Comment Re:Is this that important ? (Score 1) 434
Have to agree with other replies to your post - I was similar to you when I was a kid, (I'm only 31 so they were well before my time) but if you haven't already, please try starting at the end (Abbey Road) and working your way backwards chronologically with Let It Be and the White Album. You may be surprised. I dislike and still dislike their early works, which was next to canned pop.
The middle years (from Rubber Soul onwards) certainly improved dramatically but not until I picked up Sergeant Pepper's did I discover that I loved their music.
Comment Alternative to online account access/storage (Score 0, Troll) 299
There's some fancy schmancy new technologies called "email" and "pdf".
Why can't the companies use these amazing new technologies?
Submission + - Terry Pratchett knighted in Queen's honours list
Submission + - Terry Pratchett Knighted
ackthpt writes: Headlines have been popping up on Google News, again abruptly yanked from news servers, such as Times Online and International Herald Tribune. A Google News snippet for The Times Online states, "Terry Pratchett declared himself "flabbergasted" to receive a knighthood as he led a group of writers, actors and performers honoured today." The Discworld author and stalwart adversary of Alzheimers Disease has been a member of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for Services to Literature since 1998. He will be entering the new year as Knight Commander. Well done and Oook, Sir Terry.
Comment Senator Conroy's handiwork (Score 1, Insightful) 158
Now I am one of the last people to defend Telstra, but this smacks of Conroy's handiwork.
1) Telstra refuses to participate in "live" trials of Conroy's much-maligned internet filter.
2) Telstra denied chance to bid for national broadband network based on a technicality.
Coincidence? I hardly think so.
Comment Re:Next Abbey Road (Score 1) 292
Or more likely, Yoko won't allow it.
SOE Allows Purchase of In-Game Items In Everquest I, II 173
Zonk points out some big news for fans of the Everquest games; Sony Online Entertainment has rolled out a system which allows the exchange of real money for items used in the game. Sony is making use of a transaction system called Station Cash which charges your credit card in exchange for a virtual currency which is then spendable on the items. Massively has a walkthrough of how it will work, and shows some of the items up for sale, including vanity armor, non-combat pets, and potions that make various aspects of your character better. "Each of these types of flasks comes in a tier. Tier I flasks increase XP by 10% and cost $1.00. Tier II flasks increase XP by 25% and cost $5.00. Tier III flasks increase XP by 50%, and cost $10.00 each. All flask tiers last for 4 hours on use, and more than one can't be used at a time." Further details on the system are available in the FAQ and the Terms of Service. This comes alongside news today that upcoming MMO Star Wars: The Old Republic will not be subscription-based, but entirely based on micro-transactions instead.
Comment Re:$30K donated to fight censorship, protests plan (Score 1) 193
I'm with you on this one - I have voted and defended Labour my entire life. This is the one big straw that has broken this Camel's back. I still despise Libs, but now also despise Labour.
In the future my vote and support is going to wherever it will damage Labour the most - I may even have to vote for the despised Libs.
Canadians Battling Proposed Canadian DMCA 202
An anonymous reader writes "CTV reports on how Canadians are fighting back against the Canadian DMCA. Led by Michael Geist, the Fair Copyright for Canada Facebook group is nearing 90,000 members. There are local chapters, a YouTube contest, wikis, and people writing letters and organizing rallies against the copyright bill. Geist said, 'When you get tens of thousands of Canadians speaking out like this, there's big political risk for any political party who chooses to ignore it.'"
Why the Olympics Didn't Melt the Internet 383
perlow tips his blog entry over at ZDNet on why the Internet didn't melt when millions of users streamed 480i video for a week. The short answer is Limelight Networks of Tempe, Arizona. "[W]hy the Internet didn't 'melt' is quite simple — [Limelight is] completely 'off the cloud.' In other words, unlike Akamai and similar content caching providers, their system isn't deployed over the public Internet... Limelight has partnered with over 800 broadband Internet providers worldwide... so that the content is either co-located in the same facility as your ISP's main communications infrastructure, or it leases a dedicated Optical Carrier line so that it actually appears as part of your ISP's internal network. In most cases, you're never even leaving your Tier 1 provider to get the video."
Freeze On US Solar Plant Applications Lifted 282
necro81 writes "Barely a month ago, the U.S. Bureau of Land Management announced a freeze on applications for solar power plants on federally managed land, pending a two-year comprehensive environmental review. After much hue and cry from the public, industry, and other parts of government, BLM has today announced that it will lift the freeze, but continue to study the possible environmental effects. To date, no solar project has yet been approved on BLM land."
Anti-Evolution "Academic Freedom" Bill Passed In Louisiana 898
Ars Technica is running a story about recently enacted legislation in Louisiana which will allow school board officials to "approve supplemental classroom materials specifically for the critique of scientific theories" such as evolution and global warming. The full text of the Act (PDF) is also available. Quoting:
"The text of the [Louisiana Science Education Act] suggests that it's intended to foster critical thinking, calling on the state Board of Education to 'assist teachers, principals, and other school administrators to create and foster an environment within public elementary and secondary schools that promotes critical thinking skills, logical analysis, and open and objective discussion of scientific theories.' Unfortunately, it's remarkably selective in its suggestion of topics that need critical thinking, as it cites scientific subjects 'including, but not limited to, evolution, the origins of life, global warming, and human cloning.'"
U.S. Plan For "Thinking Machines" Repository 148
An anonymous reader writes "Information scientists organized by the US's NIST say they will create a "concept bank" that programmers can use to build thinking machines that reason about complex problems at the frontiers of knowledge — from advanced manufacturing to biomedicine. The agreement by ontologists — experts in word meanings and in using appropriate words to build actionable machine commands — outlines the critical functions of the Open Ontology Repository (OOR). More on the summit that produced the agreement here."
First Exotic Space Thruster Test Ends in Explosion 178
KentuckyFC writes "A NASA-funded test of an entirely new way to control orbiting satellites has ended with the prototype arcing dangerously and parts of the machine exploding. The new propulsion system is based on the Lorentz force: that a charged particle moving through a magnetic field experiences a force perpendicular to both its velocity and the field. So the plan is to ensure that a satellite passing though the Earth's magnetic field is electrically charged so as to generate a force that can be used to steer the spacecraft. The advantage of the idea is that it requires no propellant, which is a big deal since most satellites' lifespans are limited by the amount of fuel they can carry. But the first ground-based tests haven't gone entirely to plan."
