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The Almighty Buck

Ask Slashdot: Making Donations Count 268

Posted by samzenpus from the biggest-bang-for-your-buck dept.
An anonymous reader writes: As a recent college graduate I now have a job and enough money to actually buy things and donate to causes. Up until now I really haven't been paying attention to which groups are best to donate and which are scams. For example, Goodwill seems like a great organization until you dig deeper and discover they hire under privileged and disabled people only to exploit the related government handouts instead of doing it to benefit those people. What are some quality organizations to donate to? Who do you donate to and why? I'm looking for improving the poor, supporting constitutional rights, and supporting issues many Slashdotters can agree on such as net neutrality and anything against the media companies. I don't care what political group the money ends up going to. The specific case is more important than some arbitrary label. I'm also in the USA, so foreign recommendations are probably less helpful.
Privacy

Louisiana Governor Vetoes License Plate Reader Bill, Citing Privacy Concerns 131

Posted by samzenpus from the stop-watching dept.
An anonymous reader writes: Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal has vetoed a plan to acquire license plate reading cameras in the state. Law enforcement agencies nationwide use such cameras to scan cars and compare them to a "hot list" of stolen or wanted vehicles. That data is kept for weeks, or even years In some cases. Jindal wrote in a signing statement: "Senate Bill No. 250 would authorize the use of automatic license plate reader camera surveillance programs in various parishes throughout the state. The personal information captured by these cameras, which includes a person’s vehicle location, would be retained in a central database and accessible to not only participating law enforcement agencies but other specified private entities for a period of time regardless of whether or not the system detects that a person is in violation of vehicle insurance requirements. Camera programs such as these that make private information readily available beyond the scope of law enforcement, pose a fundamental risk to personal privacy and create large pools of information belonging to law abiding citizens that unfortunately can be extremely vulnerable to theft or misuse. For these reasons, I have vetoed Senate Bill No. 250 and hereby return it to the Senate."
Privacy

Controversial GCHQ Unit Engaged In Domestic Law Enforcement, Online Propaganda 83

Posted by samzenpus from the watching-out-for-you dept.
Advocatus Diaboli writes: Documents published by The Intercept on Monday reveal that a British spy unit purported by officials to be focused on foreign intelligence and counterterrorism, and notorious for using "controversial tactics, online propaganda and deceit,” focuses extensively on traditional law enforcement and domestic activities. The documents detail how the Joint Threat Research Intelligence Group (JTRIG) is involved in efforts against political groups it considers "extremist," Islamist activity in schools, the drug trade, online fraud, and financial scams. The story reads: "Though its existence was secret until last year, JTRIG quickly developed a distinctive profile in the public understanding, after documents from NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden revealed that the unit had engaged in 'dirty tricks' like deploying sexual 'honey traps' designed to discredit targets, launching denial-of-service attacks to shut down internet chat rooms, pushing veiled propaganda onto social networks, and generally warping discourse online."
Transportation

"Vision Zero" Aims To Eliminate Traffic Fatalities In San Diego 203

Posted by samzenpus from the be-safe dept.
An anonymous reader writes: San Diego city officials Monday expressed support for a plan called "Vision Zero" to make San Diego's roadways safer for pedestrians and bicyclists over the next 10 years. Vision Zero aims to eliminate traffic deaths in the city by 2025 by improving crosswalks, raising medians, creating buffers between vehicle and bicycle lanes, and improving sidewalks. NBC 7 in San Diego reports: "Allison Street next to La Mesa City Hall provides a blueprint of sorts. Diagonal parking lines reduce the size of the street. Jim Stone, Executive Director of Circulate San Diego, says studies show smaller streets help slow traffic. Then there's the crosswalk with lights on the ground and signs that alert drivers when someone crosses. The curb extension also provides better visibility. 'They can see cars coming but more importantly the cars can see them coming,' Stone said about the curb extensions. 'So it's a great way to improve pedestrian safety.'"
Science

General Mills To Drop Artificial Ingredients In Cereal 163

Posted by samzenpus from the less-is-more dept.
schwit1 writes: General Mills announced Monday that it will be removing artificial colors and flavoring from its cereal products over the next two to three years. The company said that Trix and Reese's Puffs will be some of the first cereals to undergo the changes adding that cereals like Lucky Charms that have marshmallows may take longer to reformulate. They say 90 percent of their cereals will have no artificial ingredients by the end of 2016. "We've continued to listen to consumers who want to see more recognizable and familiar ingredients on the labels and challenged ourselves to remove barriers that prevent adults and children from enjoying our cereals," said Jim Murphy, president of General Mills cereal division, in a statement.

Submission + - "Vision Zero" Aims to Eliminate Traffic Fatalities in San Diego

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: San Diego city officials Monday expressed support for a plan called “Vision Zero” to make San Diego’s roadways safer for pedestrians and bicyclists over the next 10 years. Vision Zero aims to eliminate traffic deaths in the city by 2025 by improving crosswalks, raising medians, creating buffers between vehicle and bicycle lanes, and improving sidewalks. NBC 7 in San Diego reports: "Allison Street next to La Mesa City Hall provides a blueprint of sorts. Diagonal parking lines reduce the size of the street. Jim Stone, Executive Director of Circulate San Diego, says studies show smaller streets help slow traffic. Then there's the crosswalk with lights on the ground and signs that alert drivers when someone crosses. The curb extension also provides better visibility. 'They can see cars coming but more importantly the cars can see them coming,' Stone said about the curb extensions. 'So it’s a great way to improve pedestrian safety.'"
Programming

MEAN Vs. LAMP: Finding the Right Fit For Your Next Project 175

Posted by samzenpus from the best-tools-for-the-job dept.
snydeq writes: LAMP diehards take note: The flexible simplicity of MongoDB, ExpressJS, AngularJS, and Node.js is no joke and could very well be a worthwhile stack for your next programming project, writes InfoWorld's Peter Wayner. "It was only a few years ago that MongoDB, Express.js, AngularJS, and Node.js were raising eyebrows on their own. Now they've grown up and ganged up, and together they're doing serious work, poaching no small number of developers from the vast LAMP camp. But how exactly does this newfangled MEAN thing stack up against LAMP? When is it better to choose the well-tested, mature LAMP over this upstart collection of JavaScript-centric technologies?"
Sony

Sony Releasing New 1TB PlayStation 4 In July 98

Posted by samzenpus from the more-storage dept.
Mark Wilson writes: Known as the 1TB PS4 Ultimate Player Edition (or PlayStation 4 Ultimate Player 1TB Edition depending on who you're talking to), Sony is launching a new PlayStation 4 next month. With the ever-growing market for downloadable content, it's difficult to have too much disk space. Recognizing this, Sony is doubling the size of the largest capacity PS4. The 1TB console will launch next month in the US, Asia and Europe, and the announcement comes just weeks after Microsoft announced a 1TB version of its Xbox One. Gamers in Japan will be able to get their hands on the console by the end of June, but the rest of the world will have to wait until July 15. There's no word on pricing, but Sony has detailed a few other changes that have been made to this version of the console.
Government

Swedish Investigators Attempt Assange Interview; Wikileaks Makes Major Release 154

Posted by samzenpus from the to-talk-or-not-to-talk dept.
cold fjord writes: It seems Julian Assange rates his own section (The Assange Matter) on a Swedish government website related to the investigation. It contains some FAQs on points that seem to keep coming up in Slashdot discussions. The website isn't completely up to date at the moment since it doesn't discuss the recent attempt by Swedish investigators to interview Assange in the Ecuadorian embassy in London. Unfortunately that attempt failed since the government of Ecuador didn't give permission to the Swedish delegation to enter their embassy. That is quite odd given the years of demands for this. Concurrent with this, Wikileaks has started releasing what is reported to be more than 500,000 leaked Saudi Arabian diplomatic documents that are sure to stir up some controversies. Most are in Arabic so it may take some time for their contents to filter out.
Transportation

Allstate Patents Physiological Data Collection 142

Posted by samzenpus from the in-measured-hands dept.
TigerPlish writes: Allstate has been granted patent no. US 20140080100 A1 for a "driving-behavior database that it said might be useful for health insurers, lenders, credit-rating agencies, marketers and potential employers." The program is just in the patent stage for now, but the company says: "the invention has the potential to evaluate drivers' physiological data, including heart rate, blood pressure and electrocardiogram signals, which could be recorded from steering wheel sensors." Imagine a world where you are denied employment or credit based on the information obtained from your car and sold by your insurer. What could possibly go wrong?
Cloud

Docker and CoreOS Join Together For Open Container Project At Linux Foundation 48

Posted by samzenpus from the working-together dept.
darthcamaro writes: The great schism in the container world is now at an end. Today, Docker and CoreOS, announced along with Amazon Web Services, Apcera, Cisco, EMC, Fujitsu, Goldman Sachs, Google, HP, Huawei, IBM, Intel, Joyent, the Linux Foundation, Mesosphere, Microsoft, Pivotal, Rancher Labs, Red Hat and VMware the Open Container Project, as a Linux Foundation Collaborative Project. The new effort will focus specifically on libcontainer — providing a baseline for a container runtime. "By participating with Docker and all the other folks in the OCP, we're getting the best of all worlds," Alex Polvi, CEO of CoreOS told eWEEK. "We're getting the contributions from Docker with the format and runtime that underpin container usage, and then we're also getting the shared standard and vendor neutrality aspects that we've designed with app container."
Spam

Ask Slashdot: How Effective Is Your ISP's Spam Filter? 269

Posted by timothy from the gmail-does-alright dept.
An anonymous reader writes with the question in the title: does your ISP do a decent job culling spam? The reason I'm asking is that my ISP is Verizon and the Verizon spam filter is next to useless. It only blocks 15% of spam while also blocking 5% of legitimate emails. I've tried calling Verizon support a couple of times and the experience is about as pleasant and productive as banging my head on a wall. At this point I think my best move is to change ISP, but before I go around changing my email address at probably dozens of web sites I'd like to be sure that a new ISP would actually be better.
Transportation

Privately Owned Armored Trucks Raise Eyebrows After Dallas Attack 609

Posted by samzenpus from the new-must-have-toy dept.
HughPickens.com writes: Manny Fernandez writes in the NY Times that the scores of military and police-style vans, trucks and cars offered for sale on Craigslist and eBay have raised concerns for some law enforcement officials, particularly after the Dallas attack on a police headquarters. Officials say the vehicles appear to be legal for the most part, so there is little they can do. Jeff Funicello, for example, is selling his black 1975 GMC armored truck on Craigslist. The body is armored, and the windows are bulletproof. It has sliding portholes to point rifles from and a sprinkler system inside. Long ago, it transported money, and it was once the target of a shootout in the 1980s. Of course, people have been driving reinforced cars long before the Dallas attack on a police headquarters. But the celebrities and executives who install bulletproof windows and other types of armor on their vehicles often do not want it noticed. Celebrity clients generally demand that the exteriors of their luxury armored vehicles look normal so they blend in. However those who buy and sell armored vans want people to look. And the popularity of apocalyptic movies and television shows has put a new twist and added a macabre cachet to such vehicles "This is America," says Funicello. "I should be able to have a howitzer or a bazooka if I want one. If I wanted to buy a fire truck, I could."
Youtube

Google Launches YouTube Newswire To Verify Eyewitness Videos 22

Posted by samzenpus from the like-you-were-there dept.
An anonymous reader writes: YouTube has started a video news service to showcase the most interesting clips recorded and posted by eyewitnesses at events unfolding around the world. In partnership with the social news group Storyful, YouTube Newswire will be "a curated feed of the most newsworthy eyewitness videos of the day, which have been verified by Storyful's team of editors," a blog post said. Cnet reports: "In addition to the newswire, YouTube on Thursday announced two other projects that have to do with eyewitness journalism. One of the projects, called the First Draft Coalition, will serve as an educational resource for journalists — helping them to verify eyewitness videos and consider the ethics of using them in stories. The other is a partnership with the Witness Media Lab, focused on eyewitness videos having to do with human rights issues."
Television

BBC Develops "Mind-Control TV" Headset For iPlayer App 27

Posted by samzenpus from the use-your-head dept.
An anonymous reader writes: The BBC has teamed up with tech company This Place to develop a prototype television headset that can be operated with the power of brainwaves. The Mind Control TV prototype works with an experimental version of the BBC's iPlayer on-demand platform. "It's an internal prototype designed to give our programme makers, technologists and other users an idea of how this technology might be used in future. It was much easier for some than it was for others, but they all managed to get it to work." said Cyrus Saihan, head of business development for the BBC's Digital division.

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