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Power

Swede Arrested For Building Nuclear Reactor 410

Posted by CmdrTaco from the now-you're-playing-with-power dept.
An anonymous reader writes "A 31 year old Swedish male was arrested for trying to build a nuclear reactor in his apartment. He got hold of radioactive material thru mail-order purchases and from smoke detectors. Police raided his apartment after he had contacted the Swedish Radiation Authority (Strålsäkerhetsmyndigheten) to inquire if it was legal to construct a nuclear reactor at home."
Earth

Submission + - G.M.'s Electric Lemon 2

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes: On a day that saw him test-drive the new Chevy Volt, President Obama declared the federal rescue of automakers a success, delivering a message to 'naysayers' who have criticized a robust government role. Presumably one of those naysayers would be NYT Op-Ed contributor Edward Niedermeyer, who said the Volt 'appears to be exactly the kind of green-at-all-costs car that some opponents of the bailout feared the government might order G.M. to build.' The future of G.M. and the $50B taxpayer investment in it, adds Niedermeyer, 'now depends on a vehicle that costs $41,000 but offers the performance and interior space of a $15,000 economy car.'

Submission + - Could bad economic times be a boom for *nix?

Submitted by NobleSavage
NobleSavage writes: A lot of prominent economists are saying things are going to get worse. The g20 is calling for austerity measures, which will force deflation on the EU. The possibility looms for sovereign default in several EU Nations (Greece and others).

In the US most states are near bankruptcy or have major budget shortfalls. At the Federal level we are running out of rope. The Fed has pulled just about every trick it it's hat and the stimulus spending seem to have made a small blip with respect to GDP. Now it seems to be sliding. The US Federal government is running out of rope and it's unlikely that Obamba will be able to pass any more stimulus/jobs bills.

In this environment of cost cutting and layoff is it possible that countries and the private sector may take a second look at Linux as a way of saving money?

Submission + - Slashdot is Dying, New York Times Confims It (nytimes.com) 12

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The New York Times is running a story about how Slashdot has dropped in popularity compared to other news sites in social web space. Quote: "Why is Slashdot almost irrelevant to the social media community? It used to be the biggest driver of traffic to tech web sites, but now it hardly delivers any traffic at all to them. We explore some of the reasons, including input from our own community."

Comment What about the Yellow Pages?? (Score 2, Insightful) 258

by NobleSavage (#28002371) Attached to: Craigslist Fires Back Over Adult Services Accusations
Just look at the Yellow Pages for any moderately large city... it will have hundreds of ads for "escorts" and "escort agencies'. This kind of activity has been going on for ages, but no one ever made a big stink. Now that it's on the intewebs prosecutors somehow feel that there is cause for concern? I say, Quit wasting my tax money!
Biotech

"DNA Origami" Could Allow For Controlled Drug Delivery 29

Posted by timothy from the biotech-ransom-possibilities dept.
esinclair writes "As reported in Nature News, researchers have designed a method which allows DNA strands to be formed into cubes and other designs by oligonucleotides. The uses of this DNA origami are still being developed. One possibility for them is to be used as a drug-delivery system. The fact that scientists have also come up with a method to lock these structures and use 'keys' to unlock them would conceivably allow for a controlled delivery system."
Censorship

Wikileaks Pages Added To Australian Internet Blacklist 437

Posted by timothy from the paging-dr-streisand-dr-streisand dept.
cpudney writes "The Sydney Morning Herald reports that the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) has added several Wikileaks pages to its controversial blacklist. The blacklisted pages contain Denmark's list of banned websites. Simply linking to addresses in ACMA's blacklist attracts an $11,000 per-day fine as the hosts of the popular Australian broadband forum, Whirlpool, discovered last week when they published a forum post that linked to an anti-abortion web-site recently added to ACMA's blacklist. The blacklist is secret, immune to FOI requests and forms the basis of the Australian government's proposed mandatory ISP-level Internet censorship legislation. Wikileaks' response to notification of the blacklisting states: 'The first rule of censorship is that you cannot talk about censorship.'" So Australians aren't allowed to see what it is that the Danes aren't allowed to see?
Privacy

UK School Introduces Facial Recognition 214

Posted by timothy from the excuse-me-while-I-register-my-delight dept.
Penguin_me writes "A UK school has quietly introduced new facial recognition systems for registering students in and out of school: 'HIGH-TECH facial recognition technology has swept aside the old-fashioned signing of the register at a school. Sixth-formers will now have their faces scanned as they arrive in the morning at the City of Ely Community College. It is one of the first schools in the UK to trial the new technology with its students. Face Register uses the latest high-tech gadgets to register students in and out of school in just 1.5 seconds.'"
Biotech

Designer Babies 902

Posted by samzenpus from the wings-and-a-nice-prehensile-tail dept.
Singularity Hub writes "The Fertility Institutes recently stunned the fertility community by being the first company to boldly offer couples the opportunity to screen their embryos not only for diseases and gender, but also for completely benign characteristics such as eye color, hair color, and complexion. The Fertility Institutes proudly claims this is just the tip of the iceberg, and plans to offer almost any conceivable customization as science makes them available. Even as couples from across the globe are flocking in droves to pay the company their life's savings for a custom baby, opponents are vilifying the company for shattering moral and ethical boundaries. Like it or not, the era of designer babies is officially here and there is no going back."
Power

Sony To Unveil New Fuel-Cell Prototype 116

Posted by samzenpus from the new-power dept.
Nakeot writes "On Friday, Sony plans to unveil their newest portable fuel-cell technology, aimed at a variety of mobile applications. From the article: "The system contains both a methanol fuel cell and a Li-on battery" and can "intelligently switch between power from the battery, fuel, or even both under high-draw circumstances." Sony intends to show off two models claimed to power your cell for a week or a month, respectively, as well as the latest developments with their sugar-batteries that can now run purely off your favorite cola beverage. This model builds on Sony's 2008 model, their first commercially-demonstratable prototype, and could make waves with Sony's OLED devices, but will Sony be able to avoid another battery recall?"

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The only possible interpretation of any research whatever in the `social sciences' is: some do, some don't. -- Ernest Rutherford

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