Post Office owes $3.5M for using wrong Statue of Liberty on a stamp

More feminine look of Las Vegas statue merits copyright protection.

Enlarge / Original Statue of Liberty is on the left. Robert Davidson's Las Vegas replica is on the right. (credit: Charles E. Rotkin/CORBIS/VCG via Getty Images, George Rose/Getty Images)

A sculptor who created a replica of the Statue of Liberty for a Las Vegas casino was awarded $3.5 million in damages last week after the US Postal Service (USPS) accidentally used a photo of his statue—rather than a photo of the original statue in New York harbor—on one of its most common stamps.

If you bought a "forever" stamp between 2011 and 2014, there's a good chance that it showed the face of the Statue of Liberty replica that sculptor Robert Davidson constructed for the New York-New York Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas. The Post Office licensed a photo of Davidson's from the image service Getty for $1,500, initially believing it was a photograph of the original statue.

The stamp with the resulting image was released to the public in December 2010; it took four months before anyone pointed out the mistake to the Post Office. In March 2011, a spokesperson said that the USPS "still loves the stamp design and would have selected this photograph anyway." The Post Office continued using the photo for almost three years before retiring it in January 2014.

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Netflix is killing off user reviews

Netflix goes all-in on the thumbs-up, thumbs-down review system.

Enlarge (credit: Getty Images | amesy)

User reviews on Netflix will soon become a thing of the past. According to a CNET report, Netflix will remove user reviews from its service this summer. The removal rollout will happen in stages: by July 30, you won't be able to write new reviews for shows and movies on the streaming service. By mid-August, you won't even be able to read existing user reviews.

According to a company email, user reviews saw "declining usage over time." Netflix is therefore canceling the written reviews, and the company said it has "notified members who have used the feature recently."

User reviews—both the ability to write them and to read them—have been limited to the desktop version of Netflix. Reviews for individual shows and movies didn't appear in any of Netflix's apps, but users could rate programs on the Netflix website and then add written comments.

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Deals of the Day (7-06-2018)

It’ll probably be a few years before you can buy a 128TB SD card. But you can store a lot of data on some of the cards that are already available… and you don’t necessarily need to spend a lot of money either. Amazon is selling a SanD…

It’ll probably be a few years before you can buy a 128TB SD card. But you can store a lot of data on some of the cards that are already available… and you don’t necessarily need to spend a lot of money either. Amazon is selling a SanDisk Ultra 200GB microSD card for $57. That […]

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FCC stands by decision to raise broadband prices on American Indians

FCC denies petition to restore $25 Lifeline subsidy for Tribal residents.

Enlarge / Kayenta, AZ - 25 July 2016: Poor rural housing estate of Native Americans at the Navajo reservation (Navajo Nation) in the Arizona desert. (credit: Bloomberg | Erik Tham)

The Federal Communications Commission is refusing to reverse a decision that will take a broadband subsidy away from many American Indians.

Under Chairman Ajit Pai's leadership, the FCC voted 3-2 in November 2017 to make it much harder for Tribal residents to obtain a $25-per-month Lifeline subsidy that reduces the cost of Internet or phone service. The changes could take effect as early as October 2018, depending on when they are approved by the US Office of Management and Budget (OMB).

Small wireless carriers and Tribal organizations sued the FCC in the United States Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit. They also filed a petition asking the FCC to stay its decision pending the outcome of the appeal.

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FCC stands by decision to raise broadband prices on American Indians

FCC denies petition to restore $25 Lifeline subsidy for Tribal residents.

Enlarge / Kayenta, AZ - 25 July 2016: Poor rural housing estate of Native Americans at the Navajo reservation (Navajo Nation) in the Arizona desert. (credit: Bloomberg | Erik Tham)

The Federal Communications Commission is refusing to reverse a decision that will take a broadband subsidy away from many American Indians.

Under Chairman Ajit Pai's leadership, the FCC voted 3-2 in November 2017 to make it much harder for Tribal residents to obtain a $25-per-month Lifeline subsidy that reduces the cost of Internet or phone service. The changes could take effect as early as October 2018, depending on when they are approved by the US Office of Management and Budget (OMB).

Small wireless carriers and Tribal organizations sued the FCC in the United States Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit. They also filed a petition asking the FCC to stay its decision pending the outcome of the appeal.

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Lenovo Ideapad D3310 10 inch 2-in-1 leaked

Lenovo appears to have a new 10 inch convertible laptop in the works. It’s called the Lenovo Ideapad D330 and, according to information obtained by Notebook Italia,” it’s a thin-and light computer with a full HD display, a low-power I…

Lenovo appears to have a new 10 inch convertible laptop in the works. It’s called the Lenovo Ideapad D330 and, according to information obtained by Notebook Italia,” it’s a thin-and light computer with a full HD display, a low-power Intel Gemini Lake processor, and it’s designed to be used in notebook, tablet, tent, or stand […]

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Bay Area: Join us 7/11 to learn what the law has to say about the gig economy

At Ars Live, Prof. Veena Dubal will school us on what California law has been up to.

Enlarge / Headquarters of car-sharing technology company Uber in the South of Market (SoMa) neighborhood of San Francisco, California, October 13, 2017. (credit: Smith Collection/Gado/Getty Images)

In early May 2018, a California Supreme Court ruled that it is now harder for employers to formally classify their workers as independent contractors rather than employees.

The court's opinion in Dynamex v. Superior Court of Los Angeles County could have a profound impact on many tech companies like Uber, Lyft, Instacart, and others that provide on-demand services. Dynamex is a courier and delivery company based in Kent, Washington.

As Ars has reported, the overwhelming majority of gig economy companies' workers are not employees, and so they do not get any health, retirement, unemployment, or other benefits that typically come with full-time employment. Uber, for example, uses the euphemism "driver partners" when referring to its non-employee drivers, who constitute the backbone of the company's service.

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Latest Denuvo Anti-Piracy Protection Falls, Cracker ‘Voksi’ On Fire

The latest variant of the infamous Denuvo anti-piracy system has fallen. Rising crack star Voksi is again the man behind the wheel, defeating protection on both Puyo Puyo Tetris and Injustice 2. The Bulgarian coder doesn’t want to share too many of his secrets but informs TorrentFreak that he won’t stop until Denuvo is a thing of the past, which he hopes will be sooner rather than later.

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and more. We also have VPN reviews, discounts, offers and coupons.

After protecting Assassins Creed Origin for the previous several months, earlier this year version 4.9 of the infamous Denuvo anti-tamper system was defeated by Italian cracking group CPY.

While all cracks of the tough and continuously developing Denuvo system are welcomed by pirate consumers, this one was particularly sweet, having also defeated Ubisoft’s decision to use VMProtect technology on top. Soon after, Bulgarian cracker Voksi, who previously defeated version 4, released a video showing how things were done.

Unlike CPY, Voksi is a rather more high-profile individual. While his true identity is known only to those closest to him, he has become somewhat of a folk hero on various cracking-focused forums, engaging in conversation with fans and discussing the latest developments.

This week, Voksi announced the passing of yet another milestone, one that’s bound to disappoint the people at Denuvo. After sinking endless hours into what he openly admits is a personal grudge against the company’s technology, Voksi revealed that its latest v4.9++ protection had fallen.

Speaking with TorrentFreak, Voksi says that after tackling previous versions, a little while back he began dissecting the newer 4.7/4.8 builds (not official Denuvo versions but a numbering system used by the cracking scene).

“Man, it seemed impossible back then. The obfuscation was insane, I had no idea what to do. So, over the next two months, with little breaks from time to time, I was analyzing exactly how [Denuvo] does those hardware checks,” he notes.

“Then I tried my tricks for 4.7 on 4.8, but something wasn’t quite right. It was way more obfusticated and had some strange patterns and I couldn’t figure out why it was like that. Soon enough though in June things started to change.”

Voksi says that he tackled several games with test cracks, with variants working on older and newer CPU generations for most people. He then came up with a new theory but needed a game to test it on.

“So I downloaded Puyo Puyo Tetris. I thought ‘it’s small game, it’d be easier to analyze’, but oh no no,” he said.

“The game executable is 128MB big, of which just 5-6MB is the real game code. The rest of it is Denuvo. It’s the most bloated Denuvo I’ve ever seen.”

Nevertheless, Voksi got to work and built a crack and implemented patches (including his new code) based on the new theory. Twelve hours later there was something to celebrate, with a crack working for the vast majority (around 99%) of users. But that wouldn’t be the end of it, he promised.

True to his word, this week Voksi announced that he’d defeated the Denuvo protection on Injustice 2, something that was met with jubilation on Reddit’s /r/crackwatch sub. He informs TF that his new techniques delivered the goods once again.

“I cracked it the same way I cracked Puyo Puyo Tetris. I don’t want to get too technical, because I don’t want to give away my techniques, but I can say it’s not an easy task,” he says.

“I cracked Injustice 2 in 10 hours. The game has custom protection on top of Denuvo and some nice anti-debug features.”

What comes next for 21-year-old Voksi remains to be seen but given his determination, other games are probably being worked on right how. He says that several other titles use 4.9 or 4.9++ protection so it’s possible he’ll have more surprises in the days and weeks to come.

“In the end, it might take some more testing and test cracks, but I’m very happy to announce that I won’t stop until we are Denuvo Cancer Free from all games,” he concludes.

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and more. We also have VPN reviews, discounts, offers and coupons.

GPD Pocket 2 mini laptop’s keyboard updated ahead of crowdfunding campaign

GPD unveiled the design and specs for its upcoming Pocket 2 mini laptop in June. While the first-gen GPD Pocket had an Intel Atom processor, a 7 inch touchscreen display, and a tiny keyboard with a pointing stick rather than a touchpad, the GPD Pocket …

GPD unveiled the design and specs for its upcoming Pocket 2 mini laptop in June. While the first-gen GPD Pocket had an Intel Atom processor, a 7 inch touchscreen display, and a tiny keyboard with a pointing stick rather than a touchpad, the GPD Pocket 2 had a faster Intel Core M3-7Y30 processor, a similar […]

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Elon Musk has an idea for saving boys stranded in a Thailand cave

Musk outlines possible plan for rescuing 12 stranded boys and their coach.

Elon Musk. (credit: Tesla Club Belgium)

Elon Musk is sending a team of engineers to Thailand to see if they can help authorities racing to save a dozen boys and their coach who are stranded in a cave there.

"SpaceX & Boring Co engineers headed to Thailand tomorrow to see if we can be helpful to govt," Musk tweeted just after midnight, California time, on Thursday night. "There are probably many complexities that are hard to appreciate without being there in person."

"Boring Co has advanced ground penetrating radar & is pretty good at digging holes," Musk wrote in an earlier tweet on Thursday.

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