Workplace

In our remote-driven society, distance is often considered a good thing. The farther away a gadget can work, the better.

So in this sense, a new projector from Sanyo is somewhat counter-intuitive: Its biggest selling point is how close it can be positioned to the image it's projecting. The LP-XL40 has an "ultra-short-focus lens" that can project the equivalent of an 80-inch screen from just 3.15 inches away, according to Akihabara News.

Why is this a good thing? Think about all the tight spots where it can work--such as mounted on a wall directly above the … Read more

The Connecticut attorney general has launched an investigation into the compromise of up to 17,000 of Pfizer employees, including some 300 employees within his home state. Pfizer would not comment on when the breach occurred other than to say it involved a Pfizer employee who had taken the data home on a laptop, a machine that subsequently became compromised. The data, including the employees' name, home address, bonus information, and Social Security number, was surreptitiously uploaded and later appeared on an Internet site. Pfizer did not know how much of that information had been copied or used by others. … Read more

It could be all the microclimates here on CNET's sixth floor, or it could just be my co-workers' widely divergent internal thermostats. Either way, a given day here in the office will see some of us shivering and reaching for thick sweaters, while others complain that the place is steaming hot. What's a newsroom comprised of such varying body temperatures to do?

Office furniture maker Herman Miller, it turns out, has come up with the C2, a $300 personal climate control device for just such a workplace dilemma. The company--which notes on its Web site that temperature control … Read more

How times have changed. At the height of the dot-com boom, one of the early symbols of egregious excess was Herman Miller's "Aeron" uber-chair, which often sold for more than $1,000 apiece. Although it still sells those chairs--which apparently haven't come down in price--the specialty furniture maker is now touting a very different kind of product that's far less visible. In fact, its effects are completely invisible.

The "C2," so far as we can tell from its product literature, is a fancy personal air conditioner and filter that goes for $280… Read more

An India-based company that counts itself among the largest recipients of controversial H-1B visas has agreed to pay $2.4 million in back wages to 607 allegedly underpaid computer professionals employed through that avenue.

The U.S. Department of Labor said Thursday it had found that Patni Computer Systems Inc., which is headquartered in Mumbai but centers its North American operations in Cambridge, Mass., did not pay the required wages to those temporary foreign workers between January 2004 and December 2005. Patni specializes in global IT outsourcing services.

In this case, Patni was not fined or barred from participating in … Read more

TechCrunch reported late on Friday about a hot new rumor in the social media space. The Germany-based business networking site Xing, according to TechCrunch's Michael Arrington, may be in talks to acquire online address book management company Plaxo. The deal is rumored to be in the $250 million range--a significant buy indeed.

Plaxo, for some background, was founded in 2002 by Napster co-founder Sean Parker. Since then, the company claims to have hit 15 million members (as of September 2006). It synchronizes primarily with Microsoft Outlook address books, but has also formed deals with companies like Yahoo and AOL'… Read more

It's a well-known fact among those of us in the tech industry that Salesforce loves to package free chocolate--and sometimes other swag along with its press kits. It's kind of notorious. So when I saw today that Salesforce sent me a package (despite the fact that my beat of social media, pool toys, and The Colbert Report has nothing to do with customer relations management) my immediate reaction was "Hey, chocolate!"

So I opened up the package, and to my dismay, I saw some kind of strange white box instead of shiny foil wrappers. CRIPES! A Salesforce missive without chocolate? That's criminal. And disturbing.… Read more

A few proxy advisory firms are urging shareholders to protest Yahoo Chief Executive Terry Semel's $71 million salary package by voting against re-election of three members of the board at Tuesday's annual meeting, according to the San Jose Mercury News.

Yahoo is struggling to get its ship back on course. After a company reorganization late last year and disappointing first-quarter results, some analysts have speculated that this year may be Semel's last. Last year, the company's revenue growth slowed, its net income slid 60 percent in the fourth quarter compared with the same period in 2005, … Read more

Presenting a new generation of blade servers at a presentation in Washington Wednesday, Sun talked a lot about speed and open source and efficiency of operation. The company mentioned saving money several times. And, of course, there was much about competitive advantage.

Then, not for the first time, but with significant emphasis, Sun talked green. In this video we hear how the servers save energy, and that they contain no plastic. Sun's CEO Jonathan Schwartz says the new Sun-engineered blade servers are 100 percent recoverable materials.