The New York Times points out that even though the “big research houses

[such as IDC] have been trimming their 2008 forecasts for global technology spending lately, mainly because they see a weaker United States market next year […],Mark R. Anderson, chief executive of the Strategic News Service, a predictive newsletter, begs to differ.  For the last few years, Mr. Anderson has come to New York in December from his base in Friday Harbor, Wash., to host a dinner and deliver a lengthy, digressive, often humorous talk that includes predictions for the coming year.  Worldwide technology spending, Mr. Anderson said last night, will be 9 percent or so next year. The United States, he says, remains the largest market for technology, but its heft and influence is receding. What is being missed, he contended, is the growth and momentum of technology buying outside America, where buying survey techniques are less developed. ‘We’re seeing the beginning of a totally new buying and selling universe,’ he said. ‘What happens here is no longer as important as once was.’”

The Sidney Morning Herald writes that “[v]ideo on mobile phones has come of age as content providers and traditional media personalities sign on to create original shows exclusively for handhelds.  Phone networks and mobile-focused digital media companies have relied heavily on content repurposed from regular TV shows, but they are fast learning the most effective mobile videos are those explicitly designed for ‘snacking’ while on the move.”

The Register reports that “[s]ecurity researcher Jose Nazario has uncovered circumstantial evidence of the use of botnets in politically-motivated denial of service attacks.  […]  Nazario, a senior security researcher at Arbor Networks, has documented how botnets have featured in more recent politically motivated DDoS events. Attacks on the Ukrainian pro-Russian site of the Party of Regions, a party led by the Ukrainian Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych, over the last three months were traced by Nazario back to networks of compromised machines.”  However, the Register also points out that [t]he motives, much less the perpetrators, of the attacks remain unclear.”

According to the San Francisco Gate, “[a] Chinese company has taken Google’s China operations to court over what it says is an infringement of the Chinese translation of its name, ‘Guge,’ according to court documents.  Beijing Guge Sci-Tech Co. was officially registered at the Beijing Municipal Industrial and Commercial Bureau on April 19, 2006, but Google didn’t register the name ‘Guge’ in China until Nov. 24 of that year, according to court arguments that began in Beijing this week.  Guge Sci-Tech wants Google change its Chinese name and pay legal costs, according to court documents. No specific sum was mentioned.  Google said that when Beijing Guge Sci-Tech registered its name there were already reports on the Internet that Google was going to use the Chinese name ‘Guge,’ according to court documents.”

ZDNet.com has an article today discussing whether “Web traffic stats [can] be trusted.”