Comment PS3 power (Score 1) 300
interestingly enough they used playstations to do so
Submission + - Court Orders Release of Telco Immunity Docs (eweek.com)
eweekhickins writes: "The White House has until Dec. 10 to produce lobbying records involving the telecommunications industry's efforts to win retroactive immunity for its participation in President Bush's domestic spying program. The decision by U.S. District Judge Susan Illston in San Francisco will allow the records to be released in time for the Senate debate on reforming the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which is set to begin as early as next week. Can the telcos deal with full disclosure? Can the White House?"
Submission + - Feds OK fee for priority Web traffic (yahoo.com)
d3l33t writes: "Yahoo News reports that "The Justice Department on Thursday said Internet service providers should be allowed to charge a fee for priority Web traffic.
The agency told the Federal Communications Commission, which is reviewing high-speed Internet practices, that it is opposed to "Net neutrality," the principle that all Internet sites should be equally accessible to any Web user.
Several phone and cable companies, such as AT&T Inc., Verizon Communications Inc. and Comcast Corp., have previously said they want the option to charge some users more money for loading certain content or Web sites faster than others.""
Submission + - Mass. now likely to OK Microsoft's OOXML (computerworld.com)
Ian Lamont writes: "Computerworld reports that the Massachusetts state government's IT department has designated Microsoft's Office Open XML as an open document format, along with ODF, plain text and HTML. It's only a draft policy, but it sets the stage for the format being given an official stamp of approval by state authorities — and weakens earlier Massachusetts support for the Open Document Format. Microsoft got a big boost at the end of 2006 when Ecma approved OOXML, and again this spring when it turned out that pro-ODF legislation had been defeated or watered down in six states. Andy Updegrove suggests that Massachusetts new governor, Deval Patrick, had been contacted about approving OOXML. He also laments what it means for ODF:
"Where does this leave proponents of ODF now? Clearly, if Ecma 376 achieves equal status with ODF in Massachusetts, it will be a cause of great disappointment. One can assume that privately, if not publicly, ODF opponents will have a field day one-on-one with other government purchasers, and will declare the open format battle over. Indeed, earlier this year Microsoft did just that, calling a unilateral truce and announcing that there had been "two winners").
Submission + - US can't meet "grand challenges" of physic (arstechnica.com)
BlueSky writes: A new report paints a troubling picture of the state of physics research in the US, which the authors believe has dire consequences for the competitiveness of the US. 'The report identifies six key questions that will represent the grand challenges that materials science will face over the coming decade, the ones most likely to produce the next revolution. But it also raises fears that those challenges will be met by researchers outside of the US. It highlights the fact that government funding has not kept up with the rising costs of research at the same time that the corporate-funded research lab system has collapsed. As a result, US scientific productivity has stagnated at a time when funding and output are booming overseas.'
