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What a Deal

In the spirit of giving, Gadzoox has a bargain for you. If you buy one of its Slingshot storage switches, Gadzoox tosses in a $300 Microsoft Xbox. I'm not sure if the math really works out, though. I get my company to pony up something like $18,000, and I get to give my kids a $300 game machine? I'm not sure if this is even kosher.

How the Mighty have Fallen

Not long ago, tech stocks and the NASDAQ were the hottest things going. Now NASDAQ has cooled and some of the former high flyers are cruising pretty low. As part of its annual purge, NASDAQ reworked its NASDAQ 100 index, purging it of some of our favorite companies. On the outs? Inktomi, Level 3, Novell, Palm, RealNetworks and 3Com. We're talking great technologies, and lousy stock prices.

Dude, You've Got a Virus --- Not!

Some people get their jollies releasing viruses that muck up computers. Others have fun tricking people into thinking they have been infected. Here's the skinny on one such joker's hoax making the rounds lately: . While most Outlook viruses automatically mail themselves to those in your address book, this hoax tricks you into doing the exact same thing.

The idea is to fool you into thinking you sent a virus to all your friends, and then convincing you to send them elaborate instructions to prove its existence and remove the offending code. But the instructions simply teach one how to find a file that is already a part of Windows, and then delete the moderately useful .exe. Follow the instructions, and you'll delete Sulfnbk.exe, a Windows file that restores long file names.

This is Going a Bit Too Far