Submission + - Panasonic unveils thinnest Blu-ray Disc drive (computerworld.com)
Lucas123 writes: "Panasonic plans to unveil the thinnest Blu-ray Disc drive at the upcoming CES show. The drive is 9.5mm high, which allows it to fit into standard laptop form factors instead of requiring manufacturers to redesign systems to fit high-def DVD players as they've been doing. "Panasonic has already begun offering samples of the drives to laptop makers with the hope that the companies will build it into new PCs.""
Submission + - Mathematicians solve the mystery of traffic jams (physorg.com)
mlimber writes: Do you ever find yourself in a traffic jam, thinking, "Man, there must be a bad accident up ahead," but as you plod along, you see no evidence of any crash? Some mathematicians have solved the mystery by developing a mathematical model that shows how one driver hitting the brakes a little too hard can cascade into a backup miles behind. The mathematicians' future research will investigate how automatic braking systems may alleviate the problem.
Submission + - Cosmic explosion detonates in empty space (newscientist.com)
mlimber writes: According to an article in NewScientist, "Astronomers are puzzling over a powerful cosmic explosion that seems to have detonated in a region of empty space, far away from any nearby galaxy." The leading theory is that the explosion was a star exploding in the gas trail that is yanked out of a galaxy when it passes or begins merging with another. Said the lead author of the study, "Even if the galaxies have stopped forming stars, in the tidal tails you can trigger new episodes of star formation [not to mention detonation]," and indeed the authors have identified two candidate galaxies that give weight to their theory.
Submission + - Active glacier found on Mars?
Smivs writes: "A probable active glacier has been identified for the first time on Mars.
The icy feature
has been spotted in images from the European Space Agency's (Esa) Mars Express spacecraft.
The young glacier appears in the Deuteronilus Mensae region between Mars' rugged southern highlands and the flat northern lowlands. "If it was an image of Earth, I would say 'glacier' right away," Dr Gerhard Neukum, chief scientist on the spacecraft's High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) was quoted as saying.
"We have not yet been able to see the spectral signature of water. But we will fly over it in the coming months and take measurements. On the glacial ridges we can see white tips, which can only be freshly exposed ice.
Dr Neukum said glacial features would be prime locations for robotic rovers to look for evidence of life on Mars."
The young glacier appears in the Deuteronilus Mensae region between Mars' rugged southern highlands and the flat northern lowlands. "If it was an image of Earth, I would say 'glacier' right away," Dr Gerhard Neukum, chief scientist on the spacecraft's High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) was quoted as saying.
"We have not yet been able to see the spectral signature of water. But we will fly over it in the coming months and take measurements. On the glacial ridges we can see white tips, which can only be freshly exposed ice.
Dr Neukum said glacial features would be prime locations for robotic rovers to look for evidence of life on Mars."
Submission + - PJs making The Hobbit (stuff.co.nz)
An anonymous reader writes: Peter Jackson has announced that The Hobbit is being made. The story will be in 2 films, and shot simultaneously like Lord Of The Rings. Filming is set for 2009 with the first part expected for release in 2010. "A decision still has to be made on who will direct the films, who will be cast and where they will be filmed."
Submission + - Next for Apple: Lossless iTunes Store (cnet.co.uk)
DrJenny writes: C|net has an interesting piece running at the moment about why Apple developed their own lossless codec, and more importantly that iTunes will become a download store for lossless audio, potentially from all the major labels. This would be a massively positive move for people who spend hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars on hi-fi gear, but refuse to give money to stores that only offer compressed music. It's a big FLAC, DRM, ALAC and GB discussion, but it's a very exciting perspective, and surely one that'll pan out meaning audiophiles will finally be able to take advantage of legal digital downloads.
Submission + - Laws of Nature, Source Unknown (nytimes.com)
mlimber writes: In the New York Times science section, there is an interesting article discussing the nature of the scientific laws. It comes partly in reply to physicist Paul Davies, whose recent op-ed in same paper lit up the blogosphere and solicited flurry of reader responses to the editorial page. It asks, "Are [laws of nature] merely fancy bookkeeping, a way of organizing facts about the world? Do they govern nature or just describe it? And does it matter that we don't know and that most scientists don't seem to know or care where they come from?" And then it proceeds to survey different views on the matter.
Submission + - Downside of Dominance -- Lockheed and the F16 (washingtonpost.com)
mlimber writes: The Washington Post reports that Lockheed Martin is building the F35, the Joint Strike Fighter, for all the branches of the military, but some are asking why it is needed. The F16, which is also manufactured by Lockheed, is significantly cheaper, has upgrades to modernize it from its origins in the 1970s, and has never lost an air-to-air battle (not to mention, "with 200,000 sorties flown, the plane has been shot down just six times"). In short, "Lockheed's most potent competitor in the fighter business is Lockheed."
Submission + - Judge:Man can't be forced to divulge passphrase (news.com) 2
mytrip writes: "A federal judge in Vermont has ruled that prosecutors can't force a criminal defendant accused of having illegal images on his hard drive to divulge his PGP (Pretty Good Privacy) passphrase.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Jerome Niedermeier ruled that a man charged with transporting child pornography on his laptop across the Canadian border has a Fifth Amendment right not to turn over the passphrase to prosecutors. The Fifth Amendment protects the right to avoid self-incrimination.
Niedermeier tossed out a grand jury's subpoena that directed Sebastien Boucher to provide "any passwords" used with his Alienware laptop. "Compelling Boucher to enter the password forces him to produce evidence that could be used to incriminate him," the judge wrote in an order dated November 29 that went unnoticed until this week. "Producing the password, as if it were a key to a locked container, forces Boucher to produce the contents of his laptop."
Especially if this ruling is appealed, U.S. v. Boucher could become a landmark case. The question of whether a criminal defendant can be legally compelled to cough up his encryption passphrase remains an unsettled one, with law review articles for the last decade arguing the merits of either approach. (A U.S. Justice Department attorney wrote an article in 1996, for instance, titled "Compelled Production of Plaintext and Keys.")"
U.S. Magistrate Judge Jerome Niedermeier ruled that a man charged with transporting child pornography on his laptop across the Canadian border has a Fifth Amendment right not to turn over the passphrase to prosecutors. The Fifth Amendment protects the right to avoid self-incrimination.
Niedermeier tossed out a grand jury's subpoena that directed Sebastien Boucher to provide "any passwords" used with his Alienware laptop. "Compelling Boucher to enter the password forces him to produce evidence that could be used to incriminate him," the judge wrote in an order dated November 29 that went unnoticed until this week. "Producing the password, as if it were a key to a locked container, forces Boucher to produce the contents of his laptop."
Especially if this ruling is appealed, U.S. v. Boucher could become a landmark case. The question of whether a criminal defendant can be legally compelled to cough up his encryption passphrase remains an unsettled one, with law review articles for the last decade arguing the merits of either approach. (A U.S. Justice Department attorney wrote an article in 1996, for instance, titled "Compelled Production of Plaintext and Keys.")"
Submission + - Synthetic DNA on the Brink of Yielding New Life Fo (washingtonpost.com) 1
mlimber writes: The Washington Post has a story about the future of biotech: "The cobbling together of life from synthetic DNA, scientists and philosophers agree, will be a watershed event, blurring the line between biological and artificial — and forcing a rethinking of what it means for a thing to be alive.... Some experts are worried that a few maverick companies are already gaining monopoly control over the core 'operating system' for artificial life and are poised to become the Microsofts of synthetic biology. That could stifle competition, they say, and place enormous power in a few people's hands."
Submission + - Faster Chips Are Leaving Programmers in Their Dust (nytimes.com)
mlimber writes: The New York Times is running a story about multicore computing and the efforts of Microsoft et al. to try to switch to the new paradigm: "The challenges [of parallel programming] have not dented the enthusiasm for the potential of the new parallel chips at Microsoft, where executives are betting that the arrival of manycore chips — processors with more than eight cores, possible as soon as 2010 — will transform the world of personal computing.... Engineers and computer scientists acknowledge that despite advances in recent decades, the computer industry is still lagging in its ability to write parallel programs."
It mirrors what C++ guru and now Microsoft architect Herb Sutter has been saying in articles such as his "The Free Lunch Is Over: A Fundamental Turn Toward Concurrency in Software." Sutter is part of the C++ standards committee that is working hard to make multithreading standard in C++.
It mirrors what C++ guru and now Microsoft architect Herb Sutter has been saying in articles such as his "The Free Lunch Is Over: A Fundamental Turn Toward Concurrency in Software." Sutter is part of the C++ standards committee that is working hard to make multithreading standard in C++.
Submission + - The Strange History Of The Vectrex
simoniker writes: "The 'ambitious and unusual' vector-based Vectrex console was one of the most intriguing game console failures of all time, and Bill Loguidice and Matt Barton continue their 'History Of Gaming Platforms' series over at Gamasutra by analyzing the rise, fall, and legacy of the cult '80s console. From the intro: "GCE's vector-based Vectrex failed to win massive audiences, like the Atari 2600 Video Computer System (VCS) or the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) did. Nevertheless, the distinctive platform gained a cult following after being pulled from the market in 1984, two years after its debut, and now enjoys one of the finest homebrew development scenes of any vintage system.""
Submission + - Flying Humans (nytimes.com)
mlimber writes: The NYTimes is running a story about flying humans who jump from planes or other high locations wearing a wing suits akin to flying squirrels. Their efforts have potential military and X-treme sports applications. They have some good pictures and a video at the site, and here's an excerpt:
YouTube also has some video along these lines, one with a flier "skimming six feet above skiers in the Swiss Alps."Modern suit design features tightly woven nylon sewn between the legs and between the arms and torso, creating wings that fill with air and create lift, allowing for forward motion and aerial maneuvers while slowing descent. As the suits, which cost about $1,000, have become more sophisticated, so have the pilots. The best fliers, and there are not many, can trace the horizontal contours of cliffs, ridges and mountainsides.
Submission + - Death of Batman? 1
owlgorithm writes: So, there are many rumors that DC Comics is going to kill Bruce Wayne, and there is a pretty good explanation
here. What do you think — can you kill an icon? Can you kill Bruce Wayne without killing Batman?
