A Dutch dating website for farmers has taken Google to court for listing sponsored links to pornographic sites when you enter the site’s name into the search engine, the website said on Monday.

The site http://farmdate.nl has 3,000 members and describes itself as “a respectable meeting website for farmers.”

It is outraged that sponsored links paid for by companies appear when Internet surfers type in “farm date” on the Google website, the biggest search engine on the worldwide web.

The links, which lead to pornographic sites, are “very damaging for Farmdate’s reputation,” said Dutch farmer’s union FNV Bondgenoten, which is defending the website.

Source: INQ7.net

In the past, if you wanted to play WMF (Windows Media format) files on Linux (with the recent exception of Freespire), you usually had to find, download, and install Microsoft’s WMF codecs. Now, RealNetworks and Novell are teaming up to deliver Windows Media support to the Linux desktop.

As a result of a Microsoft-Real anti-trust lawsuit, Real won the right to incorporate Windows media formats into its software. As a result, Real’s RealPlayer and its open-source counterpart, Helix, will soon be able to play the Windows media formats.

Novell, in turn, will distribute the upgraded RealPlayer and Helix, as part of the GNOME Banshee music player in its SLED (SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop) distribution.

Source: eWeek

Google labs released a new product called Google Music Trends.

The new web site lists the top 20 songs Google Talk users are listening to. The site lists the most popular songs by song style from alternative music thru pop and rock to indie and Latin music.

The site shows the ups and downs of songs as they go on the chart.

The World Wide Web Consortium released new editions of four core XML specifications on Aug. 16.

The Cambridge, Mass.-based standards body announced the release of the fourth edition of XML (Extensible Markup Language) 1.0 and second editions of Extensible Markup Language (XML) 1.1, Namespaces in XML 1.0 and Namespaces in XML 1.1.

W3C officials said these core XML specifications stand as the foundation for W3C-defined technologies for querying, transforming, displaying, encrypting, and optimizing XML.

The new releases includes corrections for “all known errata and clarifications where there was some potential for misunderstanding,” according to a W3C document about the XML updates.

Meanwhile, the W3C is working to continue to improve XML.

W3C officials said that by the end of 2006, there will be new standards for XML Query (XML Query 1.0) and Extensible Stylesheet Language Transformation (XSLT 2.0).

In addition, W3C officials said the organization is revising XML Schema, which is heavily used in SOAP (Simple Object Access Protocol)-based Web services, and the standards organization is planning additions to XML Query beyond the 1.0 version.

Source: eWeek

The US government has awarded net overseeing organisation ICANN the contract to administer changes at the top of the internet until 2011.

The contract covers what is commonly referred to as the IANA function, a traditional bundle of technical operations that includes the allocation of IP addresses, management of the internet root server system, and changes to the top tree of the net, defining where all top-level domains - including global domains such as .com and .net as well as the 250 country code domains such as .uk for Great Britain or .de for Germany - are located on the internet.

Source: The Register

Sony has begun shipping 50-gigabyte recordable Blu-ray Disc media to the United States.

Additionally, Wednesday’s announcement confirmed that Sony will ship rewritable Blu-ray media later this year.

The new recordable discs are dual-layer, meaning that a total of 25 gigabytes can be recorded on each side, and Sony estimates that they can hold about four hours of HD video. They will retail for about $48.

Source: News.com

You wouldn’t pay to watch TV, visit most web sites, or listen to the radio, so why should entertainment on your mobile phone cost you money? Paying to download games to your mobile phone has just become passe this summer with the launch of GameJump.com. GameJump.com offers games that run the gamut: from casino games to puzzle games to shoot ‘em up games (involving some with aliens and one involving beer). Simply put, GameJump.com gives great games for free, and consumers who pay to play are losing out.

Until now, mobile games typically cost from $4 to $12 per download, often leaving customers surprised by high charges on their month-end phone bills. GameJump.com is providing its mobile games free of charge with a business model that relies on advertisers to offset costs. Similar to Internet gaming and media sites, advertisers place full-screen branded ‘wraps’ around games from GameJump.com. Advertisers win a new hands-on interactive medium to reach consumers that are engaged and playing games up to 20 minutes at a time, while the consumers enjoy the fun of playing games for free.

Customers can directly download these games and more from the GameJump.com website. When browsing the web through the phone customers can also access the GameJump site at http://gjmp.tw. The games are compatible with most handsets and carriers worldwide. While the games are free from GameJump.com, carriers may charge for data usage fees to download the games and ads as well as for receiving text messages when download links are sent via SMS.

Washington State is suing a movie download service over allegations that it used spyware to promote its business.

Movieland.com and its associates allegedly used malware tactics to bombard punters with aggressive pop-up ads that demanded payment for its download service. The lawsuit, brought by Washington State attorney general Rob McKenna, is the second lawsuit filed under the state’s Computer Spyware Act.

“The defendants in our suit promote a movie download service through websites including movieland.com that offer consumers a free three-day trial,” McKenna said in a statement.

“After the trial period, consumers are inundated with pop-ups that appear at least hourly and subject the consumer to a 40 second payment demand that cannot be closed. These messages are generated by software installed on their computers that cannot be easily removed.

“To stop these aggressive pop-ups, many frustrated consumers ultimately give in to the defendants’ unfair tactics and pay anywhere from $19.95 to nearly $100 for the service,” he added.

Source: The Register

A “darknet” service that allows users to share music files anonymously on the web has been launched in Sweden.

Relakks, as the service is known, allows users to send and receive files through a heavily-encrypted connection.

It is the first commercial example of a darknet, a virtual network set up to share files between trusted users.

The service is endorsed by political group the Pirate Party which is running for election in Sweden under a banner to reform the country’s copyright laws.

Source: BBC

Radio Disney (NYSE: DIS), is now available via streaming live broadcasts on the iTunes Radio Tuner, in the “Top 40/Pop” section. The 24-hour, kid-driven radio network is also heard on over 50 stations in the U.S. and in the United Kingdom, Japan and most of South America. In the U.S., Radio Disney is also available on XM and Sirius satellite radio, digital cable television’s Music Choice channel, an on-demand music channel on Verizon/VOD, on XM/DIRECTV and on RadioDisney.com.

Jill Casagrande, Senior Vice President and General Manager, Radio Disney, says, “A generation of kids are accustomed to listening to their music, their way on Radio Disney and we’ve seen their demographic advance a digital media revolution so extending our Radio Disney programming to the iTunes Radio Tuner platform furthers our goal to provide Disney-quality entertainment to kids and families wherever they are and whenever they want it.”

Lenovo Group is getting behind the idea of Linux on the desktop.

The PC maker, at the LinuxWorld Conference and Expo on Aug. 15, unveiled a plan to provide ThinkPad buyers with SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 10, often called “SLED 10″ for short.

Lenovo, whose ThinkPads have long been a favorite of Linux users, becomes the first PC manufacturer in recent history deliver computer models that offer full support for a version of the operating system, including taking measures such as writing software drivers for it.

Larger customers can work with Lenovo to have SLED 10 pre-installed at the factory, while smaller customers can order one of the machines and obtain a copy of the OS—either from Lenovo or directly from SUSE—and do the work of installing the OS themselves using Lenovo’s software and technical support.

Source: eWeek

Apple has updated its Boot Camp Windows-on-Mac utility, taking the public beta test release to version 1.1. The 202MB download contains updated Windows hardware drivers, but most importantly adds support for the recently released Mac Pro desktops.

According to Apple, Boot Camp 1.1 extends its ability to create Windows disk partitions not only to any of however many internal hard drives the host Mac has installed but also to specify of one these drives as an XP-only disk. The only exception, we’d expect, is the drive containing Mac OS X.

Source: Reg Hardware