The Newspaper Shop -- Thursday edition

[walktalker]

Microsoft strikes back at AOL
Microsoft's antitrust woes are generating enough legal briefs to level several Northwestern forests. Late Wednesday, the software maker filed a brief with the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia Circuit alleging that rival AOL Time Warner is not supplying information subpoenaed as part of a discovery process for a March 11 hearing in the ongoing antitrust case against Microsoft. The hearing will involve debate over potential penalties against Microsoft. Nine states and the District of Columbia have proposed forcing Microsoft to open up the source code to its Internet Explorer Web browser, among other penalties.
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1104-821854.html

HP patents nanochip process
Hewlett-Packard and University of California scientists have patented a process they said on Wednesday would eventually help turn out powerful computers that fit on the head of a pin with room to spare. Scientists need to shrink computers to make them more powerful, but the technology of putting circuits on silicon, the basis of current computer chips, is reaching the natural limits of the wafers to hold circuits, turning up the pressure for a breakthrough.
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1103-821680.html

Marketers brace for spam crackdown
The Direct Marketing Association has created mandatory ground rules for members sending sales pitches via e-mail, a move designed to help avoid a government crackdown on commercial messages. A DMA representative said the organization plans to announce the new rules governing commercial e-mail next week. The trade group, one of the largest in the United States with 5,000 members, includes such retailers as Amazon.com, Land's End and Eddie Bauer.
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1106-822157.html

Microsoft, DOJ disclosure lawsuit filed
A nonprofit antitrust group filed a lawsuit Thursday alleging the Justice Department and Microsoft violated federal law by not properly disclosing all information and communications related to settlement negotiations. The American Antitrust Institute (AAI) filed the suit, which largely relies on newspaper reports to support its nondisclosure allegations. The Tunney Act requires the government and an antitrust violator to disclose all communications related to the settlement process.
http://news.com.com/2100-1001-822312.html

USB 2.0 tries to make the connection
USB 2.0 is starting to connect with peripherals makers. Since mid-2001, manufacturers have gradually been releasing devices that connect to PCs via USB 2.0 ports. But USB 2.0 is expected to get a significant boost once it is integrated into Intel chipsets by mid-year. In addition, an upcoming wave of products is expected to help establish USB 2.0 as the new dominant standard for connecting peripherals to PCs. The new version of USB, short for universal serial bus, allows consumers to transfer data from peripherals to PCs dramatically faster than the previous version of the standard, USB 1.1 -- and slightly faster than its main rival, FireWire.
http://news.com.com/2100-1040-822354.html

Smart homes on trial
In the future, you may never have to worry about forgetting to switch off the lights or locking the front door when you leave home. You could soon be able to do all this and more from the comfort of your car or via your mobile phone, thanks to the Internet Home Alliance group. This association of leading electronics and consumer companies have come together to produce a system that lets you control your home from wherever you are.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci...00/1776047.stm

Teaching robots dogs new tricks
Aibo, the Sony Corporation's popular robot dog, has delighted scores of critics and consumers since its introduction. But the plastic pup has also caused its creators some grief. Sony is currently struggling to resolve a copyright dispute that centers on the work of a quirky hacker known only as AiboPet. The controversy poses serious questions about the proper use of robots in homes and exposes a potentially stifling effect of the U.S. Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) of 1998. The copyright at the heart of the case protects Aibo's encrypted brain. AiboPet violated that copyright when he cracked the robot's source code to reverse-engineer software that allows Aibo owners to teach their pets to dance, speak, obey wireless commands and share the color video that serves as their vision, among other things
http://www.scientificamerican.com/ex...02/012102aibo/

Attack compels ISP to float its assets
Cloud Nine, the U.K. Internet service provider that closed down this week after being hit by a denial of service attack, has sold its assets and customer base to fellow ISP Zetnet, Cloud Nine said Thursday. The deal may not be clear-cut, though. V21, another ISP that Cloud Nine is understood to have been in negotiations with, may be considering legal action. Under the agreement, Zetnet will acquire Cloud Nine's customer base. Zetnet has set up an information page and an IRC channel for those affected by the change. Many of Cloud Nine's customers have posted angry comments in online forums about the disruption to their services and the lack of communication from Cloud Nine.
http://news.com.com/2100-1001-822162.html?tag=cd_mh

Alleged eBay hacker wants lawyer back
The case of the alleged eBay hacker took another plot twist Wednesday afternoon when the former Los Alamos National Laboratory employee asked to have his lawyer back just hours after dismissing her. In the past week, Jerome T. Heckenkamp -- accused of breaking into the computer networks of eBay, Exodus Communications and other companies -- has filed to put himself back into federal custody, asked to dismiss his attorney, noted cyber lawyer Jennifer Granick, and now has requested that she be allowed to represent him once more.
http://news.com.com/2100-1001-821582.html?tag=cd_mh

.S. won't prosecute Datek Online
The U.S. Attorney's office in Manhattan on Thursday said it will not prosecute Datek Online Holdings and its iCapital Markets in the ongoing investigation of an alleged fraudulent day-trading scheme by Datek Securities. Under a non-prosecution agreement reached between prosecutors and Datek and iCapital, the firms will continue to cooperate fully with the government in its probe. Separately, the Securities and Exchange Commission said it accepted an offer of settlement in a related civil action against iCapital in which the firm will pay a penalty of $6.3 million.
http://news.com.com/2100-1017-822258.html?tag=cd_mh

Yahoo puts a price on searches
Yahoo on Wednesday unveiled a pay-per-view search product, the latest in a string of premium services aimed at offsetting a sharp decline in the company's online advertising. As previously reported, the service, dubbed "Yahoo Premium Document Search," is designed to expand on a previous agreement with search technology provider Northern Light Technology, which Tuesday was acquired by enterprise software company Divine. Northern Light last year created a premium search engine for Yahoo's corporate clients.
http://news.com.com/2100-1023-820714.html

AOL gets 'NSync with band promotion
America Online has enlisted teen idols 'NSync as it continues to battle Microsoft's MSN for the favor of pop superstars. The AOL deal comes after 'NSync and Microsoft allowed a one-year Web contract to lapse in November. Previously, fans had access to exclusive 'NSync content, including electronic newsletters, photos and unseen video footage, through 'NSync-branded versions of MSN Messenger and Microsoft Windows Media Player.
http://news.com.com/2100-1023-822055.html?tag=cd_mh

Buy DVDs and games abroad - and break the law
British consumers will be on the wrong side of the law for the first time if they buy overseas DVDs or computer games 'unauthorised' for the UK and play them on their PCs at home. This is the major implication of a ruling in the High Court yesterday over the sale in the UK of 'mod-chips' for the Sony Playstation. Channel Technology, the British supplier of Messiah Playstation mod-chips, was found liable under the Copyright and Patents Act 1988, by supplying a way around Sony's copyright protection mechanisms.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/54/23814.html

Solar storms make a comeback
Just when you thought the sun was maxed out, scientists say they’ve detected a second peak in the 11-year cycle of solar activity. Such flare-ups of solar “weather” can create problems for satellites in orbit and power grids on Earth — and the latest double peak demonstrates how complex those weather patterns can get. The sun may seem unchanging to the casual observer, but astronomers have found that it throws off an electrically charged stream of particles that ebb and flow over the course of days and years. Every 11 years, the stream rises to a peak known as the solar maximum, or “Solar Max” — a time when unexpected bursts can become downright dangerous.
http://www.msnbc.com/news/692780.asp?0dm=C16NT

More news later on

[walktalker]

Spyware, In a Galaxy Near You
The latest scandal over so-called spyware involves a mysterious and particularly insidious program that tracks your surfing, delivers pop-up ads and could even collect your credit card information. You may not have heard of the VX2 Corporation, but if you've downloaded Audio Galaxy lately, VX2 may know a lot about you. VX2's spyware program comes bundled with other software. Audio Galaxy, a company that makes Napster-style file-sharing software, delivered it for a short time last fall, but says it no longer does so. The VX2 program is currently bundled with a free screensaver program from Aadcom, an Internet advertising company, and may be included in other popular file-sharing programs.
http://www.wired.com/news/technology...,49960,00.html

High Speed on Verizon's Horizon
To analysts' surprise, Verizon Wireless is about to become the first carrier in the United States to offer advanced wireless services such as streaming video over mobile phones. Verizon's "Express Network," which will deliver data at up to 144 kilobits per second -- almost three times as fast as a typical dial-up connection on a PC –- is coming to market "as early as next week," a source close to the company said. While analysts questioned whether there would be any cell phones to accommodate the services, the source said handsets could be sold as early as next week.
http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,49962,00.html

Filling In Answers to Black Holes
Whoever said you can't build your own black hole? Two scientific papers published in the past week develop new lines of tabletop experiments that allow scientists for the first time to probe previously untestable questions about black holes, gravity and relativity. One promises the first opportunity ever to observe an exotic species of radiation from black holes that was predicted by Stephen Hawking. The other pushes into the history books as the first experiment to observe the unreconciled worlds of both gravity and quantum mechanics together.
http://www.wired.com/news/technology...,49973,00.html

Penn State Invents State Pen
Call it the Spiderman alert system. Using acoustics technology, researchers at Penn State University have found a way to turn a simple chain-link fence into a breach detector. "The idea was to make kind of like a spider web, where you have a wire that can very easily pick up vibrations," said David Swanson, a senior researcher at Penn State's Applied Research Laboratory. In addition to companies interested in licensing it for development, the Penn State "smart fence" has drawn the attention of the U.S. Army and Navy, the Federal Aviation Administration, water utilities and oil companies, university officials say.
http://www.wired.com/news/technology...,50002,00.html

Distributed's New Word: Please
The legal nightmare for David McOwen ended last week with a minor fine, probation, and a lesson learned: Ask before you install software on somebody else’s computer. McOwen was facing a fine of up to $415,000 and eight felony counts of computer theft and computer trespass, which could have resulted in anywhere from eight to 120 years in jail, for loading a distributed computing client onto PCs at DeKalb Technical College in Atlanta, Georgia, where he worked until December of 1999.
http://www.wired.com/news/technology...,49961,00.html

An Odd Broadband Offer in Oz
Virtual private networks, cable TV, video on demand, networked gaming, telephony and high-speed Internet access -- all offered by different providers via one high-capacity digital pipe to the home. This is broadband the way it should be -- a competitive free-for-all on the content side, but delivered through a monopoly data carrier that sweats the technical details. At least, that's the "open-access" business model broadband provider Transact Communications is betting $100 million on in the sleepy Australian national capital of Canberra.
http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,49853,00.html

Smaller Heart Device on Horizon
The maker of the artificial replacement heart that has so far been implanted in five patients said Wednesday it expects in 2004 to begin testing a heart replacement device small enough for use in all adults. Abiomed's total heart replacement AbioCor is currently so big -- the size of a grapefruit -- it fits into only about 50 percent of adult males and just 18 percent of adult females. "This smaller device will address the entire (adult) population," Abiomed chief executive David Lederman said.
http://www.wired.com/news/medtech/0,1286,49980,00.html

Third anthrax toxin revealed
The thuggish third member of the toxic troika with which anthrax bacteria destroy cells has been caught on camera. Now that the form and function of all three molecules is clear, an antidote to anthrax comes a step closer. One anthrax protein, called protective antigen (PA), chaperones the two other toxins into human or animal cells. The second, lethal factor (LF), destroys the white blood cells that hosts send in defence.
http://www.nature.com/nsu/020121/020121-6.html

Ultimate stem cell discovered
stem cell has been found in adults that can turn into every single tissue in the body. It might turn out to be the most important cell ever discovered. Until now, only stem cells from early embryos were thought to have such properties. If the finding is confirmed, it will mean cells from your own body could one day be turned into all sorts of perfectly matched replacement tissues and even organs.
http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99991826

Calif. Charities May Suffer Under Proposed Privacy Law
Charitable institutions could suffer billions of dollars in lost revenue each year if lawmakers succeed in passing new privacy laws that require permission-based marketing, according to a pair of studies to be released Thursday. The Direct Marketing Association will release two reports which purport to show that so-called "opt-in" laws that bar financial institutions from sharing customer data without explicit permission could cost charities as much as $16.5 billion annually. California-based charities could lose more than $1.5 billion each year, the reports found.
http://www.newsbytes.com/news/02/173889.html

Serious Security Hole In AOL's ICQ Chat Software
A security hole in America Online's popular Internet chat software could allow remote attackers to execute malicious programs on the users' computer, a government-funded security watchdog warned today. The vulnerability lies in a feature of AOL's ICQ Internet chat program for Windows that allows ICQ users to invite others to join them in playing online games, according to the Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT), a federally funded computer security clearinghouse at Pittsburgh's Carnegie Mellon University.
http://www.newsbytes.com/news/02/173926.html

More news later on

[VWguy]

Wow! I beat the Tank here, I get the first copy!!!

Getting slow old gal....

[TankGirl]

Arghhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!



Thanks a lot WT! (next time give me an advance warning of the coming newspaper!)

- tg

[walktalker]

Originally posted by TankGirl
Arghhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!



Thanks a lot WT! (next time give me an advance warning of the coming newspaper!)

- tg

I did !! It was the hidden message in the "success" thread ! Darn bastard VWguy, he found the thing out