Slashdot Mirror

Roland Piquepaille writes "The Washington Post is really nice with bloggers. Yesterday, it carried an article named "Free Speech -- Virtually," or "Legal Constraints on Web Journals Surprise Many 'Bloggers'". Today, Cynthia L. Webb focuses on an hypothesis from Chris Gulker, which he exposed in a column published by The Independent, "The View from Silicon Valley: Bloggers come in from the cold." As said Chris Gulker, "Many of us are Webloggers 'bloggers' for short. It would be interesting to see if there's a correlation between the meteoric rise of blogging, the practice of keeping a frequently-updated online journal, and the rise of unemployment in Silicon Valley and other tech corridors. Check this column for a summary or the original article for more details."

Rowdy Ray writes "Big businesses are using Britain's libel laws to shut down websites set up by disgruntled customers or protest groups, a report by the Government's advisers on law reform has found."

MrByte420 writes "WebMD has story about every computer geek's favorite beverage enhancer. Seems like there's more to the kick than just the caffeine that makes coffee a favorite amongst the sleep deprived programmers of the world. Some more information can be found here with some interesting details why decaf can keep ya up and wired too. In related news, scientists report no progress in determining why the best computer code is written at 4:27 AM on a tuesday morning surrounded by a box of Mountain Dew."

An Anonymous Coward writes: "In this story reported at The Independent is "one of the more curious copyright disputes of modern times." It appears that the key question is "which part of the silence was stolen." If only this was April First. This is a lawsuit suing over the sound of nothing, no sound, silence, nada, zilch, bupkiss.

An Anonymous Coward writes: "In this story reported at The Independent is "one of the more curious copyright disputes of modern times." It appears that the key question is "which part of the silence was stolen." If only this was April First. This is a lawsuit suing over the sound of nothing, no sound, silence, nada, zilch, bupkiss.

Danious writes Seems Spider-Man is clocking up 'bugs' at movie-mistakes.com faster than any previous movie (now 95 and counting). The reason, according to this Independent article, is not that it may have more mistakes than usual, but that 'huge numbers of people are going to see it - and that makes for lots of pairs of eyes checking every inch of the screen.' The top movie is currently 'The Matrix' with 147." A lot of the bugs simply aren't really errors, and I'm sure the comic book guys out there can debate them.

Kredal writes "The Independent is running a story about Sony's work on a new console, being built around online games, such as Everquest Adventures and Final Fantasy 11. No word on backwards compatability, but expect it to be the X-Box killer if it is." FF11 already has me lusting.

Kredal writes "The Independent is running a story about Sony's work on a new console, being built around online games, such as Everquest Adventures and Final Fantasy 11. No word on backwards compatability, but expect it to be the X-Box killer if it is." FF11 already has me lusting.

hairybacchus writes: "The Independent News is reporting that scientists at Kingston University in London have developed video processing software that is able to predict behavior patterns of the people on-screen. They say it will be used to alleviate congestion in the London Underground or alert police to potential muggings. I wonder how long it will be before this is combined with face-recognition technology? It's spooky." I can't wait. "We searched you because the computer told us to." Trust the Computer.

hairybacchus writes: "The Independent News is reporting that scientists at Kingston University in London have developed video processing software that is able to predict behavior patterns of the people on-screen. They say it will be used to alleviate congestion in the London Underground or alert police to potential muggings. I wonder how long it will be before this is combined with face-recognition technology? It's spooky." I can't wait. "We searched you because the computer told us to." Trust the Computer.

Tardigrade submitted a brief little article that claims that chess players are paranoid thrillseekers. It's a fairly amusing little piece and definitely makes me wish that my high-school chess club would have got into epic battles with the groups that were capable of stretching us into pretzel shapes, if only for the thrill. Maybe I'm just being paranoid.

rossjudson writes: "The Independent is running an article about the shoe bomber terrorist. The interesting bit for Slashdot readers is at the bottom -- apparently the 40-bit encryption in the export version of Windows 2000 was cracked by a set of computers using a brute force method. So let's confront the question: Should the US prohibit the export of high-encryption software? Here is a case where the default values (40 bit) clearly helped recover valuable information from a system." There's another article in New Scientist focusing on the encryption issue.

rleyton writes "The Independent has an interesting interview with Jonathan Ive, the designer of the new imac (and the iBook, the iPod and original iMac...)" It's actually a pretty interesting even if you think the new iMac is repulsive. Personally I dig it.

rleyton writes "The Independent has an interesting interview with Jonathan Ive, the designer of the new imac (and the iBook, the iPod and original iMac...)" It's actually a pretty interesting even if you think the new iMac is repulsive. Personally I dig it.

jeffro writes "Dont know if this has been submitted yet, but the Independent news UK has a rather newbiesh article on the ups and down of Linux software as a free alternative to Windows. "Perhaps Linux shouldn't be regarded as an operating system at all, but more as a sophisticated multi-player game with a large number of enthusiastic players. You can lose yourself in Linux for hours, tweaking here, updating there. It's great fun if you like that sort of thing. But if you need to produce a document, spreadsheet or presentation, you're still likely to be able to do it faster and better by sticking with the Microsoft devil you know.""

jeffro writes "Dont know if this has been submitted yet, but the Independent news UK has a rather newbiesh article on the ups and down of Linux software as a free alternative to Windows. "Perhaps Linux shouldn't be regarded as an operating system at all, but more as a sophisticated multi-player game with a large number of enthusiastic players. You can lose yourself in Linux for hours, tweaking here, updating there. It's great fun if you like that sort of thing. But if you need to produce a document, spreadsheet or presentation, you're still likely to be able to do it faster and better by sticking with the Microsoft devil you know.""

With the Fellowship of the Rings just around the corner, the Slashdot Submissions bin is overflowing with stories about the film since it premiered in the UK already for you lucky brits. If you don't mind a little spoilage, here is the guardian's review, the BBC review, the telegraph review, some pictures from the premiere, and one last review. Also, Scifi.com is reporting that the film has already been pirated. The reviews have their nitpicks, but on the whole its looking good. M : LOTR tattoos!

Dollyknot writes: "Amusing story of a guy employed by IBM to check companies security out by trying to con his way onto their premises." This sounds like a fun job, to say the least, and supplies at least two good reasons to own a digital camera.

With the events of September 11, 2001 still vividly etched into our conscious minds, it was only a matter of time before the US Government would paint the crosshairs on their next target after Bin Laden: encryption. With Ashcroft's declaration of computers as tools of terrorism, and law-enforcement pushing for enhanced surveillance, it appears that one of the first victims of America's new war may be the privacy of her citizens. Of course, if you are concerned about privacy, you're probably wondering how to improve what protections you have in place, if any. So what are the leading-edge innovations on the encryption front right now, and how easily can such tech be adapted to everyday communications? C :In an interesting display of synchronicity, Timothy posted this article, earlier today, which notes that Steganography use isn't as wide-spread as previously thought. Deagol asks: "With the Feds pushing for encryption back-doors, and even more domestic surveillance, how can we resist this? I mean in a practical way, but at the same time taking a stand for our rights to privacy and assembly. What's the current state of the art in hard disk encryption? Email encryption? Steganography? There are many tools out there, as well as many link-farms, (I looked at many today), but many pages seem dated, and it's hard to tell who's using what in a useful implementation. So, who is using PGP or GPG? Who is using BestCrypt or Loopback Encryption, Freenet or Steganography? A privacy weenie wants to know what your daily-use setup is!"

One thing about encryption: the easier it is to do, the more people there will be using it. For the non-tech user, encrypting messages on a day-to-day should be no more complex than 3 steps.

JPMH asks:"First journalists and now even relatively clued-up politicians in the UK are talking about making it an offence to use strong encryption in email and web-pages. An obvious counter is that this won't work, because the messages can easily be hidden using Steganography (Slashdot Jan 2, May 8). But that assumes that the steganography itself is good enough not to be detected. Is this true? How good is the state of the art?

To be undetectable, the properties of the 'message' bits you are putting in must be statistically indistinguishable from the 'image' bits you are overwriting. According to a paper by Neils Provos and Peter Honeyman of U. Michigan (highlighted today in the Register) the simplest common programs, such as JSteg and JPHide, fail this test badly and are easily detected. But they failed to nail any confirmed steganographic content in 2 million images on EBay.

Other programs (eg Provos's Outguess 0.2) are more sophisticated at hiding the messages (and other media eg MP3s give a bigger haystack to hide them in); but on the other hand, more sophisticated statistical models of images (eg Slashdot 16 Aug) may be better at making the 'hidden' content stand out.

So, can messages reliably be hidden? Or will people trying to hide their messages in a reliable manner get caught?"

JournalistGuy writes: "The Independent wrote today about firms moving their hardware underground into a cold war nuclear bunker. Apparently they're worried about theft by criminals and attacks from anarchists." I wonder what's now become of the U.S.'s Y2K command center -- wish that would go on Ebay. One of those abandoned missile silos would make a nice hosting site, too.

regen writes "I found a very interesting document while doing some research for work. This Customs Declaration has to be one of the strangest ever filled out. It is the declaration filled out by the crew of Apollo 11 for bringing Moon rocks into the United States. A news article by Independent News confirms that this document is real."

Frankenbean writes "Three different studies have shown that a vaccine can help prevent protein deposits from forming on the brain. These deposits are widely beleived to be the cause of Alzheimer's disease. Read more here."

steelrat pointed at this article in The Independent , which says that Professor Gerhard Heldmaier of Germany's University of Marburg announced earlier this month the discovery of "two genes which are believed to trigger hibernation. The finding of the genes, which are involved in controlling, or 'switching' enzymes to equip the body for hibernation by allowing it to burn fat rather than carbohydrates, is the latest in a series of discoveries about human hibernation." While the research so far is only on animals, the story quotes University of Minnesota biochemist Matthew T Andrews, as saying "In the hibernation genes we have discovered, there are similar genetic sequences with those of humans." Eat less, sleep a lot ... maybe I can simply be awaked for major holidays and earthquakes.

Step right up ladies and gentlemen and behold, quickies so amazing, that you may not want to stare directly at them. First up, a trio of Microsoft bits: Ethan sent us an RFC for writing RFCs in Word. Russ pointed us to a great entry contained within the microsoft knowledge base. and an anonymous reader noted that boardwatch is selling BillGatus of Borg posters again. You may need a soundtrack for this one: chisox sent a bit about Jem Finer composing a thousand year song (and a machine to play it). If generative music ain't your thing, Jason noted that MC (Stephen) Hawking has made some of his R&B and Rap cuts available in MP3 format. And while it isn't exactly music, Several folks showed us the way to best learn about Semi Conductors: have Britney Spears teach it. wishus's submission is much less educational: he's kissing up to me by telling us that Sarcasta's latest update is in depth study on Carpal Tunnel Syndrome. If you need some images to enlighten and amuse, B.D.Mills noted that stinky meat is back if you didn't get enough the first time, Ant sent us the correct use for the new mac cubes, and danfairs sent us a picture of... well, a fire extinguisher. table and chair pointed us to Political Arena, a Quake 3 modwhere you blow up the political candidates (is this treason once one of them gets elected?) If blowing up Bush isn't enough stress reduction for you, einstein has shown us how best to customize your case and void your warrenty in one swing. Of an axe. Kartoffel wrote a CueCat interface for BeOS as well as a Mr T vs. CueCat Comic Strip. Even more offensive then another Mr T vs. episode is a comic featuring Admiral Ackbar debating Napster sent in by georgeha. Last of all, if you didn't know, Spinal Tap is back out in limited release. God what a great flick. Just figured I'd mention it ...

mapryan writes: "Here's a link to a story that's in today's Independent (UK) newspaper. Apparently, the goverment is planning to DNA fingerprint all criminals. How long before DNA fingerprinting of *all* new born babies is routine, and logged away in some National Police computer?" Not long. Rudy Giuliani, a U.S. politician, has already suggested that all infants have DNA samples taken at birth.

chisox writes "The Independent in London has an int erview with Ian Clarke, the man behind the Free Network Project. If you think Napster has the music industry worried, what until they see Freenet...Clarke's just quit his job in London and is heading for LA to start his own company, Upriser."

mccaffer writes: "Here's a story about how the patent laws fail to protect the small guy. It's pretty obvious the legal system exists only to protect the interests of the powerful." Hmmm. I haven't heard anything about this, but Charles Arthur, the journalist, is usually reliable... Anyone else know anything about this story?

"I got into the Internet because I believed in the promise of freedom for all; I never imagined it would be the most easily censored medium there is." These are the words of a director of the Campaign Against Censorship of the Internet in Britain - which has now been moved to the good old U.S.A. because its British ISP is too afraid of libel suits to continue hosting it. Why? Because Demon Internet settled the libel suit brought by Laurence Godfrey. British ISPs are now (rightly) terrified, and are (unfortunately) censoring Web sites like Outcast merely because of the possibility of future libels that might be published. (more)

The problem is with the British legal system, which makes defending against libel suits difficult. Essentially, the defendant has to prove his or her innocence, typically by proving the truth of every challenged statement (and there are other systemic flaws as well). In such a system, putting up a defense is such a hassle - and so expensive - that settling out of court is almost always easier.

The Laurence Godfrey case was settled out of court, setting not a precedent but a bad example. Most libel cases do settle. After Godfrey's victory, now even more will.

One of the better-known cases which went all the way to the verdict was the McLibel trial, in which everyone's favorite multinational food chain sued two unemployed activists for handing out a pamphlet. Attempting to prove the truth of every single statement in the brief factsheet took the vegetarians two years. They could not afford to pay legal counsel or even to buy the transcripts of their own trial's proceedings. They lost, but the negative publicity was a Pyrrhic victory for McDonald's.

And in very recent news, the big story has been one in which a Holocaust-denier brought suit for a book which (essentially) called him a Holocaust-denier. This time, the good guys won, but only because the author and publisher were willing to spend two million pounds to illustrate that the facts were on their side. The bookstores that were sued had settled quickly out of court and agreed to the plaintiff's terms. (If you follow this case, some excellent and very detailed legal analysis can be found at a site I happen to Webmaster, in the essays Irving'sWar.)

Even if a libel suit is only hinted-at, as in the Outcast and CACIB cases, pre-emptively removing the material is the publisher's safest move. Don't like what someone says? Afraid of what they might say? Gag'em!

The U.K. needs to wise up and bring its libel law into the 20th century, or its citizens will quickly find themselves inhabiting a Bland Speech Zone. An island on the Internet, if you will, where nobody dares say anything about anyone else - or if they do, they prudently take their speech (and their money) offshore.

As a Demon settlement news report predicted two weeks ago:

"If the ISPs become more cautious over what material they allow to be published - by screening submissions or suspending Web sites - they could inflame the debate over freedom of expression or damage internet-based businesses."

Neither of which, surely, will benefit the people of the U.K.

Update: 04/18 03:21 by J : Two good commentaries today from lawyers relating to the Holocaust-denier's lawsuit. The legal team defending against the Holocaust-denier's lawsuit has an interesting contrary view in today's Independent. They argue that British libel law works, and is getting better in response to criticism. But when they write:

"...libel actions and the associated costs are part of the process of publishing. They are to the publishing industry what construction disputes are to the building industry. If the litigation is expensive that is a criticism of the price of litigation - not of libel litigation specifically."

they obscure an important point. We are all publishers in the internet age. If publishing is to be restricted to those who can afford "industry" insurance policies against million-pound legal fees, put a fork in the U.K.'s internet - it's done.

And, see also a legal viewpoint from the defending publisher's lawyers.

maroberts writes, "Britain's larget supermarket chain, Tesco, called on Warner Home Video to abandon zoning which inflates UK DVD prices, reports The Independent. Apparently sales of Tesco's stock DVD player [Wharefdale DVD-750] skyrocketed after the UK's hi-fi press explained how to make the unit region-free. " Looks like the UK is tired of overpaying for movies.

Adam Jenkins writes "More info on the NSA patent has been reported in The Independent. Specifically they have been lab-testing software that can sift through calls and e-mails in search of key phrases." Can you say 'Echelon'? Anyone who still harbors any doubts about whether the network could exist should read this.

Julian Assange writes "According to an article by Suelette Drefyus in the British paper The Independent, the US National Security Agency has designed and patented a new technology that could aid it in spying on international telephone calls. (continued)

"The NSA patent, granted on 10 August, is for a system of automatic topic spotting and labelling of data. The patent officially confirms for the first time that the NSA has been working on ways of automatically analysing human speech. The NSA's invention is intended automatically to sift through human speech transcripts in any language. The patent document specifically mentions "machine-transcribed speech" as a potential source.

Bruce Schneier, author of Applied Cryptography, a textbook on the science of keeping information secret, believes the NSA currently has the ability to use computers to transcribe voice conversations. 'One of the holy grails of the NSA is the ability automatically to search through voice traffic. They would have expended considerable effort on this capability, and this indicates it has been fruitful,' he said." You can find more details here.

Julian Assange writes "According to an article by Suelette Drefyus in the British paper The Independent, the US National Security Agency has designed and patented a new technology that could aid it in spying on international telephone calls. (continued)

"The NSA patent, granted on 10 August, is for a system of automatic topic spotting and labelling of data. The patent officially confirms for the first time that the NSA has been working on ways of automatically analysing human speech. The NSA's invention is intended automatically to sift through human speech transcripts in any language. The patent document specifically mentions "machine-transcribed speech" as a potential source.

Bruce Schneier, author of Applied Cryptography, a textbook on the science of keeping information secret, believes the NSA currently has the ability to use computers to transcribe voice conversations. 'One of the holy grails of the NSA is the ability automatically to search through voice traffic. They would have expended considerable effort on this capability, and this indicates it has been fruitful,' he said." You can find more details here.

Julian Assange writes "According to an article by Suelette Drefyus in the British paper The Independent, the US National Security Agency has designed and patented a new technology that could aid it in spying on international telephone calls. (continued)

"The NSA patent, granted on 10 August, is for a system of automatic topic spotting and labelling of data. The patent officially confirms for the first time that the NSA has been working on ways of automatically analysing human speech. The NSA's invention is intended automatically to sift through human speech transcripts in any language. The patent document specifically mentions "machine-transcribed speech" as a potential source.

Bruce Schneier, author of Applied Cryptography, a textbook on the science of keeping information secret, believes the NSA currently has the ability to use computers to transcribe voice conversations. 'One of the holy grails of the NSA is the ability automatically to search through voice traffic. They would have expended considerable effort on this capability, and this indicates it has been fruitful,' he said." You can find more details here.

Bent Udder writes "According to todays' Independent, the US, Britain and New Zealand worked on plans for a bomb that could cause tsunamis during the latter part of the Second World War. The war ended before the device be put to use, but an Australian professor tested several small versions of the bombs in New Zealand in 1944. Weird, non? " I have visions of "Deep Impact" running thru my head right now.

The BBC news is reporting (thanks to aspodf for the link) that Channel 4 News alleges that the Ministry of Defence (MoD) has been intercepting all phone calls between Britain and Ireland for the last 10 years. A similar article in The Independent presents similar information as fact. Apparently, the tower was used to scan every single message between Britain and Ireland for certain key words (sort of like Echelon), and the tower is now up for sale by the MoD.

GrokSoup sent us a story that talks about Drug use amongst programmers. The article talks about the high tech industry, stress, and stimulants (the big ones like Cocaine and Crack, not the wussy stuff like caffeine :)

Paul Emsley wrote in with this link where you can read an interesting article discussing 2 of my favorite topics. Its not about pornography or anything, so the week of heart don't need to be scared off *grin*.

Lee Maguire writes "Chris Gulker, a columnist for London's Indepenent newspaper, is currently writing about his project involving setting up a linux system. This weeks column is here. "

Lee Maguire writes "Chris Gulker, a columnist for London's Indepenent newspaper, is currently writing about his project involving setting up a linux system. This weeks column is here. "