Journal Journal: Et tu, Slashdot?
Slashdot Burying Stories About Slashdot Media Owned SourceForge
I enjoyed the heck out of this site long ago. I'm sad that it has come to this.
Comment Thanks Rob! (Score 1) 1521
I drifted away from Slashdot site long ago, but I had to come back to comment on this. For a certain period of my life, Slashdot was a major chunk of my day, every day. The stories and community here never failed to make me happy, angry, informed, distracted, thoughtful, content, and LOL many times a day, and some of the friendships I made here have held fast since I left.
All the best of luck to you, Taco. I look forward to whatever you do next, I predict it will be awesome.
Comment Re:Ffffffsssss (Score 2, Funny) 553
Throw in the sound of the TARDIS from Doctor Who and I'll finally have a reason to get a driver's license.
Comment Re:David Lammy MP (Score 1) 155
Not to mention his busy schedule of firefighting, babysitting, flying planes, and still making it to the show in time to rock out with his band.
Journal Journal: Announcing the release of my new book 22
This feels like a mega-spam entry, and I'm very self conscious about posting it, but I'm excited about this and I wanted to share . .
Submission + - Apple design flaw proven
empaler writes: "Apple has long denied service on iBook G4s with faulty designs, denying that there was an error — but now, the Danish National Consumer Agency (press release) has released a report proving that the error is due to a design flaw. So far, the only news site picking this up is The Register, unless you understand Danish (1, 2, 3). The Danish Consumer Complaints Board is also implying that Apple needs to get a grip and acknowledge this error in the rest of the world.
The NCA also has some photos from the report (explanations in Danish, but easily transparent from context)."
The NCA also has some photos from the report (explanations in Danish, but easily transparent from context)."
Submission + - Asked to install Pirated Software, what do you do?
An anonymous reader writes: I am an IT professional, and due to budget constraints, I have been told to install multiple copies of MS Office, despite offering to install OpenOffice, and other OpenSource Office products. Even though most of the uses are for people using Excel like a database, or formatting of text in cells, other programs are not tolerated. I have been over ruled by our controller, to my disagreement.
Other than drafting a letter to the owners of the company on how I disagree with the policy, what else can I do? I would never turn them in, but I am in tough place by knowing doing something illegal. I want to keep my job, but disagree with some of the decision making on this issue.
Submission + - 12 Laws Every Blogger Needs to Know
Anonymous Coward writes: "http://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2007/05/ 12_important_us.html
12 Laws Every Blogger Needs to Know: (1) Whether to Disclose Paid Posts; (2) Is Deep Linking Legal; (3) The Legal Use of Images and Thumbnails; (4) Laws that Protect You From Stolen Content; (5) Domain Name Trademark Issues; (6) Handling Private Data About Your Readers; (7) Who Owns User-Developed Content and Can You Delete It; (8) The Duty to Monitor Your Blog Comments, and Liability; (9) Basic Tax Law Issues in Blogging; (10) Limited Liability Laws and Incorporating; (11) Spam Laws and Which Unsolicited Emails are Legal; and (12) Are Bloggers Protected from Journalism Shield Laws"
12 Laws Every Blogger Needs to Know: (1) Whether to Disclose Paid Posts; (2) Is Deep Linking Legal; (3) The Legal Use of Images and Thumbnails; (4) Laws that Protect You From Stolen Content; (5) Domain Name Trademark Issues; (6) Handling Private Data About Your Readers; (7) Who Owns User-Developed Content and Can You Delete It; (8) The Duty to Monitor Your Blog Comments, and Liability; (9) Basic Tax Law Issues in Blogging; (10) Limited Liability Laws and Incorporating; (11) Spam Laws and Which Unsolicited Emails are Legal; and (12) Are Bloggers Protected from Journalism Shield Laws"
Submission + - 2012 Olympics security to be chosen by sponsorship
denebian devil writes: In an Editorial/Blog at ITPRO, Davey Winder writes of a keynote speech at Infosecurity Europe by Member of Parliament Derek Wyatt. In this speech, which was about the IT security demands of running the 2012 London Olympics, Derek Wyatt MP dropped the bombshell that IT Security at the Olympics will hinge not on which companies show themselves to be the best in their field or to have the technology that best meets the needs of the Olympics, but rather on whether or not the companies were a 'major sponsor' of the Olympics.
So who has bought their way into being the security experts of choice, and with whom our security and that of the visiting millions will rest? Visa.
Submission + - The 20 year evolution of handheld consoles
marcellizot writes: "It has taken a while for handheld consoles to crawl from the primordial 8-bit slime to today's apex predator polygon juggling brutes. To illustrate just how much things have advanced over the last 20 years, Pocket Gamer has pulled together a few facts and figures in pretty chart form. Pitting the vital statistics of the critical handhelds of today and yesteryear against one another, there are some interesting facts to be gleaned from this infotainment extravaganza."
Submission + - RIAA Secretly Tries to Get ISP Subscriber Info
NewYorkCountryLawyer writes: "The RIAA secretly went into federal district court in Denver, Colorado, the home town of its lawyers, and — in an attempt to change the rules of the game — made an ex parte application to a federal judge there, asking him to rule (pdf) that the federal Cable Communications Policy Act does not apply to the RIAA's attempts to get subscriber information from cable companies. ("Ex parte" means application was secret, no one else — neither the ISP nor the subscribers — were given notice that this was going on.). They were, in effect, asking the Court to rule that the RIAA does not need to get a court order to be able to force an ISP to disclose confidential subscriber information. The Magistrate Judge declined to rule on the issue (pdf), but did give them the ex parte discovery order they were looking for."
Feed FCC Wants To Decide What You Can Watch On Cable (techdirt.com)
Under its current leadership, the FCC has made it a priority to impose the morals of a small group of people on all television viewers by cracking down on so-called indecent programming. Not content with abusing the power to regulate over-the-air broadcasters, FCC Chairman Kevin Martin has been trying to extend his authority to act as moral policeman over cable and other paid systems as well, by bullying cable operators into offering "family tiers" of channels or a-la-carte pricing. He does this because the FCC doesn't have the power to regulate paid networks -- though that could soon change. The FCC will soon recommend that Congress pass a new law giving it the ability to not only regulate "indecent" programming, but also violence in TV shows, and also allowing it to regulate what's shown on basic cable channels. Just to review, cable is something that people pay for, and that they willingly invite into their own home. If they don't like what's on it, they can either take advantage of the myriad tools that exist to allow people to block objectionable content (from family tiers to the V-chip to controls on set-top boxes, or simply even the remote control), or they can choose to not bring it into their home. Giving the FCC these additional powers will simply push it further towards being the Federal Censorship Commission, and will have a chilling effect on all sorts of speech. However, even if Congress should pass new legislation in this area, getting it to stand up to scrutiny in the courts will be another matter. Just as state legislators' efforts to ban the sale of certain video games to minors have consistently been knocked back by the courts, Congress and the FCC may find they're overstepping their bounds -- and the Constitution.
