It’s Republican vs. Republican on Cuba. President Bush’s senior adviser, Karl Rove, has been pressuring Republican lawmakers from farm states not to ease restrictions on travel to Cuba. By Christopher Marquis. [New York Times: Politics]

A mouse pad Couch

The economist give bush a warning

Analysts question mass move to .Net Server. Are the software giant’s customers hungry for the next version of its server operating system? The company is banking on it, but industry watchers aren’t so sure. [CNET News.com]

Valenti backs away from P2P hack bill. Not good enough for Hollywood [The Register]

Paul Andrews: “I’d feel more optimistic about R&D at Microsoft if the company could point to a single successful original product to emerge from R&D expenditure.” [Scripting News]

Microsoft Tries to Explain What Its .Net Plans Are About. Two years into its quest to create a new kind of Internet-enabled computing it describes as .Net, Microsoft found it necessary to pause Wednesday and try to explain what it meant. By John Markoff. [New York Times: Technology]

Xbox breaks US sales records. Blockbuster launch titles [The Register]

Thestar.com/Ex-Sierra Leone dictator broke, living with mom [lnk.to]

Gates: Slow going for .Net. Microsoft acknowledges that its key software plan has been slow to catch on and lays out an agenda to move it ahead. [CNET News.com]