A simple tweak to the way common silicon transistors are made could allow faster, cheaper mobile phones and digital cameras. Devices with the modification have already set a new world record for the fastest transistor of its type. To achieve the speed gain, researchers at the University of Southampton added fluorine to the silicon devices
Television screens and computer displays capable of producing a wider range of visible colours could someday be built incorporating tiny sections of electrically-activated polymer. This polymer contracts and relaxes, like a muscle, in response to a current
The US Federal Communications Commission has begun an investigation of the use of video news releases, sometimes called fake news
, at US television stations. Video news releases are packaged stories paid for by businesses or interest groups. They use actors to portray reporters and use the same format as television news stories
A mix of bacteria-killing viruses can be safely sprayed on cold cuts, hot dogs and sausages to combat common microbes that kill hundreds of people a year, federal health officials said Friday in granting the first-ever approval of viruses as a food additive. The combination of six viruses is designed to be sprayed on ready-to-eat meat and poultry products, including sliced ham and turkey, said John Vazzana, president and chief executive officer of manufacturer Intralytix Inc
Ryanair today threatened to sue the government for compensation unless airport security measures are returned to normal within seven days. Michael O’Leary, the outspoken chief executive of Ryanair, described the new restrictions as farcical Keystone Cops security measures that don’t add anything except to block up airports
, as he issued the ultimatum
Entrepreneurs are creating companies that exploit the creative opportunities in other people’s junk, sparing the environment in the process
Users of unreleased Windows update urged to fix critical security flaws. Microsoft has released two patches for its Vista operating system, saying that it too is affected by flaws that were disclosed during the company’s 8 August security updates
The warrantless Internet and telephone surveillance program authorised by the Bush administration violates the US Constitution and must cease immediately. The landmark decision makes US District Judge Anna Diggs Taylor in Detroit the first judge to strike down the National Security Agency’s once-secret program. The American Civil Liberties Union had filed suit against the government, claiming the program ran roughshod
over the constitutional rights of millions of Americans and ran afoul of federal wiretapping law
Macrovision’s best-known form of copy protection inserts noise into analogue video signals to make it difficult to get a good copy of the DVD or VHS recording. A company named Sima has products that eliminate this noise when digitising such video, as any good digitiser would do. Macrovision argues that this is a violation of the DMCA, and a court sided with them in June. Now the injunction is being reviewed, and several organisations are siding with Sima and Fair Use, including the American Library Association, the Consumer Electronics Association, the Home Recording Rights Coalition, and the Electronic Frontier Foundation. If it isn’t overturned, this decision could make it illegal to develop products for making copies of commercial analogue recordings
A federal judge ordered tobacco companies Thursday to admit they lied about the harmful effects of smoking cigarettes and to warn consumers in advertisements and packaging that tobacco is addictive. US District Judge Gladys Kessler ruled that the industry conspired for decades to deceive the public about the dangers of smoking and now must pay to help smokers kick the habit
In recent years, software companies have hammered out rules with researchers on disclosure, which cover how and when vulnerabilities are made public. Now flaw finders want something in return: more information from software providers on what they are doing to tackle the holes the researchers have reported
There will be at least 12 planets in our solar system, and probably many more, if a new definition of the word planet
is adopted. Next week the International Astronomical Union will vote on a draft definition of what distinguishes a planet from lesser space rocks. The new scheme would retain Pluto — previously threatened with ejection from the club — but it would also admit several new members, including the former asteroid Ceres, and even Charon, which until now has been classed as Pluto’s moon. Writers John Scalzi and Scott Westerfield have been having something of an on-going barney over whether or not Pluto is a planet and the whole thing resulted in Cthulhu adjudicating
Google is about to give its hometown a wonderful gift: a municipal wireless network covering the entire city of Mountain View, with free Internet access for both residents and visitors. Google’s grand gesture is incomplete in one crucial way — the company will not provide live human tech support, which is often crucial for first-time users
The state of Washington has sued the owners of the Movieland.com, alleging that the company used spyware to strong-arm users into signing up for its paid movie download service
This past weekend, the OSU Linux Users Group descended on a field in Oregon to create a 45,000+ square foot crop circle of Firefox. The photos and write-up are worth checking out — via Slashdot
The Swedish Pirate Party has launched a commercial, high-capacity darknet, on an unprecedented scale and bandwidth. This service lets anybody send and receive files anonymously without being tracked or traced. There are many legitimate reasons to want to be completely anonymous on the Internet,
says Rickard Falkvinge, chairman of the Pirate Party. If the government can check everything each citizen does, nobody can keep the government in check
AMD announced its new Rev F
generation of Opteron server processors on Tuesday in the US, the next volley in a competition with Intel’s newly competitive Xeon models. The Rev F Opterons, all dual-core models, add new virtualisation abilities and faster memory, run at the same 2.6GHz top speed as preceding mainstream models, and plug into AMD’s new Socket F
. Although that new socket disrupts server designers’ easy upgrade path from one Opteron to the next, it also lays the foundation for quad-core chips in 2007 and for server designs through the end of the decade
RealNetworks will release open-source software this year that will let Linux computers play Windows Media files
Live Writer, a new Microsoft programme for bloggers moves the company further into a growing online market, while competing with some of the smaller players that make similar software for Windows
The Australian Greens leader Bob Brown has rejected claims he has not tried to contact members of the Exclusive Brethren religious group
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