p2pnet World Headlines: Jan 25, 2010
Internet Explorer ‘hit with new set of security flaws’ Telegraph
A US security research firm has found another set of vulnerabilities within Internet Exlporer, only a day after Microsoft released an emergency software update. Microsoft had to release an unscheduled security update last week to protect IE users and could face having to do so again. Boston-based Core Security Technologies discovered the vulnerabilities on Friday January 22, only a day after the technology giant had released an unscheduled security patch to protect users of the most popular browser in the world from the flaws used by the hackers who pried into the email accounts of human rights activists in China.
At Hulu, ‘free’ may soon turn into ‘fee’ Los Angeles Times
Hulu soared to popularity by offering free online viewing of popular TV shows. Now that free ride may soon end. The Internet video site is weighing plans to charge users to watch episodes of “30 Rock,” “Modern Family” and “House.” The move would mark a sharp change of course for the venture, which was launched nearly two years ago by a consortium of studios to distribute without charge TV shows and movies over the Internet. The site has spent months studying how to strike a balance between what people expect to watch free online and what they would be willing to pay for, said people familiar with the matter who were not authorized to speak publicly.
Motorola files U.S. ITC complaint against RIM Reuters
Motorola Inc has asked U.S. regulators to bar Research In Motion from the U.S. sale of its products, accusing the BlackBerry maker of infringing on five Motorola technology patents. Motorola, which has been losing market share to Canada’s RIM for years, said most of RIM’s products infringe on at least one of the patents, which cover technology for Wi-Fi, application management, user interface and power management. A representative for RIM declined comment.
Mozilla Firefox Gets More ‘Agile’ with Lorentz Developer.com
Mozilla is now embarking on a new development and release model for its flagship Firefox open source Web browser. The model will meld both fast-moving Agile and more traditional “waterfall” development methodologies in an attempt to more quickly iterate new features while maintaining backwards compatibility, security and overall code quality. With the new model, the Firefox 3.6.x Web browser, which was released yesterday, will become Mozilla’s stable branch and will receive both bug and feature updates. Prior to Firefox 3.6, Mozilla provided stability and security updates only on the released branch (i.e., Firefox 3.5.7), while it provided new features only on new major releases (such as Firefox 3.5).
China paper slams U.S. for cyber role in Iran unrest Reuters
China’s Communist Party mouthpiece on Sunday accused the United States of mounting a cyber army and a “hacker brigade,” and of exploiting social media like Twitter or Youtube to foment unrest in Iran. The People’s Daily accused the United States of controlling the Internet in the name of Internet freedom after Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called for more Internet freedoms in China and elsewhere in a speech on Thursday. China on Friday warned that Washington’s push against Internet censorship could harm ties. “Behind what America calls free speech is naked political scheming. How did the unrest after the Iranian elections come about?” said the editorial, signed by Wang Xiaoyang.
AOL Acquires StudioNow For $36.5M; Ex-Google Reynar’s In, CTO Cahall’s Out paidContent
AOL has come out with a pair of announcements this morning… The company has made it first acquisition since spinning off from Time Warner last month: the company has bought aggregation site StudioNow for $36.5 million in cash and stock. Separately, after denying that CTO Ted Cahall was leaving AOL last week, the company has acknowledged that he is in fact departing and is looking for a replacement. In the meantime, AOL has confirmed that it has hired former Google exec Jeff Reynar as Head of Technology for Engineering and Products in New York.
Online sex ‘grooming’ law lacks teeth The Local
Sweden’s ‘anti-grooming’ law, which makes it illegal for adults to contact children online for sexual purposes has had a disappointing start. Despite surveys indicating half of Swedish girls under 15 have received online sexual advances, the law has not led to any convictions since entering into force six months ago. Since July 1st 2009, any adult in Sweden contacting a child under 15-years of age over the internet with a view to grooming them for sex, can face sentences of up to a year in jail. However the law has been slow to take effect with only a hundred suspected cases reported so far. “The low number of cases may result from the fact that the law is not that widely known,” David Lagerlöf, a spokesperson for ECPAT, an international charity working to stop the sexual exploitation of children, told the TT news agency.
HP partners on music download service in Europe CNet News
Hewlett-Packard has partnered with Ominfone to distribute the U.K. music provider’s MusicStation service on PCs sold in Europe, Ominfone announced Sunday. The service, which boasts unlimited access to more than 6.5 million music tracks from the four major recording labels, distributes music in DRM-protected WMA files. Songs are downloaded to the user’s computer for online and offline play, but the songs are playable only as long as the subscription is active. MusicStation Desktop will be preloaded on 16 HP models sold in the U.K., France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Austria, Belgium, the Netherlands, Sweden, and Switzerland. The service will be free for 14 days, at which time users can sign up for a monthly subscription, which will cost 8.99 pounds ($14.47) in the U.K. and 9.99 euros ($14.10) in most of the other countries.
OMG: brains can’t handle all our Facebook friends Times Online
We may be able to amass 5,000 friends on Facebook but humans’ brains are capable of managing a maximum of only 150 friendships, a study has found. Robin Dunbar, professor of Evolutionary Anthropology at Oxford University, has conducted research revealing that while social networking sites allow us to maintain more relationships, the number of meaningful friendships is the same as it has been throughout history. Dunbar developed a theory known as “Dunbar’s number” in the 1990s which claimed that the size of our neocortex — the part of the brain used for conscious thought and language — limits us to managing social circles of around 150 friends, no matter how sociable we are.
___________________________________
Click here for p2pnet music downloads
___________________________________
..… and identi.ca
First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win ~ Mahatma Gandhi
January, 2010
Use free p2pnet newsfeeds for your site. Subscribe to p2pnet.net | | rss feed: http://p2pnet.net/feed
Net access blocked by government restrictions? Use Psiphon from the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto. Go here for details.
January 25th, 2010 at 5:47 pm
“Hulu …is weighing plans to charge users to watch episodes of ’30 Rock,’ ‘Modern Family’ and ‘House’…”
I have to wonder WTF is going through the minds behind these sites.
Here we have countless Network TV shows people can watch for nothing over free airspace, or watch for no additional charge through their cable companies. Does Network Television need to be duplicated for the Internet?! WHY?? And, would that many people really rather watch these shows on their 13″-21″ monitors, than just switch on their actual TVs?!
Now the “free” model isn’t working for the sites that offer this programming (can’t say that’s a big surprise), so they start wanting to charge fees. Where do we see this type of thing happening these days?… Oh yeah, EVERYWHERE! Does this plan ever come to fruition?… (nope!)
“Insanity can be defined as doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”
- Albert Einstein
January 25th, 2010 at 7:42 pm
“A US security research firm has found another set of vulnerabilities within Internet Exlporer”
That’s almost as surprising as when I found holes in my Swiss cheese!
January 28th, 2010 at 3:18 am
“another set of vulnerabilities within Internet Exlporer”
There’s a big surprise.
“Now the “free” model isn’t working for the sites that offer this programming (can’t say that’s a big surprise), so they start wanting to charge fees. Where do we see this type of thing happening these days?… Oh yeah, EVERYWHERE! Does this plan ever come to fruition?”
The “free” model never works. Someone always has to pay for content. Sometimes its not the user of the content but an advertiser but the content is still paid for. Now that advertising models are failing, consumers are surprised that content really does cost money to produce and distribute.