Comment The Timing Is Not a Coincidence (Score 1) 413
Russian computer technology is so outdated, they thought the Olympics were in Atlanta this year.
Submission + - Harry Potter publisher supposedly hacked 1
akahige writes: Monsters & Critics (and other sites) are reporting that hackers used milw0rm exploits to penetrate Bloomsbury Publishing and obtain a digital copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows a month before it is scheduled to hit bookstores. A hacker known as gabriel posted supposed spoilers to the Full Disclosure list. While the veracity of spoilers (or the breach itself) have not been acknowledged by the publishers, fans have expressed great disgust with the reports. Naturally, this raises serious concerns about network security and the fallibility of those both designing and using it — even moreso when the climax of a multi-billion dollar franchise is on the line.
Feed New Scientist: Ancient trade-off may explain why humans get HIV (pheedo.com)
Submission + - Lawrence Lessig to leave copyright sphere (lessig.org)
brandonY writes: The founder of Creative Commons, the Stanford lawyer behind the "Eldred v. Ashcroft" case, and the author of "Code" has spent the last 10 years working tirelessly on behalf of limited copyright terms, net neutrality, and the public domain. Tuesday, Lawrence Lessig announced on his blog that he has "decided to shift my academic work, and soon, my activism" from fighting the good fight for the public domain to fighting the good fight against corruption and the influence of big money's effects on legislation in general.
Feed BD+ DRM is now available for Blu-ray (engadget.com)
Filed under: HDTV
Some people still haven't figured out that DRM doesn't work, and in yet another attempt to "enable content" the Blu-ray Disc Association (BDA) is proud to announce that BD+ is available. The recent exploits in AACS have been rumored to slow down the release schedule for Blu-ray titles from FOX and Disney and many believe this is because they've been waiting for BD+, -- an additional optional layer of DRM available to Blu-ray. This new code will run in a virtual machine while the disc is in use and can do just about whatever it deems necessary to validate that your player is secure before allowing the movie to be played. What BD+ cannot do is modify your player, so once the disc is ejected, the process is gone.
[Via Blu-ray.com]
Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
Office Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!
Submission + - Warrant Now Required For Email Searches By Feds
nnkx00 writes: Courtesy of the EFF:
"The government must have a search warrant before it can secretly seize and search emails stored by email service providers, according to a landmark ruling Monday in the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The court found that email users have the same reasonable expectation of privacy in their stored email as they do in their telephone calls...the government has routinely used the federal Stored Communications Act (SCA) to secretly obtain stored email from email service providers without a warrant."
Full Ruling here.
Submission + - Google Gets Political with Public Policy Blog (toptechnews.com)
Raver32 writes: "One sure sign of Google's growing importance in Washington is the fact that the Googleplex — Google's Mountain View, California campus — is becoming a popular stop on the campaign trail. Several candidates and potential candidates have stopped by to discuss technology policy.
Now Google is throwing open the doors to the internal debates that have helped shape the company's public policy stances. On Monday morning, Andrew McLaughlin, Google's Director of Public Policy and Government Affairs, announced the official launch of the company's "Public Policy Blog," and invited the public to join in the discussion by posting comments."
Feed Blu-ray disc coatings starting to rot? (engadget.com)
Filed under: Home Entertainment
A thread over at the AVS Forums has highlighted a potential problem with the coating of Blu-ray discs, described by many as "disc rot" due to the mould-like spots that have made several owner's Blu-ray discs unplayable. The five page thread has reports from dozens of forum members, many of them discovering spots which can't be rubbed off on Blu-ray versions of "The Prestige." It's impossible to judge how widespread the problem is from a single forum thread, although it's not unheard of to see a product recall after a problem is discovered by users on a forum. It's also worth noting that for every user that has reported the spots, there's one or more people with discs that have no problem. If you've encountered the same issue, your best policy is to try and get a refund / replacement disc from the place where you originally bought it from. If enough people are reporting a problem, then retailers will be a much stronger voice than a bunch of consumers sounding off in the echo chamber that is "the internet."Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
Office Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!
Submission + - T-Mobile UK blocking mobile VoIP start-up
wjamesau writes: "The war between telecoms and VOIP heats up: according to Om Malik, T-Mobile UK is refusing to interconnect with mobile VoIP provider Truphone, a UK start-up with a mobile VoIP client that enables calls cheaper than mobile. Can mobile companies successfully crush VOIP competitors like this?"
Journal Journal: James Madison on Intellectual Property
The Volokh Conspiracy, a legal blog, writes about James Madison and his opinion on intellectual property. Madison, "Father of the Constitution" and author of the Bill of Rights, disliked the idea of intellectual "property," viewing it as a dangerous grant of monopoly. While he stressed that such grants ought to be strictly limited, he apparently went
Submission + - Fun With Redistricting! (nationaljournal.com)
CrabbMan writes: ""The Redistricting Game" was developed at the University of Southern California to help teach voters that "mapmakers" can have more control over an election outcome than candidates or issues. Politically engineered redistricting, which can protect incumbents and party dominance even if voters are inclined differently, was most recently a hot topic in a Supreme Court decision last year and in the political fall of former GOP top dog Tom DeLay. Lawmakers concerned "the system is out of whack" invited the game's developers to the Hill yesterday."
Submission + - Text Messaging Used To Help People's Health
Bobtom writes: According to CNet, doctors are sending text messages with important infomation, such as appointment reminders, directly to their patients cell phones. According to the article, the system can also be used to help people remember when to renew their prescriptions or anything else the doctor feels necessary to communicate.
Submission + - EU Considering Regulating Sale of Violent Games (lawbean.com)
Spamicles writes: "European Union justice ministers met today in order to discuss the regulation of sales of violent video games to minors. Europeans were riled up last year when a German gunman shot several people before taking his life at a secondary school. A European Union Commissioner is taking advantage of the shootings last year called for stricter regulations in the video game industry. A motion introduced last month calls for legislators to "put in place all necessary measures to ban the sale of particularly violent and cruel video games.""
Submission + - Ubuntu and the Unions (ericlee.info)
Eric Lee writes: "Linux Today is reporting on the question of whether Ubuntu Linux has a special significance for trade unions, which are not usually thought of as being on the cutting edge of information technology use. The founding editor of LabourStart, the news and campaigning website of the international trade union movement, argues that it does, and makes the case for unions to adopt open source software."
Submission + - computer failures disrupt East Coast air traffic
jcgam69 writes: A cascading computer failure in the nation's air-traffic control system caused severe flight delays and some cancellations along the East Coast yesterday.
A computer system in Atlanta that processes pilots' flight plans and sends them to air-traffic controllers failed early yesterday, Federal Aviation Administration spokeswoman Diane Spitaliere said.
In response, the agency rerouted the system's functions to another computer in Salt Lake City, which overloaded under the increased volume of data, magnifying the problem.
