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Businesses

Submission + - DVDx developer labdv.com is gone

Submitted by
BillyBurrito
BillyBurrito writes: "The developers of DVDX, currently Version 2.6. as of Dec 4, 2006, Business Plate Forme (BPF) at http://labdv.com/ seem to have been facing some serious server uptime problems for the last month or so. Right now, as of 10 pm pacific time (-7:00) on 17 January they are offline with no host server listed in DNS to serve web pages. The real sadness is the product they developed has been around for several years and is the basis of many current DVD copying packages. Perhaps it is only a momentary status, but as their front page used to say, "DVDx web hosting is very expensive because DVDx is very popular" Perhaps someone can help get them back online.

brk@mail:~$ host labdv.com
labdv.com mail is handled by 10 relay1.labdv.com.
labdv.com mail is handled by 20 relay1.bpf-pro.com.

whois info:
reg_created: 2001-03-20 09:09:03
expires: 2008-03-20 14:09:03
created: 2002-09-16 10:56:02
changed: 2007-01-16 16:53:51"
Music

Submission + - Torrent file has 1mil seeds and 1mil leechers

Submitted by
k1b2501tx
k1b2501tx writes: "I noticed today that the file "Billboard Top 100 of 2006" [ http://btjunkie.org/torrent?do=stat&id=6318cb34593 c5e2e7e41cd75556b01a5ea586b5dc63e ] on btjunkie.org has 904019 seeds and 963131 leechers. That means about 2 million people (that's about 0.6% of US's population) are downloading it or have already got it. The traffic generated by this torrent alone is approximately 1.2 Petabytes. RIAA's executives must be having mass heart attacks :)"
Hardware Hacking

Submission + - Idiot-Proof Phone Hack Wanted

Submitted by carpeweb
carpeweb writes: I'm only barely smart enough to avoid tinkering with hardware, knowing that if I do, I'll likely break it or just end up calling an expert to do it right. However, I recently acquired some new hardware, in the form of a telephone set. I would like to use the set, but I already have a two-handset phone system, fed by my VOIP box (Vonage). What (I think) I need is a wireless transmitter and receiver, so that I can connect the transmitter to the existing base unit (which is connected to the VOIP box) and then plug the new set into the receiver. The reason for this "want" is that the new set needs to sit in my office — otherwise, it doesn't do me any good.

Has anyone done anything similar? If so, can an idiot (i.e., I) do it? (i.e., are there step-by-step instructions that I could follow?) As a calibration of my idiot-ness, I was able to convert my laptop from Windows to MEPIS Linux, with so far no real problems. But I draw the line at wiring new outlets, etc. In other words, I want a plug-n-play solution, but I don't need pretty dialog boxes.
Handhelds

Submission + - Apple ad suggests iPhone will have Arm inside

Submitted by General Lee's Peking
General Lee's Peking writes: According to this article, the iPhone's CPU may be ARM instead of PowerPC. A previous article which had been retracted had jumped the gun and reported Intel as the supplier of the iPhone's CPU. So it appears Mac OS X has been ported to yet another architecture.
Hardware Hacking

Methods of Learning to Build Electronic Circuitry? 134

Posted by Cliff from the beyond-resisters-and-capacitors dept.
Peristaltic asks: "I've seen some cool articles in Instructables detailing how to create various electronic gadgets. A couple of these as well as the odd DIY kit have come to life on my kitchen table. While it's satisfying to see the things work after time spent soldering, I would love to be able to take the next step beyond the basics of component functionality, i.e. a resistor does -this-; a capacitor does -that-. Forest Mimm's books have been helpful towards this end, but it's time to move forward. Every month or so, I read here on Slashdot a plea for help getting started with, or expanding someone's knowledge of programming. OK, I'd like to make that plea for help with electronics theory & circuit building. I've found plenty of references on the web, Amazon, etc., but can someone who's already taken this trip outline what has and hasn't worked for them?"
NASA

Submission + - Software Error Likely Killed MGS Spacecraft

Submitted by Aglassis
Aglassis writes: NASA investigators have determined that a software update performed in June of 2006 may have doomed the 10 year old spacecraft. Apparently the software error caused the solar arrays to drive against a mechanical stop which then forced the spacecraft into safe mode. Unfortunately, after that the spacecraft's radiator was pointed at the sun which overheated the battery and destroyed it. Contact was lost with the Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft in November of 2006. NASA will form an internal review board to formally determine the cause of the loss of the spacecraft and what remedial actions are needed for future missions.
Media

Journal Journal: PC World Editor Slain at CA Home

Journal by d0ubleplus
"A senior editor for PC World Magazine was fatally shot in his home in what authorities said Wednesday was a drug-related attack. Rex Farrance, 59, the San Francisco, California-based magazine's senior technical editor, was shot in the chest after four masked men broke into his home Tuesday evening, Pittsburg police said. The assailants also pistol-whipped Farrance's wife, Lenore Vantosh-Farrance, 56, a registered nurse
Security

Submission + - Hotel WiFi Tracks You as You Surf

Submitted by
saccade.com
saccade.com writes: "During my last hotel stay, I thought it was a pretty strange that it took two browser re-directs before the hotel's Wi-Fi would show me the web page I browsed to. Picasa developer Michael Herf noticed the same the thing and dug a little deeper. He discovered: "...their page does some tracking of each new page you visit in your browser, outside what a normal proxy (which would have access to all your cookies and other information it shouldn't have, anyway) would do. This "adlog" hit appears to also track a "hotel ID" and some other data that identifies you more directly. Notably, I've observed these guys tracking HTTPS URLs, and of course you can't track those through a proxy.". Herf notes the WiFi service provider, SuperClick, advertises that it "allows hoteliers and conference center managers to leverage the investment they have made in their IP infrastructure to create advertising revenue, deliver targeted marketing and brand messages to guests and users on their network...""
Yahoo!

Submission + - yahoo mail forcing ads through adblock

Submitted by egNuKe
egNuKe writes: Like most SlashDotters , i use Firefox and adblock.
i blocked the ads that yahoo put in my inbox , but the next time i opened it , i found other ads.
i blocked them too.
this happened for several times.
i figured out that yahoo have some script that checks if the ad is displayed , if it is not, it displays another one.
No big problem there , i just needed to add several rules to adblock to block the several ad sources they use.

but here is the problem :
when adblock is running and effectively stopping yahoo mail ads, Firefox would freeze (all open windows and tabs) for about 15 seconds.
then the page opens and there is no ads.
turning off adblock solves the freezing problem.

did anybody else notice that ? can anybody find a cure for that ? the script must be on client side , since the client's browser freezes.

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