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Supercomputing

Physicists Improve Spin Information Storage 43

Posted by Soulskill from the is-it-the-future-yet dept.
schliz writes "Researchers have made headway into developing spintronic RAM by successfully transferring spin information from an electron to a more robust atomic nucleus and accessing the information 2,000 times in 100 seconds before it decayed (abstract). The demonstration was conducted using phosphorus-doped silicon in a highly magnetized, low-temperature environment (8.59 Tesla, -269.5 degrees Celsius). Other researchers have achieved spin lifetimes of 30 hours in a weaker magnetic field (0.3 Tesla)."
Microsoft

Microsoft, Apple, EMC, and Oracle Form Patent Bloc 113

Posted by Soulskill from the axis-of-prior-art dept.
An anonymous reader writes "When Novell finally sold itself, part of the deal included the sale of 882 patents to a consortium backed by Microsoft. Thanks to a tip from Florian Mueller, it turns out that Microsoft's partners are Apple, Oracle, and EMC, which raises questions about where these companies are heading and what it means for the rest of the industry."
The Internet

UN Considering Control of the Internet 402

Posted by Soulskill from the if-you-strike-me-down dept.
Dangerous_Minds writes "News has surfaced in the wake of the WikiLeaks story that the United Nations is mulling total inter-government regulation of the internet. The initiative was spearheaded by Brazil and supported by other countries including India, China, Saudi Arabia and South Africa. Drew Wilson of ZeroPaid commented that while the Cablegate story may be bad, attempting to destroy WikiLeaks would only make matters worse for various governments around the world, given what happened when the music industry shut down Napster ten years ago."
Crime

Judge Declares Mistrial Because of Wikipedia 558

Posted by timothy from the jury-nullification dept.
Pickens writes "The Palm Beach Post reports that a police officer convicted of drugging and raping a family member will get a new trial because the jury forewoman brought a Wikipedia article into deliberations. Broward Circuit Judge Stanton Kaplan declared a mistrial after Fay Mason admitted in court that she had downloaded information about 'rape trauma syndrome' and sexual assault from Wikipedia and brought it to the jury room. 'I didn't read about the case in the newspaper or watch anything on TV,' says Mason. 'To me, I was just looking up a phrase.' Judge Kaplan called all six jurors into the courtroom and explained that Mason had unintentionally tainted their verdict and endangered the officer's right to a fair trial. Mason does not face any penalties for her actions."
PlayStation (Games)

PS3 Jailbreak Now Legal In Spain 113

Posted by Soulskill from the setting-a-precedent dept.
deek writes "Spanish gamer site NicaGamerz.com have reported that it's now legal to sell the PS3 Jailbreak modchip in Spain (Google translation of Spanish original). According to the article, one reason for the legal ruling is because Sony removed the ability to run GNU/Linux on the console. One can only wonder if Sony will soon rush out a firmware update that will re-enable the OtherOS feature, and appeal the court decision. Oh the irony of that thought. The legal ruling was made on the 13th December (Google translation). There are only 5 days to appeal, starting from that date."
Censorship

Amazon Taking Down Erotica, Removing From Kindles 641

Posted by kdawson from the slippery-cliff dept.
ctmurray writes "The independent writers who publish on Amazon report that erotica books containing incest are being taken down with no explanation by Amazon, and removed from the Kindles of purchasers of the books. Author Selena Kitt writes: 'I want to be clear that while the subject of incest may not appeal to some, there is no underage contact in any of my work, and I make that either explicitly clear in all my stories or I state it up front in the book's disclaimer. I don't condone or support actual incest, just as someone who writes mysteries about serial killers wouldn't condone killing. What I write is fiction.' Kindle's own TV ad features a book with a story line of sex between a 19-year-old and his stepmother, defined in some states as incest (Sleepwalking by Amy Bloom)."
The Military

Air Force Blocks NY Times, WaPo, Other Media 372

Posted by kdawson from the horses-and-barns dept.
The Wall Street Journal is reporting that the Air Force, not content with blocking WikiLeaks and its mirrors, has begun blocking media sites carrying WL documents. "Air Force users who try to view the websites of the New York Times, Britain's Guardian, Spain's El Pais, France's Le Monde or German magazine Der Spiegel instead get a page that says, 'ACCESS DENIED. Internet Usage is Logged & Monitored'... The Air Force says it has blocked more than 25 websites that contain WikiLeaks documents, in order to keep classified material off unclassified computer systems. ... The move was ordered by the 24th Air Force... The Army, Navy, and Marines aren't blocking the sites, and the Defense Department hasn't told the services to do so, according to spokespeople for the services and the Pentagon."
The Courts

Fourth Amendment Protects Hosted E-mail 236

Posted by kdawson from the decade-overdue dept.
Okian Warrior writes "As reported on the EFF website, today the US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit ruled that the contents of the messages in an email inbox hosted on a provider's servers are protected by the Fourth Amendment, even though the messages are accessible to an email provider. As the court puts it, 'The government may not compel a commercial ISP to turn over the contents of a subscriber's emails without first obtaining a warrant based on probable cause.'"
Image

Julian Assange's Online Dating Profile Leaked Screenshot-sm 334

Posted by samzenpus from the leaker-love dept.
Ponca City writes "The Telegraph reports that an online dating profile created by Julian Assange in 2006 has been unearthed from OKCupid disclosing that the WikiLeaks editor sought 'spirited, erotic' women 'from countries that have sustained political turmoil.' Writing under the pseudonym of British science fiction author Harry Harrison, Assange described himself as a 'passionate, and often pig headed activist intellectual.' Assange said he was seeking a 'siren for [a] love affair, children and occasional criminal conspiracy' adding that he was 'directing a consuming, dangerous human rights project which is, as you might expect, male dominated' and added enigmatically: 'I am DANGER, ACHTUNG.' Among Assange's listed interests were the 'structure of reality' and 'chopping up human brains' – although he added the caveat '(neuroscience background)' lest the latter put off potential admirers. 'I like women from countries that have sustained political turmoil,' Assange wrote. 'Western culture seems to forge women that are valueless and inane. OK. Not only women!'"
Google

Google Patents Browser Highlight All Button 150

Posted by CmdrTaco from the wish-i-thought-of-that dept.
An anonymous reader writes "Google has picked up another patent on a technology that you might think basic to the web: the highlight all button for searches in browsers. The patent will backdate to 1999 and presents an interesting problem for such software as the Firefox browser and FeedDemon RSS reader. And, in an interesting twist, Microsoft uses a similar mechanism in Windows Explorer. But Microsoft itself said that browser technology can't be separated from the operating system. Does that mean the company owes a royalty to Google for all those copies of Windows?"
Google

Stallman Worried About Chrome OS 393

Posted by CmdrTaco from the fear-the-cloud dept.
dkd903 noted that Stallman is speaking out about the risks of Chrome OS and giving up all your local data into the cloud, pushing people into "Careless Computing." Which is a much more urgent concern than something like calling it GNU/Chrome OS.
The Internet

Michael Moore Posts Julian Assange's Bail 987

Posted by CmdrTaco from the right-is-right dept.
digitaldc quotes Michael Moore in a story running on the Huffington Post where he says "Yesterday, in the Westminster Magistrates Court in London, the lawyers for WikiLeaks co-founder Julian Assange presented to the judge a document from me stating that I have put up $20,000 of my own money to help bail Mr. Assange out of jail. Furthermore, I (Michael Moore) am publicly offering the assistance of my website, my servers, my domain names and anything else I can do to keep WikiLeaks alive and thriving as it continues its work to expose the crimes that were concocted in secret and carried out in our name and with our tax dollars."
Privacy

Sheriff's Online Database Leaks Info On Informants 185

Posted by Soulskill from the second-verse-same-as-the-first dept.
Tootech writes with this snippet from NPR: "A Colorado sheriff's online database mistakenly revealed the identities of confidential drug informants and listed phone numbers, addresses and Social Security numbers of suspects, victims and others interviewed during criminal investigations, authorities said. The breach potentially affects some 200,000 people, and Mesa County sheriff's deputies have been sifting through the database to determine who, if anyone, is in jeopardy. ... The FBI and Google Inc. are trying to determine who accessed the database, the sheriff said. Their concern: That someone may have copied it and could post it, WikiLeaks-style, on the Internet. 'The truth is, once it's been out there and on the Internet and copied, you're never going to regain total control,' Hilkey said. Thousands of pages of confidential information were vulnerable from April until Nov. 24, when someone notified authorities after finding their name on the Internet. Officials said the database was accessed from within the United States, as well as outside the country, before it was removed from the server."
Communications

Anonymous Now Attacking Corporate Fax Machines 410

Posted by Soulskill from the distributed-denial-of-stationary dept.
An anonymous reader writes "Anonymous has claimed responsibility for distributed denial of service attacks against several anti-WikiLeaks websites this month. In a novel twist to the campaign, Mission Leakflood has started a new DDoS attack against fax numbers belonging to Amazon, MasterCard, Moneybookers, PayPal, Visa and Tableau Software. Some numbers have already stopped responding, and Twitter and PostFinance have since been added to the target list."
Television

The Future of Web Video At Stake In Comcast-NBC Regulatory Review 121

Posted by Soulskill from the keep-your-grubby-mitts-off-my-htpc dept.
Phoghat writes with this excerpt from the Washington Post: "It won't be long before video from the Internet is always within reach — whether it's on a smart phone, a tablet computer or a high-end television in your living room. But what if there's nothing worth watching? ... Regulators are pushing for tough conditions to ensure that Comcast can't stifle online video services by withholding content or pushing up prices for marquee NBC programs at a time viewers are starting to turn to the Internet for recent movies or the latest episodes of 'Saturday Night Live,' '30 Rock' and other popular TV shows. The concessions they extract from Comcast in its bid for NBC will help determine whether customers can someday realistically drop their cable subscriptions and go online-only for their TV. ... Comcast has been resisting federal regulators' efforts to tear down some of those walls, arguing that those efforts are unnecessary because NBC Universal accounts for about 10 percent of television viewing in the US and less than 10 percent of US box office revenue — and is therefore too small to dictate how the industry will develop."

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