SamP2 - Slashdot User

Submission + - Breaking Open Facebook with Open Source Software (newscloud.com)

Submitted by

NewsCloud

on Tuesday October 30, 2007 @03:50PM

NewsCloud writes: "Since last December, Facebook has grown from 12 to 47 million users and third party developers have launched more than 6,000 applications with its API. While privacy advocates have been concerned about Google for the past several years, most of us are just beginning to comprehend Facebook's growing impact on who, when, what and how we connect with friends. Microsoft's recent $240 million investment in the company gives it all the capital it needs for further growth. Last August, Wired published some unusual stories (see Replace Facebook Using Open Social Tools and Slap in the Facebook: It's Time for Social Networks to Open Up) describing how consumers might link together a variety of third party services to emulate Facebook and ultimately calling on the open source software community to build alternatives to the service. Inspired in part by Wired, I've posted some ideas describing what would be needed for an open source architecture for social networking."

Submission + - Courageous Blogger Wins 1.5 Year Legal Battle! (fixyourthinking.com)

Submitted by

FixYourThinking

on Tuesday October 30, 2007 @09:21AM

FixYourThinking writes: "After nearly one and a half years of harassment from a relentless attorney, it seems that quietly a blogger in South Carolina has won a monumental ruling in favor of bloggers. In a summary judgement requested by the Defendant Philip Smith was able to obtain a special sanction after the Plaintiff attorney put a "notice of lien" (called lis pendens) on Smith's residence. The judge also reprimanded the Plaintiff attorney for abusive deposition and court procedure. The case set forth the following; "It's not the format; it's the content and intention that make text journalism / reporting""

Submission + - CAPTCHA broken - thanks to a virtual stripper (bbc.co.uk) 3

Submitted by

Dynamoo

on Tuesday October 30, 2007 @05:27AM

Dynamoo writes: "A few months ago there was some speculation that spammers had managed to break the security CAPTCHA for many webmail systems and were using them to spread viruses and junk email. The problem was that no-one could actually demonstrate a mechanism to defeat the security code.

However, an novel approach has been documented by the BBC, suggesting that a virtual stripper application may be partly to blame. The woman in the application progressively undresses if the user types in the correct CAPTCHA code.. a code that is actually being generated by the Yahoo! mail security check. The application itself is a trojan, dubbed TROJ_CAPTCHAR.A by Trend."

Submission + - Intel's 45nm patch machinery exposed (tweakers.net)

Submitted by

Roboticles

on Sunday October 28, 2007 @05:47PM

Roboticles writes: "Tweakers.net has paid a visit to Intel's laboratories in the Californian town of Folsom, the birthplace of the 45nm CPU. We spoke to lead architect Stephen Fisher about the development of the Penryn chip and the day the first A0 version arrived. We were shown the machinery used to test and patch the 45nm processor, which is currently being manufactured in Arizona for release next month."

Submission + - Crysis Performance Bad News for You (pcper.com) 1

Submitted by

Vigile

on Saturday October 27, 2007 @08:08PM

Vigile writes: "Anyone that plays PC games has heard about the upcoming Crysis title for some time and yesterday the single player PC demo was finally released! After being just about a month late, you can grab the 1.7GB at all the popular file hosting sites and gamers can get their hands on the most anticipated title of the year. It was expected that Crysis would set a new benchmark for image quality but the initial performance preview over at PC Perspective indicates it might be even more of a system crippler than initially thought. Even the best-in-class 8800 GTX has trouble at common resolutions like 1600x1200!!"

Submission + - Rochester judge holds RIAA evidence insufficient

Submitted by

NewYorkCountryLawyer

on Saturday October 27, 2007 @06:15PM

NewYorkCountryLawyer writes: "Judge David G. Larimer, presiding in Rochester, New York, has denied an RIAA application for default judgment on the ground that the RIAA's evidence was insufficient, in that it contained no details of actual downloads or distributions, and no sufficient evidence that defendant was in fact Kazaa user "heavyjeffmc@KaZaA". The decision (pdf) concluded that "there are significant issues of fact regarding the identification of the defendant from his alleged "online media distribution system" username". (In case you're unfamiliar with the term "online media distribution system", that's because it is a term the RIAA coined 4 years ago to describe p2p file sharing accounts in its lawsuits; the term is not known to have been used by anyone else anywhere else.) In August a similar RIAA default judgment motion was denied on the ground that the pleadings failed to allege sufficient factual details supporting a claim of copyright infringement, in a San Diego, California, case, Interscope v. Rodriguez."

Submission + - Poll: Third of Americans believe in ghosts (cnn.com) 1

Submitted by on Friday October 26, 2007 @05:10PM

An anonymous reader writes: According to a poll conducted by the Associated Press, one third of people believe in ghosts. The article describes a story of a family who left their house in fear of ghosts haunting it. Other poll findings indicate that one-fifth of people believe in spells and witchcraft, and 48 percent in extra-sensory perceptions (down from 66 percent a decade ago). Interestingly, while belief in ghosts and witchcraft is more prevalent in poorer families and minorities, belief in ESPs is more likely among the more educated and white. Finally, liberals and Democrats are more likely to be superstitious than conservatives and Republicans. The article also provides a link with detailed instructions on what to do if your house has ghosts.

Submission + - Unreal Tournament 3 Performance Revealed (pcper.com)

Submitted by

Vigile

on Friday October 12, 2007 @10:01AM

Vigile writes: "The Unreal Tournament 3 demo might just be dropping today, but with a launch on the PC, PS3, Xbox 360 and even an in-box Linux client it will definitely be one of the best titles out for the holiday. With an early take on the UT3 demo's performance, PC Perspective has posted an article that compares cards from NVIDIA and AMD in both single and dual-GPU configurations to see which are the best performers. It turns out that even mid-range cards are going to be more than capable of playing UT3 at impressive image quality levels."

Submission + - Superefficient Solar Cell from Silicon Nanocrystal 1

Submitted by

chinmay7

on Friday August 17, 2007 @05:15PM

chinmay7 writes: "Researchers at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), have shown that silicon nanocrystals can produce two or three electrons per photon of high-energy (blue and UV) sunlight. The small size of nanoscale crystals results in the conversion of this energy into electrons instead of heat. Solar cells made of silicon nanocrystals could theoretically reach more than 40% efficiency, compared to 20% efficiency of the best conventional silicon solar cells.
An article in the Tech Review goes into more detail."

Submission + - 10 Reasons it doesn't pay to be "The Computer (lifereboot.com) 1

Submitted by on Friday August 17, 2007 @03:46PM

An anonymous reader writes: LifeReboot.com has an article discussing 10 Reasons it doesn't pay to be "The Computer Guy." Reasons vary from the declining cost of computers to some less obvious but still valid points. The article begins with a familiar scene: a group of strangers take immediate interest in you after mentioning you work with computers.

Submission + - Failing Our Geniuses [Link Corrected]

Submitted by saintlupus on Friday August 17, 2007 @03:14PM

saintlupus writes: Time has an interesting article about the failure of the US educational system to properly deal with gifted students. For example, up to ten times as much money is spent nationwide on educating "developmentally disabled" students as gifted ones. Does No Child Left Behind mean that nobody can get ahead, either?

Submission + - Poll: What would your billionaire hobby be? 4

Submitted by MontyApollo on Friday August 17, 2007 @12:39PM

MontyApollo writes: Poll: What would your billionaire hobby be?

Space Company
Sports Team Owner
Venture Capitalist
Political Foundation
Social/Charitable Foundation
Science/Tech Foundation
Just Party/Travel/Personal Hobbies and nothing else
Cloning Research Company for spare parts
Cloning an army of CowboyNeals to rule the world

Submission + - Heat wave shuts down Alabama reactor (chron.com)

Submitted by

mdsolar

on Friday August 17, 2007 @11:45AM

mdsolar writes: "In a first for the US, one of three nuclear reactors at the Browns Ferry nuclear plant in Alabama has been shut down because the Tennessee River is too hot to provide adequate cooling for the waste heat produced by the reactor. This is happening as the TVA faces it's highest demand for power ever reports the Houston Chronicle. This effect has been seen in Europe in the past forcing reduced generation, but the US has, until now, been immune to the problem. The TVA will buy power elsewhere and impose higher rates, owing to reduced river flow as a result of drought."

Submission + - Strict German Computer Crime Law Now in Effect (beskerming.com)

Submitted by

SkiifGeek

on Sunday August 12, 2007 @05:35PM

SkiifGeek writes: "With little fanfare, section 202c of the German computer crime laws came into effect over the weekend. Worryingly for Security professionals, the laws make the mere possession of (creates, obtains or provides access to, sells, yields, distributes or otherwise allows access to) many useful tools illegal. A similar law was proposed for the UK, however it was modified prior to passing through parliament due to the outcry from the industry.

Phenoelit, KisMAC, the CCC, and the Month of PHP Bugs are just some of the relatively high profile projects and groups to have already taken measures to remove or modify content under this law."

Slashdot Top Deals