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Anti-Piracy Dog Uncovers Huge Cache of Discs Screenshot-sm 283

sgt scrub writes "I've never thought about sniffing my CDs before buying them but that is all about to change. According to this Yahoo! news article, dogs can be trained to tell the difference between a legit copy of a DVD and one from those pesky pirates. From the article, 'A DVD-sniffing anti-piracy dog named Paddy has uncovered a huge cache of 35,000 discs in Malaysian warehouses, many destined for export to Singapore, industry officials said on Wednesday. Paddy was given to Malaysia by the MPA to help close down piracy syndicates, which churn out vast quantities of illegal DVDs. The dog is specially trained to detect chemicals in the discs.'" We ran a story about anti-piracy dogs being trained in Ireland a few years ago.
Portables

Arrington's Web Tablet Nearly Ready For Launch? 140

narramissic writes "The 'dead simple and dirt cheap' touchscreen Web tablet that Michael Arrington of TechCrunch set out to build last July seems to be nearing completion, writes blogger Peter Smith. 'The CrunchPad is a Linux-based touchscreen tablet using a browser-based UI. When you turn the unit on, it boots right into the webkit-based browser. There's a pop-up virtual keyboard for entering URLs and such (you wouldn't want to do any significant typing on it) and scrolling is via swiping the screen. When Arrington first visualized the project he was shooting for a $200 price point, then discovered that a $299 price was more realistic.'"

Comment Re:Lame site, and a bizarre video (Score 0) 644

I had to watch for this and spent maybe 3-4 minutes replaying that section of the video just to be safe. While at first glace the guy is doing that particular salute he's just calling for a cab. Still it would make a great 3-4 second spot to throw up on youtube and start calling Microsoft the next nazi goverment.
Who knows maybe you'll be arrested for slander, or protected by freedom of speech. maybe...

Comment Re:Actually the 'fanboy' wrote a nice piece (Score 0) 834

I found the series a few episodes in, I do admit I was lost & intrigued, but I then spent the time to actually start from pilot. From then on I have not missed the show.
The storyline had a core plot, then at last count seven major sub plots. Several of them had been sorted out by the end of the last season opening up another major set of plots.
While I do agree the Terminator franchise had both a positive & negative impact on the show. It could of just been "The Connor Chronicles" and it might of had a chance. But without the Terminator name it also probably did not get it's initial start.
This mostly my opinion and all, I feel that it was the better choice to keep over Dollhouse even if just for another season. This coming from a Whedonite fan on all his projects.
Operating Systems

64-Bit Slackware Is Alive 164

t0mg writes with this news from the top of Slackware.org "from the Slackware64-current changelog: [tap tap tap]... Is this thing on? ;-) Ready or not, Slackware has now gone 64-bit with an official x86_64 port being maintained in-sync with the regular x86 -current branch. DVDs will be available for purchase from the Slackware store when Slackware 13.0 is released. Many thanks go out to the Slackware team for their help with this branch and a special thank you to Eric Hameleers who did the real heavy lifting re-compiling everything for this architecture, testing, re-testing, and staying in-sync with -current. We've been developing and testing Slackware64 for quite a while. Most of the team is already using Slackware64 on their personal machines, and things are working well enough that it is time to let the community check our work. We'd like to thank the unofficial 64 bit projects for taking up the slack for us for so long so that we could take our time getting everything just right. Without those alternatives, we would have been pressured to get things out before they were really ready."
Censorship

Craigslist Fights Back, Sues SC Atty General 286

FredMastro writes "Craigslist has now stepped past just asking for an apology. The Wall Street Journal and CNet report that Craigslist is fighting back. 'Craigslist said it has sued South Carolina Attorney General Henry McMaster, in the latest escalation of a battle over adult-oriented ads on the company's site. Jim Buckmaster, Craigslist's chief executive, said in a blog post that the company filed its suit in federal court in South Carolina. ...'" Unfortunately, the WSJ's piece requires a subscription, but reader Locke2005 adds a link to coverage in the San Jose Business Journal.

Comment Re:From TFA (Score 0) 859

Yet I feel this will be sold as a tool for parents to control their children. Sell it with a GPS tracking package. Ability to track your child's driving history. " Is teenage Susan going to Jenny's house or Johnny's. Well now you can know the truth. " I can see the GPs used to track movements as cops are tracking teens via myspace & facebook to find out when & where the local parties are going on.
I see the merit, but when my child can drive I hope that I can place my trust her driving. I have 10 years to find out.
Transportation

Australia, UK To Test Vehicle Speed-Limiting Devices 859

nemesisrocks writes "The New South Wales government is set to begin testing a device that will limit the speed of drivers because 'excessive speed is one of the primary ways that people are killed while driving.' Located on the dashboard, it senses a driver's speed with the use of GPS. If the speed of a car goes over the posted legal limit, a warning sounds. If the driver ignores the warning, the device eventually cuts all power to the car because a cut-off switch has been installed between the accelerator and the engine." The Times Online reports that the same system will be tested in the UK this summer for use in taxis and buses.
The Courts

RIAA Victim Jammie Thomas Gets a New Lawyer 241

newtley writes "Only days after Brian Toder, her previous legal representative, had decided discretion was the better part of valour, leaving her fend for herself against the RIAA, Jammie Thomas says another lawyer has come forward with an offer of pro bono help. He's K.A.D. Camara from Camara & Sibley in Houston, Texas, says Jammie. And, 'He's the youngest person in history to graduate from Harvard Law school with honors,' she points out. Nor will her retrial be delayed, as was expected. It'll now go forward in June 15, as slated. 'I'm so happy!' Jammie said."

Comment Re:Legos (Score 0) 210

As my retired language arts(English) teacher said. Ebonics is one of the many reasons to why children these days cannot actually pronounce things properly.
As for the mixed tense sentence, I do not know.
For eye-rack instead of ee-raq, it falls back to those who apperently cannot pronounce a work and rely on the media to pronounce if for them. As for soldier, I have always pronounced it "sol-jer" but back to the previous statement, I blame Ebonics & mostly the Media for the stupidity of America today, including myself. it doesn't help that parents fear their children. But that is a different subject.
The Media

News Corp Will Charge For Newspaper Websites 453

suraj.sun writes "Rupert Murdoch says having free newspaper websites is a 'flawed' business model. Rupert Murdoch expects to start charging for access to News Corporation's newspaper websites within a year as he strives to fix a 'malfunctioning' business model. Encouraged by booming online subscription revenues at the Wall Street Journal, the billionaire media mogul last night said that papers were going through an 'epochal' debate over whether to charge. 'That it is possible to charge for content on the web is obvious from the Wall Street Journal's experience,' he said."
The Internet

What Data Center Designers Can Learn From Legos 210

1sockchuck writes "It takes most companies at least a year to build a new data center. Digital Realty Trust says it can build a new data center in just 20 weeks using standard designs and modular components that can be assembled on site. The company equates its 'building blocks' approach to data centers to building with Legos — albeit with customized parts (i.e. the Millennium Falcon Lego kit). Microsoft is taking a similar approach, packaging generators, switchgear and UPS units into pre-assembled components for rapid assembly. Is this the future of data center design?"
The Military

Unclean Military Hard Drives Sold On eBay 369

An anonymous reader writes "The Daily Mail reports, 'Highly sensitive details of a US military missile air defense system were found on a second-hand hard drive bought on eBay. The test launch procedures were found on a hard disk for the THAAD (Terminal High Altitude Area Defense) ground to air missile defense system, used to shoot down Scud missiles in Iraq. The disk also contained security policies, blueprints of facilities, and personal information on employees (including social security numbers) belonging to technology company Lockheed Martin — who designed and built the system.' Scary that they did not wipe it to Department of Defense standards, which I believe is wiping the whole disk and then writing 1010 all over it."

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