The Newspaper Shop -- weekend edition

[walktalker]

Instructions:
1) Take a paper
2) Open
3) Read
4) Enjoy
This product may contain traces of MP3s.

Open-source music format ready to play
Just a few days after the world got its first look at the updated MP3 music format, rival open-source format Ogg Vorbis is ready to reveal a major facelift. Ogg Vorbis, created by a team of independent developers, has been floating around the Web for about a year. Like MP3, the specialized computer program compresses standard audio tracks into smaller sizes without significantly compromising sound quality. But Ogg Vorbis is actually designed to result in better audio quality than MP3 without any of the associated patent royalties for software developers or music distributors.
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...092798,00.html

The week in review: Lost in music
Music fans this week got a taste of a new high-quality digital music format and a sneak peek into the future of online music with new services and partnerships. Companies behind the ubiquitous MP3 digital music format released this week an upgraded version of their music format called MP3Pro; Microsoft is weighing how much support it will offer in its upcoming Windows XP operating system for MP3s; many disappointed Napster users are turning to Audiogalaxy, a relatively new alternative for free music downloads.
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...776140,00.html

Do computers really think?
Steven Spielberg's upcoming film "Artificial Intelligence" is set to renew a long-running, centuries old, debate about mechanical brains and whether they ever may become superior to the human mind. Robots are sure to be humanized the same way space aliens were made into huggable, homesick little people in his epic "E.T: The Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence." "He is the first robotic child, programmed to love," runs the new film's advertising promotion. Critics say that machines will never actually think in the human sense, only process bewildering amounts of data. Yet, the pace of advances has given naysayers some pause.
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...776156,00.html

Apple tells Satanists they can't "Think different"
Here's an intellectual rebel who apparently won't be the next poster boy for Apple Computer's "Think different" ad campaign: America's late, leading Satanist. Apple Computer, which gained fame with its iconoclastic marketing, has told the Church of Satan it does not want to be associated with it, the group said Friday. The "Think different" slogan had until recently adorned a picture of Church of Satan founder Anton Szandor LaVey, on the group's Web site, but was pulled along with a "Made with Macintosh" Web badge at the request of the computer company, the group said.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1006-200...html?tag=mn_hd

Grandaddy of commercial PCs hits 50
James McGarvey, one of the men who worked on UNIVAC, the world's first commercial computer, never thought his labors would help spawn a revolution. McGarvey, 77, of Oreland, Pa., one of the original team members, said workers didn't realize the impact their work would have -- or that they would be viewed as high-tech pioneers. Fifty years later, computers are omnipresent, but nowhere near the size -- nor the price -- of UNIVAC.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1003-200...html?tag=cd_mh

Federal sites fail privacy test
The government is doing an inadequate job of complying with its own Internet privacy rules, according to a report Congress released Friday. The study, culled from reports of 51 inspectors general, found 300 "cookies" on the Web sites of 23 agencies. Cookies are Internet tracking devices that last year were banned, for the most part, from federal Web sites. The small software files can make browsing more convenient by letting sites distinguish user preferences, but they have been criticized for violating privacy because they can track Web surfing.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1005-200...html?tag=cd_mh

That's Advertainment
For independent filmmakers like Reitman, corporate marketers are stepping in where maxed-out credit cards or generous college roommates once served as the most viable financing options. Even veteran moviemakers, eager for a change of pace, are getting a piece of the action. In the past 18 months, BMW, Diet Coke, Ford and Volkswagen have all paid for the production of a handful of short films. In the process, they are breathing new life into the moribund realm of online entertainment.
http://www.thestandard.com/article/0,1902,27200,00.html

Moonshine and the Climate
If he were alive today, Leonardo da Vinci could spend most of his time saying "I told you so." Four centuries ago he postulated that the light that makes the dark part of the crescent moon visible to us some of the time comes from the Earth, not the moon.And now, all these years later, scientists have found a way to use Leonardo's discovery to help us understand the Earth’s incredibly complex climate system. They have figured out how to use "Earthshine," the sunlight reflected from the Earth to the moon and back again, to shed a little light on how the planet’s climate is changing.
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/scite...d/Dyehard.html

[Tom9504]

Thanks for another great paper!

One of the stories in there made me think about downloading Audiogalaxy...anyone know if it's any good?

[adealaara]

Originally posted by Tom9504


Thanks for another great paper!

One of the stories in there made me think about downloading Audiogalaxy...anyone know if it's any good?

Beware of the Webhancer spyware if you download Audio Galaxy!
I removed it using Ad Aware, but ever since, the Audio Galaxy "satellite" tells me I better upgrade to a newer version... kind of what happened with the Napster betas back in the day.

[Tom9504]

Hmm... I suspected it of Spyware, their website is just a little too... what's the word... 'funded'-looking. Still, I'll download it and remove the spyware with Ad-Aware, thanks.

[relic]

Just going out and recycling