Slashback: OpenDocument, Intelligent Design, More DRM

Slashback tonight brings a few corrections, clarifications and updates to previous Slashdot stories, including several updates to the Sony DRM rootkit fiasco, another school system's take on intelligent design, some of the first pictures of the much talked about avian flu virus, a sentencing that gives us the first torrent user to get jail time, Bernard Golden weighs in on the continuing Massachussetts OpenDocument debate, and one users commentary on recent announcements to start pay-per-download services for TV shows. Read on for the details.

Sony still not "getting it". c writes "Mark Russinovich continues his investigation of Sony's DRM as he tries out the official uninstaller. His verdict? 'I've analyzed virulent forms of spyware/adware that provide more straightforward means of uninstall.'" Relatedly Cronos1388 writes "According to the Inquirer an Italian group is also suing Sony over the rootkit." Also, an unexpected side effect of this technology is that script kiddies have been able to leverage Sony's tool to hide unauthorized cheat programs from the watchful eye of MMO creators.

Intelligent design supporters ousted. PMuse writes "The Register and others are reporting that all eight of the members of the Dover, PA school board that had required Intelligent Design to be taught alongside Evolution have been canned by voters in yesterday's election."

What does avian flu look like? DevL writes "Swedish photographer Lennart Nilsson has managed to capture images of a H5N1 (bird flu) virus entering and taking control of a cell. While the text is in Swedish, the images speak for themselves."

Torrent user goes up the river. stinerman writes to tell us that the Hong Kong man who was recently arrested for making several movies available via BitTorrent has had his sentence handed down. Chan aka "Big Crook" uploaded Daredevil, Red Planet, and Miss Congeniality which landed him 3 months in jail.

Golden weighs in on OpenDocument debate. OSS_ilation writes "With so much FUD and anti-FUD flying in the face of Massachusetts' decision to go with OpenDocument, it's no surprise that open source advocate Bernard Golden weighs in with his take on current events."

User says new downloadable television just plain "sucks." Thomas Hawk writes "In the past few weeks the three major studios have all announced deals to begin offering downloadable television for consumers -- Apple/ABC, DirecTV/NBC, and Comcast/CBS. The problem with each of these respective offerings is that they largely suck. Apple sells expensive low res limited television from ABC. NBC's new service will only work on DirecTV DVRs (uh hello McFly, why pay money for this service when I can just record it for free). And CBS' downloadable programming could contain commercials."

I'm kind of shocked..

[jeblucas]

...that they went after the guy that uploaded Daredevil, Red Planet, and Miss Congeniality. Does this mean that they are really serious and will protect their copyrighted materials no matter how crappy they may be? Or, are they so pissed at this guy for reminding P2P users that these three movies were made that they had to do something to punish him? If the latter, I hope whoever posted Gigli on eDonkey has a good lawyer.

Kansas welcoms new professor of Cryptozoology

[rastin]

Recent developments in Kansas have paved the way for the largest increase of "Science" class offerings to our next generation of young Americans. Take "CZO140: A field study of the behavior of Unicorns" for example. Students will learn how to make Unicorn calls, analyze a maidens purity through Unicorn reactions and extract faerie dust from Unicorn droppings. For years "Rational Science" has frowned upon the link between faerie dust and Unicorn dung, likening it to a futile study of plain old horse shit. But now that science is not limited to natural explanations of phenomena jobs in academia are readily available to anyone with a wild imagination and a fragile grasp on reality!

Re:Can you say "backfire"

[Ctrl+Alt+De1337]

I just wonder how the logic in the decision-making process went.

"Since CD sales have been falling, and it's cheaper to blame piracy than develop original artists, let's put a DRM rootkit on our CDs to prevent copying."

"But wait sir, what happens when people find it? Won't that motivate people to avoid buying CDs since they don't know if they can trust us anymore?"

"Don't worry. We'll hide it really really well so no one knows about it. Even though we have to run a firewall and antivirus software on our network to protect against vulnerabilities that no one even knows exist yet, we can safely assume that not a single soul on the entire earth will find our rootkit. And if we get sued, we'll can probably get off somehow by screaming DMCA. The lawyers are looking into it as we speak. Plus if no one finds it and sales go up, we all get bigger bonuses."

"Apparently, I'm engulfed in evil."

With apologies to Dilbert for the last line.

Re:I'm kind of shocked..

[Shadow Wrought]

Apparantly they felt that only authorized government agencies or the MIAA should be allowed to poison the torrents...

Possible outcome

[Spy der Mann]

Since the Avian flu video couldn't be purchased online because it sucks, and the DVD's can't be purchased because they have a rootkit, the State of Massachussets proposed to download an Open Document version of it. Luckily, this became available for all, including intelligent design proponents in Kansas who realized someone very evil had to design those viruses, because they couldn't just simply evolve. In related news, a new torrent file of the Avian Flu virus was distributed in Hong Kong, but a misunderstanding led to the government think that the distributor was actually committing bioterrorism, so they got him arrested. In his defense, he said: "the Flying Spaguetti Monster made me do it."

You have liberated...

[Grog6]

... enough energy for your Entropy to equal infinity.

This does NOT make YOU God, however.

If the second coming ever happens, God is going to be so busy, with the troubles of his own flock, and of course, twits like you.

Me, I'm hoping there's enough of my corpse left for the Valkiries to carry me back to Valhalla, to spend Eternity drinking and whoring with Thor and that bunch; I'm sure Heaven would be fucking boring.

Re:The big question...

[Trepalium]

Or perhaps more usefully, $SYS$EverquestCheats.exe. It's a pity that cheaters are using this to target WoW, when they should be targetting Everquest. It'd be much more fun to pit the Sony departments against each other even more.

Re:Actually...

[michaelbuddy]

Actually NTSC is 1080i, according to the Wikipedia article. That's becuase of course I just added that into the article myself to fit the answer I wanted to be true. Wikipedia rules!

Re:Look guys: intelligent design is NOT SCIENCE

[buckhead_buddy]

Inteligent Design is "science" once you redefine the term "science" to be more broad minded. It's like Microsoft redefining "Open" file formats to include Microsoft Word. *Heh* Perhaps we'll see an "Intelligent Document" format come out of Redmond soon.

can I...

[AbraCadaver]

"...all eight of the members of the Dover, PA school board that had required Intelligent Design to be taught alongside Evolution have been canned by voters in yesterday's election."
Can I just say "Amen to that!" :P

Re:Look guys: intelligent design is NOT SCIENCE

[Anonymous Coward]

You may not post much, but you should probably post less, considering how much stupidity you managed to pack into that one post. Also, I love the lecture about how the guy should read the Origin of Species when it's painfully obvious that you have never done so.

In short, serves you right.

[sulli]

What a crappy list of artists. Anyone with Celine Dion in his PC deserves whatever he gets.

Re:Downloadable TV

[ajs]

Slashdot poster: Greetings gentlemen, you already know my Execuscripts. Script Alpha, programmed to like things that are seen before.

Alphabot: Information wants to be free!

Slashdot poster: Script Beta, programmed to roll dice to determine preferences.

[Betascript rolls two 20-sided dice.]

Betascript: Imagine a beowulf cluster of petrified torrents!

Slashdot poster: And Script Gamma, programmed to underestimate anyone with a non-technical job.

Gammascript: It's cool, but is it enough to get the network executives to stop suing children for the FBI long enough to give me free stuff?