WH44 - Slashdot User

DHS Seizes 75+ Domain Names 529

Posted by Soulskill on Saturday November 27, 2010 @03:43PM from the going-for-the-gusto dept.

Many readers have sent in an update to yesterday's story about the Department of Homeland Security's seizure of torrent-finder.com, a domain they believe to be involved in online piracy. As it turns out, this was just one of dozens of websites that were targeted by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. "In announcing that operation, John T. Morton, the assistant secretary of ICE, and representatives of the Motion Picture Association of America called it a long-term effort against online piracy, and said that suspected criminals would be pursued anywhere in the world. 'American business is under assault from counterfeiters and pirates every day, seven days a week,' Mr. Morton said. 'Criminals are stealing American ideas and products and distributing them over the Internet.'" The TorrentFreak article we discussed yesterday has been updated with a list of the blocked sites.

Windows Phone Permanently Modifies MicroSD Cards, Warns Samsung 426

Posted by timothy on Sunday November 14, 2010 @02:33PM from the oh-didn't-we-mention-that dept.

dotancohen writes "Don't put your MicroSD cards into Windows Phones. According to Samsung, doing so is a 'permanent modification' to the card, and it can no longer be used in other devices."

Former Student Gets 30 Months For Political DDoS Attacks 486

Posted by Soulskill on Saturday November 06, 2010 @07:12PM from the distributed-denial-of-freedom-attack dept.

wiredmikey writes "A former University of Akron student was sentenced Friday to 30 months in prison, followed by 3 years of supervised release for conducting denial of service attacks on the sites of several prominent conservative figures as well as infecting several systems with botnet software. Mitchell L. Frost, age 23, of Bellevue, Ohio admitted that between August 2006 and March 2007, he initiated denial of service attacks on web servers hosting the sites of political commentators, including Bill O'Reilly, Rudy Giuliani, Ann Coulter, and others."

CBC Bans Use of Creative Commons Music On Podcasts 148

Posted by timothy on Friday October 08, 2010 @07:47PM from the but-that's-un-canadian dept.

An anonymous reader writes "The producers of the popular CBC radio show Spark have revealed (see the comments) that the public broadcaster has banned programs from using Creative Commons licenced music on podcasts. The decision is apparently the result of restrictions in collective agreements the CBC has with some talent agencies. In other words, groups are actively working to block the use of Creative Commons licenced alternatives in their contractual language. It is enormously problematic to learn that our public broadcaster is blocked from using music alternatives that the creators want to make readily available. The CBC obviously isn't required to use Creative Commons licenced music, but this highlights an instance where at least one of its programs wants to use it and groups that purport to support artists' right to choose the rights associated with their work is trying to stop them from doing so."

Comment Re:No numerical ID for small businesses (Score 2, Insightful) 342

by WH44 on Friday September 24, 2010 @02:12PM (#33689988) Attached to: I am employee number ...

*whoosh*

MPAA Asks If ACTA Can Be Used To Block Wikileaks 322

Posted by timothy on Tuesday September 21, 2010 @07:30PM from the form-a-protest-group-called-acta-up dept.

An anonymous reader writes "With the entertainment industry already getting laws to block certain sites, it appears they're interested in expanding that even further. The latest is that at a meeting with ACTA negotiators in Mexico, an MPAA representative apparently asked if ACTA rules could be used to force ISPs to block 'dangerous sites' like Wikileaks. It makes you wonder why the MPAA wants to censor Wikileaks (and why it wants to use ACTA to do so). But, the guess is that if it can use Wikileaks as a proxy for including rules to block websites, how long will it be until other 'dangerous' sites, such as Torrent search engines, are included." Note: TechDirt typically has insightful commentary, but make of the original (Spanish) twiiter message what you will.

T-Mobile Facing Lawsuit Over Text Message Censorship 181

Posted by Soulskill on Saturday September 18, 2010 @09:30AM from the stirring-the-pot dept.

Tootech writes with this quote from Wired: "A mobile-marketing company claimed Friday it would go out of business unless a federal judge orders T-Mobile to stop blocking its text-messaging service, the first case testing whether wireless providers can block text messages they don't like. EZ Texting claims T-Mobile blocked the company from sending text messages for all of its clients after learning that legalmarijuanadispensary.com, an EZ Texting client, was using its service to send texts about legal medical marijuana dispensaries in California. 'T-Mobile subjectively did not approve of one of the thousands of lawful businesses and non-profits served by EZ Texting,' according to New York federal lawsuit."

FBI Prioritizes Copyright Over Missing Persons 372

Posted by CmdrTaco on Tuesday August 10, 2010 @07:56PM from the well-that-makes...-something dept.

An anonymous reader writes "The FBI has limited resources, so it needs to prioritize what it works on. However, it's difficult to see why dealing with copyright infringement seems to get more attention than identity theft or missing persons. In the past year, the FBI has announced a special new task force to fight intellectual property infringement, but recent reports have shown that both identity theft and missing persons have been downgraded as priorities by the FBI, to the point that there are a backlog of such cases."

The Sun Unleashes Coronal Mass Ejection At Earth 220

Posted by Soulskill on Monday August 02, 2010 @04:54PM from the return-fire dept.

astroengine writes "Yesterday morning, at 08:55 UT, NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory detected a C3-class flare erupt inside a sunspot cluster. 100,000 kilometers away, deep within the solar atmosphere (the corona), an extended magnetic field filled with cool plasma forming a dark ribbon across the face of the sun (a feature known as a 'filament') erupted at the exact same time. It seems very likely that both eruptions were connected after a powerful shock wave produced by the flare destabilized the filament, causing the eruption. A second solar observatory, the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory, then spotted a huge coronal mass ejection blast into space, straight in the direction of Earth. Solar physicists have calculated that this magnetic bubble filled with energetic particles should hit Earth on August 3, so look out for some intense aurorae — a solar storm is coming."

ASCAP Refuses To Debate Lessig 183

Posted by timothy on Wednesday July 28, 2010 @07:08PM from the as-do-I dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Back in June ASCAP oddly declared war on free culture, specifically calling out Creative Commons, EFF and Public Knowledge, making a number of false statements about all three. The war of words continued as the three groups responded politely, pointing out the errors in the statement from ASCAP's Paul Williams. Larry Lessig wrote a blog post where he asked Williams to debate these topics, saying that it might help if they could get away from making false statements. Williams has now publicly declined to debate saying that it's not worth his time, and once again attacking these groups for trying to 'silence' him. It's difficult to see how a request for a public discussion and debate is an attempt to silence, but that's ASCAP's position and they're sticking to it."

Comment Re:well... (Score 3, Informative) 428

by WH44 on Tuesday July 27, 2010 @06:08AM (#33042014) Attached to: Your Online Education Experience?

What high school did you go to? I went to an excellent high school: the year I graduated (1979), 1/3 of the graduating class were PSAT/NMSQT finalists (note: semi-finalists are in the 99th percentile). I was one of three students that took Calculus BC (the most advanced math they had), and Fourier and Z-Transforms were definitely not covered. I did learn about Fourier in the Summer of '77, but it was entirely unrelated to school (a project for a university professor).

Submission + - Video Games Live: Comic-Con Edition Review (monstersandcritics.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 26, 2010 @03:36AM

An anonymous reader writes: People of all ages and ethnicities were brought together by the conductor's swaying baton – leading the exuberant crowd on a journey through video game history.

Submission + - Licit Synthetic Producers Ahead of The Law (examiner.ie)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 26, 2010 @03:00AM

An anonymous reader writes: The Irish Examiner writes of the wave of new licit synthetics drugs that use the same receptors as illicit drugs. The first wave of news laws banning them has already swept Europe; yet organized manufactures have new ones on the market already.

http://www.examiner.ie/ireland/fears-mysterious--head-shop-drugs-are-toxic-126203.html

Submission + - Louisiana Public School Mulling Intelligent Design (2theadvocate.com) 4

Submitted by rollcall on Monday July 26, 2010 @01:21AM

rollcall writes: The Livingston, Louisiana public school district is considering introducing intelligent design into its science curriculum. During the board's meeting Thursday, several board members expressed an interest in the teaching of creationism. "Benton said that under provisions of the Science Education Act enacted last year by the Louisiana Legislature, schools can present what she termed 'critical thinking and creationism' in science classes. Board Member David Tate quickly responded: 'We let them teach evolution to our children, but I think all of us sitting up here on this School Board believe in creationism. Why can't we get someone with religious beliefs to teach creationism?' Fellow board member Clint Mitchell responded, 'I agree...you don't have to be afraid to point out some of the fallacies with the theory of evolution. Teachers should have the freedom to look at creationism and find a way to get it into the classroom.'"

Submission + - T-Mobile USA Launches IPv6 Beta Program (google.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 25, 2010 @11:59PM

An anonymous reader writes: With the number of free IPv4 addresses falling below 7% and dramatic growth in smartphone subscribers, always on wireless data connections, and the emerging field of machine to machine communication, it is the wireless companies that are driving depletion of IPv4 addresses. That said, it makes sense the wireless companies should be leading the way with IPv6. T-Mobile USA has an IPv6 beta service that is currently live all over the USA. Other major movements with IPv6 include Comcast's IPv6 service and Verizon Wireless will have IPv6 as part of their next generation network.

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