Sarin - Slashdot User

Submission + - Microsoft makes free online version of Office (nwsource.com)

Submitted by walterbyrd on Sunday May 09, 2010 @03:19PM

walterbyrd writes: Microsoft will offer an online version of Office 2010 for free. I have to wonder, will this remain free indefinitely? Or is Microsoft just trying to firmly establish it's OOXML standard, then go back to business as usual?

Submission + - Project Macbook tablet (neowin.net)

Submitted by

FrankNFurter

on Wednesday May 05, 2010 @12:37PM

FrankNFurter writes: "What do you do with a Macbook the battery of which exploded? Why, try to turn it into a Mac tablet of course. A forum member on Neowin is trying just that, documenting his progress with pictures and videos."

Submission + - Apple iPad Jailbreaking Hacks (ifunia.com)

Submitted by lemoon on Wednesday May 05, 2010 @06:02AM

lemoon writes: We all know how the jailbroken community has changed the way we use our iPhone’s today. Apps like ProSwitcher, Backgrounder, qTweeter, YourTube, Google Voice, BTStack and so on have enabled iPhone and iPod touch users to do amazing things which otherwise would have never been possible. Now with the release of the new Apple iPad, will the device be the prime target of jailbreaking hacks?

http://www.ifunia.com/ipad-column/apple-ipad-jailbreak-hacks.html

Comment swimming pool (Score 1) 422

by Sarin on Saturday February 27, 2010 @05:41AM (#31295716) Attached to: What Has Your Phone Survived?

On my first night of my Ibiza holiday I dove, slightly intoxicated, into the swimming pool and stayed there for at least hour. Not sure if I also pissed in the pool.
I forgot my new iPhone was in the pocket of my swimming trousers. Next day I found my wet phone, still in the pocket, after weeks drying in the sun it worked again. I had to repace the battery though.
I bought a new iPhone in the meantime and gave the one from the pool to my girlfriend, she's very happy with it.

3D Blu-ray Spec Finalized, PS3 Supported 157

Posted by Soulskill on Friday December 18, 2009 @03:06AM from the but-at-least-one-dimension-will-have-drm dept.

Lucas123 writes "The Blu-ray Disc Association announced today that it has finalized the specification for Blu-ray 3-D discs. The market for 3-D, which includes 3-D enabled televisions, is expected to be $15.8 billion by 2015. Blu-ray 3-D will create a full 1080p resolution image for both eyes using MPEG4-MVC format. Even though two hi-def images are produced, the overhead is typically only 50% compared to equivalent 2D content. The spec also allows PS3 game consoles to play Blu-ray 3-D content. 'The specification also incorporates enhanced graphic features for 3D. These features provide a new experience for users, enabling navigation using 3D graphic menus and displaying 3D subtitles positioned in 3D video.'"

Parents Baffled By Science Questions 656

Posted by samzenpus on Thursday August 13, 2009 @12:57AM from the don't-get-smart-with-me dept.

Pickens writes "The BBC reports that four out of five parents living in the UK have been stumped by a science question posed by their children with the top three most-asked questions: 'Where do babies come from?', 'What makes a rainbow?' and 'Why is the sky blue?'. The survey was carried out to mark the launch of a new website by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills called Science: So what? So everything."

Microsoft Hardware Demos Pressure-Sensitive Keyboard 212

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on Friday August 07, 2009 @04:26PM from the wtb-vi-plugin-for-this-device dept.

Krystalo writes to tell us that Microsoft hardware has an interesting demo of a pressure-sensitive keyboard they have designed. While there are no currently announced plans to turn this into a shipping product, there are many cool uses that one could imagine a device like this providing. "The device will be put to use in the first annual Student Innovation Contest in Victoria, Canada, where contestants will be supplied with a keyboard prototype and challenged with developing new interactions for it. Contestants will demo their creations and attendees will vote for their favorite at the conference on October 5. $2,000 prizes will be given to the authors of programs deemed as the most useful, the best implementation, and the most innovative."

Psychopaths Have Brain Structure Abnormality 438

Posted by kdawson on Tuesday August 04, 2009 @11:49PM from the probably-a-funny-bump-on-the-head-too dept.

mmmscience writes "A group of scientists has identified a structure in the brain of psychopaths that is abnormal when compared with controls. The change is found in the uncinate fasciculus, a bridge of white matter that connects the amygdala (emotion/aggression brain region) and the orbitofrontal cortex (decision making region). Interestingly, the greater the abnormality in the region, the more severe the levels of sociopathy in a subject. The results were published as 'Altered connections on the road to psychopathy' in the journal Molecular Psychiatry. A researcher on the team suggests the finding could have considerable implications in the world of criminal justice, where such scans could one day be presented as evidence in a trial." The study's results have not yet been replicated by other researchers.

New Zealand Tree Stuck In Evolutionary Time Warp 337

Posted by Soulskill on Saturday July 25, 2009 @05:13AM from the decompress-the-shuttlebay dept.

sciencehabit writes "A eucalyptus-like tree from New Zealand is still waging a battle that should have ended over 500 years ago. The tree continues to sport evolutionary adaptations, such as barbed leaves, to protect it from a large, flightless bird known as a moa. There's just one problem: the moa went extinct around 1500 AD."

RIAA Moves To Keep Revenue Info Secret 130

Posted by Soulskill on Friday July 10, 2009 @07:11PM from the yes-your-honor-it's-100k-per-cd-trust-us dept.

NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "In the Boston, Massachusetts case SONY BMG Music Entertainment v. Tenenbaum, the Court had ordered the RIAA to produce certain revenue information, which would be relevant to a determination of the 'fair use' defense. The RIAA has now moved for a protective order to keep the information 'confidential.' In the opinion of the undersigned, the fact that the motion is made jointly by four competitors shows that any claim suggesting the information is valuable or 'proprietary' would be unfounded, and the sole purpose for making the motion is to keep the information out of the hands of lawyers for other defendants, thus increasing the defense costs in other cases."

Canada Considering Online Voting In Elections 324

Posted by timothy on Saturday June 27, 2009 @10:57PM from the no-more-polls-here-in-canada-south dept.

ehud42 writes "Slashdot readers generally agree that voting machines such as those from Diebold are a bad idea. Well, what about online voting? That is what the Vancouver Sun is reporting. Given that voter turnout in our most recent election was the worst on record, Elections Canada is kicking around the idea of allowing voters to register online, update registration information online, and maybe even vote online."

Comment not for a netbook (Score 2, Interesting) 291

by Sarin on Wednesday March 11, 2009 @03:46PM (#27155943) Attached to: Apple Touch-Screen Netbook?

the 17inch MacBook Pro has a lot of room beneath the keyboard.
Instead of a keypad, there could be room for a 10inch touchscreen.
It would add some extra value to this relative expensive member of the MacBook family.

Sony Makes It Hard To Develop For the PS3 On Purpose 616

Posted by Soulskill on Sunday March 01, 2009 @12:19PM from the how's-that-working-out-for-you dept.

adeelarshad82 writes "CNet reports on a bizarre comment from Sony's Computer Entertainment CEO in response to complaints from developers on how hard it is to develop games for the Playstation 3. 'We don't provide the "easy to program for" console that (developers) want, because "easy to program for" means that anybody will be able to take advantage of pretty much what the hardware can do, so then the question is, what do you do for the rest of the nine-and-a-half years?' Given that games heavily drive console sales, and the fact that the PS3 is already 8 million units behind the Xbox 360, I think making a developer's job harder is the last thing Sony needs."

Bill Would Require ISPs, Wi-Fi Users To Keep Logs 857

Posted by kdawson on Friday February 20, 2009 @09:44AM from the boon-for-disk-makers dept.

suraj.sun notes CNet reporting on bills filed in the US House and Senate that would require all ISPs and operators of Wi-Fi hotspots — including home users — to maintain access logs for 2 years to aid in law enforcement. The bills were filed by Republicans, but the article notes that the idea of forcing data retention has been popular on both sides of the aisle over the years. "Republican politicians on Thursday called for a sweeping new federal law that... would impose unprecedented data retention requirements on a broad swath of Internet access providers and is certain to draw fire from businesses and privacy advocates. ... Each [bill] contains the same language: 'A provider of an electronic communication service or remote computing service shall retain for a period of at least two years all records or other information pertaining to the identity of a user of a temporarily assigned network address the service assigns to that user [i.e., DHCP].'"

Do We Need a New Internet? 690

Posted by kdawson on Sunday February 15, 2009 @07:12PM from the alarmist-or-cassandra dept.

Richard.Tao and a number of other readers sent in a NYTimes piece by John Markoff asking whether the Internet is so broken it needs to be replaced. "...[T]here is a growing belief among engineers and security experts that Internet security and privacy have become so maddeningly elusive that the only way to fix the problem is to start over. What a new Internet might look like is still widely debated, but one alternative would, in effect, create a 'gated community' where users would give up their anonymity and certain freedoms in return for safety. Today that is already the case for many corporate and government Internet users. As a new and more secure network becomes widely adopted, the current Internet might end up as the bad neighborhood of cyberspace. You would enter at your own risk and keep an eye over your shoulder while you were there." A less alarmist reaction to the question was blogged by David Akin: "If you build a new Internet and you want me to get a license to drive on it, sorry. I'm hanging out here in v.1."

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