Bread Expert

From lancerlord:

Bread Expert: This is one of the funniest interviews on the Conan O'Brien Show. It involves bread expert Steven Kaplan telling Conan O'Brien just how sexy a loaf of bread can be.

Cohen sued for 'libelling friend' on Ali G show

By Matthew Moore
Last Updated: 1:52am GMT 28/02/2007

Sacha Baron Cohen, the British comedian behind the award-winning Borat movie, is being sued by a woman who claims he libelled her in an old Ali G sketch.

Sacha Baron Cohen promoting the Ali G film in 2002
Cohen is alleged to have referred to the woman - a childhood acquaintance - as a "minger" and a "b****" during an interview with the American novelist Gore Vidal in 2004.

He is also accused of falsely claiming he had got her pregnant, according to court papers filed in Los Angeles

I found this via: DRUDGE REPORT
Full story: Telegraph.co.uk

Miracle baby comes back from the dead

by CHRIS BROOKE - More by this author »
Last updated at 22:49pm on 27th February 2007

After trying for 30 minutes to bring two-week-old Woody Lander back to life, doctors decided there was nothing more they could do and called in his parents to say their tearful farewells.

A nurse passed Woody to his heartbroken father and gently pulled a tube from his mouth so they could kiss him goodbye.

It was then that the miracle happened.

The lifeless baby suddenly coughed and moved. Nurses immediately grabbed Woody back, re-attached the tubes and lifesaving equipment and he came back to life in front of his astonished parents.

No one has been able to explain why Woody, who had suffered a massive heart attack, was able to return from the brink. And despite being starved of oxygen for so long, he appears to have suffered no permanent brain damage.

I found this via: DRUDGE REPORT
Full story: DailyMail

Apple, Samsung, Sandisk sued over MP3

Texas MP3 Technologies claims the companies infringed its patent covering 'an MPEG portable sound reproducing system'
By Martyn Williams, IDG News Service
February 26, 2007

The suit, which came to light over the weekend, was filed on Feb. 16 in Marshall, Texas. The eastern Texas city is fast becoming one of the leading locations of patent infringement lawsuits in the U.S. thanks to speedy trials and juries that more often than not find in favor of the plaintiff.

In the complaint Texas MP3 Technologies alleges infringement on U.S. patent 7,065,417, which was awarded in June 2006 to multimedia chip-maker SigmaTel and covers "an MPEG portable sound reproducing system and a method for reproducing sound data compressed using the MPEG method."

I found this via: neowin.net
Full story: InfoWorld

From neowin.net comments:

Posted by MrA on 27 Feb 2007 - 02:09

Quote - (GP007 said @ #2.1)
That's when they finally got it from the patent office, but when did they file for it? With so many patents placed each year alone, it takes forever for them to look over it, this could've been filed years ago, before the MP3 player market took off.

According to google patent search:

Quote -
Patent number: 7065417
Filing date: Jan 29, 2002
Issue date: Jun 20, 2006
Inventors: Kwang-su Moon, Jung-ha Hwang
Assignee: SigmaTel, Inc.
Primary Examiner: Xu Mei
Attorney: Toler Schaffer, LLP

The iPod was released in 2001. The Creative Nomad before then. Both should count as prior art and hence the patent should be void.

Spyware installer hides in Messenger ad banner

Messed on: 16th of February, 2007

The banner itself appears to advertise and link to a download called Free PC-Secure (which is unfamiliar to us) but the real problem is that its appearance automatically launches a Windows dialog box telling you that "Your system is not clean" and asking you if "you want to download System Doctor to improve it." You know, the typical hoax message that tries to download a malicious ActiveX control even though you click "Cancel" in a fruitless attempt to ignore it.

The conclusion here is that a nasty spyware ad seems to have infiltrated into Microsoft's banner advertising network because one of their clients is making use of some html code trickery.

We advise everyone to pay strict attention when they receive such a message window out of the blue. Cancel any initiated downloads and close the pop-ups/browser instances it launches. The animated banner in the screenshot below (showing two random frames) is the cause of the unsolicited Windows prompt. The bottom image shows the deceitful message on the page that is automatically opened no matter your choice in the dialog window.

I found this via: neowin.net
Original source: Mess.be

Britney's New Look Is Bald

SHERMAN OAKS, February 16, 2007 - Britney Spears is back in the U.S., and she's sporting a brand new look.

Spears was photographed at the valley tattoo shop "Body and Soul" in Sherman Oaks, getting a tattoo reportedly of a pair of red and pink lips on her wrist. But the biggest change to the pop singer's style? She shaved her head bald.

Spears could be seen inside the tattoo parlor with her head fully exposed, but as she left the shop she was led by her bodyguard straight to a waiting SUV. Spears had her head covered with a hooded sweatshirt to hide her new noggin.

The sidewalk outside the shop was filled with fans, onlookers and paparazzi. Some fans that were interviewed after Spears departed declared the new look less than flattering.

Source(with video): abc7.com

Off-Duty cop helped end Utah mall rage

By PAUL FOY, Associated Press Writer
Tue Feb 13, 6:43 PM ET

SALT LAKE CITY - An off-duty police officer having an early Valentine's Day dinner with his wife was credited Tuesday with helping stop a rampage in a crowded shopping mall by an 18-year-old gunman who shot five people to death before he was killed by police.

A day after the shooting, investigators struggled to figure out why a trench-coated Sulejmen Talovic opened fire on shoppers with a supremely calm look on his face.

The teenager wanted to "to kill a large number of people" and probably would have killed many more if not for the off-duty officer, Police Chief Chris Burbank said.

... Talovic had a backpack full of ammunition, a shotgun and a .38-caliber pistol, police said. Investigators knew little about Talovic, except than he lived in Salt Lake City with his mother, the police chief said. He was enrolled in numerous city schools before withdrawing in 2004, the school district said.

Talovic's aunt, Ajka Onerovic, emerged briefly from the family's house to say relatives had no idea why the young man attacked so many strangers.

"He was a such a good boy. I don't know what happened," she told Salt Lake City television station KSL.

Source and full story: Yahoo! News

'Miracle' -- teen's heart, stopped for 4 days, beats again

POSTED: 9:39 a.m. EST, February 12, 2007

NEW YORK (AP) -- Daniel Walker was on his final lap jogging in his high school gym class when he collapsed, his flawed heart giving out on him.

More than four days later, his heart at a standstill, kept alive by a bypass machine, it began beating again. The 17-year-old's parents called it divine intervention. His physicians were no less amazed.

"I've been a surgeon for 10 years, and this is probably one of the most incredible things I've ever seen," said Dr. Abeel Mangi, one of Walker's cardiac surgeons at New York-Presbyterian Hospital Columbia.

Walker's father described his son's recovery in spiritual terms. "God turned around, put His hand on my son, and recharged him," said William Walker, 58, a retired sanitation worker.

His son's ordeal began January 19 when he collapsed in gym class. The younger Walker suffered from a rare congenital heart flaw that left his coronary artery pinched, giving him only 10 percent of normal heart capacity. He was shuttled to two hospitals before finding himself at Columbia, waiting for a heart transplant, attached to the bypass machine.

Walker's cardiac surgeons said they could not account for the young man's recovery.

"It's a miracle," Mangi said. "There's really no other way to put it."

Two days after it began to beat on its own, surgeons were able to fix the flaw in Walker's heart, increasing its capacity to 60 percent.

I found this via: ShoutWire
Source: CNN.com

MySpace Tries to Filter Videos for Copyrighted Content

MySpace to filter out both audio and video content
Tuan Nguyen (Blog) - February 13, 2007 5:00 PM

MySpace this week announced that it is experimenting with a video-filtering system that it developed in conjunction with Audible Magic Corp. to block videos that contain copyrighted material. The move comes not too long after YouTube proposed a similar system. MySpace currently has some form of blocking technology already in place which blocks uploading of copyrighted music.

According to representatives from MySpace, the direction the online social networking site is taking with copyright infringement is a serious one. Record labels along with the RIAA and MPAA have gone after many users and websites that host user-uploaded videos. In fact, MySpace faced legal action by Universal Music late last year for allowing users to upload and share music videos.

Source and full story: DailyTech

Google Accused of Helping Pirates

Film studios are going after Google for its alleged aid in film piracy
Marcus Yam (Blog) - February 14, 2007 3:33 PM

Google is coming under fire from big media studios who are accusing the search giant of aiding in film piracy. Setting this headline apart, however, is that the complaints aren’t over YouTube, but rather Google’s advertising.

The Wall Street Journal reports that Brandon Drury and Luke Sample—who ran EasyDownloadCenter.com and TheDownloadPlace.com and are currently being sued by several Hollywood studios—got significant support from Google advertising. The two men said in sworn statements that Google offered them credit as an easy start to advertise on Google's search engine, and that the search company also suggested ad keywords such as "bootleg movie download," "pirated," and "download harry potter movie." According to the report, Google received $809,000 for its advertisements.

I found this via: neowin.net
Full story: DailyTech

PeerGuardian 2.0 Beta 6c released

"PeerGuardian 2 is Phoenix Labs’ premier IP blocker for Windows. PeerGuardian 2 integrates support for multiple lists, list editing, automatic updates, and blocking all of IPv4 (TCP, UDP, ICMP, etc), making it the safest and easiest way to protect your privacy on P2P."

Download: PeerGuardian 2.0 Beta 6c
View: PeerGuardian Homepage
Source: Pheonix Labs Forums