Comment Re:tag: appleispants (Score 1) 288
I think the translation for 'pants' into Yankee is 'underwear' in which case it's a little less nonsensical. I believe 'trousers' is Brit for the Yankee 'pants'.
Comment Re:Could be fun (Score 2, Informative) 221
Very insightful post and I agree with just about everything you said, except this part:
The leftist view that we need to prop up these companies is completely wrong. The righties' hands-off approach to all things private inevitably leads to wild fluctuations as companies consolidate and dominate government and individual roles followed by epic collapses and rebuilding periods.
The government leaders of both left and right want to prop the companies up. It's everyone else who opposes this. As soon as the economy started tanking the 'free market' right turned immediately to corporate welfare, and the left went along with it because they're spineless.
The left has more to lose here as their base strongly disapproves of corporate welfare while the right's base is more interested in keeping their portfolios afloat than actual free market ideology.
Comment Re:Conspiracy (Score 1) 606
The Rothschild family, in order to destablize the US economy consipired with the Free Masons and the Illuminati
And Colonel Sanders, before he went tits-up.
Comment Re:No need for a bionic arm... (Score 1) 72
Another thing--most people use their left hand for chords on a guitar and the right for picking. The impression here seems to be that we'll see a YouTube video of this guy's bionic hand noodling up and down the neck, but chances are it will just be a pick holder.
Comment Re:What a tool... (Score 2, Funny) 457
I think you meant the company that makes the bombs for the B1. Airplanes are generally not intended to cause bodily harm, unless you're talking about NWA's economy class seating.
Comment Re:Amazing! They've invented... (Score 1) 438
There is a certain perfection in a device that only works where you don't need it and can't work where you would otherwise need it the most.
Like a solar-powered flashlight!
Comment Re:Dragging on? (Score 1) 317
My interpretation of this trial is that they're trying to get a criminal conviction, any criminal conviction, so that the findings of fact can be used in the civil wrongful death case. That way they can pretty much focus on just how big a wad of cash they're going to get.
Comment Re:shouldn't be legal (Score 2, Interesting) 637
I was curious, so I looked this up. It's murky, but apparently if he's been tried and convicted in Germany but won't serve his sentence then he can be tried again in the US. I guess they're arguing that his sentence was too light and should be treated as if he hadn't served his sentence.
I doubt Germany would have extradited him to the US for this crime since they'd tried him already, but if he goes to the US of his own free will there's no reason he couldn't be arrested and tried again under US law. It sounds like he'd have a good argument to get his case thrown out, though.
I doubt Germany would have extradited him to the US for this crime since they'd tried him already, but if he goes to the US of his own free will there's no reason he couldn't be arrested and tried again under US law. It sounds like he'd have a good argument to get his case thrown out, though.
1/3 of Amphibians Dying Out 467
Death Metal sends in a Scientific American article reporting that 2,000 of 6,000 amphibian species are endangered worldwide. A combination of environmental assaults, including global warming, seems to be responsible. "... national parks and other areas protected from pollution and development are providing no refuge. The frogs and salamanders of Yellowstone National Park have been declining since the 1980s, according to a Stanford University study, as global warming dries out seasonal ponds, leaving dried salamander corpses in their wake. Since the 1970s, nearly 75 percent of the frogs and other amphibians of La Selva Biological Station in Braulio Carrillo National Park in the Caribbean lowlands of Costa Rica have died, perhaps due to global warming. But the really bad news is that amphibians may be just the first sign of other species in trouble. Biologists at the University of California, San Diego, have shown that amphibians are the first to respond to environmental changes, thanks to their sensitivity to both air and water. What goes for amphibians may soon be true of other classes of animal, including mammals."
Submission + - Philadelphia's WiFi back online
muellerr1 writes: "A group of local Philadelphia investors is picking up where EarthLink left off last week. EarthLink abandoned their effort to provide municipal WiFi access because they couldn't lure enough paying customers. The project won't use any additional taxpayer dollars, and the new investors are thinking of using advertisements and fees for business use to support free access for ordinary citizens."
Gartner Touts Web 2.0, Scoffs At Web 3.0 187
An anonymous reader writes to mention that even though Web 2.0 is just now starting to gain widespread acceptance, there are those who are already trying to hijack the term Web 3.0. According to Gartner, there are quite a few new technologies and incremental modifications to existing Web 2.0 technology, but nothing that could equal the level of fundamental change exhibited by the shift to Web 2.0.
Submission + - MIT Student arrested for wearing circuit board art (3232zoo.com)
muellerr1 writes: An MIT student was arrested at Boston's Logan International Airport for wearing a suspicious device. She claimed it was artwork, and she was wearing it to impress potential employers at Career Day. Police said she's lucky she didn't end up in a body bag.
German Physicists Claim Speed of Light Broken 429
Byzanthy writes "Two German physicists claim to have broken the speed of light by using 'microwave photons.' According to Einstein's special theory of relativity, it would require an infinite amount of energy to accelerate any object beyond the speed of light. However, Dr Gunter Nimtz and Dr Alfons Stahlhofen, of the University of Koblenz, say they did it by using a phenomenon known as quantum tunneling.
The pair say they have conducted an experiment in which microwave photons — energetic packets of light — traveled 'instantaneously' between a pair of prisms that had been moved up to 3ft apart." New Scientist, however, is running an article that suggests Einstein can rest easy. Aephraim Steinberg, a quantum optics expert at the University of Toronto, explains that the German physicist's results aren't necessarily wrong, they are just being interpreted incorrectly.
SGI Sues ATI for Patent Infringement 283
Ynsats writes "The Register is reporting that SGI is filing suit against ATI for patent infringement. The suit alleges that ATI violated patent number 6,650,327, "Display system having floating point rasterization and floating point framebuffering", which was filed in 1998 and granted in 2003, in its Radeon graphics cards. This is coming fast on the heels of AMD's announcement of the intention to buy ATI for $4.2B and it doesn't seem to be swaying AMD's intentions. AMD hopes to finish the takeover by the end of this year. SGI has also issued an ominous statement stating that they have plenty of intellectual property left and there will be more litigation to come."
Laser TV — the Death of Plasma? 351
spoco2 writes, "As reported in major news outlets yesterday in Australia (The Age, the Herald Sun), a new television technology has been developed which is touted (by the developers) as far and away superior to both plasma and LCD. From The Age: 'With a worldwide launch date scheduled for Christmas 2007, under recognisable brands like Mitsubishi and Samsung, Novalux chief executive Jean-Michel Pelaprat is so bold as to predict the death of plasma. "If you look at any screen today, the color content is roughly about 30-35 per cent of what the eye can see," he said. "But for the very first time with a laser TV we'll be able to see 90 per cent of what the eye can see. All of a sudden what you see is a lifelike image on display."' The developing company, Arasor International, is said to be listing on the Australian stock exchange shortly."
