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Iphone

Submission + - iPhone unlock & "jailbreak" given DMCA excempt (bloomberg.com)

Submitted by thisnow1
thisnow1 writes: Hot on the heels of the "Dongle" exemption, the US Copyright Office in the Library of Congress has added cellphone unlocking and jailbreaking to a list of acceptable actions on electronic devices during its periodic review of the DMCA. Jailbreaking and unlock of phones can now be done without fear of legal penalty. (Professors, students and documentary filmmakers are now allowed to break copy protection measures of DVDs for non-commercial purposes.) Apple and the MPAA were none too pleased with this rule change. http://news.yahoo.com/s/ytech_wguy/20100726/tc_ytech_wguy/ytech_wguy_tc3236_2
Power

Submission + - Vibration Energy Cells unveiled (redorbit.com)

Submitted by Just_Say_Duhhh
Just_Say_Duhhh writes: Brother Industries unveiled the "Vibration Energy Cell" at Techno-Frontier 2010 (http://www.jma.or.jp/tf/en/) in Tokyo. The device can be used in place of AA or AAA batteries, and generate electricity using a coil, a magnet, and condenser that charges electricity. These could be used in devices such as remote controls, needing a few shakes to generate enough power for the device.

Submission + - Killed by Code: medical device source code (softwarefreedom.org)

Submitted by foregather
foregather writes: The Software Freedom Law Center (SFLC has released some independent research on the safety of software close to our hearts, that inside of implantable medical devices like ,a href="http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/03/12/1232206">pacemakers and insulin pumps. It turns out that nobody is minding the store at the regulatory level and patients and doctors are blocked from examining the source code keeping them alive. From the article:

"The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is responsible for evaluating the risks of new devices and monitoring the safety and efficacy of those currently on market. However, the agency is unlikely to scrutinize the software operating on devices during any phase of the regulatory process unless a model that has already been surgically implanted repeatedly malfunctions or is recalled."

and

"Despite the crucial importance of these devices and the absence of comprehensive federal oversight, medical device software is considered the exclusive property of its manufacturers, meaning neither patients nor their doctors are permitted to access their IMD’s source code or test its security."

The SFLC concludes that transparency going forward is the only way to prevent people from being "Killed by code". Would you want windows mobile regulating your blood pressure?
Music

Submission + - RIAA in the red on piracy lawsuits (betanews.com)

Submitted by NicknamesAreStupid
NicknamesAreStupid writes: Betanews reports that the Recording Industry Association of America, notorious for their aggressive lawsuits, is getting a two percent return on their nearly $60 million in legal expenses. That is more than the RIAA pays itself. Recording artists must be happy to know that they are losing 50 times more to lawyers than to pirates.

Comment Well, really... (Score 2, Insightful) 487

by Icarus1919 (#32845926) Attached to: Open Source Music Fingerprinter Gets Patent Nastygram
Don't get me wrong, this really sucks for the guy and is completely unfair. But this sort of thing happens all the time. If this were a rare occurrence, then yeah, I'd be up in arms. It's sort of not newsworthy anymore. I'm probably going to get flamed for saying this, and maybe I even deserve it, but it's true.
Patents

Open Source Music Fingerprinter Gets Patent Nastygram 487

Posted by timothy from the their-patent-gives-away-the-secret dept.
Nushio writes "The code wasn't even released, and yet Roy van Rijn, a Music & Free Software enthusiast received a C&D from Landmark Digital Services, owners of Shazam, a music service that allows you to find a song, by listening to a part of it. And if that wasn't enough, they want him to take down his blog post (Google Cache) explaining how he did it because it 'may be viewed internationally. As a result, [it] may contribute to someone infringing our patents in any part of the world.'" Update: 07/09 00:31 GMT by T :Story updated to reflect that Shazam is multiplatform, not Android-only, as implied by the original phrasing.
Software

Submission + - Amateur programmer meets software patents (google.com)

Submitted by Roy van Rijn
Roy van Rijn writes: A couple of weeks ago, in a spare weekend, I wrote software that could recognise music through listening to the microphone, much like SoundHound and Shazam. After populair demand I was just about to release the code into the open source community when I got an email from Landmark Digital Services LLC. They claim my hobby project is infringing their patents. This took me on a journey to find out more about software patents and the validity of the requests I got from the company.

Submission + - Blizzard to Display Real Names in Forum Posts

Submitted by Selfbain
Selfbain writes: According to this blue post, Blizzard will soon be transitioning to RealID and once the transition is complete, all forum posts will display the posters real first and last name with no option to disable it.
United Kingdom

Boy Builds Wall-Climbing Machine Using Recycled Vacuums 96

Posted by samzenpus from the hello-true-believers dept.
Joe McIntosh writes "Hibiki Kono just might be a boy genius. The 13-year-old decided he wanted to climb vertical surfaces like his hero, Spiderman. So, he used two 1,400-watt recycled vacuum cleaners and a little bit of elbow grease to make a machine that allows him to scale walls. Kono has been scaling the walls of his UK school and has told the media that he hopes his invention will help window washers eliminate clumsy ladders from their daily routine."
The Courts

Submission + - RIAA Outraged by YouTube-Viacom Decision 1

Submitted by adeelarshad82
adeelarshad82 writes: The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) voiced its opposition to the recent decision in the YouTube-Viacom copyright infringement case, stating that "the district court's dangerously expansive reading of the liability immunity provisions of the [Digital Millennium Copyright Act] DMCA upsets the careful balance struck within the law and is bad public policy." Cary Sherman, RIAA president, also wrote in a blog post, "It will actually discourage service providers from taking steps to minimize the illegal exchange of copyrighted works on their sites."

Submission + - Why Printers Get No Respect (wsj.com)

Submitted by Crash McBang
Crash McBang writes: Out of Ink, Out of Luck, Why Printers Get No Respect — Fussy and prone to paper jams, the printer has been trying tempers in offices and homes since the dot-matrix days when paper came in perforated accordion stacks. As other gadgets, from flat-screen monitors to wireless mice, have sprinted ahead toward gasp-inducing irresistibility, one electronic gadget has failed to thrill: the printer.

So, slashdotters, who gets more TLC in your corner of the world? The PC or the printer?

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