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Sony decides against downsampling on analog HDTV

3/14/2006 11:15:28 AM, by Eric Bangeman

With the imminent war over which format will be the successor to the much-loved DVD about to get underway, Sony is throwing a bone to owners of some older HDTVs. At a technical briefing last week, Sony said that it will not use the Image Constraint Token to downsample the video output on analog HDTVs.

The Image Constraint Token is part of the AACS (Advanced Access Content System) used in both next-generation optical formats. A couple of months ago, we reported that ICT would be used in both Blu-ray and HD DVD to downsample video from its 1920x1080 glory to a relatively crufty 960x540 if the player detected that it was hooked up to an analog HD display or any other display lacking an HDMI input. We also noted that use of ICT would be left up to the individual studios, rather than being made a mandatory part of the AACS spec.

Sony is the first studio to lay out its plans for how owners of older, analog-only HD sets would be able to watch Blu-ray content. According to Sony Pictures Home Entertainment Senior VP Don Eklund, none of Sony's Blu-ray releases for the "foreseeable future" will use ICT to force downsampling.

"We have no plan to implement the Image Constraint Token. All of Sony's titles will come out of the analog output at full definition"

Eklund noted that while Sony is obviously concerned about piracy, it sees analog signals as a relatively small concern. Instead, Sony is banking on the AACS to keep the digital signal from being "intercepted" and preventing HD copies of its movies from turning up on Torrent sites and Usenet.

The first Blu-ray player, a US$1,000 device from Samsung, will be available in North America starting May 23. Sony Pictures will have eight titles available at launch, including 50 First Dates, The Fifth Element, Hitch, House of Flying Daggers, A Knight's Tale, The Last Waltz (MGM), Resident Evil Apocalypse and XXX. There will be another seven titles available by mid-June, and Sony anticipates having around 100 titles available by the holiday shopping season. Some of those will be new titles, released at the same time as their old-school DVD counterparts.

Sony's decision to not use the Image Constraint Token for the time being is meant to encourage the adoption of Blu-ray players. Launching a new product that would leave the thousands of analog HDTV owners out in the standard-definition cold could have proven to be a nightmare for Sony and the Blu-ray spec in general. Reports that "Blu-ray discs don't look right on my HDTV" could result in consumers' switching allegiances to the competing HD DVD standard or postponing purchases of next-generation optical players altogether.

Oh, and if the possibility of making analog, high-definition copies from Blu-ray discs is of such small concern, then why do we need to plug the analog hole?
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20060314-6377.html

 

Amazon.com S3 storage service available today

3/14/2006 11:55:34 AM, by Anders Bylund

This morning Amazon opened up S3, its new online storage solution for web applications, and now you can store unlimited amounts of data on Amazon servers for US$.15 per gigabyte, paid monthly. S3 was purportedly built to support both Amazon's own internal applications and the external users of the Amazon Web Services platform. That should be proper motivation to build a service that's fast and robust enough for mission critical use, yet flexible enough to support any storage task thrown at it. Check out the stated design philosophy:

* Scalable: Amazon S3 can scale in terms of storage, request rate, and users to support an unlimited number of web-scale applications. It uses scale as an advantage: Adding nodes to the system increases, not decreases, its availability, speed, throughput, capacity, and robustness.
* Reliable: Store data durably, with 99.99% availability. There can be no single points of failure. All failures must be tolerated or repaired by the system without any downtime.
* Fast: Amazon S3 must be fast enough to support high-performance applications. Server-side latency must be insignificant relative to Internet latency. Any performance bottlenecks can be fixed by simply adding nodes to the system.
* Inexpensive: Amazon S3 is built from inexpensive commodity hardware components. As a result, frequent node failure is the norm and must not affect the overall system. It must be hardware-agnostic, so that savings can be captured as Amazon continues to drive down infrastructure costs.
* Simple: Building highly scalable, reliable, fast, and inexpensive storage is difficult. Doing so in a way that makes it easy to use for any application anywhere is more difficult. Amazon S3 must do both.

The storage space is accessed by standard SOAP and REST interfaces, and networking is handled by HTTP and BitTorrent protocols. The data streams are encrypted with customer-specific keys, and access rights are supposed to be granular enough to provide private or public storage object by object, and user by user. Apart from the storage fee, you pay $0.20 per gigabyte transferred, but there are no minimum fees and no setup costs, so you pay as you go. And the Amazon APIs overall are quite generic and should be usable for writing services that have nothing to do with Amazon per se. It's a lightweight, scalable, flexible, and redundant storage solution, and Amazon says it's secure, too.

So what can S3 do for you? Well, it can be used as a 15-cents-a-gig online backup drive, for instance, or backend storage for your homebrew data warehouse with distributed, reliable access from anywhere and on demand. Any application with storage needs could use something like S3, so you can think of it as a rent-an-NAS solution on a large scale.

We've seen Amazon building out Web Services before, and according to the company's documentation, there are ten years and a billion dollars' worth of development behind the platform. The idea seems to be making money by providing the nuts and bolts to the burgeoning ranks of free-ranging web developers out there. It's the equivalent of monetizing game mods or open source programs by charging for use of the game servers or for access to SourceForge.

And Amazon certainly isn't alone in looking to become the backend for web services. eBay has turned their web platform into a free—albeit eBay-centric—service. Google has APIs for nigh on every service they offer, from GMail and maps to search and advertising, all at no charge, and rumors abound about a Google-backed storage service like S3. Yahoo! has a similar range of tools available for free, and Microsoft's MSN Developer Center gives you yet another choice of web platforms.

So if all of these respectable alternatives are free, how come Amazon thinks it can charge for its offering? The fees may be low, but free is cheaper. Hooking into the Internet Archive (aka the Wayback Machine) and the Amazon store will bring in some web historians and online merchants, but other than that, it may be a tough sell. Perhaps Amazon is banking on the standards-based, company-agnostic interfaces it uses to attract developers who would rather not tie themselves too tightly to Google Maps or Yahoo HotJobs, and are willing to pay for that lack of commitment.

But the biggest issue here might be one of trust. If you're building a business around web applications, would you trust Amazon or Google with your data? What's to stop the hosting company—or for that matter the government, if they have their way—from rifling through your confidential information? As more and more applications move off your desktop and onto the web, security becomes a bigger and bigger issue. And someday soon, don't be surprised if stiff-looking cops come knocking on your door, looking for Sarah Connor.
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20060314-6378.html

 

HD DVD to launch without any movies

3/14/2006 1:07:04 PM, by Nate Anderson

Despite the recent good news that Disney is considering the format, HD DVD backers have had little encouraging news recently. That trend continues with today's announcement that Warner Home Video will not be releasing HD DVD movies on March 28, after all. This means that early adopters will have to wait until sometime in April to get their hands on U2's Rattle and Hum documentary, the first title to be released in the new format.

This is not encouraging news for Toshiba, one of the primary backers of the HD DVD specification. Two Toshiba players are set to launch later this month, but with Warner's ship date slipping, the players will initially launch without any available titles. Movies should appear within several weeks of the launch, but it's not yet clear how much they will cost. While we already have indications that Blu-ray disc pricing will be in the US$23-39 range, no HD DVD backer has yet set a firm number. Wal-Mart was initially taking orders for HD DVD films at US$25.48 a pop (based on a US$29.99 list price), but a Warner representative said that the studio has not yet decided if this is accurate.

No matter how you spin it, this is not the way to make a strong product launch. Warner will be releasing movies late, and other studios will be even further behind. In addition, Toshiba is currently the only manufacturer of the players, which does not suggest strong backing from consumer electronics manufacturers. (LG has recently agreed to build HD DVD players as well, but nothing will be available for some time). Rumors also have it that only 10,000 machines will be available at launch, a number which suggests that Toshiba's players will be the nichest of niche commodities for a while.

So, is HD DVD doomed even before launch? Of course not. Despite a shaky start, the format has the formidable backing of Microsoft, which is considering plans to release an add-on player for the Xbox 360. HD DVD also has the advantage of beating its rival to market by about two months, and if the rumors of PS3 delays are true, it may have nine months to a year in which to establish itself before Blu-ray drives begin appearing en masse in Sony's new game console. On the other hand, if the HD DVD launch is underwhelming and Sony somehow manages to get millions of PS3s on store shelves by Christmas, the format war could be over sooner than we once thought.
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20060314-6380.html

 

Windows for Legacy PCs delayed until late 2006

3/14/2006 12:03:30 PM, by Jeremy Reimer

Don't be ashamed if you hadn't heard about Windows for Legacy PCs. According to Microsoft, it's not a "general purpose operating system." The OS, based on Windows CE, was designed primarily as a client for Remote Desktop connections or Citrix servers, with the added ability to run a few local applications. It was to be offered only to Microsoft's Software Assurance customers, and was scheduled for release later this month.

Software Assurance (SA) is Microsoft's volume software licensing service, where clients choose from a dizzying array of "packages" from resellers that can include payment plans that stretch over three years, as well as "subscription" services where you don't actually own the software, but merely rent it for a fixed price per PC. Interestingly, the subscription option is not available in the United States or Canada.

In any case, Microsoft has just updated their Windows for Legacy PCs web site, and the due date for the product has slipped from "Available March 2006!" in bold letters in the headline to a more modest "currently scheduled for release in late 2006" in the main body text (thank you, Google cache!)

The most likely explanation for the delay is that Microsoft is putting all of its operating system-related resources towards getting Windows Vista out the door. However, there may be other reasons for this subtle shift in OS release priorities.

The existence of "Windows for Legacy PCs" is a bit odd to begin with. People who can't afford to replace old computers generally don't think about purchasing new operating systems and software for them. Perhaps the concept arose as a way to forestall people installing Linux on these machines instead. Microsoft has been attacking that idea from another angle as well, running tests showing that recent Linux distributions don't perform well on legacy PCs. However, limiting sales of Windows for Legacy PCs to only SA customers (who by their very nature are already distributing Microsoft software over their entire company) lessens its impact on this market.

The sales tag line for Windows for Legacy PCs on the Microsoft web site has been updated as well, and now reads: "My legacy hardware is now as secure as my newest PCs." Even the model used on the web page seems to be having a hard time buying that line. Aren't even older versions of Windows supposed to receive regular security updates as well? While Microsoft doesn't define what a "legacy PC" actually is, XP and its security updates are officially suported on hardware as old as an original Pentium 233 MHz machine. Perhaps Microsoft realized that Windows for Legacy PCs is not likely to find widespread success no matter what they do with it, and this resulted in a sudden shift in resource allocation.
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20060314-6379.html

 

Civil Disobedience petition

p2p news / p2pnet: Here's an email we've just received with "A Call for Civil Disobedient for Pedagogical Exception in France" as the subject.

It's from Laurence Allard and Olivier Blondeau who write:

"The French Parliament is currently transposing the European Union Copyright Directive, an adaptation of 1996 WIPO copyright treaties.

"There is no fair use for education and research in our country and recent private agreement are threatening the use of copyrighted works in education and research: only 30 seconds music extracts, no VOD, DVDs, cable TV programmes display...

"If you share this concern, please forward this message to the Members of Parliament involved (e-mails below) and express your support to the French teaching and research community.">>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

A Call for Civil Disobedient for Pedagogical Exception in France
The Petition: http://www.politechnicart.net/exception/

The scientific and educational committee has been informed in the last few days of the nature of the agreements reached, with no consultation with any other interested parties, between the Ministry of Education and rights-holders in the field of music, video/television, the press, the visual arts and the written word.

These agreements sector by sector are meant to replace existing legislation and are in contradiction with the exceptions provided for in the relevant European directive (EUCD). They are designed to control our use of texts, music, images and films in our classrooms, our lecture halls, our libraries, our conferences, and our publications.

For months now, the Conference of French University Presidents have been demanding that the principle of pedagogical exception be introduced into the law now under discussion in parliament concerning Royalties and Similar Rights in the Information Society (DADVSI).

Considering the shamefully regressive and repressive nature of these new agreements in matters of teaching and research, thousands of scholars and teachers, including elected members of the Conseil National des Universités (CNU), undergraduate and graduate students, and many others committed to maintaining educational policies of high standard and international reknown, hereby declare a campaign of civil disobedience!

Even as this communiqué is drawn up, these educators, teachers and scholars are preparing to announce to their students that they are no longer in a position to fulfil their educational mission in any serious way.

We all realise that a campaign of civil disobedience is a very serious matter.

It is rare option in our country and may well have no precedent: educators have committed themselves publicly to disobey their minister and the law, and they will continue, no matter what the cost and in spite of any threats or sanctions, to show films, play records, distribute texts... in any way they deem useful and relevant.

There are today colleagues who have been sued by rights-holders. We demand the immediate suspension of all such actions.

We ask our MPs, sole legitimate representatives of the national interest within the framework of the harmonisation European policies on education and research, to exert to the full their authority so that France may endow itself with a reasonable Pedagogical Exception.

We call all our colleagues around the world to send a message at French MPs for support a Pedagogical Exception in France:

* cpaul@assemblee-nationale.fr
* fdutoit@assemblee-nationale.fr
* f.bayrou@udf.org
* dmathus@assemblee-nationale.fr
* mbillard@assemblee-nationale.fr
* cboutin@assemblee-nationale.fr
* bcarayon@assemblee-nationale.fr
* pbloche@assemblee-nationale.fr
* jpbrard@assemblee-nationale.fr
* hemmanuelli@assemblee-nationale.fr
* lwauquiez@assemblee-nationale.fr
* cvanneste@assemblee-nationale.fr
* baccoyer@assemblee-nationale.fr
* jdionis@assemblee-nationale.fr
* asuguenot@assemblee-nationale.fr

(Tuesday 14th March 2006)
http://p2pnet.net/story/8194

 

New Microsoft spy app

p2p news / p2pnet: Quite a while back Hollywood's MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America) launched a Parental File Watch program designed to get parents to spy on their kids for the MPAA's owners, the Big Six studios.

You expect that kind of thing from Hollywood, but now Bill and the Boyz have come up with Family Safety Settings censorware for Vista to, "allow customers to choose to allow, block or warn settings for a range of content categories," says Ryan Hamlin, general manager of Microsoft's Technology Care and Safety group.

Quoted in PC Pro, "Parents will be able to access activity reports for each user in the family, any time from any PC, to help them stay informed about how their children are browsing the Web or communicating online," he says.

Well-known Net experts the American Academy of Pediatrics, "provide guidance on developing age appropriate settings for various online activities," says the story. "It will also be posting advice on how parents can talk to their children about their online activities and the potential dangers."

"Parents may choose to allow or restrict specific game titles, limit their children's play to games that are rated at or below a certain age level, or block any games with certain types of content they do not want their children to see or hear," says Microsoft.

"Finally, Windows Vista provides parents with a detailed activity report that shows exactly what their children have been doing on the computer, including the games they have played, the websites they visited, and the applications they have used."

Microsoft doesn't say whether or not Family Safety Settings borrows from the MPAA in another way by also allowing parents to delete offending applications.

Stay tuned.

Also See:
spy on their kids - MPAA releases anti-piracy app, January 27, 2005
PC Pro - Microsoft to debut child safety controls on Windows Live, March 14, 2006

(Tuesday 14th March 2006)
http://p2pnet.net/story/8193

 

Warnings over serious Apple flaws

By Matthew Broersma, Techworld

Security company, EEye has warned of two serious bugs in Apple media software, putting both Windows and Mac OS X systems at risk.

The new reports follow a string of security warnings this year that threaten to end the widespread perception that Apple's software is relatively secure.

EEye last week reported two separate flaws affecting QuickTime and iTunes, both allowing attackers to potentially execute malicious code on a system.

Both affect Mac OS X as well as Windows NT, Windows 2000, Windows XP and Windows 2003, according to eEye, and both are rated as "high" severity. One flaw is the result of a heap overflow, and the other is caused by an integer overflow.

The company added both bugs to its roster of upcoming advisories, which alert users to flaws that have been discovered but not yet patched or publicly disclosed. EEye doesn't give details on such flaws, in order to allow users time to react and software vendors time to issue patches.

The oldest vulnerability on the list is currently a bug affecting Windows that was reported 153 days ago and hasn't yet been patched, eEye said.

Since the beginning of this year, Mac users have begun to experience a taste of the paranoia that has long afflicted Windows users. Recently, two viruses appeared targeting the OS X platform in the space of a week.

These were shortly followed by the public disclosure of code exploiting a severe OS X bug that could allow the Safari web browser to automatically execute malicious code on a system if users view a specially crafted site. The bug also affected OS X's built-in Mail e-mail client.

Antivirus vendors, who have long had difficulty selling their products to Mac users, have said attackers' new interest on the Mac is partly spurred by Apple's switch to the Intel platform. "It shows increased activity and viability for future Macintosh-based threats on the Mac OS X platform," said Ken Dunham, director of the rapid response team at iDefense, a Versign company, in a recent interview.

He pointing out that the last major Macintosh threat was the Autostart worm in 1998. "As a result, many Macintosh users are more likely to be complacent toward computer security and therefore are more likely to be vulnerable to any future threats that emerge against the Macintosh operating system," he said.
http://www.techworld.com/security/news/index.cfm?NewsID=5554

 

14 March 2006
Workers duped by simple CD ruse

By Jeremy Kirk, IDG News Service
To office workers trudging to their cubicles, the promotion looked like a chance at sweet relief from the five-day-a-week grind.

By simply running a free CD on their computers, they would have a chance to win a vacation. But the beguiling morning giveaway in London's financial district last month was more nefarious than it appeared.

Like flies to garbage, dozens of victims took the disc, unable to control the irresistible attraction of "free."

Secret agents behind enemy lines, the CDs piggy-backed through companies' physical security systems tucked in the bags and pockets of their couriers. The office workers dutifully took the CDs to their desks and plopped them in their employers' computers.

The mission was complete.

In the process, the CDs likely skirted an array of IT security systems in place to prevent malicious code from being installed. While the CDs did not contain malicious code, the exercise accomplished the point Robert Chapman wanted to make: People are misinformed about what actions could damage their computers or expose them to malware, adware and viruses.

"All these things are bypassed by human nature and curiosity and a level of ignorance and naivety," said Chapman, director of The Training Camp, a computer training and consulting business based in London, which came up with the idea. "The lure of a free holiday entices them more than the potential damage that they may make to their corporate network."

When a user ran the disc, the code on it prompted a browser window that opened a Web site, Chapman said. The site then tried to load an image from another Web site, Chapman said.

The number of people who opened the CD could be tracked by the number of times the image was accessed, he said. Users only saw an error message saying the page could not be loaded, he said.

"There is nothing clever about it or illegal," Chapman said of the disc's code.

While the front of the CD contained a written warning to users to check their company's internal security guidelines before running the CD, as many as 75 of the 100 CDs were played. Chapman said they were able to trace IP (Internet Protocol) addresses of those computers that tried to access the image and found that employees at two well-known insurance companies and a retail bank were among the duped.

Chapman declined, however, to identify the names of those businesses.

The experiment underscores what experts say is the weakest point for IT security: people. While many companies have policies and make their employees sign legally binding documents with rules of use for company computers, it's doubtful users get specific training on why those rules are in place, Chapman said.

Firewalls can block incoming hacking attempts, but most default firewall settings allow outbound traffic, Chapman said. If malicious code was already in the system, it may not be blocked by the firewall, allowing for the transmission of data from inside the computer, he said.

Chapman said he surprisingly didn't get any angry calls from rankled systems administrators. "I was half expecting something like that to happen but I hope people realise that this is being done with a good heart," he said.
http://www.techworld.com/security/news/index.cfm?NewsID=5563

 

RIAA's new hatchet men,

p2p news / p2pnet: At the beginning of February, in Recording Industry vs The People, Ray Beckerman pointed out that hired legal guns Shook Hardy & Bacon were no longer the Big Four Organized Music cartel's sue 'em all representatives.

It seems even S, H&B, who made their bones defending Big Tobacco, couldn't stomach the music industry, or its RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America).

The job of suing innocent men, women and children for the non-existent 'crime' of sharing music online, is now in the hands of Colorado's Holme Roberts & Owen but, "If the RIAA thinks that by changing attorneys it can somehow alter the self destructive nature of this litigation onslaught, it is mistaken," posted Beckerman, continuing:

"If, on the other hand, the change in attorneys signals a change in philosophy and tone, and that present lawsuits will be discontinued, and that lawsuits will only be brought where (a) there is clear evidence of an actual copyright infringement by a defendant, and (b) there has been an unsuccessful good faith attempt to obtain a cease and desist agreement, then this will be a positive development.

"But if the pit bull tactics of the RIAA's predecessor counsel are continued unabated by the new counsel, this will accomplish nothing except further damage the recording industry, and wreak havoc in people's lives."

Now, somewhat belatedly, "Our contract with them [the RIAA] ran out, and they have moved on to a new firm," the Kansas City Business Journal has Trent Webb, chairman of Shook's intellectual property litigation practice group, saying.

"The file-sharing cases targeting online music piracy are a potential cash cow for firms capable of handling them," says the story.

"Two defense lawyers said Shook typically demanded about $4,000 per defendant to settle them, and an RIAA spokeswoman said it has pursued 18,000 separate defendants.

"But the cases, filed in dozens of states, can be expensive to manage: Shook hired a subcontractor to operate a phone bank handling inquiries about the cases, and defense lawyers said the firm may have spent thousands of dollars pursuing judgments against defendants with little money."

The story neglects to mention that not one of the more than 18,000 victims, who include school children, has yet appeared in court to answer the Big Four's civil copyright infringement claims.

In florid, dinsingenuous press releases, Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG, who are themselves under investigation at both the federal and state levels, call the people they're suing "criminals" and "thieves" although no crime has been committed and nothing has been stolen.

Patti Santangelo, a New York mother of five, is the first of the 18,000 to stand up to the multi-billion-dollar labels.

At this point, she's solely supported by p2pnet readers through the Fight Goliath campaign. If you'd like to help her fight the Big Four, make a donation through the PayPal button below.


Or mail your contribution to:

Patti Santangelo
C/O PO Box 274
Hartsdale
New York 10530-0274

Also See:
pointed out - RIAA Changing Law Firms?, February 1, 2006
Kansas City Business Journal - Shook lets RIAA deal play out, March 13, 2006
solely supported - Patti Santangelo fund nears $11.5K, March 5, 2006

(Monday 13th March 2006)
http://p2pnet.net/story/8181

 

ESA goes on anti-legislation offense

3/14/2006 4:26:24 PM, by Peter Pollack

Video game trade group the Entertainment Software Association (ESA) has gone online with a site designed to encourage grass roots reaction by gamers against current and pending video game legislation. The Video Game Voters Network (VGVN) is currently inviting the public to speak to their senators in opposition to the Family Entertainment Protection Act (FEPA), a bill introduced jointly last December by Senators Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY), Joe Lieberman (D-CT) and Evan Bayh (D-CT).

In a nutshell, FEPA uses the existing ESRB ratings system to install legal limits in place of voluntary ones. Currently, the ESRB system is a purely voluntary program at both the publishing and retail level. Publishers of video games, once they submit and accept their game to be rated by ESRB, are contractually bound to follow certain advertising and marketing guidelines—most specifically dealing with titles rated Mature. Retailers, however, are under no ESRB restrictions, although ESRB does have a program to promote responsible action on their part as well.

Under FEPA, retailers would be legally bound to follow the ESRB recommendations, and titles rated Mature, Adults-Only, or Ratings Pending could not be sold to anyone under the age of 17. An annual analysis would also be performed to study the ESRB system and ensure that "drift" in the ratings over time would remain minimal. Finally, a series of additional steps would be provided for investigation of FEPA's effectiveness at the retail level, including secret shopper surveys and a channel for parental complaints.

The VGVN is working to drum up support to defeat FEPA by presenting the bill as a something of a blow against free speech.

In the past year, Michigan, Illinois, and California have all passed laws to ban the sale of certain video games to minors. So far, courts have blocked these laws from taking effect. But anti-video game forces are pressing forward. Gamers must stand up now and take action. Government does not regulate access to or the sale of movies, books or cable TV, and it should not regulate video games.

Certainly, the issues are complex, but boil down to two main questions: how comfortable are we with selling Mature titles to children, and how much regulation is needed to prevent such sales?

Many parents probably take a cursory to strong interest in what their children are doing on the computer or playing on the PS2, and in that sense, the voluntary ratings system is a success. While it's probably unrealistic to expect that all parents are going to take the time to play a game and see what it's about, the ESRB rating—though imprecise—can allow a them to form a general idea of a game's direction and determine its suitability for their child. One can argue that any parent who doesn't care about the ESRB rating is probably not going to be affected by FEPA (they'll just buy the title for the kid anyway), and in that sense, FEPA would be little more than unnecessary government regulation.

On the other hand, the fact that retailers are not bound by the ESRB is a genuine hole. As anyone who has ever been a child knows, there are numerous ways to get around the rules laid down by your parents. I wasn't even particularly rebellious as a teen, and I still probably had five different ways to smuggle things right under my parents' noses. As long as there are retailers hunting for the extra buck that sales of Mature titles to minors can bring, the government—with the blessing of many parents—will probably be considering bills like FEPA.

In short, the choice is yours whether to support FEPA, work to defeat it, or do nothing. However, if you really want to keep the government uninvolved in video game sales, the best solution may be to support retailers who act within ESRB guidelines, and prove to the government that we don't need no stinkin' regulation.
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20060314-6382.html

 

Report: PlayStation 3 delayed six months

3/14/2006 5:16:57 PM, by Ken "Caesar" Fisher

Japan's Nihon Keizai Shimbun is reporting that the PlayStation 3 will be delayed until November for the Japanese market (subscription required). Tomorrow morning Sony will be holding a press event where it is expected that the company will show PlayStation 3 hardware in action and perhaps even shed some light on when the console will actually ship. According to the paper, Sony has officially admitted that there is a delay in advance of tomorrow's event.

If the report is accurate, Sony will cite problems with the Blu-ray drive as the cause for the delay. In particular, sources are saying that the AACS delay, which has since been resolved, is the ultimate cause. There have been rumors to this effect for some time, but there are some doubts about how accurate they are. First, while AACS is not finalized, the interim agreement is in place, and that means that HD DVD players will be hitting shelves later this month, and the launch of Blu-ray is still slated for May. Since these players will be shipping with support for AACS, it is difficult to determine why Sony's own Blu-ray player for the PS3 would need an additional 3-5 months to gain proper support. There is a possibility that Blu-ray-specific security measures such as BD+ and ROM-Mark are the root cause, but here again one has to wonder why standard players are launching in May.

My gut feeling is that Blu-ray drive explanation is misdirection. Whatever the security problems, they can be updated with firmware. There's also the possibility that the security protections in question are unrelated to AACS and Blu-ray-specific designs. Rather, Sony may be including another level of protection on the PlayStation 3 aimed at preventing game piracy, as well. It would not be entirely surprising to learn that the delays with AACS did ultimately end up pushing Sony's own game-only protection schemes back. Still, at this point, there are just no solid details to go on, and the drive delay feels like a convenient excuse.

The delay, if true, puts a holiday launch in North America in doubt. If an October/November launch for Japan is in order, can Sony also get enough units to the North American market for the holiday rush? It's highly doubtful. To miss this season would be to give the Xbox 360 the biggest Christmas gift imaginable, and Nintendo probably wouldn't mind either: they're looking for a late-year release, too. Since Sony will be talking directly to the media tomorrow, we'll close it up here, though, and wait for more details.

We will have coverage of tomorrow's Sony event in the coming hours.
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20060314-6383.html

 

March 14, 2006
Apple iTunes violating copyright laws?

I had a listener of my show complain that he was having a hard time navigating my Podcast, because I had the full name of the show in the ID3 Tags, and I replied that no I did not. Well it appears if you use iTunes to actually download podcast, iTunes is changing the pre-written ID3 tag title to what is in the title of the Blog post. As I go back through some of my notes, I guess I knew this but had kinda forgotten about it. As one listener pointed out the iTunes Podcast Submission agreement even indicates they will be doing this, and the question I have to ask it why.

So instead of having "GNC-2006-03-14 #155" which I entered into the ID3 tag manually, listeners are seeing "Geek News Central Podcast 2006-03-14 #155" which is the blog post title. This in my opinion is a clear copyright violation as Apple is changing the contents of my creative works! But seeing that somewhere in the user agreement, I and thousands of others agreed to it! But the question needs to be asked is it the right thing to do?

Apple why are you doing this. Do you change music artist ID3 tags for them to suit your needs. When using Juice (which doesn't loose episodes by the way), it leaves my ID3 tags in tact and does not change them.

For the record because of the continued weird way iTunes just stops downloading podcast and how people loose shows etc. I am still recommending Juice for the podcast listener that wants to be guaranteed not to miss a download.

Here is picture of the show info downloaded with iTunes.
itunesc1.gif

Here is a picture of the show info downloaded with Juice.
itunesc.jpg


posted by Todd at 10:18 AM
http://www.geeknewscentral.com/archives/005880.html

 

iPods cause hearing loss

p2p news / p2pnet: More than half of American high school students say they have at least one symptom of hearing loss, and many of their problems are directly attributable to iPods and other portable music players, says a new study.

But teenagers aren't the only ones at risk.

Technology that provides audio through ear buds or earphones may be hammering the hearing of everyone who uses it, says the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA).

This won't come as news to The Who guitarist Pete Townshend who in January blogged that headphones can be dangerous - that earphones, not live sound, "do the most damage."

ASHA looked at the usage habits of high school students and adults with respect to some popular technology that provides audio through earbuds or earphones - "devices like Apple’s iPod, other MP3 players, and portable DVD players – and examined the public’s views about potential hearing loss from such devices, plus what they believe would be the most effective way to convey a hearing-loss prevention message, it says.

"It is not clear from the poll what is causing the symptoms, though it found usage habits among both students and adults that are potentially detrimental to hearing health," says the poll.

"For example, two-fifths of students and adults set the volume at loud on their Apple iPods, with students twice as likely as adults to play it very loud (13% vs. 6%).

"Meanwhile, adults are more likely than students to use their MP3 players for longer periods of time. Combined, more than half of adults use them 1-4 hours (43%) or longer (9%) compared to fewer than one-third of students—a disparity that may reflect the time adults spend commuting to and from work."

Conducted the last two weeks of February 2006, the ASHA-commissioned poll also found:

* Both teens(69%) and adults (50%) are more likely to turn down the volume in an effort to prevent hearing loss than take other steps such as limiting the listening time
* Among students, African Americans and Hispanics are more likely than Caucasians to report they've experienced at least some symptoms of hearing loss
* Adults seem less concerned about dangers to their own hearing, though in some cases they use the popular technology covered in the poll for longer periods and at higher volume than teens
* Of the technology covered, only laptops were more likely to be used by adults
* Except for the Apple iPod and one other MP3 player, teens are more likely to use the products covered by the poll for longer periods, at higher volumes
* Teenage boys are more likely than teenage girls to use the products surveyed in ways that may cause hearing loss later in life, by listening for longer periods and at higher volumes
* Older adults are more likely to report using surveyed products at lower volumes than younger adults and teens
* Equal percentages of adults (48%) and teens(47%) say that they are not concerned about hearing loss from using the surveyed products, with teens(53%) much more likely than adults(33%) to say they are concerned
* More than one half of teens(58%) say they're not likely to cut down on the time they use the technology surveyed, and 31% aren't likely to reduce the volume
* While a majority of parents(59%) are concerned about hearing loss in their children from the use of the technology, less than half are willing to limit the amount of time their children use it
* Only 10% of teens say learning about the dangers to hearing from family and friends is the best way for that message to be conveyed


"I've often said that although the Who have a reputation for being loud, as a live band we were usually only as loud as everyone else," said Townsend in January.

"We were, with Pink Floyd, simply one of the first UK bands to develop effective PA systems. People often confused the size of the rigs we started to use with loudness, not improved quality. By the way, this is not exclusively a British disease: the main leap in volume at live shows started in San Francisco with Bill Graham and the Grateful Dead.

"But today, this very morning, after a night in the studio trying to crack a difficult song demo, I wake up realizing again - reminding myself, and feeling the need to remind the world - that my own particular kind of damage was caused by using earphones in the recording studio, not playing loud on stage. My ears are ringing, loudly. This rarely happens after a live show, unless the Who play a small club. This is a peculiar hazard of the recording studio.

"The point I'm making is that it is not live sound that causes hearing damage.

"Earphones do the most damage."

Also See:
ASHA - Hearing Loss Symptoms Reported In High School Age Students And Adults, March 14, 2006
headphones can be dangerous - Pete Townshend on hearing loss, January 4, 2006

(Wednesday 15th March 2006)
http://p2pnet.net/story/8196

 

RFID viruses

p2p news view / p2pnet: Ubiquitous RFID (Radio Frequency IDentification) technology is here to stay, like it or not. And many civil liberties organizations definitely don't like it, saying the tags, often called spy chips, are wide open to abuse.

Here, Princeton professor Ed Felten discusses something new – RFID viruses.>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

RFID Virus Predicted
By Ed Felten – Freedom to Tinker

Melanie Rieback, Bruno Crispo, and Andy Tanenbaum have a new paper describing how RFID tags might be used to propagate computer viruses. This has garnered press coverage, including a John Markoff story in today’s New York Times.

The underlying technical argument is pretty simple. An RFID tag is a tiny device, often affixed to a product of some sort, that carries a relatively small amount of data. An RFID reader is a larger device, often stationary, that can use radio signals to read and/or modify the contents of RFID tags. In a retail application, a store might affix an RFID tag to each item in stock, and have an RFID reader at each checkout stand. A customer could wheel a shopping cart full of items up to the checkout stand, and the RFID reader would determine which items were in the cart and would charge the customer and adjust the store’s inventory database accordingly.

Simple RFID tags are quite simple and only carry data that can be read or modified by readers. Tags cannot themselves be infected by viruses. But they can act as carriers, as I’ll describe below.

RFID readers, on the other hand, are often quite complicated and interact with networked databases. In our retail example, each RFID reader can connect to the store’s backend databases, in order to update the store’s inventory records. If RFID readers run complicated software, then they will inevitably have bugs.

One common class of bugs involves bad handling of unexpected or diabolical input values. For example, web browsers have had bugs in their URL-handling code, which caused the browsers to either crash or be hijacked when they encountered diabolically constructed URLs. When such a bug existed, an attacker who could present an evil URL to the browser (for example, by getting the user to navigate to it) could seize control of the browser.

Suppose that some subset of the world’s RFID readers had an input-processing bug of this general type, so that whenever one of these readers scanned an RFID tag containing diabolically constructed input, the reader would be hijacked and would execute some command contained in that input. If this were the case, an RFID-carried virus would be possible.

A virus attack might start with a single RFID tag carrying evil data. When a vulnerable reader scanned that tag, the reader’s bug would be triggered, causing the reader to execute a command specified by that tag. The command would reconfigure the reader to make it write copies of the evil data onto tags that it saw in the future. This would spread the evil data onto more tags. When any of those tags came in contact with a vulnerable reader, that reader would be infected, turning it into a factory for making more infected tags. The infection would spread from readers to new tags, and from tags to new readers. Before long many tags and readers would be infected.

To demonstrate the plausibility of this scenario, the researchers wrote their own RFID reader, giving it a common type of bug called an SQL injection vulnerability. They then constructed the precise diabolical data needed to exploit that vulnerability, and demonstrated that it would spread automatically as described. In light of this demo, it’s clear that RFID viruses can exist, if RFID readers have certain types of bugs.

Do such bugs exist in real RFID readers? We don’t know - the researchers don’t point to any - but it is at least plausible that such bugs will exist. Our experience with Web and Internet software is not encouraging in this regard. Bugs can be avoided by very careful engineering. But will engineers be so careful? Not always. We don’t know how common RFID viruses will be, but it seems likely they will exist in the wild, eventually.

Designers of RFID-based systems will have to engineer their systems much more carefully than we had previously thought necessary.

(Wednesday 15th March 2006)
http://p2pnet.net/story/8199

 

Bush, Google and online porn

p2p news view / p2pnet: In my mind the most amusing aspect of the Bush administration's attempt to grab users' search information from Google is the reason they actually want the info in the first place.

The Bush administration claims it's trying to prove how easy it is for minors to come across pornographic content. They tried using the Internet Archive, but didn't get much. (So, in case anyone wanted to know whether archive.org is a kid-friendly, the US government says "yes!").

The really funny thing is that making the net safer for children could have been partially achieved by the creation of a .xxx Top Level Domain. Unfortunately, Bush's own Department of Commerce helped kill the idea - apparently, acknowledging the existence of pornography somehow legitimises it, perhaps in the same way that acknowledging the existence of HIV/AIDS means that risky sexual practices are suddenly okay. I don't know - false logic and backward thinking seems to be the hallmark of a functioning government these days.

As far as the Bush White House is concerned, forcing Google to hand over search data serves two functions:

1) They don't have to dip into the Republican war chest by doing the research themselves; and,

2) They get to establish a precendent that kills the 4th Amendment, in case they want to sponge info from other companies in the future.

US District Judge James Ware said he was reluctant to give the Justice Department everything it wanted because of the "perception by the public that this is subject to government scrutiny". Weeell, so long as the US government isn't getting everything it wanted, that's fine. If they're only handing over a little bit of private information, it'll be okay. Provided they're not violating the Constitution much, I'm sure the public will feel reassured.

Sarcasm aside for a minute, I wasn't aware you could do some thing that's "partially" unconstitutional. I always thought is was one of those binary states: constitutional or unconstitutional. Alive or dead. Pregnant or not pregnant. That was one of the things that made me feel really uncomfortable when I heard about it - so long as you compromise, you can can ask for the most ridiculous things. People will ignore the outlandish request and focus on how "reasonable" you can be in reaching a compromise:

Crazed Dictator: I want a hundred nuclear bombs! Muhahaha!

United Nations: No way! No nuclear bombs!

Crazed Dictator: Okay, ten bombs then!

US Court: We'd like to thank you for being so reasonable. Request for ten nuclear weapons granted.

In case you're still not convinced that this is simply the big government trying to beat big tech companies into submission, you might like to consider the fact that AOL, Yahoo and MSN have aready handed over their search data, exactly like the Department of Justice wanted in the first place.

In terms of raw data, any statistician would tell you they have more than enough to work out how much smut there is on the net. The only possible thing Google could help them with is determining whether it's a lot, or a hell of a lot.

To take this case as far as they have can only mean the Bush administration is more interested in proving they can get the data than doing anything useful with it...which they could have done to some extent by letting people put .xxx after the name of their raunchy web site anyway.

Alex H, p2pnet - Sydney, Australia
[Alex is an operations manager for an ATM (automatic teller machine) supplier and he specialises in infrastructure development and maintenance, and logistics. He’s also an[other] active member of the Shareaza community. He also runs the Tech Loves Art blog on which you'll find previous p2pnet posts as well as other good stuff.]

(Wednesday 15th March 2006)
http://p2pnet.net/story/82

 

HD DVD likely be a sluggish start with no movies for the launch


Posted by Seán Byrne on 15 March 2006 - 00:40 - Source: Yahoo News

Even though Toshiba is set to launch its HD DVD players later this month, it looks like early buyers will be disappointed by the lack of any movies to play in them! This comes as Warner announced that they will not release any HD DVD movies on March 28th due to technical problems and no other content providers are ready to release movies for another while yet. As a result, the first HD DVD titles are expected to go on sale in April. This means that while Toshiba may have its players out early, by the time movies start rolling out on HD DVD, it will be very close to the competitor's Blu-ray launch date, not to mention a slow start for HD DVD.

Unlike Blu-ray, the HD DVD format has another drawback in that Toshiba will be the only manufacturer to initially offer any HD DVD players and as LG has only just agreed to manufacture HD DVD players, it will be a good while yet before they develop their HD DVD products, never mind getting them shipped them out. So far, no other consumer electronics manufacturer has any plans to start developing HD DVD players. Finally, even if consumers were to start rushing out to grab HD DVD players, there are rumours about that Toshiba has only ~10,000 HD DVD players available for the launch.

On the other hand, if HD DVD manages to make a good start and the PS3 gets delayed long enough, then by the time the PS3 debuts, HD DVD may potentially grab enough of the market to win the war, at least when it comes to movies. Thanks to Hypnosis4U2NV for letting us know about the following news:

Warner Home Video, the only studio that in January had set a firm date, March 28, for its first high-definition DVD titles to arrive in stores, now says it might not be ready in time because of technical problems.

"To be honest, the outlook is tenuous -- we're still coming out with an initial slate, but we may be a week or two later; we just don't know," division president Ron Sanders said.

*** Quote from ars technica: ***

This is not encouraging news for Toshiba, one of the primary backers of the HD DVD specification. Two Toshiba players are set to launch later this month, but with Warner's ship date slipping, the players will initially launch without any available titles. Movies should appear within several weeks of the launch, but it's not yet clear how much they will cost.

Some further info can be read on Yahoo and ars technica.

Like the original launch of the DVD format and players, there is a very good chance that neither format will start selling well until prices have come down considerably. For example, the last thing a cost conscious consumer would like is to spend $499 on a HD DVD player only to find that a few months down the line, the player has fallen to half its price or another model comes out with a much lower price tag.

Finally, the format war only makes matters worse, as there is also a much greater chance that the take-off will be slowed down even further if many consumers decide to wait and see which format does the best before deciding on which format to go for. For example, I cannot easily see the average consumer spending half a grand on a new player only to find out that it becomes virtually obsolete a year later! A very good example of a format war running into difficulty is DVD-Audio vs. Super Audio CD. These were originally aimed at replacing the Audio CD as the next generation audio disc format, yet each format has only managed to reach a few percent of album sales, despite both being on the market for several years now.

Feel free to discuss about HD DVD and Blu-ray on our Satellite, HD-TV, Blu-ray and HD-DVD Forum.
http://www.cdfreaks.com/news/13189

 

DRM delays PlayStation 3 launch

p2p news / p2pnet: Arguments over CRAP DRM have deprived Sony enthusiasts of the spring arrival of the company's PlayStation 3.

Instead, it's now slated to appear towards the end of the year in November.

Sony had, "hoped to launch PlayStation3 - which will take on Microsoft's Xbox 360 and Nintendo's Revolution in the $30bn global games market - in the spring in Japan, rolling it out in the US and Europe later this year," says the Guardian Unlimited.

But disagreements between Hollywood studios and manufacturers over copy protection in Blu-Ray, "meant that it would launch simultaneously in Japan, the US and the UK in November, Mr Kutaragi told a press conference," says the story, going on to quote him as saying:

"I would like to apologise for revising the release date, because standardisation talks on new Blu-ray technology and high-definition multimedia interfacing - the key features of the next generation console, have taken more time than we had originally thought.

"When we initially announced our plans to launch this spring, we had expected the standardisation work on all of the technologies to be completed by last August, but there were improvements that were decided on since then."

On the face of it, "the delay announced this morning looks to be a major setback for the chief executive of Sony [Howard Stringer], whose goal has been to revive the company's consumer electronics division," says Forbes. "While he now sits and waits for his legions of engineers to continue tinkering with the PS3's magical next-generation disk technology, arch gaming adversary Microsoft with its Xbox 360 will keep chewing away at all that potential market share.

"Japanese traders, however, reacted mildly to news of the delay and sent Sony's stock down a mild 1.8% this morning. They'd probably been expecting all this. From Wall Street to online gaming forums, the rumor mill had long gone past 'whether' the PS3 would be delayed, to 'how long' we would have to wait."

Also See:
CRAP DRM - Tired of C.R.A.P.?, March 14, 2006
Guardian Unlimited - Sony PlayStation3 delayed, March 15, 2006
Forbes - Stringer's Sony Delays PlayStation3 Launch To November, March 15, 2006

(Wednesday 15th March 2006)
http://p2pnet.net/story/8203

 

Top 10 Security Live CD distros

p2p news / p2pnet: Want to know the ten best LiveCD security distros?

Darknet has a complete list, and below are the first three >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

The newest contender on the block of course is BackTrack, which we have spoken about previously. An innovative merge between WHax and Auditor (WHax formely WHoppix).

BackTrack is the result of the merging of two Innovative Penetration Testing live Linux distributions Whax and Auditor, combining the best features from both distributions, and paying special attention to small details, this is probably the best version of either distributions to ever come out.

Based on SLAX (Slackware), BackTrack provides user modularity. This means the distribution can be easily customised by the user to include personal scripts, additional tools, customised kernels, etc.

Get BackTrack Here.
http://www.remote-exploit.org/index.php/BackTrack
2. Operator

Operator is a very fully featured LiveCD totally oriented around network security (with open source tools of course).

Operator is a complete Linux (Debian) distribution that runs from a single bootable CD and runs entirely in RAM. The Operator contains an extensive set of Open Source network security tools that can be used for monitoring and discovering networks. This virtually can turn any PC into a network security pen-testing device without having to install any software. Operator also contains a set of computer forensic and data recovery tools that can be used to assist you in data retrieval on the local system.

Get Operator Here.
http://www.ussysadmin.com/operator/
3. PHLAK

PHLAK or [P]rofessional [H]acker’s [L]inux [A]ssault [K]it is a modular live security Linux distribution (a.k.a LiveCD). PHLAK comes with two light gui’s (fluxbox and XFCE4), many security tools, and a spiral notebook full of security documentation. PHLAK is a derivative of Morphix, created by Alex de Landgraaf.

Mainly based around Penetration Testing, PHLAK is a must have for any pro hacker/pen-tester.

Get PHLAK Here. (You can find a PHLAK Mirror Here as the page often seems be down).
http://public.planetmirror.com/pub/phlak/?fl=p

Go here for the remaining seven.
http://www.darknet.org.uk/2006/03/10-best-security-live-cd-distros-pen-test-forensics-recovery/

Also See:
Darknet - 10 Best Security Live CD Distros (Pen-Test, Forensics & Recovery), March 14, 2006

(Wednesday 15th March 2006)
http://p2pnet.net/story/8202

 

Jam cell phones in cinemas

p2p news / p2pnet: Rip-off food and drink concession prices, high ticket prices, sticky floors, loud-mouthed patrons and the growing popularity of home entertainment systems are among the reasons people are staying away from cinemas in droves.

Another is mobiles and now, movie theater owners are debating whether or not to ask federal authorities for permission to, "jam cell phone reception in an attempt to stop annoying conversations during films, the head of the industry's trade group said on Tuesday," according to Reuters.

Attendees at the Las Vegas ShoWest conference for theater owners, "want to find ways to win back crowds" and, "I don't know what's going on with consumers that they have to talk on phones in the middle of theaters," NATO (National Association of Theater Owners) president John Fithian is quoted as saying.

If stop-gab measures such as sweeps by ushers to "funny fake movie trailers urging viewers to shut off phones" don’t work, "We will actually petition the Federal Communications (Commission) to remove the block" on jamming cell phones, said Fithian.

But that may not be easy because federal law and FCC rules prohibit the use of cell phone jammers, observes Reuters, adding that MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America) boss China Dan Glickman says his bosses are, "researching why and when people go to the movies and might consider an advertising campaign to encourage people to go out to the movies, just as the milk industry has succeeded with its Got Milk? campaign."

Also See:
Reuters - Movie theaters may ask to jam cell phones, March 15, 2006

(Wednesday 15th March 2006)
http://p2pnet.net/story/8204

 

Poodles Good. Cell phones Bad.

p2p news / p2pnet: Rule 300 of Australian Road Rules declares, "The driver of a vehicle must not use a hand held mobile phone while the vehicle is moving, or is stationary but not parked".

With that in mind, an Adelaide man has, "demanded changes to road rules after he was fined for touching a phone earpiece while driving," says News.colm.au.

Con Kyriakopoulos lost a Supreme Court appeal, "after being fined $A182 for using a hand-held mobile phone while he was driving."

The decision was, "clinically pedantic that borders on stupidity... and is a classic case of the law lagging behind technology," Kyriakopoulos declared.

Now he has to pay the fine – boosted to $325 - as well as $111 for the Supreme Court appeal, says the story.

Justice Richard White ruled that by holding the earpiece to his ear Mr Kyriakopoulos "was using a mobile telephone which was hand held".

"What about the people who drive with poodles in their lap, truckies eating pies, people smoking, and women who put lipstick on while they're driving?" - demanded Kyriakopoulos.

(Thanks, Sher)

Also See:
News.colm.au - Man fined for touching phone earpiece, March 15, 2006
http://p2pnet.net/story/8205