Posted 04/07/09 at 09:55:06 AM by Paul Lilly

In what might not have been the brightest move in hindsight, 10-year Foxnews.com columnist Roger Friedman posted a short review of the pirated flick "X-Men Origins: Wolverine," which will be released in theaters May 1st. Consider that 20th Century Fox is a subsidiary of News Corp, and it shouldn't be too surprising the suits in charge opted to issue Friedman a pink slip.

"Roger Friedman's views in no way reflect the views of News Corporation," News Corp. said in a statement. "We, along with 20th Century Film Corporation, have been a consistent leader in the fight against piracy and have a zero tolerance for any action that encourages and promotes piracy. When we advised Fox News of the facts, they took immediate action, removed the post, and promptly terminated Mr. Friedman."

The statement issued by Fox News wasn't quite as harsh, claiming Friedman and Fox News "mutually agreed to part ways immediately" and wishing Friedman "success in his future endeavors."

It probably didn't help Friedman's case that, in addition to writing about Wolverine, he said he was also able to find the current top 10 movies in theaters, and that "Later tonight I may finally catch up with Paul Rudd in 'I Love You, Man.' It's so much easier than going out in the rain!"

Friedman's article

Did News Corp. and Foxnewx.com overreact, or did Friedman bring this upon himself? Hit the jump and sound off.

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Posted 01/13/09 at 09:44:52 AM by Paul Lilly

Yelp describes itself as a "fun and easy way to find, review, and talk about what's great (and not so great) in your world." In Christopher Norberg's world, taking advantage of what Yelp has to offer has landed him a lawsuit accusing him of libel.

The San Franciscan was in a car accident in 2006 and sought the services of a local chiropractor. But after a dispute over billing took place, Norberg posted a negative review on Yelp essentially accusing the doctor of being dishonest. Now the 26-year-old custom furniture builder will have to defend his comments in court.

"If Christopher loses then anyone on Yelp who writes a negative review better be careful," said Michael Blacksburt, an attorney representing Norberg. "This strikes at the heart of Yelp's business model and other websites that provide a bulletin board for people to state what they think of businesses in their community."

Not surprisingly, Eric Nordskog, the attorney for chiropractor Steven Biegel, sees the situation differently. According to Nordskog, "Dr. Biegel has no problem with people expressing their views and opinions about his service," but the question is whether or not Norberg posted a false statement as fact.

Should Norbert be held responsible for his review, or is the chiropractor getting too bent out of shape? Hit the jump and tell us what you think.

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Posted 01/01/09 at 01:40:00 PM by David Murphy

Cooler Master’s V8 CPU cooler offsets  a somewhat time-consuming installation process with near-record-setting performance for an air cooler. The sleek aluminum cooler’s 12cm fan sits between two heatsinks on the device, sparing fingers from the accidental nip of its 800rpm-to-1,800rpm variable fan.

Read on for the rest of the review. 

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Posted 11/18/08 at 04:28:17 PM by Mark Edward Soper

As a counterpoint to InfoWorld blogger Randall Kennedy's controversial review of the Windows 7 pre-beta , we bring you a contrasting view from The Register's Tim Anderson:

During the press briefing for Windows 7 at Microsoft's Professional Developers Conference (PDC), corporate vice president for Windows product management Mike Nash insisted Microsoft had learned from the Vista experience.

Judging by early Windows 7 code released at PDC, the signs are that it really has....Windows 7 feels more polished than Vista, even in the preview, and performance is good.

Anderson noted the new Device Stage, BitLocker to Go, and improvements in Windows Media Player. To find out what other features Anderson likes in the next Windows, join us after the jump.

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Posted 06/20/08 at 12:33:33 PM by David Murphy

Zalman’s CNPS9700 has been the Godzilla of coolers and a Best of the Best champion for more than a year. But it’s finally facing its Megalon in Thermaltake’s DuOrb cooler. The extra-wide cooler, shaped in a 20-centimeter-wide figure eight, comes with two 8cm blue and red LED fans tucked inside two rings of copper fins.

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Posted 06/18/08 at 08:23:19 PM by Gordon Mah Ung

Much has been made of the incredible speed advantages PCI Express offers over PCI. Beyond GPUs, however, we haven’t found much worthy of occupying those slots. Asus hopes to change that with its Xonar D2X card—the first soundcard we’ve reviewed that makes use of the PCI Express interface. The D2X is basically a PCI-E version of the Xonar D2 (reviewed April 2008). In our review of the Xonar D2 we lamented the card’s lack of advanced EAX support, something Asus has tried to fix here. But do their workarounds, well, work?

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Posted 06/18/08 at 05:39:51 PM by Gordon Mah Ung

For all those readers who have added up the price of the parts in an OEM box and screamed into the night air: “Hell, I can build it cheaper than that!” CyberPower has a retort: Beat this one, sucker! While you might think you’re up to the challenge, we suspect the price-to-performance ratio of the CyberPower Gamer Ultimate SLI Quad is impossible to match—unless you’re using boosted parts. In fact, we’re not sure how CyberPower is making a profit off this stacked and packed rig.

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Posted 05/01/08 at 04:49:22 PM by Katherine Stevenson

It’s easy to be seduced by Alienware’s m15x notebook. From its handsome silver-gray case to its cool-yet-tasteful LED accents to its comfortable lap weight of less than eight pounds, this 15.4-inch machine had us at hello. Of course, only excellent performance would keep us interested.

Click Read More for more. 

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