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Science

Atomic Weight Not So Constant 147

Posted by kdawson from the thulium-and-thalium dept.
DangerousBeauty writes "Yahoo has a Canadian Press story up about new changes to the periodic table of elements concerning the weights of specific elements — it seems that the weights fluctuate based on where they are found in nature. Quoting: '"People are probably comfortable with having a single value for the atomic weight, but that is not the reality for our natural world," says University of Calgary associate professor Michael Wieser.' He is is secretary of the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry's Commission on Isotopic Abundances and Weights."

Comment Oh gods.... (Score -1, Troll) 473

by jamax (#34457470) Attached to: Medical Researcher Rediscovers Integration

Oh gods.... I'm not overly sentimental (I think), but I've almost cried over humanities' fate after reading the abstract..

This.. clown (it's the nicest epithet I can think of, since it imples at worst an improper attempt at joke) is called a researcher.. He or she comes daily to his/her work (I assume) to this Roosevelt Hospital Center, NY and probably even wears some sort of white labcoat (when not busy with composing doctorate about exciting new uses for those holes and buttons which exist on the front of his/her coat.. ("You just wait till I tell you what happens if you combine the two! You'll never guess! I'll call the process "Tais' button-hole pairing bond" and win a Nobel!")

Honestly, I can't understand how THIS could happen anywhere.. I'm just sad now...
The Internet

Submission + - Wikileaks Vows Release '7x' Bigger Than Iraq Logs (computerworld.com)

Submitted by CWmike
CWmike writes: Wikileaks has promised to release a load of information seven times bigger than the Iraq War Logs, which raised the Internet group's profile around the world and caused some nations to take notice of the issue of leaks of top-secret documents online. In a note on Twitter, Wikileaks said, 'Next release is 7x the size of the Iraq War Logs. Intense pressure over it for months,' and asked supporters to continue donating to the cause. A District Court in Stockholm last Thursday decided to detain Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, 'on probable cause suspected of rape, sexual molestation and unlawful coercion.' Wikileaks did not say what the new release of information would be about.

Submission + - Sweden issues remand request in Assange rape case

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Swedish Director of Prosecution, Ms. Marianne Ny, has requested the District Court of Stockholm to detain Mr Assange in his absence. Says Ny: 'I request the District Court of Stockholm to detain Mr. Assange in his absence, suspected of rape, sexual molestation and unlawful coercion. The reason for my request is that we need to interrogate him. So far, we have not been able to meet with him to accomplish the interrogations.' The suspicions against Assange stem from an alleged rape which took place in August in Enköping in central Sweden, three cases of sexual molestation in Stockholm and Enköping, and one case of illegal coercion in Stockholm. If the court grants the request, it would allow authorities to issue an international arrest warrant for Assange.
Piracy

Submission + - StarCraft 2 Pirated 2.3 Million Times (softpedia.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: A report from TorrentFreak cites, amongst other statistics, the fact that the torrent file for the real time strategy Starcraft 2: The Wings of Liberty has been downloaded more than 2.3 million times since the game has been released in July of this year, leading to a total of 15.77 Petabytes of data downloaded.
Science

Submission + - CERN Physicists Trap Antimatter Atoms

Submitted by mernilio
mernilio writes: A research group at CERN, the European lab for particle physics in Geneva, has managed for the first time to confine atoms of the stuff. Fleeting antimatter atoms have been produced in the lab for years, but until now the ability to trap the elusive atoms for detailed study has been out of reach.
Government

Submission + - Man Records TSA Ejection After Refusing Body Scan (signonsandiego.com) 3

Submitted by bonch
bonch writes: A man refusing a full-body scan and 'groin check' was ejected from the San Diego International Airport by the TSA as he recorded the incident with a cell phone sitting on his luggage. John Tyner, who posted his account of events along with the video on his blog, refused to pass through a full-body scanner, citing privacy and health concerns. Tyner was escorted to a security area for a patdown but, after hearing a description of the procedure, told the agent, 'You touch my junk and I'm going to have you arrested.' This led to a series of encounters with supervisors as well as a visit from a local police officer. Tyner was told that he was not being detained against his will, but that if he left the area, he would be hit with a civil suit and a $10,000 fine. He walked out the airport anyway, posting his account two hours later. The new TSA procedures have generated criticism from both passengers and airline crew, and one activist has proposed a National Opt-Out Day.
Botnet

US Reigns As Most Bot-Infected Country 121

Posted by samzenpus from the we're-number-one dept.
Trailrunner7 writes "The US has by far the highest number of bot-infected computers of any country in the world, with nearly four times as many infected PCs as the country in second place, Brazil, according to a new report by Microsoft. The quarterly report on malicious software and Internet attacks shows that while some of the major botnets have been curtailed in recent months, the networks of infected PCs still represent a huge threat."
The Military

Submission + - Russia inflates its military (bbc.co.uk) 1

Submitted by zrbyte
zrbyte writes: I've heard of inflatable prank weapons, but Russia seems to take it seriously, with deploying life-sized inflatable tanks, radar stations, rocket launchers, etc. Deception is the name of the game.

From the article:

The Russian military has come up with an inventive way to deceive the enemy and save money at the same time: inflatable weapons. They look just like real ones: they are easy to transport and quick to deploy.

Submission + - As Goes Chrome OS, So Goes Google's Chrome Browser (ostatic.com) 2

Submitted by Thinkcloud
Thinkcloud writes: If you happen to think, as I do, that Google Chrome is emerging as the very best browser available, it's worth noting a point that we've made many times on OStatic: Chrome's evolution will have everything to do with the ongoing development of Google's upcoming Chrome OS. Chrome OS, Google's first operating system aimed squarely at computing desktops, is an ambitious project for Google, and, from the outset, it's been clear that because the Chrome browser interface--and much of its plumbing--form the UI and guts of Chrome OS, the fate of the operating system and its sibling browser are inextricably tied. As glimpses of version 8 of the Chrome browser appear, this seems more true than ever...
Google

Submission + - World-Changing Awesome Aside, How Will The Self-Dr (techcrunch.com)

Submitted by Thinkcloud
Thinkcloud writes: Google made a stunning revelation this morning: the existence of a secret self-driving car project. Even more amazing: it has been in testing for months, on actual roads across California, and things seem to be running smoothly. Fans of Total Recall, Minority Report, and Knight Rider are hyperventilating at the prospects. And while the technology is likely still a long way from being widely implemented (The New York Times piece on it suggests eight years), there is one big question: why?

Google’s answer seems to be a “betterment of society” one. “We’ve always been optimistic about technology’s ability to advance society, which is why we have pushed so hard to improve the capabilities of self-driving cars beyond where they are today,” Google engineer Sebastian Thrun, who spearheaded the project (and also runs Stanford’s AI Labs, and co-invented Street View), writes today.

That’s great. But Google is still a public company in the business of making money for its shareholders. So one can’t help but wonder what, if any, money-making prospects there are here?

“The Google researchers said the company did not yet have a clear plan to create a business from the experiments,” according to the NYT. Further, they quote Thrun as saying that this project is an example of Google’s “willingness to gamble on technology that may not pay off for years.”

We know Google has a history of idealism — co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page, in particular — but this project cannot come cheap. And the fact is that Google remains basically a one-trick-pony when it comes to making money. They are so reliant on search advertising revenues, that if something suddenly happened to the market, they’d be totally screwed. Android may prove to be their second trick, but it’s not there yet.

But there may be more to these automated cars than just an awesomely cool concept. At our TechCrunch Disrupt event a couple weeks ago, Google CEO Eric Schmidt gave a speech about “an augmented version of humanity.” He noted that the future is about getting computers to do the things we’re not good at. One of those things is driving cars, Schmidt slyly said at the time. “Your car should drive itself. It just makes sense,” he noted. “It’s a bug that cars were invented before computers.”

If your car can drive itself, a lot of commuters would be freed up to do other things in the car — such as surf the web. One of Google’s stated goals for this project is to “free up people’s time”. That matched with Schmidt’s vision of mobile devices being with us all the time every day, likely will translate into more usage of Google.

That may sound silly and not worth all the R&D an undertaking as huge as this will require, but don’t underestimate Google. This is a company who cares deeply about shaving fractions of a second off of each search query so that you can do more of them in your waking hours. Imagine if you suddenly had an hour or more a day in your car to do whatever you wanted because you no longer had to focus on driving? Yeah. Cha-ching.

Or imagine if your on-board maps where showing you Google ads. Or you were watching Google TV in your car since you didn’t have to drive. Or you were listening to Google Music with Google ads. It’s all the same. This automated driving technology would free you up to use more Google products — which in turn make them more money. Make no mistake, Google will enter your car in a big way. And automated driving would up their return in a big way.

And, of course, none of this speaks to what, if anything, Google would actually charge for such technology implementation. You would have to believe that if and when it’s available, this automated driving tech would be built-in to cars. Would car manufacturers pay Google for it and pass off some of the costs to customers? Or would this all be subsidized by the above ideas?

It’s way too early to get into that, I’m sure. And in 8 years, there will be things out there that we can’t even imagine right now. But it’s interesting to think about. The Google Car.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I have little doubt Google is being sincere in their broader hopes for such a technology. Here’s their key blurb on that:

According to the World Health Organization, more than 1.2 million lives are lost every year in road traffic accidents. We believe our technology has the potential to cut that number, perhaps by as much as half. We’re also confident that self-driving cars will transform car sharing, significantly reducing car usage, as well as help create the new “highway trains of tomorrow.” These highway trains should cut energy consumption while also increasing the number of people that can be transported on our major roads. In terms of time efficiency, the U.S. Department of Transportation estimates that people spend on average 52 minutes each working day commuting. Imagine being able to spend that time more productively.

That first part is awesome. If we could halve the number of traffic deaths each year, it would be world-changing. And if energy consumption could be cut, it could re-shape economies and save our future. But again, don’t gloss over the last part. Freeing up those 52 minutes a day to be productive — that’s a lot of potential money for Google.

And that’s great too. If Google can spend the time and money working on such amazing technology they should be rewarded for it. There’s no rule that says you shouldn’t be able to make money by changing the world. And Google can’t be praised enough for trying.
Australia

Submission + - Australia under increasing cyber attacks (techeye.net)

Submitted by bossanovalithium
bossanovalithium writes: The Australian military networks are under continuous attack by foreign intelligence agencies.

According to the country's top electronic spy unit, the Defence Signals Directorate, Foreign spooks are are making 700 attempts a month this year, up from 200 a month last year.

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