Comment Genetic Engineering (Score 1) 590
As soon as we can make bacteria or algae that poop out jet fuel, we'll have it.
Comment Re:Will this chargers be "always on"? (Score 2) 82
I was surprised, a couple of years back, when I measured how much power unused wall-warts added up to.
Have you checked lately? I have a Kill-a-Watt meter, and the loads on modern chargers have gone way down in the past 10 years, especially when the load is disconnected.
Comment Re:Apparently? (Score 1) 73
everything at such small scale may and may not controlled by quantum mechanics.
Comment What is a "proto-bodice"? (Score 1) 116
... And what happens when you rip one?
Comment Re:Lalla Ward (Score 1) 1142
Sorry, offtopic: Speaking of Romana, why didn't Slashdot tell me that Mary Tamm died last July?
Comment Re:Lalla Ward (Score 1) 1142
Aaah! Beat me to that one. How about: How do you keep yourself busy while visiting the in-laws on Gallifrey?
Comment Re:Whats the point of an intermediary step? (Score 5, Insightful) 108
Also...
Until tablets have a hell of a lot better battery life,
and a display that's as comfortable as e-ink
e-readers are not a fad.
Comment Re:Second? (Score 3, Insightful) 147
I seem to be wrong
Congratulations! That's the first time I've seen that phrase in a slashdot comment!
Submission + - Undersea Cable Re-Routed to Connect Remote Island (ahumanright.org)
An anonymous reader writes: A Human Right has successfully lobbied infrastructure company eFive to modify the planned route of a 10,000 km long undersea cable connecting Africa to South America. The 4,200 people on the island of St. Helena, one of the most isolated places in the world, will be getting high speed Internet access.
Previously, the route missed the island by a mere 500 km, which would have been a lost opportunity for an island with limited connectivity. With the support of advocates in St. Helena, A Human Right launched the “Move This Cable, Connect St. Helena” campaign in January of 2012. The initiative was brought to the floor of the UK Parliament, and ultimately to the attention of the leadership at eFive.
Previously, the route missed the island by a mere 500 km, which would have been a lost opportunity for an island with limited connectivity. With the support of advocates in St. Helena, A Human Right launched the “Move This Cable, Connect St. Helena” campaign in January of 2012. The initiative was brought to the floor of the UK Parliament, and ultimately to the attention of the leadership at eFive.
Submission + - How to add 5.5 petabytes and get banned from Costco during a hard drive crisis (gigaom.com)
concealment writes: "“We buy lots and lots of hard drives . . . . [They] are the single biggest cost in the entire company.”
Those are the words of Backblaze Founder and CEO Gleb Budman, whose company offers unlimited cloud backup for just $5 a month, and fills 50TB worth of new storage a day in its custom-built, open source pod architecture. So one might imagine the cloud storage startup was pretty upset when flooding in Thailand caused a global shortage on internal hard drives last year.
Backblaze details much the process in a Tuesday-morning blog post, including the hijinks that followed as the company got creative trying to figure out ways around the new hard drive limits. Maps were drawn, employees were cut off from purchasing hard drives at Costco — both in-person throughout Silicon Valley and online (despite some great efforts to avoid detection, such as paying for hard drives online using gift cards) — and friends and family across the country were conscripted into a hard-drive-buying army."
Those are the words of Backblaze Founder and CEO Gleb Budman, whose company offers unlimited cloud backup for just $5 a month, and fills 50TB worth of new storage a day in its custom-built, open source pod architecture. So one might imagine the cloud storage startup was pretty upset when flooding in Thailand caused a global shortage on internal hard drives last year.
Backblaze details much the process in a Tuesday-morning blog post, including the hijinks that followed as the company got creative trying to figure out ways around the new hard drive limits. Maps were drawn, employees were cut off from purchasing hard drives at Costco — both in-person throughout Silicon Valley and online (despite some great efforts to avoid detection, such as paying for hard drives online using gift cards) — and friends and family across the country were conscripted into a hard-drive-buying army."
Submission + - Why Is Google Killing The Open Document Formats? (muktware.com)
sfcrazy writes: Google has zero support for Open Document Format across all its products including Android, Chrome OS, Google Drive and QuickOffice. You are forced to use Microsoft's OOXML. I am left with puzzling questions why is Google not supporting ODF and locking users into an incompatible and vendor-locked OOXML format? Will Google endorse open standards and Open Document Formats or its users will be forced to use Microsoft's OOXML? I
Comment Re:electrion year (Score 2) 1113
Simple pandering, since this took place "at a sportsman’s banquet at Liberty Baptist Church".
Comment Dyson Spheres? (Score 1) 686
That's a relief. At first I thought you meant they were searching for alien Dyson Balls.
Comment Re:Sorry but... (Score 3, Informative) 255
I'm also from America, but I don't mind giving this short summary: It's an agricultural product with a wide variation in harvest from year to year.
Comment Re:Stats Fail (Score 1) 259
What about the possibility that the "third" factor (gas) does not cause earthquakes on its own? What if it's the combination of gas and fracking?
You could look at places with natural gas deposits that are not being fracked to see how their earthquake incidence compares to areas without gas deposits.
