YouTube, Sony Pictures in talks over feature films

YouTube is in talks to acquire licensing rights to full-length content from Sony Pictures, home of such films as "The International" and "Spider-Man," sources familiar with the negotiations told CNET News. Details about what a final agreement could look like are sparse, but any partnership between the two powerhouses would likely benefit both. Representatives from both companies declined to comment

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Scientist: My quake prediction was ignored

A researcher says he predicted Monday’s devastating earthquake that killed dozens of people and left tens of thousands homeless in central Italy, but authorities dismissed him as a scaremonger. Gioacchino Giuliani, an employee at a physics institute at Gran Sasso, near the badly-hit city of L’Aquila, has demanded an official apology for what he says was an unforgivable failure to act on his predictions. “There are people who must apologize to me, and they must have the weight of what occurred on their conscience,” Giuliani said after the quake hit, according to local news site Ilcapoluogo.com.

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Facebook Takes a Dive: Why Social Networks Are Bad Businesses

The business of having online sites with content created by amateurs to be viewed by other amateurs never had a reasonable chance of making money. The fact that at one point Facebook had a $15 billion valuation, that Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp bought MySpace, and that Google bought YouTube only proves the “greater fool” theory. YouTube was started in 2005 and MySpace in 2003

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Crunch-hit tycoon loses bid to cut divorce payout

A British court Wednesday told a business financier he would still have to pay a $13.6 million divorce settlement despite losing a fortune in the credit crunch. It’s April Fools’ Day — when media outlets around the world take a break from the serious business of delivering news and play fast and furious with the facts

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Pirates captured after attacking German tanker

Seven suspected pirates are in German custody after they fired on a naval tanker off the coast of Somalia and were pursued by warships, the German military said. Well, researchers are hoping that a potential April Fool’s time bomb — the Conficker.c that is supposed to hit computers on April 1 — turns out to be equally unfounded

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China dismisses cyber-espionage claims

Analysts in China are dismissing claims that nearly 1,300 computers in more than 100 countries have been attacked, and have become part of a cyber-espionage network apparently based in China. “This is purely another political issue that the West is trying to exaggerate,” Song Xiaojun, a Beijing-based strategy and military analyst, told the state-run news agency, Xinhua.

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Red River levels dropping barely; Residents remain on alert

While the Red River level appeared to be dropping early Sunday, Fargo, North Dakota, officials said they were still holding their collective breath. “In past flooding, you have to understand, we’ve had times in which people thought it crested and then it came back and went up,” Fargo Deputy Mayor Tim Mahoney said. “And our temperature is changing, so we will be reluctant to announce a crest until we truly feel there’s been a crest.” City Manager Pat Sawyerville added, “We cannot think that we’ve passed some milestone here.” Above-freezing temperatures, followed by heavy rains this week, caused the Red River and its tributaries to swell, sending Fargo into emergency preparation mode

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Thousands expected for London G-20 protest

The first major protest ahead of next week’s G-20 summit got underway in a cold and rainy London on Saturday, but police said they expected the event to be largely peaceful despite fears of violence in coming days. Such has been the Internet’s phenomenal and dizzying growth that much of the technology which supports it has grown organically and without much forward planning. But what if the Internet was to run out of space This isn’t just a theoretical debate, but something experts warn could become a real issue within a few years

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