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Censorship

Submission + - British Comedians Fight for Free Speech (bbc.co.uk)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Comedian Stephen Fry has said he is "prepared to go to prison" over the "Twitter joke" trial. Fry was appearing at a benefit gig for Paul Chambers who is appealing to the High Court against his conviction for sending a menacing communication. Fry argued that Chambers' tweet was an example of Britain's tradition of self-deprecating humour and banter. Few of the stars were prepared to assign wisdom to Chambers' original tweet, however. Sitting inconspicuously in the stalls, he was variously described as a knucklehead, a nerd and a "donut". Murray even branded the gig the "Save Paul Chambers from his own stupid destiny event". But everyone seemed united by a desire to protect freedom of speech or at least the ability to recognise the difference between jokes and menacing terrorist threats.
Ubuntu

Submission + - 5 Out Of 11 Crashed Unity In Canonical's Study (digitizor.com)

Submitted by
dkd903
dkd903 writes: "Today the results of the Default Desktop User Testing for Ubuntu 11.04 was published by Canonical’s Rick Spencer. The test was done using 11 participants from different backgrounds to test the new Unity interface that that Ubuntu 11.04 will have. The test was interesting in many ways."
Education

Submission + - Hacking Education: A Contest for Developers and Da (donorschoose.org)

Submitted by GJSchaller
GJSchaller writes: Ten years ago, a teacher in the Bronx launched DonorsChoose.org. Since then, more than 165,000 teachers at 43,000 public schools have posted over 300,000 classroom project requests, inspiring $80,000,000 in giving from 400,000 donors.

We've opened up that data, and invite you to make discoveries and build apps that improve education in America. Help to shape your school system's budget by revealing what teachers really need. Build the first mobile app for hyper-local education philanthropy. We've got a list of suggestions to help get you thinking.

We hope to build a community of developers and data crunchers, so we're launching a contest!"

The "Big Winner" gets to Meet Stephen Colbert, accept a trophy from him, and attend a taping of The Colbert Report with three of his or her friends!
The Internet

Submission + - Comcast's 105MBit Service Comes With Data Cap (itworld.com) 2

Submitted by
itwbennett
itwbennett writes: "Comcast just announced the ultrafast, ultra-broadband "Extreme 105" 105 Mbit/sec Internet service for an introductory price of $105, when bundled with other services. That's the good news. The bad news: Comcast 'put a data cap on the service of 250 Gbit per month — about five hours worth of full-bandwidth use,' writes blogger Kevin Fogarty. 'There's no guarantee you'll be able to take full advantage of all that bandwidth, either.'"

Submission + - XXX Goes Live in the Root Servers (domainnamenews.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Earlier today IANA added the .XXX Top Level Domain to the root nameservers. While the registry operator Afilias is still in their setup process for ICM registry, the zone is currently propagating. While a number of registrars have already been taking pre-registrations, the actual timeline for the launch has not yet been published.
Government

Submission + - Need a receipt on taxes? The Federal Tax Receipt (whitehouse.gov)

Submitted by
ndogg
ndogg writes: "The White House has opened up a tool that lets you see where your tax dollars are being spent. I put my numbers in and it showed that a little over a quarter goes towards defense and military spending (I'm not sure I'm getting my money's worth on that one), and a little under a quarter for health care."
Botnet

Submission + - Former Internet Vigilante Gets Two Years For DDoS (ibtimes.com)

Submitted by RedEaredSlider
RedEaredSlider writes: A computer programmer who once volunteered for Perverted Justice, the producers of "To Catch a Predator," was sentenced Friday to two years in prison for launching a botnet that attacked the organization's web site.

In September, Bruce Raisley, 48, of Kansas City, Mo., was convicted by the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey of violating the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. He had created a virus that spread to about 100,000 computers and launched a number of DDoS attacks in 2007 and 2008.

Submission + - US rolls out Internet identity plan (arstechnica.com)

Submitted by
RareButSeriousSideEf
RareButSeriousSideEf writes: "FTA: At a US Chamber of Commerce event today, the federal government rolled out its vision for robust online credentials that it hopes will replace the current mess of multiple accounts and insecure passwords. The choice of the Chamber of Commerce wasn't an accident, either; the government wants to squelch any talk of a "national Internet ID card" and emphasize that the plan will be both voluntary and led by the private sector.

[...] Users can choose how many credentials they acquire, what information is contained in each, and how much information is revealed at login.

[...] Public meetings on NSTIC begin in June, and NIST hopes to be funding pilot projects by 2012. Still, ordinary Internet users won't be able to use the system for three to five years."
Apple

Submission + - PTO: Apple Developing Projectors For Laptops (ibtimes.com)

Submitted by RedEaredSlider
RedEaredSlider writes: Apple may be interested in embedding future computers with their own projectors, If a recent patent application is any indication.

The application, filed in September 2009, describes a low-power projector design that would be cheaper to manufacture than current versions.
Hardware

Submission + - Cheaper, more powerful alternative to FPGAs (technologyreview.com) 2

Submitted by
holy_calamity
holy_calamity writes: "Technology Review takes a look at a competitor to FPGAs claimed to be significantly faster and cheaper. Startup Tabula recently picked up another $108m in funding and says their chips make it economic to ship products with reconfigurable hardware, enabling novel upgrade strategies that include hardware as well as software."
Businesses

Submission + - Cisco Killed A Wi-Fi Enabled Flip (itworld.com) 1

Submitted by
jfruhlinger
jfruhlinger writes: "When Cisco killed the Flip earlier this week, a lot of tech commentators reacted with sadness. The video camera line might have seemed a bit out of date in the world of video-enabled smartphones, but they were much loved devices. And now word is filtering out that Flip had a Wi-Fi-enabled Flip camera, which may have had live Internet broadcasting capabilities, ready to be released at the moment when the decision to shut down the division was made."
NASA

Submission + - Solar Activity Increasing; More Auroras In Store (ibtimes.com)

Submitted by RedEaredSlider
RedEaredSlider writes: NASA scientists watching the sun are bracing for a big jump in solar activity as the quietest period in decades comes to an end.

In 2008, the solar cycle, marked by the ebb and flow of sunspots, fell to its deepest trough in nearly a century. But lately the number of sunspots, solar flares and spectacular coronal mass ejections has gone up. Increases in solar activity mean that the auroras will be visible more often and further south than usual. It also means that there is more chance of damage to satellites and danger to astronauts.
Oracle

Submission + - How To Get the Best Deal From Oracle (itworld.com)

Submitted by
itwbennett
itwbennett writes: "Oracle is known for being tough to negotiate with, but there are strategies customers can use to ensure the best possible deal ... especially now that the company's fiscal Q4 is upon them. For example, Oracle's sales representatives have a short-term focus and 'will prefer to get one big order now than get several smaller orders over the next three years, even if the latter would add up to more money in total,' said Forrester Research analyst Duncan Jones in a report released this week."
Transportation

Submission + - TSA Investigates ...People Who Complain about TSA

Submitted by
Hugh Pickens writes
Hugh Pickens writes writes: "CNN has obtained a list of roughly 70 "behavioral indicators" that TSA behavior detection officers use to identify potentially "high risk" passengers at the nation's airports and report that arrogant complaining about airport security is one indicator TSA officers consider when looking for possible criminals and terrorists and when combined with other behavioral indicators, it could result in a traveler facing additional scrutiny. "Expressing your contempt about airport procedures — that's a First Amendment-protected right," says Michael German, a former FBI agent who now works as legal counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union. "It's circular reasoning where, you know, I'm going to ask someone to surrender their rights; if they refuse, that's evidence that I need to take their rights away from them. And it's simply inappropriate." Interestingly enough some experts say terrorists are much more likely to avoid confrontations with authorities, saying an al Qaeda training manual instructs members to blend in. "I think the idea that they would try to draw attention to themselves by being arrogant at airport security, it fails the common sense test," says CNN National Security Analyst Peter Bergen."
Security

Submission + - Online Fraud Costs The Average Victim 631 Dollars (ibtimes.com)

Submitted by
gabbo529
gabbo529 writes: "President Obama, in releasing his new cyber security initiative, revealed the average victim of online fraud loses $631 out-of-pocket and it takes them over 130 hours for them to recover from having their identity stolen. The new initiative would introduce Online ID credentials; in the form of software on a smartphone or a smart card; and would store a single password, rather than forcing people to remember countless user names and passwords."

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