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Submission Summary: 0 pending, 42 declined, 6 accepted (48 total, 12.50% accepted)

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Submission + - What Turned Jaron Lanier Against the Web (smithsonianmag.com)

i_want_you_to_throw_ writes: "Details of Jaron Lanier's crusade against Web 2.0 continues in an article at Smithsonian Magazine. The article, entitled "What Turned Jaron Lanier Against the Web" continues Lanier's rant against Web 2.0. It's a mostly interesting read with Lanier suggesting we are outsourcing ourselves into insignificant advertising-fodder and making an audacious connection between techno-utopianism, the rise of the machines and the Great Recession."
Apple

Submission + - Apple Abandons Green Certification (cnn.com)

i_want_you_to_throw_ writes: "Technology giant Apple is catching heat on blogs this week for its decision to drop out of an environmental certification program for electronics, called EPEAT. There's speculation that Apple's new line of "retina display" laptops aren't easily recyclable because their batteries are glued to the aluminum case on the computer. This decision is already costing Apple with the city of San Francisco deciding to no longer buy Apple computers. San Francisco also has a rule on the books prohibiting the city from purchasing desktop and laptop computers that are not EPEAT-certified, so the city will not be able to purchase Apple desktops and laptops unless Apple gets the green certification again."

Submission + - You can't copyright a number judge rules. (cnn.com)

i_want_you_to_throw_ writes: "Pi Day this year was special for Michael John Blake. On that day, March 14 (3/14, like the number 3.14), a judge dismissed a copyright infringement lawsuit against his song, which is based on the number pi. A judged ruled that you can't copyright pi (it's a non-copyrightable fact). You CAN however trademark numbers although it is a sticky business. Boeing, for example, has trademarked "737", "757", and so on. Intel on the other hand hasn't been so lucky with "486", forcing it to switch to names like seem like newfound elements of the periodic table ("Pentium", etc)."

Submission + - Former Goldman Programmer's Conviction Overturned (cnbc.com)

i_want_you_to_throw_ writes: "It appears the legal woes of Sergey Aleynikov, a former Goldman Sachs Group computer programmer, who had been convicted of stealing part of the Wall Street bank's high-frequency trading code, are now over. A federal appeals court overturned his conviction and recommended acquittal. Slashdot previously covered this story when he was sentenced to 97 months. It will be interesting to see their reasoning (an opinion is to be released) as well as what this may mean for other programmers developing high frequency trading code."

Submission + - Reliving 9/11: TV Archive (cnn.com)

i_want_you_to_throw_ writes: "It's a time few may want to remember. But TV news reports of the September 11, 2001, attacks — the innocuous moments before, and the horrible hours and days after — are now archived online for anyone who cares to relive them.

The Internet Archive, a nonprofit digital library, has posted video from 20 television stations chronicling that grim week. The group's founder said the page, "Understanding 9/11," is designed to help researchers, historians and regular citizens put the attacks in context a decade later."

Firefox

Submission + - Firefox looking to eliminate version numbers. (webmonkey.com)

i_want_you_to_throw_ writes: "Mozilla has created a stir in the Firefox community by suggesting that the version number ought to be eliminated. The version number currently shown in Firefox’s "About" dialog has been filed as a bug. Instead of a version number Mozilla simply wants the box to read something like "Firefox checked for updates 20 minutes ago, you are running the latest version." Mozilla believes that eliminating the version number will reduce user confusion."
Novell

Submission + - Finally. SCO/Novell suit is over. SCO loses (crunchgear.com)

i_want_you_to_throw_ writes: It is over. The SCO’s long-running lawsuit against Novell over a number of patents involved around Unix copyright. In short, SCO claimed to own Unix even after Novell bought it back near the turn of the century. SCO’s patent-trolling has been shameless. The once great company reduced itself to a lawsuit machine and essentially attacked IBM and Novell for years. You can read all about the mess here, but trust me, this has been one of the nastiest patent wars in recent history.
Cellphones

Submission + - Apple Asks Court To Ban Google Phones (informationweek.com)

i_want_you_to_throw_ writes: Apple on Tuesday asked the U.S. International Trade Commission to block the importation into the country of HTC's Google Android-based mobile phones, including the Google-branded Nexus One. Apple asked the court for "a permanent exclusion order" that would bar from entry "all mobile communications devices and components" made by HTC that carry the offending technologies, according to court documents.

Submission + - CueCat 2 , Electric Bugaloo? (cnbc.com)

i_want_you_to_throw_ writes: Magazines are starting to think beyond the page and experiment with smartphone applications they say will provide their readers with additional content and bring a whole new level of engagement with the publication. Starting with its March issue, Esquire will have barcodes next to all products featured in its editorial section. Readers simply scan the barcodes and a menu on their phone will open with several options, including the choice to instantly purchase the product. Have we learned nothing from the late 90s and the CueCat ?
PHP

Submission + - PHP runtime rewritten by Facebook? (facebook.com)

i_want_you_to_throw_ writes: It's true! Facebook has completely rewritten the PHP runtime to make it faster and more efficient, and its completely open source. Named HipHop, its described as a source code transformer, changing PHP into optimized C++ which is then compiled using g++. Thus keeping the best aspects of PHP while taking advantage of the performance of C++. Using HipHop, the Facebook web server CPU usage has been decreased by about fifty percent!
Apple

Submission + - iPad DRM is bad for freedom? (defectivebydesign.org)

i_want_you_to_throw_ writes: Today, Apple launched a computer that will never belong to its owner. Apple will use Digital Restrictions Management (DRM) to gain total veto power over the applications you use and the media you can view. Is it bad for freedom? DefectiveByDesign.org (A campaign of the Free Software Foundation) says yes. From the site: DRM will give Apple and their corporate partners the power to disable features, block competing products (especially free software) censor news, and even delete books, videos, or news stories from users' computers without notice-- using the device's "always on" network connection. What do you think?

Submission + - SourceForge blocks Iran, North Korea, Syria, Sudan (downloadsquad.com)

i_want_you_to_throw_ writes: In a move that must surely strike at the very core of open source, FOSS, and the heart of GNU crusader Richard Stallman, SourceForge has now blocked all access from by countries on the U.S. 'Foreign Assets Control sanction list'.

That isn't the beginning of the story though: back in 2008 the same countries were allowed to surf SourceForge, but not interact with the source code repositories — they could download, but couldn't contribute. Now it seems the access block is complete — if you live in Iran, North Korea, Syria, Sudan or Cuba, you simply can't access SourceForge.

Since /. is part of this family, this seems to be the place to talk about it.

Linux

Submission + - Linux on the move: the future of portable distros (techradar.com)

i_want_you_to_throw_ writes: Regular Linux is discussed a lot, but how about the portable distros? They have seen an explosion these last couple of years. There's a new breed of netbook distro that's aiming to change this perception and take the fight for the perfect mobile platform back to the manufacturers. Netbooks aren't the only portable platform where there's innovation to be found: there are millions of mobile phone users completely oblivious to the fact that their devices are powered by Linux. And that's just the way it should be. But there's a growing number for whom it will become increasingly important, whether that's through Android or Nokia's latest gadget.

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