Comment Re:What About Molex? (Score 1) 277
Apple's IP .... wtf?
Magnetically coupled connectors have been used between power cords and appliances in Asia for years longer than Apple have had MagSafe
Comment Re:Too much kool-aid??? (Score 4, Interesting) 112
Michael Geist's comment is about the potential about face by the CLC to be announced this upcoming Monday Feb, 9th.
He referenced a 2007 CLC document to show that their latest positions on Copyright and IP are not in line with their previous positions.
It's a very timely comment by Prof Geist.
He referenced a 2007 CLC document to show that their latest positions on Copyright and IP are not in line with their previous positions.
It's a very timely comment by Prof Geist.
Comment It's the connector: it's not the protocol (Score 5, Informative) 277
Sorry it's not USB -- it requires the proprietary Green Plug chip to work.
They are trying to sell their chip by having us push the manufacturers into making mass purchases of the chip ( or chip schematics) because we "demand it".
And they are trying to sell this "initiative" as a standard without releasing the chip schematics to a standards organization.
They are trying to sell their chip by having us push the manufacturers into making mass purchases of the chip ( or chip schematics) because we "demand it".
And they are trying to sell this "initiative" as a standard without releasing the chip schematics to a standards organization.
Comment Introducing Emily O'Brien the real actress (Score 3, Informative) 421
The person in the video is Emily O'Brien a professional actress.
You can find a much better video of Image Metric's work on this page of her website
Microsoft and Apache - What's the Angle? 433
A week ago, we discussed Microsoft's contribution to the Apache Foundation. Now, Bruce Perens has written an analysis "exploring the new relationship of Microsoft and the Apache project, how it works as an anti-Linux move on Microsoft's part, and what some of the Open Sourcers are going to do about having Microsoft as a rather untrustworthy partner." In particular, he notes:
"...Microsoft can still influence how things go from here on. If they have to live with open source, the Apache project is Microsoft's preferred direction. Apache doesn't use the dreaded GPL and its enforced sharing of source-code. Instead, the Apache license is practically a no-strings gift, with a weak provision against patent lawsuits as its most relevant term. Microsoft can take Apache software and embrace and enhance, providing their own versions of the project's software with engineered incompatibility and no available source, just as they forced incompatibility into the Web by installing IE with every Windows upgrade."
Submission + - National Hockey League Embraces TV Placeshifting (slingcommunity.com)
Egadfly writes: "The increasingly popular placeshifting of TV programming naturally roils corporate controversy, among other things because it enables sports fans to view locally blacked-out games over the Internet.
Now, in a blow for info-freedom, the National Hockey League (NHL) has actively supported placeshifting by signing an agreement with SlingBox-maker Sling Media which allows the company's "Clip+Sling" technology to share both live and recorded NHL programming over the Internet.
Significantly, this happen only days after Major League Baseball (MLB) launched a public denunciation of placeshifting: accusing SlingBox owners of violating the law by sending television content over the Internet and accusing Sling Media itself of violating contracts with cable and satellite TV companies."
Submission + - Pirate Bay to create YouTube competitor
Jared writes: "The site will be modeled after YouTube in that content will be user generated. What will set it apart however, is that there will be "no censorship," that The Pirate Bay "will not be the moral police" and determine what content stays or goes as is oftentimes the case with YouTube. He then hinted that that the community will instead be the censors, that "the community will have to do that.""
Submission + - Bill bans NSA eavesdropping
Anonymous Coward writes: "The US house of representatives today passed a bill outlawing illegal domestic wiretapping by the government. Now Bush can pry into your private communications only under terms of FISA.
The ACLU noted that, despite many recent hearings about "modernization" and "technology neutrality," the administration has not publicly provided Congress with a single example of how current FISA standards have either prevented the intelligence community from using new technologies, or proven unworkable for the agents tasked with following them."
The ACLU noted that, despite many recent hearings about "modernization" and "technology neutrality," the administration has not publicly provided Congress with a single example of how current FISA standards have either prevented the intelligence community from using new technologies, or proven unworkable for the agents tasked with following them."
Submission + - Google search by employer not illegal, say judges
An anonymous reader writes: A court of appeals for the federal circuit has upheld a ruling (PDF) against a man who sued his former employer for Googling his name before firing him. He had accused his former employer of participating in "ex parte" communications — off-the-record communications that are used to play a part in the final outcome of a decision — that ultimately affected the decision to fire him from his job. However, the three-judge panel ruled that an ex parte communication did not occur in the case when the employer used Google.
The man in question, David Mullins, was a government employee at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Weather Forecast Office in Indianapolis, IN. Through a series of events, Mullins' employer found that he had misused his government vehicle and government funds for his own purposes — such as sleeping in his car and falsifying hotel documents to receive reimbursements, withdrawing unauthorized amounts of cash from the company card, traveling to destinations sometimes hundreds of miles away from where he was supposed to be (and using his company card to fill up on gas there), and spending company time to visit friends and/or his children. Mullins' supervisor provided a 23-page document listing 102 separate instances of misconduct.
Mullins took issue with a Google search that Capell performed just before authorizing his firing. During this Google search, Capell found that Mullins had been fired from his previous job at the Smithsonian Institution and had been removed from Federal Service by the Air Force. Mullins argued that his right to fundamental fairness was violated when Capell performed the search and that she committed perjury when she stated that the search did not influence her decision to fire him.
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070510-goog le-search-by-employer-not-illegal-say-judges.html
The man in question, David Mullins, was a government employee at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Weather Forecast Office in Indianapolis, IN. Through a series of events, Mullins' employer found that he had misused his government vehicle and government funds for his own purposes — such as sleeping in his car and falsifying hotel documents to receive reimbursements, withdrawing unauthorized amounts of cash from the company card, traveling to destinations sometimes hundreds of miles away from where he was supposed to be (and using his company card to fill up on gas there), and spending company time to visit friends and/or his children. Mullins' supervisor provided a 23-page document listing 102 separate instances of misconduct.
Mullins took issue with a Google search that Capell performed just before authorizing his firing. During this Google search, Capell found that Mullins had been fired from his previous job at the Smithsonian Institution and had been removed from Federal Service by the Air Force. Mullins argued that his right to fundamental fairness was violated when Capell performed the search and that she committed perjury when she stated that the search did not influence her decision to fire him.
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070510-goo
Submission + - Harvard prof: computers need to "forget" m
Jessamine writes: A Harvard professor argues that too much information is being retained by computers, and the machines need to learn how to forget things as humans always have. "If whatever we do can be held against us years later, if all our impulsive comments are preserved, they can easily be combined into a composite picture of ourselves," he writes in the paper. "Afraid how our words and actions may be perceived years later and taken out of context, the lack of forgetting may prompt us to speak less freely and openly." Will such massive databases make us all act like politicians? Is data retention creating a "panopticon"? These are questions that the good doctor raises.
Submission + - Vitamin D deficiency behind many Western cancers?
twilight30 writes: Today's Globe and Mail is reporting that 'research into vitamin D is suggesting a heretical notion: that cancers and other disorders in rich countries aren't caused mainly by pollutants but by a vitamin deficiency known to be less acute or even non-existent in poor nations.
In June, U.S. researchers will announce the first direct link between cancer prevention and the sunshine vitamin. Their results are nothing short of astounding. A four-year clinical trial involving 1,200 women found those taking the vitamin had about a 60-per-cent reduction in cancer incidence, compared with those who didn't take it, a drop so large — twice the impact on cancer attributed to smoking — it almost looks like a typographical error. And in an era of pricey medical advances, the reduction seems even more remarkable because it was achieved with an over-the-counter supplement costing pennies a day.
One of the researchers who made the discovery, professor of medicine Robert Heaney of Creighton University in Nebraska, says vitamin D deficiency is showing up in so many illnesses besides cancer that nearly all disease figures in Canada and the U.S. will need to be re-evaluated. "We don't really know what the status of chronic disease is in the North American population," he said, "until we normalize vitamin D status." '
In June, U.S. researchers will announce the first direct link between cancer prevention and the sunshine vitamin. Their results are nothing short of astounding. A four-year clinical trial involving 1,200 women found those taking the vitamin had about a 60-per-cent reduction in cancer incidence, compared with those who didn't take it, a drop so large — twice the impact on cancer attributed to smoking — it almost looks like a typographical error. And in an era of pricey medical advances, the reduction seems even more remarkable because it was achieved with an over-the-counter supplement costing pennies a day.
One of the researchers who made the discovery, professor of medicine Robert Heaney of Creighton University in Nebraska, says vitamin D deficiency is showing up in so many illnesses besides cancer that nearly all disease figures in Canada and the U.S. will need to be re-evaluated. "We don't really know what the status of chronic disease is in the North American population," he said, "until we normalize vitamin D status." '
Feed Safari browser exploit produced within 9 hours in hacking competition (engadget.com)
Filed under: Desktops, Laptops
Shane Macaulay and Dino Dai Zovi, a software engineer and security researcher taking part in the brilliantly named "PWN to Own" Hack-a-Mac contest at the CanSecWest conference in Vancouver, managed to hack into and take control of a MacBook by finding a security exploit that takes advantage of an open Safari browser window. Shane and his teammate Dino won the prize of a brand new MacBook -- presumably loaded with Firefox or some other browser variant -- for managing to find the hole on the second and final day of the contest. The hack wasn't exactly a breeze, since the pair admitted to a total of 9 hours in order to find and exploit the weakness. Apple has patched OS X four times over the last year to fix dozens of security updates, and only regurgitated the corporate line when asked for comment on this particular vulnerability. ("Apple takes security very seriously", well duh!) Even with the recent arousal of interest in Mac OS security, the world has yet to see any kind of exploit released into the wild world web; when / if one does, we'd probably expect the most damaging exploit to use good ol' social engineering rather than a complicated hack like this. Still, Mac users should take some form of satisfaction from knowing that the issue of Mac security is being investigated, rather than being taken for granted.Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
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Submission + - Prior art on Verizon patents
greenbird writes: Techdirt has information from Daniel Berninger documenting prior art in the Verizon patents being used to destroy Vonage. So a successful company and possible an entire market may be undermined or destroyed by blatantly invalid patents. From the article:
"In particular, the claims in both patents were anticipated by open standards assembled by the VoIP Forum (H.323) in 1996 and published in January 1997 with the participation of members from Cisco Systems, Microsoft, IBM, Nortel, Intel, Motorola, Lucent, and Vocaltec Communications, among others."
and
"The Eric Voit patent applications reflect, in particular, contributions made by VocalTec Communication to the VoIP Forum during 1996 and formally published at the same time as a separate document."
"In particular, the claims in both patents were anticipated by open standards assembled by the VoIP Forum (H.323) in 1996 and published in January 1997 with the participation of members from Cisco Systems, Microsoft, IBM, Nortel, Intel, Motorola, Lucent, and Vocaltec Communications, among others."
and
"The Eric Voit patent applications reflect, in particular, contributions made by VocalTec Communication to the VoIP Forum during 1996 and formally published at the same time as a separate document."
Submission + - Student Database Misused?
pin_gween writes: The Washington Post reports on the probable abuse of a government (go figure) database: the National Student Loan Data System. The database was created in 1993 to help determine which students are eligible for for financial aid. Students' Social Security numbers, e-mail addresses, phone numbers, birth dates and sensitive financial information such as loan balances are in the database, which contains 60 million student records and is covered by federal privacy laws.
Advocates worry that businesses are trolling for marketing data they can use to bombard students with mass mailings or other solicitations. "We are just in shock that student data could be compromised like this," said Nancy Hoover, director of financial aid at Denison University in Ohio.
The department has spent over $650,000 in the past four years protecting the data. However, some senior education officials are advocating a temporary shutdown of access to the database until tighter security measures can be put in place.
Advocates worry that businesses are trolling for marketing data they can use to bombard students with mass mailings or other solicitations. "We are just in shock that student data could be compromised like this," said Nancy Hoover, director of financial aid at Denison University in Ohio.
The department has spent over $650,000 in the past four years protecting the data. However, some senior education officials are advocating a temporary shutdown of access to the database until tighter security measures can be put in place.
Submission + - Canadian DMCA Coming This Spring
An anonymous reader writes: The Canadian government is reportedly
ready to introduce copyright reform legislation this spring, provided
that no election is called. The new bill would move Canada far closer
to the U.S. on copyright, with DMCA-style anti-circumvention
legislation that prohibits circumvention of DRM systems and bans
software and mod chips that can be used to circumvent such systems.
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