RIM set to launch BlackBerry music service

NEW YORK: Canada's Research in Motion (RIM) is developing a new service that would allow subscribers to play music on their BlackBerry smartphones, the Wall Street Journal reported Thursday.

The option is "designed to work with RIM's BlackBerry Messenger," the newspaper reported, citing unnamed sources who had discussed the service with RIM executives.

The new service, to be known as BBM Music, could be launched "as soon as next week," and allow subscribers to access around 50 songs at one time for an as-yet unspecified price, the report said.

According to the paper, the company has already signed, or are preparing to sign, agreements with four music power houses - Vivendi Universal Music, Sony Music, Warner and EMI.

The move is aimed at attracting younger consumers to the product, which is facing tough competition from Apple's iPhone and others.

According to a study by ComScore published in July, the iPhone is now more widely used than the BlackBerry in the US market.

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Taiwan develops reprint able e-papers

TAIPEI: Taiwan's Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) has developed e-paper that can be reprinted 260 times.

ITRI demonstrated prototypes of the e-paper that it aims to commercialize in two years.

The e-paper would be able to function various colors at various parts of the sheet. This also helps to keep the production cost low. The colors do not mix up.

ITRI's e-paper can be printed in a number of ways including with thermal, electrical and physical technology. With small modifications, thermal printers in fax machines can be used to print on the e-paper.

The e-paper can be thermally reprinted 260 times, and ITRI aims to increase that number to 500 times during the next year or two.

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FBI arrests 16 hackers over cyber crimes

WASHINGTON: US authorities on Tuesday arrested 16 people for cyber crimes including 14 over an online attack on the PayPal website claimed by the hacking group ‘Anonymous,’ the Department of Justice said.

The US indictment against the 14 hackers alleges the denial of service (DDoS) attacks on PayPal were "retribution" because the site terminated a donation account for the whistle-blowing group WikiLeaks.

The Paypal attack suspects were arrested in raids in Alabama, Arizona, California, Colorado, Washington DC, Florida, Massachusetts, Nevada, New Mexico and Ohio, US officials said in a statement.

Two suspects were arrested under separate indictments but similar charges in Florida and New Jersey, while British police arrested one suspect and Dutch police four, it said.

In all FBI agents made 35 raids across the US as part of a probe into "coordinated cyber attacks against major companies and organizations," the FBI said.

Anonymous, an international hackers group, rose to fame with a series of attacks on websites linked to the Church of Scientology. The group gained further prominence after launching retaliatory attacks on companies perceived to be enemies of the whistle-blowing website Wikileaks.

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With space shuttle era over, US robot set for Mars

WASHINGTON: NASA moved on to a new chapter in space exploration on Friday, a day after the end of its shuttle program, by announcing details of plans to determine if Mars has or ever had the ingredients for life.

Managers at the U.S. space agency said a robotic science laboratory, being prepared for a November 25 launch, will land in August 2012 near a mountain in a crater on the planet most like Earth in the solar system.

NASA announced which crater it has picked for the 2.5 billion dollar Mars rover, Curiosity, to probe for signs of life when the unmanned vehicle is lowered onto the red planet next year.

The six-wheeled mechanical science lab will explore a crater called Gale, which contains a mountain and will help scientists study clay and sulfate deposits at various heights.

"Scientists identified Gale as their top choice to pursue the ambitious goals of this new rover mission," said Jim Green, director for the Planetary Science Division at NASA Headquarters in Washington.

"The site offers a visually dramatic landscape and also great potential for significant science findings."

The unchosen option was a crater called Eberswalde, a clay-bearing site where a river once flowed into a lake.

No one expects the rover, also known as the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL), to actually find living beings there, just signs that that some microbial life may have existed in the depths of a crater that may have contained water.

NASA has previously sent the Spirit and Opportunity rovers to explore Mars and has set its sights on sending humans there by 2030. The launch of Curiosity is set for later this year, with its arrival expected in August 2012.

Since it is larger than previous rovers, the car-sized vehicle will be lowered onto Mars with the help of a rocket-powered sky crane.

The announcement of Curiosity's exact destination came 35 years after the first spacecraft, the Viking 1, landed on Mars in July 1976.

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Skype and Face Book Get Integrated

Facebook, meet Skype. And Skype, you should probably meet Facebook. The two met in a major way today during a Facebook "Something Awesome" press event, where a grand total of three new Facebook features were introduced. One..

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