Comment a man in Brazil is coughing (Score 2) 76
Madagascar closes its port.
Pi Day Is Coming — But Tau Day Is Better 241
PerlJedi writes "A few months ago, a Tweet from Randal Schwartz pointed me to a YouTube video about 'Triangle Parties' made by Vi Hart. My nerdiness and my love of math made it my new favorite thing on YouTube. Now, with Pi Day coming up later this week, I thought it would be an appropriate time to point people to another of her YouTube videos: Pi is Wrong. The website she mentions at the end, Tauday, has a full explanation of the benefits of using Tau rather than Pi. Quoting: 'The Tau Manifesto is dedicated to one of the most important numbers in mathematics, perhaps the most important: the circle constant relating the circumference of a circle to its linear dimension. For millennia, the circle has been considered the most perfect of shapes, and the circle constant captures the geometry of the circle in a single number. Of course, the traditional choice for the circle constant is pi — but, as mathematician Bob Palais notes in his delightful article "Pi Is Wrong!", pi is wrong. It's time to set things right.'"
Comment someone's going to try it for cybernetics.. (Score 1) 314
Someone's going to try it and end up at the hospital.
"Waterproofing and Bioproofing are different. (your body rusts things that water don't"
Best material? Glue from a glue gun, according to Lepht Anonym.
And PCBs are a no-no, but that might change too with the appropriate coating.
Full talk at: www.youtube.com/watch?v=p_JpPMIriAI
I think Lepht is still in "repairing Lepht" mode, so she probably won't be trying this new nanocoating. But it could definitely help hedge cybermancers who practice in their kitchen.
Comment Re:unary, indeed! (Score 1) 725
> +1! Excellent System!
Fixed that for you.
Comment Re:Why are you surprised? (Score 4, Insightful) 284
The problem is not toy rare earth magnets, but rare earth magnets used in toys.
A magnet used as a locking device for the clasp of a book, magnets used in a toy train to hold them together, etc.
Just like lead paint, the substitution is not obvious.
Comment Re:Not following the Google Chef reference (Score 4, Informative) 554
One of the first financial press conferences before (after?) the google IPO was by their CFO.. Chielf Food Officer, back in February 2005.
Google was proud of announcing the number of eggs they were cooking each day for their employees. Wall Street was pissed by their lack of respect.
They had a formal presentation by their chef but not their chief financial officer,” said Mark S. Mahaney, an analyst with American Technology Research. “I have never been to an investor day where the C.F.O. didn’t speak.”
Indeed, Google’s top chef, Charlie Ayers, spoke to the assembled analysts and investors about the lunch he had prepared, featuring entrees like grilled pork tenderloin. The chief financial officer, George Reyes, moderated the presentation and answered a few questions, but did not give a formal talk.
Comment Pipboy from Fallout (Score 2) 171
It actually looks like a pipboy from Fallout. He can even use it as a flashlight!
Now he needs a Geiger counter app..
I've been wanting to build one for a few years, and with a cheap ipod touch, it's feasible.
Electrical Power From Humans 220
Coisiche writes "The BBC covers a team of scientists who are working on a new way to power medical implants: an internal biofuel cell. From the article: 'Their gadget, called a biofuel cell, uses glucose and oxygen at concentrations found in the body to generate electricity. They are the first group in the world to demonstrate their device working while implanted in a living animal. If all goes to plan, within a decade or two, biofuel cells may be used to power a range of medical implants, from sensors and drug delivery devices to entire artificial organs. All you'll need to do to power them up is eat a candy bar, or drink a coke. ... In 2010, they tested their fuel cell in a rat for 40 days and reported that it worked flawlessly, producing a steady electrical current throughout, with no noticeable side effects on the rat's behavior or physiology.' Of course, there's never been a sci-fi movie using such technology as a plot device..."
What Happens When the Average Lifespan is 150 Years? 904
First time accepted submitter Macgrrl writes "It was reported today in The Age newspaper that scientists believe they will have a drug within the next 5-10 years that will extend the average human lifespan to 150 years. Given the retirement age is 65, that would give you an extra 85 years, meaning you would probably have to extend the average working life to 100 or 120 years to prevent the economy becoming totally unbalanced and pensions running out. That assumes that the life extension is all 'good years', and not a prolonged period of dementia and physical decline. Would you want to live to 150? What do you see as being the most likely issues and what do you think you would do with all the extra years?"
Comment 900,000 subscribers affected.. (Score 1) 282
Also note that Shaw Direct (Formerly Starchoice) uses Annik K2 for half of its channels.
As of 2010, Shaw Direct had over 900,000 subscribers.[1] It broadcasts on Ku band from two communications satellites, Anik F1R at 107.3W and Anik F2 at 111.1W
People really hope they have a solution before the first game of the season, which is tonight. They will lose many subscribers due to this, no doubt about it.
Comment Re:List of ideas. (Score 1) 350
Cellphones, spaceships and submarines were once fiction, too!
Ask Slashdot: Best Long-Term Video/Picture Storage? 499
First time accepted submitter (and first-time parent — congratulations!) SoylentRed writes "I recently have had my first kid, a wonderful healthy daughter who is now just over 6 months old. As one can expect, we have an abundance of photos and videos, and have started to scratch our heads about the best way to store these files and back them up long-term. My parents have asked us (funny thing is it was my mom — the least tech-savvy person among our family) what our plan is to make sure these files are saved and available for her when she is older — which made me realize that we don't really have a good plan! We are currently using TimeMachine on my wife's MacBook Pro; for now we are doing OK with that as a back-up. But my parents have offered to help pay for something that might be a better solution. We could burn DVDs — but that is tedious and gets to be a pain as we would need to back those up (or recopy) them every year or so to be sure we aren't suffering from degrading DVDs. Is our best option right now to pick up two hard drives, back up all our pictures and videos to the first, and then use a 3rd party app to mirror that drive to the second just in case one of them craps out? Is there an online solution that would be better? We are still a few years away from being able to afford the DVDs/CDs that are the 100+ year discs. Is there a better solution I haven't thought of?"
Comment Re:Affordable (Score 4, Funny) 685
PCs aren't going anywhere and the idiot who made the original comment about this is some moron who has his head in the cloud a bit too much.
*squint*
Comment competition? (Score 1) 82
[blockquote]Our obvious competitors are devices like Beagleboard and Arduino. We're cheaper than Beagleboard, and offer better processing and multimedia capabilities than either. Our interfacing is weaker than Arduino, but we'll be addressing this through add-on boards.[/blockquote]
So feature vs feature, how different will this be from the Arduino?
DOJ: We Can Force You To Decrypt That Laptop 887
betterunixthanunix writes "A mortgage-fraud case may have widespread implications for criminals who use cryptography to hide evidence. The US Department of Justice is pushing for the defendant to be forced to decrypt her hard drive, claiming that if they cannot force such decryptions, law enforcement will be unable to gather important evidence. The defendant's lawyer and the Electronic Frontier Foundation have made the claim that forcing such a decryption would be a violation of the defendant's fifth amendment right not to self-incriminate. The prosecutor in the case has insisted that the defendant would not be forced to disclose her passphrase, but only to enter the passphrase into a computer to decrypt the drive."
