E amusement

A $900 million "adjustment", pointing at several million unsold units sitting in warehouses somewhere, is probably not the way Microsoft hoped to enter the hardware market. Sure, the company had built mice, keyboards, and game consoles before, but the Surface RT was different. It disrupted Microsoft's traditional OEM model with Redmond for the first time building something that is more or less a PC, going head-to-head with devices from its OEM partners. When I reviewed it, Surface RT left me a bit nonplussed. It was not a bad device in the way that the Acer Iconia W3 was a bad device. Surface RT uses high quality materials, feels well-built, and certain aspects of its design—its keyboard covers, both the surprisingly effective Touch Cover, and the just plain good Type Cover; its aesthetics; the integrated kickstand—were smart and thoughtful. But as a complete package, it just didn't make sense. It was a touch-based tablet, but it forced you to use the touch-hostile … [Read more...] about At last, Microsoft is starting to sell Surface RT the right way

The US hasn't had a new Register of Copyrights since 1994, when Marybeth Peters stepped into the job of top US copyright official. So when Peters stepped down at the end of 2010 and a search geared up for her replacement, interest was high. The new head of the Copyright Office would enter the job during a chaotic moment for copyright, facing challenges like P2P file-sharing, rising public interest in fair use, mass copyright lawsuits around the country, and a new set of bills in Congress that attempt to make choke off streaming and P2P piracy. No longer was copyright a sleepy domain for lawyers and a few publishers; it was now at the center of crucial Supreme Court battles over things like term extensions and services like Grokster. On June 1, the Librarian of Congress—who oversees the Copyright Office—selected Maria Pallante as the new Register of Copyrights. Pallante, who had spent five months as the Acting Register after Peters stepped down, has a long history working on … [Read more...] about New Register of Copyrights: “Unfortunately, I start with enforcement”

This weekend marked the 15th anniversary of my first post on ZDNet. To mark the occasion, I went back and immersed myself in the news of the day to see how much the world has changed in the past decade and a half. It was a disorienting trip down memory lane. So many events that would irrevocably change our world were just around the corner.This is what the ZDNet home page looked like that day, courtesy of the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine.In early 2006, George W. Bush was President of the United States. The leading candidates to replace him, according to a Quinnipiac University poll, were former New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani and a freshman Senator from Illinois named Barack Obama. Whatever happened to those guys? tech that changed us The 1970s, from Pong to Apollo The 1980s, from MS-DOS to the first GPS satellite The 1990s, from WorldWideWeb to Google The 2000s, from iPhone to Twitter The 2010s, from Amazon Echo to Pokémon Go One bit of political … [Read more...] about 15 years at ZDNet: What a long, strange trip it’s been

HBO Max has even more to offer than the already-excellent selection of shows in HBO's premium library. A few gems of original content and co-productions with other networks bring fresh stories -- from the glorious I Hate Suzie, to the brilliant weirdness of Search Party. Here are the best of the bunch.Get HBO MaxRead more: The 30 best TV shows to watch on Hulu Raised by Wolves HBO Max Raised by Wolves will satisfy those who want to spend a lot of time (nearly 10 hours) in a world brought to the screen with the help of Ridley Scott. Two androids, Mother and Father, attempt to establish an atheist human colony on a new planet, after a war with a religious order destroys Earth. But they soon discover controlling the beliefs of humans is a tricky task. Directing the first two episodes, as well as pulling the strings as an executive producer, Scott sets up a provocative exploration into AI and religious beliefs. There's blood, big performances and a … [Read more...] about 12 best TV shows to watch on HBO Max

A secret historyGovernment and military secrets can range from terrifying to amusing to downright absurd, but most are nothing short of intriguing. From a secret U.S. Air Force project to build a supersonic flying saucer to a now-famous World War II-era research program that produced the first atomic bombs to a plan to train domesticated cats to spy on the Soviet Union, here are 22 declassified military and CIA secrets.Project 1794In late 2012, the U.S. Air Force declassified a trove of documents, including records of a secret program to build a flying saucer-type aircraft designed to shoot down Soviet bombers. The ambitious program, called Project 1794, was initiated in the 1950s, and a team of engineers was tasked with building a disc-shape vehicle capable of traveling at supersonic speeds at high altitudes.The declassified documents reveal plans for the plane to reach a top speed of Mach 4 (four times the speed of sound), and reach an altitude of 100,000 feet (30,480 meters). The … [Read more...] about Flying saucers to mind control: 22 declassified military & CIA secrets