You may complain that football?s World Cup in Germany is pushing other more important news to the sideline.

Still, the world deserves a bit a pleasure from some of the world?s most expensive feet and the joy of seeing some of the unknowns score major upsets of the world?s giants.

For those who somehow do not have access to television broadcasts of all the matches, there are ways and means of receiving them live via your computer and the Internet.

The language may be Chinese or Japanese, the picture may be a bit fuzzy at times, but you will see them.

Here?s how. First go to www.footballstreaming.info, a forums for football fans without a feed.

Once you register, go to the various sections of the forum, one of which contains links to the software you need. I recommend TV Ants first and PPLive second.

It?s good to have a backup in case one peer-to-peer stream sharing site does not work. TV Ants is available at www.tvants.com.

Once you downloaded and installed the software go to another section which lists the links to the various sites containing the streams.

There are about five or six channels in Asia from which you can peer-to-peer stream, that is channels put on to the Internet by various individuals.

Click on one of the streams available to TV Ants and it loads up. Wait up to five minutes and you get the match you want.

According to Wired News the streaming of TV broadcasts is still a grey area in the US.

?This is extremely controversial there is no clear answer here,? says Gwen Hinze, a lawyer for the Electronic Frontier Foundation as quoted by Wired News.

?No court has squarely faced these facts. Rights holders are likely to think that this is an infringement. The EFF doesn?t agree with that.?

Obviously broadcasters have paid huge sums to gain rights to the World Cup. Any other broadcast would cut into their viewership, and ultimately advertising revenues.

However I believe they will not sue to get a decision on the issue until the technology gets better and people start watching it to gain access to pay-for-view broadcasts.

Watching a match broadcast from China is currently like looking through a bad pair of glasses. You can see the action, but not much of the footwork. It?s only an alternative if you?ve got nothing better, or want to loaf at work.

Most of us would rather just go to the official FIFA World Cup website http://fifaworldcup.yahoo.com and watch the video highlights, available soon after the matches have ended.

Since the World Cup has started I have dug up my South American roots so that I can legitimately yell ?Go Brazil Go!?. The French now want to eject me from the country.

Of course the big news in the tech world this week is Microsoft?s reluctant revelation that its anticounterfeit tool, installed on every home computer using Windows XP, is logging into the company?s servers daily. The company has since amended the programme, as detailed below.

The company?s Windows Genuine Advantage program, is supposed to register the platform and let you know if you are using a counterfeit copy of Windows, or rather exclude you from official updates if you are using one knowingly.

The problem is Microsoft did not inform buyers of the software, myself included, that the software would perform this check every day.

Microsoft confirmed the fact in a press release last week humorously entitled ?Microsoft Provides Additional Clarity About Windows Genuine Advantage Notifications?.

The program was launched in July 2005. The WGA program consists of two major components. Validation determines whether the copy of Windows XP installed on a computer is genuine and licensed.

The notification component reminds users who fail validation that they are not running genuine Windows.

The notification component checks every day whether a newer settings file is available and downloads the file if one is found.

The settings file provides Microsoft with the ability to update how often reminders are displayed and to disable the programme if necessary during the current test period.

Microsoft says the operation is limited to the download of the new settings file. No additional information is sent to the company.

?As a result of customer concerns around performance, we are changing this feature to only check for a new settings file every 14 days,? Microsoft says, while not admitting its mistake. ?This change will be made in the next release of WGA. Also, this feature will be disabled when WGA Notifications launches worldwide later this year.?

The example provides only one more example of how intrusive Microsoft, and other companies, think they can be with the public. They do not give a hoot about whether you know or not.

Thank goodness someone out there is watching the cookies.

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