Chad's News

In a bid to compete with the iTunes music store, Amazon is now offering music downloads in MP3 format with no copy protection. The full catalog contains about 2 million songs, which is a far cry from iTunes’ 6 million, but I think it would be worth checking out the songs on Amazon before purchasing them on iTunes. It will be interesting to see where this leads.

Link #1: http://arstechnica.com/…

Link #2: http://tech.blorge.com/…
(via Slashdot)

Chad’s News has previously discussed compact fluorescent lightbulbs (CFLs). They last longer and use less energy than regular incandescent bulbs. Turns out, however, that CFLs also contain mercury, so when one finally burns out it’s important that it be properly disposed of. The linked article lists five ways to recycle a CFL.

Link: http://lighterfootstep.com/…
(via digg)

Here is a media server for the hard-core videophile. It can handle four simultaneous inputs and has 4 terabytes of storage. Sure beats the TiVo (although the media server isn’t really priced for the mass market).

Link: http://www.engadget.com/…

Admittedly, this woman is not really a criminal, but she was charged with a crime. Just goes to show that people can be highly intelligent but not very smart. I’ve always wondered what would happen if I wore my “Han Shot First” t-shirt through an airport security checkpoint. There is a picture of the device here.

Link: http://www.boston.com/…
(via Engadget)

For the first time in 30 years, a Canadian dollar is worth more than a US dollar. The linked article looks at the pros and cons of a weak dollar, and it’s not necessarily as bad as one might think.

Link: http://www.csmonitor.com/…
(via digg)

Ever seen internet activity on your computer when you weren’t accessing the web? It could be something as simple as an installed program checking for updates, or as bad as malicious botnet code. Back in 2005, I asked Slashdot how to determine if my machine had become a zombie. They had some good tips, and my computer turned out to be okay. The linked article has specific instructions on how to use the ‘netstat’ command to find out which programs are accessing the internet. Well-designed rootkits will not show up on the list, of course, but other tools exist for those.

Link: http://labnol.blogspot.com/…
(via Lifehacker)

In the wake of its decision to ditch iTunes, we now know what NBC was really up to. It will be offering free downloads of popular television shows. The downsides are that a special player is required (Windows only), the content can only be viewed for a seven-day period from the show’s air date, and there are embedded advertisements that cannot be skipped. NBC intends to implement a pay system in the future, where users will “own” the download and be able to transfer it to iPods and such.

Link: http://www.nytimes.com/…
(via Kim Komando)

As a side-effect of global warming, the fabled Northwest Passage has opened up for the first time in recorded history. Wonder if anyone is actually going to use it for commercial shipping?

Link #1: http://www.esa.int/…
(via Slashdot)

Link #2: http://news.bbc.co.uk/…

Astute Chad’s News readers already know that iPhones released in the United States will work with only one service provider: AT&T. Many consumers found this to be outrageous, and the hacking community quickly figured out how to unlock the iPhone so it can be used with other carriers. Be warned, however, that Apple is very unhappy about this, and performing the unlock will almost undoubtedly void the iPhone’s warranty. Ars Technica has gone so far as to suggest that Apple may permanently disable any unlocked iPhones, turning them into expensive bricks.

Be sure to check out this picture (via Digg), which I think is hilarious.

It has been known for some time that the advent of quantum computers will completely destroy our existing public key encryption system, which depends on the difficulty of factoring a very large number. The appropriate quantum factoring algorithm already exists—we simply need to develop a functioning quantum computer on which to run it. Two research groups have moved the technology forward by creating very small proof-of-concept quantum computers that perform a modified version of the factoring algorithm. Their quantum computers are not scalable but do demonstrate that some of the core technology is working.

For those interested, the technical writeups are available here and here.

The main lesson from this is that you cannot encrypt data with today’s technology and expect it to be safe for more than a few decades at most (who knows—it could be years instead of decades). Also, I wonder if cryptologists are looking for something other than factoring to replace the one-way algorithm essential to public key encryption.

Link #1: http://it.slashdot.org/…

Link #2: http://arstechnica.com/…

I prefer the older “wheel” interface, but it looks like this is the direction in which Apple has decided to go.

Link: http://arstechnica.com/…

Researchers have determined that the brain functions differently for liberals than for conservatives. Yet to be shown is whether the political orientation causes the different brain functioning, or whether the different brain functioning causes the political orientation.

Link: http://www.latimes.com/…
(via Slashdot)

Update: Here’s another study that finds a psychological difference between liberals and conservatives. This time it’s how they respond to threats.