Podcast: HP pretexters get wrist-slaps, the mortally wounded copyright, Red Hat seeks threesome with Microsoft, and Tellme more

This week on the Dan & David Show, ZDNet executive editor Larry Dignan fills in for Dan Farber and we cover the four biggest news stories of the week so far. While the world looks for ways to bridge the digital divide, Microsoft's attempts to close the gap between computer speech and computer code just shrunk another notch thanks to its announced acquisition of Tellme. For years now, Microsoft has been after that gap as though it were the Holy Grail. Will and acquisition of Tellme bring the Grail any closer? $800 million closer? Larry isn't so sure. Even so, Tellme's omnipresence gives Microsoft a foothold in new markets. 

Speaking of Microsoft, we've got audio of Red Hat EVP Paul Cormier talking about why it would be beneficial for the Redmond software giant to cozy up to his company now that it has shipped version 5 of its Red Hat Enteprise Linux (kids, it's not just an OS, it's platform!).  But, in Novell (with its SuSE distribution), Microsoft already has a Linux dance partner. Is Red Hat now feeling the pinch of those nuptials and is the olive branch out for a threesome? It sure sounds that way. 

Then of course there was Viacom's lawsuit of Google for $1 billion. Not only isn't it the biggest copyright lawsuit in US history, it's not a bad deal for Google. With over 1 billion viewings of the videos in question, Viacom is asking Google to pay less than $1 per. That's a better deal than any on-demand video deal on the Net today and sounds like a soul sold to the devil as much as anything else. Are copyrights dead? Or just mortally wounded?

Finally, in what I found to be an outrage, Patricia Dunn and her merry band of pretexting scandal makers were supposed to get the book thrown at them. Instead, as Dunn skates completely and the others have their felonies reduced to community service-esque misdemeanors, it looks more like a paperback toss. Was justice served? Or, did people of privilege who were associated with one of the world's most powerful companies get special treatment?