DJMajah writes "News.com.au reports that Australian Federal Police chief Mick Keelty has called for a media blackout on reporting of terrorism investigations and cases before trial in a speech to the Sydney Institute last night. Although he doesn't believe public institutions be immune from public accountability, he goes on to say that public discussion should be delayed until information is made available by the courts or legal proceedings are complete. This all comes after last years widely reported case of Dr. Mohammed Haneef who was detained then later deported from Australia on evidence described as weak — and seen by some including Haneef as a conspiracy."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

With the entertainment industry actively pushing for ISPs to filter unauthorized content, it seems that the discussion is getting wider and wider attention. Rep. Mary Bono (now Mary Bono Mack), who is rather infamous for the last copyright extension efforts, and who believes that fair use is theft, has now stated that it should be the ISP's responsibility to filter out unauthorized content. Thankfully, she hasn't reached the point of making it mandatory, but it's not surprising to hear her say that she supports the concept of ISP filtering. Not to be left out, Cary Sherman of the RIAA chimed in to note that he doesn't think we need new legislation, but that ISPs should voluntarily start filtering content.

While AT&T agrees (for reasons that still don't make any sense), it's nice to see Verizon feels otherwise. Verizon's Tom Tauke says that the company is not interested in becoming copyright police, noting the inevitable privacy questions this would raise: "We don't want to get into the business of inspecting the bits and figuring out what is and is not appropriate traffic." As much as we tend to disagree with Verizon's position on many policy issues, the company has at least a decent (though, certainly not wonderful) record in protecting privacy. Remember, it was Verizon who initially stood up to the RIAA on trying to get information on customers without filing lawsuits.

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Today on Boing Boing tv: Wilderness Information Network, an eco-art installation in the woods of northern New York state. Director Cary Peppermint and the Department of Ecology Art and Technology -- more than 30 artists in all -- contributed to this project using digital technologies, renewable energy, and sound art.

Next, Pour Les Jeunes, a surreal and eco-funky animated short by award-winning motion graphics studio PepperMelon, from Buenos Aires, Argentina. Directed by Martin Dasnoy.

Link to BBtv post with video and discussion.

A 37-year-old Japanese man has been arrested after placing 10,000 calls to directory assistance. He did not need to get phone numbers, rather, he called because he enjoyed having the operators chide him.

He reportedly told police that he was lonely and grew to enjoy annoying the operators.

"I would go into ecstasy when a lady scolded me," he was quoted as saying by Jiji Press.

Telephone operators - who in Japan are almost always women - nicknamed him the "don't-hang-up-man".

His calls usually came late and sometimes exceeded 200 times a night, Jiji Press said.

Link (Via Digg)

This commercial from 1961 features an especially ugly robot named the Great Garloo. It was designed by Marvin Glass, the genius game designer who made Ants in the Pants, Dynamite Shack, Rock 'em Sock 'em Robots, Gnip Gnop, Hands Down, Haunted House, Lite Brite, Odd Ogg, Operation, Mouse Trap, Time Bomb, Tip-It, and Toss Across, among other masterpieces of primary-colored plastic. (Via Endless Parade of Excellence)

Previously on Boing Boing:
• Robot Commando toy TV commercial
• TV commercials for 1970s Planet of the Apes dolls
• Killer reel of 1970s toy commercials
• Mr. Machine toy robot TV commercial
• Wonderfully bizarre Folger's commercial
• Creepy Crawlers TV commercial
• 1960s TV commercial for V-RROOM! tricycle noise-maker
• Early 70s Levi stop-motion commercial
• Mystery Date game TV commercial

Ninety-two-year-old Peter Davey of New Zealand says he invented a unique water boiling gadget 30 years ago. He claims it uses sound waves, not a heating element, to boil water in seconds.

Davey noticed as he played the saxophone at home that everything resonated at a different frequency.

"The glasses will tinkle on one note. Knives and forks in the drawer will tinkle on another note and I realised that everything has its point of vibration," he said. "In the same way, a component in the ball is tuned to a certain frequency."

A retired engineering professor, Arthur Williamson, was invited to look at the boiler in action. He said:

"I don't know enough about sound to know whether you can transfer that amount of energy via soundwaves. I doubt it," said Williamson.

He did remember an alternative kettle years ago that had two perforated metal plates inside. The power ran between the plates, through the water. "The resistance through the water provided the load. I wonder if it isn't working like that? Without taking it to bits, you can't tell."

Someone, please, take it to bits. Link

Following up on a pair (1, 2) of Boing Boing tv episodes in which monochrom explores the posthumous legacy of '80s pop icon Falco, who is memorialized in Austria with honorific stairs, Jacob Appelbaum says:

Some anonymous fans of both Vienna, San Francisco and Falco appear to have taken their love to the stairs. Specifically the Coit Tower stairs! Snip:

"The original Falco staircase (or Falcostiege) in Vienna was dedicated after the Musician's death in 1998. The staircase is quite small and unimpressive. Apparently the city was unable to find a street or bridge named after a dead fascist which could be rededicated. As of this week, San Francsico honors Falco with a plaque on the stairs leading to Coit Tower. At last, a fitting tribute!"

Link. Huh, I wonder who did this!

Previously:

* BBtv: Falco Stairs/Fuji Apple (monochrom)
* BBtv: Bar code artist Scott Blake / Falco stencil memorial (monochrom)

I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "The US Department of Justice has extended its anti-trust oversight of Microsoft by two years. This only applies to the requirement that Microsoft make protocol documentation available to competitors, though. All of the other requirements have expired, and Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly did not give the states complaining the full five years of oversight they requested. Still, this should prove useful given that one of Microsoft's new tricks is to use OOXML extensions to tie businesses to Sharepoint."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

A damaged undersea cable caused internet connectivity links to Egypt, India and several Gulf region countries to be disrupted today. Authorities in Egypt say services may not return to normal for several days:

It was not immediately possible to gauge the impact of the disruption on financial institutions. Egypt's telecoms ministry said 70 percent of the country's Internet network was down and India initially said it had lost over half its bandwidth.

"This cut has affected Internet services in Egypt with a partial disruption of 70 percent of the network nationwide," the Egyptian ministry said in a statement.

Link

Part of the conventional wisdom in having tech companies apply for lots of patents is that they're helpful as a "defensive" mechanism against other companies filing patent lawsuits against you. It's the nuclear stockpiling argument that suggests (without much proof) that the more patents everyone holds, the less likely actual patent litigation will result. That doesn't seem to be happening, though, as we see more and more patent "nuclear wars" happening. For example, Alcatel-Lucent went after Microsoft on a questionable patent concerning MP3 technology. While Alcatel-Lucent initially won that battle to the tune of $1.5 billion, everything's gone down hill since then. First, Microsoft hit back at Alcatel-Lucent, dredging up a bunch of patents it claimed the company was violating. Then, a judge overturned the $1.5 billion ruling. Now, Microsoft's patent attack on Alcatel-Lucent has succeeded, as a judge at the US International Trade Commission (yes, Microsoft is also using the popular loophole in patent law here) has determined that Alcatel-Lucent has infringed, suggesting that its products be barred from the US. While this seems like a silly ruling, it does show how if you're going to play the game of accusing companies of patent infringement, you might get burned yourself.

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1sockchuck writes "Google is pitting foreign governments against one another in a battle for a major new data center in Asia. In the past week, both the prime minister of Malaysia and economic minister of Taiwan have said their countries are leading candidates for the Google project, with Japan, South Korea, India and Vietnam also mentioned as contenders in an 18-nation site selection process. Google typically invests $600 million in each new data center. Tech companies often use multi-site searches as a tool to coax incentives out of local governments, which sweeten their offers to outbid rivals from other regions. Google's Asian initiative appears to be taking this strategy to a new level, coaxing heads of state to invest political capital in their lust for one of Google's mega-datacenters."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Arbitration rulings over domain name disputes sometimes have hard to understand results. Take, for example, the fact that MySpace has now won the right to the MySpace.co.uk domain. The arbitrator found that the domain name was an "abusive registration," despite the fact that the owner had registered it in 1997, six years before MySpace existed. However, by setting up a parked page and putting ads on it, the arbitrator found that the registration was apparently retroactively abusive. This seems open to rather widespread abuse. If you want to own someone else's domain name, all you have to do is build a bigger company based on that name and then point to their parked page and demand they hand it over?

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electricbern writes "Scientists have accidentally discovered how to reverse memory loss by stimulating a specific part of the hypothalamus. Good news for people with Alzheimer's and those that just forgot where he left his car's key."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Pre-PMA 2008: As part of Sigma's bumper lens launch, it has announced what might be the ultimate wildlife lens. Sigma claims the APO 200-500 f.2.8 is the world's first lens to offer an f/2.8 aperture at 500mm focal length. It comes with an "attachment" to give users a handy 400-1000mm f/5.6 option. The lens (which is cosmetically reminiscent of a piece of military hardware) weighs nearly 16kg and uses a dedicated Li-ion battery to provide power for focusing and zooming. It will be available in Sigma, Canon and Nikon mounts.

Pre-PMA 2008: To satisfy photographers who are absolutely terrified of the things they like to photograph, Sigma has introduced the frankly enormous 150-500mm f/5-6.3 zoom. It's packed with Sigma's technological goodies, including Optical Stabilization and Hypersonic autofocus motor and will be available in Sigma, Canon, Nikon, Pentax and Sony mounts.

Pre-PMA 2008: Sigma has announced an optically stabilized 120-400mm f/4.5-5.6 lens. The lens will be available for owners of Sigma, Canon, Nikon, Pentax and Sony DSLRs. A maximum magnification of 1:4.2 also makes it useful for users who want to get a little closer. The DG designation means the lens will work equally happily on 35mm or APS format SLRs.

Pre-PMA 2008: Four Thirds users far and wide will appreciate the wide angle and telephoto zooms today announced by Sigma. The company's popular 10-20mm F4-5.6 and 70-200 F2.8 lenses have been converted to fit Leica, Panasonic and Olympus DSLRs. Both lenses include Sigma's HSM hypersonic focusing motors. More information follows...

Pre-PMA 2008: Sigma has announced the launch of 70-200mm and 50-150mm constant f/2.8 lenses for Pentax and Sony owners wanting lovely bright, sensibly-priced telephoto zooms. Both are part of Sigma's premium EX range and include hypersonic focusing motors and apochromatic design.