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Earth

An Animal That Lives Without Oxygen 166

Posted by timothy from the besides-me dept.
Julie188 writes "Scientists have found the first multicellular animals that apparently live entirely without oxygen. The creatures reside deep in one of the harshest environments on earth: the Mediterranean Ocean's L'Atalante basin, which contains salt brine so dense that it doesn't mix with the oxygen-containing waters above."
First Person Shooters (Games)

Tremulous Switching To Xbox Live, Exclusively 43

Posted by timothy from the console-yourself dept.
An anonymous reader writes "Darklegion Development and Microsoft have apparently been working on a new version of Tremulous for the Xbox 360. Timbor, project founder and a main developer of Tremulous, said this in a recent announcement: 'What does this mean for you? You will now be able to play Tremulous on Xbox Live with thousands of other gamers, earning achievements and showing off your gaming skill. In the best interest of maintaining a steady and secure Tremulous playerbase, Tremulous is going to be exclusively available for Xbox Live. Existing infrastructure will no longer receive official support. Players who have already been playing for at least three months can apply for a €5/$7 coupon as a show of our appreciation of your enthusiasm so far! What does this mean for the community? Hopefully nothing! While the production of Tremulous switches from its current open source development to a closed source environment handled by the very capable and experienced Microsoft engineers, the efforts of the community will still be valued. In this collaboration we have made it very clear that the Tremulous community is very important to the game, and Microsoft agrees with us on this point. We are confident that this move will not stifle the creative output of the community.'"
Biotech

Magnetism Can Sway Man's Moral Compass 586

Posted by CmdrTaco from the so-can-hot-chicks dept.
Hugh Pickens writes "Discovery News reports that scientists have identified a region of the brain which appears to control morality and discovered that a powerful magnetic field can scramble the moral center of the brain, impairing volunteers' notion of right and wrong. 'You think of morality as being a really high-level behavior,' says Liane Young, a scientist at MIT and co-author of the article. 'To be able to apply (a magnetic field) to a specific brain region and change people's moral judgments is really astonishing.' Young and her colleagues used functional magnetic resonance imaging to locate an area of the brain just above and behind the right ear known as the right temporo-parietal junction (RTPJ), which other studies had previously related to moral judgments. Volunteers were exposed to transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) for 25 minutes before reading stories involving morally questionable characters, and being asked to judge their actions. The researchers found that when the RTPJ was disrupted volunteers were more likely to judge actions solely on the basis of whether they caused harm — not whether they were morally wrong in themselves. The scientists didn't permanently remove the subjects' moral sensibilities and on the scientists' seven point scale, the difference was about one point, averaging out to about a 15 percent change, 'but it's still striking to see such a change in such high level behavior as moral decision-making.' Young points out that the study was correlation; their work only links the RTJP, morality, and magnetic fields, but doesn't definitively prove that one causes another."
Games

8-Year Fan-Made Game Project Shut Down By Activision 265

Posted by Soulskill from the of-doors-and-ways-out dept.
An anonymous reader writes "Activision, after acquiring Vivendi, became the new copyright holder of the classic King's Quest series of adventure game. They have now issued a cease and desist order to a team which has worked for eight years on a fan-made project initially dubbed a sequel to the last official installment, King's Quest 8. This stands against the fact that Vivendi granted a non-commercial license to the team, subject to Vivendi's approval of the game after submission. After the acquisition, key team members had indicated on the game's forums (now stripped of their original content by order of Activision) that Activision had given the indication that it intended to keep its current fan-game licenses, but was not interested in issuing new ones."
User Journal

Journal Journal: Slashdot moderation is awful 5

Journal by syousef

I am sick and tired of slashdot moderation. The fiction that "it sorts itself out" or "most people do the right thing" is laughable. Yet I've seen such drivel modded +5:Insightful while the original gripe is modded -1:Flamebait. or -1:Offtopic (How one is insightful while the other is offtopic is baffling) Way to be a welcoming mature, open minded, community.
Apple

Submission + - Can You Improve Perfection? Apple Barely Did (pcmag.com)

Submitted by
adeelarshad82
adeelarshad82 writes: "So, how do you improve the mighty iPod touch? Hmm. That's a question that seems to have Apple stumped. The third generation of iPod touches looks identical to the 2nd generation models, but the capacities and prices are improved: 8GB, 32GB, and 64GB. There's no built-in video camera, as had been rumored, which is a bit of a surprise, considering the less-expensive and much-tinier nano got one. With the touch, Apple's focus remains firmly on music, and, more so than ever, portable gaming. Along with a nice speed bump come some app organization improvements and new Genius features, all of which are welcome additions. Even if there's no exciting surprise with this touch iteration, after three long years, there's still not a better portable media player out there."

Submission + - Ebay denies new page design is broken, lays blame (ebay.com)

Submitted by
krick-zero
krick-zero writes: "Ebay recently rolled out a new page design. Many Ebay sellers are reporting issues with missing description text, resulting in lost sales. Buyers are reporting the same intermittent issue, on multiple platforms, with multiple browsers. After complaining to Ebay customer service, one user got this response...

I have reviewed several of your listings using my computer and had several of my coworkers view your listings as well and we are seeing the complete listings. Many times when buyers are not able to see the whole description or just bits and pieces it is due to browser issues they are having. A lot of times if they simply clear out their cache and cookies or change browsers (i.e. change from Internet explorer to Firefox or vice versa) they no longer have this problem.

"

Comment Re:The younger generation (Score 1) 166

by Aaron5367 (#29125883) Attached to: Schneier On a Generation Gap In Privacy
Woah, hold on here, I'm 17. I don't twitter, but I have friends that do. We care about privacy more than that statement makes us appear to. While they don't slashdot, I know that I haven't found one post (higher than 3) that I've disagreed with about privacy, and I think they would probably feel the same. Now I'll wait for someone to prove me wrong.

Comment Re:11 years later and still squirming/ (Score 1) 251

by Aaron5367 (#26558261) Attached to: Child Online Protection Act Appeal Rejected

Yes, these things take a while to sort themselves out. There is simply no other way to protect the rights of the citizens while maintaining a meaningful and functional government. Subtle violations of your rights take longer, because there is more disagreement over whether or not your rights were violated at all -- you might think that the DMCA is a violation of your rights, but there are plenty of people out there who feel that it is not and that in fact, the DMCA protects the rights of the citizens (copyrights precede free speech in the constitution), including you. Seriously, why do people think the system is deficient just because problems are not solved instantly?

Woah, what America do you live in?

Comment Re:But will the wifi work? (Score 1) 482

by Aaron5367 (#25581653) Attached to: Ubuntu 8.10 (Intrepid Ibex) Released
I'm going to remove all my mod points here to answer what I had to do, to get my AR5007 to work on multiple Linux distributions.

What I did (this might be over your head, but I don't have time to explain every bit of it) was get the latest madwifi build from the svn. I don't know if Ubuntu keeps those modules in their repos, but you might want to check unstable for them. The latest ones support my AR5007, so I'd assume they would work for you.

And really now, before we throw slander lets see how 'easy' it is to install Vista on my Acer Aspire 5520. The one time I reinstalled it I had to download every driver from the manufacturer's website (on a different computer, as Vista didn't recognize the chipset, which is nearly everything). So my Linux installs have been VERY easy compared to my Windows installs (XP wasn't any fun either).
The Courts

Psystar Will Countersue Apple 1084

Posted by kdawson from the take-that dept.
An anonymous reader sends us to CNet for news that Apple clone maker Pystar plans to countersue Apple. We discussed Apple's suit last month. "Mac clone maker Psystar plans to file its answer to Apple's copyright infringement lawsuit Tuesday as well as a countersuit of its own, alleging that Apple engages in anticompetitive business practices. Miami-based Psystar... will sue Apple under two federal laws designed to discourage monopolies and cartels, the Sherman Antitrust Act and the Clayton Antitrust Act, saying Apple's tying of the Mac OS to Apple-labeled hardware is 'an anticompetitive restraint of trade,' according to [an] attorney... Psystar is requesting that the court find Apple's EULA void, and is asking for unspecified damages."

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