Slashback: AMD/ATI, Tokamak Fusion, Laptop Privacy 171
An inside look at the AMD/ATI merger. Spinnerbait writes "HotHardware spent some sit-down time with a few folks close to the AMD and ATI merger, asked some probing questions and received a few insightful answers in return. They dug in deep with AMD Execs, learned all there is to know currently and even got a hint of what the future might hold for the dynamic duo (no pun intended), now joined as one. A tighter coupling of the CPU and GPU is in our future perhaps?"
School admins back down on cell phone invasion policy. Reverberant writes "In a follow up to earlier coverage about school admins wanting access to students' cellphones, Framingham officials have decided to hold off on the policy for now because they need school committee approval. The head of the school policy committee has 'no interest in bringing it up.'"
New launch date for Scotty's ashes. wolfdvh writes "The BBC reports that Star Trek actor James Doohan, who played the engineer Scotty in the original TV series, will now have his remains blasted into space in October. The actor's ashes were supposed to be sent into orbit last year, but the flight was delayed as tests were carried out on the rocket."
Second test for China's Tokamak fusion device. Haxx writes "The first plasma discharge from China's experimental advanced superconducting research center dubbed 'artificial sun' is set to occur next month. The discharge, expected about Aug. 15, will be conducted at Science Island in Hefei, in east China's Anhui Province. The experiment will test the world's first Tokamak fusion device of this kind. The new device will be an upgrade of China`s first superconducting Tokamak device. The plasma discharge will draw international attention since some scientists are concerned with risks involved in such a process"
Forbe's missed the mark on IBM destruction of evidence. An anonymous reader writes "It turns out that Forbes.com was wrong and, based on analysis of Pacer no motion has been filed against IBM for destruction of evidence. Shortly following from a major collapse in SCO's share price, a recent article Slashdot reported Forbes.com's claim that a motion had been filed against IBM for destruction of evidence. In fact, Groklaw, the main site covering the SCO vs. IBM lawsuit, now reports that SCO has filed no motions of this type whatsoever in March."
Skype for Mac 1.5 released. Billy C writes "A few weeks after warez versions made the rounds on the Internet, the official Skype for Mac with video is here." While still only a preview version, brave users can now give it a shot.
Courts rule customs can rifle through your laptop. monstermagnet writes "On Monday, a unanimous three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals held that the files of a person's laptop may be searched at U.S. borders [PDF] without probable cause or even reasonable suspicion."
Probable Cause (Score:4, Interesting)
the files of a person's laptop may be searched at U.S. borders without probable cause or even reasonable suspicion.
Elliotte Rusty Harold recently had a good blog post about probable cause [elharo.com]. His point is that probable cause isn't just to protect the innocent from abuse; it's also to keep the police effective by forcing them to focus on people who have a high probability of actual wrongdoing. Without that constraint, they're free to go after anyone, and end up wasting their time & effort on wild goose chases.
I assume that there's no legal obligation for you to give US Customs your password. I also assume that they're under no obligation to let you into the country. If you're clearing customs while you're in the US, there's probably no obligation for them to return your laptop to you either.
Obligatory Crypto Post (Score:4, Interesting)
Just a thought.
Doh! (Score:5, Interesting)
Forbes defaming linux? In an article written by Daniel Lyons? Who would have thunk it?
The guy has a well established reputation for being wrong that you can pretty trust anything he writes about linux to be exactly 180-degrees out of sync with reality.
Ordinarily I would want some of whatever he's been smoking, but it sure seems to make you mean and spiteful as a side-effect.
Re:Feel The Burn Baby (Score:3, Interesting)
I'd like to believe, but I just haven't seen this anywhere else, much less the somewhat fishy timing of the announcement.
Re:Thank heavens for crypto. (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:Cyrix (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:Feel The Burn Baby (Score:4, Interesting)
To see a burning plasma, I think most of us are going to have to wait for ITER.
Not to steal EAST's thunder - it's a pretty amazing machine, and from what I hear, it only cost a couple tens of millions (like 40-50). If we tried to build something like that in the US it would have cost over 1 billion. yay for cheap labor.
Re:Courts rule customs can rifle through your lapt (Score:5, Interesting)
Now, there *are* situations where the most efficient way to transmit data is by shipping physical media around - but they all involve huge amounts of data or places with little infrastructure. It's hard to come up with a scenario where it makes sense to illegally transfer data from one city with an international airport to another by putting it on a hard drive in a consumer laptop and flying people around with it.
A professional pornographer isn't going to bother carrying the product around with them. They'll set up shop somewhere, pay for a decent network connection and a bunch of dvd blanks, and bring it in electronically and then manufacture it on site. Or they'll bring in ten thousand pressed dvd's in a cargo crate labeled "bananas."
Likewise, someone carrying *really* bad stuff isn't going to just leave it lying around in an unencrypted folder on a laptop. Hell, I wouldn't think of leaving my perfectly legal vanilla porn unencrypted on a laptop in my house, much less one I'd take across international borders.
In countries where anyone can ssh to anywhere in the world and pull in whatever they want, this is just silly. You might occasionally catch really stupid consumers of illegal material, but that's all.
On a tangent, if I were going to try to get some really bad data across the border into a place with no network, I'd probably stick it on encrypted flash drives, disassemble them as much as possible to remove cases and excess hardware, and then screw or cement the boards into place in the bodies of consumer electronics gear. Add an equal number of identical but unmodified drives loaded with holiday photos to use for reassembly parts, and buy the screwdrivers and soldering station at a shop when you arrive. The illegal material in my laptop, if I had any, would be on the pc board hot-glued to the underside of the mainboar - not on the hard drive. (If you really want to do it right, you design pc boards that fit into the cases perfectly and come with standoff and mounting hardware designed to fit the flash drive boards, so that it would pass even a casual inspection by a knowledgeable person. Hide any identifying bits under globs of black epoxy, or place them upside down. Extra points if you manage to route the connectors on the flash board to accessible headers and connect to the drives without even reassembling them.)