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Submission + - The Turbo Entabulator: a 3D-printed mechanical computer (chrisfenton.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: 'Have you ever been sitting there, quietly computing something and thinking to yourself, “If only this process were somehow billions of times slower, less reliable, and involved lots of physical labor”? If so, the Turbo Entabulator is the machine you’ve been looking for!' Its a (nearly-entirely) 3D-printed mechanical computer. With three single-digit counters for memory, it's driven by a hand-cranked, jacquard-style punch card reader. You can even download the files and build your own (http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:101105).

Submission + - Free State Project, one decade later (reason.com)

Submitted by Okian Warrior
Okian Warrior writes: About a decade ago Slashdot ran an article about the Free State Project: an attempt to get 20,000 liberty-minded activists to move to one state (they chose NH) and change the political landscape.

Eleven years on, and the project is still growing and having an effect on statewide politics. NPR recently ran an program discussing the movement, its list of successes, and plans for the future.

The FSP has a noticeable effect on politics right now — still 6,000 short of their 20,000 goal, and long before the members are scheduled to move to NH.

Given the direction the federal government is headed, people may want to check this out.

Submission + - NSA Scandal: Green Dam 2.0? 4

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes: In 2009, The Information Technology Industry Council, whose members included HP, Dell and Microsoft, was among 22 industry groups in North America, Europe and Japan that signed a letter urging the Chinese government to review its proposed Green Dam web-filtering software program. Separately, U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk and Commerce Secretary Gary Locke said in a joint letter to Chinese officials that the Green Dam mandate posed a "possible barrier to trade" that may violate World Trade Organization rules. Four years later, Popular Mechanics' Glenn Derene is warning that the NSA Prism Program could kill U.S. tech companies. 'Companies such as Microsoft, Apple, and Google are major exporters of information services,' explains Derene, 'through products such as Gmail, iCloud, Exchange, and Azure. Hundreds of millions of people use these services worldwide, and it has just been revealed to everybody outside the U.S. that our government reserves the right to look into their communications whenever it wants.' But, as in Green Dam, business interests may ultimately trump government interests. Derene concludes, 'I expect the Prism program to fall apart on its own, not because of public outcry but because the companies that participated will now see it as a toxic association that could threaten their status in fast-growing foreign markets. If U.S. intelligence agencies try to compel participation through the courts, I expect companies such as Apple and Google to start putting up a legal fight—not just because Prism is bad public relations, because it's bad for business.'

Submission + - Google to Buy Waze for $1.3 Billion (israelnationalnews.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Google and Israeli start-up Waze have agreed in principle on a deal in which the search engine giant will buy the road traffic information sharing application for $1.3 billion, reports Calcalist

Submission + - NSA employee behind revelations of NSA surveillance (guardian.co.uk)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: 'The individual responsible for one of the most significant leaks in US political history is Edward Snowden, a 29-year-old former technical assistant for the CIA and current employee of the defence contractor Booz Allen Hamilton. Snowden has been working at the National Security Agency for the last four years as an employee of various outside contractors, including Booz Allen and Dell. The Guardian, after several days of interviews, is revealing his identity at his request. From the moment he decided to disclose numerous top-secret documents to the public, he was determined not to opt for the protection of anonymity. "I have no intention of hiding who I am because I know I have done nothing wrong," he said.'

Submission + - Decommissioning San Onofre may take decades (latimes.com)

Submitted by gkndivebum
gkndivebum writes: Southern California Edison has elected to decommission the San Onofre nuclear plant after a failed effort to upgrade the steam generation system. "Nuclear economics" is the reason stated for the proposed decommissioning. Other utilities operating nuclear power plants in the US likely face similar decisions when it comes to weighing the costs of upgrading older facilities. Allowing the reactors to remain in "safe storage" for a period of up to 60 years will allow for radioactive decay and lower radiation exposure for the workers performing the demolition.

Submission + - Iain Banks dies of cancer

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: BBC News is reporting that Iain Banks, best known for his Culture series novels and The Wasp Factory, has died of cancer aged 59. It had been announced several months ago that he was suffering from bladder cancer, and he had stated his intentions to spend his remaining time visiting places which meant a lot to him after marrying his partner.

Submission + - 'Anti-Gravity' 3D Printer Sculpts Shapes On Any Surface (singularityhub.com)

Submitted by kkleiner
kkleiner writes: A 3D printing technique has been developed that prints objects that seemingly defy gravity. Dubbed the Mataerial 3D printing system, a robotic arm can print 3D curves on floors, walls, and ceilings, whether the surface is smooth or uneven. Custom-shaped objects are created using a thermoplast that dries on contact with air, which offers an alternative fabrication method to typical 2D layering printing approaches. Though its broad practicality is questioned outside artistic creations, the video produced by the team is mesmerizing.

Submission + - Linus Torvalds to find new ways to curse developers, their mothers (paritynews.com)

Submitted by hypnosec
hypnosec writes: Linus Torvalds has released Linux 3.10-rc5 and he is certainly not happy with the changes merged last week. The rc5 is bigger than the rc4 and has code scattered across its entire code base because it addresses a lot many outstanding problems. In the release announcement Torvalds noted, "I wish I could say that things are calming down, but I'd be lying. rc5 is noticeably bigger than rc4, both in number of commits and in files changed (although rc4 actually had more lines changed, so there's that).” Torvalds has warned that he is going to start cursing again and said "I'm going to call you guys out on, and try to come up with new ways to insult you, your mother, and your deceased pet hamster."

Submission + - NASA's "Opportunity" Rover Finds New Evidence For Once-Habitable Mars (space.com)

Submitted by nedko.m
nedko.m writes: NASA's Mars rover 'Opportunity' found clay minerals in an ancient rock on the rim of the Endeavour Crater on Mars. The discovery suggests that neutral-pH water — slightly salty, and neither too acidic nor too alkaline for life — once flowed through the area, probably during the first billion years of Martian history. Opportunity's latest discovery fits well with one made recently on the other side of the planet by the rover's bigger, younger cousin Curiosity, which found strong evidence that its landing site could have supported microbial life in the ancient past. Such observations could help scientists map out Mars' transition from a relatively warm and wet world long ago to the cold and dry planet we know today

Submission + - What to do when another dev steals your work and puts their name on it?

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: I have had an interesting situation arise where I built some web apps for a client about 2 years ago. I have no longer been working with the client and a new developer has taken over purely for maintenance work. Currently I have been looking for new work and have used the said apps as part of my portfolio. During one interview I was informed that I not telling the truth about building the apps and I was then shown the source of a few JS files. It seems the new developer had put a copyright header on them, removed my name as the author and put his own. Now this is grey territory as it the client who owns the source, not the contracting developer. It put me on my back foot and I had to start explaining to interviewers that the developer stole the work and branded it. I feel it makes me look like a fool, having to defend my position in an interview with a possible client and I feel I had lost the chance of directing the outcome of the interview. I have cut the apps from my portfolio, how ever they are some of my best work and a real testament to my skills. I decided to cut my loss and move on, I am not looking for a fight or any unnecessary heartache. So what you do in my situation?

Submission + - Asteroid Passe Within 65,000 Miles of Earth a Day After Scientists Discovered It

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Discovered a day before its closest approach to Earth, Asteroid 2013 LR6 came within roughly 65,000 miles of the planet as it flew over the Southern Ocean of Tasmania, Australia at 12:42 a.m. EDT on June 8.
Despite being more than half the size of the one that exploded over Chelyabinsk, Russia in February, the 30-foot-wide asteroid posed no threat, according to NASA.

Submission + - NSA Surveillance Heat Map -- NSA Lied to Congress

Submitted by anagama
anagama writes: NSA officials have repeatedly denied under oath to Congress that even producing an estimate of the number of Americans caught up in its surveillance is impossible. Leaked screenshots of an NSA application that does exactly that, prove that the NSA flat out lied (surprise). Glenn Greenwald continues his relentless attacks with another bombshell this time exposing Boundless Informant. Interestingly, the NSA spies more on America than China according to the heat map. Representative Wyden had sought amendments to FISA reauthorization bill that would have required the NSA to provide information like this (hence the NSA's lies), but Obama and Feinstein demanded a pure reauthorization of FISA, which they got at the end of 2012.

Submission + - First Observation of Spin Hall Effect in a Quantum Gas Is Step Toward 'Atomtroni

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: A new phenomenon discovered in ultracold atoms of a Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) could offer new insight into the quantum mechanical world and be a step toward applications in "atomtronics"—the use of ultracold atoms as circuit components. Researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have reported the first observation of the "spin Hall effect" in a cloud of ultracold atoms, acting as a single quantum object and then called BEC, the lowest state of matter, with solid and liquid coming next. As one consequence, the researchers made the atoms, which spin like a child's top, skew to one side or the other, by an amount dependent on the spin direction.

Submission + - Facebook suffers actual cloud in the datacenter (theregister.co.uk)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The Register carries the funniest, most topical IT story of the year :

Facebook's first data center ran into problems of a distinctly ironic nature when a literal cloud formed in the IT room and started to rain on servers.

Though Facebook has previously hinted at this via references to a "humidity event" within its first data center in Prineville, Oregon, the social network's infrastructure king Jay Parikh told The Reg on Thursday that, for a few minutes in Summer, 2011, Facebook's data center contained two clouds: one powered the social network, the other poured water on it.

Submission + - Gaming's Distant (And Not So Distant) Relatives (kreativeassassin.com)

Submitted by richtaur
richtaur writes: A passionate classic game collector took the time to document the shared lineage between over thirty of gaming's finest cousins. The article contains side-by-side screenshots and videos to show the similarities and shared assets between such classic relatives as Bomberman/Lode Runner, Gradius/Life Force, and Renegade/River City Ransom. Fascinating stuff for fans of games of yesteryear.

Submission + - What PRISM Program Really Is

Submitted by jmactacular
jmactacular writes: It sounds like there is some technical confusion about whether major companies have provided direct server access.

The NSA is not tapping in there, they are tapping in much earlier in the data stream at the regional ISP switching centers.

The PRISM program operates in secret rooms, where it splits the fiber optic cable, where one fiber cable continues on to the ISP switch, and the second fiber cable is fed into a NARUS STA 6400 that does real time packet inspection of the entire data stream.

It seems like the program name PRISM is based on splitting light in fiber optics, like a prism that can split light.

This was uncovered by an AT&T tech named Mark Klein, who reported it to the EFF. The regional switch was at 611 Folsom St. in San Francisco, and the NSA room was on the 7th floor.

It's detailed in the NOVA program "The Spy Factory" at around minute 00:40 here online:
http://video.pbs.org/video/1051968443/

It was also covered in the Frontline doc "Spying on the Home Front", here's an updated story with a clip.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/foreign-affairs-defense/what-an-nsa-domestic-spying-operation-looks-like/

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