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Music

EMI Using Rapidshare To Market Music 81

Posted by Soulskill from the legal-team-defeated-by-marketing-team dept.
An anonymous reader writes "While Rapidshare defends itself around the world from lawsuits by media companies for copyright infringement, new evidence was revealed that UK-based major label EMI is putting music on Rapidshare and directing people to download it in the hopes that it spreads 'virally.' This came to light in the ongoing copyright battle EMI v. MP3tunes over personal cloud media storage and the Sideload.com music search engine. EMI accuses MP3tunes of enabling piracy by linking to Rapidshare, but since EMI is using Rapidshare, this would seem to weaken their argument considerably. You can read the legal brief online."
Canada

Pirate Party's North American Debut 178

Posted by samzenpus from the scuttle-the-continent dept.
adonoman writes "A 25-year-old Winnipeg businessman is the first Pirate Party of Canada candidate to run for federal election. At the same time, the US and UK pirate parties have put out an open letter to Anonymous requesting that they cease Operation Payback's DDOS attacks and focus on taking a legal route to fix intellectual property law."
Earth

One Giant Cargo Ship Pollutes As Much As 50M Cars 595

Posted by kdawson from the stink-pots dept.
thecarchik writes "One giant container ship pollutes the air as much as 50 million cars. Which means that just 15 of the huge ships emit as much as today's entire global 'car park' of roughly 750 million vehicles. Among the bad stuff: sulfur, soot, and other particulate matter that embeds itself in human lungs to cause a variety of cardiopulmonary illnesses. Since the mid-1970s, developed countries have imposed increasingly stringent regulations on auto emissions. In three decades, precise electronic engine controls, new high-pressure injectors, and sophisticated catalytic converters have cut emissions of nitrous oxides, carbon dioxides, and hydrocarbons by more than 98 percent. New regulations will further reduce these already minute limits. But ships today are where cars were in 1965: utterly uncontrolled, free to emit whatever they like." According to Wikipedia, 57 giant container ships (rated from 9,200 to 15,200 twenty-foot equivalent units) are plying the world's oceans.
Microsoft

Did Microsoft Alter Windows Sales Figures? 165

Posted by CmdrTaco from the smoke-and-mirrors dept.
Saxophonist writes "InformationWeek claims to have analyzed Microsoft's most recent Form 10-Q and observed that a reported increase in earnings for the Windows unit may be due to accounting trickery rather than actual sales growth. Microsoft apparently increased its reported revenues for its Windows, Server & Tools, and Office units at least partly through shifting revenues from other units. While there may be nothing 'to suggest the company's revisions violate any accounting rules,' the actual growth in Windows sales was likely nowhere near the high double-digit percentage growth claimed. InformationWeek speculates that revenues from Xbox and Surface may have been among the revenues shifted to the other divisions."
Patents

Amazon Patents Bad Gift Protection 210

Posted by samzenpus from the no-more-fruitcake dept.
theodp writes "Thanks to the inventors at Amazon.com, you needn't fear Aunt Martha any longer. On Tuesday, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos received a patent for a bad gift defense system that intercepts gifts you don't want and instead sends you something that you actually do want. For example, Amazon explains that its 'System and Method for Converting Gifts' would allow you to set up a rule like 'Convert all gifts from Aunt Mildred,' which would automatically convert any online gift orders from your well-meaning-but-tasteless Auntie into a gift certificate. Other examples of how the system might be used: You could convert bad gifts to something off your wish list; block specific products ('Not another XYZ comic strip calendar'); or ensure that any clothing gifts match your exact size ('Check clothes sizes first')."
Education

Submission + - Amperes: Secret to Math Success? (newsdaily.com)

Submitted by Bell Would?
Bell Would? writes: Don't try this at home — we're professionals! "It's just like a tingling sensation in your skull.", according to one subject in an experiment using electric current to stimulate learning mathematics as reported today in News Daily.
Open Source

Submission + - The Biggest Pure-Play Open Source Companies? (ecrmguide.com)

Submitted by storagedude
storagedude writes: The Talend-Sopera merger announced this morning raised an interesting question: Who are the biggest pure-play open source companies? Talend claims the acquisition makes them number five, after Red Hat, Novell, Sourcefire and Ingres. It's hard to call Novell and Sourcefire pure-plays, however; might as well include Oracle and IBM while you're at it. So who does that leave standing? Red Hat, Ingres and Alfresco, according to The451Group's Matt Aslett; after that, it's anyone's guess who comes next.
Displays

Submission + - Samsung shows flexible & foldable AMOLED displ (netbooknews.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: During the FPD International 2010 show in Japan, Samsung is showing a bunch of new AMOLED displays from 4 to 10-inch. NetbookNews spotted a dual-screen 4.5-inch PenTile AMOLED MID prototype, various flexible displays – including one being folded in half – and a transparent 14-inch AMOLED shown in a notebook mockup. Here's a rundown of all the mobile oriented display technologies from Samsung over at FPD 2010 including videos, photos and specs.

Submission + - Anonymous commentators protected under Swiss Law (tagesanzeiger.ch)

Submitted by sjau
sjau writes: According to the Zurich based newspaper the Swiss Federal Court (=Supreme Court) rendered a judgment which protects the anonymity of commentators. The Swiss Federal Court ruled that online comentators on websites shall get the same level of protection as media confidential sources. In the case the online website of the swiss tv station SF1 contained foul-mouthed comments about other people. Towards the police and prosecution SF1 refused to hand over details of those commentators. The Swiss Federal Court protected SF1's stance under the Swiss Data Protection act — however a comment must contain at least a certain degree of information.

Considering that the Swiss Federal Court protected just two months ago filesharers from being logged by Logistep, the privacy in Switzerland has been blostered once more with this decision.

Submission + - Security App for the new German Personal ID hacked (heise.de)

Submitted by prefec2
prefec2 writes: At Nov. 1st the Germany started to issue new personal Id cards which include a security chip. In combination with a reading device and an application on a PC@home, secure transactions can be made. However, the required application can be compromized using DNS spoofing and a wrong SSL certificate as reported by http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/Neuer-Personalausweis-AusweisApp-mit-Luecken-2-Update-1133376.html
Games

Submission + - DDO hands out hundreds of bans with no explanation (massively.com) 1

Submitted by Zarrot
Zarrot writes: Turbine creators of Dungeons and Dragons online handed out multiple bans and warnings to customers over an exploit in their recent Mabar festival. Customers are angry and confused as most have no idea what the supposed exploit was. Turbine customer service has been doing little to address the concerns.

Submission + - The mechanical glory of the IBM Selectric typewrit (makezine.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: From Make OnLine: "The word of the day is "whiffletree." A "whiffletree" is a mechanical digital-to-analog converter. Brilliant science-and-technology documentarian Bill Hammack, professor of Chemical and Biochemical Engineering at the University of Illinois, has produced this fascinating video anatomy of IBM's classic Selectric typewriter, in which a 7-bit whiffletree is employed to convert keypresses (digital) to precisely coordinated tugs (analog) on the control cables that rotate and tilt the type ball. Doubly awesome is the fact that the video features an appendix (yes, a video appendix) which focuses exclusively on the whiffletree itself, closely illustrating its operation with a simple 2-bit case."

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