German WiFi Police

May 18, 2010 - Today's most interesting stories in technology, media and entertainment:

German WiFi Police: Just after Google admitted gathering data from unsecured wireless networks, the German government is working to pass a bill that would make it illegal to have a non-secure wireless network in your home. The fine, $126, oh and a visit from the German WiFi police, yikes!

Verizon 4G Tablets On The Way: Verizon is making serious headway on its new high-speed wireless network. It's called LTE which is an abbreviation for Long Term Evolution and you will start seeing 4G tablets (with an "s") as many as five different devices and some other next generation handhelds by this time next year.

Sony PSP2 Will Miss E3: The rumor mill is out of control with stories about Sony's new PSP2. Sources say it will have everything but the kitchen sink, WiFi, Touch Screen, a killer CPU, tons of storage and maybe even 3G. It's due out next year and there's no word about how much it might cost.

Today's Video -- Amazon Kindle

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Comments

[fairplaystacy]

06:42 PM on 05/21/2010

shill-ee Palmer
Amazon's desperation is showing...

[Rd Eastbay]

11:34 PM on 05/19/2010

It is amazing to me that Google could make such a major mistake for such a long period of time. How could this happen in the first place - especially with a company that is generally pretty careful.

[pat2 718]

09:35 AM on 05/20/2010

It's not hard to make this particular mistake -- reusing someone else's code without looking carefully at the side-effects. I saw it happen at another company that's also well-regarded for its software development. Code reuse is generally a good thing -- don't waste time reinventing what someone else has already done. But if the software developers are inexperienced and / or under time pressure, the authors of the code being reused may not document it well enough (or at all), and the folks reusing it may not look at what they're using closely enough. And if things seem to be "working", no-one will have reason to revisit the reuse.

[concretedonkey]

06:39 PM on 05/18/2010

This German Wifi ordeal makes me think of how out of date so many of the laws are here in the United States with regards to the changes technology has brought to 21st century. I mean, today it's possible to plant evidence, cover your tracks, etc. all from a remote location. Never before have a person's thoughts (akin to something someone may write in a journal or a diary) been so open to legal scrutiny and consequences.

[realitytrumpsbull]

12:31 AM on 05/18/2010

Germany's a country where they have a TV tax, too...that, on top of what is it, something like 17-24% 'VAT'(sales tax)? Traffic jams, high prices...I lived in Germany once, but they can keep the place...overpriced, overtaxed, on the verge of overcrowded, lots of 'ordnungs'...

[Aelfgifu]

06:53 AM on 05/18/2010

I live in Germany now. I love it. Wish I could stay here. Of course, I don't watch TV and you'd have to be dumber than a box of rocks to have an non-secured WiFi connection. Even with the sales taxes, things are still a hell of a lot cheaper than in the US. The traffic in Cincinnati is worse than I've ever seen it here. And they're so much more relaxed than Americans are about just about everything.

Of course, maybe you never had to suffer through living in a place like Ohio. ;)