Please create an account to participate in the Slashdot moderation system

 


Forgot your password?
Close
typodupeerror
×
Idle

India Wants Your Legs

Posted by samzenpus from the an-arm-and-a dept.
Things are tough economically everywhere but no place is tougher than the city of Tirupati, India where they are stealing legs. 'Holy legs' to be precise. The thieves got the original owner drunk and cut his leg off just below the knee after he passed out.
Hardware Hacking

Submission + - Garage Inventor May Cure Cancer

Submitted by clintonogamy
clintonogamy writes: A retired cancer survivor in Florida has invented a machine in his garage that uses RF to kill cancer cells. In brief, nanoparticles of gold or carbon that are coated to stick to cancer cells are injected into the patient, then the RF from his machine heats them, killing only the coated cells. It is now being investigated by a research team at the MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston.
From TFA...

"I noticed young kids losing their smiles, losing their hair. And I said to myself, 'Today's chemotherapy is cruel. There's gotta be a better way to cure cancer,'" Kanzius told ABC News. ... Using pie pans, spare parts from ham radios and know-how from his days as a radio engineer, he invented the first generation of what would become a machine that uses radio waves — not radioactivity — to fight cancer.
I wonder if it can run Linux...
The Internet

Submission + - FCC: 200,000 Cell Towers Need Backup Power (datacenterknowledge.com)

Submitted by
1sockchuck
1sockchuck writes: "The FCC is ordering telecom and wireless companies to provide backup power for cell sites and remote telecom facilities, hoping to keep communications networks running during natural disasters. The new rule was prompted by wireless outages during Hurricane Katrina. There are more than 210,000 cell towers in the US, as well as 20,000 telecom central offices that will also need generators or batteries. Municipalities are bracing for disputes as carriers try to add generators or batteries to cell sites on rooftops or water towers. The rules will further boost demand in the market for generators, where there are already lengthy delivery backlogs for some models."
Space

Submission + - First Evidence of Another Universe? 2

Submitted by blamanj
blamanj writes: Three months ago, astronomers announced the discovery of a large hole at the edge of our universe. Now, Dr. Laura Mersini-Houghton thinks she knows what that means. (Subscription req'd at New Scientist site, there's also an overview here.) According to string theory, there are many universes besides our own. Her team says that smaller universes are positioned at the edge of our universe, and because of gravitational interactions, they can be observed, and they're willing to make a prediction. The recently discovered void is in the northern hemisphere. They contend another one will be found in the southern hemisphere.
The Internet

Submission + - Captchas Thwarted By Striptease (msn.com)

Submitted by
BinarySkies
BinarySkies writes: "A new virus seems to have popped up which may push Internet scammers to the folds of what most would consider 'questionable tactics'. The virus spawns a "buxom, beautiful blonde" who creatively promises a progressive striptease for every word typed correctly. The catch? Each word is actually a captcha box, presumably from another website. Is this a new way for scammers to stay ahead of security? Seems more like a socially engineered human SETI@Home project."
Spam

Submission + - Verizon sends & profits from text message spam

Submitted by Anonymous Consumer Complaint
Anonymous Consumer Complaint writes: Verizon Wireless charges consumers for every text message they recieve, even if it is spam. Verizon customer support refuses to give refunds for text message spam. And the only options customer service discussed to address this issue are: 1) Cancelling all text messages 2) Changing the customer's phone number These are draconian options. However, what may not be known to many customers, is that there is a Verizon website that allows anonymous users to freely send text messages to Verizon Wireless phone numbers. http://vtext.com/ Thus, Verizon Wireless is enabling the sending of spam with its own website, charging customers for this easily abused service, refusing to give customers refunds, and when they complain, not making them aware that the spam could be coming from their own webservers.
Graphics

Submission + - HiRes Scan of 'Mona Lisa' Reveals Its History

Submitted by daevux
daevux writes: CNN reports that French engineer Pascal Cotte has discovered interesting details of the history of Da Vinci's "Mona Lisa" from a 240 megapixel scan of the artwork. Among the findings are the disappearance of eyebrows and eyelashes probably due to poor cleaning, and differences in skin tones.
Portables

Submission + - ATA Detains Passenger Over "Flight Mode" i

Submitted by
URSpider
URSpider writes: "C|Net, among others, is reporting that an ATA passenger was detained by police after arriving in Hawaii after repeatedly refusing to stop using his iPhone during the flight. The passenger claims that his phone was in "airline mode", which disables WiFi and cellular transmissions and renders the iPhone no different than an iPod. This comes hot on the heels of the recent announcement that Japanese airlines are banning the use of PSP's and headphones on all flights. With the proliferation of wireless-enabled devices, can flight attendants be expected to know which ones can be disabled? Can passengers be trusted to turn off WiFi and Bluetooth on their smartphones and gaming consoles?"
Sci-Fi

Submission + - Tron to be remade by Disney

Submitted by unassimilatible
unassimilatible writes: The Hollywood Reporter writes that Disney will remake the cult classic Tron, and has hired original Tron co-writer and director Steven Lisberger as producer and Joseph Kosinski as director.

The original, about a computer programmer thrust into a computer and forced to fight in games he helped create, is remembered for its sci-fi gladiator-style battles and groundbreaking special effects. It was the first movie to use computer-generated images instead of models and other optical effects in conjunction with live action. The arcade game based on the movie was so popular that it earned more than the movie.

The article also mentions that Kosinski will be remaking Logan's Run for Warner Brothers as well.

Comment Already pointless (Score 1) 348

by pHZero (#20559725) Attached to: Music Industry Set To Introduce the "Ringle"
A lot of my non-computer savvy friends got sick of paying for ringtones about a year ago and figured out how to use free music editing software to create little clips of their favorite songs. In fact, I don't know anyone anymore who doesn't know how to do this. How do these music companies think they're going to get away with charging $6-7 just because they threw in a ringtone?

Netcraft Says IIS Gaining on Apache 666

Posted by CmdrTaco from the trolls-rejoice-in-netcraft-story dept.
benjymouse quotes this month's netcraft survey "In the August 2007 survey we received responses from 127,961,479 sites, an increase of 2.3 million sites from last month. Microsoft continues to increase its web server market share, adding 2.6 million sites this month as Apache loses 991K hostnames. As a result, Windows improves its market share by 1.4% to 34.2%, while Apache slips by 1.7% to 48.4%. Microsoft's recent gains raise the prospect that Windows may soon challenge Apache's leadership position."
SuSE

Submission + - Lenovo intros ThinkPads with preloaded Linux (electronista.com)

Submitted by
JonathanF
JonathanF writes: "Sounds like an ideal mix for Linux geeks: Lenovo said today that they'll ship their rock-steady ThinkPads near the end of the year with Novell's SUSE Linux distro preloaded — and supported by Lenovo itself. No word on specs, but having a solid PC with an open-source OS sounds very appealing. Like the author of the article, though, I wonder whether Lenovo is offering Novell's distro because it's worried about that Microsoft Sword of Damocles hanging over its head if it chose an alternative like Red Hat or Ubuntu."
Microsoft

Submission + - Top 7 Microsoft Employee Bungles using Office (microsoft.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Microsoft insider Philip Su (of "Broken Windows Theory" fame) has published a hilarious take on the top 7 mistakes that Microsoft employees make using Microsoft Office. The article even manages to mention Unix, Hackers (the movie), and Hootie and the Blowfish. Worth reading if not only to feel a rewarding sense of smug satisfaction that even Microsoft employees sometimes struggle with using Microsoft software.
Security

Submission + - Harry Potter Zero-day exploit released (reuters.com)

Submitted by soccer_Dude88888
soccer_Dude88888 writes: Harry Potter Zero-day exploit released by Insecure.org

A hacker posting on a full disclosure email list run by InSecure.org claims to have obtained a copy of a transcript of the forthcoming book Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.

The self-proclaimed hacker — who calls himself Gabriel — claims to have compromised the PCs of one or more workers at Bloomsbury Publishing, the publisher of the Harry Potter books, by tricking them into visiting a hacker-run website infected with malicious code. Workers who visited the site supposedly became infected with a Trojan which allowed the unnamed cracker to extract a draft copy of the highly anticipated final installment of the Harry Potter series, due out on 21 July.

The claims are unsubstantiated by secondary sources and carry with them the whiff of hackers bragging about their cool skillz rather than authenticity.

Also the supposed motive — revealing the ending to make reading the book "useless and boring" and so prevent youngsters from exposure to "neo-paganism", is a little hard to swallow.

Responses to the post (titled Harry Potter 0day) on the email list has been dismissive. "Who are you people and why should I care? Maybe a new exploit would be more useful," said one unwhelmed punter. ®
Bootnote

The posted message claims to expose the names and ways in which two of the characters die, something that has been the subject of much speculation by fans of author J.K.Rowling and the boy wizard. For those not allergic to potential spoilers (of dubious provenance) the post can be found here.

http://seclists.org/fulldisclosure/2007/Jun/0380.h tml
It's funny. Laugh.

Submission + - World Shocked by Global Zombie Uprising (blogspot.com)

Submitted by
Analise
Analise writes: "The world was shocked today when bloggers everywhere began posting about their experiences during a freak zombie attack that seems to be occurring planetwide. Authorities are stumped as to where the zombies came from. The bloggers just want a few cricket bats and some goldfish crackers to tide them over until the attack subsides.

In all actuality, today is the day when bloggers the world over are participating in an activity known as Blog Like it's the End of the World. According to the posting, "The idea is that your posting for that day is written as if a zombie uprising were taking place — around the world, and in your home town. You blog about how it's effecting you, what you might witness, rumours or news that you hear, and so on. [...] It's a collaborative event, so the more you comment on other people's posts, link to them from your blog, spread rumours and riff on ideas, the better!""

Slashdot Top Deals

"Protozoa are small, and bacteria are small, but viruses are smaller than the both put together."

Close