Microsoft to `host` Linux virtually

Microsoft will support customers who chose to run Linux with Microsoft`s Virtual Server 2005 R2, software for running multiple operating systems on one machine, reports CNet.

The company has also made Virtual Server 2005 R2 a free download. The announcements were made in conjunction with the LinuxWorld conference in Boston this week.

Virtualisation, an emerging technology receiving growing interest from corporate customers, allows a server to run multiple instances of an operating system.

Google continues to be the search engine of choice for many users, garnering almost half of all searches last month, according to Clickz. In separate reports issued this week by Nielsen/NetRatings and comScore Media Metrix, Google maintained its lead in the share of overall US searches.

Depending on which research firm you ask, Google owned either 48.5% of searches (Nielsen//NetRatings) or 42.3% (comScore Media Metrix) in the US in February. That`s up from 36.3% a year ago, according to comScore.

Next runner-up continues to be Yahoo and MSN remains a distant third.

Digital TV broadcasts for mobile phones equipped with special receivers began in Japan`s major urban areas on Saturday, following several months of test broadcasts, according to Wired.

But finding new phones in stores proved hard as eager consumers have already snapped up the limited number of handsets on the market.

Japan`s mobile TV service is not the world`s first but its 90 million mobile phone users already play video games, download music files, exchange e-mail, read news, trade stocks, store digital photos and surf the Web - all on tiny handset screens half the size of a business card.

Fearful of the same digital piracy that humbled the music industry, two online vendors are poised to start offering recently released flicks via the Web, reports Business Week.

Movielink and CinemaNow, Hollywood`s two movie-download services, are threatening to turn the traditional model for releasing movies on its head. Both companies will offer movie downloads simultaneously with DVD releases, putting Hollywood studios in direct competition with DVD retailers.

The features offered by Movielink will include films from six of the top seven in Hollywood today, with such titles as King Kong, Brokeback Mountain, horror film Saw II, and the latest Harry Potter instalment.