France has signaled to the world and to Apple that it will stand as tough as it always has and therefore will likely Allow Apple to roll through the Streets of Paris with the Apple DRM locked up tight under Apple control.

France has signaled that it will allow the Dadvsi law to go through with a watered down version. France will require iTunes and any other service like it to open up its DRM to rivals, unless they don’t feel like it. If they (Apple) doesn’t feel like it, they will need to provide to France a ‘permission’ slip from the contents right holder.

This might appear and probably will be a victory for Apple given France’s track record, however, Apple won’t be completely out of the woods until both houses of the French parliament approve the surrendered version of the Dadvsi law.

In addition, Norway, Sweden and Denmark (with at least one of those countries having a reputation for being stout) is also threatening to force Apple to succumb to sharing its iTunes format with competitors.

Apple will probably not be satisfied with the French appeasement tactics. Even the new Dadvsi law will require Apple to go back to rights holders and negotiate for the permission to not share their format in France. This will of course cost Apple money, and may also open the door for renegotiations in areas that Apple would prefer to leave alone, especially given their full court press to sew up the rights for digital video content in the form of Movies and TV shows.

France rolls over on iTunes DRM-busting law - Law & Policy - Breaking Business and Technology News at silicon.com

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Several people have been struck by lightning around the world, while talking on their cell phone. A few countries are now recommending that people do not talk on their phones outside during a lightning storm.

This is a bit of an obvious warning, but many people do not appreciate that if lightning strikes them when them while they are holding a metalic object such as a cell phone, that it disrupts the effect known as a flashover. This is a phenomena where the electricity passes around the body and does less damage. However, holding a metalic object or cell phone disrupts the flash over effect and allows all that magnificent energy to target your internal organs.

Not to mention, its unwise to increase your odds of getting struck in the first place by talking on a live radio with an antenna in a lightning storm.

Therefore, unless you want to qualify for this years Darwin Award, be practical and don’t use your phone in a lightning storm . . . Unless you’ve just been struck and are dialing 911, then use some common sense, set the phone down and put it on speaker phone.

Mobile phone users warned of lightning strike risk - Yahoo! News

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Digg.com announced officially yesterday that they will be expanding their services such that users can beging to comment on other news stories besides just technology news.

The service bypasses the middle man known as the ‘editor’ and users step in to submit articles and the rate and comment on the articles. This social network inspired editorial system has made Digg one of the third most popular sources for technology news. The move had been anticipated for sometime now.

Digg to allow users to vote for many types of news - Yahoo! News

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The FCC today made an effective change in their Safe Harbor rules that will result in Service providers having to pay higher fees for their customers calls. This will likely be passed onto consumers, who will likely see an increase in the tax portion of their phone bills.

The FCC will require for the first time that VOIP carriers contribute to the Safe Harbor fund. The carriers must calculate that 64.9% of all VOIP calls are to be considered interstate or international thus requiring a payment into the fund.

Wireless Carriers also received bad news as their Base Calculation rate was increased from 28.5 to 37.1%. This means that the base of wireless or cellular calls will be taxed more. For example, in the past if a user made $100 worth of calls the base established that $28.50 of those calls were likely to be interestate or international and thus subject to the fee. That base is now increased to 37.1% or $37.10 for every $100 in service.

This is the equivalent of increasing a property tax assessment. The rates have not increased just the base that the rates are multiplied against. The FCC states that consumer trends in wireless and in VOIP indicate that more consumers are making long distance calls, which justify this increase.

FCC Adds VOIP to Universal Service Fund

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IBM working with Georgia Tech have successfully clocked processor speeds of 500 gigahertz (GHZ) when the silicon-germanium processor is frozen to absolute zero.

The Same chip can clock in at 350 GHZ at room temperatures, and researchers believe that the technology with additional advances should be able to yield speeds of 1000 GHZ or 1 Terahertz.

While this is more of a laboratory advance, it could have applications in space exploration where temperatures approach absolute zero. It could also be possible to recreate cooling systems that could approach these temperatures for expensive military or modelling applications.

Researchers feel that regardless of the early applications, better understanding will help them find household applications as well.

We’ll keep our eyes peeled here at Maven Mapper’s for future IBM stickers with claims of Cryogenics Inside!

Additional information, see:Technology News: Cutting Edge : IBM, Georgia Tech Deep Freeze for Gigahertz

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