Scarlet Pruitt

The Internet, this grand master of information once ushered into businesses as an invaluable workplace tool, is now being judged as something slightly more sinister: a costly employee time-waster.

It's 9 p.m., you're still at work, you're fed up and you won't take it anymore. You fire off an e-mail to your boss telling him just how you feel. Five minutes later, your senses return, you press a button and the offensive mail is retracted. Phew.

Subscription aspirants MusicNet, Pressplay and Napster Inc. took turns this week at Jupiter Media Metrix Inc.'s Plug In forum in New York, touting their wares amid promises that they would launch within the next couple months.

Hewlett-Packard Co. (HP) announced Thursday that it is slashing revenue forecasts for its fiscal third-quarter and laying off an additional 6,000 employees due to "deteriorating global economic conditions and related weakness in technology spending."

Microsoft Corp. will begin to immediately offer computer manufacturers more flexibility to configure desktop versions of the company's Windows operating system, Microsoft said Wednesday, admitting the change is in light of a recent Appeals Court ruling in the U.S. government's antitrust case against the software maker.

While cost-conscious companies have slashed technology purchases in recent months, they do not plan to cut back on external hardware and software support services, according to IT research group Dataquest Inc., a unit of Gartner Inc.

As Silicon Valley wrestles with a crippling energy crisis and massive layoffs, something very different is happening halfway around the world in Bangalore, Silicon Valley's equivalent in India, where each week a new, completely foreign-backed IT company sets up shop.

Microsoft Corp. and Mexican telecommunication behemoth Tel