Other brighter points are that where HMV has refitted its stores so that they contain many more high-value technology items, such as tablets, and electronic stuff, the sales decline isn't as bad - sales in those stores are about four or five percentage points better (or not as ghastly) as in older-format stores.

BBC: HMV clinging on

The e-book's creators say that they were turning over electronic treatments for books such as "Dawn Treader" well before technology for devices such the iPad, or Samsung's Galaxy, which was released this week, even existed.

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On the technology side, cloud based services and electronic payment methods such as PayPal, Google Wallet and mobile payment enable these services to be consumed any time, any place.

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While praising government "successes" with technology in Britain, such as taking broadband into every school, introducing electronic border controls and electronic data records in hospitals, Mr Brown said more needed to be done.

BBC: PM launching online question time