Philadelphia Tech & Business News: |
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Latest Slashdot News: Software (and Appropriate Input Device) For a Toddler? An anonymous reader writes "I have an 18-month-old who loves bright screens (TV and computer) loves loud noises and loves to mash buttons. He targets my laptop with the button-mashing and I sort of hate having to tell him 'no' when he wants to explore a computer. I was wondering if anyone knows of some fun (and maybe educational) age-specific PC software that also comes with an age-appropriate input device. I've seen those big-button devices in retail stores that seem to just hook up to the TV and I've also seen some PC software that requires keyboard/mouse input which does not seem like the right input device for a toddler."  read more >> Brazil Considering Legalizing File Sharing An anonymous reader writes "It looks like Brazil may be the country to watch if you're interested in much more consumer-friendly copyright laws (assuming US diplomatic pressure doesn't interfere). As that country goes through a copyright reform process among the proposals is one that would create fines not just for infringing but also for hindering fair use and the public domain. Also there is a big push underway with widespread support — even from some artists groups — to legalize file sharing in exchange for a small levy (~$1.74/month) on your broadband connection. Of course one reason why Brazil may be doing it this way is because of the massive success the Brazilian musical genre technobrega has had by embracing file sharing as a way to promote new works and making money (often lots of it) through other avenues like live shows."  read more >> Game Publishers Using Stealth P2P Clients An anonymous reader writes "TorrentFreak has shed some light on the dark practice of installing stealth-mode P2P clients during game downloads and using unsuspecting gamers' PCs as 'bandwidth slaves.' The clients operate in the background and largely go unnoticed until problems arise that are caused by overactive uploading/seeding. While the Akamai NetSession Interface and Pando Media Booster are specifically called out there appear to be other offenders as indicated in the comments left by TorrentFreak readers. A publisher called Solid State Networks is putting out a call for an industry-wide 'best practices' effort to promote transparency control and privacy on behalf of gamers who are otherwise being abused for their bandwidth without their consent."  read more >> Winnie-the-Pooh Parodied In Wookie-the-Chew pickens writes "Erik Hayden writes in the Atlantic that children will see endearing portraits of Chewbacca rendered in the style of "Winnie-the-Pooh" in the book of drawings "Wookie the Chew" a tribute to the combined genius of George Lucas A.A.Milne and E.H.Sheppard by artist James Hance released on September 1st. Samples from the book are available at Hance's web site. Hance bases his right to parody Winnie-the-Pooh on Fair Use as parody under which certain uses of copyrighted works which would otherwise be considered infringing are permissible. Interestingly enough the rights to the original Winnie-the-Pooh were the subject of an 18-year feud in which Walt Disney corporation fought off a challenge to its ownership of the rights ending in 2009 when a judge in Los Angeles struck out a claim against Disney lodged by the family of Stephen Slesinger a comic book pioneer who bought the copyright to Pooh in 1930 from the bear's British creator A.A. Milne. Stories of Pooh's adventures were originally created by Milne in the 1920s based on a toy bear owned by the author's son Christopher Robin."  read more >> 2010 May Be the First Year YouTube Turns a Profit eldavojohn writes "Analysts are saying that this year will be the first year YouTube turns a profit. From the New York Times article: 'In the last year the video site has become a significant contributor to the family business at a time when Google which makes more than 90 percent of its revenue from text search ads is seeking a second act. Though Google does not report YouTube's earnings it has hinted that it is hovering near profitability. Analysts say YouTube will bring in around $450 million in revenue this year and earn a profit. Revenue at YouTube has more than doubled each year for the last three years according to the company.' Of course a little over a year ago we were being told that YouTube was losing around $1.65 million each day. Regardless when you pay $1.65 billion for a business you probably don't expect it to take three to four years before you start making your money back."  read more >> VISA Pulls Plug On ePassporte Porn Webmasters tsu doh nimh writes "Credit card giant VISA International has suspended its business with ePassporte an Internet payment system widely used to pay adult Webmasters and a raft of other affiliate programs. A number of adult Webmaster forums are up in arms over the move because many of their funds are now stranded. Visa has been silent on the issue so far but KrebsOnSecurity.com points to an e-mail from ePassporte founder Christopher Mallick saying the unexpected move by Visa wouldn't strand customers indefinitely. Mallick co-directed Middle Men a Paramount film released in August that tells the story of his experience building one of the world's first porn site payment processing firms as well as the Russian mobsters porn stars and FBI agents he ran into along the way. Interestingly the speculation so far is that Visa cut ties with ePassporte due to new anti-money laundering restrictions in the Credit Card Act of 2009 which affects prepaid cards and other payment card instruments that can be reloaded with funds at places other than financial institutions."  read more >> New and Old Experiments Combine To Help the Search For Life On Mars jamie sends in a story about an unexpected finding by the Phoenix Mars Lander which has shed new light on experiments done by the Viking landers back in 1976. The Viking experiments found traces of chlorine compounds that were interpreted to be the result of contamination from cleaning fluids on Earth. In 2008 an experiment done by Phoenix found percholates in the soil which came as a surprise to researchers. After doing tests on similar soil from Chile a new study has found that those percholates paired with organic molecules could very well be the source of the chlorine compounds detected by Viking. While this is not direct evidence for life on Mars the fact that complex organic compounds can apparently persist in the Martian soil gives researchers a new avenue to pursue while looking for that evidence.  read more >> NVIDIA Announces New Line of Fermi-Based Mobile Chips MojoKid writes "NVIDIA has announced an entire line-up of Fermi-based GeForce GT and GTX 400M mobile GPUs seven in total and revealed a number of notebook design wins from major OEMs. Like their desktop-targeted counterparts the mobile GeForce GT and GTX 400M series GPUs make use of technology from NVIDIA's desktop architecture which debuted in the GF100 GPU at the heart of the company's flagship GeForce GTX 480. GeForce GT and GTX 400M series GPUs are DirectX 11 compatible and support all of NVIDIA's 'Graphics Plus' features including PhysX 3D Vision CUDA Verde drivers 3DTV Play and Optimus dynamic switching technology. The GeForce GTX 470M and GTX 460M are the most powerful of the group and target enthusiasts and gamers while the GeForce GT 445M GT 435M GT 425M GT 420M and GT 415M target performance-conscious but more mainstream consumers."  read more >> Where Does Dell Go After Losing 3Par? crimeandpunishment writes "It was the big deal Dell wanted in a big way. But now that it has lost out to Hewlett-Packard in the bidding war it started for 3Par where does Dell go in its effort to diversify its business and move into the higher-profit area of selling technology to other companies? The company faces significant challenges largely due to its lower-end focus and because many of its competitors beat Dell into branching out. One analyst says 'People see [Dell] as box-pushers'."  read more >> Anti-Google Video Runs In Times Square Hugh Pickens writes "The NY Times reports that Consumer Watchdog is running a 540-square-foot video billboard advertisement in Times Square New York that shows Google CEO Eric Schmidt as an ingratiating ice cream truck driver who knows everything about everyone and happily offers free ice cream in exchange for full body scans. The group says its goal is to push Congress and the Federal Trade Commission to create a Do Not Track Me list similar to the Do Not Call list developed to prevent telemarketers from aggressively calling consumers. 'Do you want Google or any other online company looking over your shoulder and tracking your every move online just so it can increase its profits?' writes the group's president Jamie Curtis at the group's web site. 'Consumers have a right to privacy. They should control how their information is gathered and what it is used for.' The FTC's consumer affairs group had no comment on whether the agency is considering creating a Do Not Track Me list."  read more >>
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