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Comment Re:I'll give you more than one (Score 1) 700

by dbug78 (#41641105) Attached to: Ask Slashdot: What Books Have Had a Significant Impact On Your Life?

The Bible. Except for atheists and agnostics, most people should insert their favorite holy book here.

In the USA, at least, everyone should list The Bible, even if they've never read it or don't believe a word of it. After all, it's largely because of The Bible that...

  1. Gay people can't marry.
  2. Women are second-class citizens who can't be trusted or expected to manage their own lives.
  3. Gays, non-whites, and non-Christians are second-class citizens and are treated with mistrust or contempt, sometimes to the point of assault or murder, and do not deserve to have their views reflected in government or society.
  4. Slavery was all good and well into the 1860's and race discrimination was still going strong 100 years later.
  5. Infant boys have parts of their genitals cut off.
  6. We are in perpetual war with much of the Middle East (the Qur'an shares much of the blame here).

Whether you believe The Bible or not, whether you've read The Bible or not, whether you even care about The Bible or not, it has restricted your liberty if you live amongst those who live by it.
Facebook

The Day Leo Traynor Confronted His Troll 594

Posted by Soulskill from the your-uppance-will-come dept.
McGruber writes "Dublin-based writer Leo Traynor has written a piece about confronting the troll who drove him off Twitter, hacked his Facebook, and abused and terrified his family. Quoting: 'I blocked the account and reported it as spam. The following week it happened again in an identical manner. A new follower, I followed back, received a string of abusive DMs, blocked and reported for spam. Two or three times a week. Sometimes two or three times a day. An almost daily cycle of blocking and reporting and intense verbal abuse. ... Then one day something happened that truly frightened me. I don't scare easily but this was vile. I received a parcel at my home address. Nothing unusual there – I get lots of post. I ripped it open and there was a Tupperware lunchbox inside full of ashes. There was a note included, saying, "Say hello to your relatives from Auschwitz." I was physically sick. ... In July I was approached by a friend who's basically an IT genius, and he offered some help. He said that he could trace the hackers and trolls for me using perfectly legal technology, which would lead to their IP addresses. I said yes. Then I baited them – I was deliberately more provocative toward them than ever I'd been before.'"
Handhelds

Amazon Debuts Kindle Paperwhite, Kindle Fire HD In 2 Sizes 307

Posted by timothy from the plus-they-wash-your-back dept.
Nerval's Lobster writes "Amazon used a Sept. 6 event in California to debut a range of products, including a front-lit [not back-lit, as originally reported] Kindle e-reader with a higher-resolution screen, an updated Kindle Fire, and the new Kindle Fire HD in two screen sizes. First, Bezos showed off a new version of the Kindle e-reader, the Kindle Paperwhite, complete with a front-lit, higher-resolution screen (221 pixels-per-inch and 25 percent more contrast, according to Amazon). The device weighs 7.5 ounces and is 9.1mm thin; battery life is rated at eight weeks, and the screen brightness is adjustable. He then showed off the updated Kindle Fire, before moving to the Kindle Fire HD, which features a choice of 7-inch or 8.9-inch screens, dual stereo speakers with Dolby Digital Plus, two antennas for better Wi-Fi pickup, and a Texas Instruments OMAP 4470 processor (which Bezos claimed could out-perform the Tegra 3). The Kindle Fire HD's 7-inch version will retail for $199 and ship Sept. 14, while the 8.9-inch version will cost $299 and ship Nov. 20. An 8.9-inch, 4G LTE-enabled version with 32GB storage will be available starting Nov. 20 for $499, paired with a $49.99-a-year data plan."
Science

The Sweet Mystery of Science 259

Posted by timothy from the the-leaven-is-the-best-part dept.
Hugh Pickens writes "Biologist David P. Barash writes in the LA Times that as a scientist he has been participating in a deception for more than four decades — a benevolent and well intentioned deception — but a deception nonetheless. 'When scientists speak to the public or to students, we talk about what we know, what science has discovered,' writes Barash. 'After all, we work hard deciphering nature's secrets and we're proud whenever we succeed. But it gives the false impression that we know pretty much everything, whereas the reality is that there's a whole lot more that we don't know.' Teaching and writing only about what is known risks turning science into a mere catalog of established facts, suggesting that 'knowing' science is a matter of memorizing says Barash. 'It is time, therefore, to start teaching courses, giving lectures and writing books about what we don't know about biology, chemistry, geology, physics, mathematics.' Barash isn't talking about the obvious unknowns, such as 'Is there life on other planets?' Looking just at his field, evolutionary biology, the unknowns are immense: How widespread are nonadaptive traits? To what extent does evolution proceed by very small, gradual steps versus larger, quantum jumps? What is the purpose of all that 'junk DNA"? Did human beings evolve from a single lineage, or many times, independently? Why does homosexuality persist? According to Barash scientists need to keep celebrating and transmitting what they know but also need to keep their eyes on what science doesn't know if the scientific enterprise is to continue attracting new adherents who will keep pushing the envelope of our knowledge rather than resting satisfied within its cozy boundaries."

Comment Bear in mind... (Score 1) 654

by dbug78 (#40990155) Attached to: GUI nostalgia draws me back to ...

Nostalgia translates from Greek as "painful homecoming". This is no place for happy memories. While I would probably find older versions of Windows painful to use now, I do not remember them that way.

Some of the contenders for me are Corel Wordperfect Suite 8-9, Quickbooks, Mac OS X, DOS Shell, Ins-Pro, RightNow...

Those last two probably take it. They're both so bad I'd have a hard time choosing.
Data Storage

Ask Slashdot: Storing Items In a Sealed Chest For 25 Years? 434

Posted by timothy from the termites-not-encouraged dept.
New submitter accet87 writes "We are celebrating the Silver Jubilee of our graduation next month and have come up with an idea where we will build an air-tight chest in which each of us will deposit something and will open the chest only on our Golden Jubilee, i.e. after another 25 years. I want to understand what kind of items can be safely stored for 25 years and what kind of precautions are required to be taken. I am sure things like paper, non-ferrous metallic objects, wood, etc., will hold up well. What about data storage electronically? I don't think CD/DVDs, etc., will be usable. Even if the data is retained, reading it in 2037 may be a challenge."
Google

Google Says Some Apple Inventions Are So Great They Should Be Shared 347

Posted by timothy from the gem-of-an-idea-in-there dept.
An anonymous reader writes "In attempting to fend off Apple's suit against Motorola Mobility and advancing its own patent litigation against Apple, Google, which is facing a lot of regulatory scrutiny in the U.S. and abroad over what some allege is abuse of standard essential patents, has been arguing that proprietary non-standardized technologies that become ubiquitous due to their popularity with consumers should be considered de facto standards."
Crime

Ten Cops Can't Recover Police Chief's Son's iPhone 277

Posted by Soulskill from the try-twenty-next-time dept.
Hugh Pickens writes "The Oakland Tribune reports that when Berkeley police Chief Michael Meehan's son's cell phone was stolen from a school locker in January, ten police officers were sent to track down the stolen iPhone, with some working overtime at taxpayer expense. 'If your cell phone was stolen or my cell phone was stolen, I don't think any officer would be investigating it,' says Michael Sherman, vice chairman of the Berkeley Police Review Commission, a city watchdog group. 'They have more important things to do. We have crime in the streets.' But the kicker is that even with all those cops swarming around, looking for an iPhone equipped with the Find My iPhone tracking software, police were not able to locate the phone. 'If 10 cops who know a neighborhood can't find an iPhone that's broadcasting its location, that shouldn't give you a lot of confidence in your own vigilante recovery of a stolen iProduct,' writes Alexis Madrigal. 'Just saying. Consider this a PSA: just buy a new phone.'"

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