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Submission + - Kansas drops plan for municipal broadband ban (kansas.com)

Submitted by Mokurai
Mokurai writes: "Facing public backlash over a Senate bill that would outlaw community broadband services statewide, Sen. Julia Lynn, R-Olathe, announced on Monday the postponement of hearings set to take place this week. Senate Bill 304 would prohibit cities and counties from building public broadband networks."

The bill was reportedly "introduced by John Federico, a cable industry lobbyist."

I didn't see this on SlashDot when it was introduced, but the Internet definitely responded to the threat of damage.

Submission + - Secure Smartphone Developed (popularmechanics.com)

Submitted by Shooter28
Shooter28 writes: From the source: Just more than a month before the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spanish handset maker Geeksphone, in partnership with encrypted communications firm Silent Circle, announced a smartphone that takes mobile security seriously. It's called Blackphone, and it runs PrivatOS, a security-focused version of Android.

This is supposed to a unlocked phone that can be used on any carrier and was developed with the help of the creator of PGP. Just how secure this actually is yet to be determined.

Submission + - Comedians Found To Have Higher Levels Of Four Psychotic Personality Traits (yahoo.com)

Submitted by cold fjord
cold fjord writes: Yahoo has a story from Reuters, "Having an unusual personality structure could be the secret to making other people laugh, scientists said ... In a study in the British Journal of Psychiatry, researchers analyzed comedians from Australia, Britain and the United States and found they scored significantly higher on four types of psychotic characteristics compared to a control group of people who had non-creative jobs. The traits included a tendency towards impulsive or anti-social behavior, and a tendency to avoid intimacy. "The creative elements needed to produce humor are strikingly similar to those characterizing the cognitive style of people with psychosis — both schizophrenia and bipolar disorder," said Gordon Claridge of the University of Oxford's department of experimental psychology, who led the study."

Submission + - Heat Waves in Australia are Getting More Frequent - and Hotter (climatecouncil.org.au)

Submitted by vikingpower
vikingpower writes: In a landmark report on bushfires and climate change, the Australian Climate Council concludes that heat waves in Australia, as driven by climate change, are becoming more frequent — and that they get hotter. "It is crucial that communities, emergency services, health services and other authorities prepare for the increasing severity and frequency of extreme fire conditions.", says the Council in the report. Sarah Perkins, one of the report's co-authors, was interviewed by The Guardian Australia. "“While we can’t blame climate change for any one event, we can certainly see its fingerprint. This is another link in the chain.” Perkins said her latest work had analysed heatwave trends up to 2013. She said the trend “just gets worse – it’s a bit scary really”." Already back in 2009, the United Nations World Meteorological Organization signaled that a Southeast Australian heatwave was the hottest in 100 years.

Submission + - NSA Collects 200 Million Text Messages Per Day (theguardian.com)

Submitted by ilikenwf
ilikenwf writes: A new release from the files obtained by Edward Snowden have revealed that the NSA collects millions of text messages per day. These are used to gain travel plans, financial data, and social network data. The majority of these texts and data belong to people who are not being investigated for any crime or association. Supposedly, "non-US" data is removed, but we all know that means it is sent to a partner country for analysis, which is then sent back to the NSA.

Submission + - There's a huge energy scandal happening right underneath your feet (medium.com)

Submitted by gallifreyan99
gallifreyan99 writes: Researchers from Duke revealed today that they had discovered nearly 5,900 gas leaks under the streets of Washington DC, including 12 that posed a serious risk of explosion. And it's not just Washington: a gas industry whistleblower who is part of the team showed this was happening in cities all over America. Why is that a big deal? Leaky pipes cause death, destruction —and the data means natural gas could actually be one of the worst fuels around.

Submission + - Revolutionary Scuba Mask Creates Breathable Oxygen Underwater On Its Own (themindunleashed.org) 3

Submitted by schwit1
schwit1 writes: With the Triton Oxygen Respirator, it might be possible to breathe beneath the surface of the water as if you were a fish. Requiring no bulky tank to keep your lungs pumping properly, this invention of scuba diving equipment is much more ergonomic and organic in design.

The regulator comprises a plastic mouthpiece that requires you to simply bite down. There are two arms that branch out to the sides of the scuba mask that have been developed to function like the efficient gills of a marine creature. The scaly texture conceals small holes in the material where water is sucked into Jeabyun Yeon's Triton. Chambers inside separate the oxygen and release the liquid so that you can breath comfortably in the ocean.
Internet Explorer

Open Source Add-on Rewrites the User Interface of IE11 86

Posted by timothy from the people-still-use-ie? dept.
An anonymous reader writes "This is how Internet Explorer would look if you move the tabs to the top like in other browsers. Developed as a design and UX study, the open source add-on replaces the default navigation bar and combines three traditionally separate toolbars into one. The UX project started in 2004 to demonstrate that it is feasible to combine the address, search, and find box into one. Additionally, Quero offers a variety of customization options for IE, including making the UI themeable or starting Microsoft's desktop browser always maximized."

Submission + - How the Historical Apollo 8 Earthrise Pic Was Captured by Luck

Submitted by Tablizer
Tablizer writes: On Dec. 24, 1968--45 years ago this week--by what is essentially coincidence and fast thinking, one of the most iconic photographs in human history was taken: Earthrise over the Moon. It occurred during Apollo 8 as astronauts Jim Lovell, Bill Anders, and Frank Borman were orbiting the Moon--the first humans in history to do so. Their orbital motion brought the Earth into view over the Moon’s horizon, moving slowly upward into the black sky...The good folks at NASA Goddard Spaceflight Center’s Scientific Visualization Studio...recreate the events that led to the history-changing moment.

Submission + - Disappeared Kdenlive Developer Has Been Found

Submitted by jones_supa
jones_supa writes: A month ago there was worry about Kdenlive main developer being missing. Good news guys, Jean-Baptiste Mardelle has been finally reached and is doing fine. In a new mailing list post by Vincent Pinon, he says he managed to find Mardelle's phone number and contacted the longtime KDE developer. It was found out that Mardelle took a break over the summer but then lost motivation in Kdenlive under the burden of the ongoing refactoring of the code. Pinon agreed that there are 'so many things to redo almost from scratch just to get the 'old' functionalities'. The full story can be read from the kdenlive-devel mailing list. After talking with Jean-Baptiste, Vincent has called upon individual developers interested in Kdenlive to come forward. Among the actions called for is putting the Git master code-base back in order, ensuring the code is in good quality, provide new communication about the project, integrate new features like GPU-powered effects and a Qt5 port, and progressively integrate the new Kdenlive design.
Moon

How Astronauts Took the Most Important Photo In Space History 108

Posted by Soulskill from the disposable-camera-off-the-shelf dept.
The Bad Astronomer writes "On December 24, 1968, the Apollo 8 astronauts saw the Earth rising over the limb of the Moon. The photo they took of this moment — dubbed Earthrise — has become an icon of our need to explore, and to protect our home world. NASA has just released a video explaining how the astronauts were able to capture this unique moment, which included a dash of both coincidence and fast teamwork."
Blackberry

BlackBerry Posts $4.4 Billion Loss, Will Outsource To Foxconn 141

Posted by Soulskill from the but-it'll-be-better-next-quarter-they-promise dept.
iONiUM writes "Today BlackBerry announced a $4.4 billion loss, and a deal with Foxconn to outsource hardware manufacturing. One interesting stat is that 75% of sales were actually older BB7 devices. That said, CEO John Chen says, 'We are very much alive, thank you.' He adds, 'Our "for sale" sign has been taken down and we are here to stay. BlackBerry recently announced it has entered into an agreement to receive a strategic investment from Fairfax Financial and other institutional investors, which represents a vote of confidence in the future of BlackBerry.'"

Submission + - Scientists Crack Major Aids Mystery

Submitted by mrspoonsi
mrspoonsi writes: Business Insider Reports: The difference between HIV infection and full-blown AIDS is, in large part, the massive die-off of the immune system's CD4 T-cells. But researchers have only observed the virus killing a small portion of those cells, leading to a longstanding question: What makes the other cells disappear? New research shows that the body is killing its own cells in a little-known process. What's more, an existing, safe drug could interrupt that self-destruction, thereby offering a way to treat AIDS. The destructive process has caught scientists by surprise. "We thought HIV infects a cell, sets up a virus production factory and then the cell dies as a consequence of being overwhelmed by virus. But there are not enough factories to explain the massive losses," says Warner Greene, director of virology and immunology at the Gladstone Institutes, whose team published two papers today in Science and Nature describing the work. Greene estimates 95 percent of the cells that die in HIV infections are killed through pyroptosis, so the findings raise hope for a new type of treatment that could prevent HIV from progressing into AIDS. "Inhibiting activation of the immune system is not a new concept, but this gives us a new pathway to target," says Robert Gallo. And in fact, a drug already exists that can block pyroptosis. Known as VX-765, it was tested years ago by Vertex Pharmaceuticals as a treatment for chronic seizure disorder. A trial showed that it wasn't effective enough against seizures, but it was safe for humans. "Now it's just sitting on a shelf waiting for a disease to cure," says Greene, who is trying to arrange a phase II trial to test the drug in HIV patients."

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