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Java

Submission + - James Gosling Quits Oracle (nighthacks.com)

Submitted by
WebMink
WebMink writes: "On his new blog, the "father of Java" James Gosling announces that he has decided that Oracle is not a place he wants to work after all, the latest in a long line of defections from Sun's new owner."
Censorship

Submission + - Scientologists In Row With BBC

Submitted by
CmdrGravy
CmdrGravy writes: "The Church Of Scientology is currently engaged in a row with BBC over a Panorama investigation by the BBC reporter John Sweeney. John is investigating the Church Of Scientology for the program to find out if they have changed in the last few years and moved away from the questionable practices and secrecy they have employed in the past.

The row centres around a YouTube video posted by the scientologists and a DVD they have released which show Mr Sweeney losing his temper with a scientology spokesman Tom Davis in which Mr Sweeney is driven to yelling at Tom Davis at the top of his voice. Mr Sweeney has since apologised for losing his temper which he says he now realises was both wrong and stupid. In the DVD the scientologists also accuse the BBC of organising an anti scientology demonstration and yelling terrorist death threats at John Travolta, allegations which the BBC denounce as being clearly laughable and utter nonsense. John Travolta has also accused of Mr Sweeney of harbouring "personal prejudices, bigotry and animosity" against Scientology in the documentary, and accused the reporter of displaying "hatred against my religion." This despite the fact that in the UK scientology is not classed as a religion due to the financial nature of their practices.

Mr Sweeneys outburst came at the end of a tour of a scientology exhibition which attempts to portray psychiatrists as evil nazi type torturers entitled "Psychiatry: Industry of Death" which is both gruesome and utterly unconvincing. In the days previous to this Mr Sweeney and his camera team became the latest in a long line of reporters to suffer harassment at the hands of scientologists whereby he has been shouted at, spied on, denounced as a bigot by John Travolta had his hotel invaded at midnight, and had mysterious strangers visit his neighbours and family and spy on his wedding. You can begin to see why someone might lose their temper having been victim to this sort of activity.

There is an excellent article in the Telegraph and you can read about the incident in Mr Sweeneys own words here at the BBC.

The video of Mr Sweeney losing his temper is available on YouTube, the argument is about Tom Davis claiming he has said things in a previous interview with someone else at which Tom Davis was not present and therefore cannot know what he has said. During this interview with, I think, an ex scientologist Tom Davis burst in half way through to make claims that the interviewee was some kind of paedophile.

Happily it looks like the BBC is going to stand behind their reporter, judging by this interview with the programs editor and the general tone of their reporting but, really why I'm posting this on /., what can be done against an organisation so determined to prevent fair and unbiased reporting on their activities and is clearly able to utilise the power of the internet and YouTube to further their aims. The BBC is a large organisation and can survive attacks like this which would easily cause a lot more problems to individuals or smaller organisations, is there a way of levelling the playing field in favour of the general population being able to access accurate information on organisations or corporations rather than propaganda put out by the said organisations or corporations ?"
Announcements

Submission + - Supplemental Shrubbery Sound Source

Submitted by
Chris Vecchio
Chris Vecchio writes: " Supplemental Shrubbery Sound Source an installation at the Schuylkill Center for Environmental Education
May 6 — October 30, 2007


Description
An array of motion sensitive modules is installed along a section of a nature trail. When someone walks past, the modules emit sounds which supplement the sounds occurring naturally in the environment. The sound samples are arranged along the path in a sequence which proceeds from the most "natural" to the most "man-made". The effect varies depending upon which way one happens to be moving along the path. At the "natural" end, it is not clear whether what one is hearing is part of the installation or part of the (natural) landscape. Central to this installation are questions about what constitutes "natural" versus "man-made". Just as man has dramatically modified the environment through the introduction of invasive species and transformed the landscape with technological intervention, this installation supplements and modifies the forest's sound environment, both subtly and dramatically, with invasive and technological additions.

For more information: http://www.noisemantra.com/Shrubbery/S4.htm

Supplemental Shrubbery Sound Source is part of Green Machine, a multi-media exhibition featuring work by Chris Vecchio, Keiko Miyamori, and Katie Murken in partnership with P'unk Avenue."
The Internet

Submission + - Top 17 Search Innovations Outside Of Google

Submitted by
VelvetsFan
VelvetsFan writes: "There are an abundance of new search engines, each pioneering some innovation in search technology. Read/WriteWeb has a list of the top 17 search innovations that will prove disruptive in the future. These innovations are classified into four types: Query Pre-processing; Information Sources; Algorithm Improvement; Results Visualization and Post-processing. While some of these innovations are present in various Google properties, they are either missing or available only in limited form in the main search page.

The article posits: it is very likely that in the future, the simple "search box" on the Google front page will hide a variety of specialized search engines behind it. On the other hand, trying to cram in an increasing number of these sophisticated features has the potential to make the overall architecture for Google (or any mainstream web search engine) very complex and difficult to change, so the trade-offs will present an increasingly difficult challenge."
Announcements

Submission + - Jobs doubles next best among Top Paid CEOs

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: It's amazing to learn how much money CEO are getting paid these days. Some of these guys are getting paid significant fractions of the companies overall profits. When someone takes home more than half-a-billion dollars you have to wonder if they would make more money just leaving it with the company. how many cool product or R&D teams could be funded within Apple with this money? I'm sure there are some people at Apple working much harder than Jobs who aren't already billionaires that really deserve some of this... pretty darshy if you ask me. http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?com mand=viewArticleBasic&taxonomyName=careers&article Id=9018643&taxonomyId=10&intsrc=kc_top
Communications

Submission + - Free implementation of native Exchange protocol

Submitted by
Jelmer Vernooij
Jelmer Vernooij writes: "After three years of hard work, the OpenChange project has released a first version of their project, which implements MAPI, the protocol used natively by Microsofts' Exchange server. Their initial release contains a simple command-line tool for fetching and sending email from an Exchange server. Work is also on its way to build a native drop-in replacement of Exchange server, without requiring additional client plugins, as well as improvements to the client to support fetching and changing remote tasks, address books and calendars. An online demonstration of the release and its testing tools is also available."

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