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Submission + - Actual damages for single download = single licens (blogspot.com) 1

NewYorkCountryLawyer writes: "In Real View v 20-20 Technologies, it was held that the actual copyright infringement damages for a single unauthorized download of a computer program was the lost license fee that would have been charged. The judge, in the District Court of Massachusetts, granted remittitur, reducing the jury's verdict from $1,370,590.00 to $4200 unless the plaintiff seeks a new trial. Something tells me the plaintiff will seek a new trial."

Submission + - 2011: Record Year for Airline Safety (wsj.com)

smitty777 writes: Unless something bad happens in the next two days, we are on track for having a new record for airline safety. The new record of one death for every 7.1 million passengers beats the 2004 record of 1 to 6.4m. The WSJ also notes:
— Another low is the total number of passenger deaths; as of today that number stands at 401. Though it was lower in 2004, when 344 passengers were killed in commercial aviation accidents, that year saw 30% fewer passengers as well as far fewer flights.
— Western-built planes have fared best, with one major crash per 3 million flights, the best number since the International Air Transport Association began tracking crashes in the 1940s. When factoring in other types of airliners, the crash rate is about two per million flights.
— We are also in the midst of the longest period without a fatal airliner accident in modern aviation; nobody has died in an airliner since an Oct. 13 propeller plane crash in Papua New Guinea. The previous record was 61 days in 1985.
There was also the North American and Russian numbers as well — the only country that saw a drop.

2011 also seemed to break the record for unusual airline travel events as well.

Medicine

Submission + - Does "supersizing" supershrink your brain? (bbc.co.uk)

Rambo Tribble writes: As reported by the BBC, the journal, Neurology, is set to release the findings of a study in Oregon on diet and brain shrinkage in Alzheimer's victims. The upshot is: a diet rich in vitamins and omega-3 fatty acids is beneficial; trans fat and fast food are detrimental.
The Internet

Submission + - New group paves way for 2012 Online Primary (cnn.com)

DJRumpy writes: Americans Elect, which has raised $22 million so far, is harnessing the power of the Internet to conduct an unprecedented national online primary next spring. If all goes according to plan, the result will be a credible, nonpartisan ticket that pushes alternative centrist solutions to the growing problems America's current political leadership seems unwilling or unable to tackle.

The theory: If you break the stranglehold that more ideologically extreme primary voters and established interests currently have over presidential nominations, you will push Washington to seriously address tough economic and other issues. Even if the group's ticket doesn't win, its impact will force Democrats and Republicans in the nation's capital to start bridging their cavernous ideological divide.

Idle

Submission + - Orangutans to Skype between zoos with iPads (extremetech.com)

MrSeb writes: "For the last six months, orangutans — those great, hairy, orange apes that go “ook” a lot — at Milwaukee zoo have been playing games and watching videos on Apple’s (seemingly ubiquitous) iPad, but now their keepers and the charity Orangutan Outreach want to go one step further and enable ape-to-ape video chat via Skype or FaceTime. "The orangutans loved seeing videos of themselves — so there is a little vanity going on — and they like seeing videos of the orangutans who are in the other end of the enclosure," Richard Zimmerman of Orangutan Outreach said. "So if we incorporate cameras, they can watch each other." And thus the idea of WiFi video chat between orangutans — and eventually between zoos — was born. It might seem like folly, but putting (ruggedized!) iPads into the hands of apes could really revolutionize our understanding of great ape behavior — and thus our own behavior, too."
Security

Submission + - Attack Tool Released for WPS Setup Flaw (threatpost.com)

Trailrunner7 writes: Just a day after security researcher Stefan Viehbock released details of a vulnerability in the WiFi Protected Setup (WPS) standard that enables attackers to recover the router PIN, a security firm has published an open-source tool capable of exploiting the vulnerability. The tool, known as Reaver, has the ability to find the WPS PIN on a given router and then recover the WPA passphrase for the router, as well.

Researchers at Tactical Network Solutions in Maryland on Wednesday released a tool called Reaver that implements an attack on the WPS vulnerability. The company released the tool as an open-source project on Google Code, but also is selling a more advanced commercial version.

Social Networks

Submission + - Occupy Protestors Tread The Social Networking Rout (itproportal.com)

hypnosec writes: Techie Occupy Wall Street protesters are planning to create a social networking meant primarily for organizing protests and getting people together for various causes. In the year 2011, social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook helped protesters to spread their cause and garner support across the world. What started out as a minor protest comprising of a handful of people turned into a worldwide protest thanks to the use of social media. According to Wired, after seeing the impact social media platform have had on protests worldwide, several Occupy Wall Street protesters are creating their own social networking platform aimed at spreading awareness about a particular cause and rallying people for protests.

Submission + - New Record High Temperature at South Pole (wisc.edu)

Titus Andronicus writes: The South Pole experienced its highest ever recorded temperature of -12.3C (+9.9F) on December 25, 2011, according to preliminary reporting from the Antarctic Meteorological Research Center at the University of Wisconsin.
User Journal

Journal Journal: 6 computers and nothing to compute 1

Here is where I am at with my computers these days... I have built two decent quad core Phenom II based computers (mostly just to experiment with overclocking and unlocking cores on Phenom II x2 processors). I have a Sempron based computer with 4 TB of hard disk space that I use with FreeNas to store backups for all of my computers/media (because I got interested in experimenting with FreeNas). I have two old laptops (both Athlon based). I have two Celeron based computers as well. I like

Communications

Submission + - Free Wi-Fi coming to Japanese vending machines in (gizmag.com)

cylonlover writes: Free Wi-Fi is on its way to some Japanese vending machines. Working much like a mobile hotspot at your local coffee shop, people located near the machines would be able to connect to the internet for 30 minutes at a time and surf the web. The service is available to anyone, to use with any smartphone, tablet, or computer and does not require the purchase of a drink from the machine.
Biotech

Submission + - BT Corn: insects rapidly becoming resistant (msn.com)

DrHeasley writes: BT corn, which contains the DNA for Bacillus thuringensis toxin, was once hailed as the final solution for insect predators on this valuable crop. Now it turns out that insects, and evolution, are smarter than we thought, and the corn that contains the built in pesticide is no longer reliably protected.
The Internet

Submission + - Imgur.com: Why We Dumped GoDaddy (foxnews.com) 3

Velcroman1 writes: On the eve of what has been dubbed “Dump Go Daddy Day,” imgur.com — the massive image hosting sites is responsible for an astonishing 28 terabytes of bandwidth and nearly 200 million page views per day — has already changed its registry entries, foreshadowing the potential negative effect of a boycott set to begin Thursday morning. GoDaddy.com originally supported the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) — RackSpace called it "a deeply flawed piece of legislation" that will hinder free speech and infringe on first amendment rights — but quickly recanted its position when the call of a boycott circulated. “The outcry kind of forced our hand,” imgur founder and owner Alan Schaaf said. “I’m against the SOPA act and imgur as a company is against it. We just feel it is terrible that GoDaddy.com would support this legislation.”
User Journal

Journal Journal: /. Moderation Moderation

I have spent some time recently looking over moderation and understanding some of the tweaks around it. Also spent a lot of time looking at comments in live stories and reading emails from site users about modding. Typically the messages range from astroturfing to people with a vendetta.
So my questions to you are:
Is /. moderation broken?
Is /. moderation out of date?
What would you use to help manage signal-to-noise?
Medicine

Submission + - How Doctors Die 6

Hugh Pickens writes writes: "Dr. Ken Murray, a Clinical Assistant Professor of Family Medicine at USC, writes that doctors don’t die like the rest of us. What’s unusual about doctors is not how much treatment they get when faced with death themselves, but how little. For all the time they spend fending off the deaths of others, they tend to be fairly serene when faced with death themselves because they know exactly what is going to happen, they know the choices, and they generally have access to any sort of medical care they could want. "Almost all medical professionals have seen what we call “futile care” being performed on people," writes Murray. "What it buys is misery we would not inflict on a terrorist. I cannot count the number of times fellow physicians have told me, in words that vary only slightly, 'Promise me if you find me like this that you’ll kill me.'" Feeding into the problem are unrealistic expectations of what doctors can accomplish. Many people think of CPR as a reliable lifesaver when, in fact, the results are usually poor. If a patient suffers from severe illness, old age, or a terminal disease, the odds of a good outcome from CPR are infinitesimal, while the odds of suffering are overwhelming. "If there is a state of the art of end-of-life care, it is this: death with dignity. As for me, my physician has my choices," says Murray. "They were easy to make, as they are for most physicians. There will be no heroics, and I will go gentle into that good night.""

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