Geek Week in Review

Another week, more geeks. Here are a few stories that may have slipped under your radar.

Playing chicken with search. Good news for Microsoft: After months in the doldrums, its Live Search service actually gained a couple of percentage points on Yahoo and Google last month, according to comScore. The bad news? Microsoft did it by bribing users to play games like Chicktionary that produce Live Search results; players rack up points for each search, with prizes awarded to players with the most points. Once again, Microsoft lays an egg. And you thought that SEC probe was painful. Apparently life in the broadband business is wilder than we thought. Broadcom has already been nailed for illegally backdating stock options; now former CEO Henry Nicholas is being accused of abusing heroin, hiring prostitutes, and issuing physical threats by former man-servant, Kenji Kato. (I always wondered what happened to that guy after OJ dumped him.) Nicholas has denied all charges. There is also no truth to the rumor Nicholas has signed up to be a roadie for Metallica. Open sores. In another move that’s sure to get Steve Ballmer’s boxers in a bind, Walmart has begun selling $300 Everex PCs with OpenOffice installed. I understand if you buy three of them they’ll throw in a barrel of pork rinds and a case of Mountain Dew. A-OK. An Oklahoma woman has won a suit against the RIAA, after a court found that it wrongfully sued her for file swapping. The industry

group must pay the woman’s court fees of $68,000. I understand she rejected their final settlement offer – 68,000 copies of Justin Timberlake’s “Summer Love.” Down by law. Apparently federal inmates don’t spend all their spare time whittling guns out of soap. Four guests of Uncle Sam in Oklahoma’s El Reno prison came up with a novel way to make their great escape. According to the AP, they filed copyrights on each of their names, then sued prison officials for using the names without permission. They hired an outside party to seize the warden’s assets, then offered to release them once they themselves had been released. Unfortunately for the four cons, the guy they hired was an undercover agent, and they’re all now looking at an additional 16 years as guests of the federal government. The bright side? When the gang of four do get finally get out there will be jobs waiting for them at the RIAA.

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