The House of Representatives passed legislation Friday extending a ban on Internet access taxes until 2007. The measure, which passed the Senate earlier last week, cleared the House on a voice vote. President Bush is expected to sign it. The bill blocks taxation of all types of Internet connections, from traditional dial-up services to high-speed broadband lines.

Fallon Worldwide, the Minneapolis agency that wowed the advertising world with its short Internet films for BMW a few years ago, is back in the movie-making business.

When I moved into a new neighborhood last week, I expected the usual hassles. Then I found out I'd have to wait more than a month for a DSL line. I started convulsing. If I don't have Net access for even one day, I can't do my job. So, what was I supposed to do? There's an Internet café on the next block, but they close early. I had no choice-it was time to start sneaking on to my neighbors' home networks.

While the music industry attempts to shutter peer-to-peer services in court and in Congress, one company is using P2P networks to promote and pay artists. Shared Media Licensing, based in Seattle, offers Weed, a software program that allows interested music fans to download a song and play it three times for free. They are prompted to pay for the "Weed file" the fourth time. Songs cost about a dollar and can be burned to an unlimited number of CDs, passed around on file-sharing networks and posted to web pages.

If you don't think anybody else could possibly get any more spam than you, think of Bill Gates. The Microsoft Corp. chairman receives about 4 million pieces of e-mail per day, most of it junk, says Steve Ballmer, the company's chief executive.

A top government official predicted Thursday that a proposed copyright law that has alarmed technology companies will not be enacted in the last-minute legislative rush before the holidays.

By year's end a five-year-old company called PortalPlayer will begin selling its shares to the public. What's notable is that this company owes its success--even its existence--to the popularity of Apple Computer's iPod.

For people trying to get their aging parents on the Web so they can read e-mail and get digital photos of the family, Microsoft Corp. has a message: Don't give up.

Microsoft and Yahoo have promised to boost storage limits for their free e-mail services, but for many users, the upgrades haven't been delivered.

FMCG giant Proctor & Gamble has invited major online media owners to talk about the benefits of the medium to its UK marketing chiefs, a move which suggests the Internet could play a bigger role in its marketing strategy next year. AOL, MSN and Yahoo! are all participating in the P&G 'online week', which will take place at the beginning of December.