Bungie breaks from Microsoft
Microsoft has long owned Bungie Software, the developer of the legendary "Halo" series. This changed yesterday when Microsoft announced that it was giving up exclusive control of Bungie.
Harold Ryan, president of Bungie, told The New York Times that he had long been planning to separate from Microsoft and that Bungie wanted to work for itself instead of being a corporate subsidiary.
"It's an emotionally creative point of view," he told The New York Times. "That's the state we wanted to be in."
Certain parts of Bungie's relationship with Microsoft will remain intact, but not for long. Bungie is still free to develop games exclusively for the Xbox 360, but now it is no longer obligated to do so. Maybe the Wii will see a "Halo" game in the near future.
One Laptop Per Child to offer computers in United States
One Laptop Per Child is a program that has designed a laptop offered to impoverished children in poor countries with few chances at an education. In November, this laptop will be available in the United States, and it only costs $200, according to The New York Times.
The laptop, known as the XO, is completely spill-, rain-, dust- and drop-proof. It has no fan, is silent and weighs just over 3 pounds. The laptop has a built-in memory card, video camera, microphone, graphics tablet, game-pad controllers and a screen that rotates into a tablet configuration.
OLPC has said that it will offer the laptop to the public for a period of two weeks for $400. When the buyer purchases a laptop, the extra $200 is used to buy a second laptop for a child in an impoverished country.
While the XO may not be the most digitally impressive computer, as it lacks a CD drive and only has a 7-inch screen, it has a number of impressive capabilities, including a battery that lasts six hours and color capabilities that make the monitor easy to see even in bright sunlight.
Credit freezes prove to be hassles
Credit bureaus all over the country are allowing people to immediately freeze their credit reports. A security freeze instantly locks down your credit, so creditors or identity thieves cannot check your credit or open accounts in your name. It essentially makes your credit untouchable.
Unfortunately, the cost of this fail-safe method of protecting your identity from theft is that unfreezing your account is a difficult and time-consuming process. Additionally, companies also charge fees to temporarily unfreeze accounts for purchases that require credit, which can potentially make a credit freeze financially crippling.
"Credit bureaus have the ability to do an instant online lift," Michael McCauley, media director for Consumers Union's "Financial Privacy Now" campaign, told The New York Times. "But we don't think they should wait until the law requires them to make it easy and free for people to unfreeze their credit."
Legislation is in progress to obligate credit card companies to make unfreezing credit cards a smoother process, but credit bureaus are drawing criticism for charging fees to temporarily unfreeze credit and make the process difficult.
