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Security

EVE Bans Exploiters; Dropping 2% of Users Cuts Average CPU Usage 30% 261

Posted by Soulskill from the and-stay-out dept.
Earthquake Retrofit writes "Ars has a story about EVE Online banning thousands of accounts for real-world trading of in-game money for profit. From the article: 'Those who buy and sell ISK, the game's currency, are not only exploiting the game, but unbalancing play. That's why the company decided to go drastic: a program they called "Unholy Rage." For weeks they studied the behavior and effects these real-money traders had on the game, and then they struck. During scheduled maintenance, over 6,000 accounts were banned. [Einar Hreiðarsson, EVE's lead GM,] assures us that the methods were sound, and the bannings went off with surgical precision. ... While the number of accounts banned in the opening phase of the operation constituted around 2 percent of the total active registered accounts, the CPU per user usage was cut by a good 30 percent.' Looks like they got the right 6,000.' Further information and more graphs are available from the EVE dev blog."
Graphics

Working With Ogg Theora and the Video Tag 187

Posted by samzenpus from the fighting-the-good-fight dept.
An anonymous reader writes "The Free Software Foundation's Holmes Wilson is just back from Berlin, where he participated in the Ogg Theora book sprint put on by FLOSS Manuals. Here is a broad look at Ogg Theora and how it fits into the push for free formats: where we're winning, what works, and what could be improved."

Scientists Find Way To Combat Forged DNA 45

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the i'll-see-your-dna-evidence-and-raise-you-an-authenticator dept.
An anonymous reader writes to tell us that while scientists may have learned how to forge DNA, it appears that a group of Israeli scientists has created a DNA authentication method that is able to distinguish between real and faked DNA samples. "The new process was tested on natural and artificial samples of blood, saliva and touched surfaces, with complete success, Nucleix said. It also identifies 'contaminated' DNA that has been mixed with two or more samples."

Comment Re:Jet Moto (Score 2, Interesting) 119

by MogNuts (#28959903) Attached to: <em>Wipeout HD</em> Loading Ads Scrapped After Uproar

Ur exactly right. That's what everyone doesn't realize. Ads won't lower the cost one cent. Not *one* game will be made cheaper, even if they are making more money via delivering ads.

The answer is simple. No more complaining & then just keep on buying like normal, just do one or all of the following 3 things:

1) NEVER buy games with in-game ads. If they are added retroactively, then:
a) No longer purchase games from the developer/publisher (whoever is at fault)
b) Buy a *used* copy of the game you want--never let the publisher/developer get another new sale from you.
c) Speaking in Wipeout's case, if it's available only via download, see 1a.

2) Only play games with ads that are completely free

3) If it comes to it, switch to PC gaming. I'm sure that there will be an "adblock" for games if things get too ridiculous.

Comment Infringing use of Apple's Safari logo? (Score 1) 310

by PrimeWaveZ (#28943649) Attached to: Bell Starts Hijacking NX Domain Queries

I would imagine that their use of the Apple-designed Safari logo (it is stored on their server at http://assist.infospace.com.edgesuite.net/bellassist/pics/compass.png) is an infringing use of Apple's intellectual property, especially if it is designed to appear as though Safari itself generated the message and cause confusion as to the source of the message.

Get Apple legal's hounds on Bell and see what happens.

Comment Re:Safari still a memory pig? Crash protection? (Score 2, Informative) 465

by 666999 (#26976921) Attached to: Safari 4 Released, Claimed "30 Times Faster Than IE7"

Session restore? SafariStand works great, and brings a whole raft of other features as well, such as click-to-play Flash.
Ad-blocking? I use SafariBlock with Rick752's EasyList.
Both are free.

I can't comment on your issue with Safari's memory usage, as I haven't experienced the same problem.
Internet Explorer

Microsoft Rushes Internet Explorer Patch 376

Posted by CmdrTaco from the open-source-is-faster dept.
drquoz writes "Last week, it was reported that a critical security flaw was found in Internet Explorer. On Tuesday, experts were advising users not to use IE until a patch could be released. On Wednesday, Microsoft released the patch. An interesting quote from the article: 'Kandek suggests that Microsoft is at a disadvantage in updating Internet Explorer because its browser doesn't have a built-in update mechanism like other browser makers. Mozilla, for instance, just released Firefox 3.05 to Firefox users through its auto-update system.'"
Education

Warner Music Pushing Music Tax For Universities 375

Posted by timothy from the randian-villains dept.
An anonymous reader writes "Warner Music is pitching the idea of a 'music tax' for various top universities. The idea is that students would be free to file share, but the university needs to monitor and track everything, create a pool of money, hand it over to a recording industry entity that promises to distribute the proceeds fairly. In exchange, the university gets a 'covenant not to sue' from the music labels. It's not a full license, just a basic promise that they won't sue. It's also claimed that this is 'voluntary' but the Warner Music guy says that they need to include all universities and all ISPs to really make it work. It's basically a music tax, where the recording industry gets to sit back and collect money."
The Courts

New Hampshire Law Students Take On RIAA 173

Posted by timothy from the or-die-die-die dept.
NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "We have recently learned that another law school legal aid clinic has joined the fight against the RIAA. Student attorneys from the Consumer and Commercial Law Clinic of the Franklin Pierce Law Center in Concord, New Hampshire, working under law school faculty supervision, are representing a lady targeted by the RIAA in UMG Recording v. Roy in New Hampshire. The case is scheduled for trial next Fall. That makes at least 4 law schools providing anti-RIAA defense services: University of Maine, University of San Francisco, Franklin Pierce, and, most recently, Harvard. Hopefully many more will follow. One commentator theorizes that this news 'will ... [encourage] professors and students at other law schools to take on hitherto defenseless people being pilloried by the corporate music industry.'"
Linux Business

Microsoft To Buy $100M More SUSE Support Vouchers 157

Posted by timothy from the whole-lot-of-sweetness dept.
CWmike writes "Microsoft will buy and resell up to another $100 million worth of enterprise support subscriptions for Novell's SUSE Linux Enterprise Server operating system. Two years ago, Microsoft agreed to buy and resell $240 million worth of the vouchers. Susan Hauser, general manager of strategic partnerships and licensing at Microsoft, confirmed that some of the subscription vouchers were sold to customers for less than face value, though none were given away for free."

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