The Newspaper Shop -- Friday edition

[walktalker]

Yup, time for more reading
Songwriters, Publishers Fight Royalty Moratorium
Groups representing music publishers and songwriters are asking the U.S. Copyright Office to reject a record industry proposal to impose a moratorium on royalty payments for songs downloaded from the Internet. In comments filed with the Copyright Office, the National Music Publisher's Association (NMPA) and The Songwriters Guild of America (SGA) asked the agency instead to convene a Copyright Arbitration Royalty Panel to set the rates and terms that should apply to online music services.
http://www.newsbytes.com/news/01/166161.html

Labels Suing Makers Of Aimster File-Sharing Software
With Napster appearing nearly vanquished, the music industry has turned its legal wrath upon a new, but familiar-looking, target: the upstart file-sharing program called Aimster. Citing the availability of songs by Britney Spears, 'NSYNC, Eminem and dozens of other artists via Aimster, the world's largest record labels filed a copyright infringement lawsuit Thursday against the service's parent company, which they allege has created "a new haven for massive music piracy on the Internet."
http://www.sonicnet.com/news/digital...444057&index=0

XML to the people!
Tim Bray, the outspoken, colorful co-creator of the revolutionary new Internet software standard XML, did not disappoint his fans at the XML Europe 2001 conference taking place here this week. XML, as anyone who knows anything about technology will tell you, is the intelligent way of transferring data and presenting information on websites and also, by the way, making billions for a somewhat economically challenged IT market.
http://www.upside.com/David_Bunnell/3b0d332a1.html

Flash migrates to TV
The entertainment industry is learning new tricks from the Web that could dramatically reduce costs and recast a widely used Net animation technology as a significant offline production tool. Despite early missteps in turning the Web into an entertainment channel, TV broadcasters have increasingly turned to the Internet as a talent pool to fill out their programming rosters. Just this week, for example, MTV Networks signed Josh Kimberg's 2-year-old Webtoon series, "Miss Muffy and the Muff Mob," to air in its fall schedule.
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...083542,00.html

Ad form offers one-stop opt-out
People seeking to protect their privacy can complete a single Web form to keep major advertising companies from collecting data about their Internet browsing and shopping habits. Under pressure to better protect privacy, the advertising industry has set up two new Web sites that let computer users refuse to have their personal data collected and profiled when they visit popular commercial Internet sites.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1005-200...html?tag=cd_mh

Your keyboard patterns hold some secrets
Men like the tab key and tend to use the scrolling wheel on a mouse. Women move the mouse around more, even if a scroll wheel is available. Such discoveries about gender differences in computer use are an offshoot of a new marketing technology being pushed by Predictive Networks Inc., a Cambridge, Mass., company that specializes in tracking and analyzing online behavior to customize ads to individual users.
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...765326,00.html

Napster sued by Spanish-language label
Napster faces a new lawsuit, claiming the Internet song-sharing service is infringing a Spanish-language record company's copyrights. In a suit filed in federal court in San Jose, Calif., Fonovisa says its recordings of Spanish-speaking performers such as Los Tigeres del Norte's popular Jefe de Jefes, are on Napster's popular music-swapping Web site without its permission.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1005-200...tml?tag=cdshrt

FTC: Amazon privacy switch didn't break law
Online retailer Amazon.com did not violate federal law when it altered its privacy practices to allow the sharing of its customer list with other businesses, the Federal Trade Commission said Friday. Seattle, Wash.-based Amazon altered its data-privacy policy last September to allow it to share customer data such as names and e-mail addresses with other companies, unless a customer specifically requested otherwise.
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...083551,00.html

Industry ponders impact of TiVo patent
Competitors and industry watchers of the interactive television market aren't sure yet what to make of TiVo's new patent. On Thursday, the digital video recording pioneer announced that it has received a broad patent from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office for a "multimedia time warping system." The patent, which TiVo filed for in 1998, is described in the application as an "invention allowing the user to store selected television broadcast programs while the user is simultaneously watching or reviewing another program."
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1006-200...html?tag=mn_hd

IT managers ponder Windows XP upgrade
Kelley and thousands of information technology managers like him are now facing an even more daunting decision: whether to halt migration to Windows 2000 at some point in favor of a direct upgrade to successor Windows XP. Microsoft promises that XP, scheduled to be released this fall, will be even more stable, have more robust security features, and be more reliable than its predecessors.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1003-200...html?tag=mn_hd

New proton beam suited to micro-machining
High-tech manufacturers may soon be able to use proton beams to chisel out minuscule components and circuits thanks to pioneering research from a Singapore institute. The proton beam is a stream of speeded up subatomic particles that scientists have been trying to narrow down for practical use over the last 25 years. The National University of Singapore Research Center for Nuclear Microscopy, which officially opened this week, currently holds the record for the narrowest proton beam, which measures just 1,000th of the diameter of a human hair.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1003-200...html?tag=cd_mh

IBM Linux supercomputers land oil deal
IBM, a key backer of the Linux operating system, has sold a Linux supercomputer to WesternGeco for oil exploration after similar sales to Chevron and Royal Dutch/Shell Group. Terms of the sale to U.K.-based WesternGeco, an exploration-services company, weren't disclosed. The supercomputer, which already is installed, is made up of 256 server computers, each containing two Intel processors. The system runs software that converts seismic soundings to digital maps so WesternGeco clients can distinguish oil fields from other underground formations.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1003-200...html?tag=ch_mh

Privacy terms firmed in cybercrime pact
Stiff criticism from the EU and pressure from groups has prompted drafters of the world's first treaty against cybercrime to tighten provisions protecting privacy online, the final text showed on Friday. The Council of Europe, a 43-state human rights watchdog, has amended the text to ensure police respect privacy rights when they follow digital trails to fight online crimes such as hacking, spreading viruses, using stolen credit card numbers or defrauding banks.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1005-200...html?tag=cd_mh

New Worm Takes On Kiddie Porn
A new e-mail worm that's just beginning to wiggle its way across the Internet scours infected computers for image files containing child pornography, and alerts government agencies if any suspicious files are discovered. The alert e-mail contains an attached copy of one of the files that allegedly contain child pornography discovered during the worm's search of infected hard drives, and also identifies the porn possessor's e-mail address.
http://www.wired.com/news/technology...,44112,00.html

Don't Go Gently Into That SMS
In the first major competition of its kind, the Guardian awarded cash prizes to people who wrote the best poetry on their mobile phones, using the popular short text message service (SMS). People on their way to work, people on their way home, and people just out and about, banged out poems and shot them to the newspaper at an incredible rate.
http://www.wired.com/news/wireless/0,1382,43782,00.html

Labels Suing Makers Of Aimster File-Sharing Software
With Napster appearing nearly vanquished, the music industry has turned its legal wrath upon a new, but familiar-looking, target: the upstart file-sharing program called Aimster. Citing the availability of songs by Britney Spears, 'NSYNC, Eminem and dozens of other artists via Aimster, the world's largest record labels filed a copyright infringement lawsuit Thursday against the service's parent company, which they allege has created "a new haven for massive music piracy on the Internet."
http://www.sonicnet.com/news/digital...444057&index=0

XML to the people!
Tim Bray, the outspoken, colorful co-creator of the revolutionary new Internet software standard XML, did not disappoint his fans at the XML Europe 2001 conference taking place here this week. XML, as anyone who knows anything about technology will tell you, is the intelligent way of transferring data and presenting information on websites and also, by the way, making billions for a somewhat economically challenged IT market.
http://www.upside.com/David_Bunnell/3b0d332a1.html

Geek house
Patrick Deutsch has turned an average Vallejo, Calif., condominium into a 21st century Taj Mahal. Using motion sensors, infrared transmitters, cameras and dozens of other products that communicate with each other via a protocol known as "X-10," he's created a hip bachelor pad that's extremely, well, sensitive. But X-10 is already here. A communications protocol that utilizes a low-voltage signal to network appliances across ordinary household electric lines, or over the public radio spectrum, X-10 compatible products and software are spreading fast through geekdom.
http://www.salon.com/tech/feature/20..._10/index.html

Disabled mother of four beats off MS, Mounties in piracy case
Further evidence of Microsoft's uncanny knack for publicity is provided by the story of a Canadian victim of the company's anti-piracy campaign. According to Canadian newswire CP Wire, 41 year old disabled mother of four Brenda Avery found herself on the receiving end of the full might of the Redmond SWAT team and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. She defended herself against charges of selling counterfeit Microsoft software (just a couple of packages proven out of stock of 800, apparently), succeeded, and now is demanding compensation and a phone call from Bill Gates.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/4/19214.html

Snitch-a-customer program was 'stupid', says Microsoft
Microsoft branded its shop-a-non-Windows-user program for resellers "stupid" today, and blamed its own "very very confusing" license agreements for obfuscating the picture. Spokesman Matt Pilla denied that Microsoft had shared information gained from the scheme with anti-piracy cops, and deeply regretted offering resellers such dismal prizes as a Fossil Big Tic Watch, grill, and travel chair.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/4/19195.html

TiVo wields patent club against Microsoft
Silicon Valley executives are often urged to fill those precious moments between the Stairmaster and the early coronary by reading ancient war manuals. We're not sure if any of these contains the advice: "pick your fights carefully", but if they do, TiVo doesn't seem to have reached this page yet. The company, which pioneered the "Digital VCR", is positively spoiling for a fight with Microsoft...and anyone else who wants to make boxes which decode TV streams, and play them back.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/2/19196.html

The Garfield comic strip of the day !
The Dilbert strip of the day !
The Boondocks strip of the day !

[Dawn]

Thanks again newsman.

[walktalker]

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[Periwinkle Shadow]

bump and thanks wt!!

bump bump bump! (i'm taking over a^3's job)