Mike writes to let us know that a poster on the AVS forum says that the latest issue of HMM magazine (no link given) contains a quote from Richard Doherty, a media analyst with Envisioneering Group, extolling the strength of the DRM in Blu-ray discs, called BD+. Doherty reportedly said, "BD+, unlike AACS, which suffered a partial hack last year, won't likely be breached for 10 years." He added that if it were broken, "the damage would affect one film and one player." As one comment on AVS noted, I'll wait for the Doom9 guys to weigh in.

mw13068 writes "In a recent article in the Seattle Post Intelligencer FSF General Council Eben Moglen points out that the Microsoft SUSE coupons have no expiration date. The result? 'Microsoft can be sure that some coupons will be turned into Novell in return for software after the effective date of GPL 3. Once that has happened, patent defenses will, under the license, have moved out into the broad community and be available to anybody who Microsoft should ever sue for infringement.' Groklaw is also covering the story in it's inimitable way."

An anonymous reader writes "AppleTVhacks published a full howto install guide with 12 easy steps to turn your AppleTV into a full blown OSX workstation. With a processor emulation, hacker Semthex of hackint0sh.org, managed to get full blown OSX working on a AppleTV. The kernel for this hack is freely available under APSL and opens the legal way to a really cheap Mac Nano. With 300$ difference to the Mac Mini, this is becoming a fairly interesting deal." April Fool's, btw.

An anonymous reader writes "Mac expert John Welch, author of the widely read OS X versus Vista comparison, delves into Apple's Leopard Server OS. He and Information week have on offer a deep dive into what's known so far about OS X Server 10.5, which will be showcased at Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference in June. Welch weighs in on Leopard's iCal, Wiki, file, Quicktime, and mail services, along with Xgrid 2, Open Directory 4, and 64-bit capabilities. What does it all add up to? His assessment: Apple probably isn't aiming at 'big' enterprises; just the same, Leopard Server is shaping up to be a great SMB (small and mid-sized business) product. Welch writes: 'For about a thousand bucks on existing hardware, or for the cost of an Xserve, you get a really solid server, able to support Web services, collaboration, groupware, IM, and file services. You can run it with its own directory service, or as part of an Active Directory implementation out of the box. It provides some features that due to pricing and/or setup requirements, have traditionally been reserved for big enterprises — in particular clustering of both email and calendaring servers.'"

The Wired blog 26B Stroke 6 reports on the arguments AT&T and the US government made to an appeals court hearing motions in the case the EFF brought against the phone giant for their presumed part in the government's program(s) to spy on Americans. In essence AT&T seems to have argued that the case against the telecom for allegedly helping the government spy on Americans is too secret for any court, despite the Administration's admission it did spy on Americans without warrants.

An anonymous reader writes "Two scientists have rendered amazing pictures using datafiles from the human genome project. They assigned different colors to the DNA and rendered images showing interesting patterns and strange structures of our chromosomes. It might be a groundbreaking new idea for displaying and maybe better understanding our genes. With its fascinating pictures it is a beautiful mix of science and art."

Underpants writes "Bob Cringely posts the results of his 2006 predictions (only 69% successful, so Bob is sad). He also lists his calls for 2007; none are particularly shocking, but some are at least interesting. 2007 predictions from the article: '4) No one DRM technology emerges as the winner and the RIAA begins to back off as it loses a few legal cases. Still, no Internet-only song wins a Grammy or is even recognized as existing. 9) Zune 2.0 appears, isn't brown, but still nobody buys it. 10) The year the net crashed (in the USA). Video overwhelms the net and we all learn that the broadband ISPs have been selling us something they can't really deliver.'"

All three 'next generation' consoles are out, and we can finally stop using that term. The NPD numbers for last month have been released, and there's plenty of information there to discuss. Analysts have already made some observations, with brandintel specifically pointing out the Xbox 360's 'surprising' role in last month's fight. For some more well-reasoned thought, Dean Takahashi's take is the place to turn: "At this rate, Microsoft isn't going to hit its goal of 10 million units by year end ... Sony's number is consistent with its warnings, but 197,000 is worse than what many expected ... the fair fight is really going to be what happens in the year 2007, when all three console makers should be able to ship as many consoles as consumers want. To me, this looks like consumers are hit with a case of sticker shock. The mass market is paying for cheap PS2s, DS Lites, and GBAs." Despite the Wii's success last month, it should be noted that Nintendo is no longer bragging of 1 Million units in the U.S. by the end of the year. So, essentially, it looks like all three companies will fail to hit their console goals for the year.

dptalia writes "In an effort to reduce alcohol related violence, England is rolling out mandatory fingerprinting of all pub patrons. If a pub owner refuses to comply with the new system, and fails to show 'considerable' reductions in alcohol-related crimes, they will lose their license. Supposedly the town that piloted this program had a 48% reduction in alcohol-related crime." From the article: "Offenders can be banned from one pub or all of them for a specified time - usually a period of months - by a committee of landlords and police called Pub Watch. Their offenses are recorded against their names in the fingerprint system. Bradburn noted the system had a 'psychological effect' on offenders."

AmadeoDonofrio writes, "Intel has lunched a unique guerrilla marketing campaign for their new dual-core processor. They asked world-renowned virtual builder Versu Richelieu to create a new masterpiece in the Second Life virtual landscape using their dual-core chip. What's really crazy is that they put her in a storefront window on 5th Avenue and 39th Street in New York City for 72 hours while she works. The web site is a mashup of technologies including side-by-side live video feeds from a web cam in the window, and her SL point-of-view. There's a Flickr slide show and her embedded Hipcast audio blog, and soon to come archives of the whole experience in 12-hour segments hosted by YouTube. Is Intel pushing their marketing to extremes by utilizing all these free online services to promote their product? Or is it good publicity for all parties involved?"

michuk writes "PolishLinux.org has published a review of FVWM-Crystal 3.0.4: "FVWM-Crystal is an eye-candy, functional and ultra-fast desktop environment for GNU/Linux and UNIX, based on FVWM. Crystal can be used even on very old machines, thus it is a noticeable alternative to popular desktop choices like XFCE or Fluxbox.""

afa writes "According to Xinhuanet.com, Xinhua News Agency on Sunday promulgated a set of measures to regulate the release of news and information in China by foreign news agencies. From the article: 'Where a foreign news agency violates the Measures in one of the following manners, Xinhua News Agency shall give it a warning, demand rectification within a prescribed time limit, suspend its release of specified content, suspend or cancel its qualifications of a foreign news agency for releasing news and information in China, on the merits of each case.'"

CaroKann writes "Geoplasma is planning to build a power plant in St. Lucie County, Florida that will generate electricity by vaporizing landfill trash and sewage treatment plant sludge with plasma arcs. It will be the first plant of its kind in the USA and the largest in the world. The power plant is expected to destroy 3000 tons of garbage, generating about 120 megawatts of electricity per day. The plant will also supply steam to a nearby Tropicana juice plant. The landfill is expected to be depleted in about 18 years. In addition, up to 600 tons of melted, hardened sludge will be produced each day and will be sold for road construction."

fooby12 writes "According to the Univeristy of Toronto instant messaging does not hurt the grammar of the people who use it. From the article: "With 80% of Canadian teenagers using instant messaging and adopting its unique linguistic shorthand, many teachers and parents are concerned about the medium's potential to corrupt kids' grammar. But instant messaging doesn't deserve its bad reputation as a spoiler of syntax, suggests a new study from the University of Toronto.""