coondoggie writes "Boeing this week completed work on and installed a 12,000-pound chemical laser in a C-130H aircraft. Boeing's Advanced Tactical Laser (ATL) which is being developed for the Department of Defense, will destroy, damage or disable targets with little to no collateral damage, supporting missions on the battlefield and in urban operations."

mlauzon writes "The RCMP announced that it will stop targeting people who download copyrighted material for personal use (Google translation). Their priority will be to focus on organized crime and copyright theft that affects the health and safety of consumers, such as copyright violations related to medicine and electrical appliances, instead of the cash flow of large corporations. Around the same time that the CRIA successfully took Demonoid offline, the RCMP made clear that Demonoid's users don't have to worry about getting prosecuted, at least not in Canada. 'Piracy for personal use is no longer targeted,' Noël St-Hilaire, head of copyright theft investigations of the RCMP, said in an interview. 'It is too easy to copy these days and we do not know how to stop it.'"

BladesP9 writes "Beginning with Vista, Microsoft has updated the standard Web Core Fonts that it has used since the late 1990s. 'With the release of Windows Vista, Microsoft has unleashed something quite new on the Web — the "C" fonts; Cambria, Calibri, Candara, Consolas, Constantia, and Corbel.' The article goes on to state that 'if you're a web designer and not using Vista then this download is mandatory since it will let you see your page as your Vista users see it.' The article includes a PDF document offering visual comparisons of the old and new fonts (pdf)."

An anonymous reader writes "Jack Thompson has done it again, now by making available gay porn for unlimited viewing on public records. Judge Jordan wrote on an issued order: 'The attached exhibit, which includes several graphic images of oral and genital sex between adult males, was filed electronically in the docket in this case, without prior permission from the court... To the extent that the other attorney's alleged conduct is in any way relevant... there was no need for Mr. Thompson to file these graphic images in the public record. A simple reference to the website and its alleged links would have sufficed...'" I'm usually not a fan of giving Thompson continued free publicity, but some of the things he does are just too outlandish not to share.

l-ascorbic writes "The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Microsoft is poised to buy 5% of Facebook for $300 million to $500 million, valuing the company at up to $10 billion. Microsoft already handles advertising for the site."

There's a few interesting tidbits left over from last week's Tokyo Games show worth noting. Wired categorizes the whole event as other gamemakers fighting over Nintendo's scraps in an overview piece. Certainly with titles like the new version of cult-classic Nights , Nintendo has a lot of heavy artillery this year. Just the same, (keynote aside) Sony had a fair showing at the event. Gamespot's chat with Phil Harrison gives us another glimpse inside their headspace, a useful measure given the swirl of news around their products. They also have a lot of new Square/Enix titles to look forward to. Microsoft ... pretty much just has Lost Odyssey and Infinite Undiscovery for Japanese fans to look forward to.

THX-1138 writes "A few months ago, Trent Reznor (frontman of the band Nine Inch Nails), was in Australia doing an interview when he commented on the outrageous prices of CDs there. Apparently now his label, Universal Media Group is angry at him for having said that. During a concert last night, he told fans, '...Has anyone seen the price come down? Okay, well, you know what that means — STEAL IT. Steal away. Steal and steal and steal some more and give it to all your friends and keep on stealin'. Because one way or another these mother****ers will get it through their head that they're ripping people off and that's not right.'"

dprovine writes "Universal is now offering music through Spiral Frog as free downloads supported by advertising revenue. But according to Daily Tech, the files being offered won't work on iPods. 'The move to not allow its content to be played on iPod's appears to be a clear snub by the Universal Music Group, similar to NBC's recent move of its television content from iTunes to Amazon.com. Apple has not commented on this development. For many, though, SpiralFrog.com presents an intriguing new business model that may present a legal alternative to file sharing or spending large amounts of money on CDs or paid download services, such as iTunes.'"

DailyTech posted interviews with the founder of Pandora and management from Proton Radio (and Proton Music) asking them what SoundExchange's latest rulings mean to them. A lot of net radio stations are dreading the upcoming changes in royalty rates, which are said to be around 400%... a number that would bankrupt most of the industry. An interesting read for anyone who uses online radio.

The Opposable Thumbs blog is talking about a disconcerting new idea being floated by the Official Xbox Magazine. Most people only buy the mag for the demos; they're considering just offering up the exclusive demos on Xbox Live, along with the included trailers and such. The catch? They're going to charge you $2.50 for the privilege. From the article: "We're used to paying for Xbox Live at this point--the feature set is worth the money--but it was sold to us as something of an all-inclusive deal. You're a part of the Xbox network, so you get the demos and the videos and that's part of what you're paying for. Now there is even more of an incentive to offer for-pay demos to people with this new distribution model. In some ways the magazine is already obsolete, and they could conceivably soon be in the business of selling demos." Would you pay money for a downloadable demo?