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Privacy

Submission + - Judge orders TorrentSpy to turn over "RAM" (zdnet.com)

Submitted by
virgil_disgr4ce
virgil_disgr4ce writes: "In a monumental example of the gap of understanding between legal officials and technology, U.S. Magistrate Judge Jacqueline Chooljian "found that a computer server's RAM, or random-access memory, is a tangible document that can be stored and must be turned over in a lawsuit." ZDNet, among others, reports on the ruling and its potential for invasion of privacy."
Patents

Submission + - eBay may Lose "Buy it Now" Button in Paten (lawbean.com)

Submitted by
Spamicles
Spamicles writes: "A judge has delayed his ruling on the eBay patent infringement case. eBay has been involved in a legal dispute over the use of its popular "Buy it Now" button, which allows consumers to skip the bidding and purchase items on eBay directly. The patent suit was filed six years ago by MercExchange L.L.C. In May of 2003, a jury ruled in MercExchange's favor finding that eBay did in fact infringe on the patent, but in 2005 the US Supreme Court ruled that MercExchange was not automatically entitled to a court order blocking the offending service, essentially handing a victory down to patent reform advocates. However, the ruling by the Supreme Court does not affect the final judgment of the court."
United States

Submission + - Game educates players on political redistricting

Submitted by jhsiao
jhsiao writes: As mentioned on NPR, students at the University of Southern California have created a game showing the power politicians wield in the redistricting process. The game has several missions showing how gerrymandering can be used to create an advantage for one party (like in Texas), to entrench incumbents of both parties (as mentioned before in Slashdot here), or to establish minority representation.
Education

Student Attempting To Improve School Security Suspended 282

Posted by Zonk from the no-good-deed-goes-unpunished dept.
TA_TA_BOX writes "The University of Portland has handed a one-year suspension to an engineering major after he designed a program to bypass the Cisco Clean Access (CCA). According to the University of Portland's Vice President of Information Systems, the purpose of the CCA is to evaluate whether the computers are compliant with current security policies (i.e., anti-virus software, Windows Updates and Patches, etc.). Essentially the student wrote a program that could fool the CCA to think that the computers operating system and anti-virus were fully patched and up to date. 'In the design of his computer program, Maass looked at the functions CCA provides and identified vulnerabilities where it could be bypassed. He wrote a program that emulated the same functions as CCA and eliminated some security issues. He says that the method he chose is "one of six that I came up with." Maass says his intent was not malicious. Rather, the sophomore says he was examining vulnerabilities so that they could be fixed. "I was planning on going to Cisco with the vulnerability this summer," Maass says. '"
The Internet

Illinois Bill Would Ban Social Networking Sites 293

Posted by kdawson from the including-Obama's dept.
AlexDV writes "Library blogger Michael Stephens is reporting that an Illinois state senator, Matt Murphy (R-27, Palatine), has filed a bill that 'Creates the Social Networking Web site Prohibition Act. Provides that each public library must prohibit access to social networking Web sites on all computers made available to the public in the library. Provides that each public school must prohibit access to social networking Web sites on all computers made available to students in the school.' Here is the bill's full text." This local effort harks back to an attempt last May to get federal legislation banning school and library use of social networking sites (Wikipedia summary here). The DOPA bill passed the House but died in the Senate.
Music

EMI May Sell Entire Collection as DRM-less MP3s 188

Posted by Zonk from the and-away-we-go dept.
BobbyJo writes "According to the Chicago Sun-Times, EMI has been pitching the possibility of selling its entire music collection to the public in MP3 form ... without Digital Rights Management protections. According to the article, several other major music companies have considered this same route, but none as far as EMI. The reasons, of course, have nothing to do with taking a moral stand; EMI wants to compete with Apple. 'The London-based EMI is believed to have held talks with a wide range of online retailers that compete with Apple's iTunes. Those competing retailers include RealNetworks Inc., eMusic.com, MusicNet Inc. and Viacom Inc.'s MTV Networks. People familiar with the matter cautioned that EMI could still abandon the proposed strategy before implementing it. A decision about whether to keep pursuing the idea could come as soon as today.'"
It's funny. Laugh.

Boston Globe to Blogger — "Stop Using Opera" 465

Posted by kdawson from the what-part-of-'modern'-do-you-not-understand dept.
PetManimal writes "Mac Daniels of the Boston Globe weighed in on a prickly debate involving the updated local mass transit website. The Globe's advice to one complainer named 'derspatchel': Stop using Opera. Derspatchel's response is to go medieval on Daniels' ass, and ask the question: Why should Opera users give up their browser? Quoting: 'I don't give two whoops about the "percentage of the Internet population" or whatever. I don't care if a website works on someone else's choice of browser; I care if it works or not on my choice of browser. It's a modern browser, it's in active development, and it's free. Once dev stops on the Opera browser and the last version becomes outdated and unable to support newer Web innovations, then I'll "stop using it." How's that, Chuckles?'" After a day the transit authority took the new site offline to "improve performance," reverting to the old version.

Running a Non-Partisan Political Forum? 116

Posted by Cliff from the a-sensible-discussion-of-politics dept.
cptnHaddock asks: "The internet was supposed to give a new breath to democracy. While there has been some interesting initiatives, I feel a lot more could be done. Do you have any experience, tips to share, about running a non-partisan political forum? How to encourage well-thought postings and filter out the cynical ramblings, and how to moderate without censoring? Is there any good software that you would recommend for that task? Are there other solutions even better suited to running a policy-oriented discussion board?"

FairUse4WM Breaks Windows DRM 617

Posted by CmdrTaco from the not-so-secret-any-more dept.
An anonymous reader writes "FairUse4WM, according to engadget, "can be used to strip Windows Media DRM 10 and 11". What does the slashdot community think of this development in the ongoing cat-and-mouse game going on between big media and what is available online?"

Do Not Flush Your iPod 510

Posted by CmdrTaco from the ipods-on-the-mother-fing-plane dept.
realjordanna writes "Clearly the bar for what is deemed as a security threat has had to be lowered — but should it be this low? When a rather embarrassed passenger loses his iPod in the lavatory — even admits to the crew his mistake, the plane is diverted to Ottawa and a bomb squad is brought in to investigate. Read the iPod owner's story and take one lesson from this kid's plight — clearly the iPod is not flushable."

CEO Shawn Hogan Takes on MPAA 491

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the how-long-till-it-stops dept.
IAmTheDave writes "Shawn Hogan, CEO of Digital Point Solutions, has found himself on the receiving end of an MPAA lawsuit claiming he downloaded a copy of 'Meet the Fockers' on Bittorrent. Mr. Hogan both denies the charges as well as claims he already owns the movie on DVD. After being asked to pay a $2500 extortion fee, Mr. Hogan lawyered up and has vowed to challenge and help change the MPAA's tactics. 'They're completely abusing the system,' Hogan says. Although expecting to pay well over $100,000 to defend himself, he claims 'I would spend well into the millions on this.'"

Yahoo! Sells, Advocates DRM-Free Music 244

Posted by Zonk from the could-have-picked-a-better-lead-artist dept.
prostoalex writes "Jessica Simpson's 'A Public Affair' will be sold on Yahoo! Music in MP3 format with no DRM attached. According to Yahoo! Music blog, this is a big deal for the major online music store: 'As you know, we've been publicly trying to convince record labels that they should be selling MP3s for a while now. Our position is simple: DRM doesn't add any value for the artist, label (who are selling DRM-free music every day -- the Compact Disc), or consumer, the only people it adds value to are the technology companies who are interested in locking consumers to a particular technology platform. We've also been saying that DRM has a cost. It's very expensive for companies like Yahoo! to implement. We'd much rather have our engineers building better personalization, recommendations, playlisting applications, community apps, etc, instead of complex provisioning systems which at the end of the day allow you to burn a CD and take the DRM back off, anyway!'"

Shuttle To Fly Without Safety Revisions 174

Posted by Zonk from the gotta-get-up-there dept.
HaloZero writes "In the face of safety concerns, NASA has decided to proceed with launching the Space Shuttle Discovery in July without changes to the external fuel tank. The article states that even though Discovery's last launch shed a huge 1-pound chunk of potentially devastating foam, they're willing to wait to change the spec on the disposable tank. The changes would modify the Ice/Frost Ramp assemblies, which prevent a buildup of ice on fuel lines and cables (as a side effect, they also have a tendency to dislodge large chunks of insulation)."

Are National ID Cards a Good Idea? 746

Posted by Cliff from the we-already-have-driver's-licenses-and-passports dept.
Dracophile asks: "The Sydney Morning Herald recently ran a front-page article about a 'smart card' to access government services and that it would double as a national identity card. The article points out that the current Prime Minister of Australia, John Howard, who fiercely opposed from opposition the Australia Card idea in 1985, is now a supporter. The article goes on to say that about 100 nations have some form of ID card. Is your country one of them? What concerns were raised? How were they addressed? Have welfare fraud and other identity-related crimes decreased? Have National ID cards improved or deteriorated conditions where you live?"

Google Violates Miro's Copyright? 651

Posted by CmdrTaco from the you-gotta-be-kidding-me dept.
Anonymous Coward writes "In a homage to Joan Miro on his birthday, Google changed its logo as to spell out the word "Google" in Miro's style. Google has a history of changing its logo in order to commemorate events and holidays of particular significance. In this case, the homage was not well received by the Miro family or the Artists Rights Society which represents them, as reported by the Mercury News. According to Theodore Feder, president of the ARS, "There are underlying copyrights to the works of Miro, and they are putting it up without having the rights". The ARS demanded that Google removed the logo, and Google complied, though not without adding that it did not believe it was in violation of copyright. The ARS has raised similar complaints regarding Google's tribute to Salvador Dali in 2002. "It's a distortion of the original works and in that respect it violates the moral rights of the artist," Feder said." It seems to me that the art world has a glorious history of incorporating prior art into modern creations. It's amusing to me that ARS doesn't understand that.

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