Deeplinks – Internet Archive Files Appeal Brief Defending Libraries and Digital Lending From Big Publishers’ Legal Attack

Dec 172023
 

SAN FRANCISCO—A cartel of major publishing companies must not be allowed to criminalize fair-use library lending, the Internet Archive argued in an appellate brief filed today. 
The Internet Archive is a San Francisco-based 501(c)(3) non-profit library which preserves and provides access to cultural artifacts of all kinds in electronic form. The brief filed in the U.S. Court of Appeal for the Second Circuit by the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and Morrison Foerster on the Archive’s behalf explains that the Archive’s Controlled Digital Lending (CDL) program is a lawful fair use that preserves traditional library lending in the digital world. 
“Why should everyone care about this lawsuit? Because it is about preserving the integrity of our published record, where…

External feed Read More at the Source: https://www.eff.org/press/releases/internet-archive-files-appeal-brief-defending-libraries-and-digital-lending-big

 2023-12-17  Comments Off on Deeplinks – Internet Archive Files Appeal Brief Defending Libraries and Digital Lending From Big Publishers’ Legal Attack

jwz – Dark Rock of Mothrir Unsealed: Mickey Mouse Is Public Domain

Dec 172023
 

The doors slam open. Cory Doctorow enters, papers streaming from his unlatched briefcase. “I have been preparing for this blog post for my entire life!” he exclaims: Now, if you’ve heard anything about this, you’ve probably been told that Mickey isn’t really entering the public domain. Between trademark claims and later copyrightable elements of Mickey’s design, Mickey’s status will be too complex to understand. That’s totally wrong. […] The copyrightable status of a character used to be vague and complex, but several high-profile cases have brought clarity to the question. The big one is Les Klinger’s case against the Arthur Conan Doyle estate over Sherlock Holmes. That case established that when a character appears in…

External feed Read More at the Source: https://www.jwz.org/blog/2023/12/dark-rock-of-mothrir-unsealed-mickey-mouse-is-public-domain/

 2023-12-17  Comments Off on jwz – Dark Rock of Mothrir Unsealed: Mickey Mouse Is Public Domain

World Socialist Web Site (en) – University of Michigan permanently bans student resolution against genocide in Gaza

Dec 132023
 

What is really behind the suppression of the anti-genocide resolution is the fact that it was headed for victory, something the billionaire donors and regents, Democratic and Republican politicians, and Pentagon, CIA and State Department officials who collectively run the university would not allow.

External feed Read More at the Source: https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2023/12/13/sgyt-d13.html

 2023-12-13  Comments Off on World Socialist Web Site (en) – University of Michigan permanently bans student resolution against genocide in Gaza

Hackaday – x86 ENTER: What’s that Second Parameter?

Dec 132023
 

[Raymond Chen] wondered why the x86 ENTER instruction had a strange second parameter that seems to always be set to zero. If you’ve ever wondered, [Raymond] explains what he learned in a recent blog post.
If you’ve ever taken apart the output of a C compiler or written assembly programs,  you probably know that ENTER is supposed to set up a new stack frame. Presumably, you are in a subroutine, and some arguments were pushed on the stack for you. The instruction puts the pointer to those arguments in EBP and then adjusts the stack pointer to account for your local variables. That local variable size is the first argument to ENTER.
The reason you rarely see it…

External feed Read More at the Source: https://hackaday.com/2023/12/12/x86-enter-whats-that-second-parameter/

 2023-12-13  Comments Off on Hackaday – x86 ENTER: What’s that Second Parameter?

LWN.net – The end of vger.kernel.org

Dec 132023
 

Konstantin Ryabitsev has announced
that the movement of kernel mailing lists away from the venerable
vger.kernel.org system is nearly complete:

Over the past few months we’ve migrated all of the vger.kernel.org mailing lists, with the exception of the Big One (linux-kernel, aka LKML). This list alone is responsible for about 80% of all vger mailing list traffic, so we left it for the last.

This Thursday, December 14, at 11AM Pacific (19:00 UTC), we will switch the MX record for vger to point to the new location (subspace.kernel.org), which will complete the mailing list migration from the legacy vger server to the new infrastructure.

External feed Read More at the Source: https://lwn.net/Articles/954783/

 2023-12-13  Comments Off on LWN.net – The end of vger.kernel.org

Planet PostgreSQL – Bruce Momjian: Is SQL Good?

Nov 202023
 

The Postgres mailing lists are full of practical discussions, but two years ago there was a
77-email thread titled “The tragedy of SQL” that questioned the utility of the SQL query
language; t is worth a review. While opening with “A fun philosophical discussion,” it states:

The world’s economic output would be substantially higher (5%?) if our industry had settled on almost anything other than SQL for relational databases.

It disparages object-relational mappers and suggests Datalog as an alternative query
language.

Continue Reading »

External feed Read More at the Source: https://postgr.es/p/6ch

 2023-11-20  Comments Off on Planet PostgreSQL – Bruce Momjian: Is SQL Good?

Richard Stallman’s Political Notes – Google remote attestation system

Nov 132023
 

Google says that it will use its remote attestation system (“Web
Environment Integrity”) only in the most oppressive scenario: as DRM.

Making Google drop the rest of the plan is a tactical advance, but it
is not victory. Google still plans to prevent playing “embedded
video” through an application that users can trust. Why could users
trust that application? Precisely because Google could not trust it
to impose Google’s control over the users.

As long as companies have a way to control whether we use applications
that we have modified, we are not safe! Our goal should be to
prohibit the sale or distribution of computer systems that allow
remote servers to do remote attestation of the software you choose to
run on your computer to…

External feed Read More at the Source: https://stallman.org/archives/2023-sep-dec.html#12_November_2023_(Google_remote_attestation_system)

 2023-11-13  Comments Off on Richard Stallman’s Political Notes – Google remote attestation system

Boing Boing – Happy “Oregon exploded a whale” day

Nov 122023
 

On November 12, 1970, a 45-foot, eight-ton sperm whale washed up on the beach at Florence, Oregon. What unfolded next has become an epic representation of taking a bad idea and running with it.

The Oregon Highway Division, lacking experience in whale carcass disposal but high on creativity, decided that dynamite was the way. — Read the rest

External feed Read More at the Source: https://boingboing.net/2023/11/12/happy-oregon-tried-to-explode-a-whale-day.html

 2023-11-12  Comments Off on Boing Boing – Happy “Oregon exploded a whale” day

TorrentFreak – TorrentFreak Turns 18 Today (Hospital Edition)

Nov 122023
 

On November 12, 2005, I started a ‘blog’ to share news snippets and information about emerging file-sharing technology. At the time it would’ve been unthinkable that it would still draw visitors in 2023. But here we are.
Running a site like this on your own is impossible, so luckily Andy joined TF in 2006. Without his tireless input, the site wouldn’t be where it is today. I couldn’t have wished for a better partner to work alongside, period.
With two main writers and no other editorial staff we’re just a tiny operation compared to most other news sites. This means that we can’t cover every news story. Instead, we often try to focus on unique angles and perspectives….

External feed Read More at the Source: https://torrentfreak.com/torrentfreak-turns-18-today-hospital-edition-231112/

 2023-11-12  Comments Off on TorrentFreak – TorrentFreak Turns 18 Today (Hospital Edition)

Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal (updated daily) – Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal – Science

Nov 082023
 

Click here to go see the bonus panel!

Hovertext:
Honestly geometry’s pretty dicey, as are numbers larger than 1.

Today’s News:

Thanks for a great launch day, all. I’ll be in conversation with Randall Munroe tonight in NYC if you wanna say hi!

External feed Read More at the Source: https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/science-4

 2023-11-08  Comments Off on Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal (updated daily) – Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal – Science

AnandTech – Seagate’s HAMR Update: 32 TB in Early 2024, 40+ TB Two Years Later

Nov 082023
 

Hidden deep in Seagate’s financial report released late last month was a brief roadmap update for the company’s heat-assisted magnetic recording (HAMR) technology. As noted in the latest update, Seagate is now planning to begin mass production of its 32 TB HAMR in early 2024, which is a slight delay from what the company announced early this year. Meanwhile, the company expects to start production of 40+ TB HDDs in about two years’ time. “Qualification and revenue ramp plans for our 30-plus terabyte products remain fully on track with high-volume ramp starting early in calendar 2024,” said Dave Mosley, chief executive of Seagate, during conference call with financial analysts and investors. ” These drives deliver capacity…

External feed Read More at the Source: https://www.anandtech.com/show/21125/seagates-hamr-update-32-tb-in-early-2024-40-tb-two-years-later

 2023-11-08  Comments Off on AnandTech – Seagate’s HAMR Update: 32 TB in Early 2024, 40+ TB Two Years Later

The Register – Bad eIDAS: Europe ready to intercept, spy on your encrypted HTTPS connections

Nov 082023
 

EFF warns incoming rules may return web ‘to the dark ages of 2011’

Lawmakers in Europe are expected to adopt digital identity rules that civil society groups say will make the internet less secure and open up citizens to online surveillance.…

External feed Read More at the Source: https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/08/europe_eidas_browser/

 2023-11-08  Comments Off on The Register – Bad eIDAS: Europe ready to intercept, spy on your encrypted HTTPS connections

Planet KDE – Plasma 6.0 Alpha – What this means

Nov 082023
 

What the Alpha means
The alpha release primarily focuses on preparing our software for a future release. It involves handling unreleased dependencies, version numbers, co-installation conflicts, and all the relevant bookkeeping work.
This release has been somewhat manic, with issues surfacing up to the last minute. However, that’s precisely what this early release is for: resolving these issues now and gathering feedback on packaging to ensure a smoother transition to the beta phase.
Feature Freezes
The complete feature freeze for Plasma is scheduled for the day of the first beta, which is on November 29th. After that, bug fixing will be the sole focus for a period of three months leading up to the final release.
A soft freeze is set…

External feed Read More at the Source: http://blog.davidedmundson.co.uk/?p=495

 2023-11-08  Comments Off on Planet KDE – Plasma 6.0 Alpha – What this means

Hackaday – Using Gravitational Lensing To Transmit Power And Detect Aliens

Nov 082023
 

Most of us will have at some point have bought a long power cable to charge the bike on the deck, but [Slava G. Turyshev] has a slightly more ambitious idea. In this recent paper, he outlines how an advanced civilization could use a star or two to transmit power or send signals over an interstellar distance. And his idea is also simple enough that we could do it right now, with existing technology, or detect if someone else is doing it.

Gravitational lensing is where a large mass (such as, say, a star) bends the path of light around it. That can act like a lens in a telescope, focussing light that would otherwise be impossible…

External feed Read More at the Source: https://hackaday.com/2023/11/07/using-gravitational-lensing-to-transmit-power-and-detect-aliens/

 2023-11-08  Comments Off on Hackaday – Using Gravitational Lensing To Transmit Power And Detect Aliens

Techdirt. – Verizon, AT&T Customers Sue To Reverse T-Mobile Merger, Saying It Raised Everybody’s Prices

Nov 072023
 

We just got done noting how pretty much all of the criticism of the Sprint T-Mobile merger by economists and consumer advocates wound up being true. The deal has resulted in more than 10,000+ eliminated jobs, steady price hikes, annoying new fees, a weaker T-Mobile brand, and a lower quality product overall. It also clearly distracted T-Mobile from competent network security.
T-Mobile’s reddit forums are filled with employees saying the disruptive spirit of the company has been dead since the merger. T-Mobile customers are annoyed by endless new restrictions and price hikes.
But Verizon and AT&T customers are also pissed, and are part of a new lawsuit against T-Mobile arguing that the merger raised prices for everybody…

External feed Read More at the Source: https://www.techdirt.com/2023/11/07/verizon-att-customers-sue-to-reverse-t-mobile-merger-saying-it-raised-everybodys-prices/

 2023-11-07  Comments Off on Techdirt. – Verizon, AT&T Customers Sue To Reverse T-Mobile Merger, Saying It Raised Everybody’s Prices

jwz – Happy They Live day to all who celebrate

Nov 042023
 

35 years ago today, They Live debuted at #1 at the box office. In honor of my favorite documentary about the Reagan administration, here are some highlights from my OBEY tag: 2016, just before the election: They Live and the secret history of the Mozilla logo: One of my most popular posts of all time. “I’m going to draw a line through 1930s agitprop, Ronald Reagan, methane-breathing zombie space aliens, the Mozilla logo, Barack Obama and the International Commiunist Conspiracy. It’s a long walk, so please stick with me.” I ended with, “In this upcoming presidential election, please vote against the methane-breathing zombie space alien.” Reader, my supplication did not work. …

External feed Read More at the Source: https://www.jwz.org/blog/2023/11/happy-they-live-day-to-all-who-celebrate/

 2023-11-04  Comments Off on jwz – Happy They Live day to all who celebrate

Hackaday – BeagleV Catches Fire With The BeagleV-Fire

Nov 042023
 

A new BeagleBoard is on the way, full of FPGA hotness: the BeagleV-Fire has been announced. The new $150 Single-Board Computer (SBC) from the pioneering open source BeagleBoard company is built around a RISC-V chip that has FPGA features built in. The BeagleV-Fire is built around the snappily named Microchip PolarFire MPFS025T FCVG484E, a System on a Chip (SoC) that has five Reduced Instruction Set Coding Version 5 (RISC-V) cores and a big chunk of FPGA fabric built in. That means it combines the speed of RISC-V processors with the flexibility of Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGA), a big pile of logic gates that can be reprogrammed.
The new BeagleV-Fire includes a sizeable chunk of FPGA to…

External feed Read More at the Source: https://hackaday.com/2023/11/04/beaglev-catches-fire/

 2023-11-04  Comments Off on Hackaday – BeagleV Catches Fire With The BeagleV-Fire

Ars Technica – YouTube’s ad blocker crackdown escalates, aggravating users

Nov 012023
 

Enlarge (credit: Google/YouTube)
YouTube has launched a global front against ad-blocking extensions, taking a small experiment it began in June full-scale.
As noticed by Android Authority on Monday morning, some YouTube users are now seeing a disruptive prompt when they try to watch videos while using a browser with an ad blocker. The prompt notes that “ad blockers violate YouTube’s Terms of Service” and urges users to either allow ads on YouTube or subscribe to YouTube Premium.
While I was able to still watch YouTube with an ad blocker, there’s recently been a noticeable increase in the number of users who report seeing the prompt. The Verge reported that sometimes those who see the prompt…

External feed Read More at the Source: https://arstechnica.com/?p=1980323

 2023-11-01  Comments Off on Ars Technica – YouTube’s ad blocker crackdown escalates, aggravating users

LWN.net – Garrett: Why ACPI?

Nov 012023
 

Matthew Garrett explains
why ACPI exists and why it is not as bad a thing as some think.

There’s an alternative universe where we decided to teach the kernel about every piece of hardware it should run on. Fortunately (or, well, unfortunately) we’ve seen that in the ARM world. Most device-specific simply never reaches mainline, and most users are stuck running ancient kernels as a result. Imagine every x86 device vendor shipping their own kernel optimised for their hardware, and now imagine how well that works out given the quality of their firmware. Does that really seem better to you?

External feed Read More at the Source: https://lwn.net/Articles/949625/

 2023-11-01  Comments Off on LWN.net – Garrett: Why ACPI?
 Older Entries  Newer Entries