MacCentral is reporting that Virginia Tech is requiring the 17" Apple PowerBook for students majoring in Art and Art History. The department has required PowerBooks since 1998.

CNET reports that Futuremark has dropped their assertion that nVidia cheated on their latest benchmarks. However, the explanation isn't that compelling.

Apple has released version 1.1 of iSync for immediate download. Includes support for tons of new phones (including the P800, which I've only just recently finished doing a sync program for :-) ). Also included is syncing the bookmarks between multiple macs using .Mac.

This article from Wired raises an interesting question: once you've purchased a copy of a film, what are your rights to watch it? At play is the question of whether ClearPlay, Family Shield Technologies, and Trilogy Studios can produce hardware and software that modifies the playback of movies (legally bought …

According to an article on Wired, Oregon is looking to replace the fuel tax with a tax based on the actual mileage driven by users. I'm sure that the SUV lobby likes this idea, but privacy advocates are up in arms. The process involves using a GPS device in each …

Wired reports that the ESA (European Space Agency) has launched their Mars probe.

The Globe and Mail reports that NAC Geographic Products is pushing to get its idea of a world-wide postal code used for physical addressing. Using an algorithm based on latitude and longitude, the company's product can be used in varying lengths to get a more specific address. 2 characters will …

Pioneer Press is reporting that Trepia has released an IM client that automatically creates a buddy list of strangers with similar interests or in close proximity.

Cybercast News Service reports that Barbara Streisand sued an environmental web site (California Coastal Records Project) for violating her privacy by taking a high-resolution (6Megapixel) photograph of her home on the coast from a helicopter. She wants $50M for this. I'm pretty darn sure I couldn't get $50M for somebody …

The only surprise is that it took so long to happen. The San Jose Mercury News reports that TiVo (maker of the popular video recorder product, and really the only one left in that space, with Microsoft pulling UltimateTV and ReplayTV in bankruptcy) is preparing to sell aggregated customer information …

With the ability to take standard composite or S-Video and turn them into DV signals (4:1:1, 720x480 at 30fps), the latest offerings from ForMac provide Mac users (and to a lesser extent Windows users) with the ability to read and write composite/S-Video while still concentrating on DV …

The latest beta of AOL's client software (as written about in this article from CNET) includes client-side web caching technology licensed from Inktomi (recently acquired by Yahoo!).

The Italian Job (2003) has very little to do with The Italian Job (1969), except for a scheme involving traffic lights and the use of Mini's. The lack of faithfulness in this loose remake, however, doesn't change the fact that it's a fun way to spend a couple of hours …

An article in the New York Post states that Apple and Amazon have been in discussions over using Apple's technology as the basis for Amazon's proposed new music service.

Intel has officially announced that the Centrino chips are only compatible with five particular pieces of VPN software and only then when you turn off the "Adapter Switching" feature of the chipset, Wired reports. If you don't turn that off or you use another piece of software, be prepared for …

BBC News reports this morning that the controversial Three Gorges dam in China has started to take on water. The dam has been controversial since its initial announcement. Upwards of 600,000 people have been forcibly resettled and hundreds of towns will disappear as the world's largest hydroelectric plant and …

Pixar's new hit has broken the record for an animated picture by raking in an outrageous $70.6M in its opening weekend, drowning the rest of the competition (Bruce Almighty is at 35M this week, with The Italian Job opening at 19.3M and The Matrix Reloaded now at 15M …

For those of us who have machines that cannot boot in OS 9, it comes as a relief to hear that Symantec is going to be releasing version 8.0 of Norton Utilities for the Macintosh, which will not only boot under OS X, but also include substantial speed enhancements …

This article from MacCentral reports that Apple used their own software and hardware to power the iTunes Music Store. This isn't a huge surprise, but I find it a little odd that they didn't mention it at the initial roll-out. Apparently the back-end is all Apple hardware and WebObjects 5 …

An interesting article from the land of the rising cellphone, er sun. Japanese newspaper Asahi Shinbun (article in english here) asserts that due to the growing popularity of cellular phones and the commensurate drop in land-line telephone use, a hard line is the best bet in an emergency.