Topic: MUSIK - on January 16, 2007 at 11:27:00 AM CET
How to have a top 40 hit
Unsigned musicians can now get into the UK top 40 thanks to new download rules - with Essex rock band Koopa the first to take advantage.
Fancy yourself as a pop star? Got the image and attitude and think you could handle the fame, fortune and fans? Getting into the charts is easy now - isn't it?
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Topic: WEB - on January 16, 2007 at 11:20:00 AM CET
Wikipedia has reach it's 1 Million dollar donation!
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Topic: VIDEO - on January 16, 2007 at 11:03:00 AM CET
Venice Project Launch Name: Joost
The Venice Project, the new online television startup led by Skype founders Niklas Zennstrom and Janus Friis, has always been a working name for the company. Until today, no one outside the company knew name the company would eventually launch as.
A tip from reader Joost Schreve led us to the domain name Joost.com: if you click the “cancel” button multiple times an unformatted web page pops up with information about the Venice Project. We have subsequently confirmed that this is the actual launch name of the company.
Skype founders name new video start-up Joost
The Venice Project (Screenshot Walkthrough)
Skype founders move into net TV
Skype founders' video service renamed and relaunched
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Topic: MUSIK - on January 16, 2007 at 10:30:00 AM CET
Little porkers get big with help from Mozart
A Vietnamese pig farmer says he has found a novel way to boost productivity, by exposing his 3 000 hogs to the melodies of Beethoven, Mozart and Schubert while they have their snouts in the trough.
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Topic: DRUGS - on January 16, 2007 at 10:22:00 AM CET
Drug Tax Stamps
Many people want to legalize, regulate, and tax marijuana and other drugs, however, few know that many U.S. states are content simply to tax. In fact, even the federal government wants a share, and used tax stamps in early prohibition, but only the states have recently issued issued cool stamps (be sure to click "exhibit"). The point, of course, is not to actually tax the drugs, but to penalize the drug dealers for tax evasion as well as drug sales.
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Topic: DRUGS - on January 16, 2007 at 10:21:00 AM CET
Study questions "gateway" theory of drug abuse
The findings call into question the "gateway" hypothesis - that is, that youths at risk of drug abuse progress from using alcohol and cigarettes to illegal "soft" drugs like marijuana to "hard" drugs like cocaine and heroin, Dr. Ralph E. Tarter of the University of Pittsburgh School of Pharmacy and colleagues write in the American Journal of Psychiatry.
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Topic: SECURITY - on January 16, 2007 at 10:15:00 AM CET
FBI: Terrorists Can Operate Airport Webcams, You Know
Key U.S. security agencies warn that terrorists might exploit pictures of sensitive facilities such as airports that can be routinely viewed by the public through Internet feeds.
A confidential assessment jointly prepared by the FBI and the U.S. Homeland Security Department says online webcams could be a valuable tool for extremists determined to attack critical targets.
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Topic: COPYRIGHT - on January 16, 2007 at 10:13:00 AM CET
Privately, Hollywood admits DRM isn't about piracy
For almost ten years now I have argued that digital rights management has little to do with piracy, but that is instead a carefully plotted ruse to undercut fair use and then create new revenue streams where there were previously none. I will briefly repeat my argument here before relating a prime example of it in the wild.
The theory
Access control technologies such as DRM create "scarcity" where there is immeasurable abundance, that is, in a world of digital reproduction. The early years saw tech such as CSS tapped to prevent the copying of DVDs, but DRM has become much more than that. It's now a behavioral modification scheme that permits this, prohibits that, monitors you, and auto-expires when. Oh, and sometimes you can to watch a video or listen to some music.
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Topic: COPYRIGHT - on January 16, 2007 at 10:10:00 AM CET
First pirated HD DVD movie hits BitTorrent
The pirates of the world have fired another salvo in their ongoing war with copy protection schemes with the first release of the first full-resolution rip of an HD DVD movie on BitTorrent. The movie, Serenity, was made available as a .EVO file and is playable on most DVD playback software packages such as PowerDVD. The file was encoded in MPEG-4 VC-1 and the resulting file size was a hefty 19.6 GB.
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Topic: NEWS english - on January 16, 2007 at 10:09:00 AM CET
Journalists fined over Islam joke
A court in Casablanca has given two Moroccan journalists suspended sentences of three years for defaming Islam and breaching public morality.
The journalists' weekly magazine, Nichane, had published an article entitled How Moroccans laugh at religion, sex and politics.
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