The Chinese government realized one of its old dreams today as the “real-name” system went into effect for cellphone users. Home to many of the largest markets in the world, China has implemented a real-ID system for its cellphone users. Representatives from China Unicom Limited., China Telecom, and China Mobile Limited announced a new adopted measure that will require China’s 810 million plus mobile phone users to register by name with SIM (Subscriber Identity Module) cards when setting up new accounts.
Officials from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology emphasized the need for a real-name system because most Chinese mobile phone users are shadowed in anonymity which can cause unneeded material to surface for users and “telecom fraud”. Human rights activists, however, see this new system in a different light: The government is becoming ever more rigid in face of technological advances, including the introduction of the modern cellphone, that have helped crack China’s strict censorship.
Mobile blogging, texting, and calling have started an increasing trend in public awareness of internal problems and history including certain data that the Chinese government would prefer to keep in the dark. This real-name system would allow the Chinese government to carefully observe general movements of registered individuals. Registered individuals also risk having their private text messages leaked to government workers. However, activists are still puzzled over how the Chinese government would exactly enforce this new system onto today’s and tomorrow’s cell phone users while maintaining the telecom companies’ policies of “consumer privacy”.
China Telecom stated that it expected all of its customers would adopt this system within three years. This real-name registration system not only affects Chinese citizens but it also demands that foreign travelers who register accounts in China must register with their real information while brandishing evidence of identification such as a passport.
Public reactions to today’s declaration were mixed. Some supported the real-name policy while the majority showed hesitation at this new rule. China Telecom and the companies involved say they “expected” such hesitation and stressed that this policy “would not take effect” in just a day.
Some analysts predict illegal sales of SIM cards will rise due to this system as street vendors and regular stores close down their SIM card sales. Although not much detail was revealed in the case a user does not comply with the system when creating a new phone account, it was heavily implied that legal action would strike against those who resisted the real-name system.
As China sets up this new policy, it is currently striving to adopt another real-name registration system for the Internet which is also plagued with troublesome anonymity orginating from PC cafes and private homes.
As Microsoft goes on a banning spree against the miscreants responsible for leaking Halo: Reach on the web, the company is keeping a jolly face on for its potential Halo: Reach consumers. After hackers pirated the full version of the game from Xbox Live, reports have estimated that the number of illegally owned Halo: Reach copies has increased over 450.
While this is not the first time a ”Halo” game has leaked, Microsoft is especially furious this time because not only has the leak “ruined it for the millions of other Xbox 360 gamers” but also because the marketing campaign for Halo: Reach is the biggest and most expensive ever to be launched for a Xbox 360 game.
Microsoft stated it had an obligation to “combat piracy and support safer and more secure gameplay” for the Xbox Live community. Roughly outlining Microsoft’s policy against pirating and ‘modding’, representatives warned those who played pirated games would face a permanent ban from Xbox Live and the revoking of their warranties; a pricey cost for victims afflicted by the Red Ring of Death.
Supposedly a screenshot of the pirated full version of Halo Reach.
To be exclusively released for the Xbox 360 video game console this September 14th, Halo: Reach has been anticipated and impatiently awaited for by hundreds of thousands of gamers and fans judging by multiple forums and online communities.
The wound of anticipation was made worse by the salt piles of teaser videos and promotional events. The promotion of Halo: Reach came in numerous forms including RememberReach and impressive ‘live-action’ videos. Market analysts estimate Halo: Reach will sell several times the amount of copies bought during the week Halo 3 was released which was approximately 8 million.
Oh, also… As promised, a long-awaited promotional video for Reach (below) was released today.
“Like has been acquired by Google.” wrote Munjal Shah, CEO of Like.com. Google, instead of browsing through the visual search engine to buy an accessory or something of the like, has bought the search engine itself. The announcement written by Shah of the acquisition was stamped on the homepage of Like.
Like.com is still a startup that has been praised in the past (offering visitors a more convenient search tool by using visuals instead of key words or phrases like Google) and, according to rumors, caught the eye of Google before acquisition talks were ever planned. With pride, Shah wrote down a brief summary of Like’s novel achievements:
Since 2006, Like.com has been moving the frontiers of eCommerce forward one step at a time. We were the first to bring visual search to shopping, the first to build an automated cross-matching system for clothing, and more. We didn’t stop there, and don’t have plans to stop now…
Like.com allows a visitor to search products such as watches and bags through Visual Searching (Detail Searching, Color Matching, Shape Matching, Pattern Matching). Commenting on Google’s acquisition of Like.com, Shah declared that Like “see joining Google as a way to supersize our vision ad supercharge our passion.” He added that it was “something we re truly excited about”.
What Shah didn’t mention was the amount of money Google purchased Like with among other details. As part of its expansion into the markets some speculate Google offered more than $110 million for the visual search engine.
Robonaut, or Robonaut 2, is scheduled to be shot into orbit encased in a special case called the SLEEPR (Structural Launch Enclosure to Effectively-Protect Robonaut) from the Kennedy Space Center making it the first robotic astronaut to work in space. R2′s destination is the International Space Station where the crew will unpack it and set it to work. Originally conceived during the 1990′s in the Johnson Space Center, the Robonaut series is to work as the human astronauts’ companions on formidable tasks in space meant for ‘human hands’ and human dexterity but not for human bodies.
Built from a partnership between NASA and General Motors, the humanoid R2, in contrast to the machinery that is meant for more simple tasks like the Mars rovers, is a highly dexterous, multifunctional humanoid robot (but legless) that can handle “a wide range of EVA tools and interfaces” according to NASA.
Just over 300 pounds, (over 136 kilograms) Robonaut 2 possesses hundreds of unique sensors in its fingers, hands, and elsewhere. According to NASA, R2 also contains the latest elastic joint technology, extended finger and thumb travel, mini 6-axis load cells, ultra-high speed joint controllers, a high resolution camera, and a few information retrieval systems. The R2 has more than 16 degrees of freedom in its neck, arms, hands, and fingers.
Robonaut 2 tweeting on Twitter. (NASA)
Simply put, the R2 is much more advanced and “compact” than the R1A and the R1B. In fact, the R2 is so advanced it can tweet on Twitter of its experiences on Earth and in space.
While the R2 is programmed for specific tasks in orbit, it can also tackle other tasks such as “changing out an air filter” without its design being modified.
Due to launch on the first of November, R2 will be stored in the space shuttle Discovery‘s payload along with other precious cargo such as the PMM (pressurized multipurpose module). The R2 can do many things but it can’t swallow most of the trash on the International Space Station. During its stay on the International Space Station, R2 will be tested for its ability to work in a zero-gravity environment and overall working efficiency.
Yesterday Google announced that it would close down the nearly year-old Google Wave because Wave “didn’t meet” the company’s expectations. The real-time communication and collaboration platform that had become a hype for many online back in the autumn of 2009 will be maintained until the end of 2010. Google Wave is basically a glossy tool with the elements of e-mail, Google Docs, social networking (like IRC), wiki, and other things incorporated into it.
I was lucky to get an invitation by Google Wave to beta-test it after I applied for an account amid the huge excitement that made people scurry for invitations.
I quite liked it, Google Wave is quite a useful and creative tool to use in some projects even though I encountered a few troubles with its interface, and moreover I will miss Doctor Wave. Google’s senior VP Urs Hölzle stated, “Wave has not seen the user adoption we would have liked”. So, Google doesn’t “plan to continue developing Wave as a standalone product.”
The good news for those who haven’t tried out Google Wave yet will be delighted to see Google “extend the technology for use in other Google projects”.
Many have lamented that Google Wave was too sophisticated for the average online surfer and to emphasize this Steven Walling of BetaNews remarked, “it quickly became obvious that this was a product by engineers, for engineers”.
Furthermore, some who have been using Google Wave quickly pointed out that they didn’t know “anyone else besides friends” or family who were using Google Wave which is probably why Google Wave didn’t get that expected user adoption.
Analysts speculate that the death of Google Wave will actually help Google in coming out with an actual “standalone” product.Google’s Eric Schmidt told CNet that Google “celebrate our failures. This is a company where it is absolutely ok to try something that is very hard, have it not be successful, take the learning and apply it to something new”.
Unfortunately, Google Buzz isn’t one of the failures.
Amid the news of the latest Facebook ”privacy leak” and the chatter about the iPhone, the worn-out story of search engine giant Google against the Internet tyranny of the Chinese government has resurfaced just after Google and China supposedly made peace more than 2 weeks ago.
It all started when hackers from the Chinese government assumedly tapped into Google’s and other firms’ databases trying to retrieve personal information about Chinese human rights activists primarily from Gmail. Obviously miffed, Google made sure China got the corporation’s message: Loosen up or we’re moving out. Of course, the message carried a heavy consequence for the corporation as moving out would cut off Google’s multi-million annual income in the Chinese market and probably have most of its share in the largest potential market given to Baidu, a Chinese search engine used by the majority of Chinese users.
Google then threatened it would uncensor its search results which was going against Chinese policy for search engine businesses. Google indeed uncensored its Chinese site by redirecting its visitors to Google’s Hong Kong site which is uncensored. This move led to Google ‘withdrawal’ from mainland China; a tense standoff between China and Google followed.
China then hinted that Google may lose its ICP (Internet Content Provider) license which made Google frantically look for a hole in China’s rules that would allow them to stay in China while providing unrestrained services.
And luckily for Google, it did.
The proposal was simple: Google would set up a landing page on its Chinese site providing its mainland Chinese users a link to the uncensored Hong Kong Google which was, unbelievingly, legal and fair in China’s terms. China agreed and renewed Google’s ICP license thereby defusing the dispute.
A few of Google’s services in China were mostly blocked starting last Friday up to today including Web Search, Web Search Suggest, YouTube, Sites, Ads, Blogger, Picasa, and Mobile. Features like Images, Google News, Docs, and Groups are being partially blocked. Gmail, ironically, seems to be the only thing not completely blocked to users in mainland China. Google Inc. stated that Beijing users can access Google and is now investigating if it’s a ”technical glitch”.
***UPDATE***
Google announced that its services are now running normally in China again. Google admitte that it may have exaggerated its report “slightly”.
In a degree of unexpected shock to people like Romulation shutting down its Nintendo DS downloads, visitors and users of One Manga were shocked by almost a similar announcement: that scanlated manga will no longer appear on the site. If people visit OneManga.com, they will be greeted by a pop-up titled “There is an end to everything, to good things as well” that announces this week will be “the last week of manga reading”. Announced by Zabi, the notice goes on to say “manga publishers have their stance on manga scanlations and made it clear they no longer approve of it.” One Manga is ranked #935 on the Internet’s 1,000 most visited websites gathering in nearly 4 million users each month.
On the One Manga forums, members expressed disbelief at the news. Many railed against the manga publishers’ “greed” and reasoned that scanlations could not possibly have a huge effect on profits in manga sales especially when “most of the manga” aren’t in the least popular “over there [Japan]“. “Sorta feel like a piece of my heart has been ripped out. . . . I don’t want some other manga site. I want OM. OM was in all ways the best, about everything” posted a member, eightdollarwater.
“Oh well, it was good run” stated a forlorn member. However, members began to support each other and tried to be optimistic. “These guys might be able to shut this site but I am sure new ones will come up to provide us scantilations, just keep looking guys…we still get pirated music don’t we?” encouraged another member, Indian_Shinagame.
Zabi's Message.
Japanese companies have lately started to take a firm stand against piracy in games, mangas, movies, and television shows. With the help of foreign assistance in countries where the pirate servers are located in, the Japanese companies in all cases “request” to have its licensed contents removed.
One Manga decided to remove both licensed and unlicensed content from its website. One Manga and other scanlation sites encourage their members to buy the actual copies of the manga which usually provides a few people a reason to keep working in a gray area even though the practice of scanlating is illegal.
One Manga and other such sites are hosts to teams of scanlators putting their “finished product” of English-translated manga on the websites allowing millions on the Internet to view manga without buying the comics. Popular series such as Naruto, One Piece, and Bleach are among the manga available. OneManga visiters usually wait a week or so for a new chapter of the manga series they read unless the artist of the manga declares a hiatus.
Teams of manga providers work very hard to get a well-done English-translated series or chapters of manga out in the Internet. Renowned teams of manga providers are Sleepy Fans, FrankyHouse, and IEatManga.
Teams are usually made up of:
Raw providers – Individuals who provide raw copies of manga chapters by scanning and storing them on their computers. Providers send the scans to the translator(s) of the team.
Translators - Individuals who can translate Japanese (Korean in some cases) to English and insert the translation into the manga chapters.
A small part of the Manga List that contains many manga series from #, A - Z
Cleaners/Moppers – After the translator inserts the translation, cleaners or “moppers” clean up any mess the translation has left behind.
Editors - Individuals who can “clean” the manga up after the above members finish their job.
The One Manga team and many members have decided to continue using the forums of One Manga as “OMF has developed into a great community and it would be a shame to see that dissapear”. Zabi thanked every OneManga member and visiter “for unwavering support over the years” and has hinted that the team has “some ideas we would like to try out.”
Meanwhile, other manga scanlation sites have been declining at the requests of Japanese publishers. A few sites remain untouched by the Japanese publishing companies such as MangaStream which has only a few manga series available on its site in contrast to One Manga.
After the Nintendo DS came out, something delightful for those who owned the DS and very nightmarish for those who developed games for the DS emerged. Formally known as a Nintendo DS storage device, the R4 Revolution DS Card, or simply known as the ‘R4′ allowed millions of gamers worldwide to go to websites such as RomUlation to illegally download the newest games. The chip is set up in a way that pretty much anyone can download games, music, and even videos to play, listen to, and watch on the Nintendo DS.
The R4 and other forms of the DS storage devices wreaked havoc on game sales particularly for Nintendo’s DS games. Games like the newest version of Pokemon, Mario, Zelda and other ‘hot’ games were readily available after a couple of days after their release on the Internet. “It’s a blatant exploitation of our work and the money that goes into all this”, scorned a representative of Nintendo. All the downloads worked perfectly, there were no restrictions nor exact punishments for those who pirated the games. Connect the chip to the computer via printer or other device, download, open, move the files, pull out the chip, return it into the slot located back in the DS, and play. Simple.
The only cost to the DS owner is the chip itself for as low as $12, which obviously does not equal to a sum of perhaps $60 for several DS games. Of course, the ‘paradise’ for Nintendo DS owners slowly faded away.
Nintendo, Square Enix, Capcom, and other game companies started to crusade against these storage devices starting in Japan. In an almost, easy legal ‘battle’, Japanese courts in 2008 ruled that the R4 chip and similar devices were illegal in the nation of Japan which quickly clamped down on the quiet, back-alleyway sales of these chips in the Japanese gaming market.
However, these game companies couldn’t take the law to the world where approximately more than 90 million owned a DS, DSL, or DSi. Around late 2009, regular visitors to downloading sites such as RomUlation were surprised to discover that their downloaded games suddenly “froze”, “gave an error”, “didn’t work” past a certain point in the game, or simply didn’t work at all. It was to the dismay of many who relied on downloading games to play them, that Nintendo and other game developers put in anti-piracy into the games, so if that the files for the games were downloaded something would go awry for the downloader.
Individuals determined to get their games started to ‘patch’ the anti-pirated games and even provided new versions for storage devices so the downloaded games, regardless of the integrated anti-piracy program, would work for those who downloaded them. Although download results became less satisfactory, thousands of downloads on popular games still continued. Lately, RomUlation, one of the most popular sites for individuals wishing to download Nintendo DS games rendered all DS games non-downloadable in response to a “request”.
The website states “The goal of RomUlation has always been to provide users with an opportunity to try out games in order to determine whether it is a game worth purchasing or not. We have always respected when publishers or developers tell RomUlation did more harm than good to the sales of their product.”
A small section of a colossal, list of downloadable NDS games. All NDS games on Romulation are now non-downloadable.
RomUlation continues, “The owner of this game contacted us with concerns that our service was doing more harm than good, so as per our goal and beliefs we have complied with their request ro remove their intellectual property…this current covers ALL of the NDS games and is permanent.”
Apologizing to its visitors RomUlation stated that they “understand that this may frustrate users who were looking for new games to test but we hope you also understand that this is both necessary and in accordance with our beliefs.” Downloads for Game Cube, Dreamcast, and other devices are still available on RomUlation.
Although Nintendo DS games are not downloadable on this popular site, there are still a few other reliable sites besides RomUlation to provide pirated games to millions such as NDSUniverse which had lately surpassed RomUlation in providing better, patched downloads.
Nintendo and its fellow companies still have a long fight ahead.
Millions of players of the popular World of Warcraft were aghast at Blizzard Entertainment’s “resolution” to put off ’trolling’ in its forums that constantly give ”soul-sucking” work to Blizzard’s employees and moderators. Blizzard announced that all World of Warcraft players had to use their real names when posting in game forums. The original plan was to have the Real ID solution integrated in all forums after the release of Starcraft II. Blizzard also announced that all employees will have to use their real names as well instead of their in-game ID.
Hundreds of thousands of bewildered, forum users flocked to the threads to discuss and of course, protest against Blizzard’s proposal. “I am very uncomfortable with my real name being shared with people I do not know in person” said Razloka, a forum user. Others shared similar sentiments while many plain-out rejected the idea of using real names. “If I give you my first and last name, then you can go to Google and search my name then find my relatives, address, Facebook, hobbies, and all this sensitive information…this is a horrible idea.” argued a user.
Dozens of WoW players demonstrated the Internet’s capability in finding someone immediately when Bashiok, a Blizzard employee, shared his full, real name possibly in an attempt to set an example for those who were against the entire ‘solution’. Revealing himself to be “Micah Whipple”, Mr. Whipple faced tremendous outcry that spanned quite a few pages in one of the forum threads. Many users showed Micah his own personal information including his photos, address, telephone number and other such things by providing links to his Facebook and websites that offered to show Mr. Whipple’s full address for “just $2.95″.
Many argued that Blizzard’s plans were flawed as it would just fuel more ‘trolling’ (deliberate provocation on the Internet to disrupt normal activity) by showing their actual names to a not-so-nice cyber world, expose female gamers to torrents of stalking and harrassement, strike down the game’s qualities of being anonymous while being something unique, and that there’s the likely chance of the employment of aliases by numerous people which would render the Real ID system useless. Some cited extreme cases of gaming nutjobs who killed their Internet rivals as in the case of Juliean Barreaux, the French Counter-Strike player.
Blizzard employees after seeing many outraged reactions across their boards decided to meet and after ”constantly monitoring the members’ feedback”, according to Blizzard’s CEO Mike Morhaime, for five more days, announced that it would withdraw its plans. Instead Blizzard said using real names for gamers would be optional, however employees must still use their real names; a forum-wide treasure hunt for the employees’ information is very probable.
CEO Morhaime further stated that the plans were part of Blizzard’s “efforts driven 100% by the desire to find ways to make our community areas more welcoming for players and encourage more constructive conversations about our games.” In conclusion, Morhaime expressed that the company’s “connection with our community has always been and will always be extremely important to us.”
While the reactions of gamers certainly had a major part in convincing Blizzard to hastily take back its plans, the players’ actions were crucial in pushing Blizzard away from its Real ID proposal. Hours after the announcement of the Real ID system, hundreds of players hinted that they would be boycotting World of Warcraft, quitting WoW, or contacting organizations that dealt with issues of privacy on the Internet. If there were masses of quitters, Blizzard would have found itself short of subscribers who pay an average amount of $14 per month to play World of Warcraft.
According to WoW.com, WoW players contacted the ESRB (Entertainment Software Rating Board) after learning about Blizzard’s plans, but ironically the private email was accidently leaked revealing numerous emails that sent the complaints inspiring quite a few facepalms and even, ”facedesks” in the comments below. A few people struck up petitions against Real ID, while many others kept beseiging the forums with criticism of Blizzard’s “absurd, and mortifying” decision as one user put it.
Today, Google joyfully announced that it’s ICP (Internet Content Provider) license in China was renewed by the Chinese government ending months of a tense stand off between Google and the Chinese government which pulled in U.S politicians and human rights organizations into the fray.
After the Chinese government attempted to pry into Google and other foreign companies including Adobe Systems Inc. to retrieve information on Chinese human rights activists, Google angrily responded by announcing that it would no longer censor search results on the Chinese version of Google (http://www.Google.cn) on the 19th of January. The Chinese government and Google glowered at each other until the 22nd of March when Google actually stopped censoring its search services.
Google redirected its Chinese visitors to the Google site in Hong Kong which is uncensored, all sensitive information including the 1989 Tiananmen Square Massacre was open to search. Seeing Google had no intention to stop, the Chinese government hinted that Google may lose its ICP license. Probably afraid to lose billions of potential dollars by backing out from the Chinese market, Google offered a compromise.
http://www.Google.cn - A link to the Hong Kong Google site is accessible to Chinese internet users.
The corporation announced it would stop redirecting Chinese traffic to the Hong Kong site.
However Google.cn will have a “landing page” that “links to Google.com.hk – where users can conduct web search or continue to use Google.cn services like music and text translate, which we can provide locally without filtering” wrote Google’s Chief Legal Officer, David Drummond.
Mainland Chinese users can click a link on the search engine’s homepage to directly go to the Hong Kong Google and trawl through the millions of uncensored websites and data that were previously unavailable to them. On the Official Google Blog, Drummond stated that this proposal was “consistent with local law”.
Surprisingly, the Chinese government accepted Google’s compromise and had the corporation’s ICP license renewed. Analysts have confirmed that Google’s compromise was indeed in line with China’s laws and the government thus had no reason to reject Google’s application to renew its license.
“We are very pleased that the government has renewed our ICP license and we look forward to continuing to provide web search and local products to our users in China”, a July 9 update on the corporation’s blog stated.
And so, the dispute between Google and China is finally over.
