■ Internet
ICANN drops adult site idea
Faced with opposition from conservative groups and some pornography Web sites, the Internet's key oversight agency voted to reject a proposal to create a red-light district on the Internet. The decision on Wednesday from the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) reverses its preliminary approval last June to create a ".xxx" domain name for voluntary use by the adult entertainment industry. ICANN chief executive Paul Twomey said the decision largely came down to whether the creation of "xxx" might put ICANN in a difficult position of having to enforce all of the world's laws governing pornography.
■ Communications
Time may bid for wireless
Time Warner Inc's cable TV unit is considering a bid for cellphone spectrum licenses together with three other cable companies and Sprint Nextel Corp. The chief executive of Time Warner Cable, Glenn Britt, told an analyst conference in New York on Wednesday that the group will file an application with the Federal Communications Commission that would allow it to participate in an auction of spectrum for advanced wireless services, which will begin on June 29. Time Warner Cable is already in a partnership with Sprint and three other cable TV companies -- industry leader Comcast Corp, Cox Communications Inc and Advance/Newhouse Communications Inc -- to offer cellphone service to cable customers. The consortium has said it plans to market Sprint's cellphone service in seven test markets by the end of the year, a Time Warner Cable spokeswoman said. Britt said it was not yet clear whether the group would bid for the spectrum or what its plans for the licenses would be.
■ Communications
Music videos in the offing
Japan's top mobile operator, NTT DoCoMo Inc, said yesterday it will start a next-generation service letting phone users download music videos, aiming to outdo its rivals' success with online music. The new service, which will start as soon as next month, uses a high-speed data transmission technology to allow downloads at 10 times the speed of DoCoMo's third generation (3G) FOMA handsets. It will be part of the 3G-pioneering company's "3.5 Generation" telephones. "With the release of our new handsets this summer, we will upgrade a variety of our services including the music-downloading and e-wallet services, some of which will only be available with our 3.5G next-generation handsets," said Hiroto Nakagawa, spokesman for NTT DoCoMo.
■ Appliances
Whirlpool to lay off 4,500
Whirlpool Corp, the world's largest appliance maker, will close three plants and eliminate some 4,500 jobs -- more than 5 percent of its workforce -- to cut costs after its US$1.68 billion purchase of Maytag Corp, the company said on Wednesday. Whirlpool said the aim is to restore competitiveness at Maytag, which has kept manufacturing concentrated in the US. Former Maytag washer and dryer plants in Herrin, Illinois, and Searcy, Arkansas, will close by the end of the year, Whirlpool said. The planned job cuts include 1,800 salaried employees. Overall, the firings represent 5.6 percent of Whirlpool's 80,000 workers, Bloomberg said. About 1,500 position at other locations will be added eventually, Whirlpool said in a statement. Whirlpool bought Maytag in March.
Taiwan’s Lee Chia-hao (李佳豪) on Sunday won a silver medal at the All England Open Badminton Championships in Birmingham, England, a career best. Lee, 25, took silver in the final of the men’s singles against world No. 1 Shi Yuqi (石宇奇) of China, who won 21-17, 21-19 in a tough match that lasted 51 minutes. After the match, the Taiwanese player, who ranks No. 22 in the world, said it felt unreal to be challenging an opponent of Shi’s caliber. “I had to be in peak form, and constantly switch my rhythm and tactics in order to score points effectively,” he said. Lee got
‘CROWN JEWEL’: Washington ‘can delay and deter’ Chinese President Xi Jinping’s plans for Taiwan, but it is ‘a very delicate situation there,’ the secretary of state said US President Donald Trump is opposed to any change to Taiwan’s “status quo” by force or extortion and would maintain that policy, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio told the Hugh Hewitt Show host on Wednesday. The US’ policy is to maintain Taiwan’s “status quo” and to oppose any changes in the situation by force or extortion, Rubio said. Hewitt asked Rubio about the significance of Trump earlier this month speaking with Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (台積電) chairman C.C. Wei (魏哲家) at the White House, a meeting that Hewitt described as a “big deal.” Asked whether the meeting was an indication of the
‘RELATIVELY STRONG LANGUAGE’: An expert said the state department has not softened its language on China and was ‘probably a little more Taiwan supportive’ China’s latest drills near Taiwan on Monday were “brazen and irresponsible threats,” a US Department of State spokesperson said on Tuesday, while reiterating Washington’s decades-long support of Taipei. “China cannot credibly claim to be a ‘force for stability in a turbulent world’ while issuing brazen and irresponsible threats toward Taiwan,” the unnamed spokesperson said in an e-mailed response to media queries. Washington’s enduring commitment to Taiwan will continue as it has for 45 years and the US “will continue to support Taiwan in the face of China’s military, economic, informational and diplomatic pressure campaign,” the e-mail said. “Alongside our international partners, we firmly
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday said it has lodged a protest with Pretoria after the name of the Taipei Liaison Office in South Africa was changed to the “Taipei Commercial Office” on the South African Department of International Relations and Cooperation’s (DIRCO) Web site. In October last year, the South African government asked Taiwan to relocate the Taipei Liaison Office, the nation’s de facto embassy, out of Pretoria. It later agreed to continue negotiating through official channels, but in January asked that the office be relocated by the end of this month. As of the middle of last month, DIRCO’s Web
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