One of the most discussed topics currently is California's push to legalize marijuana.

It appears that the state has at least two fans from with social networking giant Facebook, as co-founders Sean Parker and Dustin Moskovitz have donated to the campaign. Parker recently gave $100,000 and Moskovitz gave the rest.

The donations were reported in Proposition 19 campaign finance filings revealed this week.

Although neither is still with the company, both have ownership stakes that make them billionaires.

While still in college, Parker helped develop Napster, the original P2P file sharing network. He is now a partner in a Silicon Valley venture capital firm.

Support for proposition 19 has raised $2.4 million so far.

Permalink | Comments

---

George "Geohot" Hotz has released the first RC of an untethered jailbreak for all iOS devices, dubbing the jailbreak Limera1n.

The jailbreak works on the iPhone 3GS, iPod Touch 3/4G, iPad, and iPhone 4.

For the time being the jailbreak works only on Windows machines.

The jailbreak is based on low-level bootrom exploits that are different than the current exploits used by SHAtter and in the newly released "greenpois0n."

Geohot uses the same exploit found by c0mex, the hacker behind the popular one-click Spirit jailbreak.

The jailbreak should be available at http://limera1n.com tomorrow.

Permalink | Comments

---

Hitachi-LG Data Storage has shown off a prototype storage device that can backup unused files to Blu-ray cartridges. Each prototype cartridge can store up to 1TB of data. Each contains discs that use the new BDXL format, standardized earlier this year. BDXL discs offer 128GB of storage on a write-once disc and 100GB on a rewritable disc.

The prototype device is packed with four hard disk drives providing storage with two additional slots capable of holding 8 discs. Each disc contains multiple recording layers. The device runs automatic back-ups where it transfers little used data from the hard disks to the cartridges.

The cartridges are loaded with RFID chips which can be scanned with a handheld scanner, allowing users to quickly find out what a cartridge contains.

The prototype was shown off at CEATEC in Japan and the company hopes to put it on the market in 2011.

Permalink | Comments

---

IBM will continue to develop the Cell chip technology and hardware to supply for future gaming consoles, a company executive has said. Jai Menon, CTO of IBM's Systems and Technology Group, said that the company is working with Sony and Nintendo. "We want to stay in the business, we intend to stay in the business," he said.

Cell made its first appearance in the PlayStation 3 console, launched in 2006. The chip includes processor cores based on IBM's Power architecture. Neither the Xbox 360 or Wii consoles use the Cell processor, but they do use IBM processors.

"I think you'll see Cell integrated into our future Power road map. That's the way to think about it as opposed to a separate line -- it'll just get integrated into the next line of things that we do," Menon said. "But certainly, we're working with all of the game folks to provide our capabilities into those next-generation machines."

Menon also said that IBM would be providing hardware for cloud-based gaming services. Such services require giant servers with a lot of processing power. "Some of this consumer stuff is also a cloud play. There are giant servers out there that provide some of the gaming capability. Some of that will come through cloud-based offerings as well," he said.

IBM released the Power7 processor earlier this year, and is already putting a lot of resources into its next-generation Power8 processor, expected in 2013.

Permalink | Comments

---

Graham Cluley, a security expert at Sophos, has written about an Internet rumor that predicts a virus will spread across the Internet on October 10, 2010. More specific rumors say it will happen at exactly 10:10am. Of course, it sounds utterly ridiculous but the fact is these rumors do incite panic for some reason.

Cluley also had to debunk similar rumors back in 2003, when many believed a virus would start infecting computers on March 3rd, 2003. These dates are specific because of how they look: 10/10/10 and 03/03/03. "It's just the kind of scare that people love to murmur about, and share with their online friends, but I'm afraid it has no basis in fact," Cluley writes.

"The truth is that there is malicious software which triggers every day of the year - so worrying about one particular date or time is actually counter-productive, as it implies that you should take less care on other dates. The 10/10/10 rumour, just like the 03/03/03 one, is utter codswallop."

"And yes, I know that 101010 is binary for decimal 42 (the alleged answer to "Life, The Universe and Everything" if you're a fan of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy). But it's still not any reason to worry any more than normal!"

Permalink | Comments

---

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) in the United States is looking for ways to tackle "bill shock" for mobile phone customers. The trade association representing carriers insists that customers are already well informed about their calling and data plans. However, the FCC conducted a survey in which it found 17 percent of respondents experienced sudden bill increases even though they hadn't changed their plans.

CTIA, the trade group that represents mobile carriers, questions the survey and insists that there are no need to any new regulations. The FCC could, for example, force carriers to alert users via SMS or some other way when they are approaching their monthly call minutes limit or data limits. CTIA insists that carriers already carry out such measures to warn customers, and there is no need to mandate any more.

"Wireless carriers and app developers are constantly providing additional methods for alerting customers regarding their usage to avoid unexpected charges," CTIA said in a September document describing discussions with the FCC. "The FCC should not prescribe -- and ultimately limit -- carriers' ability to provide effective consumer account management tools."

U.S. Senator Tom Udall, a New Mexico Democrat, introduced the Cell Phone Bill Shock Act on September 30, which would require mobile carriers to notify customers when they have used 80 percent of their monthly minutes and to obtain customer consent before charging for services not covered by their regular monthly plan.

"The texting and Internet capabilities that make today's cell phones more useful than ever should be applied to help customers avoid bill shock," Udall said when introducing the bill.

"Sending an automatic text or e-mail notification to a person's phone is a simple, cost-effective solution that should not place a burden on cell phone companies and will go a long way toward reducing the pain of bill shock by customers."

Consumers Union, the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners, and Public Knowledge have endorsed Udall's legislation.

Permalink | Comments

---

Webroot is warning about a change that a Trojan makes to Firefox files that change the way the browser handles password information entered in forms on websites. Trojan-PWS-Nslog is found to modify a file used by Firefox (nsLoginManagerPrompter.js) in such a way that the browser simply saves all entered passwords and does not prompt a user anymore on whether or not it should.

Computer security firms generally advise against saving passwords in a web browser because they can so easily be retrieved either by a person physically using the browser or by malware installed on the computer. The keylogging Trojan, which copies itself as Kernel.exe to the system32 directory, creates a new user account on the machine in the background (Maestro).

It then retrieves information from the registry and saved passwords from Internet Explorer and Firefox. It attempts to send the stolen information to a server once per minute. The server is now actually offline, but the changes the malware makes to the Firefox browser file are not fixed by removal tools. Instead a user will have to re-install the Firefox browser to write a new copy of the file.

That's not the only interesting thing found with this trojan however. Embedded inside is an interesting string of text you wouldn't expect to see included with malware: "SaLiLoG keylogger server made by Salar Zeynali - Salixem@Gmail.com."

Webroot tracked down Zeynali's Facebook profile, where it says he is from Karaj, Iran. He writes crimeware just for fun. The "crimeware" is a keylogger creation tool he offers as a free download on a message forum he hangs out on. He also likes heavy metal music and sports a emo haircut by the way.

Permalink | Comments

---

Tech vendors are hoping for a stronger year-end as economic woes continue to impact the industry. There are signs that U.S. consumers are spending more, despite unemployment remaining high. Analysts expect consumers to spend more on mobile devices such as smartphones and tablet PCs, but will likely demand deep discounts.

Retailers are expected to see their best Christmas in four years and companies that are less exposed to the booming wireless device market are expected not to fare as well as others. "A lot depends on what happens in the economy, but some segments are pretty good," Micron Technology Inc President Mark Durcan told Reuters in an interview on Thursday.

"At least for Micron, we have very strong demand in the smartphone space and pretty good demand in enterprise and networking."

The market for tablet PCs has exploded following Apple's release of the iPad device in April. Samsung and Dell have launched competing products and dozens more are in the pipeline. However, many of those devices likely will not be out in time for Christmas.

Microsoft Corp. will be hoping that handsets featuring Windows Phone 7, expected in November, will bring in strong sales and give it back some muscle after squandering its position in the market in just a few years.

Permalink | Comments

---

Another week, another Apple rumor. Once again, a report is suggesting that Apple Inc. is moving closer to offering a music subscription service to customers. The service would grant access to a large catalog of music content for a monthly fee.

The iPod maker is reportedly in talks with the major record labels, mulling over the finer details of the concept.

The New York Post is the source of the latest report on the issue. According to the Post, Apple's iTunes boss Eddie Cue recently has discussed with the record companies how they could implement the plan, with a source saying there would be a tiered pricing range.

The monthly fee would work out at around $10-15 depending on how much music would be included and how long customers would sign up for the service.

Permalink | Comments

---

The video game industry is confident of a strong holiday season performance following strong sales of top video games recently released. New titles from popular franchises are boosting confidence in holiday sales. After Halo Reach made $200 million in its first day on sale, Electronic Arts' FIFA 11 went on to become the fastest-selling sports game ever.

U.S. games industry figures for September are due out next week from NPD, which will help to give a clearer picture. Arvind Bhatia, a Sterne Agee analyst, expects the numbers to be better than August's dismal 10 percent hardware and software sales drop.

"It's a tough economy, but the overall picture for video games is starting to look a little bit better," Bhatia said. Activision also revealed this week that its online RPG, World of Warcraft, has 12 million subscribers which is the most it has ever had at any given time.

"When you look at how the industry looks today, we are seeing the top products doing really well," said Paul Sams, chief operating officer of Activision's Blizzard Entertainment.

U.S. video game sales are down 8 percent so far this year, following an 8 percent drop in 2009, worrying the $60.4 billion global industry.

Permalink | Comments

---