43244165
submission
siddesu writes:
The Russian city of Chelyabinsk was apparently hit by a meteorite today. The meteorite disintegrated over the city, causing an explosion that broke windows and apparently lead to hundreds of injuries. More videos from the event here: http://www.lenta.ru/articles/2013/02/15/meteorite/
43080407
submission
siddesu writes:
A man was arrested this morning in Tokyo because he was videotaped approaching a famous stray cat in the popular tourist destination of Enoshima near Tokyo.
The animal was used some months ago to deliver (via an SD card strapped to its leash) a message ridiculing the cyber crime unit of the Japanese police for their failure to apprehend a "hacker", who posted "threatening messages" to several popular boards.
The investigation of the pranks since October last year has so far resulted in four arrests of innocent people.
37598729
submission
siddesu writes:
Here's an interesting recipe. Take a spoonful of graphite powder and stir it into a glass of water. Leave for 24 hours at room temperature and then filter the powder. Finally, bake overnight at 100 degrees C and allow to cool.
And voila! A material that superconducts at over 300 kelvin--room temperature. At least that's the claim today from Pablo Esquinazi and buddies at the University of Leipzig in Germany.
30496647
submission
siddesu writes:
The Asahi Shimbun has published a rather thorough and readable Q&A article, which is addressing many frequently asked questions about the consequences of the radioactive pollution that followed the accident.
Answers are given by Mariko Takahashi, a writer with the paper, who is, according to the introduction, "well-versed" in the issues at hand.
19708730
submission
siddesu writes:
TV and radio in Japan report of a hydrogen explosion in reactor #3 in the damaged Fukushima-1 plant in Japan.
Link to the Japanese news:
http://www.asahi.com/national/update/0314/TKY201103140140.html
19698952
submission
siddesu writes:
The TV in Tokyo is just announcing a schedule for electricity blackouts to last from tomorrow until the end of April.
Practically all suburbs of Tokyo will be affected by the blackouts. The 23 districts of central Tokyo seem to be exempt for the moment, but if supply is not sufficient, blackouts are possible.
Electricity will be interrupted for about 3 hours a day in each area.
19188394
submission
siddesu writes:
After 30 years of being around computers, I have, like everyone else, amassed a huge amount of files in huge amount of formats about a huge amount of topics. And it isn't only me — the family has now a ton of data that they want managed and easily accessible.
Keeping all that information in order has always been a pain, but it has gone harder as the storage has increased and people and files and sizes have multiplied.
What do you folks use to keep your odd terabyte of document, picture, video and code files organized — that is, relatively uniformly tagged, versioned, searchable and ultimately findable, without 50 duplicates over your 50 devices and without typing arcane commands in a terminal window?
I found this discussion from 2003 and this tangentially relevant post from 2006. How have things changed for you in 2011?
And how satisfied is your extended family with the solution you have unleashed upon them?
11862374
submission
siddesu writes:
Japanese big retail stores were ordered a week or so ago to stop selling Apple products online. The comments in the Japanese business newspapers suggest that Apple believes online shopping adds an aura of "cheapness" to their products, but killing the competition of the Apple store has surely been considered as well. As of today, most of the largest retailers have notices on their Apple catalog pages that ask you to kindly visit the shop if you want to acquire a piece of magic. It seems that for the moment the campaign is aimed at the big fish, as smaller shops still seem to carry and sell Apple items.
(Link goes to a google translate of the commentary of cnet japan, this is the original in Japanese).
9408558
submission
siddesu writes:
Scientists working on the Cassini mission (thttp://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/index.cfm) have found evidence of liquid water on the planet's icy moon Enceladus, suggesting the possibility of life below its surface and further limiting parking availability in the solar system.
9265196
submission
siddesu writes:
Wired has a fascinating story about a recent discovery that sheds light on the quantum physics mechanisms behind the efficiency of photosynthesis. Antenna proteins appear to "use" quantum effects to route energy almost without loss from photon-sensitive molecules to nearby reaction-center proteins, which convert it to cell-driving charges. As a bonus, the article provides a car analogy.
7314526
submission
siddesu writes:
Compelling new data that chemical and fossil evidence of ancient microbial life on Mars was carried to Earth in a Martian meteorite is being elevated to a higher plane by the same NASA team which made the initial discovery 13 years ago. Time to bow to our Marsian overlords?
6590501
submission
siddesu writes:
New study of storage technology by the former CTO of Seagate predicts that harddisks will remain the cheapest storage technology in the next decade and probably beyond.
4918225
submission
siddesu writes:
Herschel, the infra-red space telescope, opened its eyes on 14 June 2009, precisely one month after the launch. It carried out test observations labeled a 'sneak preview' making use of time initially allocated to 'thermal stabilization', following a request to attempt producing an early observational result.
Here's the first pictures and more.
2133815
submission
siddesu writes:
TV Asahi reports (video attached to the news clip, all in Japanese) that a Japanese neuroscience research institute has read images as they are processed by the brain for the fist time in history. The video shows pictures being shown to a subject and the reading of the images in the brain by a scanner developed by the institute. The researchers expect to perfect the technology so that it reads dreams and images in the near future.
(The scoop is a rough translation of the news article)
The site of the institute: http://www.cns.atr.jp/indexE.html
Video: mms://wmt-od.stream.ne.jp/tv-asahi/tv-asahia/news/0703/wmt/20081211-181211004-563-300.wmv?now=20081211185155_300k
1887819
submission
siddesu writes:
BBC mentions briefly that EU police will perform remote searches of suspect computers as a part of an EU plan to tackle hi-tech crime. "The strategy encourages the much needed operational cooperation and information exchange between the Member States," said EC vice-president Jacques Barrot in a statement. Now, that is a crime prevention I can subscribe to.
