Debian Planet reports that dpkg 1.71. should be available later this evening. “New dpkg has many new features, like Origin and BTS info which allows a single maintainer define the bugtracking system to use with this package (shouldn’t affect debian maintainers). dpkg-shlibdeps has been also upgraded to ‘work better’, and ofcourse slower… there also is dpkg.cfg which allows you to enter commandline options to dpkg from a configuration file. dpkg-deb has been made to reorder the files in packages which should prevent ‘some nasty things’ from happening.”

Sun Microsystems has posted an analysis of Microsoft’s .NET strategy. “Is .NET a radically new and innovative platform, as Microsoft claims? Or is it another migration path for Windows developers who have not yet embraced the Java platform?” asks Madhu Siddalingaiah.

Slashdot readers discuss an article by Ian Murdock at DebianPlanet talking about the differences between “pure” and “commercial” Debian.

Slashdot readers sound off on this submission: “It seems lately that a whole lot of the discussion on
Slashdot centers around copyright law. Napster, DeCSS, the GPL; in all
of these discussions the fundamental power over which there is a struggle
derives from the law of copyright. And in all these cases, the fundamental
existence of copyright is hardly ever questioned. However, copyright is
not a law of nature. Such force as it has is a product of international treaty …”

A column at Technocrat advocates Internet voting as a way to combat election fraud: “All in all, Peer-To-Peer, rather than Client/Server would seem to be the only
way to go, to avoid the Florida Fiasco in future. But, like I said, there’s not a hope
that’ll ever happen. Too much rides on there BEING crises for those with the
power to make changes to ever make such a change.” ZDNet UK also examines the possibility of Internet voting.

The Register follows up on an earlier story: “The SDMI (Secure Digital Music Initiative) group has announced, despite earlier
claims to the contrary, that practically all of the 447 entries to the ‘Hack SDMI’
challenge bounced off. This would mean all in the garden was lovely, if it weren’t for
the pesky Princeton University researchers led by Edward Felten, who stoutly
maintains that SDMI is toast, and says the Princeton team will be publishing its
results by the end of the week.”

CNet reports that Yahoo’s president is telling investors “not to be fooled into thinking the Web was a passing fad just
because so many companies had withered along with Net hysteria.” Wishful thinking?

Do any Linux users want America Online? Gateway thinks so. The Register reports that Gateway will announce its Transmeta-based, AOL-oriented Net appliance Friday. CNet has more.

InfoWorld reports that Minnesota wearable computer maker Via has chosen Transmeta’s Crusoe chip for its belt-attached computer because of the chip’s low heat and low power requirements. CNet has more, including information that the U.S. Army is testing the Via wearable computer.

ZD Net has a brief saying Red Hat has named Kevin Thompson, its vice president of operations, as its new chief financial officer.