Mozilla posts yet another Firefox 3.5 Release Candidate
Download Mozilla Firefox 3.5 Release Candidate 2 for Windows from Fileforum now.
It was apparent yesterday, after a test of the organization's latest private daily build of the Firefox 3.5 browser, that Mozilla's developers had discovered a jackpot of performance improvements in some specific areas: JavaScript math, RegEx (regular string expression) searches, and general control flow. Betanews tests yesterday gave the Thursday morning build 8% better overall speed in Windows 7 RC, and a better overall performance index score on that platform of 9.35 versus 8.81, relative to the performance of Microsoft Internet Explorer 7 on Windows Vista on the same physical machine.
Up Front: Ballmer says Bing may be worth investing 10% of Microsoft's income
The Bing marketing push has been a short-term success for Microsoft in that it got people to trying out its search engine, including several of the features Windows Live Search actually already had for a year or more and just never tried...because it was Windows Live Search. But in a speech last night, the man at the top of Microsoft presented what looked like a "moral," like at the end of a bedtime story, the message we're all supposed to have learned...as if Bing's success is a fait accompli. Sometimes when Steve Ballmer starts talking like Tom Osborne, you have to start worrying...and not always for Microsoft.
Search mavens: They've just like us!
Everyone but you is being rude with their mobile gadgets
Self-awareness, etiquette and Internet polling probably shouldn't even appear in the same sentence, but now and then they combine for a good laugh. For instance, Intel this week revealed the results of an online poll they commissioned from the pollsters at Harris Interactive, which asked 2,160 US adults about behavior -- theirs and other people's -- on their mobile phones and other devices one uses in public.
The study defined various alleged etiquette breaches ranging from speaking too loudly on phone calls to being rude to cashiers (by chattering during a transaction) and texting in the presence of others. Some so-called faux pas were the sort of thing it's hard to fathom people actually doing (using a laptop in a public restroom, really?).
Tricky AT&T iPhone 3.0 tethering
It didn't take long for crafty users to figure out how to enable tethering on their newly-updated 3.0 iPhones, irrespective of carrier regulations. Apple community MacMegasite posted its own method for tethering, and BenM.at's iPhone Help Center provides not only an iPhone-formatted config site for activating tethering, but also a rudimentary means of activating MMS as well.
Betanews is awaiting comment from AT&T on the subject, which may be forthcoming. In the meantime, check out our tethered iPhone speeds and let us know how yours compare.
Lawsuit against US on IP trade agreement dropped for national security
Opposition to a sweeping trade agreement being negotiated in secret between the United States and at least eleven other countries, plus the European Union, is being voluntarily curtailed after an apparently successful effort by Obama administration officials to prevent parties in a lawsuit against US trade representatives from obtaining any information about that agreement.
It's the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, the existence of which is about the only thing the government will barely acknowledge. A document leaked last year to the community journalism site Wikileaks.org indicated that intellectual property protections were on the agenda, and may have been part of the reason why the treaty was not ratified by July 2008 as previously planned.
Jammie Thomas-Rasset infringed, says jury; fined $80,000 / song
A Minnesota jury has returned its verdict in the Capitol Records vs. Thomas-Rasset retrial, and they found for the plaintiffs. In addition, the group of seven women and five men levied damages of $1,920,000 -- that is, $80,000 for each of the 24 songs admitted into evidence -- against the 32-year-old mother of four.
Early reports from the courtroom indicate that, in the words of Thomas-Rasset lawyer Kiwi Camara, jury members "were angry" and "didn't believe" the defendant, the only witness presented by her legal team. Camara & Sibley took the case on pro bono, and statements indicate that they plan to stick with Ms. Thomas-Rasset and appeal to the Eighth Circuit Court.
EU regulators call for tighter privacy provisions on OpenID, Facebook
The Article 29 Working Party, the same group that fought with Google over its search log data, could take similar action against developers that utilize open identification platforms such as Facebook Connect, Google Friend Connect, and Microsoft Live ID, which use open identification protocols such as OpenID and OAuth.
According to an "unpublished opinion paper" that Financial Times got its hands on, the group believes third-party developers building apps that use data from sites such as Facebook and Twitter should be subject to tougher privacy and data protection regulations.
Safari 4 for Windows slows down after Apple security update
Download Google Chrome 3.0.189.0 Beta for Windows from Fileforum now.
After Apple yesterday released a bug fix update to its Safari 4 Web browser for Mac OS, reportedly to address incompatibility issues between it and certain features in iPhoto '09, the company also issued a new file for the Windows version as well. Though some in the press have been told there wasn't really a difference, and although the new file still installs with the build number 530.17, it wasn't the same file that Apple issued last week.
New Motorola Bluetooth headsets will cancel more outside noise
Quick question: What's cooler, a guy with a Bluetooth headset, or a Secret Service agent? If your answer was "neither," you might want to divert your eyes from Motorola's new Endeavor HX1 bone conduction Bluetooth headset. The not-yet-available Endeavor HX1 is Motorola's first attempt at marketing a Bluetooth headset with a bone conduction microphone in addition to its typical noise-canceling audio microphone.
Naturally, when a person speaks, his vocal chords vibrate and disrupt the air, and those disruptions are registered by a microphone, which converts them into electrical signals. With bone conduction, the microphone is not measuring vibrations in the air, but rather vibrations taking place within the speaker's head. It eliminates the need to pass the vibrations through the air, where they'd be subject to noise interference.
Twitter grows up: Lessons from the Iran experience
It was do or die for Twitter last week. To its credit, it didn't die.
Every promising new technology reaches a point in its life cycle when it either grows up and becomes part of the everyday landscape, or it flames out and becomes a footnote to history.
What Apple will not be delivering on Friday with its iPhone 3G S
If you're an Apple fan, you could also be a ritualistic line-waiter. Cupertino metes out the information, and the rumor mills churn like crazy, causing people to queue up, sometimes completely spontaneously, in hopes of receiving something new and brilliant from the Infinite Loop.
Tomorrow morning, all 211 US Apple Stores and more than 2,200 AT&T corporate stores will begin slinging the new iPhone 3G S to customers eagerly waiting to sink their teeth into a juicy new Apple phone. But if you aren't one of the thousands of pre-order customers, you might want heed the pundits' chants of "evolutionary, not revolutionary," and sleep in your own bed tonight instead of on the sidewalk. Here's why:
Up Front: Should broadband providers offer customers tiered service?
Eric Massa, a freshman congressman from New York's 29th District, introduced a bill yesterday that would keep ISPs -- including those providing mobile service -- from abruptly changing usage rules on accounts or slapping undocumented "we know it when we see it" overage caps on so-called "unlimited" accounts. The Broadband Internet Fairness Act (HR 2902) would require most large ISPs to submit plans to the FTC and undergo hearings if they wishes to institute metering-based plans.
House of Reps examines usage-based caps
Farewell, Centrino...We think we knew ye
Two brands saved Intel from possibly being permanently relegated to also-ran status as an innovator. "Core" is one of them; arguably, the "Core" ideal that thinking smaller can lead to better performance plus power savings, may have saved the company by itself. But there was also Centrino.
And despite that fact, consumers remain confused over the whole question of just what a "Centrino" is. No, mom and dad, it's not the processor...Well, then, what is it, son? The Centrino ideal in 2003 was that a laptop computer manufacturer could base its entire design around a set of chips, most with the Intel brand. The CPU would be at the center of that heap, and six years ago, Pentium M was the CPU Intel had intended, back before Core Microarchitecture revolutionized mobile CPUs -- back then, processor overheating was still a huge issue.
Testimony ends on Day 3 of the Jammie Thomas-RIAA trial
A rogue member of the gallery got cussed out for illicit gadget use, Jammie Thomas-Rasset hit her personal wall, and the jury pondered whether 'tis better to rip than to download as testimony in the RIAA trial of a Minnesota woman concluded on Wednesday.
Jammie Thomas-Rasset was calm and collected on Tuesday. On Wednesday she hit the wall, tearfully recounting the havoc the RIAA has wrought on her life since tapping her originally for a $5,000 payout. (Most citizens contacted with that offer-one-can't-refuse have chosen not to refuse it; Ms. Thomas-Rasset did refuse, and here we are.) She accused Dr. Doug Jacobson, the computer expert who testified Tuesday, of lying (though the jury was instructed to disregard those remarks). She said, again, that she didn't download the music and didn't know who might have, but was steadfast in refusing to pin blame on anyone in particular -- especially her kids.
HADOPI 'three strikes' rule cools its heels after EU parliamentary elections
When last we checked on HADOPI, the French law that would bar citizens from accessing the Net for up to a year after three file-sharing accusations, the French Constitutional Council had ruled the "three strikes" provision unconstitutional, and the Council of Europe had likewise stated that "fundamental rights and Council of Europe standards and values apply to online information and communication services as much as they do to the offline world." Now the Sarkozy administration is working on a new version of the law that addresses the constitutional issues.
If it succeeds in creating something that passes constitutional muster, there's a good change we wouldn't be able to call it HADOPI anymore. That was, or is, the name of the organization that was to administer the program and its three-strikes punishments. In a press release, Minister of Culture Christine Albanel said that the new version would instead put the penalty phase in judges' hands, leaving HADOPI itself to prevent piracy and promote legal downloading.
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