31st December 2010 Archive

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10 top New Year's Eve party apps for iPhone, iPad, iPod touch

Eats, drinks, tunes, games

New Year's Eve is party night – and who better to spend that celebratory evening with than your constant companion, one that has served you well throughout the year? No, we don't mean your spouse or significant other. We're talking about your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch. Before you accuse us of kinkiness or fanboi device- …

Music and Media 31 Dec 02:26
Western Digital My Book Live Nas box

Review Homelan security?

Western Digital’s My Book line of drives spans nearly all areas of external storage, supporting fast modern interfaces from FireWire 800 and eSATA to USB 3.0. Yet the My Book Live is network drive and, in terms of connectivity, sports nothing more than a DC input and a gigabit Ethernet port. Silent running: Western Digital My …

reghardware 31 Dec 07:00
Vote now to name killer PARIS space cocktail

Hyperglycaemic concoction to celebrate playmonaut antics

The time has come for you, our beloved readers, to name the diabetic-busting PARIS cocktail lovingly concocted in honour of our space plane triumph. Those of you with nerves and livers of steel can find details of how to rustle up your very own hyperglycaemic brew right here, and here's our heroic Playmonaut enjoying the end …

PARIS 31 Dec 10:15
Chinese bot will slurp your Droid

Evil 'game' can also zombenate victims

A Trojan capable of stealing data from infected Android smartphones, and bundled with botnet-style functionality, has appeared in China. The mobile malware, dubbed Geinimi, which usually poses as gaming applications, has been uploaded onto third-party Chinese Android app markets. If installed, the malware sends personal data …

Malware 31 Dec 10:54
UK.gov relaxes patent application process

Enormous backlog to be plopped onto files

The UK government has rejigged the process for filing patents in Europe, which the Intellectual Property Minister Baroness Wilcox said would help bring down costs for Blighty's businesses. From 1 January 2011 anyone supplying paperwork to the European Patent Office (EPO) will be able to do so with fewer documents than had been …

Channel Register 31 Dec 11:11
BT fibre-up-your-exchange poll in 6-way Mugabe style pileup

'Race to Infinity' to end at midnight? Dictionary FAIL

Today is the last day of BT's "Race to Infinity" broadband upgrade competition, and the result already looks improbable. BT launched the competition in early October, offering small towns and villages nationwide the chance to win a fibre upgrade for their local exchange. Any community overlooked by the firm's commercial …

Telecoms 31 Dec 11:26
US woman sues again over XP 'downgrade', seeks class action

Together we can stop this somewhat improved steamroller!

A US woman who earlier this year unsuccessfully tried to sue Microsoft for allegedly charging her extra to downgrade from Windows Vista to XP has brought another lawsuit against the software giant. Emma Alvarado of Los Angeles, California, filed a complaint in a federal court last week, reports Computer World. She has now …

Channel Register 31 Dec 11:56
Civil servants touted ID cards to friends, family as flop loomed

Well-founded fears led to ignominious effort

Civil servants were asked to encourage their family and friends to sign up for a now-defunct ID cards amid Whitehall fears the scheme would flop, confidential documents have revealed. The documents, reported today by the Daily Telegraph following a Freedom of Information Act request, show how senior officials were urged to act …

Government 31 Dec 12:27
MySpace employees face uncertain 2011

Up to half for chop as News Corp seeks buyer

Beleaguered News Corp web property MySpace reportedly looks set to plan significant lay-offs in the New Year. But given the recent comments coming from the company's own COO Chase Carey, who in November this year admitted “We’ve been clear that MySpace has been a problem,” it's hardly surprising that rumours about potential …

Financial News 31 Dec 12:56
Honda US cops to vast data snaffle from marketing firm

What comes of trusting PRs

Honda US has written to customers following a data breach that led to the exposure of million of customer records. Hackers made off with a database containing names, email addresses, and Vehicle Identification Numbers (the unique ID for cars) of 2.2 million Honda customers following an attack on an unnamed third-party …

Crime 31 Dec 13:29
British-born NASA astronaut Piers Sellers becomes OBE

'Tremendous honour', says immigrant space ace

A British-born spaceman has been appointed an OBE in the Queen's New Year Honours List. Dr Piers Sellers has been honoured for his services to science, reports the BBC. The astronaut has flown on three space shuttle missions, with his most recent one taking place this year. He was on board the space shuttle Atlantis, STS-132 …

Space 31 Dec 13:56
Anonymous hacktivists fire ion cannons at Zimbabwe

Fun loving criminals weigh into Mr and Mrs Mugabe

Pro-WikiLeaks hacktivists have launched a denial of service attack against government websites in Zimbabwe. Websites belonging to the Zimbabwe government and Robert Mugabe's ZANU-PF party were blitzed by junk traffic during the latest phase of the Operation Avenge Assange campaign by the anarchic Anonymous collective. The …

Crime 31 Dec 13:59
China announces Skype ban to protect telco revenues

No place in People's Republic for imperialist P2P

China has banned Skype and other Western VoIP providers in a move designed to stop the services from eroding the profits of traditional telecoms operators in the country, China Telecom and China Unicom. The decision was made by the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology but no date for its implementation was …

VoIP 31 Dec 14:52
Groupon drops $500m in piggy bank, eyes world hungrily

Still looking for $450m, mind

Groupon confirmed yesterday that it has already raised more than half of the $950m it is seeking in a monster equity funding round. The Chicago-based ecommerce coupon website, which recently shunned a $6bn takeover plan from Google, said in a US Securities and Exchange Commission filing on Thursday that it had cobbled together …

Financial News 31 Dec 16:02
Facebook stat flood gives hope to mateless, dateless

Plus: what 'bookers do every 20 minutes

If you're moping around, lonely and dateless this New Year's Eve, you can take heart in a new statistic that proves there are, indeed, plenty of available fish in the proverbial sea: 43,869,800 people changed their status to "single" on Facebook in 2010. Get on the phone. It's not too late. That cheering stat was one of many …

Music and Media 31 Dec 18:05
Apple patent endangers unbiased product reviews

Replaces reviewers with predictors

Apple has filed a patent application for an online-store product-review system that turns the ideal of unbiased product evaluation on its head. "The present invention relates to electronic commerce," the application reads, "and more specifically to using the collective wisdom of a community to predict rankings for items for …

Music and Media 31 Dec 20:53
iPad's biggest rival? Microsoft's dead Courier

Open...and Shut Redmond, it's time for resurrection

Apple's iPad has been criticized as a super-sized version of the iPhone. While that criticism is mostly correct, it falls short in one key area: it's a heck of a lot easier to input information into an iPhone than into an iPad. The reason? The iPad's virtual keyboard doesn't fit any familiar mode of content creation. The …

Music and Media 31 Dec 22:24