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TOP STORIES FOR FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 10, 2006 Sloan Report Finds Growth in Online Students Microsoft Pays Royalties to Universal Music Group Lower Phone Prices Boost Number of Mobile Users Big U.S. Web Sites See Mostly International Visitors Gartner Finds Phishing Targets Wealthy More Often BetOnSports Settles U.S. Lawsuit SLOAN REPORT FINDS GROWTH IN ONLINE STUDENTS The latest survey of online learning by the Sloan Consortium reported that about 3.2 million students took at least one online course from a degree-granting institution in fall 2005, double the number who did in 2002. The report, issued jointly by the Sloan Consortium and the College Board, defines an online course as one in which at least 80 percent of the content is delivered over the Internet. The rate of growth of online students slowed from 2003 to 2004 despite a continuing upward trend. In contrast, only one in four academic leaders said their faculty have embraced online education, a number that has persisted through four surveys. Inside Higher Ed, 10 November 2006 http://insidehighered.com/news/2006/11/10/online MICROSOFT PAYS ROYALTIES TO UNIVERSAL MUSIC GROUP Microsoft has agreed to pay royalties based on sales of its Zune portable media player to the Universal Music Group, a unit of Vivendi. Under the deal, Universal will receive a percentage of both download revenue and digital player sales. In exhange, Universal Music will license its musical recordings for Microsoft's digital music service. Universal said it will pay half of what it receives in royalties to its artists. New York Times, 9 November 2006 (registration req'd) http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/09/technology/09music.html LOWER PHONE PRICES BOOST NUMBER OF MOBILE USERS Market researcher iSuppli claims that the number of mobile phone subscribers worlwide will hit 2.6 billion this year and 4 billion by 1010, largely because of ultra-low-cost handsets. The growth in users is driven by new subscribers in developing nations like India and China, along with Africa and the Middle East, said Dale Ford, vice president of market intelligence for iSuppli. PCWorld, 10 November 2006 http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,127820-c,researchreports/article.html BIG U.S. WEB SITES SEE MOSTLY INTERNATIONAL VISITORS More than three-fourths of Web visitors to large U.S. Web sites such as Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo come from overseas. The three companies are among 14 of the top 25 U.S. Web sites that draw more foreign traffic than U.S.-based traffic, according to market research company ComScore Networks. In 10 years, the U.S. share of the world's online population reportedly has fallen from 64 percent to less than 25 percent, although U.S. Web surfers evidently visit more pages each. InformationWeek, 9 November 2006 http://www.informationweek.com/news/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=193700359 GARTNER FINDS PHISHING TARGETS WEALTHY MORE OFTEN A study by Gartner analysts found that phishing scams preferentially target people who earn more than $100,000. People in that income bracket or higher received almost 50 percent more phishing e-mails than people with lower earnings. In addition, those with higher incomes lost, on average, four times more money than other victims. Overall losses from phishing scams have risen to $2.8 billion yearly, according to Gartner estimates. BBC, 10 November 2006 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/6135346.stm BETONSPORTS SETTLES U.S. LAWSUIT Online gambling company BetOn Sports has settled a U.S. lawsuit by agreeing not to accept any bets from the United States. The settlement, announced November 9, ended a civil case filed by U.S. Attorney Catherine Hanaway this summer. The settlement does not affect a criminal case still pending against several of the company's ex-employees, including ex-CEO David Carruthers, which should reach trial in early 2007. Wall Street Journal, 10 November 2006 http://online.wsj.com/article/SB116314426134119688.html ***************************************************** EDUPAGE INFORMATION To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your settings, or access the Edupage archive, visit http://www.educause.edu/Edupage/639 Or, you can subscribe or unsubscribe by sending e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] To SUBSCRIBE, in the body of the message type: SUBSCRIBE Edupage YourFirstName YourLastName To UNSUBSCRIBE, in the body of the message type: SIGNOFF Edupage If you have subscription problems, send e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] ***************************************************** OTHER EDUCAUSE RESOURCES The EDUCAUSE Resource Center is a repository for information concerning use and management of IT in higher education. 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