The Newspaper Shop -- Canada Day Edition

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Yay celebration time

Watchdog: FCC could harm broadband
Proposed U.S. government policies could harm competition in the "broadband" Internet market, reducing choices and driving up monthly fees for users who want high-speed access, a consumer group said on Monday. By easing regulations on incumbent cable television and local phone companies, the Federal Communications Commission will hasten the demise of independent Internet providers who reach users over existing phone and cable lines, the Consumer Federation of America said.
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1105-940922.html

Boom time's over for security pros
Despite the ongoing focus on security since the Sept. 11 attacks, computer security administrators are not immune to the current economic malaise, according to a study released Monday. Though they remain among the most highly paid tech workers, security professionals have seen their average raises drop more than 40 percent since December 2000 -- from increases of 11.6 percent to bumps of 7 percent. And trading up to better-paying jobs in the same field is a thing of the past, said Alan Paller, director of research and development for the System Administration Networking and Security (SANS) Institute, which produced the survey.
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1105-940916.html

IBM: Buy Linux power by the hour
IBM will begin offering a service Monday that lets customers buy Linux computing capacity from Big Blue in much the same way they buy kilowatt hours of electricity from the power company. With its Linux Virtual Services, IBM will sell the computing power of its mainframes, charging $300 per month for each "service unit" -- about a third the computing capacity that a typical single-processor Intel server can provide, said Warren Hart, director of offerings for IBM's Global Services division. With Intel servers costing less than $1,000, that may not sound like much of a cost advantage, but IBM's service includes server management and other tedious but costly chores and can help customers adjust to spikes in demand.
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1104-940778.html

Report: Brace for new wave of attacks
The Web is currently more vulnerable to attack than ever before, as a result of several serious security flaws for different server applications being published within a few days of one another, according to a survey from British network security firm Netcraft. Microsoft published a trio of security advisories on June 12 related to its Internet Information Server (IIS), and this was followed on June 17 by the publication of a bug in the Apache Web server application that leaves the software open to a buffer overflow attack. Together, Apache and IIS make up nearly 90 percent of active Web servers, according to Netcraft, although it has not yet been conclusively proven that the Apache flaw affects versions running on the Linux and Solaris operating systems.
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1105-940797.html

FTC: Sites must flag paid listings -- or else
The Federal Trade Commission on Friday said search-engine companies need to clearly mark paid listings on their sites, concluding an 11-month investigation. Responding to a complaint last July from Portland, Ore.-based Commercial Alert, the FTC said it would send letters outlining the need for clear disclosure to companies that offer Internet search services. Companies named in the complaint were AltaVista, AOL Time Warner, Direct Hit Technologies, iWon, LookSmart, Microsoft and Terra Lycos. The FTC said it would not take formal action at this time, however, noting that many of the sites named in the original complaint had already taken steps to flag paid listings.
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1106-940849.html

FBI computers are still far from wired
When Harold Hendershot joined the FBI two decades ago, agents used three-by-five index cards to organize their case information. The U.S. crime fighting agency has since bought computers, Hendershot reassured a crowd of tech enthusiasts at a trade show in New York recently, but it's still far from wired. "The system is broken," said Hendershot, chief of the counterintelligence computer intrusion unit at the National Infrastructure Protection Center, a division of the FBI charged with protecting U.S. infrastructure.
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1105-940801.html

Apache worm barely squirms
A program designed to infect vulnerable computers running the open-source Apache Web server application apparently hasn't made it very far, security experts said Monday. As first reported by CNET News.com, the Apache worm infects unpatched servers running the FreeBSD operating system, an open-source variant of Unix, and the Apache Web software. Despite initial reports that the worm had spread to some servers, consultants and antivirus experts haven't seen much activity. "It's pretty much dead," said Marc Maiffret, chief hacking officer for network-protection company eEye Digital Security.
http://news.com.com/2100-1001-940989.html?tag=fd_top

Decision on Net gambling unlikely bet
A congressional attempt to ban Internet gambling faces long odds of passage, handicappers say, as the clock winds down on the legislative year and interest groups continue to register their opposition. Online casinos have proliferated in recent years, raking in billions of dollars from Internet users across the globe and raising fears that they could encourage compulsive gambling and undermine local regulations. But despite attempts reaching back to 1995, Congress has been unable to pass a law that would undercut the unregulated, offshore Web casinos that stand to take in between $4.2 billion and $6.4 billion next year, according to estimates.
http://news.com.com/2100-1023-940999.html?tag=fd_top

DVD a hit at home-theater box office
Home-theater systems are selling faster than tickets to a summertime Schwarzenegger flick, and the box office appeal is coming from the unprecedented popularity of DVD players. Sales figures released Monday by retail market research firm NPDTechworld show that DVD players have become the fastest-selling product in the history of the consumer-electronics market. And consumer-electronics makers have taken notice, adding DVD player capabilities to other types of products in the hope of cashing in -- a strategy that's proved very successful.
http://news.com.com/2100-1040-940937.html?tag=fd_top

Listen.com lands last Big Five label
Taking a step ahead of any of the other competing music subscription services, Listen.com has won licenses to use music from all five of the major record labels. The company on Monday announced it has won rights to distribute music owned by Vivendi Universal's Universal Music Group, the last big label to sign on to its Rhapsody service. As the first of the half-dozen services in the budding subscription market to reach that goal, it's a substantive accomplishment -- but still a flawed one. All subscription services have been deeply criticized for offering only a narrow band of music, largely because each has lacked access to one or more labels' catalog of recordings.
http://news.com.com/2100-1023-940841.html?tag=fd_top

Drkoop.com sale raises e-mail concerns
More than six months after filing for bankruptcy protection, Drkoop.com is selling its assets, including its members' e-mail addresses, to Vitacost.com. The sale of the popular health information site, co-founded by former U.S. Surgeon General C. Everett Koop, will be final by Friday. Drkoop members have until Sunday to opt-out of having their e-mail addresses added to the mailing lists of Vitacost.com, an online vitamin discount shop based in Boynton Beach, Fla., and its affiliate HeartCenterOnline, a Web site for cardiovascular patients.
http://news.com.com/2100-1017-940968.html?tag=fd_top

Grudgingly, Music Labels Sell Their Songs Online
Increasingly desperate to woo customers away from an Internet music piracy party that shows no signs of abating, several major record labels have resolved to make more music legally available for less money online — even if it means sacrificing lucrative CD sales. For the music industry, it is a turning point. For consumers, it means the advent of new ways to buy music, including the closest approximation so far of a "celestial jukebox," where they can search for and listen to a vast range of recorded music at low cost. Three years after Napster unleashed the first wave of music-trading over the Internet, the labels are coming to terms with the notion that Internet file-sharing is reshaping their business, and they must compete with piracy or risk losing a generation of customers.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/07/01/te...gy/01TUNE.html

Cell phones change their colors
Nextel Communications debuted its first full color-screen cell phone on Monday, and two more U.S. wireless carriers are about to do the same. Color-screen phones have been selling in overseas markets for at least two years, but Nextel's product, the Motorola i95cl, is new for U.S. consumers who are used to the gray, green or blue background colors. A representative for T-Mobile U.S., also known as VoiceStream Wireless, says its first color-screen phone should be reaching store shelves now. Cingular Wireless is expected to unveil its first color-screen phone "very soon," a representative said Monday. But don't expect carriers to paint a huge swath onto their product lines. Most U.S. wireless carriers plan to release a single color-screen phone, then monitor sales to decide whether to unleash more.
http://news.com.com/2100-1033-941026.html?tag=cd_mh

Ad grab: Net firm buys DoubleClick unit
Online marketing services company L90 said Monday that it has signed a deal to acquire DoubleClick's ad sales business. Under the agreement, Los Angeles-based L90 will acquire DoubleClick's North American Media business for $5 million in cash and 4.8 million shares; it also plans to change its name to MaxWorldwide. DoubleClick said it will be entitled to an additional $6 million if MaxWorldwide is profitable for two out of three consecutive fiscal quarters over the next three years. The agreement is DoubleClick's latest move to unload its media services divisions. In January, the online marketing services company phased out its Internet ad-profiling service.
http://news.com.com/2100-1023-941037.html?tag=cd_mh

Opera expands role in China
Norwegian browser maker Opera Software on Monday made two moves to consolidate its position in the Asian market, forging a partnership with a Chinese reseller and revising its browser. Opera said it would team with Redflag Software Technologies, a Linux software distributor in Beijing, which will resell Opera's embedded browser products. Redflag plans to integrate Opera's browser software into its applications for PDAs (personal digital assistants) and set-top boxes. The deal with Redflag marks Opera's first arrangement with an Asian reseller. Opera only recently added support for the Unicode Worldwide Character Set, which lets computers render Asian-language characters, among others.
http://news.com.com/2100-1023-940919.html?tag=cd_mh

PCs: More than 1 billion served
The PC just turned 1 billion. Approximately 1 billion PCs have been shipped worldwide since the mid-'70s, according to a study released Sunday by consulting firm Gartner. Seventy-five percent of these machines have gone into professional, or work-related, environments, while the other 25 percent have been for personal, or home, use. Approximately 81.5 percent of PCs shipped have been desktops. The next billion, though, should ship much more quickly. Declining prices, the growth of the Internet, and the rapid adoption of computers in the developing world will likely double the number of PCs shipped by 2007 or 2008.
http://news.com.com/2100-1040-940713.html

Real seeks subscribers for games
The rest of the game industry is wielding huge development budgets and taking on massive technical challenges in its effort to push consumers to complex, multiplayer online games. But RealNetworks thinks there's a lot to be said for a nice game of mah-jongg. The streaming media specialist has sold more than 700,000 downloadable copies of games -- mostly simple puzzle and card titles -- through RealArcade, the game download and online play service Real launched last year.
http://news.com.com/2100-1040-940720.html?tag=cd_mh

Harriet the Online Book Reviewer
Not many people have heard of Harriet Klausner. But chances are that anyone who frequents Amazon.com has read her work. While online reviewers like Klausner aren't nearly as well known as Oprah, they may still wield significant influence in the publishing world. Like Klausner, a legion of book enthusiasts, freelance writers, doctors, lawyers and other professionals have volunteered their opinions and advice to sites like BarnesandNoble.com, Amazon.com, AllReaders.com and AllExperts.com. Who are these reviewers and self-proclaimed experts who contribute thousands of entries to e-commerce and community websites, with little payback or recognition?
http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,1284,53488,00.html

Big Stink Over a Pig Stink
Everyone in America wants to bring home the bacon. And the hog industry wants you to, as well. After all, hog factory farming is a lucrative business that makes corporations filthy, stinking rich. Emphasis on the stinking. Industrialization of agriculture has outpaced the traditional family-raised pig farm with streamlined efficiency and high profit margins, but it also has outpaced the smaller farms in another big way: swine odor problems of epic proportions.
http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,53537,00.html

What If Kids Built the Cities?
Magazines like Martha Stewart Living and Better Homes and Gardens offer endless tips for remodeling homes and sprucing up yards. But a new public art project in Ohio encourages kids to think bigger than that new porch swing: using software and digital cameras, the youngsters are collaborating to re-design their city. This summer, these digital collages will be displayed on computer monitors in 8-foot-tall colorful, fiberglass kiosks throughout Columbus.
http://www.wired.com/news/school/0,1383,53134,00.html

The Musical Stylings of High Tide
The next time you want to relax to the soothing murmurs of pounding surf, you can do more than put on a meditative ocean rhythm CD. You can stroll down the seafront at Blackpool in Britain and listen to the ocean belting out the notes at high tide. A marvel of modern architecture, the Blackpool High Tide Organ combines hydraulics, acoustics, structural engineering, musical composition and sculpture to create an unparalleled piece of artwork: a musical installation that will perform at high tide by harnessing the natural forces of the ocean, capturing and utilizing air pressure from the sea swell.
http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,1284,53152,00.html

Art as a State of Mind
Paras Kaul really lets you know what's on her mind. While most artists use paint brush on canvas or another medium to get concepts across, Kaul expresses her ideas with a brain-wave interface. She's been experimenting with the technology for years and appears poised for a breakthrough. Her newest creation, Peace Streams -- a combination of poetry, music, graphics, video and hypnosis technique -- debuts on August 1 at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C.
http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,1284,52940,00.html

Microsoft's anti-piracy plans spark controversy
A recent software update for Microsoft's Windows Media Player requires users to permit the automatic installation of undisclosed future anti-piracy measures. Computer enthusiasts have raised concerns about the agreement, saying it could force home users to hand over control of their computers and might open them up to new security risks. Microsoft has yet to explain what future updates it plans to install through the media program. The software update was issued on June 26 to fix a security bug in Microsoft's Windows Media Player. The End User License Agreement displayed during installation of the patch requires users to agree to any future security updates related to "digital rights management", i.e. preventing copyright infringement.
http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99992483

Amid a Flurry of Planet Discoveries, the True TallyDiscoveries of planets outside are solar system are coming so fast and furious that it has become difficult to keep track of the exact total. When a U.S. planet-hunting team announced 13 new planets on June 13, they actually had two more in the bag that weren't firmed up in time for their press release and have never been publicly unveiled. Adding to the confusion, a Swiss team quietly announced another dozen planets at a scientific meeting on June 18. The two groups, as it turned out, had surveyed some of the same stars and, not surprisingly, had independently found some of the same planets.
http://www.space.com/scienceastronom...rd_020628.html

CIA Unit Scours Country For Useful Technologies
Like "Q," the gadget-maker who keeps James Bond perpetually ensconced in the latest high-tech gear, Gilman Louie is looking for technologies and ideas to give American spies an edge. Louie is the founding chief executive of In-Q-Tel, the venture capital unit of the CIA that -- no kidding -- named itself after the movie character. The group, created in 1999, has made about a dozen investments in technologies that could potentially be used in information gathering and analysis of America's enemies.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...2002Jun30.html

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