Comment As another Oregonian... (Score 1) 254
I agree! Let's keep Portland weird! All of you normal people...OUT, OUT, OUT! :)
Submission + - University of Kansas will not forward RIAA letters
Bonewalker writes: Looks like the University of Kansas may not be as pro-RIAA (or anti-student) as initially assumed last week from this recent Slashdot story. Of course, this doesn't make that "one-strike" policy any less flawed, but it shows that they aren't simply throwing their students under the RIAA bus, as one poster put it. As an alum, I am happy to see this. I wonder if they needed to get a story like this out to help combat the backlash and stigma from that previous article, though?
Submission + - Identity Thief Apprehended by Victim
ewhac writes: "Karen Lodrick was entering her sixth month of hell dealing with the repercussions of having her identity stolen and used to loot her accounts. But while she was waiting for a beverage, there standing in line was the woman who appeared on Wells Fargo security video emptying her accounts. What followed was a 45 minute chase through San Francisco streets that ended with the thief being taken into custody by police."
Submission + - IT ads from the past: From the quaint to the weird (computerworld.com)
PetManimal writes: "Computerworld has dug up some funny IT advertising gems from decades past. The highlights include "The Personal Mainframe", Elvira hawking engineering software, and an image of the earliest screenless "briefcase portables." Strange to think that people not only took these technologies so seriously, but also paid big bucks for gear that seems positively primitive now."
Submission + - Weapon found in Whale blubber from the 1800's (cnn.com)
LABarr writes: AP and CNN are carrying this story. "A 50-ton bowhead whale caught off the Alaskan coast last month had a weapon fragment embedded in its neck that showed it survived a similar hunt — more than a century ago. Embedded deep under its blubber was a 3½-inch arrow-shaped projectile that has given researchers insight into the whale's age, estimated between 115 and 130 years old. The bomb lance fragment, lodged in a bone between the whale's neck and shoulder blade, was likely manufactured in New Bedford, on the southeast coast of Massachusetts, a major whaling center at that time. It was probably shot at the whale from a heavy shoulder gun around 1890." One tough whale...
Submission + - Study finds P2P has no effect on legal music sales
MBrichacek writes: "A new study in the has found that illegal music downloads have had no noticeable effects on the sale of music, contrary to the claims of the recording industry. Analyzing data from the final four months of 2002, the researchers estimated that P2P affected no more than 0.7% of sales in that timeframe. The study reports that 803 million CDs were sold in 2002, which was a decrease of about 80 million from the previous year. The RIAA has blamed the majority of the decrease on piracy, and has maintained that argument in recent years as music sales have faltered. Yet according to the study, the impact from file sharing could not have been more than 6 million albums total in 2002, leaving 74 million unsold CDs without an excuse for sitting on shelves."
