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YouTube Takedowns: Any 15-year old can do it

Submitted by BillGatesLoveChild
BillGatesLoveChild writes "Recently Slashdotters wondered how easy it would be to take down YouTube videos. Wonder no longer:

A 15-year old Australian Boy with nothing more than a HotMail account emailed YouTube saying he was the "Australian Broadcasting Corporation" and under the DMCA ordered YouTube to take down hundreds of videos. They did without immediately and without question. YouTube did not try and call the ABC back, nor ask why the email came from Hotmail. Given Cringely's recent report which lead to Slashdotters asking the question, YouTube seem remarkably slow to learn. How many more DMCA attacks will there be before they get the message?

Many of the Video's were from the ABC's The Chaser, including one where a prankster rolling a cigar asked Senator Hillary Clinton if he could be her new intern. The Chaser Staff were impressed with the youngster, "I don't think we should prosecute him — we should probably hire him.""
Space

PC World's Techlog Will the Sun Knock Out My GPS?

Submitted by
mikesd81
mikesd81 writes "Science Daily has an article about solar bursts knocking out GPS service. From the article: "During an unprecedented solar eruption last December, researchers at Cornell University confirmed solar radio bursts can have a serious impact on the Global Positioning System (GPS) and other communication technologies using radio waves."

Solar radio bursts begin with a solar flare that injects high-energy electrons into the solar upper atmosphere. Radio waves are produced which then propagate to the Earth and cover a broad frequency range. The radio waves act as noise over these frequencies, including those used by GPS and other navigational systems which can degrade a signal. On December 6, 2006, a solar flare created an unprecedented intense solar radio burst causing large numbers of receivers to stop tracking the GPS signal. Using specially designed receivers built at Cornell University as sensitive space weather monitors, Cornell scientists were able to make the first quantitative measurements of the effect of earlier solar radio bursts on GPS receivers. There are three key points to remember about solar radio bursts. "First, society cannot become overly reliant on technology without an awareness and understanding of the effects of future space weather disruptions," said Anthea Coster, Ph.D., MIT Haystack Observatory. Second, the December 6 event dramatically shows the effect of solar radio bursts is global and instantaneous. "Third, and equally important, the size and timing of this burst were completely unexpected and the largest ever detected. We do not know how often we can expect solar radio bursts of this size or even larger.""
Announcements

Fishermen Catch Big, Old Alaska Rockfish

Submitted by NowOrNever
NowOrNever writes "A commercial fishing boat hauled in what may have been one of the oldest creatures in Alaska — a giant rockfish estimated to be about a century old. The 44-inch, 60-pound female shortraker rockfish was caught last month by the catcher-processor Kodiak Enterprise as it trawled for pollock 2,100 feet below the surface, south of the Pribilof Islands in the Bering Sea."
Businesses

What is your experience with offshore outsourcing?

Submitted by
walterbyrd
walterbyrd writes "Overall, does the "Dehli discount" really cut costs all that deeply? Or, by the time you write, and re-write, the specs, etc. do you end up spending more? Will the present obstiticles to offshoring be overcome, and thereby totally decimate technology jobs in the USA? Or, will rising costs associated with offshoring cause the practise to level out? What technical specializations do you consider especially vulnerable, or invulnerable, to offshore outsourcing?"
Communications

Amp'd Mobile Hit with FCC Fine

Submitted by
eldavojohn
eldavojohn writes "Another communications company has been handed a $100k fine from the FCC for not protecting user data. This is related to fallout from the well known Dunn-HP case: "The proposed fines, announced Tuesday, come in the wake of disclosures that detectives hired by Hewlett-Packard Co. — and a myriad of other so-called "data brokers" — routinely acquire personal phone records by impersonating customers targeted in private investigations and billing collection cases." I wonder when they're going to apply these fines to companies that routinely serve private data to government agencies with no warrant?"
Microsoft

Why Microsoft Should Fear Apple

Submitted by
eldavojohn
eldavojohn writes "Simply put by ComputerWorld, "Apple has gotten smarter about how it competes with Microsoft. Clearly the underdog, Apple has to make moves that can be seen as both supportive of the Windows marketplace and good for its Mac customers at the same time." The reader should note that the author is a recent Mac convert but it is interesting that many people perceive Apple to own more market share than they actually do and that's why even though Microsoft holds more of the market, they should be wary of the buzz that surrounds Apple."

Good day for overcoming obstacles. Try a steeplechase.