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Media

Submission + - Times paywall in questionable 'success' (bbc.co.uk)

Submitted by takowl
takowl writes: Its been a few months since The Times newspaper in the UK (part of the Murdoch stable) hid its online stories behind a paywall. The media watched eagerly to see if people would pay for news online. Now The Times has uncovered its first results: some 105,000 have coughed up online, and another 100,000 print subscribers have access. Naturally, the paper is keen to promote this as a success: some people are willing to pay. The BBC's technology correspondent, on the other hand, reckons: "it's safe to assume that Times Newspapers has yet to achieve the same revenues from its paywall experiment that were available when its website was free." Will online subscribers help the Times survive? Will other papers follow its lead?
Google

Submission + - Google Bans Sale Of Android Spying App (dbune.com)

Submitted by dbune
dbune writes: Google is not letting a handset application that spies on someone's text messages be sold at its Android App Store. The Secret SMS Replicator developed by DLP Mobile to help lovers find out if their partners are cheating on them violates company policy, according to Google. The app works by secre...

Comment Not more "safety features" please (Score 2, Insightful) 157

by inigopete (#34061464) Attached to: Vans Drive Themselves Across the World

Rather than replacing drivers it is hoped that the technology will be used to study ways to complement drivers' abilities

That's become the problem with ABS, traction control, airbags and many other safety features: make drivers feel like they're safer, they will drive more like idiots. I'd far rather this system was developed to replace drivers; granted it will take more work to make it completely reliable, but it would mean fewer people thinking that because they've got the latest safety systems in their car they don't have to pay as much attention to their driving.

Submission + - CRTC to Allow Usage Based Billing (www.cbc.ca)

Submitted by Idiomatick
Idiomatick writes: The CRTC ruled in favour today for usage based billing. Bell Canada was given a monopoly on lines in Canada, in exchange they were made to resell to competitors at cost in order to have a functional market. The new CRTC ruling will allow Bell to charge their competitors more money based on individual customer usage. They are now able to implement a 60GB cap on a competitor's highest speed lines (charging $1.12/GB for overages). Bell however; it was ruled that they are permitted to continue with it's unlimited usage plan. The effect on the market seems clear.

Submission + - Ask Slashdot: Induction cooktop fun

Submitted by fishfrys
fishfrys writes: Besides generating heat quickly and efficiently in ferromagnetic pans, what sorts of fun things can you do with an induction cooktop? This seems like a pretty serious piece of electromagnetic equipment — boiling water can't be the only thing it's good for. I went to youtube expecting to find all sorts of crazy videos of unsafe induction cooktop shenanigans, but only found cooking. What sort of exciting, if not stupid, physics experiments can be performed with one? Hard drive scrubber... DIY Tesla coil? There's got to be something. Thanks.
Science

Submission + - Stopping Malaria By Immunizing Bugs (ibtimes.com)

Submitted by RedEaredSlider
RedEaredSlider writes: Millions of people in the tropics suffer from malaria, a mosquito-borne disease that has been difficult to treat and which costs many developing countries millions of dollars per year in lost productivity. Up to now, efforts at controlling it have focused on attacking the parasites that cause it, keeping mosquitoes from biting, or killing the insects.

But at Johns Hopkins University, Rhoel Dinglasan, an entomologist and biologist, decided to try another tack: immunizing mosquitoes. ...

When a mosquito bites an infected human, it takes up some of the gametocytes.They aren't dangerous to people at that stage. Since plasmodium is vulnerable there, and that is the point that Dinglasan chose to attack.

A mosquito's gut has certain receptor molecules in it that the plasmodium can bind to. Dinglasan asked what would happen if the parasite couldn't "see" them, which would happen if another molecule, some antigen, were binding to those receptors.

Comment Interesting marketing idea... (Score 1) 1

by inigopete (#34050652) Attached to: Time Traveler Using Cellphone in 1928 Movie

a) someone, somewhere in the entirety of film history has made a hand gesture that we might interpret nowadays as "a bit like holding a mobile phone".

b) this hand gesture appears on a couple of seconds of film. Two and a half minutes is a lot of Youtube single-shot watching time just to see the bit the conspiracy theorists are going to get all moist about.
Wireless Networking

Submission + - Wireless HDMI at 1080p, Lag-Free WHDI Tested (hothardware.com) 1

Submitted by
MojoKid
MojoKid writes: "Wireless HDMI technologies have finally come of age. Though there are two camps currently in the market (Intel's WiDi and WHDI), the bottom line is lag-free full HD 1080p wireless HDMI video/audio transmission is now a reality. No longer does an HTPC need to be shoehorned into the confines of the entertainment center. Also, that notebook you have perched on the coffee table just got a major display upgrade. This demo of the Asus WiCast and the briteView HDelight wirless HDMI transmitter kits, shows the technology in action and it's impressive actually. Both of these WHDI-based kits utilize the same family of Amimon WHDI transmitter and receiver chipsets. The technology is capable of full 1080p HD video and Dolby Digital surround sound audio transmissions, over distances of up to 30 feet with less than a millisecond of latency."
Security

Submission + - New Critical Flash Bug Being Exploited (threatpost.com)

Submitted by Trailrunner7
Trailrunner7 writes: On the same day that it plans to release a patch for a critical flaw in Shockwave, Adobe confirmed on Thursday morning that there is a newly discovered bug in Flash that is being actively exploited already in attacks against Reader. The vulnerability affects Flash on all of the relevant platforms, including Android, as well as Reader on Windows and Mac, and won't be patched for nearly two weeks.

The new Flash bug came to light early Thursday when a researcher posted information about the problem, as well as a Trojan that is exploiting it and dropping a pair of malicious files on vulnerable PCs. Researcher Mila Parkour tested the bug and posted a screenshot of the malicious files that a Trojan exploiting the vulnerability drops during its infection routine. Adobe has since confirmed the vulnerability and said that it is aware of the attacks against Reader.
Google

Submission + - Oracle: Google 'Directly Copied' Our Java Code (itworld.com) 1

Submitted by itwbennett
itwbennett writes: On Wednesday, Oracle amended the lawsuit it filed against Google in August, saying that 'approximately one third of Android's Application Programmer Interface (API) packages' are 'derivative of Oracle's copyrighted Java API packages' and related documents. In particular, 'the infringed elements of Oracle America's copyrighted work include Java method and class names, definitions, organization, and parameters; the structure, organization and content of Java class libraries; and the content and organization of Java's documentation,' Oracle says. 'In at least several instances, Android computer program code also was directly copied from copyrighted Oracle America code,' Oracle alleges.

Submission + - The great iPhone serial port hack (computerworld.com.au)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The iPhone's little know secret, a hidden serial port, is revealed. "The real benefit in all of this is that there are so many console packages for iPhone in Cydia now that you can have a fully functional computer, as useful as a linux box, but without carrying around a laptop."

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