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Comment A far more interesting story (Score 4, Interesting) 75

I believe a far more interesting story about Waze has eluded Slashdot:

Two Technion students reverse-engineered Waze's method for detecting a traffic jam, then created a network of fake clients that reported traffic patterns that caused Waze to mark as jammed what was in reality a perfectly empty road.

Sources: Jerusalem Post, Wired.

Comment Re:Very old news (Score 1) 48

Cool of you for finding the original link! I actually remember this being exhibited at the HUJI Open Day fair in 1999, and (as a prospective student) had a chat with Yael who explained a bit about how it worked. I'm happy to see that this little project has progressed.

Your criticism however seems out of place; if Yael is a Disney Research employee then this is a Disney Research invention, it is not "somebody else's". I'm quite sure that the team has not been sitting idly these past 14 years, and that the breakthrough in question is not what was shown back then but the fact that the technology is closer to being an actual product.

Submission + - Electric car company Better Place to dissolve

phozz bare writes: Israeli startup Better Place, that offered its customers electric cars with batteries that could be swapped with freshly charged ones at battery replacement stations, is shutting down after successfully deploying only several hundred vehicles. While the article cites various reasons for this, general consensus among the public is that the major hurdles to widespread acceptance of these vehicles were their low range (approx. 100 km or 60 miles) and the draconian, cellphone-like contracts required to maintain them which negated the potential cost savings that the transition to electric could provide.

Comment So, how do the spoon benders do it? (Score 2) 386

Most people have seen spoon bending on TV or in stage acts - I've seen it done right before my eyes, in a completely improvised setting, with an ordinary spoon taken from the kitchen. There was no sleight of hand involved - the spoon was bending while in this man's hand, being visible all of the time. The handle remained rigid in his hand while the spoon's bowl actually rotated with no apparent force being exerted on it, so that the spoon basically twisted by about 120 degrees. (I've kept the spoon as a souvenir. It remains twisted, not cracked, and will not bend in any direction with any amount of force I can apply with my hands.)

My question to you is: if this is no more than a magic trick, how was it done? The various trick methods described here could not have been employed.

Comment Re:Efficiency (Score 1) 132

That shouldn't be an obstacle, as current refrigeration technology doesn't directly cool the air in your fridge/home/office either. It would be possible to cool some object using the laser then use the low temperature of the now cold object to cool the surrounding air. However as long as the efficiency is indeed 1.2-2% as mentioned in an adjacent comment this is no replacement for current A/C tech.

Comment Re:Proportional response? (Score 1) 861

I don't know what a "computer assisted sniper" is, and even if such a thing existed, how exactly do you spread military equipment in enemy territory without the enemy destroying it once it's left there unattended?

And back to reality, what do you do when the enemy is shooting rockets from within schools and city rooftops? How do you "take them out" while guaranteeing the safety of the civilians they are hiding behind?

Comment Re:You disgust me. (Score 1) 861

Once British forces left the region and the Arabs attacked Israel, the partition plan became irrelevant and the division of the country was to be decided according to the outcome of the war. And yes, losing a war means losing the territory from which you attacked. The Arabs have no one to complain to but themselves. Perhaps in your view Israel should have surrendered instead of defending itself?

It's interesting that Egypt is also blockading Gaza but no one is complaining about them or shooting rockets at Cairo?

Comment Re:You disgust me. (Score 1) 861

Yes, but under various different regimes, none of which were Arab. Living somewhere doesn't automatically grant political power over that territory, and the political powers decided to divide the territory among the two peoples inhabiting the area; a plan that was, as mentioned, rejected by the Arabs who wanted everything.

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