Euro 2008 kicks off on 7 June and you can keep up with all the action from Switzerland and Austria online.
Surfers can catch all the action online via UEFA’s Euro 2008 website.
There are a range of packages from single matches to complete tournament passes including highlights, match replays and extensive analysis.
The BBC and ITV will be showing all the matches live on TV and and the BBC will have extensive coverage on Radio 5 also.
The competition comprises of 16 teams in four groups all battling it out to be crowned Champions of Europe at the 29 June final in the Austrian capital of Vienna.
More than one million tickets allocated for the tournament have been snapped up in what promises to be a football feast.
Group C, nicknamed the ‘Group of Death’, features World Cup finalists France and winners Italy as well as the Netherlands and Romania.
As only the top two teams from each group will progress to the quarter-finals it’s certain that one of the tournament’s favourites will exit early on.
Elsewhere Germany face rivals and neighbours Poland and Austria in Group B. England’s nemesis Croatia are the final team in the group.
Another tournament favourite Portugal are pitted against host nation Switzerland, Turkey and the Czech Republic.
In Group D reining champions Greece face Sweden, Spain and Russia.

webuser.co.uk

With household budgets under increasing pressure, the virtual mall that is the Internet appears to offer quick financial relief for consumers — shop at the right e-tailer and the transaction occurs free of state and local sales taxes. For shoppers in cities like Chicago which now has the dubious distinction of having the highest sales tax of any major U.S. city, that ensures every day can be a 10 percent-plus discount day online.
Or so it would seem.
With the exception of five states — Alaska, Delaware, Montana, New Hampshire and Oregon — all states assess sales tax as do many local municipalities. However, they consider it assessed whether it was collected from the taxpayer or not, as in the case of online or catalog purchases from out-of-state retailers.
In other words, taxpayers are legally obligated to report the amount of any sales tax they did not pay on either their annual state income tax forms or by filing a separate “use tax” form. (Use tax is what states call the sales tax when it is not collected by the retailer.)
If  this comes as news, then welcome to the “Twilight Zone” of the tax code where consumers who favor retailers who do not collect sales taxes to save money on their purchases become inadvertent, yet budget-savvy, tax cheats.
With state budgets as stressed as consumers’, there is growing interest in collecting these “unpaid” sales taxes. In California, for instance, an attempt was recently made to assess sales tax on online music downloads. The sponsoring assemblyman argued that if consumers have to pay a tax when they physically buy a CD at their local store, they should have to pay the same tax when downloading the digital version of that same album. The measure failed, but the general discussion rages on.

msnbc.msn.com

If you’ve already filed your income-tax return, odds are you’re pretty sick of hearing the constant IRS tips over the last couple of months. But if you’ve yet to file your return–with just a day left–you’re probably scrambling to find some last-minute help. Appscout feels your pain.
After the jump, we’ve got a handful of ways to meet the upcoming deadline head-on.
•At PCMag.com, we’ve got a roundup of 2007’s best–and worst–tax preparation software, including our Editors’ Choice winner, TurboTax Home & Business 2007. All the packages on the site contain online counterparts, offering either downloads of the software or Web-based filing, such as Turbo Tax’s http://turbotax.intuit.com/.
•For its part, TaxACT has been offering online tax filing for 10 years–for free, to boot.
•Sean Carroll, software senior editor and author of the tax-software roundup, points out that in order to take part in that whole economic-stimulus dealie, you have to file your 2007 return. The IRS’s official site has a calculator that can help you determine how much you’ll be getting back in May.
•Still need an extension? The IRS has you covered there, too [PDF link].
•Oh, and for the record, if you’re wondering why the IRS site doesn’t also offer direct filing, the PC Mag news team has the answer.
AppScout is brought to you by the editors and analysts of PC Magazine, who scour the world in search of the best software, sites, and Web apps. We’re reporting on it all: the killer apps, the crazy startups, the useful (or just gimmicky) Web sites, and the beta software that crashes our machines. And we love to give advice, so ask away!

appscout.com

I would like to know how the ISPs are going to determine a user is illegally pirating music. How are they to prove someone shared a commercial game and not some open source application? Would encryption fix this problem? This is crap. I hope this never happens in America.(Though i wont be surprised when it does.)
guys, this is already done almost everywhere. The only difference is that in the US, not only do you get a cease and desist letter from your ISP, but you are sued by the RIAA (if it’s audio). This will probably only affect those that watch speed fansubs, like bleach, naruto, etc. Even then, I know that the big fansubbers like dattebayo streams the aired video direct to the states for subbing.
Those F****n retards at the RIAA, i wonder if they know anything about technology and if they do i dare any of them to admit their sons or daughters has never downloaded any music of video illegally from the internet.
If the music industry cannot innovate they should not blame their lack of ideas on the consumer, because that is just a poor excuse.
In the past year my friends (wink wink) has spend over £150 buying high quality un-DRMed MP3 albums from alltunes.com the music is so dirt cheap that i don’t even think twice about the price. I could not do that anywhere else, especially if you are a compulsive music buyer and a student. Least in my eyes i am not steeling the music, even if the site is based in Russia and may not be paying the music company.
Look at the Wii, poor hardware compared to PS3 but so cheap that it is a no brainer.
Innovate do not discriminate… you only make enemies… and the war may never end

gizmodo.com.au