Palm Pre hype, EMC-NetApp tussle

IDG News Service - Well, the week was busy enough with IT news that even with an actual technology link to our favorite baseball team (St. Louis Cardinals manager Tony La Russa is suing Twitter), that story has not made the top 10. But with a lot of the current season to go, there is still hope that will change in the coming weeks. Meanwhile, Palm gets top billing with its hotly anticipated Pre smartphone, going on sale this weekend. EMC versus NetApp in a bidding war for Data Domain got a lot of attention, too, as did Intel's planned acquisition of Wind River.

1. Full review of the Palm Pre: The Palm Pre goes on sale Saturday, which kicked the hype machine into overdrive this week. PC World's Ginny Mies has been using a Pre to review it, and she likes the new smartphone but was vexed by some hardware issues. Links to other Pre stories can be found at the bottom of Ginny's thorough review.

2. EMC bids $1.8B for Data Domain, Bidding war: NetApp counters EMC for Data Domain with $1.9B offer and Data Domain asks shareholders to wait on EMC buyout offer: There's nothing like a robust bidding war to snag the headlines. The latest acquisition tussle is between EMC and NetApp. First, EMC offered $1.8 billion for Data Domain. Then, NetApp offered $1.9 billion. Then, Data Domain told its shareholders that it will make a recommendation on EMC's unsolicited offer by June 16. In other acquisition news ...

3. Intel to acquire Wind River for $884 million and Intel buys Wind River to push Linux: Intel plans to acquire Wind River Systems for $884 million as part of its Linux strategy. Wind River develops operating systems, middleware and software design tools for embedded systems. The company is a market leader in the latter area.

4. WWDC preview: What we know, what we expect with iPhone 3.0: Apple's annual Worldwide Developers' Conference, its last scheduled event of this year, is next week, and as Dan Moren noted, the always-robust Apple rumor mill has been amped up to "ear-splitting, glass-shattering pitch." He offered a synopsis of what Apple has already publicly said about the highly anticipated iPhone 3.0, which is expected to be the conference scene stealer, along with taking some best guesses about all of the rumors regarding video and the new iPhone.

5. Hackers claim $10,000 prize for breaking into StrongWebmail: Telesign challenged hackers to break into its StrongWebmail. com Web site late last week, so a group of security researchers obliged the company, which provides voice-based authentication software. It looks like Telesign will have to ante up the $10,000 it said it would pay for a successful hack into the webmail account of StrongWebmail CEO Darren Berkovitz.