licensing

ACLU seeks info on license plate camera surveillance by cops

LAS VEGAS - The American Civil Liberties Union wants to know how police around the country are using automatic license plate readers to track people's movements.

The ACLU today sent requests for information to police departments in 38 states and filed federal Freedom of Information Act requests with the departments of Justice, Homeland Security and Transportation to try to find out how much the governments use the technology and how much it is paying to expand the program.

Mounted on patrol cars, telephone poles and under bridges, the automatic license plate readers (ALPRs) can snap a photograph of every … Read more

YouTube breaks records with 4M Creative Commons videos

YouTube topped all records today by tallying up 4 million Creative Commons-licensed videos in its trove -- more than any other video hosting company in the world.

This means that users have literally millions of choices for snipping bits of footage, adding scenes, and building onto videos they're making. Everything in this collection comes branded with the Creative Commons Attribution license, meaning users don't have to get explicit permission to use the content from the creators.

YouTube launched its Creative Commons video library last year and since then it said its users have added in "40 years' … Read more

AP offers subscribers music through Audiosocket

Indie music and the Associated Press -- it's an odd couple, all right. But the AP is launching a new effort aimed at letting its subscribers use contemporary music as soundtracks or background.

Those who use the AP's photo library will now have access to original music via an agreement with Audiosocket, the two companies announced. AP Images, AP's photo licensing unit, will let customers download music for use in creative projects using the digital music licensing company's platform.

Audiosocket President Jenn Miller said the partnership allows content producers to use music that is contemporary and … Read more

Windows 8: The end of the full retail version?

There's a rumor going around that, with Windows 8, Microsoft is doing away with the full version of Windows sold at retail.

If this pans out -- and so far, I have heard it from only one source (as I noted on the Windows Weekly podcast with my co-host Paul Thurrot this week) -- I doubt there will be anyone lining up in protest.

In Microsoft parlance, a full product typically means a non-upgrade, fully licensed version of Windows sold in a box via brick-and-mortar and/or online retailers. With Windows, full product tends to be quite expensive -- … Read more

Microsoft's Windows 7 hits 600 million licenses sold

The Windows 7 platform has hit an important milestone.

Microsoft corporate vice president of OEM Steven Guggenheimer today announced that his company has sold 600 million Windows 7 licenses worldwide. Guggenheimer made the announcement during a keynote address at Computex. Microsoft confirmed his claim in a statement following the event.

The software giant has been discussing Windows 7 sales quite a bit lately. Late last month, CEO Steve Ballmer said that Microsoft expects 350 million Windows 7-based devices to be shipped this year alone.

Windows 7's sales appear to be accelerating. In April 2011, Microsoft announced that it had … Read more

The 404 1,044: Where we make May day (podcast)

Could you last a year without the Internet? It's not the first time we've heard of someone going off the grid, but a guy from The Verge has decided to spend the next year offline, so we'll challenge each other to do the same.

In other online news, Facebook has launched a new organ donor tool for Timeline that lets users add a life story to their profiles with a link to sign up for donation services in their area. Mark Zuckerberg went on ABC news and credited Steve Jobs as inspiration to use social networking to … Read more

OS X EULA changes allow installation on all of your Macs

Apple historically has sold OS X through its Apple Store and third-party vendors on physical media and included a classical End User License Agreement that limited users to one installation of the software on one Apple-branded machine. Given that people own multiple Macs, Apple introduced family pack licenses with installations for up to five systems. This offered individuals with multiple Macs a discount for upgrading.

The availability of these past options have confused people about the licensing for Apple's latest OS X Lion, since it's available as an download from the Mac App Store instead of being distributed … Read more

Yahoo picks patent fight with Facebook

Yahoo appears to be turning to patent licensing to boost its fortunes.

The foundering Web pioneer is threatening legal action against Facebook if the social-networking giant does not agree to license 10 to 20 patents held by Yahoo, according to The New York Times. The patents at issue relate to advertising, Web site personalization, social networking, and chat services, the newspaper reported, citing unidentified people briefed on the matter.

Yahoo didn't respond to a CNET request for comment but told the Times that, "We must insist that Facebook either enter into a licensing agreement or we will be … Read more

Android Atlas Weekly 84: Chrome finally hits Android (Podcast)

Chrome comes to Android with one gigantic caveat. Or maybe two. And we are joined by cell phone expert Jessica Dolcourt who gives us her personal opinion of Android.

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NEWS:

-Three years on, Chrome at last arrives on Android

-Verizon Galaxy Nexus loses Google support

-Google Voice gets the Ice Cream Sandwich treatment

-Motorola patent license will cost Apple 2.25% of sales

-Google secretly testing pair of connected devices

-An Android tablet for the tub

-Superslim Samsung Galaxy S III could drop in May… Read more