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Transportation

Out With the Red-Light Cameras, In With the Speeding Cameras 335

Posted by Soulskill from the hurry-up-with-the-driverless-cars dept.
An anonymous reader writes: Have you enjoyed reading the constant flow of news about how red light cameras are failing? They've been installed under the shadow of corruption, they don't increase safety, and major cities are dropping them. Well, the good news is that red-light cameras are on the decline in the U.S. The bad news is that speeding cameras are on the rise. From the article: "The number of U.S. communities using red-light cameras has fallen 13 percent, to 469, since the end of 2012, according to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, a nonprofit scientific and educational organization funded by the insurance industry. That includes the 24 towns in New Jersey that participated in a pilot program that ended this month with no pending legislation to revive it. Meanwhile, the institute estimates that 137 communities use speed cameras, up from 115 at the end of 2011."

Comment Re:It is not new. (Score 1) 349

by sh00z (#48698169) Attached to: United and Orbitz Sue 22-Year-Old Programmer For Compiling Public Info
Not a person who was late--one who was booked all the way through, showed up for the first leg of the flight, and then deplaned at the layover without bothering to inform anyone that he wouldn't be back. Since there's no legitimate reason that such an individual couldn't make it back in time for the second leg, I'm sure the airline had to stop and make sure that (1) the individual wasn't having a coronary in a restroom or smoking lounge somewhere, and (2) that there was no terror threat due to the vanishing (unattended luggage in the cargo bay or cabin).
Businesses

The One Mistake Google Keeps Making 386

Posted by timothy from the starry-eyed-dreamers dept.
HughPickens.com writes Gene Marks writes in Forbes Magazine that Google has brought us innovations that have literally changed our world yet the company continues to make the same mistake over and over. Google's mistake, which it keeps making, is building great products that no one will soon buy. Take Google Glass — a great idea with great technology that demonstrates the future power of the Internet of Things. There's just one problem: no one is buying Google Glass. And now there are driverless cars. After 700,000 miles of open road testing, Google has introduced its "first real build" of its driverless car and it's pretty amazing. But the mistake is the same as with Glass: it's a product without customers. "It's Google assuming that someday someone will actually buy a driverless car," writes Marks. "Not a hobbyist or an eccentric millionaire. But a customer who actually needs or desires a driverless car. Someone who, given the choice of spending $30K on a car that they fully control and can go anywhere they want at any speed they want – or another, likely more expensive buggy that will only travel on certain routes at slower speeds and with less options." Which car would you buy?

For driverless cars to work, to decrease congestion, increase safety, reduce lawsuits and lower our insurance premiums everyone would have to be driving one. For the driverless car system to truly work as desired, there would need to be more centralized control over our entire transportation system, from the roads and highways to the cars we're allowed to use, the speed we're allowed to travel and the places we're allowed to go. This, in the very country where the majority of the population fights against government regulations, red tape and bureaucracy. "But rest assured – Google knows this. They're not looking for short term profits," concludes Marks. "The dreamers behind Google, like the dreamers at Tesla and Virgin Galactic are people who are looking decades ahead."

Comment Re:It is not new. (Score 2, Informative) 349

by sh00z (#48695583) Attached to: United and Orbitz Sue 22-Year-Old Programmer For Compiling Public Info
This is just about the most selfish, self-centered, obnoxious behavior I can imagine. I was a passenger on one of these flights in October. Our departure from SFO was delayed by 30 minutes because a "through" passenger was missing. Sure, *you* get a cheaper ticket, as the cost of inconveniencing the airline and 150 other people. This asshat shouldn't just be sued by the airlines; I'd be willing to join a class-action suit. If you want to try this crap, you better make sure it's not just a layover--that it's a plane change, and you *don't* check in for that last leg. Or, on return, that you only check in at the point where you actually plan to board.

Comment Re:Stone Age diet ? he wants to live all 20 years? (Score 1) 441

by sh00z (#48659773) Attached to: How Venture Capitalist Peter Thiel Plans To Live 120 Years

Isn't HGH illegal unless it's prescribed by a doctor for a specific medical condition? This sounds like a [at best] "I paid a doctor a bunch of money to prescribe it for me" situation.

The word "illegal" applies only to sheeple. This guy's a fucking Randian superman: he's going to live forever, he's paid his guys to find a cure for cancer and his primary residence is almost certainly inside a hollowed out volcano.

He's going to live as long as he can afford bodyguards. I can't believe that this joker doesn't comprehend the intrinsic disconnect between being able to stay healthy until the age of 120, and simultaneously escalating class warfare through "no welfare, looser building codes, no minimum wage, and few restrictions on weapons."
Earth

How a Massachusetts Man Invented the Global Ice Market 83

Posted by samzenpus from the keeping-it-cool dept.
An anonymous reader writes with the story of Frederic Tudor, the man responsible for the modern food industry. "A guy from Boston walks into a bar and offers to sell the owner a chunk of ice. To modern ears, that sounds like the opening line of a joke. But 200 years ago, it would have sounded like science fiction—especially if it was summer, when no one in the bar had seen frozen water in months. In fact, it's history. The ice guy was sent by a 20-something by the name of Frederic Tudor, born in 1783 and known by the mid-19th century as the "Ice King of the World." What he had done was figure out a way to harvest ice from local ponds, and keep it frozen long enough to ship halfway around the world.

Today, the New England ice trade, which Tudor started in Boston's backyard in 1806, sounds cartoonishly old-fashioned. The work of ice-harvesting, which involved cutting massive chunks out of frozen bodies of water, packing them in sawdust for storage and transport, and selling them near and far, seems as archaic as the job of town crier. But scholars in recent years have suggested that we're missing something. In fact, they say, the ice trade was a catalyst for a transformation in daily life so powerful that the mark it left can still be seen on our cultural habits even today. Tudor's big idea ended up altering the course of history, making it possible not only to serve barflies cool mint juleps in the dead of summer, but to dramatically extend the shelf life and reach of food. Suddenly people could eat perishable fruits, vegetables, and meat produced far from their homes. Ice built a new kind of infrastructure that would ultimately become the cold, shiny basis for the entire modern food industry."
The Media

Skeptics Would Like Media To Stop Calling Science Deniers 'Skeptics' 719

Posted by Soulskill from the intellectual-brand-recognition dept.
Layzej writes: Prominent scientists, science communicators, and skeptic activists, are calling on the news media to stop using the word "skeptic" when referring to those who refuse to accept the reality of climate change, and instead refer to them by what they really are: science deniers. "Not all individuals who call themselves climate change skeptics are deniers. But virtually all deniers have falsely branded themselves as skeptics. By perpetrating this misnomer, journalists have granted undeserved credibility to those who reject science and scientific inquiry."

Comment Re:I am cynical (Score 1) 589

by sh00z (#48622173) Attached to: Top Five Theaters Won't Show "The Interview" Sony Cancels Release

I have the feeling the reason the show was cancelled , was because the pre-release feedback was very negative, that it was a bad film, but with those threat they saw an opportunity, and now they are priming the US market for a massive "buy it to spite terrorrist !" direct to DVD.

Then the next round of threats will be against Amazon, BestBuy and Walmart. Bittottent is the only real solution.

Comment Re:Huh? (Score 1) 191

by sh00z (#48621729) Attached to: Apple Wins iTunes DRM Case

They should have been punished and punished hard for the antitrust violations inherent in using their music store to force people to buy iPods if they wanted the full quality music for use away from their computer.

How did they do that? It was entirely possible to insert a CD, rip it with iTunes to high quality AAC, and put it on your iPod.

Even better, you could rip a CD entirely losslessly, and put a bit-for-bit copy on your iPod (or your Nomad or your Rio). As you could with WinAmp in Windows. Apple never FORCED anybody to do anything remotely like GP claims.

Comment Re:Huh? (Score 1) 191

by sh00z (#48620285) Attached to: Apple Wins iTunes DRM Case

...This is not about DRM on the songs, it is about DRM on the connection between iTunes and the devices. That is, you can't use a non-apple device with iTunes. And Apple can go out of their way to make that happen.

That's not what the case is about at all. I've owned non-Apple devices that worked just fine with iTunes. The case is about Real writing software that tricked iTunes into thinking that their DRM was Apple's. After the way the music labels strongarmed Jobs into including DRM in the first place, the simple defense would have been to show those threats, and describe their worries about losing access to the music if they couldn't detect and reject counterfeit DRM. Note that at the same time, Audible.com was working *with* Apple to get their DRM into the iTunes ecosystem.

Comment Re:I'm shocked. (Score 1) 191

by sh00z (#48620113) Attached to: Apple Wins iTunes DRM Case

Apple hardware/software stack is proprietary and owned by one company, so this decision is correct.

True enough, which is reason #2 that I will never own Apple anything. Reason #1 why I will never use Apple music devices is that would force me to use iTunes, which sucks beyond measure.

And does your reason #2 also carry over to Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo, all of whom use similar tactics to prevent outsiders from developing and releasing games for their platforms? This case is exactly the same premise.

Comment Obligatory joke... (Score 2) 388

by sh00z (#48618181) Attached to: Sony Leaks Reveal Hollywood Is Trying To Break DNS

uhm, regular old dotted quads (ip addrs) work fine and cannot be 'taken down' since they are not lookup based but topology based.

and even with ip alias and redirects, a dotted quad can be just about as good as a dns name. better, in some ways, since it cant' be faked like a name can, and does not require another fetch for the name->ipaddr lookup.

...about the awesome library of stuff hosted at 127.0.0.1
Space

NASA Study Proposes Airships, Cloud Cities For Venus Exploration 200

Posted by Soulskill from the billy-dee-williams-volunteers-to-lead dept.
An anonymous reader writes: IEEE Spectrum reports on a study out of NASA exploring the idea that manned missions to Venus are possible if astronauts deploy and live in airships once they arrive. Since the atmospheric pressure at the surface is 92 times that of Earth, and the surface temperate is over 450 degrees C, the probes we've sent to Venus haven't lasted long. The Venera 8 probe sent back data for only 50 minutes after landing. Soviet missions in 1985 were able to get much more data — 46 hours worth — by suspending their probes from balloons. The new study refines that concept: "At 50 kilometers above its surface, Venus offers one atmosphere of pressure and only slightly lower gravity than Earth. Mars, in comparison, has a "sea level" atmospheric pressure of less than a hundredth of Earth's, and gravity just over a third Earth normal. The temperature at 50 km on Venus is around 75 C, which is a mere 17 degrees hotter than the highest temperature recorded on Earth.

The defining feature of these missions is the vehicle that will be doing the atmospheric exploring: a helium-filled, solar-powered airship. The robotic version would be 31 meters long (about half the size of the Goodyear blimp), while the crewed version would be nearly 130 meters long, or twice the size of a Boeing 747. The top of the airship would be covered with more than 1,000 square meters of solar panels, with a gondola slung underneath for instruments and, in the crewed version, a small habitat and the ascent vehicle that the astronauts would use to return to Venus's orbit, and home."
Earth

Denmark Makes Claim To North Pole, Based On Undersea Geography 191

Posted by timothy from the that-land-is-our-land dept.
As reported by The Independent, A scientific study has found that Greenland is actually connected to the area beneath the polar ice where the North Pole lies – thanks to a huge stretch of continental crust known as the Lomonosov Ridge. Since Greenland is a Danish territory, that gives the country the right to put its hat in the ring for ownership of the stretch of land, Denmark’s foreign minister [Martin Lidegaard ] said. ... Of the five Arctic countries – the US, Russia, Norway, Canada and Denmark —only Canada and Russia had indicated an interest in the North Pole territory until now. "This is a historical milestone for Denmark and many others as the area has an impact on the lives of lot of people. After the U.N. panel had taken a decision based on scientific data, comes a political process," Lidegaard told The Associated Press in an interview on Friday. "I expect this to take some time. An answer will come in a few decades. Why such a big deal? As Business Insider notes, The U.S. currently estimates that the Arctic sea bed could contain 15% of the earth's remaining oil, along with 30% of the planet's natural gas and 20% of its liquefied natural gas. Whichever country is able to successfully claim the Arctic would have the right to extract these resources.

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