More evidence cell phone users affect polls

The latest political polling numbers suggest that poll results sway in favor of one candidate or another depending on whether a pollster calls likely voters on cell phones, Nate S new balance tennis shoe ilver pointed out on FiveThirtyEight.com on Sunday.

(Credit: FiveThirtyEight.com)

Silver's analysis shows that out of 14 polling organizations, the five that call likely voters' cell phones (shown i air max 90 current n gold in the accompanying chart) put Democrat Barack Obama ahead of Republican John McCain by an average of 9.4 points. By contrast, the eight pollsters that do not call cell phones hav air max tn e Obama ahead by 5.1 points.

The data mirrors studies that suggest likely voters who only use cell phones are more likely to vote for Obama. The Pew Research Center last month released a  white huarache study showing that cell phone users favor Obama more than landline users by at least 10 points.

Cell phone users have presented a challenge to pollsters because they may no lon huarache shoe ger live in the state to which their phone number corresponds, and the cost of using cell phone minutes could affect their participation in polls.

Stephanie Condon is a staff writer 

  for CNET News focused on the intersection of technology and politics. She is based in Washington, D.C. E-mail Stephanie. Topics: Elections Tags: Election 2008, cell phones Share: Digg Del.icio.us Reddit Facebook Twitter

More Election 2008 coverage from CNET.

More dirt in 'Vista Capable' lawsuit

You know an e-mail is going to be juicy when its subject line is "CONFIDENTIAL" and it starts out: "I would prefer not to have this discussion on email." air max 90 black white >

That's how Intel's Renee James started an e-mail to Microsoft's Will Poole, discussing the company's concerns over Microsoft's "Vista Capable" program. Intel was particularly up air max bw femme set over Microsoft's plan to require Vista Capable machines to have graphics cards that would support Vista's new driver model, as its 915 chipset was not planned to have that supp nike air max classic bw black ort.

Microsoft eventually did drop that requirement, a shift that is now the subject of a class action lawsuit. The plaintiffs in that case charge that, by cav nike air max classic bw white ing to Intel, Microsoft allowed sub-optimal Vista machines to be sold with the Vista Capable sticker.

The exchange between James and Poole is just one of many  air max 90s new e-mails detailed in the latest court filings, which were noted Thursday by Seattle-area tech site TechFlash.

TechFlash has the full court filing up on its Web site, so if it's a slo air max 90 shoes w Friday, by all means give the article and the documents a read. If you don't have time, here are some of the juiciest bits:

• Intel CEO Paul Otellini called Microsoft C nike air max 90 boot EO Steve Ballmer personally to air his complaints about the program, which initially didn't call for machines running Intel's 915 chipset to qualify for the Vista Capable sticker.

• While Sony was pleased Microsoft decided to allow the 915-based systems to qualify even though they lacked a Vista graphics driver, Dell was confused, given that such syste nike air max 90 sneakers ms wouldn't qualify for a Vista logo once Vista started shipping. HP meanwhile, was peeved, because it had invested in pricier graphics chips to support Vista's WDDM (Windows Displ nike air max 90 black ay Driver Model) graphics requirement.

• Jim Allchin was described variously as "beyond being upset" and "apoplectic" over the decision, while other Microsoft worker air max 90 boots s described it as bad for customers.

In an e-mail--one that I'm sure is a favorite of the plaintiffs' lawyers--Allchin says "I believe we are going to be misleading customers with  nike air max 90 women's the Capable program."

Computer makers "will say a machine is Capable and customers will believe that it will run all the core Vista features," Allchin wrote. "The fac nike air max 90 infrared t that aero (Vista's new graphics theme) won't be there EVER for many of these machines is misleading to customers."

During her years at CNET News, Ina Fried has changed beats  

 several times, changed genders once, and covered both of the Pirates of Silicon Valley. These days, most of her attention is focused on Microsoft. E-mail Ina. Topics: Windows, Microsoft Tags: Microsoft, Vista Capable, Vista Capable lawsuit, Windows Vista, Intel Share: Digg Del.icio.us Reddit Facebook Twitter

More about printer ink rip-offs

The latest shout about how printers prematurely warn they're out of ink came this week from PC World magazine.

The basic premise isn't news, but the article is nonetheless a useful read.

For one thing, the author calculated the cost of a gallo air max 2009 n of black ink at $4,731. No wonder printer manufacturers are motivated to make their customers buy more and more. In some of the tests, PC World found that printers "left more than 40 percent air max tn shoes  of their ink unused."

The tests were done on multifunction printers from Canon, Epson, Hewlett-Packard, and Kodak. To keep things simple, only black ink consumption was measured.nike air max tn plus >

When ink levels get low, a printer may do nothing, may warn you, and/or it may shut down to force you to change the ink cartridge. I'd avoid printers that shut themselves down. Unfo nike air max preview rtunately, this isn't an attribute of the printer that's likely to be mentioned on the box.

The tested printers from Canon, Epson, and Kodak shut down. Only the HP Photosma nike air max 1 rt C5280 did not. Thus, if you're in the market for a multifunction printer, the C5280 can save you lots of money in the long run.

Back in August, I blogged about a similar article on S air max 90 premium late, but for laser printers. That article had some tricks for faking out laser printers, so that you can actually use all the toner. As for faking out inkjet printers, it says:

T new air maxes hese tricks generally apply to laser printers. It's more difficult to find ways to override ink-level sensors in an inkjet printer, and, at least according to printer manufactures, doing so is more dangerous...There a shoes nike air max re two reasons manufacturers make it more difficult for you to keep printing after your inkjet thinks it's out of ink. First, using an inkjet cartridge that's actually empty could overheat your printer's permanen air maxs t print head, leaving you with a useless hunk of plastic. Second, the economics of the inkjet business are even more punishing than those of the laser business, with manufacturers making much more on ink supplies than they nike air max 90 white  do on printers.

See a summary of all my Defensive Computing postings.

Michael Horowitz is an independent computer consultant and the author of several classes on Defensiv 

 e Computing. He is a member of the CNET Blog Network, and is not an employee of CNET. Disclosure. Topics: Gripes Tags: printers, HP, Canon, Epson, Kodak Share: Digg Del.icio.us Reddit Facebook Twitter

'Moonlight' heads to beta

Microsoft and Novell said Tuesday that they are nearly ready with a beta version of Moonlight--a  mizuno wave running shoes Firefox add-on that allows Silverlight content to play on Linux PCs.

The software is being announced as the companies tout the second anniversary of their peace deal. mizuno soccer shoes >

Work on Moonlight began in May 2007 and an alpha version was shown a month later. Novell's Miguel De Icaza, who is heading the Moonlight effort, said on his blog last week that th cheap mizuno running shoes e beta version should be out within days.

The move helps Microsoft in its effort to position Silverlight as a rival to Adobe's Flash. Flash already runs on Linux and is installed on an overwhelming p mizuno running shoe ercentage of PCs. Both Flash and Silverlight also run on Macs.

Silverlight's biggest early win was Microsoft's deal with NBC that saw the technology used to power the video on NBCOlympics.com. Silverlight s mizuno mens running shoes uffered a blow earlier this week when Major League Baseball said it was switching to a Flash-only player for the 2009 season.

In addition to the Moonlight announcement, Novell is releasing a managemen mizuno running shoes wave rider t pack that plugs in to Microsoft's System Center product that will allow IT managers to more easily oversee mixed deployments of Suse Linux and Windows.

As for the broader work between the two  mizuno inspire running shoes companies, they now have more than 200 joint customers, said Susan Heystee, Novell's general manager global strategic alliances. That's up from fewer than 70 customers at the end of the first year.

 mizuno wave inspire running shoes  "That really goes to the value proposition and the focus we've really had around interoperability," Heystee said. "Many of these companies are deploying Linux and windows in their data centers."

See also:
• MLB.com drops Silverlight for Adobe Flash
• Adobe bringing full-fledged Flash to phones

During her years at CNET News, Ina Fried has changed beats several times, changed genders once, and covered both of the Pirates of Silicon Valley. These days, most of her attention is focused on Microsoft. E-mail Ina. Topics: Microsoft Tags: Microsoft, Novell, Microsoft-Novell, Moonlight Share: Digg Del.icio.us Reddit Facebook Twitter

Mobile messaging grows globally

Worldwide mobile messaging grew nearly 10 percent  air max classic in the third quarter compared to the second quarter of the year, fueled by new trends in the messaging market, according to VeriSign, which provides Internet infrastructure services and delivers messages on behalf air max 180  of carriers and content providers.

The company reported Tuesday that VeriSign enabled more than 58.3 billion messages per day during the third quarter of 2008. This was up from about 5 air max ltd 2 billion messages sent during the second quarter of 2008.

On average, this means that VeriSign facilitated the delivery of about 634 million messages per day during the third quarter, air max  compared to 572 million messages a day in the second quarter. In the third quarter of 2007, the company helped move 280 million messages per day across its systems. VeriSign said it expects to enable nearly 200 billion m air max 1 essages during 2008.

The company attributed a lot of this growth in mobile messaging to new uses of the technology, which include messaging for social and political change and marketing. O nike max ne of the most notable examples of this is how U.S. President-elect Barack Obama used SMS text messaging to send messages to supporters during the campaign, even using the medium to distribute some of the campaign's bigg max 360 est news like the selection of his vice presidential runningmate Joe Biden.

Other groups used text messaging to solicit charitable donations. And several businesses and financial institutio maxes shoes ns also used mobile. In fact, messaging volume from businesses skyrocketed about 115 percent in the third quarter of 2008 compared to the same period a year ago, the company said. Messaging on VeriSign's Mobile Bankin air maxes 97 g platform also saw a 35 percent bump in volume from the second quarter of 2008 to the third quarter.

VeriSigns figures, which include text messaging as well as other forms of messagin max tn g like multimedia messaging, is in line with growth other groups have observed. In September, the U.S. wireless association CTIA noted the explosion in text messaging among U.S. consumers. The group tn air shoes  reported that for the month of June, American cell phone subscribers sent about 75 billion SMS text messages, averaging about 2.5 billion messages per day. This represents an increase of 160  air 180 classic percent over the 28.8 billion messages reported in June 2007.

Marguerite Reardon has been a CNET News reporter since 2004, covering cell phone services, broadband, citywide Wi-Fi, the Net neutrality debate, as well as the ongoing consolidation of the phone companies. E-mail Maggie. Topics: Corporate & legal Tags: mobile messaging, SMS, text messaging Share: Digg Del.icio.us Reddit Facebook Twitter