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Comment Re:Troll v Troll (Score 1) 184

by OzPeter (#49801121) Attached to: Professional Internet Troll Sues Her Former Employer

I kind of have this idea that the comments section on CNN.com or foxnews.com is all troll bots.

I occasionally check into the PINAC site, and in the comments there is always one guy there taking such an outrageously contrary opinion to all the other posters that I am beginning to suspect he is actually a sock puppet of the site's owner, solely to drum up reactions from those other posters.

Sort of like what's his name, who treated this place as his personal blog and who we haven't seen here for a while (an no I am not saying his name doing so is sort of like saying "Beetlejuice" 3 times)
Robotics

MIT Trains Robots To Jump 62

Posted by Soulskill from the just-don't-tell-them-how-important-necks-and-heads-are-to-humans dept.
Nerval's Lobster writes: MIT just announced that its researchers have programmed a robotic cheetah that can leap over obstacles without a prompt from a human controller. The machine's onboard sensors rely on reflected laser-light to judge obstacles' distance and height, and use that data to fuel the algorithm for a safe jump. The robot's controlling algorithm takes into account such factors as the speed needed to launch its mass over the obstacle, the best position for a jump, and the amount of energy required from the onboard electric motor. As of this writing, the robot can clear 90 percent of obstacles on an open track. "A running jump is a truly dynamic behavior," Sangbae Kim, an assistant professor of mechanical engineering at MIT, is quoted as saying in a university press release. "You have to manage balance and energy, and be able to handle impact after landing. Our robot is specifically designed for those highly dynamic behaviors." For years, some tech pundits have worried that robots and software will gradually replace human workers in key industries such as manufacturing and IT administration. Now they have something else to fret over: Robots replacing the world's hurdlers.

Submission + - Chinese nationals accused of taking SATs for others

Submitted by Vadim Makarov
Vadim Makarov writes: The US Department of Justice has charged 15 Chinese nationals with developing a scheme to have imposters take university entrance exams. Prosecutors said suspects used fake passports to trick administrators into allowing people other than legitimate test takers to sit the SAT, GRE and TOEFL exams. The defendants, both male and female, range in age from 19 to 26, and are currently living in several cities — including Blacksburg, Virginia, and Boston, Massachusetts — where major universities are located. For each count, they could face up to 20 years in prison and a fine of $250,000, plus additional 5 years for the conspiracy charges.

Submission + - Meet the Classic Game Designers

Submitted by belg4mit
belg4mit writes: In collaboration with AMC in support of their fictionalized account of the history of video games, "Halt and Catch Fire", Motherboard TV is releasing a series of mini-documentaries about people involved in the history of gaming including Dona Bailey, the author of Centipede, and John Romero of id Software fame.

Submission + - Australian Prime Minister Thinks Kids Should Not Code (smh.com.au) 4

Submitted by Gob Gob
Gob Gob writes: The Prime Minister of Australia has come out and ridiculed an opposition policy aimed at denying teaching kids to code:

'the Prime Minister said. "He said that he wants primary school kids to be taught coding so they can get the jobs of the future. Does he want to send them all out to work at the age of 11? Is that what he wants to do? Seriously?"

Arguably software development practices can be better group educational tools than maths, literacy and art as a software project can draw on coders, artists, organisers and others with different interests and backgrounds. Is teaching coding and technology from a young age an enabler for your community or should it be discouraged until the twilight years of schooling / collage?

Submission + - Sourceforge is full of shit (sourceforge.net)

Submitted by slashdice
slashdice writes: And not the good kind of shit. You thought those adware installers were bad? It gets worse! Since everybody and their octocat moved to github, sourceforge has taken to creating "mirror" pages for popular software, complete with deceptive adware installers.

Submission + - Sourceforge staff takes over a user's account and wraps their software installer (arstechnica.com) 11

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Sourceforge staff took over the account of the GIMP-for-Windows maintainer claiming it was abandoned and used this opportunity to wrap the installer in crapware. Quoting Ars:

SourceForge, the code repository site owned by Slashdot Media, has apparently seized control of the account hosting GIMP for Windows on the service, according to e-mails and discussions amongst members of the GIMP community—locking out GIMP's lead Windows developer. And now anyone downloading the Windows version of the open source image editing tool from SourceForge gets the software wrapped in an installer replete with advertisements.

Submission + - Sourceforge staff takes over a user's account and wraps their software installer (arstechnica.com) 11

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Sourceforge staff took over the account of the GIMP-for-Windows maintainer claiming it was abandoned and used this opportunity to wrap the installer in crapware. Quoting Ars:

SourceForge, the code repository site owned by Slashdot Media, has apparently seized control of the account hosting GIMP for Windows on the service, according to e-mails and discussions amongst members of the GIMP community—locking out GIMP's lead Windows developer. And now anyone downloading the Windows version of the open source image editing tool from SourceForge gets the software wrapped in an installer replete with advertisements.

Submission + - Higgs Boson Mass Explained in New Theory (quantamagazine.org)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Three physicists who have been collaborating in the San Francisco Bay Area over the past year have devised a new solution to a mystery that has beleaguered their field for more than 30 years. This profound puzzle, which has driven experiments at increasingly powerful particle colliders and given rise to the controversial multiverse hypothesis, amounts to something a bright fourth-grader might ask: How can a magnet lift a paperclip against the gravitational pull of the entire planet?

Submission + - A new bionic lens implant could give you permanent 20/20 vision (inhabitat.com)

Submitted by Kristine Lofgren
Kristine Lofgren writes: Contacts and eyeglasses are so 2014. Researchers have revealed the Ocumetics Bionic Lens, a painless implant that can correct your vision for the rest of your life. In recent trials, patients walked away with perfect vision after a quick 8 minute procedure. The process is safer than LASIK and even protects against cataracts in the future.

Submission + - A Tool for Analyzing H-1B Visa Applications Reveals Tech Salary Secrets (ieee.org)

Submitted by Tekla Perry
Tekla Perry writes: "The golden age of engineers is not over," says a French software engineer who developed a tool for mining U.S. Department of Labor visa application data, but, he says, salaries appear to be leveling off. Indeed, salary inflation for software engineers and other technical professionals at Google and Facebook has slowed dramatically, according to his database, and Airbnb and Dropbox pay is down a little, though Netflix pay is through the roof. The data also shows that some large companies appear to be playing games with titles to deflate salaries, and Microsoft is finally offering technology professionals comparable salaries to Apple and Google. There's a lot more to be discovered in this interactive database, and researchers are getting ready to mine it.

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