now the doctors don't know what the medical applications might be, though they speculate that a large number of the bots could be used to fight certain types of cancer. Other ideas on the table include using the bots to exact revenge on anyone opposing their crazy ideas.

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DARPA laser-guided bullets

In case you didn't know, part of DARPA's job is just to think up some totally outrageous stuff and then begin to throw money at it. Well, its brain-trust must be working overtime this month, because as a follow up to the invisible, shoot-through shield, we're getting laser-guided bullets. On the very same "budget item justification sheet" in which the aforementioned sci-fi shield is proposed, DARPA honchos "justify" the laser guided bullet project, which will fund research into a low cost, high performance solution for designing "new guidance technologies" that will enable steering of bullets in flight. The hope with this technology is that compact targeting systems (to be embedded in said projectiles) will enable "overmatching fire power" and increased "first shot effectiveness", in addition to potentially cutting down on friendly fire and collateral damage -- and retroactively making JFK's "one-gunman" assassination plausible.

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Pioneer Computers' quad core laptop

While it can't claim to be the first quad-core laptop, Pioneer Computers' new DreamBook Power D90 SLI can at least claim to be one of the few. This rebranded 17-inch Phantom D900C hails from Australia, and although it features a lot of the same gear -- like the 2.4GHz Core 2 Quad Q6600, dual 512MB NVIDIA GeForce Go 7950 or 8800 cards in SLI, and up to three (yes, three) hard drives which can operate in RAID 0/1/5 -- it's not exactly identical. The company will build these to order, but the base model is considerably stripped down, sporting a measly Core 2 Duo and only 512MB of RAM. To step up to the full on Quad Core experience it's going to cost you (somewhere near $8000 AU, or $6878 US), but who can put a price on lap-searing, jaw-dropping, nosebleed power?.

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Boeing Dreamliner

Air travel can be the bane of any well-meaning environmentalist. One flight can spew tons of carbon and other pollution into the air, but let’s face it, there are few reasonable alternatives for jetsetters. So it’s great to hear that when Boeing set out to design their new airplane, the 787 Dreamliner they had a more sustainable focus in mind. Using new technologies, such as using lightweight carbon-fiber for the fuselage and wings, instead of aluminum sheeting, Boeing was able to reduce the airplane’s weight. It also increased the fuel efficiency of its new engines, yielding an overall reduction of fuel consumption of almost 30%. Because of the new materials, the humidity in the cabin can be much higher than before, which will provide for better passenger comfort.

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Spectec's miniSD GPS with microSD slot

GPS, expanded memory -- how is one to choose? Heck, is it fair to even ask one to choose? Spectec thinks not, and if you're sporting a Windows Mobile device with a miniSD slot, you might just be in luck. Its SD effort was impressive enough, but the Taiwanese firm's SDG-811 somehow manages to pack a SiRFStar III GPS receiver into a miniSD card that extends a mere 3 centimeters beyond the edge of the slot, perfect for breathing some new life into that Wizard or Apache. The SDG-811's trademark parlor trick, though, is an integrated microSD slot, effectively giving your device a second shot at expandable memory after the miniSD slot has been consumed. No word on a release date yet, but Expansys is happy to take names in the meanwhile

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Skinkers LiveStation: P2P live TV broadcasting

In the live television streaming / placeshifting realm, Sling Media is likely the first name to come to mind, but now a new competitor is gearing up to enter the market sans the use of a box. Based on the Microsoft Silverlight platform, London-based Skinkers is in the early stages of readying a new product dubbed LiveStation, which looks to provide users with live television access on their internet-connected machine via a basic P2P setup. During an interview with Matteo Berlucchi from Skinkers, he did mention that the program would remain in beta for "the next few months" as kinks were gradually worked out, but also noted that it would be Mac and PC compatible when launch day comes. Go on, hit the read link to hear it from the developers mouth.

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The Word for the day

Psalm 126:1 - When the LORD turned again the captivity of Zion, we were like them that dream.

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