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Education

Submission + - SPAM: Animal dung and climate change

Roland Piquepaille writes: "As it is Sunday, it's time for a light story. According to a Northern Arizona University (NAU) news release, Jim Read is one of the world's foremost authorities on animal dung. In Been there, dung that, Mead says that 'although I don't think anyone is keeping track, I suspect we have the largest comparative animal dung collection in the world. If someone needs to identify dung, they send it to me.' And by analyzing the thousands of dung pieces in his collection, he has been able to detect the environmental changes that took place on the Colorado Plateau during the last 100,000 years. But read more for additional details and references."
Input Devices

Submission + - Why are remotes still a usability nightmare?

mecenday writes: My mom can run her Mac better than her entertainment system. It doesn't make any sense. Why is it that in 2008 most people are still struggling with at least three remotes? Why do I have 4 generically labeled video inputs on my TV? Ditto for the sound system... and why are they still offered to me whether or not a device is connected. Why are remote controls so overloaded with buttons when the trend in interface design is toward fewer elements?

After all these years components still can't talk to eachother. I should be able to just put a DVD in the player, the player should tell the TV it has a new disc, and the TV should ask me whether I want to play it, and if I say yes it should tell the sound system we're now pulling from the DVD player.

I know that entertainment companies have difficulty arriving at standards — Bluray v HDDVD. But we don't even see two competing standards here, and it seems like better integration would be such a killer feature. Why can't these companies come together to create standards, so I don't have to learn a whole new system every time I go to a friend's house?

Also, get off my lawn. ;)
Media

Submission + - Prince, Village People to sue The Pirate Bay (thelocal.se)

castrox writes: YMCA to all! It appears the long since famous artists Prince and The Village people are getting ready to sue The Pirate Bay, if only they can figure out who to sue.

The Local:

Sandberg has been hired on behalf of the US musicians by British law firm Web Sheriff, which wants to claim "several million dollars" in damages in both Sweden and the United States, he said.
It's unclear how many tracks of Prince and Village People are being swapped via TPB at this moment. They are to seek damages nonetheless, of course..

Pirate Bay spokesman Peter Sunde told The Local that Giacobbi [Web Sheriff president] had "no clue" what he was doing but that he was welcome to try to sue the file sharing site.
You might remember TPB taunting Web Sheriff multiple times in their much appreciated legal threats section.

Moon

Submission + - Full Lunar Eclipse for the Americas on Wednesday (nasa.gov)

KingArthur10 writes: "It will be the last lunar eclipse until December 2010, and it should be spectacular. Shades of turquoise and red will pour over the moon's surface as the it moves into the Earth's shadow around 8:43pm EST. As NASA reports: 'Transiting the shadow's core takes about an hour. The first hints of red appear around 10 pm EST (7 pm PST), heralding a profusion of coppery hues that roll across the Moon's surface enveloping every crater, mountain and moon rock, only to fade away again after 11 pm EST (8 pm PST). No special filter or telescope is required to see this spectacular event. It is a bright and leisurely display visible from cities and countryside alike. While you're watching, be alert for another color: turquoise. Observers of several recent lunar eclipses have reported a flash of turquoise bracketing the red of totality.....The source of the turquoise is ozone.' So, all of your amateur astronomers need to get out there and take pictures. If you have amazing, share them on sites like SpaceWeather or Flickr so that our Asian, European, African, and Australian brethren can witness the sight as well."
Idle

The Wasted Life of an Anteater Expert 2

samzenpus writes "Many people reach a point in their lives when they realize what they have done doesn't really matter or at least could be done by someone else just as well if not better. This anteater expert has reached that point."
Security

Phishing Group Caught Stealing From Other Phishers 129

An anonymous reader writes "Netcraft has written about a website offering free phishing kits with one ironic twist — they all contain backdoors to steal stolen credentials from the fraudsters that deploy them. Deliberately deceptive code inside the kits means that script kiddies are unlikely to realize that any captured credit card numbers also end up getting sent to the people who made the phishing kits. The same group was also responsible for another backdoored phishing kit used against Bank of America earlier this month."
Space

Asteroid Missions May Replace Lunar Base Plans 237

An anonymous reader alerts us to a story about efforts to modify the United States' space exploration plans to focus on asteroid missions rather than a lunar base. Scientists, astronauts, and former NASA division directors will be meeting next month to develop an alternative to the Bush administration's Vision for Space Exploration. We have previously discussed the possibility of a manned asteroid mission. Quoting: "Numerous planetary managers told Aviation Week & Space Technology they now fear a manned Moon base and even shorter sorties to the Moon will bog down the space program for decades and inhibit, rather than facilitate, manned Mars operations--the ultimate goal of both the Bush and alternative visions. The first lunar sortie would be flown by about 2020 under the Bush plan. If alternative-vision planners have their way, the mission could instead be flown to an asteroid in about 2025."
Movies

Submission + - Cloverfield gave me a headache (sffmedia.com)

bowman9991 writes: "I've just watched J. J. Abram's new flick Cloverfield and it's given me a massive headache. SFFMedia reviews the latest science fiction monster movie from J J Abram's and ends up with a sore headThe Blair Witch-style camera movement is claustrophobic, non-stop, and at times unbearable. Just imagine a film you've recorded on your camera equipped mobile phone and then spliced together pretty much randomly on your PC's video editing software, and you'll get the idea. With a running time of only 90 minutes it's very short, perhaps because test audiences were getting extreme motion sickness and had to be sedated. Or maybe the mobile phone's memory card ran out of storage space? When something dramatic happens, which after the first 20 minutes is pretty much the entire movie, the camera goes nuts. The camera operator has probably been locked up by now."
Enlightenment

Submission + - Counter-strike and Everquest banned in Brazil (gotfrag.com)

yuri82 writes: Procon, a federal entity established to defend the consumers' rights, has already begun apprehending all Counter-Strike and EverQuest copies in the state of Goiás, as these titles have been considered "inappropriate" and "harmful for consumers".
Procon is already investigating several LAN centers in the state, and starting yesterday, seventeen have been notified. According to Procon, these games have to be deleted from every computer, otherwise the owner will have to pay a daily fine of almost $3,000 USD and may have his establishment being closed. In stores, all Counter-Strike and EverQuest copies have been removed from the shelves and sent to the Ministry of Justice.
Read more at gotfrag.com in english or here in portuguese.
Now that's just silly. With the corruption and crime rates we have (I'm from Brazil) you'd think the people here would be worried about something more important than computer games...

Education

Submission + - The impaticence of the Google Generation 1

profBill writes: As a fifty something professor who teaches introductory computer science, I am very aware that the 20 somethings in my class are much more at ease with computers than any other generation. However, does that mean they are more adept at using those computers? Apparently not, according to the researchers at University College of London (http://www.bl.uk/news/2008/pressrelease20080116.html). Their research indicates that while more adept at conducting searches, they also show "impatience in search and navigation, and zero tolerance for any delay in satisfying their information needs". Moreover, this behavior "(is) now becoming the norm for all age-groups, from younger pupils and undergraduates through to professors".

The panel makes two conclusions: That libraries (and I wonder what a library will be come the future anyway) will have to adapt, and that the information processing skills of todays young people are lacking.

The question is, why are those skills lacking and, if they are, what can be done about it?
Privacy

Submission + - Employees find Privacy Leak, then punished (channel3000.com)

DeeQ writes: University of Wisconsin-Madison officials have advised more than 200 employees their personal information was inadvertently released on the Internet. The information included e-mail addresses, phone numbers and Social Security-based campus ID numbers of faculty and staff who made purchases from a campus computer shop. It had been accessible on a campus Internet site for at least a year.

Spokesman Brian Rust said the university learned of the potential exposure after a staffer found information about his own purchase during a routine online search. He said employees involved in the exposure were reprimanded but declined to say what their punishment entailed. He said there's no indication the information was misused.

The revelation is the third privacy breach disclosed by state government agencies this month.

Software

Submission + - The Most Anticipated Video Games of 2008 (pcworld.ca)

PCWorldCanada writes: With 2007 pretty well covered, it's time to turn our gaze to all the great, big budget titles we have to look forward to. So, with an eye to the future, here are the 10 most anticipated games of 2008.

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