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United States

Submission + - DotCom offers the DoJ a Deal (stuff.co.nz)

Submitted by Master Moose
Master Moose writes: Kim Dotcom claims the United States criminal case against him is collapsing but he is offering to go there without extradition provided federal authorities unfreeze his millions of dollars.

In a now hallmark style, he made the offer on Twitter.

"Hey DOJ, we will go to the US," he tweeted, "No need for extradition. We want bail, funds unfrozen for lawyers & living expenses."

In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter Dotcom says the department knows it does not have a case.

"If they are forced to provide discovery, then there will be no extradition. That's why they don't want to provide discovery. If they had a case, they would not need to hide what they have."
Earth

Submission + - Is Our Infrastructure Ready for Global Warming? 1

Submitted by
Hugh Pickens writes
Hugh Pickens writes writes: "Megan Garber writes that last weekend, a US Airways flight taxiing for takeoff from Washington's Reagan National Airport got stuck on the tarmac for three hours because the tarmac had softened from the heat, and the plane had created — and then sunk into — a groove from which it couldn't, at first, be removed. So what makes an asphalt tarmac, the foundation of our mighty air network, turn to sponge? The answer is that our most common airport surface might not be fully suited to its new, excessively heated environment. One of asphalt's main selling points is precisely the fact that, because of its pitchy components, it's not quite solid: It's "viscoelastic," which makes it an ideal surface for the airport environment. As a solid, asphalt is sturdy; as a substance that can be made from — and transitioned back to — liquid, it's relatively easy to work with. And, crucially, it makes for runway repair work that is relatively efficient. But those selling points can also be asphalt's Achilles heel. Viscoelasticity means that the asphalt is always capable of liquifying. The problem, for National Airport's tarmac and the passengers who were stuck on it, was that this weekend's 100+-degree temperatures were a little less room temperature-like than they'd normally be, making the asphalt a little less solid that it would normally be. "As ironic and as funny as the imgur seen round the world is, it may also be a hint at what's in store for us in a future of weirding weather. An aircraft sinking augurs the new challenges we'll face as temperatures keep rising.""
Apple

Submission + - US Federal Agencies No Longer Allowed to Buy Apple Products (cellular-news.com)

Submitted by narcc
narcc writes: US federal government agencies are no longer able to purchase Apple products after the company withdrew from a mandatory certification scheme.

The Electronic Product Environmental Assessment Tool (EPEAT) certification is required under a law passed in 2009 if a federal government agency is to buy goods or services from a company. It ensures that the products meet minimum environmental protection standards.

It is not clear why Apple withdrew from the ratings service, especially as it cuts off sales to a fairly substantial customer — the US Government. One report by the iFixit blog suggested that the problem relates to the difficulty of repairing Apple products and stripping them down for recycling.

Apple has struggled with its eco-friendly credentials, with repeated reports from agencies such as Greenpeace criticizing the company, not just for what they know the company is doing, but also for their apparent secrecy about the environmental impact of their various manufacturing processes.
Education

Submission + - Does Grammar Matter Anymore? 1

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes: A lighthearted 4th of July post pointing out how Microsoft Word could help Google CEO Larry Page catch typos in his Google+ posts turned out to be fighting words for GeekWire readers. "Grammar is an important indicator of the quality of one's message," insisted one commenter. "You shouldn't have disgraced yourself by stooping to trolling your readers with an article about what essentially amounts to using a full blown word processor for a tweet. Albeit an rather long example of one," countered another. A few weeks earlier, the WSJ sparked a debate with its report that grammar gaffes have invaded the office in an age of informal e-mail, texting and Twitter. So, does grammar matter anymore?
Apple

Submission + - Sacrebleu! Did Steve Jobs Ripoff Minitel? 1

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes: CNET's Chris Matyszczyk is skeptical of reports that Steve Jobs found inspiration in France's circa-1982 Minitel Box. For you kids, the Minitel was a pre-Internet Videotex online service accessible through the telephone lines throughout France. According to a Reuters report, the chunky Minitel Box attracted the attention of Jobs. 'He bought one and took it to bits to see how it worked,' said Gerard Thery, one of the Frenchmen behind the 1982 launch of the Minitel system. Crazy, you say? Well, some might see a certain resemblance between the Minitel and the all-in-one iMac and MacBook Chiclet keyboard!
Android

Submission + - Apple forces Google to degrade Android features (techdirt.com)

Submitted by
walterbyrd
walterbyrd writes: "The latest in the ridiculous saga of the patent dispute between Apple and Samsung, which has resulted in Samsung phones and tablets being banned from sale in the US, is that Samsung, with the help of Google, has been pushing out an over-the-air software update to make its phones worse. Yes, the OTA update is designed to take away a feature, in an effort to convince the judge that the phones no longer violate Apple's patents. The feature in question? The ability to do a single search that covers both the local device and the internet."

Submission + - France Taxes Rich To Balance Budget (guardian.co.uk)

Submitted by Punctuated_Equilibri
Punctuated_Equilibri writes: New Socialist French President François Hollande, is facing a big budget deficit. His proposals for this year (http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jul/06/francois-hollande-election-taxes-france?newsfeed=true) are based entirely on taxing the rich, including increasing the top tax rate to 75% and special levies on wealthy individuals and big corporations. Will the success or failure of those policies prove whether or not keeping the rich happy is economically necessary?
Google

Submission + - Googling for Friendy Flights (itworld.com)

Submitted by
itwbennett
itwbennett writes: "British Airways wants to be the airline where everybody knows your name. The idea behind the 'Know Me' program is that by using Google Images to ID passengers, they'll be able to recreate the 'feeling of recognition you get in a favourite restaurant,' Jo Boswell, head of customer analysis at BA told the London Evening Standard. But the more privacy minded among us know that the airline could end up seeing a lot more than your face."
Patents

Submission + - US patent trolling costs $29 billion a year (itnews.com.au)

Submitted by
Bismillah
Bismillah writes: "This piece of research from Boston University seems to put an end to claims that patent trolling is "socially valuable" and instead, is a social loss.

The total cost to society could be around $80 billion according to the researchers. What's more, the costs have gone up fourfold since 2005."
Google

Submission + - Master your online search skills with the Power Searching with Google course (pureinfotech.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: It seems that Google wants to help you become a power searcher and get better answers from the service. Today the search engine giant announced that they are rolling out a new free online video course called “Power Searching with Google” that was built to teach end-users best practices and various tricks to get the most out of the search experience.

Submission + - Eric Raymond on why Stallman is a dangerous fanatic (ibiblio.org)

Submitted by Frosty Piss
Frosty Piss writes: According to Eric Raymond, 'RMS made an early decision to frame his advocacy as a moral crusade rather than a pragmatic argument about engineering practices and outcomes. While he made consequentialist arguments against closed source (and still does) his rhetoric and his thinking became dominated by terms like “evil”, to the point where he repeatedly alienated potential allies both with his absolutism and his demand that anyone cooperating with him share it.' Raymond goes on to say, 'By the late 1990s, after having observed RMS’s behavior for more than a decade, I had long since concluded that the Free Software Foundation’s moralistic rhetoric was serving us badly. The problem with it is the same problem with messianic religions in general; for people who are not flipped into true-believer mode by any given one, it will come off as at best creepy and insular, at worst nutty and potentially dangerous (and this remains true even for people attached to a different messianic religion).'
Medicine

Submission + - Black Death Discovered In Oregon (ibtimes.com)

Submitted by
redletterdave
redletterdave writes: "The Black Death, a strain of bubonic plague that destroyed nearly a third of Europe's entire population between 1347 and 1369, has been found in Oregon. Health officials in Portland have confirmed that a man contracted the plague after getting bitten by a cat. The unidentified man, who is currently in his 50s, had tried to pry a dead mouse from a stray cat's mouth on June 2 when the cat attacked him. Days later, fever and sickness drove the man to check himself into Oregon's St. Charles Medical Center, where he is currently in "critical condition.""
Businesses

Submission + - Why VCs Really Reject Startups (itworld.com)

Submitted by
itwbennett
itwbennett writes: "Instead of simply not following up with startup proposals that he doesn't intend to pursue, venture capitalist Josh Breinlinger decided to change things up and not only hear every pitch request but respond with honest feedback. For those on the receiving end of that honest feedback, Breinlinger's silence may have been golden. It turns out that Breinlinger, and perhaps most VCs, reject your proposals because you lack experience and leadership skills and your team is weak. Would you rather hear the hard truth about why your startup didn't get funded or some vague dismissal?"
Government

Submission + - Pennsylvania Man Indicted For Hack of Department of Energy Network (threatpost.com)

Submitted by
chicksdaddy
chicksdaddy writes: "A Pennsylvania man was arrested yesterday after a Massachusetts grand jury issued a four-count indictment alleging that he hacked into computer networks belonging to the U.S. Department of Energy (DoE) and the University of Massachusetts, as well as private firms in Massachusetts and Colorado.

Andrew James Miller, a 23 year-old resident of the Philadelphia suburbs, was charged with one count of conspiracy, two counts of computer fraud and one count of access device fraud. Miller is alleged to have sold access to his victims' networks to an undercover FBI agent for payments of between $500 and $1,000. At one point, he even offered access to a DoE supercomputer for $50,000."

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