Slashdot Mirror

idigjazz writes "Meet Arfa, a promising young software programmer from Faisalabad, Pakistan, who is believed to be the youngest Microsoft Certified Professional in the world. She received the certification when she was 9. During a recent meeting with Bill Gates, she presented him with a poem she wrote that celebrated his life story."

theodp writes "The USPTO has reversed its earlier rejection and notified Amazon that the patent application for CEO Jeff Bezos' invention, Coordinating Delivery of a Gift, has been examined and is allowed for issuance as a patent. BTW, Amazon was represented before the USPTO by Perkins Coie, who also supplied Bezos with legal muscle in his personal fight against zoning laws that threatened to curb the size of his Medina mansion (reg.) before the City of Medina eventually gave up on regulating the size of homes (reg.)."

theodp writes "The USPTO has reversed its earlier rejection and notified Amazon that the patent application for CEO Jeff Bezos' invention, Coordinating Delivery of a Gift, has been examined and is allowed for issuance as a patent. BTW, Amazon was represented before the USPTO by Perkins Coie, who also supplied Bezos with legal muscle in his personal fight against zoning laws that threatened to curb the size of his Medina mansion (reg.) before the City of Medina eventually gave up on regulating the size of homes (reg.)."

wbren writes "Bill Gates and Vietnam's Prime Minister Phan Van Khai have signed two 'memoranda of understanding' regarding Microsoft's presence in Vietnam, according to this AP story. They met Monday at Microsoft's Redmond headquarters for a closed door meeting and a tour of Microsoft's "home of the future". The agreement reached is expected to strengthen Vietnam's IT industry, as well as provide software training for 50,000 of the country's teachers. Khai's visit also triggered protests in Seattle, reminding everyone of Vietnam's human rights record."

Republican Dino Rossi decided last night to not appeal yesterday's decision by Chelan judge John Bridges to let last November's governor election stand -- the closest in U.S. history -- which keeps Christine Gregoire, who won by 129 votes after two recounts, in office. The Republicans claimed that fraud and mistakes far exceeded the difference between the candidates, and that statistical analysis showed Rossi might have received more legal votes. Bridges concluded there were thousands of incorrect votes and other major problems, but that the Republicans didn't meet the high threshold of proof that the result was incorrect. He also said he feared current law will make elections problems even worse, and urged the government and voters to work to fix the system.

Thomas Hawk writes "The Seattle Times is out with an article today profiling Jeremy Allaire, the founder of a new internet television company called Brightcove along with, well, a program on 'hog cooking' to be broadcast on the Barbeque Network by DaveTV. DaveTV and Brightcove, along with companies like Akimbo, Total Vid, Open Media Network and OurMedia are part of a growing new group of companies called internetworks that are seeking to compete with regular network television and offer alternative niche video content. Look for these offerings in your living room through platforms like TiVo and Microsoft's Media Center shortly."

FleaPlus writes "The Seattle Post-Intelligencer and Universe Today report that the LiftPort Group, a consortium dedicated to commercially developing and constructing a space elevator, will be opening a carbon nanotube manufacturing plant in June of this year. The new facility has been dubbed LiftPort Nanotech. Many expect the LiftPort Group to be a front-runner in NASA's recently-announced Centennial Challenges competitions for space elevator technologies, which begin in September of this year."

Slashback is back after a long absence being devoured by gnomes. Read on below for updates on past Slashdot stories about the continuing Washington election brouhaha, the FBI's latest hunt for server logs, Photoshoppified GIMP, and more.

Let's get the politics out of the way.

The Washington state Republican Party has been working to prove that the election of November 2, between Democrat Christine Gregoire and Republican Dino Rossi, was too fraudulent to be trusted, given the small margin of victory by Gregoire (129 votes), and they want a new election. Hundreds of alleged fraudulent votes (mostly felons, but also out-of-state, duplicate, and deceased voters), uncounted ballots, unaccounted-for absentee ballots, and illegally counted provisional ballots comprise the bulk of the GOP's case. The trial begins May 23, and the judge expects it to last two weeks. The hearing to decide the burden of proof standard will be May 2.

Unctuous politicians relive their student-council glory days:

Jackson West writes "As it stands, two versions of the Electronic Engineering bill (discussed earlier on Slashdot) presented to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors have passed their 'first reading.' This means both the first, unamended piece of legislation, and an amended version that will "specifically exclude web logs, forums, opt-in email lists and postings on general web pages." The Rules Committee will consider the amended bill on Monday, with a final vote on both bills on Tuesday."

How to get attention, part IIVVIVIVM.

SanLouBlues writes "On March 30th, Slashdot reported on the FBI request for the logs of several radical-leaning sites. The Washington Post has an article about the man who was responsible for the posts which resulted in the FBI request. He claimed to have killed a cop in several forum posts."

Now on to the fun stuff!

Matt Omori writes to say that GimpShop, the recently mentioned version of The GIMP hacked to feel more familiar to users of Photoshop, isn't just for Linux and Mac OS X. "Yes, it's finally been coded for Windows XP. After lots of hard work, some people devoted to a website, plasticbugs.com, have coded GimpShop for Windows."

To use it, you'll need Windows XP, GTK+, and a reboot. However, I'd also like to point out a BigSven's comment about the themeability of The GIMP; it would be great to see GIMPersonalities of all sorts -- and it sounds like this can be accomplished with some XML editing.

Still looks actionable to me.

MrToast writes "The iPodLounge is reporting that LuxPro's Super Shuffle is back, but this time with slight alterations. The Super Tangent, as it is being called, has a slightly different button area and also has new headphones. Otherwise it appears to be identical to the iPod shuffle."

(The SuperShuffle disappeared from the Web site, and was reported as a hoax, shortly after it was mentioned in mid-March.)

Let's close on some uplifting news. Vaeske writes with more on my favorite futuristic means of broadband delivery, region-covering airships. "GlobeTel Communications Corp announced that they will be showing their prototype of the Sanswire One on April 12th. This "Stratalite" as they call it, will float in the stratosphere at 65,000 feet and provide line of sight communications to approximately 300,000 square miles, providing two-way high-sped communication. This project has attracted many high-profile NASA engineers to leave their posts for a position with GlobeTel. The military has also shown interest and was present at the GlobeTel Summit."

MilenCent writes "We're starting to see our first mainstream media reports on the PSP's (lack of) sales performance, from the Seattle Times: "But while Sony is touting the rollout as a success -- and many retailers did sell their entire stock -- the event might not have been the complete blockbuster that was expected." In summary, the article says that more systems were sold than not, that dedicated gaming stores were more likely to sell out than department stores like Target, and that the biggest reason gamers didn't pick it up is likely its price -- which wasn't helped by some retailers' sale condition that customers also purchase games, which could raise the price to nearly $350. Will demand pick up once the unit is out there and seen by people, or will it take a price cut before the system sells satisfactorily?"

ChuckOp writes " front-page article in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer states: "The University of Washington associate professor has embarked on a one-man mission to persuade the Redmond company to improve the grammar-checking function in its popular word-processing program. Sandeep Krishnamurthy is also trying to raise public awareness of the issue." He includes some twisted prose that the grammar checker fails to find fault with, such as: "Marketing are bad for brand big and small. You Know What I am Saying?" and "Gates do good marketing job in Microsoft". This last comment is disputed by retired Microsoft researcher Karen Jensen, who developed part of the underlying technology; "Only by knowing that 'Gates' probably refers to Bill Gates -- and not to the plural of the movable portion of a fence -- would the program know to suggest using 'does' instead." The professor also has several twisted examples available."

lildogie writes "Two researchers, from the Florida Institute of Technology and Boston-based Security Innovation Inc., 'surprised the audience at a computer-security convention last month with their finding that a version of Microsoft Windows was more secure than a competing Linux operating system' according to the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. 'This week, the researchers released their finished report, and it included another surprise: Microsoft was funding the project all along.' When will they ever learn?"

theodp writes "An Oregon library worker was arrested after selling at least $10,000 worth of stolen library books, CDs and videotapes online in the past six months. The thief, who scanned the Net to find items in demand and went to the library to check them out, was busted after an alert college president noticed his copy of the recently-published I am Charlotte Simmons, purchased on Amazon.com, sported a library receipt with a due date of Dec. 26. Earlier this month, it was reported that a VT man was arrested for stealing hundreds of books from college libraries and bookstores and selling them on Amazon, realizing more than $4,000. The library thefts are somewhat ironic, since Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos and the NY Times seemed to suggest there might be fewer books in libraries if the Authors Guild, who opposed Amazon's used book sales practices, had their way. Bezos also once told angry booksellers there's no reason why Amazon should have to collect sales taxes, arguing that Amazon gets no police services from other states."

An anonymous reader writes "Google has apparently given the green light for Google's e-mail (Gmail) to be open to the general public." From the registration page: "As we make room for more Gmail users, we want to first extend invitations to Google users. We're still working to make Gmail better, so for now, we're just inviting a small number at random. Looks like that's you! We're really excited to share Gmail with you and we hope you like it." Observed at the P-I Buzzworthy Blog as well.

Jeff writes "On the subject of the dot com crash, the Seattle Times recently ran an outstanding three day series on the corruption at Infospace, with a follow up today on the company's continued relations with its founder, Naveen Jain. Sunday's cover photo of Jain's new office shows a birthday photo of himself and another self-portrait in the background. Only the reflecting pool is missing."

Jeff writes "On the subject of the dot com crash, the Seattle Times recently ran an outstanding three day series on the corruption at Infospace, with a follow up today on the company's continued relations with its founder, Naveen Jain. Sunday's cover photo of Jain's new office shows a birthday photo of himself and another self-portrait in the background. Only the reflecting pool is missing."

Jeff writes "On the subject of the dot com crash, the Seattle Times recently ran an outstanding three day series on the corruption at Infospace, with a follow up today on the company's continued relations with its founder, Naveen Jain. Sunday's cover photo of Jain's new office shows a birthday photo of himself and another self-portrait in the background. Only the reflecting pool is missing."

Jeff writes "In today's Seattle Times, technology columnist Paul Andrews highlights how legal torrent sites such as CommonBits may lead to wider adoption and acceptance of BitTorrent. With reports that illegal torrent usage may be more than a third of Internet traffic, sites like LegalTorrents, Torrentocracy, Prodigem and bt.etree may offer a compelling defense to future legal attacks while simultaneously promoting fair use rights. Andrews goes on to argue that the future of television may be no further away than integration of podcasting, RSS, tagging and BlogTorrent."

prostoalex writes "Every year Microsoft Research scientists show their achievements and developments at Redmond campus. Seattle Post-Intelligencer reports from Techfest, a number of other news resources and blogs are covering it. Read about network-enabled bear that allows parents to communicate with the kids, a mobile phone applications that not only checks, but predicts traffic conditions, and surface computing for digital homes." From the article: "The project isn't fully developed, but the ultimate vision is to have the stuffed animal interact with a child, doing such things as playing games and reading stories. Because the bear is on a network, a parent could also use it to interact with a child remotely -- communicating or even taking snapshots through an embedded camera."

hizzo writes "Richard Clarke, former White House cybersecurity and counterterrorism adviser, harshly critized Microsoft's security track record. 'Given their record in the security area, I don't know why anybody would buy from them.' He also called for some regulation of security for ISPs in addition to better industry self-regulation, such as disclosing QA practices and becoming more accountable for secure code. I wonder if anyone will finally start listening to him?"

cfelde writes "A Windows Web server is more secure than a similarly set-up Linux server, according to a study presented yesterday by two Florida researchers." In addition to the Seattle Times article, there is also coverage on VNUnet. From the article: "The researchers, appearing at the RSA Conference of computer-security professionals, discussed the findings in an event, 'Security Showdown: Windows vs. Linux.' One of them, a Linux fan, runs an open-source server at home; the other is a Microsoft enthusiast. They wanted to cut through the near-religious arguments about which system is better from a security standpoint."

Toadpipe writes "Washington State Court of Appeals reverses a conviction in which a computer simulation had been the main evidence. Quoting 'At issue was PC-Crash, a computer program distributed by Vancouver, B.C.-based MacInnis Engineering Associates. The program recreates traffic collisions using simulations and reconstructions. "PC-Crash had not been validated for the purpose for which the evidence was offered, simulation and prediction of multiple-occupant movement within a vehicle during a multiple-collision accident," the Court of Appeals said in ordering a new trial. "There is no general acceptance in the relevant scientific community of the use of the PC-Crash program for the purposes to which it was put."' Here is the Court's opinion."

GamesIndustry.biz has the news that the Xbox 2 will be launched sometime in late fall of this year. With EA games already working on Xbox 2 titles and rumors of a name for the console in circulation, it looks like the first of the next-gen consoles will be here soon. From the article: "Many have expressed concern that Microsoft is forcing the next generation of console hardware too early, and that the current generation still has much to achieve. The most famous example of this came from then Nintendo of Europe MD David Gosen speaking at an ELSPA summit in London last October, where he lambasted Microsoft for pushing a next generation machine to market in 2005, and even went so far as to question Microsoft's motivation as profit." Additionally, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer has Balmer saying that they will "blow by Sony" with their next console.

Rick the Red writes "In a commentary titled 'Genetic engineering for better suburbia', Vincent Barnes says, 'Cures for diseases and feeding the world with genetically modified foods is well and good but the real money is in solving the problems of homeowners, the vast silent majority of Americans who toil away every spring and summer fighting pests and every fall injuring their backs and falling off ladders.' Should Monsanto bring us designer maples that don't shed leaves? Would you buy designer grass that grows two inches and stops? Even if you won't eat GM food?"

Richard M. Smith writes "Tukwila, Washington firefighter, Philip Scott Lyons found out the hard way that supermarket loyalty cards come with a huge price. Lyons was arrested last August and charged with attempted arson. Police alleged at the time that Lyons tried to set fire to his own house while his wife and children were inside. According to KOMO-TV and the Seattle Times, a major piece of evidence used against Lyons in his arrest was the record of his supermarket purchases that he made with his Safeway Club Card. Police investigators had discovered that his Club Card was used to buy fire starters of the same type used in the arson attempt. For Lyons, the story did have a happy ending. All charges were dropped against him in January 2005 because another person stepped forward saying he or she set the fire and not Lyons."

ScentCone writes "Minnesota teen Jeffrey Lee Parsons got a year and half for releasing a Blaster variant. The lightweight sentence was due, said the judge, to the parents' neglect. Quoting the judge: 'It's not a healthy thing to lock yourself in a room and create your own reality.' Which means most slashdotters basically have a get out of jail free card."

Stephan writes "The AP reports that Norway's Supreme Court ruled Thursday that a student whose Napster.no homepage (no relation to the U.S. Napster, apparently) had links to free Internet music files must compensate the music industry. The around 170 links to mp3s will cost its creator $15,900. In a summary of its ruling, the supreme court said the music was clearly published in violation of copyright law. An unofficial English translation of the Court of Appeal decision (earlier in the case) provided by the lawyer of the defendant and more information on the case can be found at the Links & Law Website."

sriram_2001 writes "Microsoft has just had a record quarter where their profits have doubled from the previous quarter. Total sales are at $10 billion, exceeding both internal and external expectations. Microsoft has attributed the rise in earnings to increased server sales (where *nix-based systems are supposed to be doing well) and more XBox units being sold. For a company that most Slashdotters would say is on the decline, Microsoft sure has weird financial results!" To put it in perspective, Microsoft's income is about the same as New York State receives in taxes - below California, and well above the other 48 states.

komissar writes "The Seattle Times has a recent update on possible salvaging of the Atkinson Saturn experiment. With some work, the data may be recoverable."

mhteas writes "Jeff Bezos's very quiet and private spaceship company Blue Origin is preparing to set up a launch facility in west Texas on 165,000 acres Bezos bought. There's a little more information about Blue Origin's plans too."

theodp writes "27-year-old graphic artist Jeff Tweiten lives on a periwinkle blue, fold-out futon on the sidewalk in front of the Cinerama Theatre in downtown Seattle. He is not homeless, but camping out for 139 days. Waiting. For what, you wonder? Tweiten is waiting for Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith, which opens May 19. And yes, he's keeping a blog. 14 days down. 125 to go." In other Star Wars news: dbottaro writes "Who wants a JL421 Badonkadonk? NAO Design has built a functional Sandcrawler, ala Star Wars Episode IV. Complete with blaster-deflecting sidewalls, full interior carpeting, seating for five and a 400 watt stereo system." Reader dankinit writes "For all you Star Wars fans, a Darth Tater Mr. Potato Head will be released in February by Hasbro Inc. The new covers for the Episode III books due out a month before the movie were also posted today."

An anonymous reader writes "Bram Cohen just announced the CodeCon 2005 program. This follows a recent Seattle Times story about Bram, which mentions his work on CodeCon in addition to BitTorrent. The program has a number of projects that should be familiar to Slashdot readers, such as OTR and RPOW, as well as new projects like SciTools, a free bioinformatics toolkit. CodeCon, co-founded by Bram Cohen and Len Sassaman to fix their frustration with the lack of affordable, high-quality tech conferences, has delivered interesting projects each year, and its fourth year looks to be no exception. The conference is once again in San Francisco, the weekend before the RSA Security conference, February 11-13th. Admission is a mere $80 at the door for three days. In addition to being one of the highest-content tech conferences around, Google has thrown a conference party at the W Hotel each year that makes the conference more than worth the admission. (Last year, surprise 'crasher' Donald Knuth even made an appearance.)"

Washington's secretary of state certified the result of the hand recount (the third count) in the governor's race, reversing the first two results -- which Republican Dino Rossi had won -- and making Democrat Christine Gregoire the election's second governor-elect, by 129 votes out of 2.9 million. The inauguration is January 12. Predictably, the two sides have switched arguments, too, with the Democrats saying Rossi should concede and the Republicans saying they have a duty to make sure the will of the people is followed. The next step may be an election contest, which could take months, and result in a court awarding the victory to a candidate, nullifying the entire election, or sending the matter to the legislature. Rossi is calling for the legislature to pass a special law calling for a new election, which would bypass a contest procedure.

Washington's secretary of state certified the result of the hand recount (the third count) in the governor's race, reversing the first two results -- which Republican Dino Rossi had won -- and making Democrat Christine Gregoire the election's second governor-elect, by 129 votes out of 2.9 million. The inauguration is January 12. Predictably, the two sides have switched arguments, too, with the Democrats saying Rossi should concede and the Republicans saying they have a duty to make sure the will of the people is followed. The next step may be an election contest, which could take months, and result in a court awarding the victory to a candidate, nullifying the entire election, or sending the matter to the legislature. Rossi is calling for the legislature to pass a special law calling for a new election, which would bypass a contest procedure.

nikkoslack copies and pastes: "Microsoft is abandoning one of its most controversial attempts to dominate the Internet after rival companies banded together to oppose it and consumers failed to embrace it. The Redmond software company said Wednesday it would stop trying to persuade Web sites to use its Passport service, which stores consumers' credit-card and other information as Internet users surf from place to place."

didde writes "It seems like our friends in Redmond are quite happy about IE. According to this article, they won't be updating it until Longhorn. My favorite quote would be [We have a very, very innovative set of capabilities that we're putting in the next version. And in the meantime it's an extensible platform, and there will be a set of extensions that Microsoft does as well as others.] Oh boy, are they actually working side by side with the virusmakers and phishers?" That just gives the MozBoys a year head start.

sch7572 writes "Seattle Times carried this story which may be of interest to those addicted to checking Slashdot for new stories every minute. Scientists are concerned that the Information Age is nurturing 'cognitive overload,' an umbrella term for the malaise people feel as a result of distraction, stress, multitasking, and data congestion related to increasingly sophisticated technologies. People multitask because it is expected, encouraged, and considered vital, yet cognitive scientist David Meyer reports that truly effective multitasking is beyond people's capabilities."

Thu Anon Coward writes "This poor guy invented optical storage (CDs, DVDs) and never made a dime. Another case of an idea before its time and cheating a man of his due. To quote the article, 'Consumers will spend billions this holiday season on CDs, DVDs and machines to record and play the ubiquitous silver discs. But the inventor of the underlying technology won't make a cent. Today, Russell does consulting from a lab in the basement of his Bellevue home to keep in the game and supplement a modest pension from Battelle.'"

Two major developments in the apparently neverending Washington state governor's race happened on Wednesday. As the second recount wound down, with 38 of 39 counties reporting -- all but the heavily Democratic-leaning King County -- Republican Dino Rossi extended his lead from 42 votes to 49. Then, the state Supreme Court ruled that its December 14 decision which disallowed including new ballots in the hand recount did not preclude county canvassing boards from including new ballots, which paves the way for 735 previously rejected ballots in King County to be processed. Then, King County announced that its hand recount (not including the 735) swung toward Democrat Christine Gregoire by 59 votes, giving her a 10-vote lead statewide (1,373,051 to 1,373,041). More court challenges are likely to follow.

An anonymous reader writes "As reported, Avinash Bajaj, the CEO of Baazee.com, the Indian subsidiary of eBay, was arrested by the Indian police for distributing pornography. What really seems to have happened is that two high school students from Delhi Public School filmed themselves having oral sex, and this video was distributed through Delhi by email. Some time later, Ravi Raj Singh, a college student from IIT Delhi, offered his VCD of the 157-second clip for sale on Baazee. Avinash Bajaj has now been released on bail, but his U.S. passport is still impounded. AP report here." In reaction to the scandal, SoumyaRay writes, "the Indian government is planning a law based on the DMCA that would establish the responsibility of the corporation when dealing with copyrighted materials. The law 'would deal with four categories of functions by a service provider: transitory communications, system caching, storage of information on systems or networks and information location tools.' Does this differ in any major way with the DMCA? What is being overlooked and what is the potential for abuse? What would you propose?"

SirTwitchALot writes "The FCC has announced that Satellite radio services do not have to comply with the same indecency requirements as traditional broadcasters. Apparently this decision was brought forth by the complaint of a traditional radio station owner, stating that the FCC needs to "level the playing field." Chalk up a win for continued freedom on subscription services."

SetupWeasel writes "The Seattle Post-Intelligencer is reporting that 400,000 additional DSs will be shipped to the US by year's end. This will bring the US total to 1.4 million by the end of 2004." There's also a story running on Gamesindustry.biz regarding DS sales being in line with the sales of the Gameboy Advance.

Spy der Mann writes "Researchers find that men who place portable computers on their laps are inadvertently raising the temperature of their scrotums -- and possibly damaging their sperm. Guess laptops should get a namechange soon... before our fertility does."

John Patrick Luethe writes "The Seattle Times has run an article on Mount St. Helens' recent massive pollution. The article claims that since the start of the recent volcanic activity starting in early October the volcano has pumped out between 50 and 250 tons of sulfur dioxide each day and has become the states largest polluter."

Lev13than writes "The Seattle Post-Intelligencer reports that a Microsoft Employee has hacked up an Excel spreadsheet that performs 'advanced analysis' on a player's Halo 2 stats. The spreadsheet tracks statistics including average kills, deaths and ranking over time, and displays them with charts and graphs. There's even a decent UI to set up reports. Data is refreshed automatically via RSS feeds from Bungie.net. The file can be found here." Bungie's RSS tracking is something we've touched on before.

wap writes "Researchers have found that an injection of polyethylene glycol (PEG) into the site of neural injury was very effective in saving neurons in dogs, allowing them to recover their movement after the injury. This is an amazing development. PEG is a simple, safe chemical. Using it as a post-injury treatment could prevent paralysis in thousands of accident victims every year, if hospitals start using it. This doesn't mean we don't need stem cell research, but it is a simple and potentially cheap way to get many of the benefits for spinal injury."

NivenMK1 writes "The Seattle Times has an interesting article on NASA's plan to nail the comet Tempel 1 with a chunk of copper the size of a bathtub on July 4 this year. This copper 'bullet' is intended to strike the comet at approximately 23,000 mph and hit with a force equivalent to 4.7 tons of TNT. Scientists hope to discover what exactly the comet is made of and what changes have occurred to the outer layers with reference to the core."

sameerdesai writes "Seattletimes is carying this story on Intel helping major countries like China and India to help build Linux machines as an alternative to Microsoft Windows. It definitely looks like both Microsoft and Intel are using the big potential market in Asia to establish a foothold. Microsoft is using its scare tactics to warn of possible lawsuits because Linux violates about 228 patents. What do fellow slashdotters think on trends of OS and hardware in Asia will be?"

Spaceman40 sent in this ZDNet story. PeterPumpkin collects way too many links to Firefox stories: "According to SpreadFirefox.com , there were almost 3 million downloads of Firefox 1.0 in the 5 days since launch, which comes to over 500,000 downloads per day. There are news bites coming out about Firefox everywhere you could possibly imagine. According to a report on MozillaZine, Denmark's largest television channel, TV2, reported on the release of Mozilla Firefox 1.0. PC-WELT, the German equivalent of PC-World, is distributing their own customised version of Firefox to customers." Thomas Hawk writes "Rather than go outside for the past 48 hours, Scott Granneman prefers to burrow in his den and come up with one of the first definitive lists of Firefox links. Good geeking Scott. And way to overcompensate."

prostoalex writes "Seattle PI notices a rise in venture capital investments into open-source companies. JBoss, SourceLabs, SugarCRM and OSDL all attracted venture capital investments this year, with SourceLabs receiving investments from former Senior VP of Microsoft. ""You could say that it is as disruptive as ... mainframes going to PCs or landlines going to cell phones. Software as it has been sold for years is about to be turned on its head completely," says Lucinda Stewart from OVP Venture Partners."

Thomas Hawk writes "Well after almost 24 hours of public release, The Seattle Post Intelligencer seems to have the best round up on the professional opinions on the new MSN search beta. Bottom line seems to be that nobody is going to be switching over to MSN Search from Google anytime soon. The story includes opinions by Walter Mossberg, John Battelle, The Wall Street Journal and others. "