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Google announced it, then AOL immediately announced it was testing one, a feature in the stand-along Web browser it's developing (for everyone, including non-AOL subscribers). Ask Jeeves will soon announce its desktop tool too. What it means is searching for stuff on your family PC as easily and quickly as you search on the Web. But WAIT, there's an important caveat: privacy and PC security in … [Read more...] about Desktop search: Big new thing

Have all the record industry's lawsuits really helped reduce file-sharing? A little bit, but they've also sent lots of tune-swappers underground, PC World reports. By "underground," the article means to smaller, lesser-known services than Kazaa, whose numbers have gone from a peak of 30 million to about 18 million (e.g., BitTorrent nearly doubled in users between 11/03 and 5/04 and eMule almost … [Read more...] about P2P-ers gone underground

HIPSchools is a program founded by a former Pittsburgh Steeler to get parents involved in their kids' education and, Wired News reports, it turned around Brooklyn's Walt Whitman Middle School 246, which had been deemed a failure by the state of New York. "The school has seen distinct improvement in the performance of its 1,300 students, as well as regular attendance, which has risen to 98% (an … [Read more...] about ‘HIPSchools’ helps students, etc.

Microsoft told all Windows PC owners to download patches to 21 new flaws it found, USATODAY reports. The announcement came in the company's routine monthly security advisory, but "the number of serious flaws was higher than expected." Microsoft advises all home PC users to go to this page and - if they haven't already - sign up for its free Windows Automatic Update service. … [Read more...] about Get the 7 new critical patches!

Japanese police have found the bodies of nine people, some of them teenagers, believed to have committed suicide because of suicide-pact Web sites. "Japan has recently seen a wave of Internet-linked suicides, as people seek companions to die with," the BBC reports, adding that more than 34,000 people committed suicide in Japan last year, a small increase from the 2002 figure. According to the New … [Read more...] about Japan’s Net suicide tragedy