Hi all:

I need to take a break so starting tomorrow, for the next week or so, I’m going to take a bit of time off. That’ll mean more roundups, fewer stories and later than usual starts. And maybe a day or two with no posts at all.

But normal service will be resumed from Tuesday, March 16, onwards.

Cheers! And thanks …
Jon
______________________________

‘The fight goes on’ – the EU’s only woman president Mercedes Bresso marks International Women’s Day with a new call for change – EU
The number of women in public office at local and regional level across Europe is still far short of parity with men and more needs to be done to ensure a more equitable representation of both genders at every level of governance, Mercedes Bresso, president of the Committee of the Regions, said on International Women’s Day on 8 March. “That I am the first woman to be elected Committee of the Regions president is, I believe, proof that the CoR has started to achieve normality. The real anomaly is, however, the fact that I am currently the only woman president of a European Union institution. I hope that my election will help to correct this anomaly to some extent. I hope that it might serve to encourage the women of Europe to play a more active role in public life and show that excellence and being a woman are perfectly compatible.”

US eases Cuba, Iran, Sudan sanctions to allow freer web BBC
The US treasury department has eased sanctions on Iran, Cuba and Sudan to help further the use of web services and support opposition groups. US technology firms will now be allowed to export online services such as instant messaging and social networks. Companies had not offered such services for fear of violating sanctions. Opposition supporters in Iran used social networking sites and services to organise protests after the country’s disputed presidential poll last year. The US Treasury said exports would be allowed of services related to web browsing, blogging, e-mail, instant messaging, chat, social networking and photo- and movie-sharing.

Ubisoft says sorry for DRM lock outs Digital Spy
Ubisoft says sorry for DRM lock outs Ubisoft has apologised to PC gamers who were frozen out of playing sessions over the weekend due to the firm’s controversial digital rights management system. Yesterday, some players were locked out of Assassin’s Creed II and Silent Hunter 5 following an attack on Ubisoft’s servers. “Ubisoft would like to apologise to anyone who could not play ACII or SH5 yesterday,” said the publisher in a statement. “Servers were attacked and while the servers did not go down, service was limited from 2.30pm to 9pm Paris time [1.30pm - 8pm GMT]. 95% of players were not affected, but a small group of players attempting to open a game session did receive denial of service errors. All players with an open session during the attack were not affected. “We also confirm that, at this time, no valid cracked version of either Silent Hunter 5 or Assassin’s Creed II are available.”

Police get Webcam pictures in school spy case CNet News
Two IT employees at Pennsylvania’s Lower Merion School District have been put on administrative leave, and pictures taken from Webcams on school-issued computers have been turned over to the local police department, according to the attorney of one of the employees now on leave. Attorney Charles Mandracchia, who represents school district information coordinator Carol Cafiero, told Philadelphia TV station Fox 29 that that “they had a private Web site for some of these pictures for the Lower Marion Police Department to view and they were the only ones who could view it.” In February, the family of Blake Robbins, a 15-year-old student at Harriton High School filed a civil complaint in federal court against the district for allegedly using the Webcam on his school-issued laptop to take a photo of the student while he was at home. The district contends that cameras were only activated if a laptop had been reported lost or stolen. The district has since stopped using the tracking software to activate Webcams.

Courts finally catching up to texting jurors Associated Press
Enough with the tweets, the blogs, the Internet searches. That’s the message being communicated by courts across the country as jurors using their portable electronic devices continue to cause mistrials, overturned convictions and chaotic delays in court proceedings. Last year a San Francisco Superior Court judge dismissed 600 potential jurors after several acknowledged going online to research the criminal case before them. Baltimore Mayor Sheila Dixon challenged her misdemeanor embezzlement conviction after discovering five jurors “friended” one another on Facebook during the trial. And a federal judge in Florida declared a mistrial after eight jurors admitted Web surfing about a drug case. But the rules for jury service in state and federal courts alike are evolving to grapple with this 21st century issue. New jury instructions are being adopted and electronics are being banned from courtrooms.

China to punish hackers, says no Google complaint Reuters
China has pledged to punish hackers who attacked Google if there is evidence to prove it, but said it has yet to receive any complaint from the world’s top search engine. Google sent shockwaves across business and political circles in January when it declared it would stop censoring Chinese search results, and threatened to pull out of China — the world’s largest online community with 384 million users at the end of last year — over hacking and censorship concerns. Google had never filed a report to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology over the cyber attacks or sought negotiations, Vice Minister Miao Wei was quoted as saying by state news agency Xinhua late on Saturday.

3D Images–Without Glasses! PC World
Developers are showing a new breed of screen at the giant European tech show CeBit that projects a 3D image directly at the viewer and doesn’t require glasses. This can be achieved either with a panel that overlays a traditional screen, by using cameras to target a specific viewer, or by using cylindrical lenslets.

Billions in benefits paid out in error The Local
The Swedish Social Insurance Agency (Försäkringskassan) estimates that it paid out 16.4 billion kronor ($2.3 billion) too much in various benefits in 2009, according to a new analysis. “Yes, it can sound like a massive amount,” said Ulrika Larsson at the agency to the Dagens Nyheter newspaper. The newspaper reports that the high level of erroneous payments are for the most part accounted for by accidental errors from applicants, but that deliberate cheating and fraud have also made a significant contribution.

Follow p2pnet on Twitter …

..… and identi.ca

First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win ~ Mahatma Gandhi

March, 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.

This entry was posted on Monday, March 8th, 2010 at 5:00 pm and is filed under P2P. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

HOME

Viewed 1699 times