Webstandards.org will be issuing an Acid2 test to try and get IE7 in line with W3C standards in it’s support for modern web standards. IE6 doesn’t support much CSS2 and what it does support is often buggy. The reason all this is necessary is because web design and implementation cannot evolve unless all the players create interoperable browsers. As it stands now, IE is the one holding up the evolution of the web as it’s standards support has not changed in roughly 4 years or more. Cnet has the story.

Microsoft has been scant on details about the long overdue update to their web browser Internet Explorer 7. However rumours are that they are adding a heap of stuff that Firefox already has, including tabbed browsing, RSS reader, transparent PNG’s, IDN support and better security by default. However apparently they do not plan to fully adopt CSS2 which is something that has been on the developer wish list for a very long time now. So, what we end up with, is Microsoft making a Firefox look-alike that doesn’t support the new standards as well and is still built closely into Windows, and this is supposed to turn people off swapping to Firefox? Also, IE7 is only available for XP SP2 XP64 and Server 2003 SP1, so if you use 98/ME/2000 and you want an up to date browser, you’ll have to use Firefox because MS has abandoned you. Read the Microsoft-Watch report for more.

Recently we wrote about Yahoo’s new ad system, apparently designed to compete for Google’s adsense market. Up until now, MSN relied on Yahoo’s Overture to deliver keyword ads, but this appears to be slowly being displaced by a keyword ad system owned by Microsoft themselves. The search market is worth big bucks and the competition is heating up. It will be interesting to see how this MSN service evolves, and whether it ends up with a service like Google’s adsense or Yahoo’s Overture. MSN’s deal with Overture is due to end in 2006 and I suspect it won’t be renegotiated. Read more at CNET.

Itunes.co.uk now belongs to Apple, even though it was registered to Benjamin Cohen years before Apple decided to open their own music stores by the same name. This is worrying because it is a precedent whereby a big company can open a business subsidiary with a new name, and get the domain name handed to them in court for far less then they would probably have to pay for it normally. The decision is not set in stone yet and an appeal is likely, but should that go though, it means that the UK has started putting corporations ahead of private ownership. Read the full story of this disturbing situation at TheRegister. I know that if a big corporation tried to take our domain from us, they’d have to do it over my cold dead body and I wish Mr Cohen the best of luck with his litigation.

You can go out right now, and buy a domain from any number of providers for under ten dollars USD. Or you can open your cheque book (Check book for you Yanks) and score yourself something like local.com. The difference is that a nice name like local.com will set you back $700,000. I’ve racked my brain, but I can’t think of a single way that owning local.com could possibly earn back that money in a manner that a 10 dollar domain couldn’t. But hey, I never had any real urge to buy Mayfair in Monopoly either so what would I know? read the full story at Netcraft.

Nero is one of the most popular CD/DVD burning applications available for Windows users, in fact either it or Easy CD creator is usually bundled with new CD/DVD burners. Users contemplating switching to Linux instead of Windows now have another application that they can take with them to their new platform. Nero have just released their extremely popular application for Linux, and it is free for owners of the full version of Nero for Windows. I’ve read allot of stories over the last year or so about Macromedia, Adobe and others slowly porting their products to the Linux platform as well, so it is possible that one day you can swap to Linux and not have to learn any new applications at all. (unless you use MS Office as Microsoft are not likely to port their wares to Linux any time soon.) Having said that, for those of you considering the change, you need not spent a ton of cash buying applications for Linux as with a bit of searching you will find a myriad of free choices already available. (for example, OpenOffice.org can make PDF’s and is format compatible with MS Office, NVU is becoming a valid alternative to Frontpage/Dreamweaver, TheGIMP can do nearly everything Photoshop can do and there are around half a dozen Linux applications to write CD’s and DVD’s.) Most of the above alternatives have been ported to Windows as well, so you can try them for free before deciding whether to convert to Linux and get off the Microsoft gravy train for good.

INSERT: Newsforge has done a review of Nero for Linux and compared it to Kb3 (a free GPL burning application for Linux that has been out for ages) and surprisingly (or not), KB3 trumped Nero in pretty much every way.

AOL have apparently updated their TOS “Terms Of Service” for their AOL Instant Messaging application. The new terms basically give them the rights to do a great many questionable things with your data according to Eweek. A snippet of the new TOS reads “You waive any right to privacy. You waive any right to inspect or approve uses of the content or to be compensated for any such uses”. From memory Microsoft tried something like this with their Passport service not so long ago and ended up changing it after a public outcry so I can’t see AOL getting away with it either, particularly since companies are trying to move Instant Messaging into the workplace. If you are considering AOL IM, or are already a user, you should read the Eweek article and pay particular attention to the EULA when you install new versions of the software.

For those of you wondering about the title for this story, It’s a geek joke about a badly translated asian game that came out many years ago, the catch phrase is “All your bases are belong to us” and a quick Google will tell you more then you ever wanted to know about it.

INSERT: AOL have responded, and claim that the TOS changes were never about private person to person communications and were instead regarding public postings. My comment is that if this is indeed what they meant, why doesn’t the TOS impose this limit on itself rather then leaving it up for later interpretation.

INSERT 2: AOL have indicated that they are making 3 changes to the TOS to make it clear that private chats are exactly that, private. Read the update at Eweek. Isn’t public pressure a wonderful thing?