Online veterans memorial launched

NEW YORK -- Family and friends of servicemen and women who died or vanished in the Vietnam War no longer have to travel to Washington to pay their respects at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial.

An interactive version debuts online this week, a project of historical document archive site Footnote.com in conjunction with the National Archives and Records Administration.

The Web site is: www.go.footnote.com/thewall.

The virtual version of the famous memorial -- which is a pair of 246-foot black granite walls inscribed with the names of more than 58,000 American military casualties -- is searchable.

Every name etched onto the real-world wall is viewable online and linked to the veteran's service record. Online visitors can add photos and describe their memories of the servicemen and women who died in the war.

Footnote.com Chief Executive Russ Wilding hopes the site will develop into an online community for veterans, family and friends to pay tribute and share their thoughts.

"The memorial is a historical document that obviously is very emotional," he says. "We want the site to help people come together to remember the veterans who were lost."

More than 2,000 photos were taken of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial wall to create the online version, Wilding said. He said the resulting image is the equivalent of 460 feet wide and the largest of its kind on the Web.

Wednesday was the 26th anniversary of the groundbreaking for construction of the wall, which was completed in November 1982 and officially became a National Monument two years later.

Malaysian leader loses Net war

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia -- Malaysia's prime minister has said his ruling coalition made a blunder by underestimating the power of the Internet, which the opposition used extensively to win a record number of seats in recent elections.

"In the last election, we certainly lost the Internet war, the cyber war," Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi told an investors' conference on Tuesday.

He said it was "a serious misjudgment" on the part of the ruling National Front coalition to rely on government-controlled newspapers and television.

The opposition, denied fair access to the government media, wooed young voters with text messages on cell phones and blogs online. That also struck a chord with disgruntled Malaysians who were fuming at the mainstream media's partisan coverage.

The coalition lost its traditional-two thirds majority of the 222-member Parliament, the worst setback in its 51-year rule, though it remained in power. The opposition increased its presence in Parliament from 19 seats to 82 seats and won five state legislatures.

The ruling coalition spent millions of dollars on print and television advertisements during its campaign.

Make your phone a Wi-Fi hotspot

NEW YORK -- Here's a cool use for a phone that has both cellular broadband and Wi-Fi: Turn it into a mobile Wi-Fi hotspot so your friends can surf the Internet on their laptops.

A couple startups have created and made available software like this in the last year. But a more established software maker said Wednesday that it has created a package for carriers to offer their customers.

TapRoot Systems Inc. of Research Triangle Park, N.C., said it was talking with carriers about providing their customers with the software, which would let up to five Wi-Fi users connect to a phone.

A possible free trial version would let only one Wi-Fi user connect to the phone at a time.

The software works on phones with Windows Mobile or Symbian S60 software. Windows phones are common in the U.S., while Symbian is championed by Nokia Corp. and more common in Europe. There already is an independent program called WMWifirouter that turns Windows phones into hotspots, and there's one called JoikuSpot for Nokia phones.

Capacity is limited on third-generation cellular broadband networks, and carriers are somewhat restrictive of the applications they allow, for fear their networks will be overwhelmed.

TapRoot's system attempts to assuage that fear by letting carriers control access through a server, said Chief Executive Bob Bicksler. The carriers could then charge extra for the service, he said.