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17th April 2009 Archive

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  • Microsoft accepts US antitrust oversight extension

    'Appropriate and necessary'

    Microsoft had agreed to an 18-month extension of federal court oversight of its business practices mandated by its settlement in a landmark antitrust lawsuit. In court papers jointly filed by the US Justice Department and 17 states, Microsoft agreed to extend supervision until May 2011, rather than in November as previously …

    Business 17 Apr 2009, 00:28

  • Analyst postpones PC industry recovery

    Dell takes a tumble

    Don't get too optimistic about a potential recovery in the global PC market. Gartner said Thursday that while there are signs the PC channel is restocking its inventory following an abysmal first quarter, this should not be taken as a revival in sales. Research director George Shiffle said: "[It] should not be interpreted as …

    Business 17 Apr 2009, 00:29

  • Prepare for Apple's self-resizing iPhone interface

    Shake vigorously, stand well back

    Apple has filed a patent that could see the iPhone and iPod touch interfaces adjust the size of their elements in response to motion. The filing, entitled Variable Device Graphical User Interface, describes a self-adjusting user interface that would make it easier to hit the right touch-screen commands when walking, jogging, …

    Mobile 17 Apr 2009, 00:30

  • Jedi officers enlist with Scottish police

    These are not the crims you're looking for

    Scotland's largest police force employs a significant number of Jedi to ensure peace and justice this side of the Galactic Republic. Eight Strathclyde police officers and two of its civilian staff have claimed their religion as Jedi in voluntary diversity forms, the BBC reports. The monastic order of Jedi Knights working in …

    Bootnotes 17 Apr 2009, 00:41

  • Carphone Warehouse blocks union website

    Eats, shoots and leaflets

    Carphone Warehouse employees at the Irlam site were unable to get to their union website yesterday, as Carphoneworker.co.uk found itself on the list of unapproved sites for publishing information about forthcoming shift changes. Only workers at the Irlam site were denied access to the site - the rest of the company could …

    Mobile 17 Apr 2009, 06:02

  • Tory 'terror' affair shows danger of ubiquitous surveillance

    Comment Central database will 'modernise' mole hunts

    Few will be surprised by the verdict of the Home Affairs Select Committee on the Damian Green affair. But the conclusion to the debacle is a useful and timely illustration of the threat to democracy posed by the forthcoming Interception Modernisation Programme (IMP). A delayed consultation on its proposals, one of which is a …

    Law 17 Apr 2009, 08:02

  • Councils to lose some spy powers

    The end for super pooper-scooper snoopers?

    Home Secretary Jacqui Smith has opened a public consultation on how snooping laws should be used by local authorities The Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act, or RIPA, is the set of rules which governs how secret services can snoop on UK citizens. In recent years it has also been used, in a small percentage of cases, by …

    Government 17 Apr 2009, 08:21

  • Pirate Bay co-founder claims 'we lost'

    BrokeP distributes unreleased Pirate verdict

    The Pirate Bay has lost the trial against the entertainment industry according to co-founder Peter Sunde, who cites a “trustworthy source”. Sunde, also known as BrokeP, said he was given “leaked information” last night. The verdict is expected within the next hour, however, so we'll soon see just how "trustworthy" his source …

    Law 17 Apr 2009, 08:48

  • Ford faces tax bill for unsold cars

    VAT's gotta hurt

    A court ruling has thrown into doubt a company's right to reclaim VAT relating to goods that it later repossessed. The ruling could undermine the usefulness of businesses retaining the right to repossess goods they supply to other businesses. The Court of Appeal has told car maker Ford that it could not escape liability for …

    Small Biz 17 Apr 2009, 09:11

  • Boeing: Raygun dreadnoughts will rule the oceans by 2019

    Missiles, laser sharks simply nowhere

    US aerospace mammoth Boeing has made a bold announcement, saying that it will "transform naval warfare in the next decade" by developing powerful warship raygun turrets able to blast enemy missiles and aircraft out of the sky from afar. The arms globocorp said yesterday that it has been awarded an initial $6.9m contract in a …

    Science 17 Apr 2009, 09:16

  • Peugeot's on-road, off-road ‘leccy ATV

    'Leccy Tech Also suitable for Moon landings

    The internet’s awash with wacky conceptual designs for ‘leccy vehicles of one form or another. But Register Hardware’s come across one that would surely steal the hearts and minds of many: the Peugeot Capsule. The Peugeot Capsule: an on-road and off-road 'leccy ATV concept Dreamt up by South African industrial designer Alp …

    Science 17 Apr 2009, 09:25

  • Pirate Bay loses trial: defendants face prison time, hefty fines

    Co-founders will appeal decision

    It's official - the four defendants in The Pirate Bay versus entertainment industry trial have been found guilty in a Swedish court of being accessories to breaching copyright laws. The verdict was handed down to four men behind the notorious BitTorrent tracker site this morning in a court in Stockholm. "The Stockholm …

    Law 17 Apr 2009, 09:39

  • MotionPlus not backwards compatible, Nintendo confirms

    No extra motion sensitivity for Wii Fit, et al

    Gamers hoping to use the upcoming MotionPlus peripheral with some of their existing Wii titles are in for a disappointment, because Nintendo’s confirmed that the add-on won’t be backwards compatible. In an announcement the firm disappointing said that it currently has “no plans to make it [MotionPlus] compatible with existing …

    Games 17 Apr 2009, 09:47

  • Police, Cameras, Inaction!

    Comment Being filmed never worried Morse

    It's finally official: Photographing police officers up to no good is an offence under anti-Terror legislation. At least that’s the view expressed by one copper up in Enfield this week: and any member of the public who has the gall to train a lens in the direction of our Boys in Blue is likely to find themselves stopped, …

    Law 17 Apr 2009, 10:23

  • Swedish woman charged over 'stun gun castration attempt'

    Questions raised on eunuch.org - but not much else

    A Swedish man allegedly narrowly escaped castration by his former girlfriend, after he dodged the enraged ex's opening shot from an electric stun gun. The Local.se reports that the man had met with his ex to arrange the retrieval of some of his belongings. When he arrived though, he quickly realised the 26 year old woman from …

    Bootnotes 17 Apr 2009, 10:27

  • Rogues besmirch F-Secure with dodgy ad campaign

    Dirty deeds done dirt cheap

    Miscreants have attempted to trick users interested in finding out more about Finnish security firm F-secure into buying a rogue utility. Searching for "F-Secure" on Thursday lead to the rogue products, not through the usual method of black-hat Search Engine Optimization but through malicious Google ads. The dodgy ads pointed …

    Security 17 Apr 2009, 10:37

  • NetApp coughs up $128m to close over-charging case

    Gets US Gov off its back

    NetApp has formally agreed to pay $128m to the US General Services Administration to end over-charging accusations relating to US government agencies' purchases of NetApp products and services. The GSA was owed the best discounts offered by NetApp to its private sector clients under the Price Reduction Clause Provisions terms …

    The Channel 17 Apr 2009, 10:52

  • Epson gets into interactive coffee tables

    It's not Surface, honest!

    Watch out Microsoft Surface, because there’s a new touch-sensitive interactive coffee table in town: the X-Desk. Can't see the video? Download Flash Player from Adobe.com Much like Surface, X-Desk lets users interact with digital content through a flat 1024 x 768, 52in multi-touch screen that can also communicate with …

    Hardware 17 Apr 2009, 10:58

  • BOFH: Grand Theft Auto

    Episode 5 The streets of London are paved with opportunity

    "So what I'd like to know," the Boss seethes, "is what the hell took you so long?" "What do you mean 'so long'?" the PFY asks, sounding a little hurt. "You left here FIVE HOURS AGO to pick up a replacement toner cartridge!" "Yeah but..." "TWO OF YOU! IN MY CAR!" "You offered it!" I add. "But in any case we needed to be …

    BOFH 17 Apr 2009, 11:00

  • Altec Lansing inMotion Max iPhone speaker

    Review Portability and power?

    The world is not exactly short of portable iPod speaker systems, ranging from the merely adequate - such as Logitech's Pure-Fi Anywhere - to the rather good - such as Intempo's InSession. Generally, they sell for about £100, are about the size of a large house brick and produce a sound that while fine for the odd hour or two in …

    Hardware 17 Apr 2009, 11:02

  • Sony-Ericsson calls time on another 2,000 jobs

    Tosh cuts staff, forecasts

    Struggling mobile maker Sony-Ericsson is cutting another 2,000 jobs as the recession continues to bite. The handset maker expects to spend €200m on redundancy payments to those staff. It has already laid off 2,000 people at a cost of €187m, less than the €300m expected. Results for the last quarter showed a 35 per cent fall …

    Mobile 17 Apr 2009, 11:11

  • BT chief: People don't need fibre to the home

    Digital Britain Summit Ford not Ferrari for you

    BT chief executive Ian Livingstone defended his firm's limited plans for faster broadband today, arguing there is not enough demand for fibre to the home to justify its cost. He was appearing on a panel with his opposite numbers at Virgin Media and O2 at the Digital Britain summit this morning. "Of course a Ferrari is faster …

    Broadband 17 Apr 2009, 11:15

  • Doughnut balloon-chute spaceships to reach Mars, Neptune

    Rocket braking is so retro <cough>

    NASA-funded R&D engineers are working on plans for future spaceships to enter orbit around Mars using a doughnut shaped, steerable balloon-chute to slow down by flying through the Red Planet's atmosphere. Nobody believed Zralthar about the doughnut ships from Earth, until it was too late. Global Aerospace is a Californian …

    Science 17 Apr 2009, 11:26

  • Sony demos 21in XEL-2

    Sadly just a prototype

    The miniscule 11in screen on Sony’s XEL-1 OLED TV has always the main bugbear for critics. So the electronics giant’s demoed a much larger version. Sony's latest OLED measures 21in At a recent technology show in its native Japan, Sony showcased a 21-in OLED screen that – although still a prototype without an official name …

    Hardware 17 Apr 2009, 11:37

  • Pirate Bay fans: Lay off our neo-Nazi Sugar Daddy

    Mail Whatever you do, don't mention Lundstrom

    On Friday we learnt the verdict on the Pirate Bay trial in Stockholm. Whilst the Pirate four were hit with jail time and fines, the legal fisticuffs are nowhere near over, with the newly convicted quartet vowing to appeal the decision all the way to the European Court. One of the four defendants, Carl Lundstrom, has more than …

    Media 17 Apr 2009, 12:06

  • Facebook vote a 'massive con trick' says privacy advocate

    Conspiracy theory? No-one saw that coming

    Facebook has deliberately changed the rules around its much-hyped "user vote" to ensure that it won't have to follow decisions made. The company originally said that if 25 per cent of users voted in favour of a change in its terms and conditions it would consider that binding. But that percentage has now gone up to 30 per cent …

    Applications 17 Apr 2009, 12:17

  • Google puts Chrome tabs on options list

    Web page thumbnails no longer default

    Google has updated its tab feature in Chrome, allowing users of the open source browser to remove web page thumbnails. Previously the option came in default mode. The uncooked software, which is available via Google's preview channel, was given the 2.0.174.0 update yesterday. Google Chrome program manager, Anthony Laforge, …

    Applications 17 Apr 2009, 12:19

  • Wikimedia becomes latest to ban Phorm

    They'd have made a lovely couple

    The Wikimedia Foundation has asked Phorm to exclude all its domains and websites - including Wikipedia - from Phorm's BT trials, because it considers such scanning to be an infringement of its users' privacy. Phorm's automated reply said it was likely the ban would go into effect within 48 hours. Earlier this week Amazon took …

    Broadband 17 Apr 2009, 12:49

  • Tough on e-vehicles, tough on the causes of e-vehicles

    The DfT pretends to have an electric car strategy

    Tough on e-vehicles, tough on the causes of e-vehicles? The Government's ultra-low carbon vehicles strategy,* unveiled this week, seems at best a mechanism for keeping UK electric car development in a holding pattern for the next decade, and at worst a cunning, albeit inadvertent, plan to miss the boat entirely. There will be …

    Science 17 Apr 2009, 12:59

  • HP packing workers seal bosses in conference room

    French workers box clever in jobs row

    Workers bossnapped five execs at a French logistics plant yesterday, amidst anger at HP's decision to switch printer packaging activities to Malaysia. Workers at FM Logistics at Woippy in NE France are angry that 400 jobs are set to go at the firm, after HP, a major customer, decided to shift its printer packing business from …

    Bootnotes 17 Apr 2009, 13:01

  • Dixon of Threadneedle Street plan threatens confusion

    Hosing down cybercrims with alphabet soup

    City of London police are to trial the use of specialist squads to tackle data theft and other crimes against business. Three pilot units of specialist officers will begin work next month, tackling problems ranging from data theft to terrorism. Each squad will feature five officers trained in tackling different forms of crime …

    Security 17 Apr 2009, 13:08

  • Pirate Bay guilty verdict: Now what?

    Setting sail for the Supreme Court

    The four men behind BitTorrent tracker website The Pirate Bay were handed stiff sentences of one year each this morning and ordered to stump up $3.6m in damages to the entertainment industry. The judgment may come as a short, sharp shock for members of the sprawling file sharing community. But the site will almost certainly …

    Law 17 Apr 2009, 13:56

  • iPhone beta OS cracks before release

    Freetards rejoice, but for how long?

    Those devoted to cracking Apple's iPhone have outdone themselves, breaking the latest beta release of version 3.0 of the OS within a couple of days and well before anyone outside the testing community is even using the software. Version 3 of the iPhone OS offers distinct improvements, including the much-discussed cut-and-paste …

    Mobile 17 Apr 2009, 14:04

  • 'Soon soldiers will have 3 tiny choppers in their pocket'

    Norwegian 'Black Hornet' shown off outdoors

    Top Norwegian microcopter boffins say they have now successfully tested the fagpacket-sized PD-100 Black Hornet vidcam whirlybird - outdoors. The firm has also released video of the tiny aircraft in indoor flight tests: The PD-100 isn't the same as your common-or-garden cheapo remote control toy copter, great as those are …

    Science 17 Apr 2009, 14:22

  • Fujitsu creates self-nuking Flash drive

    This drive will self-destruct in 5, 4...

    Fujitsu has developed a USB memory stick ideal for anyone prone to mistakenly leaving sensitive documents lying around on trains. Why? Because this Flash drive has a self-destruct mode. Fujitsu's drive deletes itself The secure USB drive is still a prototype, but Fujitsu said the storage device – which also contains a …

    Hardware 17 Apr 2009, 14:28

  • Symbian balances on an Atom

    Because its there

    Some chaps at Symbian with way too much time on their hands have compiled the current version of the OS onto an Intel Atom processor - proving that you don't have to follow the ARM road to Symbian nirvana. The chaps concerned work for "S60 in Symbian Customer Operations" and did the port to see if it would work, and if anyone …

    Mobile 17 Apr 2009, 14:54

  • Doc invents videogame sedation headset

    Just for kids, though

    Drugging kids as they play on Game Boys is an odd and slightly creepy thought. But a gadget’s been invented that does just that. PediSedate: chill out while playing videogames The PediSedate headset has been designed to help calm children before, say, going under the dentist’s drill or before a serious operation. It’s also …

    Games 17 Apr 2009, 15:22

  • Universal Music chief renews commitment to P2P battle

    Digital Britain Summit Pirate Bay founders down, more to go

    On the day of his industry's victory against the operators of the world's biggest BitTorrent hub, Universal Music chief Lucien Grainge signalled the battle against illegal filesharing will continue in earnest. He was speaking at the Digital Britain summit in London hours after the the Pirate Bay's four founders were handed …

    Media 17 Apr 2009, 15:44

  • Twitter worm author gets security job

    Teen causes chaos, employed, hacked

    The self-confessed author of the recent Twitter worm has scored a potentially lucrative job doing security analysis and web development work. Michael "Mikeyy" Mooney, a 17 year-old student from Brooklyn, New York, created a worm that exploited cross-site scripting vulnerabilities in a ham-fisted attempt to promote a site he …

    Security 17 Apr 2009, 15:52

  • Homeless Frank and Microsoft's cookie-cutter PC campaign

    How Windows lost the world

    When Disney or McDonald's advertise to children, they know they aren't just getting one purchase - the child - by targeting the parents' emotional weak spot. They are getting multiple sales: as the whole family will go to Disney World or buy their fast food, meaning two, three, four times as much money. It's a simple trick: …

    Operating Systems 17 Apr 2009, 18:10

  • Conficker botnet wake up call only pinged zombie minority

    Resident evil

    The effective size of the Conficker botnet might be far smaller than previously thought. Last week machines infected with the latest variant of Conficker began to download additional components - files associated with the rogue anti-malware application SpywareProtect2009 and a notorious botnet client, Waledac - via the worm's …

    Security 17 Apr 2009, 18:14

  • Football lottery scam targets UK punters

    Big Cup con

    Fans of Chelsea, Arsenal and Manchester United are being targeted in a new email scam that attempts to trick recipients into sending premium rate text-messages in the hope of winning non-existent Champions League final ticket prizes. The ruse promises entry in a draw for a chance of a seat at the Stadio Olimpico on 27 May but …

    Security 17 Apr 2009, 18:17

  • Recession takes chunk out of game sales

    Finally feels pinch

    "Recession-proof" ain't what it used to be. First Google's secret money making machine starts coughing up smoke, and now the video games industry takes a hit. What's next, recession? Rainbows and unicorns going broke? March sales for the games industry as a whole dropped 17 per cent compared to a year ago, according to NPD …

    Media 17 Apr 2009, 18:23

  • Microsoft targets Barmy Army with Silverlight

    Broad front, not deep pockets

    Microsoft was embarrassed when Major League Baseball dumped Silverlight, the company's fledging browser-based media player it had signed onto in less than a year. It was the second blow to Silverlight. NBC - who'd used Silverlight to stream its Olympics coverage - picked Adobe Systems' Flash for its online NFL coverage last …

    Applications 17 Apr 2009, 19:43

  • Verizon eyes future iPhones

    4G possibility

    Don't expect the largest mobile telecom carrier in the US to add the iPhone to its stable of smartphones - at least until the next generation of wireless-broadband technology comes of age. Verizon's chairman and chief executive Ivan Seidenberg has told The Wall Street Journal it's unlikely that Apple would ever build an iPhone …

    Networks 17 Apr 2009, 19:45

  • Brutish SSH attacks continue to bear fruit

    Blame the noobs

    The number of attacks against secure shells protecting Linux boxes, internet routers and other network devices has continued to climb over the past several years, an indication that they still bear fruit for the miscreants who mount them. Data collected by DShield.org, a organization that aggregates firewall logs from across …

    Security 17 Apr 2009, 20:15

  • Boffins build super-accurate atomic clock

    300 million years without winding

    The atomic clocks currently used for regulating international time zones are great and all, but who has the time every few million years to adjust them? Fortunately, physicists in the US have figured out how to control seemingly "forbidden" collisions between neutral strontium atoms to make a clock that neither loses nor gains …

    Science 17 Apr 2009, 21:34

  • Hackers stuff ballot box for Time Magazine's top 100 poll

    'World's most influential' list is mooted

    Time Magazine's poll of the 100 most influential people has been hacked by a motley band of online troublemakers who have managed to manipulate the top 21 names so their first letters spell "marblecake, also the game." According to an inside account detailed by blogger Paul Lamere, members of the 4chan website exploited …

    Media 17 Apr 2009, 23:07

  • Storage systems slot into Vegas line-up

    Nehalem RAID among NAB debut

    A broad array of storage devices - from an 8U storage server powered by dual Intel Xeon 5500s to a multi-slot memory card reader/writer with four eSATA ports - will debut at next week's National Association of Broadcasters' 2009 NAB Show in Las Vegas. The just-released Stirling X888 scalable storage server from Aberdeen is the …

    Hardware 17 Apr 2009, 23:09

  • Harvard Prof.'s hearing against RIAA can't be streamed online

    Appeals court reverses web broadcast decision

    The local rules of the land will keep the Recording Industry of America (RIAA) free from having their high-profile case against Joel Tenenbaum broadcast live over the internet, a federal appeals court in Boston has ruled. The First US Circuit Court of Appeals has blocked a trial judge from letting streaming coverage of the …

    Media 17 Apr 2009, 23:49