Cleveland already swept the Detroit by 4-0( i Predicted a 4-1)
Orland vs. Philidelphia Orlando Still will win the series despite of D. Howard game 6 suspension.
Hawks versus Heat These series is very exciting I say that the Heat will win the series with a close series of (4-3)
Boston Versus Bulls boston in 4-3 but the guts to survived the celtics, in the last game, it was a close Paul Pierce Jumper that lift the Celtics.

Lakers wins the series against Htah by 4-0( i Predicted a 4-3 but its a 4-1) I dont know what the jazz lack, but I think Kobe is unstoppable

Denver Wins the series against the hornets its C.Anthony and C.Billups that's the factor

Mavericks wins the series against the higher ranked Spurs, its Josh Howard , Jason Terry and Dirk Nowitzki plus Jason Kidd with the support cast.. its a surprise.

houston versus portland the houston would win this series.

The Set Up

Sitting across from your chumps, place the coin on the table.
The Switch. Illustration by Jason Lee
The Switch. Illustration by Jason Lee
The Switch

Covering the coin with your fingers, pretend to pick it up but let it fall into your other hand.
The Push. Illustration by Jason Lee
The Push. Illustration by Jason Lee
The Push

Slap your top hand onto the table while hitting the coin on the underside for sound effect.
The Reveal. Illustration by Jason Lee
The Reveal. Illustration by Jason Lee
The Reveal

Pull the coin from under the table and display with an almighty "booya."

Contributed by Wired writer Chris Lesinski

This page was last modified 22:52, 20 April 2009 by howto_admin.

Download Whole Internet

Yes, you can download all the Internet on your hard disk, the only problem here is that it takes you a lot of time and a lot of space.

More or less there are 23,993′564,998 Mb. and you are going to need 4,381 years at 41.2 Kb/sec.
Just take try here:

http://www.w3schools.com/downloadwww.htm

e:
Can u find the B?
> > RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR
> > RRRRRRRRRRRBRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR
> > RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR
> > RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR
> > RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR
> > RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR
> >
> > Once youve found the b
> >
> > Find The Mistake.
> >
> >
> >
> > ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWUXYZ
> >
> > Once Youve Found The Mistake
> >
> >
> >
> > Find the 1
> >
> >
> IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
> > IIIIIIIIIIII
> >
> IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
> > IIIIIIIIIIII
> >
> IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
> > IIIIIIIIIIII
> >
> IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
> > IIIIIIIIIIII
> >
> IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
> > IIIIIIIIIIII
> >
> IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
> > IIIIIIIIIII
> >
> IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
> > IIIIIIIIIIII
> >
> IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
> > IIIIIIIIIIII
> >
> IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
> > IIIIIII1III
> >
> IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
> > IIIIIIIIIIII
> >
> IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
> > IIIIIIIIIIII
> >
> > Once you found the 1..............
> >
> >
> >
> > Find the 6
> >
> >
> > 9999999999999999999999999999999999
> > 9999999999999999999999999999999999
> > 9999999999999999999999999999999999
> > 9999999999999999999999999999999999
> > 9999999999999999999999999999999999
> > 9999999999999999999999999999999999
> > 9999699999999999999999999999999999
> > 9999999999999999999999999999999999
> > 9999999999999999999999999999999999
> > 9999999999999999999999999999999999
> > 9999999999999999999999999999999999
> > 9999999999999999999999999999999999
> >
> >
> > once youve found the 6...
> >
> > Find the N (it's hard!!)
> >
> > MMMMMMMMMMMMM
> > MMMMMMMMMMMMM
> > MMMMMMMMMMMMM
> > MMMMMMMNMMMMM
> > MMMMMMMMMMMMM
> > MMMMMMMMMMMMM
> > MMMMMMMMMMMMM
> > MMMMMMMMMMMMM
> > MMMMMMMMMMMMM
> > MMMMMMMMMMMMM
> >
> > once you've found the N...
> >
> >
> > Find the Q...
> > OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
> > OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
> > OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
> > OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
> > OOOOOOOOOOQOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
> > OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
> > OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
> > OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
> > OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
> > OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
> >
> > make 2 wishes!
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
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> >

LA SOLIDARIDAD: ADOLF HITLER - RIZAL’S SON!

Is it faithful that the Filipino doctor Dr Jose P Rizal was the biological engender of Adulf Hitler? in wide-ranging In: in wide-ranging lowering Philippines History, in wide-ranging lowering Jose Rizal in wide-ranging lowering in wide-ranging lowering in wide-ranging lowering [Edit categories] in wide-ranging lowering in wide-ranging lowering in wide-ranging lowering [Edit] in wide-ranging lowering in wide-ranging lowering in wide-ranging lowering in wide-ranging lowering in wide-ranging lowering in wide-ranging lowering in wide-ranging lowering in wide-ranging lowering [Edit] in wide-ranging lowering The order that Adolf Hitler was Rizal’s issue be beholden be based on the following facts:* Adolf Hitler was born on April 20, 1889 (that means he could take from in been conceived when all is said in August, 1888) in wide-ranging, in the shrivelled up on the ground village of Braunau, handy the German-Austrian hem. * He was born an Austrian and remained complete until the 1930’s. * The big ball of Hitler’s innate was Klara Polzl.

* At complete term she was a mademoiselle, in Vienna. * Hitler’s oldest fellow-countryman, Gustav, born on May 17, 1885, and his sister Ida, born in 1886, both died in look of he was born. * Hitler delve the ending of term considered the burgh of Linz, in Austria, as his hometown (in his Political Testament he referred to “my home-town of Linz on the Danube.”). * Bavaria was considered the “cradle” of Nazism. * The Nazis made Japan complete of the Axis powers.

He went to Heidelberg, Wilhlmsfeld, Munich (in Bavaria), all to some handy the German-Austrian border; on August 9, 1886 he dynamic on Leipzig (”visiting miscellaneous German cities along the means,” complete tome says), arriving there on August 14. At complete details they were upsetting to attempt that the Japanese were Aryans to fulfil them members of the “master descent.”Now extend to the more than expos? with the following culled from the cheerfulness of Rizal:* On February 1, 1886, he dynamic Paris on Germany. In October he went to Dresden and then to Berlin.

* In Berlin he finished Noli Me Tangere. * On May 11, 1887, Rizal began his Grand Tour of Europe. One of the book’s characters is named Maria Clara. He went to Dresden, Teschen (now Decin in the ci-devant Czechoslovakia), Prague, and then Brunn (where he irrecoverable a diamond stickpin), and Vienna (where he got deceitfully his stickpin, which was establish at workman a mademoiselle in the holiday-maker hum he stayed in in Brunn) in Austria in wide-ranging. * On May 24, 1887, he dynamic Vienna at workman riverboat to bear sights on the Danube River (on the sailboat he apothegm letter-paper napkins on the delight time). * From Linz he went to Munich (where Hitler attempted a putsch in 1923) and Nuremberg (site of the Nazi Party rallies and the War Crimes trials), and other German cities. His voyage ended at Linz.

* Rizal was in the German Empire, occasionally erstwhile the German-Austrian hem, from February 1886 until he went to Switzerland in antique June, 1887. * Rizal was again in Europe from May 24, 1888, until October 18, 1891. He was in Europe during the term Hitler was conceived and when he was born.

He was in London, Paris, Brussels, Madrid, Biarritz, Ghent. * Rizal in 1888 had an burden with a Japanese abigail, Seiko Usui, when he visited Japan. She had an at best daughter, Yuriko, at workman a extraneous master some years after her contention with Rizal. Put all this expos? together and you may be inventive to conclude the following: Hitler was conceived either in 1887 when Rizal passed in the course Linz or other towns (such as Brunn - how do you judge he irrecoverable the diamond stickpin? And who was the “maid” who establish it later and gave it to Blumentritt who forwarded it to Vienna?) handy the Austrian hem: in which if it should miss one’s footing on Hitler’s older siblings were invented, to charge up his mother’s being pointed with him. Yuriko later married the son of a Japanese MP.

In other words Hitler was exactly born in look of 1889. Or he was conceived in August, 1888, when Rizal was allegedly in London. Maybe when to Paris in 1889 it was so he could accommodate be in communication with more conclusively with the now-expecting Klara? Klara Polzl’s burden with Rizal may take from in centered ’round Linz, which is why the Hitler describe moved there later (so Mama Hitler could jaundiced where she had An Affair To Remember), which would occur Hitler’s fondness on the burgh.

Or peradventure in September, 1888, when Rizal went to Paris on a week (to take from in a rendezvous with Klara?). Finally, Seiko Usui’s at best daughter was not at bottom fathered at workman her master, Alfred Charlton. He was thoroughly a look. She old her get a grip on oneself on her fellow-countryman Adolf to talk into him to jot down into an affinity with Japan (making it complete of the Axis powers): which is why Japan invaded the Philippines! Yuriko made it manifest to Hirohito that Hitler would be au courant it if his confederate were to take from all about his father’s homeland. Yuriko, you bear, was Rizal’s daughter! And Hitler knew she was his half-sister.

And of by all means the point why Hitler wanted to adorn renew of czar of Germany was because his ingenuous engender had out some of the most engrossing years of his cheerfulness there!That is the theory behind such a wonderful order based on expos? that can be gathered from any High School textbook on Rizal and any benevolent biography of Adolf Hitler. Naturally, this can at best be done in the course picky application of the device, but it does fulfil on an amusing disregard of authentic fiction.

Adolf Rizal
Manuel L. Quezon III, Saturday, September 17, 1994
Here is the craziest thing I’ve heard (and I’ve heard it more than once, at parties): Adolf Hitler was really the illegitimate son of Jose Rizal. Here is the second craziest thing I’ve heard: Mao Zedong was actually Rizal’s illegitimate son. Two variations, I suppose, on the idea that "Yes, the Filipino Can!"

Sadly, I found the two theories so funny that I never thought of asking the people who told them to me to explain on what grounds they based their claim about Der Fuehrer and the Great Helmsman. A dentistry student friend from UE has also heard these fanciful theories, but it also did not occur to him to ask on what evidence these fanciful claims were based. So I did a little research to find out how people could make up such a story.

The claim that Adolf Hitler was Rizal’s progeny must be based on the following facts:

·
Adolf Hitler was born on April 20, 1889 (that means he could have been conceived sometime in August 1888), in the little village of Braunau, near the German- Austrian border.
· He was born an Austrian and remained one until the 1930s.
· The name of Hitler mother was Klara Polz.
· At one time she was a maid in Vienna.
· Hitler always considers a town Linz, in Austria, as his hometown (in his Political Testament he referred to " my hometown of Linz on the Danube").
· Hitler's oldest brother, Gustav born on May 17, 1885, and his sister Ida, born in 1886, both died before he was born.
· Bavaria was considered the "cradle" of Nazism.
· The Nazis made Japan one of the Axis powers. At one point they tried to prove that the Japanese were Aryans, to make the Japanese members of the "master race."

Now combine the above information with the following, culled from the life of Rizal:
· On February 1, 1886, he left Paris for Germany. He went to Heidelberg, Wilhelmsfeld, Munich (in Bavaria), all somewhat near a German–Austrian border; on August 9, 1886 he left for Leipzig ("visiting various German cities along the way," one book says), arriving there on August 14. In October he went to Dresden and then to Berlin.
· In Berlin he finished Noli Me Tangere. One of the book’s characters is named Maria Clara.
· On May 11, 1887, Rizal began his Grand Tour of Europe. He went to Dresden, Teschen (now Decin in the former Czechoslovakia), Prague, and then Brunn (where he lost a diamond stickpin), and Vienna (where he got back his diamond stickpin, which was found by maid in the hotel he stayed in Brunn) in Austria.
· On May 24, 1887, he left Vienna by riverboat to see sights on the Danube River (on the boat he saw paper napkins for the first time). His voyage ended at Linz.
· From Linz he went to Munich (where Hitler attempted a putsch in 1923) and Nuremberg (site of the Nazi Party rallies and the War Crimes trials), and other German cities.
· Rizal was in the German Empire, sometimes past the German-Austrian border, from February 1886 until he went to Switzerland in early June 1887.
· Rizal was again in Europe from May 24, 1888, until October 18, 1891. He was in London, Paris, Brussels, Madrid, Biarritz, Ghent. He was in Europe during the time Hitler was conceived and when he was born.
· Rizal in 1888 had an affair with a Japanese woman, Seiko Usui, when he visited Japan. She had an only daughter, Yuriko, by a foreign husband some years after her encounter with Rizal. Yuriko later married the son of a Japanese politician.

Put all these information together and you may be able to conclude the following: Hitler was conceived either in 1887 when Rizal passed through Linz or other towns (such as Brunn - How do you think he lost the diamond stickpin? And who was the "maid" who found it later and gave it to Blumentritt who forwarded it to Vienna?) near the Austrian border. In which case Hitler’s older siblings were fictitious, to cover up his mother’s being pregnant with him. In other words, Hitler was actually born before 1889.

Or he was conceived in August 1888, when Rizal was supposedly in London. Or perhaps in September 1888, when Rizal went to Paris for a week (to have a rendezvous with Klara?). Maybe he went to Paris in 1889 so he could communicate more easily with the now-expecting Klara? Klara Polzl’s affair with Rizal may have centered around Linz, which is why the Hitler family moved there later (so Mama Hitler could live where she had An affair to Remember), which would explain Hitler’s fondness for the town.

Finally, Seiko Usui’s only daughter was not really fathered by her husband, Alfred Charlton. He was simply a front. Yuriko, you see, was Rizal’s daughter! And Hitler knew she was his half-sister. She used her influence on her brother Adolf to persuade him to enter into an alliance with Japan (making it one of the Axis powers). Which is why Japan invaded the Philippines!

Yuriko made it clear to Hirohito that Hitler would appreciate it if his ally were to take over his father’s homeland. And of course the reason why Hitler wanted to become dictator of Germany was because his natural father had spent some of the most interesting years of his life there!

That, I think, is the rationale behind such a fantastic claim based on information that can be gathered from any high school textbook on Rizal and any good biography of Adolf Hitler. Naturally, this can only be done through selective use of the evidence, but it does make for an amusing piece of historical fiction.

Now, as to the idea that Mao Zedong was also Rizal’s son. Unfortunately this claim cannot be supported by even the most spurious evidence. Mao Zedong was born in 1893, in Hunan Province, which you could say is kind of near Hong Kong. But at that time (1893), Rizal was in exile in Dapitan. Now it would have been possible for Rizal to scamper around Europe and get Klara pregnant without anybody noticing, but he couldn’t possibly have jumped into a boat and rowed to Hongkong without being caught. He did pass through Hong Kong in 1888 and 1891 but he never seems to have visited other parts of China (unless you count Xiamen and Macao). So there are no details that can be manipulated.

These exercises in foolishness prove how creative Filipinos can be. What other people would be able to make the bogus claim that one of their heroes fathered the man who almost turned Europe into a "howling wilderness" (to borrow from the instructions for the extermination of Samar by American forces at the turn of the century). That would have been poetic justice, I suppose. The brown man strikes back and all that sort of thing.

April 21, 2009, 08:10 AM — IDG News Service —

Hackers broke into U.S. Department of Defense computers and downloaded terabytes of data containing design information about the Joint Strike Fighter, a US$300 billion stealth fighter currently under development, according to The Wall Street Journal.

The stolen files all relate to the design of the Joint Strike Fighter and its electronic systems, the Wall Street Journal reported, saying they could be used to help defend against the jet.

However, the most sensitive files were not compromised since they are stored on computers that are not connected to the Internet, the report said.

The reported attack raised more questions than it answered.

For example, the report did not say how attackers managed to download terabytes of data before being discovered. A single terabyte can take up to several weeks to download over a relatively fast data connection, such as a DSL or cable modem.

The report also suggested China could be behind the stolen data, noting that investigators believe the attack originated in China. However, it said the exact identities of the people behind the attack had not been established.

Earth Day, celebrated April 22, is a day designed to inspire awareness and appreciation for the Earth's environment. It was founded by U.S. Senator Gaylord Nelson as an environmental teach-in in 1970 and is celebrated in many countries every year. This date is Spring in the Northern Hemisphere and Autumn in the Southern Hemisphere.

The United Nations celebrates an Earth Day each year on the March equinox, which is often March 20, a tradition which was founded by peace activist John McConnell in 1969.


Significance of April 22

* Senator Nelson chose the date as the one that could maximize participation on college campuses for what he conceived as an environmental teach-in. He determined that the week of April 19-25 was the best bet. It did not fall during exams or spring breaks, did not conflict with religious holidays such as Easter or Passover, and was late enough in spring to have decent weather. More students were likely to be in class, and there would be less competition with other events mid-week, so he chose Wednesday, April 22. Asked whether he had purposely chosen Lenin's 100th birthday, Nelson explained that with only 365 days a year and 3.7 billion people in the world, every day was the birthday of ten million living people. “On any given day, a lot of both good and bad people were born,” he said. “A person many consider the world’s first environmentalist, Saint Francis of Assisi, was born on April 22.“[17]
* April 21 was the birthday of John Muir, who founded the Sierra Club. This was not lost on organizers who thought that April 22 was Muir's birthday.[citation needed]
* April 22, 1970 was the 100th birthday of Vladimir Lenin. Time reported that some suspected the date was not a coincidence, but a clue that the event was "a Communist trick," and quoted a member of the Daughters of the American Revolution saying, "Subversive elements plan to make American children live in an environment that is good for them."[10] J. Edgar Hoover, director of the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation, may have found the Lenin connection intriguing; it was alleged the FBI conducted surveillance at the 1970 demonstrations.[18] The idea that the date was chosen to celebrate Lenin's centenary still persists in some quarters,[19][20] although Lenin was never noted as an environmentalist.
* April 22 is also the birthday of Julius Sterling Morton, the founder of Arbor Day, a national tree-planting holiday started in 1872. Arbor Day became a legal holiday in Nebraska in 1885, to be permanently observed on April 22. According to the National Arbor Day Foundation "the most common day for the state observances is the last Friday in April . . . but a number of state Arbor Days are at other times to coincide with the best tree planting weather."[21] It has since been largely eclipsed by the more widely observed Earth Day, except in Nebraska, where it originated.

Scene stealer: The aXXo files

To Hollywood executives, he's public enemy number one. To film fans around the world, he's a modern-day Robin Hood. As the internet's most prolific pirate makes his 1,000th illegal film download available to the masses, Tim Walker investigates the mysterious figure known only as aXXo

At 8.40am on Monday 15 December, a new post appeared on an internet forum called the Darkside Release Group. "Darkside_RG" is a clearing house for internet pirates, a site dedicated to the online redistribution of movies, music and videogames. Its members happily spend their days sharing and discussing their ill-begotten booty on the site's many message boards.

The post in question contained a BitTorrent file – the most widespread and efficient filesharing method on the web – containing an illicit copy of a second-rate Kiefer Sutherland horror film called Mirrors. Though the mainstream media ignored it, this was a landmark moment for millions of filesharers worldwide: the 1,000th movie uploaded by aXXo, the internet's most popular and enduring pirate. If you already know his name, chances are you've been doing something illegal.

This aXXo may be anonymous, but he (or she, or they) is a global brand. His most popular uploads are downloaded illegally by up to a million internet users per week. His files regularly make up more than one-third of all the films trafficked on BitTorrent. Most of them are mainstream multiplex fare – aXXo's recent posts include Mamma Mia!; the Ricky Gervais black comedy Ghost Town; and Bangkok Dangerous and Eagle Eye, thriller vehicles for Nicolas Cage and Shia LaBeouf.

The list of the Top 100 movie downloads at The Pirate Bay – one of the largest "torrent portal" sites, which aggregate torrent links from around the web – is littered with his work, easily recognisable by the suffix "DVDrip-aXXo" left like a graffiti tag at the end of each filename. Over at The Pirate Bay's most popular competitor, Mininova.org, aXXo's fame is evident in the "search cloud", a page of the most searched terms on the site, their relative popularity denoted by the size of the font in which their names are displayed.

"Today, the largest search terms might be aXXo and Prison Break, if Prison Break aired on US television last night," explains David Price, head of piracy intelligence at the internet consultancy Envisional. "But tomorrow Prison Break will be a lot smaller, whereas aXXo will always be that size. Over the last two years, he's been one of the top five searched terms on Mininova every day."

Whenever aXXo posts a new film (which can be as often as three times a day) his followers fill the comments boards with praise. He is the lowly film-fan's Robin Hood. Last year, one aXXo fan, codenamed the_dwarfer, composed a version of the Lord's Prayer for his idol, which began: "Our ripper, who art on Mininova, aXXo be thy name..."

The name aXXo first appeared in November 2005, when he began to post pirated movies to the message board at Darkside_RG. He quickly acquired a reputation for both quality and convenience. All of his films were copied to DVD quality (or near enough for the amateur eye); in a simple format that would play instantly on almost any computer as soon as the download was complete; and handily compressed to emerge at 700Mb, just the right size to fit on a single writeable CD.

Uploaders generally have a shelf life of a few months before they get bored – or caught – but aXXo persisted. "aXXo guarantees quality," Price explains. "In the piracy world, there's no Film 2008 to tell you which version of a film to download. Instead, the community tells you that aXXo is the guy to look for, because everybody else downloads him. As soon as a DVD rip of a film appears online, people search out aXXo's copy, because they know they're guaranteed a good piracy experience."

The question of aXXo's identity is undoubtedly of interest to the authorities, but it's also an abiding obsession for his fans. One Canadian documentary film-maker, for example, is working on a film entitled Searching for aXXo. The blog Torrentfreak.com is devoted to the torrent sharing culture. In March 2007, its creator, a 28-year-old academic from the Netherlands who writes under the pseudonym Ernesto, appeared to have landed a brief but exclusive email interview with the elusive aXXo. His interviewee claimed to be a teenager working alone, a naive but philanthropic soul who believed that, if a good film is out there, "everyone has the right to be entertained by it." The interview was quickly discredited by the ensuing web chatter, and Ernesto, asked today if he thinks his interviewee was a hoaxer or the real deal, replies curtly: "I have no idea." My own request for an email interview with aXXo, left in his Darkside_RG mailbox has gone unanswered.

The otherwise uninformative Darkside_RG profile for aXXo suggests he was born in August 1972. There's no reason why this should be true but, says Price: "I wouldn't have thought he was a teenager. Whoever claimed to be him was probably a fake. From what we know, he's fairly experienced." In a recent piece about aXXo for the online magazine Slate, reporter Josh Levin said he believed aXXo was not American – but, Price suggests, he is probably a native English speaker.

As with Operation Ore, the international police operation to prosecute users of online child pornography sites, the copyright cops are planting spies in the chatrooms and forums of the torrent community, hoping to ensnare the pirates who frequent them. The ultimate prize would be aXXo. Envisional's work, says Price, has led to arrests in the past. "We have had successes searching for individual uploaders and leakers of content. With aXXo, we know where he tends to be active online. If you visited the right bulletin boards and forums, and you knew what to look out for, you would find other people who were searching for him."

BitTorrent, aXXo's chosen distribution method, is a filesharing technology that, serendipitously, arrived online at around the same time as home broadband became standard. Created in 2001 by Bram Cohen, then 26, a programmer from Seattle, the software was intended to be a means for music fans to share bootlegged videos of live performances by artists such as the US singer-songwriter John Mayer, who encourages such recordings by concert-goers.

Though the BitTorrent software itself is legal, and can be used to share any number of legitimate digital items, its efficiency and user-friendliness inevitably made it the amateur pirate's weapon of choice. Today, BitTorrent has well over 150 million users worldwide. "I'm studying social behaviour," explains Ernesto, "and the torrent community interested me because it is by far the largest library of our modern day culture. BitTorrent has a more social aspect than other filesharing protocols: sharing is rewarded."

Unlike traditional peer-to-peer (P2P) networks such as Napster and Kazaa, which share files directly (and rather slowly) between two users' computers, BitTorrent collects pieces of the downloading file from across the filesharing network, seeking out segments of the film, album or application from every user's computer. This "file-swarming" not only makes downloading faster, it's also the epitome of filesharing – the more users there are online, sharing a particular file, the faster each of them will complete the download.

Hence aXXo's popularity: as a trusted brand name, users rush to acquire his releases as soon as they appear online. His small "torrent" file takes a matter of seconds to download from a torrent portal site like Mininova, after which the user add it to their computer's BitTorrent queue, sit back and watch the data flood in. With so many people downloading the same files at once, an entire aXXo film can be complete and on a user's desktop in a few hours at most.

But aXXo's popularity can be a curse. Once his name became common currency among downloaders, it was simple enough for less sophisticated pirates to piggyback on his success by imitating his tag in their own torrent files; one site turned up calling itself axxotorrents.com. There were also more sinister schemes afoot. In 2007, word spread through the community that the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) was uploading fake, blank torrents labelled as aXXo releases, in order to collect the IP addresses of downloaders. Next, someone intent on giving him a bad name started to upload aXXo-tagged files filled with malware – software designed to infiltrate and corrupt a downloader's computer.

An angry aXXo got into a dispute with both axxotorrents.com and the torrent portals that chose to host his imitators. The pirate was infuriated by the appropriation of his work – in spite of appropriation being his own stock-in-trade – and ceased uploading altogether until axxotorrents.com agreed to close down its domain name.

Unlike other torrent portals, however, The Pirate Bay's Swedish founders – who are driven not by any code of honour among thieves, but by an ideological opposition to copyright law – refuse to give high-profile uploaders the VIP treatment. aXXo's protests fell on deaf ears and, in November 2007, after deleting all his torrents from The Pirate Bay's pages in a fit of rage, he disappeared from the web altogether. His friends at Darkside_RG reported that he'd decided to "take a break".

In aXXo's absence, other uploaders had their moment in the sun. FXG, whose DVD rips were about the same quality and size as aXXo's, became a popular alternative. One smart uploader named themselves Klaxxon, so that each time a casual downloader searched for aXXo's name, they would find a Klaxxon torrent instead. Perhaps concerned that he'd been forgotten by his fickle public, aXXo resurfaced in March.

"He tried to go away," says Price. "But he came back. The pull of it is quite attractive to him. When you have millions of people downloading your content online and they know who you are, that's quite an incentive. Even if he's not getting any money, he is getting name recognition and status." To commemorate his return, aXXo chose as his first post the symbolic – and hubristic – film title, I Am Legend.

The authorities aren't the only ones who have it in for aXXo. He's also deeply unpopular among an elite group of internet users and abusers known only as "The Scene", which has existed in one form or another since the 1970s – before aXXo (the name, if not the man) was even born. Contrary to popular belief, the majority of illicit content available for download comes not from consumer-bought CDs, DVDs and games. Instead, film industry insiders, cinema projectionists, DVD factory workers and retail assistants plunder their employers' forthcoming releases and pass them on to the high-level pirates that comprise today's Scene.

The Scene's so-called "release groups" are at the top of the piracy pyramid. Each group will likely specialise in a certain medium (film, TV, games, music) – even a specific movie genre – and will include computer experts (or "rippers") with the skills to turn a two-hour movie into a compressed file that is easy to transfer online without any loss of quality. Once the release group has their copy, they seed it online with the help of enthusiastic mediators. Within hours, it is freely available to the average BitTorrent user on The Pirate Bay or Mininova.

The Scene's motivations aren't financial. The object of the exercise is simply to get your pirate copy of a film out there before any other group, and well ahead of its official release. Respect and reputation are earned through speed and technical skill. The Scene may be elite, but it's a meritocracy. Its code – again, ironic for a group engaged in the systematic demolition of copyright law – demands that any pirated material must give credit to its original ripper or release group, no matter how far down the piracy food chain it has come.

This explains the Scene's contempt for aXXo, who, it is widely believed, simply duplicates work that has already been produced by a higher-level release group. His re-encoding of the Scene's film releases into a clean, user-friendly format requires relatively little risk, and relatively little skill. In a world where the only reward is prestige, it must be galling for the Scene to watch aXXo taking the credit for their hard work. It also explains aXXo's motivations, and his anger at seeing his name taken in vain. Like Bruce Wayne, aXXo may only be celebrated for the actions of his alter ego, but he is celebrated all the same.

Industry insiders claim that illegal downloads cost the global film business £500m last year. According to a 2006 study by Envisional, P2P networks and their ilk account for at least 60 per cent of all internet usage. In the UK alone, more than six million people shared an estimated 98 million illegal downloads in 2007. These numbers will only grow as broadband speeds increase. Virgin Media recently launched the first 50Mb broadband service, and hopes to make it available to the entire UK customer network of 12 million in 2009. At that speed, a DVD-quality movie could be downloaded to a home desktop in less than four minutes.

Earlier this month, an estimable group of disgruntled British film-makers – including Kenneth Branagh, Richard Curtis and Stephen Daldry – signed a letter to The Times demanding government action against the internet service providers (ISPs) who make illegal filesharing possible. The MPAA, meanwhile, is already lobbying the incoming Obama administration in the US to improve internet filtering technology in the hope of foiling online piracy. Thanks to new legislation, President Obama will be required to nominate the country's first "copyright tsar" to oversee such issues.

The biggest problem for anti-piracy groups is the growing social acceptability of illegal filesharing. "The easier you make it for people to download, the more people do it," says Price, "and the less moral or ethical concerns they have about it. I talk to teachers and solicitors who'll say they streamed something from the internet, without realising it's illegitimate." The entertainment industry is still seen as bloated and greedy. Downloading movies is an apparently victimless crime, and if there is a victim, it's "The Man".

"We also never see how their data is calculated," says Becky Hogge, executive director of the Open Rights Group, a civil liberties group devoted to the digital universe. "Policymakers trot out figures, but we're never sure of their provenance. There is a meme sloshing around that suggests they overestimate the numbers. They used to equate the cost of piracy to the [entertainment] industry as a multiple of how many files were being shared illicitly online, which assumes that if you didn't get the stuff for free, you'd go out and buy all of it – which simply doesn't hold."

It's even difficult to prove the pirates' detrimental effect on individual films. The most pirated movie of 2008, according to TorrentFreak's annual listing, was also the year's biggest box-office success: Batman sequel The Dark Knight. The film's cinema release grossed close to $1bn (£700m) worldwide, and three million copies of the DVD were sold on its first day in the shops. Although it was downloaded more than seven million times on BitTorrent alone, Ernesto reported in his accompanying post, comments on various sites suggest that many of the downloaders had also paid to see the film at the cinema.

One enthusiastic, London-based torrent-user who preferred to remain anonymous estimates that he downloads around four or five films each week (including The Dark Knight). However, he says, "I pay to go to the cinema at least once a week. I very rarely buy DVDs, but then who does? Most of my friends prefer to subscribe to DVD rental sites like Lovefilm. Ownership of the physical artefact seems increasingly moot.

"I do have qualms about it, but it's a two-way street. The commercial cinema is increasingly homogenic; there are hundreds of films that never get decent distribution, and now I have a platform to see them. For example, I waited months for Darren Aronofsky's The Fountain to come out in the cinemas – when it finally did, it screened on three or four screens spread across Greater London, none of them for more than a week. Roughly a month later it was online."

The Dark Knight's internet leak followed a standard pirate release pattern: immediately after the film's July premiere, a "cammed" version, filmed secretly from a seat in the theatre, dropped onto the web. Next, in early September, a DVD-screener copy (with the film interrupted at intervals by title cards announcing a copyright breach) made its way online. Finally, in November, a few weeks before the DVD was due in stores, the DVD-quality pirate copy (aXXo's speciality) appeared, was appropriated by aXXo, and soon spread across the net like wildfire.

In an article written for Torrentfreak.com in January, Matt Mason, author of The Pirate's Dilemma, wrote that "when pirates enter our market spaces, we have two choices. We can throw lawsuits at them and hope they go away. Sometimes this is the best thing to do. But what if those pirates are adding value to society in some way?... In these cases, what pirates are actually doing is highlighting a better way for us to do things; they find gaps outside the market, and better ways for society to operate. In these situations the only way to fight piracy is legitimise and legalise new innovations by competing with pirates in the marketplace."

Mason's book demonstrates that the history of piracy is also a history of innovation, one that includes the names Thomas Edison (inventor of the record player) and William Fox (founder of Hollywood). Ernesto agrees: "The ever-increasing piracy rates show there is a demand that the entertainment industry has not satisfied. Thanks to the internet, access to media on demand has become reality, and people seem to love it. It's now up to the movie and music industry to come up with a model that can compete with these filesharing networks."

iTunes has proved that the music industry can compete with a parallel black market online. In the US, Hulu.com, a website set up by the major television networks to stream their programming online, has done the same. Project Kangaroo, the UK equivalent, is currently in the works. "If it's very easy to find and has a lot of content, people will use it," says Price. "Hulu is bringing in huge amounts of advertising revenue for the TV companies, and it's bringing people back from the piracy networks."

"The entertainment industry would make more for artists if it embraced these technologies and found ways of doing business online," Hogge argues. "When you have six million people breaking the law, it's the law that needs changing, not the people."

Anti-piracy activists have celebrated some small victories, with trials pending in Sweden and the Netherlands for the creators of The Pirate Bay and Mininova respectively. But neither site actually hosts torrent files; as portals, they merely point the way to them – and there's no guarantee that the law will find a way to penalise them for it. Meanwhile, new torrent portals will spring up in their place, and as long as the authorities focus on the sites rather than individual uploaders (prosecuting individual downloaders has brought record companies almost nothing but bad PR), they will do little to stem the torrents' flow. The outlets may be closed down, but the aXXo brand can just move on elsewhere.

The internet makes power-brokers of the most unlikely people. Harry Knowles, a portly, 37-year-old film fanatic from Austin, Texas, became the web's most influential film critic after he was accidentally run over by a 1,200lb cart full of memorabilia at a science fiction convention in 1994. While bedridden, he bought a new computer and set up his own movie website, Ain't It Cool News, which today has the power to sink a film with a negative review before it even reaches cinemas.

Andrew Sorcini, aka MrBabyMan, is an animator for Disney in Los Angeles, who spends his days (and possibly his nights) recommending articles and webpages on the news aggregator website Digg. As the site's most popular recommender of content, he wields the same influence as the editor of a major newspaper.

But MrBabyMan and Harry Knowles haven't the mystique of aXXo. They're flesh and blood. You can find their faces on Google. Their fame may be remarkable, but they achieved it straightforwardly – and legally. The abilities of aXXo, on the other hand, seem almost superhuman. To his followers, he is Robin Hood, Batman, God: he is everywhere, and nowhere.

The Best Ripper in the p2p world

aXXo
aXXo is the Internet alias of an individual[1][2] allegedly harassed by the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) for copyright infringement. aXXo became popular for releasing commercial DVD movies on the Internet for free download, often before their official release dates.[3] The resulting files can in turn be easily distributed through the internet and be viewed instantly on a computer.[4]

aXXo files are popular among the file sharing community using peer-to-peer file sharing protocols such as BitTorrent. Eric Garland, the CEO of download-tracking firm BigChampagne, found that 33.5% of movies downloaded, during a random sampling, were aXXo torrents.[5] The aXXo files gained popularity due to the fact that aXXo produces files of comparatively small size and consistent quality. File sizes are approximately 700 MB – the same size as a Compact Disc.[5] Because of aXXo's reputation for re-encoded quality, the aXXo name is sometimes faked as an identifying source by a variety of imitators.[5]

Identity

aXXo's identity is not publicly known so as to make it difficult for authorities to track it down. A number of individuals have claimed to be, or had their name attached to, aXXo.

In a purported interview of a person claiming to be aXXo, he describes himself as a single individual who has been ripping DVDs since he was a teenager.[6] It has been suggested that the MPAA is waiting for aXXo to reach the age of 18 to more effectively prosecute him than if he were a minor.[2][1]

[edit] Imitators

Due to its popularity in the file sharing subculture, the pseudonym aXXo is faked by a variety of individuals and groups to mimic the source identity as a disguise for their own uploads on file sharing websites. A portion of such decoys is made available by a range of companies in the field of copyright enforcement, such as BayTSP, MediaDefender, or MediaSentry, with the aim of constricting illegal Internet traffic. Downloading a faked file, or group of files, results in data containing typically useless and potentially malicious data. The type of maliciously fake files include RAR format files that require the user to download a trojan virus disguised as a codec needed to view associated AVI format files. Other fake files encourage the user to register on dubious websites or require the user install the DomPlayer software. Fake files may also contain malware with the capability to send the IP address of the user's computer to a private server.[7]

[edit] Copyright infringement

aXXo converts commercial DVD movies into approximately 700MB AVI files which are then used to create a .torrent file that is uploaded to Bittorrent Trackers allowing the movie to be downloaded.[8] On file sharing websites, aXXo files attract a large following, with over a million users downloading aXXo files each month.[6] Files released by aXXo follow the naming convention "name of movie[year]DvDrip[Eng]-aXXo.avi"[9] where "DvDrip[Eng]" implies it was ripped from an English-language disc and "avi" refers to the resulting file format. The video is encoded according to the MPEG-4 ASP standard, compatible with the Xvid codec. The aXXo postings also carry an attached text file that states, in part: "Be aware of bogus sites and lamers, download your aXXo files from aXXo accounts. Enjoy!"

In November 2007, aXXo deleted all of their files released after September 7, 2006 from The Pirate Bay, protesting that the site would allow harassing comments to be added to his torrents by "possible members of MPAA".[3] While past aXXo torrents remained available on other torrent sites, uploads of new aXXo files stopped on November 11, 2007.[3][1] After an absence of three months aXXo returned to uploading, starting with the movie I Am Legend on March 9, 2008.[1][10][11]

On December 15, 2008, aXXo's thousandth movie upload, a copy of the Kiefer Sutherland horror film MIRЯORS, appeared on an internet forum for the Darkside Release Group.[12]

Since March 11 2009, after uploading Punisher: War Zone, aXXo hasn't uploaded any torrents.[13]

The 82-game marathon is over. Here's a look at some questions for the two-month, 16-team NBA tournament known as the Playoffs as it begins this weekend:

1. Are the Cavaliers really the favorite to win it all?

Judging by their record and the season LeBron James has put together, you'd have to think so. Mo Williams has fit in perfectly and the supporting cast knows its role. Something, though, just doesn't feel right. Despite one of the best regular seasons ever, Cleveland may be a year away, as crazy as that sounds, from bringing a trophy to title-starved Cleveland. While the Cavs appear destined to get out of the Eastern Conference for the second time in three years, expect the heavily motivated Lakers to be there waiting. More on that later.

2. Can anyone give the Lakers a challenge out West?

Doubtful. The Jazz, on paper, may have been the team most equipped to put a scare into L.A., but they've fallen apart down the stretch and don't figure to pose much of a threat in the first round. From there the candidates are muddled and flawed. Playoff newcomer Portland gave the Lakers the most trouble during the season, but the Blazers may be out before getting a shot at Kobe Bryant and Co. The Nuggets -- bursting with athletes, plus the steady hand of Chauncey Billups -- could put a scare into L.A. if they keep their heads on straight. The Rockets are a possibility with defenders to hassle Kobe in Ron Artest and Shane Battier, plus Yao Ming in the middle. But the Spurs and Hornets are just too banged up, and the Lakers own the Mavericks.

3. Which of these big guys -- Kevin Garnett or Andrew Bynum -- figures to be healthy enough to contribute to a long playoff run?

Garnett's status doesn't look good. He sat out the Celtics' last nine regular season games and 16 of 20. The knee strain suffered Feb. 19 could sideline Garnett throughout the playoffs. "We're going to move on without him," said Boston coach Doc Rivers, explaining the team's mindset. The Celtics have the luxury of a relatively stress-free first-round matchup to give KG more time to work his way back into the mix, but they need a healthy Garnett to anchor their defense in the conference semis and beyond. Watching how he ended the season, Bynum looks to be on track to take a bigger role as the postseason progresses. The 7-footer is finishing at the basket and running without pain. His defensive timing still isn't there and his stamina needs to improve, but the Lakers can continue to bring Bynum along at a steady pace.

4. Out of the Big Four (Cavaliers, Lakers, Celtics and Magic), which team is the most vulnerable?

Book the Cavs and Lakers for the conference finals, so they're out of this discussion. That leaves Boston and Orlando. The defending champs do have the talent, experience and the depth to make another title run if they're healthy, but that seems unlikely now with the latest KG bombshell. The Magic rely too much on the 3-point shot to be seriously considered a title contender. Dwight Howard is amazing, but it would have been a taken Superman-like effort to carry Orlando past a complete Boston team in the semis. Now that doesn't seem quite as demanding.

5. Is this the year Houston finally gets out of the first round?

For a franchise that hasn't advanced past the opening round since 1997, this could be the streak buster. The Rockets are stout defensively and possess a high basketball IQ -- two qualities that will serve them well in the Playoffs. Yao and Artest never had a chance to get it going with Tracy McGrady, but Houston has come together around a group of hard-working role players led by Battier, Luis Scola and Carl Landry.

6. Why are the Pistons so cocky?

Yes, they've won it before. And it wasn't that long ago when Detroit was a staple in the East finals. But these Pistons are a shell of their former contending selves. Billups is in Denver. Coaches Larry Brown and Flip Saunders have long since left. Detroit had a losing record this season, Allen Iverson is on the shelf, and LeBron and the Cavs are a freight train. Sorry 'Sheed, we expect only one team to play hard. Just try and keep the towels on the bench.

7. Can Dwyane Wade beat the Hawks by himself?

Wade did a fair imitation of the one-man act in 2006, but that Heat team had considerably more talent than this one. The Hawks parlayed last year's surprising first-round seven-game series with Boston into the East's No. 4 seed and the home-court edge over Miami. Atlanta has the defenders to throw at D-Wade, starting with Josh Smith and Joe Johnson, plus superior depth. Wade alone is enough to steal a couple of games in this series, but his postseason won't last past seven games.

8. Which of the Spurs is most likely to step up in place of Manu Ginobili?

The obvious answer is nobody if you're not counting Tim Duncan or Tony Parker. No doubt the other two cogs of the Spurs' celebrated trio have taken their games to another level at times, but finding another gear for the Playoffs may be a stretch. Duncan, after all, has been plagued by sore knees since the All-Star break. As for the rest of the roster, look to Roger Mason Jr., Michael Finley and Ime Udoka trying to squeeze into Ginobili's irreplaceable sneakers. Each brings something to the table -- Mason (late-game heroics), Finley (veteran know how) and Udoka (much-needed athleticism).

9. What lower-seeded team is most likely to pull a first-round upset?

Since we're scratched Miami off the list in Question 7, expect the East to play out according to plan. That brings us to the West. The Jazz, no chance. The Rockets, Mavericks and Hornets aren't going in intimated by their respective matchups. Stealing one on the road in Games 1 or 2 would swing home-court advantage and set up a possible six-game upset. Of the three, Dallas has the most momentum on its side and is quite familiar with the Spurs.

10. Is there a better potential Finals matchup out there than Lakers-Cavs?

Can you think of one? If this June is the beginning of a Magic-Bird run for years to come for Kobe and LeBron, the NBA and its fans are in for something special.

Sixers face a tough task in bringing down beat-up Magic

By John Schuhmann, NBA.com
Posted Apr 16 2009 11:13AM

The Magic and Sixers are two teams that suffered some untimely injuries down the stretch and didn't finish the season as strong as they would have liked.

Orlando was without Rashard Lewis (right knee tendinitis) for the last three games of the season, and without Hedo Turkoglu (sprained left ankle) for the last two. The Magic weren't at their best to close the season, losing five of their last nine games.

The Sixers lost Thaddeus Young to a sprained right ankle on March 31 and lost six straight games before edging out the Cavs on the final night of the season. At one point late in the season, they had a shot at the fourth seed, but they needed that win in Cleveland just to finish sixth.
Head-to-head

The Magic vs. the trainer's table: If the Magic are healthy and at their best, they should be making their second straight trip to the conference semifinals and would even have a shot to knock off the Celtics. But their late-season injuries are concerning.

Leg injuries can affect shooters, and no team shoots more threes (on a per-possession basis) than the Magic. So if Lewis and Turkoglu aren't 100 percent and aren't shooting well, they could be in trouble.

Even if they're close to full strength, it will take some time for the Magic starters to get back into a rhythm together.

This team had its best season since 1995-96, but it lost Jameer Nelson in early February. And now the Magic have Turkoglu and Lewis going into the postseason banged up. If they manage to crash the conference finals, it will be quite an accomplishment.
Behind the numbers

31.8 -- The percentage of 3-pointers made by the Sixers this season. They are the worst 3-point shooting team in the league.
Five big questions

1. What exactly is the status of Turkoglu and Lewis?

It's unlikely that either will be at 100 percent to start the series. But it's also unlikely that either will miss a game.

Turkoglu said on Wednesday that his ankle was "getting stronger" after doing some shooting. Lewis was unable to finish shootaround Wednesday morning. But by the time Sunday's Game 1 arrives, they'll each have had more than a week off.

2. So if the Magic don't shoot well, the Sixers will win?

No. The Magic are a lot more than just a 3-point shooting team. Along with the Celtics and Cavs, they're one of the three best defensive teams in the league. When the shots aren't falling, Orlando can rely on its defense much more than in previous years.

The Magic also rank third in the NBA in free-throw attempts per possession. The ability to get to the line is important in the Playoffs.

3. So how can the Sixers pull off an upset?

They need to get running, but that starts with their defense. Philly uses its length to force turnovers and its speed to convert on the other end. With Young healthy again, the Sixers' running game is back at full strength.

The Magic are at the league average when it comes to turning the ball over, but they do a good job of getting back and preventing transition buckets. And that will be priority No. 1 for Stan Van Gundy's team.

4. Can Samuel Dalembert keep Dwight Howard contained?

As long as his head is in the game, Dalembert has the length and the ability to defend Howard pretty well. Superman looked relatively mortal against the Sixers this season, averaging just 15.7 points and 10 boards.

In the third meeting, Dalembert was in foul trouble, but the Sixers also have Marreese Speights and Theo Ratliff to come in and provide 12 more fouls on Howard.

5. Who could be an X-factor?

Louis Williams is the Sixer with the best ability to create his own shot in a half-court setting. He can heat up and carry the offense if Philly can't get running. Williams shot just 7-for-24 (29 percent) against the Magic this season and two of the three games were close. If he had it going in one or both of those games, it may have made a difference in the result.
Prediction

Magic in 5. With Lewis and Turkoglu banged up, the scores may be lower than they would otherwise, but the Magic have proven over the course of 82 games that they're a great defensive team. And if the Sixers can't run as much as they would like, they'll have trouble putting points on the board.

Georgia Tech profs put heads together, pick an NBA champ

By Adena Andrews, NBA.com
Posted Apr 17 2009 6:43PM

The Playoffs are filled with talking heads. They're NBA veterans in nice suits, or hard-nosed reporters spending their lives in the locker rooms, all spewing opinions on who the next NBA champion migt be. Once in a while, they even turn out to be right.

What if there were some guys who were never in the league, though, and who never appeared on TV, and they turned out to be better analysts than your typical talking head?

And what if they could kick your butt in a game of Jeopardy, too?

Those guys are professors Joel Sokol, 37, Paul Kvam, 46, and George Nemhauser, 71, at the Georgia Institute of Technology's H. Milton Stewart School of Industrial and Systems Engineering. Together, the professors have invented an equation called the Logistic Regression Markov Chain (LRMC) that can predict the outcome of sporting tournaments. Using this highly complex mathematical equation, they can pick the NBA champion for the 2008-09 season without watching a game.

With the LRMC by their side, these group of mathletes claim to be better prognosticators than Charles Barkley, Gary Payton or any other talking-head analyst on the planet.

"I think we could take on Gary and the guys, when it comes to predictions," says Sokol, the mastermind behind the LRMC.

"We could give this talk about the LRMC to thousands of professors at universities who would love to hear the equation," says Kvam. "But most of them would probably say 'What are Cleveland Cavaliers and why are they playing Jazz in Utah?'"

The LRMC initially was designed to decide the champion of the NCAA men's basketball tournament. The professors were inspired by a last-second shot by Tennessee that knocked Tech out of the tournament in 2002.

Since that game, the LRMC has picked the correct NCAA tournament winner three out of five times, including this year, when North Carolina won. In addition to picking the champ, in 2008 the LRMC got all three of the final rounds correct, and it even got the NIT champion right, too.

"Everyone has this intuition just by looking at head-to-heads and blowouts for who is going to win," says Sokol. "All we are doing is making a more rigorous argument."

Because the professors seemed so sure in their equation, and did pretty well in the NCAAs, we decided to challenge them to see if they could predict the outcome of the NBA Playoffs.

They scoffed. They said they could do it in 20 minutes.

Which, when you think about it, easily beats hours of sports chatter from the talking-head analysts.

The professors took 16 years worth of NBA data from every team in the Playoffs and used that to determine the strength of each team and its ranking. The professors then picked random matches between teams from the past 16 years, took the outcomes and plugged them into a logistic-reasoning equation.

In the interest of keeping this from seeming like a college research paper, here are the results:

Eastern Conference
(All games considered)

1. Cleveland	1. Cleveland	1. Cleveland	1. Cleveland (Cavs beat LA Lakers in Finals)
8. Detroit
4. Atlanta	4. Atlanta
5. Miami
3. Orlando	3. Orlando	2. Boston
6. Philadelphia
2. Boston	2. Boston
7. Chicago

Eastern Conference
(With Kevin Garnett)

1. Cleveland	1. Cleveland	1. Cleveland	2. Boston (Celts beat LA Lakers in Finals)
8. Detroit
4. Atlanta	4. Atlanta
5. Miami
3. Orlando	3. Orlando	2. Boston
6. Philadelphia
2. Boston	2. Boston
7. Chicago

Eastern Conference
(Without Kevin Garnett)

1. Cleveland	1. Cleveland	1. Cleveland	1. Cleveland (Cavs beat LA Lakers in Finals)
8. Detroit
4. Atlanta	4. Atlanta
5. Miami
3. Orlando	3. Orlando	3. Orlando
6. Philadelphia
2. Boston	2. Boston
7. Chicago

Western Conference
(All games considered)

1. LA Lakers	1. LA Lakers	1. LA Lakers	1. LA Lakers (Lakers lose to Celts or Cavs in Finals)
8. Utah
4. Portland	4. Portland
5. Houston
3. San Antonio	3. San Antonio	2. Denver*
6. Dallas
2. Denver	2. Denver
7. New Orleans

*San Antonio has edge on a neutral court; Denver's home-court advantage makes up for it.

While the LRMC seems to be all-knowing, even the professors admit that it can't take into account things like injuries or other unforeseeables. If LeBron James suddenly comes up limping, or Dwyane Wade starts playing above his already lofty standards, lots can change.

Before Boston made the announcement about Kevin Garnett's knee, for example, the LRMC had the Celtics in the Eastern Conference finals. Without KG, the professors see an Eastern Conference finals between the Cavaliers and the Magic.

The LRMC doesn't always pick the top-seeded team. But this season, it couldn't deny that the Cavaliers are the best team in the league, picking them as the 2008-09 champions.

As for the talking heads? We'll be hearing more from them in the weeks ahead

Cleveland vs. Detroit
Cleveland wins the Series with 4-1

Lebron James Is The Biggest Factor, Also the X-Factor for the Pistons T. Prince

Boston vs. Chicago
Boston wins the Series with 4-1

K. Garnet, P. Pierce,R.Allen,R.Rondo will lead the celtics to the second round

Orlando vs. Philadelphia
Orlando wins the Series with 4-2

D.Howard Will lead this team, together with R.Lewis

Atlanta vs. Miami
Miami wins the Series with 4-3

Dwayne Wade will able to lead the heat for the second , against the hawks, but this could be a very close series

L.A. Lakers vs. Utah
Lakers wins the Series with 4-2

K. Bryant will provide the wins, can D. Williams lead the JAZZ , with A.Kirilenko,M.Okur?

Denver vs. New Orleans
New Orleans wins the Series with 4-3

C.Paul and the hornets will find a hard to pass the denver nuggets who is armed with C.Billups and C. Anthony.

San Antonio vs. Dallas
San Antonio wins the Series with 4-3

Tim Duncan Againts Dirk Nowitzki? This could a close series for the Spurs and Mavericks, Jason Kidd could lead the Mavericks along with Terry,Howard and Nowitzki. but still the spurs have enough with T. Duncan and the rest of the team

Portland vs. Houston
Portland wins the Series with 4-3

The young trailblazzers team could possible surpass Houston rockets who has R.Artest and Yao Ming, Against Brandon Roy and L. Aldridge?

By NBA.com
Posted Apr 16 2009 7:39AM

By now, the whole classical music world has heard of the Joyce Hatto scandal (Wikipedia's article is excellent).

Joyce Hatto was a pianist who died in June, 2006. She didn't play many concerts, but she recorded prolifically — or so everyone thought, until it was discovered, in early 2007, that most of her recordings were plagiarized from the records of other pianists. She never knew about it, apparently: the plagiarism was the work of her recording engineer and husband, William Barrington-Coupe.

The best part is how the deception was uncovered: when someone put her recordings onto a computer, automated comparison routines kept stubbornly identifying them as other pianists' tracks!

It's a great example of what we've been saying about artists putting their work online: sharing files widely prevents plagiarism, by making it much easier to detect. Forget Hatto herself for a moment — think instead of all those other pianists, whose recordings were passed off as her work: the reason the hoax was detected at all was because their track information was available online. And if the recordings themselves had been available online, the problem would only have been detected more quickly, probably years ago.

The unmasking had nothing to do with DRM, by the way. DRM is the set of software and hardware handicaps that prevents computers and music players from sharing files freely with each other. It's true that some of the programs that detected the similarities between Hatto's recordings and other pianists' also have built-in DRM, but the DRM is utterly irrelevant to the comparison techniques that spotted the correlations. In fact, if DRM were as effective as the record companies wish it were, it would only have hindered the comparisons, since then the other pianists' track information might not have been readily available for examination.

But we've still got a long way to go. The Wikipedia article on Hatto had the following sentence, as of early February 28th:

Meanwhile the British Phonographic Industry (BPI) has begun an investigation. If the allegations are true, it would be one of the most extraordinary cases of copyright infringement the record industry had ever seen, according to a BPI spokesman.

Notice how the hoax is identified as "copyright infringement", not "plagiarism". I checked the reference: the BPI spokesman apparently referred to "piracy", so in the interests of accurate quoting, I've changed the Wikipedia article to say "piracy". But that's not really satisfactory: the word "piracy" is often used to refer to both unauthorized printing and plagiarism, as though the two are the same offense. The word thus provided a semantic pivot, around which some Wikipedian was able turn from one of the word's meanings to the other, making it into a case of "copyright infringement".

Who was this mysterious misquoter?

We'll never know, because they did it anonymously, though clearly on purpose. For when the sentence was originally added, it quoted the BPI representative correctly. Later, someone came along and changed just one thing: "piracy" to "copyright infringement". You can see the edit here. Probably they felt that "piracy" was too loaded a term, and that "copyright infringement" would be more accurate. Unfortunately, this is exactly the conflation — equating unauthorized copying with stealing credit — that the record industry promotes; the pity is that their effort has been so successful.

I've fixed the text to say "piracy" again. But the BPI spokesman should have talked about "plagiarism" in the first place, because that's what we're dealing with here, and the more we let digital files circulate freely, the less plagiarism there will be.

he founders of a website which carries links to copies of music, films and TV programmes have gone on trial in Sweden on charges of copyright theft.

The Pirate Bay is the world's most high-profile file-sharing site and is being taken to court by media firms including Sony and Warner Bros.

The men face up to two years in prison and a fine of $143,500, if convicted.

"File-sharing services can be used both legally and illegally," defence lawyer Per Samuelsson said.

Frederik Neij, Gottfrid Svartholm Warg, Peter Sunde Kolmsioppi and Carl Lundstrom have portrayed themselves as digital libertarians and say that they cannot be prosecuted for copyright theft because none of the content is hosted on their computer servers.

The men are accused of "promoting other people's infringements of copyright laws", according to charges filed by senior public prosecutor Haakan Roswall.

Representatives of the movie, music and video games industry are seeking about 115 million kronor (10.6 million euros) in damages and interest for losses incurred from tens of millions of illegal downloads facilitated by the site.

FROM THE BBC WORLD SERVICE More from BBC World Service

"It is legal to offer a service that can be used in both a legal and illegal way, according to Swedish law," Mr Samuelsson said at the opening of the trial, which is expected to last three weeks.

He said the site "can be compared to making cars that can be driven faster than the speed limit".

Monique Wadsted, a lawyer representing media firms, including Warner Bros and MGM, involved in the case said: "It's not a political trial, it's not a trial about shutting down a people's library, and it's not a trial that wants to prohibit file-sharing as a technique.

It's not a political trial Monique Wadsted, lawyer

"It's a trial that regards four individuals that have conducted a big commercial business making money out of others' file-sharing works, copyright-protected movies, hit music, popular computer games, etc."

The Pirate Bay, which was founded in 2003, directs people to "torrent" links, which allow file-sharing program BitTorrent to download and upload files among potentially millions of users.

They have already failed to take down the site once. Let them fail again Gottfrid Warg

Swedish police raided the company's offices several times and seized nearly 200 servers in 2006, temporarily closing the site. But it re-opened a few days later with servers hosted in different countries.

Mr Warg, in a webcast on Sunday, said: "What are they going to do about it? They have already failed to take down the site once. Let them fail again.

"It has a life without us."

John Kennedy, chairman of the International Federation of the Phonographic Industries, representing 1,400 member record companies worldwide, said: "The Pirate Bay has hurt creators of many different kinds of works, from music to film, from books to TV programmes. It has been particularly harmful in distributing copyrighted works prior to their official release.

"This damages sales of music at the most important time of their lifecycle."

Mr Kennedy said the four men had "made substantial amounts of money" from the site, "despite their claim to be only interested in spreading culture for free".

On Sunday, Mr Sunde said: "It does not matter if they require several million (kronor) or one billion. We are not rich and have no money to pay."

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The NBA PLAYOFFS 2009 Eastern Conference	Western Conference
vs. (1) CLEVELAND vs. (8) Detroit vs. (2) BOSTON vs. (7) Chicago vs. (3) ORLANDO vs. (6) Philadelphia vs. (4) ATLANTA (1H) vs. (5) Miami	vs. (1) LOS ANGELES (1H) vs. (8) Utah vs. (2) DENVER vs. (7) Dallas vs. (3) HOUSTON (1H) vs. (6) New Orleans ( vs. (4) PORTLAND vs. (5) San Antonio

2008-2009 Conference Regular Season Standings
Eastern Conference
Eastern	W	L	PCT	GB	CONF	DIV	HOME	ROAD	L 10	STREAK
Cleveland1c	63	15	0.808	0.0	37-11	12-3	38-1	25-14	8-2	W 2
Boston2a	59	19	0.756	4.0	38-10	14-1	33-6	26-13	9-1	W 5
Orlando3se	58	20	0.744	5.0	36-12	13-2	31-8	27-12	8-2	W 1
Atlanta4x	45	34	0.570	18.5	28-22	10-5	29-10	16-24	4-6	W 2
Miami5x	41	37	0.526	22.0	26-22	9-6	26-13	15-24	5-5	L 1
Philadelphia6x	40	38	0.513	23.0	24-24	6-8	24-15	16-23	5-5	L 3
Chicago7	39	40	0.494	24.5	22-27	8-7	27-12	12-28	7-3	W 3
Detroit8	38	40	0.487	25.0	25-23	7-7	20-19	18-21	4-6	W 2
Charlotte	35	43	0.449	28.0	20-29	5-10	23-18	12-25	5-5	W 1
Indiana	34	44	0.436	29.0	21-27	5-8	23-15	11-29	6-4	W 2
New Jerseyo	32	46	0.410	31.0	21-27	8-7	17-22	15-24	3-7	L 1
Milwaukeeo	32	47	0.405	31.5	20-30	4-11	20-19	12-28	1-9	L 4
Torontoo	30	48	0.385	33.0	19-29	5-10	17-22	13-26	6-4	L 3
New Yorko	30	49	0.380	33.5	18-31	4-11	19-21	11-28	2-8	L 2
Washingtono	18	61	0.228	45.5	9-40	1-15	13-27	5-34	2-8	L 2
Western Conference
Western	W	L	PCT	GB	CONF	DIV	HOME	ROAD	L 10	STREAK
L.A. Lakers1w	63	16	0.797	0.0	42-7	14-2	34-5	29-11	8-2	W 5
Denver2x	53	27	0.663	10.5	34-16	12-3	32-8	21-19	8-2	L 1
Houston3x	51	28	0.646	12.0	33-16	8-6	32-8	19-20	7-3	W 3
Portland4x	50	28	0.641	12.5	28-20	9-5	31-7	19-21	7-3	W 2
San Antonio5x	50	28	0.641	12.5	32-16	9-6	26-13	24-15	5-5	L 1
New Orleans6x	48	30	0.615	14.5	29-19	8-4	27-13	21-17	5-5	L 1
Utah7x	47	31	0.603	15.5	32-16	10-6	32-7	15-24	5-5	L 1
Dallas8x	47	31	0.603	15.5	26-22	5-8	29-9	18-22	6-4	W 2
Phoenixo	43	35	0.551	19.5	27-21	10-5	26-13	17-22	6-4	W 1
Golden Stateo	28	50	0.359	34.5	17-31	6-9	21-18	7-32	4-6	L 1
Minnesotao	24	55	0.304	39.0	13-36	3-13	11-28	13-27	4-6	W 2
Memphiso	22	56	0.282	40.5	13-36	5-11	14-25	8-31	5-5	L 2
Oklahoma Cityo	21	57	0.269	41.5	14-36	4-11	14-26	7-31	2-8	L 4
L.A. Clipperso	18	60	0.231	44.5	9-39	1-14	10-28	8-32	1-9	L 6
Sacramentoo	16	62	0.205	46.5	15-33	7-8	11-29	5-33	2-8	L 6