The Newspaper Shop -- Thursday edition

[walktalker]

FBI wants to track your Web trail
From the Bill Gates e-mails unveiled during the Microsoft trial to the Enron debacle, the digital trails people leave have provided stunning insight into their beliefs and habits. Now the FBI is hoping to capture and corral more of our digital detritus in the name of fighting terrorism. The Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday will examine proposed Justice Department guidelines that would give federal investigators new license to mine publicly available databases and monitor Web use. The changes, which come after a major FBI shakeup last week, have sparked intense debate over the merits of expanding government surveillance powers as the country faces ongoing threats of terrorist attacks.
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1105-933202.html

EFF comes down hard on Hollywood
The Electronic Frontier Foundation is suing for your right to record TV programs and skip the commercials. The online civil liberties group has filed suit in federal court in Los Angeles against more than two dozen entertainment companies on behalf of five consumers who own ReplayTV recorders, asking a judge to declare activities such as recording and fast-forwarding legal. The complaint filed Thursday said court action is needed because an "Entertainment Oligarchy" made up of the networks and studios has repeatedly called consumers' use of the ReplayTV 400 "theft" and "stealing".
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1104-933415.html

Apple: Windows users, come see us
Apple Computer is expanding its retail store strategy as it considers new ways to draw Windows users to the Mac, according to sources close to the company's plans. The Cupertino, Calif.-based company is considering a number of in-store demonstrations to attract potential PC users, the sources said. One strategy under consideration would involve bringing Windows PCs into the stores, where customers could presumably be shown the advantages of Macs. If the proposal is adopted, PCs from one or more manufacturers would be compared with Macs, the sources said.
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1103-933442.html

eBay cancels Segway scooter auctions
eBay cancelled two auctions for the new Segway Human Transporter on Thursday. The auctions, which went online earlier this week, had drawn interest from a number of consumers who had missed out on getting a Segway HT through an earlier auction on Amazon.com in February. Before eBay cancelled the auctions, some 28 bids had been placed on one of them, with the price reaching more than $14,000. In an e-mail eBay sent to John Zuccarino, who bid on one of the scooters, the company said it cancelled the auctions after being notified by Segway that the auctions "infringed on its intellectual property rights."
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1106-933420.html

Shakira worm rocks the Net
There's nothing new about the latest Internet worm, Shakira (vbs.vbswg-aq@mm). An e-mail message allegedly containing photos of the Grammy-winning Colombian rock star will instead launch a flood of infected copies on other users of Microsoft Outlook or IRC. Like the Anna worm, Shakira is the product of a VBS worm-generator kit. Most antivirus software vendors already have protection available to block it, hence the official name: Vbswg-aq. When the Shakira worm invades your PC, it displays this message: "You have been infected by the ShakiraPics Worm." Because Shakira is not destructive and just sends e-mail, it currently ranks a 4 on the ZDNet Virus Meter.
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1105-933309.html

'Disturbing' Xbox ads banned in the U.K.
Regulators in the United Kingdom have given the thumbs-down to a Microsoft advertisement for the Xbox console that has offended some viewers. The Independent Television Commission has slammed the ad as "shocking" and banned the commercial from U.K. television. The ad begins with a newborn child flying through a window before aging decades in seconds -- then crashing and screaming into a grave as an elderly man. It was designed to illustrate the phrase: "Life is short. Play more." The ITC, which has the power to ban ads that it considers unsuitable to be shown onscreen, said it received 136 complaints about the Xbox ad.
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1103-933276.html

Sony turns to NEC for flat-plasma displays
Sony, the world's largest consumer electronics group, said on Thursday it had reached a deal with NEC for a steady supply of plasma display panels (PDPs) used in large flat-screen TVs. Sony is also expected to fund part of NEC's capital spending on PDP production. Sony Chief Operating Officer Kunitake Ando told journalists in Brussels Sony would make a financial investment to develop plasma displays with NEC, but he said it would not take a stake in NEC's PDP operations, which are due to be split off from the parent company in October.
http://news.com.com/2100-1040-933435.html?tag=fd_top

Music is out of this world with satellite radio in car
If you like listening to good music while you drive, you'll find it hard to resist the appeal of satellite radio -- especially now that both of the industry's major players, XM Radio and Sirius Satellite Radio, are on the air. Here are a few things to keep in mind when you go shopping for a satellite radio receiver.
http://freep.com/money/tech/newman5_20020605.htm

Questions over net snooping centre
A controversial internet snooping centre to be opened in the summer by the UK Government could cause more problems than it solves, experts say. The National Technical Assistance Centre (NTAC) will decrypt computer data and intercepted internet and e-mail traffic as part of a drive against cyber-crime, reports the technology news magazine, Computing. It follows a much-criticised law, the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act, which came into force in October 2000 and gave law enforcers sweeping powers to spy on internet communications.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci...00/2027377.stm

The Netflix way
Will the success of the pioneering DVD-rental company convince a reluctant music industry to embrace its own subscription strategy? John Andrews first heard about Netflix when his class at Harvard Business School studied the company in 2001. But it wasn't the business model that persuaded him to sign up for the service, in which people register online and pay $20 a month for a rotating crop of DVD rentals that arrive by mail. He simply thought a Netflix subscription would make his movie-watching activities more convenient -- and he has yet to doubt his initial hunch.
http://salon.com/tech/feature/2002/0...lix/index.html

Playboy flashes auction goods on eBay
Playboy, one year shy of its 50th birthday, is baring its treasure chest for the first time and selling artwork from the provocative men's magazine in a major auction. The sale, on June 23, comes as Playboy moves online auctions from its corporate site to a wider audience on an eBay storefront, reaching a potential 46 million registered consumers. "Playboy magazine created a lifestyle that many people -- both men and women -- aspire to. The art and design works seen in the magazine are as interesting today as when the issues appeared on newsstands," said Peter Loughrey, director of the 20th Century design department at Butterfields, a brick-and-mortar auction house that is now part of eBay.
http://news.com.com/2100-1017-933327.html?tag=cd_mh

Microsoft to charge for e-mail forwarding
Microsoft's MSN said Wednesday that Hotmail users who want to retrieve e-mail from outside accounts through the service will have to pay up starting July 16. In an e-mail notice to Hotmail users, MSN announced that for $19.95 a year, MSN Extra Storage would allow them to continue to use POP Mail Retrieval. The POP service allows customers to access various e-mail accounts through one Hotmail account. In addition, the paid service provides 10MB of Hotmail storage, allowing people to send and receive larger attachments, and ensures that unused accounts will not expire. Hotmail requires its free users to log on every 30 days to keep an account active.
http://news.com.com/2100-1023-933024.html?tag=cd_mh

Subpoena issued in N.Y. Times hack probe
Cable news channel MSNBC said Wednesday that U.S. prosecutors had issued a subpoena for one of its reporters to turn over information about a hacker who broke into The New York Times' Web site but later withdrew the demand. MSNBC spokeswoman Cherylynne Crowther said the subpoena, issued last month, aimed to get reporter Bob Sullivan to turn over his notes, e-mails and other communications with hacker Adrian Lamo.
http://news.com.com/2100-1023-933010.html?tag=cd_mh

Execs look to lead anti-piracy charge
A group of tech executives defended anti-piracy technology at a House subcommittee hearing Wednesday but urged lawmakers to steer clear of government regulations. A hearing at the Subcommittee on Courts, the Internet and Intellectual Property saw Microsoft, Adobe Systems, SunnComm and CenterSpan Communications outline the benefits of anti-piracy technology, saying it protects content while expanding consumer choice. But they emphasized the dangers of a broad mandate from legislators.
http://news.com.com/2100-1023-933006.html?tag=cd_mh

TiVo Town or Sonicblue City?
The battle is not yet fierce, but the warning signs are clear. There's a new product war on the horizon, one that could make the Cola War and the Browser War look like mere playground scuffles. Call it the DVR War, the battle over which company -- TiVo or Sonicblue, the maker of the ReplayTV -- will come to dominate the future of digital video recorders, and, perhaps, the future of TV. Digital video recorders aren't new, but after a slow initial rollout they're trending to become hugely popular during the next few years, according to analysts. Some predict that in the next five years there'll be tens of millions of DVRs -- which allow television watchers to pause, fast-forward and easily record TV shows, letting them watch TV the way network programmers never intended them to watch TV.
http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,53008,00.html

Cursor Company's Conduct Cursed
In a last-ditch effort to shake their company's reputation as a purveyor of spyware, the co-founders of Comet Systems have thrown themselves into a lion's den of privacy vigilantes. In recent days, Jamie Rosen and Tom Schmitter have been attempting to defend the Comet Cursor, their much-maligned free program for customizing cursors, in an online forum for users of Lavasoft's Ad-aware, a much-respected free program for removing spyware. "It feels like a lynch mob. There's a lot of vicious people shouting at us," said Rosen, Comet's chairman.
http://www.wired.com/news/privacy/0,1848,52985,00.html

Fans: Music Should Rock, Not Lock
Matthew Davidian loves music. In short, he's the type of guy the recording industry should be salivating over. He's into exploring new music, he's into legal sites, he's had a history of purchasing albums and says he has no problem with the concept of paying for music. There's just one problem: He hates digital rights management (DRM), the security systems being used to control how consumers can listen to music they legally purchase.
http://www.wired.com/news/mp3/0,1285,52895,00.html

Retiree Stuck in Netter's Prison
A 70-year-old man has been in jail for more than three months for refusing to delete from his website addresses and other personal data of employees at the retirement home that evicted him. The jailing of Paul Trummel, a native of England who moved to the United States in 1985, has drawn fire from national and international writers' groups that support his First Amendment claims. Other groups that have questioned the jailing include the National Union of Journalists in London and Reporters Sans Frontières of France.
http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,53021,00.html

MS denounces Hollywood DRM Jihad
Microsoft has come out against the schemes and dreams of the entertainment industry with a position essay criticizing any notion of the government's mandating technical standards for content protection as Hollywood wants. The authors clearly have in mind proposed legislation by Fritz "Hollywood" Hollings (Democrat, South Carolina) originally called the Security Systems Standards and Certification Act (SSSCA), recently renamed the Consumer Broadband and Digital Television Promotion Act (CBDTPA) to conceal it's proscriptive anti-consumer, and anti-tech industry nature.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/4/25593.html

Internet site beams U.S. movies from Iran
An Internet company that lets viewers watch pirated hits like "Harry Potter" and "The Mummy Returns" for $1.50 or less has set up shop in a place that might be out of the film industry's long reach -- Iran. Film88.com, the apparent sequel to a similar Web venture called Movie88.com that was quickly shut down by Taiwanese authorities in February, is the latest example of Hollywood's increasing problems with online movie piracy. Representatives of the Motion Picture Association said the international trade group is pursuing several legal avenues to pull the plug on Film88.com.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cg...6/BU154153.DTL

NASA Developing Radar to Locate Lost Planes
NASA’s ability to track spacecraft is crucial to the exploration of the stars. But the space agency is also looking earthward, hoping to build a radar system that could peer through trees, clouds and other obstructions to find lost planes and hopefully save lives. Satellites watching for lost souls turn out to be lifesavers. Atlanta-based EMS Technologies Inc. is acquiring Digital Space Systems Inc., which makes software for the Cospas-Sarsat satellite-based system for detecting and locating electronic distress signals. The radar, called synthetic aperture radar or SAR, is meant to complement a global satellite system that listens for electronic emergency beacons sent by wrecked planes or people in distress.
http://www.space.com/businesstechnol..._020605-1.html

China loses grip on internet
The internet is changing China profoundly, breaking down the stranglehold on information held by China's communist rulers.
The Chinese are now the second biggest internet users in the world. Last year more than 56 million of them logged on from home, and that number is growing by 6% a month. But the Chinese state will not give up its monopoly without a fight - and using the internet to express dissent in China is still a very dangerous game to play.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/wor...00/2027120.stm

More news later on ! !! ! !!! !! !!! ! !!!

[Mowzer]

Letter to the Editor,

I like your paper, but could you also post some little bit "harder" stuff. Maybe mix in some Bizzare stuff, kinda like rotten.com does?

Thank you,

Faithful reader in Canada.