1 a bee - Slashdot User

China blanks Nobel Peace prize searches-> 0

Submitted by 1 a bee on Friday October 08 2010, @04:25PM

1 a bee writes "CNN is reporting that China is attempting to block all communication regarding Peace prize winner Liu Xiaobo. Even texting is affected:

Text-messaging on mobile phones is not immune from censors, either. A Shanghai-based netizen, @littley, tweeted his unfortunate experience: "My SIM card just got de-activated, turning my iPhone to an iPod touch after I texted my dad about Liu Xiaobo winning the Nobel Peace Prize."

Might as well add slashdot to the censored list.."
Link to Original Source

On Facebook Friends' Privacy Settings Matter Much 0

Submitted by 1 a bee on Thursday July 29 2010, @08:44PM

1 a bee writes "News of a file containing the personal details of 100 million Facebook users is making the rounds on the internet. An MSN reporter writes:

The information was posted by Ron Bowes, an online security consultant, on the Internet site Pirate Bay.

Bowes used code to scan the 500 million Facebook profiles for information not hidden by privacy settings. The resulting file, which allows people to perform searches of various different types, has been downloaded by several thousand people.

Since this is just a compilation of already public information available on the web, it begs the question, Why the fuss? Turns out, many Facebook (and other social net) users haven't quite considered that no matter how much they lock down their own privacy settings, much of their personal information still leaks from friends who haven't. So, for example, if you make the list of your friends private, but those friends don't make their list of friends private, it's easy to tell who your friends are. Other examples may include photos in which you've been tagged. Is this type of information leak something online social networks should attempt to try to fix--say by enshrining a principle of maximum restriction (your friends can't list you as a friend if you've elected to keep your own friends list private, for example), or is this type of leak part and parcel of being on the web?"

When social media are news 0

Submitted by

1 a bee

on Thursday July 09 2009, @10:36PM

1 a bee writes "Lately, the only information flowing out of Iran about the unrest there has been through informal media like email, twitter, youtube, and blogs--many, many blogs. Meanwhile, the Iranian government has hampered on-scene reporting by foreign journalists, and the established news outlets like CNN and the major networks, wont report this information as news, because, as they say, the videos and stories cannot be independently verified. It appears the old charge leveled against news bloggers, "lack of original content," has now been supplanted with "lack of verifiable content."

Really? What about corroborating eye-witness accounts? What about videos of the same scene shot from different angles? Isn't the standard that the reporter has to be one of your own before you can call the story "verified" a bit antiquated? Borrowing from the legal concept of hearsay, Melody Moezzi, argues in Exhibit A: Word From Iran that it is:

The hearsay rule initially seems easy on its face. But then there are the boatload of exceptions: excited utterances, dying declarations, public records and about thirty others, including a catch-all exception that allows for admission of hearsay that is not otherwise included in any of the other exceptions to the hearsay rule.

In other words, if a piece of evidence serves the interests of justice, it's packaging becomes irrelevant. There are enough YouTube videos of the events in Iran to fill the airwaves for the next year. The least the mainstream media can do is accept a few of them into evidence. If not in the interest of justice, then in the interest of truth.

In an age of ever increasing citizen-reporting, what criteria do we use to determine what is news and what's not? Are there any hard and fast rules we can stick to? Or do we make exceptions (e.g., if it's a video of the last gasps of a dying girl shot on the streets of Tehran)?"

Disney strikes against net neutrality 1

Submitted by 1 a bee on Friday June 12 2009, @12:37AM

1 a bee writes "Ars Technica is running a story by Matthew Lasar about how Disney's ESPN360.com is charging ISPs for "bulk" access to their content. According to the article, if you visit ESPN using a "non-subscribing" ISP, you're greeted with a message explaining why access is restricted for you. This raises a number of issues:

..it's one thing to charge users an access fee, another to charge the ISP, potentially passing the cost on to all the ISPs subscribers whether they're interested in the content or not.
Ironically, the issue came to fore in a complaint from the The American Cable Association (ACA) to the FCC. A quoted ACA press release warns
"Media giants are in the early stages of becoming Internet gatekeepers by requiring broadband providers to pay for their Web-based content and services and include them as part of basic Internet access for all subscribers. These content providers are also preventing subscribers who are interested in the content from independently accessing it on broadband networks of providers that have refused to pay."

So is this a real threat to net neutrality (and the end-to-end principle) or just another bad business model that doesn't stand a chance?"

Names of advisors cleared to access ACTA documents 0

Submitted by 1 a bee on Monday March 16 2009, @04:26AM

1 a bee writes "With the White House claiming national security grounds for failing to release ACTA related information, including negotiating documents and even the list of participants, the spotlight is now on just who does have access. Turns out, according to James Love, hundreds of advisors, many of them corporate lobbyists, are considered "cleared advisors." The list looks a who's who of captains industry. So even if we're to take the national security argument at face value, what kind of a state secret is it that can be entrusted with so many without fearing that it leaks? A secret that is in the interest of all involved?"

Google is down (4:37pm) 0

Submitted by 1 a bee on Wednesday April 30 2008, @06:43PM

1 a bee writes "Google appears to be suffering from some sort of attack right now..."

Portable Operating Environments (POEs)-> 0

Submitted by 1 a bee on Thursday September 20 2007, @09:35PM

1 a bee writes "An increasing number of Linux-based, live distros have been recently created. An interesting article argues that such distros, especially USB-based live distros, could become the common computing norm in the future. From the introduction:

Just as the web heralded the widespread use of thin client computing devices and services (mobile phones and Google are respective examples that come to mind), we argue here that portable OSs herald a complimentary tug in the opposite direction, towards safe, low-cost, easy-to-manage, personalized, portable operating environments (or POEs, for short).
No need for chip implants. All you need is a USB port behind your ear!"
Link to Original Source

Court Concludes Novell Owns Unix 0

Submitted by 1 a bee on Tuesday August 14 2007, @03:28AM

1 a bee writes "In a new twist involving SCO's ever worsening prospects in its legal adventures, MarketWatch reports that in a case involving Novell, " the court concludes that Novell is the owner of the Unix and UnixWare copyrights."

The presiding judge has also ruled that Novell may now direct SCO Group to "waive its claims against IBM." Novell has not indicated, according to the article, whether it will do so. This is an opportunity for Novell to show its better colors. Will Novell direct SCO to waive its claims against IBM and others? Or will it try to wield this new ruling as an ax against the rest of the Linux community?"