TEAC’s One-Step DVD/CD Duplicator will rip your CDs, or DVDs, without the need for a connection to a PC. That is enough information for us to decide we like it; it is simple and it can copyright infringe in around 6 minutes flat, thanks to the 48x CD drive read speed / 16x DVD read speed. Nice—but don’t use it to copyright infringe, or you shall be hunted down like a dog and be made to pay like a millionaire pooch.
We like it for its law abiding backup qualities, of course. The 8MB internal buffer might mean you have a few error reads, but at $349.95, if you intend on copying media on the regular, give your PC’s fans a rest and grab one of these to do the dirty work instead. [Product Page via Gadget DNA]
Original post by Haroon Malik
South Korea’s Jump Up Internet Rescue School is the first of its kind, providing rehabilitation to those who cannot escape from the confines of the great interweb. Fittingly, South Korea is the world’s foremost internet connected nation, with over 90% of homes having access to cheap, high speed broadband. Worryingly, this has been the reason for the establishment of a rehabilitation center for those who are addicted; the ready availability of the internet means users have grown seriously dependent on the world wide web’s offerings.
As nations extend the reach of the internet throughout their own countries, South Korea’s situation may serve as a warning beacon in light of further expansion. Some may deduce that preventative measures need to be implemented, prior to expansion, to avoid internet addiction becoming a global issue. The notion of a rehabilitation center of this kind certainly seems comical initially, but beyond its novelty value, concern [...]
Original post by Haroon Malik
We ship 50 to 80 percent of the 300k to 400k tons of electronics that actually make it to recycling each year—out of 2 million tons tossed—overseas. The “recycling” part happens when workers in places China, Nigeria and India bust up old gear with hammers, gas burners or their bare hands to pull out metals, glass and “other recyclables,” taking a toxic shower in the process. And the most likely stuff to make its way over there is what’s collected at free drives.
Event sponsors often take the cheapest hired gun they can find and don’t ask questions about what’s going where and how. The “recyclers” then turn around and hawk the wares, handing off what they can’t sell to export brokers. And if they get busted, they just say they were selling secondhand goods to poor countries that need them.
The article-concluding solution propagated by Green Earth hippies actually makes [...]
Original post by Matt Buchanan