DzM Portal

Oblig - by phalse phace (Score: 2, Funny) Thread
Billg: Novell partnering with EFF? That’s the dumbest fucking idea I’ve heard since I’ve been at Microsoft.

Too late! Once you go Slack, you never go back! - by SadGeekHermit (Score: 2) Thread
Hail Dobbs! 
 

Same Old Story - With a Different Beat - by Bob9113 (Score: 5, Insightful) Thread
Husband sleeps with his secretary. Wife finds out. He buys her a Tiffany’s bracelet. For some wives it’s the bracelet that matters. For some it’s the remorse (or lack thereof). For some there is no uncheating. Same story here.

Doesn’t really work like that - by 26199 (Score: 3, Insightful) Thread

For me, at least, there aren’t any second chances. The great thing about the Linux market is there’s plenty of choice. Why choose Novell now?

I won’t be.

(Same idea behind not buying Sony ever again.)

Re:Doesn’t really work like that - by caffeinemessiah (Score: 3, Interesting) Thread
Could this be Novell trying to get back in the good graces of Linux users?

Oh grow up. Novell doesn’t give a rats a** if its “in the good graces” of Linux users. If MS gets serious about pursuing litigation (however unlikely), Novell is sitting on a plump little target — Suse. MS (or anyone else who has a bone to pick with FOSS) won’t go after end users — it’ll go after the cash cow that is Novell.

Actually its watching the traffic wardens… - by martijnd (Score: 2) Thread
All nice and orwellian; but actually these camera’s are watching the traffic wardens. So instead of just quietly slipping into civy street wear, and drinking the afternoon away in the pub they are now part of the city wide CCTV network. No more quickly at the struck of five just ticketing the whole street outside the pub and getting your quota. 
 
And then there is the boss screaming on the walkie-talkie — robbers, robbers, i want visuals, get a moveable camera^H^H^H^H^H warden to stand in the middle of traffic at Charring Cross… 
 
Takes the fun right out a job that does.

Propaganda - by teh moges (Score: 5, Insightful) Thread
I understand the reason why this story is on the front page, and I understand that the reader might have concerns about the privacy implications. That doesn’t mean that a “news story” should contain such forcing language: 
The Surveillance Society of Great Britain has taken another turn for the worse  
This sentence imposes the view that this move is obviously bad, when in fact, although I really hate privacy breaches and measures that remove privacy, I like this idea. It gives some legal weight to these fines, and will hopefully do their part to stop people littering mindlessly. While anti-social behaviour is a bit ambiguous in terminology, I’m sure that if you are given a fine with evidence on camera, then the reason can’t be that frivilous.

Re:Propaganda - by gnuman99 (Score: 3, Insightful) Thread
I like this much better than the entire CCTV surveillance. The camera just sees what the officer sees. So no blatant invasion of privacy as we see with the CCTV system. 
 
Now if only they removed CCTV and use the cameras like this on every officer we should probably have less misconducts and brutality. 

Re:Propaganda - by m0nkyman (Score: 2) Thread
And if you don’t have anything to hide, why object to us installing a camera in your home… 
 
This ain’t just a slippery slope. It’s a fucking teflon ski hill.

Re:Propaganda - by StikyPad (Score: 4, Insightful) Thread
Moreover, I like the idea of police actions being recorded at all times. It (conceivably) increases accountability for the officers. This is not at all like posting cameras at fixed locations with loudspeakers, which offers no accountability for officers and plenty of opportunity for abuse.

possible upside? - by circletimessquare (Score: 4, Funny) Thread
so if i don’t shower, that means i will be saved from this horrible cell phone and wifi radiation i keep hearing about? 

Radiation Hormesis - by dontthink (Score: 5, Interesting) Thread
First off, IAAMP (I am a medical physicsist). This is sort of radiation-induced growth stimulus was actually studied extensively in the first half of the 20th century. A great reference for this behavior is a paper published in Human & Experimental Toxicology called “Radiation hormesis: its historical foundations as a biological hypothesis” by Calbrese and Baldwin, which examines the dozens of studies examining the effects of low dose radiation on plants, fungi, and insects - fascinating stuff. Over 2/3 of the studies in this time period showed increased growth with radiation, while the other 1/3 used relatively high doses (which is known to have net detrimental effects). People were actually interested in putting radioactive isotopes in fertilizer to encourage crop growth, but results weren’t great and the A-bomb happened… and we all know where the public’s perception of radiation went after that. I’ve got a PDF of that paper if anyone is interested (the online version requires a subscription, I believe).

Re:Radiation Hormesis - by dontthink (Score: 4, Interesting) Thread
Yup, I sometimes feel like I missed out by being born after the golden age of radium enemas. On a more serious note, the concept that low doses of radiation can be beneficial has been a pretty hot topic of debate in the radiological science community lately. There was an incident in Taiwan where radioactive Co-60 (is there really any other kind?) was accidentally recycled into scrap steel that was used in over 200 buildings, giving the occupants low doses of radiation. The standardized incidence ratios (the ratio of observed cancers to expected cancers based on the entire population) in these occupants was on the order of ~0.8, or a 20% reduction in cancer incidence. Also look at studies of cancer incidence between regions of high and low background radiation - rates are lower in high background regions. There are all kinds of problems with these epidemiological studies (confounding factors like socioeconomic status and such), but not always. One study compared 100 years of cancer incidence and mortality data of British radiologists - their life expectancies and cancer rates were significantly than other British physicians (also by ~ 20%). If interested, the Nuclear Shipyard Worker Study also has some very interesting results in this vein. Good, controlled research on the topic of low-dose radiation with respect to humans is hard to come by, however, considering the major stigma attached to radiation. Other than worker and background radiation studies, you’ve pretty much got to wait until an accident happens.

hyphenation - by onemorehour (Score: 5, Informative) Thread
Radiation is eating Fungi? I think you might have wanted: “Radiation-eating Fungi,” especially in a headline. Consider: “Insect eating plants.”

Original headline was correct… - by raehl (Score: 4, Funny) Thread
Remember, Chernobyl was in Soviet Russia.

I hope that is not windows based - by Joe The Dragon (Score: 2) Thread
it it is we may be in for some real bad crashes.

Just moving the delay into the air - by PDMongo (Score: 2, Insightful) Thread
It seems like this is a partial response to the backlash of people getting stranded on planes on the ground during bad weather. Now the airlines have the option of putting the planes in the air, and flying the long way around to avoid the weather. 
 
The end result is that people will still be spending more time in airliners.

Re:Just moving the delay into the air - by Timesprout (Score: 2) Thread
It will mean longer flights but I guess the airlines feel it’s less expensive to burn the extra fuel rather than deal with or compensate stranded and irate passengers.

better all around - by wizardforce (Score: 3, Informative) Thread
they aren’t flying through storms, they fly AROUND storms- they aren’t stupid. their choices increase from just straight up delays to either flying around a storm or a delay [they didn’t do this already?] it is a good improvement- the delay could be a lot less and if it works well things will get better.

(sorry) - by The New Andy (Score: 3, Funny) Thread
This idea will never take off.

Radiation Hormesis - by dontthink (Score: 5, Interesting) Thread
First off, IAAMP (I am a medical physicsist). This is sort of radiation-induced growth stimulus was actually studied extensively in the first half of the 20th century. A great reference for this behavior is a paper published in Human & Experimental Toxicology called “Radiation hormesis: its historical foundations as a biological hypothesis” by Calbrese and Baldwin, which examines the dozens of studies examining the effects of low dose radiation on plants, fungi, and insects - fascinating stuff. Over 2/3 of the studies in this time period showed increased growth with radiation, while the other 1/3 used relatively high doses (which is known to have net detrimental effects). People were actually interested in putting radioactive isotopes in fertilizer to encourage crop growth, but results weren’t great and the A-bomb happened… and we all know where the public’s perception of radiation went after that. I’ve got a PDF of that paper if anyone is interested (the online version requires a subscription, I believe).

Re:Radiation Hormesis - by dontthink (Score: 5, Interesting) Thread
Yup, I sometimes feel like I missed out by being born after the golden age of radium enemas. On a more serious note, the concept that low doses of radiation can be beneficial has been a pretty hot topic of debate in the radiological science community lately. There was an incident in Taiwan where radioactive Co-60 (is there really any other kind?) was accidentally recycled into scrap steel that was used in over 200 buildings, giving the occupants low doses of radiation. The standardized incidence ratios (the ratio of observed cancers to expected cancers based on the entire population) in these occupants was on the order of ~0.8, or a 20% reduction in cancer incidence. Also look at studies of cancer incidence between regions of high and low background radiation - rates are lower in high background regions. There are all kinds of problems with these epidemiological studies (confounding factors like socioeconomic status and such), but not always. One study compared 100 years of cancer incidence and mortality data of British radiologists - their life expectancies and cancer rates were significantly than other British physicians (also by ~ 20%). If interested, the Nuclear Shipyard Worker Study also has some very interesting results in this vein. Good, controlled research on the topic of low-dose radiation with respect to humans is hard to come by, however, considering the major stigma attached to radiation. Other than worker and background radiation studies, you’ve pretty much got to wait until an accident happens.

hyphenation - by onemorehour (Score: 5, Informative) Thread
Radiation is eating Fungi? I think you might have wanted: “Radiation-eating Fungi,” especially in a headline. Consider: “Insect eating plants.”

Original headline was correct… - by raehl (Score: 4, Funny) Thread
Remember, Chernobyl was in Soviet Russia.

Danger! (Evolution) - by nebaz (Score: 5, Funny) Thread
Eventually, the bacteria will evolve into this.

Self-regulation - by Aeron65432 (Score: 4, Informative) Thread
Correct me if I’m wrong, but doesn’t the ESRB’s rating system have no legal ground at all? Therefore it’s not illegal for stores to sell to u-18s…depends on store policy.

Gentlemen, this is a hoax - by netcrusher88 (Score: 5, Interesting) Thread
How do I know? 
 
* The writing style is juvenile, and though Thompson may be a fool, he is a lawyer, which means he knows how to write official-looking documents, and that was too casual for even a professional memo. 
* Who the hell has ever heard of GameAlmighty? Attention whores like Thompson don’t CC legal threats to unheard-of small gaming blogs with about a hundred readers. They CC it to NBC or something. 
* Who the hell has ever heard of GameAlmighty? Claiming to have received a letter from Jack Thompson is an extremely effective way to get hits. 
* Thompson already sent a letter to Bill Gates, about Counter-Strike. If he was going to send a letter about Halo 3, it would likely go to Steve Jobs. 
* Again with the writing style. It just feels very, very wrong. Can we get a literature/psychology professor/professional to analyze these? 
 
I know I’m going to get modded down for this, but I’ll be the one laughing. Or maybe you will, and I’ll be laughing at myself. I could be wrong.

Go for it Jack Thomson… - by NinjaTariq (Score: 4, Funny) Thread
As a parent I wish to let someone have the responsibility of bringing up my kids right, I am tired or trying to stop them doing things that they shouldn’t… 
 
I am going to buy Halo 3 for my own enjoyment, and I want Jack Thomson to personally come to my house here in PA and keep them out of the room so they don’t see the graphic violence as I take the convenant and flood once more… You go Jack, I assume because your self righteous head is so far up your own self righteous ass, that you won’t even need me to pay you… 
 
I love you Jack, you are my hero, I hereby grant you all of my parental responsibility, since you are so much better at it than me. I urge parents on slashdot to do the same. 
 
The man is an idiot, I bet the guy who reads Bill’s mail got a good laugh. Jack Thomson should NOT breed.

Oh my God. - by adam.dorsey (Score: 5, Funny) Thread
He just kicked the 800-pound gorilla in the nuts. 
 
This is so wonderful. This story just made my day.

Don’t believe it… - by Jeff Carr (Score: 5, Funny) Thread

Jack Thompson’s goal isn’t to prevent Halo 3 sales.

It’s quite clearly to get himself and Microsoft’s lawyers in the same room at the same time. That much concentrated evil will surely create a gateway to hell and let through all the imps, pain elementals, and cyberdemons. Then his purpose for preventing people kids from playing Doom will become clear as his armies rampage unhindered and he begins his thousand year reign over all the nations of the earth!

Alternative headline - by Zouden (Score: 4, Funny) Thread
“Ham Just As Bad As Spam”

I have no hesitation - by jeevesbond (Score: 4, Insightful) Thread

Having been on the wrong side of ‘cybersquatters’ this is an issue close to my heart. I wouldn’t mind if these people took a domain and did something useful with it, but instead they just plaster it with advertising and watch the cash roll in.

Am not even that bitter (it wasn’t even me that lost the domain but the previous owner of my site), what makes me angry is the way these people just leech ad views without giving anything back. Scummy blighters, the lot of them!

Problem is what should be done about these people? It’s not as if the government(s) of the world are competent enough to deal with problems like these (tubes anyone). ICANN is the organisation we should turn to: perhaps make a rule that the owner of a domain has to actually do something with it within a set period of time (say 6 months to a year). If all they’ve done in that time is plaster it in advertising (or have done nothing) it should return to the pool, perhaps with a bar disallowing the ghastly spammer from buying it again for a year.

This is pretty controversial and I suppose if someone pays for something they have a right to do what they like with it. That doesn’t detract from the fact that these people are like parasites, filling the Internet with rubbish and getting in the way of those of us who just want to provide a service.

What? - by spellraiser (Score: 5, Funny) Thread

I thought this guy owned the Internet.

Re:Really? - by Solandri (Score: 4, Insightful) Thread

Why do I suspect that his business colleagues are using botnets to artificially inflate those pageviews? If one follows the money paid in the advertising—whose pockets are he picking?

Having a bunch of domains == “owns the Internet”? - by dn15 (Score: 4, Insightful) Thread
Sensational much?

This “news” is only about 4 weeks old… - by CptTripps (Score: 3, Interesting) Thread
…but it’s still awesome. 
 
I’ve been using mine for a while now, and can tell you that this is about the coolest invention I’ve seen in a while. Originally, I wasn’t sure why I’d need one…now I can’t travel without it. I sit in airports watching TV on my MacBook, and always get 1-2 people that ask about it. 
 
Great stuff…

Re:Isn’t this news a little stale? - by Timesprout (Score: 3, Funny) Thread

Slingbox for Mac went 1.0 a few weeks ago I think. I’m not sure why it’s just making Slashdot now.

Full circle - by jfengel (Score: 5, Funny) Thread
Can I then use the iTV to sling it back to my television set? 
 
Maybe we can get them to sling it back and forth until it opens a wormhole or something.

Mac or not, the Slingbox simply rocks! - by LibertineR (Score: 4, Funny) Thread
No more being a slave to whatever is playing in my hotel room. With a fast connection, I can watch and control my own DirecTV from wherever I happen to be. Either on my laptop, or my Treo, I can watch what I want, when I want. Slingbox ought to hire me, because I help sell a few units everytime I connect up waiting at an airport gate. People cant believe I am watching my own DirecTV on my phone.

Get one, bitches.

Re:Mac or not, the Slingbox simply rocks! - by jaredcat (Score: 4, Informative) Thread
I’ve got one of these too (CompUSA’s going out of business sale), and I love it. 
 
I travel for business about 2 weeks per month, and I go mad trying to find something to watch on Hotel television. 
 
The Slingbox lets me see and control everything on my Tivo Series3 and the quality is pretty good even at full screen. 
 
The SlingPlayer client is amazingly well thought out, even though the UI could use some refinement. For instance, during initial setup, the SlingPlayer client asked me for my home router’s password and automatically configured the ports it needed. 
 
Also, I don’t need to know my IP address at all… Once I’ve connected to my Slingbox 1 time on my own home network, it remembers that Slingbox’s ID on SlingMedia’s server. The next time I go online anywhere in the world, the SlingPlayer client looks up the real IP address of my Slingbox on SlingMedia’s server and then connects automagically. 
 
My only complaint about the SlingBox (and its really not SlingMedia’ fault) is my HDMI troubles with the Tivo Series3. When the Tivo is connected to a TV via HDMI, and that TV is off, it doesn’t see the HDMI DRM handshake signal. When that happens, Tivo displays an error message on all video outputs. My SlingBox is connected to my Tivo via Component video. So the first time I went off on a trip, all I could see when I connected to my Slingbox was the menu screen and that stupid HDMI error message. The workaround was to just unplug the HDMI cable when I know I’m going to travel… Or I guess I could leave my TV on 24-7 too. 
 
Sometimes I use SlingPlayer at home when I just want to watch Tivo in a little square while I’m working insted of putting my laptop in front of the TV. On the local LAN, the quality is at least as good as SDTV. 
 
Anyway IMHO the SlingBox is a must-have for any business traveler.

quit already with ‘optimized’ drivers - by BattleTroll (Score: 5, Insightful) Thread
I’m getting tired of the back and forth between AMD and Nvidia. Drop the whole ‘optimized’ drivers crap and give us cards that work great out of the box. This entire trend of releasing per-game tweaked drivers is just hurting consumers. I shouldn’t have to wait for Nvidia to tweak their drivers to get the best performance out of one of their cards. I shouldn’t have to download new drivers every time a new games comes out. The whole reason you create your cards based on a known standard is to avoid this mess. 
 
Stop fucking around and do it right the first time. 
 
How hard is that? 

DX10 - by Richard McBeef (Score: 5, Funny) Thread
DX10 or for the uninformed, Derendering eXtraction (10 megapixels/second) is a standard benchmark for measuring the performance of GPUs or Gradient Pixilization Units. Pretty much this is what the video card companies all base their prices on with price being directly related to how many pixels can be gradiated per unit (usually about 30 cents per pixel/ounce).

I thing, you thing, we all thing - by Timesprout (Score: 3, Funny) Thread
Sorry I bit my tounge and I cant pronounce sing properly. What was the Author singing for anyway, shouldn’t he have just written it down?

Re:John Carmack - by peragrin (Score: 4, Insightful) Thread
Use OpenGL.

Re:John Carmack - by Applekid (Score: 4, Interesting) Thread
He seems to be less anti-DirectX these days: 
 
“JC: DX9 has its act together well. I like the version of DirectX on the 360. Microsoft is doing well with DX10 on tightening the specs and the exactness.” 
 
Of course, he’s still calls it like it is: 
 
“The new features are not exactly well-thought-out. Most developers are pretty happy with DX9. The changes with DX10 aren’t as radical. It’s not like getting pixel shaders for the first time. Single-pass shaders are nice with DX10, but it’s a smaller change. ”

Google buying traffic again. But why? - by Animats (Score: 5, Interesting) Thread

What’s so weird is that, as with YouTube, Google is buying traffic. Not revenue. Not technology. Traffic. One wouldn’t think that Google needed more traffic. More revenue from its traffic, maybe, but more traffic from free services?

Google, according to Alexa, is #2 in traffic, and Yahoo is #1. But Google isn’t far behind. These buys look like a desperate attempt to displace Yahoo as #1. Whether this make economic sense isn’t clear.

Interestingly, Google traffic takes a dive every weekend, as does Feedburner, but Yahoo traffic does not. Look at the Alexa graphs. That gives a sense of how much work-related use the site gets. Slashdot, incidentally, has a strong weekly cycle, much stronger than Google.

It’s still not clear if Google’s expansion beyond search will be seen a few years hence as a good move or as corporate megalomania.

“Locked in for a couple of years?” - by PHAEDRU5 (Score: 5, Funny) Thread
This can’t end well.

I’ve been in this room for eight years now, Clarice. I know they will never, ever let me out while I’m alive. What I want is a view. I want a window where I can see a tree, or even water. I want to be in a federal institution, far away from Dr. Chilton.

Eat my dirt, techcrunch! - by mfaras (Score: 4, Informative) Thread
I googled techdirt, and I searched their blog, and there’s nothing about google and feedburner, take a look: 
http://www.techdirt.com/search.php?q=feedburner 
 
So I’m betting scuttlemonkey typo’ed it, and it’s actualy techcrunch, as the link says. 
 
Please correct the summary. 
 
— 
Eat my dirt.

Why bother? - by garcia (Score: 4, Interesting) Thread
Google already gets my feed itself through feedfetcher and it is one of the few subscribers to my feedburner feed. It also subscribes itself to several other feeds (bloglines). 
 
I don’t see what good it does Google to own this company.

Re:Why bother? - by drinkypoo (Score: 5, Insightful) Thread
I think they’re just stamping out competition. And they don’t have to keep doing it forever, either. They buy one or two more of ‘em and people will stop starting them. When Google has the top three of whatever, people will mostly stop making whatever. The procedure worked for Microsoft time and time again, why not Google? :)

svn+ssh and master mode ssh. - by frodo from middle ea (Score: 5, Insightful) Thread
My solution, use svn+ssh and keep a ssh connection to the svn server in Master mode. All svn+ssh activity tunnels through this master connection , no need for ssh handshake each time or for that matter no need to even open a socket each time.

Plus if the master connection is set to compress data ( -C ) , then you get transparent compression.

Now if only I could expand all this to fit 2 pages…Profit!!!

Re:Why binaries? - by javaxman (Score: 4, Insightful) Thread
1) you want deployment without the need to build 
2) you have proprietary build tools limited to developer use, or release engineers unable to build for whatever reason ( similar to #1, I know… ) 
3) images, of course. 
4) Word, Excel, other proprietary document formats are all binary. 
5) third-party binary installation packages, patches, dynamic libs, tools, etc. 
 
You’re just not trying, or you’re thinking of version control as something that only programmers would use, and that they’d only use it to store their text source. There are as many reasons to store binary files in version control as there are reasons to have binary files…

Re:Why binaries? - by jfengel (Score: 5, Insightful) Thread
It’s really nice to be able to have your entire product in one place and under version control. Third party DLLs (or .so’s or jars), images, your documentation… just about anything that’s part of your product. 
 
That way it’s all in one place and easily backed up. If you get a new version of the DLL/jar/so you can just drop it into a new branch for testing. If your customer won’t upgrade from version 2.2 to version 3.0, you can recreate the entire product to help fix bugs in the old version rather than just saying, “We’ve lost it, you’ve got to upgrade.” 
 
Basically, by putting your entire project under version control, you know that it’s all in one place, no matter what version it is you want. Even if the files don’t change, you know how to reconstruct a development installation without having to dig around in multiple locations (source in version control, DLLs in one directory on the server, etc.) 
 
Yeah, so it costs some extra disk to store it. Disk is cheap.

Re:Why binaries? - by Anonymous Coward (Score: 4, Informative) Thread
putting a toolchain under CM control, so that you can go back to not only an earlier version of your own code, but the version of the toolchain you used to compile the code at that point in time. Absolutely necessary to be able to recreate the full software environment of a past build, without relying on that version of the toolchain still being publicly available (not to mention including any patches/mods you made to the public toolchain).

Re:SVN will not replace CVS (IMO) - by scribblej (Score: 4, Informative) Thread
You ever try to move a directory structure full of source code from one place to another in CVS — or even to move or rename a single file…? 
 
HINT: When you do it the way CVS provides, you will lose all of your revision history. 
 
SVN does not have this fatal flaw. 
 

Ah, the Slashdot review - by popo (Score: 3, Informative) Thread
 
Ah, the Slashdot review. Normally it is well written. The first sentence isn’t misleading. The reviewer gets straight to the point. There is no confusing turnabout within the first paragraph. But this is not that review. 
 

A really nice book on the evolution of our tech - by Churla (Score: 3, Informative) Thread
I read this back in 86, a year after it was published in 85. Recently it was republished with a new afterword by the author. So now it’s “retro history” but still great if you want to learn about the people behind a bunch of the technology : 
 
http://www.amazon.com/Tools-Thought-History-Mind-E xpanding-Technology/dp/0262681153/ref=pd_bbs_sr_2/ 002-1089548-0663244?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1179948333 &sr=8-2 

Re:Defeats/Prevents the purpose… - by dpaton.net (Score: 3, Informative) Thread
Innovation can be taught too. Ask anyone who has gone through the TRIZ process: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TRIZ 
 
It’s not rocket science, it’s a new way of thinking about problems and their solutions. 
 
Some people are born with it, others are taught it. The results are essentially the same for all but the most esoteric and rare cases.

Re:Defeats/Prevents the purpose… - by jcgf (Score: 3, Insightful) Thread

Beliefs like that lead one down the road of mediocrity.

No, I won’t. - by xxxJonBoyxxx (Score: 4, Funny) Thread

After reading this book you will want to dig right back into those crazy ideas lurking around in the back of your mind and give them another shot.

Chapter five, “the lone innovator”, debunks the legend of, well, the lone innovator. It sounds good, and plays into our noble story of the hero, but it’s not common in reality.

Chapter eight talks about how we believe that the “best ideas always win” but that’s least often the case.

Still better light-weight armor out there… - by Techguy666 (Score: 2) Thread
http://gizmodo.com/gadgets/gadgets/dragon-skin-bul letproof-vest-repels-ak47-rounds-203003.php 
Dragon Skin bullet proof vests are light weight but can stop (multiple) armor piercing rounds. That’s rather impressive. 
 
They use silver-dollar sized “scales” of ceramics. If it’s as light and flexible as advertised, this is far better for soldiers and law enforcement. 
 

Send them to Iraq - by jfengel (Score: 2) Thread
I hear they could use some extra body armor over there. And they’ll never, ever, ever be exposed to moisture in the freaking desert.

Dynema? - by Red Flayer (Score: 3, Funny) Thread
I think maybe they should rethink the name of the material (“Dynema SB61”)when/if it goes into production.  
 
I, for one, would rather not have my bulletproof vest sound like it’s a cross of high explosives and bowel cleansing kits.

One word. - by Palmyst (Score: 3, Funny) Thread
Mr. McGuire: I want to say one word to you. Just one word. 
Benjamin: Yes, sir. 
Mr. McGuire: Are you listening? 
Benjamin: Yes, I am. 
Mr. McGuire: Plastics

Re:to bad our troops are treated like shit - by Applekid (Score: 3, Interesting) Thread
“doubt this technology will see iraq, oh and don’t flame the truth, thanks” 
 
Yes, don’t flame the truth. Rather, flame the complete ignorance of the process by which new technologies trickle down to soldiers from the numerous trials and tests. 
 
If it’s good enough, it will eventually be used. The question then will be whether troops will still be in Iraq at that time.

I’m not exactly jumping up and down - by uradu (Score: 3, Insightful) Thread
Until regular old read-only drives become cheap and plentiful—nay, let’s just even say available for now—my enthusiasm is somewhat dampened.

Yay - by blackmonday (Score: 3, Insightful) Thread
This was the same story for CDR, DVDR, etc. Eventually, a spindle will be available for 12 bucks at Fry’s. I am hoping it’s not a long wait, this kind of storage will be great for those of us who make frequent backups of our home directories.

Re:$10 for 20GB+ R/W is cheaper than a thumb drive - by Eccles (Score: 3, Insightful) Thread
It’s especially cheap compared to the value of that time. I’ve been trying to back up photos on DVDs, but with the amount of pics and movies I can take with a 2 GB card, it’s a pretty time-consuming process. On the other hand, with 500 GB external drives for ~$140, that’s less than $6 for 20 GB, so that’s still a cheaper option at the moment.

Taiwan is NOT “Thai” ! - by Golgafrinchan (Score: 5, Interesting) Thread
Ritek is a Taiwanese company.

The headline implies that Ritek is located in Thailand.

Way to go, American geography experts!

Re:Taiwan is NOT “Thai” ! - by L. VeGas (Score: 5, Funny) Thread

I will address this question - by Timesprout (Score: 3, Funny) Thread
When i wake up after my Halo induced nap.

*Extremely* wrong headline - by HanClinto (Score: 3, Insightful) Thread
Mundane != Boring. 
 
This title is just wrong. Zonk, is there any way we could please change it?  
 
Mundane means commonplace, everyday, ordinary. Boring means uninteresting. Not the same. The article is not saying that games should be less interesting — the article is saying that games could do well to apply more to real life, and to real skills (I.E. Smooth Moves having players balance brooms on their hands). 
 
I’m all for making games more mundane — I think it’s a great idea, and it’s a phenomenal idea for making games ultimately more fun. If “fun” is about learning patterns (as Raph Koster posits), then it only makes sense to build off of patterns that are found in real life (hence why driving games are so much fun). 
 
However, I’m [b]not[/b] in support of making the games boring.

Ordinary != Boring - by drinkypoo (Score: 5, Insightful) Thread

It’s absolutely ordinary for there to be shootings in South Central LA, but it’s not boring.

To say Brain Age is boring because the tasks are ordinary displays stupidity and a lack of vocabulary. Rather simple vocabulary, I might add.

Also, the link is to the third page of the story, which is where Brain Age is discussed, but it is bad form.

Enough about the stupidity of anonymous cowards and their story submissions, on to where I talk shit about the article!

The article is just pathetic. “television is so familiar, it’s not even startling to think about television programming produced solely to discuss other media forms.” This is in response to a comment about TV shows about making movies. But there are movies about making things, and on this planet we call them documentaries. This lack of ability to stop and notice reality pervades the article, which is split into three pages to garner ad impressions, but has little enough content to have been on one page of this size.

His summary (which is not actually a summary - this not being an essay, but a meandering rant) follows: “we should want games to be more boring. Not just some games, we should want many of them, maybe even most of them to be boring, so that the ones that are not can become the Casablancas of our future medium.” What he seems to be saying here is that we should want games to be crap, so that the non-crap can look even better by comparison.

Say it with me: mundane does not equal boring. Sure, most things which are mundane are also boring. But then there’s sex.

Gah - by toolie (Score: 4, Funny) Thread
This article reinforces my belief that most people are complete and total idiots and don’t have anything better to do than show everybody else how much they just don’t get it. 
 
Yeah, yeah, I know… kind of like this post.

Boring vs Diverse - by Raindance (Score: 4, Interesting) Thread
Of course games shouldn’t be more boring (with the caveat that games should stay away from pressing peoples’ addiction buttons). 
 
But yes, I think it would be good (for developers and for gamers) for games to break out into more genres. Here’s a quote from Rod Humble, Executive Producer of The Sims, which neatly sums up a good way to think about this:

I don’t know if there’s any fixed lifecycle for the Sims franchise because I think that it can go a lot more places. Part of the mandate that I had when I took over the position is to really break this franchise out into a more mainstream audience. So the way I like to look at the franchise is walk into a bookstore and take every video game you know and just place them on a shelf in the bookstore. And I think you’ll find they tend to cluster a lot in certain areas in the bookstore. And I want the Sims to fill up the rest of the bookstore.

The tags say it all - by Marxist Hacker 42 (Score: 4, Interesting) Thread
Get an MBA, then do something in the financial industry, which has a stranglehold on everything else to the extent of destroying progress. American corporations and government no longer care for education or REAL progress, unless it can make a buck, and even then aren’t willing to reward the people who actually create that progress.

Re:Teachers - by Mathonwy (Score: 5, Insightful) Thread
Sorry, but had to bring something up here: 
 
Show me a teacher who only puts in the hours 8-4, and I’ll show you a teacher that the administration feels “isn’t putting in the effort”, and “is only doing the minimum needed to get by”. 
 
And the thing is, they’re right. 8-4 is just the time they are required to be AT SCHOOL, in the room. Any teacher worth their salt spends plenty of extra time making sure that their lessons are prepared for the next day (or week) and that they are generally ready for anything the class can throw at them. Teaching doesn’t just “happen”; it requires a tremendous amount of prep and organizational work. 
 
Also, the vacation is lengthy, but fairly inflexible. Hope you don’t want to take any time off OTHER than what the district says, or you’ve got some problems. Want to take a month off in March instead? Too bad! It’s definitely a trade off. 
 
Don’t get me wrong, the vacation time is nice, but it has its flip side, and if you think it’s a 40 hour a week job, you’re deluding yourself. (Or talking about the crappy teachers who DO deserve the low end.) 
 
Which brings us to… 
“but why should experienced teachers get more money than the new teachers. They are doing the same job” 
 
Erm. 
 
EXCUSE ME? 
 
Let me turn it around, and see if I can point out just a little bit of hubris on your part. Why should an experienced software developer get more money than a new one? They’re doing the same job? Why should an experienced ANYONE get more money? 
 
Answer: Because they do it better. Because years of experience mean that they will generally be more efficient at whatever the job is, do it better, with fewer errors, and have more bandwith to deal with more things. They will also have the experience to deal with the stranger situations that pop up, and will generally require less supervision and be more valuable employees. If you somehow think that this doesn’t apply to teachers just as much as it applies to anyone else, then you have a very distorted view of teaching.

Only a shortage for the brilliant - by DrDitto (Score: 4, Insightful) Thread
There is no shortage of math and science majors. I’m nearing completion of a PhD in science, and if I could go back 6 years, I would go to law school instead. Yes, there is a shortage of brilliant scientists and mathematicians because hey, our economy depends on innovation that comes from the elite few. Science and math jobs? Maybe you can call engineering jobs related to science and math and of course corporations don’t want there to be demand of engineering students because that would drive up salaries.

The one you like - by kevin_conaway (Score: 5, Informative) Thread
In terms of money, what career would you pursue coming out of college right now with a math or science degree?

The one you’re most interested in. Seriously, if all you care about is money, go be an investment banker or a money whore somewhere else. Our field is littered with people like you who get a job hoping for big bucks but end up circling the drain for a few years while producing horrible work.

However, software engineers at the various consultancies pay fairly well. Perhaps the R&D arm of a pharmaceutical company as well.

I could not disagree more - by anomaly (Score: 5, Insightful) Thread
The challenge is that the current generation of college students and recent graduates has been led to believe that they are entitled to a life filled with stuff and with little self-sacrifice required. 
 
If *everyone* would learn to adjust their expectations about what constitutes a minimal acceptable standard of living so that they can live without debt within or - gasp - below their means - our culture would be wealthier, stronger, and better equipped to face challenges. 
 
My next door neighbors are first generation immigrants from El Salvador. They have a three bedroom house which the two parents, three kids, his dad, her mom, share the house with two renters who live in the basement. 9 people in a 1700 square foot house! This is in one of the wealthiest counties in the States. The mom and dad have two jobs. The grandmother has a job, and the dad has occasional work on a third job. These are people who have little education and very poor English skills. They are thrilled to have the opportunity to live in this country, and they are making it happen. It’s tough going, but a better deal than in Central America, and they consider it a privilege to have American citizenship. Perhaps we should, too. 
 
Most of these college kids could live at home, have a part time job, enroll in community college for core credits, before transferring to a 4 year college, drastically cutting their tuition. They could refuse to allow themselves to spend more on their credit card than they can pay in a given month. They could live off-campus with several roommates to minimize housing costs. They could forego cable, cell phones and cars to reduce their expenses until their income increases. 
 
Instead, our culture of consumption tells people that they should “buy it now.” People actually think that they cannot expect to pay off a car or a house within their lifetime. Ridiculous! 
 
We’re generally narcissistic and convinced that stuff, power, or sex will satisfy us. This leads to frustration, deeper debt, and hopelessness. 
 
It’s not that life is hard and these kids are victims! It’s that mostly they think that they have to obtain a standard of living that is higher than their income, and they become indentured servants at 20%/year interest.

Lobbyists - by iamacat (Score: 5, Informative) Thread
Nah, once big software companies feel threatened rather than empowered by patents, lobbyists will make sure that laws gets passed to protect them. One onerous requirement might be for a patent holder to maintain a credible product in commercial production in order to sue others for royalties. This will be phrased to stop patent-only law firms that skim companies without innovation themselves, but will take care of open source authors quite nicely.

Re:Lobbyists - by ronadams (Score: 5, Interesting) Thread
One onerous requirement might be for a patent holder to maintain a credible product in commercial production in order to sue others for royalties. Add “or be able to substantially prove ready plans in development to do so” to that, and you’ve got my vote. This idea of patents being some repository to hold ideas hostage is really detrimental to the technology market. Kudos to Shuttlesworth for pointing out our common enemy.

Re:Reform the System - by Zontar_Thing_From_Ve (Score: 5, Interesting) Thread
Why not just (common sense)reform the patent system, thus crushing this holding companies?  
 
I’ve explained this before. I used to work for the US government many years ago. Look at it from Uncle Sam’s perspective. 
 
1) The patent office makes money. A lot of it. Unlike other government agencies who consume tax dollars, the patent office makes a profit. Profit = good. Why would you “reform” an agency who is making you a ton of money and thus make less money? 
2) Businesses have yet to scream en masse that patent reform = a good thing. Until Microsoft and IBM and Cisco and Intel and lots of Fortune 500 companies say “The system is hurting us and costing us more money than you are making under the current system. A reform would actually bring you more money.” then it will never happen. 
3) Government bureaucrats are outstandingly good at protecting their own turf. Expect patent office mangement to fight tooth and nail against reforms. 
4) The government is convinced that this is win-win for everyone because it’s like Mutual Assured Destruction. Everyone has patents, so nobody will use them unfairly. Unfortunately, the reality is that Shuttlesworth is right. The company everyone should fear is the company that has nothing but patents, like the guys who went after BlackBerry. 
5) Most people in Congress are lawyers. Most lawyers like patents. It provides easy work for other lawyers on both the “infringing” companies and the IP holders doing the suing. If everybody is being sued, lawyers have lots of work and earn lots of money. Win-win!

Re:Reform the System - by Kadin2048 (Score: 5, Interesting) Thread
I’m not convinced that any sort of software algorithm should be patentable, but if we are going to allow patents on some narrowly-defined “implementations,” which might involve software at some point in them (but not being wholly comprised of software), I think it’s pretty clear that the term of the patents needs to be substantially reduced. 
 
The term of our patents was set in an era when sending a message from one city to another took days, or if it was separated by an ocean, weeks (potentially months). The flow of information moved at a completely different pace. Ten years then would have been a very brief time in which to bring a product to market. In today’s world, I think it would be about 12-18 months: just enough to give the patentee a slight advantage over the rest of the marketplace, but not enough for them to amass an arsenal of patents with which to destroy all competition. 
 
Now, perhaps there’s something to be said for somewhat longer patents on pharmaceuticals, because of the long government-mandated review process that they have to go through, before they can become profitable (and which mandate disclosure of the ingredients, meaning that keeping it a trade secret isn’t an option). However, I think this should clearly be the exception rather than the rule. 
 
A patent length of a year — five or at most ten for pharmaceuticals — non-renewable, would do wonders towards improving competition and the production of new ideas in the technology sector. (While we’re at it, lets have a 20-year copyright span, too.) Unfortunately I think by the time the major players come around to realizing that the system is hurting more than it’s helping, the U.S. will be increasingly irrelevant.

Re:Microsoft to Ubuntu - by h2_plus_O (Score: 5, Informative) Thread

what the fuck does Ubuntu mean?

”… the concept of ubuntu defines the individual in terms of their several relationships with others […] while the Zulu maxim umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu (“a person is a person through (other) persons”) may have no apparent religious connotations in the context of Western society, in an African context it suggests that the person one is to become by behaving with humanity is an ancestor worthy of respect or veneration.”

Laws and Mores - by drDugan (Score: 4, Interesting) Thread
This is yet another example of a serious, growing problem with the American mentality. 
 
We can not legislate all aspects of human behavior. It simply won’t work. 
 
Healthy societies have both laws and mores to shape human behavior. Laws derive from a logical/thinking framework, and mores are primarily from an emotional/feeling framework. All people have the ability to use both thinking and feeling in making decisions about what is right or wrong. But in American society, and more generally in a capitalist mentality, laws and money interests have so completely dominated that people have forgotten about the mores. 
 
Mores are like laws, but enforced by society feedback, typically emotional feedback. People frown at Bob if he acts like an ass, and he understands that he should stop acting like that, because Bob doesn’t like it when people frown at him. That is because Bob is healthy and likes to have healthy happy people around him. Note, nowhere in here are we able to legislate that Bob “acting like an ass” is illegal in a logical way. 
 
We can that the Bush administration as the PRIMARY promoter of this mentality: “If it is not illegal, than I can get away with it.” As such shining examples leading the USA today, more and more people (like Enron) are saying, “Hell, why not me too?” 
 
This problem will not stop unless and until people start giving strong emotional feedback (disapproval, and eventually ostracizing people) for bad behavior. 
 

Contact Info - by Anonymous Coward (Score: 4, Informative) Thread
Sparta Police Department 
Chief Andrew Milanowski 
260 W. Division 
Sparta, MI 49345 
General Phone: 616-887-8716 
Fax: 616-887-7681 
Email: policechief@spartami.org 
 
T Lynn Hopkins 
Firm: Kent County Prosecuting Attorney 
Address: 333 Monroe Ave NW 
Grand Rapids, MI 49503-2211 
Phone: (616) 774-3577 
Fax: (616) 336-3095

Fifth amendment? - by KarmaMB84 (Score: 5, Interesting) Thread
The officer extracted a confession out of a citizen without informing them of their rights. Can we now expect officers to start feigning ignorance about obscure laws only to claim later they looked it up and then use previous confessions to throw people in jail?

Re:Fifth amendment? - by grape jelly (Score: 3, Interesting) Thread
I’m amending point #1. :) 
 
1. The fifth amendment doesn’t guarantee you protection against self-incrimination. Rather, it allows you to legally deny requests from the authorities whose results may incriminate you (e.g., avoidance of obstruction of justice charges). You can have a right not to answer their questions, deliver evidence, etc., etc., etc, on the condition that it would demonstrate you guilty of *some* crime. 
 
If we assume voluntary confessions inadmissible in court as a result of the fifth amendment, nobody would be able to plead guilty to a crime — that constitutes self-incrimination. Similarly, criminals who turn themselves in would have to be turned away because by turning themselves in, they are incriminating themselves. 
 
The officer asked the man, “What are you doing?” It was and still is fully within the man’s right to say, “I with to use my fifth amendment right and not answer.” However, the man unwittingly offered up what amounted to an admissible confession, and was thusly boned.

Bravo! - by evil_aar0n (Score: 5, Insightful) Thread
> Milanowski didn’t immediately cite or arrest Peterson, mostly because he wasn’t certain a crime had been committed. “I had a feeling a law was being broken,” the chief said. Milanowski did some research and found Michigan’s “Fraudulent access to computers, computer systems, and computer networks” law, a felony punishable by five years in prison and a $10,000 fine. 
 
A job well done to chief Milanowski. Way to dig for a tool to hit the guy with. Instead of tracking down drug dealers, thieves or physically abusive spouses - or even setting speed traps - he’s protecting the town against wi-fi users. I feel so much safer… 
 
I wonder if it came into consideration the idea that a) using a freely offered wi-fi connection doesn’t seem to cover the intent of the law as described; and b) the cafe offered the wi-fi connection _freely_. Whether it was offered specifically to customers or anyone in a radius - which isn’t made clear - the cafe was offering and didn’t even complain about the guy using it. They certainly could either post a sign saying, “Must be a customer to use this service,” like restrooms, or enable a key that would be given out only to customers. 
 
Again, Bravo! to chief Wiggum - oops, Milanowski - for going well out of his way to bust someone. You, sir, are a shining example of what law enforcement should be like - in a police state…

Great White Jesus? - by xxxJonBoyxxx (Score: 2) Thread

Scientists started investigating after a…shark was mysteriously born at Omaha’s Henry Doorly Zoo in a tank that housed 3 female sharks…with no sign of a male parent.”

On Henry Doorly - by ender81b (Score: 4, Informative) Thread
Just a quick note, if you are ever in the Omaha, Nebraska area definitely stop by Henry Doorly Zoo. It’s probably the nation’s second best zoo behind San Diego’s, and the shark tunnel is fantastic. As are the penguins, and the desert dome, and indoor jungle, and… A few winters ago we went to the Zoo and the place was deserted. Was able to just lay down in the Shark Tunnel and watch the sharks swim overhead for about a half hour with no one coming down. Was fantastic. At any rate, also — as far as the article goes — I wish someone would have some more explanation for how this works. Kindof freaky.

Re:Obligatory - by Goobermunch (Score: 3, Informative) Thread
No, you shouldn’t. Hermaphrodism is the presence of sex organs for both genders. These sharks are all female. They just happen to be able to parthenogenically reproduce. 
 
—AC

All the geeks … - by eck011219 (Score: 4, Funny) Thread
… at splashdot.org were just ruled obsolete. Slashdotters, beware … we’re next!

Necessary improvement - by 6Yankee (Score: 3, Funny) Thread
They were forced to evolve this ability after all the males were killed in frickin’ laser accidents during mating attempts.

Legal system problem - by MobyDisk (Score: 5, Insightful) Thread
This quote has the essence of the biggest problem in the 20th century, boiled down to one simple sentence:

my attorney in the UK ? - by Anonymous Coward (Score: 4, Insightful) Thread
 
since when has anybody in the UK called a solicitor or lawyer/barrister an “attorney” 
that word is used almost exclusivly by Americans, was this reseller an American in the UK or was the “quote” edited for a US audience 
 
smells like bullshit here in London

actionable? - by sammy baby (Score: 5, Interesting) Thread
Okay, first, IANAL. But I know that in the US, harassment of a company’s business partners can be considered actionable under RICO. Anyone know if AllOfMP3 may be able to bring a suit against IFPI?

The RIAA wins then… - by BecomingLumberg (Score: 5, Insightful) Thread
I guess the RIAA wins… I’ll just have to go back to BitTorrent…

Re:The RIAA wins then… - by NetDanzr (Score: 5, Insightful) Thread
Actually, that’s exactly what I was recommending to my friends to whom I previously recommended Allofmp3. I don’t have the time and energy to keep troubleshooting their problems with music file formats from various legit stores that don’t play on their mp3 players, and Allofmp3 was the only significant source of regular mp3 files that worked; now it’s back to music piracy again…

IT’s the apps. - by Lumpy (Score: 3, Insightful) Thread
I know of several film students at Ferris State university that use or pirate windows simply because all Video editing and DVD authoring apps under linux suck horribly and pirated versions of MAC software are hard to get.. (they prefer final cut) 
 
Cinerella is unstable and not even 1/2 as usable as Adobe Premiere 4.0.. Apps like Sony Vegas, the current Premier, Canopus, and Avid Dv express kick the absolute living crap out of all the linux video eding apps all rolled together hands down. 
 
DVD authoring also stinks under linux. It’s not even at the par of the dirt cheap Dvd-Lab product out there without being a comand line expert. 
 
Dont get me started with the effects and composting apps that simply do not exist under linux. 
 
How about Engine tuning software? ALDL or ODB-II scan tool software? Electronics design software (Eagle Cad is the ONLY ONE and it’s not that good) how about a Decent CAD package that is even 1/2 as useable as autocad was from 3 years ago? 
 
It’s the apps. People cant rip their DVD’s easily (no anydvd for linux), they cant sync with their ipod without pulling teeth, they cant sync with their phone’s contacts easily, installing non free and not in a RPM repository apps is something that even a seasoned linux user sighs at. 
 
Linux is there, it’s a rock solid OS. it just suffers from the same problem that OS2 and BeOS sufferd from. Nobody is making software that people want for it. 
 
Hell I’d buy a decent video editing app for linux. It does not exist. Main Actor is utter crap and is the only commercial offering. 
 
I’d pay for a native photoshop and Dreamweaver+flash suite for linux, and thousands of others would to. 
 
It’s the apps, plain and simple.

The hassel factor - by simm1701 (Score: 5, Insightful) Thread
I’m a linux user and admin. By most peoples standards (ie in the developement department of a bank in which I work I’m a linux/unix expert). 
 
My home laptop (which is my main computer) is dual boot XP/ubuntu. 
 
What do I boot to 95% of the time? 
 
XP. 
 
Simply because its less hassel. 
 
I’ve used wineX, cadega, etc. I’ve built it from cvs, submitted bugs and the occasional patch to it, I’ve contacted game devs and worked with them to get new games to run under it (and had screen shots from my PC posted on developement group walls after they were impressed about it running under linux) 
 
I only have 1 game even installed under windows, morrowind, and I know for a fact I could get it running under linux. 
 
Why don’t I? 
 
Time. 
 
It would take me an hour or two of messing around to get it working under linux. 
 
It would also take me that time or more to get my wireless networking working how I like it under linux (ie knowing the WPA key for several different areas and using whichever is available at the time). 
 
I’m a very busy person and I just feel no need to do it, when its already working without the hassel on my windows partition. I’m not fond of windows, but cygwin covers me for most things I need to do, if its really desparate I’ll boot to linux, but thats a pretty rare occurance. 
 
My home file server runs linux, my firewall runs linux, my personal IMAP server runs linux - I dont have an issue setting these up. 
 
But when someone like me tends to use windows as a desktop it points to the fact that there still needs to be moreease of use put into linux on the desktop. 
 
Users are lazy, until its actually easier to run linux in 99% of cases then its not going to happen. (and I don’t mean better, I’d argue in general linux would be better for almost all things I do, but it isn’t easier)

Naming - by Snap E Tom (Score: 3, Insightful) Thread
I’ve always believed a big problem for desktop, mainstream linux adoption was the naming of popular applications. 
 
Imagine using Linux for the first time. 
 
Noob: What do I use to play CDs and MP3’s? 
Linux Teacher: XMMS 
Noob: What do I use to edit photos? 
Linux Teacher: Gimp 
Noob: What do I use to play movies? 
Linux Teacher: There’s xine and VLC. 
Noob: How about for IMs? 
Linux Teacher: GAIM 
Noob: Email? 
Linux Teacher: Evolution 
 
What the hell’s an XMMS, Gimp, xine, VLC, or Gaim? Those names are awful, and they’re often acronyms. If you ask any average Joe what a Gimp was, they’ll tell you it’s a guy who walks funny. How the hell are you supposed to know that that’s an image editing application? Evolution’s for email and not something to do with biology? 
 
Photoshop. You have an idea what that’s for. Internet Explorer. Same thing - I probably use it to explore the internet. Those are good names. If you’re new to Windows, and you want to do something but can’t remember the name of the program you’re supposed to use, just look around in your Start menu or Programs directory. The names will probably clue you in. 
 
Marketing and branding can definitely help - more and more people are hearing about Firefox, but that gained popularity first in Windows. Access and Excel aren’t that descriptive, but they became household names because of marketing and bundling with Word, which is descriptive. 
 
If people want to make Linux more “user friendly” developers should think a lot about the name they give their programs.

Number 3 nailed it - by niloroth (Score: 3, Insightful) Thread
Quite frankly, i think the 3rd point was one of the biggest. I am rather good with computers, and networking, but getting my acer laptop to work with the wireless b/g card in it under any distro is more than i am willing to do. I can NDISwrapper the drivers, and have a card that will only work in b mode under linux, if i go in and mess about with the conf files. But even then there are seemingly random times where it will just stop working. And going between multiple networks without stopping and restarting the service is simply an exercise in futility, something windows doesn’t have a problem with at all. I realize that without driver support from the manufacturers this will continue to be a problem, but non the less, it is a reason for the lack of market share, because if i don’t fell like going through the hassle, i feel most users wouldn’t even get far enough along to realize that all this work is far more than should be needed. 

i think they are missing the issues - by noldrin (Score: 3, Interesting) Thread
What are the numbers of people who install windows via CD VS people who install Linux via CD?

The main reason is that under Linux your hardware won’t work as well, more internet stuff won’t work, and you can’t play your games like Evercrack and WoW. People who use Linux generally are either really care about freedom, or are computer hobbyists who like messing around with their computer. Average users often just get frustrated and move back to windows if they were curious enough to switch anyways.

I think Linux would be better off targeting the computer hobbyists rather than prematurely going after average users. We are prematurely slapping an easy to use GUI on top of a system that you need to know about in order to maintain, translation: we are giving people enough rope to hang themselves before they know how to use rope safely. Once Linux has most of the computer people using it, the casual user will follow. This is how it worked in the world of DOS vs Mac

RTFA, damn it! - by Lurker2288 (Score: 4, Interesting) Thread
If you read the article, it isn’t even clear at this point that the kid who’s being suspended was involved in producing the video, either by acting up in the classroom or by assisting in filming it. It sounds like all he did was post a link to it on his Myspace page, and the school is busting him because they want him to rat out the people who DID make it.

It’s okay… - by Thrace (Score: 5, Insightful) Thread
All kids involved in the video taping the teacher are morons. I remember when it was common sense not to do something so blatantly stupid and self-incriminating while in school. What ever happened to being able to sit for 45 minutes without acting like a jackass?

Re:40 days? - by DrivingBear (Score: 5, Funny) Thread
In my day kids got one week suspensions for smoking pot and getting in to fights.

But pot and fights never hurt anybody. He gave her bunny ears. There’s no recovering from that kind of humiliation.

The Video in question - by baboonlogic (Score: 4, Informative) Thread
Mongzilla is still up on Youtube.

The teacher may have something to say. - by iknownuttin (Score: 5, Informative) Thread
The teacher was in frame and the video was published on the internet. Where’s the model’s release? This isn’t a news item so it’s arguably warranted.

Try getting a man on the street photo published sometime, you’ll see.

Spatial and temporal dithering - by AlpineR (Score: 5, Interesting) Thread

I never heard of this LCD dithering before. A little bit of Googling found a simple explanation of what it is, a simple test to look for it, and a detailed explanation and test.

This seems to be a very common practice on LCD screens, not just a trick used by Apple. I’m still not clear whether most LCDs use spatial or temporal dithering. It seems like temporal dithering would work very well with an LCD. They’re known for their sluggish response times, so sending “80-84-80-84” at 60 Hz should result in a nice smearing into “82-82-82-82” over time.

I didn’t see any dithering artifacts on my MacBook Pro (Core 2 Duo). Either it doesn’t dither (unlikely) or the dithering is better than my eyes can see.

We all know that screens are actually made of red, green, and blue (RGB) dots that combine to make the apparent color of each pixel. An 8-bit screen would have 256 levels of brighness for each of those subpixels, yielding 256 x 256 x 256 = 16.8 million mixed colors. But if you wanted to be really technical you could say that the screen can actually show only 256 + 256 + 256 = 768 colors; the mixed colors are an illusion. Likewise a 6-bit screen can generate only 262 thousand colors in a given pixel at a given instant, but it can simulate many more colors over time or space.

The argument depends on how many pixels the manufacturer claims to have. If they say their screen is 1024 x 768 with 16.8 million colors then we would expect to have 786,000 independently addressable pixels, each of which comprises three RGB subpixels. If in fact it takes four RGB subpixels (1-1/3 of each 6-bit subpixel to get 8 bits) to yield 16.8 million colors then they should really only claim a resolution of 768 x 576. If, however, they do the dithering temporally and the pulsation is unnoticeable then I think continuing to call the resolution 1024 x 768 is fair.

AlpineR

8-bit vs 6-bit LCD displays - by Trevin (Score: 5, Informative) Thread

This got me wondering how many bpp my own Viewsonic Pro series monitor can display. I was surprised to find that it wasn’t listed in the product specifications — neither as bits nor total number of colors.

A little further digging brought me to this article which gave some good insight about the differences. Some highlights:

Since consumers were demanding faster screens, something needed to be done to improve response times. To facilitate this, many manufacturers turned to reducing the number of levels each color pixel render. This reduction in the number of intensity levels allows the response times to drop but has the drawback of reducing the overall number of colors that can be rendered.

High-speed LCD monitors typically reduce the number of bits for each color to 6 instead of the standard 8. … This is far fewer than the true color display such that it would be noticeable to the human eye.

If no color depths is listed, it should be assumed that monitors of 12ms or faster will be 6-bit and the 20ms and slower panels are 8-bit.

This is very subjective to the actual user and what the computer is used for. The amount of color really matters to those that do professional work on graphics. For these people, the amount of color that is displayed on the screen is very important. The average consumer is not going to really need this level of color representation by their monitor. As a result, it probably doesn’t matter. People using their displays for video games or watching video will likely not care about the number of colors rendered by the LCD but by the speed at which it can be displayed. As a result, it is best to determine your needs and base your purchase on those criteria.

Far more interesting: Better under Windows? - by Animaether (Score: 5, Informative) Thread
From the PDF ( http://www.engadget.com/videos/PDF/apple_macbook_l awsuit.pdf ) : 
 
’‘The extent to which a particular make of computer is capable of “dithering” is a function of the sophistication of the programming of the software. For example, in the case of the MacBook and MacBook Pro, because of the uniqueness of these computers to be able to run both Apple’s OS operating system, and the PC’s Microsoft Windows operating system, it is possible to compare the quality of the display between the two operating systems. In the case of the display that the MacBook and the MacBook Pro produces using the Microsoft Windows operating system at all resolution levels is superior to the display that those same computers display using Apple’s OS operating system.’’ 
 
Some nasty grammar in there, but in summary: no such problem when running Windows on the same machine? 
 
If that is true, then it is indeed an Apple software problem. Note that software shouldn’t be in charge of this sort of thing in the first place. LCD displays themselves handle incoming 8bit values on a 6bit displays in one of three ways: 
A. ‘as is’, 91 becomes 92. 
B. ‘dither’, 3 out of 4 pixels are 92, the other one is 88, averaging to 91 
C. ‘frame rate control’, 3 out of 4 refreshes it draws the pixel as 92, the other one is 88, averaging to 91. 
 
B&C are both common, and both have pros/cons. But either way, the software shouldn’t be doing anything there (arguably, a driver might - i.e. if the monitor specifically allows you to specify which method to use, what dithering pattern, etc. by means of driver control).

eyeballs - by CheeseTroll (Score: 5, Funny) Thread
I’d like to sue the manufacturer of my retinas and/or brain, because my retinas are only capable of Trichromatic vision, but my brain keeps tricking me into thinking I’m seeing millions of variations. 
 
And don’t get me started on those so-called “color printer” things. I only see 3 colors of ink/toner going into those.

The point - by Z0mb1eman (Score: 5, Informative) Thread
How about providing the IMPORTANT part from the article in the summary, hmmm? 
 
“At the heart of the case is plaintiff’s claim that rather than delivering 16,777,216 colors with an 8-bit LCD, Apple chose a cheaper route, delivering the illusion of millions of colors using a 6-bit LCD and dithering.” 
 
2^24 = 16,777,216 
2^18 = 262,144 
 
Nothing wrong with 6-bit LCDs, but they shouldn’t be advertised as 8-bit… 
 
*gets ready to be torn apart by rabid mac fans*

Next up… - by woolio (Score: 2) Thread
DHS will attempt to create national a database of irrational numbers… 
 
After all, computer security could be improved if we keep these pesky numbers out of our calculations. By Federal Law, all numerical calculations will require verifification with the National Irrational Number Database (NIHD) to ensure these numbers do not penetrate our borders. 
 

Well that’s neat… - by LordPhantom (Score: 2) Thread
You know, this may be being implemented with the best of intentions (stopping illegal workers, etc), but do we really want to give the government an easy way to “flip a switch” (or bit) and make it impossible for any one person to earn a living?  
 
This isn’t just a “don’t fly” list, and I suspect that in its initial incarnation it wouldn’t have the same … due process that the local police arresting someone would.  
 
If not this government what about the one that is elected five years from now? Nine? What about the (admittedly hypothetical) government that is elected in 2020 that wants to prevent convicted felons from holding certain classes of jobs (more so than stigma already does?) Political dissidents?

Across the border… - by danbert8 (Score: 2, Insightful) Thread
This won’t affect illegal immigrants working. Employers know they aren’t elligible to work, they choose to employ them not just because they are cheaper labor, but because they do better work than the unionized workers here in the states.

Re:Across the border… - by b0s0z0ku (Score: 2) Thread
This won’t affect illegal immigrants working. Employers know they aren’t elligible to work, they choose to employ them not just because they are cheaper labor, but because they do better work than the unionized workers here in the states.

Mod parent up. Does anyone with half a clue think that the workers hanging around a street corner at 6am looking for construction bosses to pick them up are LEGAL? Who’s kidding whom here?! They’re not checking documents now, and that’s a legal requirement already. They think that the existence of a database will somehow make people care any more?

-b.

Re:Across the border… - by Ihlosi (Score: 2) Thread
They think that the existence of a database will somehow make people care any more?

It will, once they’ve extraordinarily renditioned the first couple of offenders, or shipped them to Gitmo, or just disappeared them.

Sorry, no. - by imsabbel (Score: 5, Insightful) Thread
That whole “give away so much that they cannot use all the Data” might have worked back when all was done by humans. 
 
Nowdays, you just buy some more computers to do the datamining and cross-referencing. Dont worry, there are thousands of PHDs working at google to make 1984 a reality. 
 
(Dont believe me? Take a look what googles CEO says here : http://www.ft.com/cms/s/c3e49548-088e-11dc-b11e-00 0b5df10621.html . In short, a quote: “The goal is to enable Google users to be able to ask the question such as ‘What shall I do tomorrow?’ and ‘What job shall I take?’”)

Shouldn’t we all stop fighting? - by Nymz (Score: 5, Insightful) Thread
“But it was all right, everything was all right, the struggle was finished. He had won the victory over himself. He loved Big Brother.” Part 3, Chapter 6

Nice, clever, but still not right - by mcvos (Score: 5, Interesting) Thread
It’s great that he’s created the perfect alibi, and keeping himself out of accidental incarceration on Gitmo, but the real message here is that government institutions are way too sloppy, and that if you do not give up your privacy like this, you may be risking all sorts of harassment and worse. Innocent people do get locked up because of mistakes, malice, or a combination of both.

New religion - by Romwell (Score: 5, Insightful) Thread
Privacy nowadyas is like a religion. Some people believe in it, some don’t; some fight to protect it. But it is still as intangible and unattainable as deities from other religions.

Come on… - by niceone (Score: 5, Informative) Thread
You could at least try to slashdot the guy’s site, it is^H^Hwas kind of cool.

‘Bout Time - by Vornzog (Score: 5, Insightful) Thread
As someone who is less than 48 hours away from a completed thesis Ph.D. thesis and a little over a week away from my defense, there is only one thing I have to say about this. 
 
It’s about damn time. 
 
I hate to see that these services even exist. 
 
I understand the cheating will always go on, at all levels of academics. The practice isn’t against any laws, but it is nice to see Google not condoning something legal but flat out wrong.

dickens was paid by the word - by User 956 (Score: 5, Funny) Thread
which now join other items on the banned list such as tobacco, drugs, weapons, and prostitution.  
 
Essay writing is just a simpler form of prostitution. You know the old saying “Prose before Hos”.

Bender Says. . . - by Apple Acolyte (Score: 3, Funny) Thread
“I’ll create my own search engine, with blackjack and hookers” and essay writers.

Distinction - by gowen (Score: 3, Insightful) Thread

‘punish legitimate businesses.’

Banned list? - by Whiney Mac Fanboy (Score: 4, Insightful) Thread
which now join other items on the banned list such as tobacco, drugs, weapons, and prostitution.” 
 
Depends on the drug 
 
Anyway, who really cares who Google accepts for advertising - its what they index that really matters.