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Comment IBM Model M Secret key-combination (Score 1) 304

by lanimreT (#48095191) Attached to: The Greatest Keyboard Ever Made
A few years ago I stumbled on a hardware level easter egg of sorts for the Model M: 1) hold down both shift keys. 2) press and hold the v key. 3) release both shift keys. 4) release the v key. Your model M will print out a number that I suspect is a model number of its microprocessor. If you know more please post below. This is my keyboard's output: "1900312120d3d0001"
Privacy

Submission + - Facebook Calls All-hands Meeting on Privacy (computerworld.com)

Submitted by CWmike
CWmike writes: A Facebook spokesman said that the company will hold an all-staff meeting on Thursday to discuss privacy issues, but would not say whether executives are looking to make significant changes to to the popular site's highly contentious privacy policies following a bevy of changes to the service. In an interview with Computerworld last week, Ethan Beard, director of the site's developer network, defended Facebook's policies and even said users love the changes that Facebook has made. However, it seems calls for people to delete their Facebook accounts, which have gathered momentum, have not fallen on deaf ears at Facebook. Adding to the perception of a crisis on hand, the NY Times profiled on Wednesday a project called Diaspora*, which is creating a more private, decentralized alternative to Facebook.
Software

Submission + - Common Ground vs. Raiser's Edge

Submitted by lanimreT
lanimreT writes: I work at a medium sized non-profit organization. We've been considering a switch from our current constituent relationship manager (CRM): The Raiser's Edge to Common Ground (a non-profit focused CRM built on SalesForce). I would like to hear from other organizations who have already done this. What features are present in Raiser's Edge but missing in Common Ground? Is your work-flow improved by the new software? If you had it to do over again, would you still make the switch?

Submission + - Cheap cancer drug finally tested in humans (edmontonjournal.com) 1

Submitted by John Bayko
John Bayko writes: Mentioned on Slashdot a couple of years ago, the drug dichloroacetate (DCA) has finally finished its first clinical trial against brain tumours in humans. Drug companies weren't willing to test a drug they could not patent, so money was raised in the community through donations, auctions, and finally government support, but the study was still limited to five patients, showing extremely positive results in four of them. It also raises the question of where all the money donated to Canadian and other cancer societies, and especially the billions spent buying merchandise with little pink ribbons on it goes, if not to actual cancer research like this.
Software

Submission + - Customer Resource Management for Non-Profits (skidmorebluffs.net)

Submitted by
NoTerminal
NoTerminal writes: "My 60 person non-profit organization is looking for a tool or set of tools to keep track of our donors and contacts. A perfect solution will either replace or *gracefully* synchronize with outlook's contacts module as well as provide a powerful back-end that can handle donation tracking, grant reporting, and interaction tracking. What contact management system (CMS) or customer relations management (CRM) package is your non-profit using? How do you like it?"
Software

Algorithms Can Make You Pretty 288

Posted by timothy from the too-late-for-me dept.
caffeinemessiah writes "The New York Times has an interesting story on a new algorithm by researchers from Tel Aviv University that modifies a facial picture of a person to conform to standards of attractiveness. Based on a digital library of pictures of people who have been judged 'attractive,' the algorithm finds the nearest match and modifies an input picture so it conforms to the 'attractive' person's proportions. The trick, however, is that the resultant pictures are still recognizable as the original person. Here's a quick link to a representative picture of the process. Note that this is a machine-learning approach to picture modification, not a characterization of beauty, and could just as easily be used to make a person less attractive." Note: As reader Trent Waddington points out, the underlying research was mentioned in an earlier story as well.
The Courts

MySpace Suicide Charges Threaten Free Speech 687

Posted by kdawson from the then-we-are-all-criminals dept.
Naturalist recommends a piece up at Ars about a friend-of-the-court brief filed by the EFF, CDT, Public Citizen, and a group of 14 law professors in the case of Lori Drew, who posed as a teenage boy to harass another teen online, eventually driving her to suicide. (We've discussed the case a few times.) "[The amicus brief argues] that violating MySpace's Terms of Service agreement shouldn't be considered criminal offense under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. The groups believe that if the mother, Lori Drew, is prosecuted using CFAA charges, the case could have significant ramifications for the free speech rights of US citizens using the Internet."

iPhone Root Password Hacked in Three Days 311

Posted by Zonk from the not-that-it-will-do-anybody-any-good dept.
unPlugged-2.0 writes "An Australian developer blog writes that the iPhone root password has already been cracked. The story outlines the procedure but doesn't give the actual password. According to the story: 'The information came from an an official Apple iPhone restore image. The archive contains two .dmg disk images: a password encrypted system image and an unencrypted user image. By delving into the unencrypted image inquisitive hackers were able to discover that all iPhones ship with predefined passwords to the accounts 'mobile' and 'root', the last of which being the name of the privileged administration account on UNIX based systems.' Though interesting, it doesn't seem as though the password is good for anything. The article theorizes it may be left over from development work, or could have been included to create a 'false trail' for hackers."

Will Apple Follow Microsoft's Lead to Restrictive DRM? 326

Posted by Cliff from the inevitable-or-avoidable dept.
Steve Ryan asks: "The direction Microsoft are taking with Windows (for example, the DRM issues in Vista) have led me to believe Windows will soon be an OS which controls the user, rather than the other way round. I like XP, and I find it stable, but I do not want to upgrade to an OS (Vista) which is restrictive. This leaves me with either Linux or Mac OS X. I like Linux, but it may not work with my laptop, so I don't really want to risk it. OS X seems nice. I spend most of my time writing documents and surfing the web, so it should handle everything I want, and I would be happy to buy a lovely MacBook Pro. This leaves me with my question: Will Apple follow Microsoft's lead and implement a DRM loving policy?"
The Almighty Buck

Apple Execs Reportedly Faked Options Documents 172

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the hands-in-the-cookie-jar dept.
theodp writes "Federal prosecutors are reportedly looking closely at stock option administration documents that were apparently falsified by Apple execs to maximize the profitability of option grants. While Apple has said CEO Steve Jobs did not profit from the stock-option backdating, Jobs has reportedly hired his own attorney to deal with the SEC and Justice Department."
GUI

Is Ubuntu a Serious Desktop Contender? 463

Posted by Cliff from the land-of-the-heavy-weights dept.
Exter-C asks: "2006 was the year that a large amount of people started to talk Ubuntu as a possible contender for the Enterprise Linux desktop. There are several key issues that have to be raised: Is Ubuntu/Canonical really capable of maintaining Dapper Drake (6.06 LTS) for 5 years? I know this is not a new question but the evidence after 6 months seems to be negative. A case in point is the 4-5+ day delay for critical updates to packages like Firefox. Given that such a large percentage of people use their desktop systems on the web critical, browser vulnerabilities seem to be one of the core pieces of a secure desktop environment (user stupidity excluded). Can Ubuntu/Canonical really compete with the likes of Red Hat, who had patches available (RHSA-2006:0758) the day that the updates came out?"

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