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Television

How an Online-Only TV Series Stays Successful 163

Posted by timothy from the roll-enough-dies dept.
ChronoDragon writes "The Wall Street Journal points out that it is possible to make a successful web series without the backing of a studio. With the release of a music video, Do you Wanna Date My Avatar, and the start of Season of 3, the web series The Guild is ready for even more success. The Guild, created by Felicia Day (Doctor Horrible), is a low-budget comedy series about a group of MMORPG gamers and their interactions both online and off. While there are a lot of references that will be instantly recognized by gamers, the show is still very accessible to non-gamers."
The Courts

Court Appoints Pro Bono Counsel For RIAA Defendant 123

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the level-the-playing-field dept.
NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "In what could be a turning point in the RIAA's litigation campaign, a Michigan judge has decided to appoint pro bono counsel to represent college student Brittany Kruger, who is being sued by the RIAA in SONY BMG Music Entertainment v. Kruger. As this article points out, 'if other judges follow suit, things will change dramatically.' That is because the RIAA's entire litigation campaign is based upon economic inequality of the litigants: almost none of those sued by the RIAA can afford legal representation, and the RIAA has a huge economic incentive to fight cases to the death, while the defendants have no economic incentive greater than the 'settlement' amount, which they often pay even when entirely innocent. If the courts follow the lead of District Judge Timothy P. Greeley [PDF], and appoint pro bono legal counsel, the RIAA will no longer be able to achieve the easy pickings default judgments and 'settlements' it's routinely obtained in the past."
Security

Hospital Equipment Infected With Conficker 289

Posted by timothy from the would-never-happen-with-electronic-medical-records dept.
nandemoari writes "Recently, the Conficker/Downadup worm infected several hundred machines and critical medical equipment in an undisclosed number of US hospitals. The attacks were not widespread; however, Marcus Sachs, director of the SANS Internet Storm Center, told CNET News that it raises the awareness of what we would do if there were millions of computers infected in hospitals or in critical infrastructure locations. It's not clear how the devices (including heart monitors, MRI machines and PCs) got infected. Infected computers were running Windows NT and Windows 2000 in a local area network (LAN) that wasn't supposed to be Internet accessible, but the LAN was connected to one with direct Internet access. A patch was released by Microsoft last October that fixes the problem, but the computers infected were reportedly too old to be patched."
Data Storage

Forensics Tool Finds Headerless Encrypted Files 374

Posted by timothy from the sir-there's-an-anomaly-here dept.
gurps_npc writes "Forensics Innovations claims to have for sale a product that detects headerless encrypted files, such as TrueCrypt Dynamic files. It does not decrypt the file, just tells you that it is in fact an encrypted file. It works by detecting hidden patterns that don't exist in a random file. It does not mention steganography, but if their claim is true, it seems that it should be capable of detecting stenographic information as well."

Comment Re:Interesting (Score 1) 898

by PixelThis (#27740237) Attached to: Air Force One Flyby Causes Brief Panic In NYC
I stand corrected. I was taking my original comments on the bends from an article on the construction of the Brooklyn Bridge (The Makers of Things) it was not clear in that article that the caissons used to set the bridge towers were pressurized, so my assumption was simply that they were they were watertight and very very heavy.

Comment Re:Interesting (Score 1) 898

by PixelThis (#27738407) Attached to: Air Force One Flyby Causes Brief Panic In NYC
You also take a long time driving from Denver to Death Valley... and it's the time of ascent and descent that makes all the difference with .
It doesn't matter what causes the pressure difference... the gases in your blood don't know or care what the external pressure difference is caused by.

Comment Re:Interesting (Score 2, Insightful) 898

by PixelThis (#27735923) Attached to: Air Force One Flyby Causes Brief Panic In NYC
I'll probably regret responding to this but it's a slow Monday...

* Building "tall" buildings underground costs a whole lot more than building up above ground. There are also issues with depth and air pressure, especially when you start talking about 40+ story buildings going down. All of a sudden getting the bends becomes an issue when it's time to go home (or God forbid evacuate the building).

* Required mandatory high altitudes for all planes... how were you imagining that they'd land? Most major cities have airports right close by.

* Normal parachutes don't always deploy effectively for drops of less than 500 feet, so that eliminates a lot of buildings. Also parachutes don't work so well when the wind blows you into the side of building you just jumped out of... or the one across the street.

Maybe we should work on helping these people get over their panic-first think-later reactions? It'll be long term less expensive and ultimately more effective.
Privacy

Using Net Proxies Will Lead To Harsher Sentences 366

Posted by Soulskill from the no-word-on-mask-and-cape-penalties dept.
Afforess writes "'Proxy servers are an everyday part of Internet surfing. But using one in a crime could soon lead to more time in the clink,' reports the Associated Press. The new federal rules would make the use of proxy servers count as 'sophistication' in a crime, leading to 25% longer jail sentences. Privacy advocates complain this will disincentivize privacy and anonymity online. '[The government is telling people] ... if you take normal steps to protect your privacy, we're going to view you as a more sophisticated criminal,' writes the Center for Democracy and Technology. Others fear this may lead to 'cruel and unusual punishments' as Internet and cell phone providers often use proxies without users' knowledge to reroute Internet traffic. This may also ultimately harm corporations when employees abuse VPN's, as they too are counted as a 'proxy' in the new legislation. TOR, a common Internet anonymizer, is also targeted in the new legislation. Some analysts believe this legislation is an effort to stop leaked US Government information from reaching outside sources, such as Wikileaks. The legislation (PDF, the proposed amendment is on pages 5-15) will be voted on by the United States Sentencing Commission on April 15, and is set to take effect on November 1st. The EFF has already urged the Commission to reject the amendment."
Education

College Police Think Using Linux Is Suspicious Behavior 1079

Posted by CmdrTaco from the so-is-your-mom dept.
FutureDomain writes "The Boston College Campus Police have seized the electronics of a computer science student for allegedly sending an email outing another student. The probable cause? The search warrant application states that he is 'a computer science major' and he uses 'two different operating systems for hiding his illegal activity. One is the regular B.C. operating system and the other is a black screen with white font which he uses prompt commands on.' The EFF is currently representing him."
Media

Google Losing Up To $1.65M a Day On YouTube 290

Posted by timothy from the lancelot-galahad-and-I-Jump-out-of-the-rabbit dept.
An anonymous reader writes "The average visitor to YouTube is costing Google between one and two dollars, according to new research that shows Google losing up to $1.65 million per day on the video site. More than two years after Google acquired YouTube, income from premium offers and other revenue generators don't offset YouTube's expenses of content acquisition, bandwidth, and storage. YouTube is expected to serve 75 billion video streams to 375 million unique visitors in 2009, costing Google up to $2,064,054 a day, or $753 million annualized. Revenue projections for YouTube fall between $90 million and $240 million." Maybe this is in part because, as Al writes, "Researchers from HP Palo Alto studied videos uploaded to YouTube and found that popularity has little to do with quality or persistence."
Displays

Work Progresses On 10,000 Year Clock 307

Posted by timothy from the artifexian-contrapulation dept.
KindMind writes "CNet has pictures of a planned 10,000 year clock to be built in eastern Nevada by the Long Now Foundation. From the article: 'Running under its own power, the clock is an experiment in art, science, and engineering. The six dials on the face of this machine will represent the year, century, horizons, sun position, lunar phase, and the stars of the night sky over a 10,000-year period. Likely to span multiple generations and evolutions in culture, the thinking and design put into the monument makes it a moving sculpture as beautiful as it is complex.' This was reviewed on Slashdot in 2005. Really cool pictures, including one of a mechanical 'binary computer' that converts the pendulum into positions on the dial."

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