Comcast, America’s largest ISP, has made a move to stop government regulation of the Internet, with the proposal of a filesharing bill of rights.

Despite being under investigation for meddling with users’ connection to filesharing networks, Comcast is keen on the idea of a “bill of rights and responsibilities” for users of filesharing programs like Limewire.

Comcast has already promised to stop interfering with access to filesharing services. This bill of rights would lay out what is an acceptable sue of filesharing technology. Comcast says that the move would help filesharing companies.

This could be a step forward in the battle to legalize filesharing and have it regulated. Whether or not this will be good for filesharing and free music downloads remains to be seen.

The main reason why Comcast is doing this is because the company desperately wants to avoid government intervention when it comes to filesharing.

Ruckus is causing a ruckus in dorm rooms across the county; it’s the all-new all-singing all-dancing music download service being pimped to students by their learning institutions as the alternative to ‘naughty’ P2P filesharing that proliferates our colleges and universities.

Why are colleges and universities even bothered? Because the RIAA are putting the clamps down on those who aid and assist P2P filesharing; even if this aiding and abetting manifests itself just by offering a quick network connection, demanding that students hand over all their cash to someone else, then putting lots of like-minded individuals with similar tastes in music, movies and games in the same close space.

Essentially, P2P filesharing is an inevitable side effect of young people with no money. Why anyone could think that they would prefer to use Ruckus rather than the free (in all senses of the word) alternative of p2p filesharing using services like Ares is beyond me. Will it work? No.

Back to the drawing boards!

Salvia – or salvia divinorum to give it its full name – is an inexpensive, easy to obtain and, in many cases, legal alternative of marijuana. While it is illegal in some states it remains readily available in others and is still very much the flavor of the moment in its native land of Mexico, Salvia is gaining the attention of the authorities and of the government.

So why has Salvia escaped the legislator’s pen so far despite it being touted as being more potent in many respects than Marijuana? Probably because of a lack of awareness from those that would seek to ban it.

Salvia is a hallucinogen, inducing an out of body experience and a sense of traveling through space and time. The experience lasts for a much shorter time than other hallucinogens like LSD or PCP and is not known to have caused any deaths at the time of writing.

Pirate torrents are wonderfully useful things. And they are so simple .This is a brief introduction to the wonderful world of torrents and file sharing.

Pirate torrents are simply the roadmaps to finding certain files over a file-sharing network. Downloading and opening torrents in a BitTorrent client will allow your computer to connect to others (this is a peer-to-peer network, and this is what distinguishes pirate torrents from simply downloading files from the Internet using http or ftp protocols).

Once connected to other computers with the file (they may have all the file – in which case they are called ’seeds’ – or they may just have bits of it) your client will begin to download the file sections that it needs to get all necessary sections of your torrents. Once you start getting sections of the file your client will make these available for others on the network. This interchange of the pirate torrents’ files between all those requiring and sharing the pirate torrent is the torrents’ swarm. The bigger the swarm, the more efficient the p2p file-sharing process.

There is nothing more frustrating than waking up to a day of work with your new home business only to find that your computer or telephone isn’t working. Fixing it (or getting someone to fix it) will take up time that you cannot afford. Maybe you need to get a new phone? That’s an hour out of your schedule. Maybe you need to get a new computer and load all your software and data back onto it? In this worst case scenario you might have lost an entire day that would have otherwise been spent on your home business.

In the case of the broken phone and the broken computer you may have shopped around for the cheapest deals to start with. Now you can see why this is false economy that will effect both you and your home business.

A new home business could do a lot worse that take a look at Plantronics range of telephones and wireless headsets, and at Apple’s range of computers.

Apple fans have got a lot to be happy about: not only has the apple iphone music industry is in a download frenzycome onto the market, proved a great success and is now going from strength to strength, but also Mr Jobs keeps rolling out little goodies like a new iPod Nano. Allegedly.

The pictures of the new gadget appeared very briefly on the web – presumably until Apple’s army of lawyers got on an iPhone and get them taken down – and while the pictures were of relatively low quality it is certainly something that the fanboys can get all excited over.

Europeans have something to look forward to now, too. The download an app for iPhone is making its way over the Atlantic – not before time many would say – and will shortly be appearing in French, German and UK shops. Vive la free iPhone downloads! An iPhone deal has apparently been signed and is expected to be announced next week with service providers.

Salvia Divinorum is the new drug on the block: it is a totally legal (at least in most countries and most states in the US) and widely available both over the counter in many tobacco shops and over the Internet. The herb, a close relation of the Salvia plants that you may find flowering in your garden, is billed as the most potent naturally occurring drug. It is, scientists and users state, as potent as LSD.

The active hallucinogenic ingredient in Salvia Divinorum – Salvinorin A – works in a very unique way on the brain’s receptors. Dr. Bryan Roth of the National Institute of Mental Health’s Psychoactive Drug Screening Program (NIMHPDSP is the catchy acronym) says: “What we found is quite remarkable and unprecedented among naturally occurring drugs of abuse … [The Salvia Divinorum] compound seems to have absolute specificity for a single receptor site on the brain.”.

Not much at all is known about the long term effects of Salvia Divinorum but fans may find some solace in the news that it, at least potentially, might eventually lead to new drugs that could be used to treat diseases such as Alzheimer’s, schizophrenia.

Ready! Steady! Go! Apple recently announced the release of their iPhone SDK with download. Fans ‎were raring to go see this new bit of kit for their new toy, and over 100,000 iPhone apps downloads of the ‎flocked to the site do hit the download button. Unfortunately this volume of eager ‎punters – along with the others who generated over 1 million views of the release ‎video in the same period – caused much strain on the server. The downloadable iPhone SDK and the ‎video combined demanded, apparently, over 210 terabytes of traffic for the Apple ‎server. It crashed.‎
Industry leaders are as excited as iPhone owners, and Six Apart’s CEO admitted that ‎it’s already using the apps for iPhone SDK and developing a “native iPhone application for ‎TypePad”. Big names in the gaming industry – PopCap and Namco also announced ‎their intention to release a number of classic games like Pac-Man and Zuma. Release ‎dates, prices, and details are all yet to be confirmed. Watch this space. The iPhone ‎SDK and download it here.‎

The future of CD sales looks doomed: it was predicted in a recent Forbes magazine survey that by 2012 sales from music downloads would outweigh sales of CDs.

Even that estimate looks to be shaky now as totally free, totally legal download sites have been given a huge boost in the unlikely form of Sony BMG. Sony BMG is not renowned for assisting any aspect of music downloads, and certainly not for endorsing sites that actively encourage it.

We7 – Peter Gabriel’s fledgling free music download service – has done the impossible and secured Sony’s backing for its venture. From the end of April all of Sony’s back catalogue will be available completely free for streaming from the site. In terms of securing a future for the site, and for music downloads in general, this is a coup of epic proportions.

Interestingly there are rumors of many other partnerships between big name industry players: mobile provider 02 has announced a partnership with music download giant Napster, who are also in talks with Vodafone. Interesting times for music downloads and for us, the users.

Be careful what you download with filesharing programs like Limewire or you might end up in trouble like 21-year-old Jennifer Dunham. She was recently arrested for having child porn images on her computer, a claim she has vehemently denied.

It looks like Jennifer may have inadvertently downloaded the files while downloading images through filesharing network Limewire.

It is quite possible that Limewire users would try and download one thing and end up with something totally different. That’s the problem with filesharing. You never know what you’re doing to get. It’s not yet clear what will happen to Jennifer, but she wouldn’t be the first person to be convicted in a case like this.

While it is possible for this to happen, it’s incredibly difficult to prove and it leaves the door open for people charged with similar offenses to plead their innocence, even if they are guilty. Filesharing can get you into all sort of trouble.