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Submission + - Ghost towns in China (dailymail.co.uk)

Submitted by Krokz
Krokz writes: These amazing satellite images show sprawling cities built in remote parts of China that have been left completely abandoned, sometimes years after their construction.
The photographs have emerged as a Chinese government think tank warns that the country's real estate bubble is getting worse, with property prices in major cities overvalued by as much as 70 per cent.

Another report from IndiaExpress with interviews with lonely people. http://www.expressindia.com/latest-news/Chinas-ghost-towns/713677/
And amazing AlJazeera report on this topic on youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0h7V3Twb-Qk

Submission + - The animal world has its junkies too (pjonline.com)

Submitted by
Phoghat
Phoghat writes: "Research scientists have used many animal species in investigating mind-altering drugs, but it may come as a surprise to learn that animals in the wild — from starlings to reindeer — also make use of psychoactive substances of their own accord.
It seems that many of these species have a natural desire to experience altered states of consciousness, and man may well have found his way to some of his favourite recreational drugs by observing the behaviour of animals."
Earth

Submission + - What if the earth stood still

Submitted by crus0e
crus0e writes: As the german weekly newspaper DIE ZEIT reports [Google-translated link to the article], the german computer-scientist and expert for geographical information systems, Witold Fraczek, simulated how a total slowdown of the earth rotation would affect the shape and the appearance of mother earth. Though he does not claim his simulation to be perfectly correct, it seems to be a nice intellectual game to play.

Comment Analogy (Score 1) 312

by Krokz (#32791804) Attached to: World Cup Prediction Failures
This is the worst analogy I've seen this week. Clearly someone doesn't know how football works. Even the octopus has more chance to guess the results than an algorithm with no referee error or pure luck modeled in. You do not need a computer to tell you who the favorites are.

Comment modern mass gathering (Score 4, Insightful) 248

by Krokz (#31368922) Attached to: China's Human Flesh Search Engine
It looks to me like modern mass gathering. We all know what a charismatic leader and with a few pugilistic punch lines can do to the mass mob. You are innocent until proven guilty and this is a one sided witch hunt and strongly against peoples right to privacy. It is a good thing in some cases, but bad in most.

Submission + - I Hate Bad Reporting - now usually reliable Guardi (blogs.com)

Submitted by Krokz
Krokz writes: Here is an excellent rant from Tomi T Ahonen, who was pissed off by the latest article in the Guardian ("How the Smartphone made Europe look Stupid" by Richard Wray) which was reporting band wagon information on the latest mobile market.

"And of Europe? The world's largest handset manufacturer is not North American, it is Nokia of Finland. The world's largest mobile equipment maker is not North American, it is LM Ericsson of Sweden. The world's largest mobile operator group is not North American, it is Vodafone of the UK. The world's largest mobile smartphone operating system is not North American, it is Symbian of the UK. The world's largest mobile application developer is not North American, it is Buongiorno of Italy. The world's largest SIM card maker is not North American it is Gemplus of France."

Comment Get less data greedy browser (Score 2, Interesting) 441

by Krokz (#30381884) Attached to: AT&T Moves Closer To Usage-Based Fees For Data

Well I tested Opera mini against symbian browser in my Nokia, but still:

BBC main mobile page:
Operi Mini: 7kB (!); 3 good q thumbnails
Symbina in build browser: 26kB; one thumbnail more - commercial

CNN main mobile page:
Opera mini: 13kB
Symbian in build browser: 68kB; one thumbnail more - local weather

Engadget main page, tested several times, couldn't bealive the results:
Opera Mini: 177kB
Symbian in build browser: 2.50MB (!)


Ofc, App store would never allow Opera ;)
Even dough Opera uses their proxy servers, for compressing the data and sending it to clients, the loading of pages is still faster because of the good compression and add-blocking.
PC Games (Games)

Submission + - BlizzCon 2009 starting

Submitted by Krokz
Krokz writes: BlizzCon 2009 (press release and official site), an annual convention of the game giant Blizzard, is starting today. This years opening ceremony announcement is to be another World of Warcraft expension called Cataclysm. Guys at MMO champion collected some data on it and posted it on their forum. This years BlizzCon will be separated into several areas where a two day schedule will cover WoW and incoming Diablo 3 and Starcraft 2. Tournaments will take place in Starcraft, Warcraft 3 and WoW arena as well as scheduled live raids from top guilds on the convention itself. Ozzy Osbourne, the only mortal to openly challenge the Lich King's claim to the title "Prince of Darkness" and survive, will take the stage live at Anaheim Convention Center to rock the closing ceremonies. Although tickets to the convention sold out in minutes, you can still join in with the 'BlizzCon Virtual Ticket' live Internet stream or via DIRECTV Pay Per View. The Virtual Ticket will feature 18 hours of BlizzCon coverage, including Ozzy's live performance.
Wireless Networking

Submission + - Major growth of Wi-Fi devices in US

Submitted by Krokz
Krokz writes: Network company Meraki has conducted an interesting census about recent changes in Wi-Fi area. Here is 9to5mac article about it:

"The census compared activity seen by a single set of 10,000 randomly selected Meraki wireless access points in North America in 2008 and 2009 in order to understand macro-level traffic and end-user device trends. The number of Apple devices observed, including laptops, iPhones and iPods, grew by an impressive 221%. Apple devices now represent 32% of all the devices seen by this set of Meraki networks in North America, compared to just 14% in 2008. The number of Research In Motion (RIM) devices observed in North America grew by 419% from 2008 to 2009, and Nokia devices grew by 114%. In 2008, RIM devices represented just 2% of all devices observed, but grew dramatically to 8% for 2009. In 2008 and 2009, Nokia represented 1% and 2% of all devices, respectively.

Comment lOld (Score 1) 105

by Krokz (#29055935) Attached to: Joachim De Posada Talks About Delayed Gratification
Does a clip have to get on YouTube to get posted on /.? Its been on TEDs for months now... several speeches emphasized these theme in the past and like someone said, was widely distributed more then a decade ago in Goleman's bestseller Emotional intelligence.

Comment Does it really matter what the study sais? (Score 1) 921

by Krokz (#28879269) Attached to: UK's FSA Finds No Health Benefits To Organic Food
What is the point of a study if everyone thinks it was corporate sponsored? I am a cynic person myself but if the study said that organic is healthier then everyone would say it was paid by the green/organic industry corps. btw, I know farmers that just fill out the state forms and get federal subvention for being 'organic', but what they do on the field is something different. Of course they don't spray the shit out of it but its certainly not organic or else the harvest is halved.

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