A scan of an advertisement in the upcoming Official Playstation Magazine seems to indicate that Sony is launching an all-out assault on the XBox Live service with a better service of their own. Sony's online service will include compatibility with the unreleased PS3 and the portable Sony PSP.
Computer And Video Games

Here are some pictures of the gold RAZR offered by Dolce & Gabbana. They are limited to 1,000, so it won't be like the silver or black RAZRs, where you were cool when you had one last year at this time, but by 6 months ago everyone had one, and your's didn't have a decent camera function.
TechEBlog » Dolce

The Motion Picture Association of America, which has fought movie piracy for many years, has admitted that they made unauthorized copies of a movie.

The movie in question is a documentary that is critical of the MPAA's method of rating movies. The MPAA has all but admitted that they accept favors in exchange for more favorable ratings, which can impact a film's gross revenue by tens of millions of dollars.

The MPAA claims they have not harmed the documentary they pirated, titled This Film Is Not Yet Rated, and they have given it a lot of free publicity. They also claim that they did not sell the copies for a profit, so what's the harm? The problem is, for many years they have been suing people who have done exactly what they did: copied movies for their own personal use. Now the MPAA claims no harm is done. Seems a bit hypocritical, doesn't it?
MPAA admits to unauthorized movie copying

This goes in the technology blog, rather than the business blog, because I think it affects the tech world more. Imation, one of my favorite brands of blank DVD-R discs, has bought Memorex, one of my favorite brands of blank DVD-R discs when I don't have a lot of money. Both companies make various tech products, and I consider them both to be mid-range as far as quality goes, with Imation a little better than Memorex in most cases.
Imation Buys Memorex

Here's a great article about fighting back against spammers using some rather unique methods. One strategy actually involves responding to the spam. A site posts the domain that the spammers does their activities from, and users visit the site and fill out the feedback forms using fake information. They try to make the information look real, so that the spammer will not know which names and email addresses are valid and which ones are fake. This poisons the spammers database, making it harder for them to spam effectively.

Spammers usually have very high bandwidth costs, and they need to convert a certain number of emails into sales or they will not be making a profit. This strategy increases the number of emails they have to send for each sale, to the point that it could shut them down and force them to start over with a new user list (which also could be poisoned).
Being A Squirrel Against Spammers

The Department of Justice has asked a federal judge to order Google to hand over data showing millions of searches. The data is not needed for a criminal investigation, but to help the DoJ prove its case that a Child Protection Law is sound.

Basically, the government is asking Google to do its research for free, even if it means Google has to violate its own privacy policy. Other major search engines, including Yahoo and MSN, have already complied with the DoJ request. Everyone already knew they did not care about user privacy, as they had previously helped the Chinese government track down a blogger who had posted items critical of Chinese leadership. That blogger was arrested, and is still behind bars.

Google's refusal of the government request shows that there are still things bigger than the Bush administration, such as American ideals of freedom and rights such as protection from unlawful search and seizure. This request has nothing to do with upholding the law, as the Bush administration just wants the data to help it pass a law that is not currently on the books. There is no reason why Google should be forced to comply with that request. Companies do not have an obligation to support the legislation brought forth by a president or political party. Just because the Republicans are in charge of the White House, Congress, and Supreme Court does not mean that they can ignore the law. People and businesses still have rights in this country, no matter who is in charge.
Bush Administration Demands Search Data; Google Says No, Yahoo

Look for even bigger capacity hard drives in the coming year, especially for notebook computers. A new design allows data to be stored both horizontally and vertically on a hard drive. Old hard drives just store data horizontally. The new technology is already in use in a 160GB notebook hard drive being shipped by Seagate Technology. The previous largest notebook hard drive made by the company was 120GB.
New technology boosts hard drive capacity

Camera maker Nikon will be doing away with film cameras, focusing instead on its future in the digital camera market. As digital cameras have advanced, the need for film cameras has diminished. Digital SLR cameras offer pictures of nearly the same quality as film, and they are advancing in quality every day. Just yesterday I read about a 38 megapixel digital camera. I can't imagine the image quality on that camera being any worse than the highest end film cameras.
NikonUSA

Why not more? I remember using Mavis Beacon to aid my typing skills, and that was about 15 years ago. Why are teachers still reluctant to use video games to help their students gain valuable skills and learn various material? A lack of equipment was cited as one reason why. That does not make much sense to me. That computer I played Mavis Beacon on would be worth about $50 now, including the monitor. Can schools really not afford to spend maybe $400 to outfit several classrooms with a couple old computers apiece? Seems like a lame excuse to me. I think some schools are still afraid of technology. Students are left behind because their teachers are living in the past. The 1950's will not be coming again, so it's best to say good-bye to it now.
Linky Linky

Computer manufacturer Asus has launched a new Lamborghini line of notebooks. The company already has a successful line of Ferrari notebook computers that feature top of the line components and Ferrari red accents on various parts of the computer. Expect the Lamborghini line to have Lamborghini decals and insignias along with Lamborghini black or yellow paint jobs.
Asustek launches Lamborghini notebooks