CrankyRants.com - 
The title could stand on it’s own, but if you’re interested in the details, apparently scientists at the University of Washington are genetically altering trees to pull toxins out of contaminated ground water. Not necessarily the quicker-picker-upper, these trees and plants spend years absorbing the bad stuff through their root system and turn them into I’m guessing some form of grotesque glowing mutant tree leaves or something. Remember the “Kite Eating Tree” from the old Charlie Brown cartoons? Big tree? Giant creepy smile? Lot’s of childhood tree nightmares that resulted? That’s what it’s like.
The relatively new field of phytoremediation is the cause for the new discoveries. Through a plant’s natural ability to extract chemicals from water, soil, and air, specific trees and plants are being bio-engineered to extract specific forms of chemical by-products and waste. Great idea. Horrible dilemma for your typical environmentalist.
“Love that we’re cleaning up the toxins here… but icky water make tree cry!”
Okay, summer break’s over. Back to Work.
First up, a Microsoft punishment might stick? We’ve all read the article. Apparently a European Union court dismissed Microsoft’s appeal against an EU antitrust order that ordered it to share communications code with rivals and sell a copy of Windows without Media Player and upheld the $689 million fine.
“The court observes that it is beyond dispute that in consequence of the tying consumers are unable to acquire the Windows operating system without simultaneously acquiring Windows Media Player,” it said.
Microsoft has a final appeals route to the EU high court, but what does this mean for the Wild Bill and the Monopoly Bunch? Possibly alot. The money is obviously meaningless as the Microsoft compound fuels the cavernous coding sweatshops in the winter with furnaces burning 20’s and 50’s. But the media player split could mean future overseas releases of Vista might need to exclude media player as an application. However, since it is “integrated” into the operating system, according to Microsoft, that may simply mean that the front-end will be absent, and download from an update only after the OS is activated. That would leave the courts to then determine if it’s legal to grab it afterwards.
This is speculation, of course. Truth is, Microsoft may simply find an easier loophole or continue to shell out the fines. Either way, you can bet on two things:
- It will likely not affect any U.S. releases.
- Microsoft is well on their way to worming those features even deeper into the fleshy code for future legal excuses.
The next time you need to write an email… expect it to happen inside of “Microsoft Media Text Content Player Composer Manager 11.0″.