Follow Slashdot blog updates by subscribing to our blog RSS feed

 



Forgot your password?
typodupeerror
×
Image

Woman Trademarks Name and Threatens Sites Using It Screenshot-sm 273

An anonymous reader writes "Be careful mentioning Dr. Ann De Wees Allen. She's made it clear that she's trademarked her name and using it is 'illegal... without prior written permission.' She even lists out the names of offenders and shows you the cease-and-desist letter she sends them. And, especially don't copy any of the text on her website, because she's using a bit of javascript that will warn you 'Copyright Protect!' if you right click on a link."
Databases

Developing a Niche Online-Content Indexing System? 134

tebee writes "One of my hobbies has benefited for 20 years or so by the existence of an online index to all magazine articles on the subject since the 1930s. It lets you list the articles in any particular magazine or search for an article by keyword, title or author, refining the search if necessary by magazine and/or date. Unfortunately the firm which hosts the index have recently pulled it from their website, citing security worries and incompatibilities with the rest of their e-commerce website: the heart of the system is a 20-year-old DOS program! They have no plans to replace it as the original data is in an unknown format. So we are talking about putting together a team to build a open source replacement for this – probably using PHP and MySQL. The governing body for the hobby has agreed to host this and we are in negotiations to try and get the original data. We hope that by volunteers crowd-sourcing the conversion, we will be able to do what was commercially impossible." Tebee is looking for ideas about the best way to go about this, and for leads to existing approaches; read on for more.
Image

Protect Your Children From Religion Online With GodBlock Screenshot-sm 2

Are you're children becoming too pious? Are you tired of all the fundamentalist pop-up ads on their favorite websites? If so, then GodBlock is for you. From the GodBlock website : "Most deeply religious people are born into their religion, but even children raised in a secular household are vulnerable to content on the web. That's why we've produced GodBlock. GodBlock is a web filter that blocks religious content. It is targeted at parents and schools who wish to protect their kids from the often violent, sexual, and psychologically harmful material in many holy texts, and from being indoctrinated into any religion before they are of the age to make such decisions."

Comment Random, but related (Score 3, Interesting) 84

On a sort of random, but related note...
A recent foray into the underworld of chatroulette led me to a conversation with two Chinese nationals, although admittedly I WAS looking for naked fat bald men... They asked me what I thought of Obama, and I told them I wasn't fond of socialist or communist policies that manage vast amounts of my paycheck for me. I asked them what they thought of their government. Their only response was a single word: "love".
It showed to me that the average Chinese citizen is keenly aware of the ability of the government to spy on them and monitor activities. It also seemed as though there was some degree of fear. Granted they weren't afraid of talking to me or asking about the United States, but talking about their own government was a big no no, and could bring reprisals.

Comment really? (Score 2, Insightful) 443

Why would the average iPad consumer care about the app approval process? The average iPad buyer is not a developer. If that's the best complaint that they can manufacture in this article, I'm inclined to say this is an anti-Apple article with questionable researching techniques. Although, I didn't RTFA, so maybe I missed something.
The Internet

Submission + - New Northern Arizona Univ. Internet policy 2

An anonymous reader writes: I'm a student at NAU, and just today I told to use a software called SafeConnect that will monitor my computer for violations to the terms of Use (which follows)
"Internet Use Policy

All computers attached to the Campus Network must have appropriate software running on their machine to ensure a secure environment for all users. Campus Network will provide the monitoring software to ensure compliance with this policy. The software will assist students in maintaining their computer's in the manner prescribed by Campus Network . Software needed to ensure a secure environment will include:

                * Campus Network approved anti-virus software
                * The most current security patch software for your operating system(s).
                * Monitoring software to ensure that copyrighted files are not freely shared over the internet.
                *Other software as periodically deemed appropriate by Campus Network to ensure a safe and secure Internet and Intranet for all students and faculty.

In addition, bandwidth consumption is monitored to prevent inappropriate use of university resources (for example, setting up a public web site from a dormitory room). Students are asked not to exceed 1 GB of bandwidth use per week. No enforcement will occur at present, however we will be monitoring use and taking more affirmative action if there is wide violation of this policy.

The use of the Campus Internet Service is a privilege that may be revoked at any time for inappropriate behavior. Such behavior would include but not be limited to the use of obscene, abusive, or otherwise objectionable language and/or materials in either public or private messages.

The primary purpose of the Campus Network is to support students' educational goals. In support of these goals, the following activities are prohibited with express written consent of Campus Network . Participating in these activities may result in revocation of Campus Network without refund and possible University judicial action and/or criminal charges.

        * Setting up a router and building a private subnet.
        *Setting up any type of information server such as a web, gopher, e-mail, game, etc.
        *Propagating e-mail chain letters.
        *Forging mail.
        *Allowing unauthorized persons access to Campus Network .
        *Using Campus Network for personal financial gain.
        *Copying University-owned or licensed information to another computer without prior written approval.
        *Copyrighted files and software cannot be shared over the Campus Network .
        *Modifying or attempting to modify University-owned or licensed information including software and data.
        *Attempting to damage or disrupt networking services.
        *Using the Campus Network , the University'(TM)s campus-wide network, or related resources in the commission of a crime.
        *Using traffic intensive applications that may cause problems within the network or diluting the level of service to other users. No print servers, mail servers, FTP servers, etc. are allowed. The network sharing of any computer-related device or materials that may cause excessive network traffic is forbidden.

The user is not allowed to share her/his RJ45 Ethernet port with more than one computer/device at the same time. This prohibition includes any use of hubs and/or switches which would permit the user to connect more than one computer/device to the RJ45 Ethernet port and share the port with others or herself/himself.

The user will abide by all policies and statues included in the Computer Crimes Act. Crimes against this Act will result in University judicial action and/or investigation by the University Police Department for criminal offense. The Act includes offenses against intellectual property; offenses against computer equipment and supplies; and offenses against computer access. The Computer Crimes Act is available at each area office."

Want I wonder is this legal, and is there any way to fight this new policy, i understand some of it but what I don't like is this gives them access to all my private messages and accounts
Crime

Submission + - 178 Arrested in US/EU Credit Card Cloning Ops (krebsonsecurity.com)

eldavojohn writes: Authorities have moved in on 178 people accused of working in credit card cloning labs across the USA and Europe but with the bulk of the work apparently operating out of Spain. Original source states that "Police in fourteen countries participated a two-year investigation, initiated in Spain where police have discovered 120,000 stolen credit card numbers and 5,000 cloned cards, arrested 76 people and dismantled six cloning labs. The raids were made primarily in Romania, France, Italy, Germany, Ireland and the United States, with arrests also made in Australia, Sweden, Greece, Finland and Hungary. The detainees are also suspected of armed robbery, blackmail, sexual exploitation and money-laundering, the police said." Krebs notes a new credit card debuting at Turkish banks that appears to have a built in LCD that has a random six digit number associated with each transaction much like RSA SecurID keys used for computer logins.
Games

Design Contest Highlights Video Games With a Purpose 43

drew30319 writes "Game developers' website Gamasutra discusses a video game design contest with socially redeeming qualities — is this a productive role video games can play? Quoting: 'A unique game design competition aimed at teen violence prevention has announced its winners, revealing that Grace's Diary is taking home the top prize. The annual contest is sponsored by Jennifer Ann's Group, a non-profit organization focused on teen violence education and prevention since its founding in 2006. The "Life. Love. Game Design Contest" challenges entrants to design a game about the issue — without using violence itself.' The winning games are available to play online now."

Comment Re:Same way you get your kids interested in gaming (Score 1) 704

Omitting the brace, in my experience, leads to more errors and bugs down the road. Sure it might take an extra few hundred milliseconds to type (or have Visual Studio auto-complete it for even faster results), but when you want to add something to that while loop you don't run the risk of forgetting to add braces and having the added statement not actually be included in the loop block.
Government

New "Circuit Breaker" Imposed To Stop Market Crash 460

Lucas123 writes "The SEC and national securities exchanges announced a new rule that would help curb market volatility and help to prevent 'flash crashes' like the one that took place on May 6, when the Dow dropped almost 1,000 points in a half hour. That crash was blamed in part on automated trading systems, which process buy and sell orders in milliseconds. The new rule would pause trading on individual stocks that fluctuate up or down 10% in a five-minute period. 'I believe that circuit breakers for individual securities across the exchanges would help to limit significant volatility,' the SEC's chairman said. 'They would also increase market transparency, bolster investor protection, and bring uniformity to decisions regarding trading halts in individual securities.'"
Crime

Justice Not As Blind As Previously Thought 256

NotSoHeavyD3 writes "I doubt this is much of a surprise but apparently Cornell University did a study that seems to show you're more likely to get convicted if you're ugly. From the article: 'According to a Cornell University study, unattractive defendants are 22 percent more likely to be convicted than good-looking ones. And the unattractive also get slapped with harsher sentences — an average of 22 months longer in prison.'"

Slashdot Top Deals

Get hold of portable property. -- Charles Dickens, "Great Expectations"

Working...