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America Online

Time Warner Confirms Split With AOL 94

Posted by Soulskill from the no-plans-for-coaster-hall-of-fame dept.
ausekilis writes "Many outlets are reporting that Time Warner has confirmed plans to spin off AOL. All that's left to deal with are a few financial hurdles, such as buying out Google's 5% stake in AOL. The interesting part of the story is that both AOL's CEO and Time Warner's CEO said effectively the same thing, that AOL will be better off as an independent unit, as opposed to 'a cog in the Time Warner wheel.' Interesting to note that when they originally merged, the idea was for AOL to be a one-stop shop for all your internet goods. Makes you wonder what would have happened if Time Warner had invested in AOL as an exclusive media outlet for movies, TV, music, etc. Perhaps AOL would have regained some speed and become the prominent household name it once was, instead of being that company who sent us all the free coasters."
Image

iTunes Prohibits Terrorism Screenshot-sm 124

Posted by samzenpus from the great-songs-come-with-great-responsibility dept.
Afforess writes "A recent closer look at the oft-skimmed EULA agreement for iTunes has an interesting paragraph in it, Gizmodo reports. 'You also agree that you will not use these products for any purposes prohibited by United States law, including, without limitation, the development, design, manufacture or production of missiles, or nuclear, chemical or biological weapons.' Although humorous, some readers suggested that this may be a defense measure to previously discussed price changes in the iTunes music store."
Businesses

With a Computer Science Degree, an Old Man At 35? 918

Posted by timothy from the logan's-run-time dept.
GrApHiX42 writes "I pissed away my 20s and now I want to go to school and get a bachelor's degree in computer science. The thing is, I'll be 35 when I get out of school, and I've read on numerous sites that there seems to be some ageism going on in the IT industry when it comes to older geeks. What have some of the 'older' Slashdot readers experienced as far as being replaced or just plain not getting hired because IT is a 'young man's game'?"
Software

How Do You Deal With Pirated Programs At Work? 958

Posted by Soulskill from the make-them-walk-the-plank dept.
LoneAdminOK writes "I started working for a small company in the middle of January as their IT Manager. I am the first actual 'IT Guy' that they have had; before me it was someone that performed another job within the company and just handled the IT on the side. The problem that I am running into is that most of the software I am finding on the network and on people's computers isn't owned by the company. The person before me would just get it from 'somewhere' and install it on the computers as needed. This is putting me in a bad position when I have to reinstall the program or find it to install on someone else's computer. Often, I am telling people that we don't have it or we have to buy another license, and they get mad at me because the other guy said that we had it. I can't even tell where the versions of Windows Server that they are running came from. The only one I know is legit is the one that is installed on an HP server with the OEM sticker on it. How have any of you handled a situation like this? I don't install 'borrowed programs' in a production environment because I know that if the BSA got wind of this, it would all fall on me when they stormed in."
Sci-Fi

The Real Monsters Behind Godzilla 243

Posted by kdawson from the radioactively-enhanced-cash-cow dept.
eldavojohn writes "A Wired blog looks at the real monsters behind Godzilla: his lawyers. Do you think Godzilla is basically a glorified T. Rex? Guess again, as his lawyers have tirelessly argued: 'He's erect-standing. He's got muscular arms, scaly skin and spines on back and tail and he breathes fire and has a furrowed brow, he's got an anthropomorphic torso. The T. rex has emaciated bird-like arms and stands at a 45-degree angle.' Read on to find out why they targeted the site davezilla.com but not mozilla.org. Another abuse of the American trademark & copyright system? You decide — just don't make a float of him or you'll find yourself paying an undisclosed sum to Toho Co. Ltd."
Security

Lenovo Service Disables Laptops With a Text Message 257

Posted by kdawson from the say-the-magic-word dept.
narramissic writes "Lenovo plans to announce on Tuesday a service that allows users to remotely disable a PC by sending a text message. A user can send the command from a specified cell phone number — each ThinkPad can be paired with up to 10 cell phones — to kill a PC. The software will be available free from Lenovo's Web site. It will also be available on certain ThinkPad notebooks equipped with mobile broadband starting in the first half of 2009. 'You steal my PC and ... if I can deliver a signal to that PC that turns it off, hey, I'm good now,' said Stacy Cannady, product manager of security at Lenovo. 'The limitation here is that you have to have a WAN card in the PC and you must be paying a data plan for it,' Cannady added."
Media

Submission + - Mythbuntu 8.04 Release Candidate (mythbuntu.org)

Submitted by
murisfurder
murisfurder writes: "Today we are introducing the Mythbuntu 8.04 release candidate.

Feel free to checkout the updated screenshots

Changes from Beta:

Artwork
* All of the artwork on the CD has been improved upon. Also, the website has been refreshed.

MythTV improvements
* MythTV knows how to send shutdown and restart commands via dbus/hal.
* Firewire improvements

Diskless support
* Diskless support is now in RC. The MCC interface for it is now available, as well as an Alternate Disk."
The Internet

A Law Professor's Opinion of Viacom vs YouTube 155

Posted by Zonk from the winning-isn't-everything dept.
troll -1 writes "Lawrence Lessig, a well-known law professor at Stanford, has an op-ed in the NY Times entitled Make Way for Copyright Chaos which references the Viacom vs YouTube case. What's interesting about this article is that it gives some historical perspective on copyright law and the courts. Up until Grokster, Lessig says the attitude of the courts was, 'if you don't like how new technologies affect copyright, take your problem to Congress.' But in the Grokster case the court seemed to rule against the technology itself, cutting Congress out of the picture. He also explains that Viacom is essentially asking the Court to rule against the safe harbor provision of Title II of the DMCA which should protect YouTube and others against liability so long as they make reasonable steps to take down infringing content at the request of the copyright holder. Lessig doesn't give us any insight into who's going to win but he does conclude that 'conservatives on the Supreme Court have long warned' about the dynamic of going against Congress when it comes to copyright."
Microsoft

Submission + - Does Microsoft really suck ? And if so ,how bad?

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: MICROSOFT's formerly tame blogger Robert Scoble has recently protested that Microsoft sucks . I just wanted to know what has Microsoft done lately that has been right besides belittle the competition . I know they released Vista but I didn't see anything there that was earth shattering . With so much money in the bank has Microsoft become to big move effectively through the market. Has Microsoft's sheer size killed any agility in the market . Instead of offering good innovating products at reasonable prices , they use there market dominance end up shoving them down your throat. http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/ind ustry_sectors/technology/article1529988.ece
Microsoft

Submission + - Microsoft's lame attempt at advertising.

Submitted by
Azhar
Azhar writes: "After their pathetic Ads for the Zune, Microsoft manages to come up with something even lamer, this time in India (this shot is from the Times of India) to promote their Genuine Software. Not only is the entire thing ironic, it's just stupid. Enjoy"
Education

Submission + - Clever Garbage Disposal methods

Submitted by
Grumbeys
Grumbeys writes: "So after a recent college visit i realized that garbage just tends to accumulate in any space of living, pretty much no matter how often you clean. So i thought, perhaps there is a lazy mans way to avoid this constant picking up of beer cans and such. Something that involves a few of the following -A wet/dry vac on reverse -Some tubing of some sort, either pbc or duct i'm assuming. my plan is to construct a device that will allow one to throw garbage into a vat and have the garbage propelled by the wet/dry vac into a large garbage container far away from the living quarters. I need some ideas, and comments. could this work or can i not get enough propulsion from a wet/dry vac.."

The Videogame Industry is Broken 232

Posted by Zonk from the busted-up dept.
GameDaily is running an interesting opinion piece running down the ways in which the gaming industry is just broken. The author cites soaring costs, huge risks, a reduction in creativity, and a stagnation in market growth as just some of the signs of this crisis. From the article: "The next-gen systems require publishers to place very large bets with each title. This will mean decreased risk taking and just regurgitated sequels of big brand franchises. How many publishers will take risks with multiplatform original IP? This is clearly not good news for the consumer as innovation has driven our industry from the beginning. The irony is that the amazing tools, capabilities and quality of the new systems may very well doom what is most important, which is the game itself. Reconciling what a creative team wants and what the executive suite needs in terms of profits will be a growing challenge for many companies."

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