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Submission + - Cryptography to be export-controlled again, now under Wassenaar Arrangement? (theverge.com) 1

Submitted by spuk
spuk writes: Apparently, the 41 states signatory of the Wassenaar Arrangement, lead by the UK, are planning to try to control international negotiation of cryptography and other security related software (particularly "deep package inspection" software). Such software would be treated and internationally regulated as weapons.

Submission + - Elegant Solution Found For Vexing von Neumann-Day Math Problem (cornell.edu) 1

Submitted by cold fjord
cold fjord writes: A famous math problem that has vexed mathematicians for decades has met an elegant solution ... Graduate student Yash Lodha, working with Justin Moore, professor of mathematics, has described a geometric solution for the von Neumann-Day problem ... in the early 20th century ... mathematicians first proved that a ball that exists in three-dimensional space can be chopped into a finite number of pieces ... and can be reassembled, like a jigsaw puzzle, into two balls, each the size of the original ball. This is known as the Banach-Tarski paradox. von Neumann ... was the first to describe the reason behind it: He attributed it not to the geometry of 3-D space, but to the algebraic properties of the symmetries inherent to the sphere. ... von Neumann further observed that if a group contains free groups, which are groups that have a finite alphabet and no rules, then it must be non-amenable. He posed the question of whether the opposite is true – are there groups that do not contain free groups and are also non-amenable? ... mathematician Alexander Olshanskii cracked it, although Olshanskii’s group had an infinite set of rules. ... Lodha describes a group that has only nine rules, a natural geometric model, is non-amenable and does not contain free groups. ... among his most valuable insights was one first described by ... Bill Thurston, Fields medalist ... which involved a way of expressing the group ... as a “continued fractions model.” — The academic paper.

Submission + - Bitcoin (Probably) Isn't Broken

Submitted by Trailrunner7
Trailrunner7 writes: In the wake of the publication of a new academic paper that says there is a fundamental flaw in the Bitcoin protocol that could allow a small cartel of participants to become powerful enough that it could take over the mining process and gather a disproportionate amount of the value in the system, researchers are debating the potential value of the attack and whether it’s actually practical in the real world. The paper, published this week by researchers at Cornell University, claims that Bitcoin is broken, but critics say there’s a foundational flaw in the paper’s assertions.

Bitcoin is a decentralized cryptocurrency that depends upon the honesty of its users to publish each of their transactions in a central, public ledger. The Cornell paper, written by Ittay Eyal and Emin Gun Sirer, says that if a group controls one third of the Bitcoin mining resources, it can then begin mining “selfishly” mine blocks and keep them secret from the rest of the miners. Then, when the chain that this group has mined is longer than the public one, it can publish its chain and have the authoritative one, since Bitcoin will always ignore the shorter block chain when there’s a fork.

The idea of a majority of Bitcoin miners joining together to dominate the system isn’t new, but the Cornell researchers say that a smaller pool of one third of the miners could achieve the same result, and that once they have, there would be a snowball effect with other miners joining this cartel to increase their own piece of the pie. However, other researchers have taken issue with this analysis, saying that it wouldn’t hold together in the real world.

“The most serious flaw, perhaps, is that, contrary to their claims, a coalition of ES-miners [selfish miners] would not be stable, because members of the coalition would have an incentive to cheat on their coalition partners, by using a strategy that I’ll call fair-weather mining,” Ed Felten, a professor of computer science and public affairs at Princeton University and director of the Center for Information Technology Policy, wrote in an analysis of the paper.

Submission + - Ars Technica writer plagiarizes space history posts

Submitted by Greg Lindahl
Greg Lindahl writes: Last May, I really enjoyed reading an Ars Tecnica post “The secret laser-toting Soviet satellite that almost was” [down, see mirror at archive.org.] It turns out that most of the details were taken from an article titled Soviet Star Wars published in the Smithsonian Air & Space Magazine in 2010. Here are the details of the plagiarism, including some other space history articles with similar copying by the same author. Ars Technica's response? Unhistory! They've removed the posting, but haven't published a retraction or explanation.

Comment Unhinged minority? (Score 1) 1144

by Ellie K (#45056323) Attached to: Slashdot Asks: How Does the US Gov't Budget Crunch Affect You?

You believe that the GOP represents an "unhinged minority"? I don't think that is true. Or rather, I think that there are many, maybe even the majority, who aren't well represented by either party. The current Democrat regime is all about deregulation, privatization, anti-labor and ceding wealth to Wall Street. By "Wall Street", I don't refer to the financial sector. Consumer finance, life insurance, small business banking, accountants and actuaries do productive work and contribute positively to the economy. Most of Wall Street isn't even Wall Street any longer, just a few massive investment banks, private equity partnerships, hedge funds and Carl Icahn-types. All of Obama's second term cabinet members are scions of very wealthy families, his ambassadorial appointments were chosen from financiers who were major campaign contributors, with zero diplomatic experience. It wasn't like this in 2008, but it is now. They call themselves Democrats, but they are more venal and corrupt, in terms of (selectively) favoring big business and other special interests than we've had in a long time.

The GOP has not offered an appealing alternative, though they would be wise to try.

One could just as easily say, "If the Democrat Party wins, then American democracy loses". Everyone loses if we have one-party rule.

Comment An address on the steps of the Capitol... (Score 1) 1144

by Ellie K (#45056239) Attached to: Slashdot Asks: How Does the US Gov't Budget Crunch Affect You?

Ah man, now I want to see Boehner give an address on the steps of the Capitol holding a sawed-off shotgun...

I know this will sound terrible, but I felt a frisson of delight at that image. I don't know about Boehner; Any honest Congressman giving an address on the steps of the Capitol while holding a (fully intact) shotgun, saying something genuinely constructive... yes, that would make me very happy.

Comment Re:As a non-American... (Score 1) 1144

by Ellie K (#45056185) Attached to: Slashdot Asks: How Does the US Gov't Budget Crunch Affect You?

... it only affects me by having too many stories about it on /.

Similar to Eurovision on Twitter :o) but grim instead of fun. I hope this won't go on for as long as the Eurovision contest. Many critical parts of the U.S. government have about four weeks of reserves, then they'll have exhausted all operating funds.

Comment Slashdot demands recognition! (Score 1, Interesting) 130

by Ellie K (#45056107) Attached to: Newly Discovered Meltwater Streams Flow Beneath the Antarctic Ice Sheet

Altmetrics is a new-ish bibliometic service for scholarly journal articles, including Nature, which is where this was published. Altmetrics includes mainstream media coverage as as well as social media appearance counts e.g. SciBlogs, Twitter as valid data. Physorg is mentioned but I do not see Slashdot. We, the Slashdot collective, demand recognition!

* Unless we are deemed insufficiently social? Anti-social? Of course not.
** Altmetrics is beta-ish, possibly open source, so my indignation is mostly insincere.

Submission + - We don't want your Coffee (ponyfoo.com) 1

Submitted by bevacqua
bevacqua writes: It isn't JavaScript, it just compiles down to it. Stop trying to subjugate people on StackOverflow by answering their JavaScript questions with CoffeeScript code. Stop trying to get JavaScript help posting Coffee code we don't understand.

Submission + - Fighting Zombies? Chevrolet Reveals New 'Black Ops' Concept Truck (motorauthority.com)

Submitted by cartechboy
cartechboy writes: Whether its the Mayan calendar, a rough economy, or a fear of zombies, there are people who are currently preparing for the end of the world, coming, like, soon. And they can attract some fringe elements. So maybe those elements are worth a little truck marketing. Yesterday at the Texas State Fair, Chevrolet unveiled a "Black Ops" concept truck that it says will "explore the extremes of preparedness." The truck comes with a vault storage unit, solar power pack, gas masks, gloves, a military first aid kit, a folding shovel, a generator and some rope. Twinkies apparently not included.

Submission + - Shoe thrown at Iran's President Rouhani while rhyton returns home (cnn.com)

Submitted by Ellie K
Ellie K writes: Upon his return to Tehran Airport today, an Iranian threw a shoe in the Iranian president's direction. According to CNN and Fararu, the semi-official media of Iran, it was an act of protest over President Rouhani's recent conversation with U.S. President Obama.

The historic conversation between the two world leaders was associated with more positive activities as well, including the return of a 2700-year-old Persian artifact in the shape of a rhyton. The rhyton was smuggled into New York in 2003, but languished in a U.S. customs warehouse for decades:

Customs officials had wanted to return it to Iran... but frigid relations between Washington and Tehran kept it in bureaucratic limbo.

* A rhyton is a mythical beast with a lion's body and the head of a bird of prey.

Comment Re:Does it make money? (Score 1) 56

by Ellie K (#44915735) Attached to: Twitter Seeking To Go Public

Does Twitter even make money?

Positive net revenue? Or have a clearly stated business plan that will result in prophit? Uncertain. The secret S-1 is a red phlag, regardless oph what Business Insider says.
* I apologize; my "eph" key is broken, thus my misspellings.

Comment Twitter IPO (Score 1) 56

by Ellie K (#44915701) Attached to: Twitter Seeking To Go Public

I honestly think it's going to be yet another fiasco for the tech sector.

I honestly think you are likely to be correct. I use Twitter a lot. It has given me amazing opportunities, that I would never have had otherwise, to interact and share my opinions with people who are so remote from me in distance, intelligence, fame, fortune*, accomplishment and occasionally notoriety.

Here's the problem: Who will pay to sustain that? I haven't. Other users don't either. There are promoted Tweet advertisements. Do they generate adequate revenue to sustain Twitter? I doubt it, but maybe they will. This bizarre IPO, without a public S-1, is troubling, to say the least. Somehow, Twitter needs to generate revenue while remaining (reasonably) open and unbiased as a communications platform. I want them to succeed, but don't know how they will do that.
* Distance: far
* Intelligence: above me
* fame and fortune: I have none; etc.

Submission + - Neither Dem nor Repub, Zuck 'Pro-Knowledge Economy'

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes: Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg's search for more talented people in America, aka immigration reform, brought him to Washington, DC last week. 'The issue is there aren’t enough talented people who we can bring into the country,' explained Zuckerberg, 'and that is a real issue that people feel.' When asked to place himself on the political spectrum — "Liberal, conservative, Libertarian, Democrat, Republican, or something else?" — Zuckerberg rambled for a few minutes before replying, "So um, I dunno. I think it's hard to affiliate as being either a Democrat or Republican. I'm pro-knowledge economy." No word if Zuckerberg, from whom the President has sought advice, is also still strongly pro-youth. Valleywag's Nitasha Tiku explains why she feels Zuck's 'pro-knowledge' politics are just more corporate bullshit. "Zuckerberg's personal political beliefs are important," argues Tiku, "because he has invested and solicited millions of dollars for FWD.us, a secretive politically-active non-profit (sometimes called a stealth PAC) that is trying to influence the way immigration legislation is written. While Zuckerberg' touted FWD's “novel structure”.(a “mother group” with Republican and Democrat arms), Tiku wasn't buying the spin. "Trying to appease both sides of the aisle for your own personal gain," she wrote, "is hardly a 'novel' approach."

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