Tookis writes in with news that Novell has released an Office Open XML (OOXML) translator for OpenOffice.org. The article argues that, though this move may represent a nail in the coffin of the franchise known as Microsoft Office, and therefore a Good Thing, what is truly needed is a fully supported Evolution on Windows.

Uryugen writes "A new dinosaur species was a plant-eater with yard-long horns over its eyebrows, suggesting an evolutionary middle step between older dinosaurs with even larger horns and the small-horned creatures that followed, experts said. The dinosaur's horns, thick as a human arm, are like those of triceratops — which came 10 million years later. However, this animal belonged to a subfamily that usually had bony nubbins a few inches long above their eyes"

SeaDour writes "This Saturday night, March 3rd, a total lunar eclipse will be visible from nearly all inhabited parts of the world. A great shadow will stretch across the surface of the moon, eventually casting it in an eerie red glow as sunlight filters through our atmosphere onto the lunar surface. Viewers in Europe and Africa will have the best vantage point, able to watch the entire eclipse in action, while observers in most of the western hemisphere can see it eclipsed as it rises just after sunset."

MattSparkes writes "The Shuttles March launch has been delayed to late April after golf-ball sized hail caused 7000 pits and divots in the foam that shields the fuel tank. NASA say it's the worst damage of its kind that they have ever seen, but hail is not a new problem for the agency. In 1982, a hailstorm damaged the sensitive heat shield tiles on the Columbia's wings. The damaged tiles then absorbed about 540 kilograms of rain. Once in space, the orbiter faced the Sun to allow the tiles to dry out."

zakkie writes "New Zealand fisherman have caught a massive 450-kg colossal squid in Antarctic waters. This is by far the biggest yet found, measuring over 10 meters in length and weighing 450 kg. It has been taken back to New Zealand for study." The NZ government's announcement page features a downloadable backgrounder on the colossal squid (Mesonychoteuthis hamiltoni) and a 1.1-MB popup portrait of the animal in the fishing boat's hold.

PetManimal writes "Open-source software development once had a reputation as a grassroots movement, but it is increasingly a mainstream IT profit center, and according to Computerworld, some in the industry are asking whether 'open source' has become a cloak used by IT vendors large and small to disguise ruthless and self-serving behavior. Citing an online opinion piece by Gordon Haff, an analyst at Illuminata Inc., the article notes that HP and IBM have not only profited from open-source at the expense of competitors, but have also boosted their images in the open-source community. The Computerworld article also mentions the efforts by the Microsoft/Windows camp to promote open-source credentials: '[InfoWorld columnist Dave] Rosenberg is more disturbed by the bandwagon jumpers: the companies, mostly startups, belatedly going open-source in order to ride a trend, while paying only lip service to the community and its values. Take Aras Corp., a provider of Windows-based product lifecycle management (PLM) software that in January decided to go open-source. Rosenberg depicted the firm in his blog as an opportunistic Johnny-Come-Lately. "I'm not impressed when a company whose software is totally built on Microsoft technologies goes open-source," said Rosenberg, who even suspects that the company is being promoted by Microsoft as a shill to burnish Redmond's image in open-source circles."'"

ForestRangerBob writes "Comes v. Microsoft is over after Microsoft agreed to a settlement. The class action lawsuit alleged that Iowa consumers had been overcharged for Microsoft products for a decade owing to Microsoft's monopoly of the market. Predictably, the lawyers are about to get a big payday and 'the software giant will certainly be on the hook for millions of dollars, some of which may end up helping Iowa school kids. Average consumers will probably end up with a few bucks or a coupon for a free operating system upgrade, but the real winners will no doubt be the lawyers — the team prosecuting the case has already earned $60 million in legal fees from a 2004 case in Minnesota that charged Microsoft with similar offenses.'"

Elektroschock writes "The British Open Rights Groups yells the alarm bell. Europe again. Ipred v.2, a directive proposal, will pass the Legal Affairs Committee soon. ipred2 would brand 'all intentional intellectual property rights infringements on a commercial scale' a criminal offence, thus the public prosecutor will take action and take over the role of RIAA. For commercial social communities where infringements are inevitable — think of Youtube — they expect dangerous times ahead. On the other hand life of content industrials would get a lot easier. It is difficult to imagine how the consumer would benefit. Toine Manders, Dutch MEP in that Committee, openly advocates his amendment proposal aimed to criminalize consumers. Open Rights Group suggests you to write to your Members of Parliament. Will they have any impact? Janelly Fourtou, wife of the Vivendi boss, is a member of the Committee. And she pushed through ipred number 1, so why should public action make a difference? The EFF started only this month to build up an office in Brussels. Do MEPs listen or could Sealand be an option for Web 2.1?"

We've all heard of Google bombing; the US Government may be taking the expression rather literally. Planning is now underway across the government for the proper way to respond to a cyber attack, and options on the table include launching a cyber counterattack or even bombing the attack's source. The article makes clear that no settled plan is in place, and quotes one spokesman as saying "the preferred route would be warning the source to shut down the attack before a military response." That's assuming the source could be found. From the article: "If the United States found itself under a major cyberattack aimed at undermining the nations critical information infrastructure, the Department of Defense is prepared, based on the authority of the president, to launch a cyber counterattack or an actual bombing of an attack source."

theodp writes "Microsoft has applied for a patent for 'securely providing advertising subsidized computer usage.' The application describes how face-recognition webcams and CAPTCHAs can be used in schools to ensure that computer users are paying attention to ads, and the recourse of 'disabling or even repossessing the computer' if they are not."

Hymer writes "Reuters is reporting that Novell may be banned from selling Linux. In the wake of the (much maligned) Novell/Microsoft deal, the Free Software Foundation is reviewing Novell's right to sell the operating system at all. The foundation controls the rights to key parts of the operating system, and council for the organization said that 'the community wants to interfere any way it can' with the Novell business arrangement. No decision has yet been reached, but one should be made in the next two weeks." Is this a measured response, or an over-reaction to the Novell/Microsoft arrangement?

ZonkerWilliam writes "It seems, at least theoretically, that there may be 'ocean planets' out there in the galaxy. If there are, we are closer than ever to detecting them. The formation of such planets is fairly likely, reports the PhysOrg article, despite the lack of an obvious example in our own solar system. We may have a former ocean planetoid in the neighborhood, orbiting the planet Jupiter: the moon Europa. These water worlds are the result of system formation castoffs, gas giant wannabes that never grew large enough. If any of these intriguing object exist nearby, the recently launched CoRoT satellite will be the device we use to see it. The article explains some of the science behind 'ocean worlds', as well as the new technology we'll use to find them."

swschrad writes "There's a story up on Reuters today saying Dell faces a class-action lawsuit for finagling the books to hide under-table money from Intel. The hidden cash, up to a quarter-billion dollars a quarter, is alleged to have been paid to keep competing CPUs out of Dell PCs. Dell, their accountants at PriceWaterhouse, company founder Michael Dell, and former CEO Kevin Rollins are all avoiding comment on the pending litigation."

w1z4rd writes "According to an article in the Guardian, scientists and economists have been offered large bribes by a lobbying group funded by ExxonMobil. The offers were extended by the American Enterprise Institute group, which apparently has numerous ties to the Bush administration. Couched in terms of an offer to write 'dissenting papers' against the findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, several scientists contacted for the article refused the offers on conflict of interest grounds."

An anonymous reader writes "Since May 2006, a mud volcano in Indonesia has spewed out up to 126,000 cubic metres of mud a day, flooding an area of more than 4 square kilometres. This unprecedented natural disaster has become so bad that geophysicists now plan to enact an untested scheme to try and slow the flow: dropping concrete balls into the volcano."