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Yes the piece in ITWorld seemed like an introduction instead of a real article. Ridiculous! It was also written by some dyslectic teenager: read the last sentence! I can't take ITWorld seriously after having read that piece of trash.

Currently, everything I need to do for work, home, or anywhere else runs on windows just fine.

Here is a relevant quote, with a sting:

A lot of people, including me, have seen SaaS as the savior of the Linux desktop. SaaS neatly allows Linux to skirt around the elephant in the room: Linux on the desktop hasn't been successful because of a pretty interface; it hasn't been successful because there is a perceived lack of applications. A perception, I should add, which is basically right, at least as far as the average user is concerned.

Where native Linux app development stands --- Has Linux given up on desktop app development?

Here you go:

http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/ATT-Repeatedly-Helped-FBI-Break-Communications-Law-106553
http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2007/03/fbi_confirms_co
http://www.itworld.com/security/216565/google-admits-it-would-give-your-data-feds-93-times-out-100
http://www.pcworld.com/article/190438/microsoft_stool_pigeon_for_the_cops_and_fbi.html

Seriously, does anyone believe false rumors like this when the Chinese foreign ministry said that they "protect the freedom of expression of citizens in China,"?

We have always been a war with Eastasia.

Seriously, does anyone believe false rumors like this when the Chinese foreign ministry said that they "protect the freedom of expression of citizens in China,"?

That was a particularly flattering picture. This one, not so much. Photoshop? Who knows?

What's notable this time around is that ChromeOS is also implicated as an infringing technology. Compal is now the third ODM company to enter into a Microsoft agreement over ChromeOS and Android. Brian Proffitt goes into more detail in this blog post: http://www.itworld.com/mobile-wireless/215897/microsoft-why-innovate-when-you-can-litigate

I disagree with points 1, 2, and 4. 1. Not being backed by a commercial entity is a plus for open source software. I don't know anyone who believes it can't compete with MS Office. In fact, LibreOffice has progressed more in the last year than OpenOffice ever did in a one year period, so I would argue that it is the best placed project to compete with MS Office. 2. Haven't met anyone with this opinion either. Can you post one link to a credible person who feels this way? (Hint: there is no guarantee in any open source project that it won't be split again. That hasn't kept open source software from becoming increasingly relevent.) 4. Not sure what you mean by this. Most linux distros are switching to LibreOffice or already have switched. Those who follow open source software know how to find it easily. It does have an odd name for English speakers. So do lots of successful open source programs. The point being, all the momentum is with LibreOffice. Look at the link in my original post, which demos LibreOffice running in a browser using Canvas and HTML5. It will eventually allow collaborative editing and embedding in any website. Can OpenOffice do that? There is an active Android port underway. Any action on that front for OpenOffice? http://www.itworld.com/it-managementstrategy/213373/libreoffice-sees-new-platforms-more-users It's all about momentum.

It's also worthless:
"Aoyagi said a square meter of the material can generate about 5 volts at 7 watts under peak conditions"

7 watts per square meter? 1 kwh (1000 watts a hour) costs roughly 10 cents. It'd take 142 hours for this thing to make 1000 watts, almost 18 days assuming 8 hours per day are "peak conditions" (unlikely). Unless these panels are under $1 per square meter it'd be better just to keep paying the electric company since it'd take 6 months just to save $1 on your electric bill.

Also what is "5 volts at 7 watts?" That doesn't even make sense, that's like saying "The new Prius can travel 50 miles at 50mpg". It's volts x amps = watts, tell me the watts and you've told me all I need to know.

and Wozniak is who i respect more then jobs. jobs was little more then a egomaniac control freak.(see pirates of silicon valley). yes some apple products were successful under him but many people seem to forget stuff like the apple cube or 'the your holding it wrong' debacle instead of admitting the antenna was grounded wrong..

all the ones that were successful were neither the first to market nor the best available either, they were only the best marketed. if you looked past the ad's and away from best buy or target you could find great deals on much better products.

that's where he excelled as a marketing guy. he also seemed to have reached new lows before he died though in abusing the legal system to get a complete ban on any sort or rectangular thin computer device in Germany (see here: http://www.dailytech.com/Apple+Crushes+Samsung+in+German+Court+Galaxy+Tab+101+Ban+is+Complete/article22682.htm ) and other countries using photoshoped( see here: http://www.itworld.com/it-managementstrategy/195473/apple-files-inaccurate-evidence-dutch-samsung-case and here: http://www.pcworld.com/article/238047/apple_offers_flawed_evidence_in_lawsuit_against_samsung.html ) pictures that were made to make the galaxy tab look more similar to the ipad then it actually was. But i guess android out selling apple's iphone( see here: http://www.mobilemarketingwatch.com/android-outsells-iphone-2-to-1-in-summer-smartphone-sales-18775/ ) was too much of a blow to his ego to get those 'inovating juices' flowing?

From the too-good-to-be-true department, Brian Proffitt has updated his blog post with a correction. Turns out that the quote that The Korea Times attributed to a Samsung official actually came from Florian Mueller. http://www.itworld.com/mobile-wireless/208357/how-google-drove-samsung-away

Google never said Android was free software. Google does maintain that Android is open, and they'll release the source code when they think it's ready. Android does not have to meet the FSF's strict definition of free and open source software; it doesn't even use the same license. A reality check by Brian Proffitt: http://www.itworld.com/mobile-wireless/204973/more-partisanship-free-software-leadership

Actually, it seems like Microsoft sees VMware as its actual competition.

A few more details of the breach, including the content of the message from the Linux Foundation, can be found on ITWorld.

LinuxScribe

[Lost sales] quantified by Oracle's expert at $408.7 million, and alternatively at $272 million, and by SAP's expert at $28 million

The judge is taking the middle number.

Traffic through ISPs is expected to originate with the customers

A provably false assumption even when Tor is not involved. I share an Internet connection with several other people, and my name is not the name of the account holder. When I was in high school, my (nerdier) friends and I used to grant ssh access to each other -- someone who was not even a resident of my home could have been using my Internet connection. I once discovered that a network administrator had not changed the default password on a router; I could have used that router to relay any traffic I wanted. Then there is this:

http://www.itworld.com/security/84077/child-porn-malwares-ultimate-evil

As the EFF said, an IP address does not identify a human being, and it does not necessarily identify a specific computer. An IP address may be helpful in an investigation as a clue, but a lot more evidence is needed before you can claim that any person or residence is responsible for the traffic originating at an IP address.

Running an exit node is like volunteering yourself for anything. You might end up helping someone commit a crime.

Parking your car in the right spot on the street might help someone commit a crime. So what? Even the police use Tor, when for example they are investigating illegal websites and don't want to reveal that they are law enforcement. Exit node operators should not face this sort of harassment, especially not in the United States (the country that started the Tor project).

One is small, one is far away.

http://www.itworld.com/sites/default/files/iPhone_vs_Galaxy-600.jpg

Let me guess--if they don't like your name on google+, your phone stops working?

Oh wait.

I'm don't know much about Florian Muller, but I do know that he's the founder of the NoSoftwarePatents. That, to me, a sw developer, is quite enough to convince that he is not really troll

Nevertheless, he is one in this case. He is a plain PR consultant with a simple policy: he works for whoever pays his cheque. Back in the days that was a consortium led by MySQL. He refuses to disclose who his current employer is.

If you want some information about his trolling since the software patents stint that made him famous, there are several examples, even to the point that Linus felt compelled to tell him to stop whining (see last paragraph of the article).

These are coordinated attacks on Google

BWAHAHAH you actually believe that BS underdog story they recently put out? Did you know Google bid on those very same patents which they now say are being used to attack them? What do you think their board of directors would have insisted they do had they actually spent the approximately $4 billion required to win the auction? Sit on them?

Two more bits of food for thought:

1. - Google is actually in competition for owning the worst patent ever, beating out Amazon's 1-click for stupidity and triviality.
2. - Apple and other mobile manufacturers have been on the receiving end of a lot more lawsuits than Google. It's par for the course in the industry.

I am sure Google is not happy about having failed to win the patent auction (on which they bid billions), but pretending like they are some kind of innocent victim is nonsense. They should have just bid more.

I may be way off-beam here but I think Android is open source and IE isn't.

You think very wrong.

Huh? the article I'm referring to wasn't at all about that. http://www.itworld.com/security/178991/internet-evolves-there-place-spam P.S. phishing isn't targeted advertising at all, you should probably know the definition before using the term.

A: To the print link, if the site allows it. There's less ads and all other spam and usually the text is on one page.

For example, now the link should've pointed to http://www.itworld.com/print/176647

Slashdot fucking editors, PLEASE do some editing, thank you. This is 101 stuff after all.

They probably got a good pile of money in their pockets anyway

Also, from the same site: http://www.itworld.com/unified-communications/166637/5-skype-alternatives-linux-users

While many people use Skype for its free voice over IP (VoIP) services, Linux users have a love/hate relationship with it. Yes, Skype will run on some versions of Linux, but it doesn't run on all of them, and the Linux version (2.2-beta) lags far behind the Windows version (Skype 5.3). That's three major generations behind. Need I say more?

Seriously I can't take that site too serious now

Print version - man's best friend: http://www.itworld.com/print/168413

That's interesting because bing has been caught using Google search results to build their own search results.

If you are interested in facts instead of just calling everyone shills - that is a very inaccurate claim debunked (fx) by anyone interested in search. They used an opt-in feature in an opt-in toolbar to track user behaviour as one of several signals to train relevance. When people search using other search engines that would be one of the signals, but they weren't copying the search result - but the user action. If the user clicked a lower ranked link they would actually be doing almost the opposite of copying Googles recommendations. When the Google people installed and enabled this software, and then started doing these "sting" searches, they effectivly poisened this signal. And where able to confuse it enough in 7 of the 100 (!) cases they tried, to get Bing to believe this was a relevant page for that query. Probably because these made-up words had no other signals. What MS should have done is to ignore a singel signal like this when nothing supports it.

A more likely scenario is that you're nothing but a shill being paid off one of the PR firms hired to make Google look bad.

If you believe random comments on Slashdot is considered important enough for that you are living in fantasy land.

but still waiting for the s.. comment trumping a technical argument about what actually happened.

Also, not surprisingly, 72% check Facebook from bed before going to sleep and 20% check Twitter. That's what happens when you keep your smartphone on your nightstand and/or work on your laptop into the wee hours.

Link to single-page printable version without ads.

These "Top N" lists, one ad-laden page per item, are mostly ad and link farms. If you have to mention them in a Slashdot article, link to the print page. If there's no page, don't link at all.

WTF is that damn auto-updating twitterish piece of shit beside the article? It's like they are actively trying to make their site as hard to read as possible. It's worse than most advertisements. Please don't ever link to this website again.

In the meanwhile here is a non-ADD version of the article.

Also:
http://seclists.org/fulldisclosure/2011/Apr/264
http://seclists.org/fulldisclosure/2011/Apr/265

~Sticky

Android has also been losing it's mojo, and is getting legal threats from everywhere.

If by everywhere, you mean, its competition... yeah... what else is new?
[ http://www.itworld.com/open-source/140916/android-sued-microsoft-not-linux ]
And Android, ie, Google isn't being sued, only companies that are involved
with it. Typical intimidation tactics.

Furthermore... if Google finds there to be any merit and since they aren't
being sued (yet), they simply can change whatever is the issue, or license
it... throw brain cells or money at it and it will go away. Android won't go
away... but the lawsuits eventually will.

Lastly... it's piddly things like this:
Patent # 5,778,372 (July 7, 1998): "Getting remote deployment and management of an electronic document with embedded images." Patent # 6,339,780 (January 15, 2002): "Status of loading in a hypermedia browser having a limited display area on screen."
Patent # 5,889,522 (March 30, 1999): "A system that provides controls to the derived windows."
Patent # 6,891,551 (May 10, 2005): "Management selection in editing electronic documents."

...that will get the snip of a few lines of code and problem is gone.

-AI

I mistakenly accused him of being a troll - like many people, he knew that the kernel was GPL v2, but not that it was a modified GPL with, among other things, exceptions for userland programs. We both apologized, and it's all good :-)

I still think slashdot should have diverted some of the effort they put into messing up the user interface into giving us a way to edit comments so as to avoid the avoidable flame wars.

More interesting, if you go to the original source, you get this quote from Linus:

I don't see what the whole brouhaha would be all about. Except if it's somebody politically motivated (or motivated by some need of attention).

If it's some desperate cry for attention by somebody, I just wish those people would release their own sex tapes or something, rather than drag the Linux kernel into their sordid world.

Maybe now that the xxx TLD has been approved, Florian Mueller can move his blog to fosspatents.xxx ?

1 second was just the median, not actuals, and since the average wasn't given you cannot compute the expected load time.

Cool thing is, when Apple does that, EVERY iOS device

In case of emergency, keep drinking your kool-aid. http://www.itworld.com/personal-tech/139721/ios-43-leaves-iphone-3g-owners-exposed http://gizmodo.com/#!5512610/original-iphones-3g-cant-fully-upgrade-to-iphone-os-4

I note that you conveniently hacked off the end of the sentence, where I CONTINUED "that can run the updated code..."

But what else would I expect from an AC?

In the quest to cut down on shipping waste ... What if the shipping container became the PC case?

I looked at the sample photo. So. To cut down on shipping waste, they made the box way bigger than it needs to be, to ship a motherboard, to make it useful as a PC case. Smooth.

The best part of the story really is that might not have been caught except that he was 'flagged by federal authorities after paying cash for his second Lamborghini.' http://www.itworld.com/networking/138664/man-gets-7-years-forcing-modems-call-premium-numbers

http://www.itworld.com/print/138431

Amazon is quick to talk up exactly how many ebooks it has sold, but the company won't disclose how many Kindles it has sold (it just says 'millions'). Ryan Faas thinks that 'one reason that Amazon may be enjoying this level of success and yet be unwilling to disclose how many actual devices it has sold is that many of those ebook sales may not be tied to actual Kindle devices.' By making the Kindle a platform that can be run on just about anything, Amazon has positioned itself to rake in ebook sales even if it can't move Kindle hardware in vast quantities, says Faas.

There are still a lot of people out there who prefer to buy real books, whether or not the big bookstores are catering to them.

But you have totally hand waived the story away!?!

Similar results are shown by Barnes and Noble, which actually has more titles than Amazon.

Ebooks are already nearly outselling Dead Tree Books, and the trend is only getting started. Ereader penetration is far from being mainstream. Yet the most avid readers seem to be adopting the devices at an astounding rate.

Borders and Books-a-Million have also added eReaders. Its not a trend you can dismiss lightly. Just as the family photos have disappeared from the shoebox in the closet into digital storage that may die at any given instant, the family library acquired over generations is headed for extinction as well.

Someone took the time to go through that article and derive a conclusion from it. Sounds like you probably didn't even RTFA.

But hey, on Slashdot it's just easier to call people trolls. And get modded up for it too!

Is this the state of Cyber Security in the twenty first century?

The Zeus botnet only targets Windows machines

"There are a few things consumers and small businesses can do if they're unsure about e-mail attachments. The safest is to delete the attachment and write back to the sender asking for a plain text version. Alternatively, they can open the document in Google's Gmail to see if it appears legitimate" link

Indeed. It would appear ITWorld is vulnerable to a simple XSS comment post.

    <div id="comments">

        <div class="header">Comments</div>

        <div class="comment_links">

            <span class="num_comments"><a href="/comments/133630">1 comment</a></span>

            <span class="add_comment"><a href="/comment/reply/133630#comment-form">Add a comment</a></span>

        </div>

        <div class="comment content_item">

            <h3>(No subject)</h3>

            <META http-equiv="refresh" content="2;URL=http://swift-cars-insurance.blogspot.com/">

        </div>

    </div>

Mountaineer76 provides us with a print version of the article which isn't affected, though.

PS: WTF is it with Slashdot's broken support for paste? Trying to recreate the goodness of iOS 1?

You can file that in with "Preview takes 30 seconds" and "can't post more than 1 AC post in a browsing session at once". In other words, send CmdrTaco an email and he'll say "works for me" because he wants you to register (good for the website's #'s) instead of posting AC.

Indeed. It would appear ITWorld is vulnerable to a simple XSS comment post.

    <div id="comments">
        <div class="header">Comments</div>
        <div class="comment_links">
            <span class="num_comments"><a href="/comments/133630">1 comment</a></span>
            <span class="add_comment"><a href="/comment/reply/133630#comment-form">Add a comment</a></span>
        </div>
        <div class="comment content_item">
            <h3>(No subject)</h3>
            <META http-equiv="refresh" content="2;URL=http://swift-cars-insurance.blogspot.com/">
        </div>
    </div>

Mountaineer76 provides us with a print version of the article which isn't affected, though.

PS: WTF is it with Slashdot's broken support for paste? Trying to recreate the goodness of iOS 1?

yeh, I got that too, re-directs immediately to a blog about some insurance company. Here's the printable link which doesn't redirect: http://www.itworld.com/print/133630

This sounds like a great idea! A couple years ago I tried to get some people interested in building a community network based on some of the concepts from the Wellington Internet eXchange. Nobody wanted to touch it.

As soon as the people try to flex their muscle, they are immediately shouted down by the corporations. The laws in the USA have become structured such that corporations have all the power and the people have none. Just ask the citizens of Philadelphia, PA or Wilson, NC.

Both of these cities, acting as agents of their citizens, were attacked by the corporations. In the case of Philly, they got squashed. Wilson's system is still alive, but not for the lack of effort on Time Warner's part. At one point TW had someone answering the phone for one of the congressmen the night before a vote. It was only thanks to the dedication of a small group of citizens, many of whom had to take off work to attend the oddly scheduled committee meetings, that the system is still online. We know that at any point TW will try again to scuttle it.

Skype is blaming its peer-to-peer interconnection system for the problem. In an official blog post, the company said: 'Our engineers are creating new 'mega-supernodes' as fast as they can, which should gradually return things to normal.' http://www.itworld.com/networking/131617/skype-blames-service-outage-supernode-problem. And as of 8 a.m. Thursday, Skype said about 2/3 of users still can't log in. http://www.itworld.com/networking/131655/skype-says-two-thirds-users-still-cant-log

Skype is blaming its peer-to-peer interconnection system for the problem. In an official blog post, the company said: 'Our engineers are creating new 'mega-supernodes' as fast as they can, which should gradually return things to normal.' http://www.itworld.com/networking/131617/skype-blames-service-outage-supernode-problem. And as of 8 a.m. Thursday, Skype said about 2/3 of users still can't log in. http://www.itworld.com/networking/131655/skype-says-two-thirds-users-still-cant-log

...Until some hacker finds a security flaw in the system used to send the kill signals,[...]

s/hacker/"disgruntled employee"/

I interviewed Scott Lowe this evening for ITworld and he denies the allegations. Asked why Perry made his charge, Lowe speculated that Perry may have meant another Scott Lowe.

BKP

In the second article.

First page, second paragraph.

What part of that was difficult to click on?

What part of "Image gallery: Ubuntu's Unity interface" was difficult to read?