All Things News

A convoy in Iraq takes a wrong turn down a dead end street. They turn around to head back, that’s when all hell breaks loose…

Straight from Slashdot: “Microsoft insists that its Windows Genuine Advantage anti-piracy program is nearly flawless. But that’s not the impression you get when you visit the company’s WGA Validation Problems forum. Ed Bott at ZDNet went through 137 problem reports submitted there during a two-week period, each one accompanied by the output from the official Microsoft diagnostic utility, and found that 42% of the people reporting problems were actually running Genuine software. From the article: ‘One large group consists of people who, for some unexplained reason, were displaying cryptographic errors related to digital signatures. The problem is so common, in fact, that Microsoft representatives have a canned response they paste into replies to forum visitors who appear to be showing false positives caused by these errors.’ In a related story, the first WGA errors from Windows Vista and Office 2007 have appeared in the wild.”

Straight from Ars Technica: “The online movie download market may have gotten a bit more interesting today. Universal Pictures and CinemaNow announced that “The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift” will be available for download and burning to DVD on the same day as the DVD is released in stores. For $9.99, consumers will be able to download the movie and burn a DVD complete with menus and bonus features.”

Straight from Ars Technica: “We have known for some time that Vista will be available in a number of different versions. Late last week, Microsoft said that most of those versions will come on a single DVD. Instead of shipping a different disc for each version of Windows Vista, the company will streamline its manufacturing and distribution by including the full version of its upcoming operating system on each DVD.

The flip side of Microsoft’s decision to include all versions of Vista on a single disc is giving pirates a steady target. As soon as Vista DVDs are loose in the wild, you can bet that hackers will begin working on a way to crack the install process so that users paying for the Starter Edition or Home Basic will be able to install Vista Ultimate instead. Naturally, Microsoft will rely heavily on Windows Genuine Advantage and Windows Product Activation to thwart pirates, but the availability of Vista Ultimate on every DVD should ensure that attempts to circumvent it keep coming.”

Straight from Joystiq: “Console makers and movie studios both have a lot riding on the success of the competing DVD formats, but a new patent recently filed by Warner Bros. engineers may help calm the battle. The patent details the creation of a disc that holds HD-DVD, Blu-ray and standard DVD data on the same disc by using three different layers of information. The discs would cost more to produce, but the cost might be worth it if movie consumers could be sure that the disc will work on whatever HD player they may end up with.”

Straight from Slashdot: “Richard Branson presented a mock-up of the new SpaceShipTwo in New York. From the article: ‘Future passengers aboard Virgin Galactic spaceliners can look forward to cushioned reclining seats and lots of windows during suborbital flights aboard SpaceShipTwo, a concept interior of which was unveiled by British entrepreneur Sir Richard Branson Thursday.’ The video is worth watching; the spaceport details are more concept than reality, but the depiction of the phases of space flight is very good.”

Straight from Slashdot: “China claims to have carried out a successful test of its experimental thermonuclear fusion reactor. But what exactly made this test ’successful’ is not clear. From the article: ‘Xinhua cited the scientists as saying that deuterium and tritium atoms had been fused together at a temperature of 100 million degrees Celsius for nearly three seconds. The report did not specify whether the device… had succeeded at producing more energy than it consumed, the main obstacle to making fusion commercially viable.’

China is a participant in the 10-nation ITER project to build a fusion reactor in the south of France by 2015. The article quotes the research head of ITER as saying, “It was important for China to show that it is part of the club. Here are English language versions of the Chinese news release: announcement, background.”

Straight from Slashdot: “China has fired high-power lasers at U.S. spy satellites flying over its territory in what experts see as a test of Chinese ability to blind the spacecraft, according to sources.

The article mentions the reluctance of the U.S. administration to talk about this “asymmetric” effort by the Chinese military.”

Straight from Ars Technica: “Apple has just sent a cease-and-desist letter to the folks behind the Podcast Ready website, telling them that “Podcast Ready” and “myPodder” infringe Apple’s own trademarks, according to Wired. Predictably, the blogging community is up in arms over the apparent attempt to claim ownership of the word “podcast.”"

Straight from Slashdot: “Microreactors have already been used for on-site reforming of fuels, such as methanol or propane, to produce hydrogen to be used in fuel cells. Now, researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) have designed very efficient ceramic microreactors to do this task. The scientists say that their microreactors are much better than other fuel reformer systems. They are now trying to reform gasoline and diesel, which are more widely distributed than propane. Does this mean that one day we’ll be able to go to a gas station to refill the fuel cells powering our laptops? Probably not before a while, but read more for additional details, references and a picture of a prototype.”

Straight from Slashdot: “The latest New Scientist has an article about an engine that exploits relativity and microwaves to generate thrust. There is a working prototype.”

From the article: “Roger Shawyer has developed an engine with no moving parts that he believes can replace rockets and make trains, planes and automobiles obsolete … The device that has sparked their interest is an engine that generates thrust purely from electromagnetic radiation — microwaves to be precise — by exploiting the strange properties of relativity. It has no moving parts, and releases no exhaust or noxious emissions. Potentially, it could pack the punch of a rocket in a box the size of a suitcase. It could one day replace the engines on almost any spacecraft. More advanced versions might allow cars to lift from the ground and hover.”

Straight from Slashdot: “Microsoft has quietly released an official patch for the zero-day VML vulnerability. The patch was publicly available yesterday, But Microsoft has just added it to the Security Bulletin Index.

Eight days from time of first report to patch is pretty fast for Microsoft, and is almost two weeks ahead of their normal patch schedule. This security flaw was being aggressively exploited out in the wild.”

Straight from Engadget: “We’re still scrounging for more info, but we’ve just been alerted to the fact that Sony, the mothership of all of these battery problems, is going to begin a global replacement program. As surely those of you who’ve been following along already know, Sony’s batteries have been at the heart of this explosive saga that has already claimed IBM / Lenovo, Dell, Apple, Panasonic and Toshiba as victims. It appears, however, that because Sony makes the internal components to each of these batteries but not the actual computer-specific housing that finishes them, the company is putting the onus of recalling and replacing the bad batteries on OEMs “that choose to participate regarding the quantity and scheduling of replacement battery packs.” Well, at least ol’ Sony is finally going public with the scope of the problem, and no longer trying to just put the whole mess behind it in favor of pushing those PS3s out the door.”

Straight from Slashdot: “LiveScience is reporting out of NextFest on a Japanese-built power suit that amplifies the strength of its wearer. The onboard computer is hooked up to sensors that monitor natural movements, then it inflates cuffs to boost lifting power. The Power Assist Suit could be used by hospital workers to move heavy patients, the researchers say.”

Straight from Slashdot: “The question of how a dodder finds a host plant has puzzled researchers. Many thought it simply grew in a random direction, with discovery of a plant to attack being a chance encounter. But the researchers led by Consuelo M. De Moraes found that if they placed tomato plants near a germinating dodder, the parasite headed for the tomato 80 percent of the time. And when they put scent chemicals from a tomato on rubber, 73 percent of the dodder seedlings headed that way. Turns out, it sniffs out it’s prey.”

Straight from The New York Times: “Iva Toguri D’Aquino, the Japanese-American convicted of treason in 1949 for broadcasting propaganda from Japan to United States servicemen in World War II as the seductive but sinister Tokyo Rose, died Tuesday in Chicago. Mrs. D’Aquino, who served more than six years in prison but steadfastly denied disloyalty and received a presidential pardon in 1977, was 90.”

Digg Comments

Straight from Gizmodo: “Like when Alienware was abducted by Dell, we’re dumbstuck by this buy. Voodoo PC, my personal favorite maker of exotic gaming rigs, just got snatched up by HP. Rahul and Ravi, you were rich before, but man, are we going to have to start reading about you in Forbes? And sweet baby Jesus, what kinds of watercooled, monster machines are you guys going to start building with a harem of HP engineers at your beck and call.”

Straight from Slashdot: “CNN reports that the ‘Opportunity’ rover on Mars has reached the Victoria crater. The rovers Spirit and Opportunity arrived on Mars three years ago with planned mission lifetime of 90 days. The rover Spirit is wounded, having only 5 of 6 wheels functioning, and so it’s moving quite slowly. However, Opportunity is still going strong and has been trucking towards the massive crater Victoria for almost the past year. Scientists have been hoping that Opportunity would get there so they can have a look at geologically older areas — and it’s finally made it!

See the NASA press release for links to photos of the Victoria crater.”

Straight from Slashdot: “As expected, Microsoft has dropped their price on the Zune in response to Apple’s recent iPod updates. Ars Technica has an article that discusses the Zune’s use of Microsoft’s prepaid ‘points’ system for songs. Will the masses notice the difference between an iPod and a Zune? Will they want the FM and wireless capabilities?

The Zune lists for $0.99 more than the comparable iPod and songs from the Zune Marketplace will cost just under $0.99.”

Straight from Slashdot: “Microsoft is tightening the screws on their up & coming DRM platform. First, Windows Media Player 11 removes the right to move music from one machine to another. According to their website, WMP11 ‘does not permit you to back up your media usage rights (previously known as licenses).’ Worse, if you rip your own CDs and the ‘Copy protect music’ option is turned on, WMP11 will require you to ‘connect to a Microsoft Web page that explains how to restore your rights a limited number of times.

The Inquirer has an even more jaundiced take on Microsoft’s turn of the thumbscrew.”