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Google

People Trust Yahoo! and Google For the Brands 95

Posted by Zonk from the weighty-logos dept.
amigoro writes "Here's an interesting experiment: Copy Google results pages from four different e-commerce queries. Tell 32 test subjects who are going to evaluate the results that the results were from four different search engines: Google, MSN Live Search, Yahoo! and an in-house engine created for the study. Then see which ones they rate as the best. As it turns out Google and Yahoo! win hands down, proving that even on the Internet it's all about branding."

Feed Engadget: Next-generation Zune "Scorpio" set for July production? (engadget.com)

From feed by engfeed

Filed under: Portable Audio, Portable Video

According to a super-secret, top level official inside Microsoft's megaplexing-hyper-bunker in Redmond, the Zuneinites are readying an 80GB Zune 2.0 called the "Scorpio", which will be a companion to the also-rumored 4GB or 8GB flash-based "Draco". The rumor additionally proffers that production on the Scorpio will begin towards the end of July, although we can't recommend any fancy breath holding. The diabolical naming convention apparently stems from the original Zune codename "Argo" and its WiFi component, called "Pyxis." Regardless, if Microsoft was trying to make their products sound less Satanic, it isn't working.

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Office Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!
Privacy

Submission + - Police Chief Wants Surveillance Cameras In Homes

Submitted by
An anonymous reader writes: "I know a lot of people are concerned about Big Brother, but my response to that is, if you are not doing anything wrong, why should you worry about it?" Chief Harold Hurtt told reporters Wednesday at a regular briefing.

Full story here.
Software

Submission + - Gaim renamed to 'Pidgin'

Submitted by
edmicman
edmicman writes: "Gaim has posted an update that explains in part why the 2.0.0 version has been in beta for such a long time:

Many years ago when this project was first started, it was called "GTK+ AOL Instant Messenger." AOL naturally complained, and Mark Spencer changed the name to "Gaim." AOL was appeased, and no one really ever heard of it because there were very few users back then. A few years later AOL trademarked "AIM," and started referring to their IM services using that name. They complained. The issue was brought up on Slashdot, and the Gaim developers at the time got some legal support. That legal support advised that the ongoing discussions with AOL be kept confidential until fully settled, and so it remained. The public thought the issue had gone away then. It sorta did, in that AOL stopped responding to Gaim's legal support for a while.


At long last, I am pleased to announce that we have a signed settlement and can release our new version. There is one catch however: we have had to change the project's name. After a long, and unfortunately secret debate (as we could not say why we were looking at a name change, we ended up just doing this ourselves), we settled on the name "Pidgin" for gaim itself, "libpurple" for libgaim (which, as of 2.0.0 beta6, exists), and "Finch" for gaim-text. Yes, the spelling of "Pidgin" is intentional, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pidgin.
"
Software

Submission + - AOL sues, Gaim is now Pidgin

Submitted by Pat J
Pat J writes: Gaim has announced that the reason for the long awaited 2.0.0 release has been an ongoing discussion with AOL over rights to the name AIM. Today, they announced on their blog that Gaim 2.0.0 will now be called Pidgin and will be released within a week or so. http://gaim.sourceforge.net/index.php?id=177.
Security

Asus.com Compromised With Exploit Code 117

Posted by kdawson from the be-careful-out-there dept.
Juha-Matti Laurio writes in with news that the Web site of ASUSTeK Computer (asus.com) has been compromised to spread exploit code. The original report from Kaspersky Lab claimed that the compromise lead to code exploiting the recently patched Microsoft Windows Animated Cursor (.ANI) 0-day vulnerability, but sans.org found no evidence of this. Apparently a malicious iframe was added to one of the machines in asus.com's DNS round-robin.
The Courts

Submission + - Gaim threatened by AOL, changes name to Pidgin

Submitted by
Vorratt
Vorratt writes: "Under threat of legal action by AOL, the instant messaging client Gaim is now ... Pidgin. This is also why there haven't been any non-beta releases in a while, apparently, and they "hope to have the final Pidgin 2.0.0 release late this week or early next." It's good to see that open-source projects and big, mean ol' corporations can still come to (reasonably) civil agreements with each other."
Software

Submission + - Gaim Forced to Change Name

Submitted by Thib
Thib writes: Gaim has settled out of court with AOL over the trademark "AIM", and as a result has been renamed Pidgin. The threat of lawsuits has been secret and is described in a news post to the new Pidgin website. The developers announced that they will finally be able to come out of 2.0.0 beta limbo where they have been for years. From the article: "On legal advice, we have refrained from any non-beta release during this process as a show of good faith, and to keep AOL from giving up on it. Again, on legal advice, we have also kept this information closely controlled. At long last, I am pleased to announce that we have a signed settlement and can release our new version." Gaim-text has also been renamed Finch, and libgaim has been renamed libpurple.
United States

USPTO Peer Review Process To Begin Soon 116

Posted by Zonk from the it's-like-every-einstein's-dream-come-true dept.
An anonymous reader writes "As we've discussed several times before on Slashdot, the US patent office is looking to employ a Wiki-like process for reviewing patents. It's nowhere near as open as Wikipedia, but there are still numerous comparisons drawn to the well-known project in this Washington Post story. Patent office officials site the huge workload their case officers must deal with in order to handle the modern cycle of product development. Last year some 332,000 applications were handled by only 4,000 employees. 'The tremendous workload has often left examiners with little time to conduct thorough reviews, according to sympathetic critics. Under the pilot project, some companies submitting patent applications will agree to have them reviewed via the Internet. The list of volunteers already contains some of the most prominent names in computing, including Microsoft, Intel, Hewlett-Packard and Oracle, as well as IBM, though other applicants are welcome.'"
The Internet

China Treats Internet Addiction Very Seriously 249

Posted by Zonk from the glad-i-don't-live-in-china dept.
eldavojohn writes "China has taken new extremes in preventing internet addiction in youths and is even offering boot camps to parents who want their child weaned from the electric teat. The article notes that 'no country has gone quite as far as China in embracing the theory that heavy Internet use should be defined as a mental disorder and mounting a public crusade against Internet addiction.' The article mentions the story of Sun Jiting who 'spends his days locked behind metal bars in this military-run installation, put there by his parents. The 17-year-old high school student is not allowed to communicate with friends back home, and his only companions are psychologists, nurses and other patients. Each morning at 6:30, he is jolted awake by a soldier in fatigues shouting, "This is for your own good!"' Sun found himself spending 15 hours or straight on the internet. Thanks to his parents' intervention and the treatment, he now has life mapped out until he's 84. "
Windows

Unofficial Win2K Daylight Saving Time Fix 299

Posted by kdawson from the it's-about-time dept.
Saturn2003a writes "Microsoft has stated that they will not be offering a patch for the new US Daylight Saving Time for Windows 2000 and earlier. Only customers with an extended support agreement can get a Hotfix from Microsoft. To get around this, IntelliAdmin has created an unofficial patch (source code provided) that will fix Daylight Saving Time on Windows 2000 and Windows NT machines."
Privacy

Submission + - MINI introduces RFID-activated billboards in US

Submitted by frinkster
frinkster writes: MINI USA has placed interactive billboards in 4 US cities (Chicago, Miami, New York and San Francisco) and invited a few hundred MINI owners in those cities to join their targeted "advertisement" pilot program. The owners sign up on MINI's website and receive an RFID keyfob in the mail. When that MINI owner drives by the billboard, a targeted message appears. What sort of messages will be shown? Well, that's where the fun comes in. Each owner tells MINI what to show when they drive by, such as "Jim, you are one sexy beast" or "nice to see you finally out of your mother's basement, Joe." If the pilot program is successful, MINI plans to put up more billboards in more cities and allow every MINI owner to participate. MINI swears that no personal information in contained in the keyfobs and that all communication between the owner and user is subject to their privacy policy and thus the program is completely safe, but how well will they keep their billboard logs away from the prying eyes of local law enforcement or private detectives? And what are they doing to prevent "hackers" from changing the personal messages to insults, such as "Nice to see you finally emerge from your mother's basement"?
PC Games (Games)

Submission + - World of Warcraft now the size of New York City

Submitted by
DeadBugs
DeadBugs writes: "World Of Warcraft has passed 8 Million subscribers. This would put it on par with the population of New York (the largest city in the United States). With the first expansion coming out since the game was released, the game could easily pass 10 million people.

From the press release: "Since debuting in North America on November 23, 2004, World of Warcraft has become the most popular MMORPG around the world. Today, World of Warcraft is available in seven different languages and is played in North America, Europe, mainland China, Korea, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, and the regions of Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau.""
Businesses

AT&T Offering Merger Concessions 98

Posted by CowboyNeal from the speeding-things-along dept.
TheFarmerInTheDell writes that AT&T is offering concessions to make their merger with SBC happen as fast as possible. From the article: "AT&T filed a letter of commitment with the [Federal Communications Commission] Thursday night that adds a number of new conditions to the deal, including a promise to observe 'network neutrality' principles, an offer of affordable stand-alone digital subscriber line service and divestment of some wireless spectrum."

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