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Bug

Microsoft Zunes Committing Mass Suicide 785

Posted by CmdrTaco from the i-bet-a-bricked-zune-is-still-warm dept.
jddeluxe writes "There are multiple reports springing up all over the internet of a mass suicide of Microsoft 30GB Zune players globally. Check Zune forums, Gizmodo, or other such sites; the reports are spreading rapidly, except apparently to the Microsoft official Zune site."

Comment Re:How, indeed. (Score 0) 331

by Eighty7 (#26161415) Attached to: How Apple Could Survive Without Steve Jobs
Yeah, that's why I said "high profile" projects. Apple has done some great work on webkit with standards & javascript engines & they deserve some credit. Darwin has somewhat less visibility, but FreeBSD owes a lot to Apple. I can't think of even a minor project with that much MS support. Can you?

The APSL is more restrictive, but it IS a free software license & that's a lot better than BSD's network stack did under microsoft. If the KHTML/Darwin people disapproved of this behavior, they were free to choose a different license. It makes no sense to grant people rights & frown when they exercise those rights.
Space

Future of Space Elevator Looks Shaky 486

Posted by kdawson from the a.-c.-clarke-quaking-in-his-grave dept.
lurking_giant writes "In a report on NewScientist.com, researchers working on development of a space elevator (an idea we have discussed numerous times) have determined that the concept is not stable. Coriolis force on the moving climbers would cause side loading that would make stability extremely difficult, while solar wind would cause shifting loads on the geostationary midpoint. All of this would likely make it necessary to add thrusters, which would consume fuel and negate the benefits of the concept. Alternatively, careful choreography of multiple loads might ease the instability, again with unknown but negative economic impacts."
Space

Alien Comet May Have Infiltrated the Solar System 208

Posted by kdawson from the starseed-lure dept.
New Scientist has a piece about Comet Machholz 1, whose uncommon molecular composition suggests, but does not prove, that it may be an interloper from another star system. "Comet Machholz 1 isn't like other comets. David Schleicher of the Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona, measured the chemical makeup of 150 comets, and found that they all had similar levels of the chemical cyanogen (CN) except for Machholz 1, which has less than 1.5% of the normal level. Along with some other comets, it is also low on the molecules carbon-2 and carbon-3."
Books

Reading Guide To AI Design & Neural Networks? 266

Posted by kdawson from the open-the-library-doors-hal dept.
Raistlin84 writes "I'm a PhD student in theoretical physics who's recently gotten quite interested in AI design. During my high school days, I spent most of my spare time coding various stuff, so I have a good working knowledge of some application programming languages (C/C++, Pascal/Delphi, Assembler) and how a computer works internally. Recently, I was given the book On Intelligence, where Jeff Hawkins describes numerous interesting ideas on how one would actually design a brain. As I have no formal background in computer science, I would like to broaden my knowledge in the direction of neural networks, pattern recognition, etc., but don't really know where to start reading. Due to my background, I figure that the 'abstract' theory would be mostly suited for me, so I would like to ask for a few book suggestions or other directions."

Comment Re:Wow! Think about how many free man-hours Netfli (Score 1) 77

by Eighty7 (#25860413) Attached to: Interest Still High In the Netflix Algorithm Competition

Why is it considered selling yourself short if you do work for free for a commercial entity... but not when you contribute to, say, FireFox, ThunderBird, Apache, the Linux kernel, and so forth and so on?

Duh, because they also open source their (paid for) improvements? Its quid pro quo.

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