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House Bill Seeks to Exempt Backups from DMCA Violation
By Scott M. Fulton, III, BetaNews
February 27, 2007, 6:40 PM

In an announcement this afternoon prior to the publication of the bill by the Library of Congress, Reps. Rick Boucher (D - VA) and John Doolittle (R - CA) introduced a bill that apparently would grant a new exemption for private, non-commercial copies of digital content, from violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act - technically creating a new class of "Section 1201 exemptions."

"The Digital Millennium Copyright Act dramatically tilted the copyright balance toward complete copyright protection at the expense of the public's right to fair use," reads a prepared statement from Rep. Boucher's office today. With a seasoned lawmaker's skill at creating acronyms, the statement continues, "The FAIR USE Act [Freedom And Innovation Revitalizing U.S. Entrepreneurship Act of 2007] will assure that consumers who purchase digital media can enjoy a broad range of uses of the media for their own convenience in a way which does not infringe the copyright in the work."

There will likely be other purposes for the bill, which will become evident when its text is published, probably by tomorrow morning. Boucher's office's statement acknowledges that the FAIR USE Act as introduced will differ substantively from H.R. 1201, a bill introduced in the prior Congress that ended up going nowhere.

But that bill's main purpose was to establish a labeling system for warning consumers when a compact disc includes copy protection. The Librarian of Congress has since allowed a 1201 exemption for copy protection circumvention in audio CDs, rendering another section of the earlier H.R. 1201 legislation (the use of the same number here being a coincidence) redundant.

More likely than Boucher's staffers may be aware, the FAIR USE Act is more likely to re-introduce language from another bill which stalled in the 109th Congress, introduced in December 2005 by Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D - CA) - a co-sponsor of the new bill. That previous legislation would have amended US Code Section 1201 with this language:

"It is not an infringement of copyright for a person who lawfully obtains a copy or phonorecord of a digital work, or who lawfully receives a transmission of a digital work, to reproduce, store, adapt, or access the digital work: (1) for archival purposes, if all such archival copies are destroyed or rendered permanently inaccessible in the event that continued possession of the work should cease to be rightful; and (2) in order to perform or display the work, or an adaptation of the work, on a digital media device, if the work is not so performed or displayed publicly."

But Boucher's statement today also said the new bill would not establish a "fair use defense to the act of circumvention," which would have given consumers a legal shield in case of lawsuits. Instead, the new language will define "circumvention" as the bypassing of digital locks. It apparently will not make illegal the use of such digital locks - for instance, the multitude of keys cryptographically generated by AACS.

As lawmakers argued during prior debates, circumventing copy protection schemes is not a right that the law can guarantee. Apparently this new legislation recognizes that as a fact, and is adopting a new strategy that simply pares down the DMCA. Content producers would not be able to claim copyright infringement in lawsuits against alleged copy protection violators; whether they will remain capable of claiming they contribute to piracy - and would then be liable for damages - remains to be seen.

Consumer Electronics Association president and CEO Gary Shapiro voiced his support for the new bill this afternoon. In a prepared statement, Shapiro said, "This bill will reinforce the historical fair use protections of constitutionally-mandated copyright law that are reflected in the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. It ensures that consumers, libraries and educators will not be liable for otherwise legal conduct and it codifies the important principles of the Supreme Court's Betamax decision. H.R. 1201 provides much needed fair use protection at a time when some in the content industry are challenging consumer rights to make use of lawfully acquired content."

Whether Shapiro meant to refer to last year's H.R. 1201 (which is no longer on the floor), or this year's bill, or whether he really meant to refer to Section 1201 exemptions, is something else that remains to be seen.
http://www.betanews.com/article/House_Bill_Seeks_to_Exempt_Backups_from_DMCA_Violation/1172619649

 

K-Lite Codec Pack Full 2.85
Author: KL Software
Date: 2007-02-27
Size: 18.1 Mb
License: Freeware

K-Lite Codec Pack is a collection of codecs and related tools. Codec is short for Compressor-Decompressor. Codecs are needed for encoding and decoding (playing) audio and video. This Codec Pack is designed as a user-friendly solution for playing all your movie files. You should be able to play all the popular movie formats and even some rare formats.

The K-Lite Codec Pack has a couple of major advantages compared to other codec packs: It it always very up-to-date with the latest versions of the codecs; It is very user-friendly and the installation is fully customizable, meaning that you can install only those components that you really want; It has been very well tested, so that the package doesn't contain any conflicting codecs; It is a very complete package, containing everything you need to play your movies; and has different packages.

Full contains even more codecs. It also has encoding support for various formats. This package is for power users and people who do their own encodings.

download here
http://www.majorgeeks.com/download4844.html



K-Lite Codec Pack Standard 2.85
Author: KL Software
Date: 2007-02-27
Size: 7.2 Mb
License: Freeware

K-Lite Codec Pack is a collection of codecs and related tools. Codec is short for Compressor-Decompressor. Codecs are needed for encoding and decoding (playing) audio and video. This Codec Pack is designed as a user-friendly solution for playing all your movie files. You should be able to play all the popular movie formats and even some rare formats.

The K-Lite Codec Pack has a couple of major advantages compared to other codec packs: It it always very up-to-date with the latest versions of the codecs; It is very user-friendly and the installation is fully customizable, meaning that you can install only those components that you really want; It has been very well tested, so that the package doesn't contain any conflicting codecs; It is a very complete package, containing everything you need to play your movies; and has different packages.

Standard contains everything you need to play all the commonly used formats. This package should be enough for the average user.

download here
http://www.majorgeeks.com/download4620.html



K-Lite Codec Pack Basic 2.85
Author: KL Software
Date: 2007-02-27
Size: 3.5 Mb
License: Freeware
Requires: Win All

K-Lite Codec Pack is a collection of codecs and related tools. Codec is short for Compressor-Decompressor. Codecs are needed for encoding and decoding (playing) audio and video. This Codec Pack is designed as a user-friendly solution for playing all your movie files. You should be able to play all the popular movie formats and even some rare formats.

The K-Lite Codec Pack has a couple of major advantages compared to other codec packs: It it always very up-to-date with the latest versions of the codecs; It is very user-friendly and the installation is fully customizable, meaning that you can install only those components that you really want; It has been very well tested, so that the package doesn't contain any conflicting codecs; It is a very complete package, containing everything you need to play your movies; and has different packages.

download here
http://www.majorgeeks.com/download5228.html

 

RipIt4Me,Version 1.7.0.0 2-28-07


28 February: Version 1.7.0.0 has been released. The major change is the adaptation of the FixVTS code within RipIt4Me. This should eliminate all those issues about not pointing correctly to FixVTS.exe. See the changelog for full details. Thanks also to our strings translaters - there's a few changes in this version. See the version history.


Version 1.7.0.0 (28 February 2007)

* First version that integrates our adaptation of FixVTS. There is no need to have FixVTS installed anymore. Several options concerning FixVTS have been renamed/removed, including the FixVTS log, which is now included (and much simplified) into the RipIt4Me log.
* When a cell is removed, the next cell's STC discontinuity flag is now set. This might help with playability problems with certain players when tiny cells are removed.
* In Step 1, if your preferences are not to empty the target directory at the start, you're no longer asked to confirm whether you want to delete all the files.
* If the DVD is episodic with episodes in different VTSs and the user selects "movie only" or "movie+menus", Step 1 offers to switch back to "Full DVD" when the user presses OK.
* Attempted to make the copying of the original IFOs faster. In case of failure, we re-try 10 times.
* Fixed a potential crash during the cell cleanup when the IFOs are a bit messed up (cell command declared, but non-existent).
* Fixed a small problem in the analysis code that could cause errors in the Stargate DVD.
* If for some reason the PSL file was not imported, the user is only notified if dummy sectors are found, since if none are found it really does not matter.
* The first time 1.7.0.0 is run, the user is prompted to increase maxvobdur to 300 (if it is not already so). This is a one-time offer. Please accept it.
* The lock on the RipIt4Me.log and DebugLog.txt files are now released at the end of the Wizard and 1-click modes so you can open/move them if you wish.
* The part of the debug log that concerned Step1 (ripping the IFOs) was no longer present in the final debug log. This is now fixed.
* Fixed (once more) a problem with moving the original IFOs in linux.
* Other minor IO confirmation messages added.

String translators - Please note string changes as follows: Top line (470), Lines 6, 24-26, 28, 30, 65-67, 73, 83-87, 102, 119, 120, 144, 146, 154, 155, 162, 210, 271-275, 302, 344-347, 461-470


DOWNLOAD Version 1.7.0.0 (RipIt4Me.zip, 169 KB)
http://www.ripit4me.org/download.php

Help file for version 1.7.0.0 (RipIt4Me Help.zip 702 KB)
http://www.ripit4me.org/RipIt4Me Help.zip


Note: If you are having any issues installing RipIt4Me, use the RipIt4Me installer (1.06 Mb), which installs RipIt4Me, the RipIt4Me help file and all the language string files. Remember to have DVD Decrypter v3.5.4.0 and DVD Shrink v3.2.0.15 already installed.
http://www.ripit4me.org/RipIt4Me Installer.exe


RipIt4Me is a freeware utility to help you rip and backup your DVDs. It supports DVDs that software like DVD Shrink or DVD Decrypter cannot handle (new ARccOS™ or RipGuard DVD from Sony, Disney - please refer to the FAQ section of the guide for more information on when RipIt4Me is needed). RipIt4Me is the highest rated software on VideoHelp.com and on Digital Digest.

main web site
http://www.ripit4me.org/

 

New "watermark" system scours the net for infringement, notifies owners

2/27/2007 10:05:26 PM, by Ken Fisher

Watermarks date back at least to the 13th century, when paper manufacturers found a way to "mark" sheets with an unremovable, barely-visible signature to denote either the paper's origin, ownership, or both. Watermarks have come a long way, and companies such as Macrovision and Digimarc have made a king's ransom offering "digital watermarking technology" to today's purveyors of content.

These days, digital watermarking is now being tasked to make money on unauthorized file distribution. The proposition is simple: what if video and audio content flowed freely online, sans DRM, but owners were somehow compensated when files were played or accessed? That's the basic idea behind Digimarc's latest patent.

According a patent filing at the US Patent and Trademark Office, Digimarc's "Method for monitoring internet dissemination of image, video and/or audio files" is a monitoring service that scans the Internet, consuming content as it goes. The system downloads audio, video and images, and then scans them for watermarks. If it finds a watermark it recognizes, the system then contacts that mark's registered owner and informs them of the discovery.

Digimark announced their successful patent application this month, but the patent has been a long time coming. It was first filed in November of 1998, long before the YouTubes and MySpaces of the world existed. Now Digimarc is promoting the monitoring system as the cure to what ails these social networking sites. According to Bruce Davis, Digimarc chairman and CEO, the system could help build "viable business models" in an arena rife with "disruptive changes in entertainment distribution and consumption."

"Much of the repurposed content on YouTube, for example, contains copyrighted entertainment," Davis said in a statement. "If social networking sites implemented software to check each stream, they could identify copyrighted subject matter, create a report, negotiate compensation for the value chain and sell targeted advertising for related goods and services. There is no need to impede consumers. In fact, the specific identification of the content could guide provision of related goods, services and community designed to maximize the consumer’s enjoyment of the entertainment experience."

For the system to work, players at multiple levels would need to get involved. Broadcasters would need to add identifying watermarks to their broadcast, in cooperation with copyright holders, and both parties would need to register their watermarks with the system. Then, in the event that a user capped a broadcast and uploaded it online, the scanner system would eventually find it and report its location online. Yet the system is not designed to hop on P2P networks or private file sharing hubs, but instead crawls public web sites in search of watermarked material. As such, this "solution" is more geared towards sites like YouTube and less towards casual piracy, which rarely involves posting things to a web site.

Generally we've laughed off most watermarking solutions because they seemed like solutions in search of a problem. Now that Google has learned the hard way that content owners want to be paid when their content shows up on YouTube, we may see more of these "solutions" in the future.
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070227-8937.html

 

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http://gamemaker.nl/

 

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http://www.freefixer.com/





FreeFixer

FreeFixer is a general purpose removal tool which will help you to delete potentially unwanted software, such as adware, spyware, trojans, viruses and worms. FreeFixer works by scanning a large number of locations where unwanted software has a known record of appearing or leaving traces. The scan locations include the programs that run on your computer, the programs that starts when you reboot your computer, your browser's plug-ins, your home page setting, etc.

FreeFixer does not know what is unwanted, so it presents the scan result and it's up to you decide if some file should be removed and if some settings should restored to their default value. Please be careful! If you delete a legitimate file you may damage your computer. To assist you when determining if anything should be removed you can find more information at FreeFixer's web site for each item in the scan result. You can for example see what other users chose to do in the same situation. You can also save log file of your scan result and consult the volunteers in one of the FreeFixer helper forums.

For more detailed information about FreeFixer, please see the User's Manual.

 

Monetize the music !

p2pnet.net news:- "We're running out of time," warned Ted Cohen, managing director of a music consulting firm, talking to 200 people at yesterday's Digital Music Forum East conference. "We need to get money flowing from consumers and get them used to paying for music again."

Cohen was moderating a State of the Digital Union panel and his words came, "as the music industry suffers through one of the worst slumps in its history," says CNET News, going on:

"CD sales fell 23 percent worldwide between 2000 and 2006. Legal sales of digital songs aren't making up the difference either. Last year saw a 131 percent jump in digital sales, but overall the industry still saw about a 4 percent decline in revenue."

Apparently, the creation of the new consumer base with a marked aversion for anything to do with Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG didn't come up.

The Big 4 labels are currently engaged in a world-wide effort to sue their customers, put off by high music industry prices, indifferent product and severely limited catalogues, into abandoning the free p2p networks and independent sales and music sites they now favour online.

And some panel members "lashed out" at Steve Jobs calling his recent Thoughts on Music diatribe, "perceived by many in the music industry as a 180-degree shift in direction," and in which he blamed the majors for DRM consumer control, "insincere" and a "red herring," says the story, stating:

"The view expressed at the conference is that Apple has maintained a stranglehold on the digital music industry by locking up iTunes music with DRM."

CNET says most of the panel, which included Thomas Gewecke, Sony BMG senior vp, and Gabriel Levy, general manager of RealNetworks Europe, still believed in DRM (Digital Restrictions Management).

But Greg Scholl, ceo of independent music label The Orchard, flatly said DRM doesn't work, declaring, "The idea that DRM gives us choice isn't right."He also stated, "The economics of the business are over for good and aren't ever going to be the way they were before."

But, according to the story, Gewecke argued against criticism that the music industry, "has its head in the sand and just doesn't understand the Digital Age".

Sony BMG is working with technologists and retailers, and is constantly is looking for technological solutions to some of the industry's problems, he promised.

However, the company is still reeling under the spyware PR disaster which ensued after it was discovered it'd been hiding self-installing spyware DRM with the potential to damage computers on its music CDs,

Meanwhile, "there's more music being listened to now than ever before," he said. "There's more opportunities to monetize the music. We want to be out there looking for new ideas and companies."

Slashdot Slashdot it!

Also See:
CNET News - Music executives lament state of industry, February 27, 2007
http://p2pnet.net/story/11465

 

FAIR USE Act analysis: DMCA reform left on the cutting room floor

2/28/2007 10:12:38 AM, by Timothy B. Lee

When a politician introduces legislation with a cutesy acronym for a title, it's always a good idea to double-check its contents. The 2001 USA PATRIOT Act, for example, curtailed civil liberties while making the none-too-subtle insinuation that anyone who opposed it was on the side of the terrorists. Ars recently covered the Internet SAFETY Act, legislation that's purportedly about combatting child pornography, but which mostly requires data retention by ISPs and labeling of ordinary porn sites.

The latest example of misleadingly-titled legislation is the "Freedom And Innovation Revitalizing U.S. Entrepreneurship Act," introduced by Reps . Rick Boucher (R-VA) and John Doolittle (R-CA). As we reported yesterday, the legislation does little to reform the DMCA or shore up fair use. Despite bearing the title "FAIR USE," and despite Boucher's press release touting the harms of the DMCA, a closer examination of the bill reveals that the DMCA-related provisions of the legislation are almost entirely symbolic.

The meat of the bill is focused on a different problem: the danger that the Grokster decision will discourage high-tech innovation by making the inventors of groundbreaking products liable for the infringing activities of their customers. That's an important issue, and Boucher's legislation would be a step in the right direction. But it's puzzling that he has chosen to emphasize the bill's largely symbolic DMCA reform provisions, rather than candidly admitting that he has decided to put DMCA reform on the back burner in order to deal with the fallout from Grokster.
DMCA reform deficit

The legislation will be especially disappointing to DMCA reformers because Boucher has been the standard-bearer for serious DMCA reform in previous sessions of Congress. In 2003, he sponsored legislation that would have allowed consumers to circumvent copy protection schemes in order to make fair use of copyrighted material. And, most critically, it allowed the manufacture and distribution of the devices that make it possible for consumers to exercise their rights under copyright law.

Those provisions are nowhere to be found in Boucher's new legislation. In their place are some narrow exemptions that would allow consumers to:

* Make "a compilation of audiovisual works" for classroom use,
* Skip commercials and "objectionable content,"
* Transmit files over a home network,
* Access works in the public domain, and
* Access works "of substantial public interest solely for purposes of criticism, comment, news, reporting, scholarship, or research."

There is also a special exemption for libraries engaged in archival and preservation activities. These are all legitimate reasons for circumvention, but in practice they're rendered toothless by the fact that they apply only to the act of circumvention itself, not to the act of "trafficking" in tools that would enable non-programmers to take advantage of them. So if Boucher's legislation passed, a film studies professor would be permitted to use software such as Handbrake to circumvent the copy protection on DVDs and create an audiovisual presentation featuring scenes from various movies. However, developing or distributing Handbrake in the United States would still be a crime.

Obviously, as a practical matter, that college professor already has the ability to use Handbrake without any real fear of prosecution. The MPAA knows that prosecuting a college professor for showing videos in his class would be a PR disaster. The problem is that, unlike previous versions of the legislation, Boucher's new bill offers no legal protections for the developers of software like Handbrake. As a result, the tools required to exercise fair use are difficult to find, not as user-friendly as they could be, and not supported by major software companies like Apple and Microsoft. Perhaps worst of all, the law makes it impossible for legitimate software firms (in the United States, at least) to develop new software to make innovative uses of content obtained from DVDs, iTunes, or other DRM-encumbered formats. In the 1990s, software companies developed MP3 software that revolutionized music over the objections of the recording industry. An entrepreneur wanting to do the same thing for DVDs would run afoul of the law—and Boucher's legislation would do nothing to change that.

The legislation also codifies the six exemptions the Copyright Office granted last November. But these suffer from the same defect. For example, one of the exemptions allows a blind user to circumvent DRM in order to enable the "read aloud" feature on eBooks. That's great for those blind users who happen to be DRM hackers. But it's useless for other blind users, because supplying the required software to a blind person will still be a crime.
Grokster fix

Boucher seems to believe that the fallout of the Grokster decision poses an even larger threat to high-tech innovation than the DMCA. The Consumer Electronics Association, which has traditionally been one of the most powerful critics of the DMCA, also filed an amicus brief in Grokster urging the Supreme Court to uphold the historic Sony Betamax standard, which held that the manufacturers of products "capable of substantial noninfringing uses" would not be held liable for the infringing activities of their customers. The Supreme Court ruled against Grokster in 2005, holding that "one who distributes a device with the object of promoting its use to infringe copyright ... is liable for the resulting acts of infringement." Consumer electronics manufacturers are understandably nervous about this rather subjective standard.

Boucher's legislation would shield consumer electronics manufacturers from liability in two key ways. It instructs the courts not to impose "statutory damages" on a defendant found guilty of aiding others in copyright infringement unless the copyright owner can show that "no reasonable person could have believed such conduct to be lawful." This would be a welcome change to copyright law because statutory damages are draconian penalties imposed without regard for the actual damages to the copyright holders from a defendant's infringing activities.

The 2000 case of MP3.com illustrates the problem with statutory damages. The company was founded to help individuals access their own music collections from different locations via the Internet. They were sued by the recording industry. When the company lost its case in district court, it was required to pay statutory damages so large that it was impossible for the company to post the bond it needed before it could appeal the decision. Statutory damages effectively forced MP3.com into bankruptcy without the opportunity to even make its case to an appeals court. Boucher's legislation would rein in the abuse of statutory damages by making it much harder to apply them to "secondary" infringers—that is, companies whose products or services assist others in infringing activities.

Another provision specifically shields hardware manufacturers from liability for manufacturing devices "capable of substantial, commercially-significant non-infringing use." That would formally enshrine the Sony Betamax standard, but only for hardware manufacturers. The developers of software or Internet-based services would still have to take their chances with the more subjective Grokster standard.
A separate peace?

Why would Boucher, traditionally a staunch supporter of real DMCA reform, choose to put it on the back burner this session in favor of reforming secondary liability rules? It's a pretty good guess that Boucher's allies in the consumer electronics industry had a big influence on his decision. Indeed, the legislation appears to be an attempt by the consumer electronics industry to make a separate peace with copyright interests, leaving the broader movement for balanced copyright policies to soldier on without its support.

In the 1980s and 1990s, hardware manufacturers were frequently in the crosshairs of copyright battles, with copyright holders trying to shut down hardware devices such as the VCR and the MP3 player. But more recently, copyright holders have shifted their focus to Internet-based software companies such as Grokster and YouTube. Hardware companies may have calculated that they can get Hollywood to go along with narrowly-crafted legislation that exempts them from secondary liability without shielding the software firms that are today the target of most secondary infringement suits. The copyright industry, in turn, may decide that Boucher's legislation is a way to buy off one of their most powerful adversaries on copyright issues, helping to undermine support for broader copyright reform efforts.

Boucher's legislation would remedy some real problems. However, truth in advertising would be nice. If shielding consumer electronics manufacturers from liability under Grokster is good policy, Boucher should defend that proposal on the merits instead of pretending that his legislation would reform the DMCA or shore up fair use.
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070228-8942.html

 

Microsoft to charge for Daylight Saving hotfixes for older products
Posted by Mary Jo Foley @ 10:52 am Categories: Windows server, Corporate strategy, Office, Exchange Server, App Compatibility
icn_balloon_154x48
+3
5 votes Worthwhile?

March 11, the new date on which Daylight Saving Time (DST) will take effect in the U.S. and a growing number of other countries, is fast approaching. And Microsoft is working overtime to get the message out that users need to patch a bunch of their Microsoft products, from Exchange Server, to Windows Mobile, in order to head off date-change headaches.

There's one bit of DST fine print that Microsoft isn't sharing quite so readily, however. (I discovered it by wading through a slide deck that Microsoft is providing to analysts to get them up-to-speed on the company's DST guidance.)

Page 20 of the deck mentions that Microsoft has decided, due to the number of customers and products affected by the DST 2007 changes, to "amend the regular Extended Hotfix support program." If you need to patch older Microsoft products that already have moved from "Mainstream" to "Extended" support phase, Microsoft will give you a chance to buy the hotfixes you need — for $4,000.

Microsoft explains:

"For products that have entered into the Extended Support phase, Microsoft will provide customers with the opportunity to purchase the DST 20007 hotfix at a reduced price of Four Thousand Dollars (US $4,000). Customers will only be charged a single fee of $4,000 to obtain all hotfixes, for products in Extended Support phase, needed to update their systems for DST 2007.

"For customers who have previously purchased DST 2007 hotfixes for products in Extended Support, Microsoft will reimburse the difference to them under the new pricing category."

A Microsoft spokesman said that the $4,000 price represents a substantial discount.

"Originally, all the out-of-support patches were $40,000 each. However, we realized this hardship and lowered the price to $4,000 for ALL THE DST PATCHES for our customers best interest. The $4,000 is to just cover costs," he said.

Windows Server 2000, Exchange Server 2000, Outlook 2000 and a number of other Microsoft products are currently in the Extended Support phase. The full list of Microsoft products affected by DST 2007 changes is here.



List of products affected by daylight saving time
Product Family No Update Needed Update Available
Windows Server Windows Server 2003 SP1
Windows Server 2003
Windows 2000 Advanced Server Service Pack 4
Windows Embedded for Point of Service
Windows Fundamentals for Legacy PCs
Windows Client Windows Vista Windows XP Home SP2
Windows XP Professional SP2
Exchange Server Exchange Server 2007 Exchange Server 2003 Service Pack 2
Exchange Server 2003 Service Pack 1
Exchange Server 2003 Lotus Notes Connector
Exchange Server 2000
Exchange Conferencing Server 2000
Outlook Outlook 2007
Outlook 2003
Outlook 2002 (Outlook XP)
Outlook 2000
Windows SharePoint Services Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 Windows SharePoint Services 2.0
SQL Server Notification Services SQL Server 2005 Notification Services
SQL Server 2000 Notification Services
Office Live Meeting Office Live Meeting
Dynamics CRM Dynamics CRM 3.0 (as of March 2007)
Visual SourceSafe Visual SourceSafe 2005 and 6.0d
Windows Mobile Windows Mobile
Windows CE Windows CE-based devices
Entourage Entourage
http://support.microsoft.com/gp/dst_prodlist

 

RIAA college settlement plan





p2pnet.net news:- If you're a p2p, file-sharing college student, here's your chance to volunteer your name, address and other personal details to the Big 4 record labels so they won't have to actually go looking for you themselves.

As p2pnet posted recently, the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) has launched a new incriminate yourself site, and it's more than vaguely reminiscent of the failed Clean Slate program the RIAA tried on between September, 2003, and April, 2004.

Quoted in the San Francisco Chronicle, ex-RIAA lawyer Matthew 'The Dentist' Oppenheim said, at the time, the so-called 'amnesty' program was an easy way for people to avoid a costly RIAA lawsuit.

The idea was: kids would in effect 'confess' to the RIAA, signing notarized affidavit promising never to download copyright-protected songs again and saying they'd delete whatever songs they'd already downloaded.

Said Oppenheim in the story, "if you would like some comfort that you can sleep at night after you engaged in illegal behavior, here's a way to get that comfort."

Then Eric Parke took it on himself to sue the RIAA..

In his court document, he said:

In brief, the RIAA's assurances of 'amnesty' for complying with its 'Clean Slate Program' are hollow and deceptive, and provide members of the general public with no real legally binding assurance that those individuals who are induced by the RIAA's empty promises to admit activity objectionable to the RIAA, its members, or other recording companies, will be free from later prosecution by the government or lawsuit by Copyright owners for the very copyright infringement admitted under the 'Amnesty' program. The RIAA describes the program as 'Clean Slate' but yet does not promise to destroy any data or evidence collected on members of the general public who submit affidavits under the 'program' leaving the 'slate' anything but 'clean' for those Copyright owners or Government prosecutors who subpoena such information from the RIAA. This lawsuit seeks a remedy to stop the RIAA from engaging in unlawful, misleading, and fraudulent business practices including advertising an 'Amnesty Program' that does not provide real amnesty from lawsuit and a 'Clean Slate Program' that does not provide a real 'clean slate.'

That was then and now, here's a way for college students to avoid a costly RIAA lawsuit, says Associated Press, beating the RIAA's drum.

The RIAA says it'll give, "hundreds of college students suspected of illegally sharing music online a chance to reach settlements before being sued for copyright infringement".

AP is talking about the RIAA's so-called 'crackdown' on US colleges. Of it, "It's something we feel we have to do," said RIAA president Carey Sherman, quoted in another AP article which went on:

"A few schools, including Ohio and Purdue universities, already have received more than 1,000 complaints accusing individual students since last fall - significant increases over the past school year. For students who are caught, punishments vary from e-mail warnings to semester-long suspensions from classes."

Ohio, specifically singled out, says it's had more RIAA p2p file sharing notices than any other college in the US this academic year.

But university officials have serious concerns about the validity of RIAA data, they say in The Post Online.

"The RIAA sent OU 1,287 notices of copyright infringement this academic year, up from 232 last year," says the story. But the amount of bandwidth, which determines how much students can download, isn't limited for p2p programs at OU, cio Shawn Ostermann is quoted as saying.

"A large number of students living on campus and the ease of Internet access also contribute to the high number of notifications," says David Hendricks, quoting dean of students Terry Hogan.

"They've never said anything about why they looked, where they looked," says Hogan. "The list of notifications doesn't indicate how much music is being pirated or that the amount has increased from last year. The only thing that the RIAA's information shows is that they sent more notices.

"If there'd been a tenfold increase in students downloading, we'd have noticed. The university monitors network traffic and bandwidth use, which would have dramatically increased if that had occurred."

Meanwhile, the new RIAA incriminate yourself site says it'll, "guide you through the settlement process for your case. You can pay the settlement by credit card, using either Mastercard, Visa or Discover. If you wish to pay the settlement by cashier's check, you will need to telephone one of our settlement representatives [913-234-8181/ 8182].

"In order to process your settlement, you will need to have your case identification number. That number appears above the salutation of the letter sent to you by the record companies."

Stay tuned.

Slashdot Slashdot it!

Also See:
incriminate yourself site - RIAA 'extortion' letter to ISPs, February 13, 2007
San Francisco Chronicle - Novato man sues RIAA over amnesty program, September 11, 2003
The Dentist - RIAA's Oppenheim hits the road, March 8, 2004
Associated Press - Music labels offer college piracy deal, February 28, 2007
crackdown - RIAA boosts attacks on US schools, February 22, 2007
AP - Music companies target colleges in latest downloading crackdown, January 21, 2007
than any other - Ohio U No 1 on RIAA p2p chart, February 13, 2007
The Post Online - University questions RIAA data, February 23, 2007

If your Net access is blocked by government restrictions, try Psiphon from the Citizen Lab at thIs the end (of the Net) nigh?zze University of Toronto's Munk Centre for International Studies. Go here for the official download, here for the p2pnet download, and here for details. And if you're Chinese and you're looking for a way to access independent Internet news sources, try Freegate, the DIT program written to help Chinese citizens circumvent web site blocking outside of China. Download it here.
rss feed: http://p2pnet.net/p2p.rss | | Mobile - http://p2pnet.net/index-wml.php | | And use free p2pnet newsfeeds for your site Tired of being treated like a criminal? They depend on you, not the other way around. Don't buy their 'product'. Do bug your local politicians. Use emails, snail-mail, phone calls, faxes, IM, stop them in the street, blog. And if you're into organizing, organize petitions, organize demonstrations and then turn up on your local political rep's doorstep, making sure you've contacted your local tv/radio station/newspaper in advance. Don't just complain. Do something!

(Wednesday 28th February 2007)
http://p2pnet.net/story/11479

 

RIAA slams FAIR USE Act

2/28/2007 4:14:26 PM, by Eric Bangeman

Although the FAIR USE Act introduced yesterday by Rep. Rick Boucher (D-VA) and Rep. John Doolittle (R-CA) will have little more than a symbolic effect on the DMCA, that isn't stopping the Recording Industry Association of America from unloading on the bill with both barrels. In a statement released earlier today by the RIAA, the group said that Rep. Boucher's bill would have the effect of kneecapping the DMCA.

"The DMCA has enabled consumers to enjoy creative works through popular new technologies," the RIAA said in a statement. "The DVD, iPod and the iTunes Music Store can all be traced to the DMCA. Online games, on-demand movies, e-books, online libraries, and many other services are coming to market because of a secure environment rooted in the DMCA's protections."

Well, the DVD precedes the DMCA by a couple of years, but the "secure environment" bit is accurate. The DMCA limits the availability of tools that can be used to circumvent DRM, so content creators are free to impose draconian limitations on how their customers can view and listen to content. Without the protection of the DMCA, Big Content would be forced to make its offerings more palatable to consumers.

Once again, the RIAA finds itself at odds with the Consumer Electronics Association. CEA President and Gary Shapiro is welcoming the FAIR USE Act, saying that it "will reinforce the historical fair use protections of constitutionally-mandated copyright law that are reflected in the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA)."

Shapiro and the CEA would get a significant boost from the bill, should it pass, due to provisions that would significantly shield electronics manufacturers from liability for infringement. The Act would make it difficult for rights-holders to receive statutory damages in most cases of infringement.

That sets off alarm bells for the RIAA. The FAIR USE Act "would repeal the DMCA and legalize hacking," says the RIAA. "It would reverse the Supreme Court's decision in Grokster and allow electronics companies to induce others to break the law for their own profit."

The RIAA also takes issue with the bill's narrow exemptions to the DMCA. "Proponents of H.R. 1201 claim it legalizes hacking only for 'noninfringing' uses," reads the RIAA's statement. "But as Congress recognized when it enacted the DMCA, the difference between hacking done for noninfringing purposes and hacking done to steal is impossible to determine and enforce. That's why Congress created a review process that takes place every three years to determine whether fair uses of copyrighted works are in peril—and why Congress gave the power to the Librarian of Congress to take away DMCA protections in cases where fair use is in danger."

Earlier today, we wondered if the copyright industry would "decide that Boucher's legislation is a way to buy off one of their most powerful adversaries on copyright issues, helping to undermine support for broader copyright reform efforts." It looks like we have our answer. Even though the FAIR USE Act doesn't do nearly enough to fix the very real problems with the DMCA or to shore up fair use, the content creation industry looks set to fight the legislation tooth and nail.
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070228-8948.html

 

Boucher DMCA Exemption Bill Would Legalize Commercial-Skipping
By Scott M. Fulton, III, BetaNews
February 28, 2007, 7:16 PM

A copy of the early draft language of the revised H.R. 1201, sponsored by Rep. Rick Boucher (D - VA) and introduced on the floor of the US House of Representatives yesterday, shows the revised legislation would add six new exemptions to US Code section 1201, which had been amended by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. But the language in the new draft is shorter and simpler, and perhaps more prone to broader interpretations.

The six new 1201 exemptions the FAIR USE Act (its name is an acronym, thus prompting the otherwise rude capitalization) would add are further simplified as follows:

* Teachers can make copies of audiovisual works for teaching purposes exclusively, and may circumvent copy protection to do so.

* Individuals can circumvent any technology that would force them to watch commercials or offensive content (whether a Web page qualifies as an "audiovisual work" in this context may become a re-opened debate). This will be extremely important news to content producers, who have claimed in recent years that commercial skipping mechanisms such as those used on TiVo devices enable users to effectively break the terms of their contract with TV services, constituting not only a breach of contract but, as some executives have argued, outright theft of service.

* Circumvention is permitted for individuals making copies of AV files they've downloaded for transmission over their own home networks, but not to the Internet.

* You can defeat copy protection if your objective is to seek out a work in the public domain.

* If you're a reporter or researcher, you can circumvent copy protection in the act of research or journalism (something very much of interest to us here at BetaNews).

* Finally, as we reported yesterday, individuals can defeat copy protection in order to make backup copies of downloaded material.

As anticipated, the Recording Industry Association of America issued a statement to news organizations opposing the new Boucher Bill, on the grounds that its language is too ambiguous, and thus may enable IP theft. "The difference between hacking done for non-infringing purposes and hacking done to steal is impossible to determine and enforce," the RIAA statement reads this afternoon. (Whether the RIAA is suggesting that legislation should instead "enforce a difference" is equally impossible to determine.)

For its part, the Electronic Frontier Foundation has come out in support of the bill, also as anticipated. "Technology companies play a game of Russian roulette whenever they create products with both infringing and non-infringing uses," an EFF statement reads this evening. Another provision in the new Boucher Bill language would declare individuals free from liability for copyright infringement that takes place on devices that they design, manufacture, or distribute, if those devices have a principal, non-infringing purpose.
http://www.betanews.com/article/Bou..._Would_Legalize_CommercialSkipping/1172707864

 

RIAA to College Students: Settle Now
By BetaNews Staff, BetaNews
February 28, 2007, 5:41 PM

The RIAA said Wednesday that it had sent some 400 letters to individuals at 13 universities offering an opportunity for students accused of piracy to settle with the recording industry. Although the RIAA is not specifying the settlement amount, it is said to be significantly less than what the group would sue for in court.

Over the next several months, the organization expects to send hundreds more settlement offers. According to the RIAA, letters this month were sent to students at schools such as Arizona State University, North Carolina State University, Ohio University, Syracuse University, Amherst, University of Southern California, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, and University of Texas, Austin, among others.
http://www.betanews.com/article/RIAA_to_College_Students_Settle_Now/1172702471

 

New AMD Chipset Integrates ATI Logic
By Scott M. Fulton, III, BetaNews
February 28, 2007, 3:45 PM

When AMD acquired graphics card producer ATI last year, the immediate expectation was that the two companies would converge toward a common platform - specifically a notebook CPU/graphics/networking platform that could hold its own against Intel Centrino. But whether the combined entities would propel AMD into the integrated desktop chipset market was uncertain, especially with Intel both leading that market and languishing in it - it's not that company's major revenue-producer by a long shot.

This morning, AMD took its own long shot by announcing its introduction of a desktop-level integrated chipset that will combine its designs for systems and peripheral bus controllers with ATI's graphics logic, all in one package. AMD's announcement this morning specified only one chipset, the 690, though enthusiast sites everywhere with sources in the motherboard community are actually expecting two versions: the 690G which uses ATI's X1250 logic, and the 690V to address the value market with X1200 graphics logic.

What's the difference? Perhaps a very few dollars and a scintilla of a performance point, which may be why today AMD is only referring to the 690 as a single platform.

Chipsets with integrated graphics help large manufacturers produce low-priced PCs in volume, with decent features but also with a minimum of headaches for OEMs. In recent years, however, the relative performance of discrete graphics cards made by both ATI and nVidia has distanced itself from that of integrated graphics from Intel, by an almost laughable margin.

So while AMD's vice president and general manager for chipsets, Phil Eisler, called the 690 today "the first in a line of innovative, high-performance AMD chipsets that we'll introduce to address every sector of the market," the reality is more likely that the 690 (whether it has one or two versions) will address the low "better" end of the traditional three-tier, "good/better/best" scenario.

To give you a clue as to why: Although the X1250 has a four-digit number and a big "X," it's actually a modified version of the chipset that ATI has shipped with its X700 graphics cards since 2004. In under three years' time, graphics performance has exploded in the discrete end, from both ATI and nVidia. Using a battery of performance tests from one enthusiast site, a computer model shows ATI's Radeon X1900 XTX graphics card, introduced at the top of its product line last August, produces on average 462% better graphics throughput than an X700 XT card produced just over two years earlier.

But high-end gaming won't be where the 690 is put to use; instead, AMD is aiming for producers of media center PCs. One of the prizes AMD acquired from ATI is its Avivo streaming display technology, which included a 10-bit-per-color processor that delivers 64 times the color resolution of typical graphics processors - even on the upper edge of "better" - along with built-in MPEG-2, H.264, and VC-1 codecs. It's worth noting that AMD is touting the Avivo brand today rather than the "AMD Live" brand it had previously developed to counter Intel's Viiv platform for media center PCs.

With the 690's introduction, AMD finds itself in a curious position: It has to compete against Intel for a bigger share of a business that isn't exactly booming. On the other hand, AMD promises to maintain its relationship with ATI's rival nVidia, going ahead with Better-by-Design (BBD) platform projects that mix AMD CPUs and chipsets with nVidia graphics - though typically for a higher-end customer than the 690 addresses.

How does AMD plan to pull this off? BetaNews asked AMD's Mark Welker, senior member of its client performance analysis staff, whose job has been not only to gauge the relative performance of AMD products to one another, but to act as a liaison with ATI, nVidia, and other BBD partners.

"Intel has had more time in the integrated graphics industry," Welker told us, not surprisingly. "They've not necessarily been leading-edge, but they have had volume. There was a point when it was fairly high volume, simply because they had their chipsets that allowed them to get the volume that way. It's never been high-performing. ATI and nVidia have always done excellent integrated graphics."

From here, it gets interesting: "BBD is not just about us and ATI or us and nVidia," Welker told BetaNews, "it's us and anybody that'll be good at it." Commandeering a new noun for use as a cool adjective for performance, he continued, "It's 'scoreboard' for the end user; we're trying to get to them what the best possible solution [would be]. Yes, ATI will have access to some of our tools that they didn't before [but] we will not cast aside our relationship with nVidia. It will still be there; as long as they will work with us, we will work with them and give them the information we can to help their systems get better, because [nVidia is] more than just a graphics company. They too have integrated chipsets.

"It's old-fashioned capitalism at its best," he went on. "We're trying to give [consumers] as many choices as possible, rather than, 'You have to buy from us top-to-bottom.' There are people who say, when you buy top-to-bottom, you know where [your platform] is and you know it's stable. It's mediocre, and that's alright, you know it will work. But it might not be the best value."
http://www.betanews.com/article/New_AMD_Chipset_Integrates_ATI_Logic/1172695505

 

RIAA says Fair Use Act isn't fair

p2pnet.net news:- H.R. 1201, the Fair Use Act, isn't fair, says Big 4 record label cartel.

It would "would effectively repeal the DMCA," declare EMI (Britain), Vivendi Universal (France), Sony BMG (Japan and Germany) and Warner Music (US) through their RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America).

"The difference between hacking done for non-infringing purposes and hacking done to steal is impossible to determine and enforce," the IDG News Service has the RIAA declaring.

The Freedom and Innovation Revitalizing US Entrepreneurship (Fair Use) Act has just been introduced by Rick Boucher and John Doolittle.

"The Digital Millennium Copyright Act dramatically tilted the copyright balance toward complete copyright protection at the expense of the public's right to fair use," Boucher said. "The Fair Use Act will assure that consumers who purchase digital media can enjoy a broad range of uses of the media for their own convenience in a way which does not infringe the copyright in the work," Boucher explained.

It would allow customers to by-pass DRM (Digital Restrictions Management) consumer control in six "discrete" areas which don't threaten coopyright owners' business models, and to make limited numbers of copies.

But the bill would "allow electronics companies to induce others to break the law for their own profit," says the RIAA, according to IDG.

"The difference between hacking done for non-infringing purposes and hacking done to steal is impossible to determine and enforce," the RIAA stated.

Says the Home Recording Rights Coalition (HRRC) of the Fair Use Act:

"In suits for iindirecti infringement, aimed at legitimate products like the VCR, it limits copyright owners to actual damages rather than out of scale 'statutory' rewards, unless the conduct is clearly and obviously illegal.

"It codifies the Supreme Court's 'Betamax' holding that findings of indirect infringement should not be based on the design of consumer electronics or computer devices, or on their design or selection of components, if the device has a substantial non-infringing use.

"It codifies consumer protections as recently formulated by the US Register of Copyrights: That activities of consumers, librarians, and educators in using content at home or for other constructive purposes that are legitimate under the copyright law should not be held to be violations of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA)."

Slashdot Slashdot it!

Also See:
Fair Use Act - Fair Use Act introduced, February 27, 2007
IDG News Service - RIAA opposes new fair use bill, February 28, 2007
http://p2pnet.net/story/11484

 

Virtual PC 2007 is now available WORKS ON XP-POOP PRO

Use Microsoft Virtual PC 2007 to run multiple operating systems at the same time on the same physical computer. Switch between virtual machines with the click of a button. Use virtual machines to run legacy applications, provide support, train users, and enhance quality assurance.

Virtual PC lets you create separate virtual machines on your Windows desktop, each of which virtualizes the hardware of a complete physical computer. Use virtual machines to run operating systems such as MS-DOS, Windows, and OS/2. You can run multiple operating systems at once on a single physical computer and switch between them as easily as switching applications—instantly, with a mouse click. Virtual PC is perfect for any scenario in which you need to support multiple operating systems, whether you use it for tech support, legacy application support, training, or just for consolidating physical computers.

The Virtual PC application requires a 400 MHz Pentium-compatible processor (1.0 GHz or faster recommended), and requires approximately 20 MB of disk space. It runs on Windows Vista Business, Windows Vista Enterprise, Windows Vista Ultimate, Windows XP Professional, or Windows XP Tablet PC Edition.

Guest Operating System

Windows 98, Windows 98 Second Edition

Windows Millennium Edition (Windows Me)

Windows 2000 Professional

Windows XP Home Edition

Windows XP Professional

Windows Vista Enterprise

Windows Vista Business

Windows Vista Ultimate

download here
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/winfamily/virtualpc/default.mspx

 

CSS protection for DVD-R gets approval from DVD Forum

3/1/2007 10:38:32 AM, by Jacqui Cheng

The DVD Forum announced today that they will officially support the burning of CSS-protected content to DVD-R discs. The forum specifically approved "CSS Managed Recording" during its 36th Steering Committee Meeting in Tokyo, which will allow users to burn copy-protected content—either from another DVD or a CSS-protected download—to a special type of DVD-R disc for use in set-top DVD players.

This decision to support CSS Managed Recording comes six months after the DVD Copy Control Association (DVD CCA) loosened its reins a little bit by allowing movie-burning kiosks in retail stores to burn fully CSS-complaint DVDs for customers instead of an obscure format that was not compatible with most normal DVD players. Movie studio Warner Bros.—as well as download service Movielink, burner-makers, DVD manufacturers, and a number of movie kiosk makers—then signed on with Sonic Solutions' Qflix licensing program in January. This marked the first move on the consumer end toward actually enabling people to burn CSS-encrypted DVDs, although doing so would involve a number of caveats—updated burning software, upgraded DVD burners, and special recordable media.

The DVD Forum also reportedly took compatibility with current DVD players into consideration during its meeting, as well as a special logo for CSS-capable devices. The next step in allowing the masses to burn CSS-protected DVDs will be—you guessed it—available content. Right now, there is a very limited scope of services that offer compatible content and the DVD CCA says that the system will be initially restricted to professional uses, meaning that consumers won't be able to burn CSS-encrypted DVDs at home just yet. Despite all of these caveats, official support from the DVD Forum is encouraging. But is giving consumers this type of extended "freedom" going to be enough to make a difference to anybody? Unless large numbers of movie studios and video download services hop on board with content that can be burned to CSS-enabled media, all of this sudden support for the burning of CSS-protected content will likely fall flat.
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070301-8952.html

 

Xbox 360 hack allows unsigned code

3/1/2007 11:57:47 AM, by Jeremy Reimer

An anonymous hacker has posted a technique for circumventing the Xbox 360's restriction on running only signed code. The hack exploits a vulnerability in the console's operating system kernel, and uses a privilege escalation to switch into hypervisor mode. In this mode, any unsigned code can run—including alternate operating systems such as Linux—with full access to the 360's hardware.

The exploit only works on versions of the kernel between build 4532 (released October 31, 2006) and build 4548 (released in on November 30 of the same year). The kernel bug that the hack exploits was introduced by that first build, and patched by Microsoft in version 4552, which was released on January 9. As such, the hack will only work on Xbox 360s that were connected to Xbox Live and received patches up until October but were then disconnected from the Internet and left unpatched since then. Microsoft was able to issue a patch so quickly because the hackers contacted them in December with full details of the exploit.

Normally, the highly customized Windows kernel that runs on the 360 separates all executable threads into "hypervisor" and "supervised" modes. Only a few operations—such as essential services provided by the kernel itself—are allowed to run in hypervisor mode. Games and applications run in supervised mode, where all code is read-only, encrypted, and is only allowed to run if a signed key is present. The memory encryption is handled with a unique session key every time it is run, making traditional memory attacks (such as buffer overflows) extremely difficult.

However, unprivileged code still needs to interact with privileged code from time to time, and so an instruction (syscall) is used for this purpose. Each time syscall is invoked, it is passed a number to identify that particular call. Two different instructions that reference the syscall number, "cmplwi" and "rldicr," parse this number slightly differently, with the former looking only at the lower 32 bits of the number and the latter examining the full 64 bits. It was this difference that was used to trick the hypervisor into jumping into an unprotected bit of memory and running unsigned code.

While the exploit would theoretically allow any code to run, including another OS such as Linux, nobody (as yet) has demonstrated this on an actual 360. As the number of machines capable of being exploited by this hack is extremely low, it is doubtful that Microsoft is too worried about the exploit having an effect on Xbox 360 game sales. For those who aren't interested in experimenting but instead want to run backup versions of their games instead of the real discs, last year's DVD firmware hack would be a better bet. And for those who really just want to run Linux on a console, Sony is allowing vendors to release Linux distros specifically compiled for the PlayStation 3, although those releases do not allow direct access to the hardware (specifically the display chip). Still, the hack does show that there are many different ways to sneak past even the most secure protections, something that hackers have known for decades.
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070301-8954.html