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Comment Wrong number (Score 4, Funny) 584

When carrying a pager for one of Google's farms I occasionally get messages from unknown numbers saying things like "WHERES THE STUFF YOU DIDNT SHOW". So obviously some people still use them.

I'm sometimes tempted to text back "Double dumbass on you" or something else inflammatory -- then sit back and watch the 6 o'clock news. But that would be evil.

Space

SpaceX's Fourth Launch Attempt RSN 71

jcgam69 writes "SpaceX's Falcon 1 is on the pad in the South Pacific Kwajalein Atoll ready for its fourth launch attempt, according to a blog post over the weekend from SpaceX CEO Elon Musk. The countdown is scheduled for Tuesday, Sept. 23, between 4 p.m. and 9 p.m. PDT, though the launch window will extend through Thursday if need be."
Science

Oldest Skeleton In New World Discovered 485

Death Metal Maniac writes "Dubbed Eva de Naharon, or Eve of Naharon, the female skeleton has been dated at 13,600 years old. If that age is accurate, the skeleton along with three others found in underwater caves along the Caribbean coast of the Yucatán Peninsula could provide new clues to how the Americas were first populated. The skeletons' skulls hint that the people may not be of northern Asian descent, which would contradict the dominant theory of New World settlement. 'The shape of the skulls has led us to believe that Eva and the others have more of an affinity with people from South Asia than North Asia,' González explained."
Moon

Ares V Rocket Bigger and Stronger For Moon Mission 295

wooferhound writes "In a move to make the heavy-lift vehicle more robust (predicting an increased launch thrust requirement) to send four astronauts, a lunar lander plus supplies, NASA has announced the Ares V rocket will be beefed up to cater for our future needs to get man back to the Moon. This huge vehicle is now designed to carry payloads of over 156,600 lb (71,000 kg), some 15,600 lb (or 10%) more than the original concept. Ares V was originally designed to be approximately the same length as the original Saturn V lunar rocket (361 feet or 110 metres long), but to accommodate an extra booster engine and extra payload volume, Ares V will be 381 feet (116 metres) long. This upgrade will be capable of sending far more instrumentation into space, an extra 15,600 lb (7,000 kg, or the equivalent mass of a male African elephant)."

McCain Asks Supporters To Campaign On Blogs 889

Vote McCain in 2000! writes "McCain is not the stranger to technology some think him to be. McCain is now asking supporters to stump for him on blogs. Republican Web 2.0 consultant David All was effluent with praise for this outreach, calling it 'smart' and 'unique.' McCain's blogger outreach section has a handy list of political blogs which might be interested in hearing about McCain, such as the DailyKos, Crooks and Liars, and Think Progress. You can even report your posts to the campaign and 'receive points for your success,' though the page doesn't say what exactly the points are good for." Slashdot is not on their suggested blogs list. Can't imagine why.
Biotech

Scientists Image an HIV Particle Being Born 129

FiReaNGeL alerts us to a huge development in virology and microscopy: by using a specialized microscope that only illuminates a cell's surface, scientists at Rockefeller University have watched, in real time, hundreds of thousands of molecules coming together in a living cell to form a single particle of HIV-1. A video is available on Rockefeller's front page. "By zeroing in at the cell's surface, the team became the first to document the time it takes for each HIV particle, or virion, to assemble: five to six minutes. 'At first, we had no idea whether it would take milliseconds or hours,' says Jouvenet. 'We just didn't know.' 'This is the first time anyone has seen a virus particle being born,' says Bieniasz, who is an associate professor and head of the Laboratory of Retrovirology at Rockefeller and a scientist at the Aaron Diamond AIDS Research Center. 'Not just HIV,' he clarifies, 'any virus.'"
Security

Malware vs. Anti-Malware, 20 Years Into The Fray 62

jcatcw writes "Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols considers the dissimilarities between malware of yore and current infiltrations as we approach the 20th anniversary of the Robert Morris worm. Modern malware apps curl up and make themselves at home in your system, where they wait for a chance to snatch an important password or a credit card number. Welcome to the era of capitalist hacking. Any self-respecting malware program today is polymorphic, making signature-based antivirus approaches difficult. Heuristics and virtual sandboxes offer alternatives, but all such methods are reactive. Unfortunately, monitoring lists and networks is about the only current alternative."
The Internet

Scientology's Credibility Questioned Over Video Channel 450

stonyandcher writes to share that the Church of Scientology has come under fire for some items on their recently launched video channel. Most notably, claims have been leveled that dignitaries in one of their videos were faked and at least one of the people featured in the video is claiming their statements were taken out of context.
The Internet

Acid3 Race In Full Swing, Opera Overtakes Safari 261

enemi writes "Just a few days after Safari released version 3.1, Opera employee David Storey writes on his blog that they've overtaken Apple's browser in the Acid3 test. In the race to be the first to reach the reference rendering, Opera's software leads now with 98%, closely following by Safari with 96% and Firefox 3 beta 4 with 71%. He also noted the implemented features will not make a public appearance in the following weeks, because they are getting close to releasing Opera 9.5. That version has been under public testing since September and the new CSS3 color modes and font rendering features might further delay this. They will probably show the score in a preview build soon and wait for a post 9.5 stable build to release the new features to the public." Update: 03/26 21:21 GMT by Z : Opera is now at 100%, apparently, with Safari close behind at 98%. Update: 03/27 by J : Public build r31356 of WebKit (Safari's rendering engine) is at 100%.
Microsoft

158 Pages of Microsoft's Dirty Laundry 296

KrispyRasher writes "Even internally, Microsoft couldn't agree on what the base requirements to run Vista were, but that didn't stop it from inaccurately promoting the OS as running on some hardware. 158 pages of Microsoft internal emails reveal scandalous truths about the squabbles that took place in the lead up to Vista's launch."
Security

Serious Vulnerability In Firefox 2.0.0.12 355

Oh, Not Now writes "Mozilla Firefox 2.0.0.12, mere hours old, is vulnerable by default to a directory traversal trick, via the view-source mechanism. Although mitigated by the NoScript plug-in, this is quite a serious bug — the default installation is vulnerable from the get-go."
United States

Science Debate 2008 322

bhmit1 writes "BusinessWeek is reporting about Science Debate 2008, an attempt to put the scientific issues front and center in the US Presidential race. After 12,000 scientists signed on in support of the idea of a debate focused on science, no campaign has replied to an invitation to such a debate. The article notes that only one candidate has said much about science issues in the campaign, and that some who are running are sufficiently anti-science as to deny evolution. There is a link to a comparison of the candidates' positions on issues informed by science. (Yes, Ron Paul is included.)"
User Journal

Journal Journal: What if we all biked to work? 2

Here is an article related to building a 'Bicycle Highway'. This type of structure could help combat current Obesity issue plaguing the country's suburban population. Since most of us who live in the suburbs tend to commute to the nearest city to work, and all we're doing is sitting in the car, on the way to work as well as at work, when we go home, and when we relax at night. Well if we could eliminate this sedentary lifestyle by using some of the time we require to get to work by biking, then
Media

Submission + - Russian ploar submarine video faked

billlion writes: According to The Guardian (Sat 11 August, p3), and The Guradian Online the videos shown by the state-controlled Russian TV channel Rossiya of the Russian submarines (MIR 1 and 2) planting a flag on the sea bed at the North pole were faked, and included shots from the James Cameron film "Titanic". The scam was spotted by a 13 year old Finnish boy Waltteri Seretin.

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