Ars Technica
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Supremes Wrestle With Business Method, Software Patents
For the first time in a generation, the nation's highest court on Monday pondered the question of which inventions are eligible for patent protection. For the petitioner, Bernard Bilski, the issue was whether he'd get a patent on "a method for managing the consumption risk costs of a commodity sold …
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Verizon's $350 Early Termination Fee Rubs Senator Wrong Way
Verizon has gotten on the bad side of US Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), who publicly criticized the company this week for its decision to significantly jack up early termination fees (ETFs) for some customers. Not only did Klobuchar send a letter to Verizon president and CEO Lowell C. McAdam calling …
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MSN Videos Becomes Bing Videos
Microsoft today started rolling out a new version of Bing Videos, which combines the video search we've come to expect from Bing plus the content we've been getting from MSN Video. The rollout begins today, but will only be fully available on both Bing and MSN by mid-November, a Microsoft spokespers …
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Go: New Open Source Programming Language From Google
Every computer programmer has a copious pile of opinions about how their programming language of choice could be improved. Who doesn't want more syntactic sugar, better runtime performance, and faster compilation? That's one of the reasons why there are so many programming languages. Creating a comp …
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Pirates Navigate Around Windows 7 Activation Again
A new activation crack method has been discovered and implemented to bypass Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 activation: remove and disable Windows Activation Technologies (WAT, older versions were referred to as Windows Genuine Advantage). The hack in question works by bypassing activation alto …
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GNOME Roadmap Updated, Version 3 Pushed Back To Late 2010
The GNOME desktop environment is undergoing a significant transformation. The developers behind the open source project are working on version 3.0, the first major overhaul since 2002. The GNOME release team has updated the roadmap and has set September 2010 as the target for the launch of GNOME 3.0 …
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Bot Herders Turn To The Cloud For Command And Control
On Monday, the security blog at Arbor Networks reported finding a bit of malware that checked in with a remote account to download some URLs. On its own, this is hardly a newsworthy event; botnets have used all sorts of communications protocols to receive updated code and information. What makes t …
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Apple's Mini DisplayPort Becomes Official VESA Spec
Apple's Mini DisplayPort has been the butt of a few jokes since its introduction in 2008. It may soon become more ubiquitous, however, as the Video Electronics Standards Association (VESA) announced Tuesday that Mini DisplayPort (also known as mDP) is officially becoming part of the current DisplayP …
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Kindle For PC Adds Flexibility, But Not A Whole Lot More
Kindle for PC, Amazon's e-reader software for Windows, has finally been released to the throngs of Kindle users who wish to read their books on the computer. The software, which was announced late last month, offers yet another way for customers to read their electronic booksthis time in full color. …
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Netbooks Shunned By Official Mac OS X 10.6.2 Release
The fears of netbook users with an appreciation for Mac OS X have been confirmed this week with the release of the 10.6.2 update to Snow Leopard. Users of "hackintoshed" netbooks are now finding out the hard way that attempting to install the just-released 10.6.2 update results in an unusable m …
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Public Pressure Stops BBC's HDTV DRM Drive (for Now)
Hollywood's attempt to force DRM measures on the BBC's over-the-air high-definition broadcasts looks to have come a cropper after intense public pressure.
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First Borderlands DLC Hits November 24, Brings Zombies
If the multitude of zombie-themed games currently on the market isn't enough, Gearbox has announced that the first downloadable content pack for BorderlandsThe Zombie Island of Dr. Nedwill be coming to both the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 on November 24. The pack will cost $9.99 or 800 Microsoft p …
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Microsoft Buys Teamprise, Gets Cross Platform Support For VS
Microsoft has announced plans to purchase Teamprise-related assets from SourceGear but refused to reveal details of the acquisition. The Teamprise division of SourceGear, a Microsoft partner and leading provider of solutions for software developers using Microsoft tools and platforms, has been creat …
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The ghost of the PS2: God of War Collection reviewed
We're a few months away from the launch of God of War 3, and everyone has played the first two games in preparation, right? For those interested in revisiting the PlayStation 2 classics, or for gamers who somehow missed them the firs time around, Sony has released quite the package: God of War 1 and …
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Finland, Spain bringing 1Mbps broadband to everyone
While the US talks, other countries are acting. Both Finland and Spain have now decided to add "broadband" to their universal service requirements. By 2011, any Finn or Spaniard, no matter where they live, should be able to get a reliable 1Mbps connection at a reasonable price. "Universal service …
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Ars responds to Big Cable: TV networks nothing like an iPod
Yesterday, the cable industry's top lobbyist made his case to the Ars audience about the virtues of selectable output control. Today, media historian and Ars author Matt Lasar explains why he's not convincedand why iPod upgrades aren't a good analogy for what SOC backers want to do. "Warning! Hol …
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Ethics leaks spur House bill banning P2P apps on .gov PCs
Peer-to-peer filesharing applications have been wildly popular, especially among those interested in accessing pirated software, music, and media. But not everyone who operates a P2P client knows how to properly configure the software, and some clients may share entire directories unless explicitly …
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IGF attendees: America, surrender the root zone file!
Back in October, the US Commerce Department changed its agreement with the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). Out went the "Joint Project Agreement" and in came the "Affirmation of Commitments." That may not sound like much of change, but the new document removed even more …
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ICANN attendees: America, surrender the root zone file!
Back in October, the US Commerce Department changed its agreement with the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). Out went the "Joint Project Agreement" and in came the "Affirmation of Commitments." That may not sound like much of change, but the new document removed even more …
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Inside "MinWin": the Windows 7 kernel slims down
As Windows 2000 was being developed in the second half of the 1990s, Microsoft was firmly focused on building in as much functionality as possible, in a play to push Novell Netware aside and establish Windows NT as the operating system for the business world. When NT was released to manufacturi …
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