Domain: aftenposten.no
Stories and comments across the archive that link to aftenposten.no.
Stories · 29
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Piracy Rates Plummet As Legal Alternatives Come To Norway
jones_supa writes "Entertainment industry groups in Norway have spent years lobbying for tougher anti-piracy laws, finally getting their way earlier this month. But with fines and site-blocking now on the agenda, an interesting trend has been developing. According to a new report published by Ipsos, between 2008 and 2012 piracy of movies and TV shows collapsed in Norway, along with music seeing a massive drop to less than one fifth of the original level. Olav Torvund, former law professor at the University of Oslo, attributes this to good legal alternatives which are available today (Google translation of Norwegian original). Of those questioned for the survey, 47% (representing around 1.7 million people) said they use a streaming music service such as Spotify. And of those, just over half said that they pay for the premium option." -
Piracy Rates Plummet As Legal Alternatives Come To Norway
jones_supa writes "Entertainment industry groups in Norway have spent years lobbying for tougher anti-piracy laws, finally getting their way earlier this month. But with fines and site-blocking now on the agenda, an interesting trend has been developing. According to a new report published by Ipsos, between 2008 and 2012 piracy of movies and TV shows collapsed in Norway, along with music seeing a massive drop to less than one fifth of the original level. Olav Torvund, former law professor at the University of Oslo, attributes this to good legal alternatives which are available today (Google translation of Norwegian original). Of those questioned for the survey, 47% (representing around 1.7 million people) said they use a streaming music service such as Spotify. And of those, just over half said that they pay for the premium option." -
Ask Slashdot: How To Bypass Gov't Spying On Cellphones?
First time accepted submitter jarle.aase writes "It's doable today to use a mix of virtual machines, VPN, TOR, encryption (and staying away from certain places; like Google Plus, Facebook, and friends), in order to retain a reasonable degree of privacy. In recent days, even major mainstream on-line magazines have published such information. (Aftenposten, one of the largest newspapers in Norway, had an article yesterday about VPN, Tor and Freenet!) But what about the cell-phone? Technically it's not hard to design a phone that can switch off the GSM transmitter, and use VoIP for calls. VoIP could then go from the device through Wi-Fi and VPN. Some calls may be routed trough PSTN gateways — allowing the agencies to track the other party. But they will not track your location. And they will not track pure, encrypted VoIP calls that traverse trough VPN and use anonymous SIP or XMPP accounts. Android may not be the best software for such a device, as it very eagerly phones home. The same is true for iOS and Windows 8. Actually, I would prefer a non cloud-based mobile OS from a vendor that is not in the PRISM gallery. Does such a device exist yet? Something that runs a relatively safe OS, where GSM can be switched totally off? Something that will only make an outgoing network connection when I ask it to do so?" And in the absence of a perfect solution, what do you do instead? (It's still Android and using the cell network, but Red Phone — open sourced last year — seems like a good start.) -
Record Meteorite Hits Norway
equex256 writes "Early Wednesday morning, a meteorite streaked across the sky in northern Norway, near Finland and Russia. A witness (Article in Norwegian) went up the mountain to where it hit and reported seeing large boulders that had fallen out of the mountainside, along with many broken trees. Norwegian astronomer Knut Jørgen Røed Ødegaard told Aftenposten, Norway's largest newspaper, that he would compare the explosive force of the impact with the Hiroshima bomb. This meteorite is suspected to be much larger than the 90-kilo (198-pound) meteorite which hit Alta in 1904, previously recognized as the largest to hit Norway. From the article: 'Røed Ødegaard said the meteorite was visible to an area of several hundred kilometers despite the brightness of the midnight sunlit summer sky. The meteorite hit a mountainside in Reisadalen in North Troms.'" -
ITMS Faces Complaint From Norwegian Ombudsman
Whiney Mac Fanboy writes "Following the French Bill that threatened Apple's iTunes service in France, the iTunes music store is facing more uncertainty in Scandinavia. According to a report in Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten, Norway's Consumer Ombudsman has filed a complaint with Apple's music download sales service iTunes, arguing that the transaction terms violate Norwegian law. The Register is also reporting this story:, saying a contract cannot be regulated by English law, rather than Norwegian law, so iTunes must accept responsibility for damage its software may do, and said it is unreasonable to alter terms and conditions after a song has been sold. Consumer Council told the Reg: 'The Consumer Council has asked Apple to respond as to whether iTunes should work on other platforms - they have until 21 June to respond. After that the Ombudsman is likely to set another deadline and then start fining the company.' The BPI (Britain's RIAA equivalent) has also called upon Apple to license Fairplay." -
"DVD-Jon" Demands Compensation
orzetto writes "Jon Lech Johansen, known as DVD-Jon, and aquitted in a trial in Norway, after being accused of infringement for making a GUI for DeCSS, is now demanding that Norwegian Oekokrim pay for all the time and money he has lost to the trial, claiming 150,000 NOK (about 17,500 euros)." -
"DVD-Jon" Demands Compensation
orzetto writes "Jon Lech Johansen, known as DVD-Jon, and aquitted in a trial in Norway, after being accused of infringement for making a GUI for DeCSS, is now demanding that Norwegian Oekokrim pay for all the time and money he has lost to the trial, claiming 150,000 NOK (about 17,500 euros)." -
DVD-Jon Completely Clear
A reader writes: "The case against DVD-Jon was finally ended today. DVD-Jon won the first trial on the 6th of January 2003. The Norwegian Okokrim appealed but Jon also won the new trial the 22. December. It was expected that Okokrim would appeal this decission to the Supreme Court, but today Nettavisen is reporting that Okokrim have decided not to pursue the case further. No news in English yet, but they will probably be there soon. I guess the news will be on in English soon." Okokrim is the Norwegian equivalent to the RIAA here in the States - and yes, Virginia, this means DVD back-up is fully legal in Norway. Spelling updates - thanks, Disillusioned. -
DeCSS: Jon Johansen Acquitted In Retrial
EssJay writes "DVD-Jon is acquitted in the retrial. The verdict was expected in January, but was announced today in the papers." We had posted about the retrial beginning - it's a good holiday present to get this early. -
Slashback: Hilbert's, Transgenic, Silicon
Slashback tonight with another round of updates and corrections to recent stories, including transgenic fish, Hilbert's 16th problem, Microsoft's FAT patent plans, Utah's hyped public fiber network, and more. Read on for the details.Still an acorn at this point. Jose Nazario writes with a correction to my recent post claiming that OpenBSD had gained a "fuzzy" user-profiling IDS. Jose writes: "It is NOT in tree. it is a privately developed research project. It is not an official project."
And Yes, the Apple I schematics were available, too. In response to the recent article about the freely available chip design from opencores.org implemented by Flextronics, Henry Keultjes offers a reminder that this is not the first time chip whose internals have been open for inspection:
"Happened quite some time ago with PowerPC. That's the essence of Microsoft's deal with IBM because without that Open Architecture Microsoft would have had to buy a lot more than it did. This for example is used in a roughly $150 French set-top box that has USB and, according to a friend in the UK who has tried that, runs just fine as a PC with the attached USB HDD, KB and rodent."
Could Wayne Inouye sell you an eMachine? After reading many pointed comments in the story about eMachine's Athlon offerings, arrasmith writes "To add to the topic of AMD64 eMachines and the launch of "I hate eMachine" posts I'll throw out why you should buy one.
eMachines are the number-3 seller of computers, only behind Dell and HP. If you are wondering about how that happened, you need to read about the new CEO.
Wayne Inouye has had some articles published about him in Business Week and Forbes. Great articles on how you can sell good computers at reasonable prices. And if you are wondering why eMachines is selling an AMD64 system read the Business Week article."
OK, as long as you buy it from us. Alien54 writes "As reported in the most recent Spyware Info Newsletter, Dell seems to have listened to the criticism handed to them last week, after their decision to forbid tech support persons from providing assistance to spyware-infected customers became public knowledge. They have partnered with PestPatrol, Inc. to sell Pest Patrol's spyware removal software to Dell customers. It is interesting to note that Dell does not recommend any freeware or shareware product because 'we cannot test these open source utilities reliably.' Which is simply silly, of course."
Utah may not be Utopia after all. brysnot writes "The Salt Lake Tribune reports that the Utopia project, which plans to run fiber to every home in Utah, has miscalculated its 2003 budget and now needs each member cities to come up with an additional $250,000. Also reported is that 'Its largest member, Salt Lake City, is uncertain whether to provide financial backing to guarantee payment of the principal and interest on the bonds the project needs -- a development that could force the project to be scaled back.'"
Writes Lighthop "The best way to overcome Qwest's vast resources and well orchestrated opposition is for citizens and business owners to speak out and let their city council members know we support them in approving UTOPIA's funding. We have to be visible and give them some political cover.
The 18 UTOPIA member cities are Brigham City, Cedar City, Cedar Hills, Centerville, Layton, Lindon, Midvale, Murray, Orem, Payson, Perry, Riverton, Roy, Salt Lake City, South Jordan, Taylorsville, Tremonton and West Valley."
Hilbert's 16th is still a problem. commodoresloat writes "The work of Elin Oxenhielm, the 22-year old Swedish student who apparently solved part of the 16th Hilbert problem, is coming under heavy fire from some prominent mathematicians, including her own adviser, who said the work contained "serious mistakes, which I think any educated mathematician can easily see." Here's an article in English. Oxenhielm responded to the criticism by saying that the journal that accepted her work, which now owns the copyright, is responsible for any errors. More information on this weblog."
Periscope is up, showdown commences. McSpew writes "The Register states that Microsoft's patents on the FAT filesystem may be subject to new scrutiny, thanks to their announced plan to collect royalties from media and CE manufacturers. The Public Patent Foundation is behind the effort to get the USPTO to start from scratch with Microsoft's FAT patents."
FDA gives GM fish sales the eerie green light. fishfishfish writes "The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Tuesday released a statement saying that it will not be stopping the sale of transgenic Zebra danios in the USA. The move could allow fish retailers in any U.S. state to sell the fish. Apart from California, where Arnie has banned them..."
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Caffeine Level In Sea Causes Concern
DarkHand writes "Researchers at the Norwegian Institute for Air Research (NILU) have spent three years looking for trace remains of pharmaceuticals in drainage water and the sea near Tromsoe in northern Norway. The project has focused on 16 substances and a high concentration of caffeine was one of the surprising finds. Need a lift in the morning? Have a refreshing glass of seawater!" -
Swedish Student Partly Solves 16th Hilbert Problem
An anonymous reader writes "Swedish media report that 22-year-old Elin Oxenhielm, a student at Stockholm University, has solved a chunk of one of the major problems posed to 20th century mathematics, Hilbert's 16th problem. Norwegian Aftenposten has an English version of the reports." -
NASA Eyes Svalbard For Mars Research
TomMajor writes "The US space agency NASA is keen on using Svalbard as a regular testing grounds for future expeditions to Mars. One expert says research conditions on the Norwegian Arctic archipelago are "first-class."" -
Norway to Wire North Pole
TomMajor writes "Norway will lay an underwater fiber-optic cable from the mainland to Svalbard and turn remote Longyearbyen into the world's best connected village, providing residents with 100 TV stations and a full VDSL (very high bit-rate DSL) network..." -
"DVD-Jon" Faces Retrial
An anonymous reader submits: "Norway's special division for white-collar crimes, Økokrim, has decided to appeal the acquittal of 19-year-old Jon Lech Johansen, accused of copyright violation for helping bypass DVD code protection, web site Nettavisen reports." -
'DVD Jon' Acquitted On All Counts in DeCSS Case
benh57 writes "Jon Johansen, the author of DeCSS, has been acquitted on all charges by the Norwegian Supreme Court.' Johansen and his defense attorney Halvor Manshaus won on all counts, with the Oslo court ruling that Johansen did nothing wrong when he helped cracked the code on a DVD that was his own personal property.'" Here's Aftenposten's story, in English. Read on below for some more links, and please post others in the comments. Update: 01/07 14:02 GMT by T : Reader Torstein Grotnes writes with a correction: The court which cleared Johansen is not Norway's Supreme Court, but rather "the 'tingrett' which is two steps below 'supreme court' level."Here's John Leyden's story at the Register about the ruling.
LarsBT links to this Reuters newsflash and points out that since Johansen's arrest, "Norway has introduced legislation similar to the European Unions directive on copyright [pdf], making it illegal to circumvent any copyright protection - making it highly unlikely that he would be found not guilty under these new rules."
An anonymous reader writes with some background (or do a search on Slashdot for DeCSS ;)): "Read the DVD-Jon lawsuit story here and here" and notes that "'the prosecution decided to charge Johansen with a data break-in, rather than handle the matter as a copyright case.' The court said that DeCSS could be used both legally and illegally and referred to similar cases outside the computing industry. The court said it was difficult to conclude on Johansen's intentions with DeCSS, but there was no conclusive evidence."
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Jon Johansen Trial Continues
An anonymous reader writes "The Norwegian prosecution has been allowed to change the indictment in their case against "DVD-Jon" Johansen. There is an English language article on Friday's trial proceedings now available." VG.nett is also covering the trial. -
Jon Johansen Trial Continues
An anonymous reader writes "The Norwegian prosecution has been allowed to change the indictment in their case against "DVD-Jon" Johansen. There is an English language article on Friday's trial proceedings now available." VG.nett is also covering the trial. -
Johansen Trial Underway
Info is trickling in about Jon Johansen's trial In Norway, where he is accused of violating Norwegian law. Aftenposten and VG Nett have stories, and there's at least one amateur account of the trial. The trial is supposed to last a week, and I'm sure Slashdot will keep up with it, so please submit only *new* stories about it, thanks. -
Jon Johansen DeCSS Trial Next Week
daniel_howell writes "Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten has a story on the imminent start (after delays in finding judges qualified to hear the case) of the trial of local teenage Jon Johansen for helping to write and distribute the DeCSS program to play DVDs on a home computer. The article notes that under Norwegian law it is perfectly legal to make a copy for your own personal use. The Norwegian press is generally supportive of Johansen, and Aftenposten is usually good at posting updates to big stories like this on its English pages, so watch this space to follow the story as it unfolds." -
Jon Johansen DeCSS Trial Next Week
daniel_howell writes "Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten has a story on the imminent start (after delays in finding judges qualified to hear the case) of the trial of local teenage Jon Johansen for helping to write and distribute the DeCSS program to play DVDs on a home computer. The article notes that under Norwegian law it is perfectly legal to make a copy for your own personal use. The Norwegian press is generally supportive of Johansen, and Aftenposten is usually good at posting updates to big stories like this on its English pages, so watch this space to follow the story as it unfolds." -
Jon Johansen DeCSS Trial Next Week
daniel_howell writes "Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten has a story on the imminent start (after delays in finding judges qualified to hear the case) of the trial of local teenage Jon Johansen for helping to write and distribute the DeCSS program to play DVDs on a home computer. The article notes that under Norwegian law it is perfectly legal to make a copy for your own personal use. The Norwegian press is generally supportive of Johansen, and Aftenposten is usually good at posting updates to big stories like this on its English pages, so watch this space to follow the story as it unfolds." -
Beware the Haunted Cordless keyboard
dr. greenthumb writes "The norwegian newspaper Aftenposten reports about an incident where a computer suddenly seemed to develop a life of its own. A game which the user could not remember using that day suddenly appeared on the screen. When he went over to shut it off the screen displayed a message asking him if he "really wanted to delete this file?" His computer was receiving keystrokes from another computer (with the same type of wireless keyboard) 150 metres away! Check out the full story and a follow-up, where experts warns against using wireless keyboards." /me plans to destroy Hemos' sanity... -
Beware the Haunted Cordless keyboard
dr. greenthumb writes "The norwegian newspaper Aftenposten reports about an incident where a computer suddenly seemed to develop a life of its own. A game which the user could not remember using that day suddenly appeared on the screen. When he went over to shut it off the screen displayed a message asking him if he "really wanted to delete this file?" His computer was receiving keystrokes from another computer (with the same type of wireless keyboard) 150 metres away! Check out the full story and a follow-up, where experts warns against using wireless keyboards." /me plans to destroy Hemos' sanity... -
Beware the Haunted Cordless keyboard
dr. greenthumb writes "The norwegian newspaper Aftenposten reports about an incident where a computer suddenly seemed to develop a life of its own. A game which the user could not remember using that day suddenly appeared on the screen. When he went over to shut it off the screen displayed a message asking him if he "really wanted to delete this file?" His computer was receiving keystrokes from another computer (with the same type of wireless keyboard) 150 metres away! Check out the full story and a follow-up, where experts warns against using wireless keyboards." /me plans to destroy Hemos' sanity... -
Norwegian Government Expires Microsoft Contract
Jeppe Salvesen writes "The Norwegian sites are bristling with the news, and hopefully this will leak worldwide. The Norwegian Government has dropped their contract with Microsoft. Microsoft had an exclusive deal with national and regional government. Administration Secretary Victor D. Norman states that 'we feel that our contract with Microsoft in reality has given Microsoft a monopoly in a field where competition would serve us better.'. My translation. The race is on." -
Jon Johansen Indicted by Norwegian Authorities
phlawed writes: "This story (norwegian) states that the authorities responsible for investigating economic crime in Norway today (after 2 years of "investigation") charged JLJ for violating a law regarding computer "break-ins", commonly known as the "hacker paragraph". This is for distributing the DeCSS sourcecode. The analysis so far (by media) is that the authorities not necessarily thinks JLJ is guilty, but due to unclear wording in the relevant law they seem to think that the courts should have a look at it... It is worth noting that JLJ has *not* been charged for violating any law regarding IP, piracy or such." I've only found one story in English, which is quite vague. Hopefully the above poster is correct in summarizing the situation. -
Sony Threatens to Sue for PS2 Domains
pallotta writes "The privately owned Norwegian domains http://ps2.no and http://playstation2.no are threatened with legal action by Sony. They ask the owners of the sites to give up the domain names or (in a letter to the owner of ps2.no) "If we do not receive your letter of confirmation within 10 February 2001, SCEE (Sony Computer Entertainment Europe) reserves its rights to bring an action against you to recover the said domain name". Full article in the Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten can be found here (in English)." -
DeCSS Author Arrested
TyFoN sent us a link to a CNN story where you can read that the author of DeCSS was arrested for violating copyright law. If anyone can find something in English, I'd really appreciate it... the usual translation engines seem to be less then enchanted with norwegian. Update: here's an English version of said story.