http://clickworldnews.com Updated News Articles Daily! Fri, 12 Mar 2010 19:16:00 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en Late last year we noticed that Apple seemed to be getting needlessly (and at times ridiculously) aggressive over its trademarks in Australia. There was the software developer who had a product named iPodRip, which had been around for years, which Steve Jobs suddenly decided needed to change its name. ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/australian-trademark-tribunal-tells-apple-that-it-cant-stop-other-products-from-using-the-letter-i/ A geologist proposing bombing Japan's volcanoes to win the war in a January 1944 issue of Popular Science. [via Google Books via Pink Tentacle] http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/an-alternative-to-the-atomic-bomb/ itwbennett writes "The takedown of the Mariposa botnet and so-called advanced persistent threat attacks, such as the one that compromised Google systems in early December, were hot topics at the RSA conference last week. What both Mariposa and the Google attacks illustrate, and what went largely unsaid at RSA, was ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/security-industry-faces-attacks-it-cant-stop/ You gotta love the MPAA for the sheer Hollywood brashness of two recent press releases, that the Washington Post's Rob Pegoraro decided to compare and call the MPAA on its blatant dishonesty. The first press release, from back in December, was all about how the internet and file trading ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/mpaa-brags-about-how-awesome-the-movie-business-is-right-after-it-claims-file-sharing-is-destroying-the-industry/ As a relative newcomer to the craft of sewing, I just recently started to realize the value of fabric scraps. That's why I was intrigued when I heard of Looptworks, a new apparel company — started by three guys who worked together on product design and management at Adidas — ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/laptop-sleeve-made-out-of-recycled-wetsuits/ krou writes "The Christian Science Monitor has an interesting story about how the University of Wyoming's English Department is helping fund a collective called the Learning Games Initiative to study video games. Jason Thompson, an assistant professor at UW who is part of the group, explains that 'it's a group ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/university-of-wyoming-studies-video-games/ Lately we've had lots of folks writing in seeking practical advice on collecting tissue samples for use in studying whaleborne disease. I had no idea there were so many amateur cetopathologists out there! Anyway, as you folks know--all too well, I'm sure--it is extremely difficult to collect blood ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/how-to-collect-whale-snot-using-an-rc-helicopter/ Kumquat marmalade Thinly slice 24 kumquats and 2 oranges. Measure how many cups they add up to, then put them in a large pot. Add 3 cups of water for each cup of fruit, and let it sit overnight. The next morning, bring the mixture to a boil, then reduce heat ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/taste-test-kumquat/ TorrentFreak has an article about how Ari Emanuel, brother of Obama chief of staff Rahm Emanuel and the "inspiration" for Jeremy Piven's "Ari Gold" character in the show Entourage, is claiming that he's talking to President Obama about implementing a three strikes law in the US. While I'm sure ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/james-murdoch-is-very-very-confused-about-copyright-infringement-and-so-is-his-dad-rupert/ theodp writes "ComputerWorld reports that IBM has stopped providing breakouts on US employees, closing a door to data that provided insights into the bellwether company's employment shift. In its latest Annual Report, Big Blue only provides its global headcount, and an IBM spokesman confirmed that disclosure of US headcount is ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/ibm-stops-disclosing-us-headcount-data/ WorldBytes, a charity that trains people to make their own journalism got sick and tired of British policemen, bureaucrats and officials telling them that they don't have the right to shoot motion pictures in public places. There's no law against making movies or taking pictures in public in Britain -- ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/mini-documentary-on-the-british-war-on-public-photos-and-videos/ All of Carl Sagan's Cosmos. All for free. Enjoy. http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/cosmos-on-hulu/ arcticstoat calls our attention to MIT research that has produced a version of polyethylene that can conduct heat away from computer chips. Polyethylene is the most widely used plastic. It's not clear how practical this research is for industrial-scale use, involving as it does an atomic-force microscope. The work is ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/mit-scientists-make-a-polyethylene-heatsink/ What do you do when your toddler's having trouble reaching the buttons on the guitar for Beatles Rock Band? Why, modify it and make an Instructable, that's what! Toddler's Guitar Hero controller Read more | Permalink | ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/how-to-toddlers-guitar-hero-controller/ UCLA collects ads for patent medicine. Princeton has piles of 17th-century porn. UNLV? Showgirls and Dean Martin, of course. Mental_Floss presents a guide to some of the best weird library collections at American universities. http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/beyond-books-university-library-collections-for-happy-mutants/ jprlk was the first of a few of you to send in the news that the Canadian Booksellers' Association is apparently so afraid of competition from Amazon, that it's asking the government to block the company from building a distribution center north of the border. Apparently, they're relying on ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/unwilling-to-compete-canadian-booksellers-association-tries-to-block-amazon-distribution-center/ santosh maharshi writes "On social networks like Facebook, even if you have kept your profile very private, people can just look at your friends list and infer lots of vital information about you. Most of the social networks like Facebook and LinkedIn allow people to see your picture and your ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/on-social-networks-you-are-who-you-know/ A few weeks ago, we moved the studio (affectionately dubbed the BitCave) across the street to newer, slightly larger digs. It’s more comfortable, the windows open, we have our own temperature controls–you know, real lavish stuff. Yesterday, we relaunched the SimpleBits Shop, bringing the fulfillment back in house. Our slightly larger ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/new-at-the-shop/ Bruce Schneier's blog links to a few sources for hollow spy coins, one being BoingBoing's Bazaar — where a nickel that can hold a microSD card costs $27. Another is Slashdot's sister company ThinkGeek, where you can get hollow quarters and half-dollars in the low 20s. As if corporate and ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/hollow-spy-coins-2/ Someone, who prefers to remain anonymous, alerts us to the news that Symantec has discovered that a USB battery charger from Energizer installs a dangerous rootkit after installing the required driver. You would think that legit companies would know better than to install a secret rootkit after the Sony ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/energizer-introduces-usb-battery-charger-with-bonus-rootkit-feature/ We here at MAKE are thrilled to have teamed up with the fine folks at Jameco to bring you The Make: Robot Build. Over the next eight weeks, we'll be featuring a series of tutorials here on the site about the basics of robot building, from overall design considerations to ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/gear-up-for-the-make-robot-build-sponsored-by-jameco/ James from the New America foundation sez, "The FCC launched a consumer broadband test on their blog broadband.gov yesterday. Internet speeds in the US are often 50% to 80% lower than advertised and its vital consumers have reliable information on the actual performance of their connections. One of the two ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/americans-test-your-broadband-speed-help-the-fcc-keep-isps-honest/ Photo courtesy Coastal Treated Products Company. In a discussion in the comments on yesterday's "plastic plywood" post, I mentioned that I was often reluctant to buy plywood and other "new" timber products at the hardware store because I didn't know how to tell if I was buying forest-friendly wood or not. ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/how-to-buy-sustainably-managed-lumber/ AnotherUsername writes "The Federal Communications Commission is asking the nation's broadband and smartphone users to use its broadband testing tools to help the feds and consumers know what speeds are actually available, not just promised by the nation's telecoms. At http://www.broadband.gov/, users enter their address and test their broadband download ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/fcc-asks-you-to-test-your-broadband-speeds/ scumm writes "This year's Turing Prize has been awarded to Charles Thacker, whom they describe as (among other things) the 'creator of the first modern personal computer.' From the ACM's announcement: 'ACM, the Association for Computing Machinery today named Charles P. Thacker the winner of the 2009 ACM A.M. Turing ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/acm-awards-2009-turing-prize-to-alto-creator-charles-thacker/ I'd love to read this hypothetical sequel to J.G. Ballard's Crash, since Dinos and Jake Chapman have already designed the perfect cover. "Ambiguous aims": a review of Crash: Homage to J.G. Ballard (NSFW) [Ballardian] http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/jg-ballards-bang-wallop/ Take a look "behind the scenes" as Kipkay shares what goes into shooting the Weekend Project videos and shares some tips to help you be a better movie maker. To download the Making The Weekend Projects video click here ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/weekend-project-making-the-weekend-projects/ There was some hubbub earlier this month when sex columnist Violet Blue discovered that one of her old columns for the SF Chronicle had been altered by the Chronicle's online site, SFGate.com. She was upset that the changes implied the article said the opposite of what it actually said ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/newspapers-gaming-google-with-questionable-tactics/ Almost every Richard Thompson song could be subtitled, "Watch out!" You never know where it's going next and you always have to be wary, even when he's having fun. Thompson is as familiar with the dark end of the street as any songwriter, he's a singer of uncommon emotion, and ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/richard-thompson-for-shame-of-doing-wrong-greatest-song-of-all-time-of-the-day/ itwbennett writes "Sony on Tuesday 'rolled out the ability to buy HD movies from the PlayStation Network,' writes blogger Peter Smith. Sony claims they're the first service to offer HD titles to own from all six major movie studios. Smith runs the numbers on 'standard' pricing for titles ($19.99 for ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/sony-begins-selling-hd-movies-on-its-psn/ judgecorp writes "Harriet Harman, the deputy leader of the Labour Party, has said that UK government ministers are 'taking action' to get Facebook to add a British child protection button (called CEOP) to its site. The move comes after the UK's Daily Mail withdrew allegations that teenagers on Facebook are ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/uk-govt-wants-facebook-to-feature-child-safety-button/ PocketWizard has tested a prototype of its radio controlled flash triggers for Nikon flashguns. The hot-shoe mounted FlexTT5 transceiver is currently available only for Canon flash systems and allows photographers to wirelessly control flashguns. The company plans to release a beta version to the public once it completes initial testing ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/pocketwizard-tests-flextt5-for-nikon/ CP+ 2010: Ricoh has exhibited prototypes of its A12 28mm equiv. prime and P10 28-300mm equiv. lens modules for the GXR system at the CP+ photographic trade show. The show report by Japanese website DC Watch includes camera writer Fumio Nakamura's mock-ups showing the potential of the system including remote ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/ricoh-exhibits-gxr-modules-at-cp/ The book publishing business really does seem to be going through the same process that the recording industry went through not so long ago. That is, it's crying about all the doom and gloom. Layoffs are rampant, and there are all sorts of concerns about how the industry ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/forget-the-doom-gloom-look-how-good-things-are-in-the-book-business/ lilbridge writes "Huge reserves of "combustible ice" — frozen methane and water, have been discovered in the tundra of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau in China. Estimates show that there is enough combustible ice to provide 90 years worth of energy for China. Burning the combustible ice may be a far better ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/china-to-tap-combustible-ice-as-new-energy-source/ Blueprint Magazine describes a very neat machine: In a small shed on an industrial park near Pisa is a machine that can print buildings. The machine itself looks like a prototype for the automotive industry. Four columns independently support a frame with a single armature on it. Driven by CAD software ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/giant-3d-printer-can-print-buildings-theoretically/ An anonymous reader writes "Another one bites the dust, as New Zealand's Internet filter stealthily goes live with two smaller ISPs, and three of the largest already rumoured to have signed up to do the same. However, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is apparently 'committed to helping people to ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/a-sad-day-for-the-new-zealand-internet/ scott mc laughlin alerts us to an interesting blog post from the composer Kyle Gann, discussing his feelings on posting musical scores as free PDFs online. Gann does this happily, but a publisher he was speaking with was upset that this created "unfair competition." Gann doesn't find the ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/classical-music-composers-debating-the-value-of-free-too/ code prole writes "With two upcoming trips to Germany, and no readily available Internet (WiFi or otherwise) in the location where we'll be staying, I'm looking for a no-contract USB stick and pre-paid data plan. Vodafone has a huge selection of USB sticks but has proven to be unresponsive to ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/best-pre-paid-data-plan-for-a-visit-to-germany/ A Montreal man has had his lawsuit against Air Transat dismissed. He was suing the airline because the flight attendants refused to help him look at his scrotum and determine why it had started bleeding on a flight (they gave him some sanitary towels and told him they'd land for ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/look-at-my-scrotum-lawsuit-dismissed/ "Pony Express," a Bulgarian mechanical horse (created by T.J. Tangpuz) is made out of discarded packaging, plastic ties, and other detritus, and it delighted the people of Oryahovo, Bulgaria with its regular perambulations, before it was moved to a gallery. Mechanical cardboard horse Previously:Mechanical papercraft toys -- including a Maneki Neko Mechanical ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/mechanical-cardboard-junk-horse-walks-the-streets-of-bulgaria/ These beautiful, fanciful miniature cities built into household objects like power-strips and desk-fans are part of the graduate show at the Kyoto University of Art and Design. The artist is uncredited, but it's very lovely work. Student Work | Kyoto University of Art and Design (via Cribcandy) Previously:Photographer takes photos of real scenes ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/miniature-cities-on-household-objects/ For 50 years, residents of the French village of Pont-Saint-Esprit have tried to understand the "cursed bread" incident, a moment of terrifying mass insanity and hallucinations that left at least five dead and dozens in asylums. Now the mystery is solved: the CIA secretly spiked the bread from the bakery ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/french-village-went-insane-after-cia-spiked-its-bread-with-lsd/ The Olympics are coming to London, so our civil liberties are going out the window: because nothing epitomises the spirit of global competition and cooperation like corporate bullying and unfettered truncheon-waving. Police will have powers to enter private homes and seize posters, and will be able to stop people carrying non-sponsor ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/london-olympics-police-powers-to-force-spectators-to-remove-non-sponsor-items-enter-houses-take-posters/ harryjohnston writes "The Register points out that the takedown of a significant number of Zeus command-and-control servers, which we discussed earlier, was a short-lived victory, as about one-third of the affected servers were back on the net in less than 48 hours." ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/zeus-botnet-down-but-not-out/ Turkish courts have been really quick to ban various websites for flimsy reasons. A few years ago it went back and forth a few times before banning YouTube entirely, just because of a juvenile video on the site. However, it's now been nearly two years since the last ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/turkish-reporters-finally-point-out-that-the-govt-should-drop-its-silly-youtube-ban/ Gary Mauler and the folks who put on the RobotFest in southern Maryland each year are expanding their enterprise to include a Mid-Atlantic 2010 Mini Maker Faire! Gary writes: I work with Maryland College Institute of Art each year to produce the artwork for T-shirts and advertising for RobotFest (and this ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/robotfestmid-atlantic-2010-mini-maker-faire-april-24th/ "About Adafruit video" by RocketBoom A lot of readers are likely familiar with Adafruit Industries, supplier and maker of many kits found in the Maker Shed. In addition to my role here at MAKE, as senior editor, I also work with Limor (Ladyada), helping her with the open source hardware kit ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/maker-business-adafruit-industries-how-its-made-an-open-source-hardware-company-in-nyc/ Mississippi's Itawamba County school district has cancelled a prom after Constance McMillen, an 18-year-old student, asked permission to bring her girlfriend as her date. The student planned to wear a tux. The school district's bureaucratic non-excuse for the cancellation is that it's "due to the distractions to the educational process ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/lesbian-panic-shuts-down-mississippi-high-school-prom/ Two years ago, we noted that Brazil had asked the WTO for permission to ignore certain US patents and copyrights as a retaliation against the US's refusal to abide by a WTO ruling. This is, of course, typical of the US. When the WTO sides with the US ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/brazil-moves-forward-with-plan-to-ignore-us-patents-and-copyrights-after-us-refuses-to-abide-by-wto-ruling/ Filmmaker Kathryn Bigelow, who won Best Director and Best Picture Oscars for Hurt Locker this week, "was a member in good standing of the [NYC] punk scene of the late '70s and early' 80s," according to Paper Mag. (via Cate Park) http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/kathryn-bigelow-was-a-punk-rocker/ Embedded here, a little teaser video for The Story of Bottled Water, created by the same people behind "The Story of Stuff" (Wikipedia). Looks neat. I'm a big fan of tap water. I spend a fair amount of time in very poor communities in poor countries, with people who don't ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/story-of-bottled-water-from-story-of-stuff-folks/ Note the conspicuous lack of smut! Frame from a Seattle Post-Intelligencer gallery of Playboy founder hugh Hefner's teenage doodles, sent to his high school sweetheart friend Jane Sellers in the early 1940s. The full collection is for sale at $250,000, from rare book dealer Lux Mentis (who will send you ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/hugh-hefner-teenage-cartoonist-1943/ Google's bike maps are "filled with potentially fatal flaws, including routes that cut across Central Park's treacherous transverse roads and steer cyclists through truck-riddled thoroughfares." New York Post, Information Week. http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/googles-bike-maps-filled-with-potentially-fatal-flaws/ CWmike writes "Canadian interface design firm MetaLab has accused Mozilla of stealing user interface elements for a development tool in the browser maker's Jetpack project, which aims to simplify add-on making. MetaLab leveled the charges on Tuesday when the 11-person firm's founder, Andrew Wilkinson, blogged about the similarities between his ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/metalab-accuses-mozilla-of-ripping-off-ui-elements-in-mockups/ On Mashable, math teacher Rebecca Zook weighs in on the whole Computer Engineer Barbie (aka Coder Barbie) "controversy" with "Why Computer Engineer Barbie Is Good for Women in Tech." While some have embraced Coder Barbie, others have attacked the concept, saying that her pink laptop, sparkly leggings, and trendy glasses are ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/more-thoughts-on-coder-barbie/ We have noted, recently, that Italian laws and politicians seem to have a somewhat troubling view of the internet, where they are quick to blame the internet for anything bad that happens, and then look to pass laws that would throw out plenty of good just to protect against the ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/lessig-gives-a-well-timed-speech-to-the-italian-parliament-on-internet-freedom/ Lobbying groups and activists write proposed legislation all the time -- it's part of how the process works. But with controversial legislation, you would at least think that politicians would be sensitive to some of the concerns of others before essentially doing a copy-and-paste on what the lobbyists give ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/leaked-documents-show-uk-web-censorship-proposal-written-by-record-labels/ Love this whimsical iPhone stand made out of forks and spoons. [via ManMade] Forked Up Art More:All of the iPhone stands on MAKE Read more | Permalink | Comments | ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/12/iphone-stand-made-from-cutlery/ Rich Gibson of the Gigapan project stopped by the Make offices today and showed me some of the cool super high res photos he's got online. The barnacle is mind blowing. Be sure to view the full image at GigaPan.org This barnacle Nano Gigapan is really cool. Take your time, ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/ultra-detailed-photo-of-barnacle/ From Romenesko: "NPR blogger uses all of Tribune CEO's banned words in one sentence" He lent a helping hand to a legendary incarcerated pedestrian lone gunman (the perpetrator who over in a neighboring state, perished in a perfect storm of no brainers and things that went terribly wrong, and was plagued ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/npr-blogger-uses-all-of-tribune-ceos-banned-words-in-one-sentence/ nut writes "Everybody's favourite actor, author and starship captain is bringing some new ideas to the world of social networking. Myouterspace.com is, in the Captain's own words, '...a Sci Fi Social Network for those with a passion for the arts.' Facebook and Myspace should be worried. Sign up now. Go ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/william-shatner-takes-on-social-networking/ The adorable little boy in this video, whose name is Calen, is sorting out what it means when two fellas get married to one another. At one point, while face-palming, he says pensively: "I always see husbands and wifes, but this is the very first time I ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/child-sorts-out-concept-of-gay-marriage-husbands-and-husbands-video/ There's something anti-competitive afoot in the 'VoIP over 3G' space this year. Let me run you through a timeline, and see if you can't spot the dirty pool: Skype has had a highly functional VoIP client for Windows Mobile devices for a few years. It allowed smartphone customers to use most ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/skype-deliberately-crippling-functionality-of-iphone-and-winmo-and-verizon-apps/ From ManMade comes this video about how to create a quick n' dirty no-sew toolbelt from recycled fabric and duct tape. I don't think you're going to rock the construction site in this thing, but for light tools and crafting supplies, it's an easy way to cobble something together. ManMade Video ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/simple-no-sew-toolbelt/ Visit our new online store, filled with a hand-picked selection of books, toys, games, gadgets and miscellaneous tat that we like. It uses Amazon's platform, which means that we get paid with referral fees cut from their end: the prices to you are the same as usual. We're going to ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/online-store-open/ MikeChino writes "A group of scientists from Germany's Fraunhofer Institute have devised a way to encode a visible-frequency wireless signal in light emitted by plain old desklamps and other light fixtures. The team was able to achieve a record-setting data download rate of 230 megabits per second, and they expect ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/researchers-beam-230mbsec-wireless-internet-with-leds/ Now in the Boing Boing Bazaar: chunks of aerogel! $50 buys you a pair of aerogel discs. Silica aerogel, the infamous and ethereal material comprised of up to 99.98% air, can be yours at last. Known for its superinsulating abilities, ultralow density, and its use on the Mars rovers, silica aerogel ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/aerogel-chunks-in-boing-boing-bazaar/ If you've ever wished you could get an insider's look at the daily activities of NASA Goddard's largest clean room, you're in luck. Web cams are now providing live coverage of work on the components of the upcoming James Web Space Telescope. The cameras snap and display one picture per ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/web-cam-view-of-a-nasa-clean-room/ HvitRavn writes "SolarPHP 1.0 stable was released by Paul M. Jones today. SolarPHP is an application framework and library, and is a serious contender alongside Zend Framework, Symphony, and similar frameworks. SolarPHP has in the recent years been the cause of heated debate in the PHP community due to provocative ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/solarphp-10-released/ This visualization of the way colors in Flickr images change over the course of the year was created by Fernanda Viégas and Martin Wattenberg of IBM's Visual Communication Lab. It's called "Flickr Flow." The two of us see the world as a stream of color, and in 2009 ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/seasonal-flickr-color-cycle/ j00bhaka writes "I am a US citizen attending university in Nova Scotia, Canada. I currently have the Verizon America and Canada plan (also known as the North American plan). My bill is currently around $80-$100 per month. I chose this for a couple reasons. One, I have had my number ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/best-smartphone-plan-covering-us-and-canada/ With the EU Parliament soundly voting against ACTA secrecy and current proposals, lots of folks have been wondering how the US was going to respond. So far, it's not looking good. The USTR gave a giant no comment, and President Obama (who had been pretty quiet on ACTA ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/obama-we-must-move-forward-on-acta/ Jalopnik reports that "James Sikes, the San Diego runaway Toyota Prius driver, filed for bankruptcy in 2008 and now has over $700,000 in debt. According to one anonymous tipster, we're also told he hasn't been making payments on his Prius." So was his story a fake? (via Chris Anderson) http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/was-this-weeks-runaway-toyota-prius-driver-video-a-fake/ Holga, © Stavro Papadopoulos, from an image gallery curated by Sean Bonner of work by various photographers using toy cameras, over at Magnesium Agency. http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/through-a-plastic-lens-toy-camera-photography/ An anonymous reader writes "Pennsylvania's chief information security officer Robert Maley has been fired for publicly talking about a security incident involving the Commonwealth's online driving exam scheduling system. He apparently did not get the required approval for talking about the incident from appropriate authorities." ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/pennsylvania-ciso-fired-over-talk-at-rsa-conference/ I don't know where this came from, or if it is from a real choose-your-own-adventure book, but as Margaret Wise Brown might say, the important thing is that it is funny. Page 56 http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/page-from-a-choose-your-own-adventure-game-about-free-will/ Josh at imsolidstate came across an extra battery charger, so he decided to turn it into a spot welder. We've seen spot welder projects in the past, however his goes the extra mile, adding a digital control circuit and current monitoring capabilities, to give precise control over the welding ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/building-a-spot-welder-from-a-battery-charger/ Kanan excerpts from a BBC report out of Scotland: "A study of sexually scrambled chickens suggests that sex in birds is determined in a radically different way from that in mammals. Researchers studied three chickens that appeared to be literally half-male and half-female, and found that nearly every cell in ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/half-male-half-female-fowl-explain-birds-sex-determination/ Boing Boing readers are interested in Edgar Allan Poe (examples 1, 2, 3, and 4), so I suspect you'll want to be the first to know about 4 by Poe, an upcoming collection of four Poe stories designed and illustrated by Eric Mongeon. Mongeon is best-known 'round these corners ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/striking-new-edgar-allan-poe-collection/ So lots of people have been submitting versions of the story about how Pink Floyd is suing EMI, claiming that EMI isn't paying the band what it owes for iTunes downloads. I'd avoided posting this, because it's basically the same contractual dispute we've seen from other acts, where they ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/because-only-the-record-labels-are-supposed-to-get-away-with-not-paying-their-musicians/ A Wichita, Kansas man was apparently beaten up by a drug dealer after the man paid for crack cocaine with Monopoly money. The man, who was bleeding from the head when police pulled him over, said he had purchased the drugs weeks before and the dealer was only now taking ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/man-buys-drugs-with-monopoly-money/ adeelarshad82 writes "T-Mobile announced that the webConnect Rocket USB Laptop Stick, the first HSPA+ device for the US, will be available beginning on Sunday, March 14. The device was originally announced at MWC in February. HSPA+ is interesting because it could enable 4G LTE-like speeds using existing 3G infrastructure and ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/t-mobiles-first-hspa-modem-goes-on-sale-sunday/ The Final Cut saw blade packs sandpaper on the sides for a smoother cut. The latest in saw blade technology. Fully patented and proven successful in cutting and sanding your work piece all at one time. Use with table saw and power miter boxes for the perfect joint or finished edge. ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/saw-blade-that-cuts-and-sands/ smooth wombat writes "Before the advent of iTunes and MP3s, EMI and Pink Floyd entered into a contract which stated that EMI could not unbundle individual songs from their original album settings. This was insisted upon by the members of Pink Floyd, who wanted to retain artistic control of their ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/emi-cannot-unbundle-pink-floyd-songs/ If you're going to pull a telco scam, perhaps targeting the FCC isn't the best idea. However, some employees at a couple of video relay services apparently scammed the FCC out of a few million dollars. In case you don't know, Video Relay Service is a mandated program ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/fcc-scammed-out-of-millions-in-telco-scam/ lord_rotorooter writes "Felix Ortiz, D-Brooklyn, introduced a bill that would ruin restaurant food and baked goods as we know them. The measure (if passed) would ban the use of all forms of salt in the preparation and cooking of food for all restaurants or bakeries. While the use of too ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/bill-to-ban-all-salt-in-restaurant-cooking/ Lanxon writes "It's true: 'Effects of cocaine on honeybee dance behavior,' 'Fellatio by fruit bats prolongs copulation time,' and 'Are full or empty beer bottles sturdier and does their fracture-threshold suffice to break the human skull?' are all genuine scientific research papers, and all were genuinely published in journals or ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/the-10-most-absurd-scientific-papers/ Roq La Rue Gallery's "Lush Life 2" group show opens in Seattle this Friday and it's a tour-de-force of Pop Surrealism and contemporary painting and sculpture. The show includes new work by: Joe Sorren, Chris Berens, Marion Peck, Kris Kuksi, Travis Louie, Brian Despain, John Brophy, Martin Wittfooth, Ryan Heshka, ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/lush-life-2-art-show-at-seattles-roq-la-rue/ Twine is selling these magnificent vintage rotary phones, retrieved from the British General Post Office where they were never used. They ain't cheap though: $210. Tellies (Thanks, Kelly Sparks!) http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/deadstock-rotary-phones-for-sale/ Victor Pineiro put a lot of work into a funny, popular post about the "top ten geek anthems of all time." Shortly after, CNN ran an extremely similar article, which replicated many of Victor's picks and had extremely similar copy. But the CNN article didn't credit Victor with the inspiration. Victor ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/cnn-geek-anthem-post-is-implausibly-similar-to-scrappy-bloggers-earlier-article/ Instructables user zieak upcycled some discarded keyboard circuit sheets into this attractively geeky document folder for his wife. Read more | Permalink | Comments | ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/how-to-document-folders-from-keyboard-circuit-sheets-2/ Instructables user zieak upcycled some discarded keyboard circuit sheets into this attractively geeky document folder for his wife. Read more | Permalink | Comments | ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/how-to-document-folders-from-keyboard-circuit-sheets/ The latest word on the iPhone is that the 4.0 OS will finally have honest-to-goodness multitasking. This could hopefully lead to things like a real chat client, and dangerous battery consumption. I still hope it's true. Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/multitasking-in-for-iphone-40-2/ The latest word on the iPhone is that the 4.0 OS will finally have honest-to-goodness multitasking. This could hopefully lead to things like a real chat client, and dangerous battery consumption. I still hope it's true. Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/multitasking-in-for-iphone-40/ As part of our spring-cleaning sale in the Maker Shed we're offering FREE shipping on orders over $125! (Contiguous US only) Just use the code "CLEARME" at checkout. But what about all of our international friends? No worries, we have a deal for you too! You'll get $10 off your ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/spring-cleaning-sale-in-the-maker-shed-3/ As part of our spring-cleaning sale in the Maker Shed we're offering FREE shipping on orders over $125! (Contiguous US only) Just use the code "CLEARME" at checkout. But what about all of our international friends? No worries, we have a deal for you too! You'll get $10 off your ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/spring-cleaning-sale-in-the-maker-shed-2/ Kolargol00 writes "Heise online reports the availability of an exploit (Google translation) for the yet-unpatched MSA-981374 affecting Internet Explorer 6 and 7. It has already been spotted in the wild by McAfee and integrated into the Metasploit Framework." Read more of this ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/ie-6-7-unpatched-exploit-goes-wild/ I have to admit that I've been a bit in shock over Congress's decision to simply renew the Patriot Act, recently, without a single safeguard to protect against abuse. That's because just before all this happened, we wrote about how a report from the government found (not for the ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/wheres-the-outrage-over-the-govt-brushing-mass-privacy-violations-under-the-rug/ Spotted in the MAKE Flickr pool: Flickr user syano made this stylish clothtylophone, a functional cross-stitch Stylophone. Nice work! Here's what the insides look like: In the Maker Shed: Lilypad E-Sewing Kit Read more | ... http://clickworldnews.com/2010/03/11/play-clothtylophone-combines-best-features-of-pillow-synthesizer-2/