DrEnter - Slashdot User

+ - Puerto Rico votes to become 51st state-> 0

Submitted by DrEnter on Wednesday November 07, 2012 @03:01PM

DrEnter writes "Not really getting much attention in all of the presidential election coverage was the fact that Puerto Rico voted to become a U.S. State yesterday. The option has come up for a vote several times in the past, but never had much popular support until this year when it won with 53% of the vote choosing to change the government structure and a surprising 65% of the vote for choosing statehood as that change. The other choices were a sovereign-free association (31%) and independence (4%). Obama has already committed to supporting the will of the voters and there is currently no major opposition in either the House or the Senate. It looks like the U.S. may have a 51st state in a few months! Now this Wikipedia page can get some attention."
Link to Original Source

+ - Church of Scientology Enlisting Followers in Censorship-> 0

Submitted by DrEnter on Friday July 06, 2012 @02:15PM

DrEnter writes "Apparently, the recent very public divorce of Katie Holmes and devout believer Tom Cruise is reflecting negatively on the Church of Scientology. Adding to this are other recent issues causing problems for "church" leadership. In response, the "church" has decided to encourage its followers to censor online chatter and comments about the "church" and the divorce. This Yahoo blog post sums it up nicely. In short, they are encouraging members to complain about people posting negative comments about the "church" as violating the "Code of Conduct" in the posting venue. I can only imagine they are hoping these complaints will just be rubber-stamped and respected without investigation, but I think the campaign deserves a bit more attention."
Link to Original Source

+ - Microsoft Gives Up On the Kin-> 0

Submitted by DrEnter on Wednesday June 30, 2010 @06:40PM

DrEnter writes "After only two months, Microsoft is dropping their social-network heavy Kin mobile phones. That certainly didn't take long. Apparently, lacking several features smart phone shoppers are looking for (an app store, GPS, etc.) was a bad thing when it came to sales."
Link to Original Source

+ - MySpace Teen Sent to Jail by Corrupt Judge 0

Submitted by DrEnter on Friday February 13, 2009 @11:18AM

DrEnter writes "According to this NY Times article, the reasons the judge that sentenced Hillary Transue to 3 months jail time for a spoof MySpace page may have become a bit clearer:
The answers became a bit clearer on Thursday as the judge, Mark A. Ciavarella Jr., and a colleague, Michael T. Conahan, appeared in federal court in Scranton, Pa., to plead guilty to wire fraud and income tax fraud for taking more than $2.6 million in kickbacks to send teenagers to two privately run youth detention centers run by PA Child Care and a sister company, Western PA Child Care.

Many of the teens involved are still in detention. While the facts are only now just emerging, let's hope the U.S. Attorney General is on the ball and gets a quick release for those wrongly or excessively imprisoned."

+ - Two Satellites Collide in Orbit 0

Submitted by DrEnter on Wednesday February 11, 2009 @07:11PM

DrEnter writes "According to this story on Yahoo, two communications satellites collided in orbit, resulting in two large clouds of debris. The new threat from these debris clouds hasn't been fully determined yet. From the article:
The collision involved an Iridium commercial satellite, which was launched in 1997, and a Russian satellite launched in 1993 and believed to be nonfunctioning. Each satellite weighed well over 1,000 pounds.

This is the fifth spacecraft/satellite collision to occur in space, but the other four were all fairly minor by comparison."

+ - Yahoo Offers Compensation For Unplayable Music 0

Submitted by DrEnter on Wednesday July 30, 2008 @03:04PM

DrEnter writes "According to this article, Yahoo will offer some compensation after they turn off their DRM servers and Yahoo Music customers' will no longer be able to access their music:
The company said Wednesday it is offering coupons on request for people to buy songs again through Yahoo's new partner, RealNetworks Inc.'s Rhapsody. Those songs will be in the MP3 format, free of copy protection. Refunds are available for users who "have serious problems with this arrangement," Yahoo said.

Nice to see them step-up and do something, especially without trading one DRM scheme for another."

+ - MST3K To Be Made Available Online 0

Submitted by DrEnter on Thursday January 24, 2008 @02:49PM

DrEnter writes "All 198 episodes of Mystery Science Theater 3000 will be made available on both DVD and online, from Shout! Factory. Exciting news for those of us who have been unsatisfied with the Rhino collections. For those not in the know, the show is centered around a hapless man trapped on a space station by mad scientists who force him to watch bad movies with his robot companions. It won a Peabody award for writing in 1994, and two Emmy nominations over its 11 season run."

+ - Man WrongIy Imprisoned After Google IDs Him 3

Submitted by DrEnter on Wednesday November 07, 2007 @02:41PM

DrEnter writes "A man in Bangalore, India was wrongfully arrested and imprisoned for 50 days after being misidentified as the individual who posted images deemed insulting to a revered historical figure. The Indian police asked for, and Google provided, the IP address of the user which was then given to the ISP Airtel, who misidentified it as belonging to someone it didn't. That someone than spent the next 50 days in jail (including 3 weeks AFTER the real individual was caught). Disturbingly, when questioned if the authorities provided a court order or merely asked for the anonymous poster's info., Google was hazy about the answer, only saying that they complied with Indian law."

+ - France Bans People from Recording Violence

Submitted by DrEnter on Tuesday March 06, 2007 @01:00PM

DrEnter writes "According to this PC World story found on Yahoo!, the French government has made it illegal for anyone except a professional journalist to film or broadcast an act of violence. Civil liberties groups warn that the law could lead to the imprisonment of eyewitnesses who record acts of police violence, or the operators of web sites that publish them. The government is also discussing a method of government "certification" of web sites, blog hosters, mobile phone operators, and ISPs if they adhere to certain rules."

+ - Turner to pay Boston $2 Million over ATHF Scare

Submitted by DrEnter on Monday February 05, 2007 @01:22PM

DrEnter writes "After defeating the city of Boston and Homeland Security in a brief conflict last week involving small signs made from christmas tree lights, Turner Broadcasting has agreed to pay each of them $1 million. This is a far cry from the $500+ million Boston was claiming the Aqua Teen Hunger Force "war" had cost them. Maybe they realized that if this actually went to court, they would probably only end up with a bill for the court costs?"