Senate Judiciary Committee staff have launched a preliminary probe into whether Windows RT, the coming version of Windows 8 for ARM processors, is anticompetitive because it gives preferential treatment to Microsoft's Internet Explorer Web browser.

Mozilla, maker of the Firefox Web browser, alleged last week that Microsoft intentionally is building advantages for IE into Windows RT over other browsers.

An aide to Judiciary antitrust subcommittee Chairman Herb Kohl, D-Wis., told reporters that Mozilla's charges will be examined by subcommittee staff. The initial efforts will be exploratory rather than a full-blown official inquiry involving hearings, the aide said.

Microsoft refuses to give Mozilla and other third-party software developers access to the requisite APIs for building browsers that can fully access Windows RT's complete set of capabilities when running in Metro mode. The rival browser maker claims that this violates a 2006 antitrust settlement between Microsoft and the U.S. Department of Justice.

Google is also wary concerning how Microsoft's Windows RT strategy may affect Google's Chrome browser.

"We share the concerns Mozilla has raised regarding the Windows 8 environment restricting user choice and innovation," a Google spokesperson said in an e-mail.

Locking Out Competitors

Google noted that it has always welcomed innovation in the browser space across all platforms and strongly believes that having great competitors makes everyone work harder.

"In the end, consumers and developers benefit the most from robust competition," Google's spokesperson said.

However, that won't happen if Microsoft succeeds in locking out competing browsers when it comes to Windows running on mobile computing devices such as laptops as well as media tablets equipped with ARM-based chips.

"Microsoft made legally binding commitments around antitrust [which doesn't] go away because Microsoft wishes them away," said Asa Dotzler, the community coordinator for Firefox marketing projects. "None of the commitments talk about hardware -- tablet or laptop, ARM or x86...

Cash, coins and credit cards are so Twentieth Century. At least, that's the opinion of the electronics manufacturers, phone companies, banks and credit card issuers that expect cellphones to be the main way consumers pay for purchases in the not-so-distant future.

The trouble is, that vision-of-tomorrow is somewhat blurry, as evidenced at the U.S. cellphone industry trade show held this week in New Orleans. There are a lot of ideas, but little agreement.

The stakes, however, are high.

"Eighty-five percent of the world's transactions are still made with cash and checks. We have a wonderful opportunity to convert those," said Gary Flood, MasterCard's president of global products and solutions, in a keynote speech at the show.

One concept that gets a lot of attention is the "digital wallet" -- a virtual repository for our credit card numbers, receipts, coupons. It's not much different from a PayPal account, which can be linked to different cards. A lot of companies see the wallet as the key to influence in the world of mobile payments, especially if it sits on a cellphone, not just on a PC. Google introduced its Wallet last year. It's available on a few phones that can be tapped against certain payment terminals to complete a payment.

Andrew Lorentz, a lawyer at Davis Wright Tremaine LLP who works with the payments industry, said at the show that if he had a dime for every digital wallet that's been announced, he'd be rich.

"I can have more wallets than cards," he said.

At the show, MasterCard announced a service that could speed up wallet proliferation even more. The company's idea is to let any company that wants to set up its own wallet.

"The idea behind this is: How do we get more wallets and more innovation?" said Ed Olebe, MasterCard's senior vice president of e-commerce development.

Consumers trust...

Google Wallet hopes to make a comeback -- or at least turn some heads -- when it debuts on its second device. After a poor reception on Sprint in September, Google Wallet is about to show up on the LG Optimus Elite through Virgin Mobile.

Google Wallet is a free Android app that lets customers turn their smartphones into wallets and make purchases with the tap of the phone. The app stores virtual versions of your credit cards, offers and loyalty cards on the smartphone.

Google Wallet currently supports Citi MasterCard credit cards and the Google Prepaid MasterCard, powered by First Data. Google plans to support additional cards. Some of the hundreds of thousands of participating retailers include American Eagle Outfitters, The Container Store, Macy's, Foot Locker and Subway.

Google Wallet's Slow Take-Off

The Optimus Elite debuted on Sprint's network on Sept. 20. Now, Virgin Mobile is getting into the Google Wallet game by offering the device, which features Android 2.3 Gingerbread. In order to run Google Wallet, smartphones need NFC, or near-field communication, capability. NFC is a short-range communication protocol that's similar to Bluetooth.

The Optimus Elite also offers a 3.5-inch capacitive touchscreen, 800 MHz processor, 5-megapixel rear-facing camera and camcorder with flash, virtual QWERTY keyboard and mobile hotspot capability. Consumers can also download Box on LG Optimus Elite and get 50 GB of free cloud storage and sharing directly from LG.

We asked Rob Enderle, principal analyst at the Enderle Group, how Google Wallet is performing in the marketplace. His answer: Adoption is still slow.

"Because Google owns Android, we thought Google Wallet was going to be a bigger thing sooner," Enderle told us. "But the fact that this phone is coming out from LG might indicate that we are on the front edge of what could be a Google Wallet movement. On...

Businesses now have a choice of another collaboration platform. Citrix debuted this week its team-based collaboration platform, called Podio, which is based on technology obtained during the recent purchase of the cloud service by the same name.

The unveiling of Podio is accompanied by Citrix's announcements of new integrations with other productivity and collaboration services. These include Citrix's own GoToMeeting and Sharefile, Evernote, Google Drive, Microsoft SkyDrive and SugarSync. The intent, according to the company, is to create new solutions for distributed teams -- and especially mobile ones -- to work together in the era of the cloud.

'Natural Extension' of GoToMeeting

Citrix had already announced integrations with Box, Dropbox, and Google Docs, and said that the new enhancements mean that Podio supports all major cloud file and document sharing services, as well as several popular cloud-based business tools and services, including FreshBooks, Google Apps, Campaign Monitor and Zendesk.

Bernardo de Albergaria, Citrix vice president and general manager of Collaboration, said in a statement that the social power of the Podio collaboration platform makes it the first to provide "this type of integrated, cloud-based support for team-based collaboration."

The platform allows users to connect and create workspaces for their teams, get free apps from the hundreds of free ones available in the Podio App Market, and extend or otherwise modify apps. The company said the platform is a "natural extension" of its GoToMeeting and related products.

The enhancements for GoToMeeting include the ability to connect meetings to workflows in Podio, in order to manage meetings more productively. A Podio meeting app can also be structured to support particular meetings, such as providing required content for specific tasks.

Podio also provides an Application Programming Interface, or API, for companies and outside developers to integrate the platform with other services, and to build new tools and other apps on...