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Medieval Copy Protection 226

Posted by samzenpus from the thou-shall-write-your-own-book dept.
An anonymous reader writes "In medieval times a 'book curse' was often included on the inside cover or on the last leaf of a manuscripts, warning away anyone who might do the book some harm. Here's a particularly pretty one from Yale's Beinecke MS 214: 'In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, Amen. In the one thousand two hundred twenty-ninth year from the incarnation of our Lord, Peter, of all monks the least significant, gave this book to the [Benedictine monastery of the] most blessed martyr, St. Quentin. If anyone should steal it, let him know that on the Day of Judgment the most sainted martyr himself will be the accuser against him before the face of our Lord Jesus Christ.'"
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California Legislature Declares "Cuss-Free" Week 262

Posted by samzenpus from the f#*k-those-f@^king-f%&kers dept.
shewfig writes "The California legislature, which previously tried to ban incandescent light bulbs, just added to the list of banned things ... swear words! Fortunately, the measure only applies for the first week of March, and compliance is voluntary — although, apparently, there will be a 'swear jar' in the Assembly and the Governor's mansion. No word yet on whether the Governator intends to comply."
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How Famous OS Logos Got Started 103

Posted by samzenpus from the in-the-beginning dept.
Shane O'Neill writes "Ronald McDonald and the NBC Peacock may get more TV air time, but today's operating systems have cool logos, too. Google, Apple, Microsoft and the Linux crowd crafted mascots ranging from cute lizards to circles of life. In this slideshow, we look at the origins of the logos and look ahead to their future."
Microsoft

Submission + - Vista piracy the least of Microsoft's problems (itwire.com)

Submitted by
WirePosted
WirePosted writes: "Like thousands of other media commentators around the world, in January this year I attended the offical Microsoft launch of Windows Vista. In my show bag of goodies, among the press releases, I found shiny new boxed copies of the Ultimate versions of Vista and Office 2007. Since I didn't have a computer at the time that could run Vista, I loaned my copy to iTWire blogger Sam Varghese for a review. What happened next is most interesting."
It's funny. Laugh.

Submission + - Microsoft Censors... Its own Naughty Santa

Submitted by CajunArson
CajunArson writes: The Register has a story about a rather naughty Santa. It appears that the seemingly nice holiday service provided via Windows Live Messenger took on a mind of it's own. When the AI version of Santa Claus began to talk dirty to underage children, it appears that the ghost of Microsoft management present decided to sent AI Claus packing back to the digital north pole.
Security

Submission + - User-Privilege Flaw Hits Vista

Submitted by
IT071872
IT071872 writes: "According to PC world, A security firm has discovered one of the first security flaws to directly affect Windows Vista, a bug that it claims allows local users to escalate their privileges.

The flaw involves Windows' system for managing user security levels, User Account Control (UAC), which was introduced with Vista. UAC is designed to limit the damage that can be caused by mass attacks such as worms by giving standard users limited privileges, a practice common with other operating systems."
Java

Submission + - TopLink: All Major Java ORMs now Open Source

Submitted by Floyd Marinescu
Floyd Marinescu writes: InfoQ.com reports that Oracle is contributing TopLink (one of the first production object persistence engines first launched in 1994), to Eclipse as an open source project. Oracle is proposing that TopLink become the The Eclipse Persistence Platform (tentatively named EclipseLink). Going forward, all production features of TopLink will be available in EclipseLink and Oracle's commercially supported TopLink will only contain an additional thin proprietary integration code layer necessary for some Oracle AppServer and SOA Suite features. TopLink is the last major production Java ORM/persistence engine to go open source. BEA's Kodo engine is also being built off of their contribution of Kodo to the Apache OpenJPA project. Hibernate now has two open source competitors, each with signficant install bases and years of commercial investment.
Security

Submission + - Exploit code targets WordPress bloggers

Submitted by
criticalmass24
criticalmass24 writes: "Attackers have injected exploit code into the downloadable software for the WordPress blogging service. The open source software allows users to set up and publish postings to a blog. The company has issued an update that repairs the vulnerability. Although blogging services such as Blogger, TypePad and WordPress allow users to publish blog postings directly from a browser, client software offers users more flexibility."
Microsoft

Submission + - FAA Vista shun indicates Linux and Google rise

Submitted by Tookis
Tookis writes: A report in Information Week that the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) may shun the idea of upgrading to Windows Vista and Microsoft Office in favor of Linux and Google Apps must be giving the big software company air sickness. The FAA is worried about two major things with a Vista upgrade: compatibility with existing applications and cost. Looks like the FAA will stick with XP for some time though. http://www.itwire.com.au/content/view/10276/1023/
Media

Submission + - Ubuntu Ultimate Gamers Edition

Submitted by
Usser
Usser writes: "What is Ubuntu Ultimate Gamers Edition ?screenshots.

Due to the increased popularity of each prior release Ubuntu Christmas Edition (~15,000 downloads in 2 weeks), Ubuntu Ultimate 1.2 has seen over 50,000 downloads in 3 days. I have decided to make another distro I'm calling "Ubuntu Ultimate Gamers Edition" it has everything included from any of the prior distros plus many many games & a few enhancements. I have however removed Java, Flash and Acrobat reader due to licensing agreements. Please freat not included in the release is my custom repo which contains all the software and much more. Firefox's homepage will give a detailed description on obtaining all additional software from the repo.

Ubuntu Ultimate Gamers Edition is here http://ubuntusoftware.info/ubuntu_ultimate_gamers/ "
Editorial

Submission + - Is GNU/Linux for you? Probably not

Submitted by FranklinDelanoBluth
FranklinDelanoBluth writes: Sam Varghese has an article at iTWire about why Linux may not be for you: either at work or at home. The article includes this special shoutout to /. folk:

From time to time, it is not uncommon to encounter a confession on the net, a bleating essay that says "I can't run Linux, though I'd love to", and advances a host of assorted "reasons" for this act of commission.

Nine times out of ten, this kind of tripe ends up being linked off a dozen or so so-called technology websites, and Linux fanbois begin to vent. The site where one is most likely to find this kind of "I love Linux but I can't use it for no fault of my own" rubbish is the American website Slashdot.


Though I personally think his reasoning might be a bit circular (e.g. the argument that Windows-only apps are a reason not to change, but if no one ever switches to GNU/Linux, no GNU/Linux apps will be developed...), he does make some interesting points about the guilt that many of us may feel when we aren't able to use Linux as a primary OS.

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