Yooouuutuuube Puts YouTube on LSD

There are some pretty cool add-ons and tools for YouTube: in fact we wrote about more than 100 of them in our YouTube Toolbox. Some are fun, some useful and some - like the tools to download YouTube videos - aren’t necessarily legal.

But the YouTube tool that’s got people buzzing this week is just plain out of this world. Yooouuutuuube.com lets you put tens, even hundreds, of YouTube videos into rows and columns, creating an utterly trippy experience. Just enter a YouTube () video ID and frame width for each “piece” of the mosaic, and Yooouuutuuube will generate a video grid.

The best example: view this 36 by 36 column Alice in Wonderland masterpiece…and be warned that either your computer, mind, or both may be pushed to the max.

See also: Top YouTube Videos

Original here

Report: AT&T to cut iPhone service plan by $10

by Marguerite Reardon

AT&T may slash the price of its iPhone service plan by $10 when a new version of the touchscreen smartphone is launched this summer, according to a story on TheStreet.com.

The article cited analyst Michael Cote of Cote Collaborative saying that there is a "strong possibility" that AT&T will drop the entry-level price of its service plan to $59 from $69. Apple is expected to unveil the latest iPhone on June 8 during the company's World Wide Developers Conference in San Francisco.

(Credit: Apple)

AT&T declined to comment for this story, and Michael Cote did not respond to an e-mail request for an interview.

The price cut would likely help make the iPhone, which now retails for $200 with a two-year service plan with AT&T, more appealing to more mainstream customers. I've been saying for quite some time that the biggest hurdle to widescale adoption of the iPhone or any other smartphone in the mainstream market is the high price tag of the service contracts.

Consumers have shown that they are willing to pay anywhere between $100 and $200 for a sophisticated smartphone device. But the monthly service charge, which starts at $69 for the iPhone, is much harder to swallow.

It puts the real cost of the iPhone 3G over the life of the two-year contract at a whopping $1,856, which includes the price of the 8GB phone and 24 months of the most basic iPhone voice and data plan. It doesn't include the activation fee or taxes and other fees associated with the account. For subscribers who need more voice minutes or unlimited texting, the price tag is even higher.

Still, a $240 reduction in the overall cost of the phone over the life of the contract could entice some cost-conscious consumers.

AT&T and Apple have slashed the price of the iPhone twice already. The first version of the device introduced nearly two years ago was originally priced at $599 for the 8GB version. A couple months after the release, Apple reduced it to $399. When the new iPhone 3G was introduced, AT&T subsidized the cost of the phone and offered it for $199 with a two-year contract. The price cut likely helped the companies sell about 17 million iPhones last year, compared to about 4 million devices in 2007.

For the most part, Apple and AT&T have managed to keep the subsidy and sale price of the iPhone constant over the past year, while other carriers and smartphone makers have been forced to slash prices to attract customers.

Only a month after it hit the market, T-Mobile's G1 started selling for $148 from Wal-Mart. And three months after it launched the Storm, Verizon Wireless started offering a special buy-one-get-one free promotion that allowed customers who bought any BlackBerry device, including the Storm, to get another one free.

But as competition heats up in the smartphone market, AT&T and Apple could be forced to address the affordability issue to gain new customers. This is especially true as Research In Motion's consumer-focused BlackBerry Curve surpasses the iPhone in sales. And with the Palm Pre also set to launch in early June on Sprint Nextel's network, Apple and AT&T will face even more competition.

Marguerite Reardon has been a CNET News reporter since 2004, covering cell phone services, broadband, citywide Wi-Fi, the Net neutrality debate, as well as the ongoing consolidation of the phone companies. E-mail Maggie.

Original here

Pirate Bay Founder Devises DDo$ Attack

Pirate Bay founder Gottfrid Svartholm (aka anakata) recieved a bill for the 30 million SEK that he, along with Peter Sunde (aka brokep), Fredrik Neij (aka TiAMO), and Carl Lundstrom, was fined in the verdict of the Pirate Bay trial just over three weeks ago. The bill inspired anakata to devise a plan involving sending money to Danowsky’s law firm, but not to pay the fine of course which they say will never be payed. Anakata’s clever plan is called internet-avgift, internet-fee in English. Anakata encourages all Internet users to pay extremely small sums around 1 SEK (0.13 USD) to Danowsky’s law firm, which represented the music companies at the Pirate Bay trial. The music companies will not benefit from this, instead it will cost them money to handle and process all the money.

The plan can be called a Distributed Denial of Dollars attack (DDo$). The plan is an away-from-keyboard DDoS attack. DDoS attacks involve lots of users overloading the victim with internet traffic damaging their ability to provide services. Money, instead of Internet traffic is used in this case. The victim is Danowsky’s law firm which represented the IFPI at the Pirate Bay trial.

A friend of anakata told Blog Pirate that the bank account to which the payments are directed has only 1000 free transfers, after which any transfers have a surcharge of 2 SEK for the account holder. Any internet-fee payments made after the first 1000, which includes the law firm’s ordinary transfers, will instead of giving 1 SEK, cost 1 SEK to the law firm. Since Danowsky & Partners Advokatbyrå is a small firm, all the transactions are handled by hand. Handling all payments will be time consuming, costing the law firm in productivity. Maybe it will even affect their success in other cases.

Make direct payments to
Danowsky & Partners Advokatbyrå KB. Plusgiro 79 31 21-5.

Additionally if after paying the internet-fee you determine that your payment was erroneous, Swedish law states that you can request the money back, putting an additional load on Danowsky’s law firm.

Since the Pirate Bay crew was provided with such clear, logical, and well explained methods for calculating the damages in the trial, an explanation on how the internet-fee was calculated is provided. Use the formula below, substituting anything anywhere, to check that the internet-fee really is 1 SEK.

The name internet-avgift, as well as the layout of the site is based on tv-avgift and they layout of its site. Radiojanst, a state owned company, is responsible for collecting TV license fees in Sweden.

Original here