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Comment Re:know your rights (Score 5, Informative) 453

by sirkumi (#45670227) Attached to: NZ Traveler's Electronics Taken At Airport; Interest in Snowden to Blame?
Sadly I don't think you have any rights - at least not in Australia - where I come from, and which has very similar customs laws to those of New Zealand.

It would appear that they can take any and all of your electronic devices and storage equipment - including laptops, smartphones, usb keys - and they don't have to explain why or state what "reasonable suspicion" they have that you might have something illegal. On the whim of the customs officer, they can keep it for 14 days, or longer if they feel they have cause to.

At most all you can do is lodge a complaint...

Comment Re:Gee, I wonder what Slashdot will think (Score 0) 307

by sirkumi (#38898239) Attached to: Pirate Bay Founders Lose Final Appeal
Seriously - I have mod points, but I'm going to forsake them for replying to your post...

You are currently at +4 Interesting. That alone says enough for me that your first and last sentences are just plain WRONG. While you gleefully generalise slashdot mods (and even general commentors), the fact is that people have different opinions, and it's how they present them that gives you points in this forum. You have a valid point, but I hope you take the time to read the people who have replied to you, and acknowledge the merits of their argument as well as their position.

People who constantly say "I'm going to get modded down for this...." annoy me. You underestimate the value of discussion, and you diminsish us all.....
Piracy

Submission + - Indie Linux Game Devs Upload Own Game on PirateBay (ubuntuvibes.com)

Submitted by dartttt
dartttt writes: To counter the piracy problem, Tiny Build Games who released No Time To Explain few days back, uploaded their own version of game on Pirate Bay. But there is a difference is this version and the original game that you can buy from the game website.

All in game characters wear Pirate hats and entire game is Pirate themed basically making it No Time to Explain 'Pirate Edition'.
Open Source

Submission + - UK: Open Standards Must be RF, not FRAND (computerworlduk.com)

Submitted by
Glyn Moody
Glyn Moody writes: "There has been a big battle in the UK over whether open standards should be Restriction/Royalty-Free (RF) or Fair, Reasonable and Non-Discriminatory (FRAND). That matters, because open source can't in general implement FRAND standards (there are legal hacks that can be applied in a few special circumstances.) First it seemed that RF had the upper hand [.pdf], but later comments from officials cast doubt on that. Now we have the definitive answer from the UK Minister for the Cabinet Office, Francis Maude: "The Government require that their ICT should be built on open standards, wherever possible, to improve competition and avoid lock-in to a particular technology or supplier. Fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory (FRAND) specifications may present some difficulties for the open source software development model in terms of patents and royalties. To deliver a level playing field for both open source and proprietary software, open standards are needed." Will UK government use of open source finally take off, or is this a hollow victory?"

Comment Re:An update on this story by Grubb... (Score 3, Interesting) 200

Here's a transcript of the interview he had with police:

http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/journalists-facebook-arrest-transcript-of-police-interview-20110518-1esrr.html

It is abundantly clear that, while everything was going ok for a while, Ben's fatal flaw was being "helpful" to the police and offering information to them. The interview was voluntary, and they even told him he could walk out at any time. The minute he mentioned that he had taken notes of the converstaion with the security researcher on his iPad though, the police then had the information they needed to seize it. When he refused citing his sources and private information contained on it, they arrested him (later releasing him without charge). Once again, as has been linked to so many times here on Slashdot, the following should be REQUIRED viewing by everyone!

Don't talk to the Cops
Space

Construction On Spaceship Factory Set To Begin In the Mojave 147

Posted by timothy from the want-a-lift? dept.
angry tapir writes "A production facility that would build the world's first fleet of commercial spaceships is set to begin construction on Tuesday at the Mojave Air and Space Port. The facility will be home to The Spaceship Co, or TSC — a joint venture owned by Mojave-based Scaled Composites and British billionaire Richard Branson's space tourism company, Virgin Galactic."
Education

Submission + - Evolution, Big Bang Polls Omitted From NSF Report (sciencemag.org)

Submitted by cremeglace
cremeglace writes: In an unusual last-minute edit that has drawn flak from the White House and science educators, a federal advisory committee omitted data on Americans' knowledge of evolution and the big bang from a key report. The data shows that Americans are far less likely than the rest of the world to accept that humans evolved from earlier species and that the universe began with a big bang.

Submission + - Web Copyright Crackdown on the Way

Submitted by
Hugh Pickens
Hugh Pickens writes: "Journalist Alan D. Mutter reports on his blog "Relections of a Newsosaur" that a coalition of traditional and digital publishers is launching the first-ever concerted crackdown on copyright pirates on the web. Initially targeting violators who use large numbers of intact articles, the first offending sites to be targeted will be those using 80% or more of copyrighted stories more than 10 times per month. In the first stage of a multi-step process, online publishers identified by Attributor will be sent a letter informing them of the violations and urging them to enter into license agreements with the publishers whose content appears on their sites. In the second stage Attributor will ask hosting services to take down pirate sites. “We are not going after past damages” from sites running unauthorized content says Jim Pitkow, the chief executive of Attributor. The emphasis, Pitkow says is “to engage with publishers to bring them into compliance” by getting them to agree to pay license fees to copyright holders in the future. Offshore sites will not be immune from the crackdown because almost all of them depend on banner ads served by US-based services and because the DMCA requires the ad service to act against any violator, Attributor says it can interdict the revenue lifeline at any offending site in the world."
The Internet

Submission + - U.K. bill would outlaw open Wi-Fi (zdnet.co.uk)

Submitted by suraj.sun
suraj.sun writes: The government will not exempt universities, libraries and small businesses providing open Wi-Fi services from its Digital Economy Bill copyright crackdown, according to official advice released earlier this week.

This would leave many organizations open to the same penalties for copyright infringement as individual subscribers, potentially including disconnection from the internet, leading legal experts to say it will become impossible for small businesses and the like to offer Wi-Fi access.

"This is going to be a very unfortunate measure for small businesses, particularly in a recession, many of whom are using open free Wi-Fi very effectively as a way to get the punters in.

Even if they password protect, they then have two options — to pay someone like The Cloud to manage it for them, or take responsibility themselves for becoming an ISP effectively, and keep records for everyone they assign connections to, which is an impossible burden for a small cafe" Lilian Edwards, professor of internet law at Sheffield University told ZDNet UK.

ZDNet : http://news.zdnet.co.uk/communications/0,1000000085,40057470,00.htm

Submission + - Hungarian electric car splits into 2 smaller cars (wired.co.uk)

Submitted by Lanxon
Lanxon writes: Hungary's Antro, which is developing a car that splits into two smaller cars, and plans to take it/them to market by 2012, assuming the Mayan phophecies fall through, reports Wired. Futuristic looking in itself, the grander plan for the car is much more audacious: Antro intends to allow users to be able to connect two Antro Solos to form a six-passenger Antro Duo. Or perhaps more interesting still, owners of a Duo could split the car into two smaller Solos should Mom have different weekend plans to Dad. Or if they divorce.

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