Don't forget the Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff.

My step-father was one of the curators at the Pioneer Museum in town for a few years. They had the actual mechanical computer that Clyde Tombaugh used to calculate the orbit of Pluto. It still worked. It might be worth phoning them to see if they still have it on display.

Here in Utah, where the government seems to own most of the state, we have our own share of odd structures. Like these on the Dugway Proving Grounds:

http://g.co/maps/9uz4u
http://g.co/maps/yyyfk
http://g.co/maps/zs7c3
http://g.co/maps/vh7mf
http://g.co/maps/q2zg5

There are a gazillion odd things on the landscape of Earth. It seems most of them are either built by scientists, the military, or both.

My personal guess for the China structures is that it is something really boring. Like a geological study using satellites. Some of the structures do seem to be military/bombing related. However, I have to wonder if the squiggly line structures are related to a satellite based geological study. If you look close, it rather seems like some of the lines have been "moved" or are folded on itself by some natural process. Doesn't that seem like a lot of disruption in the soil for being less than a decade old? If I were a geologist, that might be just the kind of area I might want to research. Doubly so if I was trying to protect the many important archaeological artifacts found in that area of China. I might even try some anti-erosion studies, etc. Even more meaningful would be understanding how important those archaeological sites are to the economy. If they wash away, will tourists still pay to see a small mound of dirt?

Yeah, I know it isn't as exciting as space aliens... which I would much prefer to be true. ;-)

This is what they "built:"
http://www.draganfly.com/uav-helicopter/draganflyer-x6/

"Iranian aerospace scientists have built an unmanned flying saucer..." Or just copied a picture from a website from a company that actually does.

Much have I have seen, and much have I done, for I am LOFAR of the Hill People!

You know, I will do battle with my telescope, and lose. I will do battle with my telescope, and win.. and yet, I still lose! And I am supposed to feel great sorrow for it! I swear, by Zeena's teats, if I had my telescope's advantage on the field of war, I would be a god.

Sounds like a great way to sell more routers. Most people won't understand the details. If some Geek Squad goon says "you need to upgrade your router to support the New Internet(TM)." Most people will pony up the $50 and move on.

Instead of spewing hate, we should be lauding Cisco on their capitalist business savvy. They are going to make loads of money selling people new gear that they otherwise wouldn't need.

It isn't my intention to troll. Please /. editors. No more Sarah Palin stories. No one cares. That is all..

You still enjoy free speech, but only on Tuesdays or Sundays while wearing your knickers standing on the toilet in your bathroom with a government trained jaguar lying in the tub. The jaguar won't have been fed in six days due to a bureaucratic mix up (turns out it is impossible to file triplicate copies of feeding form W-FU-HMBOY-5 after a Ted Stevens look-alike found the warehouse).

Don't worry, if the jaguar bites you Medicare will cover the ER expense. But only for the first 20 minutes. After that unionized monkeys trained to act like doctors will stand over your corpse throwing feces at the wall while inviting the nurses to a smoke out on Friday. It's gonna be a killer time.

While this may seem a horrible way to ensure a basic human right, the courts can find no legal means to prevent it (the feces slinging monkeys, or the free speech).*

*Please note that only certain subjects are approved on Sundays, such as: the mating calls of feral cats, ingredients found in a bag of Pop Rocks, and Tommy Wiseau.

The CEO has promised to revert the product back to GPLv2:

http://winmtr.net/slashdot.html

"Instead of dealing with this, I decided to take the blame and do the mature thing: revert to GPL v2. By the end of the week (January 16 2011) the updated sources (stating the new license) will be on Sourceforge for all to download and further enhance."

Please update the story. It seems like Dragos is at least trying to operate with good faith and fix a potential mistake.

I didn't bother reading the article. I'm simply posting an emotional response based solely on the probably inaccurate summary. I don't really care about privacy policies because I'm use to getting tracked all the time. Security cameras watch me drive to work, my badge records when I enter the door, cameras watch me inside the building, my credit card leaves a trail everywhere I buy something... and I don't really care. So go ahead and track what you want and sell the data to whoever. The hundreds of spam messages I get a day proves that there is no hope of ever retrieving any of my privacy. If you start asking for money to visit this site I'll probably pay for it because I tend to develop habits that make me comfortable. I don't like those habits being interrupted.

I'm now going to hit submit without doing a preview because I could really care less about the quality of this post.

I've been PC gaming for about 20 years, with a serious addiction for about 16 years (we all need a hobby). My life is much busier now with a wife, 6 kids, a dog, and several thousand servers to look after. I've canceled all the MMORPG subscriptions, what a money pit! Eve Online was the last hold out because I could still balance work/life/gaming. The best thing that has happened to my gaming experience since has been Valve's Steam. Collecting achievements gives you stuff to work toward. What has been most fun is accessing some of the many indie and smaller distributor titles available through Steam. They have multiple deals a week, and special deals around Christmas, Thanksgiving, etc. Occasionally you can pick up multi-packs in the $5-$10 range. Buy a bunch in advance so when you get bored you have something new to try out. So far my collection is about 117 games, but I only keep 20-30 installed at a time.

A few fun suggestions:
- Tank Universal (Tron tanks, done right!)
- Galcon Fusion (try it in retro mode)
- Defense Grid (tower defense, done right)
- Altitude (multiplayer side scrolling air combat)
- Garry's Mod (awkward moments with co-workers)
- X3 (default is lame, add mods and it becomes fun)
- Multiwinia

she has my vote!

*My eyes! The goggles do nothing!*

Some of our local LUG people have gotten bit by the minecraft bug. We've built a massive multiplayer island. Some of the locations include Lua Beach, Torvalds Torrent, FreeBSD falls, and Xen caverns. We also have logic gate fields, where members are working on a binary adder. Working already are various logic gates. One of our members built tux out of blocks (who also doubles as a water slide!).

http://plug.org/mc_tux.png

This game is soooo addicting. Don't get sucked in. The best phrase I've heard describe minecraft went something like this... This game is crap. It is full of bugs and nothing works. I hate it, hate it, hate it! I'm logging in right now.

I was listening to an interview on NPR while in my car. The point made was that most human beings have to work to pay attention, and can be easily distracted. It does not come naturally. As an example they explained that listening to the radio while driving made you a poorer driver. This is because most people's brains are incapable of processing that much information at one time. Just as this was said I started hearing car horns behind me. I had switched my attention from driving to the radio interview about paying attention while driving. I had stopped at a green light.

I believe that most of us have a physiological limit of how much sensory input we can process at once, and how fast we can switch our full attention from one task to the next. The distractions I have right now: the blackberry dinging, the "new mail" flag popping up, the "bell on screen 1" messages, gathering status of several simultaneous running jobs, and writing this post. Something has to be tuned out or lots of work is completed with little progress. I often use music (without lyrics) to drown out distractions, simplify the amount of messages going to my brain, allowing me to pay attention to one task at a time. I usually do this when the "background noise level" is so severe I finally recognize what is happening.

This is why I love /. Summaries for the weak minded and highly-distracted, like me!

That is a spacecraft sir, we do not refer to it as a capsule.

I have purchased the entire galaxy known as NGC 1365. If you're interested in renting a planet, the price is $1.8M/month US. If anyone settles there without my permission, expect to be sued.

Further, I am leasing all the space between the Earth and the Moon. If you'd like access to the Moon, the toll will be set at $750,000 US each way.

For ownership verification please see the public records division on Alpha Centauri.

Thank you.