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Education

Submission + - Call To Halt Donations To Stop Wikipedia Deletions 4

Submitted by
ObsessiveMathsFreak
ObsessiveMathsFreak writes: "Howard Tayler, the webcomic artist of Schlock Mercenary fame, is calling on people not to donate money during the latest Wikimedia Foundation fund-raiser, in protest at the "notability purges" taking place throughout Wikipedia, where articles are being removed en-masse by what many see as overzealous admins. The webcomic community in particular has long felt slighted by the application of Wikipedia's contentious Notability policy. Wikinews reporters have recently begun investigating this issue, but are the admins listening? Is Deletionism becoming a dominant ethos on Wikipedia? Are the right people holding the reigns?"
Worms

Submission + - The Computer Virus Turns 25 in July 1

Submitted by bl8n8r
bl8n8r writes: In July of 1982, an infected Apple II propogated the first computer virus onto a 5-1/4" floppy. The virus, which did little more than annoy the user, Elk Cloner, was authored in Pittsburgh by a 15-year-old high school student, Rich Skrenta. The virus replicated by monitoring floppy disk activity and writing itself to the floppy when it was accessed. Skrenta describes the virus as "It was a practical joke combined with a hack. A wonderful hack." Remember, he was a 9th grader when he did this.
Google

Submission + - Google Maps now does interactive re-routing (blogspot.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Remember how cool it was the first time you used MapQuest or Google Maps or Google Earth? Once you try the new interactive dragging of routes on Google Maps, you'll find yourself wasting too much time again just playing with it and being amazed at how fast and scalable it is.
Education

Journal Journal: Our Solar system was adopted? 4

Journal by mandark1967
Our Solar System is traveling at a 60 to 90 degree angle compared to the rest of the Milky Way Galaxy and scientists have now discovered why. It seems our solar system originated not in the Milky Way Galaxy, but in the Sagittarius dwarf galaxy, which is in the process of being eaten by the Milky Way.
The Internet

Submission + - Wikipedia gets state funding in Germany (heise.de)

Submitted by
tmk
tmk writes: "How can the Wikipedia be improved? The German government started today a project to train experts to contribute to Wikipedia. The goal is to write or improve several hundret articles about renewable ressources in the Internet encyclopaedia. The project ist funded by the German Ministry of Nutrition, Agriculture, and Consumer Protection. The German chapter of the Wikimedia Foundation is hiring a Wikipedian to coordinate the efforts."
Education

Submission + - UK Government rules Inteligent Design not Science (theregister.co.uk) 1

Submitted by blane.bramble
blane.bramble writes: The Register is reporting that there is no place in the science curriculum for Inteligent Design and that it can not be taught as science. The UK Government has stated that "The Government is aware that a number of concerns have been raised in the media and elsewhere as to whether creationism and intelligent design have a place in science lessons. The Government is clear that creationism and intelligent design are not part of the science National Curriculum programmes of study and should not be taught as science."
Novell

Submission + - Mono coders hack Linux Siverlight in 21 days

Submitted by Etrigoth
Etrigoth writes: After the recent announcement of Silverlight by Microsoft at their Mix event in Vegas, Miguel de Icaza
galvanised his team of developers in the Mono group at Novell to create a Linux implementation, a so-called 'Moonlight'.

Remarkably, they achieved this in 21 Days.

Although they were first introduced to Silverlight at the Las Vegas Mix, de Icaza was invited by a representative of Microsoft France for a
10 minute demonstration at the Paris Re-Mix 07 keynote conference, should they have anything to show.
Joshua, a blogger for Microsoft has confirmed that the Mono team did not know anything about Silverlight 1.1 before its launch.

Other members of this team have blogged about this incredible achievement, Moonlight hack-a-thon.

It's worth noting from a developer perspective that Moonlight is not Mono and doesn't require Mono to work
The Courts

Submission + - Student Blogger Loses Small Claims Defamation Case

Submitted by
An anonymous reader writes: Yaman Salahi, a UC Berkeley student and blogger, lost a lawsuit brought against him by Lee Kaplan, a journalist for FrontPageMag.com. Kaplan had sued Salahi for tortious business interference and libel in a California small claims court suit in response to a blog Salahi had set-up about him called "Lee Kaplan Watch." Judge Marshall Whitley presided over the appeal on June 8, 2007, and entered his ruling on June 13, 2007 in favor of the plaintiff, asking that Salahi pay him $7,500 (the maximum in small claims court) plus court fees. No written opinion was offered with the decision, though all other court filings are available here. From Salahi's update on the blog:

"...because [Kaplan] sued me in small claims court, I did not have the protections of the anti-SLAPP [Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Policy] statute. I initially did not have the protection of a lawyer, nor did I have the assurances that the trial would be conducted with consistency and integrity, ensuring me my due process rights, because the standards for acceptable evidence are much lower and more informal for small claims court than they are for real courts. Furthermore, I will never know why I lost the initial hearing, or why I lost the appeal, because small claims judges are not obligated to release written opinions with their rulings.... I will never have the opportunity to take this to a real appellate court where my first amendment rights might be protected."
What does this mean for bloggers' rights, in general? Should defamation cases be heard before small claims court in the first place? What are bloggers with little or no available resources to do when they are targeted for their political slant?
Privacy

Submission + - Identity Thief Apprehended by Victim

Submitted by
ewhac
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."
Quickies

Submission + - Weapon found in Whale blubber from the 1800's (cnn.com)

Submitted by LABarr
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...
Software

Submission + - Is Microsoft getting paid for patents in Linux?

Submitted by
kripkenstein
kripkenstein writes: "In an interview, Jeremy Allison (of the Samba project) implies that Microsoft is secretly getting paid for patent licenses on Linux-related products:

[Interviewer:] One of the persistent rumors that's going around is that certain large IT customers have already been paying Microsoft for patent licensing to cover their use of Linux, Samba and other free software projects.[...]

Allison: Yes, that's true, actually. I mean I have had people come up to me and essentially off the record admit that they had been threatened by Microsoft and had got patent cross license and had essentially taken out a license for Microsoft patents on the free software that they were using [...] But they're not telling anyone about it. They're completely doing it off the record.
If true, is this slowing down Linux adoption? Or are these just rumors — which may accomplish much the same effect?"
Microsoft

Submission + - DirectX10 drops Hardware Acceleration for Audio.

Submitted by
shrewd
shrewd writes: ""Imagine your surprise when you fire up one of your favourite games in Vista — say World of Warcraft or Prey — only to find your fancy EAX-endowed soundcard and 5.1 surround speakers are dribbling out flat, unenhanced stereo sound. Then, in a vain attempt to spruce up the audio by enabling EAX, you get a nice taut error message saying EAX is not detected on your hardware. What's going on? Welcome to the world of Vista audio. And a brave new world it is.""

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