Web tool 'as important as Google'

A web tool that "could be as important as Google", according to some experts, has been shown off to the public. Wolfram Alpha is the brainchild of British-born physicist Stephen Wolfram. The free program aims to answer questions directly, rather than display web pages in response to a query like a search engine. The "computational knowledge engine", as the technology is known, will be available to the public from the middle of May this year. "Our goal is to make expert knowledge accessible to anyone, anywhere, anytime," said Dr Wolfram at the demonstration at Harvard University's Berkman Center for Internet and Society. The tool computes many of the answers "on the fly" by grabbing raw data from public and licensed databases, along with live feeds such as share prices and weather information. People can use the system to look up simple facts - such as the height of Mount Everest - or crunch several data sets together to produce new results, such as a country's GDP. Other functions solve complex mathematical equations, plot scientific figures or chart natural events. "Like interacting with an expert, it will understand what you're talking about, do the computation, and then present you with the results," said Dr Wolfram.

Source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8026331.stm

Pirate Bay IP Addresses Assigned to Prosecution Lawyers

The Pirate Bay recently got a new range of IPs and to everyone’s surprise they are now linked to several movie and music industry lawyers involved in the TPB trial. According to the Pirate Bay’s Wikipedia entry the change was due to a hostile takeover, but most people know better. RIPE is the Internet registry that keeps track of all IP-addresses allocated in Europe. When the Pirate Bay got a new range of IP-addresses this week, something odd happened. Aside from the usual TPB ASCII art there was some unusual information added to the RIPE database. According to the recently updated RIPE database entry, the Pirate Bay is now listed as a customer of Danowsky & Partner law firm (who represented IFPI), Maqs Law Firm (representing the MPAA) and the Swedish anti-piracy bureau. All three were involved in the recent trial, which led some to believe that they somehow gained control over the site. This is nonsense of course. So why is this info in there, some might wonder. One explanation might be that during the Pirate Bay trial the prosecution used (incorrect) data from the RIPE database claiming that this was the absolute truth. The Pirate Bay team probably put the lawyers’ info in there themselves to show that this is not the case. Indeed, there is no doubt that they will have a hard time selling this ‘truth’ to the public now, with their own names being featured in the recent entry.

Source: http://torrentfreak.com/pirate-bay-ips-assigned-to-prosecution-lawyers-090426/

Austin Bandwidth Hog Claims Time Warner Cut Him Off

Time Warner Cable may have publicly backed off of metered broadband, but a subscriber in Austin claims his Time Warner broadband service was cut off earlier this week, without warning, because he downloaded 44 gigabytes of data over a one-week period (hat tip Stopthecap.org). A Time Warner Cable spokesman did not return calls or emails seeking comment. Ryan Howard, a 25-year-old computer science major at the University of Texas at Austin, tells us that Time Warner Cable cut off his broadband service this past Tuesday. Howard says that when he got through to Time Warner to ask what had happened to his connection, he was transferred to several people before finally being put through to a rep in the company’s security and abuse division who told him that his use over the prior week had been “excessive.” According to Howard, the rep informed him that he had downloaded 44 GB of data during that time, and that he needed to cut his usage by one-fourth or even one-third. His service was subsequently reconnected Wednesday evening. Howard says he guesses he downloaded so much because he uses his broadband connection in lieu of subscribing to cable TV, and because he also downloaded (illegal) audiobook copies of the entire “Wheel of Time” series by Robert Jordan, on BitTorrent, which clocked in at about 16 GB. As for the impact of video files, Howard estimates he spends about 20 hours a week watching TV via his web connection on Hulu and most recently though MLB.com, which streams HD versions of the games to subscribers. Such video streams can add up quickly under GB caps. When asked how he plans to cut his usage, Howard said, “I guess I’ll stick to downloading legal content.”

Source: http://www.salon.com/tech/giga_om/tech_insider/2009/04/24/austin_bandwidth_hog_claims_time_warner_cable_cut_him_off/index.html?source=rss&aim=/tech/giga_om/tech_insider