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Submission + - UFO Above Chicago O'Hare International Airport

Submitted by Aglassis
Aglassis writes: On Nov 7, 2006 at about 4:30 p.m. several United Airlines employees including several pilots observed a 6 to 24 ft diameter flying saucer-like object above Chicago's O'Hare International Airport. After hovering for several minutes without displaying any lights it then shot straight up and punched a hole in the 1,900 ft cloud ceiling. No explanation has been given nor did the air traffic control tower detect the purported craft on radar. One controller did note that "to fly 7 million light years to O'Hare and then have to turn around and go home because your gate was occupied is simply unacceptable."
Security

Submission + - QuickTime Exploit Kicks Off Month of Apple Bugs

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: A previously undocumented security hole in Apple's QuickTime media player could expose Windows and Mac users alike to having unwanted software installed on their machines if they view a specially-crafted streaming media file, according to the first entry over at the controversial Month of Apple Bugs project. The problem apparently resides in the way QuickTime handles URLs that begin with "rtsp://". The Washington Post's Security Fix blog notes that while Safari and Internet Explorer will happily load such links, Firefox 2.0 does not. From the piece: "If the advisory is correct, this vulnerability does not strictly rely on tricking the would-be victim into clicking on a maliciously-crafted hyperlink. The exploit could be inserted into a video embedded in a Web page, one that loads automatically when the user visits the site. It also can be invoked inside of Macromedia Flash code or through Javascript commands.
Microsoft

Submission + - Welcome to the controversy - MS wants laptops back

Submitted by
newscloud
newscloud writes: "Snap. Apparently, after yesterday's Slashdot post on Microsoft giving bloggers $2,200 laptops, the company reversed itself. GeekNews says:
Someone at Microsoft has lost their minds! Well first Microsoft gives bloggers laptops with Vista loaded on it for review and they are told they can do whatever they want with the laptop as in keep it, give it away when they were done with the review. But shockingly today Microsoft has asked that the laptops be returned after the people get done doing the reviews.
Hey Microsoft, where's my laptop? Could I have one of these? I hear it runs Windows."

Red Hat Says They'll Be In Linux Long After Novell 150

Posted by Zonk from the fighting-words dept.
Jane Walker writes "Red Hat general counsel Mark Webbink goes to the mat for his company regarding the Microsoft/Novell partnership, in this SearchOpenSource.com Q&A. 'In one year, Red Hat will be all that remains of commercial Linux, he said.'" From the article: "Between last week and this one, it is clear that the two largest software vendors in the world perceive Linux to be at least on the same plane as them. They have got to respect what we have done. Having said that, does Red Hat think either of them has taken the right approach, now that Microsoft and Novell have made 'Microvell'? They've gone off the road a bit, we think, but we are feeling good about the attention that has been brought to Linux. "
Privacy

Submission + - Cyber Bullying Destroys Anonymity

Submitted by
aussie_a
aussie_a writes: "The BBC has an article on online bullying in South Korea. The problem has grown so large that in addition to the police having dedicated cyber terror units, the South Korean government will enact a law next year forcing South Koreans to reveal their name and ID before posting online. However some ISPs want the government to go further and to ban some people from being able to log onto the internet at all."

Conducting an International Job Search? 34

Posted by Cliff from the overseas-classifieds dept.
An anonymous reader asks: "Ask Slashdot recently did a question about leaving America for someplace else, and that got me thinking — for those that left, how did you get started? After you had picked your destination country, did you just hop on a plane and look from there, if so how much money did you keep in reserve? Did you find the job before you went? What is the best site to look at for international job postings?"
Privacy

Submission + - U.S. citizens to require consent to leave country

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: On http://sianews.com yesterday: "Forget no-fly lists. If Uncle Sam gets its way, beginning on Jan. 14, 2007, we'll all be on no-fly lists, unless the government gives us permission to leave-or re-enter-the United States. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (HSA) has proposed that all airlines, cruise lines-even fishing boats-be required to obtain clearance for each passenger they propose taking into or out of the United States. It doesn't matter if you have a U.S. Passport — a "travel document" that now, absent a court order to the contrary, gives you a virtually unqualified right to enter or leave the United States, any time you want. When the DHS system comes into effect next January, if the agency says "no" to a clearance request, or doesn't answer the request at all, you won't be permitted to enter-or leave-the United States." Also discussed here.
The Internet

Submission + - Reporting Engine for YouTube's Daily Show Purges

Submitted by
jeff
jeff writes: "Updated with different first link — typepad has an outage: NewsCloud released its reporting engine on YouTube's ongoing takedowns of Comedy Central material. There is a summary report and a video search. While Viacom has said they were targeting YouTube with requests to take down whole episodes, we found the takedowns to be fairly indiscriminate. e.g. 63% of Daily Show clips (and 58% of all shows) taken down were less than 5 minutes in length. As Slashdot reported, now that the Daily Show is as substantive as network news, clips such as Net Neutrality, Stem Cell research, Hurricane Katrina and interviews with public officials such as Bill Clinton and Al Gore should get more careful consideration under for fair use. We also wanted to get a sense of the number of page views that Comedy Central clips had generated for YouTube over time — this also represents potential lost revenue for Viacom. Our subset of broken clips represented 14,867,004 viewings. While the live videos left at YouTube represent 23,322,598 viewings. That's 38,189,602 combined."
The Internet

Submission + - Reporting Engine for YouTube's Daily Show Purges

Submitted by
Jeff
Jeff writes: "NewsCloud released its reporting engine on YouTube's ongoing takedowns of Comedy Central material. There is a summary report and a video search. While Viacom has said they were targeting YouTube with requests to take down whole episodes, we found the takedowns to be fairly indiscriminate. e.g. 63% of Daily Show clips (and 58% of all shows) taken down were less than 5 minutes in length. As Slashdot reported, now that the Daily Show is as substantive as network news, clips such as Net Neutrality, Stem Cell research, Hurricane Katrina and interviews with public officials such as Bill Clinton and Al Gore should get more careful consideration under for fair use. We also wanted to get a sense of the number of page views that Comedy Central clips had generated for YouTube over time — this also represents potential lost revenue for Viacom. Our subset of broken clips represented 14,867,004 viewings. While the live videos left at YouTube represent 23,322,598 viewings. That's 38,189,602 combined."
Businesses

Submission + - Posthumous GPLing?

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Has anyone ever heard of somebody GPLing his/her work posthumously?

I ask because in the small world of screen reading software for the blind, the owner of a small business that had a product called Slimware Window Bridge died suddenly and his product, if it had been GPLed, could be helping millions of blind people in developing countries today; not to mention some of you.
Portables (Apple)

Submission + - New MacBook Dual Core 2 Benchmarks

Submitted by ApolloX
ApolloX writes: New Macworld Benchmarks are now available, from the article:

"Like the iMac before it, Apple's MacBook Pro underwent an upgrade highlighted by a chip swap — the Core Duo processor that used to power Apple's pro laptop is gone, replaced by the next-generation Core 2 Duo. And as with our iMac benchmarks, these updated Core 2 Duo MacBook Pro models show a modest performance gain when compared to older systems running on Core Duo chips with the same clock speeds."

As expected, the new 15-inch Intel Dual Core 2 (2.33Ghz/2GB RAM) is the new king of apple portables, with results for the 17-inch model still pending.
User Journal

Submission + - API nightmares: what's your story?

Submitted by vaspersthegrate
vaspersthegrate writes: While I gather my thoughts and references, relative to API design, testing, and promotions, let me ask you a question. Feel free to respond. What API disasters have you experienced? Tell me about your API nightmares. APIs that changed, didn't work, had bad documentation, poor presentation format, were hard to work with, had a buggy core product, had lousy developer support, etc. Help me compile my research into API Marketing, and ride my coattails into oblivion! Actual research findings, URLs, and citations coming soon. Stay tuned.

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