Comment Think of the patents! (Score 1) 213
A patent dies everytime you mentaly masterbate on slashdot. Oh the horror.
Leak Shows US Lead Opponent of ACTA Transparency 164
An anonymous reader writes "Throughout the debate over ACTA transparency, the secret copyright
treaty, many countries have taken public positions that they support
release of the actual text, but that other countries do not.
Since full transparency requires consensus of all the ACTA partners,
the text simply can't be released until everyone is in agreement.
A new leak
from the Netherlands fingers who the chief opponents of transparency
are: the United States, South Korea, Singapore, and Denmark lead the
way, with Belgium, Germany, and Portugal not far behind as problem
countries."
Comment Re:I guess the only question is... (Score 2, Insightful) 350
I think most if not all hospitals have this tech.
The station(s) go offline, and service personel come and fix it... parts of the network going offline is not an unusual event. Unlike the 19th century tech, these packet (plastic canister) routed pneumatic tube systems lack humans at the core of packet routing.
From a volunteer's point of view at a non-Stanford hospital, the IT integration was less than stellar. Maybe Stanford has done some work in that area, or maybe this is just astroturfing by a pneumatic tube company.
Simulation of Close Asteroid Fly-By 148
c0mpliant writes "NASA and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory have released a simulation of the path of an asteroid, named Apophis, that will come very close to Earth in 2029 — the closest predicted approach since humans have monitored for such heavenly bodies. The asteroid caused a bit of a scare when astronomers first announced that it would enter Earth's neighborhood some time in the future. However, since that announcement in 2004, more recent calculations have put the odds of collision at 1 in 250,000."
Submission + - Financial Fix cost is $206K per person-on-plane (mi2g.com)
Richard0Thomas writes: The cost to fix the financial systems problem is going to be $206k per
person-on-planet based on the USD 1.405 Quadrillion world wide derivatives
bubble
Mi2g. This does not include fixing the inherent core flaws in the worlds
monetary / financial systems. What most don't realize is that the monetary
system is nothing more than an accounting system. Money is not printed except
for convenience, money exists only as an accounting entry. We pay trillions for
the use of the accounting system which any group here could set up and run
charging only 100 million yearly and still make a hefty profit. The complex
sounding financial jargon is simply to obfuscate what is actually going on.
On http://coinage.me they have put it very
simply for everyone to understand.
- Derivatives = Bets
- Credit Default Swaps = Insurance on bets
- Hedge Funds = Borrowing of money to gamble with (unregulated and secret also used to manipulate markets)
- Taxpayer Bailout = Taxpayers covering the gambling losses for gamblers?
- Reality = Insurance (e.g. AIG) cannot cover failed bets which amount to: USD 206k per person-on-planet. The number it is based on has grown from USD 1.144 Quadrillion last year to USD 1.405 Quadrillion, ie, +22% worldwide. The GDP of the entire world is only USD 50 trillion.
A few accounting entries is all it takes to fix this problem, literally
erasing the bogus value much to the dismay of a few but not the many. An entirely new system is required to eliminate
the core flaws and a global currency will not work properly for the common
economic system participant because of the disparity between the economies of
various countries. What has been suggested is localized regional value exchange
systems that would interface with other regional systems in a totally
transparent and "natural" market manner.
I will leave you with this thought, if you went to a bank and asked to borrow
money to go to the casino what do you think they would tell you? The banks did
not need to ask anyone. They should have asked the US citizens because they are the ones backing the banks with a portion of their future labor potential. Sure the odds would usually be better than a casino, but
in review of some of the financial instruments the actual odds were worse than
the casino.
Submission + - Who thinks Firehose software is working right? 6
NewYorkCountryLawyer writes: "I find the Firehose software to be infuriating. It seems to have no 'stickiness' but constantly reverts to other views and searches than what I was looking at. I'm about ready to give up on it unless they tell me they recognize it's dumb and are doing something to make it work right. Am I the only one who feels this way?"
Journal SPAM: "Everybody in the country" was Subject of Illegal Wiretap 5
The Washington Post drops this bomb, in the middle of the page:
Journal SPAM: California City Sues Man for Canceling Trash Collection 4
Eddie House claims to have reduced his waste to nearly nothing out of concern for the environment. He now faces a lawsuit from San Carlos for canceling his garbage-collection service. The suit seeks a permanent injunction forcing House to maintain garbage service. City officials are also seeking to recoup from House the costs of the lawsuit. The city claims that House broke the municipal code requi
Submission + - Whatever Happened to Eric Raymond? (linuxjournal.com)
Glyn Moody writes: "Once the the unofficial voice of open source, Eric Raymond has been pretty silent for the last few years. I asked him why, and for his thoughts on open source past, present and future. As well as telling me about the reasons for stealth mode, his biggest surprise in the ten years since the publication of Cathedral and the Bazaar, and why World Domination would be a "damned near-run thing either way", he also explained how the open source way can solve climate change, sea acidification, water shortages and resource depletion. Time for ESR to un-stealth?"
Submission + - SCALE Announces 2008 Speaker Line Up (socallinuxexpo.org)
An anonymous reader writes: SCALE has announced its speaker line up for 2008. Speakers will include Don Marti, Josh Berkus (Postgres), Bdale Garbee (HP), Jono Bacon, and others. In addition to the recently announced speaker line up, registration is now open and available online. SCALE will be held Feb 8 -10, 2008 at the Los Angeles Airport Westin in Los Angeles California.
Submission + - Perl is 20!
ChurchyardTX writes: "According to Wikipedia:
Happy Birthday, old friend..."
Larry Wall began work on Perl in 1987, while working as a programmer at Unisys, and released version 1.0 to the comp.sources.misc newsgroup on December 18, 1987.
Happy Birthday, old friend..."
Submission + - Racist Nobel Laureate Sports African Genes (blogspot.com)
Mike Kuykendall writes: "Ironically, it turns out Nobel laureate, DNA co-discoverer, and hardcore racist James Watson actually descends from Africans a couple of generations back..."
Submission + - A short history of Microsoft's OOXML ISO campaign (fanaticattack.com)
christian.einfeldt writes: "Russell Ossendryver is the open format advocate whose open letter to the GNOME Foundation touched off a widespread debate about whether and to what extent GNOME is supporting Microsoft's drive for ISO status for its OOXML office productivity data format. Now, Ossendryver has published the first in a concise three-part series aimed at examining Microsoft's strategy in opposing ODF's rapid growth as an open international data standard. It is not news that Microsoft has vigorously lobbied to have its OOXML standard supplant ODF, the current international office productivity data format standard, such as its recent efforts to halt the adoption of ODF by the Dutch Parliament. But Ossendryver's summary gives a bird's eye overview of that history, based on his extensive involvement in those debates as a long-time member of the OpenDocument Fellowship."
Submission + - Watson is 16% Black (independent.co.uk) 1
An anonymous reader writes: James Watson, a Nobel-prize winning scientist who has been in hot water lately over racist remarks and one of the few people whose genome has been sequenced, has just found out that his own DNA is 16% African. Dr. Watson said he was "inherently gloomy about the prospects for Africa" because "all our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours — whereas all the testing says not really".
Submission + - SCALE 6X Announces Registration and Speakers (socallinuxexpo.org)
irabinovitch writes: "Registration for SCALE 6X, the 2008 Southern California Linux Expo, opened on Monday night. The community run linux and open-source conference will hold its 6th annual event on Feb 8 — 10, 2008 in Los Angeles, CA. In addition to registration, the first set of speakers and exhibitors was announced. Exhibits will include demos from groups such as IBM, Novell, Plain Black, Debian, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, Gentoo, and others. Those interested in speaking still have time to submit an abstract to the call for papers which will close on November 30th. With a strong speaker and exhibitor line up as well as an expanded selection of mini-conferences, SCALE 6X should be the best year yet!"
