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The Almighty Buck

Predicting a Future Free of Dollar Bills 753

Posted by samzenpus from the your-money-is-no-good-here dept.
An anonymous reader writes with this story about how a cashless society might work and how far-off in the future it is. "...We're not there yet, but a cashless society is not as fanciful as it seems. Recent research suggests that many believe we will stop using notes and coins altogether in the not-too-distant future. New payments technologies are rapidly transforming our lives. Today in the U.S., 66 percent of all point-of-sale transactions are done with plastic, while in the U.K. it's just under half. But while a truly cashless society is some time away yet, there is raft of groundbreaking technologies that will make cash a mere supporting act in the near future."
Wireless Networking

FCC Approves Plan To Spend $5B Over Next Five Years On School Wi-Fi 54

Posted by Soulskill from the all-about-the-wireless-benjamins dept.
itwbennett writes: The Federal Communications Commission, in a 3-2 party-line vote Friday, approved a plan to revamp the 17-year-old E-Rate program, which pays for telecom services for schools and libraries, by phasing out funding for voice service, Web hosting and paging services, and redirecting money to Wi-Fi. FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler had proposed a $5 billion budget for Wi-Fi, but Republican commissioners and some lawmakers had questioned where the money would come from. Still, the E-Rate revamp (PDF) approved Friday contemplates a $1 billion-a-year target for Wi-Fi projects "year after year," Wheeler said.
The Military

DARPA Successfully Demonstrates Self-Guiding Bullets 188

Posted by Soulskill from the jerks-with-aim-bots dept.
Lucas123 writes: A DARPA-funded project has successfully developed a .50 caliber sniper round capable of maneuvering during flight in order to remain on target. The self-guiding EXACTO bullet, as it's being called, is optically guided by a laser that must remain on target for the bullet to track. The EXACTO round is capable of accurately tracking a target up to 1.2 miles away, DARPA stated. The technology, which is being developed by Teledyne Scientific and Imaging, is targeted at helping snipers remain at longer distances from targets as well as improving night shots. While DARPA's tracking bullet is the first to use a standard, small-arms caliber round, in 2012 Sandia National Laboratories (SNL) successfully demonstrated a prototype self-guided bullet that was more like like a four-inch dart.

Comment Sunk cost fallacy (Score 1) 364

by EmagGeek (#47423015) Attached to: The Pentagon's $399 Billion Plane To Nowhere

The whole program is a sunk cost fallacy at this point. Congress needs to look at the cost and return of fixing the F35 program versus scrapping the entire thing, which is probably the best decision it could make.

The F35 is an unmitigated disaster. It is everything a military jet SHOULDN'T be. The entire process was destined to fail from the beginning, and it all boils down to the DoD's decision processes, like those that award contracts based on the race and gender of a company's owner rather than the merit of that company's products, and the ones that say "gee, if there could only be one plane that did everything, that would definitely be the best way to go!"

Jack of all trades, master of nothing, is not what we need in a fighter. The reason we have different branches of the military is because each has starkly unique needs compared to the others. Their needs are so unique that even the most junior engineer can look at the F35 proposal and say "hahaahh fuck no."
The Military

The Pentagon's $399 Billion Plane To Nowhere 364

Posted by Soulskill from the flights-of-fancy dept.
schwit1 writes with an update on the U.S. government's troubled F-35 program, the cost of which keeps rising while the planes themselves are grounded. A fire in late June caused officials to halt flights for the entire fleet of $112 million vehicles last week. Despite this, Congress is still anxious to push the program forward, and Foreign Policy explains why: Part of that protection comes from the jaw-dropping amounts of money at stake. The Pentagon intends to spend roughly $399 billion to develop and buy 2,443 of the planes. However, over the course of the aircrafts' lifetimes, operating costs are expected to exceed $1 trillion. Lockheed has carefully hired suppliers and subcontractors in almost every state to ensure that virtually all senators and members of Congress have a stake in keeping the program — and the jobs it has created — in place. "An upfront question with any program now is: How many congressional districts is it in?" said Thomas Christie, a former senior Pentagon acquisitions official. Counting all of its suppliers and subcontractors, parts of the program are spread out across at least 45 states. That's why there's no doubt lawmakers will continue to fund the program even though this is the third time in 17 months that the entire fleet has been grounded due to engine problems."
Build

15-Year-Old Developing a 3D Printer 10x Faster Than Anything On the Market 203

Posted by samzenpus from the greased-lightning dept.
New submitter jigmypig writes: One of the main issues with 3D printers today is that they lack in one area; speed. A 15-year-old boy named Thomas Suarez is developing a 3D printer that he says is the most reliable, most advanced, and faster than any 3D printer on the market today. In fact he claims it is 10 times faster than any 3D printer ever created. "There's something that makes me want to keep going and keep innovating," he says, laughing at being asked if he'd be better off outside climbing trees or riding a bike. "I feel that my interests will always lie in technology. Maybe I should go outside more but I just really like this stuff."
Earth

Study: Global Warming Solvable If Fossil Fuel Subsidies Given To Clean Energy 385

Posted by Unknown Lamer from the we're-doomed dept.
An anonymous reader writes A research team at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis in Laxenburg, Austria, says it has studied how much it would cost for governments to stick to their worldwide global warming goal. They've concluded that for "a 70 per cent chance of keeping below 2 degrees Celsius, the investment will have to rise to $1.2 trillion a year." Where to get that money? The researchers say that "global investment in energy is already $1 trillion a year and rising" with more than half going to fossil fuel energy. If those subsidies were spent on renewable energy instead, the researchers hypothesize that "global warming would be close to being solved."

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