All Things News

Straight from Ars Technica: “The HP pretexting scandal is likely to result in indictments, according (subscription required) to California Attorney General Bill Lockyer. In an interview on PBS earlier today, Lockyer said that his office has uncovered enough evidence to issue indictments against “people both within Hewlett-Packard as well as outside.”Even before Lockyer announced the preliminary results of his office’s investigations, HP Chairman Patricia Dunn has announced her resignation, effective following the next board meeting on January 18, 2007. In a statement released by HP, Dunn said that the leak investigation conducted by third parities “included certain inappropriate techniques. These went beyond what we understood them to be, and I apologize that they were employed.”"

Straight from Slashdot: “MetaMachine Inc., the firm behind online file-sharing software eDonkey, has agreed to pay $30 million to avoid potential copyright infringement lawsuits from the recording industry. The company also agreed to take measures to prevent file sharing by people using previously downloaded versions of the eDonkey software. The eDonkey application now displays the message, ‘The eDonkey2000 Network is no longer available. Please see eDonkey.com for more details.’ After that message is displayed the uninstaller is launched automatically.”

Straight from Joystiq: “A financial analyst estimates that 80% of retailers will demand the more expensive 60GB PS3 at launch (the oh-so affordable $599 one). If Sony then allocates according to this estimate, that would mean only 80,000 of the 400,000 available US launch units will be of the cheaper $499 kind. This would be consistent, however, with higher sales of Microsoft’s 360 premium package last November, and what Sony would obviously hope for while still being able to market their console as “starting at $499!”

The report also quotes one Sony manager suggesting the unlikelihood of both full-game downloads on the PS3 due to “storage and bandwidth constraints,” and a holiday price reduction of the PS2. So for those already sold on the PS3 at launch, which version do intend to buy?”

Straight from Ars Technica: “The HP pretexting scandal is likely to result in indictments, according (subscription required) to California Attorney General Bill Lockyer. In an interview on PBS earlier today, Lockyer said that his office has uncovered enough evidence to issue indictments against “people both within Hewlett-Packard as well as outside.”Even before Lockyer announced the preliminary results of his office’s investigations, HP Chairman Patricia Dunn has announced her resignation, effective following the next board meeting on January 18, 2007. In a statement released by HP, Dunn said that the leak investigation conducted by third parities “included certain inappropriate techniques. These went beyond what we understood them to be, and I apologize that they were employed.”"

Straight from Slashdot: “After reading Ed Foster’s blog about how the Embroidery Software Protection Coalition (ESPC) is suing grandmothers over using pirated digitized designs, I thought you might want to call your own grandmothers and tell them they are going to be needing a lawyer. And the ESPC is very serious. On the ESPC faq page they scare these grandmothers by telling them even if they didn’t know the software was pirated, that ‘Unfortunately, when it comes to copyright violations, ignorance is no defense.’”

Straight from Slashdot: “According to two sources, MGM and New Line are partnering to produce ‘The Hobbit’ as part of MGM’s new plans to create blockbuster movies again. From theonering.net: ‘Over the next few years, MGM is planning to release half a dozen films, some in the $150 million to $200 million-plus range. Studio is ready to unveil such high-profile projects as “Terminator 4″; one or two installments of “The Hobbit,” which Sloan hopes will be directed by Peter Jackson; and a sequel to “The Thomas Crown Affair” with Pierce Brosnan.’”

Straight from Slashdot: “ExtremeTech has an extensive performance roundup across the entire line of Intel Core 2 Duo and AMD AM2 CPUs, from the cheap to the ultra-high end. Both companies bring five processors to the table, ranging from $152 to $1,075, with the mid-range CPUs boasting the best in price/performance. From the article: ‘It’s clear that Intel’s Core 2 Duo lineup offers superior performance across the product line when compared with AMD’s Athlon 64. In some applications, even a lower-cost Core 2 Duo can outperform some of the higher-end Athlon 64s.’”

Straight from Engadget: “Ben Heckendorn’s Xbox 360 laptop is one such mod. Having garnered no small amount of fame from previous portable projects like the nPod, PPS2, and N64p, Ben was commissioned by a generous benefactor to somehow make a 360 “good to go” a la the Crunchwrap Supreme — and since this is the great Mr. Heckendorn we’re talking about, slapping a hinged LCD onto an out-of-the-box console simply wouldn’t do. Instead, Ben spent three months designing and building the so-called Xbox 360p, machining a custom aluminum laptop enclosure by hand into which he stuffed a keyboard, 1,280 x 720 Westinghouse LCD, and get this — even a custom-built water cooling system to replace the 360’s stock, bulky heat sinks. The end result is a polished, professional looking (albeit heavy — this machine weighs in at about 14 pounds) laptop complete with WiFi, USB ports, obligatory glowing green ring, and converged power supply so that the monitor and gaming system only require a single cable snaking out the back.”

Straight from Slashdot: “…an article over at the Guardian, reporting on the surveillance of over 5,000 bank accounts in the interests of terrorist tracking. Accounts at such reputable British banks as HSBC, Barclay, and Lloyds TSB are having their activity tracked for ’suspicious activity’. Financial details from these banks, it turns out, was part of the trail of evidence used to apprehend terrorism suspects in a plot to bomb airplanes last month.

From the article: “However, the extent of the banks’ involvement in neutering the terrorist threat has sparked a fierce backlash from some British Muslims amid claims of mistaken identities and the persecution of innocent account-holders. Ahmed Salama was stunned when his HSBC account was frozen nine days ago. He received a letter informing him that HSBC wished to end their relationship after 11 years. The decision left Salama unable to pay 12 bills and his mortgage. Despite repeatedly asking for an explanation, HSBC has only told him it detected ’suspicious’ payments in his account.”"

Straight from Slashdot: “C|Net article about the largest sentence for software piracy ever handed down by a U.S. court. Nathan Peterson of Los Angeles has been levied with an enormous fine after selling millions of dollars worth of software between 2003 and 2005. “U.S. District Court Judge T.S. Ellis III on Friday ordered Peterson to pay restitution of more than $5.4 million. Peterson pleaded guilty in December in Alexandria, Va., to two counts of copyright infringement for illegally copying and selling more than $20 million in software. Justice Department and industry officials called the case one of the largest involving Internet software piracy ever prosecuted. “”

Straight from Slashdot: “A second set of four movies are now available on both high-def disc formats, allowing for another set of head-to-head comparisons — and unlike last month’s first round comparisons, Blu-ray fared much better this time. In fact, in comparing Warner’s four latest Blu-ray disc releases (‘Firewall,’ ‘Lethal Weapon,’ ‘Blazing Saddles‘ and ‘Full Metal Jacket‘) to their HD DVD predecessors, High-Def Digest found three of the four titles to be more or less at picture quality parity. The key difference between these titles and Warner’s Blu-ray launch titles last month? On all three of the titles receiving high marks, Warner switched from using the MPEG-2 compression codec to VC-1, which the studio has been using from the start on its counterpart HD DVD releases.”