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Comment Re:terrorism! ha! (Score 1) 453

by noahwh (#45493771) Attached to: Imagining the Post-Antibiotic Future

Antibiotic resistant bacteria is as bad as terrorism. Neosporin is an antibiotic. Petroleum jelly is as effective as Neosporin. Petroleum jelly is oil based. So if you're against drilling for oil you're a terrorist, right? Pretty sure I took the right message away from this thread.
Government

Submission + - Stolen cellphone databases switched on in US (networkworld.com)

Submitted by alphadogg
alphadogg writes: U.S. cellphone carriers took a major step on Wednesday toward curbing the rising number of smartphone thefts with the introduction of databases that will block stolen phones from being used on domestic networks. The initiative got its start earlier this year when the FCC and police chiefs from major cities asked the cellular carriers for assistance in battling the surging number of smartphone thefts. In New York, more than 40 percent of all robberies involve cellphones and in Washington, D.C., cellphone thefts accounted for 38 percent of all robberies in 2011. It's been a particularly ugly year for iPhone thefts. http://www.networkworld.com/news/2012/100812-iphone-ipad-thefts-263110.html
Transportation

Submission + - Self-Driving Car Faces Off Against Pro on Thunderhill Racetrack

Submitted by
Hugh Pickens writes
Hugh Pickens writes writes: "Rachel Swaby writes that a self-driving car and a seasoned race-car driver recently faced off at Northern California's three-mile Thunderhill Raceway loop. The autonomous vehicle is a creation from the Center for Automotive Research at Stanford (CARS). "We tried to model [the self-driving car] after what we've learned from the best race-car drivers," says Chris Gerdes. So who won? Humans, of course. But only by a few measly seconds. "What the human drivers do is consistently feel out the limits of the car and push it just a little bit farther," explained Gerdes. "When you look at what the car is capable of and what humans achieve, that gap is really actually small." Because the self-driving car reacts to the track as if it were controlled in real time by a human, a funny thing happens to passengers along for the ride. Initially, when the car accelerates to 115 miles per hour and then breaks just in time to make it around a curve, the person riding shotgun freaks out. But a second lap looks very different. Passengers tend to relax, putting their faith in the automatically spinning wheel. "We might have a tendency to put too much confidence in it," cautioned Gerdes. "Watching people experience it, they'll say, oh, that was flawless." Gerdes reaction: "Wait wait! This was developed by a crazy professor and graduate students!""
Mars

Submission + - Curiosity Completes First Soil Analysis, Finds Volcanic Soils (gizmag.com)

Submitted by Zothecula
Zothecula writes: NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover has completed its first soil analysis of the Red Planet. The unmanned explorer used an advanced, miniaturized X-ray diffraction instrument that is part of the Chemistry and Mineralogy instrument (CheMin) of its internal laboratory. The soil, collected at a site designated “Rocknest” in Gale Crater, reveals that Martian soil is a weathered volcanic type similar to soils found in the Hawaiian Islands.

Comment Re:This is nothing more than a declaration of inte (Score 1) 817

by noahwh (#41769949) Attached to: Texas Attorney General Warns International Election Observers

You're deliberately misrepresenting the results of the very report you link to.

According to a massive months-long study commissioned by eight news organizations in 2001, George W. Bush probably still would have won even if the U.S. Supreme Court had allowed a limited statewide recount to go forward as ordered by Florida’s highest court.

Bush also probably would have won had the state conducted the limited recount of only four heavily Democratic counties that Al Gore asked for, the study found.

On the other hand, the study also found that Gore probably would have won, by a range of 42 to 171 votes out of 6 million cast, had there been a broad recount of all disputed ballots statewide. However, Gore never asked for such a recount. The Florida Supreme Court ordered only a recount of so-called "undervotes," about 62,000 ballots where voting machines didn’t detect any vote for a presidential candidate.

The quote you chose conveniently cut out the caveats.
Google

Submission + - Google Street View Heads into the Grand Canyon (slashdot.org)

Submitted by
Nerval's Lobster
Nerval's Lobster writes: "Google is taking Street View down—into the Grand Canyon, that is.

“On its first official outing, the Street View team is using the Trekker—a wearable backpack with a camera system on top—to traverse the Grand Canyon and capture 360-degree images of one of the most breathtaking natural landscapes on the planet,” read an Oct. 24 posting on Google’s Official Blog.

The Trekker automatically records high-quality images as the operator walks. Google’s initial foray into the canyon will take place around the South Rim of Grand Canyon National Park, which includes some famous paths such as the Bright Angel Trail. Google promised to make the images live (at some point) on Google Maps. “The narrow ridges and steep, exposed trails of the Grand Canyon provide the perfect terrain for our newest camera system,” the blog added."
Software

Submission + - Windows 7 isn't getting another Service Pack (geek.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Windows XP got three service packs, Windows Vista got two, and it now looks as though Windows 7 is only getting one. Service Pack 2 was expected any time now, but apparently the Windows engineering team won’t be producing one. Instead, any updates will continue to be offered through Windows Update on a regular basis.

It’s unclear why that decision has been taken, but it is most likely because Service Packs require a lot of testing before release and Microsoft doesn’t want to spare the engineers to produce them. Instead, the focus is now on rolling out Windows 8 and ensuring compatibility improves and bugs get tackled quickly over the coming months.

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