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Comment What about non-HTTP? (Score 5, Interesting) 362

by slushdork (#28640915) Attached to: Comcast DNS Redirection Launched In Trial Markets
I'm a Comcast "customer" in an affected "market" (Colorado). How will this affect DNS resolution requests for non-HTTP purposes? There is no way for the Comcast DNS servers to know what a DNS name resolution request is for: it could be for HTTP, or it could be for SSH, FTP, etc. So if I mis-type an FQDN hostname in an SSH command, will the DNS resolution request now suceed? Previously SSH would fail with a "cannot resolve hostname" error or something similar. Will it now try to connect with SSH to the Comcast "domain helper" servers? What about its effects on local DNS caching servers (e.g. dnsmasq)?

Also, this statement from Comcast's blog is blatantly false:

Despite the fact that web addresses are easier to remember than their IP address counterparts, sometimes you mistype an address. Let's say you type in http://www.comtcas.com/ (instead of http://www.comcast.com./ Normally you then sit and wait for the Web browser to time out, then you receive an error message that the site does not exist, and then you have to retype the correct address.

Normally you would *never* "sit and wait for the Web browser to time out" (well, these *are* Comcast's DNS servers after all, so in this specific case it might be true). Normally, your browser would get a DNS resolution failure and show you a built-in error page instantaneously. Now, on the other hand, you have to wait until your browser goes off and loads a page of Comcast ads.

Domain Helper my a$$!
Television

Octopuses Have No Personalities and Enjoy HDTV 482

Posted by kdawson from the or-was-that-redundant dept.
Whiteox writes about an Australian researcher named Renata Pronk, who has discovered that octopuses prefer HDTV. She recruited 32 gloomy octopuses from the waters of Chowder Bay. Previously, researchers have reported little success when showing video to octopuses. Miss Pronk's insight was that the octopus eye is so refined that it might see standard PAL video, at 25 fps, as a series of stills. She tried HDTV (50 fps) and her subjects reacted to the videos of a crab, another octopus, or a swinging bottle on the end of a string. A further discovery is that octopuses show no trait of individual personalities, even though they exhibit a high level of intelligence. It would certainly be possible to quibble about the definition of "personality" employed, and whether Miss Pronk had successfully measured it.
Medicine

VR Snow Game Functions As Pain Management 27

Posted by Soulskill from the doesn't-help-eye-pain-so-much dept.
eldavojohn writes "Burn victims — especially soldiers from war — have been proven to deal with therapy and pain better when immersed in a calm, cold virtual world. The game Snow World lets players hit targets with snowballs in a winter wonderland. The results of the study show unarguably that victims handle treatment and healing much better when their mind, eyes & ears are occupied — mind over matter, indeed."
Role Playing (Games)

New EVE Online Expansion Detailed 96

Posted by Soulskill from the excel-in-space dept.
Eurogamer reports on the EVE Online Fanfest, at which developer CCP revealed details on the game's next expansion, due out in March. It will be the biggest expansion yet for EVE, and it will "introduce 'Tech 3' modular ship designs, branching epic mission arcs, further improvements to the new player experience, and exploration of uncharted space through unstable wormholes. ... The focus of the expansion will be 'true exploration,' with players using new skills and modules to travel through wormholes into all-new, unconnected space." CCP also hinted that further graphical upgrades would be coming, and a standalone first-person shooter based on EVE may be in development for a console release.
Yahoo!

Yahoo Interested In a Microsoft Buyout, But Microsoft Isn't 174

Posted by Soulskill from the baby-come-back dept.
Linux Blog writes "The Google-Yahoo advertising deal has been rejected by the Department of Justice, and Google has pulled the plug on a search-ad partnership with Yahoo that would have given Yahoo major new revenue, but that raised antitrust concerns. Now, Yahoo has said the 'For Sale' sign is still on its front lawn and that Microsoft should buy the company. The internet portal's co-founder and CEO Jerry Yang made this comment despite the fact Yahoo rejected a $33 a share offer from Microsoft back in May. What a huge loss for the share holders. Microsoft was quick to respond that their buyout efforts were a thing of the past, but left the door open to a search partnership."
Biotech

Frozen Mice Cloned 272

Posted by CmdrTaco from the science-fiction-will-be-real-in-our-lifetime dept.
m0rphin3 writes "Japanese scientists have cloned mice whose bodies were frozen for as long as 16 years and said on Monday it may be possible to use the technique to resurrect mammoths and other extinct species. Could we finally see Jurassic Park become a reality, or perhaps use this for colonizing other galaxies?"
Announcements

Particle Physicists Share the Physics Nobel 67

Posted by timothy from the wave-physicists-get-it-simultaneously dept.
somegeekynick writes "The 2008 Nobel Prize in Physics has been jointly awarded to Yoichiro Nambu of the University of Chicago 'for the discovery of the mechanism of spontaneous broken symmetry in subatomic physics,' and Makoto Kobayashi of the KEK lab and Toshihide Maskawa of the Yukawa Institute for Theoretical Physics, both in Japan, 'for the discovery of the origin of the broken symmetry which predicts the existence of at least three families of quarks in nature.'"
Government

House Republicans Renew Push for Telecom Immunity 123

Posted by Soulskill from the wiretapping-a-dead-horse dept.
CNet is running an update to the controversy over giving telecommunications giants such as AT&T immunity from lawsuits involving the assistance they gave the NSA for illegal wiretaps. Republican leaders are circulating a petition which would force a vote on the bill passed by the Senate but not by the House. Democrats are holding out for a version of the FISA bill which opens the telecoms to prosecution. President Bush still intends to veto any such document. "At a wide-ranging House hearing on Wednesday, FBI Director Robert Mueller again urged passage of a bill that includes immunity for phone companies, arguing that 'uncertainty' among the carriers 'affects our ability to get info as fast and as quickly as we would want.' He admitted, however, that he was not aware of any wiretap requests being denied because of Congress' inaction."

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