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Input Devices

The Best Keyboards For Every Occasion 523

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the right-touch dept.
ThinSkin writes "ExtremeTech has written an article on the best keyboards in every category, such as gaming keyboards (macro and hybrid), media center keyboards, keyboard gamepads, and so forth. Of course, the big companies like Microsoft and Logitech dominate these lists, while smaller companies like Razer, Ideazon, and others play an important role as well."
Moon

Submission + - Growing plants on the moon

Submitted by
Smivs
Smivs writes: "European scientists say that growing plants on the moon should be possible. Bernard Foing, a senior scientist with the European Space Research and Technology Centre (Estec) in the Netherlands, believes growing plants on the Moon would be a useful as a tool to learn how life adapts to lunar conditions, and as a practical aid to establishing manned bases.
The new step, taken in the experiments reported at the EGU, is to remove the need for bringing nutrients and soil from Earth. A team led by Natasha Kozyrovska and Iryna Zaetz from the National Academy of Sciences in Kiev planted marigolds in crushed anorthosite, a type of rock found on Earth which is very similar to much of the lunar surface. In neat anorthosite, the plants fared very badly. But adding different types of bacteria made them thrive; the bacteria appeared to draw elements from the rock that the plants needed, such as potassium."
Editorial

Submission + - Using Google Earth to find ancient lost cities (cosmosmagazine.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: A story in the online site of the Aussie science mag Cosmos discusses how archaeologists are using sophisticated sateliite images to find previously undiscovered cities. What 's really cool is how some are simply using Google Earth — and discovering all sorts of previously unknown sites!
Microsoft

Submission + - Microsoft wins "Best Campaigner against OOXML& (ffii.org)

Submitted by
pieterh
pieterh writes: "Following the ISO vote one month ago against Microsoft's Office OpenXML (OOXML) format, the FFII has awarded Euro 2,500 to Microsoft for making "a heroic — and costly — effort to discredit their own proposal". The FFII says, "By pushing so hard to get OOXML endorsed, even to the point of loading the standards boards in Sweden, Denmark, Switzerland, Portugal, Italy, and beyond, Microsoft showed to the world how poor their format is. Good standards just don't need that kind of pressure. All together, countries made over ten thousands technical comments, a new world record for an ISO vote.""
Microsoft

Submission + - Microsoft loses EU appeal

Submitted by rcasha2
rcasha2 writes: Microsoft has lost its appeal against the EU fine of almost 500m / $700m. Microsoft could still appeal again at the European Court of Justice. More important than the fine, however, is the confirmation of the ruling that Microsoft must share with competitors information needed for interoperability. This ruling could have an effect on such products as Samba, email clients etc.
Microsoft

Submission + - Microsoft loses anti-Trust EU case (bbc.co.uk)

Submitted by CPUsInHotPlaces
CPUsInHotPlaces writes: The BBC is reporting that the European Union's "Court of First Instance" has ruled against Microsoft in the ongoing anti-trust case. As a result of this ruling, they must pay abide by the original ruling from 2004 (including a 497m euro fine), and also pay 80% of the EU commission's legal costs.

The only section of the original ruling that was not upheld was the comission's attempt to impose an independent monitoring trustee
Windows

Submission + - Microsoft buys the Swedish vote on OOXML (os2world.com)

Submitted by CoolCat
CoolCat writes: From the site: "As bad as it sound it currently looks like that the vote that took place at the SIS, Swedish Standards Institute, was a total joke due to the facts that 23 new companies applied to take part of today's voting and most of them in favour of Microsoft agenda. One would think that SIS would not accept new companies to participate in the vote since they haven't been part of the earlier discussions and meetings. But according to SIS they didn't see any problem that new companies wanted to take part in this vote without prior notice. So what happened here is that Microsoft gather together a bunch of loyal partners that would vote yes to their standard without any questions."
Movies

Submission + - Pirated Simpsons video filmed on mobile (smh.com.au)

Submitted by fullcircleflight
fullcircleflight writes: A 21-year-old man from Sydney Australia faces up to five years' imprisonment after he was charged with uploading a pirated copy of The Simpsons Movie on the internet. Adrianne Pecotic, executive director of the Australian Federation Against Copyright Theft, said it was the first illegal copy of the hit movie to be intercepted anywhere in the world. Police alleged the man illegally filmed the movie via a mobile phone on July 26, the first day of release, and within hours had uploaded the footage onto the internet.The man was arrested in a raid on his home yesterday and charged by Federal Police with copyright theft after information provided to the AFP by the movie's producer, 20th Century Fox in the US. Pecotic said the illegal footage was removed within two hours, but not before it was downloaded about 3000 times. The file quickly spread to BitTorrent sites and other file sharing networks and within 72 hours had been downloaded by another 110,000 people.
The Internet

Submission + - Rethinking 'Crossing The Chasm' (readwriteweb.com)

Submitted by ReadWriteWeb
ReadWriteWeb writes: In 1991 Geoffrey A. Moore wrote a book that became widely read and quoted in the business community and turned into a theory — Crossing the Chasm. Moore argued that there is a gap that exists between the early adopters of any technology and the mass market. He explained that many technologies initially get pulled into the market by enthusiasts, but later fail to get wider adoption. So to create a company that is worth hundreds of millions of dollars, entrepreneurs need to come up with strategies that will help them build a bridge across that gap.

The problem is that compared to a few years ago, the speed with which new technologies are coming to the market has increased dramatically. All these technologies are aimed at the early adopters. And they love it and they try it. But the question is what happens when your early adopters run off to play with a new great thing before you have a chance to take your technology mainstream?
Toys

Submission + - Open source laser pointer whole building graffiti

Submitted by GAATTC
GAATTC writes: A 60mW laser pointer, camera, laptop, and a 5000 lumen projector are tied together with some open source code to produce the best whole building interactive graffiti ever. A bicycle mounted system consiting of a camera connected to a laptop tracks a laser pointer signal on the side of buildings. A connected projector projects what is drawn in real time with a variety of effects, like the tools available in Photoshop. What a great way to get your political message across without running the risk of getting arrested for property damage.
Mars

Submission + - Scientist Calls Mars a Terraforming Target (space.com)

Submitted by
Raver32
Raver32 writes: "Mars will be transformed into a shirt-sleeve, habitable world for humanity before century's end, made livable by thawing out the coldish climes of the red planet and altering its now carbon dioxide-rich atmosphere. How best to carry out a fast-paced, decade by decade planetary facelift of Mars — a technique called "terraforming" — has been outlined by Lowell Wood, a noted physicist and recent retiree of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and a long-time Visiting Fellow of the Hoover Institution. Lowell presented his eye-opening Mars manifesto at Flight School, held here June 20-22 at the Aspen Institute, laying out a scientific plan to "experiment on a planet we're not living on.""
Movies

Submission + - 9 Laws of Physics That Don't Apply in Hollywood

Submitted by
Ant
Ant writes: "Neatorama lists nine laws of physics that don't apply in Hollywood (movies and television/TV shows). In general, Hollywood filmmakers follow the laws of physics because they have no other choice. It's just when they cheat with special effects that people seem to forget how the world really works..."

Feed News: A Mountain Of Merchandise!!! (penny-arcade.com)

From feed by pennyarcadefeed
Tycho: Our third book is now available on the store, if you haven't purchased it elsewhere. Entitled The Warsun Prophecies, it incorporates all the strips from 2002. I'm usually scared to read something I've written once I've written it, which may help you to understand the state these posts sometimes arrive in - but I think this one turned out really well.I've just now finished the final edits on the fourth book, which will be released... in the future. Also, on the very same store, our Fire Sale continues to rage - with the heat of a thousand bargains! Huge savings in every department, etc.(CW)TB

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