The number one complaint about Apple machines over the years has often centered on inexplicable crashes that had to do with odd conflicts between this or that extension software.

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And I really do think there could be an opening for Windows Phone 8, particularly if Microsoft can sow seeds of doubt with the Android OEMs about the conflicts Google has in both supplying software to handset makers and competing with them at the same time.

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Researchers at the University of North Dakota, working with NASA and others, recently flew a Cirrus SR22 equipped with special software to see if it could sense and avoid conflicts with a nearby Cessna 172.

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At the same time, a new breed of online financial advisory firm is out to do what human advisers do, only with software and without the mazes of fees and conflicts of interest that can plague traditional brokerage firms.

WSJ: Advisory Services for Investors on Their Own