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Censorship

Submission + - New Jersey bans sex offenders from using internet

Submitted by the_humeister
the_humeister writes: According to the AP, New Jersey has just enacted a new law restricting internet access to sex offenders. Now this wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing save for the fact that "sex offender" now covers such a wide range of actions such that getting caught urinating in public can get you such a label.
Announcements

Submission + - Florida election ballots to be printed on-demand

Submitted by davidwr
davidwr writes: The St. Petersburg, FL, Times reports that Florida is going back to paper ballots, but with a twist. They are printing the ballots on-demand, right there at the polling booth. This isn't machine-assisted voting where a touch-screen fills in your printed ballot for you. It's just a way to save printing costs and reduce paper waste.
The Internet

Submission + - New Jersey Denies Internet from Sex Offenders (nytimes.com) 3

Submitted by
eldavojohn
eldavojohn writes: "New Jersey just passed legislation making it illegal for sex offenders to use the internet. NJ congresswoman Linda D. Greenstein said, "When Megan's Law was enacted, few could envision a day when a sex offender hiding behind a fake screen name would be a mouse-click away from new and unwitting victims. Sex offenders cannot be given an opportunity to abuse the anonymity the Internet can provide as a means of opening a door to countless new potential victims." While they still can search for jobs, this is a major expansion over the prior legislation which barred them from social networking sites like facebook or myspace."
Portables (Games)

Submission + - Should Retailers Wipe Used Games and Consoles? 2

Submitted by
Draconum
Draconum writes: "For Christmas this year, one of my (much) younger cousins received a used copy of Nintendogs for the DS. However, the previous owner of the cartridge felt it prudent to name his pet dog a racial slur that is highly offensive and not printable on Slashdot. As well, the saved file was not yet at the point at which you can change game settings or erase the save, so erasing it would mean my cousin (or at least someone else) would have had to play through the game's introductory section, all the while being exposed to that highly offensive term.

My aunt, who purchased the cartridge for her, was outraged and felt that the retailer should take responsibility for this. My question is, then, do you think it's reasonable for retailers to be required to factory-reset game cartridges that could possibly contain highly offensive user-created content? (This is not as simple as it seems, though, as many games make it difficult or impossible to do this effectively.) Note that I'm not questioning whether or not they should accept a return, but whether or not they should responsible for literally erasing the saved files before reselling them.

It occurs to me that, additionally, as consoles (Wii, Xbox360, and PS3 included) are starting to allow storage of vast amounts of content within the console itself, on hard drives or flash memory, should retailers wipe those as well? (As far fetched as it seems — or not — think pornographic images, offensive text, etc.)"
Networking

Submission + - Content filtering for free wi-fi 5

Submitted by Munk
Munk writes: My in-laws own a truckstop and want to start offering free wi-fi to their customers. Since the wi-fi would cover the restaurant and other public areas, they don't want folks surfing porn where other customers could see it. And as a side benefit, I would also like to be able to block P2P traffic that would use excessive bandwidth. Does anybody have an suggestions for a setup to handle this sort of thing? I would obviously like to use linux and other free software if possible.
Microsoft

Submission + - Microsoft fires its CIO after investigation

Submitted by Stony Stevenson
Stony Stevenson writes: Microsoft has fired its chief information officer, Stuart Scott. "We can confirm that Stuart Scott was terminated after an investigation for violation of company policies," the company said. "We have no further information to share." But according to this article, Microsoft is already looking for a replacement. Microsoft General Manager Shahla Aly and Alain Crozier, a Microsoft VP in charge of the company's CFO, sales, marketing and services group will take over Scott's duties while Microsoft looks around.
Google

Submission + - Web 2.0 A Bigger Threat Than Outsourcing?

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: According to InformationWeek, Web 2.0 is even worse than outsourcing for IT jobs. The article talks about corporations that have laid off IT staff and replaced them with technologies like mashups and wikis that can help people get things done without involving IT. Most IT people still think Web 2.0 is an overhyped buzzword, but that might not matter: So many Web 2.0 apps are sold (or given away for free) by software-as-a-service companies like Google that people can bypass IT altogether, and IT might not even know until it's too late.
The Internet

Submission + - RIPE states urgency for IPv6 deployment

Submitted by Bigon
Bigon writes: After the RIPE-55 meeting last week, RIPE makes a statement that says that the pool of unallocated IPv4 address would be completely allocated within two years in the worst case

The remaining pool of unallocated IPv4 address space is likely to be fully allocated within two to four years.
and encourages everyone to push IPv6 adoption.

We recommend that service providers make their services available over IPv6. We urge those who will need significant new address resources to deploy IPv6. We encourage governments to play their part in the deployment of IPv6 and in particular to ensure that all citizens will be able to participate in the future information society. We urge that the widespread deployment of IPv6 be made a high priority by all stakeholders.
The Courts

Submission + - RIAA's Sherman Attacks NewYorkCountryLawyer 4

Submitted by
NewYorkCountryLawyer
NewYorkCountryLawyer writes: "When questioned by a journalist on the viability of the RIAA's "making available" theory of copyright law, Cary Sherman, the organization's Chairman and CEO, responded by saying "It basically comes down to, who ya gonna believe, Ray Beckerman, or the Register of Copyrights?". Beckerman (alias NewYorkCountryLawyer on Slashdot) replied on his blog "I'm sure my readers know what the correct answer to the question is. Question: Who are you going to believe, Ray Beckerman, or the Register of Copyrights? Answer: Neither. I'm going to read the statute and believe what the statute says"."
Privacy

Submission + - Posting on web led to supension from work

Submitted by
c0rruptc0d3
c0rruptc0d3 writes: "IANAL and I doubt most of you are but being techies maybe you all can give me some advice. I was recently told by my employer I am being placed on a paid leave of absence and have to go through what amounts to a forced psych evaluation and counseling and then I might be allowed to return to work. While I will admit what I posted was not flattering it was posted non-publically without specific references to any person, name of the organization etc. The employer would not specify exactly what the grounds were only that what I posted was construed as a potential threat and that someone had made a complaint. What would you do in this situation? Have any of you been through this before? Do I have a right to freedom of speech?"
Links

Journal Journal: Do we want to know what others think about us?

Journal by Glammy
A new service - http://myfeatures.org is offering us to know what other people think about is - were they friends, colleagues, etc. I think most people are sometimes nudged by the question - "what do they think about me, am I cool or boring?". But of course few people are going to tell you that you are "boring, irritating" or "awesome". A school game introduces the concept of anonymous evaluation - every student writes a good and a bad features of each class

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