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Microsoft

Microsoft Uses WGA To Obtain Record Jail Sentences 311

Posted by CmdrTaco from the zomg-i-can-ping-my-router dept.
theodp writes "According to Microsoft, 'No information is collected during the [Genuine Advantage Program] validation process that can be used to identify or contact a user.' That's little comfort to the software counterfeiters who were just handed jail sentences ranging from 1.5-6.5 years by the Futian People's Court in China, especially since Microsoft contends that much of the estimated $2B in bogus software was detected by its Windows Genuine Advantage program. 'Software piracy negatively impacts local economic growth,' explained Microsoft VP Fengming Liu in a celebratory New Year's Eve press release. But then again, so does transferring $16B of assets and $9B in annual profit to an Irish tax haven, doesn't it?"
The Courts

New York Times Sued Over URL Linking 74

Posted by samzenpus from the can-you-sue-for-heat dept.
Davros writes "GateHouse Media, which publishes more than 100 papers in Massachusetts, accuses the Times of violating copyright by allowing its Boston Globe online unit to copy verbatim the headlines and first sentences from articles published on sites owned by GateHouse."
The Courts

Capitol Records Flooded Internet With MP3s, Says MP3Tunes CEO 168

Posted by timothy from the how-much-carrot-how-much-stick dept.
NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "In court papers filed in New York in Capitol Records v. MP3Tunes, the CEO of MP3Tunes, Michael Robertson, has accused the plaintiffs EMI, Capitol Records, and other EMI record labels of flooding the internet with free MP3s of their songs for promotional purposes, 'free to everyone (except, apparently, MP3tunes).' His 10-page declaration (PDF) provides exact details of specific song files, including the URLs from which they are being distributed free of charge, both by paid content distributors, and by EMI itself from its own web sites."
The Media

Time Warner Recommends Internet For Some Shows 379

Posted by timothy from the how-to-keep-hulu-in-page-views dept.
EdIII writes "The dispute between Time Warner and Viacom over fees seems to be without any resolution this year. Time Warner faces the possibility of being without content for almost 20 channels. Alexander Dudley, a spokesperson for Time Warner, is fighting back: 'We will be telling our customers exactly where they can go to see these programs online,' Mr. Dudley said. 'We'll also be telling them how they can hook up their PCs to a television set.' Why pay for digital cable when many content providers are now providing it on demand via the Internet? Not to mention the widespread availability of TV shows in both standard and high definition on public and private torrent tracker sites. It is entirely possible to watch television with no commercials or advertising with only an Internet connection. So getting your content via the Internet is not exactly free, but it certainly isn't contributing to Time Warner or any other cable providers' revenue stream. The real question is why Time Warner would fight back by so clearly showing how increasingly obsolete they are becoming and that cable providers are losing their monopolistic grip on media delivery." If no agreement is reached, those channels are supposed to be dropped just after midnight tonight.

Comment Designed Obsolescence (Score 4, Funny) 785

by neo (#26279967) Attached to: Microsoft Zunes Committing Mass Suicide

Designed Obsolescence.

You didn't really think they'd support this thing through 2009 did you? Oh, go back and read your EULA. It clearly states that at the start of 2009 you'll have to pay a subscription fee for you unit to continue working. You signed it in blood from the paper cut. Legally binding in hell.

Comment Wikipedia is Targeted Ad Nirvana (Score 1) 412

by neo (#26279863) Attached to: Wikipedia Almost Reaches $6 Million Target

Someone looking up plumbing finds an ad for plumbers...
Someone looking at the London listing finds hotel and air travel...
Someone looking up nukes gets an ad for the FBI...

A simple google ad, text only, wouldn't kill off anything that Wikipedia is trying to accomplish.

However the idea of paying people to moderate, edit, or create articles is a horrid idea. The reason I trust Wikipedia is because it's run by the commons and while they don't get everything right, they get more right than most encyclopedias and with a lot more volume.

If they start paying, I'll just branch it for the free editing.

Keep to your strengths Wikipedia. You have good information that people rely on daily. Having a small text ad wont kill that.
Bug

Microsoft Zunes Committing Mass Suicide 785

Posted by CmdrTaco from the i-bet-a-bricked-zune-is-still-warm dept.
jddeluxe writes "There are multiple reports springing up all over the internet of a mass suicide of Microsoft 30GB Zune players globally. Check Zune forums, Gizmodo, or other such sites; the reports are spreading rapidly, except apparently to the Microsoft official Zune site."

Comment Maybe it's done. (Score 1) 676

by neo (#26258909) Attached to: Michael Meeks Says OO.o Project is "Profoundly Sick"

Unlike projects by for profit organizations there's no need to continually create new versions of projects. Perhaps the dwindling developers is actually a great sign that the project has reached it's goals. Personally I think it works just fine and I can't think of any "new" feature creep I'd like to see added.

I know people who still use Word 5. Why? Because it was done. There wasn't a need for anything else. Maybe some bug fixes.

Are you using it?

Is it missing anything? (if you say yes... then you should really go add it.)
Software

Michael Meeks Says OO.o Project is "Profoundly Sick" 676

Posted by timothy from the important-alternative dept.
unassimilatible writes "Michael Meeks, who works full time developing OpenOffice, writes in his blog that the project is 'profoundly sick.' 'In a healthy project we would expect to see a large number of volunteer developers involved, in addition — we would expect to see a large number of peer companies contributing to the common code pool; we do not see this in OpenOffice.org. Indeed, quite the opposite we appear to have the lowest number of active developers on OO.o since records began: 24, this contrasts negatively with Linux's recent low of 160+. Even spun in the most positive way, OO.o is at best stagnating from a development perspective.'"
Windows

Microsoft Extends XP To May 2009 For OEMs 605

Posted by timothy from the that-pesky-reality-again dept.
beuges writes "Microsoft has announced over the weekend that it would allow computer manufacturers to receive copies of XP until the end of May 2009, shortly before Windows 7 is expected to hit the market. This should allow users to skip Vista entirely and move straight to 7, which has been receiving cautiously favorable reviews of pre-release and leaked alphas."
Medicine

Blood From Mosquito Traps Car Thief 198

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the plausible-deniability dept.
Frosty Piss writes "Police in Finland have made an arrest for car theft based on a DNA sample taken from the blood found inside a mosquito. 'A police patrol carried out an inspection of the car and they noticed a mosquito that had sucked blood. It was sent to the laboratory for testing, which showed the blood belonged to a man who was in the police registers,' a police officer told reporters. The suspect, who has been interrogated, has insisted he did not steal the car, saying he had hitchhiked and was given a lift by a man driving the car. I'm wondering if the suspect should have denied any association with the car at all. After all, who knows where that mosquito had been?"
Security

NSA Patents a Way To Spot Network Snoops 161

Posted by CmdrTaco from the welcome-to-the-holidays dept.
narramissic writes "The National Security Agency has patented a technique for figuring out whether someone is messing with your network by measuring the amount of time it takes to send different types of data and sounding an alert if something takes too long. 'The neat thing about this particular patent is that they look at the differences between the network layers,' said Tadayoshi Kohno, an assistant professor of computer science at the University of Washington. But IOActive security researcher Dan Kaminsky wasn't so impressed: 'Think of it as — if your network gets a little slower, maybe a bad guy has physically inserted a device that is intercepting and retransmitting packets. Sure, that's possible. Or perhaps you're routing through a slower path for one of a billion reasons.'"
Music

Will People Really Boycott Apple Over DRM? 664

Posted by kdawson from the for-tuppence-and-a-pretty-interface dept.
Ian Lamont writes "DefectiveByDesign.org is waging a battle against DRM with a 35-day campaign targeting various hardware and software products from Microsoft, Nintendo, and others. On day 11 it blasted iTunes for continuing to use DRM-encumbered music, games, TV shows, movies, audiobooks, and apps with DRM, while competitors are selling music without restrictions. DefectiveByDesign calls on readers to include 'iTunes gift cards and purchases in your boycott of all Apple products' to 'help drive change.' However, there's a big problem with this call to arms: most people simply don't care about iTunes DRM. Quoting: 'The average user is more than willing to pay more money for hobbled music because of user interface, ease of use, and marketing. ... Apple regularly features exclusive live sets from popular artists, while Amazon treats its digital media sales as one more commodity being sold.' What's your take on the DRM schemes used by Apple and other companies? Is a boycott called for, and can it be effective?"
Television

Octopuses Have No Personalities and Enjoy HDTV 482

Posted by kdawson from the or-was-that-redundant dept.
Whiteox writes about an Australian researcher named Renata Pronk, who has discovered that octopuses prefer HDTV. She recruited 32 gloomy octopuses from the waters of Chowder Bay. Previously, researchers have reported little success when showing video to octopuses. Miss Pronk's insight was that the octopus eye is so refined that it might see standard PAL video, at 25 fps, as a series of stills. She tried HDTV (50 fps) and her subjects reacted to the videos of a crab, another octopus, or a swinging bottle on the end of a string. A further discovery is that octopuses show no trait of individual personalities, even though they exhibit a high level of intelligence. It would certainly be possible to quibble about the definition of "personality" employed, and whether Miss Pronk had successfully measured it.

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