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Comment Terry Pratchett, Naomi Klein, Anne McCaffrey (Score 1) 647

by cekerr (#38446572) Attached to: Ask Slashdot: What Do You Like To Read?
Anything by Terry Pratchett, but starting with "The Color of Magic" and "The Light Fantastic" if you want the beginning of his "Discworld" series.

The Shock Doctrine by Naomi Klein provides an insightful history and sadly predicts the future (i.e. our present) quite well.

The late Anne McCaffery has written or co-authored many wonderful trilogies and the many "Dragonriders of Pern" novels. Fabulous stuff.

Submission + - Quantum wavefunction is a real physical object aft (nature.com)

Submitted by cekerr
cekerr writes: Nature reports:
  Quantum theorem shakes foundations
The wavefunction is a real physical object after all, say researchers.

"... the new paper, by a trio of physicists led by Matthew Pusey at Imperial College London, presents a theorem showing that if a quantum wavefunction were purely a statistical tool, then even quantum states that are unconnected across space and time would be able to communicate with each other. As that seems very unlikely to be true, the researchers conclude that the wavefunction must be physically real after all.

David Wallace, a philosopher of physics at the University of Oxford, UK, says that the theorem is the most important result in the foundations of quantum mechanics that he has seen in his 15-year professional career. “This strips away obscurity and shows you can’t have an interpretation of a quantum state as probabilistic,” he says.
Your Rights Online

Submission + - ICANN and .xxx taken to court by biggest porn comp (theregister.co.uk)

Submitted by SharkLaser
SharkLaser writes: Two of the largest porn companies on the internet, Manwin and Digital Playground, yesterday sued both ICANN and ICM Registry, which runs .xxx TLD, to court over extorting defensive registrations with ICANN's blessing. 'The complaint focuses on ICM's recently concluded "sunrise" period, during which porn companies, for about $200, could apply to own a .xxx address matching their trademark or .com domain.' Schools also felt the same way, and had to reserve domains under their name so that no porn content could be put up on them. The .xxx TLD has also previously been subject to criticism by both religious groups and adult industry, but for different reasons. Religious groups believe the .xxx TLD legitimases pornography, while adult industry believes it could lead to censorship.
The Internet

Submission + - Warner Brothers Abusing DMCA Takedown Rules (itworld.com) 1

Submitted by
itwbennett
itwbennett writes: "In a court case between Hotfile.com and Hollywood studios, Warner Brothers admitted they sent takedown orders for thousands of files they didn't own or control. Using an automated takedown tool provided by Hotfile, Warner Brothers used automated software crawlers based on keywords to generate legal takedown orders. This is akin to not holding the Post Office liable for what people mail, or the phone companies liable for what people say. But the flip side is that hosters must remove files when receiving a legal takedown notice from the copyright holder — even when the copyright holders themselves don't know what material they actually own."

Submission + - A job fair for jobs in India in Calif. (computerworld.com)

Submitted by dcblogs
dcblogs writes: Indian and U.S. companies are holding a job fair at the San Jose Convention Center this weekend for jobs in India. The job fair is aimed at Indian workers in the U.S., but anyone with an interest in working overseas can attend. India is pitched as a "sea of opportunity" in a PowerPoint presentation about the job fair, That's in contrast to another slide that makes the obvious point that U.S. has "barely recovered from a downturn," with "signs that it's headed for another."
Science

Submission + - Crowdfunding for Science - Can it Succeed? (rockethub.com)

Submitted by
jearbear
jearbear writes: "Can crowdfunding work for science? Having raised nearly $40,000 for scientific research in 10 days for projects as diverse as biofuel catalyst design to the study of cellular cilia to deploying seismic sensor networks (that attach to your computer!) to robotic squirrels, the #SciFund Challenge is taking off like a rocket. Might this be a future model for science funding in the U.S. and abroad? What would that mean?"

Feed Google News Sci Tech: Safety regulators open probe of electric vehicles after Volt fire - Los Angeles (google.com)

From feed by feedfeeder

Reuters
Safety regulators open probe of electric vehicles after Volt fire
Los Angeles Times
Federal safety officials have launched a probe into whether the batteries in Chevrolet's Volt plug-in hybrid sedan are prone to fires. The probe by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration was launched after a Volt caught fire following a ...
GM Volt Fire Said to Prompt U.S. Probe of Lithium BatteriesSan Francisco Chronicle
Regulators Examine Electric Car Batteries After FireNew York Times
Fire in GM's electric Chevy Volt prompts US probeAFP
Reuters-Chicago Tribune-WSOC Charlotte
all 308 news articles

Submission + - How to use DVDFab 2D to 3D Converter? (sbs3dcreator.com)

Submitted by
linda820721
linda820721 writes: "Download DVDFab from our website (for free) and run it. DVDFab 2D to 3D Converter works with DVD Ripper, Blu-ray Ripper and Video Converter. So we may begin with one of them to tell you how to use this 3D video converter. We can take "convert 2D DVD to 3D video" as an example. After running DVDFab, navigate to DVD Ripper. Choose "to FLV" on the left pane (we do this also as an example, and there are also many other supported modes). You have three ways to import in your source movie – by inserting a DVD to your computer's hard drive or importing in a DVD folder/image file. Then DVDFab will automatically start to read your DVD contents. A couple of seconds later, the reading process will be over."
Science

Submission + - Pristine Big Bang gas found (abc.net.au)

Submitted by cekerr
cekerr writes: US scientists have found two interstellar clouds of original gas, which contain only original elements created moments after the universe's birth.

Unlike everything else in the universe — the gas clouds have never mingled with elements forged later in stars.

The existence of pristine gas that formed minutes after the Big Bang explosion some 13.7 billion years ago, had been predicted, but never before observed.

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