Want to read Slashdot from your mobile device? Point it at m.slashdot.org and keep reading!

 


Forgot your password?
Close
typodupeerror
×

Comment Re:No wifi, less space than a Nomad, lame? (Score 1) 74

by Powercntrl (#49534061) Attached to: Apple Offers Expedited Apple Watch Order Lottery To Developers

Yeah. Must be the buyers who are braindead, not people like yourself (and CmdrTaco) who can't see what Apple actually does bring to the table.

I fell for the hype and bought a first generation iPhone when Apple knocked $200 off the price. Because, what do you know, at the time they weren't actually selling like hotcakes.

Let's not forget, back then it didn't run apps, couldn't record video, had no stereo bluetooth, didn't do MMS and maxed out at EDGE speeds (when even dumbphones were beginning to ship with 3G). The battery life was lackluster, the reception and call quality was abysmal. Sure, mobile Safari was pretty awesome at the time compared to the competition - when it wasn't constantly crashing, that is.

Fast forward to today and while my phone is still technically an "iPhone", it bears only a superficial resemblance to the original model that I frequently found myself cursing at, back in the day. The battery life is tolerable, reception and call quality is excellent. The screen size has been increased and the pixel density has doubled. The cellular data connection is faster than my cable modem at home. Web pages render in the blink of an eye and Safari only seems to crash on me once in a blue moon. I don't feel like I'm missing out on any essential features - stereo bluetooth, MMS, front facing camera, 1080p video recording, the gang's all here. Heck, it even has a feature of dubious value which I don't even use - a fingerprint reader.

The Apple Watch could have some potential, but you'd be idiotic to believe that potential will be realized on first generation hardware. I've been burned enough times on first generation Apple products (Mac Mini, iPhone and the iPad) that I've decided to sit this one out. But hey, the way I look at it is: the idiots buying this thing today are subsidizing the development costs of the future model I might someday actually want.

Oh, who am I kidding? I loathe wearing a watch and I don't need one to tell me to look at my phone. The damn thing may as well be a pocket pager, for all intents and purposes.

Comment Re:Why all the complaining? (Score 1) 112

by Powercntrl (#49533335) Attached to: Google Launches Project Fi Mobile Phone Service

This deal is good for some people, not good for others. If you think it'll work for you, sign up, if you don't, then don't. It seems more than a bit of a stretch to proclaim that the plan is a colossal failure because it does not meet your particular needs.

Don't know if you missed the part where it requires a Nexus 6. Due to Sprint being one of the network providers, it's also very likely to continue to be limited to "approved handsets" only, going forward. So, even if you think this is a great deal and the plans are up your alley, you still also have to want/already own a Nexus 6.

Personally, for my usage, Cricket's $35/mo plan is still a better deal. Plus, it runs on AT&T's network and I can use any unlocked GSM phone I want.
The Courts

Update: No Personhood for Chimps Yet 336

Posted by timothy from the do-you-have-standing dept.
sciencehabit writes: In a decision that effectively recognizes chimpanzees as legal persons for the first time, a New York judge [Monday] granted a pair of Stony Brook University lab animals the right to have their day in court. The ruling marks the first time in U.S. history that an animal has been covered by a writ of habeus corpus, which typically allows human prisoners to challenge their detention. The judicial action could force the university, which is believed to be holding the chimps, to release the primates, and could sway additional judges to do the same with other research animals. Update: 04/21 21:39 GMT by S : Science has updated their article with news that the court has released an amended order (PDF) with the words "writ of habeas corpus" removed, no longer implying that chimps have legal personhood. The order still allows the litigation to go forward, but we'll have to wait for resolution.
Earth

If Earth Never Had Life, Continents Would Be Smaller 64

Posted by timothy from the war-of-concretion dept.
sciencehabit writes It may seem counterintuitive, but life on Earth, even with all the messy erosion it creates, keeps continents growing. Presenting here this week at the annual meeting of the European Geosciences Union, researchers say it's the erosion itself that makes the difference in continental size. Plant life, for example, can root its way through rock, breaking rocks into sediment. The sediments, like milk-dunked cookies, carry liquid water in their pores, which allows more water to be recycled back into Earth's mantle. If not enough water is present in the mantle about 100 to 200 km deep to keep things flowing, continental production decreases. The authors built a planetary evolution model to show how these processes relate and found that if continental weathering and erosion rates decreased, at first the continents would remain large. But over time, if life never evolved on Earth, not enough water would make its way to the mantle to help produce more continental crust, and whatever continents there were would then shrink. Now, continents cover 40% of the planet. Without life, that coverage would shrink to 30%. In a more extreme case, if life never existed, the continents might only cover 10% of Earth.
Google

Google Ready To Unleash Thousands of Balloons In Project Loon 48

Posted by timothy from the buncha-crazies dept.
jfruh writes Google has figured out how to produce an Internet-broadcast balloon in a few hours, and is on the verge of unleashing Project Loon onto the world. The project, which will work with ISPs to beam LTE cellular signals to remote regions that don't have Internet access, will be working with local ISPs rather than selling broadband directly to customers.
Science

Scientists Close To Solving the Mystery of Where Dogs Came From 167

Posted by Soulskill from the evolved-to-fit-the-need-for-a-natural-vacuum-cleaner dept.
sciencehabit writes: For years researchers have argued over where and when dogs arose. Some say Europe, some say Asia. Some say 15,000 years ago, some say more than 30,000 years ago. Now an unprecedented collaboration of archaeologists and geneticists from around the world is attempting to solve the mystery once and for all. They're analyzing thousands of bones, employing new technologies, and trying to put aside years of bad blood and bruised egos. If the effort succeeds, the former competitors will uncover the history of man's oldest friend — and solve one of the greatest mysteries of domestication.

Comment 2 words: Government Auction (Score 1) 325

by Powercntrl (#49487443) Attached to: LA Schools Seeking Refund Over Botched iPad Plan

Sell the iPads at auction and sue the 3rd party software vendor for failing to deliver on their promises. Not sure if the news article is just daft or the school really thinks Apple should take back 120,000 used iPads because of what amounts to a case of very late (the article says this project started in 2013) buyer's remorse.
Movies

Jack Thompson Will Be Featured In BBC Film 'Grand Theft Auto' 118

Posted by Soulskill from the enjoy-your-legacy-buddy dept.
New submitter requerdanos writes: Former attorney and professional troll Jack Thompson is set to become a major motion picture figure, played by Bill Paxton, in the upcoming film Grand Theft Auto. According to Cinema Blend, "Paxton is in line to play Jack Thompson. A Miami lawyer, Thompson came into the public eye by frequently blasting Grand Theft Auto, creator Rockstar Games, and video game violence in general. Before that, he was known for attacking media companies who promoted both hip hop and sex. In 2008, allegations of professional misconduct, including harassment, defamation, intimidation, and false statements led to Thompson being disbarred."

Comment Re:flippers (Score 1) 290

A million eBay traders; riiiiiiiight.

The people who make moronic comments about flipping hard-to-get gadgets on eBay have clearly never sold on eBay. Very often, the winning bidder turns out to be a non-paying deadbeat or a scammer, and then you're stuck waiting a few days on eBay to refund your end-of-sale & listing fees or arguing with PayPal. Even if you manage a successful sale, eBay takes 10% and PayPal takes somewhere around 2.9%.

As the Apple Watch comes in more combinations than a bag of mixed nuts, I doubt there's as much flipping potential as say, a phone that's only available in 3 different colors.

Comment It's about time (Score 1) 86

by Powercntrl (#49279131) Attached to: Nintendo Finally Working On Games for Smartphones

For the current generation of very young kids, their first taste of video gaming is Angry Birds, Fruit Ninja, Candy Crush, Temple Run and the like, played on their parents' mobile devices. They're not going to ask for a Nintendo when they're older; they'll ask for an iOS or Android device. The days of selling "kiddie" handhelds with QVGA screens and $40 games are numbered. I'm just glad Nintendo has finally decided to start rolling with the tide, rather than face being washed under, like Polaroid.
United States

How To Execute People In the 21st Century 1081

Posted by samzenpus from the end-of-the-road dept.
HughPickens.com writes Matt Ford writes in The Atlantic that thanks to a European Union embargo on the export of key drugs, and the refusal of major pharmaceutical companies to sell them the nation's predominant method of execution is increasingly hard to perform. With lethal injection's future uncertain, some states are turning to previously discarded methods. The Utah legislature just approved a bill to reintroduce firing squads for executions, Alabama's House of Representatives voted to authorize the electric chair if new drugs couldn't be found, and after last years botched injection, Oklahoma legislators are mulling the gas chamber.

The driving force behind the creation and abandonment of execution methods is the constant search for a humane means of taking a human life. Arizona, for example, abandoned hangings after a noose accidentally decapitated a condemned woman in 1930. Execution is also prone to problems as witnesses routinely report that, when the switch is thrown, the condemned prisoner "cringes," "leaps," and "fights the straps with amazing strength." The hands turn red, then white, and the cords of the neck stand out like steel bands. The prisoner's limbs, fingers, toes, and face are severely contorted. The force of the electrical current is so powerful that the prisoner's eyeballs sometimes pop out and "rest on [his] cheeks." The physical effects of the deadly hydrogen cyanide in the gas chamber are coma, seizures and cardiac arrest but the time lag has previously proved a problem. According to Ford one reason lethal injection enjoyed such tremendous popularity was that it strongly resembled a medical procedure, thereby projecting our preconceived notions about modern medicine—its competence, its efficacy, and its reliability—onto the capital-punishment system. "As states revert to earlier methods of execution—techniques once abandoned as backward and flawed—they run the risk that the death penalty itself will be seen in the same terms."
Mars

Kim Stanley Robinson Says Colonizing Mars Won't Be As Easy As He Thought 228

Posted by Soulskill from the canceling-my-retirement-vacation dept.
An anonymous reader sends this excerpt from io9: Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy filled us all with hope that we could terraform Mars in the 21st century, with its plausible description of terraforming processes. But now, in the face of what we've learned about Mars in the past 20 years, he no longer thinks it'll be that easy. Talking to SETI's Blog Picture Science podcast, Robinson explains that his ideas about terraforming Mars, back in the 1990s, were based on three assumptions that have been called into question or disproved:

1) Mars doesn't have any life on it at all. And now, it's looking more likely that there could be bacteria living beneath the surface. 2) There would be enough of the chemical compounds we need to survive. 3) There's nothing poisonous to us on the surface. In fact, the surface is covered with perchlorates, which are highly toxic to humans, and the original Viking mission did not detect these. "It's no longer a simple matter," Robinson says. "It's possible that we could occupy, inhabit and terraform Mars. But it's probably going to take a lot longer than I described in my books."

Comment Re:This ex-Swatch guy doesn't have a clue (Score 5, Interesting) 389

And back in 2007 you'd be telling us the iPhone would present no threat to BlackBerry. And before that you'd have told us that the iPod would pose no threat to other mp3 players. The sheer amount of fault predictions that Slashdot nerds have made about Apple are hilarious.

You're revising history as much as Apple revises their products. A $599 phone (with no subsidy discount), locked to one carrier, that can't run 3rd party applications, doesn't support MMS, has poor call quality and no 3G support was no threat to Blackberry. A $399, Mac-only, MP3 player that lacks USB was no threat to other MP3 players.

The iPod didn't become a genuine threat to competitors (and a runaway success) until hell froze over and Windows support was added. The iPhone didn't become a threat to competitors until Apple allowed AT&T to subsidize it. By the time the products had overcome their respective major roadblocks to widespread adoption, the current versions resembled their initial predecessors in name and physical appearance, but most of the missing capabilities the nerd peanut gallery derided them for, had been addressed.

If anything, this is a cautionary tale that while the Apple Watch may eventually be yet another blazing success story for Apple, the model that goes on sale on April 24th will be nothing like the updated version that catapults it to mainstream popularity. Of course, it could also flop. As they said on Mythbusters, "failure is always an option." Either way, it will be an amusing show, and I'm sure plenty of people will have their own revisionist history to write when it succeeds or fails.

Slashdot Top Deals

Work continues in this area. -- DEC's SPR-Answering-Automaton

Close