Poetro's blog

Monday, July 30, 2007

Eddie Murphy's Not So Spicy Engagement

A month ago, Eddie Murphy was not only single, but the father of five children.

Now, he's the father of six and headed for yet another trip down the aisle: The Shrek star popped the question to his girlfriend of 10 months, movie producer Tracey Edmonds, last week.

"Tracey and Eddie were engaged last Wednesday," Edmonds' personal assistant told E! News. "Tracey and Eddie are both very much in love and are excited about spending the rest of their lives together."

Source: eonline.com

YouTube anti-piracy tool due sometime in the fall

Google’s YouTube is set to have video fingerprinting software tested and enabled sometime in the fall according to statements made in court on Friday. The statements were made during the initial hearing of the Viacom trial against YouTube owner Google. Viacom sued Google in March over copyright infringement seeking $1 billion in damages. According to Associated Press wire reports, Google said they were working “very intensely” on a video recognition technology, which is said to add another layer of protection for copyright holders such as Viacom.

Viacom, known as the father to such shows as South Park, The Daily Show, The Colbert Report, and Reno 911, each from Comedy Central, as well as MTV, MTV2, Nickelodeon, CMTV, and several other stations and programming, ordered the removal of any video on YouTube that contained footage, images, and likenesses of any of their shows. It was a popular pastime in several offices to surf to YouTube and watch the Daily Show each day after it aired the night before. Clips were often posted almost instantly. Then earlier this year Viacom issued a removal order under the DMCA that caused the removal of several hundred thousand videos from the popular website. The backlash was that the removal order caused is still being seen today.

Viacom, and by proxy YouTube, faced a storm of negative press when some of the removed clips had nothing to do with copyrighted material. Likewise, those that could have been flagged as infringing on copyright, according to The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), used the content under fair use and were not subject to removal. All the while, Viacom sued Google for $1 billion because they fail to prevent the uploading of the copy written works to their website. Google maintains that they are doing nothing wrong, and are complying with the DMCA by removing the offending material as soon as they are asked.

Source: tech.monstersandcritics.com

The Wireless World Up for Grabs

The biggest drawback for many iPhone enthusiasts has been that, to use it, you must switch to AT&T’s mobile phone service. Every network has its weak spots, and if your home sits in one of AT&T’s, no iPhone for you.

Apple was certainly intent on changing the market, but mobile phones aren’t truly mobile, as Randall Stross wrote in The New York Times last week. To get in the race, then, Apple had to pick a single network horse.

The Federal Communications Commission could change that, and much more, with an anxiously awaited decision that is expected on Tuesday, The Washington Post reports today. At stake is $15 billion worth of airwaves that will be suddenly become available when the nation fully converts to high-definition television broadcasting. That’s supposed to happen by February 19, 2009.

Source: thelede.blogs.nytimes.com

Northwest Airlines pilots stay home; 200 flights dropped

Northwest Airlines' cancellations continued Sunday, with more than 200 flights dropped as pilots stayed home, saying they were pushed to the limit of hours they are allowed to fly each month.

The airline blamed the pilots, who in turn blamed the airline for failing to address staff shortfalls

Northwest, which emerged from bankruptcy reorganization in May, canceled 514 flights Friday through Sunday evening.

Northwest canceled more than 2,000 flights in June, many of them toward the end of the month.

Source: archives.seattletimes.nwsource.com

Google vs Jimmy Wales & Open Source Search

Jimmy Wales, the founder of not-for profit Wikipedia and for-profit, San Mateo, Calif.-based Wikia is part of a growing number of people who are discomforted by the growing control Google over search. And he is doing something about it. His company, Wikia, last week bought the distributed crawler Grub from LookSmart and plans to make it available in open source. Not that Looksmart wasn’t really using it anyway, not to mention the ad business they got from Wikia.

His bet: like Linux became a migraine for the monopolist of the last generation, open source search tools will keep companies like Google honest. It is not an easy task, for it is impossible to get away from Google that is firmly embedded into our digital lives.

“Search is part of the fundamental infrastructure of the Internet. And, it is currently broken,” Wales said back in December 2006, when Wikia launched Search Wikia effort. “Why is it broken? It is broken for the same reason that proprietary software is always broken: lack of freedom, lack of community, lack of accountability, lack of transparency.”

Source: gigaom.com

X-48B flight a milestone for program

Looking like something out of a Batman movie, a small, unmanned experimental aircraft is taking to the skies over the Antelope Valley.

Continuing the tradition of X planes that dates back to 1947 at Edwards Air Force Base, Boeing Phantom Works is flight-testing a 21-foot-wide airplane called the X-48B. The aircraft is being used to try out a design concept called "blended-wing body" or "BWB" that could provide more lift, greater range and as much as 30percent greater fuel economy - a valuable element for military tankers and transports.

Unlike the traditional design in which a tubelike fuselage is fitted with wings, the blended-wing body merges the fuselage with the wing. The result is a cross between a conventional aircraft and a flying wing such as the B-2 stealth bomber.

Source: dailynews.com

"Yeah!" singer cancels his wedding with Foster

Hours before the wedding was to take place, actor and R&B singer Usher and his pregnant fiancée Tameka Foster have changed their minds to tie the knot. While the Grammy winner did not give reason behind the refusal, his publicist in a last-minute statement confirmed that wedding bells would not be ringing.

"It was announced today that the wedding ceremony for Usher Raymond, IV and Tameka Foster was canceled," said publicist Patti Webster. "No additional information will be given regarding the circumstances of the cancellation, but we hope the privacy of this matter will be respected."

Foster, 37, and Usher, 28, were due to wed at music mogul Antonio “LA” Reid’s Hamptons estate in New York on Saturday (July 28). Between 70 and 100 guests were expected to attend the ceremony. A fellow R&B crooner Robin Thicke was reportedly scheduled to perform at the reception.

Last month, the multiplatinum singer announced that he and his longtime girlfriend are expecting a baby in the fall of 2007. "We are extremely excited at this point in our lives planning our wedding and the joy that comes with expecting our first child together," the couple said at the time.

Source: themoneytimes.com

Latest Potter breaks records around world

The latest Harry Potter book continues to break records around the world while in the UK, Waterstones sales were more than double those of the previous volume of the boy wizard's adventures.

In the first seven days since 'Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows' unleashed a new wave of wizard mania, Waterstones sold 460,000 copies across its 311 branches in the UK. That is more than double the sales of the previous book, 'Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince,' the publisher Bloomsbury said this morning.

At bookshops and supermarkets across the UK, a total of 2,652,656 copies of the latest book were sold in the first 24 hours, Bloomsbury said - up 32% from the first day total for the previous book in July 2005. In Germany, 398,271 copies were sold.

Source: business.guardian.co.uk

Friday, July 27, 2007

Sprint embraces Google, hints at an open network

Sprint and Google announced today that they would work together to create custom applications for Sprint's cellphone customers. The deal's significant for a couple of reasons: It marks the first time Google will provide several of its apps to cell customers. Though you can already get Google's search engine through a standard wireless browser (and you can get a Gmail Java program on most cellphones), this deal would let people use the chat application Google Talk and other data services Google is creating on Sprint's WiMAX service, which provides long-range, fast wireless Internet connections.

The program also marks a willingness among cell networks to open up their operations to Internet firms. I've been writing a great deal about Google and eBay's efforts to persuade the FCC to adopt a "wireless Carterfone" rule, which would require that carriers let customers run any application on their phones. On Wednesday, Verizon said it would support letting customers use any device or program they choose on the 700 MHz radio band, which the FCC will put up for auction next year. Now Sprint is saying something similar.

Source: machinist.salon.com

Intel says EU made errors in antitrust charges

The European Union's top antitrust regulator made errors of fact in its charge sheet against Intel (INTC.O: Quote, Profile, Research), the chipmaker's general counsel said on Friday. The European Commission has alleged Intel tried to use its huge market share to push smaller rival Advanced Micro Devices (AMD.N: Quote, Profile, Research) out of the central processing unit (CPU) business.

It sent the company a statement of objections, or SO, in a move that could lead to fines of as much as 10 percent of Intel's annual turnover.

"I can tell you that having read the SO there are factual assumptions which have been made which we think the Commission has simply gotten wrong -- not intentionally," general counsel Bruce Sewell told Reuters from California.

Sewell said there were assumptions about pricing and manufacturing costs "which the Commission has simply misunderstood".

The Commission had in some areas indicated it lacked an adequate record to go on and therefore made assumptions, he said.

Source: reuters.com

Rowling wept for Potter

Some stories and specially in books can give high emotions to people

that can rise tears. Harry Potter's stories are not that full of

emotions, but when a long, and good story ends it can burst out in

crying.

Author

JK Rowling admits that she felt “terrible” for the first two days after

completing the seventh and final Harry Potter book. After that, it all

got a bit easier.

Rowling finished writing the book on 11th January this year, and

announced it to the world by scrawling it on a bust in her hotel room

at the Balmoral Hotel in Edinburgh on February 1.

And now that the Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows has been

released, Rowling opens up about her emotions after completing the

series that has captured the world for about a decade.

Source: timesofindia.indiatimes.com

Thursday, July 26, 2007

What it took to hack the iPhone

The iPhone vulnerability that could let hackers steal data or commandeer the device also exists in the desktop edition of Apple's Mac OS X operating system, the exploit's researchers said Tuesday.

Charles Miller, one of the three researchers from Baltimore-based Independent Security Evaluators (ISE) who found the bug and wrote proof-of-concept exploits, confirmed that the vulnerability in the iPhone version of Safari is also present in the desktop version of the browser. Safari is included with all Mac OS X installations.

The Windows version of Safari is also vulnerable. "[But] it may or may not be exploitable there," Miller said.

Source: computerworld.com.au

Sony profit more than triples on digicam, yen

Sony said on Thursday its quarterly profit more than tripled after strong digital camera sales and a softer yen far outstripped losses at its game unit.

Sony, in the final year of a three-year turnaround plan led by Chief Executive Howard Stringer, has seen its PlayStation 3 game console outsold by Nintendo's Wii since the two machines were launched late last year.

But Sony's Cyber-shot digital cameras were in strong demand. The electronics and entertainment conglomerate also benefited from a weaker yen and a firmer stock market, which has boosted earnings at its financial division.

Source: news.com.com

Jessica Alba's phone break-up

Jessica Alba has split from boyfriend Cash Warren.

The Hollywood beauty reportedly called time on the couple's two-and-a-half year romance during an emotional telephone conversation, in which she told the movie producer she "didn't love him anymore".

After delivering the heart-breaking news last weekend, Jessica, 26, allegedly sent an aide to the Los Angeles home the couple shared to help Cash, 28, pack up his belongings and make sure he moved out.

Source: people.monstersandcritics.com

Digg signs advertising deal with Microsoft

Digg has signed a new advertising deal with a new advertising partner - Microsoft. The three year deal means that Microsoft will exclusively provide the display advertising and keyword targeted adverts on the Digg site.

Digg aggregates content from all over the internet, from tiny blogs to huge internet portals. Anything that is of interest to the community there will receive positive votes and will be promoted up the rankings. The variety of content that can be browsed through, coupled with the ability to vote for content you like, makes for an addictive user experience - leading to the site attracting 17 million unique users a month.

This is not an insignificant portion of the available ad audience. Microsoft is trying to gain market share in online advertising, and is especially keen to take revenue away from the market leader Google. And this many new users will only be a positive step for Microsoft.

Source: bigmouthmedia.com

Tags: Advertising | Digg | Microsoft | PARTNER

Lohan declares her innocence

Lindsay Lohan says she is innocent of driving under the influence and cocaine possession.

The actress was arrested early Tuesday in Santa Monica for investigation of felony cocaine possession and misdemeanour driving under the influence and with a suspended licence, less than two weeks after completing her second trip to rehab.

"I am innocent ... did not do drugs, they're not mine. I was almost hit by my assistant Tarin's mum I appreciate everyone giving me my privacy," the 21-year-old actress wrote in an email to Access Hollywood host Billy Bush, the show reported on its website Tuesday night.

Source: smh.com.au

FCC Leans Toward One-Third Plan for Open Access

FCC Chairman Kevin Martin's plan to bring open access to one-third of the 700 MHz spectrum band, which will hit the auction block next January, appears to have the necessary support of two out of four commissioners. The plan is also backed by AT&T, which initially opposed any open access. It falls short of Google's request for total open access.

During a congressional hearing Tuesday before the House Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet, members of the Federal Communications Commission Latest News about Federal Communications Commission (FCC) came out in favor of a plan that would bring open access to one-third of the airwaves set for auction in January.

The 700 MHz band spectrum used by broadcast television stations will be available to the highest bidder once the switch to digital broadcasts takes place in February 2009. The FCC will auction off those soon-to-be-vacant airwaves in January 2008.

It was the first public indication of how the commissioners viewed the proposal put forth by FCC Chairman Kevin Martin two weeks ago.

Source: technewsworld.com

'Hundred-Dollar Laptop' Is Revolutionary, Amazing

One Laptop Per Child's XO (commonly referred to as the "$100 laptop") is designed to change the world by bringing computing resources to children in the developing world.

But the many innovations in the XO may also end up changing the world of technology.

When you first see the XO, the thought that immediately jumps to mind is "kid's toy."

Source: foxnews.com

Don't be alarmed: 29,000 sex offenders on MySpace

There are about 600,000 convicted sex offenders in the United States. As of this month, 29,000 of them had profiles on MySpace.

The number comes from a group of state attorneys general who threatened MySpace with legal action if it didn't scrub its social network of registered sex offenders. In May, the company estimated that only 7,000 sex offenders had profiles on the site; the actual number, it found after deeper research, was four times as many.

MySpace has deleted the 29,000 profiles. But as Roy Cooper, North Carolina's attorney general, noted in a statement, MySpace can only associate sex offenders with profiles when the offenders use real names to set up their sites; there could be many other sex offender profiles the site doesn't know about.

Source: machinist.salon.com

Friday, July 20, 2007

Silicon Knights sues Epic Games

Last August, rumors spread that Silicon Knights was ditching Unreal Engine 3 for its long-awaited Xbox 360 game Too Human, because the frequently licensed game engine supposedly ran poorly on Microsoft's console. Those rumors didn't last too long before Silicon Knights president Denis Dyack squashed them in a statement, saying rumors of the group "completely scrapping" the engine were false.

Despite Dyack's statement, those rumors appear to have been partially true, as revealed by Silicon Knights this week in a 54-page lawsuit it filed against Epic Games over Unreal Engine 3. In its complaint, the Ontario-based developer claims that it licensed the engine based on "false and misleading statements" from Epic. Silicon Knights said the Gears of War creator's contractual breaches forced it to begin making its own game engine last May, just before an underwhelming public debut of the Unreal-powered Too Human at the Electronic Entertainment Expo.

Source: gamespot.com

Google Earnings Up 28% but Miss Expectations

The Internet search giant reported another quarter of rapid revenue growth on the strength of its core Internet search and advertising business Thursday, but expenses grew faster than investors had anticipated and profits fell short of analysts’ expectations.

Within minutes of Google’s announcement, which was made after the close of markets, disappointed investors sold off Google’s shares in after-hours trading, slashing their value by about $42, or more than 7 percent, to about $506. Shares of Google had risen steadily in recent weeks, in part, on speculation that the company, which does not provide guidance about its expected financial performance, would surpass Wall Street estimates.

“The company spent too much, as they said they might some day,” said Jordan Rohan, an analyst with RBC Capital Markets. “It wasn’t a bad quarter. It was a quarter where the analysts’ models need to be reset at a slightly lower level of profitability, and that hadn’t happened in a while.”

Source: nytimes.com

Monday, July 16, 2007

Our new house

Web DJs silenced by royalty fees

From the attic of his condo in Woodbridge, Va., the 38-year-old Web developer ran an Internet radio station that spun his beloved Christmas carols all year long. Then in March, a panel of federal judges sharply increased the royalty charges for playing music online.

Since then, it's been one long, silent night for Clark and his hundreds of listeners at christmasmusic247.com. His site and hundreds of other free Internet radio stations already have shut down, and most others have said they will stop. The new rates became effective Sunday.

"It really isn't fair," said Clark, who pulled the plug when he realized he could owe more than $20,000 in royalties if he continued.

The decision threatens the diversity that webcasters bring to an era of large radio conglomerates and homogenized Top 40 playlists on many over-the-air stations. Each month an estimated 72 million listeners tune in to thousands of Internet radio stations programmed by devotees of every musical genre and subgenre.

Source: baltimoresun.com

Thursday, July 12, 2007

Slimmer PSP on its way

Sony launched its fight back against Nintendo in the portable gaming market by unveiling a slimmer, lighter PlayStation Portable at the E3 video game expo, the industry's biggest event.

Kazuo Hirai, chief executive of Sony Computer Entertainment said: "From a distance, this PSP might not look very different from the current model ... but when you have it in your hand, the difference becomes quite clear.

"It's actually 33 percent lighter than the current PSP. It's also 19 percent slimmer."

Source: channel4.com

Microsoft movie downloads will harm DVD sales?

Concerns surrounding the future of DVD are arising this week following Microsoft’s E3 Business & Media Summit confirmation that its 120GB Xbox 360 Elite videogames console will be hitting European shores on August 24.

The Elite’s 120GB hard drive represents a massive storage jump from the 20GB Premium Xbox 360 currently available throughout Europe, and is to be the precursor to the arrival of Microsoft’s popular Video Marketplace download service.

Both the 120GB Elite and Video Marketplace are already available to Xbox 360 owners in the US, and Microsoft has now said it is immersed in talks regarding the integration of the download service for European audiences.

A Telegraph.co.uk article reports that the Video Marketplace would allow users to download movie (and television) content both quickly and cheaply, which could well have a detrimental effect on regular DVD sales and rentals.

Source: tech.monstersandcritics.com

Microsoft movie downloads will harm DVD sales?

Concerns surrounding the future of DVD are arising this week following

Microsoft’s E3 Business & Media Summit confirmation that its 120GB

Xbox 360 Elite videogames console will be hitting European shores on

August 24.

The Elite’s 120GB hard drive represents a massive storage jump from

the 20GB Premium Xbox 360 currently available throughout Europe, and is

to be the precursor to the arrival of Microsoft’s popular Video

Marketplace download service.

Both the 120GB Elite and Video Marketplace are already available to

Xbox 360 owners in the US, and Microsoft has now said it is immersed in

talks regarding the integration of the download service for European

audiences.

A Telegraph.co.uk article reports that the Video Marketplace would

allow users to download movie (and television) content both quickly and

cheaply, which could well have a detrimental effect on regular DVD

sales and rentals.

Redmond-based Microsoft has said that it’s currently talking with

leading movie suppliers such as Disney, Paramount, and Warner Bros. in

order to secure plenty of Video Marketplace content prior to the

service’s official European launch – which is expected before the close

of 2007. The American software behemoth is also communicating with

television broadcasters (including the BBC) to widen the service’s

scope to popular TV programming too.

Poetro's blog

Monday, July 30, 2007

Eddie Murphy's Not So Spicy Engagement

YouTube anti-piracy tool due sometime in the fall

The Wireless World Up for Grabs

Northwest Airlines pilots stay home; 200 flights dropped

Google vs Jimmy Wales & Open Source Search

X-48B flight a milestone for program

"Yeah!" singer cancels his wedding with Foster

Latest Potter breaks records around world

Friday, July 27, 2007

Sprint embraces Google, hints at an open network

Intel says EU made errors in antitrust charges

Rowling wept for Potter

Thursday, July 26, 2007

What it took to hack the iPhone

Sony profit more than triples on digicam, yen

Jessica Alba's phone break-up

Digg signs advertising deal with Microsoft

Lohan declares her innocence

FCC Leans Toward One-Third Plan for Open Access

'Hundred-Dollar Laptop' Is Revolutionary, Amazing

Don't be alarmed: 29,000 sex offenders on MySpace

Friday, July 20, 2007

Silicon Knights sues Epic Games

Google Earnings Up 28% but Miss Expectations

Monday, July 16, 2007

Our new house

Web DJs silenced by royalty fees

Thursday, July 12, 2007

Slimmer PSP on its way

Microsoft movie downloads will harm DVD sales?

Microsoft movie downloads will harm DVD sales?

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