Napster was an online music peer-to-peer file sharing service created by Shawn Fanning while he was attending Northeastern University in Boston. The service operated between June 1999 and July 2001.[1] Its technology allowed people to easily share their MP3 files with other participants, bypassing the established market for such songs and thus leading to massive copyright violations of music and film media as well as other intellectual property. Although the original service was shut down by court order, it paved the way for decentralized peer-to-peer file distribution programs, which have been much harder to control. The service was named Napster after Fanning's hairstyle-based nickname. Napster's brand and logo were purchased after the company closed its doors and continue to be used by a pay service.

Microsoft Windows is a series of software operating systems and graphical user interfaces produced by Microsoft. Microsoft first introduced an operating environment named Windows in November 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces (GUIs).[2] Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal computer market, overtaking Mac OS, which had been introduced in 1984. As of October 2009, Windows had approximately 91% of the market share of the client operating systems for usage on the Internet.[3][4][5] The most recent client version of Windows is Windows 7; the most recent server version is Windows Server 2008 R2; the most recent mobile OS version is Windows Phone 7.

CNET Networks Inc. is a media company co-founded in 1993 by Halsey Minor and Shelby Bonnie. CNET was also originally an acronym that originally stood for Computer Networks, but the name was later changed to CNET Networks, losing its acronymity. It was acquired by CBS in 2008 and its properties were merged into CBS Interactive.

In computing, a processor is the unit that reads and executes program instructions, which are fixed-length (typically 32 or 64 bit) or variable-length chunks of data. The data in the instruction tells the processor what to do. The instructions are very basic things like reading data from memory or sending data to the user display, but they are processed so rapidly that we experience the results as the smooth operation of a program. Processors were originally developed with only one core. The core is the part of the processor that actually performs the reading and executing of the instruction. Single-core processors can only process one instruction at a time. (To improve efficiency, processors commonly utilize pipelines internally, which allow several instructions to be processed together, however they are still consumed into the pipeline one at a time.) A multi-core processor is composed of two or more independent cores. One can describe it as an integrated circuit which has two or more individual processors (called cores in this sense).[1] Manufacturers typically integrate the cores onto a single integrated circuit die (known as a chip multiprocessor or CMP), or onto multiple dies in a single chip package. A many-core processor is one in which the number of cores is large enough that traditional multi-processor techniques are no longer efficient — this threshold is somewhere in the range of several tens of cores — and probably requires a network on chip.

Radio-frequency identification (RFID) is the use of an object (typically referred to as an RFID tag) applied to or incorporated into a product, animal, or person for the purpose of identification and tracking using radio waves. Some tags can be read from several meters away and beyond the line of sight of the reader. Radio-frequency identification involves interrogators (also known as readers), and tags (also known as labels). Most RFID tags contain at least two parts. One is an integrated circuit for storing and processing information, modulating and demodulating a radio-frequency (RF) signal, and other specialized functions. The second is an antenna for receiving and transmitting the signal. There are generally three types of RFID tags: active RFID tags, which contain a battery and can transmit signals autonomously, passive RFID tags, which have no battery and require an external source to provoke signal transmission, and battery assisted passive (BAP) RFID tags, which require an external source to wake up but have significant higher forward link capability providing greater range. There are a variety of groups defining standards and regulating the use of RFID, including: International Organization for Standardization (ISO), International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC), ASTM International, DASH7 Alliance, EPCglobal. (Refer to Regulation and standardization below.) RFID has many applications; for example, it is used in enterprise supply chain management to improve the efficiency of inventory tracking and management. Contents [hide]

NTT Docomo, Inc.[1] (株式会社エヌ・ティ・ティ・ドコモ, Kabushiki Gaisha Enu Ti Ti Dokomo?, TYO: 9437, NYSE: DCM, LSE: NDCM) is the predominant mobile phone operator in Japan. The name is officially an abbreviation of the phrase, "do communications over the mobile network", and is also from a compound word dokomo, meaning "everywhere" in Japanese. Docomo provides phone, video phone (FOMA and Some PHS), i-mode (internet), and mail (i-mode mail, Short Mail, and SMS) services. The company has its headquarters in the Sanno Park Tower, Nagatachō, Chiyoda, Tokyo.[2] Docomo was spun off from Nippon Telegraph and Telephone (NTT) in August 1991 to take over the mobile cellular operations. It provides 2G (mova) PDC cellular services on the 800 MHz band, and 3G FOMA W-CDMA services on the 2 GHz (UMTS2100) and 800 MHz(UMTS800(Band VI)) and 1800 MHz(UMTS1800(Band IX)) bands. Its businesses also included PHS (Paldio), paging, and satellite. Docomo ceased offering a PHS service on January 7, 2008.

Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP, Voice over IP) is a general term for a family of methodologies, communication protocols, and transmission technologies for delivery of voice communications and multimedia sessions over Internet Protocol (IP) networks, such as the Internet. Other terms frequently encountered and synonymous with VoIP are IP telephony, Internet telephony, voice over broadband (VoBB), broadband telephony, and broadband phone. Internet telephony refers to communications services — voice, facsimile, and/or voice-messaging applications — that are transported via the Internet, rather than the public switched telephone network (PSTN). The basic steps involved in originating an Internet telephone call are conversion of the analog voice signal to digital format and compression/translation of the signal into Internet protocol (IP) packets for transmission over the Internet; the process is reversed at the receiving end.[1] VoIP systems employ session control protocols to control the set-up and tear-down of calls as well as audio codecs which encode speech allowing transmission over an IP network as digital audio via an audio stream. Codec use is varied between different implementations of VoIP (and often a range of codecs are used); some implementations rely on narrowband and compressed speech, while others support high fidelity stereo codecs.

Skype (pronounced /skaɪp/) is a software application that allows users to make voice calls over the Internet. Calls to other users within the Skype service are free, while calls to both traditional landline telephones and mobile phones can be made for a fee using a debit-based user account system. Skype has also become popular for its additional features which include instant messaging, file transfer, and video conferencing. The network is operated by a company called Skype Limited, headquartered in Luxembourg and partly owned by eBay.

The Lexus and the Olive Tree is a 1999 book by Thomas L. Friedman that posits that the world is currently undergoing two struggles: the drive for prosperity and development, symbolized by the Lexus, and the desire to retain identity and traditions, symbolized by the olive tree. He says he came to this realization while eating a sushi box lunch on a Japanese bullet train after visiting a Lexus factory and reading an article about conflict in the Middle East. Friedman leads the reader on an international quest for a new understanding of the often misunderstood and misapplied term "globalization" by tapping on to stories of his actual experiences in interfacing with many of the global movers and shakers. He proposes that "globalization is not simply a trend or fad but is, rather, an international system. It is the system that has replaced the old Cold War system, and, like that Cold War System, globalization has its own rules and logic that today directly or indirectly influence the politics, environment, geopolitics and economics of virtually every country in the world."