Slashdot Mirror

acidradio writes "The Maryland Supreme Court has ruled that fining a spam mailer in New York is unconstitutional as it tries to control commerce outside Maryland's borders."

An anonymous reader writes "According to the Star Tribune: 'The Microsoft antitrust suit in Minnesota was settled out-of-court Monday seven weeks after it began, but before the plaintiffs even finished putting on their case before the jury. Terms of the settlement won't be disclosed until they are finalized and presented to a Hennepin County judge for preliminary approval 'in early summer,' Microsoft said in a statement. The antitrust suit in Hennepin Country District Court sought as much as half a billion dollars from Microsoft for alleged overcharges of more than 1 million Minnesota consumers and businesses who bought Microsoft Windows, Word or Excel software between 1994 and 2001.'"

hiero writes "From an article in the Star Tribune: 'Federal authorities said Tuesday they thwarted an extortion plot against Best Buy Co. Inc. by a man who sent the company an e-mail threatening to expose what he claimed were weaknesses in the retailer's computer system unless he was paid $2.5 million.' What's really interesting to me, though, is this paragraph further on in the article: 'The federal search warrant was obtained the morning of Oct. 24 and allowed the FBI, with Best Buy's cooperation, to use an Internet device known as an Internet Protocol Address Verifier. It contained a program that automatically sent back a response to Best Buy after the company sent a message to the e-mail address. The response allowed investigators to identify Ray as the sender of the e-mail threats, according to the government.' Internet Protocol Address Verifier? Is this Carnivore in action?"

indros13 writes "The Hon. Mark Dayton, Senator from Minnesota, is reportedly considering a "miniscule email tax" to counter the flood of spam. Thinking like an economist, he's obviously hoping to make mass emailing unprofitable. 'You can't say, "We want it to be totally free and unrestricted and on the other hand we want it to work smoothly and civilly," he said.' No word on how all those lobbying groups that use mass emails will respond, but I'm sure there are a few emails on the way..." Politician weasel words are part of the package, though; Dayton says a tax is "just one of the tactics that should be considered, but I don't favor it at this time."

slammin'j writes "According to this article from the Star Tribune, Hormel has filed a lawsuit against Spam Arrest LLC. for endangering "substantial goodwill and good reputation" of their meat product, Spam. If Hormel wins, it could be bad news for umpteen companies that make use of the word spam in their name."

slammin'j writes "According to this article from the Star Tribune, Hormel has filed a lawsuit against Spam Arrest LLC. for endangering "substantial goodwill and good reputation" of their meat product, Spam. If Hormel wins, it could be bad news for umpteen companies that make use of the word spam in their name."

wendigo2002 writes "Get used to that daily flood of e-mail come-ons, Viagra offers and lucrative enticements to invest in Nigerian pyramid schemes. Internet gurus, software designers and lawyers today ended a three-day Federal Trade Commission discussion on combating spam by concluding neither technology nor laws are yet capable of completely dealing with the plague."

koehn writes "In an interesting turn of events, the Attorney General of Pennsylvania has ordered all PA ISPs to block sites that have child porn. If that's not bad enough, they won't tell you which sites those are because - so the excuse goes - that could be construed as 'disseminating pornography.' So much for public review, huh?" See the previous story.

RodeoBoy writes "It seems that regardless of what NASA and Boeing wants the public to believe there are still questions about damage to the shuttle's left wing. Some Boeing engineers have raised concerns that proper analysis of the damage was not done at the time, due to changes and cutbacks in Boeing. It is also coming out that more than one chunk of foam might have hit and damaged the wing. With Boeing having some financial troubles and NASA under public scrutiny again, what is the future of the space shuttle program..."

thejuggler writes "A call to Samuel Meltzer's St. Paul home is greeted with the message that he doesn't want to be bothered by solicitations. But, this story in a Minneapolis newspaper tells how the Feds and SEC claim he is a huge spammer. They claim he sends out spam spreading false and misleading information about various penny stocks. So far he has made at least $159,600 in stock and cash from 1998-2001 for spreading this false information. In a brief interview Tuesday, Meltzer (The evil spammer), 37, said he hadn't seen the complaint. "This is a surprise," he added."

vena writes "The Star Tribune reports the House and Senate today agreed not to allow email surveillance of American citizens proposed by the Total Information Awareness program. Additionally, negotiators agreed to halt all future funding on the program without extensive consultation with Congress."

CriX writes "There's been some work on creating a more intuitive airplane cockpit. The idea is to use graphics and symbols instead of gauges and numbers to enhance a pilot's awareness. The data shows that these are a lot easier to read under turbulence and the information easier to interpret for less experience pilots. Sweet, I love human factors engineering."

ttol writes "In the Star Tribune, they write that "PC games fell 6.2 percent through the first 10 months of this year, making the first such decline ever." They go on to say that consoles will break record sales this year, and that there is a shift towards console gaming from PC. Is this due to the fact that there are now three major contenders (XBox, Playstation 2, Game Cube) and all the advanced features they offer (DVD ability on the first two etc)? I, for one, will continue with my Battlefield 1942 on my PC."

smackthud writes "According to this article in the Minneapolis StarTribune website Stanford University is planning to clone human embryos. Story summary says it all: 'Stanford University announced today its intention to clone human embryos, becoming the first U.S. university to publicly embrace the politically charged procedure. The intent of the project is to produce stem cells for medical research.'" Stanford has released a statement distinguishing what Stanford is doing from reproductive cloning.

smackthud writes "According to this article in the Minneapolis StarTribune website Stanford University is planning to clone human embryos. Story summary says it all: 'Stanford University announced today its intention to clone human embryos, becoming the first U.S. university to publicly embrace the politically charged procedure. The intent of the project is to produce stem cells for medical research.'" Stanford has released a statement distinguishing what Stanford is doing from reproductive cloning.

qaz submits a story about a remote-controlled graveyard. Supposedly this site is another computer-controlled setup, but it's not responding at the moment. Still looking for a pumpkin carving pattern (the Ellen Feiss pattern is nice too)? Or perhaps you'd prefer yet another punkin-chunking machine, a new model which has several news stories about it: here and here. And if spooky stories are more your style, everything2 is running a scary story contest (see last year's for ideas).

SEWilco writes: "A Minneapolis Star Tribune story points out that small repair shops say they lose money because they don't have access to car computer codes. These 'codes' are the diagnostic messages used by onboard computers to report problems and perform tests. Older designs only required a jumper wire to make a test light flash code patterns, certain dashboard actions to display codes, or a cheap display terminal from a parts store. Now the interfaces and code meanings are more complex and undocumented, so only auto dealer repair shops can easily find causes of some problems. U.S. Senate S.2617 and House H. R. 2735 would force auto manufacturers to share the codes. Sen. Wellstone says that manufacturers are acting like a cartel, blocking independent shops and car owners. But GM is being helpful."

jweb writes: "The Minneapolis Star Tribune is running an article about a bill in the Minnesota legislature that would make it illegal for an ISP to disclose personal information about websites that its customers visit. According to the article, this bill has passed both houses of the legislature, with one key difference: the House version requires customers to 'opt-out' of this information-sharing, but the Senate version would be 'opt-in', requiring the customer to specifically state that they would like their personal information made available. Not suprisingly, AOL and Yahoo are lobbying against it."

tunabomber writes: "Those planning on tuning in to America's Patriotic Sports TV Event of the Year to catch the new commercials will no longer have to sit through all that football filler. PBS, of all networks, is airing a postgame show in which the subject of discussion is not the game, but the commercials. Super Commercials: A Mental Engineering Special is a beefed-up episode of the cultish Mental Engineering series where a panel of experts, including former Daily Show host Lizz Winstead and a Silicon Valley computer scientist, critique (read: eviscerate) Super Bowl commercials. There are also blurbs about this at The Kansas City Star and The St. Paul Star Tribune." One thing you'll be able to look forward to: fewer sock puppet commercials, more anti-terror commercials.

WallytheWalrus writes "Today's Minneapolis Star-Tribune is carrying an article about the installation of a wireless network throughout Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, the first of five such airports across the nation to get a uniform wireless network system. The system, which cost only $250,000 to install, will be free to business travellers passing through the airport (who have the correct hardware), and available through a number of kiosks throughout the airport. One can only hope this is the first step towards bigger and bolder public wireless network projects."

WallytheWalrus writes: "According to this article from today's Minneapolis Star-Tribune, the Minnesota State Commerce Department is investigating the fairness of Qwest DSL subscribers being switched over to MSN (as a part of the two companies' new "friendly strategic alliance"). A group of DSL service competitors have alledged that it's unfair that Qwest subscribers aren't being told of other ISPs available, and that if they do switch to MSN, switching out is overly complex and expensive. Can you smell the legal precdent abrew?"

F452 writes: "From an AP story in the Minneapolis StarTribune: 'A crocodile longer than a school bus and weighing about 10 tons was the top predator in an African river 110 million years ago, routinely dining on large dinosaurs that came within range of its toothy jaws.' Cool."

speleo writes: "An article in the Minneapolis-St. Paul Star Tribune tells how the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad has been ordered to stop its secret genetic testing of employees to determine whether they were predisposed to developing carpal tunnel syndrome. Holy Gattica!" This is a follow-up to this story.

speleo writes: "An article in the Minneapolis-St. Paul Star Tribune tells how the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad has been ordered to stop its secret genetic testing of employees to determine whether they were predisposed to developing carpal tunnel syndrome. Holy Gattica!" This is a follow-up to this story.

SEWilco writes: "The Minneapolis Star Tribune points out there's a high-tech snowplow being road tested around the country. It uses differential GPS, radar, joystick-controlled plow, rumble seat, and a heads-up display for zero-visibility driving. CNN and Nando/AP had related reports. I wonder if they'll automate a plow conga line." These will still be useful for a few more years as global warming advances...

SEWilco writes: "The Minneapolis Star Tribune points out there's a high-tech snowplow being road tested around the country. It uses differential GPS, radar, joystick-controlled plow, rumble seat, and a heads-up display for zero-visibility driving. CNN and Nando/AP had related reports. I wonder if they'll automate a plow conga line." These will still be useful for a few more years as global warming advances...

J.t.Qbe writes "The Minneapolis Star Tribune reports that Northwest Airlines has begun searching home computers belonging to some of its employees for e-mail evidence that the employees helped organize a 'sickout' over New Year's. Scary stuff. Still eager to take that 'free PC' from your employer?" The best quote is from a corporate lawyer who redefines commercial speech to be speech about a corporation rather than speech by one: "Business speech is not subject to the same protections as political speech," said John Roberts, a Minneapolis attorney who specializes in cyberlaw. "You can't say whatever you want about a company."

Update: 02/09 20:41 by michael : Some slashdot readers are not reading the story before commenting. The computers in question are the personally-owned machines of their employees. The company is fighting the union in court, and obtained a court order to search the personal property of these people who are not even union officials.

Why2K writes "This article provides some interesting comments on the differences between FreeBSD and Linux, and the reasons why Linux is more popular. " Its sorta an outsider fluff piece, but its a nice summary. Talks broadly about the technical differences in the code, the sociologies, and of course, the fact that BSD has a cooler mascot ;)

Ed Bailey wrote in to say that the Linux-7K project to get Linux on the Psion has started Bearing Fruit Fict sent in a link to LinuxApps which recently got a recamp. Looks strangely familiar GVeloper wrote in to say that gdev has been revamped (to use Slash) as well as containing some comments about glide and glade possibly merging. Lincoln sent us a link to a CG short parody of the politics of sfx which will be of interest to Star Wars fans. my copy of xanim won't play it, but several people told me it's really excellent. freejack wrote in to say that the Star Tribune rated Slashdot in top sites for geek gossip mongers. Whatever that means. Shave sent in a link to Jerry Pournelle's web site a where he talks about Refund Day and Slashdot (and neither in particularly cheerful terms) And finally, for the gamers out there, mgix sent a link to a N64 Emulator that can do Zelda64. That game has been a staple in the Geekhouse for weeks now. Addictive.