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Comment Re:Linux + Sound = BAD! (Score 4, Informative) 78

by Chuckaluphagus (#23504982) Attached to: Penny Arcade Releases Episodic PC Game
The technical support forums for the game clearly show some people having sound issues on Linux, but I managed to get away clean.

For reference, I'm running Ubuntu 8.04 with PulseAudio on an AMD X2 using whatever integrated sound (Realtek, I think) is built into the motherboard. Sound works perfectly well, no stuttering, no lag.

Microsoft Trolling for New Acquisitions 142

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the playing-catch-up dept.
NewShinyCD writes "Sources tell Valleywag that startup Ustream.tv is in advanced discussions with Microsoft to acquire the lifecasting service for more than $50 million, but there are other companies in the bidding as well. Ustream is currently raising a very large initial round of VC financing, and Microsoft is attempting to grab them prefunding for a cheap price. Our tipster also mentions that Microsoft would use Ustream as a way to promote its Adobe Flash competitor, Silverlight." Relatedly, Microsoft has also announced their intent to buy Sidekick maker Danger. Financial details of the Danger buyout were not disclosed.
Microsoft

DoJ Extends Microsoft Oversight for Two Years 118

Posted by samzenpus from the problem-solved dept.
I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "The US Department of Justice has extended its anti-trust oversight of Microsoft by two years. This only applies to the requirement that Microsoft make protocol documentation available to competitors, though. All of the other requirements have expired, and Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly did not give the states complaining the full five years of oversight they requested. Still, this should prove useful given that one of Microsoft's new tricks is to use OOXML extensions to tie businesses to Sharepoint."
PlayStation (Games)

Submission + - Grand Theft Auto IV delayed

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: BBC reports that the game, which had been scheduled for release in October ahead of Christmas sales, is now due in mid 2008. Shares in the firm behind popular computer game Grand Theft Auto fell 16% after it said that its latest version of the popular game would be delayed. Take-Two Interactive Software said the late arrival of Grand Theft Auto IV meant it would record an annual loss. Full story: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/6928872.stm
Announcements

Submission + - Time travel barriers overcome... (newswise.com)

Submitted by
Samarian Hillbilly
Samarian Hillbilly writes: "Israeli physicist Amos Ori claims to have overcome many of the theoretical obstacles to time travel. He claims that a space-time warp could "evolve" on it's own with a little bit of a "push". Caveats, travel would only be possible between times that have developed this technology and implemented the infrastructure.
http://www.newswise.com/articles/view/532037/"
Portables

Submission + - The demise of the Nokia E90 communicator

Submitted by S3D
S3D writes: Nokia is not quite famous for the great smartphone design, but in the case of E90 Communicator hardware looks nice. However where Nokia completly failed is software side — the The Register think. The first mistake was replacing business oriented S80 platform with consumer oriented S60. S60 is designed for one-thumb actions — not an adequate choice for full-keyboard communicator. The article go on listing deficiencies and missing features, concluding that Nokia, trying to impress gadget bloggers completely forgot core market of business users. Immature 3rd party application market for Symbian make it unlikely those deficiencies will be fixed.
Wireless Networking

Submission + - Google Wants to Play in 700MHz Band

Submitted by
scubacuda
scubacuda writes: "The FCC's Wireless Telecommunications Bureau is soliciting feedback on Google's proposal for the 700 MHz band spectrum (Word ver), which currently is occupied by broadcasters in TV channels 52-69 and is being made available for wireless services. Google wants (a) the band to allow licensees to utilize "dynamic auction mechanisms", such as real-time auctions and per-device registration fees; (b) to "posit at least whether it would be in the public interest to mandate for some, or even all, of the commercial spectrum to be auctioned in the 700 MHz bands"; and (c) the unpaired 6 megahertz E Block (722-728 MHz) in the current lower 700 MHz band plan to be designated, "primarily or exclusively, for the deployment of broadband communications platforms." (More on the fight for the 700 MHz band here and )"
The Almighty Buck

Why Do Games Sell? 103

Posted by Zonk from the psychic-powers-beats-gang-violence dept.
simoniker writes "Game designer Pierre-Alexandre Garneau has published a new article compiling a list of factors that make games popular, and although he notes: "The test assumes that the game is good — if it's bad, chances are it won't sell no matter how high it scores on this test," his comparison of GTA 3 and Psychonauts tries to apply common-sense reasoning to why one sold well and the other did not."
The Internet

Submission + - The Pirate Bay launches 'Oscartorrents'

Submitted by gloom
gloom writes: After turning legal threats into entertainment and trying to create a new pirate state, what do you do next? You go for the gold of course. The Pirate Bay has launched oscartorrents.com — an easy-to-use torrent-site for finding good versions of this years Oscar nominees.

In their own words: "You haven't beaten us, so why not join us? Think of a new business model that doesn't involve overpriced pieces of plastic and skanky cinemas hawking cheap carbohydrates while relying on $6/hr projectionists who can't keep a film in focus — not to mention insulting your audiences by (to pick a few examples) surveilling us with nightvision glasses, searching bags, 30 minutes of commercials and bombarding us with ridiculous anti-piracy propaganda. Take a look at yourselves. Is it really any wonder we're winning?"

No lack of cohones in Sweden, that's for sure.
Microsoft

Journal Journal: MS copies feature, then patents it

Journal by jbgreer
Michael Kölling, a senior lecturer at the University of Kent and one of the developers of BlueJ, an educational development environment, realized last year that Microsoft had copied one of the BlueJ features into Visual Studio. Flattery, right? Well, recently he was informed that Microsoft has filed a patent describing the very same feature.

Michael's blog entry describing this here
Announcements

Submission + - Dinosaur extinction - meteor not to blame?

Submitted by
The Fun Guy
The Fun Guy writes: "Recent microfossil evidence casts fresh doubt as to whether an asteroid wiped out the dinosaurs. Prof. Gerta Keller of Princeton University: "We now have evidence that the Chicxulub impact occurred about 300,000 years before the end of the Cretaceous and thus didn't cause the mass extinction and, in fact, didn't cause any species to go extinct." These findings were presented during the October 2006 meeting of the Geological Society of America."
Censorship

Submission + - ABC warned over blogger shutdown

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Remember the story about ABC/Disney shutting down a blogger who criticized them? I am glad to announce that the tables have just turned on them. Electronic Frontier Foundation has warned them to drop the case against www.spockosbrain.com. If they fail to comply immediately, EFF has threatened to sue them for (a) misrepresentation of liability under DMCA, and (b) engaging in unlawful, unfair and fraudulent business practices.

This chilling abuse of DMCA to silence critics has gone on for long enough. I am glad EFF is fighting for the rights of bloggers around the world. I hope they manage to teach ABC a lesson in fair use.
Space

Submission + - New ice age theory: Sun's dimmer switch

Submitted by
amigoro
amigoro writes: "Most believe that the ice ages are the result of subtle changes in Earth's orbit, known as the Milankovitch cycles. According to an embargoed article to appear on Nature, one scientist think that is not the case. Robert Ehrlich of George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia, has developed a model of the sun which hypothesizes a dimmer switch inside the sun that causes its brightness to rise and fall on timescales of around 100,000 years — exactly the same period as between ice ages on Earth.

He extended the work of earlier scientists who calculated that magnetic fields in the sun's core could produce small instabilities in the solar plasma. These instabilities would induce localised oscillations in temperature, and his model shows that whilst most of these oscillations cancel each other out, some reinforce one another and become long-lived temperature variations oscillating around its average temperature of 13.6 million kelvin in cycles lasting either 100,000 or 41,000 years. Ehrlich says that random interactions within the sun's magnetic field could flip the fluctuations from one cycle length to the other.

The main problem with Milankovitch cycles is that they can't explain how the ice ages go from 100,000 year cycle to 41,000 year cycle. But they cycles predicted by Ehlrich's model are bang on with the observations."

Defending RIM Blackberry Against Productivity 120

Posted by CowboyNeal from the always-online dept.
Jasksk writes "Is Blackberry causing masses to lose productivity? This article on CoolTechZone.com clears the myth. The author writes, 'Ever since the patent litigation has settled between NTP and RIM, Blackberry has recaptured the headlines, but this time, it's because of the device itself. While numerous users, generally corporate executives, adore the device, the environment surrounding Blackberry isn't too positive. A number of recent reports and columns are portraying Blackberry (and similar solutions) as time wasting, productivity lowering behemoths that don't deserve to exist.'"

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