The Newspaper Shop -- Wednesday edition

[walktalker]

MIT prof: Don't cripple Windows
An MIT professor on Wednesday criticized antitrust sanctions sought by nine states against Microsoft, telling a federal judge they would cripple the Windows operating system and give away the company's technology to competitors. Stuart Madnick, professor of information technology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said the states' demand for a version of Windows that can be customized by computer makers and other software makers would be difficult to achieve and sap resources devoted to improving the operating system.
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1104-896281.html

New Sony notebook makes some noise
Sony plans to play a different tune for PCs this summer, with the introduction of a notebook that can act as a music studio on the go. The company's Vaio PCG-NV170 includes a recordable CD drive and pre-loaded music editing and management software, as well as a subwoofer -- a device that is designed to enhance tones in the lower range of music -- small enough to fit into the floppy drive. The package is geared for music enthusiasts who want to create CDs or listen to music, but are looking for a machine that is less bulky than a typical desktop.
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1103-896853.html

Judge sends Melissa creator to prison
The creator of the Melissa computer virus, which hobbled computer systems across the United States three years ago, was sentenced Wednesday to 20 months in prison and ordered to pay $5,000 in fines. Virus creator David L. Smith also must serve 3 years of supervised release, during which he cannot use the Internet, computer networks, or bulletin boards unless authorized by the court. The judge also ordered Smith to complete 100 hours of community service, which will take advantage of his computer skills in a supervised atmosphere.
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1105-896504.html

Apple sues over Macromedia Flash MX
Apple has filed a lawsuit against Sorenson Media over technology licensed to Macromedia for the new Flash MX player. Apple licenses similar technology from Sorenson for its QuickTime video server and player software. The lawsuit states that Sorenson has "intentionally disrupted the economic advantage that Apple expected to gain from its exclusive rights under the Agreement." Sorenson says it licensed Sorenson Spark to Macromedia, while the technology in QuickTime is Sorenson Video.
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1104-896466.html

Stallman takes Gates to task over GPL
Attacks by Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates on the GNU General Public License, under which much open source and free software is distributed, have been driven by a fear that the GPL creates a domain of software that Microsoft cannot privatize and control, according to GPL founder Richard Stallman. Gates' latest speech on the issue was delivered in mid-April to a Government Leaders' Conference in Seattle, where he warned developing countries against using software based on the GPL, saying those who put development time into it are denying themselves the benefits of essential taxes.
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1104-896171.html

Netscape flaw exposes hard drives
An Israeli software firm has discovered a flaw in Netscape and Mozilla software that allows code hidden in a Web page to read files from the user's PC. The bug is a more serious variant of one patched in Microsoft's Internet Explorer in February. GreyMagic Software reported that the problem affects XMLHttpRequest, which allows Web pages in the browser to send and receive XML data via HTTP, the standard Web transfer protocol. XML is an Internet language for describing just about any sort of data.
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1104-896099.html

HP announces final results of vote count
Hewlett-Packard announced Wednesday that a final tally shows its shareholders have approved the Compaq Computer acquisition, paving the way for the largest technology merger in history to close. HP said it expects to close the deal Friday and launch the new company Tuesday.
http://news.com.com/2100-1001-896803.html?tag=fd_top

Lawmakers want biometrics for state IDs
A bill introduced in the House of Representatives on Wednesday would require states to include biometric features such as retinal scans or fingerprints on encrypted microchips in driver's licenses and state-issued ID cards. The Driver's License Modernization Act, sponsored by Reps. Jim Moran, D-Va., and Tom Davis, R-Va., would give states five years to conform to a new nationwide standard for licenses. "We all know that today, fake driver's licenses are so common that they are almost considered a rite of passage for American teenagers," Moran said in a statement.
http://news.com.com/2100-1017-896649.html?tag=fd_top

Will the Web Save Comics?
Comics publishers are doing everything right — expanding creative rights for artists, tapping new global markets, reworking old genres to keep franchises alive and vital. Throughout much of Europe and Asia, comics have large readerships, are the subject of major arts exhibitions and even have their own museums, and attract lively critical debate. The problem is that almost nobody in this country actually reads them. By some estimates, there may be as few as 500,000 comics readers in the United States today while the blockbuster new Spiderman movie is apt to attract ten to twenty times that many viewers on its opening weekend.
http://www.techreview.com/articles/wo_jenkins050102.asp

College without wires? Students log on
At Washington's American University this fall, students will be able to check their grades, see if a class has been canceled, or mix sunbathing with Web surfing on their laptop computers over a new first-of-its kind wireless network. The 10,000-student institution in the nation's capital said on Wednesday it plans to become the first fully integrated wireless university by getting rid of telephone lines and installing a wireless system to handle voice, data and messaging.
http://news.com.com/2100-1033-896721.html?tag=cd_mh

Copyright holders praise proposed bill
Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., has introduced a bill that would expand counterfeit laws to cover digital music and movies and make it illegal to replicate authentication measures on copyrighted materials. The introduction of S.B. 2395 Tuesday was praised by copyright holders such as Microsoft, which lose millions of dollars to software pirates each year. "The proposed legislation is essential for law enforcement to be able to effectively combat the proliferation of counterfeiting activities involving computer software, motion pictures and other audiovisual works," Jeff Raikes, a Microsoft vice president of Productivity and Business Services, said in a statement.
http://news.com.com/2100-1023-896676.html?tag=cd_mh

Ashcroft renews child porn crackdown
Criticizing a Supreme Court ruling that struck down a "virtual" child pornography law, Attorney General John Ashcroft on Wednesday unveiled legislation that seeks to address the constitutional concerns and restore the government's ability to prosecute such cases. "The Supreme Court's legalization of computer-generated child pornography has created a dangerous window of opportunity for child abusers to escape prosecution," he said in announcing the Justice Department-crafted legislation that was introduced in Congress.
http://news.com.com/2100-1023-896673.html?tag=cd_mh

Family names flop in domain disputes
If you own a Web address that contains your name, a more famous person or company may be able to snatch it from you, especially if you sell something on the pages. The organizations charged with mediating domain name disputes issued two rulings last month against individuals who registered their family names, turning over the sites to guitarist Peter Frampton and to Miller Brewing. The issue of whether people have the rights to their name in Web addresses has been a tricky one. Several celebrities, including singer Madonna and actress Julia Roberts, have won such cases. However, others, including President George W. Bush and Maryland Lt. Gov. Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, haven't succeeded.
http://news.com.com/2100-1023-896561.html?tag=cd_mh

Eminem may wrap CDs in copy controls
Universal Music is in talks with its best-selling rap artist Eminem to incorporate copy-protection technology into all upcoming CD releases of "The Eminem Show," marking the biggest move yet to protect its top acts from music piracy, a label representative said Wednesday. Discussions are under way between Universal, a division of French media conglomerate Vivendi Universal, Eminem, and his Universal-owned label Interscope Records to make the anticipated top-selling release copy proof, thwarting the industry's biggest concern: piracy.
http://news.com.com/2100-1023-896391.html?tag=cd_mh

Freenet founder launches P2P product
Uprizer, a start-up co-founded by one of peer-to-peer's chief ideologues, plans to release its first product Wednesday, aiming at businesses that want to broadcast video and other presentations in-house. That's a far cry from the radical anticensorship drive of co-founder Ian Clarke, who's Freenet project which first brought him and Uprizer into the public eye. But it's also one of the first examples of the underground file-swapping technology being retooled into a product.
http://news.com.com/2100-1023-896028.html?tag=cd_mh

Microsoft brings MSN to the Mac market
Microsoft's MSN Internet service is dipping its toe into the Macintosh market. The Redmond, Wash., software giant has quietly introduced MSN Internet Access for the Mac to customers in the 14 states that get local phone service through Qwest Communications International. The service, which has been running for about two weeks, is part of a deal Microsoft struck with Qwest a year ago to transition Qwest's dial-up and broadband customers from the Qwest.net service to Microsoft's MSN service.
http://news.com.com/2100-1023-896236.html?tag=cd_mh

Unraveling the Drama of Science
From Bertolt Brecht and Friedrich Dürrenmatt to Steven Poliakoff and Tom Stoppard, science has proven an enduring theme for playwrights. While writers generally don't know much about science, sometimes their dramatic reconstructions of scientific endeavor can impact the science establishment in ways they never envisaged. For Frayn, as for many other playwrights, science only serves as a metaphor for exploring a broader philosophical concept.
http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,1284,51984,00.html

The Day the Music Sighed
Hundreds of Web broadcasters went silent Wednesday in an organized protest against proposed U.S. royalty rates they say would undermine the industry and stifle innovation on the Internet. The Web radio stations started their protest at dawn to oppose rates recommended in February by a Copyright Royalty Arbitration Panel working for the U.S. Copyright Office. Under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, the Librarian of Congress is required to set sound recording performance royalty rates for Web radio stations by May 21.
http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,52237,00.html

Site Barks About Deep Link
the proprietor of BarkingDogs.org, a "proactive" news website that unearths political malfeasance in and around Dallas, Texas, Adelman has been, as he loves to say, "a thorn in the side of a lot of people out here." And for all his digging, he has faced more than a few scrapes. Once, the city actually tried to shut down his site. They failed. Now Adelman is locked in a battle against the Belo media corporation, owner of The Dallas Morning News, which sent him a legalistic letter this week demanding that BarkingDogs.org remove all "deep links" to the DallasNews.com site.
http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,52213,00.html

Modified Crops Go Underground
An illegal but well-known underground market for genetically modified crops is growing fast in Brazil. But oftentimes, farmers who bought the seeds with promises of better yields at lower costs have reaped financial disasters and plantation damages instead. The problem seems to stem not from defective genetically modified organism (GMO) crops, but from a lack of understanding by farmers who purchase the crops, which are supposedly imported from Argentina or from other regions of Brazil. The upshot is that crops that may work well in their native soils don't react well when transported.
http://www.wired.com/news/technology...,51961,00.html

Step Right Up, See the Universe
A new, keen-eyed camera on the Hubble Space Telescope is capturing views of distant galaxies with a clarity never before possible. Astronomers say the instrument may dramatically change basic knowledge about the universe. The Advanced Camera for Surveys "is opening a wide new window onto the universe," said Holland Ford of Johns Hopkins University, leader of the team that developed the new camera.
http://www.wired.com/news/technology...,52232,00.html

Call Them Mouse-Controlled Rats
By implanting electrodes in rats' brains, scientists have created remote-controlled rodents they can command to turn left or right, climb trees and navigate piles of rubble. Someday, scientists said, rats carrying tiny video cameras might search for disaster survivors. "If you have a collapsed building and there are people under the rubble, there's no robot that exists now that would be capable of going down into such a difficult terrain and finding those people, but a rat would be able to do that," said John Chapin, a professor of physiology and pharmacology at the State University of New York in Brooklyn.
http://www.wired.com/news/technology...,52236,00.html

Superconducting Super Collider Site Eyed for Counter-Terror Training Camp
A cavernous building where workers once constructed the world's most powerful magnets now stores thousands of Styrofoam cups. Miles of tunnels that were designed to contain one of the loftiest missions in science lie forgotten and filled with gravel. But, if two former Marines have their way, the sprawling site of the Superconducting Super Collider (SSC) in Waxahachie, Texas, will soon become home to a large, privately-run counter-terrorism training camp.
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/scite...tor020430.html

More news later on

[theknife]

Eminem may wrap CDs in copy controls

In a related move, Universal is also closely monitoring the circulation of Eminem's first single "Without Me," the company said. The number of promotional copies, ordinarily delivered to radio stations and the media, has been limited to ensure it doesn't fall into the wrong hands.

...and a quick search of Grokster reveals some 66 available versions of this song. Looks like this one got away from you, Universal!