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The Internet

Submission + - slashdot.org has no AAAA record

Submitted by
terrymr
terrymr writes: "How can we nerds be taken seriously when our own "News for Nerds" site is not available by IPV6. This is trivial to set up for anyone who's willing to spend a few minutes researching it. So where is it guys ?"
Star Wars Prequels

Submission + - Boy defends mother with Jedi weapon

Submitted by
terrymr
terrymr writes: "An 11-year-old boy has used a toy lightsabre to chase off a man who abused his mother in an English village.

The man, believed to be in his 30s, verbally abused and punched the boy's mother, provoking the Star Wars-style attack, British newspaper The Sun reported."
Robotics

Robots That Bounce on Water 137

Posted by CmdrTaco from the something-about-tigger-goes-here dept.
inghamb87 writes "The way water striders walk on water was discovered years ago. The insect uses its long legs to help evenly distribute its tiny body weight. The weight is distributed over a large area so that the fragile skin formed by surface tension supports the bug on the water. However, the ability of water striders to jump onto water without sinking has baffled scientists, until now." If nothing less, you need to see the picture: it's awesome.
The Courts

Submission + - Ohio University finds key to getting RIAA to stop 7

Submitted by
NewYorkCountryLawyer
NewYorkCountryLawyer writes: "Ohio University, in Athens, Ohio, has found the key to getting the RIAA to stop inundating it and its students with "settlement" letters. According to the university's student online publication, the university paid $60,000, plus $16,000 per year "maintenance", to Audible Magic, the business partner of the RIAA's all-purpose expert witness Dr. Doug Jacobson, for its "CopySense" filtering software. Once it made the payments, the letters stopped. This of course raises a lot of questions as to the 'disinterestedness' of Dr. Jacobson, whose deposition in the UMG v. Lindor case was the subject of interesting Slashdot commentary."
Announcements

Submission + - Newton Predicts World Will End No Sooner than 2060 (cnn.com)

Submitted by Sean H
Sean H writes: Writings of Isaac Newton recently made public include a prediction that the earth will end no sooner than 2060 — among other observations made from interpretations of the Old Testament.
Movies

Submission + - Jack Valenti Dead at 85

Submitted by NeuroManson
NeuroManson writes: Long time nemesis to nerds everywhere, Jack Valenti, passed away today following a stroke. Not sure whether to dance a merry jig yet, but "Ding Dong the Witch is Dead" springs to mind.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18339220/

LOS ANGELES — Jack Valenti, the former White House aide and film industry lobbyist who instituted the modern movie ratings system and guided Hollywood from the censorship era to the digital age, died Thursday. He was 85.

Valenti had a stroke in March and was hospitalized for several weeks at Johns Hopkins University Medical Center in Baltimore.

He died of complications from the stroke at his Washington, D.C., home, said Seth Oster of the Motion Picture Association of America.
Movies

Submission + - Jack Valenti dead at 85.

Submitted by Unlikely_Hero
Unlikely_Hero writes: Jack Valenti, one of the copyright industry's most aggressive lobbyists, has died at the Johns Hopkins University Medical Center in Baltimore, Maryland. How will he be remembered 50 years from now? As the man who lead hollywood away from the Hays Code which prohibited most violence and frank discussion of sex or as the crusader of the MPAA obsessed with the 'danger' of copyright infringement? http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18339220/
Businesses

Vonage Barred From Using Verizon VoIP Patents 247

Posted by Zonk from the those-are-my-patents-do-not-touch-them dept.
thefiremonk writes "Bloomberg reports that U.S. District Judge Claude Hilton has issued a permanent injunction against Vonage. The goal: to stop allowing customers to make calls to standard phone lines. 'U.S. District Judge Claude Hilton approved Verizon's request for a block today in Alexandria, Virginia. Hilton said he won't sign the order before a hearing in two weeks on Vonage's request for a stay. A jury found March 8 that Vonage infringed three patents and should pay Verizon $58 million.' Does this spell doom for the already troubled Vonage? "
Space

Submission + - Space X Falcon 1 launch failure speculation

Submitted by jafac
jafac writes: As discussed in this SpaceDaily article, the video footage from the launch, earlier this week (available at www.spacex.com), of the Falcon 1 vehicle, seems to show a problem with the stage separation. I noticed this when I watched the video last night — it appears that the top of the first stage bumps the engine nozzle.

The upper stage guidance does a good job of setting the craft straight after this bump, but some odd things happen after that, including some kind of ring flying off the engine, and a wobble that gets progressively worse until the vehicle goes completely out of control. I've been fascinated by the availability of these kinds of videos more and more; but this is the first one I've seen that documents a failed launch — (Elon Musk's denials notwithstanding), and because of that, it's probably the coolest video I've seen all year.
NASA

Submission + - NASA Finds New Evidence of Sun-Climate Connection

Submitted by CorSci81
CorSci81 writes: Climate scientists at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory and Caltech recently published findings providing a much clearer link between short-term climate oscillations and solar activity. The article itself is published in the Journal of Geophysical Research (subscription required, preprint available here) but NASA has a summary of the paper here. This research is particularly interesting because it relies on highly accurate Egyptian records of auroras and Nile water levels spanning 622-1470 AD, making it much more detailed than other more indirect methods (such as ice cores). These results will hopefully shed light on the role of the sun in the current warming trend as they are incorporated into future climate models and theories.
Mozilla

Submission + - Microsoft Needs More Information About Firefox

Submitted by
terrymr
terrymr writes: "A colleague of mine updated firefox this morning, which prompted windows defender to pop-up "Microsoft needs more information about this software". The dialog doesn't reveal exactly what information would be sent to Microsoft if the Send Information button is clicked, it appears that the entire Firefox binary would be uploaded. Screenshot here"
Music

Submission + - Luxpro sues Apple for damages and "power abuse

Submitted by Dystopian Rebel
Dystopian Rebel writes: The Financial Times reports that Taiwanese company Luxpro (discussed on Slashdot last year) intends to sue Apple for US$100 m for "lost revenue caused by Apple's abuse of their global power." In 2005, Apple had obtained an injunction against Luxpro's Super Shuffle/Super Tangent but the Taiwanese Supreme Court has overturned the injunction, opening the door to Luxpro's legal action.

From the article: "The {Luxpro} product had almost the same measurements and weight, came in a white plastic casing and had similar buttons on the front. Its name, Super Shuffle, also closely resembled the original."

The Luxpro product has OLEDs on it but visit your optometrist immediately if you don't see other similarities.

Apple has since changed the design of the Shuffle significantly.
Linux Business

Layoffs and CEO Resignation At OSDL 158

Posted by kdawson from the linus-is-ok-though dept.
lisah writes "Big changes are afoot at Open Source Development Labs (OSDL) with today's surprise announcement of the departure of CEO Stuart Cohen and the layoff of nine other employees. Details are still emerging about what exactly this means for OSDL but according to a preliminary announcement, Cohen is 'leaving to pursue other open source opportunities' and OSDL is 'refocusing the scope of [their] work to better align resources with [their] revenues...'" The article also mentions the last year's layoff at OSDL.

Windows Chief Suggests Vista Won't Need Antivirus 361

Posted by CowboyNeal from the steadfastly-bulletproof dept.
LadyDarth writes "During a telephone conference with reporters yesterday, outgoing Microsoft co-president Jim Allchin, while touting the new security features of Windows Vista, which was released to manufacturing yesterday, told a reporter that the system's new lockdown features are so capable and thorough that he was comfortable with his own seven-year-old son using Vista without antivirus software installed."

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