You may recall the company Perfect 10 -- a purveyor of pornographic images -- which made a name for itself suing Google. It was an odd case with an odd decision. Basically, Perfect 10 was upset that some other websites (not Google) had taken their photos and placed them on free websites. Google then indexed those sites, and would display thumbnails for the images in its image search. According to Perfect 10, this is copyright infringement -- even though it wasn't Google that had done the copying, but other sites. Also, this was odd because courts have found that thumbnails linking to full images are fair use. Either way, what became clear was that Perfect 10 wasn't exactly concerned with how things got where the were -- it just wanted to sue anyone who touched its photos in any way. So, it probably shouldn't come as a surprise that the company is also suing various payment processors who process payments for other porn sites. Once again, the situation is that these other porn sites made unauthorized copies of the photos, but are then charging fees to access the content. The billing company have absolutely no way of knowing how these sites got their content, but Perfect 10 is arguing that since they profited from these sites anyway, they're liable. So far, the courts don't appear all that sympathetic to the reasoning -- but the appeals court has just sent it back to the lower court to examine whether one of the billing sites lost its DMCA safe harbor provisions by cutting off Perfect 10's credit card. The billing company says it did so for perfectly legitimate reasons: Perfect 10 kept buying subscriptions to various sites and then canceling the subscription, costing the billing company money. What's still not clear is why Perfect 10 feels the need to go after all these companies who were just doing their jobs -- rather than focusing on the companies who actually made copies of its content.

The release of Vista was supposed to have been a boon for the computer industry, as many were expecting business and consumers to upgrade their hardware at the same time they upgraded their operating system. But, despite Microsoft's claims to the contrary, the launch has generally been regarded as weak. The upshot is that makers of computers and parts are now being forced to ratchet down expectations. Yesterday, chip maker AMD warned of terrible earnings stemming from low volume and a brutal price war with Intel. Today, hard drive maker Seagate is getting slammed after it warned of weak demand and a difficult price environment. The company didn't say it explicitly, but it seems that the whole industry may have produced way too many drives in anticipation of strong, Vista-driven sales that never materialized. Seagate, of course, has another challenge: convincing investors that its core business is not under threat from makers of flash memory. There's no evidence that its troubles are related to competition from flash, but you can be sure that investors are keeping a close eye on the situation. If makers of flash memory continue to sail along, and prices in that space hold up fairly well, you can be sure that obituaries for the hard drive industry will be written once again.

Escalating tensions between water users are among the key challenges facing North America says the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Shifts in rainfall patterns, melting mountain glaciers, rising temperatures, increased demand and reduced supplies in some places are likely to aggravate the situation unless cuts are made in greenhouse gases to reduce the scale and pace of climate change.

Justin Barone, associate professor of biological systems engineering at Virginia Tech, is investigating ways to create biodegradable plastics from agricultural byproducts such as poultry feathers and eggs that would be comparable to petroleum-based plastics.

A new computer chip developed by Intel promises to perform calculations as quickly an entire data center, while consuming as much energy as a light bulb. By the Associated Press.

The federal government is holding a competition for a new cryptographic hash function that will become the national standard. Really, this is exciting stuff. Commentary by Bruce Schneier.