bherman - Slashdot User

Submission + - SCO Loses Ruling Over Unix Copyrights

Submitted by

bherman

on Saturday August 11, 2007 @07:53AM

bherman writes: "It looks like SCO has finally been dealt their TKO. Utah state judge Dale Kimball ruled that SCO does not own the copyrights to the Unix kernel or the UnixWare OS. I wonder what the stock market will think of SCO come Monday."

Submission + - AACS broken for all HD and Blu-ray disks

Submitted by on Monday February 12, 2007 @11:26AM

An anonymous reader writes: Two months after Muslix64 initially publicized his method for getting AACS keys, a user on Doom9 has found the processing key, which is able to decrypt all disks for both formats released thus far. The exploit can even be reused for future keys. This will allow the creation of a one-click backup utility and is a major blow against DRM.

Submission + - Big Pharma's Open Source Biology

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 12, 2007 @10:57AM

An anonymous reader writes: Big pharmaceutical companies used to hoard genetic information to themselves. But this Forbes story says that Novartis and Pfizer are now giving genetic info they found away for free, because it is worth more to them to have lots of researchers working on it than to keep it away from competitors.

http://www.forbes.com/business/2007/02/12/novartis -genes-diabetes-research-biz-cz_mh_0212novartis.ht ml

This represents a big change from a decade ago, when companies bought up genetic databases for hundreds of millions of dollars — then found out that they couldn't really use these to invent new medicines.

Submission + - Earth will turn to Venus because of computer bug

Submitted by

amigoro

on Friday January 19, 2007 @02:24PM

amigoro writes: "The story so far: NOAA reports that 2006 growth rate of CO2 concentration is 2.64 ppm/year. This is an increase from 2.42ppm/year in 2005 and 1.65ppm/year 2004, and The Guardian, using this data, reports that Earth will soon turn to Venus because of runaway greenhouse effect. Then NOAA tells the Guardian it ain't so, that the figures are only preliminary and pulls the December data, bringing the value down to 2.05ppm/year. But they tell others that the wrong value was published because of a computer bug.

The way I see it, three things could be happening here

It was a genuine computer bug

They are trying to stop people getting alarmed about Earth atmosphere becoming inhabitable

They are trying to cover up because someone from the top ordered them to do so

"

Submission + - Verizon spins off rural lines

Submitted by ffejie on Tuesday January 16, 2007 @02:23PM

ffejie writes: Verizon has announced that it will be spinning off rural assets to FairPoint Communications. The deal will close sometime in 2007 and is worth $2.7 Billion. 1.6 Million phone lines, 234,000 high speed (DSL) subscribers and 600,000 long distance customers will be moved to FairPoint in an effort for Verizon to shed it's low margin lines in rural areas. The sale has been rumored since at least the summer. With Verizon offering high speed FiOS (FTTP) to only it's local service areas, what will happen to the consumers stuck with a smaller telco like those moving to FairPoint? In the future, will there become an even deeper digital divide between the rural users and the high revenue areas?

Submission + - Dear Senator Feinstein: please don't PERFORM

Submitted by

tcahill

on Tuesday January 16, 2007 @01:56PM

tcahill writes: "tcahill thinks Senator Feinstein's new PERFORM act requires some audience participation. The Senator's Website is set up to receive email (1), perhaps slashdot readers might want to send her some appropriate audience feedback. Most politicians are more impressed by individually written letters than mass mailings. For example, here is what tcahill sent:

Regarding the PERFORM Act, it fundamentally offends the principle of free speech that you would contemplate mandating that only certain forms of communication (those using approved DRM) would be permitted for those broadcasting over the Internet. You can only do harm by persisting in seeking to impose controls over — not what information — but how information itself is disseminated. Beyond the constitutional offense inherent in what you contemplate, there are anti-market and anti-innovation assumptions inherent in your assumption that you can dictate exclusively which forms of technology are to be used. Finally, you clearly endanger the principle of fair use by mandating all internet broadcasts must be protected by DRM, which, by law, may not be circumvented. As I know you to be a progressive I am confident you will see the error in your approach and stand down.

Links

1. http://feinstein.senate.gov/email.html"

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