There isn’t a man alive who hasn’t had to sit through some commercial about piracy or heard about the sue-fest that has gone round again and again to do with all of the piracy.  Warner Bros. just happens to be one of the many trying to fight piracy.  They’ve sued popular music sites and even hired interns to find pirated items and issue takedown notices.  None of that is remotely surprising to anyone.  The twist to the tail is that Warner Bros. may actually be using pirated software themselves.

You see there is a German company called Medien Patent Verwaltun or MPV for short.  Way back in 2003 they showed off their anti-piracy technology with Warner Bros.’ invite.  Then in 2004 they started using it to put anti-piracy coding onto their future films.  Now the tricky thing is, they didn’t have the permission of that company.  Now it hasn’t been proven one way or the other just yet.  Either way, this is probably not going to help them appear all that high and mighty while they’re hypocritically chasing down the little guys pirating films.

Source: Switched

No matter where you go, you’re going to run into laws that can be described as nothing but pure stupidity.  Be it old outdated laws that should be gotten rid of or just ones that are a royal pain in the ass.  Well those of us in the US are definitely no exception to that.  Now we have just one more ridiculous law to make those of us here in the US groan and justifiably roll our eyes in annoyance.  There is fantastic news though, it’s perfectly legal for you to store backup copies of all of your DVDs.  It’s too bad that won’t help you out a whole lot though, since it’s perfectly illegal for anyone to manufacture the software that makes it possible to create those backup DVDs.

Just another backwards and ridiculous way to attempt to slow down illegal DVD copies.  I doubt it’s going to work even a little among the determined, but it’s an attempt on the DMCA’s part nonetheless.  This means that RealDVD, which allowed for you to watch the copy of your movie on the computer it was created on, illegal as well.  It’s not as if it was allowing you to create several copies of the movie.  As far as software goes, it’s one of the more innocent ones out there.  Some would call it a happy medium, even somewhat of a compromise.  Sadly though, the DMCA is still far too greedy to do something as ridiculous as compromise.

Source: OhGizmo

The world has officially turned upside down.  First Apple starts whimpering over Microsoft’s new commercials and now Microsoft has actually admitted to being threatened by Linux.  It’s complete madness!  Both Microsoft and Apple always seem to act as if they could never be threatened by anyone, they are untouchable, and that’s the end of the discussion.  For Microsoft to actually admit that Linux distributors Red Hat and Canonical are competition to Windows is a touch on the mind blowing side of things.

All of this was discussed in the annual filing to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.  There’s talk that what finally made Microsoft stop and think is when Netbooks started using Linux.  Microsoft’s way of dealing with that was to attempt to release lightweight alternatives to Netbooks in an attempt to keep up with the new Linux sporting Netbooks.  Were it not for the change with the Netbooks, it’s unlikely that Microsoft would have ever even hinted that Linux was even somewhat threatening their market.

Source: Crunchgear

Sound strange? I thought so, too. Someone at Slashdot discovered the patent application over the weekend. Here’s how Microsoft explains the logic:

“The current business model for computer hardware and software relies on a user purchasing a computer with hardware and software that is suited to the most demanding applications that the user expects to encounter. Therefore, a user may buy a multi-core processor with a significant amount of memory and advanced video support for gaming applications that are only used on the weekend, while the user’s day-in, day-out activities may involve little more than word processing or web-browsing.”

Microsoft’s plan would give you a computer, then, that had powerful capabilities — but the hardware would only see its full potential when you anted up for the high-end hourly plan. Likewise, the software would only show when it was part of the package you purchased at any given moment. You might pay anywhere from $0.80 an hour for a simple “browsing bundle” to $1.15 an hour for a “homework bundle,” or $1.25 an hour for the more intense “gaming bundle” of resources.

Microsoft says it may even apply the concept to other areas of technology — things like GPS systems, for example. You’d get the device’s nonfunctioning body, then be billed by the hour based on what you did with it.

In related news, that hooker from downtown has filed an intellectual property lawsuit against Microsoft.

Indiana’s Bureau of Motor Vehicles has released a new set of rules for driver’s license photos. The change comes because of facial recognition software now being used by the department’s computers.

So, on the no-no list: smiling, wearing glasses, or wearing a hat or head scarf. You also can’t have your hair hanging down on your face. (Damn. There go my plans to masquerade as the guitarist from Radiohead circa 1992 in my next license photo.)

The government says any of those things could interfere with its software’s ability to match your face with others in its databases. Match your face, you ask? Yep. The system will automatically scan your mug and check it against more than 6 million others to make sure you’re really who you say. And, apparently, this high-tech creation can’t function if you’re flashing your pearly whites.

Luckily, there’s very little to smile about in a Motor Vehicle Bureau, so we suspect the adjustment won’t be too tough to make. At least, as long as you’re not Tom Cruise. That guy’s gonna have problems.

It sounds crazy, but it’s apparently true. Some scientists at the University of California-San Diego have come up with an algorithm that can generate a physical key from a simple image of one. Almost any kind of picture will work, whether it’s taken from near or afar, whether it’s shot straight-on or from an odd angle.

The program, revealed to the Discovery Channel this week, is one powerful piece of software. The researchers say the system was able to replicate real keys from thousands of regular photos they found on Flickr-style sites, where someone’s keys just happened to be visible in the picture.

But it’s not only online profiles this thing can crack — leaving your keys out on a table at a restaurant could make them vulnerable, too. The scientists have an 80 percent success rate at duplicating keys after photographing them from as far as 200 feet away. And the whole process takes a matter of minutes. Freaky, eh?

The UC San Diego team insists it won’t use the invention for any questionable purposes. I’m not sure what their actual intentions were in developing it, but I can tell you this: I won’t be flashing my keys in any digital photographs any time soon.

A University of Cincinnati law professor’s blog talks about a growing trend of employees suing their bosses over their computer startup and shutdown times. The hourly workers say they should be paid for the minutes wasted waiting for their operating systems to boot up at the beginning of the day and close down at the end.

Numerous companies have faced such suits over the past months, the story notes, ranging from AT&T to UnitedHealth Group. The employees say they’re spending 15 to 30 minutes a day sitting, waiting, and losing out on time they should be getting paid.

The blog quotes a National Law Journal article that claims computer boot time should be not be counted as work. An attorney in the story rationalizes that “most employees boot the computer, then engage in nonwork activities.”

“They go have a smoke, talk to friends, get coffee. They’re not working, and all they’ve done at that point is press a button to power up their computer, or enter in a keyword,” he says.

Well, sure — what else are they supposed to do while their slow OS is starting up? Would sitting there and staring at the screen be a more appropriate and productive activity?

The fact of the matter is that people get to work at a particular time and should be paid accordingly. The reality that they have to wait six minutes for their system to be ready isn’t their fault.

Where this’ll get interesting is if the employee lawsuits win, then the companies in turn sue Microsoft for creating the slow operating system and causing the problem.

Of course, Windows 7 is going to fix all of that, right?

The Internet-driven OS, announced Monday at Microsoft’s Professional Developers Conference in Los Angeles, has been in the works for more than a decade — at least in name, anyway. Microsoft snatched up the domain azure.com back in October ‘94 and currently has it locked down with GoDaddy till next fall. (Random side note: Microsoft uses GoDaddy? Interesting.)

Somehow, though, the trademark itself seems to have slipped through the cracks. A search of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office turns up no results for “Windows Azure” or even “Microsoft Azure.” “Azure Services Platform,” a moniker also mentioned during the product’s introduction, also has no trademark entry on file.

A Microsoft spokesperson told Computerworld, which first noticed and reported the missing record Monday afternoon, that the company had in fact filed a registration and that it “would appear on the agency’s database” before the close of the day. Doesn’t look like it happened, though.

Whoops.

Here’s what we do know: Mr. Jobs and crew have hired the dean of Yale’s business school, Joel Podolny, to head up the upcoming Apple U. A note from Yale’s president indicates Podolny will “lead educational initiatives at Apple.” A follow-up note from Podolny himself says he will serve as “vice president and dean of Apple University.” (He then goes into a long-winded speech about how no company has had as “tremendous personal meaning” for him as Apple and how it has been a “fabric of [his] life.” We’ll spare you the details.)

The question, then, is what in the world Apple U will be — and who it’ll be for. Nerds worldwide are no doubt hoping for a full-fledged alternative to the four-year college. Just think if that did happen, and if other tech companies followed suit. The rivalries that resulted would be the stuff of comedic legend. The annual Apple-Microsoft football faceoff, in particular, would have to be the most hilarious sporting scenario imaginable.

But in actuality, the odds are against such an admittedly awesome reality. Most signs suggest the “university” is more likely to end up being some kind of internal employee training facility, possibly akin to the Jobs-founded Pixar Animation Studio’s Pixar University. (Random fact: Did you know there’s also a McDonald’s Hamburger University? I had no idea. But I would trade my degree for the Hamburgler’s stamp of approval in a heartbeat.)

The new dean, by the way, is currently researching “how leaders infuse meaning into their organizations.” Tips for leaders to instill meaning? Well, crap — the wrong company got him. This guy needs to go to Yahoo.

A scientist from Britain’s Leeds Metropolitan University says he’s developed a program that can find and translate messages from outer space. The software, he says, would compare the alien messages to 60 different languages to try to identify any overlapping qualities. The guy claims that space speak would share similar components to some earthly dialect or other.

“Language has to be structured in a certain way. Otherwise, it will be inefficient and unwieldy,” he stated during an interview with New Scientist.

How he is so certain of this, we are uncertain. But the fella says he’s confident his program could break down the base phrases and decipher the structure of an alien tongue. He says clues such as the lengths of individual phrases would indicate how intelligent the creatures were. The longer the phrases, he believes, the more intelligent.

We’re guessing this guy speaks with very short phrases.