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Atari Online News, Etc. Volume 09 Issue 23
Volume 9, Issue 23 Atari Online News, Etc. June 8, 2007
Published and Copyright (c) 1999 - 2007
All Rights Reserved
Atari Online News, Etc.
A-ONE Online Magazine
Dana P. Jacobson, Publisher/Managing Editor
Joseph Mirando, Managing Editor
Rob Mahlert, Associate Editor
Atari Online News, Etc. Staff
Dana P. Jacobson -- Editor
Joe Mirando -- "People Are Talking"
Michael Burkley -- "Unabashed Atariophile"
Albert Dayes -- "CC: Classic Chips"
Rob Mahlert -- Web site
Thomas J. Andrews -- "Keeper of the Flame"
With Contributions by:
Stephen Moss
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=~=~=~=
A-ONE #0923 06/08/07
~ Search Results Danger! ~ People Are Talking! ~ Firefox 3 Alpha!
~ Norton AntiBot Released ~ Goodmail Gains Allies! ~ JagFest UK 2007!
~ World's First Palmtop! ~ Intel's $199 Laptop! ~ "Wiiitis" Is Real!
~ Pay To Bypass Filters! ~ Another MS Linux Deal! ~ New Dragon Ball Z!
-* Stricter Anti-Spyware Bill! *-
-* SSDs To Render Hard Drives Obsolete? *-
-* Guilty Verdict Dropped In Porn Pop-Up Case *-
=~=~=~=
->From the Editor's Keyboard "Saying it like it is!"
""""""""""""""""""""""""""
Well, I see that I managed to get people thinking as a result of my
editorial a couple of weeks ago, about the news media. Amazing, isn't
it? I won't go into it further; Joe did a good job with some more valid
points.
I don't have much to say this week. It's been a tiring one, for sure.
All I can say is that I'm not as young as I used to be, nor am I in the
best physical shape these days. Still, it's a "good" feeling to do some
physical work for a change. I wonder if I can convince my wife to take up
massage therapy!
Well, the weekend is upon us, so I'll get in a little rest mixed up with a
little yard work. Those gardens won't plant themselves! So, let's move on
to this week's issue, shall we!
Until next time...
=~=~=~=
Atari's Portfolio: The World's First Palmtop
There's nothing new under the sun, some folk say, and that's certainly
true of Palm's recently announced Foleo. It's the palmtop reborn in a
slightly sexier, slightly larger form. Even its name is reminiscent of
that bygone arena - it's rather like the Atari Portfolio, the world's
first palmtop PC, released in June 1989.
Atari's compact clamshell ran an MS-DOS compatible operating system -
DIP-DOS, from Guildford-based Distributed Information Processing (DIP)
Systems - on a 4.92MHz Intel 80C88 processor. The Portfolio has 128KB of
memory on board, 32KB of which was reserved for data storage, exposed as
the C: drive and backed up by the three AA batteries the Portfolio ran
from. A built-in long-life cell protected the memory when the batteries
needed changing.
The Portfolio's display was a 40-character by eight-line job with a 240
x 64-pixel graphics mode, mounted next to the unit's speaker and above
the calculator-style QWERTY keypad. A slot on the side took a range of
device-specific memory cards running from 32KB to 128KB.
Anticipating Palm's own Pilot - which shipped in April 1996, seven years
after Atari first showed its palmtop - the Portfolio had diary and
address book applications, along with a basic word processor and a
spreadsheet package. The apps and the OS resided in 256KB of ROM. Plenty
of space, you might think, for programming tools, but the Portfolio had
none, not even a Basic language interpreter. To be fair, this wasn't a
machine aimed at coders but at the growing number of folk who wanted a
computer for information storage and retrieval, a feature Palm was later
to major on with the Pilot. In any case, programming tools were later
offered as add-ons.
Unlike the Pilot and, now, the Foleo, the Portfolio was designed to
operate on its own, independently of a desktop machine or other device.
That said, data could be transferred back and forth between the palmtop
and a desktop, via a cable connected to the Portfolio's add-on parallel
port.
Incidentally, movie buffs may recall an Atari Portfolio was the device
the young John Connor used to hack an ATM in /Terminator 2./
The Portfolio measure 20 x 10 x 2.8cm, so it wasn't much smaller than
the hefty ring-bound manual it and other computers of its era came with.
The manual, like the on-board software and even the hardware itself, was
created by DIP, which launched the Portfolio as the DIP Pocket PC not
long before Atari licensed the technology and released it under the
Atari brand, primarily in the US but in the UK too, where DIP continued
to sell its own version.
DIP would go on to offer three versions of the Pocket PC: the unit on
its own; an Executive version bundled with an AC adaptor and a 64KB
memory card; and the Professional, which packaged the Pocket PC, a 128KB
memory card, a serial adaptor and cable, and the AC adaptor in a
custom-made briefcase.
DIP was co-founded by three ex-Psion employees, David Frodsham, Ian
Cullimore and Peter Baldwin - their first-name initials providing the
firm's name, though it got a more appropriate, business-friendly full
name soon after.
Incidentally, the lid of the Foleo sports a dark grey ribbed look
decidedly reminiscent of Psion Series 3 palmtop... Another nod by Jeff
Hawkins to his new toy's ancestry?
Cullimore, who had worked on Psion's original Organiser, would later go
on to co-found Poqet, which produced the Poqet PC and shipped it in the
US in September 1989, five months after Atari first showed off the
Portfolio. Slightly larger than the Portfolio, the Poqet had a more
PC-like keyboard, a 7MHz 80C88 processor and a full 640KB of memory. It
ran MS-DOS 3.3. Poqet was acquired by Fujitsu in 1994, shortly after
which the machine was killed off.
How long the Portfolio and Pocket PC lasted is less clear. Certainly it
was doing a good trade in 1992 - DIP cut its prices, for instance - but
with the launch of the Apple Newton MessagePad 100 in August 1993, the
arrival of the Palm Pilot in April 1996 and Windows CE in September
1996, its days were numbered at that point.
=~=~=~=
PEOPLE ARE TALKING
compiled by Joe Mirando
joe@atarinews.org
Hidi ho friends and neighbors. Well, this is going to be another short
one. Again this week, there aren't a lot of messages in the NewsGroup.
But I'm going to give it a shot because I also want to spout off about
today's media and the stories that get foisted upon us every day and
our seeming willingness to just accept what we're told.
Sure, there is still some good reporting out there. The law of averages
alone says that they should get it right at least SOME of the time. But
what we're seeing today has ceased to be 'news'. It's entertainment.
When just about every newscast either clutters the airwaves with
'late-breaking news' on Paris, Nicole, Lindsay or whichever
tart-of-the-week happens to be catching the public's attention at the
moment, then you can be pretty sure that there's a story out there that
they didn't WANT to cover. Let's face it, the war is depressing. What's
going on in Darfur is too uncomfortable to think about, and the fact
that someone (or a group of someones) is doing their best to erode our
rights... they're all depressing. Who wants to read or hear about that?
To make matters worse, there are those who constantly whine that news
coverage isn't fair. This happens on both sides of the aisle. Liberals
know for sure that the media is controlled by some very rich, very
conservative old, white men who just want to further enrich themselves,
while conservatives are just as convinced that the media world is full
of tree-hugging pinkos who just want to tear down our civilization to
its very foundation.
I find myself on one side of that argument, and I'm convinced of the
correctness of my opinion. Why? Well, because it's my opinion, of
course. I'm not going to mention which side I'm on, but you probably
already know.
There's one particular news service out there that touts their coverage
as 'fair and balanced'. Well that, right there, is an indication that
they're hiding things. News is supposed to be fact. Either something
happened or it didn't. Either someone said something in particular or
they didn't. Where does 'fair' enter into that?
It's the same thing with the 'balanced' part of the equation. I'll tell
ya what, news guys and gals... report the facts and let the scale worry
about the balance, okay?
Several years ago, my boss had expressed the opinion that the news
services and programs only reported on the depressing, disgusting, dark
side of the world. "They should make it a law that they could only
report positive things... I'll betcha that viewership would skyrocket!"
Well, I won't go into a word-for-word review of my rebuttal, but the
truth is that the media IS run by rich white guys who are constantly
watching their bottom line. That's not necessarily a bad thing. It's
business. They MUST watch their bottom line or they'll no longer be in
a position to do anything. If reporting only on 'positive' things would
increase their audience and, therefore, their ad revenue, you can bet
your bippie that they'd have started doing it shortly after the first
edition of the first newspaper was published.
In my opinion, we've become a 'client society'. We want people to do
things for us. We shouldn't have to do any research on opposing
opinions or things like that... it should just be provided for us...
that's what we're paying them for, right?
If you doubt that, just take a look at all the chain-letter type emails
being circulated these days. It's easy enough to go to snopes.com or
one of the other very good debunking sites and find out if it would
really help if we all refrained from buying gas on a certain day, or if
the U.S. Mint is really going to keep "In God We Trust" off coins from
now on, or if Pepsi is really going to put the Pledge of Allegiance on
it's cans and omit the words 'Under God', or if heating water in a
microwave causes cancer, but the number of people who check these
things out before they send the offending emails out is incredibly
small.
People don't want to learn anymore. The want to 'know'. There are too
many people out there who 'know' that the Earth is only 6,000 years
old, 'know' that you can catch VD from a toilet seat, or 'know' that
Iraq was involved in 9/11. They didn't 'learn' anything about the
subject, but someone told them so, so they 'know' it.
And it's not just, as one might think, those with little intellect or
education that have this mindset. It's everywhere you look; in
business, economics, marketing, etc., and it continues all the way up
to the hallowed halls of government.
So next time someone tells you something or sends you an email about
something that's 'known', take a minute and do a bit of research.
You'll probably be glad that you did.
Now let's get to the news, hints, tips and info from the UseNet.
From the comp.sys.atari.st NewsGroup
====================================
Mike Freeman asks about printer setup:
"I just installed Linux for the first time on one of my computers, and
was struck by the fact that while our Atari's are struggling with using
a very expensive program (NVDI) with way outdated drivers, Linux has
really well done printer drivers available for it - for free and open
source! I investigated a little, and got to thinking, why don't we have
Foomatic, CUPS (Common Unix Printing System), and Gutenprint ported to
Mint yet? Yeah, I'm sure the memory needs on them is a bit big for many
Atari's, but then again, how many people with a complete Mint setup are
running it on an ST? I would think most are using a TT, Hades, Milan,
Afterburner, CT60, or Aranym for that task. From what I've read of
them, they should be easily portable to any Unix system. I would think
Mint falls under that category.
Does anyone know if it would be possible to incorporate CUPS and
Gutenprint either into fVDI (if we want an NVDI-type configuration
again) or into a stand-alone program (probably preferred)? If it were
possible to accomplish, it would add greatly to the goal of having a
completely free OS on the Atari, since that's one of the few common OS
elements that's not currently free in any modern, usable fashion."
Jo Even Skarstein tells Mike:
"Another option that would require a lot less effort would be to use a
PC running Linux or Windows as a print server. The printer driver on
the Atari could print plain bitmaps to /dev/printer, the device driver
will then talk to the server on the PC which prints the bitmaps. NVDI
is already capable of "printing" to bitmap files, so you "only" need to
develop the server software."
Mike replies:
"Yeah, that would work, too, although not the idea I was shooting for. I
was just trying to think/dream of possible alternatives should my
NVDI-compatible printers completely die and I can't get anything
compatible (that day is coming, you know, if not already here).
Personally, I don't cherish the idea of having to fire up all of my
computers just to print a document. I'd rather find some atari-based
solution. Also, what about those of us, like myself, who don't have
ethernet on their Atari's and have a Mac or other computer without a
parallel port? I don't want to buy a PC (spit, ptoi! Hate those dumb
things!) just to be able to print. If we could just buckle down and
port something or write something that could use already ported and
free drivers, I think it would be well worth it! Just my opinion."
Ekkehard Flessa adds:
"You'd have to find a printer with parallel port still. While this is
still possible (e.g. Brother Laser Printers), I'd rather use such
printer over the network.
I've got a Falcon with Ethernet card, and a Brother MFC-7820N multi-
function laser printer attached to the network. It's located in
another room, so no way to use a parallel cable.
This printer knows both PostScript and PCL, and can be accessed
using both Samba and the older lpr.
How do I print to that printer from my Atari running MagiC and
MagiCNet? Or from MiNT+XaAES, for that matter?
[Porting pre-existing drivers] should integrate seamlessly with NVDI, so
one can simply print via GDOS and the system cares for the rest."
'Mark' asks about different flavors of SCSI:
"Forgive this if [it's] a silly question, but can you adapt an Ultrawide
scsi HDD for use with an STf?? 4.3Gb"
'PPera' tells Mark:
"Yes. Need UW-50 pin SCSI adapter. I use UW IBM drive in mega STE so.
Of course need ACSI-SCSI adapter too."
'Mark' asks about the TT's internal SCSI connector:
"Hi there, this is probably going to seem a little dumb but here goes.
I would like to put a small HD in my TT, but I am not sure where the
internal 50 pin SCSI connector is. There is a small card, which seems
to have two 50 pin connectors attached, and is perpendicular to the
motherboard. Any help is appreciated."
Guillaume Tello tells Mark:
"The VME connector is just under the floppy unit."
Mark now asks about his Centurbo:
"I have a Falcon with a Centurbo II fitted. It works pretty
well, but I can't seem to save the flash parameters. When I set it to
"external" hard disk driver and such things, it always reverts to
"Cecile" and other settings. Also I can't seem to save the NVRAM
settings, like for the desktop language for example. Is this a NVRAM
problem or something to do with the Centurbo, or both?"
Yvan Doyeux tells Mark:
"It's [an] NVRAM problem. Read this:
[NEW] KEEPTIME v1.0 System patch when battery of your Real Time Clock is
down.
Friday, December 1st 2006,
KEEPTIME v1.0 is a patch to disable a system time reset when the battery
of your RTC is dead. This text has been written for the Atari Falcon.
It may be applied to Falcon, TT and compatibles.
--------------
The Problems
--------------
"My Falcon loses the time and date when I switch off."
( 15/31/07 0:00 for each boot )
"My Falcon boots in low resolution."
"My TOS is always in English and the keyboard is Qwerty."
----------------
The Explanation
----------------
Whenever you are shutting down your Falcon, the time,the date and NVRAM
settings are saved into the RTC chip ( Real Time Clock ).
The Real Time Clock can also be named 'CMOS Clock' or 'CMOS Battery'.
The RTC contains a 128 bytes memory to save setup information.
The approximative life length of this chip is about 10-12 years because
the RTC contains a built-in battery. The Falcon is not a very young
machine, so the battery of your RTC is now dead !!
This chip soldered on the Falcon motherboard ( U64 ) is a Dallas DS1287.
It can be replaced by unsoldering with the same chip or equivalent ( ST
MK48T87B-24, MC146818A, MCCS146818BM ) . The Dallas DS1287 is, in fact,
a DS1285 which a lithium battery has been included in the same block.
So you can also break the shell of the RTC to find the built-in
battery. Then, you must disconnect the circuit of the battery and
redirect it to a new external battery added. You can find infos about
this process on Atari forums on the web or inside ST Magazine.( issue
141 )
Unfortunately, you don't want to open your Falcon and replace the RTC
chip because you think you are not able to do this !
-------------
The Solution
-------------
First of all, a good solution is to launch the classic accessory Control
Panel to set the time and date for each boot of the machine.
Yes, it's a safe solution but there is a problem !
If you are using TOS or MagiC operating systems, when you quit a
program, a time and date reset occurs ! No problem, if you are using
Mint OS. I think it is a little bit irritating to work with that !
It is due to the specific XBIOS Function Gettime(). This same function
can be found on TOS versions 3.xx ( TT ) and 4.xx ( Falcon ).
This function is called by the system when you return to desktop after
closing an application.( I don't know why... )
The Gettime() function has a special behavior when it finds that the
battery of the RTC is dead, this function simply resets the time and
date! The dead battery information is sent by the RTC itself.
KEEPTIME is a patch to disable in TOS the time reset by Gettime()
function if the battery of your RTC is dead.
http://doyeuxyvan.free.fr/keeptime/v1.0/
You must run it in the AUTO folder.
Caution: To take effect, the TOS must be found in RAM !
Basically, the Falcon works with the TOS located in ROM.
Therefore, the TOS in ROM must be copied in RAM.
So you can use the excellent free tool by Uwe Seimet called ROMSPEED:
http://www.seimet.de/files/atari/romspd31.zip
http://doyeuxyvan.free.fr/keeptime/v1.0/romspd31/
You have just to run ROMSPEED.PRG in the AUTO folder before
KEEPTIME.PRG. In this case, you must know that the MMU is used by
ROMSPEED to remap TOS in memory. KEEPTIME takes into account this
functionality to locate the TOS.
Under MagiC operating system, the same function Gettime() as the TOS is
present. However, you don't need to run ROMSPEED because MagiC is
already loaded in RAM.
Copy in this order ROMSPEED.PRG and then KEEPTIME.PRG in your AUTO
folder ( Generally C:\AUTO ). Be sure that your XCONTROL.ACC file is
present in the root directory. ( Or any kind of another tool to set
time and date )
"Thanks, time and date reset has been disabled as long as my Falcon is
powered on, but I'm still booting in low resolution with wrong keyboard
configuration..."
Yes, it remains the NVRAM configuration problem.
You can find different tools to set up keyboard, TOS language, etc.
But you can only reboot your Falcon if you want that parameters take
effect.
I have selected NVRam by Centek:
http://centek.free.fr/atari/softs/nvram.zip
http://doyeuxyvan.free.fr/keeptime/v1.0/nvram/
With this tool you can, of course, configure the NVRAM ( into the RTC
chip ). In addition, you can write a bootable program on a floppy disk
which writes your selected configuration into NVRAM chip for every
Falcon boot. Be sure that your floppy disk is present in the drive of
course !
Follow this process to create a bootable floppy disk with NVRam:
- Run NVRAM.APP from the desktop.
- Set keyboard and TOS language, time format, boot resolution, ...
- Click on the floppy disk icon and insert a floppy disk in drive A.
- Click on the left icon ( NVRAM -> Floppy Disk ) in the new window
opened.
The program quickly writes the boot sector program on the disk with your
NVRAM Settings.
- Then quit NVRam application. Your floppy disk is good.
( If you click on the NVRAM icon for quit, the settings are saved on
NVRAM chip, but to take effect you must reboot. So, you can perform
infinite reboots with your good parameters until you switch off your
Falcon. )
At each boot, NVRam bootable program looks for if it has been already
installed in memory. In the case of NVRam already installed, the NVRAM
config is not written.
So be careful when you have just switched off your Falcon, the memory
and the RTC are not cleared instantly because it may remains residual
current in the components. I advise to wait a long minute.
---------
The End
---------
Here is my summary procedure to work with a dead RTC battery:
- Switch on the Falcon with the correct floppy disk in drive.
- Very quickly, the floppy disk boot program will be read ( You can read
on the screen NVRam flag ) and a system reset will occur.
- Now your Falcon boots with the correct NVRAM settings.
- After comes ROMSPEED and KEEPTIME loading.
- On the desktop, it remains to set the correct time and date in the
Control Panel.
- That's all! Good Luck!"
Well folks, on that note, we're going to pack it up for the week. Tune
in again next week, same time, same station, and be ready to listen to
what they are saying when...
PEOPLE ARE TALKING
=~=~=~=
->In This Week's Gaming Section - Xbox Live Pac-Man, Founder's Swan Song!
""""""""""""""""""""""""""""" Dragon Ball Z Harukanaru Densetsu!
Could It Be "Wiiitis"?!
And more!
=~=~=~=
->A-ONE's Game Console Industry News - The Latest Gaming News!
""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
New Pac Man for Xbox Is Swan Song for Founder
Pac Man will be reborn on Microsoft Corp.'s Xbox Live online service on
Wednesday as a final tribute for designer Toru Iwatani, who is retiring
from the $30 billion games industry he helped ignite.
The new version of the iconic arcade game is a faithful interpretation of
the addictive 27-year-old original, where players wrenched joystick
controllers to race a character - resembling a yellow pizza missing a slice
- around a digital maze to chomp white pellets and chase multicolored
"ghosts."
The new game, "Pac Man Championship Edition," is the second and final
version Iwatani personally designed, and was created for the final round
of the Xbox 360 Pac-Man World Championship in New York, when nine
finalists played it for the first time.
Iwatani, 52, an employee of Japan's Namco Bandai Holdings, said in an
interview he will retire from active duty at Namco and spend more time
teaching the next generation of game designers at Tokyo Polytechnic
University.
He said there were no immediate plans for another version of Pac Man, but
that he could work with Namco in a supervisory position or work on a new
version with his students.
The new game, which pulses to dance music and has mazes that change
shapes, marks Iwatani's swan song from electronic interactive
entertainment, an industry with annual revenue that now tops U.S. box
office movie sales.
But Iwatani said the future of the games industry, where development
budgets now rival those of some feature-length movies, lies not with
professional creators, but outsiders.
The designer of "Tetris was not from the industry. He was a scientist," he
said, referring to another legendary 1980s game, in which players organize
falling blocks, designed by Russian scientist Alexey Pajitnov in 1985.
"For someone thinking outside of the industry, they can have a fresh new
idea," Iwatani said.
Despite the last decade's advances in computer graphics technology and
design, Iwatani created the new Pac Man as he did the original - in
two-dimensions. "I wanted to stay with the original simple rules of Pac
Man," he said.
The new version also reshuffles older formats. In one mode, called "Dark
mode,' most of the maze is hidden from view with players guided only by a
flashlight lighting Pac Man's path.
"Pac Man Championship Edition" will be sold for about $10 as a download on
the Xbox Live service, starting on Wednesday.
Atari Ships Dragon Ball Z Harukanaru Densetsu
Atari, Inc. Wednesday announced that Dragon Ball Z Harukanaru Densetsu
for Nintendo DS has shipped to retailers across North America. The
immensely popular Dragon Ball Z series is the gold standard of anime-based
video games, with more than 26 different games and over 10 million units
sold since May 2002. Dragon Ball Z Harukanaru Densetsu, the latest
must-have DBZ chapter, is rated E for Everyone and will be available for a
suggested price of $29.95.
Developed by NAMCO BANDAI Games Inc., Dragon Ball Z Harukanaru Densetsu is
an all new DBZ experience unlike any other for the Nintendo DS. Harukanaru
Densetsu combines strategic card based gameplay and role playing to
deliver a game that is easy to understand but hard to master. Players'
progression is determined through their use of the cards to evolve
characters, strengthen moves and create new moves.
"Dragon Ball Z is one of our most successful franchises, we are delighted
to deliver an all new way to play with DBZ Harukanaru Densetsu," said
Emily Anadu, senior product manager, Atari, Inc. "We are especially
excited to bring to fans of all ages a role playing game that combines
simple card-based play mechanics in the much loved DBZ universe for the
Nintendo DS."
With eight types of actions, eight power levels and eight guard levels,
the title allows for 512 possible combinations that will determine
progression. The intensity of the DBZ special attacks will increase and
multiple cards can be played together to power up attacks and enhance
guard level for super combos. Dragon Ball Z Harukanaru Densetsu supports
wireless battle for up to four players and includes a game sharing mode.
For more information on Dragon Ball Z video games, please visit
http://www.atari.com/dragonballz.
If It's Not Tennis Elbow, It May Be "Wiiitis"
When Dr. Julio Bonis awoke one Sunday morning with a sore shoulder, he
could not figure out what he had done. It felt like a sports injury, but
he had been a bit of a couch potato lately.
Then he remembered his new Wii.
Bonis, 29, had spent hours playing Nintendo's new video game in which
players simulate real movements. Bonis had been playing simulated tennis.
It was not quite tennis elbow, he decided.
"The variant in this patient can be labelled more specifically as
'Wiiitis,"' Bonis, a family practice physician, wrote in a letter to the
New England Journal of Medicine.
"The treatment consisted of ibuprofen for one week, as well as complete
abstinence from playing Wii video games. The patient recovered fully."
Wiiitis - pronounced "wee-eye-tis" - is the latest ailment to develop
from the video game era, beginning with Space Invaders' wrist in 1981,
which was caused by the repeated button mashing required by the popular
arcade game.
Nintendo's Wii game can captivate for hours and "unlike in the real sport,
physical strength and endurance are not limiting factors," Bonis of the
Research Group in Biomedical Informatics in Barcelona, Spain, wrote.
"What convinced me to send the case report was that a friend of mine,
after playing 'Wii Sports' suffered from a similar complaint," Bonis told
Reuters in an e-mail. "I have not found other cases in my clinical
practice, but it is probably an underdiagnosed condition."
It is not the first time Nintendo has received attention in the medical
field.
In 1990, a Wisconsin doctor characterized the thumb soreness brought on by
pushing the buttons on a controller as "Nintendinitis" after it affected a
35-year-old woman who played a Nintendo game without interruption for five
hours.
With virtual golf, boxing, baseball and bowling already on the market,
"future games could involve different and unexpected groups of muscles,"
Bonis said. "Physicians should be aware that there may be multiple,
possibly puzzling presentations of Wiiitis."
Bonis said he still plays the games, "but I try to use it with
moderation. Sometimes it's hard to do!"
=~=~=~=
->A-ONE Gaming Online - Online Users Growl & Purr!
"""""""""""""""""""
JagFest UK 2007
Due to arising issues, the event has had to be suspended and will be
rearranged to a new date this year which will be announced ASAP.
Stephen Moss
=~=~=~=
A-ONE's Headline News
The Latest in Computer Technology News
Compiled by: Dana P. Jacobson
House Approves Second, Stricter Anti-Spyware Bill
The House of Representatives passed on Wednesday legislation that would
impose new requirements on software companies and advertisers to protect
computer users from spyware.
House lawmakers approved an anti-spyware bill that would require software
distributors to clearly notify and obtain consent from consumers before
programs can be loaded onto a computer. The bill passed on a vote of 368
to 48.
The legislation is opposed by the software industry, which argues that new
regulatory requirements could hurt innovation and technology investment.
The industry favors an alternative bill, passed by the House last month,
that would impose specific penalties for the fraudulent use of spyware but
would not adopt new regulations.
Lawmakers in the Senate have yet to take up the issue.
Spyware has emerged as a major headache for computer users. It can end up
on users' computers through a virus or through downloaded games or other
free programs off the Internet.
Spyware can sap computing power, crash machines and bury users under a
blizzard of unwanted ads. Scam artists can also use spyware to capture
passwords, account numbers and other sensitive personal data.
McAfee: Search Results Can Be Dangerous
The odds of a search engine directing you to a risky Web site are getting
slimmer, but some companies are better at filtering out bad links than
others, McAfee reported Monday.
Google has improved over the past year, but AOL has the safest search
results on the Web right now, McAfee said. The riskiest? Yahoo.
Overall, a significant percentage of Web links are still risky, McAfee
said. In its latest study, published Monday, about 4 percent of search
results were found to be risky. A year ago, that number was five percent.
McAfee's study looked at the first five pages of search results provided
by AOL, Yahoo, Google, MSN, and Ask.com for about 2,300 widely used
keywords. It then compared those links to its Web safety database, which
records sites that are associated with things like spam, online scams, Web
attacks, and risky downloads.
The study took a look at both the sponsored links returned by search
engines and the "organic" links that are not sponsored, and Yahoo's poor
performance is due to a spike in the number of sponsored links that McAfee
deemed risky. When looking at organic links alone, Yahoo actually had the
best results of any of the five search engines, returning risky links just
2.7 percent of the time.
The most dangerous subjects to search for are words related to digital
music and tech toys, McAfee found. Searches for terms relating to these
two categories return risky results nearly 20 percent of the time.
Some types of these "risky" results are much more common than others. For
example, 0.03 percent of search results lead to a Web site that tries to
run attack code on your PC. The chance of a link that is associated with
spam is much higher: 1.3 percent, according to McAfee.
Improvements at Google, which provides search technology to AOL and
Ask.com, have been boosting the safety of search results in general, said
Mark Maxwell, senior product manager with McAfee's SiteAdvisor group.
Google returned risky results 3.4 percent of the time. A year ago, it
scored 5.3 percent.
McAfee's top-rated search engine, AOL, gave risky links 2.9 percent of the
time, an improvement over last year's 5.3 percent. Yahoo, formerly one of
the safest engines evaluated by McAfee, jumped from 4.3 percent in 2006 to
5.4 percent in the latest study.
Microsoft's MSN also took a step backward, jumping from 3.9 percent in
2006 to 4.2 percent in 2007. Ask.com went from 6.1 percent to 3.5 percent.
Over the past year, the industry has been better at acknowledging that
there is a problem with risky search results and has reduced the
percentage of risky sponsored links from 8.5 percent last year to 6.9
percent in 2007, Maxwell said. "You're seeing a lot more communication and
cooperation toward the goal of trying to improve the online experience."
Intel Intros $199 Laptop at Computex
On Tuesday, Intel Executive VP Sean Maloney announced plans for a $199
laptop that industry observers are saying will compete with the One
Laptop Per Child (OLPC) project. At the Computex computer trade show in
Taiwan, where this announcement and several others were made, Intel
presented the new, under-$200, education-focused mobile PC that the chip
giant is developing with Taiwan-based motherboard and computer
manufacturer Asustek, whose brand is also known as Asus.
Although the OLPC project was not mentioned by name, the competition with
the nonprofit group was clear. Headed by MIT Media Lab cofounder Nicholas
Negroponte, OLPC has been working for two years to develop a robust $100
laptop designed for developing countries.
The initial price of the OLPC laptops has recently been revised to about
$175, and, in a recent story on CBS' 60 Minutes as well as elsewhere,
Negroponte accused Intel of "dumping" its low-priced Classmate PC laptop
in several targeted developing nations as a way to undercut OLPC's plans.
Intel's new $199 laptop might add more fuel to that fire.
News reports indicate that this new Intel-Asustek laptop, which will be
available in both $199 and $299 models, will be sold alongside Intel's
existing Classmate PC. Called the Eee PC 701, the new laptop reportedly
has 802.11b/g wireless, 10/100 Ethernet, a 56K modem, a 7-inch screen, 512
MB of memory, a webcam, and is designed to accommodate several solid state
disk (SSD) drives. No release date was announced.
Martin Reynolds, an analyst with industry research firm Gartner, said that
the biggest challenge for very low-cost laptops is not hardware, but the
cost of the operating system. "Microsoft has to recognize," he said, "that
it should become more interested in this new, very low-cost market."
However, there have been reports that the OS on the demonstration machine
at Computex did not appear to be Windows.
Over the next decade, Reynolds added, low-cost computers will move from
the current $500 to $700 range, to a $200 to $400 range, with the current
efforts by OLPC, Intel, and Asustek being the first wave of those
lower-cost devices. In the not-too-distant future, he added, "people will
own several laptops."
Also announced at the Taiwan show were the new Intel 3 Series chipsets,
formerly known by the codename of Bearlake. They are designed to support
higher-quality graphics, and are intended for use with the new, 45-nm
Penryn processors coming later in 2007. The Santa Clara, California-based
company said the new chipsets will be important for Intel's
next-generation Viiv and vPro technologies.
Two of the Intel 3 Series chipsets, the G33 and the G35 Express, support
Intel's Clear Video technology for enhanced video and the High Definition
Media Interface playback. The company said that they can be used by HD DVD
and Blu-ray manufacturers to reduce the costs associated with separate
graphics chipsets. Additionally, the G35 integrates hardware support for
DirectX 10 for smoother, more realistic 3D applications.
According to the company, all of the 3 Series chipsets enable users to
add up to six external drives to a PC for extra data protection and
performance, Intel High Definition Audio for up to 7.1 theater-like
surround sound quality, and Intel Quiet System Technology to help enable
reduced system noise and heat for a much quieter, yet high-performing PC.
In addition to the 3 Series chipsets, Intel announced a new Core 2
Extreme mobile processor, intended for high-end gaming notebooks. The
chip, which will be available in the third quarter, is designed to help
the company extend its Extreme Edition desktop brand to laptops,
specifically for gaming enthusiasts seeking maximum performance.
Will SSDs Render Hard Drives Obsolete?
Attention, hard disk drives. Your younger sibling, the solid state drive
(SSD), is growing in leaps and bounds, and new products now being shown at
the Computex computer trade show in Taiwan are leading some observers to
wonder whether your days are numbered.
SSDs have greater reliability and durability than hard disk drives (HDDs),
because they have no moving parts. Data transfer rates can be faster, and
booting a large operating system such as Windows Vista can be quick work
for SSDs. In addition, they consume less power compared to HDDs, and they
are quieter and lighter.
But HDDs are still much larger in capacity, and their cost-per-gigabyte
is a fraction of what it is for SSDs.
SanDisk, a major player in the world of flash technology, introduced at
Computex this week a 64-GB SSD, which the company is targeting toward
enterprise users and early adopters, such as gamers. In 1.8-inch UATA and
2.5-inch SATA formats, the new SSDs are designed as drop-in replacements
for hard drives in most notebook computers.
According to reports, SanDisk officials have said that it can produce
even higher-capacity SSDs, but the expense in manufacturing them would
price them out of the market. So SanDisk instead is concentrating on the
"sweet spot." The price of the new 64-GB SSD has not been announced.
Apacer Technology, another example of a company banking on SSDs,
presented at Computex a 128-GB industrial-grade SSD in a 2.5-inch form
factor, able to function at temperatures between -40 and 85 degrees
Celsius. It will be available by the end of this year.
Toshiba's Dynabook RSS RX1, an ultralight laptop, uses a 64-GB SSD instead
of a traditional drive, but users can replace it with a hard disk if they
wish.
A SanDisk executive yesterday told Reuters that it is "well-positioned" to
enter the laptop market, and it has recently signed a deal with Dell to
supply 32-GB SSDs for its notebook computers.
Journalists have been predicting for years that hard drives will be
replaced by other technologies, noted Gartner analyst John Monroe. "It
reminds me of Soviet President Khrushchev banging his shoe on the table
and saying that his system would bury ours," he said. "In terms of SSDs
taking over the world, it's a nonstory."
Industry research firm iSuppli said in a recent report that 60 percent of
laptops sold in the final quarter of 2009 will have SSDs, compared to less
than one percent in the first quarter of this year. Monroe said that the
report was inaccurate in its projections.
First, he said, the performance and power advantages of SSDs have been
overstated. NAND flash, he said, actually is slower in many write
functions, and the power saving is only about 5 percent of the total power
cost of running a laptop. "A laptops's power consumption for storage is
only a small part of its total power needs," he pointed out.
He called attention to the huge price differences between HDDs and SSDs.
SanDisk's 32-GB SSD will add about $450 to the cost of a laptop, while one
can buy an 80-GB HDD for about $50.
He also pointed out that, even at 64 GB, about half of an SSD would be
needed just for Windows Vista. "Some form of solid state storage
technology will eventually replace HDDs," he predicted. "But it's not
going to be NAND flash. And it probably won't be feasibly,
cost-effectively manufacturable for at least another 10 years."
Firefox 3 Alpha 5 Hits the Streets
Mozilla today made an early testing release of its Firefox 3 browser
available for download, and this alpha version (code-named Gran Paradiso)
for the first time adds the anticipated Places feature for bookmarks.
According to Mike Connor, director of Firefox development at Mozilla, the
Places feature in Firefox 3 Alpha 5 represents the biggest upcoming change
for the new browser version. With Places, your bookmarks and browsing
history are stored in a SQLite database, which allows for better
performance, more stability, and other features. (The previous alpha
release implemented Places for browsing history.)
Places won't look much different initially, and in my brief look at the
Gran Paradiso alpha, the user-facing portion of Places didn't appear to
function any differently at all. "People with very large history or
bookmark files will notice a big difference [in performance]," says Mike
Connor, director of Firefox development at Mozilla. The database can be
queried as needed, he says, rather than having to keep the full history or
list of bookmarks in memory.
Places will also be less likely to lose data in the event of program or
Windows crashes. In fact, according to Connor, "We haven't figured out how
to make Places lose data." For backwards compatibility and manual backups,
Firefox 3 will save bookmarks in the traditional bookmarks.htm file when
it closes.
For other bookmark upgrades, Mozilla is planning to enable bookmark
tagging, and is considering building its own synchronization client into
the browser capable of backing up and sharing bookmarks. Today, extensions
from Foxmarks and del.icio.us can sync bookmarks; Connor says Mozilla is
in talks with both groups to ensure their services continue to work with
Firefox 3.
If you're thinking about trying the alpha, keep in mind that it's early
testing software and not meant for everyday browsing. At a minimum, be
sure to back up your bookmarks before installing it. The download is
available from Mozilla.
Other Firefox 3 updates will include improvements to password handling, so
that users won't be prompted to save credentials until after a successful
login, and better add-on management, according to Connor. One change I had
personally been hoping for, moving the downloads manager from a separate
(and annoying) window to something more like an All-in-one Sidebar pane,
probably won't make it into Firefox 3, he says. For a list of all the
planned upgrades, see the Firefox 3 product requirements document.
These changes will no doubt please Mozilla fans, but don't get your hopes
up for a radical step forward with the new Firefox 3, like the change
from IE 6 to IE 7. Aside from Places and some support for offline
caching, Mozilla doesn't have a "big killer feature" planned for the next
Firefox, Connor says.
Instead, he promises, "It will all feel like an organic growth."
Goodmail Gains Allies In War On Bad E-mail
Pioneering e-mail certification firm Goodmail Systems has new allies in
its campaign to keep spam and scams out of people's in-boxes.
The Mountain View, California-based Internet start-up said Thursday that
Internet service providers (ISPs) Verizon, Comcast, Cox Communications,
and Warner Cable will respect its seal of approval as proof e-mails are
legitimate.
Accepting the seal, actually encrypted software "tokens" embedded in
e-mails which then get a virtual blue ribbon envelope, means the messages
are automatically deemed not spam or cons referred to as "phishing."
Senders of "CertifiedEmail" pay Goodmail a quarter of a cent per message
and the Mountain View, California-based start-up shares that money with
ISPs that accept its seal.
"We tend to think of e-mail as free, it isn't," Goodmail co-founder and
chief executive Richard Gingras told AFP. "The consumer doesn't pay but
the company behind it does. It is appropriate they get a percentage."
An average e-mail service provider spends about six dollars (US) annually
on blocking and filtering spam and fraudulent e-mails, according to
Goodmail.
Internet mail service providers Yahoo and America Online signed on with
Goodmail after its launch last year.
"The problem of phishing and fraud erodes trust in email," said Verizon
director of consumer broadband services Peter Castleton.
"A certification service, such as CertifiedEmail, enables us to help
restore that trust and makes it easier for consumers to identify
legitimate email messages."
With the announcement on Thursday, Goodmail said it became a standard of
authenticity for ISP providers handling an estimated 65 percent of
business to customer e-mail in the United States.
"Our role is trying to surface and identify the good, legitimate messages
from sources you are engaged with," Gingras said.
"I am not at all suggesting certifying e-mail means the bad mails are
going away - no more than putting a lock on the door means the bad guys
will stop trying to get into your house."
Goodmail checks companies to make certain they are legitimate before
certifying their e-mail and then monitors mailings for abuses. Firms in
business less than a year can't qualify for Goodmail.
Goodmail certification is meant only for e-mail from businesses to
existing customers and can't be used for messages prospecting for new
clients, according to Gingras.
ISPs aligned with Goodmail route certified e-mails past spam filters and
into the in-boxes of addresses.
The blue envelope signals recipients that e-mail is legitimate and not
"junk" such as "phishing" expeditions by cyber-criminals intent on
tricking them into revealing personal information.
"We use Federal Express every day; it is an indication of something good
and its tagline is 'When it absolutely, positively has to be there over
night'," Gingras said.
"The true tagline for e-mail today would be 'Maybe, possibly, sometimes.'
Maybe it will be something I want. Possibly it will be good. And
sometimes I'll get it. We need it to be reliable and safe."
Approximately 400 businesses contract with Goodmail for CertifiedEmail,
according to Gingras.
Internet advocates are concerned that allowing companies to pay for e-mail
priority will result in people able to pay premiums getting preferential
message handling on the increasingly crowded Internet.
There are also worries that it is a first step in free e-mail going the
way of free television.
"I don't believe in the inevitability that people will pay for e-mail like
posting letters," Gingras said. "The problems in the e-mail space aren't
about personal e-mails. They are about large-volume messages, fraudulent
or not."
Symantec Releases Beta of Norton AntiBot
Symantec announced late Friday a free public beta for its new Norton
AntiBot software that attempts to identify malware on your system by
analyzing its behavior.
The stand-alone software is based on existing (and currently available)
technology from Sana Security, with a few minor add-ins from Symantec's
SONAR behavioral scanning technology that is now included in Norton
products.
Symantec says AntiBot is meant as a supplement to antivirus software, not
a replacement, and doesn't use signatures as traditional antivirus
products do. Instead, it examines how a program behaves - where it runs
from, what Registry changes it makes, what Internet sites it may attempt
to contact, and so on. The company says it won't conflict with other
antivirus programs, either its own or those of competitors.
While the SONAR feature runs only during virus scans, Symantec says
AntiBot stays running in the background to observe all programs'
behavior. Though the name emphasizes its focus on catching the versatile
"bot" malware that can turn infected computers into remote-controlled
"zombie" PCs, the program will look for behaviors associated with a wide
range of malicious software, including keystroke logging and other
suspicious activities.
The beta is available as a free download from Symantec. The company plans
to release the final version around July, at which time the beta will
expire. Symantec hasn't yet announced a price for the program, but says
that it may eventually add the technology to its existing line of
antivirus programs.
This latest move signals security companies' continued interest in
developing technology that doesn't rely on exact signature matches in
order to identify malware, since online crooks are continually devising
new approaches to evade signatures. For more on these evasion techniques
and the proactive technologies that combat them, see "When a Signature
Isn't Enough," a section of the PC World article, "Virus Stoppers."
E-mail Senders Can Pay To Bypass Filters
Four more Internet service providers will start charging banks, e-commerce
sites and other large e-mail senders for guaranteed delivery.
In deals expected to be announced Thursday, Goodmail Systems Inc. is
expanding its CertifiedEmail program to Comcast Corp., Cox Communications
Inc., Time Warner Cable Inc.'s Road Runner and Verizon Communications Inc.
Yahoo Inc. and Time Warner Inc.'s AOL became inaugural participants last
year.
Individuals, businesses and organizations will be able to continue
sending messages for free, but they risk finding those missives caught in
increasingly aggressive spam filters.
With Goodmail, a company can pay a quarter of a penny per message to
bypass those filters and reach inboxes directly. Recipients see a blue
seal verifying that the message is legitimate; senders get confirmations
and can resend messages lost in transit.
Non-profit groups can participate, too, at about a tenth of the
commercial rates.
At least half of the fees go to the service provider, Goodmail Chief
Executive Richard Gingras said.
For now, Goodmail will approve only companies and organizations in
existence for at least a year, to thwart fly-by-night operations. Those
that have prompted too many spam complaints will be disqualified.
The service is designed to certify credit card statements, e-commerce
receipts and other communications with existing customers. It does
potentially give a boost to larger corporations and groups that can afford
the charge, but Gingras says their messages are the ones most likely to be
mischaracterized as junk.
Peter Castleton, Verizon's director of consumer broadband services, said
his company would still let senders apply for "whitelisting" - and thus
bypass filters as well - without charge. Goodmail's service, he said, is
for those that want approval at multiple ISPs at once.
Microsoft Strikes Another Linux Deal
Microsoft Corp. said Monday it will share technology with Linux
distributor Xandros Inc., the latest in a string of deals meant to help the
patent-protected Windows operating system work more smoothly with
open-source programs.
Under the terms of the agreement, New York-based Xandros, which makes and
distributes open-source desktop and server software, will license server
code from Microsoft and develop software tools that work with Microsoft's
systems.
The companies also will work on technology to translate between two types
of documents, Microsoft-developed OpenXML format and the Open Document
Format. That could improve interoperability between Microsoft's Office
software and open-source rivals.
Microsoft also said in a statement it will endorse Xandros Server and
Desktop programs as a preferred Linux distribution.
Key to the agreement is a clause that protects Xandros customers from
running afoul of Microsoft's legal machine for patent infringement. A
growing number of companies and government agencies rely on elements of
both Microsoft's Windows and various versions of Linux to run their office
networks, but fear being sued by the software maker, which claims
open-source software infringes on hundreds of its patents.
Financial terms of the arrangement weren't disclosed.
The Linux server software segment is dominated by Red Hat Inc. and Novell
Inc.; Xandros' share of that worldwide market is so small that research
group IDC doesn't track it. Xandros captured less than 1 percent of the
desktop Linux operating system market in 2006, according to IDC, far
behind big players like Red Flag Software Co., based in China, and
Turbolinux Inc. in Japan.
The deal with Xandros is similar to one Microsoft struck with Novell last
November. It sparked considerable outcry from some open-source
programmers, who make all of their code - and any software that includes
their code - available without charge to users and other developers.
Free software proponents argued that under the public license governing
Novell's code, Microsoft must give up patent claims on its software if it
makes exceptions for some customers.
In a May filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Novell noted
that Microsoft could conceivably back out of the deal to avoid extending
its patent covenants to a broader range of recipients.
Guilty Verdict Dropped in Porn Pop-Up Case Against Teacher
A school teacher facing jail time after spyware programs exposed her
students to pornographic images has been given a reprieve.
Julie Amero had been convicted of four felony counts of "risk of injury
to a minor," but on Friday, the Connecticut superior court judge in
charge of her sentencing set aside a guilty verdict in the case.
The ruling by Judge Hillary Strackbein grants Amero a new trial, but
whether that will actually happen was unclear Friday. In an interview,
Assistant State Attorney David Smith said he had taken "no position" on
the defense's motion that triggered the judge's decision to set aside the
guilty verdict. Smith declined to comment further on the case because it
is still pending.
Amero, formerly a substitute teacher at Kelly Middle School in Norwich,
Connecticut, was charged after an Oct. 19, 2004 incident during which a
classroom computer exposed Amero's seventh graders to pornographic
images. She was facing up to 40 years in prison after her Jan. 5
conviction.
The prosecution had charged that Amero had endangered her students by
accessing pornographic images and the case had become a cause celebre in
the antispyware community, which has portrayed her as an innocent victim
of a malicious spyware program.
One of Amero's most vocal advocates, Sunbelt Software Inc. CEO Alex
Eckelberry said in a blog posting he was"very pleased," with the judge's
ruling. But, he cautioned that "there's still the specter of a new trial
and so the show isn't over yet."
Evidence presented at Amero's trial showed that the school's computer was
infected with malicious JavaScript code, after a visit to a Web site
devoted to hair styles, according to Eckelberry.
Neither Amero nor her lawyer William Dow could be reached immediately for
comment. However, Amero was pleased with the ruling, according to Herb
Horner, a computer forensics expert who was hired by Amero's attorney to
testify at her trial.
"She's flying high. She may not be out of the woods yet, but at least the
verdict is taken away," he said. "This is the best I've seen Julie... in
a long while."
Brits Are Busiest Surfers
Web surfers in the U.K. spend more time online than those in the rest of
Europe or the U.S., according to results from a study released on Monday.
The average U.K. Internet user spends 34.4 hours on the Web each month -
or almost a day and a half - followed by the Swedes with 31.7 hours and
the Spanish with 30.6 hours, according to the figures, from comScore
Inc.'s World Metrix study.
The U.K. and Sweden also beat out the U.S., where the average Web surfer
spends 31.4 hours online each month, the study found.
Asked to explain the U.K.'s high usage rates, Bob Ivins, managing
director of comScore Europe, cited an increase in broadband usage and
Britain's poor weather.
Germany has Europe's biggest Internet population, with 35.6 million
people, although Germans spend less time in front of their computers on
average, racking up just 22.6 hours online each month. The average for
Europe is 24.1 hours per month.
The Netherlands has the greatest Internet penetration, at 83 percent,
followed by Norway and Sweden with 70 percent each. Russia came last
with 11 percent Internet penetration.
The figures come with several caveats: They include only Internet users
aged 15 and older, and are based on data from 16 of Europe's biggest
markets, with the numbers extrapolated to find averages for the rest of
the continent. They are based on data collected in April from PCs at
home and at work, and do not include Internet access from mobile phones
and Internet cafes.
On average there were 122 million Europeans online each day in April,
compared to 114 million in the U.S., comScore said. Web sites owned by
Google Inc. generated the most page views in most of the countries,
followed by those of Microsoft Corp.
The countries studied were Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France,
Germany, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Russia,
Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the U.K.
eBay To Ban Global Ivory Trade On Its Sites
Online auction site eBay will ban all international trade of elephant ivory
on its sites, the company said on Tuesday in a move welcomed by an animal
welfare group which found the bulk of the ivory was most likely illegal.
A spokeswoman for eBay (Nasdaq:EBAY - news) said it was tightening its
policy on ivory sales and that the ban on international trade in elephant
ivory would come into effect by the end of June.
International Fund for Animal Welfare said it was the first online
international trade ban of elephant ivory.
"IFAW believes that this is an important step forward, but that a total
ban is ultimately needed, and we will continue to work with eBay and
others to implement this," Peter Pueschel, IFAW head of the global program
against wildlife trade, said in a statement.
The Fund said a survey carried out in February found that 94 percent of
elephant ivory traded on eBay sites was potentially illegal and that
eBay's policies varied from country to country and were often vague and
not enforced.
International wildlife trade laws differ from country to country and are
often complex but according to the IFAW, in general it is illegal to sell
carved or uncarved ivory unless it is antique and accompanied by a proof
of age certificate.
The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES)
imposed a ban on international ivory trade in 1989, practically ending
trade but this has since revived.
eBay will implement clearer and stricter policies on a national level for
in-country trade, the Fund said.
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