Taking the DMCA Biscuit

This is almost Jesuitical in its contorted logic:

Media Rights Technologies and BlueBeat.com have issued cease and desist letters to both companies and to Adobe Systems Inc and Real Networks -- which produce the Adobe Flash Player and Real Player respectively -- for actively avoiding their X1 SeCure Recording Control, which they said is an effective copyright protection system.

MRT and Bluebeat said the failure to use an available copyright protection solution contravenes the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, which prohibits the manufacture of any product or technology designed to circumvent a technological measure that effectively controls access to a copyrighted work or protects the rights of copyright owners.

How do they come up with this stuff?

Windows Media for Windows - Really

Little things can make all the difference. If there is some audio stream using Microsoft Windows Media Format that you absolutely must listen to, then switching to GNU/Linux is that much harder. So anything that removes such obstacles is to be welcomed.

Such is the case for the news that Real and Novell are working to make Windows Media work out of the box for GNU/Linux.