RealNetworks on Tuesday released free software to create audio-enhanced slide shows on the Internet, the latest addition to its stable of multimedia products.
RealSlideshow is available for download over the Internet, and will be bundled with Adobe Systems' photo-editing software and other products, the company said.
Also:
Sought-after Frontier warns of lower profits
Xerox going commercial with e-paper
Justice backs BT, AT&T venture
Singapore gets cell-phone stock trades
Med sites to recruit guinea pigs- - - - - -
Len Jordan, Real's senior vice president for media systems, said the product shows a recognition that video isn't the best medium for many Net users because of slow connection speeds and sophisticated production requirements. The new product allows Web site producers to create a hybrid medium that relies on a series of sequenced photographs or other images accompanied by music and narration.
Jordan said the agreement with Adobe would give RealNetworks (RNWK) access to an installed base of more than 20 million units of products such as Adobe Photoshop.
RealNetworks has distributed more than 65 million copies of its RealPlayer software for sending and playing streaming audio and video. Earlier this year, the company expanded into digital music by offering a new product for organizing and playing music files from CDs or Internet downloads.
- Back to topProfit warning: Frontier, the long-distance phone company that Qwest and Global Crossing both want to acquire, said late Monday that its profits in its second quarter and full year will fall well short of market expectations.
Frontier (FRO) said it now expects to post second-quarter profits in the range of 20 to 22 cents a share, trailing the First Call consensus of 28 cents. It sees full-year profits to be at $1 a share, 13 cents shy of market forecast. But the earnings shortfall will have "no impact" on its ability or timing to proceed with its merger pact with Global Crossing (GBLX), the company said.
Frontier also has an offer outstanding from Qwest (QWST) , which is coupling its acquisition effort with a bid for local carrier US West. Both Frontier and US West (USW) decided to take no action on Qwest's original offer, and continued to mull when Qwest upped the ante to a total of $48 billion – about $7 billion more than Global Crossing's offers.
4. Back to topNo dead trees: Xerox will announce Tuesday that it has signed a manufacturing agreement with 3M, a move intended to turn its research into electronic paper into a commercial venture.
Electronic paper is a new kind of reusable electronic display, like a computer screen but more portable and convenient. A bit thicker than ordinary paper but almost as flexible, it has been in development at Xerox's ([XRX](https://www.wired.com/stocks_quotes.asp?symbol=xrx)) Palo Alto Research Center for about four years. Electronic paper's display capabilities make it suitable for such applications as electronic newspapers that could add late-breaking news even as they were being read.
But don't expect to see it any time soon.
"It won't be on the market in the next year," said Bob Sprague, manager of Xerox PARC's Document Hardware Lab. Sprague said that Xerox might sign many different deals with hardware companies and content developers but had nothing else to announce for now.
5\. [Back to top](#top)__Getting closer:__ British Telecommunications and AT&T have cleared one more hurdle on the road to a $10 billion global joint venture.
BT and AT&T ([T](https://www.wired.com/stocks_quotes.asp?symbol=t)) said the Justice Department approved the deal without conditions late Monday, paving the way for the two biggest carriers in the world's most competitive telecom markets to pool their global assets.
The last regulatory step remaining for the venture is approval from the Federal Communications Commission. United States regulators had been widely expected to clear the deal after the European Commission gave the venture the green light in March, provided that AT&T sell ACC UK, its British long-distance calls unit.
The 50-50 joint venture, agreed to last July, will plug holes in the two titans' international strategies by allowing them to offer combined voice, data, and Internet services to the lucrative multinational business market. The venture, with $10 billion in sales, will serve directly more than 250 multinationals in the financial, petroleum, and information technology sectors, while also boosting earnings at BT and AT&T in 2000.
5\. [Back to top](#top)__Trade by phone:__ IBM and MacroVision, the technology arm of the Stock Exchange of Singapore, said Monday they created a mobile stock trading system by which investors can trade stocks online over cellular phones.
Investors are now able to buy or sell stocks on the Stock Exchange of Singapore, receive updates, view their account balances, and check the status of orders on their mobile phones, the companies said. Fraser Securities, the oldest brokerage in Singapore, and Singapore Telecom unit SingTel Mobile also partnered with IBM and MacroVision to create the system.
The system, called mobile e-trading, is an extension of Fraser's existing online share trading system, introduced earlier this year.
An IBM spokeswoman said taking electronic businesses to devices such as handheld computers, cell phones, and pagers was a top priority for the world's largest computer maker. She said other deals in the United States and elsewhere in the world were in the works to bring new functions to cellular phones and handheld devices. The US wireless data market is expected to grow from 3 million users this year to more than 36 million by 2003, according to Dataquest.
5\. [Back to top](#top)__Guinea pig recruitment:__ Two Internet sites say they'll help recruit patients for clinical trials testing drugs and other treatments.
The sites, [Drkoop.com](http://www.drkoop.com) and [Americasdoctor.com](http://www.americasdoctor.com), will give information about clinical trials that use volunteers to test new drugs and will allow interested people to sign up for trials on the site.
"Patient enrollment is the No. 1 challenge in completing trials on a timely basis," said Dennis Gillings, head of Quintiles Transnational, which is helping the Drkoop site launch the service.
Last month, cancer experts complained that only 2 to 3 percent of all adult cancer patients are enrolled in clinical trials, although such trials are where they are most likely to get the best drugs and treatment. But some groups have complained that patients in clinical trials do not always understand that the drug they are testing is experimental, and that they may get no treatment at all.
*Reuters contributed to this report.*
