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Mozilla

Submission + - Student starts firefox campaign

Submitted by rascher
rascher writes: James F. Beckner, a student at ASU, has started a campaign to "raise firefox awareness". Backed by the Mozilla foundation, he has received a lot of firefox-embalmed swag and is giving it away in a raffle. Says Beckner, "The purpose of the campaign is to raise awareness of Firefox and to get people to switch over to Firefox." My reaction is, what's the point? Firefox is great, and I'm glad people are getting excited about it, but its just a web browser. Seems like he should spend his efforts on learning something useful about the HTTP protocol or submitting a patch instead of evangelizing — on the whole, this doesn't help the stereotype of the brash and overzealous OSS fanatic.
The Courts

Submission + - Supreme Court to Hear 'Bong Hits 4 Jesus' Monday

Submitted by
theodp
theodp writes: "In 2002, 18-year-old Joseph Frederick held up a 14-foot banner saying 'Bong Hits 4 Jesus' as the Olympic torch passed by his Juneau high school, sparking a feud with the principal that heads to the Supreme Court on Monday. Legal experts say Morse v. Frederick could be the most significant case on student free speech since the days of Vietnam War protests."
The Internet

Submission + - Web Spider Sued By Colorado Woman

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The Internet Archive is beind sued by a Colorado woman for spidering her site. Suzanne Shell posted a notice on her site saying she wasn't allowing it to be crawled. When it was, she sued for civil theft, breach of contract, and violations of the Racketeering Influence and Corrupt Organizations act and the Colorado Organized Crime Control Act. A court ruling last month granted the Internet Archive's motion to dismiss the charges, except for the breach of contract claim. If Shell prevails on that count, sites like Google will have to get online publishers to "opt in" before they can be crawled, radically changing the nature of Web search.
Space

Submission + - A United Federation of Planet Earth

Submitted by
UltimaGuy
UltimaGuy writes: "Fourteen space agencies around the world have agreed to coordinate their space exploration efforts, paving the way for truly planet-wide collaboration in space science. The agencies involved are from Italy, Japan, China, Britain, France, America, India, Korea, Ukraine, Russia, Canada, Germany, Australia and ESA, the European Space Agency. Will this be the beginning of a new era in space exploration ?"
Graphics

Open Source Image De-Noising 205

Posted by kdawson from the fuzz-be-gone dept.
GREYCstoration is an open-source tool able to de-noise, inpaint, or resize 2D color images. This is a command-line program developed by the IMAGE team of the GREYC Lab in France and is available for Unix, Mac, and Windows systems under the CeCILL license. The algorithm is based on anisotropic diffusion partial differential equations. These equations are able to smooth an image while preserving its main structures. The demo page presents interesting examples of color image de-noising and reconstruction. This is a serious free alternative to commercial products like Noise Ninja or Neat Image that perform the same kinds of operations. The tool is still a little bit hard to use (command-line based), but I hope the simple C++ API will ease the integration of the algorithm in more user-friendly interfaces. Previous versions of GREYCstoration are already available in Digikam and Krita.
It's funny. Laugh.

XP On 8-MHz Pentium With 20 MB RAM 410

Posted by kdawson from the golden-hourglass dept.
swehack writes "The guys over at winhistory.de managed to get their Windows XP Professional running on a very minimal box: an Intel Pentium clocked down to 8 MHz with 20 MB of RAM. (The installer won't work with less than 64 MB, but after installing you can remove memory.) The link has plenty of pictures of their progress in achieving this dubious milestone. They deserve a Golden Hourglass award for 'extreme waste of time.' What obscure hardware configurations have you managed to get Windows running on?"
Microsoft

Mr. Ballmer, Show Us the Code 462

Posted by kdawson from the open-letter dept.
DigDuality writes "A new campaign, Showusthecode.com, requests every leader in the Linux world, and companies invested in Linux, to stand up and demand that Steve Ballmer show the world where Linux violates Microsoft's intellectual property. He has been making these claims since the Novell-Microsoft deal. If Microsoft answers this challenge — by May 1st — then Linux developers will be able to modify the code so that it remains 'free' software. If such infringing code doesn't exist, we will have called Microsoft's bluff. And if the campaign garners enough attention and if Steve Ballmer maintains silence, then the community and companies behind Linux can take the silence for the admission that it is."
Music

Submission + - MP3 Patent Troubles

Submitted by
Vengance Daemon
Vengance Daemon writes: "The New York Times and many other sources are reporting that Microsoft lost the patent case regarding "...the way the Windows Media Player software from Microsoft plays audio files using MP3..." They go on to say "If the ruling stands, Apple and hundreds of other companies that make products that play MP3 files, including portable players, computers and software, could also face demands to pay royalties to Alcatel."

At first glance, it appears that Fedora, and the other distributions that did not include MP3 capabilities in their products because of patent concerns were quite right. Ogg Vorbis works great for music, and many commercial players support it."
Announcements

Submission + - Creative Commons Licenses Version 3.0 Released

Submitted by
lithis
lithis writes: "A new version of the Creative Commons licenses has been released. What's new: “we have spun off the "generic" license to be the CC US license and created a new generic license ... we are ensuring that all CC jurisdiction licenses and the CC unported license have consistent, express treatment of the issues of moral rights and collecting society royalties ... [the license now explicitly declares that] a person may not misuse the attribution requirement of a CC license to improperly assert or imply an association or relationship with the licensor or author ... licenses will now include the ability for derivatives to be relicensed under a "Creative Commons Compatible License" ... the licenses include minor clarifications to the language of the licenses to take account of the concerns of Debian and MIT.”"
Censorship

Submission + - Egyptian blogger sentenced to 4 years in prison

Submitted by
An anonymous reader writes: 22-year old Egyptian blogger and former law student Abdelkareem Nabil Soliman (aka Kareem Amer) was sentenced by an Egyptian court on Thursday to 4 years in prison, three years for "disparaging religion" and a fourth one added for "defaming the president." Amer, whose blog is still online, has become a cause celebre for human rights activists in Egypt and around the Arab world, who have set up a "Free Kareem!" campaign calling for his release online. Amer's case is interesting in that almost everything, from the crime itself to those rallying to Amer's aid, has been conducted in large part over the Internet. At one point, the legal defense team even tried to force the court to bring in a computer expert who could testify that the blog was hosted outside of Egypt and therefore out of the court's jurisdiction. While for an increasing number of individuals like Amer, blogging has become another form of regulated expression, it is also "an essential communication strategy for many frustrated Arabs who use blogging as a tool to promote democratization," as this editorial by one of the leaders of the "Free Kareem!" campaign claims.
Television

Submission + - BBC mulls less DRM; wider OS support for iPlayer

Submitted by
zombieflesheater
zombieflesheater writes: "The BBC has detailed its proposals for new on-demand services to be made available through its iPlayer software. Among the offerings are TV catch-up over Internet and live TV streaming. Now the Beeb asking its customers how they think the services should work. Under its new Public Value Test process, the BBC trust has started a public consultation to gather license payer opinion. Among other things, Auntie wants to know whether the proposed service should be made available to consumers who are not using Microsoft software. The removal of DRM restrictions from certain audio downloads are also being considered. The consultation period ends on 28 March."
The Courts

Couple Who Catch Cop Speeding Could Face Charges 876

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the turnabout-isn't-fair-play dept.
a_nonamiss writes "A Georgia couple, apparently tired of people speeding past their house, installed a camera and radar gun on their property. After it was installed, they caught a police office going 17MPH over the posted limit. They brought this to the attention of the local police department, and are now being forced to appear in front of a judge to answer to charges of stalking."
Media

Submission + - Anti-DRM Petition Response From Downing Street

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Downing Street have released a statement in response to a petition on their website.
It states that all products with DRM should be labelled on how the product can be used or not used.

It is clear though that the needs and rights of consumers must also be carefully safeguarded. It is reasonable for consumers to be informed what is actually being offered for sale, for example, and how and where the purchaser will be able to use the product, and any restrictions applied.

It also references the Gowers Report [PDF warning] published December 2006 and the recommendations proposed in the report.

Recommendations include introducing a limited private copying exception by 2008 for format shifting for works published after the date that the law comes into effect. There should be no accompanying levies for consumers. Also making it easier for users to file notice of complaints procedures relating to Digital Rights Management tools by providing an accessible web interface on the Patent Office website by 2008 and that DTI should investigate the possibility of providing consumer guidance on DRM systems through a labelling convention without imposing unnecessary regulatory burdens

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