Personal Computer

SEATTLE - Despite a bumpy year in the stock market, an uncertain future in the courts, and shareholder dissent over some of its political contributions, Microsoft Corp. presented a relatively upbeat picture of the company at its annual meeting here last week. While Microsoft, the world's largest software company, is promoting initiatives built around cellular phones, digital cameras and televisions, the company's leaders said their focus remains where it has always been: on personal computers.

In the near future, predicts Jay Steinmetz, school teachers armed with handheld gadgets may scan student ID cards to log attendance for the day and then beam the information to a central school computer. Parents - at least those with access to a personal computer - could then check the school Web site to ensure that their kids didn't play hooky. Sound like a page out of Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World"? Perhaps. But the scenario isn't fantasy and it highlights the coming explosion in functions, or "applications," for handheld wireless devices - cell phones, pagers, and the array of personal digital assistants.

WASHINGTON -- Top CIA officials impeded an internal investigation into evidence that the agency's former director, John M. Deutch, mishandled large volumes of secret material, a classified report by the agency's inspector general concludes. The report details a series of actions by the agency's former executive director and general counsel that it says "had the effect of delaying a prompt and thorough investigation of this matter." It asserts that George J. Tenet, the agency's current director and Deutch's top deputy, should have done more to "forcefully ensure" that the case was properly investigated.

LAS VEGAS -- If it seems as if the Internet is everywhere these days, just wait: From the toilet to the TV room, you ain't seen nothing yet.Technology companies here at the mammoth Comdex computer show last week pulled the wraps off a new class of Internet devices called "information appliances." They're betting that these gadgets will become the Next Big Thing for the home.If the term "information appliance" sounds like a cross between a toaster and a computer kiosk, you're on the right track.

Will Microsoft Windows go the way of the abacus?On Friday, U.S. District Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson issued the first part of his decision in the government's antitrust case against Microsoft, finding that the software giant has a monopoly in the operating systems that act as the brains of computers worldwide.But even as the court mulls what should be done about Microsoft and its popular operating system, companies are tapping the Internet to create technologies that might someday make Windows -- and possibly the personal computer -- a high-tech has-been.

WASHINGTON -- Microsoft chairman and co-founder Bill Gates thinks he can buy my admiration by pledging a billion dollars to minority scholarships, he's right -- not just because it is generous, but also because it is clever.Figure it out: The more college-educated Americans we have, the more computers are likely to be sold, which means more money for Microsoft, the world's biggest maker of computer software.And by targeting minorities, particularly blacks, Hispanics and American Indians, Mr. Gates helps expand the slowest-growing racial market for computer use.All of which illustrates something I have been arguing for years, that wise investments in the poor -- investments that help the needy to become self-sufficient -- pay back huge dividends for everybody.

Choosing a computer style has long been easy: You can have any color you want, as long as it's beige.In a world where people speed by in hunter green sports cars and flaunt cherry red cellular phones, the personal computer -- perhaps the most important new consumer product of the last two decades -- has stuck with its original bland shade and boxy architecture. "Function over form" has been the serious-minded computer industry's message to the masses, and the masses have gone along.Until now.New waves of computer consumers are looking for devices that reflect their personalities.

This is an excerpt of a Boston Globe editorial published Thursday.E-MAIL can be a seductive and evil genie. Summoned to serve man, it can incriminate him, or her, as the temptation to tell all -- or at least the juicy parts -- overwhelms caution at the keyboard.The genie tripped up Bill Gates, who saw a series of blunt exchanges between his executives become what the government called "the smoking gun" in its antitrust case against Microsoft.The genie trapped chatty presidential paramour Monica Lewinsky, whose e-mail and that of confidante Linda Tripp and others was confiscated by independent counsel Kenneth Starr and read all over the country.

WASHINGTON -- Barring a last-minute settlement, the Microsoft antitrust trial will enter the payoff phase, probably late this month, with the warring parties seeking to overcome weak spots in their initial arguments.The Justice Department and Microsoft Corp. each named three rebuttal witnesses yesterday. They will use those witnesses to try to gain the upper hand during the crucial period of the case, which promises to shape antitrust law in the high-technology field for the coming century.

The hottest trends in high-technology are on display at the Maryland Technology Showcase, which began its two-day run yesterday at the Baltimore Convention Center. Children line up three deep to try Apple's new computer; TV monitors show off crisp digital pictures; booth after booth heralds a better, faster way of connecting to the Internet.Gaining access to such wonders, of course, requires a certain amount of technical know-how and money, but it often demands something even more basic: sight.