Archive for April 24th, 2008
- In: Craigslist | Diluting | eBay's | eBay: | Stake | Sues
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ebay and Craigslist fight it out in court over ownership percentages
Craigslist and eBay are seen in many eyes as direct competitors, but despite the competition between the two eBay holds a minority stake in Craigslist. A 2004 purchase grabbed eBay a 28.4% stake in Craigslist.
A suit filed by eBay this week against Craigslist alleges that the Craigslist Board of Directors, consisting of only two members including founder Craig Newmark and chief executive Jim Buckmaster, took action to dilute eBay’s stake in the company.
According to eBay unspecified actions taken by Craigslist have reduced eBay’s stake in Craigslist by more than 10%. ebay asked the court to reverse the actions of Craigslist to protect eBay’s investment and preserve its stake in Craigslist.
Reuters reports that a blog post on Craigslist stated that it was surprised and disappointed by eBay’s allegations that reportedly came without any dialog with Craigslist. The blog post continued saying, “[the lawsuit by] a company that views Craigslist as a prime competitor … seems unethical, and suggests ulterior motives such as a hostile takeover of Craigslist or the sale of eBay’s stake to an unfriendly party.”
Fashion
Posted on: April 24, 2008
- In: actor | actress | artist | awards | baby | Britney Spears | candids | celebrity | couple | cover | event | family | fashion | gossip | Halle Berry | Hilary Duff | Hot | interview
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(Source: Rockstar Games)
Lawmaker calls for free, family-friendly wireless internet access open to the public; another auction required
With the internet littered with foul, explicit material, parents worry more and more about their children finding out what the internet fully has to offer. The solution, proposed by Rep. Anna G. Eshoo (D-CA), is to open up spectrum.
Eshoo proposed a new act on Monday, dubbed the Wireless Internet Nationwide for Families Act, instructing the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to auction off 2155-2175MHz band of spectrum.
The winner of the auction of is required to use the spectrum to create free, nationwide wireless internet service that blocks all pornographic websites. It would be a service targeted directly towards families. Eshoo hopes the auctioning of the spectrum would attract types of national broadband service providers.
“The cost of broadband service is a barrier for too many families who want broadband, with more than 100 million Americans without broadband at home,” Eshoo said. “The results of the 700 MHz auction disappointed many of us who hoped that a new entrant would emerge. 70% of the spectrum auctioned went to only two carriers. While the auction required under this legislation is open to anyone, it is my hope that the bold conditions of requiring free, family friendly service will encourage the entry of a new kind of national broadband service provider.”
The two carriers Eshoo speaks of are Verizon and AT&T, already top-tier broadband carriers in the U.S.
- In: Announced | Australia | Bundle | Europe | Grand Theft Auto | GTA | GTA IV | PlayStation 3 | Sony
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The GTA IV bundle box art (Source: SCEE)
Sony announces PlayStation 3 packed with Grand Theft Auto IV
Along with Metal Gear Solid 4, Grand Theft Auto IV is one of the biggest titles yet for PlayStation 3 – the only difference with MGS4, of course, is that GTA IV isn’t a platform exclusive. But that’s not going to stop Sony from treating GTA IV as one of its very own, and creating a new system bundle around the highly-anticipated title.
Announced today by both Sony Computer Entertainment Europe and Australia is an official Grand Theft Auto IV bundle that will pack the game in along with the 40GB PlayStation 3 model. “We are delighted to offer the millions of PS3 and GTA fans the ultimate gaming package,” said David Reeves, president of Sony Computer Entertainment Europe.
Unfortunately for those hoping to get the latest DualShock 3 controller model with the new bundle, Sony indicated that the GTA IV bundle will include the outgoing SIXAXIS controller only. Such news may be the most disappointing for Australian gamers, who will have to purchase the DualShock 3 controller separately for a mindboggling AUD$99 (USD$92) when it releases this week. Gamers in Europe have yet to hear of an official launch date for their rumbling controllers.
The Grand Theft Auto IV PlayStation 3 bundle will retail in Europe at €439 (USD$696) and in Australia for AUD$749.95 (USD$715).
Who says Earth gets all the life? Scientists look at Saturn’s moon Enceladus as a possible hot spot for brewing the Good Stuff
In years past, Jupiter’s moon Europa has received much attention for its interesting geological properties. Thought to conceal liquid water oceans somewhere beneath its icy surface, some scientists wish to explore the Luna-sized moon in search of life. At least life similar to what we know.
More recently, Saturn’s tiny moon Enceladus has been in warm relations with planetary scientists for its unique geology. The 500 km diameter moon sports a giant geyser, spewing ice and other particles out into space to distances of 1,500 km. The ice spout helps feed Saturn’s incredible rings.
There are two very important things to note about geysers made of ice particles. One is that if there’s ice, especially water ice, that means there’s, wait for it … water. Similar to Europa, Enceladus may contain liquid or at least some semi-liquid form of water below its solid ice surface.
In addition, the 1,500 kilometer tall geyser indicates there is some sort of geothermal process occurring on the moon.
Enceladus’ interesting processes could harbor life in one of the two classic “life begins here” theories; the primordial soup theory and the deep sea vent theory. Primordial soup is probably more familiar to most people. Having been theorized by Charles Darwin and subsequently tested and (somewhat) proven by Stanley L. Miller and Harold C. Urey, the life-goop theory has been taught in most life-science courses for the past few decades. A pool of seemingly innocuous chemicals, in reaction to some sort of catalyst, an electrical discharge is a likely culprit, spontaneously combine to create amino acids, the building blocks of life.
Enceladus’ possible sub-surface water could harbor the necessary chemicals for this process to occur, along with the heat to drive chemical reactions. It does seem a little more far-fetched than Earth’s life’s foundation, but stranger things have been known to happen in the universe.
The deep sea vent theory seems a little more plausible for the Saturnian satellite. Various microbial and bacterial life exists on Earth which is mostly unlike much of the life we’re accustomed to. These critters survive in very unique ecosystems, such as the high pressure, super-heated, random mineral filled plumes of debris spewing from deep sea hydrothermal vents, or fracture zones deep within the Earth’s crust where no light, oxygen or organic input of any kind can reach them. While vent microbes feed on the various minerals in plumes, the deep earth variety have actually been shown to “eat” the radioactive decay of the rock they live in.
Who says Earth gets all the life? Scientists look at Saturn’s moon Enceladus as a possible hot spot for brewing the Good Stuff
In years past, Jupiter’s moon Europa has received much attention for its interesting geological properties. Thought to conceal liquid water oceans somewhere beneath its icy surface, some scientists wish to explore the Luna-sized moon in search of life. At least life similar to what we know.
More recently, Saturn’s tiny moon Enceladus has been in warm relations with planetary scientists for its unique geology. The 500 km diameter moon sports a giant geyser, spewing ice and other particles out into space to distances of 1,500 km. The ice spout helps feed Saturn’s incredible rings.
There are two very important things to note about geysers made of ice particles. One is that if there’s ice, especially water ice, that means there’s, wait for it … water. Similar to Europa, Enceladus may contain liquid or at least some semi-liquid form of water below its solid ice surface.
In addition, the 1,500 kilometer tall geyser indicates there is some sort of geothermal process occurring on the moon.
Enceladus’ interesting processes could harbor life in one of the two classic “life begins here” theories; the primordial soup theory and the deep sea vent theory. Primordial soup is probably more familiar to most people. Having been theorized by Charles Darwin and subsequently tested and (somewhat) proven by Stanley L. Miller and Harold C. Urey, the life-goop theory has been taught in most life-science courses for the past few decades. A pool of seemingly innocuous chemicals, in reaction to some sort of catalyst, an electrical discharge is a likely culprit, spontaneously combine to create amino acids, the building blocks of life.
Enceladus’ possible sub-surface water could harbor the necessary chemicals for this process to occur, along with the heat to drive chemical reactions. It does seem a little more far-fetched than Earth’s life’s foundation, but stranger things have been known to happen in the universe.
The deep sea vent theory seems a little more plausible for the Saturnian satellite. Various microbial and bacterial life exists on Earth which is mostly unlike much of the life we’re accustomed to. These critters survive in very unique ecosystems, such as the high pressure, super-heated, random mineral filled plumes of debris spewing from deep sea hydrothermal vents, or fracture zones deep within the Earth’s crust where no light, oxygen or organic input of any kind can reach them. While vent microbes feed on the various minerals in plumes, the deep earth variety have actually been shown to “eat” the radioactive decay of the rock they live in.
- In: 300GB | Bore | Full | Goes | HDD | RPM | VelociRaptor | Western Digital
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(Source: Ron Reznick)
Western Digital’s 300 GB VelociRaptor (Source: Western Digital)
Western Digital takes the fight to SSDs with next generation VelociRaptor
With all of the talk these days in the storage industry swirling around solid-state drives (SSDs), it’s easy to forget that advances are being made in the hard disk drive (HDD) market as well for consumers. That fact is even more pertinent today with the announcement of the long-awaited update to Western Digital’s line of 10,000 RPM Raptor HDDs: the 300 GB VelociRaptor.
The new VelociRaptor takes an untraditional approach for a desktop HDD with its 2.5″ drive design. The 2.5″ form factor allows the drive to be smaller, lighter, and more power efficient than its 3.5″ rivals.
But what good is a 2.5″ HDD in a desktop system which typically accommodates 3.5″ HDDs? Western Digital addressed that issue by affixing the VelociRaptor to an “IcePack” heatsink which allows the drive to fit into a standard 3.5″ drive bay.
“Demand for ever-higher PC performance continues to increase and WD is the leader in this category with the WD Raptor. We created WD VelociRaptor hard drives to lead PC enthusiasts into the next era of PC and Mac storage performance and satisfy their insatiable thirst for computing speed,” said Western Digital’s Tom McDorman. “The new WD VelociRaptor delivers the greatest performance and reliability of all SATA hard drives currently on the market.”
When it comes to performance, Western Digital promises a 30% increase in performance through its SATA 3Gb/sec interface, 1.4 million MTBF, and Rotary Acceleration Feed Forward (RAFF) to improve performance in vibration-heavy environments.
Windows XP SP3 Goes RTM
Posted on: April 24, 2008
- In: center | Download | Goes | Microsoft | RTM | SP3 | Windows | Windows UpdateDailyTech | Windows XP SP3 | XP
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Windows XP SP3 is finally finished
DailyTech reported last week that Service Pack 3 (SP3) for Windows XP would be released to manufacturing (RTM) on April 21. The initial reports from Neowin came true and Microsoft today officially announced SP3.
Microsoft’s Chris Keroack posted the news in the TechNet Forums:
Today we are happy to announce that Windows XP Service Pack 3 (SP3) has released to manufacturing (RTM). Windows XP SP3 bits are now working their way through our manufacturing channels to be available to OEM and Enterprise customers.
We are also in the final stages of preparing for release to the web (i.e. you!) on April 29th, via Windows Update and the Microsoft Download Center. Online documentation for Windows XP SP3, such as Microsoft Knowledge Base articles and the Microsoft TechNet Windows XP TechCenter, will be updated then. For customers who use Windows XP at home, Windows XP SP3 Automatic Update distribution for users at home will begin in early summer.
Thanks to everyone here who installed the public betas — you not only gave us detailed feedback but also helped each other out with timely troubleshooting. Through the beta program we found several important issues and were able to confirm some essential fixes. We couldn’t have done this without you.
We will still be monitoring this forum during the next few weeks in case you have more feedback about the release of Windows XP SP3.
Windows Connect and MSDN/TechNet Subscribers should be able to download soon. The public will have to wait until April 29, however, to download the update from the Microsoft Download Center and Windows Update.
- In: acquire | Apple | chip | designer | P.A. Semi | Santa Clara
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In a move that may help differentiate future iPods and iPhones, Apple has agreed to acquire chip designer P.A. Semi of Santa Clara.
The deal, worth $278 million, gives Apple a PowerPC-based chip that is known for high performance and low energy needs. That will prove helpful in bulking up its iPod and iPhone lineup, giving it some differentiation from competitors. But it may also help power new devices from Apple.
Apple has not said what it plans to do with P.A. Semi, which has about 150 employees. P.A. Semi designs processors using the PowerPC architecture, which Apple abandoned for its computers in favor of Intel chips.
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A ground crew member checked the level of radiation near the Soyuz capsule after its landing.
Although NASA is concerned about last weekend’s rough, off-target landing of a Russian Soyuz spacecraft carrying three astronauts, an agency official expressed confidence on Tuesday that the Russians would solve the problem.
The Soyuz capsule, carrying a crew home from the International Space Station, made a steeper-than-normal re-entry early Saturday and landed in Kazakhstan about 260 miles short of its target.
Russian and American officials said the astronauts — Dr. Peggy A. Whitson of NASA; the Russian capsule commander, Col. Yuri I. Malenchenko; and a South Korean bioengineer, Yi So-yeon — had been exposed to twice the normal stresses of gravity, but were not harmed. They remain in Russia for normal postflight debriefings and examinations.
William Gerstenmaier, NASA’s associate administrator for space operations, told reporters Tuesday that the incident was “clearly a concern” to the agency but that it was too early to judge the impact on future space flights.
Mr. Gerstenmaier said there had been a problem with the Soyuz descent module separating as planned from a propulsion module. This was the second consecutive Soyuz re-entry with a separation problem, he said, noting that a return last October also ended in a steeper-than-normal “ballistic re-entry.”
The Soyuz has explosive bolts that are supposed to separate its three sections before the center descent module carrying the astronauts assumes a normal re-entry orientation with its heat shield down. If the other modules do not break away as planned, Mr. Gerstenmaier said, the heat and forces of re-entry are supposed to pull them apart.
If this does not happen, the descent module could be damaged or destroyed by returning through the atmosphere at the wrong angle.
Mr. Gerstenmaier cautioned against giving too much credence to initial reports out of Russia that the astronauts had been in extraordinary danger, noting that the Soyuz had been safely launched and recovered for decades and that there was “an inherent reliability in the system.”
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