One tenth of the stars in our galaxy might provide the right conditions to support complex life, according to a new analysis by Australian researchers. And most of these stars are on average one billion years older than the Sun, allowing much more time, in theory, for any life to evolve.

The concept of a "galactic habitable zone" (GHZ) for the Milky Way was first proposed in 2001. Now Charles Lineweaver of the University of New South Wales and colleagues have defined a life-friendly GHZ using a detailed model of the evolution of the Milky Way to map the distribution in space and time of four major factors thought essential for complex life.

"We're looking at what we think are the most robust and conservative pre-requisites for life - but they are very, very basic," Lineweaver says.

COLUMBUS, Ohio - At a recent showing of "Big Fish," several moviegoers at a local theater held up camera-equipped cell phones and took snapshots of the screen. Doing the same with a video camera will soon be a crime.

Yet the October study by AT&T Labs questioned the impact of camera-toting movie pirates. Researchers created a list of the 312 most popular movies released between January 2002 and June 2003.

Their conclusion: 77 percent of the films came from insider sources, either motion picture companies or theater employees taping from the projection booth.

Stevenson of the MPAA says the researchers used flawed data. The movie industry says its internal analysis last year found that 92 percent of recently released movies found on the Internet came from camcorders.

Despite its usual song and dance over CD burning, the record industry is in rude health, says Peter Martin.

The recording industry survey was carried out by Quantum Market Research using a sample of about 1000 people. It suggests that 31 million homemade CDs are given away as gifts each year (about four for each of the eight million Australians it says receive them). If, as seems reasonable, 31 million homemade CDs are kept rather than given away, the total number created each year would top 62 million.

A dent of 62 million in CD sales in stores each year should be easy to spot. Except for this problem. CD sales in Australian stores have hardly ever been that high.

At various times we have been told that the pianola was going to kill sales of sheet music, that radio was going to kill sales of records, that photocopying would kill sales of books, that the VCR would stop people going to movies, and that cheaper imported records would stop people buying Australian music.

BOULDER, Colorado (AP) -- In a phenomenon that has scientists puzzled, the Earth is right on schedule for a fifth straight year.

At the National Institute for Science and Technology in Boulder, spokesman Fred McGehan said most scientists agree the Earth's orbit around the sun has been gradually slowing for millennia. But he said they don't have a good explanation for why it's suddenly on schedule.

The leap second was an unexpected consequence of the 1955 invention of the atomic clock, which use the electromagnetic radiation emanated by Cesium atoms to measure time. It is extremely reliable.

Kevin Mitnick has been commissioned to pen another book on the art of hacking and wants you to do the grunt research work for him.

America's "most-wanted" computer outlaw, who spent five years in the clink, is calling on fellow Net naughties to submit stories of their exploits for inclusion in a book tentatively titled The Art of Intrusion. Mitnick is offering up a paltry 500 bones to the hacker that supplies 'the most provocative' story of deception and network intrusion. The lucky winner will also receive a copy of Mitnick's first book The Art of Deception signed by no less than Mitnick himself. What a treat!

It was the worst year in history for computer worms and viruses. The trouble began in January when the highly contagious Slammer worm infected a quarter of a million computers in just a single day. The following months saw further outbreaks with the viruses Fizzer spreading via both email and file-sharing networks in May and Bugbear attempting to steal passwords and other information from victims in June.

The most striking use of technology came in March when the US and allies went to war in Iraq. The conflict was characterised by unprecedented use of smart bombs, cruise missiles, satellite surveillance and hi-tech propaganda, highlighting the military's growing reliance on technology.

The year ended with a celebration of the centenary of manned flight. Researchers at Boeing Phantom Works and DARPA revealed what the next hundred years may deliver, including personal air vehicles and morphing aircraft.

According to this NY Times article (registration required), while Congressional members were busy passing the U.S. anti-spam law that will go into effect on January 1, they were also busy sending unsolicited e-mail to their constituents. This activity was aimed at growing the subscriber base receiving their political messages because these email lists are not subject to the normal 90-day blackout period before an election where members are forbidden to use taxpayer-supported Congressional mass communications. Consumer advocacy groups say that this policy may be unfair to the challengers because this loophole could be used by elected officials to communicate with voters right up to Election Day.

We are experiencing a major IT industry shift right now, and if you know where to look you can actually see it as it happens. This shift is all about Microsoft and open source.

Until very recently, Microsoft owned everything in the personal computer business, both low and high on the food chain. The low end was occupied by Palm, the high end by Sun, IBM and others. In the vast soft middle, there was Microsoft and only Microsoft.

About a year ago, things started to change. The cries that Linux would dethrone Microsoft remained the same, but there was a shift in the corporate reaction to those cries. CxOs started to say 'tell me about it'. In a down economy, free is much cheaper than hundreds of dollars, and infinitely more attractive. Linux started gaining ground with real paying customers using it for real work in the real world, really.

In its wisdom, Microsoft decided to squeeze the users a little, and to its abject horror it began to realise that people were willing to take the slightly less functionality of OpenOffice for the $500 a machine discount. Who would have guessed that result? See foot, see gun, see gun shoot foot.

Despite efforts to stem the billions of spam e-mails flooding inboxes, unwanted messages are still turning e-mail into a quagmire of misery.

Spammers send out tens of millions of e-mails to unsuspecting computer users every day, employing a myriad of methods to ensure their pills, loans and "requests for our lord" pleas fox e-mail filters.

The development has been called the Penny Black project, because it works on the idea that revolutionised the British postage system in the 1830s - that senders of mail should have to pay for it, not whoever is on the receiving end.

This weekend users of Kazaa Lite K++ learned that almost every download site of the popular peer-to-peer file-sharing application had disappeared, including the links on its own home page.

Sharman Networks, the company behind the original Kazaa, approached the ISP of every website that hosted the program and ordered its removal on grounds of copyright infringement.