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The fuss over Pluto's planethood started a few years ago when astronomers began to discover large, icy bodies in the outer solar system, some of them not much smaller than Pluto. Then in 2005 came the killer: the object designated 2003 UB313, popularly known as Xena, is 2400 kilometres across, making it slightly bigger than Pluto. Should it be called the tenth planet? If so, how many more planets might there be? Nobody had a clear definition of the term.

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Petrol Ofisi, one of the leading oil companies in Turkey, has said it will include in its diesel fuel an additive from British nanotechnology specialist Oxonica that helps increase gas mileage by 5 percent to 10 percent and cut down nitrogen-based emissions. The change to fuel consumption also helps reduce carbon dioxide emissions. A tour bus company in Britain and another group in the Philippines already incorporate Oxonica's Envirox fuel additive into its diesel fuel. The additive, based on cerium oxide (a powder often used for polishing glass lenses), makes the combustion process more efficient.

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Today, the Swedish Pirate Party launched a new Internet service that lets anybody send and receive files and information over the Internet without fear of being monitored or logged. In technical terms, such a network is called a "darknet". The service allows people to use an untraceable address in the darknet, where they cannot be personally identified. "There are many legitimate reasons to want to be completely anonymous on the Internet," says Rickard Falkvinge, chairman of the Pirate Party. "If the government can check everything each citizen does, nobody can keep the government in check. The right to exchange information in private is fundamental to the democratic society. Without a safe and convenient way of accessing the Internet anonymously, this right is rendered null and void."

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Another significant change with Rev F Opteron is a faster version of the Double Data Rate memory technology called DDR2. With Woodcrest models of Xeon, Intel already moved to DDR2's sequel, FB-DIMM (fully buffered dual inline memory modules), which is based on DDR2 today but provides more capacity. AMD argues that FB-DIMM right now is merely more expensive and power-hungry, but the company will move to the technology later.

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The battery packs were included in some models of Round Rock, Texas-based Dell's Latitude, Inspiron, XPS and precision mobile workstation notebooks. Dell launched a Web site, http://www.dellbatteryprogram.com , that described the affected models. Williams said the Web site would tell consumers how to get free replacement batteries from Dell. Rick Clancy, a Sony spokesman, said the companies have studied problems with the battery packs intensely for more than a month, after getting reports of about a half-dozen fires or smoking laptops in the United States.

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With Zimbra Collaboration Suite 4.0, the San Mateo, Calif., company is seeking to expand its product beyond e-mail and calendaring into shared Web documents, or wikis. For "ad hoc collaborations" in a small group, users can share Web documents with people in their e-mail address book. Or documents can be shared and authored by people in company-defined groups, Dietzen said. Zimbra has embraced AJAX-style Web development extensively in an effort to combine the benefits of Web-based software, such as mobile clients and mashups, with the look and feel of traditional desktop software.

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The details of the new tech are as follows: XNA Game Studio Express will be available for free to anyone with a Windows XP-based PC, and will provide them with what's described as "Microsoft's next-generation platform for game development." In addition, by joining a "creators club" for an annual subscription fee of $99, users will be able to build, test and share their games on Xbox 360, as well as access a wealth of materials to help speed the game development progress.

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This is an important case. While it may appear to many as just one woman defending herself against several large corporate copyright plaintiffs, as the court is undoubtedly aware, this lawsuit is but one battle in the broader war the RIAA is waging against unauthorized internet copying. As a result of this war, the RIAA has wrought havoc on the lives of many innocent Americans who, like Deborah Foster, have been wrongfully prosecuted for illegal acts they did not commit for over a year despite their clear innocence and persistent denials. Using questionable methods and suspect evidence, the RIAA has targeted thousands of ordinary people around the country, including grandmothers, grandfathers, single mothers, and teenagers. In its broad dragnet of litigation, the RIAA has knowingly entangled the innocent along with the guilty, dragging them through an expensive and emotionally draining process of trying to clear their names. In deciding whether or not to grant defendant Deborah Foster's Motion For Attorneys Fees, the court should consider the broader context of the RIAA lawsuit campaign - especially the positive effect that a fee award would have on encouraging the RIAA to be more diligent in conducting its pre-suit investigations, more prompt in dismissing suits when a defendant asserts substantial claims of innocence or mistaken identity, and more responsible in asserting its legal theories. Moreover, a fee award would encourage innocent accused infringers to stand up and fight back against bogus RIAA claims, deter the RIAA from continuing to prosecute meritless suits that harass defendants it knows or reasonably should know are innocent, and further the purposes of the Copyright Act by reaffirming the appropriate limits of a copyright owner's exclusive rights.

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This release represents the start of a long term effort by Intel to work with the X.org and Mesa communities to continuously improve and enhance the drivers. While these drivers represent significant work at both Tungsten Graphics and Intel, as our first release of this code, they're still in need of significant testing, tuning and bug fixing before they'll be ready for production use. We're releasing them now to demonstrate our ongoing commitment to providing free software drivers for Intel hardware.

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Microsoft worked with the Department of Homeland Security on the alert, a company representative said. "Microsoft...encourages customers to deploy this update on their systems as soon as possible, given that we are aware of targeted exploitation of the vulnerability," the representative said. Microsoft deems the vulnerability critical for all versions of Windows. However, users of Windows XP with Service Pack 2 and Windows Server 2003 with Service Pack 1 should be protected by the Windows Firewall if they do not use file sharing and printer sharing, Christopher Budd, a security program manager at Microsoft, said in an interview Tuesday.

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The affected five kilometre stretch of pipeline carries oil from BP's Prudhoe Bay oilfield in Alaska to the Trans-Alaska Pipeline, which connects all of Alaska's oilfields to seaports. On Sunday, BP announced plans to begin shutting down its 400,000-barrel-a-day Prudhoe operations while it replaces 25 kilometres of suspect piping. BP officials say the best guess so far is that bacteria colonised part of the pipe and corroded the metal. A similar problem probably led to a 750,000-litre oil spill in another part of BP's Alaska pipeline in March 2006.

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Satellite providers DirecTV and EchoStar are teaming up under the name Wireless DBS to put down $972.5 million in bids for spectrum. Cable operators Comcast, Cox Communications and Time Warner have joined forces with Sprint Nextel to form a group called SpectrumCo that is bidding $637.7 million for licenses. Cingular Wireless and Verizon Wireless, which already have plenty of spectrum, have also made separate deposits to bid on the spectrum, according to public documents filed with the FCC. These companies are likely bidding to ensure that others don't get the spectrum too cheaply, some analysts say.

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Erickson also said that as Apple completed its transition to Intel-based Macs, the Mac BU had made progress in gradually moving to the new platform and in providing Mac customers with solutions to meet their needs. Tens of millions of lines of Office code have been transitioned to Xcode on the road to a Universal version of Office for Mac, while free, downloadable converters will also be provided to allow users of current versions of Office for Mac to read the new Microsoft Office Open XML formats following the availability of Office for Windows, he said.

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While Leopard's spots are not all known, Microsoft has been very public about what is coming with Vista, and the software has been in public testing for some time. Chief among the new features are improved desktop search, a new graphics subsystem, and improved security and mobility features. Even though Apple is largely on track with Leopard's timing, some analysts noted that the company could have scored an even bigger coup had it had the revamp ready in time to include on Macs for this year's holiday shopping season.

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From October, MySpace users will be able to use Google to search for groups and friends through the site. Google will also provide text-based adverts triggered by keywords found on the websites. The deal ends speculation about which search engine would serve MySpace. Yahoo and MSN were also reported to have been in the running.

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Called the Patent Reform Act of 2006, the measure followed two years of hearings, meetings and debate, the senators said. It bears a number of similarities to a bill offered last summer by Texas Republican Lamar Smith in the House of Representatives. Specifically, it would shift to a "first to file" method of awarding patents, which is already used in most foreign countries, instead of the existing "first to invent" standard, which has been criticized as complicated to prove. Such a change has already earned backing from Jon Dudas, chief of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

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The team used light, velocity, and temperature measurements to calculate the true luminosity of the two stars, which eclipse one another every five days. By comparing this intrinsic luminosity to their observed brightness, the team calculated that the galaxy lies 3.14 million light years away from us. Surprisingly, this is about half a million light years farther than previously thought. Measuring astronomical distances is not simple. Distant, bright objects, for example, can look the same as closer, dim ones. So astronomers have built a ladder-like system that starts by using several independent methods to accurately determine the distance to nearby objects. They then use these measurements to define a more distant cosmic yardstick, and so on.

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Verizon's fuel cells use natural gas piped in from a local gas company to obtain the hydrogen atoms for the chemical process. The natural gas is not burned. Instead, the hydrogen atoms are detached from the gas as it is fed into each of the seven cells, and then combined with oxygen atoms from the air to generate direct current electrical power. Heat and water are then vented from each cell, and direct current is converted to alternating current electricity for use in the building.

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Now, here's an interesting question that looks back 25 years: What if IBM demands an exclusive license to that operating system? One of two things happens: Microsoft and IBM don't get a deal done, or Microsoft caves. Let's follow both scenarios as far as they can go:

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France's main opposition party, the Parti Socialiste, has promised that, should it be elected in 2007, it will revise the law, after consulting with artists, consumers, businesses and Internet service providers. "The law is unworkable, and its problems are growing," said Anne Hidalgo, the party's national secretary for culture and the media.

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More than 70 percent of 2007-model cars in the United States will offer a way to link up the iPod with car stereos under the agreements, Apple said. GM will offer iPod connections on all 56 of its models, representing millions of cars and trucks, Apple said. Mazda's global 2007 lineup of cars and sports utility vehicles will offer an iPod feature as well. The iPod car feature will allow drivers to charge the digital music player and store it in a glove compartment as they listen to its songs. It will also allow listeners to use car stereo controls to select music on the iPod device.

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The video shows Ellch and Maynor targeting a specific security flaw in the Macbook's wireless "device driver," the software that allows the internal wireless card to communicate with the underlying OS X operating system. While those device driver flaws are particular to the Macbook -- and presently not publicly disclosed -- Maynor said the two have found at least two similar flaws in device drivers for wireless cards either designed for or embedded in machines running the Windows OS. Still, the presenters said they ultimately decided to run the demo against a Mac due to what Maynor called the "Mac user base aura of smugness on security."

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Intel, fresh off the launch of its Core 2 Duo chips, has announced plans to accelerate the introduction of a quad-core processor called Kentsfield, now expected in the fourth quarter. Not to be outdone, AMD later this year will release a product called "4x4," which is two AMD processors connected together on a high-end motherboard. Both chipmakers' products will run hotter than the current processors, although it's unclear how much of a gap will exist. Intel hasn't released thermal specifications for Kentsfield yet, said Intel spokesman George Alfs. However, Kentsfield is essentially two Core 2 Duo processors bolted together onto a chip, so its thermal profile will certainly be higher than a single Core 2 Duo processor.

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The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) revealed its ambition to an international conference in Tokyo this week but has not yet been allotted the budget for the ambitious project. JAXA hopes to launch a satellite into lunar orbit in 2007, followed by uncrewed spacecraft that will land on the Moon and collect lunar rock samples. Under the plan, astronauts will be sent to the Moon around 2020 to start construction of the base that will be completed by 2030, the agency said. Japan had earlier given 2025 as the target date for a lunar base.

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The bulk of the Mac OS X flaws affect both the client and server versions of the operating system. Attackers could exploit several of the vulnerabilities, specifically those related to image processing and file compression, by crafting malicious files and tricking people into opening them, Apple said. This attack method is seen often on computers that run Microsoft's Windows operating system. Other flaws could expose user data, let a malicious user gain elevated privileges on a system running Mac OS X, or cause a crash, Apple said.

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In accordance with these and other objects, provided is a system for providing to a community of users access to a plurality of online courses, comprising a plurality of user computers and a server computer in communication with each of the user computers over a network. Each user computer is associated with a user of the system having predefined characteristics indicative of a predetermined role in the system. Each role provides a level of access to data files associated with a course, and a level of control over data files associated with a course. The server computer has means for storing data files associated with a course, means for assigning a level of access to each file, wherein the level of access is associated with the ability of a user to access the file, means for determining an access level of a user requesting access to a file, and means for allowing access to a file associated with a course as a function of the access level of the user.

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AMD on Monday said it increased its share of the x86 server processor market to 25.9 percent, a number confirmed by Mercury Research's Dean McCarron, who tracks market share figures. Intel now holds 72.9 percent of the overall market for x86 processors, while AMD has 21.6 percent. Intel's share decreased from 82.2 percent in the second quarter of 2005, while AMD's increased from 16.2 percent over the same period.

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The discussion went on for almost two hours and didn't often stray from concerns about fair and personal use, privacy and rights protection for digital content. The criticism of Sony and its industry was fierce, considering the audience consisted of computer graphics industry professionals, who themselves benefit from the protections of copyright laws. There was one source of consumer irritation, however, that Singer did not even try to defend. "Why, when I buy a DVD, am I forced to watch commercials?" an audience member asked. "I know. I agree. I'm with you there," Singer said, laughing.