grassy_knoll - Slashdot User

Submission + - Groups launch $200M gigabit-per-second broadband project (networkworld.com)

Submitted by alphadogg on Wednesday May 23, 2012 @03:17PM

alphadogg writes: An Ohio startup company has raised $200 million to fund gigabit-per-second broadband projects in six university communities across the U.S., the company announced Wednesday. Gigabit Squared will work with the University Community Next Generation Innovation Project (Gig.U), a coalition of 30 universities focused on improved broadband, to select six communities in which to build the ultra-fast broadband networks, they said. The two organizations will select winning communities between November and the first quarter of 2013, Mark Ansboury, president of Gigabit Squared, said. The new project comes at an important time, when many commercial broadband providers have stopped deploying next-generation networks, said Blair Levin, executive director of Gig.U and lead author of the FCC's 2010 national broadband plan.

Submission + - Interview With Bioethicist Jonathan Moreno About Military Neuroscience (vice.com)

Submitted by

pigrabbitbear

on Wednesday May 23, 2012 @03:10PM

pigrabbitbear writes: "Who’s driving a lot of neuro research? The military. Much of it is health related, like figuring out how to make prosthetics work more seamlessly and helping diagnose brain injuries. But the military’s involvement highlights the basic ethical quandary of neurological development: When our brains pretty much define who we are, what happens when you start adding tech in there? And what happens when you take it away?

Jonathan Moreno is quite possibly the top bioethicist in the country, and along with Michael Tennison, recently penned a fascinating essay on the role and ethics of using neuroscience for national security. He also recently updated his book Mind Wars, a seminal look into the military’s work with the brain. In this interview he discusses brain implants, drones, and what will happen when military tech hits the civilian world."

Submission + - Indy 500 Drivers Get Earful of MEMS Accelerometers (eetimes.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 23, 2012 @03:05PM

An anonymous reader writes: Believe it or not, but this weekend there will be six MEMS accelerometers inside the ears of each Indy 500 driver--three inside each ear. In the event of a crash, a black box between their legs records the G-forces exerted on the drivers head to instantly determine if the driver has a concussion. Drivers used to have to wait around to see if their head hurt after a race before going for medical help, but now concussions can be determined ahead of time so that preventative medicines can be administered to keep their brains from swelling. I knew that some of these drivers had 'big heads' but now their size is actually being measured with accelerometers :)

Submission + - Nvidia, Citrix Bringing Graphics Power to the Cloud (wired.com)

Submitted by

MikeatWired

on Wednesday May 16, 2012 @05:15PM

MikeatWired writes: "The chip giant Nvidia has combined forces with Citrix to deliver graphics processing power from the cloud. The companies have teamed up to integrate Nvidia’s new virtual GPU technology with Citrix’s XenDesktop and XenServer hypervisor desktop virtualization offering to '[extend] GPU capability beyond power users like design engineers and radiologists to other workers in the organization who need access to large 3-D models but don’t require the power of a dedicated graphics card.' But the new virtual graphics power is not quite on-demand just yet. The 3-D-capable VGX cloud platform, which holds up to four Kepler GPUs with 16GB, will only be available as joint beta trials that are not expected until the end of the year. 'Scalability of this new technology looks very promising. While GPU sharing has been available for some time with XenApp HDX 3D, it has been limited to DirectX-based applications compatible with Windows Server 2008 R2 Remote Desktop Services (RDS), with scalability of no more than 10 or 12 users per high-end graphics card,' Citrix’s Derek Thorslund writes in a blog post. This new offering runs on standard Windows 7 virtual desktops and supports both DirectX- and OpenGL-based applications, he added."

Submission + - Canada's Internet Surveillance Bill: not dead after all (www.cbc.ca)

Submitted by Maow on Wednesday May 16, 2012 @04:59PM

Maow writes: Despite a recent story claiming that Canada's Bill C-30, covering internet surveillance, has died a "lonely" death, the minister responsible claims otherwise.

"Public Safety Minister Vic Toews is denying reports that the Harper government intends to quietly shelve its controversial online surveillance bill, C-30. Speaking to reporters on Wednesday morning, Toews insisted the legislation was moving ahead."

This is the bill that you either support, "or you stand with the child pornographers."

Submission + - ACM ICPC Programming Contest Finals on Thursday - Live Broadcast Available (acmicpc.org)

Submitted by

jazdc

on Wednesday May 16, 2012 @04:57PM

jazdc writes: "The world's oldest and largest programming contest, the ACM International Collegiate Programming Contest, ICPC, is about to be decided for the 36th time. On Thursday May 17th, 10:00-15:00 CET, the 2012 ICPC World Finals are held in Warsaw, Poland. This year, 112 teams of three battle it out over who will be crowned World Champions. The contest is broadcast live, the show (which, based on previous years, tries to mimic broadcasts of sporting events) starting an hour before and ending an hour after the contest itself."

Submission + - Facebook tracking for messages now active (tech-stew.com)

Submitted by

techfun89

on Wednesday May 16, 2012 @04:55PM

techfun89 writes: "Facebook messages now feature the ability to determine if the message you sent a friend has been read.

Every message you send now has this turned on by default. The message gets marked as "seen" if the person is actively chatting or checking their messages. No matter where you send the message from, whether your phone or the web it is enabled.

This change goes along with Facebook's new privacy policy which was updated last Friday. Some may feel the added feature of message tracking is a good addition. Yet for others this brings up questions, those of privacy and also what exactly "seen" may mean."

Submission + - A DVR Ad-Eraser Causes Tremors at TV Upfronts (nytimes.com)

Submitted by gollum123 on Wednesday May 16, 2012 @04:48PM

gollum123 writes: As with past technological threats, network executives are closing ranks against a Dish Network device that undermines the broadcast business model. The disruptive technology at hand is an ad-eraser, embedded in new digital video recorders sold by Charles W. Ergen’s Dish Network, one of the nation’s top distributors of TV programming. Turn it on, and all the ads recorded on most prime-time network shows are automatically skipped, no channel-flipping or fast-forwarding necessary. Some reviewers have already called the feature, called the Auto Hop, a dream come true for consumers. But for broadcasters and advertisers, it is an attack on an entrenched television business model, and it must be strangled, lest it spread elsewhere.

Submission + - Leisure Suit Larry remake will be "be dirtier than anything on the Internet" (gameshampoo.com)

Submitted by chronodev on Monday April 16, 2012 @08:03AM

chronodev writes: Replay Games Inc's Kickstarter Campaign, Make Leisure Suit Larry come again!, has raised over $350,000 out of the $500,000 goal, with 16 days to go as of the time of writing this article.

In a Reddit IAmA, addressing a concern that "adult jokes and saucy environment in a computer game" are no longer a novelty today because of the web, creator Al Lowe promised that the remake will be "dirtier than anything on the internet."

Submission + - NYTimes says Cybercrime Risk Vastly Overstated (nytimes.com)

Submitted by retroworks on Sunday April 15, 2012 @09:45PM

retroworks writes: Dinei Florencio and Cormac Herley write that cybercrime, like unrestricted fishing, depleted gullible and unprotected users, producing diminishing returns (over-phishing?). They argue that the statistics on the extent of losses from cybercrime are flawed because there is never an under-estimation (or gain) reported. Do they underestimate the number of suckers gaining internet access born every minute? Or has cybercrime become the "shark attack" that gets reported more often than it occurs?

Submission + - Egypt Banned Porn, But How Much of the Internet Is That? (vice.com)

Submitted by

pigrabbitbear

on Wednesday April 04, 2012 @03:23PM

pigrabbitbear writes: "The recent web pornography ban in Egypt has raised questions about the evils of censorship (and porn) and the changing tide of popular attitude of Egyptians. It perhaps reflects the emerging influence of more conservative Muslim elements in government, a shift . Apparently the same ban was passed 3 years ago but was not enforced because their filtering system was not effective.

But porn bans are nothing new. Other countries with strict censorship laws like China and Saudi Arabia have successfully implemented bans that restrict pornography along with anything else they deem inappropriate for public viewing. In 2010 the UK discussed a ban that would require users to specifically request access to pornographic material from their internet service providers. And porn-banning rhetoric has even stomped through the US news media over the last few months, thanks to GOP also-ran Rick Santorum claiming President Obama is failing to enforce pornography laws. (There have also been some awesomely ridiculous pornography PSAs.)"

Submission + - MyUnity - Unity desktop easy tweaking tool (amateurgeek.net)

Submitted by

sikedestroya

on Wednesday April 04, 2012 @03:20PM

sikedestroya writes: "MyUnity is small and simple tool in active development, which combines the most important parameters of Unity in several sections in one window."

Submission + - BYOD And The Hidden Risk Of IT Security (infoworld.com)

Submitted by

snydeq

on Wednesday April 04, 2012 @03:18PM

snydeq writes: "When employees use personal devices for business purposes, too much security can create more risk than it prevents, writes Advice Line's Bob Lewis. 'Risk comes in two forms. Some risks are possibilities of increased costs; the remainder are risks of decreased revenue. The former gets the most attention because those are the ones that happen in big bites — and are the most visible,' Lewis writes. 'But risks that lead to less revenue are arguably more important. They come in such forms as customer dissatisfaction, reduced innovation, poor collaboration among employees and with business partners and customers, and employee apathy. Information security has, for the most part, focused its attention on the pitfalls of increased cost, which has led to its being one of the biggest sources of revenue risk. It doesn't have to be that way, but it will be unless and until business leaders insist on alternatives to the traditional lock-'em-down-and tie-'em-up so-called best practices'"

Submission + - Minecraft Creator's New Game Called 0x10c (0x10c.com)

Submitted by silentbrad on Wednesday April 04, 2012 @03:14PM

silentbrad writes: As announced last month, Notch — creator of Minecraft — is working on a sandbox space game (no, not the Mars Effect April Fools joke, though it's similar). "The game [0x10c] is still extremely early in development, but like we did with Minecraft, we expect to release it early and let the players help me shape the game as it grows. The cost of the game is still undecided, but it's likely there will be a monthly fee for joining the Multiverse as we are going to emulate all computers and physics even when players aren't logged in. Single player won't have any recurring fees. ... The computer in the game is a fully functioning emulated 16 bit CPU that can be used to control your entire ship, or just to play games on while waiting for a large mining operation to finish. Full specifications of the CPU will be released shortly, so the more programatically advanced of you can get a head start."

Submission + - How to Cheat eBay Sellers and Scam PayPal (benchmarkreviews.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 04, 2012 @03:06PM

An anonymous reader writes: Most people are familiar with eBay, the website with an endless catalog ready for purchase. Like many, I've needed to purchase an out of production item and found it available from International sellers. I will also occasionally use eBay to sell random unwanted items to help fund the upgrade or repair. Overall my experience has remained positive, but very recently my opinion of eBay and its banking service PayPal have significantly changed. I have discovered that eBay and PayPal have policies in place that blindly protects buyers, even when they're clearly out to scam and abuse honest sellers.

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