A frustrated businessman has blown his top with Microsoft after he claimed that a critical security update for Windows 2000 made his PCs unuseable for weeks.

Randy Hubbard, of Raceware Engineering LLC, claimed that SP4 contained defective software, and after going through a lengthy correspondence with Microsoft technical staff, has concluded that he has no further alternative but to be "lead plaintiffs in a Class Action suit against Microsoft for consumer fraud".

He said Microsoft had asked him if it could do anything else to "make him happy". Hubbard told him to send a cheque for $6,000 to cover some of his company's losses. But the Microsoft representative said he didn't have the authority to do that. "I told him to call Dollar Bill and tell him the situation and have him send us a check. He declined," said Hubbard. "I said 'no problem, we're switching to Linux like every other business, have a nice day'".

A draft bill obtained by Wired News, recently circulated among members of the House judiciary committee, would make it much easier for the Justice Department to pursue criminal prosecutions against file sharers by lowering the burden of proof. The bill also would seek penalties of fines and prison time of up to ten years for file sharing.

In defending the Pirate Act, Hatch said the operators of P2P networks are running a conspiracy in which they lure children and young people with free music, movies and pornography. With these "human shields," the P2P companies are trying to ransom the entertainment industries into accepting their networks as a distribution channel and source of revenue.

"I commend Senators Patrick Leahy and Orrin Hatch for their vision and leadership in combating the theft of America's creative works," said Jack Valenti, MPAA's chief executive.

So far in 2004, Leahy has received $178,000 in campaign contributions from the entertainment industries -- the second-biggest source of donations to Leahy behind lawyers. Hatch has received $152,360.

If the draft becomes law, anyone sharing 2,500 or more pieces of content, such as songs or movies, could be fined or thrown in jail. In addition, anyone who distributes content that hasn't been released in wide distribution (for example, pre-release copies of an upcoming movie) also would face the penalties. Even a single file, determined by a judge to be worth more than $10,000, would land the file sharer in prison.

There is life on Mars, a researcher has announced at a conference - unfortunately it is just spaceship-borne contamination.

"I believe there is life on Mars, and it's unequivocally there, because we sent it," Andrew Schuerger of the University of Florida told the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference in Houston, Texas, recently. He has been granted funding from NASA's planetary protection office to help develop better sterilisation techniques for future missions.

Schuerger says that of all the space probes sent to Mars, only the two Viking craft in 1976 were adequately heat sterilised. The procedures used for all missions since then, including NASA's twin rovers and Europe's Beagle 2, would have left some microbes aboard.

"They are probably not going to survive in 200 kelvin conditions and in sulphuric acid," says Jeff Kargel of the US Geological Survey, who believes that ponds and marshes of acidic brines are possible or even likely on Mars today.

But, he adds, "Maybe they could. And maybe we've just done a really terrible thing."

Giant PC firm Dell has finally admitted that its PowerEdge 1650 servers made between January 1 and May 6 have a Hunter Thompson tendency to overheat, smoke and shut-down.

The problem first turned up in Australia, where a Dell spokesperson told smh.com.au the company had advised all affected customers to have these motherboards replaced and has contacted all affected customers.

Until the motherboard is replaced, customers can continue to use the systems as normal. That is if they are prepared to put up with a hot, smoking server which shuts down.

However a poster to the Full-Disclosure mailing list claimed the problem was more widespread than Dell admitted. He thought that Dell 1600 servers also showed such anti social tendencies too.

However Dell was insistent that only the 1650 suffers from this anti-social habit.

Australian magistrates have blocked the extradition of the alleged head of a software piracy syndicate to the US.

Hew Raymond Griffiths, 41, of Berkeley Vale in New South Wales, Australia, was indicted on one count of criminal copyright infringement and one count of conspiracy to commit criminal copyright infringement by a Virginia grand jury last year. US investigators charge that Griffiths rose trough the ranks to become leader of the infamous DrinkorDie piracy group, which released a pirated copy of Windows 95, days before its official release and has been getting up to similar antics ever since.

But the circumstances of the case failed to persuade Downing Centre Local Court Magistrate Daniel Reiss that Griffiths ought to be extradited.

Griffiths' alleged crimes took place in Australia. Griffiths had never travelled to the US and, what's more, he'd "never been a fugitive fleeing or hiding from the extradition country".

The decision by Wal-Mart (WMT) and other retailers to require that their largest suppliers attach inventory-tracking RFID (radio frequency identification) chips to their products is creating a brand-new chip market -- one with a bright future. RFID chips, whose data can be grabbed by electronic readers, could one day hold all of an individual's personal information. In theory, that means they could displace credit cards, medical-insurance cards -- perhaps even wallets, predicts Scott McGregor, CEO of Philips Semiconductors, a division of Koninklijke Philips Electronics (PHG) and the world's No. 1 maker of RFID chips, which are also known as "tags."

And for a lot of makers of sports shoes, RFID provides added benefit to customers. The average life of a sports-shoe model is about three months. Say that when your shoes wear out, you want a similar pair. It's incredibly difficult today for the retailer to tell a customer which new model corresponds to the old one. But we could fix that with RFID. That's a great sales tool.

Also, privacy concerns around RFID tags are a little like concerns about supermarket scanners years ago. When the laser scanners were coming out, everybody was saying, retailers are going to collect information about what you buy. And none of that happened. I think the situation with RFID is similar.

A senior figure at the Department of Justice and the leader of the Senate have damned Mario Monti's judgement on Microsoft.

Hewitt Pate, head of antitrust at the Department of Justice, described the decision as "unfortunate" and said the restrictions put on Microsoft may have "unintended consequences".

Senate majority leader Bill Frist was no happier, described the decision as "preposterous", according to CNN. "I now fear that the US and the EU are heading toward a new trade war - and that the commission's ruling against Microsoft is the first shot," he said.

Washington (AP) -- President Bush poked fun at his staff, his Democratic challenger and himself Wednesday night at a black-tie dinner where he hobnobbed with the news media.

Bush put on a slide show, calling it the "White House Election-Year Album" at the Radio and Television Correspondents' Association 60th annual dinner, showing himself and his staff in some decidedly unflattering poses.

There was Bush looking under furniture in a fruitless, frustrating search. "Those weapons of mass destruction have got to be somewhere," he said.

Bush showed himself playing cards on Air Force One and cracked that he was on his way to an international summit and using a special deck to help him bone up on the names of the leaders he was about to meet.

More than 532 students at 21 American universities have been sued by the RIAA which claims they were illegally sharing digital music files over the Internet.

It is the first time that the RIAA has gone for students swapping individual files. Last year four students who were at the centre of a file swapping hub were targeted.

Other suits were issued against 443 people using commercial Internet access providers were also filed in California, Colorado, Missouri, Texas and Virginia.

The RIAA President Cary Sherman said in a statement: "We are sending a clear message that downloading or 'sharing' music from a peer-to-peer network without authorisation is illegal, it can have consequences and it undermines the creative future of music itself."

However, it is not all clear cut. The RIAA has to find out who the people they are suing actually are. It will take time for the RIAA to work through the courts to force various university administrators to identify who belongs to what IP address.

The White House has dismissed charges by a former top US security aide who claims President George W Bush did a "terrible job" in tackling terrorism.

White House spokesman Scott McClellan denied the claims, accusing Mr Clarke of political opportunism ahead of November's presidential poll.

"See if Saddam did this. See if he's linked in any way," Mr Clarke quoted Mr Bush as saying.

"The entire conversation left me in absolutely no doubt that George Bush wanted me to come back with a report that said Iraq did this," he added.

Mr Clarke also told CBS that the day after the 11 September attacks, Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld called for retaliatory strikes on Iraq, even though al-Qaeda was based in Afghanistan.