In the News
After a recent quarterly loss of $209 million, Sun Microsystems may not look like the ideal purchase, but it was Oracle and not IBM that announced today it will be buying the home Java and Solaris for a sum total of $7.4 billion, which nets out at $5.6 billion after cash and debt.
Said Oracle president Safra Catz:
We expect this acquisition to be accretive to Oracle's earnings by at least 15 cents on a non-GAAP basis in the first full year after closing. We estimate that the acquired business will contribute over $1.5 billion to Oracle's non-GAAP operating profit in the first year, increasing to over $2 billion in the second year. This would make the Sun acquisition more profitable in per share contribution in the first year than we had planned for the acquisitions of BEA, PeopleSoft and Siebel combined.
Speculation as to the motivation behind the buyout has run toward ideas about Oracle "integrating hardware and software with Oracle's Exadata database machine," and the transaction was approved unanimously at Sun.
Safra Catz, who owns a super cool name in addition to one, now two, of the world's top tech firms, made it clear that he does not consider the purchase of Sun as much of a gamble:
"We intend to ensure that it is profitable... We believe we will be able to run Sun at substantially higher margins."
Oracle to buy Sun in $7.4 billion deal [CNet]
The four defendants in Sweden's uber-high-profile PirateBay case have been found guilty, and are facing millions in fines and a year of jail time. I'll let my darling colleague Pixel Poet explain it all:
A ruling from a Swedish court was given today on the case that was brought against the founders of Pirate Bay by many of the big giants in the recording industry. Turns out the founders were found guilty and charged with one year of jail time as well as $4.7 million in damages to pay. The verdict partially came as a surprise to the defendants, the founders of Pirate Bay, since they argued the fact that their servers never held any of the copyrighted material and therefore were not breaking any copyright laws. Peter Sunde, one of the founders, had this to say about the verdict:
"It's serious to actually be found guilty and get jail time. It's really serious. . . It's so bizarre that we were convicted at all and it's even more bizarre that we were [convicted] as a team. The court said we were organised. I can't get Gottfrid out of bed in the morning. If you're going to convict us, convict us of disorganised crime."
So it seems like the verdict is currently a big win for the record companies who fear the effects that music file torrents has on their bottom line. The verdict also indicates that a program that can be used for malicious purposes, such as the torrenting of copyrighted material, can have legal repercussions on the makers of that software and/or system if they are knowledgeable about its illegal use; however, the founders of Pirate Bay are not going to be walking the plank just yet, one of their lawyers told the press that the verdict is:
". . . outrageous, in my point of view. Of course we will appeal. . . This is the first word, not the last. The last word will be ours."
The internet exploded upon hearing this news. Sites like TorrentFreak seem to have been brought to their knees by the verdict, one way or another.
Court jails Pirate Bay founders [BBC]
[Thanks to Philip for the pic, Neij is a cutie!]
I just received an official response from Amazon regarding the Amazon petition I signed earlier today, which corroborates our stalwart Sgt. Sausagepants' update suggesting the whole affair is/was human error rather than human malice:
Hello,
This is an embarrassing and ham-fisted cataloging error for a company that prides itself on offering complete selection.
It has been misreported that the issue was limited to Gay & Lesbian themed titles - in fact, it impacted 57,310 books in a number of broad categories such as Health, Mind & Body, Reproductive & Sexual Medicine, and Erotica. This problem impacted books not just in the United States but globally. It affected not just sales rank but also had the effect of removing the books from Amazon's main product search.
Many books have now been fixed and we're in the process of fixing the remainder as quickly as possible, and we intend to implement new measures to make this kind of accident less likely to occur in the future.
Thanks for contacting us. We hope to see you again soon.
Please let us know if this e-mail resolved your question:
If yes, click here:
If not, click here:
Please note: this e-mail was sent from an address that cannot accept incoming e-mail.
To contact us about an unrelated issue, please visit the Help section of our web site.
Best regards,
Amazon.com
We're Building Earth's Most Customer-Centric Company
Okay. 'Ham-fisted' indeed and it's good to see Amazon acknowledge that. But all those horrible anti-gay books are still popping up on a simple "homosexuality" search for me, which makes me wonder how long it will be before that ham's fist gets removed from Amazon's guts, so to speak. Or have these shenanigans now legitimately skewed the rankings, or something woeful like that?
It seems that Conficker's ultimate purpose has finally been revealed!
Drum roll please!
.
.
.
It's a spam bot!
Yes, that's right. Despite huge amounts of hysteria painting Conficker as some world destroying super spy doomsday botnet, it seems Conficker's makers are a little more practical and therefore... money driven.
According to a report by Karpersky Labs, the purpose of the mysterious download by Conficker machines on April 1 has been revealed as a directive to send out spam offering users a fake anti virus programme for $49.95.
Yep, it's peddling snake oil spam.
How anticlimactic, but money makes the world go round, neh?
Conficker Doomsday Worm Sells Out For $49.95 [Wired]
One of the longer-running patent cases against Microsoft was resolved yesterday, and not in the computing giant's favor.
Microsoft faced allegations from Uniloc that Uniloc's patented technology has been used as part of Microsoft's software activation service, and a federal jury in Rhode Island found that, indeed, Windows XP, Office XP and Windows Server 2003 all infringed upon the Uniloc patent in question.
Microsoft will appeal the decision that granted Uniloc $388 million in fines:
"We are very disappointed in the jury verdict," Microsoft spokesman Jack Evans said in an e-mail. "We believe that we do not infringe, that the patent is invalid and that this award of damages is legally and factually unsupported. We will ask the court to overturn the verdict."
Microsoft slapped with $388 million patent verdict [CNet]
Oh joy, just what the world needed: Bono has another opinion he'd like to share with us. The light-sensitive Irish rocker told Toronto DJ Alan Cross that U2 had approached Apple with the idea to design a U2-specific product but was (gasp) rejected, which led U2 to seek partnership with RIM instead:
"I'm very excited about this," Bono told Mr. Cross about the RIM deal. "Research In Motion is going to give us what Apple wouldn't -- access to their labs and their people so we can do something really spectacular."
I'm trying to work out which is more offensive, that Apple would dare to say no, eventually, to the world's most self-important rockers, or that those self-important rockers would publicly announce that RIM was their second choice? That's a backhanded compliment if ever I've heard one.
What exactly U2 and RIM are cooking up remains to be seen, but Apple must have some nerve to say no to the group that sold bunches of U2 Edition iPods between 2004 and 2006 and continues to sell U2-related (product) Red iPod nanos and shuffles to benefit Bono's AIDS charity. Ok, I guess the guy ain't all bad.
But is anybody really surprised that an Apple with Steve Jobs back at the helm would be anything less than icily aloof and unwilling to collaborate? C'mon now.
RIM rocks a new tune [GlobeAndMail]
If you're a Mac user looking to add 16 apps worth over $981 dollars to your Mac for the price of $39, then you're in luck! The MacHeist 3 bundle has just reached the $500K level of charity fundraising, meaning that all the apps in the bundle have been unlocked!
You many not need all the apps in the bundle (I mean, there's 3 different photo editing apps within the bundle), but just a few together already add up to a deal. For you gamers out there, there's World of Goo, Multiwinia and Cro Mag Rally, which already make the bundle a deal for $39 together. Add to that Delicious Library 2 (my favourite media library application that I should make a Homotron recommendation in the future, it's amazing) and the deal is even sweeter. Check out all the apps you get for $39:
- Delicious Library 2
- Multiwinia
- World of Goo
- Cro Mag Rally
- Espresso
- Acorn
- BoinxTV
- iSale
- Picturesque
- SousChef
- PhoneView
- LittleSnapper
- Kinemac
- WireTap Studio
- The Hit List
- Times
And the best part is that 25% of the purchase price goes to the charity of your choice from a list of 10, including the AIDS Research Alliance and the World Wildlife Fund.
If you want in on the MacHeist action, you only have 1 day left to buy the bundle!
Gadget get!
MacHeist 3 Bundle [MacHeist]
Remember when Nokia ruled the world? Well the days of ubiquitous candybar Nokia handsets are long behind us, and the Finns know it. But we were still surprised to hear Nokia's new markets EVP Anssi Vankoji admit as much at the recent Web 2.0 Expo, where he said that Nokia's phones have dropped behind the iPhone when it comes to software.
Hardware, not so much - Vankoji believes Nokia has technically superior hardware, but when it comes to ease-of-use and feature sets Nokia still has "quantum leaps" to make before it can catch up to Apple.
But Vankoji also pointed out that not even the iPhone is capable of conquering the world:
"We [at Nokia] don't think the world is so simple that you just make one device for everybody," Vankoji says. "We know more about the consumers in the world than any other consumer goods company in the world because we have so many customers. We know they have different tastes and uses and so you have to offer a whole line."
"I don't think the world will unite on one platform," he explains. "There are several that will succeed. Our platform, Symbian, is an open platform and will make a major impact in the industry."
That may be true, but not without touchscreens, better messaging, and a holographic Dean Stockwell to guide them while they hope that each jump will be the jump home.
Nokia making "quantum leaps" to catch iPhone [Electronista]
HP, Lenovo and Dell have all seen their Greenpeace scores drop for backing out of their promises to eliminate certain toxins from their product lines by the end of this year. Both PVC and brominated flame retardants were slated to be eliminated from Dell, HP and Lenovo products by the end of 2009. Apparently the companies have not lived up to their word the way competitors like Acer and Apple, who also made the promise, have:
Dell produces a desktop, a notebook and several models of monitors that have a reduced use of PVC and BFRs, and a few monitor models that are free of these substances. Lenovo has two models available that are PVC and BFR-free. HP is trailing behind and has yet to bring out models with even a reduced use of PVC and BFRs. While HP and Dell have yet to set a new timeline for completely eliminating these substances from all their products, Lenovo has delayed its deadline to the end of 2010.
Indeed, with the exception of PVC-free power cords, Apple met its requirements by the end of 2008, and Acer is on course to follow suit.
But with a nearly dead-in-the-water hardware sales industry and pricing advantage a major selling point, it's perhaps not surprising to hear PC manufacturers prioritizing business above greenness.
I just received an email from Netflix that really pisses me off. After baiting users for a few months with a reasonable $1/month charge for the ability to rent Blu-ray discs, Netflix has just sent out an e-mail saying they're now quadrupling the monthly charge (for 3 disc at a time customers) to $4/month!
You are receiving this email because you added unlimited Blu-ray access to your account for $1 a month. The number of Blu-ray titles has increased significantly and will continue to do so. As we buy more, you are able to choose from a rapidly expanding selection of Blu-ray titles. And as you've probably heard, Blu-ray discs are substantially more expensive than standard definition DVDs.
As a result, the monthly charge for Blu-ray access is increasing for most plans and will now vary by plan. The charge for monthly Blu-ray access on your 3 DVDs at-a-time (Unlimited) plan will increase from $1 a month to $4 a month. The price of your 3 DVDs at-a-time (Unlimited) plan is not changing and remains at $16.99 a month.
The new charge for Blu-ray access will be automatically added to your next billing statement on or after April 27, 2009 and will be referenced in your Membership Terms and Details.
If you wish to continue unlimited Blu-ray access for $4 a month, you don't need to do anything. If not, you can remove Blu-ray access anytime by visiting Your Account.
$1 a month was reasonable, and they led us to believe that would be the charge for the foreseeable future. Now they pull a bait and switch on us after a few months and quadruple it?!
They say "well, if you don't like it, cancel your Blu-ray access." Yeah... you know what else is easy to cancel? My Netflix subscription. Back off on this or I'm jumping ship.
Ridiculous!
Who knew that nerds were so anti-gay? Eastern European hackers took down Bilerico this week, the popular LGBTQ blog that hosts all sort of content (one of my personal favorites). So what exactly happened? I'll let Bilerico's Michael Crawford tell you:
We've been fighting off these Eastern European hackers for over a year now; they're the same crowd that took down popular feminist political blog Shakespeare's Sister a year and a half ago. They're professionals and they're nasty.
Earlier this week, they managed to take us down for about 9 hours overnight but we were able to regain control. They severely compromised the server though, so we had to get a new server up and running quickly. Yesterday, we got the new server racked up and were planning on making all of the switch overs (we also host quite a few Indiana LGBT organizations' websites), but the hackers managed to crack through our defenses again yesterday afternoon.
This time they firebombed the place; our old server is toast. Unfortunately, none of the data was transferred before they regained control. We have backups and are trying to get the site back up ASAP, but we're still suffering from the lag required to set up a new server from scratch, retrieve as much data as possible from the old server, install all of our attendant software like Movable Type, and then port over the Bilerico database and double check to make sure it all works again since our site was so customized.
Yep. More homophobic nerd attacks. We've never seen that around these parts, have we? This is all the more reason for sites like ours to exist: if they could, these anti-gay fanatics would just wipe us all away.
The popular download service FileFront will close its doors at the end of the month, now that parent company Ziff Davis Media has sold 1UP and closed EGM, according to a statement on the site:
Dear FileFront User:
We regret to inform you that we are forced to indefinitely suspend the FileFront site operations on March 30, 2009. If you have uploaded files, images or posted blogs, or if you would like to download some of your favorite files, please take this opportunity to download them before March 30th when the site will be suspended.
We would like to give a warm thank you to all of you who have been part of the FileFront communities we have built together. Your support has had a meaningful impact for all of us here at FileFront. Again, we want to give you a sincere "thank you" for your support over the years and wish you all the very best.
Keep gaming alive,
FileFront Management and Team.
Contact_us@filefront.com
When Ziff Davis sold off 1UP to Hearst's UGO, FileFront was not included, unlike Mycheats.com, Gametab.com, and GameVideos.com.
And girls who like girls who like fembots!
Gadget of the Week
3D iPhone glasses. Why?
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